Twisted Metal

Style, sophistication, the ability to launch napalm into oncoming traffic. If these are the things you look for in an automobile, it's time you test drive Twisted Metal.

—Commercial for Twisted Metal 2

Dubbed "Doom with cars", a series of demolition derby games that allows the player to choose from various vehicles armed with guns, missiles, and other weapons. The prize? You get one wish from the man in charge, Calypso. You can wish for anything you want in the world, no matter what the cost, how rare it is, or impossible it would be to obtain. But Be Careful What You Wish For, you might be surprised at what you get.

Twisted Metal 1 and 2 were created by Singletrac (now Eat Sleep Play) and were regarded as the best in the series. After those, 989 Studios took over and made Twisted Metal 3 and 4, which changed, among other things, the graphics to a more "3D" look (while the first two were in 3D, things like weapon pickups were 2D sprites), several characters' backstories, and in 4, even the origin of the wish-granting magic. Twisted Metal changed hands once again, this time back to the original developers (then known as Incognito, Inc.), who released Twisted Metal Black for PS2. Black was considered Darker and Edgier, even in a series revolving around killing anything and anyone that moves, due to new takes on characters and their backstories. Shortly after, Twisted Metal Head-On was released for PSP, which "went back to the series' roots," and takes place directly after Twisted Metal 2, making 3 and 4 Canon Discontinuity.

The eighth entry into the series, simply titled Twisted Metal, was released on February 14, 2012.

Tropes used in Twisted Metal include:

• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Black has a sewer level with tunnels large enough to drive a semi truck in.
• All Just a Dream: From various in-game hints, Black seems to occur completely in Needles Kane's head. In 2, the driver of Roadkill wakes up from a coma caused by a massive highway pileup, giving the impression that the competition happened in his head, with the other drivers involved being the other contestants.
  • Or Was It a Dream?: However, Marcus' ending shows with a brief glimpse of Calypso's burning eyes...
• Anime Hair: Dollface in reboot sports bright pink hair.
• Ancient Egypt: A stage in Twisted Metal 3 and Head-On.

Sweet Tooth: Its good to be back.

• Area 51: A stage in Twisted Metal 3.
• And I Must Scream: Outlaw's fate in the Lost Ending.
• As Himself: Rob Zombie is a playable character in 4.
• Avenging the Villain: Needles' son wants to kill Calypso for killing his father
• Back from the Dead: Krista Sparks and Simon Whittlebone, the drivers of Grasshopper and Mr. Slam, respectively, return as ghosts in Head-On.
  • Also Scott Campbell, the driver of Spectre in 1, and Preacher in Lost, the bonus Black pseudo-sequel game included in Head-On.
  • And Calypso resurrects Sophie Kane in the reboot.
• Bad Boss: Both Needles and Dollface in the reboot are revealed to be pretty dickish towards their gunners. The former killed off his gunner after he finished planting the C4 under the remaining Grimm Brother to detonate the bomb. The latter shot her gunner after defeating the Carnival of Carnage. Seems that only the 'asshole' Mr. Grimm isn't such an asshole he claims to be. In fact, he would have let his men who were driving the "Brothers Grimm" Monster Trucks enter the nest tournament, had they killed Needles.
• Badass Driver: The entire cast.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: The characters get their wishes granted, but not how they imagined them. Arguably one of the main themes of the series.
  • Generally averted when the desire is to take vengeance or otherwise allow others to come to harm (as is usually the case with Needles Kane, the driver of Sweet Tooth). Of course, Calypso got his powers by stealing them from a demon, so it's arguable if he's even capable of being nice.
    • Axel's ending in 2 would imply that he is.
  • Played straight in 3. Every ending was scripted the same way: car gets in, Calypso states the winner's wish, then cue to Incredibly Lame Pun as Calypso gets the last laugh. Taken to such extreme that some drivers ask for completely random stuff (Auger's driver entered to get revenge for his buildings being destroyed, but he wishes to "connect to his inner child"...).
  • In 2, Mr. Grimm, who feeds on the souls of the dead, wishes to feast -- which leads to humanity wiping itself out. He gets his feast, but after that there are no more humans to die, and thus, no more souls to feed on, leaving him to starve.
