Line #71 Main/ArmedBlag


1	%%
2	%%
3	%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample entries are not allowed on wiki pages. All such entries have been commented out. Add context to the entries before uncommenting them.
4	%%
5	%%
6
7	%%
8	%%
9	%% This page has been alphabetized. Please add new examples in the correct order. Thanks!
10	%%
11	%%
12
13	[[quoteright:350:[[Film/{{Heat}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/heat_9.jpg]]]]
14
15	A type of typically British [[TheCaper Crime Caper]] revolving around the robbery of an armoured car carrying a company's payroll. For obvious reasons, it will be set in older times when workers received a pay ''envelope'' (full of cash) rather than a pay ''cheque'', necessitating delivery via armoured car. The cast is likely to be full of {{London Gangster}}s, {{Violent Glaswegian}}s and/or other British "undesirables".
16
17	When this trope gets used in works set in different time periods, it's often re-dressed, with the "armored car" turning into other vehicles, from horse-drawn carriages to spaceships. The payroll is also often changed to other types of goods, such as jewelry, contrabands, technology. Sometimes it may even be carrying the MacGuffin.
18
19	Assault on such vehicles is a common mission type in videogames, especially in a WideOpenSandbox, since the concept of catching or defeating a vehicle to claim its loot translates smoothly to gameplay. {{Escort Mission}}s to protect these are also common.
20
21	Compare TrainJob and TheCaper. See TechnicallyATransport for a dangerously armed transport vehicle and DefenselessTransports for when the vehicle is harmless on its own. Compare and contrast VulnerableConvoy, where the target is a live prisoner rather than cash. JustForFun/NotToBeConfusedWith an armed ''{{blog}}'', regardless of [[Webcomic/{{XKCD}} how it's spelled]].
22
23	----
24	!!Cases for you to 'ave a butcher's at:
25
26	[[foldercontrol]]
27
28	[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
29	* Happens in the second episode of ''Literature/{{Baccano}}''. Given that it's pulled off by [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} Isaac and Miria]], though, you can bet that the [[RefugeInAudacity execution is more than a little WTF-inducing]]. (Note: They said they were going to do a [[TrainJob Train Robbery.]] Which they understood as [[ComicallyMissingThePoint riding a train to the robbery location, doing the robbery and then get back on the train for their getaway]].)
30	[[/folder]]
31
32	[[folder:Comic Books]]
33	* Knocking over armoured cars transporting cash was a staple of crooks in ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'' comics until at least the 1980s.
34	* ''ComicBook/Criminal2006'': The the set-up of first volume, ''Coward'', is about [[TheChessmaster Leo Patterson]] working with an old buddy and some corrupt cops for OneLastJob: hitting an armored convoy transporting blood diamonds as evidence from a police lockup to a high profile court case. [[spoiler:Except the ''actual'' target is a trunk full of heroin being used as evidence in a ''different'' case, not diamonds. And the "old buddy" and the cops are in on it and betray most of the heist team.]]
35	[[/folder]]
36
37	[[folder:Films — Live-Action]]
38	* In ''Film/{{Antigang}}'', Kasper's ultimate plan involves spooking the Daedalis Bank into transferring its assets in a fleet of armoured cars so he can hijack the convoy.
39	* The second robbery in ''Film/BabyDriver'' involves heisting an armoured car that is delivering cash to a bank. It does not go as smoothly as the first robbery.
40	* ''Film/CircusOfFear'' (the 1966 film starring Creator/ChristopherLee, not [[CircusOfFear the trope of the same name]]) opens with an armed blag on the Tower Bridge.
41	* ''Film/CruelGunStory'': A Japanese spin on this trope, as a {{Yakuza}} gang ambushes and robs an armored car carrying the day's take from a race track.
42	%%* ''Film/TheDayTheyRobbedTheBankOfEngland'', more of the same
43	* The gang's opening gambit ''Film/DenOfThieves'' is hijacking an armoured car when it stops for breakfast. The twist is that the car is empty.
44	* ''Film/DeadPresidents'' closes with one of these. Despite the heist being well-planned and the participants (mostly) being well-trained [[UsefulNotes/TheVietnamWar Vietnam]] veterans, the operation goes pear-shaped, with most of the robbers dying along with several cops and civilians and [[AllForNothing most of the money burned up when the robbers attempt to blow the door of the car]].
