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Tap on the Head: Difference between revisions
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[[File:tap-on-the-head_tintin_870.png|link=Tintin (Comic Book)|right]]
{{quote|''"Knocking people out... by hitting them on the head... that's movie stuff!"''|'''Mike Thorton''' (who has just been beaned with a lamp), ''[[Alpha Protocol]]''}}
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In fictionland, anyone caught unawares may be easily, instantaneously and noiselessly incapacitated with a single blow to the head (or alternatively, a karate chop to the neck). A character thus treated will usually be [[Hard Head|perfectly fine afterwards]]; at worst they may have a headache, dizziness, slightly blurred vision, or in the very worst cases, [[Laser
Needless to say this is not [[Truth in Television]] at all; in reality a blow to the head is probably the least reliable way of rendering someone unconscious. Any head injury severe enough to cause unconsciousness is also severe enough to cause a skull fracture, concussion, intracranial bleeding, permanent cognitive impairment, amnesia, blindness, personality change, and even death. In [[Real Life]], a sharp blow to the head the causes unconsciousness of more than about one minute is usually a sign of brain damage. It will probably take months to recover, if not years, and you will likely have permanent impairment. In action genres, though, getting knocked out is treated like a nap. Heroes wantonly deliver painful and dangerous concussions to guardsmen, and friends knock each other out in disagreements, with little acknowledgement that brain cells are dying. In many role-playing games, knockout punches are actually treated as a form of nonlethal damage from which you recover quickly. Contemporary audiences are becoming [[Discredited Trope|increasingly canny about this]], meaning the characters now typically use more elaborate, realistic, or permanent techniques for dealing with opponents.
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* Although "tap" is sort of a mild way of putting it, [[Asterix]], Obélix and company frequently employ this against Roman legionaries, bandits, and other foes.
** In ''Astérix and the Big Fight'', Obélix accidentally flattens Getafix the Druid with a menhir (causing the latter to develop temporary [[Identity Amnesia]]); he then describes it to others as "just a tap on the head".
* The Belgian comic book character [[Tintin (Comic Book)]] falls prey to this so often that one suspects he has a fainting button on his head.
** In fact, in a joke section of a medical journal dealing with brain injuries it was once speculated that Tintin's perpetually youthful appearance was due to the repeated blows to the head damaging his pituitary gland and stunting his growth.
* [[Action Girl]] [[Yoko Tsuno]], the main character of Roger Leloup's comic book of the same name, is an Aikido expert who uses the "chop to the neck" movement (which is named ''yokomen'' in Aikido) regularly on her rivals. Yoko herself frequently faints after being chopped on the neck, her enemies all seem aware of Yoko's vunerability in this area, almost as if Yoko has something on her neck that says hit me here to make me faint.
* Happens to [[Green Lantern|Hal Jordan]] almost constantly. Having a magic ring to help boost your biological systems helps.
* [[Wonder Woman]], back in the late [[The Golden Age of Comic Books|Golden Age]] and early [[The Silver Age of Comic Books|Silver Age]], could be stopped by a simple blow to the back of the head (this replaced the earlier "powerless if [[Author Appeal|tied up by a man]]" [[Weaksauce Weakness]] used so many times previously). Since [[Power Creep, Power Seep]] was making it increasingly hard to [[Hand Wave]] her having the same vulnerabilities as a mere mortal, blows to the head were actually [[Voodoo Shark|Voodoo Sharked]] at one point by stating that Amazons had a nerve cluster there that remained an [[Achilles Heel]], no matter how [[Nigh Invulnerable]] they were.
* [[Batgirl]] II, Cassandra Cain, did this multiple times to her sometimes partner/sidekick Spoiler (Stephanie Brown) [[Percussive Prevention|whenever they faced a threat she felt was too great for her]]. It should be noted Cassandra was pretty much the poster girl for [[Charles Atlas Superpower]] and Stephanie complained later that it felt like Cass broke her jaw.
* ''[[Kick-Ass]]''. The hero gets smacked around so hard he needs a steel plate in his head. After much, much healing the plate somehow provides a limited amount of impact-to-skull protection.
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* In the [[Time Scout (Literature)|Time Scout]] book, ''Wagers of Sin'', Skeeter gets knocked out from behind and spends several days recovering, with nausea, dizziness, and continuing headaches.
