History Characters / RobotWarsSemiFinalists

* AnimalMotifs: Weevil.

* DropTheHammer: In Series 4, though it was never seen in action.

* JokeCharacter: The team's Series 1 entry Detonator returned in the Series 4 sideshow War of Independence tournament, where it was ''destroyed'' by its American opponent, [=frenZy=]. All of the other American robots had lost their first round battles against the other UK participants and it is widely believed that another robot was switched for Detonator at the last minute to ensure that an American robot made it to the second round.
* LethalJokeCharacter: Napalm looked like it was about to fall apart at any time, with a weapon that never did any damage, and yet still made a semi-final.
** JokeCharacter: To be completely honest, though, this was in the 2nd Wars when the standard of engineering was much lower and it only made the semis by a controversial judges decision (the result was booed by the audience) over Demolition Demon, a simple wedge with a few spikes on it. They only ever really entered an upgraded robot once, when they entered "Shadow of Napalm" in Series 4, but it didn't live up to expectations and after it was trashed by Dominator 2 they entered in Series 5 with Napalm II (confusingly just called "Napalm" again despite actually being a new machine), which was just a marginally upgraded version of their original Series 2 design painted black, leaving it ''appallingly'' outclassed. Although to be fair, they were never eliminated in the first round during any of the team's five appearances.

-->'''Jonathan Pearce''': ...[[TemptingFate so Firestorm]] [[LiteralGenie obliged]].[[note]]Actually, Pitbull was flipped by [[ScrappyMechanic the arena spike]], not Firestorm, and had looked to be well on top of the battle up to that point.[[/note]]

* ThirteenIsUnlucky: Was seeded 13th in Series 4, and was promptly eliminated by Thermidor 2 and Kronic the Wedgehog thanks to its flipper arm malfunctioning. Lampshaded by Philippa and the team afterwards.

* ExplosiveInstrumentation: Probably the only real example in the show's history. Early in Series 7 Heat Final battle against Raging Knightmare, Spawn Again flipped and the pneumatic ram cylinder literally ''[[https://youtu.be/O5y2cKHZKrA?t=589 exploded,]]'' blasting out the front of the machine in a spray of metal. Unsurprisingly they lost the battle.

* RewardingInactivity: Spawn Again rose from being seeded tenth in the Sixth Wars to being as high as the sixth seed in the Seventh Wars. This was not because of any improvement in the robot's performance, but simply because it was one of the few [[OldSoldier Old Soldiers]] left standing after Hypno-Disc, S3, Wild Thing, Dominator 2 and Razer all decided not to enter that year.
* TakeThat: From Series 4 up to about Series 6 the Scutterbot team wore backwards baseball caps, bandannas, sunglasses and affected "tough guy" personalities to take the piss out of the Plunderbird team. They eventually phased it out again once Plunderbird retired.

* AlwaysSomeoneBetter: One of the nine robots who fought in more than one UK championship and never failed to reach the semis. In ''three'' out of their four attempts they were eventually stopped in the first round of the semis by the ''current reigning champion'' (Panic Attack in Series 3, Chaos 2 in Series 5 and Razer in Series 6). The one time they didn't was in Series 4, when they reached the second round, only to face the Series 3 runner-up instead- ''Hypno-Disc!'' In the main series at least, they never lost to anything but the best.[[note]]That said, the reason they have 6 main series defeats on their record is due to falling into the losers' melees in both the 5th and 6th Wars- in the 5th Wars they survived but lost the judges' decision to S3, in the 6th the pit was opened underneath them by Dantomkia and they sank to their doom.[[/note]]

** This was Wild Thing's entire schtick, actually- they were ''incredibly'' tenacious, with seemingly bottomless batteries and internal engineering that never let them down. It was a recurring theme of their battles that they'd start out getting knocked around by more powerful robots (most notably 259 in Series 6) but would keep coming back for more again and again, still going strong and hurling themselves back at their opponents even when their enemy was starting to run out of steam, meaning they almost always finished strongly. The only times they were EVER immobilised were in Series 3 when the original Thing (which had no srimech) was flipped by Panic Attack, and in Extreme when Firestorm flipped them when they already had their lifting arm raised, getting stuck on it at an awkward angle that wouldn't let them self-right.

