Line #44 Main/BenchBreaker


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11	When a character is [[BoundAndGagged tied to a chair, bench, stool or other sitting device]], they usually try to pick their handcuffs, rub their ropes against a ConvenientlyPlacedSharpThing, or some other action that affects their bindings. Not so with the Bench Breaker; the character manages to break free by destroying whatever they are tied to.
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13	This is ''not'' simply BreakingTheBonds--it usually is done by a normal human who is desperate enough to ram themselves into a wall just to damage the chair, or nearly break a limb leveraging it.
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15	Compare BringTheAnchorAlong, where the prisoner ends up dragging whatever they're tied to along with them.
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18	!!Examples
19	[[foldercontrol]]
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21	[[folder: Anime and Manga]]
22	* Kotomine Kirei from ''Literature/FateZero'' is tied to a tree by his hands. His response? ''Rip the damn tree straight out of the ground.'' Kirei is also [[CharlesAtlasSuperpower arguably]] a normal human.
23	* ''Manga/InuYasha'' is, at one point fairly early on in the series, tied to a tree by a demon using her hair like garrote wire. [[TakeAThirdOption He breaks the tree.]] Only a partial example, though, because he [[HalfHumanHybrid doesn't qualify as an ordinary human]].
24	[[/folder]]
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26	[[folder:Comic Books]]
27	* ''Comicbook/KickAss''. After he's captured, tortured, and is about to be executed by Frank Genovese's goons, Kick-Ass comes up with a frantic and desperate last-ditch escape plan that revolves around [[IShallTauntYou taunting them]] to punch and kick him to death instead of shooting him, until the chair he's tied to shatters, then he picks up the splintered parts of the broken legs to fight his way out.
28	[[/folder]]
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30	[[folder:Film — Animation]]
31	* In ''WesternAnimation/BarbieAndTheMagicOfPegasus'', Annika escapes Ollie the giant by tricking him into testing his strength by chaining himself to a post and [[BreakingTheBonds breaking free]]. Rather than breaking the chain, he ends up breaking the post causing his roof to collapse on him.
32	[[/folder]]
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34	[[folder:Film — Live-Action]]
35	* Black Widow of ''Film/{{The Avengers\|2012}}'' does a flip ''while tied to a chair'', shattering it on impact and freeing herself. And then she uses bits of the chair as weapons.
36	* Twice in ''Film/TheBoondockSaints''. Connor, handcuffed to a toilet while his brother Murphy is being taken out back to be shot by two goons from TheMafiya, smashes himself screaming against the toilet trying to break it apart before he finally just rips it up from the floor. [[DeathFromAbove Before he drops the toilet off the roof onto the Russians.]]
37	** Later in the film, both brothers have to help each other escape from being handcuffed to chairs. While this involves one brother kicking the other brother's hand to break his thumb, it is relatively tame compared to [[TheCanKickedHim the toilet scene]].
38	* ''Film/TheButchers'': When Simon is tied up by John Wayne Gacy, he escapes by smashing the chair he is tied to.
39	* ''Film/ColdPursuit'': When Kyle and Dante are abducted, Dante has his wrists bound over his head to the handle above the car door. During the confusion, while the gangsters are trying to subdue Kyle, Dante manages to escape by ripping the handle off and jumping out into the snow.
40	* In ''Film/CharliesAngels2000'', Creator/{{D\|rewBarrymore}}ylan breaks her chair with a flip, similar to the ''Film/{{The Avengers\|2012}}'' example, although [[WithMyHandsTied her hands stay tied]] after the chair is broken.
41	* In ''Film/Cyborg1989'' Creator/JeanClaudeVanDamme's character is crucified on the mast of a beached derelict ship and LeftForDead. After spending the night there he's eventually able to break the mast by kicking it repeatedly with his feet, though he still has to be untied by another character who turns up to rescue him.
42	* Lennie Pike from ''Film/ItsAMadMadMadMadWorld'' breaks the chair that he was tied to after breaking himself free from the pillar and duct tape that the gas station attendants tried tying him up to.
43	* ''Film/HouseOfWax2005'': When Cary is strapped to a surgical chair in the basement of the gas station, she manages to escape by pulling loose the rail on one side of the chair.
44	* ''Film/MissionImpossibleFallout'' has Ilsa Faust simultaneously breaking a chair she was tied to and attacking the one who put her there in the first place.
