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1[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/07130f6ba14dbbf30f96e3c89dd7075b.jpg]]
2
3->''"I mean, there we were, both of us, at the beginning of our careers. And all of a sudden, one of us took off, lit up the sky like a meteor! And why? Because he met the other."''
4-->-- '''Earl Talbot Blake'''
5
6''Ricochet'' is a 1991 thriller film directed by Russell Mulcahy and starring Creator/DenzelWashington, Creator/JohnLithgow, Music/IceT, and Creator/KevinPollak.
7
8Nick Styles (Washington) is a young cop who is studying to become a lawyer so that he can help make his neighborhood better. Earl Talbot Blake (Lithgow) is a hitman who is taking a job to make it into the big leagues. Chance pits these two men against each other, and Styles walks away as a hero and having achieved the career he has sought while Blake is sent to prison with nothing. This leads to Blake becoming obsessed with Styles, and as he climbs the ladder of success, Blake follows every step, plotting his revenge. Years later, Styles has risen to become a star Assistant District Attorney. Blake finally escapes from prison and then starts a campaign to destroy his life.
9----
10!!Examples in this film:
11
12* AndYourLittleDogToo: Blake tells a probation officer that, after being released, he'd pay a visit to fuck the man's wife, his daughter, and maybe even his dog.
13* AnswersToTheNameOfGod: When Nick sees Blake again.
14-->'''Nick''': Jesus Christ!
15-->'''Blake''': Almost.
16* ArtisticLicenseMedicine: After Styles is rescued after being drugged and kidnapped by Blake, he's informed about having gonorrhea due to his blood work. This is wrong on so many levels: first, the only [=STD=]s that show up on blood work are syphilis and HIV. Second, these are based on the body's antibody response, so it takes a while to turn positive, not overnight as in this scenario. Thirdly, doctors only run tests that are actually medically needed (or at least the ones they are sure they'll get paid for!). Since they didn't know he'd been raped or had unprotected sex, there would never have been a test for that (only whatever drugs he had).
17* BigBad: Blake is the main bad guy of the movie.
18* BigNo: Blake lets out one when he thinks that Styles has killed himself, which ruins his plans.
19* BondOneLiner: "You got the point now, don't you, [[spoiler: Blake?]]"
20* BrokenPedestal: Thanks to Blake's {{Gaslighting}} and {{Frame Up}}s, Styles's friends and family along with the rest of the public who once looked up to him began to quickly lose faith in him, the DA, and his wife Alice in particular. After clearing his name, he becomes a RebuiltPedestal at the end.
21* ButForMeItWasTuesday: A rare heroic example. At first, Styles doesn't remember who Blake is.
22* CallBack: Blake and Styles arm-wrestling each other.
23* CassandraTruth: Blake is alive and he did all those things to discredit Nick.
24* CharacterOverlap: The film appears to take place in the continuity of the ''Film/DieHard'' films, with which it shares a writer and producer. Journalist Gail Wallens, played by Mary Ellen Trainor, reappears from the first ''Die Hard''.
25* ChekhovsGun: The metal tower.
26* ClearMyName: This becomes Nick's goal after Blake re-enters the picture.
27* ClimbingClimax: Styles lures Blake onto the unfinished child center grounds for the climax, where they start climbing the thing while fighting.
28* [[CrucifiedHeroShot Crucified Dragon Shot]]: [[spoiler: Kim, Blake's right-hand man, after Blake shoots him]].
29* CruelMercy: Blake's response to Styles's question "Why don't you just kill me?" is a [[FauxAffablyEvil laugh]] and "I don't wanna kill you; I wanna kill your life!"
30* DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale: Used as a plot point in-universe. Part of Blake's plan involves drugging Nick and videotaping him being forcibly raped by a female prostitute...but when he leaks the tape to the media (with dubbed-over sound), people take it as evidence of an extramarital affair. Even Nick's wife initially refuses to believe that it wasn't consensual simply due to the fact that he got it up.
31* TheDragon: Kim to Blake.
