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Jade: I had no idea those pliers came equipped with the "club" option.
Pey'j: Model D53, little lady. Slices, dices... and pounds.

Wrenches are tools often associated with The Engineer, Mr. Fixit and the Wrench Wench, using them to build and repair objects, whether by tightening bolts or Percussive Maintenance. Like other tools used in construction (hammers, nailguns, etc.), wrenches can be very effective weapons, even by the Improbable Weapon User.

Very much Truth in Television as a good monkey wrench (also known as a pipe wrench) can be made of very sturdy materials, and some can weigh quite a bit on top of that. So, in a pinch, you can very easily break someone's skull wide open if you tap 'em on the head hard enough.

Unrelated to Spanner in the Works, unless what derails your Evil Scheme is underestimating the combat potential of the Wrench Wench. See Crowbar Combatant for another tool used as an effective weapon.


Examples:

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    Anime & Manga 
  • In Baccano!, Graham Specter carries around a monkey wrench about three-foot long so he can use it to bash people and catch shotgun slugs out of the air.
  • The Castle of Cagliostro: Lupin wields a large wrench from one of the Clock Tower's tool racks against the Count. This is a case where the wrench's size is justified: The machinery in clock towers uses big bolts, which consequently need big wrenches.
  • When Wrench Wench Winry from Fullmetal Alchemist gets mad, poor Ed often winds up the victim of this trope. Usually when he breaks his automail, which happens a lot.
  • Takashi in Highschool of the Dead uses a wrench as a weapon as they enter Shizuka's friend's apartment.
  • Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure Battle Tendency: It's briefly mentioned during a flashback that when Caesar was young, his favorite opening move when getting into a fight was hitting his opponent with a wrench.
  • In Another World with My Smartphone: Fredmonica, the gynoid who runs the Babylon Hangar, uses a giant monkey wrench as a tool and a weapon. More noticeable given that she's the smallest of the gynoids, so the wrench is about as long as she is tall.
  • Mikazuki Augus from Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans adapted a gigantic wrench mace for the Gundam Barbatos since the original mace was lost. He also doubles as Improbable Weapon User since the wrench mace wasn't supposed to be a weapon, but rather a tool for repairing mobile suits.
  • Smile from Occult Academy has a giant wrench as his weapon of choice.
  • Isara does this to Knute in the Valkyria Chronicles anime, while also doubling as an Offhand Backhand.

    Board Games 
  • One of the possible murder weapons in the game Clue (also known as Cluedo). Befitting their source, it also appeared in the related video games and books as a suitable blunt instrument.

    Comic Books 
  • In The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones #24, Indy battles a Giant Mook armed with a wrench atop a speeding truck.
  • In G.I. Joe comics, a large automechanic's wrench is the weapon of choice for the recent Deadnok recruit Heartwrencher. In spite of his name, the same doesn't apply to longtime Dreadnok Monkeywrench.
  • The Goon calls the chrome-plated adjustable pipe wrench "the finest monster-hunting technology 1932 had to offer."
  • A dead worker is shown with a wrench embedded in his face in Hatchet / Slash.
  • Rulah, Jungle Goddess: In "The Ice Beast" (Zoot Comics #10),an evil witch doctor kills the American engineer who built his Weather-Control Machine by smashing his head with a wrench. He soon regrets this act when he realises that he doesn't know how to operate the machine.
  • In Runaways, Gert once attacked Victor with a gigantic monkey wrench Nico had conjured up earlier in the issue.
  • In Secret Six #14, Ragdoll smashes Smythe the Slaver's hand and back with a wrench before lodging it in his head. It doesn't kill him, though.
  • In She-Hulk, during Byrne's run, the main character was being mind-controlled by Xemu, her BFF whacked him on his brain-dome.
  • One early Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles comic issue has Raphael getting so angry at Michaelangelo's teasing that he tries to hit him with a wrench. The other turtles are shocked by this as he could have killed Mike, and so they order him to go cool off outside. Raph progressively realizes how his reaction was disproportionate, and feels guilty about it.
  • Tim Drake: Robin: Darcy's choice of weapon is a set of wrenches on thin chains.
  • Wonder Woman (1942): One of the mobsters in the issue 301 Huntress feature attacks Huntress with an oversized monkey wrench which he evidently carries with him while playing pool.
  • Serenity: Leaves on the Wind: Psycho for Hire Jubal Early sneaks aboard Serenity and captures most of the crew... except for Kaylee this time, who gets the drop on him with a pipe wrench to the face.