45	* ''Film/{{Red 2}}''. Frank Moss is being interrogated by US officials while handcuffed to a desk. Then a hit team bursts into the building killing everyone. Frank convinces an agent to uncuff him, but too late as the hitmen burst in and shoot him, catching Frank helpless...until he [[UseYourHead breaks the desk with his head]] and uses the pieces to knock out the hitmen.
46	** Later in the movie, Frank handcuffs Han to a refrigerator. When police show up to arrest him, Han rips the door off and uses the pieces too, etc.
47	* in ''Film/TodayWeKillTomorrowWeDie'', O'Bannion is tied to a chair with one of the Comancheros advancing on him with a set of brass knuckles. Just as the Comanchero gets to him, O'Bannion manages to rip the chair apart with his StoutStrength.
48	* In ''Film/TomorrowNeverDies'', Wai Lin undoes the handcuffs [[ChainedHeat chaining her and Bond together]] while they are [[ShowerScene under a shower]]. She then handcuffs Bond to the shower pipe and leaves. Bond simply snaps the copper pipe and follows her.
49	* A flashback in ''Film/{{Unknown 2006}}'' reveals how one of the characters frees himself from the chair he was tied to by breaking the chairback.
50	* In ''Film/PulpFiction'', Butch breaks free at the TortureCellar by ripping the chair apart he was tied to.
51	[[/folder]]
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53	[[folder:Literature]]
54	* In Creator/LeeChild's ''Die Trying'' book, the main character Literature/JackReacher finds himself chained up to a huge beam of wood with a female captive, who is about to be sexually assaulted by their captors. Reacher, summoning up every ounce of his considerable strength, tears the chain clean out of the wooden beam. The chain is intact, but the beam is destroyed.
55	* Creator/StephenKing's short story ''The Gingerbread Girl'', from the collection ''Literature/JustAfterSunset'', features a version of this. The protagonist is duck taped to a chair by a psycho who will return in a little while to kill her. She's unable to get free of the tape, so she ends up breaking the chair instead to free herself. This later comes in handy when the psycho returns, as she's able to use the splintered remains of the chair to fight him off.
56	* In Creator/DeanKoontz's ''Literature/{{Intensity}}'', the protagonist escapes her captor by ramming a wall with the chair she is tied to and splintering it. She injures herself in the process.
57	* ''Literature/KateShugak'': In ''A Taint in the Blood'', Kate is captured and tied to a camp bed in an old cabin. She escapes by breaking the bed till she can squirm across the floor, and then [[ConvenientlyPlacedSharpThing lighting a Coleman stove and using it to burn through the rope]].
58	* In ''[[Literature/KnightAndRogueSeries The Last Knight]]'', Sir Michael is chained to a bed by a captor and spends most of his time kicking the bedpost to try to detach it from the bed. [[spoiler:He succeeds just in time to aid Fisk in rescuing him.]]
59	* In ''Literature/UnseenAcademicals'', Mr. Nutt is a "goblin" ([[spoiler: not really; he's an orc]]) who recently arrived in the big city after being raised by [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire Lady Margolotta]]. ''Before'' he came to Lady Margolotta he was kept prisoner in some kind of mine or forge, and grew stronger by first lifting the light tools, then the heavier tools, and finally, the anvil. Trev asks why it was so important to be able to lift the anvil, and Nutt says "Because, Mr. Trev, I was chained to the anvil."
60	[[/folder]]
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62	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
63	* In ''Series/TwentyFour'', Jack Bauer escapes by smashing his chair and attacking his captor.
64	* ''Series/AlteredCarbon''. In "Fallen Angels", Vernon tries fighting Kovacs [[WithMyHandsTied while still strapped to his chair]], then breaks it, but is still not able to defeat Kovacs, who then secures him to a huge puffy armchair with an excess of duct tape.
65	* In ''Series/TheAvengers1960s'', Mrs. Peel gets handcuffed to a wooden chair. When the time comes, she swiftly breaks the chair and beats up the baddies with the sticks. At the end of the episode, as they stroll off across a golf course, Steed asks her what her handicap is. She shows him the chunk of wood still cuffed to one of her wrists.
66	* ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer''.
67	** In "Gingerbread" the residents of Sunnydale fall under the influence of a demon and try to [[BurnTheWitch burn Buffy and Willow at the stake]]. Buffy is bound so tightly she can't snap the ropes even with her SuperStrength. When the demon attacks her, she breaks the stake and leans forward, [[ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice impaling it on the tip]].
