Basic Trope: A sharp bladed weapon that is attached to the arm, springs from the arm, or IS an arm.
- Straight: Ninja Kenshin wields a foot-long retractable blade attached to his left vambrace.
- Exaggerated:
- Expy Carmillia has a trio of them spring out of her fists on all six arms, and each claw is 3 feet long.
- He has a groovy CHAINSAW attached there that is still somehow retractable.
- Downplayed:
- Kenshin has spiked gloves.
- Kenshin's fingernails have been replaced by blades.
- Justified
- He’s an assassin, and as it turns out blades that seamlessly retract into his sleeve are easy to hide.
- He has cybernetic limbs which hold a internal housing for the blades.
- Aerobot's arm-mounted-while-in-robot-mode wings are sharp enough to double as blades.
- Inverted: Howard the Hero's sword has an arm growing from the hilt.
- Subverted: Kenshin flexes his arm and poses as if to call forth the blade... and activates the smoke bombs he placed there.
- Double Subverted: He’s pressed the wrong button, and after the smoke clears he sheepishly unretreacts his blade.
- Parodied:
- Kenshin has trouble keeping his blades retracted when around his crush...
- Kenshin's face is covered in scars because he keeps forgetting to retract his blades before picking his nose.
- Zig Zagged: Sometimes Kenshin has arm blades, some days he doesn’t, and sometime he has a bootknife instead.
- Averted: All weapons are wielded, and no retractable blades appear.
- Enforced: It's a series trademark.
- Lampshaded: “Why not just carry a sword?” “...It’s the principle of the thing!”
- Invoked:Kenshin asks to have blades added to his gauntlets.
- Exploited:
- Kenshin keeps his blade retraced until the villains least expect it.
- He uses the armblades so he can fight and gesture rudely at the same time.
- He uses armblades so he doesn’t forget to bring a weapon with him.
- Defied: “No, Timmy, you can’t have the vambrace. We don’t trust you around concealed sharp objects anymore...”
- Discussed: “Bet he has trouble picking his nose.”
- Conversed: There’s fanart of the above incident.
- Deconstructed:
- Carmillia has Wolverine Claws that retract into her flesh, but not the regeneration to protect her from the damage done. She’s none to happy about this.
- The retractable blades limit movement when retracted. When Carmilla's Wolverine Claws are in, she can't move her wrist without grievous internal injuries.
- Kenshin's arm-blades are Awesome, but Impractical: they have a shorter reach than normal weapons, they prevent him from using his wrists to feint, and attempting to block with them would break his forearm. He eventually abandons them for the more traditional Katana.
- Reconstructed:
- But Carmillia's arms are actually high quality cybernetic limbs, her body isn't damaged by the blades.
- Kenshin's arm-blades are worthless as a primary weapon, but are an excellent supplement to Kenshin's normal arsenal. The retractable armblades are unfamiliar to most, giving him an edge, and as his hands are still free to use his sword, he is effectively triple wielding.
- Played For Laughs: Kenshin modified the claws to go *Snikt* when exposed.
* Snikt!* Back to Blade Below the Shoulder!