* HeroicSecondWind: Wild Thing's trademark; as mentioned in the {{Determinator}} entry it often started off a fight on the back foot, but would always still be running at close to full power by the end of the battle, while most opponents would be starting to slow down, letting Wild Thing shove them around and overwhelm them. It was often a case of whether the work they got done in the second half of the battle was enough to make up for the beating they took in the first half.

After making their ''Robot Wars'' debut in Series 3 as the first competitor in the Pinball Warrior tournament, the Dominator team gave the ailing axe bot concept a shot in the arm with their powerful, long-hafted piercing weapon and the sleek, angular, heavily-armoured machine that carried it. Consistant competitors during the show's middle years, they were another team who never failed to win their heat across multiple entries, going out in the second round of the semifinals in Series 4, 5 and 6. Unfortunately a broken baseplate caused them to miss Series 7 and they failed to return for the reboot, leaving them the most successful robot to never actually win any kind of award or trophy.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Was supposed to have entered Series 7 but dropped out at the last minute (in fact so last minute that the robot had been seeded and still appeared in some promotional material) due to the base breaking.

* TheBusCameBack: Thermidor 2 was confirmed to be returning for Series 8 by WebVideo/StuartAshen, who's the cousin of team member Ian Harvey. The official contestant list indeed confirms Thermidor 2's return.

* NoSell: What tends to be forgotten about the Splinter v Hypno-Disc was that, for the first thirty seconds or so, ''Splinter was actually winning''. Its front-mounted scoop was able to deflect Hypno-Disc's blows like they were nothing, allowing Splinter to shove Hypno-Disc around... then Hypno-Disc hit it at just the right angle and ''[[OhCrap tore the scoop clean off]]''. [[CurbStompBattle What happened next is history]].

* PropheticName: Well, it certainly was [[IncrediblyLamePun “Splintered”]].

* BestServedCold: After Sir Killalot destroyed Wheely Big Cheese's predecessor, The Big Cheese, its builder designed this robot specifically to flip over Killalot, armed with a reported 800 kg of throwing power. Sadly, while it got the chance when Killalot drove up its flipper in its Series 4 melee, it failed to avenge The Big Cheese.

--> '''Roger Plant:''' Well, we re-read the rules you see, and it said in there that flying robots are allowed.
* OvershadowedByAwesome: The Big Cheese; while Wheely Big Cheese did better (reaching 2 semifinals) and was famous for its incredible flipping power, it's easy to forget that Roger Plant's 3rd Wars entry was the most powerful electric lifter ''ever'' seen on ''Robot Wars'' (it famously picked Sgt. Bash up ''completely'' off the arena floor and ''shook him to pieces'') and the only reason it ''didn't'' reach a semifinal was that it came up against eventual series champions Chaos 2 at the end of its heat, in what was later voted the single best battle in all of Series 3.

* SingleStrokeBattle: Its battle against Axe-Awe is the most famous example in Robot Wars history. At the start of the battle Axe-Awe got in a single axe blow, which did nothing, and Wheely Big Cheese then slid underneath it and hurled it over the arena wall ''from fifteen feet away''.

Series 5 mainly saw a consolidation of the competitive scene, with only one robot making their first appearance in the semifinals (aside from eventual champions Razer, who had finally sorted out the bugs). The 1 Law Associates team (named after [[ThreeLawsCompliant Asimov's 3 Laws]]) had competed in Series 2 and 3 with the unimpressive Sting, a robot they admitted had only been made to qualify rather than seriously have a chance of winning, but once they got serious the arrival of S3 saw one of the biggest [[TookALevelInBadass upgrades in power]] ever seen, being the first truly effective vertical spinner, capable of ripping chunks out of its opposition. However, after 2 consecutive semifinal appearances the team could no longer afford the time and money required to keep the machine in fighting shape and decided to quit while they were ahead.

