Characters getting “knocked out” in films and TV shows

It just occurred to me that it's a long time since I saw a "knockout" in a film or on TV, and that's most likely due to what I choose to watch or not watch. It's not that I specifically avoid movies that might have a knockout scene, more that those are not the kind of movies that interest me much anyway. "Action" movies generally bore the you-know-what out of me.

 

Not too off topic but ......how come nobody ever explained as to why Superman ducked when the gun was thrown at him

 

Alias tried to make this more realistic by the use of tranquilizer darts but, you guessed it, the victim always fell unconscious two seconds after the dart hit them. At least they came up with something new.

 

"If looks could kill, they probably will."

 

In some of those old Westerns, 1 shot from a cowboy and a dozen Indians fall off their horses. I'm guessing they weren't seriously hurt.

 

I don't know that killing is any better dramatically than getting knocked out.

I watch these shows like 24 or Fargo, where over half the main and guest cast winds up dead over the course of the season, and it just takes me out of it how much killing there is. Whatever your scheme is, good guy or bad, don't you value your life more than that? It just makes the characters pieces on a chess board, they're moved around and killed for plot purposes, but the character motivation isn't believable.

 

Hitchcock made that point with the scene at the beginning of Torn Curtain where Paul Newman kills the East German agent who's trailed him. Having said that, I'm not sure a scene like that quite works dramatically; it could make an audience start laughing. Storytelling conventions exist for a reason.

 

He doesn’t want a black eye. (The actor not Superman.)

 

I always get a kick out of the Bruce Lee nunchuck scene in the alley. If you hit someone a solid whack in the head, they are not getting up. I grazed my ear once with a practice foam pair and thought I was gonna die from the pain.

 

Never been knocked out. Took a shot to the head playing football. I remember somebody holding my face mask and asking me questions. I was trying to look at the scoreboard when they asked me who we were playing. Kept me out of the game after that. Had a concussion as a kid. The feeling of your brain moving inside your skull is one you never forget. Had a serious headache for two weeks. No matter what I took it didn’t help.

 

Nonsense. Jackie Chan never gets knocked out. Oh sure, he may break his skull, sternum, ankle, shoulder, nearly lose an eye, etc. But unconsciousness? Don't be such a sissy.