Super Speed - Television Tropes & Idioms

The passive ability of Ichigo's released sword in Bleach, as seen in the pic above.
- Strangely enough, although Ichigo releases his Bankai many, many times in the anime, he rarely if ever shows this ability again, probably due to his enemies suddenly being as fast as or faster than he is. This makes him unique in that his Bankai is literally useless against any post-Soul Society-arc foe.
  - Of course, the depicted move is just him showing off, all show and no go as it were. This, combined with the fact that his enemies do indeed rival or surpass his speed, means that he can't afford to be showing off like he did with Byakuya.
Joe Shimamura aka Cyborg 009 of, well, Cyborg 009 has the power to accelerate to freeze time (or greatly slow it down, from his subjective view), therefore allowing him to move at the blink of an eye. One episode actually had his power malfunction for the whole episode.
- He's not the only one, either. Jet aka 002 also had it (though it's not his main skill), and IIRC several enemies had that same skill too (Magnificent Bastard Vog Bogoot and Blood Knight Cain among them)
- Lampshaded, by showing what happens to things when they face sudden acceleration. Paper burns, for example...
- J Soldat, the cyborg in GaoGaiGar that's a shout out to Cyborg 002, also possesses the super speed and flight present.
Vampires in Hellsing are all faster than humans. The fastest thus far was minor antagonist Luke Valentine, who was complimented on it by none else than super-vampire and series Heroic Sociopath Alucard.
Much of the fight scenes in Dragon Ball Z feature sequences of "colliding blurs" where characters fight at Super Speed. Sometimes it is taken to the level where all we can see are random shockwaves in midair as the camera jerks around to track them. Even in the original Dragon Ball, characters were able to move at such speeds that God himself could not see them!
In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, the Combat Cyborg Tre can move at Super Speed at all times, and so can Fate when she's using her Sonic Form.
Straight Cougar from S-Cry-Ed. His alter power (named "Radical Good Speed") enables him to transform objects (including his own body) to reach their fullest speed capacity. He also both drives and talks very quickly. ("I love it! Two more seconds to live...")
Yuki Nagato of Suzumiya Haruhi. How fast is she? Well, remember the Mikuru Beam? Turns out, thanks to a certain Reality Warper, she really was firing laser beams. And these were not the usual slow laser beams. These were actual, fast-as-light laser beams. Nonetheless, in literally a blink of an eye (Mikuru's, specifically), Yuki moved from her position two meters away to block the laser headed for Kyon with her palm, then continued blocking every other laser heading for him until she was able to nullify the Mikuru Beam.
Misora's artifact in Mahou Sensei Negima are a pair of shoes that grant her super speed. She uses them to bravely, bravely run away whenever danger rears its ugly head.
- In a recent chapter, the lead Negi learned how to use his Black Magic to fuse with his own lighting magic to become a being of lightning speed. He pin-balled his enemy though the air with it.
In the Pokémon anime, Ash's Pikachu, Cyndaquil, and Turtwig were trained to take advantage of their speed in battle. Turtwig subverts it however when it evolves into Grotle and has to adjust to a Mighty Glacier battle style.
- Of course, that's nothing compared to the games, where speed is the most important stat. Ninjask and Jolteon would be pretty useless without that blinding speed to Baton Pass.
Naruto has Rock Lee, whose speed at least back in the Chunin exams was way above human perception. Not that it really helped that much in the end...
This is the secondary power of Wrath/Bradley from the Fullmetal Alchemist manga. The combination of bullet-dodging speed with his primary power of the Ultimate Eye, which lets him always see the best move to make in combat makes him a terror to behold. Most fights he enters end up being horribly one-sided.
- It's also the primary power of /Sloth
Played with in the second season of Darker Than Black. A Contractor who briefly appears has Super Speed, yes, but he lacks nearly all the Required Secondary Powers. He complains that his muscles will be sore the next day when he has to Flash Step twice, he can't change direction fast enough to avoid crashing face-first into a tree, and it turns out that when you're moving fast enough to dodge bullets, everything else is moving towards you just as fast. So when April makes it rain...
In Ranma One Half, as with Super Strength, anyone who practices the right style of martial arts gets this ability. Ranma Saotome himself, in the first volume/second episode, manages to jab at Kuno's forehead fast enough to leave bruises in the pattern of insulting kanji without this being seen or even being felt by Kuno. Later on, he kicks Kuno about a dozen times so fast that, to an observer, he seems to just be sweeping his leg up in front of Kuno. A subsequent story has him hitting Mikado Sanzenine five hundred-plus times in the span of a few seconds. And he does all of these feats before undergoing the Kachu Tenshin Amaguriken training.
- The training above makes him even more ungoddly fast, to the point where he has been known to punch water at villains with enough force to cause serious hurt. Whereas before he was kicking Kuno a dozen times in the blink of the eye, he later learned to punch HUNDREDS of times fast enough so that no-one (Including Ryoga, who was being punched), noticed more than one blow.
In Claymore, Clare first develops this power during the fight against Rigardo by applying her demonic transformation to just her legs instead of her whole body; before then, any sort of controlled "awakening", as it is referred to in the series, was unheard of.
Sena of Eyeshield 21 to a "human degree" from time to time. While never running at "super speed," he's able to run 40 yards in 4.2 seconds, when the average players runs at 5 seconds or so (which is a huge difference). He's still shown in the manga zipping around people, and the Devil Bat Ghost allows him to run through people by changing the pace of his footsteps but keeping the same speed, leaving the foe unable to predict where he will turn.
- Sena also parodies this in non-football situation. During a football (soccer) kick-off match, due to his inability to kick, he instead ran around the ball at high speeds to confuse the goalie... but he got tired, had to catch his breath, and the goal didn't make it in. In another chapter, during a sumo match against Monta, he rushed around the ring, but lost when his foot just barely stepped out of the ring.
In Rurouni Kenshin, Kenshin himself is trained in battou-jutsu (i.e., quick draw with a blade, effectively) techniques, and his speed is called "God-Speed" In Universe. Unfortunately for him, he meets an opponent who's even faster: Soujirou—The Dragon in the Kyoto Arc—who can move faster than the human eye can even see and is capable of Le Parkour to the point of being able to run on ceilings, and whose Dissonant Serenity makes it difficult for Kenshin to read his body language.

