Useful Notes / Capoeira

Zum, zum, zum, capoeira mata um.

"Capoeira is breathtaking, but it is also breathgiving."

— Jairo, Bob's Burgers

Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian martial art which combines fighting with performance art. It's a very recognizable style with its emphasis on acrobatics, attacks from the ground, feints, and spinning kicks, frequently all at the same time. Dating back at least to the 18th century, the art spread first throughout Brazil, from poor blacks to wealthier classes, and throughout the world in the latter part of the 20th century. Practitioners are called capoeiristas.

Its origins are hazy and debated, but it emerged as a fighting style among Africans enslaved by the Portuguese in Brazil. According to legend, the elements of dance existed partly so that the slaves could mask it as a cultural activity unrelated to fighting, while the kicks and leg sweeps would have been emphasized so slaves could fight with their hands chained. It evolved to be a favored fighting style among criminals, and at various times in Brazilian history, it has been declared illegal to practice. As a result, much of the known history is based on stories and legends.

Capoeira is substantially different in execution to most other martial arts, to the point some believe it would be fitter to call it an "art" without any adjective. Its way to spar is the roda, a circle formed by practitioners singing and playing music at the head (called the bateria ("drum kit"), where the goal is not destroying the opponent, but rather having the most awesome exhibition of skill possible at the music's beat. There is certainly an element of making the opponent look worse than you, which can involve striking, tripping and countering, but this is generally done in a hit-and-run way rather than an all-out exchange; there is no true way to "win" or "lose", and the interaction is more akin to a dialogue than a fight. Only some groups endorse beating the crap out of each other, and even they stress the importance of the dancing and acrobatic aspects, which are as important in capoeira as the martial side.

Capoeira as practiced today stems primarily from two schools created in the early 20th century, Regional and Angola, but there have been more styles.

• Capoeira Regional: a school founded in 1932 by Mestre Bimba, a Bahiano who sought to make capoeira a recognized martial art without forgetting about its ritual and music aspects. His style is highly dynamic and vigorous, incorporating acrobatics, risky sequences, and some moves from other martial arts. This is the most popular and internationalized form of capoeira by a wide margin, as well as the one usually featured in films, series and videogames, being combative and exotic at the same time. It was also the school that introduced the art's signature white pants and rope belt system, as well as possibly being the main influence in the de-criminalization of capoeira.
• Capoeira Angola: a school founded by Mestre Pastinha in 1941. Its creator desired to keep closer to the art's spiritual roots, and as such his style is more complex and subdued, almost esoteric. Capoeira here is played very slowly and in controlled, harmonious movements close to the ground, generally ditching all-out acrobatics and direct attacks in favor of very strategic interactions. This style is usually practiced by very hardcore fans of the art.
• Capoeira Carioca: the "other" school, an obscure one that actually predated the previous two, established by Mestre Sinhozinho in 1930. Sinhozinho, a wrestler and capoeirista based in Rio de Janeiro, sought to maximize the art's martial effectiveness to the highest degree, and therefore he dropped all the music and dance and fully integrated boxing and grappling, which made his style more of a Mixed Martial Arts form than a true capoeira style. It was a very personal school, though, and it disappeared when Sinhozinho died, with his main apprentices going to become judokas and athletes.
• Capoeira Contemporanea: this is a term for many modern schools which aren't affiliated to Regional or Angola, or which branched off from them and became their own thing. Most of them employ a style basically similar to that used in Regional, but their independence leaves space for frequently unorthodox variations. Some of the most well known schools that are considered this are Grupo Senzala, Grupo Axe Capoeira, Grupo Capoeira Brasil, Grupo Candeias, Senzala de Santos, Cordão de Ouro and ABADÁ.
• Capoeira Estilizada: another obscure school founded by Mestre Carlos Senna in 1955 after a falling out with Mestre Bimba. Also known as Capoeira Senavox, it was for a time considered the "third" school of capoeira alongside Regional and Angola. It introduced the regular use of the abadá as uniforms for capoeiristas, the salve greeting that begins and ends capoeira sessions, a ranking system that uses coloured fita (tape-like string that is tied around one’s waist), its own system of classification and rules for competition. Senna's style was described as a more "stylized" version of capoeira compared to the other main two, with a military-like rigidness on its training and rodas that appealed to the Brazilian armed forces and sympathizers to the Brazilian Military Regime in the 1960s and 70s and there were even thoughts and designs to truly "sportify" it, but once the legitimacy of the regime eroded, so did his style's popularity and relevance with it. Today it lives on through some of Senna's students like his son Yoji Senna, but they seem to have let go of the rigidness that distinguished the style before.

