Some people just don't feel the need to follow certain rules. Like, using a door to enter a room. Instead, they prefer to simply burst through a wall or window in a dramatic fashion, even if it makes no sense or it would have been easier to go the conventional way. This is especially common when someone shoots through a door despite the considerable time and ammo this would take in Real Life. Use of this Trope may be an indicator that the buster is really a Ted Baxter and/or not the brightest bulb in the chandelier.
Also often happens in the form of a fake out, where the audience is led to believe someone will enter through the door when the camera focuses on it, only to have them burst through the wall somewhere on either side instead.
Frequently lampshaded by someone shouting out the trope name, especially the Deadpan Snarker or the disgruntled owner of the building. Also, keep in mind the old joke about the stupid burglar: he breaks two windows, one to get in, and one to get out. The gag can run loose if the person goes through a different place every time, or does it just as the hole is being repaired, much to the frustration of the owner.
Oftentimes this is committed because they forgot that We Have The Keys. See also Impact Silhouette (Man-Shaped Hole), Bullethole Door, Dungeon Bypass, Super Window Jump, Enter Stage Window, Car Meets House and The Exit Is That Way. Compare Barrier-Busting Blow. When going through the wall (rather than the door) is actually the easier solution, Myopic Architecture may be in play.
Referenced in the first episode of Family Guy, and then parodied in several later episodes. In "Peterotica," a car crashes through the wall of Kool-Aid Man's house, and he remarks "Wow! You know, from the other side, that's kind of annoying." After Kool-Aid has just finished repairing it, he says "Good as new!" — when Peter comes crashing back through the wall, and he shouts "OH, COME ON!!" Also in the courtroom, where the courtroom audience goes "Oh, NO!" and the Kool-Aid Man comes crashing through the wall, "OH YEAH!" When the Kool-Aid Man realizes where he is, he backs out in embarassment. The Judge tells everybody to stop doing that, "'Cause the f*ckin' Kool-Aid Man gonna keep showin' up."
Later revisited in a Call Back episode to the pilot — this time, Kool-Aid Man misses his cue and looks even more awkward than before. Worse, when he backs out of the room, he falls over on his face and shatters his glass body, causing him to bleed fruit punch and swear at Brian and Stewie for making him screw up.
Also done in Robot Chicken multiple times in one episode. Interestingly, the protagonists of the scenes (who are the same two guys) are intentionally invoking Kool-Aid man even after witnessing his reign of terror.
Dane Cook had a field day with this.
Dane:BEEP drinking out of him; if that was me, I'd be like, "You fix that BEEPing wall before my dad gets home from work! He's gonna beat me with a belt; he's not gonna believe a talking bowl of fruit punch came in here."
As The Critic's awful student film proved, the Kool-Aid Man breaking through a wall is highly symbolic of... um, something. We're not sure what. Just make sure you play O Fortuna in the background.
Yo mama is so fat, when people yell Kool-Aid, the bitch comes crashing through the wall.
Linkara grows increasingly annoyed with this over the course of Adventures of the Kool-Aid Man #1.
One of the first Three Musketeers commercials (the ones with the eponymous badass trio) had two musketeers burst through the stone wall of the Princess' cell... while the third walked through the door.
A Whiskas cat treats commercial has the cat bursting through the wall (which has several already patched holes in it) to get to the bag of treats.
In the Fruits Basket anime it become a Running Gag that people keep destroying Harem Nanny Shigure's house, and he says this line at least once when someone bursts through the screen. In Shigure's case, he's probably good-naturedly remarking on that very fact. Kagura is later shown spending most of the night trying (and failing) to fix the screen after she wrecks it even more than usual.
Shampoo tends to burst through walls in her appearances. When asked why she doesn't use the door, she replies "Door take too long!" From observation, it appears that whenever she's chasing someone (usually Ranma), she focuses on the chase to the exclusion of the building's floorplan. If there happens to be a door in her way, she'll open it, but she won't take an alternate route just because there's a wall in her way. On at least one occasion, she is seen to exit the room by smashing a new hole in the wall, right next to the one she made coming in. Takahashi must love this trope.
Ryū Kumon, from the late manga, also walks through walls (he's just that strong) in order to intimidate people. Worse, he broke through an entire wing of walls at Fûrinkan High School, from the ground floor and up to the third floor, completely ignoring the stairs and the doors. Ranma's classmates even felt the tremors and thought it was an earthquake.
From the first movie, after Kunō thrusts his way into the living room with his wooden sword:
Nabiki:(sarcastic) Hey, Kunō-baby, the door... Kunō: Be silent, woman!
Pantyhose Tarō also does this a lot in monster form — but then again, he doesn't fit the door.
Edo Phoenix of Yu-Gi-Oh! GX has a taste for dramatic entrances, i.e. skyboarding into school, jumping from a helicopter through a closed skylight. Would it have been such a tragedy to wait for the chopper to land?
Shuichi Shindo of Gravitation seems to lose his ability to use doors whenever he is excited. This does not please Yuki. Nor is Tohma happy at the damages to his property when an exuberant Shuichi breaks down a wall to deliver his complete album. Yuki lampshades this.
Yuki: Learn how to open a door, you damn brat, I've just moved in here and you're already wrecking the place!
After Vanilla Ice is introduced in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, he uses the power of his Stand to phase a hole into the wall when he goes to attack Jotaro's party. Dio's response: "At least open the door when you leave..."
In Baccano, Nice blows up the wall of a warehouse when coming to Jacuzzi's rescue. "But Nice, the entrance was right there, why did you blow up the wall?" "Why did she blow up the wall? What kind of stupid question is that? Boss likes blowing things up, so she blew up the wall!"
Princess Tutu contains a scene where Fakir dramatically crashes through a window to gain entrance to a building... even though both Mytho and Tutu were able to easily enter using the door.
Hunter × Hunter. The two main heroes evade an enemy in a subversion. They kick through wall after wall...then double back one room and simply leave by the front door. It works.
The enemy bases tend to have maze-like layouts, so most travel is done by either smashing through walls or jumping over them. This trend reaches its climax during the second Ichigo vs. Ulquiorra battle, where four characters separately bust into the same room through the floor, the inside wall, the outside wall, and from another dimension. (That last one might technically count as a door, since it can be opened and closed without inflicting structural damage).
The design of one Hueco Mundo tower was openly mocked in an omake. The character explaining it claimed that the building was designed without stairs and multiple heavy pillars to allow people to smash through the floors without completely destroying the building.
Grimmjow's epic save of Orihime. To stress just how epically unnecessary this was, Grimmjow blew a hole in the wall when the door, which was destroyed by Loly and Menoly when they entered, was literally three feet away. He even acknowledges the door was open, but says he came through the wall because the door was "busted".
Loly: How'd you get in here!? Grimmjow: How? Through the wall, of course.
Kenpachi loves this too, having busted through several walls and even a ceiling to get to where he needs to be. If he didn't, he might never get to where he's going.
Yammy does this so often there's a listing on his character page calling him Kool-Aid Man.
In the Mai-HiME manga, Mai and Mikoto smash into Natsuki's apartment through the window to rescue Tate. Natsuki's response? "You guys are going to owe me for that window. Why didn't you use the DOOR?" Apparently window-smashing is Mikoto's stock in trade.
In the second episode of Arcade Gamer Fubuki, Mr. Mystery jumps through Fubuki's window to give her a card. He then jumps out another window to make his exit. Umm...
Mr. Yotsuya of Maison Ikkoku frequently uses a log to break through the wall between his apartment and Godai's.
The Raikage in Naruto takes "the shortest distance between two points is a straight line" to a new and completely awesome extreme, starting with his own office window. Judging from his assistant's response, he apparently does this a lot. Whether it be a wall, a person, a table, Amaterasu fire and the Susanoo absolute defense, and even the ground, god help whatever happens to be between the Raikage and his goal, because by the time he gets there, it no longer exists. At one point he does it to a wall in a room that was being used for a diplomatic meeting. Granted, he was in a hurry. It has now become a Running Gag for the Raikage to break a wall and exit, after which Darui apologizes for it and remarks to C that he will just use the door.