The comic book example is the Flash — a.k.a. "The Fastest Man Alive". Breaks every single law of physics, and has fun doing it. His standard cruising velocity has ranged from the speed of sound to the speed of light.
- Deconstructed in the song "The Ballad of Barry Allen", where the narrator (Barry Allen) laments about the inability to slow down his perception, at one point noting that the world is boring because when things happen in an instant, they're almost fast enough for him.
- Such is their speed that Flash-type speedsters (those who draw their power from the Speed Force) are the fastest living beings in their universe once they get going; yes, even faster than gods. At least one of the Flashes (Wally West) was able to outrun death. Or a version of it, at least.
Superman. Most versions show him as just slightly slower than the Flash, usually because running is much more strenuous for him than flying. However, when the Flash's top speed changes, Superman's top speed has changed as well, usually preceding or following by months or years. This is probably because their races are a classic battle.
- It has been shown (in Flash Rebirth #3) that the Flash is still much faster. As he put it "Those races were for charity, Clark."
- Smallville's Clark Kent probably uses it most frequently, not having mastered the gift of Flight yet. When he's moving and seeing things in super-speed, Impulse is still little more than a red streak.
  - Which just goes to show how obscenely fast Flash/Impulse is, considering that Smallville Clark has proven to be FASTER THAN BLOODY LIGHT.
  - There's a reason we of /co/ call the Flash "godhax" and consider him to be more powerful than nearly everyone else; certainly anyone on Earth, at least. And that's not getting into the crazy stuff the Speed Force provides...
Captain Marvel is canonically faster than Supes, and while he also cannot outrun Flash, he is fast enough to sneak up and grab him if Flash were at rest.
Quicksilver from the Marvel Universe can "only" go about 700 MPH. He's explained to a psychologist that of course he's quick-tempered, irritable, and impatient — imagine a world where everyone is that annoying person who doesn't know how to work an ATM and you're behind them in line.
- Ultimate Quicksilver is much faster. He once gave an enemy speedster an object lesson in what real speed is by taking hold of her and running so fast her skin was stripped off and then she burst into flame.
Aurora and Northstar, from the Marvel Comics super-team Alpha Flight, have both super-speed and flight, making them ridiculously maneuverable.
Marvel comics has a character from Power Pack and Loners named Julie, nicknamed Light Speed. She can move fast, react fast and heals fast.
DC Comics' Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew featured as a team member Fastback, a turtle with super speed powers. The "Just'a Lotta Animals" from Earth-C-Minus also featured the Flash's counterpart, the Crash (a turtle with super speed and Flash's costume). And to top it all off, Fastback's uncle was DC's Golden Age funny animal superhero (and speedster) the Terrific Whatzit (yet another turtle, of course, wearing a version of the Golden Age Flash's costume).