32* EmbarrassingNickname: In-universe. The DA is called "Priscilla the Hun." Nick himself is "PK" (PreachersKid), but, in his case, the trope is subverted, as he feels that it's a badge of honor.
33* EvilRedhead: Blake has red hair and is VERY bad news.
34* FakingTheDead: After escaping from prison, Blake fakes his death. [[spoiler: Nick stages his own death at the end to draw Blake out.]]
35* FauxAffablyEvil: Earl Talbot Blake never drops his cheery and upbeat tone even as he makes Nick's life a living hell.
36* {{Filth}}: After killing Farris, Blake plants child pornography on his belongings to frame both him and Nick.
37* {{FrameUp}}: Part of Blake's plan. First, he makes it appear like Styles is a child molester and stole the money raised for a children's center. Then he kills Styles's former partner, throwing the gun to him so his prints are on it.
38* FriendlyRival: Odessa, to Nick.
39* {{Gaslighting}}: Blake uses a form of this on Nick with the sex video and the swimming pool.
40* GenreSavvy: Nick knows the police can't be trusted to protect his family, but Odessa and company can.
41* GroinAttack: Blake kicks Chekowski's groin during the fight, which happens when Blake becomes his cellmate.
42* GunmanWithThreeNames: Blake is always referred by his full name in media.
43* HeroAntagonist: Wiley (the DA's right-hand man), who doesn't seem to like Nick very much to begin with. And [[StrawmanNewsMedia Gail Wallens]].
44* HeroWithBadPublicity: Styles, courtesy of Blake's RoaringRampageOfRevenge torment.
45* HiddenWeapons: Blake keeps a blade in his shoe.
46* {{Homage}}: The prison swordfight homages the last fight in ''Film/{{Highlander}}''. Both were directed by Russell Mulcahy.
47* HoodFilm: It's one of those 1990s films that is mostly set in the inner-city slums and crime-ridden streets and involves African-American characters.
48* HostageSituation: During Styles's and Blake's first meeting.
49* IfItBleedsItLeads: Coverage of Blake's demise, with no censorship of his condition, or Kim's.
50* ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: [[spoiler: Blake]] falls from a tower and is impaled.
51* ImprovisedArmor: The combatants in the prison swordfight are given armor made of books and duct tape.
52* IntercontinuityCrossover: News anchor [[Film/DieHard Gail Wallens]].
53* IntoxicationEnsues: Nick becomes a jittery, rambling mess of a man after Blake and Kim inject him with drugs.
54* ItWasHereISwear: Blake makes a video of Nick drugged in bed being raped by a prostitute, with audio added to make it sound consensual. The bed is at the bottom of a dry swimming pool. When Nick shows the pool to verify his innocence, he finds it filled up with water again. Making this an inverted trope: "It wasn't here, I swear!"
55%%* ItsPersonal
56* JackBauerInterrogationTechnique: Styles beats up an Aryan Brotherhood member to get information on Blake picking up passports at his bookstore.
57* LargeHam: Both TheHero and the BigBad.
58* MalcolmXerox: Nick is watching a talk show on TV when a man argues with the host about an evil conspiracy that supposedly befell Styles and was meant to bring him down. Nick just chuckles. [[HilariousInHindsight Funnier yet]], considering who Creator/DenzelWashington would play [[Film/MalcolmX about a year later]]...
59* MediaScrum: A gaggle of reporters is always ready to follow Styles around and hound him about alleged misconduct.
60* NeverSuicide:
61** Farris's murder is staged to look like he killed himself, complete with a handwritten suicide note.
62** [[spoiler: Styles pretends to kill himself in front of Blake, complete with a laundry list of things he was accused of doing, to lure him into a trap.]]
63* NonIndicativeName: Ricochets don't come into play at all. It's not immediately obvious, but the name probably refers to the fact that Styles's actions (taking down Blake) rebounded on him later.
