There is a long list of awesome weapons in film history, and it’s about time we narrow it down to the top 25 (in our all-knowing, unerring opinion).
The inception of this list came while watching Iron Man and the scene where Tony Stark presented the amazingly destructive Jericho Missile. Then again, maybe it truly began when I bought a replica Hattori Hanzo sword at C2E2 a month ago. Either way, we’ve all been fascinated by the technology filmmakers come up with, and weapons tend to be at the top of amazing innovations that catch the filmgoer’s eye.
I’ve made a compilation video of all the weapons in the style of my previous movie trailers. If you’re not one for lists or words or reading in general, you can jump to the very last page of this list to enjoy the 25 best movie weapons in their native form (film/video). For the record, they are not completely in order and I used what I could find, so apologies if your favorite weapon gets little screen time.
From weapons the size of a moon to a gun no larger than your pinkie, there’s plenty of variety on the list. But we couldn’t add them all – a couple just missed the cut. The Bear Jew’s baseball bat from Inglourious Basterds, the prawn electric Tesla arc splattering gun from District 9 and the intense .50-caliber, M82 sniper rifle in Smokin’ Aces should be considered honorable mentions.
Also just off the list is the Gatling gun/jetpack in Kick-Ass. If you are looking for the BFG from Doom, you won’t find it. I’ve erased that entire film from my memory, so it doesn’t actually exist in my mind.
The actual rankings are based on the capability of the weapon itself. Some sit lower on the list because they would be near useless without the specific user. A few at the top of the list may have been destroyed, but it makes them no less powerful or worthy of the their spot.
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Some others for your consideration:
Predator’s plasma caster, smart disc, or telescopic spear.
Freddy Krueger’s glove
Wolverine’s claws
Ripley’s pulse rifle/flamethrower
Bob have you heard of Thermo Hydrostatic Ordinance Rounds? (THOR)
Just curious?
I know nothing of these but I’d like to. I was intrigued and Googled it and came up with nothing. If you’ve got a link or something, I’d appreciate it.
The only place I’ve heard of these rounds is in a Punisher comic book, particularly a handbook of the Punisher’s weapons. It detailed the weapons as being for use at close quarters in confined spaces such as in the bulkeads of a submarine.
If I can find it I’ll scan and upload the page where they are described.
@ Mike – - Ripley’s pulse rifle/flamethrower from “Aliens” definitely needs to be on your list somewhere. You actually disappointed me with your lead in to number 2. I thought it was going to be from “Aliens” and I caught myself sighing in resignation for the lightsaber. I love all things “Star Wars” (prequels with a massive dose of salt) and you had me sighing at lightsabers! Not cool.
You know, it’s funny when you’re putting a list like this together, even with the help of others, some of the things that don’t occur to you that after the fact seem obvious.
For example, Aliens is my all time favorite movie and I had input to the list and totally spaced on it.
No, no, no, this cannot be allowed to let stand. You’re writing about awesome weapons, influential weapons, devastating weapons- and you left out Bruce Lee’s iconic nunchucks from Enter the Dragon and other movies? Come on! The guy influenced the entire Kung-fu craze of the 1970s and made nunchucks a household name. And he kicked some major ass with them! Just take a look and remember why they should be on the list:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bv9uFxYhp3c
Great addition, LOVE the nunchucks scene from Enter the Dragon.
Great list. I’m sure I’ll think of some other great movie weapons and post them here over the next couple of days.
Note to Screen Rant: I really like the lists. Loved the sequels one and this one! Keep ‘em coming!!
An idea I have for another one is movies that are so bad they are entertaining. I’m really into those haha.
Thanks, bud. It’s an area where we’d been lacking for a long time but we’re on it now.
your list insnt at all complete, the number one weapon in ANY movie is CHUCK NORRIS
Did ent Bruce kick Chuck’s ars in “Enter the Dragon?”
Thos chucks were cool,,,,
norris wasnt in enter the dragon…you are thinking of return of the dragon perhaps?