The watch in the film Clockstoppers speeds up the molecules of the wearer so that time appears to be standing still.
- Did Not Do The Research: Middle school level physics would tell you that speeding up your molecules would not slow down your perception of time. It would drastically increase the heat energy of your body and probably kill you painfully.
  - On the other hand, Superfriends teaches us it's impossible to do anything with super-speed without invoking molecules somehow.
Dash from The Incredibles is another example of a speedster.
In Kung Fu Hustle, The Beast catches a bullet fired at very close range and attacks quickly even when the world is shown in slow-mo.
In the third X-Men movie, Callisto was shown as being an unusual mutant in that she had two distinct powers: she could sense the power level of other mutants and move at super-speed.
The Matrix movies show increased reaction time and movement speed as being common abilities for those who know the Matrix is an illusion... but Neo can move at such speed that his slipstream drags along cars behind him.

According to Vergil, the Thracian Harpalyce (daughter of Harpalycus, king of the Amymnei) was capable of outrunning horses, the river Hebrus and even the East Wind. Thus this power is Older Than Dirt.
The 1901 H. G. Wells short story "The New Accelerator" was about a man who had invented a serum that would accelerate a human to time-stop speeds.
- "The New Accelerator" provided the plot basis for The Wild Wild West episode "The Night of the Burning Diamond" and the Star Trek The Original Series episode "Wink of an Eye".
The Shrike from the book Hyperion, who can move at... 300 times light speed! definitely a crowning example.
- What's worse, he has time manipulating powers meaning there was no good reason to make him so ridiculously fast in the first place.
In Heretics of Dune, Miles Teg gets this power as a result of a botched interrogation — implied to be a result of the unique mechanics of the interrogation device unlocking a latent genetic talent. His speed also includes accelerated reflexes, slowed time perception, a form of Super Senses (explained as an amplification of his Mentat training), and massive boosts to his metabolic rate and the oxygen storage capacity of his blood to handle the increased energy demands. The effect also turns him into a Big Eater, which is played for both drama and laughs. Fortunately, he can turn the ability on or off at will.
John D. MacDonald, who normally writes mainstream detective fiction starring Travis McGee, once wrote a novel titled The Girl, the Gold Watch, and Everything, which featured a watch that could slow time down to near-timestop levels. The inertia that ordinary objects would have at such superaccelerated perceptual speeds played a key role in the story.
Anne Rice's vampires have this ability.

Glory, the Big Bad from season 5 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer — although she didn't use it nearly as often as she could have.
Six of Kamen Rider Kabuto's eight heroes (and nearly all of their enemies) have an ability called Clock Up, enabling them to move at nearly light speed. The titular character later gets an even more powerful version that, while occasionally letting him time travel or hop dimensions, generally just makes all the other characters "stop" even though they're using the skill too. Naturally this trick is hardly ever important to the plot, used only to allow for fierce battles with surrounding civilians standing in place or debris falling at a microscopic rate to make the fight prettier.
- Before Kabuto, Kamen Rider Faiz had Accel Form, which enabled him to move at the speed of sound for ten seconds. When the eponymous Kamen Rider Decade squared off against a Kabuto character, he uses Accel Form to match his opponent's Clock Up.
- Decade also uses it as a plot device in its Kabuto World arc, wherein Tendou's AU counterpart is stuck in permanent Clock Up and can't revert to human form.
- A requirement for Double riders seems to be that they are abnormally fast. Double is running and brawling speed, Skull is shooting, And Accel becomes a living motorcycle on top of high speed sword fighting.
In Season 3 of Heroes, Hiro meets Daphne, a girl who can go so fast that when he stops time she is just brought down to normal speed.
- Edgar from Season 4 has the same power. In one scene, Peter copies it and they have a super-speed battle.
True Blood. Vampires can move at super speeds, and apparently without harming the human they're currently carrying. They can even do this while wearing high heels and a dress.
Jekyll, from BBC's Jekyll, has been shown to be able to get up from a chair and to the door of a room in the time it takes the woman who had been facing him to turn to the door, among other examples.