Sōsuke from Full Metal Panic tends to do this. In one instance, he ends up blasting a hole in the wall to get to the classroom next door... Instead of, you know, using the door. When asked whyhe responds that it's more efficient this way, which from his point of view is entirely true: On an actual battlefield, using the door is generally a very poor idea since they're natural chokepoints.
Natsu does this often. Kageyama lampshaded Natsu's searching method during the Lullaby arc.
Kageyama: Has this guy never heard of a door?
Gildarts would also apply. He's so accident prone that he had to divide the whole city into two going straight to the Fairy Tail Guild so that he would not accidentally destroy some private houses!!!
The Crimson Alchemist prefers blowing walls up as opposed to opening doors.
Ed and his teacher Izumi might count as an inversion; on several occasions they transmute doors on walls that didn't already have them, so they can enter through said doors rather than smashing the wall.
Sloth plays it straight during his grand entrance in the final arc.
Code Geass R2 has a magnificent example: when the UFN council is unwilling to admit Britannia among themselves since Britannia would get absolute majority due to its population and essentially hand the world over to the Britannian Emperor, Lelouch responds by pointing skyward. Seconds later, Suzaku crashes through the ceiling with the Lancelot, Dual WieldingVARIS rifles and announcing that he "will not tolerate any insolence towards His Majesty!"
Piedmon from Digimon Adventure tears through several walls when hunting down the Digidestined through his palace. Likely at least some of them is likely because it's a quicker path. But in the end, when chasing TK and Kari, the only two he hasn't captured, he comes across the door to the outside were they'd be trapped. Instead of opening the door, he decides to blow it up to make a dramatic entrance. Large Ham that he is, he lampshades this:
Piedmon: I must stop this, it costs me a fortune in new doors!
In Tiger & Bunny, Kotetsu has a known habit of taking the most direct route in or out of a dangerous situation — walls or windows be damned. Ben chides him for it in the first episode, reminding him that entering monorails through the front window will just up the premium on his Hero Insurance.
Rebecca Reed in Shakugan No Shana tends to blast through doors rather than opening them. Even in her own headquarters.
In Saiyuki Reload, Gojyo's old friend Banri says hi by kicking down Gojyo's door.
Gojyo: I've told you over and over again, that door opens outward!
Comedy
Musician Wendy Bagnell's "Here Come the Rattlesnakes" features a hypothetical example. Once, when performing at what turned out to be a church of snake-handlers, he relates his and his backup singer's reactions when the eponymous reptiles are produced:
''I said, "Just take it easy! Don't panic. Just look around, and figure out where the back door is." She said, "I already looked, and there ain't none!" I said, "Reckon where do they want one?"
In one of the X-Babies appearances (perhaps Excalibur: Mojo Mayhem), there's a sequence where — of course — the door is not used.
Kitty Pryde:(exasperated) Classic X-Men style, guys: Never use a door when you can make one of your own!
Note that the above remark is from someone whose power allows her to walk through walls. On that note, while Kitty does phase through walls, she at least has the courtesy to phase through the door.
From Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run, Danger has teamed up with Sufficiently Advanced Alien Ord of the Breakworld to invade the X-Mansion (again). The superstrong and mildly berserk Ord is bashing through everything in his path, ripping doors off their hinges and generally making a mess.
Danger: I'm assuming that Breakworld technology never evolved doorknobs?
In an issue, the X-Men are imprisoned in Murderworld. Cyclops faces three doors, and Arcade tells him one of them leads to life, the two others lead to death. Cyclops takes a fourth option and just blasts through the side wall, which turns out to be the right move because all three doors were trapped. (There's a reason Arcade calls his personal amusement park "Murderworld"...)
Heck, the X-Men were doing this as far back as the fifth issue. Professor Xavier has been depowered, so the X-Men have to break him into his own house to get him some rest. Cyclops blasts the front door despite the fact that the key was right there.
Rorschach in the Watchmen comic does use doors. They're just usually locked. The sequence of events goes something like this: Rorschach breaks into his old partner Dan Dreiberg's apartment by smashing the lock. Dan has the lock replaced. Rorschach breaks the new one effortlessly. Dan has the lock replaced a second time. Then the police try to break in, and the lock holds, but the door itself smashes to pieces. But really the lock makers were asking for this. After all their company is called GordianLocks.
The Juggernaut is fond of this means of travel, particularly in X3. Well, he was chasing Shadowcat, and HE'S THE JUGGERNAUT, BITCH, so... Then again, what good are doors for a person larger than the door frame?
In an issue of Young Justice, former heroine Cissie King-Jones has been captured at her school. As Red Tornado breaks down the wall, and Wonder Girl smashes through the window, she says "We have doors here, you know! Only superheroes could turn entering a room into a 'who is muy macho?' competition!"
During Peter David's run on the Hulk, when he had the brains of Banner in the Hulk's body, he decides to sneak out the back way by creating a back way. Subverted in a later punch up with Captain America, where despite being inside a fragile house, nothing is damaged. He's thrown cleanly out the front door thanks to Cap's judo skills.
Broken subversion in Earth X: Bruce Banner (separated from the Hulk) appears to be telling Hulk to be careful with Dr. Strange's walls. But he tells Hulk "We don't need to use a door here", apparently a typo for "We need to use a door" or "We don't need to make a door". Hulk use door anyway.
In the animated version of Asterix meets Cleopatra, a soldier tries to prevent this by rolling a large stone in front of the door — only to have Obelix crash through the wall right next to it.
He often tries to knock, but even a gentle tap with his superhuman strength is enough to shatter stone, so it doesn't do much good.
He also resizes the door every now and then. And sometimes he doesn't bother punching the door — just walking through it as if it weren't there. He once ripped open a cell door just with a belly push.
This frustrates the prison guards to no end. To whit:
Played with: The two protagonists find themselves in a cell with a steel door. Filemon starts making a hole in the wall, all the while brushing off Mortadelo who's trying to tell him something. When, after considerable time, he finally breaks through the wall, he finds Mortadelo there waiting for him — it turns out that the bad guys forgot to lock the door...
In another case, a number of prisoners are discovered to have escaped through an equal number of Man-Shaped Holesfrom the same cell. Lampshaded when Filemon comments on how stupid one would have to be to not just use the same hole for everybody... only to find out that the thought hadn't occurred to either his partner or his boss, either.
Lampshaded in an issue of The Avengers, where the team helps Jean Grey get back into her old life after being replaced by the Phoenix for so long. They take her to parents' house but they weren't home, so Hercules breaks down the door and is chewed out by Jean, who points out that there was a key beneath a paving stone meant for her and her sister. Captain America assures her they'll write her parents a check.
Batman never uses a door if a window will suffice. Why? Because he's the goddamn Batman.
Superman: Super strong, super fast, can fly, is invincible, has X-ray vision, heat vision, can time travel, can't work a doorknob.
He does it so often, in fact, that Jimmy once caught him with the "bucket over the door" gag by putting the bucket over a random spot in the wall, which Supes of course broke right through.
And let's not forget our friend, Doomsday. He pretty much won't go anywhere, unless there's something in his way to smash to pieces. Granted he's basically violence incarnate, so he may just smash stuff because he likes to.
This is a common problem for Ben Grimm in most universes, due to being a giant rock-man. One comic showed him involuntarily smashing through a wall and muttering, "Why must they build doorways so narrow?"
In an Ultimate Fantastic Four/Marvel Zombies crossover, Ultimate Reed Richards finds himself trapped in the Marvel Zombie universe with Magneto and a handful of human survivors. They are found by the rest of the Ultimate Fantastic Four and hurry to escape the building. Ben heroically breaks down a wall so they can get out and Reed points out that the door was right there.
Reed: Ever heard of a door, jackass? Ben: Okay, now I feel stupid.
Sin City: In his first appearance, Marv invokes this trope and subverts it... by running straight through a door instead of the wall.
