recently, one of my favorite words has come to be endure. because that the basic word to about just going through the fire and the flames of whatever goes through life for better or worse. in a way i think that's part of how you try live in this life. and with that, i've personally enjoyed many battles from either movies, video games or more often, comics where you are pretty much fighting to the last man or when it one or little more people against seemingly countless. So i'm pretty much stating my top enduring battles (or basic fights where the good guy(s) are outnumbered)
#10 300
well sure, this was not a great movie. but the idea of the battle is enjoyable. they knew they were going to die and they were more than willing to take as many as possible with them. And it seemed like for the most part they did fine. I mean at least with the beginning, they had a good defense and stood their ground taking so many people and rarely losing men at some point until the end. But my main problem was the battles against the Immortals. My brother who had just saw the movie at the time, through that particular battle started was stupid. basically, it started out with the Spartans making a barrack made out of their dead enemies from before. Then they attack by pushing the top of the barrack which fell on just one of those Immortalsm, killing him, and from there they attack to kill more. firstly, they did all that just to kill one guy, secondly, they should've kept their barrack as it was. they'd defend better and the Immortals are more vulnerable that way. And I checked to see that my brother was right. Plus when Daniel Wenham knocked off the mask of one of the Immortals, the Immortal turned out to look just like an orc from The Lord of the Rings. and not to long after that, he and the king were fighting a guy that one could consider to be something of a troll or something like Lurtz from the end of the Fellowship of the Ring. In other words, the One Ring has been destroyed for four years and poor Farimir still has to fight orcs and trolls. But other than that, I still enjoy it in terms of it having the concept of what this list is about, but there's enough about it that makes it really low on the list.
#9 the battle against the Hammer-drones in Iron man 2.
After War-Machine's suit is no longer hacked to attack Iron-Man, they begin to settle the score once and for all against the Hammer drones. This one is more just plain old b.a. I mean it's Iron Man and his friend in a updated version of one if his suits fighting a bunch of robots that are trying to impersonate them. and to be a little fair, this is automatically one of the more just battles where the good guys are highly outnumbered than an enduring battle. I mean they didn't really do anything to show that the drones were the least bit of a challenge. I mean I didn't see the point when Iron Man fired two or three tank missles each on three of those drones at one point. one should be enough. or better just just hit them with his repulsor rays. The other problem with this battle is that it's short...at least it's shorter than the final boss on the bright side so we know that that wasn't too inceadibly shot while it still was really fricking short. But it's still a cool battle with our old buddies, Iron Man and War Machine
#8 The battle of the Frost-Giants in Thor
In this one, Thor, Loki and their friends went out to fight the Frost-Giants as Thor's stubborn response to a couple of giants secretly entering Asgard. What makes this a fun battle is because it's a battle against just about an entire world of enemies. The only problem about it is that it makes it more of a cool battle just for Thor. Which is a good thing on one hand. I mean Thor is awesome and the movie made that perfectly clear through and through, but I would've liked to have seen a little bit more from his friends before one of them got injured. But that doesn't stop this scene from being fun with Thor fighting an entire world of enemies.
#7 Almost anything with Optimus Prime
As far as a character goes that really wants to go through the fire and the flames to save all that is good, there's not a lot of heroes that are as completely willing as Optimus Prime. I mean he is a cheesy character when it comes to fighting for what is right and all that, but when it comes to the actual fighting and making the hard choices, Optimus truly knows how to willingly accept what is front of him and faces the consequences for the sake of Autobot and Human lives/Earth/ the entire universe no matter the cost. And that makes him an ultimate b.a. because of that, especially in the sequals when he single handedly took on Megatron, Starscream and Grindor in the second one and did that whole mile long Decepticon slaughter before with killing Shockwave.
But there's a reason why I say almost. There are times when Optimus gets carried away with enduring the dangers all by himself. Sometimes he dies as a result or gets really close to dying. and it's a matter that has been gravely overused. I mean it was heartbreaking when he first dies in the animated movie.