  • Of course, in the first game Calypso really did seem to grant the wishes without a catch for the most part. And occasionally, while he deliberately ignores the thought or intention behind a wish, he does something fairly harmless - like giving Axel a pizza or sending Needles to the dentist.
  • Sweet Tooth is a half-and-half guy; plays ball sometimes, screws them over sometimes, and even rejects their wishes twice. This distibution is not based on Alignment.
  • The new 2012 Twisted Metal only has three drivers and all three endings are this trope.
    • Sweet Tooth: He finally found the one who got away after 10 long years. Waking up confused in a casket and asking where his prize was, Calypso drops the ball on him: after the attack, Sophie Kane checked out of the psych ward and committed suicide. Sweet Tooth was condemned to share the casket with Sophie's rotted corpse. At least until Marcus' surviving son digs the grave up to retrieve the mask and vow revenge...
    • Grimm: Daniel Grimm got his wish to go back and keep his father from dying in the stunt accident. But Calypso set him in the backseat of the truck and his appearance caused father Grimm to try and fight him off, resulting in a crash that killed his father anyway. Both versions of Daniel survived... until the younger version took his father's hidden revolver and shot the older version dead.
    • Dollface: As she progressed through the contest, Dollface eventually became torn between either finally having her mask removed or succumbing to her ego and wishing to become the most famous supermodel in the world. She chose the latter, wishing to be sent to the world's biggest runway in hopes of instantly becoming famous. Just her luck, she ends up on an airport runway instead of the catwalk. She tried to run away as an airplane started to land, but in a twist of cruel irony, one of her heels broke off. The fall sealed her fate and she was run over by the plane's landing gear. The saddest irony? The mask finally did come off...
• Bedlam House: Blackfield Asylum, of course.
  • It seems that Calypso has the Preacher from the reboot sent to this during the ending. And then the camera scales back, and back... and back.
• Big Bad: Calypso.
• Big Screwed-Up Family: The Kanes. Needles Kane (the driver of Sweet Tooth) is a serial killer, and Charlie Kane is either an old drunkard taxi driver turned insane (main series) or a dead zombie remote-controlled by his son (Black continuity). Marcus Kane seems to avert this until we learn that he and Needles are the same person, just two different personalities.
  • And in the reboot, his son, Charlie, takes over his father's (Needles specifically) place and Calypso resurrects his daughter, Sophie, as a female version of the titular clown.
  • In a manner of speaking, The Joneses from 4 also qualify. Damn tourists. Sweet Tooth was right to drive them all off a cliff at his own expense!
• Bonus Feature Failure: The hidden characters of Black except for Yellow Jacket are missing introduction movies and character bios; all of them are missing mid-game cutscenes to follow the boss fight against Minion; and the FMVs they do have are very cheap-looking compared to those of the normal drivers.
  • The Boss Characters in 4 don't have specific ending FMVs either, it's the generic one also used when playing with a custom car.
• Boss in Mooks Clothing: Juggernaut in the reboot certainly counts if you're fighting against it in the campaign. An already tough vehicle which can dish out tremendous damage by just ramming you, it also always has it's trigun and quad cannon activated (both capable of spamming TONS of bullets and swarmers) and is bound to be a Mook Maker. If that wasn't bad enough, it's weakpoints are pretty hard to hit; it's trailer doors open for a brief moment when releasing mooks and trying to attack it head-on is usually near suicide.
• Bowdlerise: Due to their very graphic and unsettling nature, the PAL version of the game saw the removal of character FMVs.
  • Also the story behind the "Lost Endings" for Twisted Metal 1, with the higher ups objecting against them due to the violence and Stripperific chicks appearing in them.
• The Cameo: The final boss of Black is a large assault chopper called Warhawk; Warhawk (1995 video game) is a small series of Sony-platform games created by Singletrac/Incog where the player pilots such a vehicle.
• Canon Discontinuity: Twisted Metal: Head-On acts as a direct sequel to 2, and ignores Twisted Metal 3 & 4. Black, meanwhile, is set in its own continuity, as is Twisted Metal: Small Brawl (basically Twisted Metal for kids, with RC cars). The reboot is yet another continuity.
