I’m pretty sure they went thataway!
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
It was referred to as a Devilfish which by its description and comments by the characters was clearly a giant octopus (French edition) or squid (older English translations).
A couple of times in the Fleischer cartoons, but even there it was rare. And it was an Art Deco booth with frosted glass.
It showed up on some comic book covers, obviously played for a joke
Although they did it “straight” at least obce:
It’s the kind of thing that falls too easily into parody. I’ve seen it once in an advertisement, they made fun of it in Richard Donner’s 1978 Superman movie, and there’s a wonderful cartoon by some DC artist that shows Superman holding his clothes (and shoes – which no one ever talks about) while yelling at a guy to get out of the phone booth so he can change. The guy in the phone booth is Alfred E. Neuman.
There’s also this. I have no idea where it appeared – it’s not a Mad magazine cover.
https://www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=1101030
And this bit of weirdness
Considering the number of phone booths around (not even necessarily working booths), this is a concept made obsolete by technology.
Damn! Someone’s done a webpage on it already:
https://www.supermanhomepage.com/other/other.php?topic=phonebooth
The Mounted Cowboy on this movie poster is using his gun all kinds of Wrong!
Which was mentioned back in Post #76.
I suspect no author really gave a lot of thought to the phrase, especially how it would work. There is a reason trails go where they do. It’s because it’s easier and faster travel. If there was actually a shortcut that saved time, that would be the regular trail.
We still see this not working in shows today, even tho no one says the phrase. Two good guys are chasing a bad guy, all running directly north. On of the good guys pauses, glances east, then north. He then runs directly east. Magically, at the end of the block, he plows into the bad guy going west at full speed. Physically impossible, but I guess people really like it still.
Trails aren’t necessarily the shortest. They are the easiest, because they’re less sloped, or widest, or have fewest obstacles. Out West they often loop around hills and valleys and avoid rocks and swift water. In certain circumstances it would be totally plausible to try a riskier but shorter route. In real life, this is a good way to break a horse’s leg, but in the movies it always works.
If there’s two things that have been pretty firmly established in this thread, its that there are a lot of different ways this saying makes sense, but it doesn’t really matter, because no writer every actually used it.
But we’re still getting posts like this.
No, not really. Just because you can make up a reason for it to theoretically work doesn’t mean it would work or that anyone would use such a shortcut. Humans and animals, like water, take the path of least resistance. If there was a shortcut, people and animals would have been using it.
Your own example depends on the pursuers already being closer to the pass than the pursued. That’s not a short cut, that’s being ahead.
Yes, and as you said, it’s often the fastest because they are easier. Louis L’Amour used the short cut occasionally, but it almost always involves something like abandoning your horse and climbing down a cliff to gain ground. Needless to say, not many people are willing to try that.
I gave three real-life examples of people heading off others at a pass in this thread alone. All were emergency exigencies. The practice doesn’t have to be common, and nobody has said it was. Nevertheless, it’s real. Movies didn’t make it up.
Well, no, because terrain is a thing. The shortest distance between point A and point B might go down the side of a ravine. Which could be navigable for a skilled horseman, like Our Hero, but is totally impassible to a wagon, which is why the road goes the long way around. The Bad Guys don’t know the area as well as Our Hero, and ignorant of the steeper path down the ravine (and possibly not very skilled on horseback) are following the road.
So? Who said a short cut is required?
Again, so? We’re talking about armed parties in pursuit of each other, not daily commutes. It’s an exceptional circumstance by definition, and since we’re talking about dime store novel cliches, it’s a given that Our Hero is an exceptional person, who regularly does stuff “many people” would not be willing to try.
Even in cities, where all of the roads are easily passable by any sort of vehicle, it’s not uncommon for locals who know their way around to be able to make better time getting from A to B than folks unfamiliar with the area.
As shown in ten zillion car chases in movies and tv. Or I should say vehicle chases, since motorcycles are often involved. And probably bicycles, mopeds, scooters, ice cream trucks, and snowplows.