    Fan Works 
  • Super Power Beat Down, episode "The Joker & Harley Quinn vs Deadpool & Domino": Harley Quinn takes out Domino by mean of a lucky throw with a wrench landing on her skull.
  • Deconstructed in Torque (Jak and Daxter). A wrench used on a normal person might do some damage, but trying to use it against monsters like Metal Heads doesn't go as well. Keira nearly gets herself killed when she goes out on her first mission for the Underground armed with only a wrench. She promptly gets a gun from Tess after that.
  • A Darker Path: The only weapon Taylor brings to fight Oni Lee is a pipe wrench from her Dad's toolbox. As soon as Lee's minions notice her, she clubs one alongside the head and then throws the wrench into the other's forehead. After killing Lee, she picks the wrench up again to put down his third minion, breaking his arm and then knocking him unconscious on the backswing.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Referenced in Assault on a Queen. Tony was dishonourably discharged from the US Navy for hitting his superior officer with a wrench.
  • In Breakheart Pass, the engineer clobbers the trooper acting as his fireman with a wrench just before being shot by Deakin and Major Claremont.
  • Brute Force (1947): When attacked in the machine shop, Wilson grabs a wrench to defend himself; not that it helps him.
  • The Cannonball Run: In the brawl with the bikers, J.J. punches a huge biker in the face several times to no effect in a Punch! Punch! Punch! Uh Oh... moment. The biker mockingly points to the other side of his jaw and suggests J.J. try there. J.J. says "Thanks" and immediately smacks the biker across the face with a spanner.
  • In Cloud Atlas, a hitman played by Hugo Weaving gets a giant wrench to the back of the head courtesy of a tiny Hispanic woman played by (who else) Korean actress Doona Bae.
  • Clown Motel: One of the girls kills one of the clowns by driving a wrench into its skull, handle first.
  • Clean, a 2021 action film starring Adrien Brody has a fight scene where Brody's character whacks multiple mooks to death using a pipe wrench.
  • One of the murder weapons in Clue.
  • Death Bell: When searching the school for the killer, Mr. Kim grabs a pipe wrench from a storeroom and carries it as a weapon for the rest of the film (for all the good it does him).
  • From DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story: "If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball."
  • The climax of The Dragon Family is set in the warehouse of a drug-production plant, where the Lung brothers takes on enemy mooks. While most of the mooks have firearms, those who don't carries wrenches and often attempts sneaking upon the three protagonists, the youngest Lung brother even briefly getting a pipe wrench in the shoulder which stuns him until his two brothers shot the pipewrench mook who's taking another swing for the head.
  • Elves (2017): After having had enough of his dad's verbal abuse, Ken, under the influence of the elf doll, takes a wrench and hits him in the back of the head with it, which is all it takes to send him down.
  • In Eternal, Irina kills Nancy by hitting her over the head with a shifting spanner, even though she only intended to knock her out (thereby averting Tap on the Head).
  • Part of The Fast and the Furious protagonist Dominic Toreto's backstory. After a rival driver accidentally causes his father to die on the racetrack, Dom uses a wrench to savagely beat the man almost to death, leading to the predictable results and is implied to be what kick-started his criminal career.
    • Dom Dual Wield a pair large wrenches in his showdown with Decker Shaw in the climax of the seventh film.
  • A character gets impaled through the head by a wrench in Final Destination 5.
  • A sewer worker gets clobbered with his wrench in Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan.
  • The Gingerweed Man: Barbara grabs a wrench to use as a weapon against the main villain of the movie when she goes to save Buddy from him.
  • Home Alone loves this trope - especially the second film.
