Talking Is a Free Action: Difference between revisions

* Subverted ''hard'' in [[Berserk]]. Then again, if a person is sprouting a speech about how good his troops are, or how screwed his enemy is, or... thus marking him out as important or high ranking right in front of our protagonist nicknamed the [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|Hundred Man Slayer]], he probably deserved to be cut off in mid sentence.

 

* ''[[Spider-Man (Comic Book)|Spider-Man]]'' has a reputation for having panels over half-full of him talking. Justified artistically during action scenes when Spidey is drawn in 3 or 4 different places in the same panel to highlight the maneuver of him leaping from one spot to the next, using his agility and witty banter to annoy the hell out of the enemy who is drawn in a still shot in the same panel.

** In fact, some gamers even refer to this phenomenon as "Marvelling", referencing ol' Web-Head himself. One of the reasons Spider-Man came off as more emo in [[Spider-Man (film)|the films]] is because they couldn't logically work any of his usual in-battle joking into live-action fight scenes.

* ''Man-Eating Cow'' as a [[pastiche]], of course, has this. Criminal Cannibal and Schwa Man while fighting discuss cable TV. Then during a ninja attack Lord Byron started a discussion of poetry that pulled in the police.

 

* Sometimes played straight, sometimes averted/subverted in '[[The Tainted Grimoire]]''.

** Played straight: {{spoiler|Crow}} took time out to explain how a certain spell was possible during a duel with Luso.

'''Sir Loin''': IF YOU GUYS DON'T MIND, WE COULD USE SOME HELP HERE! }}

* ''[[In the Service]]'' takes the ''[[Lyrical Nanoha]]'' tendancy to talk a lot and subverts it: usually if somebody is talking or allowing their opponent to talk, they're doing it to buy time for more serious firepower to arrive.

 

* Subverted in ''[[The Incredibles]]''. During the initial encounter between Mr. Incredible and Syndrome, Mr. Incredible attempts to catch Syndrome off guard by [[Talk to the Fist|attacking him]] while he's [[Just Between You and Me|explaining the source of his powers]].

** [[Genre Savvy|"You sly dog, you got me]] [[Monologuing|monologuing!"]]

* Averted in ''[[Mulan]]''. Just as Yao is on the verge of saving Mulan and Shang from getting knocked off the cliff by the avalange by firing a rope-tied arrow to them, he takes the time before grabbing the rope to say out loud that he should grab it, causing him to just miss it.

* At the climax of the film ''[[Point Break]]'', Keanu Reeves's and Patrick Swayze's characters fall out of an airplane at four-thousand feet and have a ninety-second shouting match which, as ''[[MythBusters]]'' demonstrated, is about three times as long as it would take to actually fall that distance. And that's not getting into the problems with being able to ''hear'' someone in free fall.

* ''[[Crank]]'' takes the above shouting match and cubes it by having a character fall out of a helicopter (at what looked like a relatively low altitude), have a fight to the death, and still have time to pull out his phone, connect to an answering machine, ''wait through the message'', leave one of his own, and '''hang up.'''

* Subverted in ''[[The Good, the Bad and the Ugly]]'', when the bounty hunter who tried unsuccessfully to kill Tuco right at the beginning of the movie locates him again, three quarters of the way through the movie, in the bath, naked. He's clearly got the jump on him, but can't resist going into a speech about how glad he is to have finally cornered him. Tuco immediately whips out the revolver around his neck and kills him, saying to the corpse, "[[Lampshade Hanging|If you have to shoot, shoot! Don't talk!]]" Most fans consider it Tuco's [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]].

* Both parodied and played straight in the third ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]'' movie, when Will and Elizabeth ask Barbossa to marry them during the final battle. Barbossa tries to deliver the "Do you (insert name here) wish to" -speech, but has to constantly stop to fight Davy Jones's crew. Played straight in that when he finally gets enough and yells: "Just kiss!", Will and Elizabeth kiss for several seconds and not a single pesky enemy tries to kill them during that.

* Spoofed in ''[[Scott Pilgrim vs. the World]]'', where Ramona has enough time to tell Scott about Roxy's [[Achilles' Heel]] while Roxy is throwing a kick at his face. The lines are ''slightly'' slowed down, which mostly just makes them sound drunk.

** It's also brutally deconstructed in the {{spoiler|first attempt of the}} final battle with Gideon, where Scott manages in-between the fight to tell both Ramona & Knives that he cheated on both of them. {{spoiler|Only for Gideon to sneak up on Scott and stab him from behind, killing him. However, Scott did get better, thanks to the 1-Up.}}

 

* ''[[The Eye of Argon]]'':

{{quote|"All that you hear is less than I hear! I heard footsteps coming towards us. Silence yourself that we may find out whom we are being brought into contact with. I doubt that any would have thought as yet of searching this passage for us. The advantage of surprize will be upon our side." Grignr warned.}}

* The sundry supernatural menaces of the [[Ghost Finders]] series seem remarkably polite about waiting for the trio of heroes to speculate, plan, and/or snark off to one another before actually attacking them. Sometimes justified by said menaces merely toying with the heroes, but even mindless entities seem to do the same.