* In [[John C Wright]]'s ''[[Hermetic Millenium (Literature)|Count to a Trillion]]'', Menelaus takes out two guards, but the third gets him with this.
* In [[Edgar Rice Burroughs]]'s ''[[The Monster Men (Literature)|The Monster Men]]'', Professor Maxon is knocked unconscious by a blow to the head. Its only effect is to cause him to recover from being [[Mad Scientist]] -- that is, to take up [[What Measure Is a Non
* Completely averted in [[Vernor Vinge]]'s ''[[The Children of the Sky (Literature)|The Children of the Sky]]''. The blow that knocks out {{spoiler|Ravna}} is treated completely realistically, with various debilitating aftereffects until she gets advanced medical treatment.
* [[The Hardy Boys]]: Frank & Joe Hardy have both been knocked out by getting hit in the head so often that, in real life, the two should be vegetables in permanent coma in the hospital.
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** In "[[Doctor Who (TV)/Recap/S14 E1 The Masque of Mandragora|The Masque Of Mandragora]]", when the Doctor realizes that Sarah Jane is being kidnapper and tries to intervene, one takes him out with a rock to his head.
* An episode of ''[[Smallville]]'' has Clark knock someone out with a literal tap on the head. You get one [[Superman|guess why]].
* The Karate Chop of Doom was the standard ''[[
** Interestingly enough, Avon once tried to subdue a maddened Blake using this technique, which was rather risky. Then again, this being Blake, it may have been intentional.
* In quite a few murder mysteries, attempting the Tap On the Head via blunt object very often leads to [[Accidental Murder]] instead.
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* Similarly tested on ''[[Deadliest Warrior]]'' with a pistol whip. If not fatal, it would be catastrophic and permanent injury.
* Subversion: In one first-season ''[[Sledge Hammer]]!'' episode, Sledge jumps a Mook from behind, and hits him over the head with the butt of his gun. The Mook's reaction is to cry "Owww," but not to go down. Sledge tries again, with similar results. After several attempts, he is unable to knock the mook out by hitting him on the head. Alan Spencer, creator of ''[[Sledge Hammer]]!'', in his voice-over commentary for the episode, states that this was the entire purpose of the scene -- to take the Mickey out of this trope.
* Subverted and parodied in one episode of ''[[Hogan's Heroes]]'', in which [[Know
* In ''[[Relic Hunter (TV)|Relic Hunter]]'' ("Etched in Stone"), Sydney smacks some bad guys in the head with a freakin' rock ([[Special Effects Failure|an obviously Papier-mâché rock]], but still) the size of a turkey. They are fine.
* Mostly averted in ''[[Burn Notice]]'', where mooks are heroes alike are usually shown as being stunned and in serious pain rather as a result of hand-to-hand scuffles, and are rarely KO'd by fisticuffs.
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** In the ''Deus Ex: Human Revolution'' [[Tap On the Head]] plays an important role as Adam Jensen can use his augmented strength to perform various non-lethal takedowns with punches to the head, chokeholds, or striking an enemy's head against a hard object (or striking the heads of two enemies together).
* ''[[Splinter Cell]]''. From ''Chaos Theory'' onward, Sam commonly uses the sleeper hold. He also uses punches to the back of the head and palm-strikes to the solar plexus.
* In ''[[Dark Cloud (Video Game)|Dark Cloud]] 2'', [[Action Girl]] / [[Black Magician Girl]] [[Royals Who Actually Do Something|Monica]] [[
* ''[[Avalon Code]]'' ends Chapter 3 with Anwar using the "solar plexus" variant on your character. Heath uses the same variant at the end of Chapter 5 to keep you from getting the book out of a hijacked Valdo's hands.
* The ''[[Shadowrun]] Genesis'' game uses the "solar plexus blow" variant as a distraction in which your character will stealthily pull it off then claim they had a heart attack to sneak into corporations as flavor text. This always works regardless of the unarmed combat and social capabilities of the main character.
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== [[Web Originals]] ==
* [[Shadowhunter Peril]] has [[Shell
** Hilariously, Veronica actually tried to knock him out once, only for Bezaliel to [[Hard Head|appear offended and slightly ruffled]]. [[Hilarity Ensues|Then they overheard Umbra and Nicholas having sex.]]
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[[Category:Artistic License Medicine]]
[[Category:Tap On The Head]]
[[Category:Trope]][[Category:Pages with comment tags]]
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