  • In the Line of Duty III: Force of the Dragon has the heroine Rachel and villainess Michiko battling each other in a wrench fight.
  • The garage fight scene from In the Line of Duty 4: Witness has Rachel beating up mooks with a pair of wrenches. Bonus points for tying those wrenches together into a pair of makeshift nunchucks (wrench-chucks?).
  • Julia X: Before taking The Stranger out of the boot of her car, Julia whacks him over the head with a lug wrench to make sure he is unconscious.
  • Used for a Bait-and-Switch in The Living Daylights. A Brawn Hilda woman tells James Bond she's going to take care of the supervisor while hefting her wrench significantly, but she uses Marshmallow Hell tactics instead.
  • Dr. Igora in Monster Brawl aids Frankenstein in his match by entering the ring and whacking Zombie Man in the head with a wrench.
  • In Preservation, Wit brains one of the hunters with the lug wrench out of the truck.
  • Primal: During the fight in the engine room, the assistant engineer Jerome attempts to clobber Loffler with a huge monkey wrench.
  • Subverted in Red Wolf during a fight scene. Christy Chung's character, Lai, is cornered by the Ax-Crazy terrorist Dark Action Girl Elaine, but noticed a toolbox nearby. Lai grabs a wrench, swings, and misses - Elaine promptly beats up Lai with ease.
  • In Raiders of the Lost Ark, while Indy's going for the pilot's seat of a still-grounded airplane, an on-hand Nazi mechanic innocently questions the jacketed figure with a wrench, then when Indy kicks him in the face for his troubles, gets up and starts swinging it.
  • In the Hong Kong gangster film Return Engagement a.k.a Hong Kong Corruptor, the Big Bad tortures the hero's Love Interest by whacking her with a wrench until she bleeds.
  • Rumble in the Bronx subverts this with Jackie Chan starting by hitting the Giant Mook, to no effect – then the Tagalong Kid passes him a bike helmet, which he whacks the guy's face with, still no effect - then the kid gives him a big wrench. One look at it and the mook caves.
  • Sands of the Kalahari: Expecting dirty tricks from O'Brien, Bain hides a spanner in the sand on the cave floor. When O'Brien is strangling him, Bain is able to retrieve the spanner and hit O'Brien in the head hard enough to knock him out.
  • Savage Dog: Martin's penultimate battle against his last opponent, Rastignac, who had a wicked-looking curved knife as his weapon. When Rastignac mamaged to land a slash on Martin, Martin retaliates by grabbing a wrench from a nearby toolbox to counter his opponent's blade.
  • During the epic training scene of Shaolin Soccer, the Shaolin goalie gets hit in the head by a wrench. The wrench bends without leaving a mark on his face.
  • In Shrooms, Bluto beats the wounded goat to death with a lug wrench.
  • The villain in Sorority Row is using a lug wrench with innumerable blades jutting out of it. And it's collapsible.
  • Speed Racer features a fight scene in which a monkey wrench is wielded by, appropriately enough, a monkey.
  • Stiletto:
    • When the two mechanics work out that Beck is a cop, one of them attacks him with a spanner. Beck grabs the spanner off him and uses it to break the mechanic's leg, and then beat his mate into submission.
    • Later, Lee grabs a lug wrench from his trunk and uses it to attack Raina. Raina then gets ahold of it and kills Lee by driving the tyre iron end up though his jaw and out the top of his skull.
  • Frank/The Crimson Bolt's weapon in Super. As a deconstructive superhero film, the results of someone being bludgeoned with a wrench are portrayed more realistically — read "a lot of blood from the open scalp wound and a split open skull".
  • The Texas Vibrator Massacre ends with the main character being beat to death with a wrench by Porn!Leatherface's father and sister.
  • At the end of The Toolbox Murders remake, Coffin Baby tries to kill Nell with a wrench, but she fends him off long enough for the police to show up and shoot him out a window.
  • V for Vendetta: The revolution officially begins when a man does this to a policeman who just shot a little girl for wearing a Guy Fawkes mask.

