Troperville
Editing Help
Tools
Toys
|
He really needed to go to the bathroom
Useful for chopping wood and heads alike, axes are often pressed into service as weapons. An axe's wide, cleaving head is effective against armor, making it a slower and more powerful weapon than a sword, though not quite as massive as a hammer. Smaller axes, such as the tomahawk or the francisca, can be used as throwing weapons. In certain media, they may even return to the user's hand like a boomerang, though they have the tendency to stick in enemies if they score a hit.
Historically, due to being somewhat easier to master, their general familiarity to the peasant population and mobility (real-life combat axes were small and rarely weighed more than one kilo), they used to be the close combat Weapon Of Choice of the common foot soldiers, as opposed to the officers and nobility, who wore swords. Franks used them extensively (lending their name to the francisca), and nowadays axes are associated with dwarves, Vikings (and other members of proud warrior races), woodcutters, firefighters, and psychopaths (giving Ax Crazy its name and meaning). If the Big Guy of a Five Man Band isn't using a hammer or his bare fists, he'll generally use a gigantic axe as a weapon. For extra comedy, the Cute Bruiser may be given a head-chopper bigger than the rest of her body.
May also include halberds and other poleaxes, which combine the chopping power of an axe with the range of a Blade On A Stick.
Not to be confused with Author Filibuster or Author Tract.
Examples:
Anime and Manga
- Getter Robo: GETTAAAAAAAA TOMAHAAAAWWWKKK!!!
- This being a perfect example.
- Each version of Getter 1 has this. From a fairly standard-sized tomahawk (relative to the mech itself) in the original to twin, double-bladed one's for G, a massive one for Shin Getter that's actually more of a halberd than a tomahawk and a GIANT, double-bladed, double-ended ax for Shin Dragon (which is already absolute gigantic to begin with). And then there's the above "Final Getter Tomahawk" which might as well be the Most Triumphant Example; it is to axes as the Goldion Crusher is to hammers.
- BUSTAAAA TOMAHAAAAWK... which didn't make it to the Gunbuster anime, but was included in Super Robot Wars where Getter Robo's Ryouma teaches Noriko.
- Bui from Yu Yu Hakusho. Typical Big Guy example.
- Not so typical, as he's not really an axe-wielder or a Big Guy. All that armor he wears is not for protection, but rather to keep his immense power in check, and as you can expect the fight only really begins once he takes it off.
- Fate's Bardiche from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, whose basic form is, well, a bardiche, a long poleaxe.
- Flora and Schierke spend some time forging a giant axe for Guts to wield against the Trolls that are attacking their village in Berserk, but Guts turns it down because he's already doing just fine with his big whacking Dragon Slayer, thank-you-very-much.
- Midori Sugiura from Mai-HiME uses one as her Element.
- Dinoking in Transformers Victory uses an axe.
- Zeon mobile suits are often equipped with 'Heat Hawks,' axes with an extremely hot blade that can cut through armour, in the original Gundam continuity. Presumably easier to make than beam sabers.
- Eventually they split the difference and make beam versions, too. These also are used by the Zaku Expys in Gundam SEED Destiny.
- Utu from The Tower Of Druaga had a regular axe that he exchanged for a beam axe in the second season.
- Denmark from Axis Powers Hetalia is drawn with an axe in the trading cards. Since he hasn't officially showed up, we don't know if it's just decoration or if it really is his Weapon Of Choice.
- Chris Armalite from Scrapped Princess carries a large axe with a chain attached to it for extra reach.
- Bleach's Jidanbou uses not one, but two enormous axes. Or at least he did, until Ichigo smashed them.
- And then there's Espada #2 Barragan Luisenbarn, who sports a very huge axe for a weapon/zanpakutou.
- Kyo Aguri in Weiss Kreuz Gluhen had an axe he could also shoot a chain out of. Didn't help him much.
Comic Books
- A double edged battleaxe is the Weapon Of Choice and insignia of the Marvel Comics villain Skurge the Executioner.
- The "Atomic Axe", which can cut through anything, is the weapon of choice for the Persuader, foe of The Legion Of Superheroes.
- Part way through the first Sin City story, The Hard Goodbye, Marv acquires a hatchet and uses it to kill a bunch of people.
- The Headsman of the Thunderbolts weilds a giant axe and has a disturbing fixation with cutting heads off.
