Train Conductor: Board! Board!
[Passenger looks at watch, sees that it's not nearly time to leave, scoffs; then passenger gets hit by man carrying wooden boards, twice]
Train Conductor: Told ya. Warned ya twice.
[Passenger looks at watch, sees that it's not nearly time to leave, scoffs; then passenger gets hit by man carrying wooden boards, twice]
Train Conductor: Told ya. Warned ya twice.
A subtrope of Slapstick and Amusing Injuries, this is an old gag where Alice is carrying long items such as planks, logs, poles, or ladders, turns around and accidentally hits Bob, who was standing behind or next to her.
This happens either because Bob called Alice from behind, and she instinctively turned around to greet him, or because she wasn't aware of his presence, or simply because Alice isn't careful of her surroundings.
One common variant is to have the carrying character unknowingly knock out an attacker that was furtively approaching from behind. Another is to have a sufficiently quick-witted character duck the first swing, only to be clocked in the head when Alice turns back around.
This gag find its origins in Vaudeville and Music Hall, leading to its use in the Silent Movie era. Virtually every silent movie, starting from Chaplin to Laurel and Hardy, used this gag at least once, even when talkies came along. The Plank Gag was also a favourite of the Three Stooges. It's still used on stage today in the UK with Pantomime.
In Real Life, safety rules are set up specifically to avoid this situation.
Characters likely (but not necessary) to be involved in the gag are The Klutz for the long item-wielder, and the Butt-Monkey and The Chew Toy for the person suffering the hit.
If you're thinking about a guy getting hit in the face by a board that he stepped on, that's actually a variation of the Rake Take. Also compare Nautical Knockout and Dangerous Backswing. And watch out for the Priceless Ming Vase. A Plank Gag might be set up, but subverted by the Coincidental Dodge.
Examples:
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Advertising
- An old Australian television ad for insurance has some average Joe walking along the street, narrowly avoiding accidents. One of the accidents he ducks (literally) is the Plank Gag. He drops the coin he is flipping and bends down to pick it up just as the workman with the plank turns around, the plank passing harmlessly over the top of him.
- A Swedish TV ad for Vicks Blue cough drops has a man trying to call attention to a running purse snatcher, however his voice fails him. He's offered a pill, his throat clears, and he shouts loudly across the street where the man's escaping — "Stop the thief!!" Everyone turns towards him, including a man carrying a rafter, who accidentally knocks the purse snatcher out cold as he comes running.
Anime & Manga
- In One Piece, pirate captain Mikazuki gets hit in the backhead by a huge log carried by a shipwright when he threatens the Galley-La workers during his and their first appearance. In this case, it's not an accident, but an actual attack.
- In Zoids: New Century, this plus a Coincidental Dodge enables Bit to unintentionally and unconsciously rescue Naomi Fluegel from two thugs by brutalizing them with a large pipe. He's confused as to why they are unconscious afterwards. As he's also an ace Zoid pilot, this causes Ms. Fanservice to develop a bit of a crush on him.
Naomi: Is this guy totally zoned out or did he do all that
on purpose?
Comic Books
- Happens once in the Bone collection The Great Cow Race. One page has Smiley holding a ladder from one end while the other is between Lucius and Phoney. In the back is Fone Bone is calling to Smiley, pointing to the left. In the next page, Smiley has completely turned around, while Lucius and Phoney are knocked over, clutching their heads in pain. Fone Bone has an "Oops!" look on his face.
- The Gaston Lagaffe books made use of this gag several times, with the eponymous klutzy character obviously being the one accidentally smashing the items into his unfortunate working colleagues' faces.
- In Jon Sable, Freelance In #10, Sable goes looking for trouble and finds three thugs standing by a Trashcan Bonfire with baseball bats. Jon challenges the biggest one to a fight and picks up one of the bats. He then says "Okay, let's get the rules straight". when another of the thugs responds "There ain't no rules!", Sable invokes the Plank Gag by turning quickly with bat over his shoulder and whacking the big guy in the head. He then follows it up by using the bat to launch a Groin Attack on the second thug.
- Common in kid comics like Spiff and Hercules. In one strip at a mountain resort, Hercules happily swirls around with a pair of skis on his shoulder. Spiff ducks under them, but a passerby gets hit in the face. The man grumbles "Do you think you're in a Mack Sennett movie?" and chases after them.
Comic Strips
- Peppermint Patty does this to Marcie in one Peanuts strip; accidentally beaning Marcie with a loaf of French bread she brought back from her trip to Paris.