In Before Watchmen: Comedian #6, Rorschach and Nite-Owl smash their way through a barroom window, causing the Comedian to snark "Door was open, you morons..."
There's one strip in which Jon calls Garfield to dinner. Garfield comes bounding up to Jon from off panel. Jon says, "I appreciate your promptness, Garfield...." and finishes in the last panel, "... but next time, OPEN THE DOOR!", revealing that Garfield broke through the (closed) door. Could be justified in that Garfield is a cat and can't work a doorknob, but....
There's also one where he comes through the pet door, but gets stuck inside because he's too fat and thus rips the normal door from its hinges anyway. Also, he repeatedly kicked Nermal out the front door without opening it first.
And there's another wherein he smashes the front door down and says, "When I want in, I want in NOW!"
Happens in yet another strip when Jon yells "FIRE!" to test his pets' fire drill knowledge. Both run straight through the wall — or, rather, we assume they did, thanks to the hole.
Tired of the messGarfield and Odie were making, Jon opened the door and told them to go outside. They jumped through the window. Berating his pets, Jon told them to use the door next time. Unfortunately, since it was closed then, they broke it while reentering.
Fan Works
In the Jackie Chan Adventures fic Queen Of All Oni, in one chapter, Jade is at a shrine, going after a Shadowkhan tablet version of a Tome of Eldritch Lore, and is attacked and thrown through the wall repeatedly, and when she says she is tired of it, he throws her through the roof instead. After that, though he doesn't say anything, she just bursts through the wall.
In the second Interlude's Big Lipped Alligator MomentDream Sequence, Jade bursts through the door of Shendu's palace, smashing it, and he says "I have a door gong."
Bando: Thanks for the new arm and leg, but I gotta run! (jumps out a third story window) Scientist inside building: You could have used the door, asshole.
"Spectre" Garrus Vakarian demonstrates his disdain for the traditional methods of entry by repeatedly knocking down walls with a cargo hauler to surprise groups of mercenaries. In his own words:
Garrus Vakarian: I've yet to encounter a potentially dangerous situation that can't be defused by smashing through a wall.
This backfires a bit when He revisits the first warehouse (going through another wall of course) and finds the guy he needs to talk to has gone through the first hole and stole a car. Garrus's response to this? Borrow a tank from C-Sec.
Doubles as a Continuity Nod in the beginning of chapter 6 of Port-Ed, as Ed once again sticks his foot through the door instead of using the knob. "Ed, there's a thing called a doorknob, you might wanna use it!!"
Later, Megamind busts through the wall with the fist of his giant robot, this time out of frustration. Bonus points for the fact that there was already a hole there, thanks to Hal himself, and Megamind just enlarged it.
Hal: Megamind! You're just the man I wanna see! Also, there's a door here.
Inverted in Over The Hedge. The main characters escape through the door even though that's the only part of the wall left.
The villains in Superman II do this a lot, especially when they take over the Daily Planet office, with Lex Luthor delivering the line.
This is a Call Back to the first movie when Superman tracks Luthor down to his hidden lair, and dramatically smashes through the wall rather than use the door, causing Lex to quip "It's open! Come in!". In the second movie, then, he's muttering to himself that not knowing how doors work seems to be a problem for Kryptonians in general.
In the fourth movie, Nuclear Man is no better, although he seems to enjoy bursting through floors and ceilings suspended by incredibly obvious wires.
Iorek Byrnison in The Golden Compass film does this after getting back his armor, though in this case it's probably symbolic of him no longer being subservient to humanity (or its etiquette) since he is a giant Ice Bear. Or he opted not to use the door because he knew there'd be guards pointing rifles at it.
In Superhero Movie, Hourglass blows a hole in a wall to exit, 10 feet from the hole he blew in the wall to enter.
Lampshaded in The Mummy Returns, while fleeing Imhotep's mummified soldiers, Evie tries blocking the entrance with a nearby chair. Rick, however, having learned a thing or two in the previous film pulls his wife along reminding her that "these guys don't use doors." Sure enough, a few seconds later, the mummies are busting through the wall above the door.
The movie version of Alone in the Dark (2005) sports large swaths interspersed with accidental lulz. In the fight scene near the beginning, the snarling Implacable Man insists on leaping headlong through every plate glass window that crosses his path.
Reversed in Balls Of Fury: In a brief scene, a team of soldiers attempts to break through an armored door with a battering ram. Another soldier off to the side simply takes his gun and smashes through the window right next to the door.
Done in a way where during a gun fight, one of the defenders breaks a small window in a 5x4 window frame. The next defender breaks a new window and so forth. In the end a very small man shows up and he jumps in front of the window while under heavy fire for about 15 seconds before he manages to break and fire out of the last window, which was on the top row.
Then done again with a 3x3 window, only this time with only two defenders who smash "X" and "O" shaped holes in the windows, when one of the defenders manages to get three "O"-es in a row, the window gets blasted out.
Then again with the black defender "Chocolate Mousse" who grabs a cannon, lights the fuse and rams the muzzle through the window to shoot.
In The Film of the SeriesSWAT, the team uses a huge grappling hook attached to a truck to smash through a house's outer wall and pull out a large chunk. This allows the team to get the drop on the crazy armed man inside. Somehow, the crazy man failed to notice the big truck engine roaring outside, the noise of the winch, etc. (The original TV series was also noted for such lapses in story logic). In this case it is marginally excusable, however, as in addition to his Hollywood Schizophrenia the guy was as drunk as a lord.
Interestingly, in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Dr. Scott enters the lab through the wall, but not because it was in the script. It was because the set builders had forgotten to build an extra door!
David in Shaun of the Dead smashes the window of The Winchester to get in (causing security problems later) before Shaun has a chance to tell him there's another, unlocked door round the back.
And in Hot Fuzz, by the same creative team, Nicholas Angel breaks a glass storefront and jumps through it to pursue a killer. Keep an eye on the writing on the glass panes. He throws his baton through the window, then jumps through the door.
Reversed in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, by the same director: After throwing Scott through several walls, Todd looks as though he's about to fly through the holes he's made...but then he teleports to the last wall and calmly opens the door next to the hole in it.
Mab: We thought we'd enter the traditional way, through the door. Merlin: It's traditional that you open it first.
Men With Brooms: Cutter is laying on his bed in his motel room while next door, his former curling team mate Lennox is trying to avoid being beaten into a new reincarnation by a very large, very angry loan shark. At one point, Lennox abruptly gets sent head-first through the wall over Cutter's bed, before being sent through the wall entierly, followed by the giant loan shark. Cutter ends up having to knock the loan shark out by smashing his head in with a curling stone.*
Not to worry, the loan shark is Made of Iron and survives one or two more such curling stones to the head with no apparent long term effects. Because it's funny
.]]
Parodied in the final scene of Malibu's Most Wanted when the epic battle between B-Rad's crew and the bad guys happens in the head Bad Guy's house. Two different cars smash through the wall of his house, causing him to shriek: "Can't ONE of y'all use the door?!" To add to the hilarity, Bad Guy is later seen yelling at the cops to fix the house before his mother gets back.
Inverted in Sky Captain And The World Of Tomorrow. While Joe is trying to devise a way to get into the professor's lab through an upper-story window, Polly picks up a rock, breaks the glass on the front door, reaches in and opens it.
Countess: Wait! I have to replace every door you people smash. Can't you at least try the knob first? Sebastian:(vampire in front tries the knob and it opens easily) Jocks.
In the infamous mall chase scene in The Blues Brothers, they enter the mall through the walls and shelves of a Toys "R" Us. They exit through a plate-glass window at J.C. Penney. Not that there were likely to have been any doors in the mall that would have fit their police cruiser anyway.
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. Duke is told the bad guys are driving along the next street over, but there's no door through to them. He's told, "Make one" and so smashes through the building in his Powered Armor.
A Good Day To Die Hard. An FSB Alpha Team attacks the CIA safehouse, so Jack McClane whacks a frame charge against the wall and blows a nice rectangular exit. For the rest of the movie however they just jump out the window.