Tropes associated with capoeira

• Action Girl: Though not in a mainstream way, capoeira had female practitioners since ancient times. For example, Mestre Bimba's mother was described as lethal with the legs.
• Armed Legs: A common misrepresentation is that some early capoeiristas performed with razor blades held between their toes as a hidden weapon. In actuality, razors were used, but generally in the user's hands. There are videos on YouTube showing people playing with razors held in their feet, but these games are very slow and cautious.
• Arsenal Attire: Back in the old times, some capoeiristas were smart enough to conceal knives in their hats and play while wearing them, as random stabbings in street rodas weren't unheard. More interestingly, the berimbau instrument could be used to conceal knives inside and even to turn into a weapon by attaching a blade to its tip; there were also Sword Canes called tira-teima; and Mestre Bimba himself was said to own an umbrella equipped with hidden blades.
• Artistic License – Martial Arts: Even although capoeira is a popular martial art in media, it rarely gets portrayed in a accurate way. Chances are that if a work is going to feature capoeira, it inevitably will show only the most difficult and flippy moves (the classic handstand tornado kick, based in the pião de mão, is pretty much ubiquitous despite barely existing in real life, as well as some backflips and even breakdance moves thrown to the mix) and it will make it seem that capoeira is just composed of those. Part of the fault goes to authors like Ikki Kajiwara, who wrongly believed that capoeira was entirely fought in handstand position and lacked arm techniques for that reason.
• Awesome, but Impractical: How it is seen among many people, at least those who don't see it as Difficult, but Awesome. In actuality, capoeira leans towards the latter, being a legitimately versatile fighting style, but it does require an unusually long time and large amount of dedicated effort to master compared with other martial arts.
• Beat Them at Their Own Game: Hélio Vigio, an apprentice of the submission-specialized Gracie Jiu Jitsu academy, was submitted by the capoeirista Adão in a vale tudo match. As dictated by the opportunistic nature of capoeira, Adão saw his chance in a takedown by Vigio and caught him in a guillotine choke, which was strong enough to make the guy tap out.
• Combat Pragmatist: Justified, as the art was largely trained in the streets. Capoeiristas outside the roda or other sanctioned fights can easily become this with techniques like telefone ("telephone"), in which you clap your hands on either of the opponent's ears to disorient them and potentially permanently ruin their hearing, or arpão de cabeça ("head spear"), in which you throw your whole body into a headbutt aimed at the enemy's head, chest, or groin. When in the roda never accept if the other person offers you a "blessing". Just to elaborate, the Blessing (or, in Portuguese, "benção") is an unbalancing pushing kick that is one of the most basic (and effective) moves in capoeira.
• Confusion Fu: Part being constantly in motion and the dance-like movement is to make you hard to predict. Unlike monkey kung fu or Drunken Boxing, which utilize feints and fakes to set up the real attacks, capoeira's feints are actually its very attacking dynamics in disguise, taking advantage less on the freaking out effect of the hits and more on the ability to charge a torqued strike while preventing the opponent from realizing it is actually an attack until it's too late.
• Dance Battler: Capoeira is pretty much the go-to example of this trope in real life, as the art was designed to disguise battle techniques behind flashy movements (that may or may not have inspired breakdancing, no less). Furthermore, a traditional sparring circle, called a roda ("circle"), is performed to music and is as much about looking impressive and showing off how clever you are as it is about landing blows. More often than not, it's not even about landing blows so much as it is about showing what you've learned and having a good time, though some groups will want to be sure that you do land (and receive) some blows.
• Dangerous Forbidden Technique: An obscure capoeira style was taught by Mestre Sinhozinho in the 1920s, and it was called Capoeira Carioca. It worked without music and involved a heavy emphasis in street fighting, with weapons training and krav maga-like hand techniques. Traditional capoeiristas deemed it as brutal and immoral, and as unfortunately Sinhozinho never created a teaching system, his capoeira was lost when he died. However, Mestre Bimba was smart enough to integrate some of its techniques in his own style after seeing two of his students being schooled by Carioca alumns, so Sinhozinho's style is not completely forgotten.
• Deadly Graduation: Downplayed (but not very much). During the Regional graduation ceremonies, newly graduated students were awarded with a medal pinned on their shirt and were obliged to play a tira-medalha, a roda in which they fought more experimented players who would try to rip off their medals. In this game everything would be allowed, from hand strikes to throws, and if the veterans managed to rip off your medal, you would be degraded and returned to rookie state, which is considered something shameful.
• Devious Daggers: In old times, capoeiristas used to carry knives and straight razors, as stabbings in street rodas were a real possibility. Mestre Pastinha was said to never forget his knife when going to play.
• Disguised in Drag: An interesting strategy, used back when capoeira was forbidden in Brazil, involved several capoeiristas disguised as women standing around the rodas to act as camouflaged watchmen. If their pals didn't evacuate the roda in time, they sometimes even pretended to plead with the soldiers to attack them off guard.
• Dueling Dojos: In a place like Brazil, this was somewhat common, and capoeira was not an exception.
