Follow TV Tropes

Following

Standard Bleeding Spots

Go To

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/zoro_one_piece1.jpg
And yet, he can still see with both eyes.

In any prolonged battle in manga and anime, usually one that has cuts to other scenes in the middle, you can expect to find the combatants bleeding from one or several of these places, with the probability and quantity increasing with time:

Works featuring bladed weapons often add a fifth:
  • a remarkably shallow cut or a set of parallel cuts across the back, chest, or stomach.
These are the Standard Bleeding Spots. In Shounen series in particular, the universe seems to be almost intent on inflicting just these wounds and nothing more: Internal bleeding can be cured afterwards with bandaging like anything else, direct trauma to the head is never accompanied with a concussion, and cutting and piercing weapons always miss by just enough to nick the hero and not leave a horrible, spurting gash.

In addition to these wounds, characters may also start spontaneously bleeding from their closed fists as a display of their own power.

Related to First Blood, Blood from the Mouth. Note that Standard Bleeding Spots do not necessarily entail defeat—indeed, many a shounen hero has just stood up after sustaining each and every one of them and proceeded to completely trash the antagonist.

Contrast Dirt Forcefield.


Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Anime & Manga 
  • In Fist of the North Star, characters often experience cuts on their cheeks and over their shoulders in fights, made even more likely when one of the characters uses a Nanto Seiken art, most of which involve cutting or slicing foes.
  • In Fullmetal Alchemist, Edward actually has a scar right above his right eye susceptible to cuts, making it nearly impossible for him not to get one of these in a fight. Arakawa says it just makes the panel look better.
  • Fullmetal Alchemist The Conqueror Of Shamball: Edward gets a cut on the cheek on a broken window that later becomes plot-important.
  • A scene in Mobile Suit Gundam Wing takes a slightly different angle on the hairline spot. During a Knife-Throwing Act in the circus, Trowa Barton does not dodge a knife thrown at his head, and as a result is cut on the side of his temple near his sideburn area.
    • Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans has its own Standard Bleeding Spot: the right eye. The number of times where characters in this show bleed from their right eyes (complete with the eye turning red) is truly astounding.
  • In Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, Kamina's Humongous Mecha was once hit so hard that it apparently made him bang his forehead against the inside. Earlier in the same episode, Viral also suffers a cut to the cheek.
  • Chrono Crusade uses these a lot, particularly for Chrono. Rosette also gets cut on the cheek enough that it's not unusual to see her running around with a band-aid on her cheek after a fight.
  • The "along the hairline" one is lampshaded in Bleach when Ichigo fights Ikkaku. They both get that same cut then Ikkaku notes how inconvenient it is to have blood trickling into your eyes and puts some salve he kept in the hilt of his sword on it to stop the bleeding, which pisses Ichigo off because his is still bleeding.
    • Bleach has its own particular spots as well, such as the two vertical downward cuts to the middle of the collar bones that show up again and again and again. Apparently lungs are one of the least essential parts of the body because everyone seems to function fine with theirs in tatters.
  • In Ranma ½, when Ranma and Shinnosuke clash over Akane, they leap at each other with fists/brooms drawn. When they land, the shoulder of Ranma's shirt is ripped, and Shinnosuke somehow manages to get a bleeding cut across his cheek (even though Ranma overwhelmingly favors punches over open-hand strikes.)
  • In what must be a Running Gag for Saint Seiya fans by now, Dragon Shiryu is blinded (again) during combat with the Asgardian God Warrior Fenrir, who uses his Cloth's wolf-like claws to cut a gash across Shiryu's forehead. The blood flows so freely and thick that it washes over his eyes until he literally can't see anymore.
  • The heroes of Magic Knight Rayearth bled from the cheek in great Mortal Kombat-style gushes, in pretty much every fight.
  • Sonic receives a wound on his upper arm courtesy of Dark Oak at the beginning of the Metarex saga. The injury is still visible throughout the entirety of the episode.
  • In One Piece, during the Enies Lobby arc, every member of the Straw Hats ends up with the same streak of blood running down their face.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • In Doctor Strange (2016), Strange is bleeding from his eyebrow and lip after his melee with Kaecilius and his henchmen.
  • The final act of Prisoners, has Detective Loki experiencing some temporary blindness from being grazed along the forehead and needing to maneuver through traffic with blood slowly cascading into his eye, so he can get Anna to the hospital.
  • Averted in Spider-Man: No Way Home; when Aunt May is attacked by the Green Goblin, she comes out of it banged up a bit, but functioning somewhat normally...until she tells Peter-1 the classic line, "With Great Power..." Soon after she collapses from internal bleeding.

    Live-Action Television 
  • In tokusatsu programs, such as Kamen Rider or Super Sentai, the typical consequence of suffering a Non-Lethal K.O. is the loser's superhero costume shattering into light, putting them back in civilian clothes and with an array of cosmetic scratches on the cheeks or forehead. If it was a really bad defeat, they might also end up with torn clothes and shallow cuts on the shoulders or chest.
  • In Supernatural this is very common with Blood from the Mouth in almost every episode, and bleeding from a cut across the forehead or cheek or a wound on the shoulder also appearing often.

    Professional Wrestling 
  • The forehead variant is especially common in Professional Wrestling. Typically, a wrestler will inflict it on themself using a razor blade hidden on his person (a process known as a bladejob or blading) and through a little cooperative sleight of hand, it will be made to look like the opponent, usually a Heel, inflicted the wound. There is also a technique wherein a wrestler can split open another performer's eyebrow with a well-placed punch. More common in the early days, few are skilled enough to execute it properly today. In Pro-Wrestling terminology the practice of intentionally drawing blood is known as "juicing", "gigging" or "drawing colour" and has become less common in recent years, due to concerns over HIV and other blood-borne diseases. The forehead is the favored spot for bleeding because of the abundance of blood vessels and the fact that the blood will mix with sweat on the forehead and run everywhere, making the wound look more dramatic (forehead cuts that aren't running are more likely to be accidental). The best example would probably be the 1992 New Japan Pro-Wrestling match between The Great Muta and Hiroshi Hase, in which Muta bled so profusely that by the end of the match his face was stained completely red. To this day the severity of bladejobs is measured on the "Muta Scale".
  • Abdullah the Butcher is famous for having a forehead covered in scars from years of blading. Other cases include Carlos Colon, Savio Vega, New Jack, and Masato Tanaka, the latter of whom went considerably well into his career before the scar tissue started forming, but it came on like a vengeance.
  • One of the few times the "Muta/Hase" case was surpassed (Eddie Guerrero vs John "Bradshaw" Layfield) was by an accidentally too hard chair shot. Coincidentally, it still came out of the standard forehead spot.

    Webcomics 
  • In The Zombie Hunters, Jenny's forehead-variant has become part of her character's signature look in promotional artwork, even though it only appears in one scene.

Top