    Literature 
  • The Bastard Operator from Hell once used a large Stilton wrench to sabotage the board's new secure room, first by smashing the comms panel and then to close a stopper and flood the secure room in sewage.
  • In one of the Doc Savage novels, Ham - having been on the receiving end of yet another one of Monk's practical jokes - picks up a monkey wrench and whacks Monk in the head hard enough to knock him out.
  • During the climax of the gamebook Freeway Fighter, you will inevitably get into a fight with the leader of the Doom Dogs, called The Animal. You can choose to accept his challenge for a fistfight, which isn't recommended because of his high SKILL stats; or, instead, take down his mooks in a shootout and then fight him, at which point the battle ends a few pages later when your partner, Amber, whacks the Animal out cold using a wrench.
  • Sergeant Julio Poertena from the Prince Roger series uses a "big pocking wrench" to dismantle jammed power armour and hostile cannibalistic aliens with equal gusto. In the former case, Percussive Maintenance is, in actuality, better at unjamming powered armor than the official method.
  • Young Sherlock Holmes: In Red Leech, Grivens attempts to kill Sherlock with a large engineering spanner in the ship's engine room.

    Live-Action TV 
  • The A-Team, "Knights of the Road": when Tyler's men move in on her, Jenny picks up a wrench and swings at them. It ultimately does no good, and one of the men takes the wrench from her to bust up her and her father's tow truck.
  • In Battlestar Galactica (2003), a wrench is used to kill Laird.
  • On Boardwalk Empire, a stressed Eli gives George O’Neill a wrench whack right in the windpipe if that didn't kill him the repeated strikes to the head afterwards did.
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer
    • After Faith goes Rogue Agent in "Consequences", Wesley cuffs her and tries to drag her back to the Watcher's Council, only to get a faceful of wrench for his efforts, having failed to remove any long solid objects from the vicinity.
    • In "Doomed", Spike tries to hit clobber Xander with a wrench only to keel over in pain without him even noticing.
    • Subverted in "Flooded" when a spanner-wielding Buffy is shown creeping through a Creepy Basement...to fix a leaky pipe.
      Buffy: We meet at last, Mr. Drippy.
  • Cold Squad: The Victim of the Week in "Tess" was in done in by a blow from a lug wrench, which left a distinctive hexagonal shaped indentation in her skull.
  • The killer in the Criminal Minds episode "Painless" tries to attack Hotch and Prentiss with a wrench after being shot (he doesn't feel pain) but is stopped by a second shot, this one fatal.
  • CSI:
    • The Victim of the Week in "Mea Culpa" is a hardware store owner killed by a blow to the head by a monkey wrench.
    • In "Turn of the Screw", the killer beats the Victim of the Week to death with a pipe wrench he had just used to sabotage the roller coaster.
  • The Doctor Blake Mysteries: At the climax of "The Open Road", Jean grabs a wrench and clobbers the murderer who is attempting to crush Lucien beneath a car on a jack.
  • Doctor Who: In "Victory of the Daleks", the Eleventh Doctor attacks a Dalek with a large wrench, trying to provoke it into dropping the "helpful automaton" act in front of the supporting cast.
  • Elementary: In "Fight Risk", the Victim of the Week finds the murderer sabotaging a plane in the hanger and the is killed by a wrench blow to the back of the head. The murderer stuffs the body into the cargo bay of the plane. When the plane crashes due to the sabotage, Sherlock finds a body that was dead before the crash and initially assumes this is a case of Death in the Clouds.
  • Father Brown: In "The Laws of Motion", the Victim of the Week is done in with a blow to the head from a lug wrench. The killers then plan to make it look like she died in a car accident.
  • In Firefly, Mal knocks out Jayne this way toward the end of "Ariel".
  • Forever: Henry uses a wrench to strike the mass murderer in the pilot, leading to a struggle over the gun he'd been holding on Henry.
  • Jake and the Fatman: In "Last Dance", the Victim of the Week is the blackmailing owner of an auto repair shop who is beaten to death with a large wrench.
  • Midsomer Murders: The first Body of the Week in "The Flying Club" is done in by a blow to the back of the head with a wrench.
  • Red Dwarf: In "Duct Soup", Kochanski coldbloodedly beats Kryten over the head with a wrench for his getting the crew trapped in Starbug's ducts (and almost getting the ship destroyed) just because he was jealous of her relationship with Lister.
  • Rizzoli & Isles: In "In Plain View", the Victim of the Week is beaten to death with a lug wrench.
  • Used more than once in Star Trek: The Original Series.
    • In "Court Martial", Finney uses a (20th-century) wrench in a fight with Kirk but doesn't get a good blow in.
    • Similarly, in "Operation: Annihilate!" one of the mind-controlled human colonists ineffectually attacks the away team with a large wrench.
    • In "Space Seed", Kirk surprises Khan with a whack from a (23rd-century) Space Wrench. Take that, superhuman!