Its a miracle I can remember anything past 1977,,,
Wonderful! I’m so gald you remembered the Zorg ZF-1 from The Fifth Element. Man that was a cool gun!!!
“Fifth Element”, great film, one of my top 50 films!!!
“Supernova” – wasn’t that weapon made by aliens to repeatedly eliminate a parallel universe that got too advanced?
If you’re gonna include something like the Death Star then you have to count the Gunstar from ‘The Last Starfighter’.
@Bob Adair, the (THOR) is a nylon handgun bullet(mainly developed for the 38 special) that has a muzzle velocity of 3000fps at point blank range from a 6 inch barrel. 2800fps from a 4 inch and 2400fps from 2in snub.
Its mainly used by DEA and Airline Cops. The bullet won’t penetrate the hull of a jet aircraft or the wall of a house.
It transfers all its energy on contact and disintegrates.
At close range it makes quite a mess, at 450ft you can catch the round in a baseball glove without damage.
Alright, I got my baseball glove, let’s go 790, this sounds like fun.
Kidding obviously, lol. I think I’ll just stick to my golden saber rounds though.
Curious though, I assume if you can catch it with a baseball glove that after 450ft you’re saying it’ll lose enough velocity to where it isn’t lethal at all even if it hits exposed soft tissue? I mean if it’s nylon, in theory I can see how that would work. What kind of accuracy do you get from something like that? I would assume something made out of nylon would not travel through the air too well. I know you’re saying it’s mainly for very short ranged stuff, but just curious.
I wonder, what is the melting point of nylon, don’t have that on the top of my head right now… Just thinking about the physics of it and the friction it would have to endure especially through rifling in a barrel. I know you can melt nylon pretty easily with an exposed flame and I can’t imagine that the flame from a standard lighter mix to be anywhere more than 900 degrees C…
And I’m not sure how much heat a bullet is put through while being fired through a barrel. If you know or anyone knows, please chime in…
Ok, I’ve tried googling it, and can’t think of good words to search to get that information, lol. I googled the lighter flame thing and got 600-800 degrees C BTW. Although I googled the melting point for nylon and there are different types of nylon, but they seem to have a relatively low melting point, ranging from like 250 degrees C to 300 degrees C. So the question is, does a bullet endure more than 250 degrees while being fired?
Great list. I am a Star Wars nerd so I am happy with the end result. Man, if you think about it, this list could go on forever. That star like weapon from Kull( very old school) was cool. He controlled it with his mind and hand movements. And I totally agree that gun from Aliens was sweet. What about the proton packs from Ghost busters? It help capture and defeat ghost but it would toast anything else. Like I said the list could go on and on. Great list.
The Glaze? from Krull was a mighty weapon. More like a boomerang with knives but still cool.
Yeah i have that movie . You know Robbie Coltrane (Hagrid in Harry Potter) played in that. The weapon was called the Glaive. As neat as you would think the potential for the weapon would be, it doesn’t get much play or credit in the movie. It was more prominent in the coin-op video game than the movie, which is a shame really. I always thought the slayer death screams were cool. Nothing to do with weapons though…
Yeah, I’m gonna disagree with the Death Star. it’s too overpowered for this list and needs to be retired to the Ultimate Waepon Hall of Fame and just be an asterik in every weapons list from here on out. I was disappointed you missed the following:
The gun-kata pistols (with face-plate smashing action!) from EQUILIBRIUM.
The twin vulcans mounted jet pack from KICK ASS.
The TERMINATOR.
Martin Riggs from LETHAL WEAPON.
The Nude Bomb from THE NUDE BOMB (Get Smart movie c. 1980).
Wolverine’s Claws from the X-Men movies.
and the ultimate combo: The Orbital Mining Laser combined with the Red Matter from STAR TREK.
A list of grewat weapons not on the list. Also “Magnito” Can’t think of too many things not made of metal.
How about the gernade launcher that shot out a tiny nuke in “Startship Troopers” or that gun they had at the end of the first film.
One more might be the excelerator suit in G.I.Joe, wouldn’t mind having that to play with.