64* NotHelpingYourCase: Nick rambles on and on to his wife about what he did or didn't do to keep the prostitute away, comes running out of the house like a madman upon seeing Blake's video, pulls a gun in front of a bunch of kids, assaults a clown, and goes on a stammering tirade after the DA confronted him about the sex tape and the assault on the clown (watch Priscilla's face as Nick talks about "water in the pool"). He's paranoid, stressed out, intoxicated, and should be laying low during the DA's office investigation, but noooo...
65* ObfuscatingInsanity: Styles, as a ruse to bring Blake into the open and fight him.
66* ObstructiveBureaucrat: The DA and her right-hand man Wiley are this to Styles once they viewed him as a BrokenPedestal to them after Blake's {{Gaslighting}} made the latter appear to be a HeroWithBadPublicity undergoing SanitySlippage, resulting in Styles's suspension.
67%%* OneWordTitle
68* QuipToBlack: "News at eleven? Nahhh!" (switches video camera off). Subverted after the screen goes to black: "Styles, you can't do that, we're live!" "We're live now, huh? Good. Gail, kiss my ass!"
69* TheOnlyOneAllowedToDefeatYou: Blake to Nick.
70* PantsPositiveSafety: Styles's hidden gun in his underwear.
71* RedRightHand: Blake's milky eye, and perhaps his bright ''red'' hair.
72* RoomFullOfCrazy: Blake's cell has a wall covered with Styles's pictures and clippings from newspapers and magazines.
73* SacrificialLion: [[spoiler:Larry Doyle, Nick's partner]].
74* SharedUniverse: Mary Ellen Trainor reprises her role as Gail Wallens from ''Franchise/DieHard'', with which the film shares a writer and producer.
75* ShootTheDog: When he escaped, Blake killed the bookmobile guy, who was harmless.
76* ShoutOut:
77** "[[Film/WhiteHeat Made it, Ma! Top of the world!]]"
78** The Aryan swordfight, to ''{{Film/Highlander}}''.
79* SlippingAMickey: Blake drugs Styles's nanny and Styles's kids's cocoa. Thankfully, he doesn't do anything to either.
80* StalkerWithoutACrush: Blake.
81* StealthInsult: When they fight at the end, Styles compares Blake to a pig slaughtered in sacrifice by Hawaiians as a gift to their gods.
82* StrawmanNewsMedia: Gail Wallens. Consistent with media portrayals in that [[Film/DieHard other picture she appeared in]].
83* SuperWindowJump: Blake performs one, which leads to his initial meeting with Styles.
84* SwordFight: Members of the Aryan Brotherhood arrange a swordfight between Blake and Chekowski in prison.
85* ThoseWackyNazis: The Aryan Brotherhood, whom Blake makes a deal with to escape prison.
86* TookALevelInJerkass:
87** In her depiction in this film in contrast to her appearance in ''Film/DieHard'', Gail Wallens becomes no different from the nosy {{Jerkass}} reporter colleague of hers Richard Thornburg, given she meddled with Styles for being a HeroWithBadPublicity similar to how Thornburg messed things up for John [=McClane=] in his appearances.
88** The DA starts out as a ReasonableAuthorityFigure holds Styles in high regard, but once the latter ends up a BrokenPedestal to her for his publicized alleged SanitySlippage and other {{Frame Up}}s caused by Blake, she swings to being an ObstructiveBureaucrat who suspends him.
89* UnusuallyUninterestingSight: Gail was covering the explosion, oblivious to Blake, whom everybody thought was dead, standing next to her, ranting like a madman.
90* VillainousBreakdown: [[spoiler: Blake starts to have one when the crackhouse blows up. It continues when Kim calls him out at the end.]]
91* WorthyOpponent / PetTheDog: Blake shows some sympathy to Styles when he eavesdrops on his live call to the talk show.
92* WouldHurtAChild: Blake goes into Nick's house disguised as a power company technician, drugs the babysitter, takes Nick's sleepy daughters to bed, then shoots a video of himself threatening the little girls. When Nick sees the video, he goes paranoid quickly. Of course, that's just the reaction Blake wanted.

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