    Music 
  • The video for a-ha's "Take On Me" shows the hero squaring off against two thugs, all of them holding wrenches. (The actual fight happens off-screen, though.)
  • One of the large bears in the music video for "Donkey Rhubarb" by Aphex Twin throws a wrench at another bear, before running over and...er, "accosting" them.

    Professional Wrestling 
  • Moose was undefeated in Ring of Honor until Cedric Alexander hit him with a wrench. Alexander also ended his Tag Team with Caprice Coleman after Coleman prevented him from using it on War Machine.

    Tabletop Games 

    Video Games 
  • Wrenches are one of the first weapons you can pick up in 64th Street: A Detective Story. They're short in range and does average damage, slightly better than using fists.
  • Aftertime: One of the melee weapons you can wield in the game is a wrench. It takes somewhere around 7 or 8 hits to kill a zombie with it.
  • Back in 1995: Kent can wield a monkey wrench as a weapon against the monsters.
  • Banjo-Kazooie:
  • Pey'j's weapon of choice in Beyond Good & Evil. His wrench even comes with a secondary wire cutter function.
  • BioShock:
    • Since BioShock is a spiritual successor to the System Shock, it would naturally feature a wrench as the first available weapon. With the right Tonics and Plasmids, the wrench goes from a weak Emergency Weapon to the sole weapon you use. Tonics can boost the wrench's damage, swing speed, and even give it Life Drain, meaning you can run headlong into a group of enemies swinging wildly and come out with more health than you had to go in. There are also Tonics intended for stealthy players that give huge damage boosts to the wrench on enemies that aren't aware of your presence... except no stealth is required, since stunning an enemy with either Electro Bolt or Insect Swarm will make the game count them as not being aware of you.
    • A wrench identical to the one in the first game shows up in BioShock Infinite. Booker doesn't wield it, though; Elizabeth knocks him out with it when she finds out he's actually kidnapping her, not rescuing her. Ironically, Elizabeth is later beaten to death with a wrench in BioShock Infinite: Burial at Sea.
  • Bloody Zombies allows you to pick up heavy-duty pipe wrenches for breaking zombie skulls, as one of the game's more powerful melee weapons.
  • Dark Cloud 2 features Max using wrenches as his primary melee weapon from the beginning of the game. It can be upgraded to many different, more combat-designed wrenches, including Smash Wrench, Drill Wrench, and Poison Wrench.
  • The wrench is a basic weapon in Death Road to Canada. It's unbreakable, but doesn't deal that much damage and takes a not-insignificant amount of strength or fitness to swing multiple times.
  • Die Young features a variety of tools that double as weapons, among which is a simple monkey wrench providing the most balanced option of speed, stamina drain, and power.
  • Wrenches appear in all Fallout games after the second one, but are only used as weapons in Fallout 2, Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel and Fallout 4.
    • A typical wrench used by mechanics for hurting people.
    • In Fallout: New Vegas, a particular quest implies a wrench was used to murder an NCR Engineer for his outfit. Strangely, wrenches still aren't useable as weapons. You can use a lug wrench or a piece of piping but you can't use an adjustable wrench.
    • In Fallout 4, the pipe wrench is a fairly effective melee weapon at low to mid-levels, thanks to the weapon mod system, as it gains mods that not only boost its damage but also increase its chances of crippling a target or deal extra damage to limbs.
  • Mechanic Abella from Fear & Hunger: Termina starts off with a pipe wrench, and she can additionally toss it at enemies to stun them.
  • Cid uses wrenches as weapons in Final Fantasy IV. Hilariously, they're some of the strongest weapons in the game while he's in your party- even better than swords and karate.
  • Fullmetal Alchemist: Sonata of Memories: Winry is a party member in this game, and one possible animation for her normal attack shows her throwing a small spanner at the enemy. She sometimes does this even after getting a gun.
