A History Channel Reality Show where 16 guys joust each other. Full contact, armor, horses, lances: the whole deal. Brutal drama in the jousting arena leaves the series mostly free of typical reality show backbiting.
Two teams, the Red and the Black, are pitted against each other once a week in an elimination round. The sole winner will gain a $100,000 prize. Just before the final match of Season 1, a $25,000 joust was held between two of the 14 eliminated players.
No relation to Full Metal Jacket, Fullmetal Alchemist, Full Metal Panic! or anything else beginning in "Full Metal".
Full Metal Jousting provides examples of:
- Attack! Attack! Attack!: There is no defense in jousting. The only option is for rider and horse to charge in hard, aim well, strike hard, and hope for the best.
- Berserk Button: When Josh is on the verge of losing a match, his coach tells him "You're stealing a hundred thousand dollars from your daughter." Cue a Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
- The show's host, really hates sloppy lance control for a number of reasons. During latter episodes, you could hear him get more and more disgusted with lance to lance parries that resulted in mere touches on the scoring plate of the each other's armor.
- Body Horror: Some of the injuries obtained can invoke this, and one of them forced a jouster to withdraw from the tournament.
- Bullet Time: Used often to review a joust. Special mention for it capturing the horses ducking or tracking a lance.
- Cool Horse: All of them, but special mention goes to Praetorian, Superman, Navarro, and Crispin for being either extremely badass or extremely reliable.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Happens on a few occasions when the margin of victory is 15-20 points. Due to the potential for a win by knockout, though, any joust can instantly turn around in the trailing player's favor.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Some of the guys gain nicknames based on their performances, like The Wolfman, The Hammer.
- Golden Snitch: A person can win by knockout at any time if the opponent gets unhorsed and is unable to continue the joust within two minutes (not counting time given for medical checks). This includes the very last pass of a joust. Thus all jousts are done to full completion regardless of the score, since one good hit can be all that's needed to win it.
- Horsing Around: Happens a lot.
- Kick the Dog: Landon gets kicked off the show for punching a horse in the face when it steps on his foot. Considering the show has been pretty much universally praised for its treatment of horses otherwise, most of the trainers and other competitors considered it a
Moral Event Horizon. - Lock-and-Load Montage: Putting these guys in their competition armor. Some parts seem to require the use of an impact wrench
. - Loyal Animal Companion: Invoked as necessary by the host and jousters. One jouster is even saved from falling off by his horse. Conversely, a lack of confidence on the part of the rider can lead to a balk or misbehavior.
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Can happen at any time during any pass. As the host points out, jousting has no defense, so even a lucky, random strike can devastate an experienced jouster.
- Non-Standard Game Over: Landon gets disqualified for mistreating a horse, and Brian withdraws after a groin injury. Each of them is replaced by a player who had lost an earlier joust, chosen by the host and coaches.
- Once an Episode: The point system is reviewed. 1 point for a touch, 5 points for a broken lance, and 10 points for an unhorsing.
- Pet the Dog: It's hilarious to see roaring, grunting men talk smack, then turn around and gently pat their horses.
- Pint-Sized Powerhouse: James, who is the smallest guy, but whose riding ability gives him accuracy and power.
- Testosterone Poisoning: Like you wouldn't believe. Jousting makes rugby look tame.
