The 11 Most Idiotic Fictional Weapons
-
Geoff Shakespeare
·
- January 22, 2009
What would you give for a working lightsaber? Or, barring that, a pulse rifle from Aliens?
If we could make fictional weapons real, there's no limit to the ass we could kick. That's because writers and prop departments are usually pretty good at coming up with weapons too badass to exist. Usually.
Sometimes, though, they get so involved in making something that looks cool on the screen that they come up with a weapon that, in reality, would be more dangerous to the guy using it. For instance...
11The Batarang
Used By:
Batman.
Why It Could Be Cool:
Because he's the goddamned Batman.
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
We all know Batman loves to maintain a consistent theme. And we're fine with that. We don't mind that he calls his car the Batmobile, or his hideout the Batcave, or his computer the Batputer, because it doesn't affect his crime fighting. If he wants to have a cool bat screensaver or a bat-shaped birthday cake, whatever, as long as it works.
It was at the invention of the batarang that somebody should have intervened and told Bruce to spend less time worrying about every single accessory fitting the theme. Making your deadly boomerang thing bat-shaped makes it hard to store, hard to throw and, in reality, would be next to impossible to catch without severing three of your own fingers.
Look, Batman, the bad guys aren't going to care what your weapon looks like once it's lodged in their neck. Don't worry about it, you look fine. Quit primping, get out there and stop some goddamn criminals.
10The Bowcaster
Used By:
Chewbacca.
Why It Could Be Cool:
It looks pretty cool, and considering Chewbacca can do a pretty good job of tearing your head off without a weapon, you'd assume whatever he's carrying is ten times as badass as, say, whatever Han is carrying.
Why It Is Absolutely Not Cool:
According to the type of people who study the workings of completely fictional weapons, the bowcaster is like a crossbow that uses two polarizing orbs to generate a magnetic field to accelerate the little arrows.
That's right. Instead of the hundreds of other energy weapons available in the Star Wars universe, this one decides to use a technology we gave up somewhere around the time we decided that being covered in mud and shit wasn't all that cool. Sure, the bolt is covered in a sheath of something called plasmoid, but then what's the point of having a little bit of metal in the middle of it? Why not just fire the energy? Is there some super-futuristic armor in the Star Wars universe that can stop an energy beam but not an arrow?
"Shit."
The bowcaster also has to be cocked before each shot, which would be fine if you were fighting the Senior Citizens of the Molasses Nebula, but can be bothersome when the enemy can fire unlimited blasts of energy at the speed of light. Hell, we're pretty sure that alone makes the bowcaster shittier than the guns you can pick up in an average pawn shop.
9The Bowler Hat from Goldfinger
Used By:
Oddjob.
Why It Could Be Cool:
The hat does cut the head off a statue at one point. Though it could have been a really shitty statue for all we know.
"No wait! Use a watermelon or something to demonstrate your stupid hat. That statue cost me six dollars."
Why It Is Absolutely Not Cool:
Okay, we understand that even though Oddjob is an incredibly tough dude (we see him shrug off a gold brick to the solar plexus) he may still need to kill somebody at a distance and that this would require a weapon of some kind. There is no reason, however, for this weapon to be a sharp novelty hat.
That's what guns are for. And don't tell us he's never heard of one, or has some obscure religious aversion to them--Oddjob uses one earlier in the film. Even if he needs to be silent, there is this thing called a throwing knife. They came out with those about 1000 years ago.
This thing makes the Batarang well thought-out by comparison, as the only thing this is good for is accidentally slicing open your fingers about three times a day when you go to take it off your head. Go ahead and invent a circular saw codpiece while you're at it, Oddjob.
8The Boxing Glove Arrow
Used By:
The Green Arrow.
Why It Could Be Cool:
What's cooler than boxing? How about long-distance boxing?
Why It Is Absolutely Not Cool:
When you've decided to be a superhero and you're coming up with a theme for yourself, you could do a lot worse than arrows. They're fast, deadly and let you attack from a distance without having to resort to the guns that are so frowned upon in the superhero world.
But, not content to stick to plain old arrows with maybe a flaming one every once in a while, Green Arrow thought he'd get innovative. Having quickly run through, apparently, the only three good arrow ideas in the universe, he wound up with glue arrows and net arrows and fire extinguisher arrows and a boomerang arrow. But hands down, his worst idea was the boxing glove arrow.
