Unflinching Walk/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: A person walks away from an explosion without reacting with concern or increasing their speed.

  • Straight: Alex walks away from an exploding building without flinching.
  • Exaggerated: Alex walks out of an exploding city block, unfazed despite the debris and screaming bystanders.
  • Justified: Alex is a terrorist; he planted the bomb himself so he knows he's safe where he is and is enjoying everyone else's hysteria.
  • Inverted: Alex calmly walks into an exploding building without flinching.
    • Buildings explode as a result of Alex walking away from them.
  • Subverted: Alex is calmly walking away from the building about to explode. It turns out that it won't, because he defused the bomb in time.
    • Alex calmly walks away from the building about to explode, but isn't far enough since he misjudged the amount of explosives or the timer. He dies when the explosion hits him.
    • Alex tries to walk away without flinching, but once the bomb goes off, he jumps in terror and begins to run away screaming.
  • Double Subverted: ...or so he thought. The bomb goes off anyway, Alex shrugs and keeps walking.
    • It only immediately looked like he died, but a moment later he walks out of the fire unharmed.
    • But he regains his cool and, without flinching again, walks away from the following blasts.
  • Triple Subverted: ...even though his whole back is covered in burns and bruises.
  • Parodied: Alex is strutting away in his Badass Longcoat, triumphant guitar solo playing in the background... and then there's a larger secondary explosion and he panics in a very unmanly fashion.
  • Deconstructed: In a cynical world, walking slowly away from an explosion gets you killed by shrapnel, which is not normally depicted in this trope or in Hollywood explosions in general. Also, if Alex really is the terrorist who planted the bomb then not blending in with the crowd when the bomb goes off is a good way to get noticed.
  • Reconstructed: All of that is true, but Alex isn't concerned about getting killed by his own bomb or getting caught; he's a terrorist, remember?
  • Zig Zagged: New guy on the bomb squad, Bob, walks coolly away from an explosion... but then you see that this is a simulated explosion for a drill, and old hand Alex chides him for not following proper procedure... but then when the two of them are escaping a real bomb, Alex starts walking away because, damnit, it's too much fun not to, regulations be damned... but then as the two of them are walking side by side the blast wave picks them up and drops them on their asses, to the amusement of all.
  • Averted: Alex gets out of the building with time to spare. There's no chance of anyone walking or running away from this explosion.
  • Enforced: "And then Alex runs out of the exploding building." "I dunno, we could make it cooler and establish Alex as an explosives expert by having him look calm and walk out instead."
  • Lampshaded: "Hey, drama queen! Stop trying to look cool and take cover, idiot!"
  • Invoked: Alex is a bit of a ham, and sets some explosives just so he can make a badass entrance.
  • Exploited: Alex knows security or news cameras are rolling, and he wants to cultivate a badass impression on the police/public.
  • Defied: Outrun the Fireball.
  • Discussed: "Don't worry, any second now he's going to casually stroll out of the collapsing building. Just you wait. *BOOM* ...Aaaaany second... Oh Crap.
  • Conversed: "So, you think people can really just casually walk away from an explosion?" "Let's send it to MythBusters."

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