Ground-Shattering Landing

Complete with a Three-Point Landing!

What goes up must always come down. In this case, it comes down hard.

This trope illustrates characters who can land with such an impact that it can break the ground beneath them. Remember though, to have enough force to break the ground, (often a concrete sidewalk or asphalt street) you also would have enough force to break your legs, or if you are falling from high enough, every bone in your body. Though given the mass of the human body even that isn't likely to be enough to break solid concrete. However, those who make a dramatic entrance this way are rarely human anyway.

Can be combined with Three-Point Landing for extra Badass points.

See In a Single Bound who this would probably apply to. Also see Ground Pound for examples of more hard landings.

Examples of Ground-Shattering Landing include:

Anime and Manga

• Happens a few times in Ranma ½
• Also in Dragon Ball Z, when the Saiyans land their space pods. Raditz's makes quite a crater, and Nappa and Vegeta's actually destroy buildings before leaving their mark on the Earth. And that's not to mention what happens during the fights that the characters get into.
  • The series also features Ground Shattering Takeoffs - As the characters get stronger, the Chunky Updraft climbs to ridiculous levels, usually culminating in a violent explosion just as a character launches into flight.
• Major Kusanagi does it both in the Stand Alone Complex and |the movie version of Ghost in the Shell, who is a full-body cyborg. The series tends to be inconsistent on this part, however, as she rarely leaves markings when starting her leaps and is on one occasion capable of doing huge leaps on the roof of an antique wooden building without any of the old lumber giving way during take-off or landing.
• In the Appleseed manga Briareos (a full conversion cyborg) inflicts a fair amount of damage to things he lands on.

Comic Books

• See Superman, The Incredible Hulk, and other heroes with massive strength or mass.
  • The Incredible Hulk often uses this as an attack.
  • Iron Man's famous Three-Point Landing pose is well known for causing this kind of damage.

Fan Works

• When Paul lands (or jumps, for that matter) with significant force in With Strings Attached, he leaves a big hole. Enough of a problem that he's very careful about when and where he jumps.

Film

• Iron Man does it in the movie version: he crashes through the ground and ends up in his underground garage.
• Colossus landing in the battlefield in X-Men: The Last Stand.
• Hancock does this after flying to show how messy and inefficient he is.
• Morpheus ends his demonstration of his gravity-defying skills with this in the first Matrix film.
  • And in the second, Neo makes the ground ripple when landing or taking off.
• Selene does this in the opening of Underworld. Her legs not breaking can be excused by her being a vampire. Her high-heeled boots on the other hand...
• The film Chronicle features this trope when the film's protagonist lands in front of several neighborhood bullies.

Live Action TV

• Kamen Rider Kiva's Finishing Move is to jump superhumanly high and descend on the Monster of the Week with a kick so powerful it slams it into the ground... leaving a giant imprint of Kiva's symbol. The enemy then shatters. This is impossible, but awesome. In The Movie, he slams the enemy all the way into the freaking moon, leaving a Kiva symbol imprint that must be continent-sized. For our peace, we are soon shown that the imprint is not permanent in this case.
  • Kamen Rider G is likely homaging this when Goro is knocked off of a building, but lands on his feet, smashing the G symbol into the ground. Asskicking ensues.

Video Games

• Alex Mercer in the game Prototype can do this. The best part is that some landings can send cars flying depending on the height you jump from!
• Cole in In Famous also can do this. Extra fun when you charge up with electricity on your way down...
  • Both the Prototype and inFAMOUS characters, while they can do it, also have special attacks that charge up the slam.
• Added as an ability in the first patch to Crackdown.
  • Oddly enough, the ground heals.
• When the title characters in EarthBound land in their incredible flying machine, they typically crash land, making a nice big boom.
• In Warcraft, Infernals are summoned demons that land meteor-style, doing damage and stunning any unfortunate enough to have been landed on.
  • In War3, stomp-type spells leave a small crater around the caster, despite going no more than an inch or so in the air (and this assuming they didn't simply raise a single foot and bring it down in an almighty impact).
• In the later Tekken and Soul Calibur games, being thrown onto the ground (via either a literal throw or a botched landing) results in that spot being cracked. It only disappears when another crack happens.
• The fat and heavily armored knight in Trine is heavy enough to break fragile surfaces (such as wooden planks) by falling on them from a good height.
• Characters on Champions Online do this if falling from a high enough height. Always happens if you use Super Jump or Rocket Jump.
  • The same is true of DC Universe Online.
• This is Mace Windu's trademark jump attack in Star Wars Battlefront II.
• The DS game of the Transformers film does this whenever you jump.
• An actual power in The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, with several variations.
• Sonic the Hedgehog can do this with the bounce/bound attack in some of the games. Knuckles can also do this.
• Shogun type enemies in The Dishwasher: Vampire smile do this either when they spawn or when they leap in the middle of combat. And at higher difficulties, they really, really hurt.
• Jarvan in League of Legends does this, leaping on someone and trapping them within the circle of rock that shoots up around the impact point.
• Ezio in Assassin's Creed: Revelations does this to a wooden platform during the opening cinematic, after escaping from his impending hanging by wrapping the rope around the hangman's neck and jumping off, untying himself while dangling in midair, then falling at least three stories and finishing with a Three-Point Landing. Better, this is Canon, as gameplay starts immediately following the event, from which Ezio walks away without a scratch. Did we mention that he's 52 at the time?
• You can do this everytime you respawn in Section 8 (video game)'s multiplayer, complete with Three-Point Landing... which is to be expected since 'respawning' includes dropping in (Being shot out of a Drop Ship) from 15 kilometers above ground with nothing but your Power Armor. While you do have airbrakes to give you a somewhat softer landing, there's always the possibility of some self-induced Death From Above on some poor sap who forgot to look up to see you coming.

Western Animation

• Nathan Explosion does this in the title-opening for Metalocalypse, but it's just for drama since he can't do this in the actual series.
• Earthbenders in Avatar: The Last Airbender and its Sequel Series The Legend of Korra can do this to greater or lesser degrees.
  • Also to soften their landing
• The Tick (animation). He also tends to leave indents and craters when starting his leaps, in according to Newton's third law.

Webcomics

• Bud from Wapsi Square unsuccessfuly attempts to skate down some stairs. Since she's an indestructible golem the ground comes off worse.
• In A Miracle of Science Agent Prester and Caprice fall to the surface of Mars. From orbit. The leave a small crater where they land.
• The Crusader does this in Fellowship Of Heroes, presumably because he doesn't have the hang of landing lightly.

Web Original

• An unusual example here: Evidently, Stephen Fry is a god.