I Have The High Ground - Television Tropes & Idioms

Supernatural and magical beings in anime often stand on tall, thin objects, such as the tips of pine trees or lampposts. This is flying for people who cannot fly. Or even the ones who can.

Less about true strategy and more about looking cool. Expect Dramatic Wind (actually, wind speed increases with altitude, so wind that seems dramatic to those on the ground is *normal* at high altitude).

This seems to have originated from training techniques that involved standing on bamboo; see, for example, the Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and Teen Titans examples. This is common in Wire Fu movies.

For extra cool points, combine this with Walk On Water by standing on tall, thin bamboo poles in a pond or lake. But look out, sirs! Very bad you fall in water! And it's a killer of coolness if you're trying to pose, something goes wrong, and you become a victim of your own Super Drowning Skills.

Named after a quote from Star Wars Episode Three; it's actually a pun (among other things). Obi-Wan has the physical and the moral high ground. When it actually has strategic or tactical advantages, you are playing with Geo Effects.

Examples:

Anime

Tuxedo Kamen from Sailor Moon was a master of I Have The High Ground. That was pretty much all he ever did. Haruka and Michiru were fond of standing on high pillars as well, and the Sailor Moon S opening credits put all the senshi up there.
- The Stars anime actually parodies this: when Uranus and Neptune try the high ground trick by standing on the dinning table in Usagi's house, Aluminium Siren actually remarks on how rude they are for doing so with shoes on, making them blush in embarrassment.
Ciel from Tsukihime, above.
- Arcueid of Tsukihime in the Massive Multiplayer Crossover Battle Moon Wars was immensely fond of this, at one point revealing that she hadn't shown herself until then because there wasn't a cool lamppost that she could stand upon when making her entrance.
First shot of Rukia in Bleach has her standing on top of a powerline pole. When the other two Shinigami first appear, they too are standing on lampposts.
Occurs constantly in Naruto, related to the ninja's ability to channel chakra into their feet. Also used the Walk On Water combination with logs that balanced on the surface of a lake a pivotal point during the climactic Naruto vs. Sasuke battle.
- Not to mention Sasuke's first warning that his charming big bro Itachi has gone Ax Crazy is catching a glimpse of him doing this in blacked-out silhouette on a telephone pole, against a rising red moon, with only his crazy eyes visible. Shortly afterwards, Sasuke stumbles on the first of many, many bodies...
In the original Ah My Goddess OAVs, Belldandy watched Keiichi go to work while improbably on top of a thin willowy tree. (However, Belldandy gets a pass because she's both literally and figuratively a Goddess. Not to mention the fact that she can also fly.)
Likewise various characters from Yu Yu Hakusho. At one point, Kurama is seen standing on the railing of a balcony in the manga. Why he just didn't stand on the balcony is a mystery; the anime corrected this, if memory serves.
And the Bakuen Campus Guardress.
Chii from Chobits does it too, with some impressive Dramatic Wind.
The Shamanic Princess and her primary opponent actually generate their own tall, thin objects to stand on while fighting.
Amelia is introduced in The Slayers doing this as she confronts a bandit. She explains to Gourry later that as an "ally of justice", she is expected to make this sort of entrance. The problem is that she's still working on the dismount; every time she does a dramatic jump down to begin the battle, she crashes. One of the Slayers movies takes this even further, with two characters climbing stone precipices to hurl verbal abuse at each other (at a distance of less than fifty feet).
Anju and Ren both do this in Karin. Both are able to fly by various means but seem limited by the vampire creed to the Rule Of Cool.
Cyberdoll Sara leaps up onto a powerpole in Hand Maid May, to aid her search of the city for May. Kotaro Nanbara, being mortal and far less cool, is forced to scramble up with normal climbing.
Kaitou Saint Tail does it at least Once An Episode, either when she reveals her presence or once she's secured the stolen goods.
Used in a couple of Angel battles in Kidou Tenshi Angelic Layer.
Lelouch is seen in the first OP of Code Geass doing this. Given his utter lack of physical skills and his flair for the dramatic, what we didn't see was the 15 minutes he spent using his Mind Control Eyes on an army of people to get him up there.
Volfogg from Gao Gai Gar is a transforming ninja giant robot who does this. And can become invisible (visually, and to most sensors), too.