Fan Works
Films — Animation
- The Adventures of Tintin: On the lifeboat, Captain Haddock manages to obliviously knock out both Tintin and Snowy while setting up the oars. By the time Tintin comes back to consciousness, the drunken sailor had started a fire on the boat.
- The Loud House Movie: Leni accidentally subjects Morag to this with a bolt of fabric.
- Moana: Maui nearly brains the title character with her own boat when he turns to face her. Fortunately, she sees it coming and ducks in time.
- Once Upon a Studio: While Goofy carries the ladder from which he'll take the big group photo, he almost hits Ichabod Crane with it. Ichy ducks just in time, briefly making it seem like he lost his head.
- The Rescuers: Bernard is rather clumsy with the comb-ladder he carries into the R.A.S. meeting and, nearly hitting the Chairman with it.
- Toy Story 2: A Zurg toy has been dislodged from its packaging and is threatening Buzz Lightyear and another Buzz Lightyear atop an elevator. Rex (a toy tyrannosaur) shouts "I can't look!" and does an about-face... knocking Zurg off the edge with his tail.
Films — Live-Action
- Used with frequency on The Benny Hill Show. For example, Benny carrying a plank is easily distracted by pretty ladies, with predictable results.
- Bill: Shakespeare whacks Ian over the head with a stick he has over his shoulder as he wanders through the London market.
- The Chronicles of Narnia: In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Eustace is attempting to set an oar in a rowboat (backwards), nearly loses his balance, and swings it about, knocking out a pirate leader who was sneaking up behind him with a knife.
- Invoked intentionally in Down Periscope. While everybody else is doing scut labor repainting the sub's deck, Stepanek sets up a lounge chair and goofs off. (He's trying to get himself thrown out of the military, and The Captain knows it, but isn't willing to oblige.) After getting Stepanek's hopes up with a promise of "relocation", the Captain barks at a passing sailor who is carrying an armload of planks. The sailor spins, swatting Stepanek off the deck, thus successfully relocating him into the sludge tray that was alongside.
- In The Fifth Element, Ruby Rhod accidentally knocks out a flight attendant behind him by swirling around his mic/pimp-cane.
- Occurs in Godzilla Millennium (Godzilla 2000 in the West) when Yuki visits Yuji and Io, and has to ask two dockworkers for directions to the Godzilla Prediction Network HQ.
- In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, a Running Gag is that Filch is seen climbing a ladder to display the many "Educational Decrees", as passed by Professor Umbridge. During one of these scenes, he turns round while carrying the ladder, causing students to duck out of the way.
- In Holmes & Watson, Watson knocks out Queen Victoria when he turns around while carrying a box camera with a tripod.
- Hot Shots! Part Deux, as quoted above. There's also a scene involving some ex-presidents getting knocked out by the shovel-wielding president as they broke ground for a new hospital. Except for Gerald Ford, who falls down anyway.
- Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl includes a "comedy tutorial" sketch featuring plank and other slapstick gags. The routine was originally written for the TV sketch show We Have Ways of Making You Laugh (1968). Notable for the sight of Terry Gilliam in obvious and considerable pain with the effort of trying not to bust up laughing.
- In A Loud House Christmas, it happens a bunch of times during the scene where Lori calls the family, while saying that he wants to talk to her, Lincoln swings his wrapped sled over the family a bunch of times. He does this again when protesting against the family supporting Lori not being home for Christmas, but, Lynn Sr. (the dad), knowing what's gonna happen, warns the family to duck.
Lynn Sr: Incoming. [the family ducks to avoid being hit by Lincoln's sled]
- During the fire drill in Mutiny on the Buses, Arthur turns around while holding a ladder and swings it into Blakey.
- In My Fair Lady, happens during the "With a Little Bit of Luck" song, since Alfie Doolittle is singing in what seems to be a construction area and there is inevitably someone who swings a plank around and someone else gets hit by it.
- Vintage British comedians Eric Sykes and Tommy Cooper actually made an entire 45-minute film devoted to exploring and using every possible permutation of this gag. It is simply called The Plank and is much better than it sounds note . It also received a TV remake in 1979.
- Pokémon Detective Pikachu: While discussing what happened to Harry, Pikachu paces in small circles, accidentally hitting Tim a couple of times with his tail. (He's standing on a bar counter at the time.)
