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Henchmen are an essential part of every plot to take over the world. Unfortunately, even the best henchmen let us down. Is it something inherent in the henchman archetype? Or is it just that we expect too much from grown men in form-fitting body armor? Honestly, we don't know. But we do know that it hurts every time, and nowhere more so than in the six cases below. #6.
Imperial Stormtroopers
Who Are They? Soldiers of the Galactic Empire, as featured in the Star Wars franchise. Why Were They Feared? Stormtroopers started out strong. The way they stormed that Rebel blockade runner in Star Wars was pretty sweet. And the way they overran that Rebel base in The Empire Strikes Back was the epitome of cool (OK, so they let most of the rebels escape from Cloud City, but the rebels had inside help from known scoundrel Lando Calrissian, so we could let it slide). By that point, it seemed like Stormtroopers could do no wrong. But then something happened, something... awful.
What Went Wrong? After convincing us that they were the baddest asses in henchmen history, Stormtroopers suddenly went all France on us. Somehow, a frigging army of Stormtroopers was outwitted, outmaneuvered and just plain outfought by a bunch of overgrown merkins whose most advanced weaponry was flint-tipped arrows. But that's not even the worst part. The worst part is that these weren't just any Stormtroopers. No, these were, in the Emperor's own words, his best troops, for fuck's sake.
Of course, no one wanted the Stormtroopers to win. Yes, we loved them the way only impressionable adolescents can love something, but we knew they were evil, and we wanted them to get their comeuppance in the end. But not like this. Losing as ignominiously as they did on Endor didn't just diminish the villains, it also diminished the heroic men and women who defeated them. A Typical Stormtrooper's Last Thought: "I can't see a thing in this helmet!" #5.
Cylon Centurions
Who Are They? Robotic soldiers of the genocidal Cylon Empire, as seen in the original Battlestar Galactica and its spin-off, Galactica 1980. Why Were They Feared? Battlestar Galactica had its share of problems, including a monkey playing a dog, epic re-use of special effects footage and subversive Mormon overtones. The clear highlight of the whole enterprise was the Cylons, especially the Centurions, the cycloptic rank and file of the mighty Cylon Empire. And yet, the Centurions had their own share of problems. They were slow, they were clumsy, they were terrible shots, they were even worse pilots (and that's with three of them piloting each Cylon Raider) and, for some inexplicable reason, they were armed with swords. Swords, for fuck's sake.
But Centurions did have one thing going for them: they were unapologetically robotic. Up until then, most film and TV robots were little more than human surrogates, with personalities or character traits to which actual humans could relate, but there was nothing human about Centurions, no hint of humanity in that monotone voice. They were programmed to kill humans, and so they killed humans and that was that. And so what if they were slow and plodding? In a human, being slow and plodding makes you boring. But in a robot, being slow and plodding makes you a relentless mechanical menace. Plus, they were real shiny.
What Went Wrong? But then, in the very last episode, Centurions went soft on us. In that episode, Starbuck and a Raider full of Centurions both crash land on a desolate planet. Bored, Starbuck rebuilds one of the Centurions for company. At first, the Centurion tries to kill Starbuck (yay!), but then Starbuck gives it a name (Cy, of course) and teaches it to play cards, whereupon its cold mechanical heart thaws and man and robot become the best of friends! Later, when more Centurions arrive, Cy sacrifices itself to save the life of Starbuck's son (don't ask), thereby ending its days as just another robotic Uncle Tom. A Typical Centurion's Last Thought "A sword? Seriously, a sword?! How did robot technology beat out weapon technology in the race to the finish line?" #4.
SPECTRE Henchmen
Who Are They? Agents of the Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion (SPECTRE), an international crime syndicate, as seen in the early James Bond films. Why Were They Feared? SPECTRE henchmen are different: they don't wear masks or armor or colorful thematic costumes. Instead, their menace comes from their characterization, as with Dr. No (Dr. No), an evil genius with bionic hands; Red Grant (From Russia With Love), an Aryan superman whose only weakness is wine appreciation; and Emilio Largo (Thunderball), a swarthy dude with an eyepatch and an honest-to-goodness shark pool in his backyard. Admittedly, Bond killed them all in the end, but Bond was the epitome of 60s cool, so it wasn't so bad.