  • Grandia III: Yuki's starting weapon is "Silver Wrench", as he's introduced building his own plane. However, he's the main character, and since Heroes Prefer Swords, his model always shows him with a sword. Still, the wrench is the only weapon in the game with a unique icon, and it can be sold for some nice money.
  • Guild Wars 2's Engineer has the Tool Kit skill that replaces weapons with a wrench used to repair turrets and as a melee weapon, and the Heart of Thorns expansion adds the Scrapper elite specialization that allows the Engineer to use hammers and along with it two hammer skins in the shape of massive wrenches (that any other class that uses hammers can equip too).
  • Adrian Shephard in Half-Life: Opposing Force has one. It's stronger than Gordon Freeman's crowbar and can be raised to perform a highly-damaging alt-fire attack, but has an overall slower swing speed. He later obtains a combat knife, which lacks an alt-fire attack but is compensated by having a faster swing speed.
  • Heimerdinger from League of Legends; he doesn't whack minions and champions with his wrench though, he throws them.
  • Lexis in Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals has wrenches as a primary weapon.
  • Wrenches are used by Engineers in Makai Kingdom with the Tech Bash skill, and possibly as an acquirable weapon.
  • In Metal Max Xeno, Yokky is a mechanic, who has a giant wrench on his model, comes equipped with a weapon called "boomerwrench", and has a special attack called "spanner attack". He also uses his wrench for his defence stance.
  • Colonel Vark from Mighty Goose can assist you in combat by whacking enemies with his wrench.
  • One of the bosses in Mole Mania, the aptly-named "Mad Wrencher", uses wrenches as throwing weapons.
  • The Gremlins from Monster Hunter (PC) are armed with wrenches, which they use to whack the player unconscious.
  • Ninja Outbreak: The first weapon you can get in the game is a wrench. It can take out crawlers in two hits.
  • Hazel in One Step From Eden wields a wrench as big as her. With the Build loadout, her Mech Wrench gives structures Spell Power and shields, and in her Teardown loadout, her Dismantle Wrench destroys a structure to fully restore her mana. It can do some damage to enemies if you can reach them.
  • Principal Takashi Hanya in Persona 2: Innocent Sin uses a giant wrench as a melee weapon.
  • Yosuke in Persona 4 usually has dual daggers/kunai, but can pick up a pair of spanners if you revisit the liquor shop in the TV world. They're also a great weapon for that early in the game thanks to its high critical ratio.
  • In the original Prey (2006) Tommy's first weapon is a pipe wrench. It isn't all that strong, but still good for the occasional head-bashing of weaker creatures like Fodder.
    • The only real resemblance Prey (2017) has to the original Prey is the first weapon being a wrench. This loop-handled hunk of steel is much more powerful than it looks, and Morgan Yu can deal some real damage to even the stronger Typhons with the right neuromod investments.
  • Ratchet & Clank: Ratchet uses the Omniwrench, which he uses for its actual purpose too.
  • Led from Septerra Core uses oversized wrenches, not only as a blunt weapon but also to dismantle robotic enemies.
  • Tinker Knight from Shovel Knight can toss his spanner like a boomerang in his desperate attempt to defeat the player. Knock his hit-points down enough and he starts throwing fountains of spanners.
  • Sonic Frontiers: IN the "Final Horizon" DLC, Tails is throwing wrenches as his primary melee attack. He seems to have an infinite supply.
  • Wave from the Sonic Riders series has this as her level 2 attack in the original and as her only attack in Zero Gravity.
  • Gremlin Thwackers in Spiral Knights.
  • Suikoden:
    • Sergei, a recruitable Star of Destiny in Suikoden, is an inventor who can be put into the active party; his weapon is a Wrench, which can be enhanced into an Iron Wrench, then a Killer Wrench.