• Car Fu: It's an option with every vehicle, but a few have it as part of their Special Weapons arsenal. Darkside, Hammerhead and Mr. Slam are the most notable examples, and in Black, Axel and Yellowjacket have secondary Car Fu modes as hidden moves. Grasshopper's special attack in 2 and Head-On, meanwhile, involves launching her buggy into the air and landing on enemies. Melee combat is particularly important in the first game, where most of the devastating weapons of the later games do not exist yet and many special weapons are useless. When you are in a semi truck and all you have is a wimpy firebolt as your weapon, you probably want to hit the turbo and plow into people instead.
  • It's even more prevalent than ever in the 2012 reboot. Larger vehicles like Darkside and his bigger brother Juggernaut, are capable of dishing out enough damage with a single ram to knock off at least 50% of another vehicle's armor.
• Catapult to Glory: Brimstone's special weapon involves launching a crucified sinner through the air who then latches onto your vehicle and ritualistically kamikaze's with dynamite while yelling "Repent!" on contact with enemies.
• Character Customization: Amazingly present in 4. However, it's extremely primitive, with few options for your vehicle and only four breeds of special weapon from which to select.
• Characterization Marches On:
  • In the first game, Calypso just grants the wishes straight-up, without any twists or manipulation... save for Outlaw. In the "lost endings", he's more of a dick, granting and then brutally subverting the wishes. (What he does to Scott Campbell is outright Kick the Dog.) It's only with the second game that he becomes the master of Be Careful What You Wish For and Literal Genie.
  • The first game plays "Needles" Kane's psychosis purely for laughs, especially in the dumped live action endings. The second game added in the perma-burning scalp, but still treated him as an actual clown with murderous tendencies. It wasn't until Black that he was fully transformed into the very definition of a Monster Clown, both in backstory AND in-game.
• Composite Character: Dollface in the reboot has the mask of the Twisted Metal: Black Dollface, but shares her name (Krista Sparks) with an unrelated character from 2 and Head-On, and her motivations (pursuit of fame) call to mind the driver of Spectre in 2.
• Continuity Nod / Intercontinuity Crossover: In the 2012 reboot, Mr. Grimm's story shows Calypso's office. He has kept mementos of past drivers and Twisted Metal Contests from the 1 to Head-On and Black continuities. Among the items we have:
  • From the first Twisted Metal: Sweet Tooth's imaginary friend Crazy Harold the Wacky Lunch Sack, Crimson Fury/Warthog's black box and Spectre/Yellow Jacket's vial of potion (from the live-action endings)
  • From Twisted Metal 2: Twister's fossilized helmet, Hammerhead's plane tickets and some bricks from Simon Whittlebone's tower.
  • From Twisted Metal: Black: The girl's teddy bear from Outlaw's story (though it could also be Krista's teddy bear from Head-On), No-Face's surgical boxing gloves, Shadow's voodoo dolls and John Doe's wallet
  • From the 2012 game: Sweet Tooth's Machetes.
  • Shout-Out: Kratos's blades and a boxart of War of the Monsters are also part of the memento.
• Comic Book Adaptation: A tie-in comic for Twisted Metal 2 came out back in its time as a giveaway prize. It focus on Calypso's Start of Darkness and how he become the host of the tournament.
• Cool Car: Virtually every vehicle in the series.
  • Cool Bike: Mr. Grimm.
  • Cool Plane: Warhawk in Black. The Play Station 3 game adds the Talon, a helicopter.
  • Tank Goodness: Minion, usually. Warthog to a lesser extent (if it's not a tank, it's a hummer.)
• The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: In 2012, if you watch one of the AI opponents, you will notice they can re spawn their special weapons almost instantly. With one time using its special five times in one go just after the match started. It is also able to use other items without having to previously acquire them.
• Crapsack World: Every stage. If they aren't when the match begins, they sure as hell are when it ends.
• Curse Cut Short: "Shut up and bleed, you motherfu--[[[Scare Chord]]]"
• Cypher Language: How Minion communicates to the player during Black's loading screens. 1=A, 2=B, etc.
• Darker and Edgier: Applies to Black.
• Dark Messiah: As explained by Calypso in the reboot, The Clowns worship Needles Kane, going so far as to build a horrifyingly huge robot circus tent in his image. They are even convinced that, just like The Messiah, he will one day return (might be true, if you consider either Charlie or Sophie...). But we all know that Needles is just an Ax Crazy Monster Clown Split Personality who killed most of his alter ego's family and doesn't give a shit about killing his own men for his own gain.