  • Averted with Mestre Bimba and Pastinha's schools, which were mostly friendly to each other. It's said, however, that this friendship was a tense one, and that Bimba secretly instructed his students to beat up Pastinha's ones during shared rodas.
  • Until the popularization of judo in Brazil (the future Brazilian jiu-jitsu), capoeira fighters were the toughest guys on the vale tudo rings, and in fact it used to be a "rite of passage" for a jiu-jitsu guy to defeat a capoeirista in order to be considered a dangerous fighter. When further adaptation by the BJJ rendered capoeira obsolete for the rings, the luta livre inherited the torch (see Odd Friendship below).
  • Even today, though not to the extent of the early 20th century, there is some friction between some capoeira groups which differ in philosophy or techniques.
• Escalating Brawl: A legendary one happened in 1917 at the Rio de Janeiro location of Curva Grande when a military police squad tried to arrest a full roda of capoeiristas. As soon as the police sergeant drew his gun, he was disarmed by one of the fighters and a monumental brawl broke on the place. Both sides received reinforcements when the fight attracted more police forces and thugs, and the place soon become a battlefield truly a la The Raid Redemption, with the additional similarity that some of the policemen were capoeiristas as well. At the end, according to sources, the battle (which was called "O Barulho" or "the great brawl") ended with destroyed urban furniture and dozens of dead people.
• Extremity Extremist: The basic dozen or so kicks are pretty much always the first thing new students will learn, and probably 70% of the attacks in the roda are kicks. Takedowns account for another 20% or so, and the remaining 10% is left to acrobatics and feints. Hand strikes are usually reserved for illustrating to your opponent that they're conspicuously dropping their guard. Elbow strikes and full-force takedowns are generally reserved to more experienced practitioners, but can become fairly frequent in games between skilled capoeiristas.
• Genius Bruiser: Cisnando Lima, who helped Mestre Bimba to found his capoeira academy and get it legalized, was a renowned psychiatrist. He was just a puny medical student when he met Bimba, so the mestre naturally thought of him as unsuitable to master the art, but Lima turned out to be a hardworking apprentice and ended reaching the rank of contra-mestre later in his life. He was also an avid practitioner of other arts, and also learned primitive Brazilian jiu-jitsu from a Mitsuyo Maeda colleague.
• Handicapped Badass:
  • During the era of the challenges to capoeiristas by the Gracie family, the matches (originally of the vale tudo kind) were always stipulated with some restrictive rules against the capoeira practitioners: they had to wear a gi top and could only kick, without striking with the arms or any other body part. Still, some of them led the jiu-jitsu fighters to stalemates and draws.
  • And for a literal example there is this guy who, well, demonstrates that humans have no limits.
• Heroes Fight Barehanded: Historically averted. While Mestre Bimba believed a good capoeirista did not need weapons, he knew it was useful to know how to use them. He taught the use of all kind of weapons, like machete, long knife, straight razor, scythe, club, stick, chanfolo (double-edged dagger) and disguised weapons, and also taught how to disarm an opponent. However, it's not currently part of the mainstream curriculum, and is usually only taught as a curiosity.
• Iconic Outfit: A telltale implication for a capoeirista is rainha sneakers, as these are most commonly worn by practitioners.
• Initiation Ceremony: In capoeira regional, a new student had to pass an entry test in which he was put in a guillotine choke or neck crank by an experimented member for three minutes. If he resisted without complaining or tapping out, he was accepted. Intuitively, Bimba ended changing this test for a more mundane one, in which the student simply had to do some body positions to see how flexible he was.
• It Will Never Catch On: Back when Only the Strong came out, a film critic called capoeira "the lambada of martial arts". While it's still not a mainstream art, Capoeira is now much more well-known, appearing in many films and shows.
• Kung-Fu Clairvoyance: Despite the many flips and acrobatics, a capoeirista is instructed to never take his eyes from his opponent(s) and maintain the situational awareness at his maximum, all while doing its complicated moves. True capoeira is not called one of the most difficult martial arts for nothing.
• Machete Mayhem: Old capoeira school taught armed combat, in which the main weapon was the facão or machete.
• Martial Pacifist: According to Mestre Bimba, "The best way of self-defense is not getting into fights at all". Facing off in the roda is referred to as "playing" rather than "fighting", and it is always the duty of a more skilled player to look out for the safety of the less skilled opponent.
• Mood Motif: The music played during the roda determines how the game is played. Slower music results in a slower, more strategic game, typically with a lot of ground fighting, close fighting, and elaborate reversals. Faster music results in a more acrobatic and high-flying match and usually involves more distance so as to not harm your partner.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Usually inverted; apelidos, or nicknames given to capoeiristas, tend to be unimpressive or just plain silly sounding, as they always came from a physical characteristic, a habit or any remarkable element of the person. However, this is not obstacle for the nicknamed to be real badasses. Perhaps the most known example of this inversion was the capoeirista Passarito (literally, "little bird"), real name Wilson Oliveira, who had a legendary feud with Carlson Gracie, and who some sources say as well to be a judo, boxing and/or wrestling champion.
