Similar to a
Slow Motion Drop but instead of an inanimate object dropping, we see a person falling backwards (or, rarely, forwards) in slow-motion, usually, after being shot. Bonus points if their
Nakama is watching as it happens and gives us a
Big No.
See
Disney Villain Death for when the fall happens without slow-motion.
Be warned that
this is frequently a Death Trope!
Examples:
Anime
- Maes Hughes in Fullmetal Alchemist.
- Katekyo Hitman Reborn: Whenever Reborn shoots Tsuna with the "Dying Will Bullets" he is shown falling backwards in a show of dying to the ground before getting a fierce expression on his face and going into "Dying Will Mode", complete with massive Clothing Damage.
- Wolfs Rain: Toboe, after being accidentally shot by Quent instead of Taking The Bullet for him. At this point the audience can tell that Toboe's Not Quite Dead yet because he's still maintaining his human disguise.
- This happens to Soul, complete with flying blood drops in mid-air, when he Takes The Sword for Maka in the fight against Ragnarok.
- The Last Guidance in Noir.
- Probably a homage to the above is the scene in El Cazador De La Bruja when Nadie falls down after being apparently shot but it turns out she just slipped on the ice.
- Madlax "killed" by Margaret for the first time right after Vanessa's death.
- Subverted with Revy and a toy gun in Black Lagoon.
- Parodied in Lucky Star: "The drawing hand is an artist's everything..."
- Euphie in Code Geass.
- Julia in Cowboy Bebop. This one comes with Disturbed Doves in the background...
- Also, when Spike falls from the stained glass window in the first chapter featuring Vicious, we get one of the slowest drops of all time. Spike falls through the air for fully 1 minute 50 seconds as both he and Vicious have flashbacks, some of which are themselves in slow motion.
- Various Gundams like to do this, especially since Anyone Can Die.
- A fixture in Bleach combat scenes, if almost never fatal.
- Despite the extreme Anyone Can Die atmosphere, only happens once in Death Note.
- Happens to Haruhi in the last episode of Ouran High School Host Club, though she was just thrown over the side of a bridge instead of being shot. The thing is, she falls so slowly that Tamaki has time to say thanks to Eclaire, get out of a carriage, jump over a car and off a bridge, grab and hug Haruhi, and execute a swan dive before she actually starts falling.
Film
- Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid when the title characters shot down the Bolivian bandits.
- Hans Gruber in Die Hard, though he actually falls at normal speed after the first twenty feet or so.
- Trinity in the second Matrix film.
- Qui-Gon Jinn in Episode I.
- Haldir's death in The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers movie is an interesting take on this as we see it through his eyes. Followed promptly by a Foe Tossing Charge by Aragorn.
- Aman's wife for good in Survive Style 5+.
- The Comedian being thrown through the glass in The Movie of Watchmen, as seen in the trailer.
- Isabeau in Ladyhawke
- Done for hilarity and/or cruelty in Shaolin Soccer when a woman slipping on a banana peel is stretched out to more than a minute with multiple camera angles for good measure. In the epilogue She slips on another peel, but has now learned Kung-fu, so she rights herself in mid-air and then performs a Slow Motion Pass By on the man who popularised Kung-fu for a new generation.
Live Action TV
Theater
- The Light in the Piazza has an indirect one- there's a song in which Margaret describes her daughter's slow motion fall, but we don't actually see it, which wouldn't work on stage anyway and is much more effective.
VideoGames
Western Animation
- The Family Guy episode "Stewie Kills Lois", with Lois falling in slo-mo off the ship's railing.
- Used in X Men Evolution when Rougue Pushes Mystique off a cliff. Nightcrawler tries to BAMF down to save her, but he can't get there in time. When she finally comes to a halt in pieces at the bottom of the cliff, he teleports down there and starts crying over her remains.
- You might call this a subversion since she technically wasn't a person at the time.