Film
Literature
- Gimli from Lord Of The Rings. Not to mention countless other dwarves from fantasy fiction (both Tolkien and those inspired by him). Ironically, all the main dwarves in The Hobbit fought with swords.
- Korgan Bloodaxe in Baldur's Gate II.
- Discworld plays with the idea of Dwarves being commonly portrayed with axes. There, it's their cultural weapon so Dwarven officers of Ankh Morpork can carry them around, and in Dwarven mines carrying a huge axe strapped to one's back is perceived as more of being properly dressed rather than heavily armed.
- The particular axe preferred by these dwarves is mentioned to be a multipurpose tool: It's got a pick on one side, for prospecting, and an ax on the other in case anyone tries to stop you.
- The dwarves with axes thing is so common that in the webcomic DM of the Rings, the person playing as Gimli mentions how there are only hammer dwarves and ax dwarves, and in one scene wishes he had chosen a hammer when there is a barrier to smash through.
- Also lampshaded in Battle For Wesnoth where Tallin was shocked by the revelation that some dwarves are proficient in swords (and bows).
- Romance Of The Three Kingdoms has quite a few users of both axes and halberds.
- For modern adaptations, the best-known is probably Dian Wei from Dynasty Warriors and his enormous axe.
- Li Kui, from The Water Margin, was well known for his twin axes and, not surprisingly, being a little Ax Crazy.
- A moon-bladed hand axe was Perrin's Weapon Of Choice for some time in The Wheel Of Time.
- Fitz from Robin Hobb's The Farseer Trilogy.
- In the original Stephen King novel The Shining, Jack Torrance goes after his family with a roque mallet when he finally goes over the edge. But in the movie..."Heeeeeeeeeeere's Johnny!"
- Raskalnikov in Crime And Punishment and Caderousse in The Count Of Monte Cristo both murder people with axes.
- Several of the Church Knights from Dave Eddings's Elenium and Tamuli series were axe-users, most notably a huge Lochaber axe which could lop off heads with ease.
- The Valerian footsoldiers of the Lensman series use the space axe as their Weapon Of Choice. It's functionally identical to the Medieval poleaxe, but in SPACE! As Valerians are canonically Dutch Heavyworlders, this essentially makes them "space dwarves".
- 6 to 7 foot tall space dwarves. Unlike many versions of Heavyworlders, the Valerians aren't described as short.
The space-axe, a combination and sublimation of battle-axe, mace, bludgeon, and lumberman's picaroon.
- While Conan generally uses swords as his weapon of choice, he has used the battleaxe from time to time in Howard's stories, such as in the first Conan story, "The Phoenix on the Sword," which has King Conan taking one to the assassins trying to kill him in his bedchamber after breaking his sword. King Kull, another Howard creation, famously used the axe, with his catchphrase being "With This Axe I Rule!"
- David Gemmell's Druss the Legend was also called "Druss the Axe" because his signature weapon was Snaga, a powerful axe that had a demon inside.
- Older Than Print, as the weapon of choice of the titular Green Knight in Gawain and The Green Knight is an axe with a four-foot head.
- Averted in Gene Wolfe's Book Of The New Sun ... despite Severian being a Journeyman of the Torturer's Guild and therefore (amongst other things) a public executioner, his beheading weapon is a sword rather than the more iconic axe.
- Kaz the minotaur of Dragonlance fame. His weapon of choice was a magic axe, Honor's Face, that could be returned to his hand at will (among other awesome abilities).
- Jean Tannen from the Gentleman Bastard series is skilled with a large variety of weapons, but prefers to fight with two axes he calls the Wicked Sisters, and considers to be family members rather than weapons. Jean does not conform to the usual axe-fighter tropes, though, being a well-educated and well-read cat burglar and con man.
- Three examples occur in The Elenium: Boisterous Bruiser Ulath, Badass Bookworm Bevier and Only Sane Man Side Kick Berit all wield axes of varying sizes and types. Ulath uses a double-headed axe, Berit an infantry axe and Bevier a lochaber axe.
- In The Hunger Games (well, the sequel) the girl from the lumber district is quite adept with an axe.
Live Action TV
- Garrett's "Twin Timber Axes!" from The Mystic Knights Of Tir Na Nog.
- Axes frequently show up on Buffy The Vampire Slayer, usually in one of two forms:
- In addition to fire extinguishers, Sunnydale High School is also equipped with fire axes. Joyce uses one of these when she goes Mama Bear on Spike.