45	* ''Film/DiamondsOnWheels'' opens with the gang pulling an armed blag on an armoured van transporting diamonds. The professionalism of this job stands in stark contrast to their transformation into StupidCrooks later in the film.
46	* At the start of ''Film/{{Dobermann}}'', Dobermann and Nat knock over an amoured car on a remote country road.
47	* This is the entire premise of the film ''Film/GreyHound''. A WWII movie following an allied supply convoy traversing the Mid Atlantic Gap, aka "The Black Pit". The convoy is escorted by the Destroyer U.S.S Keeling, call sign "Greyhound", and several other Destroyers and Corvettes from various allied nations, who work together to fend off attacks by German U-boats.
48	* ''Film/{{Heat}}'' opens with this kind of job. The robbers wear hockey masks to hide their faces.
49	* ''Film/TheHoodlum'': Working at a gas station across the road from a bank, Vincent concocts a plan to heist the armored car that stops there every Thursday.
50	%%* ''Film/TheItalianJob1969'' (and [[Film/TheItalianJob2003 the 2003 remake]])
51	%%* ''Film/TheKillers'' (1964, Don Siegel)
52	* "Professor Marcus" and his associates pull this off pretty neatly in ''Film/TheLadykillers1955''. Unfortunately for them, the little old {{Cloudcuckoolander}} lady they're using as a cover catches them ''in flagrante delicto''.
53	* ''Film/TheLavenderHillMob'' robbed an armored car of gold bullion.
54	* In ''Film/LayerCake'', this is referenced as being the crime of choice for [[LondonGangster London gangsters]] before they discovered drug dealing by the protagonist (Creator/DanielCraig). At the end of the film, the two [[OopNorth Scouse gangsters]] relish the opportunity to rip off the MagnificentBastard via armed robbery, and they comment to the effect that it reminds them of old times.
55	* ''Film/MoneyMovers'': A trio of robbers knock over an armoured car when the drivers stop for lunch in a crime that becomes known as the 'leg of lamb' robbery.
56	* ''Film/MoneyTrain'' merges this with a TrainJob, in which the main characters rob an armored subway train that collects the revenue from the stations.
57	* The half of ''[[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 [=MST3K=]]]'' veteran ''Film/TheRebelSet'' that wasn't beatnik-sploitation revolved around the Chief from ''Film/GetSmart'' planning an armored car robbery in Chicago -- with the twist that the robbers would do the job while travelling from New York to LA by train, during a layover; they'd be gone on the train, with the cash, before the police would know what happened.
58	* The 1967 film ''Film/{{Robbery}}'', directed by Peter Yates, begins with a heist of a suitcase full of jewellery being transported by car.
59	* The crew in ''Film/{{Serenity}}'' pulled off the post office version, hitting a trade station and making off with, ironically enough, the pay for the security guards who were supposed to stop them. Mal mentions that the crime won't be investigated too heavily since it's out in the boondocks and the company will hush it up -- if they let it get out that they couldn't protect their own wages, they sure as hell won't get any customers lining up for security contracts.
60	* In ''Film/SherlockHolmesAndTheDeadlyNecklace'', Moriarty's gang steals the necklace while it is being transported in a police van from Scotland Yard to the auction rooms.
61	* ''Film/TheSoldier'' (1982). {{Renegade Russian}}s attack a convoy transporting nuclear material, to make an atomic bomb.
62	* ''Film/{{Transit}}'' starts with a gang knocking over an armoured car on a remote country road.
63	* ''Film/WrathOfMan'' revolves around the robbery of armored cars.
64	[[/folder]]
65
66	[[folder:Literature]]
67	* Literature/{{Biggles}} was involved in foiling several of these in his post-war career with the London Metropolitan Police's aviation wing, only [[JustForFun/RecycledInSpace Recycled WITH AEROPLANES!]].
68	* "Payroll jobs" the American equivalent are mention Donald Westlake's crime novels in his Literature/{{Parker}} and Literature/{{Dortmunder}} books (two different series), but later books mention how corporate practices change making these jobs rarer and rarer.
69	* ''Literature/TheStainlessSteelRat'' is shown doing this [[OutlawCouple along with his wife]], as much for fun as for gaining cash. SchizoTech is used to justify this trope, there not being much RuleOfCool in Jim and Angelina trying to rob a cashless society via computer fraud.