Norse Mythology: In one legend, Thor's servant Thjalfi nearly outruns "Thought".

Dungeons & Dragons wizards have the happy opportunity to cast the haste spell, which grants a small dose of super speed to the party. In 2nd Edition, this boost came at the cost of a year of the targets' lifetimes, as their metabolism kicked into overdrive. 3rd Edition removed this drawback, and also added magical weapons that move fast enough to grant extra attacks per round.
- The partially Chop Sockey-inspired 3rd Edition supplement The Book of Nine Swords draws on the super speed concept with the "Diamond Mind" school, whose practitioners are described as acting in moments others aren't aware of. The ultimate Diamond Mind technique is named Time Stands Still, which lets the user take two full attacks in one round. To actually receive a Time Stop effect, you have to take a Diamond-mind focused prestige class.
Vampire The Masquerade has the vampiric Discipline of Celerity which accelerates a vampire to superhuman speeds, often becoming quite a Game Breaker in combat-oriented campaigns. In fact, using Celerity above level one in front of Muggles is an instant breach of The Masquerade.
In GURPS, you can get either Enhanced Move which lets you accelerate to high running speeds. However Altered Time rate is a more traditional speedster power, allowing you live at double speed (or tripe, quadruple etc).
- The game also suggests that you to take Resistant To Acceleration, if you don't the character is liable to blackout if he tries to start too fast.
Mutants and Masterminds has a Super-Speed power, but it essentially deconstructs into a combination of the Speed (run faster) and Quickness (perform skill checks in a shorter duration) along with an array of alternate powers (things like being able to use your super-speed to run up a wall, spin and deflect projectiles, dodge oncoming attacks, etc). The core game does not allow multiple attacks per turn, so the only use of super-speed to attack allowed is in the form of descriptors on alternate powers.
DC Heroes had a Superspeed power. Power values in this game system were described by a single number; in the case of Superspeed it described your running speed, could be used in place of your Dexterity for dodging attacks, and defined how much "faster" you could perform a lengthy action such as disarming a bomb. An optional rule allowed you to roll dice to see how many extra "simple actions" you could perform on your turn.

In Bionicle, the Mask of Speed allows you to speed yourself up and the Mask of Time allows you to slow someone else down.