Looks like SOMEONE should've spent less time asking questions and more time not getting his ass handed to him.
The saddest part about the boxing glove arrow is that in order for it to be even plausibly aerodynamic, the boxing glove has to be shrunk down to about the size of a baby's fist. Now, babies are terrifying in their own way, but it has nothing to do with their fists and everything to do with their shitty diapers. Put one of those on the end of an arrow and maybe you'd have something.
7The B.B. Gun
Used By:
The Blue Beetle.
Why It Could Be Cool:
What it lacks in firepower it more than makes up for in girth. Yeah, keep telling yourself that Blue.
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
No, it's not the "BB Gun" you had as a kid, but is somehow even lamer.
The Blue Beetle's weapon was a bulky, oversized gun that shot compressed air and light. And because, apparently, his enemies include stray cats and his little sister, he gave it a totally unthreatening name: "B.B. Gun."
Now, we at Cracked wouldn't want a shot of compressed air to the gut (although on a hot day the B.B. Gun can be quite refreshing if aimed at the face) but we're not supervillains. Well, not tough ones anyway.
Though, in fairness, he's barely a superhero.
If you're throwing it down with some superpowered madman hell bent on ruling the universe, you probably want something a little stronger than a puff of air. As for the blinding light, a trip to Sunglasses Hut renders that feature useless.
Even if the enemy forgets his shades at the beach, all a blast of light is going to do is piss him off. Is it any wonder you hardly ever saw Blue Beetle use it in the comics? Even he thought it was useless, and it was freaking named after him.
6The Triple-Bladed Sword
Used By:
Talon, from The Sword And The Sorcerer.
Why It Could Be Cool:
Swords are cool. It's a triple sword. That means it's triple cool, right? Right?
Wait, you're saying you've never seen this movie? Hang on to your asses, kids:
Oh, shit yeah!
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
As amazing as that clip up there was, we're afraid it only made the triple sword appear awesome. Sure it's three perfectly aligned blades are awesome for slicing bread, but pretty much make it three times as hard to stab somebody.
Sure, as you so vividly saw, two of the blades launch (by compressed air no less) but where the hell do you find replacement blades for it? You know you're not getting that shit back.
5The Ultimate Nullifier
Used By:
Reed Richards of The Fantastic Four.
Why It Could Be Cool:
It may not look like much, but when it comes to nullifying, there's no better nullifier on the market.
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
It isn't that it can destroy anything at the speed of thought. It isn't that it looks like a camera from the twenties. It isn't even that the guy who made it--Galactus--is basically a god who shouldn't even need a weapon. It's that there isn't even a half-assed attempt to explain how it's supposed to work.
The mind-boggling schematic.
No pseudo-scientific jargon, no magic incantations, no nothing. It just nullifies. It's like they bought it from some dude in an alley. "Trust me, dude, if you need something nullified, this'll nullify it right up." The Ultimate Nullifier is especially effective against gaping plot holes.
So easy, even a baby can use it. Just point and nullify.
The Ultimate Nullifier is one of those fictional weapons that exists for no other reason than to resolve an unresolvable plot. The Fantastic Four, facing the near omnipotent Galactus, are basically given the Ultimate Nullifier by another near omnipotent being (The Watcher) and quicker than you can say deus ex machine, they use it to save the world. It's as if the writer of The Fantastic Four, Stan Lee, had dinner reservations and wanted to wrap the story up.
The Fantastic Four would go on to save the Earth again with the Total Eradicator (Stan Lee had Rangers tickets), the Super Eraser (when his brother was in town) and the Mighty Make-Bad-Thing-Go-Awayer (this time he just didn't give a shit).
4The Krull Glaive
Used By:
That dude in Krull.
Why It Could Be Cool:
It looks like a five bladed switchblade. And it's magic!
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
The Krull Glaive is the magic weapon in the film Krull. The hero, Prince Colwyn, has to find the glaive, find the lair of the beast who has attacked his kingdom and kill it, all while maintaining his perfectly blow-dried hair and beard.
Like a lot of ridiculous fictional weapons, the obvious uselessness of the Krull Glaive is explained away by it being "magic." There have been weapons like this in history (like the African tribal weapon, the awesomely named hunga munga), but they all had something the Krull Glaive lacks: a fucking handle.
"It's like a Frisbee made of paper cuts."