- In the first Police Academy, Fackler is carrying a mattress while he crosses Larvell Jones and Mahoney in a hallway. Introducing himself, he turns around some to shake Mahoney's hand, pushing Jones into a door and down service stairs with the mattress.
- In Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, one of the townsfolk "accidentally" does this to one of the brothers — although he's openly a Jerkass about it and he never really expected anyone to believe it was an accident.
- In Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, Bobba Fett, about to shoot at Luke, gets accidentally thwarted that way by Han, who hits his jet-pack and sends him flying off the skiff into Jabba's barge, and then in the Sarlacc's mouth.
Literature
- Discworld:
- Making Money features a martial art based on slapstick routines, including carrying a ladder over one shoulder and hitting assailants with it when one turns around. The clown doing it manages to tie up five watchmen between the rungs and is praised highly by Dr. Whiteface.
- As seen in The Fifth Elephant, this is also why the Fools' Guild's fire department has never managed to stop any fires — you hand a group of clowns a ladder and a bucket, and the instinct to pull this gag immediately takes over.
- The key element in Koloman Kocúr's goofy satiric comedy Man Long (Muž Dlhým) is a recurring random construction worker carrying a single girder to enter the scene and unwittingly hit just the right person with said girder whenever turning around.
- In The Pendragon Adventure, when Bobby completes his Training from Hell with Loor and Alder and is awarded a real fighting staff, he launches into a long series of these. He'd nearly whack one of them with the staff end as he turns to the other to apologize for nearly whacking them, and then spins around to apologize for that...
- Played with in Mr. Men, where Mr. Bump carries a very long ladder, so he can mend his chimney.
Mr. Bump turned the corner. CRASH went the living room window. "Oh dear," he said, and turned to see what had happened. CRASH went the kitchen window. "Oh dear," he said, and he rested the ladder against the side of the house, so that he could climb up. CRASH went the bedroom window!
Live-Action TV
- In an episode of 3rd Rock from the Sun, Dick is trying to figure out the Earth concept of humor. Coincidentally, Sally is trying to organize her closet. In this scene she inadvertently employs the plank gag no less than five times by carrying a ladder and not noticing anyone around her. This display of slapstick does not help Dick learn anything.
- All That has a character Lester Oaks, Construction Worker who sometimes carries around a big plank to make use of this gag, one example being an "Okrah" sketch where he knocks show host Okrah over this way a few times.
- A non-violent gag in one of the rare episodes of Are You Being Served? occurring outside of the Grace Bros. sales floor. Captain Peacock quickly enters a scene carrying a stack of planks on his head. Informed that the planks are needed elsewhere, he turns about face, departing just as effortlessly.
- The first episode of Bananas in Pajamas features this. With B1 narrowly missing B2 as they clean up the beach.
- Prone to happen anytime El Chavo grabs a broomstick or similar in El Chavo del ocho.
- ChuckleVision has one of these practically Once per Episode, accompanying the brothers' catchphrase.
- In the Doctor Who story "Dragonfire", the bait-and-switch version of this gag is played. Where it looks like the Doctor is going to accidentally clobber Glitz (with the Doctor's umbrella in place of the plank), but Glitz is Distracted by the Shiny and ducks at the last minute unwittingly letting the umbrella swing harmlessly over his head.
- Happens with some regularity on Home Improvement, usually with Al on the receiving end. And once with Bob Vila.
- Horrible Histories: In a sketch about Edward III's wedding in the unfinished Yorkminster, his bride — Philippa of Hainault — gets clonked on the head when a workman carrying a beam turns around.
- Mystery Science Theater 3000:
- A skit has Tom Servo with a long canoe on his head, explaining the concept of "portage". As he turns his head this way and that, he repeatedly knocks out Crow and Mike.
- Another skit has Mike explaining the gag to Crow and Tom using an actual plank. While Mike is close to tears about the gag, the bots are... less than amused.
- Smart Guy: In a gag inspired by the Three Stooges, Marcus and Mo accidentally clobber TJ with a couple of 2-by-4s. TJ spends the rest of the episode acting loopy.
- In a Christmas episode of Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em, Frank knocks his boss into a hole twice with a plank of wood.
- The Star Trek: Voyager episode "Survival Instinct", had Chakotay trying to lug a huge piece of alien sports equipment across the bridge and nearly whacking a visiting alien with it.
Pro Wrestling
- A stock spot in Professional Wrestling ladder matches, or other hardcore matches with a ton of weapons. More commonly, the ladder is used to assault other wrestlers, but this spot is common as well, especially in team matches.