The video game example is Sonic the Hedgehog, who can run faster than sound.
- Unlike other examples on this page, however, Sonic's power seems to be limited solely to his running speed; you never really see him doing anything else with it.
  - He does bounce between enemies quickly with the homing attack. With the Ancient Light in Sonic Adventure 2, he could move through the air REAL fast.
  - Also, whenever he becomes Super Sonic, he can fly at super-speed.
  - Don't forget the Light Dash, another special move he picked up in the Adventure series that allowed super-fast aerial travel as long as there was a path of rings.
In City of Heroes, Speed is one of the four "travel" power pools (the others being Flight, Leaping, and Teleportation). It consists of Super Speed, the "run really fast" power, Flurry, "punch fast", Whirlwind, the "spin around and make a tornado" trick, and Hasten, which makes it so that you can use your other powers more often.
- The Kinetics power Siphon Speed allows you to drain the speed from an enemy and become fast yourself. The same powerset also has Speed Boost, a much-loved buff that bestows Super Speed on other players.
Spiritual Successor Champions Online has Super Speed as a travel power as well, except in this case it does leave some major marks into the ground you run on, due to the friction.
Viewtiful Joe uses "Mach Speed" as one of his time-controlling powers, complete with Speed Stripes.
The Time Bangle of Devil May Cry froze mooks in place, but bosses were unaffected. The Chrono Heart in DMC2 and Quicksilver in DMC3 only slow things down... But vitally work against bosses. Some Fan Fic writers also hold that all demons are naturally much faster than humans and the games are depicting a slowed-down "version" that we players can come to grips with - which would elevate a resident Badass Normal to Charles Atlas Superpower.
Many Nasuverse characters are superhumanly fast. Generally, they have to be actually beyond human, but there are some exceptions.
- Most vampires can keep up with a sprinting human at walking pace. Somehow.
  - Arcueid, even while most of the nerves in her body aren't even connected, can still achieve this. Who knows how fast she really is.
- The Servants of Fate/stay night, being real superhumans, can move and fight faster than the protagonists can actually see. The most extreme example would be Saber going Mach 13, headfirst-leaping four kilometers in a second (she had help). Lancer, the fastest Servant, is so fast his movements were a blur even to another Servant, and a single back 'step' moved him about fifty metres.
  - Given that Berserker's attacks are at the speed of sound, Shirou must have pulled off Mach 8 when he used Nine Lives Blade Works...
- Araya Souren can dodge a bullet after it's been fired. Ryougi Shiki can move faster than Araya's eyes can track, cut apart Araya's one-word instant spell with a sword attack clearly begun after Araya had spoken it, and remove his arm via said sword attack before he realized he was cut.
  - In a later chapter, Ryougi actually managed to react to and escape three pipebombs, after they were detonated. Granted, she didn't so much clear the explosion as kill the entire situation, but doing it in time is still pretty ridiculous.
- Shiki, from Tsukihime, is apparently quite a speed demon. Running up walls seems pretty easy for him. Take this quote from the game for instance: "I was so fast that I disappeared from Akiha's vision in an instant." Talk about DBZ teleportation speed, and he wasn't even fully pumped up nor was he in his other self. Though it was probably more of a Flash Step.
Wild ARMs 4 depicts any user of Accelerator, such as Jude and Hauser, as being able to move at this speed.
One of the recurring powerups in Metroid games is the Speed Booster, which allows Samus to run at supersonic speeds. While moving at super speed she can run through certain walls (as well as any enemies unfortunate enough to be on the way), but stopping, turning or bumping into something makes her lose the speed. She can however temporarily store the energy generated by running and release it to fly very fast in a straight line, or run again if there is a slope she can run on. Many puzzles depend on clever utilization of this ability.
In the Suikoden series, the possessors of the True Holy Rune (which is a mistranslation and not actually a true run, and in later games is correctly translated as the Godspeed Rune) tend to have the ability to run at super high speeds (in addition to other nifty powers, such as double world map speed and a 100% escape rate from battles). One such character, Stallion from S1 and 2, was able to outrun a village-destroying explosion. While carrying another character.
- Suikoden Tactics, being the only game in the series where combat is movement-based, presents a vague idea of just how fast the Godspeed Rune makes a character. There's one mission where, in order to recruit the bearer of the Godspeed Rune, you have to catch him. It's ridiculously hard, even with you being able to send characters in opposite directions of a circular map in an attempt to surround him; a single error and you lose, and even without one you might still lose.
Lechku, a boss from Okami, has this power. It seems to need its twin to activate it, though.
Many Star Wars games feature the so-called "Force Speed" available for the Jedi:
- The Dark Forces saga features it extensively. What's more, Jedi Academy also has a Force power called "Dark Rage", which stacks up another speed bonus on top of Force Speed. Once you max out Speed and Rage powers and learn the Fast Lightsaber Style, you can literally kill most enemies before their even switch their lightsabers on.
- Knights of the Old Republic had Force Speed (or whatever it was called) as a fairly basic spell increasing your movement rate and the number of attacks per round.
In the latter portion of Dead Space, you face off against Twitchers. Originally soldiers with time-manipulating gear similar to Isaac's, when reanimated it allows them to move crazy fast.
Super Speed is a powerup in many games in the Backyard Sports series. Several characters allegedly have this naturally, like Pete Wheeler and Luanne Lui.
In The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, there is the Marathon Man, who you cannot beat in a race no matter how fast you run. If you say you can, you will be Gannon Banned.
The Bunny Hood of Super Smash Bros. Melee gives the characters super speed.
From Touhou, Youmu can reach an appreciable fraction of the speed of light when she slashes something. Aya's even faster.
Kabal from Mortal Kombat has a move where he runs at the opponent at super speed to make them dizzy. Lampshaded in Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe, where Kano states that the Flash would give Kabal (who doesn't appear in the game) a run for his money.
Quickman and Pharaohman in the Mega Man series. They both are weak to weapons for which Time Stands Still.