70	* In the ''Literature/{{Wyatt}}'' novels, VillainProtagonist Wyatt used to like payroll jobs, as the risk to reward ratio was extremely good. With the demise of cash payrolls, that avenue closes off. In ''Paydirt'', he attempts a robbery on an armoured car delivering one of the last cash payrolls going: being delivered to workers on a remote pipeline project in the outback where there is no easy access to banks or electronic funds transfer. Unfortunately for Wyatt, things do not run entirely to plan.
71	[[/folder]]
72
73	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
74	* ''Series/AshesToAshes2008'': The Season Two arc climaxes with [[spoiler:a plot by a group of corrupt cops to step into an Armed Blag they've been tipped off to and take the money themselves.]] Quite possibly inspired by a couple of RealLife incidents in the 70s and 80s, a period when the London Metropolitan Police in general and the Flying Squad in particularly might just as well have been another gang.
75	%%* Early seasons of ''Series/TheBill''.
76	* ''Series/TheCoroner'': In "Pieces of Eight", a gang of robbers dressed as pirates snatch an armoured van delivering cash to the bank.
77	* ''Series/DempseyAndMakepeace'': In "The Squeeze", a heavy-duty transit van carrying half a million pounds in used notes is high jacked, drivers and all and S.I. 10 is tasked to find it.
78	* Several ''Series/DoctorWho'' stories have attacks on UNIT convoys, usually transporting dangerous technology, including "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS7E3TheAmbassadorsOfDeath The Ambassadors of Death]]" (space capsule containing alien visitors), "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS8E2TheMindOfEvil The Mind of Evil]]" (decommissioned nuclear missile), and "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS9E5TheTimeMonster The Time Monster]]" (reinforcements). In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS26E1Battlefield Battlefield]]", for a change, the convoy (transporting another decommissioned nuclear missile) just gets bogged down due to bad weather -- and ''then'' the villains discover it and attack.
79	* One episode of ''Series/TheLastDetective'' deals with a retired LondonGangster and centers around a past robbery similar to the actual Great Train Robbery.
80	* ''Series/LawAndOrderCriminalIntent'': "Astoria Helen" opens with a gang knocking over an armoured car that is delivering cash to [=ATMs=]. Major Case get involved months later, when one of the gang starts picking off his accomplices.
81	* This, or variants, showed up a few times in the original ''Series/LawAndOrder''. One was a cold case from the 60s in which some radical college kids and a few hardened criminals stuck up a payroll shipment. Another was a modern case in which some far-right-wing extremists stuck up an armored car carrying the take from an OTB (off-track betting; licensed location for placing almost any kind of bet).
82	* In the fourth episode of the second series of ''Series/{{Misfits}}'', the gang robs an armoured car so that they can ransom Kelly. Simon's invisibility simplifies the process considerably.
83	%%* Another American example: The ''Series/KraftSuspenseTheatre'' episode "The Jack Is High".
84	%%* Being an homage to ''Series/TheProfessionals'' and ''Series/TheSweeney'', ''Series/{{Life On Mars\|2006}}''.
85	* In one episode of ''Series/PersonOfInterest'', the VictimOfTheWeek is part of an armoured truck's guard crew, and the heroes suspect someone will try to rob the truck while it transports platinum. [[spoiler:Someone does, but their "victim" is the ringleader and the [[InsideJob Inside Man]]]].
86	* The short-lived Music/IceT series, ''Series/{{Players}}'' had a RashomonStyle episode dealing with an armored car theft the team was supposed to prevent.
87	* ''Series/TheProfessionals''
88	** In "Heroes", the robbery of an armoured car is actually the cover for a political assassination. Turns out a controversial American politician was being smuggled out of the country disguised as a security guard, but those after him got wind of it.
89	** In "Where The Jungle Ends", a squad of mercenaries rob a bank, using submachine guns to drive off the police, stealing an aircraft and parachuting to safety before RAF interceptors can reach them. Their leader then turns up at the home of Britain's top organised crime boss, [[RobbingTheMobBank returning his safety deposit box]] which they stole as a demonstration of what they can do.
90	* ''Series/ShadesOfBlue'': The big score the FBI is after in season 1 is the robbery of an armored truck hauling evidence money, which Woz's unit of {{Dirty Cop}}s will be involved in.