Yes terrain is a thing, and you had to fanwank a bunch of reasons to come up with a scenario where it would work. You needed five different things to happen for your plan to work. I’ll do it with one, and I won’t even need to use your other four or the alternate route. Bad guy is in a wagon, so good guy is faster and more maneuverable on his horse so he simply overtakes the wagon on the well used trail. Much simpler that your convoluted plan.
Well, according to your story, the good buy is chasing the bad guy and needs all those five steps to be sure to overtake the bad guy. So, I guess you said a shortcut was required, along with 3 or 4 other things.
But why would he? If he’s as exceptional as you say, he would just run down the wagon on the well used trail. And shoot the gun out of the bad guys had at full gallop while shooting from the hip. There’s no reason for all the other stuff you threw in to make your plan happen other than to make a movie seem more exciting. Kind of like how Indiana Jones would have had the same ending if Indy had just stayed home.
Sure, but that’ s in heavy traffic and a lot of alternate routes. We’re talking about one route and apparently, a bunch of made up stuff to show how cool the Good Guy is by going over a dangerous, slower route to overtake someone that’s ahead of him. It’s not like there were going to be a tangle of wagons and carriages blocking the main route.
Bike messengers are the worst. I’ve thought of killing a few of them in NY. Good thing I don’t have a car when I’m there. We could save a lot of lives by removing the ramps from the back of vehicles so fleeing cars don’t hit them and do a barrel roll or two before crashing into a fruit stand.
I’m not saying the stuff doesn’t happen on film or in books, but that’s fiction. If it happened in real life, there were very specific reasons. Simply put, going off of game or hiking trails or horse trails is not an advantage in anything. There is a reason those trails have been there for hundred of years and have been used for generations upon generations. If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.
I caught an old episode Maverick flipping channels, and they used the phrase “Head them off” when the bad guys took off. I laughed and thought of this discussion. They never made it out of town so there was no pass.
“Fanwank?” What work exactly do you think I’m fanwanking here? Because again, there’s no actual work of fiction attached to this cliche.
It’s not “my” plan. I’m not hatching a scheme to catch bad guys on horseback. I’m describing a hypothetical scenario in which this equally hypothetical saying would make logical sense.
How you think “number of steps involved” is a relevant criticism entirely escapes me. As, for that matter, does how you got to five steps in the first place.
Sure, but also, not descriptive of heading anyone off at anything. That’s just “catching up.”
I’ve offered two different scenarios. The first scenario didn’t involve a shortcut. The second one did. You objected to the first one on the grounds that I didn’t mention a short cut. Which isn’t really an objection to the scenario, because the concept doesn’t require a short cut to make sense.
Yeah… that’s how movies work. You make up a bunch of stuff the hero has to overcome, in order to make the movie more interesting. That’s kind of basic to the concept of storytelling since… forever?
What on Earth do you think is being discussed in this thread, other than fiction?
Well, I’ve been discussing real people doing it in real life, which @mordicaiB has carefully avoided citing. It only takes one real-life occurrence to justify its use in fiction, where it can be dramatized to any degree. “But it did happen” is the best rejoinder to “it can never happen.” And while the ones I cited were unusual they did not involve extraordinary or superhuman means, just a bit of planning and effort well within normal bounds.
Yep, sorry about the hijack. My only point in my post was that the trope is still used extensively in tv and movies today, it’s just not named as such. I didn’t think that would be controversial.
Personally, I’m going to watch this thread to see if anyone finds a good site for a real life origin. I don’t even mind if it’s not an exact quote. Something similar that morphed into “Head 'em off at the pass!” would work for me.
@Exapno_Mapcase , what newspaper archive do you use? I may want to give it a try. I looked at a couple of online books about Big Hole Pass and neither uses that line. Since you are the expert on this stuff, how often can you find a first person source? For instance, General Gibbon writing a book about the battle and using the term? Did John Paul Jones ever confirm somehow that he said his famous “I have not yet begun to fight!” or was it simply reported he said that?
I use newspapers.com. That’s a pay site.
However, the cites in post #44 and #74 are old enough that they should be on the free, public domain Chronicling America site from the Library of Congress.