What Went Wrong? But then the unthinkable happened: Sean Connery quit, and the producers hired George Lazenby to take his place. And in his one and only outing as Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, Lazenby thoroughly demolished the Bond mystique. First, he chucked Bond's swinging über-bachelor lifestyle in order to settle down and get married; later, on the hunt for his wife's killer (*spoiler alert*), he slipped into a sporran and went undercover as a genealogist, of all things; and, finally, he caught up with his foe just in time for what one Wikipedia editor implausibly describes as "...a furious bobsled chase down Piz Gloria." Now, there's dignity in being killed by a suave super-spy, but there's no dignity whatsoever in being killed by this guy:
The producers tried to undo the damage--they even rehired Sean Connery to reprise the role--but it was too late, SPECTRE's once-sterling reputation was ruined. Clearly, no henchman worth his salt wanted anything to do with SPECTRE anymore. A Typical SPECTRE Henchman's Last Thought "Red wine with fish? What the Hell was I thinking? Dammit, I deserve to die." |
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You know one could write a book about how George Lucas is a racist piece of s**t just based upon the fact that he chose 'Stormtrooper' to define the Empire's henchmen/army.
In defense of The Lord Of The Rings, the good guys did have GHOSTS are their side.
fortunately in Battlestar Galactica 2003 the Cylons are fixed.
The best failure of the Z-Putty guys was one episode I remember from when I was little because even then, I thought it was really lame. Somehow, the badguys reverted the Power Rangers to little kids, with no memory of their older selves. The Z-Puttys ambush them, and one of them accidentally bounces a dodgeball into the chest Z and kills it. The group of 10 year olds then realizes the weakness and takes out the rest of them. They got defeated by a small group of non-superpowered 10 year olds. Seriously.
yeah, i remember that after that the only reason i kept watching was kimberly.
hahahaha YES!!! Oh jesus... that episode was horrible!!!
Pretty funny but I must point this out
'But Centurions did have one thing going for them: they were unapologetically robotic. Up until then, most film and TV robots were little more than human surrogates, with personalities or character traits to which actual humans could relate, but there was nothing human about Centurions, no hint of humanity in that monotone voice.'
Daleks man, Daleks AnD Cybermen. Defeated by a (mostly) non-violent time lord and his 'magic box' and THEY dont make the list? You include Centurions but not Daleks.
Other than that, hilarious!
Nope, just going with henchmen that failed harder than a 2x4 on Viagra.
Though yes...Daleks and Cybermen failed pretty danged hard.
Luckily I turned 11 and outgrew the power rangers around the time of 'lord zedd' but I do remember the chest weakness.
It was pretty lame even then.
Actually I don't see why you count the Orcs are number one, the battle of helms deep is a classic flanking move, often in battle the most losses are taken when an army is retreating.
At the front they are facing a fortress, only to be hit in the back, now unless they are put into order quick, they are going to be crushed between the two forces. A lot of battles were lost this way in history.
But yea the Samwise thing is just lame.
@ spectre3 yes everything to do with power rangers sucked huge chuncks of ass.
@everyone whos not interested in lotr. stop reading now.
orcs were cool! when samwise gamgee (the fat little fuck) went up that tower and killed those orcs, THEY were tired from fighting the traitorous uruk-hai and suprised to see a small ball of spiky death coming up the stairs and HE was mad as hell and had the element of surprise. At the battle of pellanore fields the riders of rohan/the mark (or rohirihm or whatever) had the advantage of being mounted and being awesome. as well as a presumed sally from Minas Ithil (gondor) AND the dead men of dunharrow, who were a battle winning force on their own. PLUS aragorn, legolas and gimli joined in! And Mithrandir/gandalf (and the hobbits and eowin+eomer)! Plus the element of some surprise (theodin insisted on making an admittedly cool speech before hand, after the orcs had seen them on the hill).
peace y'all!
In all fairness, it's not like you're going to get any of that information from the movie.
Really a self-destruct button i knew power rangers was retarded but a self-destruct button?!?!