- Giles (and later Angel) owns several medieval battleaxes, and they seem to be the preferred weapon for fighting demons.
- The "Scythe" found near the end of Buffy is clearly an axe.
- Then there's Gunn's battle axe made out of a hubcap.
- In Kamen Rider Den-O, Kintaros wields an axe, as does his version of Den-O, which is actually named Axe Form. This is because Kintaros is based on the Japanese myth of Kintaro the Golden Boy, who himself used an axe.
- Guess what Kamen Rider Axe's Weapon Of Choice is?
- At the end of Serenity, River dual-wields a scimitar and an axe while fighting the Reavers.
- Norbert the Nutjob in How To Train Your Dragon is one hell of an Axe Crazy.
Tabletop Games
- Warhammer and Warhammer 40000. The latter with chain-axes.
- Said chain-axes are favored weapons of one of the franchises evil deities
- Hatchets were the first close-combat weapon to be used in Battletech. One mech in particular, the AXM-2N Axeman, was the first mech used by Adam Steiner in the animated series.
- Although it's not required per se, the traditional barbarian stereotype in Dungeons And Dragons is waving an axe about as large as himself. They're also a popular Dwarven weapon along with warhammers and crossbows.
Toys
- Several Bionicle characters use or have used axes such as Lewa in his original form, Gali as a Toa Nuva, and Axonn.
Video Games
- Rock and Astaroth from the Soul Series. Their weapon sets often include hammers as well.
- One of the three basic weapon types from Fire Emblem (along with swords and lances). Axe users have a tendency toward Big Guy archetypes: Fighters, Berserkers, Pirates, Journeymen, Brigands, Warriors, Generals. In Blazing Sword, Hector of Ostia is actually a Lord who specializes in axe use.
- The Fighter class from Final Fantasy can use a few axes as weapons. However, he likes swords better. (Technically, the Fighter should use swords instead of axes because axes have a lower inherent accuracy, reducing the possibility of multiple hits, which is the big source of damage multiplier in the game.)
- Both The Beastmaster and Warrior classes in Final Fantasy XI use axes as a Weapon Of Choice. While Warriors use giant axes to the best ability, halberds are still considered polearms, and thusly Dragoons are best at them.
- Axes appear periodically in other Final Fantasy games, but not at the same frequency as swords, spears, and some other weapons. They tend to be used by Viking or Berserker-type classes.
- In Vampire The Masquerade:Redemption, halberds give the most bang for the buck in early stages. The drawback is requiring a heavy investment in strength.
- The arcade game Golden Axe, where the dwarf Gilius Thunderhead wields the titular axe (he's stuck with a boring old steel one in the home versions, though).
- Axes and Polearms are both prominent, of course, in the Total War series of games, with barbarian factions and units tending to be the biggest users of the former, and militia-class units the biggest user of the latter.
- The Pyro from Team Fortress 2 uses a fire-axe as his melee weapon.
- Also, the unlockable melee replacement, 'The Axtinguisher', is arguably even more bad-ass, being a battle-axe wrapped in barbed wire. It inflicts critical hits on burning targets - for those times when fire simply isn't enough.
- The marines from Quake used Axes as their melee weapons. When the original Team Fortress was developed as a mod for that game, the Medic used an axe to heal.
- Presea from Tales Of Symphonia is a prime example of the "Cute Bruiser with implausably huge axe". They do justify how she can even lift the thing through Applied Phlebotinum, though.
- They aren't quite as big, but Presea is predated by Cless Alvein, Mary Argent, Loni Dunamis, and Rid Herschel as far as axe-users go. She's also succeeded by Innes Lorenz, whose weapon is described as an "axe blade" which can probably rival Presea's Gaea Cleaver for raw size and power (especially given that Presea is a Token Loli while Innes has Boobs Of Steel). Cless and Rid are technically swordsmen, but they both can swing axes and halberds as well.
- Kaeli from Final Fantasy Mystic Quest is a White Mage in nature (definitely not squishy), but her standard weapon is an axe (later the mighty Giant's Axe).
- The Axe Knights from Castlevania.
- The Warrior class from Gauntlet uses an infinite supply of magical throwing axes.
- Tomahawk Man from Mega Man VI, Mino Magnus from Mega Man Zero 4.
- Most Orcs in Warcraft 3. True, there are sword users, but orcs are mostly associated with axes in the series.