I mean like I said in my review for that film: despite some Autobot characters were already getting killed, it was Optimus' death that got people to leave the theater and for the creators to get angry mail from parents whose kids have been locked in their rooms crying their eyes out over his death.
But then it started to happen so often that you may as well expect it to happen every 30 issues after he's ressurected in the comics.
At that point, he's so good at dying, that it was because he was killed when he was Orion Pax millions of years ago that there was ever an Optimus Prime.
But the worse death was the video game kill. some guy made a video game where he put Optimus and Megatron inside the game where they have to fight and the loser gets their bodies in the real world blown up by a bomb the kid planted inside them.
Optimus won the battle but he killed a few video game characters in the process. feeling ashamed that he killed life (even though those things have to life or characteristics or anything) he claims that he lost the battle so the kid blows up Optimus' body.
But here's the kicker. before the body was destroyed, the kid putted all of Optimus, his whole set of memories adc characteris, his whole life inside a one gig floppy disc. I'm really not kidding. a one gig floppy disc put the list of a highly advanced mechanical organism where they used it to ressurect Optimus with a new and much more cool looking body.
So Optimus does really get carried away at fighting for the greater good, but when he does regaurdless is enough for me to enjoy how he'll endure anything to stop the Decepticons.
#6 The Battle of Pelennor Fields
This is the second to last final battle in The Lord of the RIngs where 200,000 orcs attack the city of Minas Tirith which involves Rohan eventually taking part until they end up fighting the Harradrium and their Mumukil. Now I know you guys are wondering why the heck this battle is not so high on the list. The reason is because it's not really edurance through and through. I mean don't get me wrong, 90% of this battle does contain the good guys getting their butts handed to them. But there's still the 10% where the good guys did put up a good fight, twice. I mean in the beginning, the seige towers aside, the Gondorians were doing really well with defending the city with their trebuches, strong gate and archers that mowed down hundreds of orcs. And later, the 6,000 Rohirrim did make that big charge where they may've won the battle if it wasn't for the Harradrium. Regaurdless, this battle was big and dark enough to go fairly high on this list
#5 The Wild Bunch (Last Stand)
I have a confession: I actually have not seen this movie yet. I only know about this scene because I watched it when my brother and I looked at the rotten tomatoes list for best gun fights. But it's still awesome. The wild bunch did a very exciting job at fighting to the last man. Especially with the gatling gun. I enjoyed every minute of one of the characters mowing down a whole bunch of enemies until they were shot. This is all I really have to say about thsi fight other than admitting that I really hope to see the movie soon.
#4 Omaha Beach (saving private ryan)
In a way, the idea of enduring worked on both sides. the German only had a few guys and the Americans knew a lot of them were going to die...thus the river of blood. but truly gets you. like how powerful it is along with the rest of the movie, you still have to like the idea of how they were willing to endure through the line of fire throughout the scene. It is a very brutal battle.
#3 The Bride vs. the Crazy 88 (kill Bill Vol.1)
of all the movies, to my knowledge that contains a scenes where it's one person against seemingly countless. the bride aginst the crazy 88 is one of the best examples there are. they just keep on coming and she just man-handles them to the point were the whole place is just red with blood. it's just so cool. and it's pretty much the one thing you can see similar to a lot of video games (I mean in some video games, you can do just as much killing like in Assassins Creed where if given the chance, you can kill a couple dozen enemies in one spot. I've done one fight where i killed 30 guards over saving a civilian...it was awesome.) but you are showing it in film with this fight. You just have to love it
#2 Kick-Ass vs. the thugs (Kick-Ass)
in a way frankly, this falls in line more to the graphic novel than the movie, but this still represents how Kick-Ass as a major attitude to endure troubles. cause with his messed up nerve endings and metel plates, sure he can take whatever he likes easily. but still, if you read the book, you'll find times were not even all that will save him from a lot of pain, he'll make some mafia guys keep on hitting him until the chair he's tied to breaks, where from there, he'll grab some broken legs from the chair and face the mafia guys going "alright, how's first?" ignoring their laughter. and even while there isn't too much like that in the movie, they show enough on how he endures in exploring the idea of actually becoming a super hero with saving a guy from a group of thugs and when one of the thugs asked if Kick-Ass was really going to fight for somone that he didn't even know, Kick-Ass reminds him that there are witnesses watching the fight and then shouts "yeah, i'd rather die. so BRING IT ON!!!" so really that falls in line for Kick-Ass as one of my favorite super-heroes and makes this fight #2 on this list.