In Its Walky! and its spin-off Shortpacked!, Robin is a truly troubling combination of Super Speed and Genki Girl.
Saiko of Saiko and Lavender has superspeed to such a degree that is also grants multipresence.
Sluggy Freelance has a couple cases of this. Hyperactive ferret Kiki enters a Caffeine Bullet Time state whenever she eats candy (to the extent that she can circle the globe several times before anyone can react). Santa Claus, meanwhile, can move at tremendous speeds by harnessing the same power that lets him deliver presents all over the world in a single night. After acquiring the position of Easter Bunny, Bun-Bun can do the same thing using his egg hiding abilities. When the two fight, the rest of the world appears to be frozen in time.
Neuria's soulstone power in Earthsong.
In Everyday Heroes, Dot Dash is the speedster on the S.A.V.E.U.S. team. Her top speed hasn't been clocked; one treadmill got up to 400 mph before blowing up.

There are lots of speedsters in the Whateley Universe. However, the Whateley world has much lower power levels than the DCU, so top speed for these speedsters typically ranges between 80 and 250 mph, depending on the individual. The Super Hero School Whateley Academy currently has more speedsters than any entire country except the U.S. and maybe China.

The Powerpuff Girls get into the relativity scenario while racing home from school, and travel 50 years into the future, during which time Him conquered the city of Townsville.
Cheetarah of Thundercats.
Kim Possible receives a pair of shoes that allow her to move at "hyper speed" to combat the Beebees who have developed the ability since their first appearance. After Kim uses them to help manage her hectic schedule, the shoes speed up to "the rest of the world looks like it's standing still" speed, despite the viewers' ability to see the obvious passage of time.
Avatar: The Last Airbender: An Airbender's power to control air currents and wind resistance allows Aang to quite literally "run faster than the wind".
Ulrich's "Super Sprint" ability on Code Lyoko.
Blurr, from Transformers Generation 1, is the fastest land-based Transformer on any side, faster than some jet-based members of his species. He moves fast, talks fast, shoots fast, and annoys the hell out of you only a hair slower than Wheelie.
- His Transformers Animated incarnation is admitted to be the fastest thing on wheels even by the immodest Bumblebee.
One of Bravestarr's animal-based powers is "speed of the puma".
The Road Runner (accelerati incredibilus) from Looney Tunes is a famous super-speeder...
- ... as well as the basis for Little Beeper of Tiny Toon Adventures and Rev Runner from Loonatics Unleashed.
- Speedy Gonzales. "¡Ándale! ¡Ándale! ¡Arriba! ¡Arriba!"
- In accordance with the trope, the crossover race ended inconclusively.
The Rabbit Talisman from Jackie Chan Adventures grants the carrier the ability of super speed.
In one episode of The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest, while traveling in Japan, Jonny wears an experimental device on his ankle that grants him super speed. At his fastest, he's able to chase down a jet airplane as it's taking off. The downside is it hyperaccelerates his metabolism; any scene in which he's not running he's eating a sizable amount of ramen.
"Sonic! He's the fastest thing alive!"
Hunter from Road Rovers, who even leaves a trail of fire behind him.
Obviously The Flash in the DCAU. Less so Superman, in keeping with the show's producers generally keeping Supes a little more powered-down than his comic equivalent.

An episode of Stragate SG 1 had the team (except Teal'c) get enhancement devices that give them this, along with Super Strength and amplified appetites. They use the "speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out" properties of Stargates to defeat the Jaffa guarding a Goa'uld base.

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