* MeaningfulName: The peculiar name comes from the names of the team captain’s kids, Daniel, Thomas & Kiara.

** Heavy Metal's weak points were its large metal wheels, covered in numerous rubber studs to gain traction. The studs invariably flew off all over the place and lowered the machine's grip, and Concussion immobilized it by tearing one off and throwing it out of the arena.

* LongRunner: An oft-forgotten fact is that Team 13 are one of the oldest teams in the competition, albeit not as prolific as some like Behemoth. Captain John Denny first fought in Series ''2'' with Limpet (which admittedly was a completely forgettable robot that fell in the trials) and after a successful run with 13 Black, they're back in the rebooted Series 9 with Heavy Metal.

* SpectacularSpinning: 2 large spinning flywheels in fact, one as a roulette wheel, the other with just the number 13 written on it. It was generally considered the second-best horizontal flywheel bot after Hypno-Disc. It could also spin on its axis to turn into a full-bodied spinner.

* FountainOfExpies: Chaos 2 may have popularised the high-pressure rear-hinged flipper as the most popular weapon in UK robot combat and Spawn Again may have been the robot that debuted the full-body flipping ramp, but Gravity was the robot that ''perfected'' the design that would be dominant on the UK live circuit for the next decade and a half. Series 8 champion Apollo and Series 10 champion Eruption can both trace their lineage almost directly back to Gravity and its distinctive tapered wedge shape, as can other notable competitors like [=TR2=].

* ConclusionInAnotherMedium: The team were working on a Dominator 3, but the show was cancelled before it was finished and as a result Dominator 3 would only be seen at live events.

* TheResolutionWillNotBeTelevised: The team were working on a Dominator 3, but the show was cancelled before it was finished and as a result Dominator 3 would only be seen at live events.

* MeaningfulName[=/=]PropheticName: Well, it certainly was [[IncrediblyLamePun “Splintered”]].

-->'''Jonathan Pearce:''' Go on then, throw Killalot! You can't, you can't!

* LongRunner: Another one of the elite few robots to fight in both the 2nd and 7th Wars (although it took Series 6 off), and one of even fewer to have fought in the reboot. In 2018 it was rebuilt to take part in [=RoboGames=] in America and joins Behemoth in the elite group of robots that have been competing with the same name and basic design for ''20 years''.

* AwesomeMcCoolname: Seriously, “Raging Knightmare”?!

* BornLucky: Won the Robotic Soccer Championship, despite not scoring a single goal.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Could’ve done well in its Series 4 heat, had the team captain [[WhatAnIdiot remembered to charge the batteries]].

* AnAxeToGrind: One of the most deadly in the early series.

* AnAxeToGrind: Although it only really saw use in its first battle.
* BornLucky: Trident reached the semi-finals not through skill, but through its opponents putting up ''even less'' of a fight than it did. Twn Trwn broke down at the slightest touch, Victor 2 was a poor robot with weak weaponry that sealed its own demise by getting stuck on the edge of the pit, and [[TheAllegedCar Dreadnaut]] [[RunningGag predictably]] broke down without Trident doing any real damage to it. Its luck ran out big-time after that, as it was drawn against Chaos 2 in the semi-finals and swiftly dispatched.

* AnAxeToGrind: One of the most powerful in the whole show.

* AnAxeToGrind: When Splinter was rebuilt after its encounter with Hypno-Disc (see NoHoldsBarredBeatdown below), the team added an axe to coincide with the grabbing arms.

* AnAxeToGrind: The team's Series 8 entry, Bonk.

* BornLucky: Survived their opening melee fight barely, with the other qualifier doing most of the work, beat Behemoth because it got stuck in forward gear in a freak accident,[[note]]Admittedly an accident Mute was unintentionally responsible for[[/note]] and after being dominated for a whole battle by Judge Shred 3, it got one flip in, which caused it to also break down. Its luck ran out in the Semi-Finals, when it was thrown out of the arena by Firestorm.