Meta Knight was quite fond of this pose in the Kirby anime, although this is rather understandable given his short stature.
In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, Fate is standing on a telephone pole firing magic when Nanoha first sees her.
All of the cloaked Dragon Knights from Noein do this, it's an aspect of their otherworldliness.
"Twilight Suzuka" in Outlaw Star does this several times, usually as she's about to enter battle.
Ranma and his father trained by sparring atop bamboo poles... and were Cursed With Awesome by falling off into the Cursed Springs of Jusenkyou. Ranma also frequently runs along fence railings. And Kodachi Kuno does this as part of her Martial Arts And Crafts.
The holy city guards that fight Claire in Claymore don't remark how incredible she is until she leaps onto a steeple.
Subverted in Mai-HiME, with Lampshade Hanging. Nagi (who is fond of having the high ground to say the least) appears on top of Fuuka Gakuen's clock tower in a very cool and dramatic manner and starts delivering an important message to the main characters, and Midori tells him to step down because standing that high is dangerous.
In the first episode of Yu-Gi-Oh GX, Flame Wingman does this after the Skyscraper card is activated, glaring down at Ancient Gear Golem from one of the taller 'scrapers, despite being quite visibly capable of flight. It does look cool, though. The same happens later in the series, just before Jaden defeats another student who had stolen Yugi's deck and was imitating him.
Master Asia of G Gundam clearly one-upped almost everyone at this trope when he once performed it by standing on the tip of his own martial arts belt twisted into a pole shape while balancing on top of the wreckage of the Humongous Mecha that he'd just defeated with nothing but said cloth and his bare hands. He also tended to do it in the traditional manner, and at times even did so while in his Gundam, despite the fact that its weight should have caused the collapse of what he was balancing on.
In another Gundam example, Norris Packard did this with his Gouf Custom on top of an already bombed out Vietnamese office block in The08th MS Team. This is even more egregious, as that series was meant to be a more realistic take on the Gundam mythos.
Reiri the vampire girl is doing this on the steeple of a church in the opening of Princess Resurrection.
Inumari does it on his first appearance in The Law Of Ueki.
Light of Death Note visualizes himself and L doing this as imagery of their struggle against one another, using incredibly thin skyscrapers.
Jeanne of Kamikaze Kaitou Jeanne almost always starts begins her transformation sequence by jumping off a building, tower, etc. She enjoys attacking her adversaries this way as well.
Raitei and the Four Kings in Get Backers are often portrayed sitting or standing on large columns of rubble. Two in particular seem to enjoy it: when Ban and Shido get into a fight on a sloped rooftop, Kazuki makes sure to be standing higher along when he steps in, and honestly? Sitting on a(nother) rooftop and making cryptic remarks is really about all Masaki does until the final arc of the manga.
A recurring trope in X1999 in which almost every character gets to pose dramatically in an absurdly high place at one time or another. (Sorata even comments on this when he first meets Yuuto standing on the top of a rather tall tree.) They always seem to prefer leaping from telephone pole to telephone pole at perilously high speeds rather than take the public transportation.
Sonic does this a few times in Sonic X. There are also variations involving the nosecones of high-speed jets, and trees.
Spoofed in Soul Eater where Black*Star often does this, in one case he was so high up nobody could hear him.
Polylina in Galaxy Fraulein Yuna. May be a spoof of Tuxedo Kamen, since she wears a mask and holds a rose, and seems to be the main character's crush.
Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou combines this with Walking on Water. Achieved not for coolness but for a sense of serene surrealism (check out the main article on YKK for a picture)
Meta Knight in the Kirby anime often appears in high places when he needs to work as Mr Exposition. It's become a joke in the fandom that he does it to compensate for his otherwise short stature.
Manga example: In the "Battle Royale" manga, Kiriyama takes this to the extreme, standing on THE EDGE OF A SPLINTER sticking up from a broken wooden pole. To make it more ludicrous, he stands as if he were standing on solid ground, both feet spread wide apart..despite under a square millimeter of one foot (if that) actually having support.
- The page in question is Here. This shows him getting on the edge of the splinter.
Various characters do this in Silent Moebius, including both Cheyenne sisters, Katsumi Liqueur, and Ganossa Maximillian.