Sorcerers tend to disregard niceties such as doors when irritated or in a hurry, frequently using their powers to blast through doors, walls, or in Garion's case in the second series, entire buildings, making this a crossover with Dungeon Bypass.
Garion makes a point of threatening the pre Heel Face Turn Zakath with a broken city when he finally decides he's been delayed long enough... and smashes through a few walls while going to make this threat.
Garion: Take me to the library, now! (Garion points his sword at the wall and it blasts outwards; he re-aims while the emperor looks on in terror) Garion: Now... the library is about that direction, isn't it?'
"Belgarion," Velvet chided him gently, "now really, that's no way to behave. Kal Zakath has been a very courteous host. I'm sure that now that he understands the situation, he'll be more than happy to cooperate, won't you, your Imperial Majesty?" She smiled winsomely at the Emperor. "We wouldn't want the Rivan King to get really angry, now would we? There are so many breakable things about — windows, walls, houses, the city of Rak Hagga — that sort of thing."
Played straight and then inverted (and almost literally invoked) when Garion smashes down Senji's locked door, and then Belgarath makes him fix it, which Garion does by pointing at the shattered doorframe and creating a new door via sorcery by saying "Door." Belgarath is not amused by his choice of Word.
Skulduggery Pleasant. Derek Landy tends to use windows, even when it's unecessary. "Doors are for people with no imagination."
At one point in the series, Jake morphs into a rhinoceros to charge through a compound. He finds that it's easier to rhino through doors than walls, but his vision is so bad in that shape that he has a little trouble seeing which is which in time.
Averted later in the same book when Jake (now a tiger) tells Marco (a gorilla) to open a door. Marco prepares to knock the door off its hinges, for Jake to tell him to try the knob first. He does.
In the Discworld novel Thief of Time, Mira Le Jean is talking to some fellow Auditors. When they want to go through a door, one glances at it, and the door disintegrates. Ms. Le Jean observes this and says "Doorknob is simpler."
Harry does this by pulling a door outward (to avoid deadly shrapnel hitting those inside the building) in order to make a dramatic wizard entrance.
Marcone, being Genre Savvy, starts using cheap doors because of the regularity with which Harry does this.
In And Another Thing..., Thor leaves through the ceiling, causing Hillman to complain to Zaphod that ceiling tiles are so expensive, and why Thor "just couldn't use the door". Zaphod replies: "He's a God. He doesn't do doors". (Or something very similar).
In one of the stories in If I Were an Evil Overlord (a collection of short stories inspired by the Evil Overlord List) the royal family is barricaded behind a magical door. The invading empress orders her men to tear down the wall instead.
The agents of the US government have a perchance for breaking through random walls in Of Snail Slime, regardless of other means of entry. As they so aptly put it, "Doors are for dorks."
Live-Action TV
In Smallville, Clark does this on occasion, but you are not an evil kryptonian if you break down every door you see.
Absolute Justice, Part 1: Hawkman smashes through the windows of the Watchtower to dump Oliver in front of Chloe.
And in the Grand Finale, Clark crashes through the top of the Fortress and flies into the sky as he changes into Superman. Who cares, it is awesome.
This happened at the end of the KYTV episode that spoofed the opening of the Channel Tunnel. A Running Gag through the episode was a reporter standing next to the tunnel, waiting for the first train to arrive. Which it eventually did, bursting out of the wall ten feet to the left of the tunnel.
There is a Gilligan's Island episode where the title millstone dreams of being a swashbuckling hero. He breaks through the door to meet the Distressed Damsels, then closes a second door in the same frame and breaks through it.
On Friends Chandler apologises to Monica for an argument by proposing. Monica assures him he didn't need to propose and asks what he'd have done if she'd said yes. and Chandler says he would have been happy, or "there would have been a Chandler shaped hole in that wall."
Mike: How about a bit of consistancy? Some days you come through the door... some days you actually open it...
Subversion, all thanks to Vyvyan again, when a messenger wanted to come through the door normally...
Rick: Oh, no! The front door's exploded. VYVYAN! Mike: VYVYAN! Vyvyan: Vyvyan! Vyvyan! Vyvan! Honestly, whenever anything explodes in this house, it's always blame Vyvyan! Mike: Well who do you suggest we blame? Rick: Thatcher! Vyvyan:No, blame whoever rang the front doorbell, 'cause they obviously triggered the bomb I'd set up. Mike: What bomb? Vyvyan: Well, I was a bit worried we wouldn't be able to hear the front doorbell, so I thought I'd pep it up a bit!
One episode has an obnoxiously intelligent patient lock the door on Dr. Kelso. He enters the room anyway by stealing Janitor's electric screwdriver and removing the hinges and kicking the door down. He does this again on the same patient, despite the door being unlocked, because he likes the dramatic entrance (watch the scene).
Laverne once punched through the window of Turk's car before Carla could tell her We Have The Keys.
In season five episode eight (My Big Bird) JD gets kicked through the window of a former patient's window. Turk later comes crashing through as well, with the patient yelling that "There is a door!"
First episode has Bryce jumping through the window above an open door.
Ellie: How did you get in here? Morgan: Chuck's window, or as I like to call it, the "Morgan Door". Ellie: I'm gonna go close the window.
In yet another episode, Casey crashes his car through the wall of a restaurant to rescue Sarah. Complete with Bond One-Liner: "Anyone order drive-thru?"
Frequently in the first season, instead of merely opening a door, Angel would kick it open dramatically (often breaking it). The recapper on Television Without Pity speculated that Angel just really hated doors. Sometimes doesn't quite work the way a normal person would use it. Being a vampire, he can't enter a home where he hasn't been invited. That's why he brings a human partner, who can enter an apartment uninvited.
In one early episode, he bursts through a window... and later gets a bill for it.
In another episode, Wesley and Gunn break into a house to steal a MacGuffin. Wesley makes a big deal of cutting a perfect hole in a window. Gunn simply opens the unlocked door.
Glory, a big bad in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, decided to make an entrance by ripping out the entire wall. Relatedly, bad guys liked to smash through the windows all the time. Thank goodness Xander develops carpentry skills. Oddly, despite repeated instances, the windows are never armored. To his credit, Xander does eventually realize the futility of repairing windows that were smashed through on a weekly basis and just gives up.
What makes it funnier? Once he gives up on fixing the picture window (which at that point was getting smashed in seemingly every other Tuesday, he just boarded it up with cheap particle board. From that point on, nobody ever tried to break into the house again.
Blackadder: The sound of wood splintering, followed by Baldrick dragging the front door in to Lord Blackadder's Breakfast Room.
Edmund: Baldrick, I advise you to make the excuse you are about to give, phenomenally good! Baldrick: You said "Get the door." Edmund: Not good enough, you're fired! Baldrick: But my lord! I've been in your family since 1532! Edmund: So's syphillis, now get out!
Also the Baby-Eating Bishop of Bath and Wells throws Baldrick through two separate doors in Blackadders home.
Lord Flashheart punches Percy through the door of the throne room for daring to stand in his place at Blackadder's ill-fated wedding.
The Sarah Connor Chronicles. In this case it is actually justified, since the door is made from reinforced steel, whereas the wall is "merely" concrete.
Sarah: Can you get through the door? Cameron: Yes. (beat) Cameron: But the wall will be much faster.
In the pilot, Michael marks areas on a drug dealer's wall with duct tape as targeting for where he'll a) shoot him in the leg with a gun and homemade suppressor, and b) crash through the wall.
Michael (voiceover): Any two-bit thug has a bulletproof door, but they rarely realize that a wall is rarely more than drywall and plaster. (A little later...) I don't like guns, guns make you stupid. Better to fight your battles with duct tape. Duct tape makes you smart.
In "False Flag", Sam and Mike kick an air conditioner out of a wall so they can escape some gunmen through the resulting hole.
Michael (voiceover): People watch doors and windows. They don't watch air conditioners.
