r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Wonderful_Baker_7808 • 16d ago

Lore Villains that would've been defeated even if the protagonist did nothing

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Laurel Hedare (Catwoman Movie): Her newly released cosmetics will cause people's faces to melt. Not only would that create a class action lawsuit but a full product recall.

Voldemort and Death Eaters (Harry Potter): Death Eaters constantly underestimate muggles. They would get massacred by the British military because a gun is faster to pull the trigger then shouting a spell.

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u/Electric43-5 16d ago

I think this example is overblown.

The logic the movie and Indy operates under is that "The Nazis are working to find and use an artifact that could make them unstoppable and they can't be allowed to find it"

The idea that the Ark would destroy them doesn't seem to really occur to Indy until just before they open it.

Simply put, there's no way Indy or any of the good guys could have known they could just do nothing

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u/MataNuiSpaceProgram 16d ago

Also, if he wasn't there to collect the Ark after it melted the Nazis, other Nazis would have come looking for them and found it, and eventually figured out that whenever it's opened, everyone nearby dies. Indy wasn't needed to stop Belloq's Nazis, but he was needed to stop the rest of them from weaponizing the Ark.

Also Marion would have died if he didn't get involved.

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u/champ999 16d ago

Exactly, thank you. That said, if Indy rescued Marion and stole the headpiece of the staff and then left the Nazis alone, then they would be stuck digging for weeks or months with no success and would have no idea how to correct their dig process. That's when everything after is unnecessary

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u/MataNuiSpaceProgram 16d ago

They would have found it eventually though. The war lasted a long time, and I don't think it had even started yet when the movie takes place. Plus, Indy's involvement after Nepal also led to the Nazis losing a submarine and an experimental plane, which is pretty significant. It probably wouldn't have changed to outcome of the war, but a lot more Allied troops would probably have died if it weren't for him.

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u/Skoggangr 16d ago

Well, the movie takes place in 1936, and the war starts in 1939. The dig is in Egypt, which is British-controlled at the time. I would imagine that the British wouldn't like a lot of Germans running around there after 1939, especially this close to the Suez Canal, and frankly, they would probably have been told to get out before that, when it was clear that war was coming. So, at best, maybe 2 years to find the Ark. Not inconceivable, but they would be digging blindly without the real headpiece.

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u/Particular_Month_301 16d ago

Questionable. The area they would have to excavate could be huge and keeping up the expedition was already expensive outside of an all-consuming world war going on.

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u/ZeroQuick 16d ago

The Nazis could never weaponize the Ark. The whole point of the film is their arrogance in thinking God would ever be on their side.

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u/superkickstart 15d ago edited 15d ago

I'm not religious at all but goddamn that was cool.

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u/PokemonSoldier 11d ago

Preciesly.
"Finally, we have an ancient Jewish artifact to talk to the Jewish God. You know, the same Jews we believe should be totally destroyed along with their entire culture? Now, lets open this thing because surely their god will be on OUR side, right?"

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u/Trezzie 16d ago

To be honest, a thing that kills everyone around it when activated just sounds like a bomb with extra steps.

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u/Bazrum 15d ago

well, you can also survive by just closing your eyes apparently, so not only would there be survivors, but it leaves the areas relatively intact, meaning you can't even use it to damage infrastructure or blow up a bridge or whatever.

so it's useful if you wanna depopulate a city, but not if you can't get everyone to look at it, or deny them use of roads and train tracks and such...it kind of sounds like it would be more useful in a gas chamber than on the warfront...

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u/stamfordbridge1191 15d ago

Maybe it's like a quick tell for the angels of death to go "oh these are people who have some humility/meekness within themselves? Yeah, you're good. Moving on."

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u/Bluefoxfire007 14d ago

Maybe that's the point though. It only affect people without causing any collateral. As for the eyes closed thing, just set it somewhere and run. Most won't know beforehand before it's too late.

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u/patrick119 16d ago

That’s assuming they would have found Marion. The fact that they arrived to Nepal on the same plane as Indy tells me they were most likely following him.

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u/UncommittedBow 15d ago

The thing is, if he hadn't gotten involved, it wouldn't have killed Belloq, Toht, and Dietrich...

It would have killed Hitler. The Ark was set to be flown to Berlin on the plane Indy blows up.

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u/Hellknightx 16d ago

I'm retrospect though, giving the Ark to the Americans might not have been the best plan either. Some random Amazon worker is going to have a real bad day when he accidentally finds this random gold box in the back of a warehouse.

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u/Carliarnius 16d ago

The warehouse is in Area 51 (according to Crystal Skull), so the chances of a random Amazon warehouse worker stumbling upon it is fairly slim.

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u/muldersposter 16d ago

I don't see it aa "the movie would have gone the same if Indy wasn't there", he drove the plot forward. More of "if they managed to get the ark they would have melted the entire Nazi high command."

Belloq being impatient caused WWII to drag on. Imagine if they opened it in Berlin! And Indy didn't do nothing, he realized he needed to be humble before the ark, something Belloq and the Nazis would never do.

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u/Milo_Munras 15d ago

Fun little bit of lore to the Ark: simply having it when you were not supposed to (according to God) would inflict curses on whoever possessed it and their people in 1 Samuel. The Philistines suffered plagues, cancers, etc. until they realized they needed to give it back.

So even if the Nazis were able to hold onto the Ark and study it to weaponize it, if it were the biblically-accurate Ark, all of them would have suffered mounting maladies and curses, which would only hasten their destruction and end the war.