• Didn't See That Coming: Every game includes one or two endings where Calypso has the tables turned on him.
  • Averted in Twisted Metal 3. He wins EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.
  • Averted again in the reboot, ironically. He also wins EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Though less jarring than in TM 3, since for the most part, it was a case of Karmic Justice.
  • Sweet Tooth is not exempt from this in Twisted Metal 4 either. A few of the endings screw him over.
• Early Installment Weirdness: The first game is less silly than the rest of the series, lacks or implement differently several gameplay features and has a major case of Characterization Marches On.
• Evil Versus Evil
• Exact Words: When you meet Calypso, you need to be very careful how you word your wish...
• Expansion Pack: Twisted Metal Black Online, which is Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
• Exploding Barrels: A unique example
• Expy: Mr. Grimm in Twisted Metal 2 bears a striking resemblance to the Ghost Rider. When you select him on the car select screen, his skull even catches fire.
• Eye Scream: No-Face from Black had his eyes and tongue removed by a back alley doctor who lost $20,000 betting on him in a boxing match, although he can still see well enough to drive. Also, Shadow's ending in Black features Raven using voodoo dolls to gouge out the eyes of the two punks who killed her best friend Kelly, then implying that she will do the same to her parents.
  • The manual clarifies that No-Face has some sort of psychic ability that lets him 'know' where everyone is so he can drive his car.
  • This is how Sophie was able to Escape from Needles, she stabbed him in the eye.
• Fragile Speedster: Twister, Crimson Fury, ATV and Quattro, among others.
• Freaky Friday Flip: Needles Kane's Head On ending. Calypso, in Needles Kane's body, is then killed when...

Calypso: "Guards! Kill the intruder!"
Needles Kane: "Oooh, good idea! Do that!"
Calypso is promptly gunned down by his old guards.

• Freestate Amsterdam: Twisted Metal 2 stage "Holland: Field of Screams" which consists of several tulip fields and a pair of windmills.
• Frickin' Laser Beams: Besides being the special of a few cars throughout the series, it's the special weapon pickup in the Tokyo (shot from a satellite dish) and Egypt (shot from the tip of the pyramid) stages in Twisted Metal 3.
• "Friend or Idol?" Decision: Dollface in Black has the chance to obtain the key to unlock her mask, but at the life of her boss, who put the thing on her in the first place. She takes the key, killing him, but decides that she doesn't want it anyway, saying that the mask will never grow old and ugly, while her normal face will. Although in Twisted Metal: Lost, this was revealed to be a bad decision, because as Dollface found out, while the mask will never age, it will never grow either, and being a fourteen year old girl, her SKULL IS STILL GROWING...
  • Hold on a second... if she's fourteen, how'd she get a job? You'd think they have child labor laws even in the TM universe.
  • It goes beyond that. In her flashback, she says that "it was [her] first real job after college..." Wait, college? 14? What?
    • Well it has been stated that Black takes place inside Needles' imagination...
• Gatling Good: Many cars use gatling guns as their basic armament, and the Death Warrant vehicle in the Play Station 3 game has your gunner use a man-portable one as a Special Attack.
• Gay Paree: Twisted Metal 2 stage "Paris: Monumental Disaster". It consists of a small chunk of the Paris city center filled to the brim with historical monuments, boutiques and alleys, and crammed between the Eiffel Tower (which you can destroy by detonating a remote bomb on the upper level) and the Louvre Museum. And it's awesome. So awesome, that they remade it in Head-On.
• Genre Savvy: The Robertses in Head-On, with regards to Calypso's wish granting methods. But, of course, they had already been screwed over twice before, so they learned from their mistakes.
  • Or not... Jamie's ending in 2 is an example of this trope played straight, as she tricked Calypso into helping her find her brother. A good example from Head-On is Agent Shepard, who, in his ending, doesn't even bother making a wish, he just arrests Calypso.
• Glorious Mother Russia: Twisted Metal 2 stage, "Moscow: Suicide Slide".
  • The Moscow level in Head-On is arguably a better example. While the one in 2 only contained a small arena with none of the city's landmarks, the one in Head-On featured Red Square, St. Basil's Cathedral, the Kremlin, and a few SCUD missiles that could be used to blow up parts of the scenery.