The season 1 finale has Michael drive his brother's pickup truck through a warehouse wall. They were in a hurry to rescue Fiona from more gunmen and Mike's voiceover notes that warehouse doors are often reinforced.
The season 3 finale has Sam and Fi drive her coupe through the front of a house. This was purely to scare the living daylights out of the small-time arms dealer on the opposite side prior to interrogation. Remarked on by Sam in the next scene:
Sam: You know, you never really know a car until you've driven it through a wall. This little baby did good!
Children are in trouble, but the doors are locked, and Mickey is desperately trying to think of a way to get in. K-9 just says "We are in a car."
In the 2010 Christmas Special, upon being asked why he entered through the window, the Doctor answers "Because if I was going out the window, I'd be going the wrong way. Pay attention."
One of the episodes of It Takes A Thief 2005 features a store with a massive steel door, multiple locks and one smug store-owner who was sure they wouldn't be able to get in through it. He was right, they just smashed through the brick wall.
Clarissa Explains It All Sam always enters the Darling household through Clarissa's upstairs bedroom window via a ladder. Even on the rare occasions he comes through the first floor, generally after finding that Clarissa isn't in her room, he comes in through the window beside the door. There's a specific reason why he chooses to go to Clarissa's window: he hates her younger brotherFerguson so much he uses the ladder to avoid him. Lampshaded in one episode where, after Sam leaves, Clarissa's father asks "Why doesn't that kid ever use the door?"
The show features an escape from Charlie's apartment:
(Charlie screams and throws a chair through the window) Mac:Why would you do that? Charlie: Huh? I don't know, it's all happening so fast, man! Mac: You could have just opened it! Charlie: That's true.
As well as in the fifth season, where Frank throws a heavy object through a gate wall screaming "ABORT":
Windows were usually Shawn Hunter's choice of entry in earlier seasons.
Eric did it once or twice as well, most notably in the graduation episode when he was trying to persuade Mr. Feeny not to retire.
When the Monkeemen burst in in The Monkees' episode, "Monkee Chow Mein," the Yellow Peril villain Dragonman (Joey Forman) protests: "The door was open!"
One Pit Stop on Season 5 of The Amazing Race was located on a small island, which Kami & Karli swam to. Upon arriving, they were told by Phil, "That was quite an entrance. Everyone else just walked through the shallow water over there."
The 3rd Rock from the Sun episode "Dick is from Mars, Sally is from Venus" has Sally going out with a student at the college, only to be unceremoniously dumped. After waiting by the phone overnight, thinking he's going to call, she ends up paying a visit to his apartment....
(Brad sitting on a couch in his apartment; suddenly, the door is kicked inward, revealing Sally) Sally: Hello, Brad. Brad: Sally! Sally: I've come to check your phone.
The intro to Robocop the TV series shows various scenes from the show occasionally interrupted by someone trying to punch through a giant reinforced door from the other side. Finally, as the music reaches the climax, the last punch sends the door flying, revealing everybody's favorite cyborg lawman.
M*A*S*H: It's Colonel Flagg's trademark that nobody ever sees him leave: "I am like the wind." So he demands that everyone cover their eyes. A few seconds, then:
(tinkling sounds) Hawkeye:(peering out the newly-broken window) The wind just broke his leg.
A variation of the trope occurs on an episode of EUReKA when Carter retrieves a Nobel Prize by smashing the glass pane of a display case.
Stark: It was open.
Even more common for Batman in the 1966 Batman series than for his comic book counterpart.
Done on Knight Rider more times than anyone would care to count. Often justified in that there isn't a door, at least not one that KITT can fit through, anyway. But sometimes, even when there's a proper exit, walls are sacrificed for the sake of speed, or perhaps just because KITT busting through a barrier makes for a really awesome shot.
In the 2006 Fox Volant of the Snowy Mountain, martial artists Wu Yidao and Miao Renfen smash through three walls in a row when kicking off their Interesting Situation Duel.
Invoked by accident in Everybody Loves Raymond: Ray and Debra suddenly hear a loud noise approaching their house... Seconds later, a car comes blazing into the living room and totals the front entrance of their house. The car stops, and two people get out- Frank, who was just an unwitting passenger, and the real culprit — Marie. The poor woman hit the gas at just the wrong time.
Eddie, being the designated recipient of each week's AnviliciousAesop, tries to drive a car after failing his license exam, guilty of the classic cliche, "I did it to look cool and impress my girlfriend"- and promptly wipes out half the front entrance of the Winslow household.
Another episode has Eddie and Waldo trying to make sense of a snowmobile- Hilarity Ensues.
(ominous sounds of the snowmobile can be heard outside the Winslow household while Carl and Harriet are in the living room, confused and concerned) Eddie: TURN IT OFF, TURN IT OFF, TURN IT OFF!! Waldo: I CAN'T, I CAN'T! I'M TRYIN'!! Eddie:WALDOOOOOOOO!!!(snowmobile crashes through the front door in slow-motion with Eddie and Waldo hanging on for dear life, pulverizing the living room; Carl gets bowled over, Harriet runs to safety; Eddie and Waldo are flung off the snowmobile to the living room floor; snowmobile roars into the kitchen, crashes through the backdoor and wrecks outside; long pause as everyone tries to make sense of what just happened) Carl:(gets up, dumbfounded, assesses the damage, then sees Eddie struggling to get up) ... Edward? Eddie:(dazed) ... Yeah?? Carl: Can you move, son? Eddie:(pauses) ... Yeah.... Carl:THEN I SUGGEST YOURUN.(Eddie leaps up and bolts out the door for his life as Carl chases him down the street) Harriet:(at a loss for words after seeing the carnage inflicted on her house; turns to face Waldo) Waldo? Waldo: 'Sup? Harriet: Is this your snowmobile? Waldo:Yeah, how much do I owe you for parking? Harriet: (DEATH GLARE) ... Waldo... (begins to approach him; Waldo freezes with fear) Waldo:(panics, flees in terror) Harriet: COME BACK HERE, WALDO!! (chases after him)
The phrase "drive-through convenience store" has become infamous on shows such as The Smoking Gun Presents Worlds Dumbest or similar series that show police archive footage or viewer submissions of crimes caught on tape. Simply put, someone drives their car through the front entrance (sometimes side) of a convenience store, strip mall entrance, or any place that has parking in front. This can range from being just a simple accident caused by a doddering 94-year old lady named Gertrude who floored the car by accident when she was trying to brake and park, drivers falling asleep at the wheel and running off the road, a drunken dumbass at the wheel, or a flat-out breaking-and-entering robbery. If the latter case is true, it's also often used as a means to try and hitch something like a chain from the car to an ATM machine so the robbers can try to uproot it from its post the moment they step on the gas. And if it involves actual people having to run for cover to avoid being hit by the car or flying debris, it turns into something in the same vein of Grand Theft Auto- especially if a gas station pump also gets nailed and bursts into flames, along with any unfortunate vehicles nearby.
In the short-lived US run of Hole in the Wall, if players didn't successfully contort themselves to fit through the cutout shapes in the wall, chances are they'd end up destroying part of the foam walls by accident.
Neil: Look out everyone, he's coming through the doors...
Vyvyan: BRILLIANT! HE DIDN'T EVEN OPEN THEM!
Pro Wrestling
Parodied by the WWE tag-team The Acolyte Protection Agency, whose "office" consisted of a door, a card table, a cooler full of beer — and no walls. Anybody who walked around the door to try and talk to them was admonished in this manner.
Attempted with the Shockmaster to hilarious results.
Inverted in Max Payne, where in one in-game scene you overhear two enemies arguing over a bomb they are about to place on a door so you set it off when you open that door. During their argument, they accidentally set off the bomb, killing themselves and blowing out the wall surrounding the door. The door is untouched, and remains resolutely locked, forcing you to go through the hole surrounding it.
Due to Insurmountable Waist High Fence, a number of games may allow you to break through doors, but never allow you to just open them. Some, such as Call of Duty, have doors that can be opened by NPCs, but not you, or only unlock after a certain Scripted Event. May be used as a Dynamic Loading barrier.