    • Wabon in Suikoden V is a cave dwarf involved with mine carts who similarly thinks to bring his Stone Wrench into battle; it enhances into an Iron Wrench, then a Steel Wrench.
  • Rocky Wrench from the Super Mario Bros. 3 airships and their subsequent appearances. Notably, when defeated in Paper Mario: Sticker Star, they sometimes drop a Wrench sticker that allows Mario to whack people with wrenches too.
  • Paprium have heavy wrenches available as weapons, which has short range but deals huge damage.
  • In Super Robot Wars, Super Robot Gunleon carries a number of these, ranging from ones that are appropriately scaled to fit in its hand like humans would to a normal wrench, to wrench nunchucks, to a massive crescent wrench almost as tall as it is. Naturally, these are used to bash or crush enemies, but the largest wrench will occasionally become an enormous crushing clamp... with a Pile Bunker situated at the joint of its jaws.
  • Syndrome: Your melee weapon in the game is a clamp-like wrench.
  • While the original System Shock did not feature a wrench melee weapon (the starting weapon was a lead pipe), its remake included one as a Call-Forward to the sequel.
  • System Shock 2 has a wrench as a weapon. On the harder difficulties, it's pretty much the best weapon available.
  • Weapon-girl in Super Catboy, being a Wrench Wench, carries a wrench as large as herself, and uses it to bash skulls in cutscenes.
  • Team Fortress 2: the default melee weapon of the Engineer. It is used for repairing, upgrading and hastening the construction of the Engineer's buildings. Other uses include hurting people - and the wrench is good at it, hitting critically often because Sentries do a lot of damage - especially removing Spies and their sappers from the Engineer's buildings. Then we get unlockable variants: the Southern Hospitality, a pipe wrench modified with a sharp piece of metal affixed to the top and a spiked knuckle guard, which causes the hit enemy to bleed at the cost of a 20% fire damage vulnerability; the Jag, which hastens building construction rate in conjunction with its faster swing speed, at the cost of a decreased building repair rate and reduced damage (more so against enemy buildings compared to players); and the Eureka Effect, which can teleport the Engineer back to spawn or his teleporter exit (and after the Meet Your Match Update, build teleporters at half cost) at the cost of half the construction speed and 20% less metal from ammo boxes and dispensers.
  • The Mechanic in Terraria can throw her wench like a boomerang at nearby enemies.
  • The Engineer in Torchlight 2 starts with a massive wrench and can find more of them optimized for their class-specific Whacking skills throughout the game.
  • Wheeljack uses Dual Wielding wrenches as his default melee weapon in Transformers: Devastation. Functionally, they're similar to dual-wielding swords but with slower attack speed.
  • In Trials of Mana, the animation for the Nightblade Ninja's "Deadly Weapon" skill has the Nightblade throwing a wrench at their enemy's head.
  • In Valkyria Chronicles II, the Armored Tech class carries an enormous wrench as a melee weapon and multipurpose tool.
  • In The Walking Dead: Michonne, the player has the option of murdering a captured Randall with a wrench rather than using him as a hostage in episode two. Doing so will graphicly demolish part of his head, although he still revives as a walker after.
  • Warframe has a deluxe skin for Hammer type weapons which reskins them into the Motherwrench, an enormous two-handed wrench commonly used as a maintenance tool by the Solaran debt-slaves. You can reskin the Wolf Sledge with it, allowing you to have a rocket-powered man-sized throwing wrench.
  • In Wasteland 2 NPC Angela Deth comes equipped with a wrench as a hand-to-hand weapon: it is very effective.
  • Watch_Dogs: The Bad Blood DLC has T-Bone make use of a large wrench as his melee weapon.
  • Watch Dogs: Legion: Recruited construction workers usually carry wrenches that they can use as their primary melee weapon and for knocking mooks out in stealth takedowns.