What?! Ganados or Majini didn't make it, or even goblins, or zombies. What about those things in siren blood curse, their effing retards, they kill someone, make them one of them, and then they're either equally as retarded of five fu**king times as retarded, fu**ing come on, they may not be henchmen but they sure succeded as being number one for making themselves look like a bunch of hopeless zombie idiots. Or what about the things from silent hill, for being one of the scariest games on earth, the enemies have no brain, i mean honestly, look at a fu**ing straight-jacket, they could run into a car and get themselves killed and the last thing they think 'i'm a fu**ing monster, just cause i'm fu**ing blind doesn't make it as fu**ed up as hell' I mean c'mon, they should have been on here, or carrions, their just zombie animals with oversized asses that are full of fat, and not the hot kind of fat either. Or maybe heartless, all they are is a bunch of monster henchmen with glowing ey
How can Orcs possibly be ranked number one? They're the only ones on this list to successfully kill a main character!!! Plus I'm outright insulted that Battle Droids aren't on this? I seriously think that for every one stormtrooper, Orc, Cobra soldier, etc...ten Battle Droids were killed with little to no effort at all. They devolved into bumbling idiots that looked about as stable as a toothpick. Whoever wrote this doesn't know much about this stuff whatsoever...
Those stupid Battle Droids couldnt' take out a Z-Putty Patroller.
Somebody at Cracked.com should give me a job.
me 2 d00d
Oh, but not you, obviously. There are 83 people ahead of you.
In retrospect, I was on the green ranger's tip, but reading the post by Voyager VI about the crappiest bond movie that ever happened, I feel justified. At least Tommy didn't suck and wear a skirt.
Yeah, Z-putties sucked, especially after the green ranger showed up and single-handedly raped everybody else on the show. He was the hardest kung-fu anti-hero since Chuck Norris in Return of the Dragon. And Chuck Norris has another fist where his chin should be.
Seriously, I never thought I would see beastiality on a children's TV show until the first time Dragonzord dropped in and skullfucked all the other robots through to the back of the brainpan. People ride Voltron's nuts with the whole robots coming-together-first-thing, but then again, as far as I know, nobody from Voltron ever murdered an intergalactic space-demon, then left for the local milk bar to bang out the head cheerleader and the asian female president of the math and chess club. Tommy was the fucking Glen Quagmire of Power Rangers. Giggidy, Giggidy, it's morphin' time.
When you're ripping a movie to bits, it might help to have actually watched it first. You clearly didn't. Bond is not hunting for the killers of his wife in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, because the murder and the wedding happen at the end of the film. It is in fact Connery who goes on the hunt in the NEXT movie. The kilt is worn because the person Bond's impersonating is, can you believe it, Scottish. Ask your average Scot whether kilts are girly, and then chuckle when you regain consciousness in the ER. Bond is not undercover as a genealogist, but as an expert on heraldry. There is a difference. The Bond 'mystique' is not destroyed by this film, unless you consider that Ian bloody Fleming did the destroying, because the film is a faithful representation of the novel. The best-selling, hugely popular novel. And the bob sled chase is totally awesome.
Want your dildo back?
The mouth of Sauron was WAAAAAY worse at his job than the orcs. Orcs = killkillkill. Mouth of Sauron = catty bantering culminating in embarassing decapitation. Orcs were decent henchmen(regardless of in-fighting), but MoS was just a ninny!
the orcs where defeated by the ghost army. the heavy cavalry was getting their asses handed to them until they arrived, on boats?
Korea: US 36940, NK 500000, PRC 400000
Vietnam: US 58209, NVA+VC 1100000
War on terror: US 4902, Terrorists 70807
You're right Kull the US sure sucks at fighting wars, only like 1 American dies for every 100 enemies killed
Shame all the "enemy" were civies.
American politicians suck at fighting wars. The soldiers are toprate. Except for those f**kin' marines.
Just as a heads-up, the only reason why Sam ascended the Tower was because there were only 5 Orcs remaining. If he took on a giant spider he can take on 5 Orcs. Remember that the Orcs and Uruk-Hai fought with each other leaving only 5 alive (and the two leaders, one of whom was also killed by Sam). Besides they were exhausted and Sam just threw them down a stairwell via tripping. That'll kill anybody. As for the Battle of Pelennor Fields thing, they didn't flee, they still fought, just got out of the way of the oncoming stampede.
Bay of Pigs: 4 US pilots vs. Cubans: 176 regular army, around 4500 militia KIA
Even the wars we "lose" we still kick ass