In the Half-Life Modification "Afraid Of Monsters", the enemies migt attack by running into the rooms via doors. However, they stop when the player reaches the City Level. From now on, they "simply" tear down the nearby wall when the player happen to pass by them. It effectively makes them Jump Scares in the process.
In Knights of the Old Republic II, Mandalore and his soldiers board an enemy ship. The Sith set up at the airlock ready to shoot anything that comes through, in a direct Shout Out to the opening scene from Star Wars. The Mandalorians blow a hole through the wall on their flank, and massacre them.
In both the original The Legend Of Zelda and Oracle of Seasons/Ages, Links is occasionally forced to pay for bombing or burning down the door to some Grumpy Old Man's home.
In Sonic '06, Shadow breaks into Eggman's lair. The doctor simply retorts with "Wouldn't the door have been easier?"
Red Faction: Guerrilla provides the player with a sledgehammer of unlikely power. You have the option of bashing your way through walls and windows rather than use the door. This can be a lifesaver when rescuing hostages, running from a horde of drones, and so forth.
In the original: "Don't have a key? Create your own door." Generally only works where the plot requires it.
Yet why exactly walls can get shredded by grenades and yet doors remain unscratched in the face of multiple rockets remains a complete mystery.
Bad Company
The same thing is possible in this game, which allows you to blow holes in almost everything. It's often the best way to get to snipers or MG nests.
Invoked a LOT in Bad Company 2. The walls and doors are all destroyable by rockets and grenades and the like (and doors and fences can be shot and knifed). There's one level in single player where you're trying to spend very little time outside for risk of freezing to death, and you need to run from house to house to get warm. Typically the fastest way to do this was to take a rocket launcher and blow a hole in the next building. How the buildings don't lose their heat after this you'll never know. If you're playing multiplayer, and moving at all, odds are you'll end up doing this a few times in just one match!
Easily done to any door in Nethack. Bash it down, kick it down, whatever. Not to mention you can do the reverse: you can create a door where there wasn't one before.
In Cave Story, Balrog is first introduced doing this. Amusingly, he did enter exactly where the door was, but since he's way too wide to use it, he just busts through the door and the door-sized bits of wall on either side of it. That scene is probably why his Catch Phrase of "Huzzah!" was changed to a Kool-Aid-Man-style "OH YEAH!" in the WiiWare release. Later in the game, he tends to make his entrances by crashing through ceilings.
In Deus Ex Human Revolution, there's an augmentation which lets the player punch through walls. If a guard is positioned behind it, Adam (the protagonist) will snap the guard's neck in the process.
At one point in Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, you come to a wall with windows that you can't climb through, and you can't blow it up with your Panzerschreck either. You have to lure a Tiger Tank into destroying the wall. In a later level, there's a gate that can only be opened with a bazooka.
After solving the carriage wheel puzzle in Resident Evil 2's second scenario, Mr. X comes crashing through the wall. Then when you're back in the hallway, he smashes back through the same wall.
If there is both a door and window into a building in Resident Evil 4, you can always dive through the window instead of taking the door. However, this isn't usually a good idea, since an intact window will slow down Ganados for a second and give you an advantage.
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky has a Ludicolo and his team of Bellossom crash through the wall of Spinda's cafe whenever you win a jackpot at the lottery. Then comes the most hilarious Big Lipped Alligator MomentEver.
In Metroid: Other M, after getting his ass handed to him by Samus yet again, Ridley ends up so freaking scared of her that he crashes through a wall in a frantic attempt to get away.
You can technically open doors in God Hand, but it's usually easier to kick them in. That's just the way Gene is.
This is simple expedience in X-COM, especially on terror missions, where civilians are apt to be standing behind doors blocking your way. As one online guide says, "That farmhouse was probably insured anyway."
Collette from Tales Of Symphonia has a nasty habit of going through walls instead of using the door, though this is more a testament to her clumsiness than anything else. Lampshaded when interacting with a human-shaped hole in Raine's classroom earns Collette a title.
In Crusader, if you don't have the keycard or lock combination, you can blow open just about any door in the game with explosives instead. This will set the alarm off, however.
In Prototype, it is possible to break the walls surrounding the courtyard of a military base, but there are doors on both sides and they are always open.
While never seen occuring onscreen, there are a few mission maps in City of Heroes that suggest this method was used by the villain groups to invade the map. In some of these maps, you'll encounter walls with gaping holes blasted through them and a doorway left untouched. One notable example has you following the very obvious trail of, and eventually catching up with, a huge fire demon.
The Godfather 2 has various options for this. Do you:
Let an Arsonist burn down something?
Make a Bruiser knock down a side entrance?
Order a Demolitions guy to blow up a weak wall?
Get an Engineer to cut through a fence?
In Jagged Alliance, this is one of the recommended ways to deal with buildings where the enemy is lurking inside. You could go through the doors, wasting AP and leaving your pointman vulnerable to enemy fire, or you could have your demolitions guy plant a couple of blocks of C4 on the wall, blast open a hole, and then storm in through the back, or even just open a hole to let your snipers with their armor-piercing anti-tank rifles start picking off the enemy.
In one level of Superman Countdown To Apokolips for the GBA, Superman breaks into an Intergang hideout by crashing through a brick wall.
Baman from Baman Piderman rarely uses the door, usually just smashing through the wall, and using that hole.
In Arfenhouse the Movie, Good Kitty likes to enter the scene by crashing through a window, even when she's already there or when the scene is the surface of the moon.
Bar'd: One time we see Roby the Biker crash into the front door of the Leafy Bar, just narrowly avoiding slamming into Vas. The rest of that day, the bar had a gaping hole that needed repairs.
Parodied in Bear Versus Zombies when Bear scares Jack the rabbit's children, prompting the entire survival group to crash through each and every window in the house one at a time to attack Bear, much to Jack's dismay, and ending in Bear leaving by crashing through the wall in disgust. Despite the fact the front door was open.
In Beyond The Canopy, there is a window in the room, but it's too low for Chief Redwood. So he enlarges it. With his fists.
Siegfried: DOMINIC DEEGAN! I REQUIRE YOUR ASSISTANCE!... You, however, require a new door.
In the same comic, Dominic's older brother Jacob is fond of coming up through the floor to make his entrances. When he tries this on Dominic's house (which was made to prevent such magic entrances), a loud thud is heard, then Jacob is seen knocking on the door and rubbing his head.
In Gunnerkrigg Court, the robot resurrected by Kat crashes through a wall looking for Jeanne's "tomb." As usual, this is lampshaded by Tom in The Rant:
Occurs several times, once with Elan, the resident Cloudcuckoolander, bursting through the window with the "the door was open" gag added in. His Dashing Swordsman Prestige Class prevents damage from glass.
In the prequel Start of Darkness, Xykon, after being transformed into a lich, kicks off his Look What I Can Do Now sequence by surprising Lirian this way.
Sawtooth Rivergrinder, a VTOL bulldozer and as such one of the toughest robots around. Who tend to "plot the most efficient route" when humans aren't nearby. When others in the team were stopped by an automated and shut down door...
Bennie: Now, if I were a ten tonne terraforming robot, the answer would be obvious. (cut to Sawtooth already inside the building) Sawtooth: Doors are for the weak.
Although at least he cleans up after himself. He also threatens to do this as a means of gaining entrance without actually having to.
Sawtooth: Oh look. There is another wall in my way. Temporarily.
The giant robots in Titanzer have a bad habit of doing this.
Agent Delacroix in the SCP Foundation tale Pulsar. He was delivering flash drives.
Narrowly averted in Suburban Knights. One of the teams breaks into a stranger's house and realizes the Voice of the Ancients that they've been looking for is under the floor. They nearly start ripping it up until the woman they tied up points out that there's a basement.
G.I. Joe, during the "Arise Serpentor, Arise" arc. In his attempt to arrest every one of his treacherous underlings, Cobra Commander blows up a perfectly functional door in order to make a flashy entrance. He even orders the people he intended to arrest to fix it when he leaves.