* AnAxeToGrind: Not a great one, but Iron-Awe is notable for being the first robot ever to self-right using an axe (in their 4th Wars battle against Steg 2), which was quite a surprise at the time.
** By Series 7 the axe was actually pretty damn good- with Dominator 2 and Terrorhurtz both being forced to withdraw from the series it was probably the strongest axe left in the warzone, almost approaching the level of Shunt's mighty chopper, as seen when it won the Axe Attack special event of that series. Ironically, it still ended up being [[OvershadowedByAwesome overshadowed]] by the flipper they'd initially added to the robot as a secondary weapon, which ended up flipping out ''Bigger Brother!''

* BringMyBrownPants: Only ''just'' [[AvertedTrope averted]] during their explosive win over Apex, as stated by team member Dan:
-->'''Dan:''' If that bar came this way, I'd need a change of trousers!

GadgeteerGenius Roger Plant first fought in Series 2 with an innovative machine called The Mule (which managed to win the Best Engineered trophy), then returned to Series 3 with the awesome electric lifter The Big Cheese, but after losing the single-best battle in the series against eventual champions Chaos 2 in the heat final, he decided to one-up George Francis with the biggest flipper robot combat has ever seen. Wheely Big Cheese was a flipper taken UpToEleven, nothing but a giant wedge-shaped titanium flipping jaw carried around on giant wheels. While unbelievably powerful, its impracticality meant it was often lucky to win through, but it still entered into legend for a single flip in Series 5 which to this day has ''still'' possibly never been equaled for height and distance.

* UpToEleven: Do you like flippers? Do you like wedges? How about a robot that's all wedge, a wedge that that splits open like a mouth revealing it's all one huge invertible flipper? One that can fling other robots [[PunchedAcrossTheRoom clear across]] or ''out of the arena?'' Or even both?

* FragileSpeedster: The Series 6 version took this UpToEleven: after its powerful vertical disc broke, the team adapted the robot and replaced the disc with a large tyre, allowing it to move at an alleged top speed of ''70mph'', making it the fastest robot in the show's history. However, its weak aluminium armour meant it was easily beaten by Terrorhurtz.

* MurphysLaw: Quoted verbatim by team captain Kevin Pritchard after they were eliminated in round 1 of their Series 4 heat because he'd chosen a set of batteries that hadn't been charged.

* AndNowForSomethingCompletelyDifferent: All the team's robots were markedly different. Scrapper was a boxy machine armed with multiple circular saws, G.B.H. was a dome-shaped MightyGlacier whose rear saws were secondary to its immense pushing power, Facet was a wedge-shaped FragileSpeedster with a pneumatic flipper and a ''ludicrously'' high top speed, and G.B.H. 2 was a box-wedge with front and rear flippers that was painted to resemble a racing car.

* SomethingCompletelyDifferent: The team entered four robots, all of which were completely different and unusual; the omni-directional Tri-Terra-Bot, Mousetrap, Mutant Mousetrap (about which we only really know that it had a spinning drum) and the clusterbot Black & Blue.

* AndNowForSomethingCompletelyDifferent: Has been completely rebuilt for every series it's entered, with the only constants being the yellow-and-black paint scheme and some sort of spinning weapon. Averted as of Series 10, as they appear to have kept the Series 9 design with a few upgrades.

The original [[YouMakeMeSic "Thermador"]] was just one of countless weak [[AnimalMotifs animal-themed]] robots to enter into Series 3, and was quickly dispatched like most of the rest. Returning in Series 4, they'd taken a cue from Chaos 2 and mounted a powerful flipper on their front between the increasingly-ornamental claw weapons, showing a surprising amount of power that was capable of hurling robots clean into the air in a manner comparable to the champion themselves! After their first run to the semifinals, the team suffered from a slump for the next 2 series, before coming back strong in the more open field of Series 7. They were also surprise returnees in the reboot Series 8.

* YouMakeMeSic: The team originally mis-spelled the name as "Thermador" in Series 3, until a French-speaking member of the production crew pointed out the mistake.

* MeaningfulName: Named after the French lobster dish of the same name.