Chased by Angry Natives

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Stock scene for the Adventurer Archaeologist and Mister Danger types, the not-so-Noble Savages are angry at his stealing their sacred idol and/or refusing to be their dinner. Expect there to be hilariously ineffectual thrown spears, hooting and jumping as he makes a clean getaway via plane, boat, car, or train.

Of course, this amounts to nothing so much as Mighty Whitey stealing "preserving for posterity" the ancient sacred objects of a lesser culture to a place they'll be truly appreciated: a public museum.

Perhaps one of the most cliché things in these adventure movies. But hey, it sets the adventurous, peril dodging tone rather well.

If the villain sets them on the hero, it's Give Chase With Angry Natives.

Compare the Thundering Herd, a more comedic version.

Examples of Chased by Angry Natives include:


Anime and Manga

  • Subverted in One Piece. The Straw Hat pirates think this is what happening, since they were attempting to make off with the Skypeian's gold. However, gold is absolutely worthless to Sky Islanders and the Straw Hats had just defeated their false god. They were, in fact, going to give the Straw Hats even more gold, in the form of a gold pillar. But the size of it and the fact it was covered made the pirates mistake it for a cannon and sent them scurrying.
    • However this is the case with Chopper. In the manga chapter and cover story (as well as the anime adaption of said cover story) Chopper IS chased by the very very native looking natives of Torino Kingdom (obese people wearing nothing but straw skirts), attacking with spears.....that get fired out of a cannon.
    • Don't forget what happened to Luffy in the anime rendition of the Amazon Lily arc.

Comic Books

  • This happened once or twice to Tintin.
  • In the Excalibur story arc The Crosstime Caper, we get a few short vignettes of strange dimensions our heroes passed dimension-hopping, and one is a weird world where Europe was colonized by the Native Americans and is, essentially, the Wild West. We see them chased by angry warpainted British "braves" wearing bowler hats and swinging umbrellas.

Film

  • Ace Ventura at the end of Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls when the Wachatis and Wachootoos find out that the princess is not a virgin.
    • "They can tell that?"
    • The villain of the movie also has to get away from pissed-off natives when his plan to start a war between the two aforementioned tribes comes crashing down around his ears. He manages to get away, only to be cornered by a silverback gorilla with...amorous intentions.
  • Jackie Chan's movie Armour of God starts with our hero stealing a sword from a bunch of natives, during while the natives are worshiping the said sword. After being chased by the angry natives, he flies away with an ultralight aircraft, natives awed by this wonder start worshiping the flying thing.
    • Played with in the sequel, Operation Condor, sneaks in and goes for the big, expensive looking gems built into the natives' idol. Their witch doctor seems OK with it. He's quite displeased when he takes some of the water from the spring at the base of the idol, but even then he's willing to let it slide if he marries the chief's ugly daughter. Cue chase scene.
  • Raiders of the Lost Ark.
  • Doomsday, where the "natives" are Violent Glaswegians after a viral epidemic turns them into post apocalyptic survivors.
  • Happens to Jack Sparrow in the second Pirates of the Caribbean movie. In fact, the image of him running away from them was one of the first things released about the movie, prompting many fans to wonder just what he's done this time. It was the refusing-to-be-dinner scenario, but with a twist: the natives believed Jack was a flesh-imprisoned god yearning to be set free.
  • The beginning of Peter Jackson's Braindead (known to American audiences as Dead Alive), in which angry natives from Skull Island (yes, that one) pursue a New Zealand zoo official as he makes off with the indigenous rat monkey. This is at least one case where it probably would have been for the best if the natives did catch their target.
  • The Disney 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea has one following the "research trip" onto a nearby island, disturbing the local cannibals, which becomes really racist rather quickly as well as an outrage to all logic and logistics, but does allow Nemo a reason to point out the Nautilus' defenses.
  • Happens to Thugg Speedman in Tropic Thunder. Both in the Movie and in the Movie Within The Movie.
  • Kinda what happens in the middle of The Mummy Returns, though said natives are undead pygmies.
  • Not a literal native example, Shooter Gavin in Happy Gilmore gets chased by angry spectators after he steals the golden blazer when Happy manages to beat him.

Literature

  • Used in the first Age of Fire book, as the starving dragon Auron flees from an angry fishing village after eating a child for nutrition. In a clever ploy, he leads them to another, more hostile dragon, and takes up the dragon's home after the fishermen kill the surprised drake.

Live Action TV

  • In Star Trek: Voyager "Basics, Part II", a part of the marooned crew is chased by angry stone-agey aliens. This particular part of the crew getting chased, oddly enough, is led by Chakotay.

Newspaper Comics

  • Parodied in The Far Side where a rainforest tribesmen cuts the rope bridge sending pursuing suburbanites to their doom, the idol (a TV) and its curse were now his.

Video Games

  • This happens to Crash Bandicoot near the end of the Totem Hokum level in Crash Twinsanity.
  • The "natives" in this case aren't primitive, but the "Modern Warfare 2" level "The Hornet's Nest"'s ending probably counts too. Espescially since it features a surprising amount of rooftop-jumping for a FPS.

Web Comics

  • Order of the Stick: Elan, Durkon, Daigo, Therkla and Lien are chased away by orc natives at various times.

Western Animation

  • Jonny Quest TOS had this at least twice:
    • A piece of animation in the closing credits, with two people in a hovercraft escaping a group of savages shaking their spears. Starts at about 1:45 here.
    • "Pursuit of the Po-Ho". As Race and the boys rescue Dr. Quest, the natives throw spears and pursue in their canoes. Watch it here, starting about 2:55.
  • This happens to the entire Griffin family in Family Guy, when the natives in the South American region where Chris is working as a missionary find out that he's a freshman. Cue the entire family being chased to their seaplane with the natives firing poison-tipped darts from blowguns. Just as the family takes off, Brian reveals that they had left behind Butt Monkey Meg... who then drops dead. She gets better.
  • The Angry Beavers: When the girl racoons shockingly realize that Daggett is not the Mighty Knothead they imagined, Both Dagget and his brother Norbert are chased down by the girl racoons.
    • The Girl Racoon Chieftain: "Bring me their teeth on a plate!"

Real Life

  • This happened to David Attenborough in his youth while filming in Africa - in fact, while on camera. His response was to turn around and extend his hand to the chief with "How do you do?", upon which it turned out that the chief was Oxford-educated and his people had mistaken Attenborough for Prince Philip. No, really.
    • Wasn't it in Papua New Guinea?
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