    Webcomics 
  • Lou, the Gadgeteer Genius plumber and handyman from Dead Winter naturally arms himself with not only a pipe wrench but sometimes even a plunger, usually even Dual Wielding them both. They show to be surprisingly effective combination in their own right.
  • Ed, from Fake Knight carries a wrench.
  • In Girl Genius:
    • Agatha clobbers Moloch, Vole and Prof.Tiktoffen with variety of wrenches. They're supposedly as good at breaking things as fixing them.
    • Gil whacks Othar.
    • Princess Zulenna is shown early on with a bent wrench after apparently having done this to a guard who was between the Castle Wulfenbach students and the lifegliders they wanted to use to get back to the main part of the castle.
  • In Skin Horse, Jonah sometimes tries to use his faithful companion Wrenchy as a weapon. It rarely works.
  • In the xkcd comic "Security", hypothetical bad guys who want access to someone's files figure that using a wrench for torture would be the mundane alternative to intensive hacking.

    Web Original 

    Western Animation 
  • In one episode of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Meatwad can be seen beating a homeless man to death with a monkey wrench.
  • In the Code Lyoko episode "Mister Puck", Yumi wields one against a possessed Jeremie taking Aelita hostage.
  • Dexter's Laboratory: Dexter, particularly in Ego Trip, uses a large wrench as a weapon.
  • George of the Jungle: Baron Otto Matic of the Tom Slick segment usually uses a wrench to hit his henchman Clutcher with. It's done so often that, when he creates an Irish alter ego to violate a ban, Clutcher says people will figure out it's him if he keeps doing itnote  and he reacts by using a different object to hit Clutcher with.
  • Space Ghost Coast to Coast: In "Flipmode", there's a whole confused thing with a wrench and whether or not it was, at some point, used to kill someone ("That's when you tried to fix the, uh, gas-leak... and you made it leak"), including pummeling Zorak and then treating it as a murder mystery. "Do NOT! DISTURB! THE JUDGE!"
  • Star Trek: Lower Decks: In "Terminal Provocations", Fletcher attacks the isolinear core with a wrench to make it let go of Mariner and Boimler, although he only does it because the alternative — reporting the incident as the two suggest — would mean taking responsibility, and he would rather have them to blame than do so.
  • Star Wars Resistance: In "The First Order Occupation", Synara knocks out two stormtroopers who nearly had Kaz cornered with a wrench from behind.
  • Transformers: Ratchet has been known to throw wrenches at those who intrude in his med-bay.
  • Wacky Races: In one occasion, Muttley covers his head with a bucket under the belief that Dick Dastardly will hit him bare-handed (if the gloves he wears don't count) as usual but Dastardly uses a wrench instead.

    Real Life 
  • Around the turn of the 20th century, many manufacturers such as Bemis & Call designed their monkey wrenches to include a hammerhead on the backside of the wrench. They were meant to be multi-purpose tools rather than being overly specialized. They fell out of favour for lighter designs.
    • Some modern designs fit the bill too, though due to ludicrous size and mass rather then having hammer heads. In particular, you can buy massive cast iron pipe wrenches that are 2-3 feet in length and well over 5 pounds, while tools designed for railroad service like air brake hose wrenches are the same length, forged steel, with some heavier models weighing in the neighborhood of 9 pounds.
  • Someone made a rather James Bond esque wrench.
  • Yes, someone has actually done this in real life.
  • In some circles, a large crescent wrench is called a "crescent hammer", for the obvious weight on the fixed side of the head. Also useful as an improvised weapon when readily available, like on a ship.


 
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Rocky Wrenches

These wretches called Rocky Wrenches attempt to drench Mario with wrenches to bench him.

How well does it match the trope?

4.67 (3 votes)

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Main / WrenchWhack

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