• Newer Than They Think: Although all kinds of lofty claims about capoeira's origin and development float about, most solid historical evidence stems from the late 19th/early 20th century at the earliest. Granted, capoeira was already fairly well established at that time, but how it came to be is likely a Riddle for the Ages.
• Odd Friendship: In the old vale tudo scene, capoeira was commonly associated with Brazilian luta livre, to the point that most of the greatest lutadores (Roberto Leitao, Flavio Molina, Euclides Pereira, Eugenio Tadeu and Marco Ruas, among others) were capoeiristas as well. This was mostly due to an Enemy Mine situation against the jiu-jitsu boom in Brazil, along with the luta livre's eagerness to assimilate new styles like capoeira and muay thai.
  • However, there was a surprising exception in the famous Mestre Neyder, who was close friends with Carlson Gracie of all people. If you know about MMA history, you will know how freaking odd was a friendship between a Gracie and a capoeirista at the time.
• Old Master: Some of the founding mestres are still around and at the age of 70-80, they're still happily flipping around the roda and schooling students at the promotion ceremonies.
• One-Hit Kill: Mestre Bimba once defeated fellow martial artist Henrique Bahia with a single, devastating kick to the chest. He was also known as "Tres Pancadas" ("Three Hits") because that was how many he needed to knock out his opponents. It can be argued that the motions of capoeira itself are oriented to confuse the opponent in order to land knockout kicks or sweeps, as opposed to other striking arts.
• One-Man Army: Capoeira was conceived to fight in extreme conditions, as evidenced in its emphasis on moving unceasingly and using wide attacks. There are stories about capoeiristas who fought overwhelming numbers of opponents at once, and while many of them are probably exaggerated, some have historical records.
  • A bohemian capoeirista named Madame Satã was said in police reports to have once battled twenty-four policemen in a street brawl, hospitalizing seven of them and forcing the rest to fly away.
  • Mestre Bimba has another crazy story about his badassery. Supposedly, he was once ambushed in the streets by six policemen armed with sabers and led by a crooked policeman (who lost a bet because Mestre Bimba beat the guy he betted on), who also carried a gun. Bimba then disarmed and knocked all them out, dumped the gunman into a nearby garbage container, and finally left in the streetcar, all without losing his straw hat.
• Radial Asskicking: Capoeira has some of the most complex full body evasion mechanics in the martial arts world, and with the proper application, it can turn a many-on-one scenario into a cleaner series of one-on-one fights simply by moving the body to the correct position to prevent opponents from surrounding the practitioner. The unpredictability factor thrown in also can make the opponents to fall in a forced Mook Chivalry, as they have it difficult to anticipate which of the strange moves the capoeirista is directed to them individually.
• Roundhouse Kick: The style actually focuses more on the less practical full spin roundhouses, especially to chain spinning kicks, but the shorter arc ones are also used. Unlike taekwondo and other kick-based arts, in capoeira, emphasis is made in not losing contact with the ground (either by a foot or a hand) while kicking, and thus jumping kicks are rare. Unless, of course, they're showing off.
• Rule of Cool: The roda where capoeiristas play is not so much about beating your opponent as both practicing and showing off your own techniques as well as giving the opponent opportunity to show his own. Also, did we mention that it looks really impressive?
• Scarf of Asskicking: Street capoeiristas used to wear esguiãos de seda or silk scarves around their necks as a way to add some protection against razor cut attacks to the throat. It became a sign of rank in established schools after the legalization.
• Spectacular Spinning: Multiple spinning kicks are frequently linked together, building up momentum and, again, looking impressive. The spinning kick exchanges may also be used by one player to lull the other into a false sense of security before dumping him or her on his butt with a sudden sweep. All part of the fun of the game.
• Stone Wall: Back when capoeiristas fought jiu-jitsu fighters in vale tudo, holding down and stall was their main tactic on the ground, as capoeira did not have groundfighting methods and the jiu-jitsu fighters at the time were not skilled enough in ground and pound to bypass their submission defense. Even the original Gracie brothers, George and Carlos, were often led to draws by those tactics. However, after vale tudo advanced over the time, it was relegated to the past.
• Technical Pacifist: As said in Martial Pacifist above, rodas are focused in showing skill instead of beating the opponent, which is the reason they are rodas and not fights. However, the martial connotations of the art are always present, and the grade of "aliveness" of the techniques can vary between modern groups. Some of the more martial-oriented ones, like Muzenza and Topázio, can host especially violent rodas.
• Use Your Head: A fairly standard move. Unlike most martial arts, headbutts are almost always done with the top of the head in a spearing movement.
• With My Hands Tied: According to legend, capoeira was developed to fight effectively while handcuffed or in shackles, and this is the reason that it has so many techniques which involve the lower body and can be performed without separating the hands.
• The Worf Effect: A challenge between capoeira and Brazilian jiu-jitsu in 1953 ended with both sides being worfed with a surprising defeat, when Carlson Gracie destroyed Cirandinha with mounted punches and Mestre Sinhozinho apprentice Rudolf Hermanny demolished Carlson's teammate Guanair Gomes.