In Scooby Doo Where Are You, as Shaggy and Scooby escape a villain (a supposed ghost of a Chinese emperor), this exchange occurs as they board up a door to hide behind:
Shaggy: Ha! He won't be getting through that door!
(The ''entire'' wall the villain's behind lifts up like a curtain)
Shaggy: ...And wouldn't you know he comes through the wall?
Referencing One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, there's a scene where an elderly Native American man dramatically throws a water fountain through the window and jumps out, prompting the Old Jewish man to yell after him. Later in the scene, the man throws the fountain back through another window and jumps up again because he forgot his hat.
Barney actually pulled off the parody in an earlier season — after Homer refused beer after being hospitalized from an exploding Duff can, Barney (unsuccessfully) smothers him with a pillow and does the fountain-through-the-window gag.
Moe: He really needs a girlfriend.
When the family travels to Japan, Homer does this repeatedly by walking through shoji doors, apparently not getting the concept that they slide. He even does this when he and Bart go to prison! (But only after the bail is paid, and the door is actually opened.)
Subverted for laughs in the episode where Marge becomes a cop. One obstacle was a brick wall that she thought she had to climb. Chief Wiggum remarks "Huh, women. Always having trouble with the wall. They can't seem to use the door." The shot then goes to the rest of the recruits (all male) walking nonchalantly through a door.
In an episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the now-addleminded Baxter walks through the wall five feet to the left of the door to April's office. April manages to trick him into leaving. When he realizes this and comes back, he walks past the hole he made earlier, past the door, and breaks through the wall on the other side. This is made funnier by the fact that the door was open at the time. Later in the episode, the Turtles run past both the first hole and the open door to go through the second hole.
He did this in a later appearance as well, breaking into a lab and leaving a Baxter-shaped hole in the wall to the left of an open door, which tipped Raphael off as to who the culprit was.
In the Imaginationland trilogy of South Park, this becomes a Running Gag, with Cartman always breaking through the window in the room, in a different spot if necessary.
"Why is it so easy for children to break into the Pentagon?!?"
Roberto once broke himself and Bender out a robot asylum using this technique. He has Bender on a table, and the two have a conversation while Roberto is smashing through walls. When asked when they plan to escape, Roberto responds, "About five seconds ago." Zoom out to them on the lawn, and a hole punched in the building.
One The Fairly Odd Parents episode, "Information Stupor Highway," had "parental battering rams", which are used by parents to break into their kids' rooms. They always say "(child's name), I'm respecting your privacy by knocking, but asserting my authority as a parent by coming in anyway" before doing it, and it's transparently obvious they just want to break something because they never give a kid the chance to open the door. Timmy's Dad also did the "never go through the same hole" joke, and mentioned he needs to remember to hire a contractor to repair the wall. Good thing that Timmy can just wish the wall fixed. The same cannot be said for other kids' poor, battered walls. And That's Terrible.
It is a Running Gag that the Powerpuff Girls always leave the building they are in by smashing through the ceiling.
In their origin story, it was revealed that the Professor's house did not originally have the three large circular windows on the top floor. The Powerpuff Girls cut them out with their laser vision so they could leave easily and quickly without (relatively) damaging the house.
Mojo Jojo complains a few times that the Girls smashing through the walls of his evil lair has cost him a lot of money in repairs. Mojo lampshades this in the comic book story "Micro Managing" when Blossom arrives to discuss a matter with him and she knocks on the door:
Mojo: Powerpuff Girl Blossom, what are you doing politely knocking on my door when you usually and rudely burst through my ceiling in an unwelcome and uninviting manner?
A commercial for The Powerpuff Girls showed them smashing through the ceiling, only for the hole to be patched with wood, then bricks only to get destroyed each time. The last shot finally shows the hole turned into an opening with an "Exit" sign... only for the girls to break through the wall.
Lampshaded in one episode where a Hollywood producer making a movie starring the girls has a breakaway wall ready for them to smash through.
In the Freakazoid! episode "Dexter's Date", Freakazoid crashes through a wall full of TV monitors while trying to stop the Lobe. The Lobe immediately scolds him for causing damage and not using the door instead.
In the Legion Of Super Heroes episode "The Man from the Edge of Tomorrow; Part 2", Kell-El flies up through the roof, leaving Superman to look through the resultant hole and remark, "I'm guessing they don't have doors in the future." (Kell-El is from the 41st Century.)
There is one episode where Billy repeatedly exits his home by breaking through the doors and windows. He doesn't stop until he realizes, in dismay, that he's broken through them all. At which point he's trapped, as apparently leaving through the holes was completely out of the question. Then again, this IS Billy we're talking about...
And after that, he does leave through the door, so that he can go to his friend's house and jump through his window!!
Not to mention the fact that, after jumping through a window, he kept returning into the house where Mandy and Grim were still dressed as clowns (in an attempt to scare out Billy's fear of them), apparently having forgotten why he ran away in the first place. He'd then see them again and repeat the process.
Given his comment during that gag, he actually forgot where he ran away from.
Secret Squirrel (at least in the original series) would always dismay his boss by never leaving through the door.
In Super Secret Secret Squirrel, it's his method of entrance. Usually non-destructive, though. Morocco Mole's attempt at the same — well, that varies.
Subverted in one episode where secret actually enter the office through the front door. The same episode that showed the only time the chief was worried where secret would pop up from today.
In the dream sequence Rugrats episode "Visitors from Outer Space", Angelica, after being abducted, steals a high-tech alien device and uses it to blast through several doors to escape from the ship. Finally, a prisoner who's escaping with her says, "You know, these doors do open automatically."
In the Hey Arnold episode "Field Trip," Arnold and Grandma go to break into an aquarium to free an unhappy turtle named Lockjaw. At one point, Grandma uses a rope and grappling hook to climb over a barrier maybe five feet high, while Arnold simply walks around it.
In one episode of The Wild Thornberrys, Eliza, Darwin, and Donnie, are trying to cross an island as quickly as possible to catch a boat on the other side. On the way there, they have to climb a mountain. Eliza does it the hard and dirty way, while Darwin and Donnie simply take the visitor's trail that Eliza never sees.
In an episode, Ron uses a pair of oversized dogs to bust down the door of Professor Dementor's secret lab. Counts as a Crowning Moment of Funny for Dementor, the one Straight Man in the show's rogues gallery. The exact words went along the line of (with a despairing look): "Vha-vhy did you kick down ze door? It vasn't even locked. I JUST HAD IT PAINTED!"
In "Mad Dogs and Aliens", Drakken instructs Warmonga to get rid of Shego, first saying "Show her the door" and then (after she simply tells Shego where to find the door) "Make her leave through the door". The latter instruction is also applied a bit too literally.
Drakken: Well, I didn't literally mean through the actual door...
Hilariously used in an episode of in which Ed knocks both the door AND the wall to Edd's room down causing Eddy to reply in annoyance, "There's a KNOB, Ed!"
He also keeps ripping through Edd's screen door. "Not the screen door AGAIN, Ed! Father hasn't recovered from the last time!"
Launchpad: Uh, D.W., why couldn't we go through the gate like everyone else? Darkwing: Because I am not like everyone else.
The Critic: Jay enters his apartment to find Duke waiting for him and asks how he got in, to which he responds, "I have my ways." Jay then notices a huge hole in the wall. Duke later leaves the same way. Apparently using Jay Sherman as a weight is a great way to get Super Strength!
The Incredible Hulk animated series has the Hulk leaping towards Doctor Doom's lair, and after smashing up his enforced cage, he makes for the door to do the same thing, until it opens by itself, to which the Hulk simply says: "Oh." Doctor Doom then says "There was a door, you destructive brute."
Captain Caveman introduces himself in this way. After talking to Birdman, he vaults through the wall a workman had just finished patching.