First off, I think that the light saber should be #1 because it is and has been a phenomenon and as for the deathstar I dont think that it even fits into this genre of weaponry Also where is the magic wand from Harry Potter? Def deserves to be on this list.
My bad, typo ” Krull ” but it was a cool weapon. I was figuring the same thing, like can we suggest Terminators because I wanted to shout out the liquid metal one. He was bad ass and man, could he run down a car. I mean how exactly are we defining weapons because there is some vehicles we can add, robots, and people . Making this really a never ending list period. Any how that Martin Riggs suggestion was genius if indeed he can be considered a weapon. Good stuff.
Its been years since I read the specs (THOR) rounds. It might have been 1000ft to catch in a bb glove Ken. I don’t remember too well it was prob 15 years ago when I came across these.
Basically the 42gr nylon hollow point wadcutter has a very powerful close range effect.
The bullet being so light looses most of inertial force at around 1000ft.
The 38spl nylon round is white and loaded to max pressures. It was designed for police back-up guns. It must be fired from a non aluminum frame revolver or it could cause frame breach.
It basically turns a 38 into a 357 close range wise.
When I fired the round I noticed a white color residue but nothing that would be considered a buildup of nylon from the melting of the outer surface.
The flash was huge and it was as loud as a 44mag. The bullet totally transfers all its energy on contact by basically exploding when it reaches its target.
The technology was later developed for other calibers. The (THOR) round is more or less totally banned from the public at this point.
The weapons from District 9 should’ve been in that list. They were awesome.
I’m starting to think we should have made this the “Top 100 Movie Weapons of All Time.”
Vic
See, that’s what you get for getting a bunch of geeks in one room talking about geeky stuff.
Most entertaining piece, Mike. I’d add:
The Sandman pistol from Logan’s Run (movie not book). Sleek, simple, nice muzzle flash.
Deckard’s handgun from Blade Runner. First time I’d ever seen LEDs used on a weapon.
The pulse rifles from Aliens. Naturally!
Hellboy’s oversized lump “The Samaritan”.
The battlin’ frisbees from Tron. They double up as an attractive bowl, you know…
The artillery lasers from Forbidden Planet.
The tripods’ heat rays in Spielberg’s War Of The Worlds. The whole tripod, in fact.
Barbarella’s trashy ray gun.
Anyone remember a ’70s pile called Laserblast? The weapon/necklace combination that turned the wearer into a crazed alien killer for no apparent reason. Quality.
Honourable mention, though they’re from a TV show, to the Stun Guns from Space: 1999.
Oh yeah, what about the talking bomb in Dark Star?
MAN I knew their should have been a 12th choice to my list. Good call Big D…
Nobodies mentioned the gun Gene Simmons used in the film “RUNAWAY”, starring Thomas Magnum.
That bullet would lock on to a target and then fly around like a missile until it got ya. Comical
Oh yeah, I loved that gun. Smart bullets all the way!
Good one Big D, “Dark Star” great film!
I loved the classic scene where Doolittle, uses human psychology to reprogram Bomb 20.
Prob not the best idea. X-O
Hilarious film!
“Let there be light”!
(Dark Star)
Shows you how great writting and direction can overcome cheap effects.
“Well bomb everything looks good, dropping you off in about 35 seconds.”
^
“Thanks!”
It’s like a degenerate 2001 – Dan O’Bannon’s dry-run for Alien with no budget and an actual beachball as the alien, visible seams and everything. From a period when John Carpenter could do no wrong. I wonder if he ever rewatches it and reflects on where it all went pear-shaped over the last twenty years for him?
I was just thinking the same thing Big D.
LOLMTF!, a degenrate version is the perfect term!!!
GREAT new list idea: 25 Best Movie Villains Of All Time!!
Khan ties with Darth Vader.
Great list!
I’d suggest the addition of the rotary shotguns from Split Second and the crazy occult disco / weird beat em up game rays from Big Trouble in Little China (that Egg Shen and Lo Pan duel with)
my 2p
You forgot red matter