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Examples of capoeira in fiction:

Anime and Manga

• L in Death Note, as well as the Action Girl who taught him in the manga, Naomi Misora. Actually, the capoeira element was accidental, as Takeshi Obata did not know it when he created the character. It was the fandom who identified a particularly twisty kick which L throws in the anime as capoeira, and Obata was happy to make it Ascended Fanon (yes, that single kick is all the capoeira L shows in the anime).
• Oddtaxi: Shirakawa is a capoeirista, as demonstrated in a now-memetic scene. It becomes a Chekovs Gag in the finale, when she kicks a door through to rescue a drowning Odokawa.
• Kilik Lunge from Soul Eater has a pair of Weapons named Pot of Fire and Pot of Thunder that practice capoeira.
• Fabiola Iglesias in Black Lagoon uses it in conjunction with gunplay.
• Mugen of Samurai Champloo uses this on top of the rest of his anachronistic character.
• In Tsubasa -RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE-, Syaoran's kicking based fighting style (taught by Seishiro) is very clearly influenced by capoeira, even featuring distinctive moves like negativas and martelos do chao. Same can be said of Fei's fighting style, as seen in his gracile kicks and twists.
• Drossel from Fireball practices capoeira, even though she insists it's karate.
• Kenichi: The Mightiest Disciple features a team of capoeiristas.
• In Tenjho Tenge, Bob Makihara uses capoeira.
• Kayna from Battle Angel Alita also uses it as her fighting style.
• Some fighting styles from Naruto strongly resemble capoeira. The most notable is Rock Lee, who uses kick combos and handstand kicking with frequency. Also Sasuke uses some capoeira-like kicks early in the series, as does the anime original character Chen.
• Shows up in All Rounder Meguru, when a capoeirista from Brazil suddenly joins the All Japan Shooto Championship and becomes Maki's first opponent in the tournament.
• The manga, Batuque, is about a young girl's journey to personal freedom through learning Capoeira from a seemingly homeless man in the park.
• Booty Royale: Never Go Down Without a Fight!: Recurring porn star Goujima Sara learned capoeira from a Brazilian mestre, Alexandro Velasquez, and uses it in a fight against protagonist Haebaru Misora, who practices traditional Okinawan karate. Mestre Velasquez makes an appearance in the Tournament Arc, and his sister Emmanuella is an entrant in D-bracket, though she loses her opening bout to kenpo practitioner Umezawa Mayu.

Comic Books

• Captain America's fighting style is mentioned to be based in capoeira, among many other arts.
• Batman has mastered all forms of belligerent discipline known to man, so it's safe to assume capoeira is among them.
• The Guardians of Kandrakar in W.I.T.C.H. learned the basics in the New Power arc as part of their attuning to the titular power-up.

Fan Works

• In Amazing Fantasy, Izuku makes use of whirlwind kicks and on-the-ground acrobatics akin to capoeira during his brawl with Bakugou.
• Rocketship Voyager. Brazilian-Venusian B'Elanna Torres is introduced using her Capoeira skills to advantage during a brawl in zero-gravity. She later tells Tom Paris she learned the martial art while studying at the University of San Paulo, and demonstrated it to her Disappeared Dad when she finally caught up with him.