• Hammerspace: Where the weapons are stored after weapon select animations were introduced starting with Black. There is even an animation for the motorbike producing a large oil barrel. In Black, Sweet Tooth's special attack involves it transforming into a Humongous Mecha, even though there isn't enough room in car mode to store its towering clown robot form.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: At least once someone has been able to successfully make a wish that screws Calypso over. This isn't the only way Calypso is defeated though.
  • Most directly was Head-On, where Sweet Tooth wishes for he and Calypso to swap bodies. Sweet Tooth immediately orders Calypso's guards to shoot him
• Humongous Mecha: Sweet Tooth's special in Black transforms his ice cream truck into this.
  • Tower Tooth in Head-On, conveniently hiding in the streets of Tokyo as an ice cream shop.
    • Then of course there's the Iron Maiden Dear crap, look at it ^{[dead link]}
    • Then there's also the Carnival of Carnage, a hideously gigantic Monster Clown robot built in the image of Needles, by far the largest fully functional combat vehicle in Twisted Metal history. Its so big that it takes up several levels to fight it (the flamethrowing clown head beneath it, the giant pinball table inside it, the trap-laden path towards the actual boss, the actual boss itself).
• I Am a Humanitarian: Mr. Grimm in Black
• I Am Not Shazam: The Monster Clown is Needles Kane. His car is Sweet Tooth. The third and fourth games screw this up and call the clown Sweet Tooth, but Incog Inc. makes a point of having characters only ever call him Needles.
• I Have a Family: This is said by one of Needles Kane's victims in his opening cinematic in Black. Needles Kane's response? "Shut up and bleed, you mother-", being interrupted by the sound of lightning.
  • It's also the last thing John Doe remembers before Calypso kills him.
• Incredibly Lame Pun: The endings of Twisted Metal 3' involve these.
• Innocent Innuendo: Meter Maid's ending in 4. She gives Sweet Tooth a parking fine worth millions of dollars. She says she'll clear it all up if Sweet Tooth himself does a "few minutes of community service." Sweet Tooth is enticed and takes her up on her offer. We then see Sweet Tooth taking a driver's safety course.
• It's Going Down: The Eiffel Tower in both versions of the Paris stage.
• Jackass Genie: Usually Calypso is a Literal Genie, but he's still guilty of doing this on a couple of occasions.
• Just Between You and Me: How the characters, especially Needles Kane, in Black describe their stories to the player using FMVs.

"Let's face it, boys and girls: a man has to have his priorities."

• Land of Dragons: Twisted Metal 2 stage "Hong Kong Crunch".
• Large Ham: Calypso.
• Last Breath Bullet: Outlaw's ending in Black. Just after killing the terrorist the second time, he looks over at the family he was trying to save. We hear over his earpiece "Target is still hot! Repeat, target is still hot!" just before the Pink Mist gets splattered everywhere.
• Legacy Character: Many of the cars that appear in multiple games keep their appearance and special attack. Some, however, like Sweet Tooth, don't technically count, since their drivers are actually the same person every time.
• Lethal Lava Land: "Amazonia: The Fire Walk" in Twisted Metal 2.
• Lighter and Softer: Small Brawl. it's still somewhat dark, however. The game itself is bloodless and kid-friendly because you drive radio-controlled cars, but then you get to the endings where Calypso is eaten by a giant frog, nearly blown up with a large firework rocket, shoots one of the drivers into space or leaves a giant pile of explosives to try and blow up another participant.
  • 4, while not to that degree, is in general much sillier and more colorful than any other game in the series so far.
• Literal Genie: Calypso switches between being this and just misinterpreting wishes in general. Some of the best examples of this are Warthog's ending in 2 (a 100 year old man wishes for the body of a 20 year old, but didn't get the head to match) and Twister in Head-On (Came Back Wrong in a nutshell).
• Mayincatec: The "Amazonia" level from the second game features Aztec-style pyramids surrounded by lava emerging from a volcano, in Brazil.
• Macross Missile Massacre: Some weapons such as the MIRV, Rain 2, Reticle, Zoomy, Swarmer and the specials of some characters such as Sweet Tooth's and Roadkill's in Black.
• Mind Screw: For a Vehicular Combat game, Twisted Metal is this trope as a whole! Many got confused guessing what is Marcus'/Needles' real identity. It also didn't made sense as to how Marcus and Needles, who are the same person, could co-exist as separate people and fighting each other in the contest. That said, if they are the same person, how is it that one of them could STILL survive after killing the other since they're the exact same person?
