History Main / BareHandedBladeBlock

** ''Series/KamenRiderDenO'': Ryotaro spends part of episode 41 practicing the maneuver, with varied results; Kin and Ura help out in a rather straightforward fashion, Momo [[SchmuckBait pulls the old "what's that?" maneuver]], and Ryuu [[Jerkass just smacks him on the head as hard as he can without warning]] (and [[LaserGuidedKarma rightly paying for it moments later]]). The scene ends with Ryotaro successfully pulling the maneuver off.

* DoubleSubversion in ''LightNovel/{{Baccano}}''. At first the guy [[DecoyProtagonist Carol pinned as]] TheHero (Firo) gets his fingers sliced clean off trying one of these on a mugger with a knife... and then it becomes immediately clear that the reason Firo was willing to do something so apparently dumb is because [[HealingFactor he knows those fingers are coming right back in a second]], freaking the mugger out enough to make way for an easy shot at his face while delivering a BadassBoast.

* Ryuuji pulls this off against Taiga in the first episode of ''LightNovel/{{Toradora}}''. Played realistically in that it was a wooden sword, and Ryuuji still was hurt by the maneuver.

** In the opening of ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda3'', Kai makes his first appearance by throwing his chained-blade at Oogway, who effortlessly catches it...'''with his eyes closed'''.

* ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda'': Master Shifu manages this trick by catching a thrown sword, spinning it around his body, and then burying the blade in the floor.

* Inverted in ''Webcomic/TowerOfGod'', where Endorsi stops Serena's second ArmorPiercingSlap with the broadside of the Ignition Weapon [[CoolSword Narumada]].

* In ''LightNovel/HaruhiSuzumiya'', Yuki Nagato catches Asakura's combat knife with nasty spikes on the backside straight-faced in her BigDamnHeroes moment. Although, her doing this features [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome expectable amounts of blood]]. Yuki, of course, [[FeelNoPain ignores that]].

* [[HotAsHell Hild]] from ''Manga/AhMyGoddess'' does this a couple times, once in the ''Fighting Wings'' arc/OVA and again in chapter 248, both times against [[{{Valkyries}} Lind]].

* ''Fanfic/JWITCHSeason1'':
** Will does this with Bartholomew Chang's clawed prosthesis.

** A Sumo Khan does this with its fingers when Caleb tries to slice it with his katana.

As the Series/MythBusters [[JustForFun/TropesExaminedByTheMythbusters demonstrate]], the "clap between your hands" trick of stopping a full-speed sword cut won't work: The reflexes and speed needed to catch the flats of a blade coming at about 40 mph/65 kph[[note]]ballpark figure for a European longsword quoted by ''WebVideo/{{Skallagrim}}''[[/note]] between two hands ''without'' touching the edge are beyond most people.[[note]]This is more difficult than, say, catching a baseball, where you don't fail by moving "too early" because it won't maim you if you just stick your palm in its path to intercept it.[[/note]] This means that the blade will probably either avoid your block completely if you clap a fraction of a second too late, or else slice your palms and/or fingers off when you catch it imperfectly and probably continue cutting to your head without losing momentum. Furthermore, if the attacker twists the sword to present the edge diagonally instead of vertically, the defender will get cut through one hand or the other regardless of timing. However, a trained martial artist using hand protection like the metal grips used to help climb walls could pull off this technique while (depending on size) presenting the illusion of doing it barehanded.

** Wearing leather gloves was also recommended if trying to grasp an opponent's blade. It did catch on enough that dueling daggers were made with wave-edged blades: grabbing the blade only stands a chance of working if the cutting edge of your opponent's weapon is straight. This is why in sport fencing, the off hand is traditionally ungloved in order to prevent this sort of nonsense.

* ''VisualNovel/YoJinBo'' has Mon-Mon do this to Harimoto. [[spoiler:In an unusual twist, he simply throws his arm in the way, instead of actually catching it with his hands. He then [[CasualDangerDialog tells Harumoto he must be a lousy swordsman, since he failed to cut his arm off]]. Of course, the pain and bloodloss of a cut down to the bone fails to do any damage...[[BeautyIsNeverTarnished or even show up as a splash of red in the art]].]]

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* Megatron does this once in ''WesternAnimation/TransformersPrime''. Justified because he is a giant robot.
** Followed up by an epic CallBack in the episode "Orion Pax Part 3" where [[spoiler:Optimus is the one who blocks a strike from Megatron, reversing their roles from the above situation]]. Can also count as a BookEnds since it closes a storyline that spanned seven episodes.

* Many fencing masters in European sword fighting manuals of the 14th-17th century suggested grabbing your opponent's sword as a possible, albeit risky move to set yourself up for a counterstrike. The sword would be firstly stifled in a bind. Thus, the blade could be more safely (that's more safely, not necessarily safely) grabbed. This includes edgeless "later" rapiers of the beginning of the 17th century espoused by Capo Ferro and similar masters as well as the two handed war sword.

* In the original novel/anime of ''LightNovel/VampireHunterD'', Count Lee is able to block a sword strike with his two bare hands. Justified because he's a vampire with superhuman speed and strength, and that he was taught the technique by ''Dracula.''

* [[Characters/Avengers70sMembers Wonder Man]] has used this fairly often, notably in ''ComicBook/WorldWarHulk'': It's a quick way to show his experience and set him up for a [[TheWorfEffect defeat]].

* In ''Webcomic/{{Sinfest}}'', [[http://www.sinfest.net/view.php?date=2010-08-15 Jesus uses it against Death's scythe]] and ''breaks it''.

* In ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'', Sarah [[DeepImmersionGaming imagines]] Justin [[http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1968 doing this]].

* Creator/ChuckNorris gets in on the fun in ''Film/ForestWarrior'', catching a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdwC4vhc594 CHAIN SAW with his bare hand]].

* In ''Manga/LoveHina'', Keitarō manages to do this against Motoko, which has her worrying that her abilities are slipping. She starts to completely lose it, though, when Tama-chan (the turtle) manages the same feat.[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AihDh85DWbY]]

As the Series/MythBusters [[JustForFun/TropesExaminedByTheMythbusters demonstrate]], the "clap between your hands" trick of stopping a full-speed sword cut won't work: The reflexes and speed needed to catch the flats of a blade coming at about 40 mph/65 kph[[note]]ballpark figure for a European longsword quoted by ''WebVideo/{{Skallagrim}}''[[/note]] between two hands ''without'' touching the edge are beyond most people[[note]]this is more difficult than, say, catching a baseball, where you don't fail by moving "too early" because it won't maim you if you just stick your palm in its path to intercept it[[/note]]. This means that the blade will probably either avoid your block completely if you clap a fraction of a second too late, or else slice your palms and/or fingers off when you catch it imperfectly and probably continue cutting to your head without losing momentum. Furthermore, if the attacker twists the sword to present the edge diagonally instead of vertically, the defender will get cut through one hand or the other regardless of timing. However, a trained martial artist using hand protection like the metal grips used to help climb walls could pull off this technique while (depending on size) presenting the illusion of doing it barehanded.