91	* Done in an early episode of ''Series/TheShield'', with a van transporting evidence to a case. The catch: the attackers are none other than [[spoiler:the [[CorruptCop Strike Team]], launching a last-ditch effort to get rid of evidence ''[[NiceJobBreakingItHero they planted]]'' that would've sent an innocent man to jail.]]
92	* Practically every other episode of ''Series/TheSweeney''. Which is kind of TruthInTelevision, as the Flying Squad were actually the Metropolitan Police's specialist armed robbery taskforce.
93	* ''Series/{{Westside}}'': In "Dire Combustion", Ted and his gang heist an armoured car. Things start going badly wrong when they attempt to bust it open.
94	[[/folder]]
95
96	[[folder:Music]]
97	* "The Hardest Part" from ''Eat To The Beat'' by Music/{{Blondie\|Band}} is an unusually American example of this trope, depicting a robbery on an armored car. The "hardest part" of the title refers to getting past the armed guards inside the truck.
98	* Official music videos to Music/RobbieWilliams double single "Eternity"/"Road to Mandalay" from the ''Sing When You're Winning'' album feature the robbery of a money van in Monaco, though it's not actually armed: the robbers throw the van off the road by hitting it with a crane truck and then threaten the guards off by showing them a dog of one of them, implying that they know where the guards live.
99	[[/folder]]
100
101	[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
102	* In the ''TabletopGame/HeroesUnlimited'' adventure "One Dam Thing", the Gold Falcon's plan is to rob an armoured car transporting millions of dollars worth of evidence (in cash and coke) from a recent drug bust while his unwilling accomplice Brainstorm distracts the cops with a flashy attack on Hoover Dam.
103	[[/folder]]
104
105	[[folder:Video Games]]
106	* In the [[UsefulNotes/SuperNintendoEntertainmentSystem SNES]] version of the ''VideoGame/{{Area 88}}'' ShootEmUp game (''UN Squadron'' Stateside), enemy supply convoys are a source of easy money (and extra lives for the patient).
107	* In the side-scrolling {{RTS}} ''VideoGame/ArmorAlley'', each side tries to sneak convoys past the other's [[HeroUnit helicopter]] assaults.
108	* In ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedIII'' convoys filled with money and special items occasionally spawn in different parts of the frontier and Connor is able to steal from them after killing every guard. It´s also implied the player is on the receiving end of this as sending a land/naval convoys with products to a city or the frontier will usually present a percentage of failure.
109	* One possible mission hook in ''VideoGame/BattleTech'' has you attack a base and steal a government payroll with your [[HumongousMecha BattleMechs]]. One "flashpoint" mini-campaign event from the DLC of the same name, "Yang Virtannen's Big Score", is a more elaborate example in which your mercenaries hijack a bunch of pristine vintage battlemechs.
110	* In ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' and ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'', the Brahmin caravan merchants are highly susceptible to attack by raiders, Super Mutants, Radscorpions, Yao Guai, Deathclaws, and in the latter game, Legionaries. An evil player can also raid and loot caravans themselves. At the beginning of the ''Honest Hearts'' DLC, [[DoomedExpedition the caravan the player was traveling with is slaughtered by the White Legs raider tribe]].
111	* In ''VideoGame/FarCry2'', the weapons dealers ask the player to destroy convoys driven by their business rivals so that news weapons are unlocked. Strangely, the convoys never actually go anywhere, as they are always endlessly driving around in a circle. Bizarrely, they are also ''completely empty'', which means that someone in your information chain is either screwing up big time or having one over on you.
112	* In ''VideoGame/TheGodfather'' game, you can ambush enemy mobsters' racket trucks in order to pry cash from the guards' cold dead hands. You can also interrogate the driver for the location of a racket. You then have to return the cash to your safehouse before it becomes usable currency. The main threat to you is not the cops but a TeleportingKeycardSquad or two of enemy mobsters, though.
113	* ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAuto''
114	** An early mission in ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIII'' has you stealing an armored van for TheMafia.
115	** ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV'':
116	*** Armored cars randomly spawn throughout Los Santos. If you happen to have some explosive charges and a getaway vehicle handy, you can blow the doors off of them and make off with their contents.
117	*** The mission "Blitz Play" is one big {{Homage}} to the opening scenes of ''{{Film/Heat}}''. You even get extra points if you have the protagonists wear hockey masks.