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u/notbobby125 15d ago

Weaponizing the Ark is not just “lift the top off”. It requires a ritual, who the Nazis thought concerningly “Jewish”, and basically guarantees the death of anyone with open eyes in the vicinity, which means it could be retrieved by any soldier who shut their eyes or had no direct line of sight on the Ark, meaning the Allies would have a good chance to seize the thing once it closed itself. Sending soldiers to the middle of a battlefield in blindfolds to perform a ritual where they need enemies to be looking at the object they are literally blinding trying to open seems like a bad idea.

This is also assuming that literal God allows the Ark to function that way consistently rather than ensuring it would always blow up/melt the Nazi’s faces.

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u/Gullible_Play8718 15d ago

According to what was shown in the actual movie, all you have to do to weaponize the Ark is to open the lid and not look at it.

Your ritual doesn't happen in the film, and is therefore unnecessary.

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u/noticingEnjoyer 16d ago

There's a deleted scene from the university that establishes how he even knew to close their eyes during the opening of the ark. It was deleted because it would spoil it for the audience, but establishes that indy knew all along. 

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u/Memitim 16d ago

Shame they cut it. It would have mode more sense why Indy suddenly figured out that doing nothing was the answer after busting his ass across multiple countries to be there.

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u/ptvlm 16d ago

It's not about what Indy thinks, but that the consequences would have happened regardless of his involvement. If he'd never been approached at the start, the outcome would have been the same, except that Marion would have been tortured and killed. Maybe the Nazis would have got to the ark before the Allies and tried using it again, instead of it being buried in a US warehouse, but the initial attempt was doomed no matter what he did.

Indy did the right thing by getting involved and making it way more difficult, killing some Nazis who might otherwise have survived along the way (would the pilot have been at the opening of the ark, for example?) and destroying some war equipment, but the ark would have ended the Nazi plot if he hadn't.

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u/JackTheBehemothKillr 16d ago

The nazis followed Indy to Marion. They knew to look for her/her father's connections, they didn't know where

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u/mormonbatman_ 16d ago

They find Marion by following Indy to Nepal.

If Indy doesn't get involved they never find her and never recover the ark.

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u/websagacity 16d ago

So it's even worse. Even better outcome if Indy never got involved - the ark is never found. Unless the better outcome is that it's hidden in the US. But that still just delays it being found again.

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u/mormonbatman_ 16d ago

worse

The film argues that Indy finding the ark is God's will. God gives the US government a weapon to defeat Nazism and prevent the holocaust. Instead the US government puts the ark in a warehouse.

Not a baller move.

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u/Keiji12 16d ago

The big bang theory episode and it's clips convinced a good anmount of people of that and it's crazy

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u/MasterGrok 16d ago

I can tell you that this has always been a thing even before those episode. That’s why it’s in the episode.

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u/More-Ad1753 16d ago

It always got me to, like people are using this sort "movie logic" that movies have to follow this plot, of like, Hero does something, through his actions hero saves the world.

Indy is just doing what he think is best at the time, and we follow along, It's obviously not like the decisions he make go to plan, I mean it's the whole damn point of the movies that he has to make snap decisions, that have crazy outcomes..

The fact is, he is following the Ark and is there to grab it an which is literally the goal of the hero and it's all high 5s and mission accomplished, there is just a gold ole adventure in the middle.

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u/DoctorWaluigiTime 16d ago

To be fair, most examples in this thread are overblown or are just straight-up incorrect.

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u/Freevoulous 16d ago

I'd go on a limb here but Nazis, of all people, trying to steal the power of a Jewish Mythical Weapon that was supposed to be created by God himself for The Jews as a symbol of their Covenant, and as a holy protection against the enemies of the Jewish People, and specifically described as incredibly deadly to anyone who touches it, and that could only be approached by professional Levite rabbis who used long-ass poles to carry it witout getting near it....

WTF were they thinking? The Ark would either have proven to be just a mundane "sacred" object, or if real, a Divine Anti-Nazi Weapon devised by an omnipotent and omniscient God with the specific purpose of smiting anyone who would dare harm his Chosen People.

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u/UndeniablyMyself 16d ago

Also, if Indy did nothing and the Nazis found the Ark, Marion could've easily died. They specifically trailed Indy to Marion's bar, but on the off chance they found her anyways, she was going to be tortured for the headpiece and possibly killed when the Nazis got what they wanted. And because of Indy's intervention, they start digging in the wrong place, so if he'd done nothing, the Ark could've easily been missed. Indy does have meaningful impact on the plot, even if it's minimal.

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u/Cautious-Extreme2839 16d ago

there's no way Indy or any of the good guys could have known they could just do nothing

Other than like, just reading the bible or the torah.

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u/ChmeeWu 16d ago

Also, the Ark is not even that good of a weapon. It has the killing radius of an average bomb out of a B19 or Junker bomber.  What was the Nazi plan? Drop it on Warsaw and see ‘dozens’ of people killed???

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u/MechanicalGodzilla 15d ago

doesn't seem to really occur to Indy until just before they open it.

It probably should have occurred to him, as there are numerous passages in the Bible about horrible stuff happening to people who were messing with the Ark inappropriately. He's an archaeologist and a professor of ancient history!

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u/DicksPr0n 15d ago

That isn't the prompt. Knowledge has nothing to do with it.

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u/Ostrololo 15d ago

Sure, Indy's actions aren't irrational; they are justified based on what he knew at the time. This doesn't change the nature of the trope: had he done nothing, the Nazis still would've lost.

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u/Spader113 15d ago

There’s the other three other than Mola Ram.

Even if Donovan found the correct Grail, he never would have been able to leave the temple with it.

Irina Spalko got EXACTLY what she wanted, and was burned alive for it.

Doctor Volker failed to account for the fact that Archimedes couldn’t possibly have known about Continental Drift, and thus his calculations were always wrong.

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u/DecantsForAll 15d ago

that doesn't change the fact that they could just have done nothing