How the hell are you supposed to throw this thing? Even if you use it in hand-to-hand combat, you're just as likely to hurt yourself as anyone else. No matter how you hold it, half the blades are pointed back at you. Seriously, we could have done a whole separate article on "fictional weapons that would cut your own fucking hand off."
3The Bat'leth
Used By:
Worf from Star Trek: The Next Generation and overweight guys dressed in homemade Klingon outfits everywhere.
Why It Could Be Cool:
It's wicked sharp, and you could probably do a lot of damage to a guy with it, provided he wasn't armed in any way.
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
Never has a fictional weapon so beautifully illustrated the old adage, "never bring a knife to a gun fight." In a universe where phasers and disruptors are commonplace, why the hell would anyone carry around a boomerang so huge and heavy that it can't even do boomerang stuff?
Sure, you could impress your enemy with your cool bat'leth moves and wow him with how fast you can twirl it around, but once the rhythmic gymnastics display was over, all he has to do is pull an Indiana Jones and shoot your flailing ass.
The savage poetry of the bat'leth in action.
In fact, the bat'leth is an incredibly shitty weapon even by pre-gunpowder standards. It's clumsy, heavy and, because you need two hands to use it, it has almost no reach. You can go one handed to swing at your opponent, but that sends the other razor-sharp end directly at your own gut.
Sure, you could say the same about the cool two-bladed lightsaber in The Phantom Menace, but at least that could deflect lasers. The bat'leth can't even deflect the scorn your enemies will have for you for carrying the damn thing.
2The Gunsword
Source: Christos Tzeremes
Used By:
This pretty boy from Final Fantasy VIII.
Why It Could Be Cool:
Guns and swords--together at last!
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
Never mind that emo kid up there looks like he could barely lift a hanky to dab away his tears at the end of Twilight, let alone a massive sword, what you're probably wondering is how the hell this thing even works.
Well, the gunsword is also a revolver, with a tiny barrel that runs the length of the blade. You may be thinking that revolvers are a hassle and why not make the sword automatic so it wouldn't take forever to reload, but that's really only scraping the surface of the how retarded the gunsword is.
Oh, by the fires of agony that swirl in my tortured heart, I declare this gunsword lamer than the last Cure album!
Want to use it as a gun? Well, too bad, you've got like 20 pounds of sword weighing down the barrel while you try to aim it with one hand. Want to put your hand on the end there to hold it up like a rifle? Congratulations, you've just joined the "I sliced off all my fingers with a fantasy weapon" club.
Want to use it as a sword? Also too bad, you've got to hold it by this idiotic little grip made for revolvers, and the first time you stab somebody you're going to get the tiny little barrel on the end crammed full of bad guy guts. So the next time you try to use it as a gun, it's going to blow your other hand off.
Pretty much the only use for this thing would be to mail it to the enemy the day before the battle in gift wrap, and pray they're stupid enough to use it.
1The Dalek Plunger
Used By:
The Doctor Who enemy, the Daleks. Also janitors, plumbers, housewives and, you know, anyone who needs to plunge.
Why It Could Be Cool:
The Daleks managed to conquer the universe countless times despite their inability to climb stairs, so they have to have something going for them.
...What is this show about?
Why It Absolutely Is Not Cool:
Records are spotty, and the stories told around campfires are probably more legend than fact, but every little Dalek soldier grows up listening to the tale of the ancient Dalek warrior Lenny, the resourceful janitor who used his plunger to single-handedly fend off an entire battalion of overflowing toilets in the Great Sewage War. From that day forth, no Dalek has ever gone to battle without their trusty plungers.
The plunger isn't the Dalek's main weapon--that would be the egg whisk thing to the left--but it's still pretty useful. It can open doors, move things and strangle people.
You know what else can do that? Hands. Why the Daleks chose to go with plungers over hands is never quite explained in the series but, then again, neither is the fact that they only have one eye that can easily be covered with a hat.
We don't know how close the Doctor Who universe is to ours, but if its most feared soldiers look like they were put together out of whatever was lying around the kitchen, we guess it can't be all that bad. No wonder an unarmed, eccentrically dressed British guy with a posh accent and a phone booth time machine is able to beat them so easily.
If you liked that check out 8 Pointless Laws All Comic Book Movies Follow. And be sure to view the lovely ladies in Cracked.com's Top Picks or we'll be forced to use our awesome bat'leh skills against you.
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