118	*** If you bring [[BadassSpaniard Gustavo Mota]] along for "The Paleto Score", when asked about his first heist, he replies that he robbed an armored car.
119	*** One version of the final heist involves hijacking two armored cars and using them for a BavarianFireDrill.
120	* Assaulting convoys full of goodies is one of the many open-world activities in the ''VideoGame/JustCause'' games.
121	* The player can accept a mission to raid a convoy hauling weapons in ''VideoGame/MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries'', and actually gets to keep the weapons as loot (you even get more if you keep the transports intact while destroying their escorts). You can raid the convoy a second time; this time the escorts are stiffer and include enemy Mechs, but are beatable. If you take on the mission [[RuleOfThree a third time]], though, it's [[LuredIntoATrap a trap]] -- there's no convoy at all, only several lances of very tough Mechs out for your blood.
122	* Enemy supply convoys are frequent targets in the ''VideoGame/NavalOps'' series, though not in the only game where the player is allowed to drive a submarine.
123	* ''VideoGame/PAYDAY2'' has a rather more violent spin on this trope in its Transport Heists: you intercept [=GenSec=] armored cars in the middle of their route, break them open, and steal their contents, all the while law enforcement is trying to bring you down. Those "interceptions" consist of such tactics as ramming them with a semi, hiring a sniper to shoot the drivers, faking an emergency with an ambulance, dropping a cargo container in front of them, or dropping a skybridge with C4 to stop them.
124	* ''VideoGame/PAYDAY3'' takes a more hi-tech route with ''Road Rage'': the heist involves disabling an armored truck with an {{EMP}} before hacking into it and driving it onto a nearby ramp. Afterwards, the crew can drill open the truck's underbelly to rewire the locking mechanism, opening the doors and letting the crew loot the rare-earth elements inside.
125	* In ''VideoGame/SleepingDogs2012'', the player can occasionally come across armored bank cars that they can hijack and deliver to a Triad garage for a bit of cash.
126	* You regularly encounter crooks holding up armoured cars in random encounters in ''VideoGame/SpiderMan2'', to the point where you start to wonder why anyone actually ''uses'' the damn things given that half a dozen seem to get knocked over every day.
127	* Can randomly happen in ''VideoGame/{{XCOM2}}'' since you are commanding LaResistance fighting against the [[VichyEarth ADVENT Coalition]]. Sometimes you attack a convoy or [[TrainJob train for supplies]], sometimes you attack an armored truck carrying a captive Resistance VIP (An Engineer or a Scientist).
128	[[/folder]]
129
130	[[folder:Western Animation]]
131	* In the ''WesternAnimation/GeneratorRex'' episode ''Badlands'', Rex was part of a Providence convoy transporting unstable nanites and toilet paper. It isn't long before they are besieged by desert-dwelling anarchists.
132	* The first episode of the ''WesternAnimation/GIJoe'' five-parter "Revenge of Cobra" opens with the Joes transporting a high-tech device, and a Cobra strike force attacking the convoy and making off with it (along with Duke and Snake Eyes).
133	* The teen heroes of ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice2010'' were charged with guarding trucks containing the pieces of the disassembled Amazo android, a convoy that included decoys. Sure enough, the trucks carrying the deadly machine parts are attacked...by [[FunWithAcronyms MONQUI]]S!
134	[[/folder]]
135
136	[[folder:Real Life]]
137	* The most famous British RealLife example is the 1963 Great Train Robbery, which was actually woefully badly done and resulted in the arrests of nearly all involved; the robbery itself went off fairly well... until the culprits decided to play a game of Monopoly with the real money, getting their fingerprints everywhere.
138	* While the van wasn't carrying cash ''per se'', and it certainly wasn't armoured, a [[http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-05-27-splatoon-stock-swiped-in-nintendo-lorry-heist group of criminals managed to rob a truck carrying copies of the]] [[LimitedSpecialCollectorsUltimateEdition Limited Edition]] of ''VideoGame/{{Splatoon\|1}}'' in the UK.
139	* It's alleged that the infamous North Hollywood shoot-out was supposed to be this, hitting a truck delivering cash to a bank branch in a strip mall, but the truck was held up in traffic and the robbers got impatient.
140	[[/folder]]

Context Main / ArmedBlag