Birdman himself did it when he was a superhero, in the Flashback Episode. He melts Reducto's door with his powers:
Reducto: That was an automatic door. All you had to do was step in front of it and it would have slid open. X the Eliminator: Here he comes! I'll open the door for him. (Birdman blasts his way through the roof) Or he can use the ceiling.
Perry the Platypus breaks down the door to Dr. Doofenshmirtz's apartment a few too many times. Given the openness of their relationship, Doc doesn't even bother locking it. He even gave Perry his key. So whenever Perry bursts through the wall/door/ceiling/etc., Doofenshmirtz is justifiably annoyed.
At least once, Perry bursts in and Doofenshmirtz declares, "Perry the Platypus! You will PAY!" Perry takes out his wallet and pays for the broken door. "That's right, fork it over."
Taken to a ridiculous extreme when Doofenshmirtz builds a trap consisting of a door with a Perry-shaped hole in it, claiming to have been inspired by Perry breaking through the door... and the wall... and the ceiling... and the fridge door (apparently Perry was extremely hungry on that occasion).
Made even funnier in the episode where they were all cavemen when Doofensmirtz angrily grunted about Perry breaking a whole in his stone wall when there was a giant opening.
In "Chez Platypus", Doofenshmirtz tightens the hinges of his door, so when Perry goes to kick it down, he gets his foot stuck in the hole he made.
In "S'winter", Doofenshmirtz prepared a trap at the front door, but Perry evaded it because the maid forgot to lock the backdoor.
The evil Kryptonians Jax-Ur and Mala just fly through any building they meet in a straight line. This is used to emphasize how they don't care about the humans at all. In the same fight, Superman flies around the buildings.
Joker: Nice entrance. Either you've never heard of a door or you just like pulling glass out of your shorts!
An early Justice League episode "Injustice for All" ruins a Big Damn Heroes moment when five of the heroes bust into the villains' lair. Hawkgirl breaks down the door, Superman breaks the wall next to the door, and Green Lantern goes through the window next to the hole Superman made.
An episode in Danny Phantom has Jack and Maddie bursting through a wall in order to ask Sam and Tucker if they had seen their son. They leave by busting open another part of the same wall. Knowing this to be a common occurrence, Maddie disappointingly tells Sam to send the bill their way.
Played with in Lilo And Stitch The Series. The roof is on hinges due to Captain Gantu lifting it off regularly.
Ignignokt and Err of Aqua Teen Hunger Force regularly crash through the windows of the main trio's house whenever they arrive.
A classic example, where Orpheus opens a portal on the ceiling of the room Doc is stuck in (don't ask) and falls onto the floor covered in ectoplasm, causing Doc to yell "WE HAVE A DOOR, Orpheus!"
In the fourth season finale, Brock does a variation on this trope. He used a grappling gun to get into the ceiling of a building, despite there being a ladder five feet away from him.
Shore Leave: You know there is a ladder right there? Brock: Where's the fun in that?
When the first trailer of Wolverine and the X-Men came out, fans quickly began to joke about Wolverine's obvious problem with opening doors normally, since the trailer contains at least 3 scenes of him kicking a door in, with a few more by MRD soldiers. While the first episode does then indeed contain several scenes of Wolverine kicking doors, the second one actually shows him opening a door in Magneto's Citadel. However the same episode also contains a scene of Cyclops blasting dozens of doors open, apparently too lazy to open them by hand. During the rest of show, there seems to be a competition between Wolverine and Cyclops on how many doors to crush in or how many new entrances they can create.
In the The Super Hero Squad Show, the Hulk is... about as bad with doors as the other versions. At one point, he's told to use the door, so he rips the doors off of their hinges, and smashes them to pieces. Afterwards, he decided he preferred his way.
Invader Zim once features a floating screen... thing bursting through a wall to deliver a message to Dib. When it was done, it turned around, moved aside, and proceeded to blast another hole to exit.
In Star Wars: The Clone Wars, instead of waiting for his rather incompetent replacement astromech droid to open a door, Anakin cuts through it. Most Jedi seem to prefer cutting holes in walls, even when a door is in plain sight.
In an accidentally hilarious way in Mister T. In one episode a door spontaneously explodes to reveal Mr. T behind it. Supposedly he kicked it down like he always does, but the animation didn't suggest any kicking at all.
Diablo:(runs into a panic room) He'll never get me now! This door is made of titanium! And with this timelock— (the Thing bursts through the wall) No!
Virtually no-one in Teen Titans can be bothered to use doors. They just break through windows, walls, and even the doors themselves! It's made even funnier by the fact that most of the doors open automatically.
The Forever Knights blast a hole in a building where Ben is signing autographs despite a double door being not three feet from one side of the hole. They apparently felt that they needed to enter in formation.
Reference in a later episode when bad guy Agregor crashes through the ceiling... twice. The second leading a rather annoyed Kevin to tell him there's a door.
Kevin himself is not above using unnecessary force instead of a more mundane method of entry:
Ben:How'd you get in here? Kevin:The usual way. By the way, you might wanna fix that hole I punched in your door. Ben: You could have knocked! Kevin: I sorta did.
Spider Man And His Amazing Friends went through this in the "Swarm" episode. Iceman blasts a wall, and Spidey opens the door beside the just-formed hole, adding, "The door WAS open."
The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes: Tony Stark moans about this one more than one occasion, like when Thor bursts through the floor rather than coming up the stairs, or the Hulk kicks a hole in the door (even though they open automatically). Understandable, given that it's usually Tony's private property that's getting smashed up.
Hank Pym makes a similar complaint when Ulysses Klaw and his henchmen smash down the door of his lab. "You know, that door didn't have a lock on it. You couldn't just opened it."
Beavis And Butt Head actually subvert this trope: the title characters watch a RoboCop-like series and Butt-Head gets the idea to imitate that. Beavis runs into their house head first... and proceeds to knock himself out, upsetting Butt-Head that he screwed it up.
(notices all the Transbormers partying in his house) Sam: How did they get in my house? Optimus: Maybe they found the spare key? Sam: I don't have a spare key. Optimus: Then maybe from that huge hole in the wall. (screen pans out to show a giant hole in the wall)
In one episode of Stroker And Hoop, Coroner Rick thought Hoop's mom killed herself in prison, so he tried to climb the fence with barbed wire at the top to get into the yard. he's standing about two feet from a guard on his left and a door on his right.
Guard: What the hell are you doing? You can use the door, you work here! Coroner Rick (hands covered in his blood): I know, I know! Dumb idea.\\
In the Regular Show episode "Jinx": after Rigby locks the door to escape Ybgir, Mordecai says that won't do any good- there's a big hole in the wall from when Ygbir escaped.
Biker Mice From Mars: The title mice never use the door. They lampshaded it in "Back to Mars", when Limburger was using Charley as a bait in a trap that relied on them using the door.
In one episode of Scooby Doo Where Are You, Shaggy and Scooby are trapped in a cabin with the only door locked and the key on the outside (and no manual lock on the inside), so naturally, the two of them HAVE to break out some other way. Shaggy chooses to leap through the window—in order to grab the key, unlock the door, jump back through the window he busted, and open the now-unlocked front door.
Real Life
Police and military units will often avoid using the front door of a target building, to gain the element of surprise and to avoid the chance that whoever's on the inside is aiming right at the door with a finger on the trigger.
Case in point: "Operation NIMROD", the SAS assault during the Iranian Embassy Siege, London 1980. Some of the most famous images of the SAS are of officers breaking into the embassy through windows◊ and balconies◊.
Standard practice in urban warfare is called mouse-holing: cutting (or blasting) a hole to move from room to room and building to building. As often as not, this is done because the needs of the military are different than the needs of the previous occupant, and so there actually wasn't a door.
Also, in a fortified building there is a good chance that the occupants have boobytrapped any obvious entrances. Making your own entrance is not only the quickest, but also the safest, option.
alternative title(s): Bursting Through A Door; Breaking Through A Door; Kicking A Door Open; Kicking Open A Door; Kicking Down A Door; Kicking A Door Down; Kicking A Door