- May be the trope namer, as the Tauren Chieftain says "I have an axe to grind." upon training.
- In World of Warcraft Orcs have a racial ability that increases their skill with axes.
- "ARCANITE REAPER! HOOOO!"
- City Of Heroes has a Battle Axe powerset for Tankers and Brutes, which may be ported to the other melee classes at some point (if you can get your head around the idea of a stealthy Stalker with a giant axe). As of a recent update, said axe can be customised between different colours and different models, including a fireman's axe, an energy axe and a shovel. (the edge of the shovel; the blunt end is an option for the War Mace powerset) Notable NPCs with Axe powers include the Greek Mythology styled street gang known as the Warriors, and the heroic yet demonic Infernal. (and his Evil Twin)
- Gremio from Suikoden, among many others.
- Hulk Davidson from Viewtiful Joe.
- Barbatos Goetia of Tales Of Destiny 2 has a mean axe, and a hidden special move called World Destroyer where he slams his axe down and kills everyone in one hit. Talk about cheap.
- The best Melee weapon in Urban Dead. Also, the same in Dead Frontier - until you get your hands on a katana.
- Axes show up in Persona 3, possessing the greatest damage potential, but the worst accuracy rating. They are part of a group of weapons called Bludgeons, which also include hammers, maces, and a bus stop sign. And for a short while he's with your group, Shinjiro Aragaki uses an axe.
- And in the first Persona, the axe user is Mark/Masao Inaba.
- Axes are a weapon option in Arcanum Of Steamworks And Magick Obscura, popular with dwarves and orcs. High damage, slow, but also capable of hacking open a door or stubborn chest without being damaged.
- Playerwise Axes are poor choices as attack speed is more important in Arcanum than damage.
- Except for the Pyrotechnic Axe, which does more than enough damage to make up for its below-average speed.
- Axes are one of three weapons usable by Warriors in Guild Wars, AoE attacks for Pv E. (Though hammers have the ability to knock foes down and swords have some really good skills like Dragon Slash, so they're fairly even.)
- In Age of Wonders, the dwarves use axemen as their basic melee infantry rather than the swordsmen most races have, and their berserkers and boar riders also go into battle with axes.
- A new executioner miniboss from Resident Evil 5 appears to be following this trope. His axe is so large he has to lug it around and takes huge swings at Chris, even knocking out some of his fellow Majini in the process.
- There are multiple types of axe ghosts (the kinds that charge found swinging an axe on seeing him) in Wario Land 4, with Hotel Horror especially having a freaking ton of them (about four to every door in the hotel).
- Axes are a popular weapon choice in Dwarf Fortress; when first starting a new fort, it's a good idea to give your designated woodcutter some martial axe training as well, as a stopgap until you can train some real soldiers.
- That being said, woodcutters and miners will both use their professonal skill in place of a combat skill in a pinch. Legendary woodcutters and miners are SCARY to watch in action...
- In Dynasty Warriors, Dian Wei used a giant axe which was later replaced with a flail.
- "Touch not this awesome axe, or suffer the wrath of the Tainted Coil!!"
- Choosing the Barbarian from the character select screen in Diablo II will prompt him to let out a yell and start grinding an axe while you choose his name. His starting inventory includes an axe.
- Shania from Shadow Hearts 3 duel wields them.
- Lexaeus of the Kingdom Hearts series uses an over-sized weapon referred to as a tomahawk in Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts II, and as an Axe Sword in 358/2 Days.
Web Comics
Web Original
Western Animation
- Transformers Animated Optimus Prime has the "Boomerang Tomahawk" version with an energon axe with a rocket attached. It also fits in with the firetruck theme (his other weapons are grapples and fire-retardant foam).
- This is based on an axe made of energon that G1 Optimus could turn his hand into, but this was only used once. Nonetheless, it became iconic for him.
- Lugnut also has one. It's much, much bigger. (He also only uses it once.)
- On The Fairly Oddparents, Vicky, as well as a few other characters, have used axes.
Fan Fiction
- Samuel D. Axe, the protagonist of one of the best-known One Piece OC fafictions, uses a diamond axe as his main weapon, and is even named after said weapon.
- One of Stalkkus' weapons in humanoid form in the Godzilla fanfilm Godzilla vs the Kaiju Killer
Music
- A guitarist may refer to his instrument as an "axe" and few will question him. Typically, the louder the music he plays, the more likely and more acceptable this is.
|
|
