Evil henchmen decide not to intervene in a pitched battle in a number of movies. In the 5th Element, Leeloo is going apeshit on a bunch of Mangalores. Two late arrivals see their buddies flying out the door and turn tail. I remember a similar scene in one of the Star Wars sagas where Vader is vaderizing some ‘disappointing’ individuals and a couple of stormtroopers do the same about face. Which Star Wars and which came first?
I’m sure it’s a bit of a trope. What other movies/series has this happened in?
I don’t remember that in the Vader trilogy. However, there is a scene in the sequel trilogy where Kylo Ren is flying off the handle, furiously lightsabering the consoles in a side room, and two approaching stormtroopers pause, exchange a look, and then turn and leave. Is it possible that’s what you’re remembering?
Iron Man 3, at about the 1:40 mark in this clip. The henchman drops his gun and says “Honestly, I hate working here. They are so weird,” and quickly walks away.
After shooting up Fist’s bar in the first Mass Effect game, Commander Shepard and his crew go into the back room, where they find two more people with guns - dock workers. You can choose the Paragon option of talking them out of fighting you.
“This might be a good time for you to find a different place to work.”
THE PRINCESS BRIDE: four armed guys charge at Inigo Montoya; four seconds later, they’re worse off than if they’d charged at Clark Kent; fifth guy makes a choice.
There’s a good inversion in Avengers: Age of Ultron where all the henchmen are shouting “No surrender!” and the main bad guy quietly tells his #2 that he’s going to go surrender.
I like the bar fight in the first jack reacher movie - or atleast Reacher’s description to the person he’s fighting:
Reacher: It’s 3 against one… BadGuy: How do you figure, there’s 5 of us Reacher: Once I take out the leader, which is you, I’ll have to deal with 1 or 2 enthusiastic wingmen - the other 2 always run BadGuy: You’ve done this before? Reacher: yeah, many times… let’s get this done
That reminds me a bit of a scene from the first John Wick movie. Wick is sneaking into a club and gets the drop on the henchman watching the back door. It turns out that they know each other, so they make very tense small talk, and Wick tells the man to take the night off. The goon, with obvious relief, says thank you, walks away and we never see him again.
Other movies, the hero would have knocked him out, or the henchman would have tried to pull a fast one on him. Here, though, the goon knows the score. He’s been given his life as a gift, and he’ll take it.