  • Twisted Metal's alternate universes are also pretty damn confusing to get it right. While Black does takes place in Needles' mind, Marcus also made an appearance in that universe (as Minion) who as we've known, is always paranoid about Twisted Metal being just a nightmare. He says that he misses the colourful world. But in the colourful universe, Marcus is still as paranoid as ever, forever stating that everything isn't real while Calypso always tells him that Twisted Metal is as real as how he wanted it to be. This could be suggested that the colourful universe takes place in Marcus' mind. That said, the Black and colourful continuities are both just dreams and that nothing is real.
    • And then we have Small Brawl, which is a Lighter and Softer version for kids. You wouldn't expect this to be connected to the Black and colourful universes, right? Well, in Spectre's ending, it was revealed that the boy was the son of Ken Masters, the Spectre in Twisted Metal 2, which is set in the colourful universe Marcus always regards as a nightmare. This makes Small Brawl a dream within a dream... Goddamn! Are the creators of Twisted Metal fans of Studio Gainax's or 7th Expansion's animes or what?
    • And then we have to fit in the Alternate Universe of the 2012 game.
• Monster Clown: Needles Kane. What else do you expect from a serial killer whose head is on fire?
  • Sophie Kane in the reboot is an Evil Is Sexy version.
• Mnogo Nukes: Twisted Metal 2 stage "Moscow: Suicide Slide" is an abandoned Soviet missile silo.
• Monumental Battle: The Eiffel Tower, the pyramids of Egypt...
• Monumental Damage: The Eiffel Tower, the pyramids, the Statue of Liberty, the Hollywood sign... and many, many more.
• Moral Dissonance: Even the good guys leave a trail of death and destruction that tends to be massively out of proportion to what they want to achieve. In Black, for instance, Raven wants to avenge the death of her friend who was drowned by bullies and Agent Stone went mad with grief because he accidentally shot a family during a hostage crisis. To make things right again, both drivers run over tens of pedestrians, blow up civilian cars that happen to be in their way or in the blast radius and destroy a large number of buildings. The number of innocent deaths would probably be well over a hundred. Raven returns in Twisted Metal: Lost, where she protects the city from the other rampaging killers... by using her voodoo powers to blow the hell out of everything.
  • This is sometimes brought up. Jebediah is less than thrilled when he realizes they're fighting in a town he used to preach in, and several characters in Black apologize to Warhawk before the final battle (Agent Stone in particular is crushed -- "I know this man"). It's just that they're usually out of options.
• Name of Cain: The Kane family: a madman with a Monster Clown split personality and his father, the drunkard insane taxi driver (main continuity)/corpse being remote controlled by his other son (Black continuity). The 2012 game adds in Marcus/Needles two children, both of whom take up the Monster Clown legacy at the end.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Does anybody else agree that Calypso in 1 resembles a burnt-face Gene Wilder?
  • In Black he looks very much like Jason Voorhees minus the mask.
    • Or Glenn Jacobs, AKA Kane.
• Not Drawn to Scale: Scale problems exist like nuts in this series. Axel, a man on a platform stuck between two wheels, is approximately 20 feet tall, judging by the civilian and house sprites on some levels. Even the motorcycle & dune buggy vehicles are house-sized.
  • This even leaks into gameplay. In Twisted Metal 2, Axel could run over and crush any other vehicle short of a boss, justified by being bigger than any of them, despite being just a man standing upright between two monster truck wheels. Yes, he can crush Hammerhead, which is an actual monster truck.
  • Black is actually somewhat realistically scaled: buildings do indeed tower above the vehicles, and although Axel is too big again, even the missiles are generally properly sized as opposed to the giant warheads in every other game.
• Ominous Chanting: Used in the Rooftops theme in the original, and the Suburbs theme and others in Black, complementing the Gothic Crapsack World setting in the latter.
• One-Woman Wail: The Freeway and Snowy Roads music themes in Black.
• Only Sane Man: Quite possibly Agent Shepherd (Crimson Fury) in Head-On, who's pretty much the only guy who realized that Calypso is an asshole, doesn't even bother making a wish, and arrests him on spot. Score one for justice!