68	** In "Never Leave Me" after Spike is revealed to be a ManchurianAgent, Buffy ties him to a chair until she can figure out what to do. Spike even tells her to tighten the bonds. When he's activated, however, [[SuperpoweredEvilSide he breaks the chair in berserker fury]] and attacks Andrew, forcing Buffy to chain him up in the basement next time.
69	* In the episode of ''Series/BurnNotice'' where Fiona gets abducted, she breaks the arms of the chair she's handcuffed to so that she can move around the room freely.
70	* On ''{{Series/Chuck}}'', whenever Casey gets handcuffed to a piece of furniture, he ends up breaking it and using the attached pieces as a melee weapon.
71	* ''Series/{{Haven}}:'' In a season 4 episode, [[TheWorfEffect Dwight]] (played by WWE wrestler [[Wrestling/EdgeWrestler Edge]]) is kidnapped by mooks working for the season's BigBad. They tie him to a chair, which he promptly busts out of. Oh, and this is while he's still recovering from a close-range gunshot wound. The only reason the mooks gain the upper hand in this scenario is because Dwight's [[DifferentlyPoweredIndividual Trouble]] is that he attracts bullets, and the mooks are armed.
72	* ''Series/HawaiiFive0'': When Danny is tied to a chair by gangsters, he manages to escape by ramming himself into the wall to break the chair and subsequently fighting and shooting his way out.
73	* From time to time in ''Series/TheIncredibleHulk1977'', David Banner would get tied to a chair, only for him to HulkOut; [[BreakingTheBonds so Hulk breaks the chair]].
74	* ''Series/ThePrisoner1967'' episode "The Girl Who Was Death" had him tied to a chair inside a missile set to launch and destroy London - he struggles against the rope for some time before he realizes he can just pull the back of the chair up and off, freeing himself.
75	* Doreau does this accidentally in the ''Series/SledgeHammer'' episode "Wild About Hammer". The villain for that episode ties her to a chair. Sledge manages to untie her ankles from the chair before he's attacked. While those two are fighting, Doreau manages to stand herself up on her now freed legs, only to trip, fall over backwards, break the chair, and free herself from the rest of the rope.
76	* Glen does this in one episode of ''Series/TheWalkingDead'' after being locked in a room with a zombie.
77	[[/folder]]
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79	[[folder:Mythology]]
80	* One tale of Hercules has him go down to the Underworld to rescue Theseus, who'd gone on a ''profoundly'' stupid quest to help abduct Persephone (yes, the wife of the god of the Underworld) along with Pirithous, the friend he was accompanying (whose idea it was in the first place). They ended up trapped on an enchanted bench that prevented whoever sat on it from getting back up. Hercules just ripped Theseus off the bench (''ow''), but the earth started to shake when he tried to do the same to Pirithous, due to the magnitude of Pirithous' blasphemy.
81	[[/folder]]
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83	[[folder:Video Games]]
84	* In the intro scenes of ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamCity'', Bruce Wayne rocks back and forth in a chair he's been tied to, and then escapes from his bonds once he (and it) topples to the ground.
85	* ''VideoGame/MaxPayne'' waits until Frankie "The Bat" Niagara is out of the room, before falling backwards on his chair in order to break it and set himself free.
86	* In ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption2'' one of the missions on [[BananaRepublic Guarma]] begins with Arthur being knocked out and interrogated by the local regime. He manages to escape by toppling the chair he's tied up in and knocking out his captor.
87	[[/folder]]
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89	[[folder:Webcomics]]
90	* In ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'', when Grace breaks free of her shackles Damien had her in she destroys the chair she was sitting in in the process. This has [[http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=546 consequences]] for the prisoner who was sitting near her.
91	[[/folder]]
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93	[[folder:Western Animation]]
94	* This becomes a RunningGag in ''[[WesternAnimation/DragonsRidersOfBerk Dragons: Race to the Edge]]'' -- when captured by dragon-proof chains, break the winches; when captured by chains on a dragon-proof winch, blast the winch off the wooden deck. The dragon hunters are finally forced to make ships entirely out of dragon-proof metal to defy this trope.
95	* In the ''WesternAnimation/LittlestPetShop2012'' episode "[[Recap/LittlestPetSHop2012S2E2TheNestHatsCraze The Nest Hats Craze!]]," Blythe gets so mad at Whittanny and Brittney tying her to a wooden chair that she breaks the chair to escape.
96	[[/folder]]
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Context Main / BenchBreaker