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This looks very dramatic on camera, but [[Fridge Logic]] kicks in a little while later and you ask "Well why didn't she enter one of the buildings instead of letting the car chase her down the freeway?" or what have you.
Note that this doesn't apply when there's an actual ''reason'' that the character can't simply leap to the side: Maybe that car is cruising down a [[Blind Alley]], that [[Raiders of the Lost Ark
[[Truth in Television]]: In real life, many animals (including humans) have a natural 'herding' response to danger, so having a terrified character run directly ''away'' from an approaching threat may not be tactically sound, but it does make sense psychologically. (And if the threat is a predatory animal, simply leaping to the side wouldn't help in the first place because the predator would take note.) Savvy military conquerors have exploited this fact for centuries to herd panicked civilian crowds to where they want them, although they need to keep the crowd in a state of panic so that no one has a chance to consider the tactical advantages of veering off to the side.
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* In the ''[[Gantz]]'' manga and anime, after being caught on the train tracks, Kurono and Katou decide to try and outrun the train to get beyond where the front car will stop. Even if {{spoiler|the train hadn't turned out to be a non-stop express,}} it's unlikely they would have been able to run far enough in time, and the fact that they break off an attempt to climb onto the platform in favor of running seems pretty counter intuitive. They probably would have made it up with help from the bystanders. Then again, the theme of this scene seems to be [[Humans Are Bastards|general apathy and the onlookers' interest in seeing someone die.]]
** Which totally fails to explain why one of them couldn't lift the other out, then get pulled up himself. Basically this was a case of [[Plot Induced Stupidity]], because the story couldn't happen without them dead.
* In the second ''[[
* In episode 17 of ''[[Digimon Adventure]]'', the chosen first dodge the [[World Gone Mad|cruise liner in the middle of the desert]] by, sensibly, running to the side. When it it actually start chasing them, though, the trope promptly kicks in full force. Late, in Episode 49, it shows up again as they are fleeing a balled-up Waru Monzaemon.
* In ''[[Tokyo Magnitude 8.0]]'', {{spoiler|the Tokyo Tower falls, but the characters run parallel to the direction of the falling tower rather than running off to the side.}}
* In ''[[
* Averted in episode 8 of ''[[The Third:
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== Film ==
* In ''[[Star Wars]] [[Attack of the Clones
** Or he could have just pulled Anakin and Obi-Wan out from under it before it hit.
** Moving injured people can be risky if you don't know what you're doing. What Yoda decided to do was a bonehead move either way, though.
* The first ''[[
* In the film ''[[Alien (
* ''[[Forrest Gump]]'': "Run, Forrest, run!" Try "Dodge, Forrest, dodge!" Though he does take off across a field and hop a fence at least once.
* Directly parodied at the start of Weird Al's [[
* In the bad TV movie ''[[
* Parodied in ''[[Wrongfully Accused]]'', when Harisson flees a runaway train by running into the woods--whereupon the train promptly follows him.
* Played with in ''[[Mars Attacks (Film)]]'' when a flying saucer, planning to crush a group of Boy Scouts, demolishes the base of the Washington Monument, only for them to run out of the way. The saucer then flies around to the other side of the falling obelisk to make it fall the other way. Rinse, repeat.
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*** And in the third film, Marty has to think ''four''-dimensionally. He's in the DeLorean being pushed along an incomplete train track, but he travels forward in time, to a point where the track is complete.
* The remake of ''[[Nightmare On Elm Street]]'' has the human-Krueger do this for a while as angry parents pursue him through an abandoned factory complex.
* The [[Rule of Funny]] gives an interesting twist to this one in ''[[Who Framed Roger Rabbit?]]'': A way too amorous toon is running full bore towards Eddie Valiant. Instead of running away or stepping to the side, he takes the white line on the road that she's running on and directs it into the wall. Naturally, a wall pizza ensues.
{{quote| '''Eddie''': Toons. Gets 'em every time.}}
* ''[[Buckaroo Banzai]]''. While being pursued by a Red Lectroid driving a truck, Buckaroo runs straight ahead down the road, where he would have inevitably been run down if a Blue Blaze Irregular helicopter hadn't arrived to rescue him.
* Countess Lisl from ''[[For Your Eyes Only (
* Parodied in [[Austin Powers|Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery]]. As the protagonists escape on a very slow Road Roller, a lone security guard screams in terror as the roller approaches and proceeds to scream "STOOOOOP!!" multiple times as it approaches, making no attempt to move to the left or right until finally being run over.
* [[Played With]] in ''[[
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* Naturally, the narrator of ''[[Flatland]]'' visits Lineland, a world where this is literally true. The inhabitants of Lineland can't pass each other, and each being only ever sees two things: his two immediate neighbors' eyes/asses. Reproduction is pulled off by having sex partners ''sing'' to each other over long distances, which is handy, since at least one of a Linelaner's neighbors will always be a parent or sibling.
* Deconstructed/Parodied/somethinged in [[Dr. Seuss]]' "The Zax", a short tale in his book ''The Sneetches and Other Stories." A creature called a North-going Zax and another called a South-going Zax run into each other, and both refuse to go around the other since it would require them to move, very slightly, in a direction different than they're used to. Their refusal to compromise means they basically stand glaring at each other forever while a highway overpass is built over their heads.
* Averted in [[Neil Gaiman]]'s ''[[
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* In the pilot episode of ''[[Lost]]'', Jack, Hurley, and Claire run from the plane's falling wing. None thinks to run sideways out of its path.
* Appears in an episode of ''[[Criminal Minds]]'', where a serial killer runs over people with a truck. What makes it worse is that he's a ''serial killer'', so he has done this repeatedly without anyone just running off the side of the road.
* In an episode of ''[[Star Trek: Enterprise]]'', the crew learn that a highly radioactive [[Negative Space Wedgie]] is heading straight towards them, and it's going faster than the ship can. They proceed to evacuate the whole crew into heavily-shielded areas to survive. The idea of simply getting out of its way never occurs to anyone.
** They do consider it. It's explicitly said that it is too large for them to try to get out of its way before it hits them.
* Played hilariously straight in an episode of ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]]'', in which Chakotay is running from the bad guys, and he stays on a winding path instead of just cutting across the grass.
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== Webcomics ==
* Parodied in this ''[[Irregular Webcomic]]'' [http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/1704.html strip].
* Webcomic example: In [http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20030924 this page] of ''[[Girl Genius]]'', Baron Wulfensbach seems to be having an "I'm [[Surrounded
* [[Bob and George]] [http://www.bobandgeorge.com/archives/001126c Averted here because the author really was annoyed by this trope]
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* One of the Halloween episodes in ''[[The Simpsons]]'' features Mr. Burns being crushed by a statue. He hobbles as fast as he can - straight ahead, in the direction the statue is falling, rather than a few steps to the side, which would have allowed him to avoid it entirely.
* ''[[The Powerpuff Girls]]'': An episode has Princess Morebucks getting hit by a de-powering ray because she's too <s>stupid</s> evil to simply fly out of its way.
* ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
* In an episode of ''[[Batman: The Animated Series
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