  • Marcus Kane, who most would pass off as a delusional madman after reading his bios, is usually proven to be this in his endings. His split personality, however...
• Orifice Evacuation: Goggle Eyes' ending in 4 has him wishing to contain all the bugs in the world so he can kill them. He immediately chokes to death as every bug in the world bursts from his body.
• Pause Scumming: The second game implemented the pause feature in an odd way. Your car and the enemy cars would stop dead as expected, but projectiles would continue as normal, the sole exception being the ricochet bomb. With timely use of the pause button you could land every single Roadkill boomerang, every single Sweet Tooth ice cream cone, every single freeze missile, break out of a Mr. Slam infinite freeze missile loop, blow up opponents with their own mines (because the delay before they arm didn't stop when the game was paused, of course) and avoid running into projectiles fired in front of you. The list goes on. Conversely, you could also die during the pause screen.
• Precision F-Strike: First used in Black by Needles in his intro. It was bleeped out though. The reboot was the first time in the series where the F-bomb was used openly. In a nod to Black, the first time the F-bomb was used, it too was cut short by the scream of Marcu's/Needles' wife upon her getting chopped. For the rest of the game, F-bombs were dropped without censors.
• Pyramid Power: Obviously enough, in the Egypt stages.
• Real Song Theme Tune: Black uses "Paint It Black" by The Rolling Stones in the credits.
• Recurring Car: Sweet Tooth, Warthog and Mr. Grimm (renamed Reaper in the reboot) are the only vehicles seen in every game in the series; Axel and Outlaw are in all games except one; Thumper, Spectre, Hammerhead and Roadkill are in all except two.
  • Recurring Character: Calypso, Needles Kane and Mr. Grimm are in all games, though Grimm is a different character in Black and the upcoming PS3 game. Axel, Marcus Kane, Preacher Jebediah, the Roberts siblings, Bruce Cochrane, Minion, Captain Rogers, Krista Sparks and Simon Whittlebone appear in more than one game.
• Ring of Power: Twisted Metal 4 sets up the premise that Sweet Tooth managed to steal a magical ring from Calypso that gave him all his powers to grant wishes.
• Road Cone: While no two characters' endings could technically occur (since, by the nature of the contest, you kill all the other drivers), several endings from Twisted Metal 2 are treated as happened in Head-On: Axel, Outlaw 2, Twister, Mr. Slamm and Grasshopper (sorta). Though Axel's story is written in a way that suggest his previous ending happened as a result of having survived rather than because he won, and the others may be Hand Waved by the fact there are 2 years between the games, and the tournament has always been annual.
  • On the other hand, Outlaw's ending in the first Twisted Metal is pretty much the ending that happened, as its the only one brought up twice: it's the focus of Outlaw-2's story in Twisted Metal 2 and is referenced again in Head-On.
  • Twisted Metal: Lost, the mini-game found in the PlayStation 2 port of Head-On which serves as a "sequel" to Black, treats EVERY ending from Black as having happened, even if they included objects/events impossible to come by any other way. Maybe Calypso got nicer and granted everyone's wishes after the tournament?
  • Twisted Metal 3 had the same issue to a lesser extent, what's with Warthog's driver wishing to have the head to match his body, the two Outlaws being reunited and Axel claiming he separated from the machine (though his hands does seem undamaged).
• Rob Zombie: A Guest Fighter in 4. He even drives his Dragula roadster.
• Roof Hopping: A staple stage setting in the series: "Rooftop Battle" in the first, "New York: The Big Leap" in 2, "Tokyo" in 3, "Skyscrappers" in Black and "Tokyo Rooftops" in Head-On.
• Ruined FOREVER: Some people despise 3 and 4 while others despise Black.
• Sdrawkcab Name: The name of the Doctor that gave Dollface/Krista her mask in the 2012 reboot? Dr. Ospylac.
• Secret Character: Minion in every entry in which he's playable, but also Sweet Tooth in 2 and 3; Manslaughter, Warthog, Yellowjacket, and Axel in Black; Axel, Darkside, Mime, PieceMeal, and Trapper in Small Brawl; Axel, Mr. Slam, Hammerhead, Crimson Fury, ATV, Cousin Eddy and Dark Tooth in Head-On; and Warthog in the 2012 Twisted Metal.