Films

• Only the Strong, generally the movie most U.S. capoeiristas cite as their introduction to capoeira. The actual performance of capoeira in the film has become pretty questionable, but it is nonetheless considered the gateway to its popular knowledge along with Eddy Gordo.
• In The Batman (2022), Selina Kyle/Catwoman uses capoeira in conjunction with taekwondo in her fight with Batman, but is quickly subdued after she telegraphs her attack from jumping off a wall.
• The natives in The Rundown employ capoeira in their fight against Dwayne Johnson.
• In Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the attackers in the graveyard use several capoeira techniques in their hit-and-run attacks.
• Cordão de Ouro is a film is about the history of capoeira.
• Lateef Crowder is probably the closest Hollywood has to a "go-to" Capoeira practitioner:
  • Naturally, Eddy Gordo in Tekken (2010). Christie Montero's style is listed as Mixed Martial Arts, but she still uses some capoeira moves.
  • Andriago Silva, the Brazilian fighter in Undisputed III: Redemption. While his part was fairly minor, both of his fights avert the Extremity Extremist aspect hard by knocking a kickboxer with two-fisted ground and pound.
  • The Tom-Yum-Goong (known as The Protector in the United States) features a darkish capoeira thug. His fight against Tony Jaa was cut short due to an injury on-set, but it was still one of the coolest-looking fight scenes in the whole movie.
• Its sequel, Tom Yum Goong 2, has martial artist Marrese Crump as one of the main antagonists, and he delivers some (more realistic and ground-based than Lateef, but still quite awesome) capoeira performances in every one of his many fights on the film.
• In Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Abe employs some capoeira evasions, among them a negativa/rolê combination, to evade Wink's attacks.
• The Night Fox from Ocean's Twelve uses capoeira to get past a laser security system, as seen here. This is unique in that he specifically uses capoeira Angola, a style that, despite being one of the more popular styles of the art, is almost never seen in the media.
• In the Chocolate, Tourette's boy Thomas uses many capoeira moves as part of his Confusion Fu. His tough fight against the protagonist girl, who is able to read and copy her opponent's moves, features highlights like a martelo do chao exchange which results in a Double Knockout and a beautiful mariposa executed by her to finish him.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • T'challa of Black Panther uses capoeira. This makes sense due to capoeira's African origins. His moves were choreographed by Marrese Crump.
  • Chris Evans trained in capoeira for his role as Captain America.
  • Tom Hiddleston has said in an interview that he was asked to portray Loki with fluid and wind-like motions reminiscent of capoeira.
  • Cate Blanchett trained in the art as well for her role as Hela in Thor: Ragnarok.
• Never Back Down has one of Ryan McCarthy's opponents in the tournament specialise in this. He spends the whole (brief) bout showboating until Ryan lays him out with a single punch.
• In the direct-to-DVD sequel of Never Back Down, Never Back Down 2: The Beatdown, boxer Zack learns capoeira in a surprising little time and beats a guy in a MMA cage with a meia lua de compasso.
• Jean-Claude Van Damme's The Quest features a capoeira fighter who shows some skill defeating a savateur before being himself worfed by a wild kung fu fighter. He is played by renowned Mestre César Carneiro.
• The Harry Potter film based on the Goblet of Fire features the intimidating Durmstrang students (played by Mestre Ponciano and a few of his apprentices) performing a few moves during the Bulgarians's introduction in Hogwarts.
• The French film Vidocq features a heavily costumed antagonist performing some capoeira-looking handstand kicks against the protagonist's more setting-realistic savate.
• The enemy captain of Episode 2 of Mercs employs capoeira in his fighting style.
• The title character in Oya: Rise of the Orishas uses capoeira as her fighting style.
• The Assailant (Besouro in Brazil) is a 2009 film dramatizing the life of Mestre Besouro Manganga, a legendary figure in the history of capoeira.
• Shaft (2019). JJ, while drunk in a nightclub, ends up subduing a man with Capoeira.
  Shaft II: What-the-fuck was that?
  JJ: Capoeira. (puzzled look from Shaft II) It's ahh... Brazilian dance fighting. My mom had me take lessons when I was a kid so... when I get drunk it just comes out.
  Shaft II: I was this far, from being proud of you.
• In Black Orpheus, Death employs Capoeira in his confrontation with Orfeu.
• 1989 Film Rooftops has Squeak learning Capoeira in the pursuit of dominance in "Combat", a ritualized rooftop dance battle.
• Get Hard has James King shown practicing Capoeira initially to show how rich and out-of-touch he is, that he is buying personal tutelage in a martial art that he has no fighting skill with (and which is entirely ineffective when he tries to demonstrate it). Subverted in the climax where he suddenly gains competence and beats down several henchmen with a mix of Capoeira techniques and improvised weapons.