Puppet Shows
- Magellan from Eureeka's Castle has a Running Gag variant on this. His tail is the long object, so for instance he'll build something out of blocks and knock it down with his tail when he turns around. Typically, he then scolds his tail as if it were sentient.
- The Muppet Show:
- In the Roy Clark episode, Kermit narrowly avoids being hit in the head with a plank by Fozzie as he attempts to fix a hole in the stage. He then falls down the hole.
- In Jean Stapleton's episode, Miss Piggy gets talked into doing a sketch where she's Chained to a Railway. When her co-stars get distracted Miss Piggy breaks off the section of tracks, marches backstage with it still tied to her back and swings the prop around this way to show Kermit what she thinks of the sketch.
Radio
- Our Miss Brooks: In "Going Skiing", Miss Brooks knocks off a pair of Mr. Conklin's glasses with one of her skis.
Theatre
- In Peter Pan Goes Wrong, Robert (as Starkey) repeatedly knocks down Dennis (Smee) and Annie (Tiger Lily) by turning around too quickly while wearing the rowboat prop.
- This was demonstrated as part of the "Comedy Masterclass" skits in The Secret Policeman's Ball.
Video Games
- This is one of Gintoki's attacks in Jump Ultimate Stars. The attack might be based on chapter 9 of Gintama, but the actual gag doesn't happen there.
- In Super Gem Fighter, one of Akuma's special attacks is to perform one of these on his opponent while wearing a construction worker's outfit.
- In one of Tanimura's Revelation for Yakuza 4. One event that unlocks "Essence of Skull-crushing" has this gag be one of the final parts of an almost Rube Goldberg-esque sequence of accidents. With a construction worker carrying a large long piece of lumber, getting surprised with a large trash can landing on his head, ends up spinning around wildly (for some reason) and while he does miss a guy (who was asking for Laser-Guided Karma) it ends up hitting a lamp post instead that dislodges a a sign which subsequently lands on the back of the man's head knocking him out.
Visual Novels
- In Tokimeki Memorial 2 Substories: Leaping School Festival, this happens in an Event of Akane's storyline, when the protagonist, surprised and worried to see her carrying such heavy-looking logs (which are no problem for her, being from a family of martial artists), calls her from behind.
Web Animation
- In the Happy Tree Friends episode "The Wrong Side of the Tracks", Lumpy does this when he hears Mime's balloon pop, except the plank has exposed nails that stab Mime in the back of the head.
- A variation happens in Episode 63 of The Most Popular Girls in School: when dancing together, Deandra spins around with her robotic arm outstretched and hits Rachel right in the face, knocking her right onto the floor.
Western Animation
- In the Camp Lazlo episode "Snow Beans", this happens to Chip and Skip, using a pair of skis rather than a plank.
- In the Danger Mouse episode "Quark Games", Penfold knocks Jeopardy Mouse into a Pit Trap with a mop he has over his shoulder when he has a bucket stuck on his head.
- Gunther does this to Kick on Kick Buttowski: Suburban Daredevil a few times in the appropriately named episode Knocked Out.
- In several episodes of The Koala Brothers, one character will unintentionally hit another with a plank, a railway track etc. The most frequent victim of this trope is Buster.
- On The Penguins of Madagascar, King Julien challenges Fred the squirrel to a duel with staffs. Fred beats him without even trying, just by moving around with the staff on his shoulder.
- In the Pinky and the Brain episode "Pinky and the Brain... and Larry", Larry does this to the Brain.
- In the SpongeBob SquarePants episode "Rock Bottom", every time SpongeBob turns around to look for his wallet, he hits the bus driver with his big, glove-shaped balloon. Eventually, he gets so fed up with getting hit that he tells SpongeBob to get to his seat without paying.
- Axl does it to Bull Gator in an episode of Taz-Mania. Bull hangs a lampshade on the gag, saying "I really should have seen that coming".
- Total Drama:
- "Not So Happy Campers - Part 1": Bridgette twice nearly hits Duncan, Harold, and Trent with her surfboard when first Geoff asks her attention and next Beth.
- "Not So Happy Campers - Part 2": Bridgette twice hits Harold with a plank: once when she picks it up and another time when she turns around with it on her shoulder.
- "Evil Dread": Scott knocks out Manitoba with his shovel when a trap triggers behind him, prompting him to turn around.
- "Paddle Field Earth": Priya smacks Millie with a broom when she turns to greet Julia, then smacks Millie again when she turns back around to apologize.