#1 Battle of Helm's Depp (The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers)
if anything truly lead me and my brothers to love The Lord of the Rings, it was everything in The Two Towers and the best part of it all, The Battle of Helm's Deep. with only a few hundred to hold the defenses, you watch as Aaragorn, Legolas, and Gimbli, generally face Uruk-kai of all different sizes, strengths and military kinds, witness almost all of soldiers die one by one, and have hope diminish step by step from the Uruk-kai going up the wall via ladders, to the destruction of the wall, all the elven allies die including Haldir, and ultimately all but the great hall is captured. then at the end with the sun rising they decide to ride out and meet then with Theoden as their last stand before Gandalf, the Rohirrim and the trees of Fangorn to destroy the rest of the Uruks. Now again, some think Pelennor Fields is a more enduring battle. But think about it: like I said before, Gondorians at Minas Titirh at least had trebuches, a strong gate, the Rohirrim charge, and archers that made large piles of orcs corpses. Altogether, they had more of a fighting chance. But in the Battle of Helms Depp, they hardly had anything worth calling a defense because 1)their wall was nothing two bombs and one lone Berzerker that doesn't die easily couldn't handle, 2) The Elves were alright in terms of Archery, but as soon as the actual sword fighting started, they were getting slaughtered.
I mean Haldir was probably the only Lothlorien elf to actually kill an Uruk-kai on screen through sword fighting, but he ultimatey died too 3) their gate was broken in three to four hits, 4) In a way, Aragorn, Legolas and Gimbli were there kinda there just to make sure any Uruk-kai were being killed at all, and 5) quite a few of the soldiers were actually old men and kids. KIDS!!!! And the most they generally did was throw rocks at the Uurk-kai that were at the gate...I mean they killed a few then but STILL!!! I mean my brothers and I weren't too thrilled about Lord of the Rings right away after seeing Fellowship of the Ring, But when this movie came out, our parents saw it first to check and were a little concerned with this battle because it was so dark and suspenful that they used kids as soldiers. one of my bothers and I decided to see it anyway just to try, but my youngest brother went "nope" and hung out at a friend's house when we went to see it. I mean sure, we were kids ourselves back then. I mean I'm the oldest and I was only 12 at that time. but still, even if you don't think of it from that point of view, you have to agree that you are practically facing hell itself if you're going so far as using kids for soldiers.
I mean even the battle when you're palying a Lord of the Rings video game is usually hard. I mean I remember only too well how with the deeping wall level especially was an arch-nemesis for me and my brothers in the video game to the actual film. and I have plenty of friends and aquintances who will tell you the same thing.
It was a bit hard in LOTR: Third Age as well,
but thankfully, it eventually was too easy when it comes to Battle of Middle-Earth... after everyone died the first one or two times.
and sure the level in LOTR: Conquest was easy but that's just because it was level one.
And while we're only beginning to get into the Two Towers story with Rise of Isengard, only heaven knows what terrors await for online gamers out there once they get to the extended pack for Lord of the Rings Online that eventually contains the fighting against Isengard's fricking forces in Helm's Deep. I mean say what you will about it, but i say it's one of the best battles i've seen and it is more than enough to be the biggest enduring battle i've ever seen.
and that's my list for the top 5 enduring battles. tell me what you think.
Great work, and nice blog! I'm Matt S. from RT, you used to comment on my review from time to time haha. Anyways, I followed your blog!
ReplyDeleteThank you! and Matt! Nice to see you again!
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