• Ship Level: The "Prison Passage" stage in Black. A big chunk of the Greece stage in Head-On happens aboard one as well.
• Shock and Awe: The Environment (Env) pickup, introduced since Twisted Metal 2, is an special item found on certain stages, which activates a lightning attack in a limited range around whatever its generating it. Certain cars (most commonly Outlaw) have this as their special weapon, too.
• Signature Line: The page quote.
• Slasher Smile: Needles Kane throughout the series, and Calypso in 2.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: "Antarctica: The Drop Zone" in 2, "The North Pole" in 3, "Amazonia 3000 BC" in 4 and "Snowy Roads" in Black.
• Spinoff Babies: Twisted Metal: Small Brawl.
• Split Personality: Needles Kane, the driver of Sweet Tooth, and Marcus Kane, the driver of Roadkill. Starts out as Split Personality, but eventually turns into Jekyll and Hyde, and Enemy Without, then into Split Personality Takeover. Needles could also be considered a Super-Powered Evil Side.
• Spiritual Successor: After making Twisted Metal 2, Singletrac was bought by GT Interactive and lost the Twisted Metal license. This lead them to create two stand-alone vehicular combat games: Rogue Trip: Vacation 2012 and Critical Depth. Both games ended up leaving their mark on the series - Black adopted the visible damage indicator and slightly more involved storytelling of Critical Depth, and Rogue Trip's faster pace and more interactive arenas.
• Stock Scream: The death screams, notably in Black.
• Strictly Formula: All of the endings in Twisted Metal 3 follows the same formula: Car drives in, Calypso reiterates the wish of the winner and shoot lightning with his hands, the driver screams for no reasons and then suffer the consequences of the wish, Calypso makes a terrible pun and thank you for playing Twisted Metal.
• Stuff Blowing Up: One of the main features of the series.
• Take a Third Option: More of a second option, but in Head-On, the driver of Crimson Fury, Agent Shepard of the FBI, chooses to simply arrest Calypso in his ending rather than trying to collect his prize from the Literal Genie.
• The Kid with the Remote Control: The driver of Yellowjacket in Black is Charlie Kane, reanimated by his son and literally controlled by a remote control. Also, the vehicles in Small Brawl are RC cars driven by little kids.
• The Grim Reaper: Mr. Grimm, in the first two three games and Head-On.
• Took a Level in Badass: Hammerhead in the Play Station 3 reboot. It went from sluggish enemy who could fight, though outmatched, to a massive boss battle alongside Slayer (the truck, not the band, though both were based off of heavy metal bands).
• Transforming Mecha: Sweet Tooth's super in Black turns it into one of these.
• Troll: Calypso. He makes contestants risk their lives fighting in his freak show contest then screws them over when they make their wish, complete with his own trollface.
• Vehicular Combat: The entire point of the series.
• Weaponized Car
• What Could Have Been: The first game was originally titled High Octane, but was changed due to another game called Hi-Octane, a car-racing game. Then again, "Twisted" Metal seems an appropriate title for this series.
  • Designer David Jaffe revealed (about 44 minutes in) ^{[dead link]} that Twisted Metal could've gone in two different directions post-Black: a post-apocalyptic title, or a slick, polished look inspired by Midnight Club and Michael Mann movies, the latter of which would've featured Sweet Tooth as a slick, black gangster with the flames tattooed on his head.
    • Actually, the post-apocalyptic approach was being developed after Black in what would've been Twisted Metal: Apocalypse. However, six members of the team working on that game died in a plane crash, leaving the game unfinished. However, their work did land into the hands of Eat, Sleep, Play, which incorporated the work into Twisted Metal (2012).
      • I'm pretty sure that plane crash was Kayfabe.
        • The game they were working on was Twisted Metal: Harbour City, not Apocalypse. The remnants of Harbour City were integrated into Head-On as a bonus.
• What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic: The fact that Needles and Marcus Kane, despite being split personalities (Needles being a violent, psychotic half and Marcus being his sanity and reason), exist as two separate entities, drive two separate vehicles, and constantly battle each other until the Dark Tooth ending from Head On where Needles and Marcus meet in the middle of a field curious about seeing the other but ultimately decide to work together, resulting in an unstoppable force of destruction.
• White-Haired Pretty Boy: Calypso in Twisted Metal: Head-On.
• Working Title: As noted above, High Octane.