Live-Action TV

• Cal of First Kill occasionally uses this, but mostly sticks with kickboxing.
• An episode of Kung Fu (1972) features a capoeirista called Isaac Montola.
• Mike from Power Rangers Samurai sometimes uses capoeira.
• The Jaffa martial art mastaba in Stargate SG-1 is capoeira: in fact, the show used actual practitioners as extras and doubles for "The Warrior". It was enforced by a random coincidence: there just happened to be a capeoira exhibition in a nearby town when they were planning the episode.
• Star Trek: Picard: This featurette of a Deleted Scene from "Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2" demonstrates that the fight choreography is based on capoeira. Narek uses a dance-like and acrobatic Romulan martial arts with lots of flashy kicks when he attacks five Soong-type androids.
• One of The BBC's Rhythm And Movement idents depicted two capoeiristas on the roof of the International Press Centre.

Literature

• Força of the Whateley Universe is a capoeira practitioner. As noted by several characters, using a fighting style employing handstands makes less sense when your hands are the only point from which you can discharge your energy blasts.
• "Kothifiran street fighting" in Chronicles of the Kencyrath has been confirmed by the author to be capoeira in all but name.
• In The Joshua Files, both Joshua and his friend Tyler practice Capoeira, and it's used liberally when Joshua gets into fights, complete with handstand kicks and chained spinning kicks.
• The Dragon in the Net Force book Cybernation uses Capoeira, and practices frequently. He ends up fighting protagonist Alex, who is an intermediate silat practitioner, and ends up fighting to a draw.

Music

• The video for Lindsey Stirling's "The Arena" features a pair of capoeira performers as arena fighters.
• In Takeo Ischi's "Rat Attack", both the transformed rat and some of the enemy henchmen fight almost exclusively using Capoeira moves.

Professional Wrestling

• John Morrison and Kofi Kingston have training in capoeira, and the former uses it during his matches.
• K-1 entertainer turned pro wrestler Yuichiro Nagashima occasionally threw capoeira kicks in his pro wrestling matches.
• Mexican luchador Zumbi's wrestling style is 90% based in capoeira.

Video Games

• Eddy Gordo and Christie Monteiro of the Tekken series, possibly the best reproduced example in non-Brazilian media.
• The Pokémon Hitmontop, known as Kapoerer in the original Japanese, was inspired by a capoeirista. As of Gen 6, its idle animation shows it doing the ginga, a triangular step motion that is fundamental to the art. Of note is that is the only Pokémon to learn the unique move Triple Kick, a flashy but unreliable attack that may be a nod to some of the less practical maneuvers in capoeira (the move was given to Phermosa in Gen 7, but likely as a non-capoeira variant).
  • The Dancer Pokémon, Quaquaval, is mostly based on sambistas and other Brazilian carnival performances, but has two physical attack animations that resemble basic capoeira kicks, namely the armada and the bênção. Its Aqua Step is also reminiscent of a more complex capoeira kick.
• Fatal Fury and The King of Fighters feature several: Soiree Meira, Momoko, Richard Meyer (the first capoeirista to ever be in a video game), Bob Wilson, and Zarina. Yashiro has some acrobatic kicks that resemble capoeira, and while Duck King's style is stated as "Breakdance Martial Arts", he uses several capoeira moves.
• In Street Fighter, Elena uses capoeira as her style, being an Extremity Extremist who did kicks even when the punch buttons were pressed. Also, Blanka occasionally had capoeira listed as his fighting style, but it was in name only. Elena's style, save for the flashier specials, is also quite accurate, mainly because producer Yoshiki Okamoto had gone to Brazil in 1996 to research the art for Street Fighter III, leading to plenty of hype amongst the local gaming media, since apparently she was going to be Brazilian early into the game's development.
• In Eternal Champions, Trident uses capoeira despite its existence being an anachronism in his given time period.
• Echidna in The Bouncer uses capoeira.
• Capoeira Fighter is a Flash-based fighting game which has had at least two sequels.
• Capoeira Legends is an Indie Game for Windows which features capoeira as an exploration of Brazilian culture.
• It's likely that Kai in Mortal Kombat 4 was designed to be a capoeirista, given his handstand stance and attacks, despite them not resembling much the art (like most other examples in this page, in all fairness).
• Male trolls in World of Warcraft have capoeira as their dance emote. Few players are any good at replicating it.
• Martial Arts: Capoeira for the PC and Wii, rather obviously, features the style.
• In Rage of the Dragons, Pupa Salgueiro, one of the playable characters, uses this style in conjunction with her wrench.
• Copperhead, in Batman: Arkham Origins, is explicitly noted by the producers to have many Capoeira moves mixed into her "acrobatic fighting style".
• Rena, of Kakuto Chojin, uses Capoeira as her fighting style.
• Video game Beat Battle is a phone/tablet rhythm game where the protagonist uses Capoeira as her primary fighting style.
• In Guild Wars, the male monk dance appears to be a combination of capoeira and tai chi.
• In Injustice 2, Cheetah incorporates some wheel kicks and cartwheels into her moveset.
• Lola, of Beat Down: Fists of Vengeance, uses Capoeira moves in her fighting style.
• In Inazuma Eleven, Capoeira Snatch is a defensive technique that attempts to stop a shot by catching it between the user's legs after a series of acrobatic flips.
• In Spider-Man (PS4), Spidey makes extensive usage of capoeira-style kicks and rolling along with pro-wrestling style takedowns to suit his highly mobile fighting style.
• Flashkick enemies in Sifu have many attacks that seem heavily inspired by capoeira; the protagonist's attack after getting knocked down, and the unlockable Ground Counter skill, bear more than a passing resemblance to some techniques as well.
• Brawl Stars: In the winning animations for Max's Leopard and Panther skins, she preforms capoeira moves.
• Cataclysm has Capoeira as one of the usable styles, with a heavy emphasis on dodging and moving around.
• Honor of Kings features Mari Capoeirista, a capoeirista from Brazil who has a toucan companion and carries an atabaque on her back. She's technically an alternate skin for Mayene, but functions as a whole new character.