 

* The Doctor from ''[[Doctor Who]]'' often lapses into long mocking speeches that get his enemies stunned by his sheer audacity. Subverted in "The Idiot's Lantern", when he starts: "Hold on a minute! There are three important, brilliant, and complicated reasons why you should listen to me. One--" and is promptly [[Talk to the Fist|KO'd with a punch to the face]].

** Inverted with the Daleks, who usually take time to shout "EXTERMINATE!" before actually shooting at the Doctor, which gives him time to get away.

** Though if you notice, a lot of the time the Demons are kind of vibrating/shuddering while the spell is being recited, which indicates that a Power of Three spell is not one that instantly blows the demon up once it has finished being said, but proceeds to destory the Demon throughout the duration of the spell being spoken, climaxing at the end.

** But not when they first defeated The Source, where the destruction chant was so ridiculously long that they did have to find a way to bind it while they spoke.

* Inverted in the Season 7 opener of ''[[NCIS]]'', where Tony babbles on for several minutes to the terrorist villain, even stopping him from shooting McGee so he could explain his plan for escaping (borrowed from the movie ''[[True Lies]]''). The point of his monologue was actually to spend as much time as possible talking {{spoiler|to give Gibbs enough time to set up a sniper's nest and shoot the terrorist through the window.}}

* Subverted in the ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' episode ''The Zeppo'' where Xander starts making a speech and the other guy runs off. 'I wasn't finished!'

** And played straight at the climax. Apparently, a scary, manly stare-off has nothing to do with that timer over there, no sir.

* Played so straight it wraps around to being a hilarious aversion on ''[[Saved by the Bell]]'', where [[The Ace|Zack Morris]] could literally ''freeze time'' while he [[Breaking the Fourth Wall|talked to the audience]].

* Averted in ''[[Scrubs]]''; sometimes J.D. will come out of his [[Inner Monologue]] or fantasy sequence to realize he's missed something and now has no idea what's going on. On other occasions, people complain about J.D. always staring off into space while they're talking to him.

 

== [[Music]] ==

** Later on, when they're being initiated into the order, Tamino and Papageno are all singing in a test of silence.

{{quote|'''Papageno''': "Immer stille und immer stille und immer stille und immer still!"}}

 

== [[Professional Wrestling]] ==

* A hilarious, played-completely-straight variant (more like "''Fighting'' is a Free Action") occurred at the 2002 ''Royal Rumble''. Maven pulls off a huge upset by eliminating [[The Undertaker]] from the ring when 'Taker has his head turned. Ordinarily the match would continue with new entrants coming out every 90 seconds or so, but this time the match ''stops dead for several minutes'' just so 'Taker can dish out some [[Disproportionate Retribution]] (attacking Maven and dealing him a [[No-Holds-Barred Beatdown]] that takes them out of the ring, into the crowd, and all the way up to the concession area surrounding the arena where 'Taker slams Maven into an old-fashioned popcorn cart, breaking the glass and spilling popcorn everywhere, before [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|scooping up a handful of popcorn]] and [[Crowning Moment of Funny|munching on it]]). Then - and ''only'' then - does the TV camera cut back to the actual ring, where the next scheduled entrant (Scotty 2 Hotty) is ''only starting'' to make his way toward the ring, [[Medium Awareness|as if he were waiting for the camera to finish filming up in the concession area]].

 

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

* Occurs in ''[[Rogue Trader]]''. You can even play an Astropath and have "mindtalk" as a free action.

 

* Subverted in ''[[Bionicle]]''. Krika had drained Tahu's power and was was giving a lengthy soliloquy to him while he stood there apparently helpless. However, Tahu took advantage of the situation and allowed his powers to recharge somewhat while Krika was speaking, allowing him to attack Krika and escape.

 

* Played around with in ''[[Asura's Wrath]]'', at certain points during certain deity fights, you can shut them up by punching them in the face. You even get a few trophies for it.

* Talking is a free action for characters in ''[[Eternal Sonata]]'' when they deliver their lines prior to delivering a charged-up special attack. Which is good, because some of these lines seem to take longer to deliver than all of the time on the Action Gauge. "When the plants die, the earth does not tremble. When the hills crack, the flowers are bright. Morning Frost! Shadow Beam!"

 

== [[Web Comics]] ==

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

Then Megatron is punched square in the face by Optimus Primal. }}

* In ''[[Danny Phantom]]'', in the midst of heated battle, foes often seem to just stop and let Danny finish his superheroic, corny jokes.

* On and off in ''[[Kim Possible]]'', but the episode "The Twin Factor" has plenty of examples of characters visibly hanging about waiting for others to finish their lines instead of taking advantage of the moment.

* Deconstructed in the ''[[Futurama]]'' episode "Mars University". Gunther the super-intelligent monkey is sitting on a log attached to a vine which is breaking. He is suspended over a waterfall, and begins to debate with himself whether to climb up the vine or not. He says "On the other hand-" and the vine snaps. {{spoiler|He survives, though.}}

* Talking most definitely seems to be a free action for [[Word Girl]] when she stops in the middle of a pitched battle to define a word.