Some fictional badasses come with a certain level of credibility. Watching a dead eyed Sylvester Stallone machine gun an entire Vietnamese village to shreds, we had no trouble believing John Rambo could rip our throats out if the situation called for it.
Other times, however, you really get the feeling that 100 percent of a character's fighting ability is due to clever editing and a script that calls for his opponents to fall down at his touch. With that in mind, here are seven supposed badasses who we're pretty sure you could take in a fight:
Strengths:
Good handyman abilities; high tolerance for menial, mind-numbing work, creative costume designer; able to take a good beating.
Weaknesses:
Fairly limited formal instruction in martial arts, little to no musculature, fighting techniques consist of "special" moves of questionable usefulness.
How You Can Beat Him:
He relies heavily on some obscure technique that seems to require his opponent to rush blindly into it. So when you see him propped up on one leg, your obvious strategy would be to go low and kick his other leg out from under him. That should be followed by a righteous stomping from the top. This should provide a better chance of success than the Cobra Kai's favored tactic of running at him chin-first with their arms behind their back.
Further research (that is, watching the second film) should teach you not to make the opponent's mistake of falling for the same trick ... 50 times in a row.
Yes, while the old block-and-punch maneuver is mighty clever, we'd suggest changing the approach once you get hit by it once, and not allow yourself to be knocked unconscious by getting smacked with the same move for five straight minutes. We learned our lesson on that back in 5th grade.
Strengths:
Well trained; access to lots of firepower; Mr. T.
Weaknesses:
Poor marksmanship; internal bickering; lack of focus; wanted by the law.
How You Can Beat Them:
At first glance it would seem that you'd have no chance at this supposed crack commando squad. However, careful analysis shows the A-Team succeeded due to the incompetence of their opponents more than their own fighting abilities.
Assuming they're even able to bring the whole A-Team to the fight (meaning they were able to break Murdoch out of whatever mental hospital he is in and try and shoot B.A. Baracus with tranquilizer darts to get him onto the plane), their chances of success are still slim. Even with their military training and access to a seemingly unending supply of ammunition, the A-Team never successfully shot anyone during their career as mercenaries.
As you can see, the team seemed completely unfamiliar with the concept of aiming their rifles, just firing randomly in the direction of their enemies. Note that when we said they never successfully shot anyone, we're not counting the hundreds of bystanders they likely gunned down with their hail of stray bullets.
Now, if the TV series is any guide, you'll be tempted to lock the team away somewhere and patiently wait for them to cobble together a tank out of old plywood and scuba tanks. Instead of doing that, try just shooting them instead.
Strengths:
Good at pebble-snatching game; trained by badass Shao-Lin monks, dual citizenship.
Weaknesses:
Prefers not to fight; has no posse to back him up; fighting style is too rigid.
How You Can Beat Him:
Kung Fu could have been an amazing show about a legendary warrior, instead the creators ditched Bruce Lee and gave the part to David Carradine, in part, because he was quiet and could dance. So instead of Kwai Chang Caine being some uber nuclear-powered kicker of asses, we get a lame flute-playing, sleepy monk who Pepe Le Pews his way across the American West.
While we have to give it up for his Shao-Lin training, (because we saw a show where they let people kick them in their junk) we are less than impressed by his passivism and lack of killer instinct. Caine looks like he would rather be off smoking some skunk weed than anything else. If he weren't so laid back he would have probably found his brother a whole lot quicker on the show instead of wandering around for years.
That video vividly demonstrates the flaw in Caine's technique, particularly his method of stopping throwing stars by allowing them to impale themselves in his bare hand. And no, the video isn't in slow motion. That's the speed Caine actually moves.
You should be fine as long as you avoid his opponent's strategy, which seems to involve trying to confuse Caine by running past him and flinging himself into a pond.
Strengths:
Greater-than-average strength; knows how to use blades; multi-lingual.
Weaknesses:
Less than average intelligence; laughable adherence to a strange code of honor; can barely move; no pockets.
How You Can Beat Him:
We admit Worf seems like a strange choice for this list at first glance, but a close examination of his fighting technique indicates his reputation far exceeds his actual ability.
His other weakness is his antiquated sense of honor. By challenging him to a straight up one-on-one fight you can be assured that he will show up, alone and unarmed. Worf will overlook the fact that unlike his ridiculous uniform, the cargo pants you bought at Old Navy have plenty of pockets for carrying useful things.
By useful things we mean Tasers, pepper spray, brass knuckles and a bat. At that point your only concern will be whether green blood comes out of clothes more readily than red.
Strengths:
Heals faster than grown ups, plenty of energy, cuteness.
Weaknesses:
Is a small child.
How You Can Beat Him:
Who is Tum-Tum? See the picture above. See the old guy, not him. See the kid next to the old guy, not him either, and not his brother in the middle. No, Tum-Tum is the little kid at the end. That's right, somehow we were supposed to believe that the little 5-year-old was some kind of devastating ninja. This was the point at which we stood up in the theater and screamed, "Bullshit."
For the sake of argument let's give him full credit for the ninja training his grandfather gave him. Being five, we think that he spent the first few years of "training" learning things like "ninja potty" and "ninja walking without falling on your ass." This leaves little time for more important skills like punching, kicking and learning how to make awesome smoke bombs.
We know this will be controversial, but we question the scientific accuracy of the above scene. You know what happens when a 5-year-old performs a flying kick against a grown man? The kid falls on his barely- out-of-diapers ass. Why does this happen? Physics. It's the law and everyone knows you can't fight the law, especially if you weigh 30 pounds and stand 3-feet-tall.
We also doubt that any of Tum-Tum's ninja training ever prepared him to overcome the sure-fire defense against all 5-year-olds, namely the "palm against the forehead" move. It's a variation of the technique the first ninja used up there, only modified to keep yourself out of range of his tiny kicking legs.
No, we're thinking the two ninjas in that video would have met the exact same fate if they had been fighting the empty room. Though we should note that before this match-up you should first find out if it is illegal in your state to fight children.
Strengths:
Surprisingly good chin; appears to have decent medical coverage; has a butler.
Weaknesses:
Little-to-no knock-out power; built like a 12-year-old girl; beatdown-inducing costume.
How You Can Beat Him:
A supposed superhero who makes the Karate Kid look like the Terminator, Robin is the least physically imposing specimen ever to put on tights and a cape. While we can cut him some slack because he is supposed to be a teenager, that doesn't change the fact that they'd like us to believe he can take on the baddest criminals in Gotham with his fists.
The two things criminals fear, bats and colorful song birds.
For starters, after reviewing many of his fights it becomes clear that Robin has absolutely no knock-out power. He is seen repeatedly throwing wild haymakers that connect flush on the chins of opponents, we know this because the words "Pow" or "Whap" appear when he connects. But his opponents usually quickly pop right back up for more.
While he displays decent cardio in his ability to throw punch after punch, you should wade in against him unconcerned, especially since each of his punches is telegraphed well in advance. Seriously, even if he begins his punch while you are in the middle of a nap, you should have plenty of time to wake up, stretch and give him the thrashing of his life.
Obviously your biggest concern shouldn't be Robin at all, but whether or not a pissed-off Batman will come to his rescue. But keep in mind this is not the Christian Bale Batman from the films, but the flabby Adam West Batman from the TV show. We actually still like your chances even if he jumps in, but we don't want to get cocky here.
Find more from Adam over at Scenic Anemia.
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