Web Animation

• Deadpool pulls off several moves ripped straight from Tekken's Eddy Gordo during his fight with Deathstroke on DEATH BATTLE!.
• Mercury Black of RWBY's fighting style appears to be heavily based on Capoeira. He's a kick-fighter and his weapons are based around his shoes and ankles. His fighting style can make him look like he's break-dancing, involving lots of body rolling and spinning, to free his legs for attacking. He will even drop to the ground, spinning his body and legs to enable his weapons to fire in all direction.

Western Animation

• In Iron Kid, Shadow's hand-to-hand fighting style resembles capoeira. At the very opening of the series he is shown striking an aú batido/chapa de costa/piao de mao combination against Lightning.
• Combo Niños features capoeiristas as the protagonists.
• Bob's Burgers: "Sexy Dance Fighting" focused on Tina trying to learn capoeira. "Capoeira" in this instance consisted primarily of the dreamy instructor Jairo hitting people in the face with his ponytail while yelling "Ponytail! and tripping people while saying "Brazil." In this instance, capoeira is heavily parodied. Mestre Amen Santo even pokes fun at it here.
• The dance between Aang and Katara in the Avatar: The Last Airbender episode "The Headband" shows major inspiration from it.
• In Xiaolin Showdown, Raimundo Pedrosa surprisingly almost never use this art, despite being from Rio de Janeiro and his animation in the opening showing his shadow using an au. He does use it in the tie-in video game, however, where he's seen using more obvious kicks in his combos.
• In Season 2, Episode 4 of Big Mouth, "Steve the Virgin", Missy reveals that she's been taking Capoeira before doing an aú sem mão over a bully to preemptively pants him. It gets a callback in Season 4, Episode 9, "Horrority House", where she claims to have a green belt in Capoeira although one of her reflections sports a brown cordão (sometimes used for instructors).
• Xever Montes/Fishface from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2012) is from Brazil and uses capoeira in conjunction with a pair of butterfly knives, making him more than a match for the turtles on more than one occasion. After his mutation, he gains a pair of robotic legs, making his capoeira even more difficult to deal with.

Other

• This Stand-Up Comedy session in Spanish has the comedian Sergio Freire commenting about capoeira in a very... special manner.

Famous or notable capoeira practitioners

• Wesley Snipes: Has capoeira among his many martial arts.
• Vincent Cassel: Has done a lot of capoeira training and demonstrated it magnificently in Ocean's Twelve.
• Lateef Crowder: Though you might have not heard talk of him, he's capoeira's main stunt guy in Hollywood. He also played Eddy Gordo in Tekken (2010).
• Marrese Crump: Another capoeira exponent in the technical side of Hollywood.
• John Morrison: A practitioner who uses some capoeira kicks in his matches.
• Mixed martial artists like Anderson Silva, Anthony Pettis, José Aldo, Junior dos Santos and Thiago Santos have capoeira training and sometimes use techniques in their fights.

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