Video Games

In the Sly Cooper games, one of Sly's many moves is the "Ninja Spire Jump", which allows him to stand atop tall, narrow objects. In Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves, Sly does battle with General Tsao, a crime boss who fancies himself a Chinese warlord, in a Boss Battle atop a bamboo grove, obviously inspired by Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon.
The cover◊ of Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix+ shows all the major characters either sitting or standing on poles (or in the case of Goofy, clinging to one).
Altair of Assassins Creed can climb most buildings, and on some of them, he can perch on a ledge to spot what is happening on the streets (thus revealing side missions). And then do an improbable somersault in strategically placed hay carts all the way to the ground.
Ryu Hayabusa of Ninja Gaiden fame likes doing this in the cutscenes of the Xbox remake series.
The Big Bad of Metal Wolf Chaos, Richard Hawk, does this on a helicopter in a Humongous Mecha at one point.
An example of the high ground having a strategic advantage is in Final Fantasy Tactics, as bow-users gain extra range to their attacks.
The first time Auron is seen in Final Fantasy X, he's standing on a high ledge in Zanarkand, watching Sin approach. As it enters the world, he holds his jug of sake out in tribute before heading back down.

Western Animation

In one episode of Teen Titans, Robin also fights atop a bamboo grove against an anthropomorphic monkey while journeying up a mountain to meet a martial arts master.
In Avatar The Last Airbender, Princess Azula is able to execute this by perching on a pole by the tips of her toes, during a chase sequence situated near a scaffolding. Looks cool, doesn't it?◊ Aang does the same during his fight scene with Zuko, in the unaired pilot which the sequence was based on. Not so much◊.
- It's also how you play Airball, apparently.
An episode of Cow And Chicken featured the characters training with this method. When they ask why, their teacher says "I saw it in a movie once".

Live Action TV

In Dark Angel, Max frequently sits on top of the Seattle Space Needle, especially when she is brooding. Other characters, such as Ben and Logan, occasionally go up there as well.
In Torchwood, especially the first season, Jack Harkness is often found on top of Cardiff buildings. Flagged up in the second series when Ianto notes he's "good on rooftops". Also spoofed in Dead Ringers by having a scene shift to a rooftop for no good reason.

Comic Books

Recent incarnations of Spider-Man have also got him doing doing this, which isn't too much of a stretch, due to his adhesive abilities and equilibrium. (His more usual trick is to hang from beneath a lamppost arch or flagpole.)
Used to the point where it is considered an explicit sign of otherworldly skills or powers in the now-physically published webcomic Megatokyo. Many characters are observed walking on phone lines or on poles. It is even used by Miho (a possible Dark Magical Girl, and definitely one of the comic's most powerful beings) to convince Yuki that she is a Magical Girl by making her follow her up onto a power line without realizing it. Largo can also do it, but for Megatokyo, being good at games also counts as otherworldly skills.
Fan Art example: A "manga-tized" Dee Dee from Dexters Laboratory performs on top of a fence pole in this comic◊ done by artist Tavisha Wolfgarth-Simons.

Film

The fight along the tops of the bamboo grove in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon.
- Spoofed in a second Asterix movie.
Daniel LaRusso in Karate Kid practiced his Finishing Move on wooden posts.
As mentioned above, present in Revenge of the Sith. Obi-Wan defeats Anakin once he announces that he has the high ground, despite having had it multiple times previously during their battle. But then, he hadn't announced it before, so of course it hadn't had any effect.
- Just because it has to be done: It's over Anakin! I have the high ground!
  - You're doing it wrong. It's "The geography that I stands compares you superior"
  - Frankly, this troper found that completely anticlimactic. They've been fighting on a self-destructing planet, across broken buildings and falling columns, on mini-droids above lava, and it ends because one guy's standing a few yards higher than the other? Total Wall-Banger.
  - You're saying that was the FIRST Wall Banger for you? Clearly you weren't paying attention to the parts before that.
  - This troper thinks of two things. One, Obi-wan likely said that to goad Anakin into being irrational and suicidal, and two, He was on a continuous gradient for the first time in that fight, which means no matter what Anakin did Obi-wan would have been able to maintain his advantage, hence, the fight being unwinnable for Anakin.
- This reminds this troper of a dnd game he was playing, in which he could have used a high ground bonus several times during a fight, but didn't remember until he missed a would be devastating hit by one point, and then recalled "Wait a minute... I HAVE THE HIGH GROUND!" and vanquished his foe in that one blow thanks to a measely +1 bonus to the roll.
The angels in The Prophecy have a fondness for standing on the backs of chairs, railings... anything that looks cool, basically.

Literature

In Larry Niven's Patchwork Girl, a short story taking place in his Known Space universe, a Moon native leaps onto a spire of rock. Gil Hamilton, an Earth man, calls it "Graceful as all hell."

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