I was watching Jurassic World a little while ago, enjoying Chris Pratt's improbable transformation from the pudgy village idiot in Parks and Rec to the ripped, rebellious protagonist of a film in which he leads a pack of dinosaurs as the alpha velociraptor. I also noticed something else. Jurassic World made patently obvious a simple Hollywood formula that I should have picked up on long ago, but somehow hadn't until that moment in the theater.

The formula couldn't be simpler, really. Motorcycles are for people who kick ass. Trucks and SUVs are for pussies, politicians, police, or those criminal masterminds who let their henchmen do all the dirty work.





Now I know some of the contrarians out there will come up with counter-examples, and I'm sure there are many. Mad Max: Fury Road came to my mind immediately, since it's the best movie of 2015 and the protagonists spent most of it in a tanker truck. But let's not forget that all of the heroes abandoned the big rig and took off on motorcycles after finding Furiosa's old tribe. Did you ever see Immortan Joe, The People Eater, or The Bullet Farmer in anything other than an over-sized vehicle? No, of course not. They just ordered people around the entire time from the interior of a monster truck while lacking the moral fortitude and courage of conviction to step outside their steel fortresses solo & kick ass mano a mano.





Taken as a whole, I think the stats will speak for themselves. Badasses, whether heroes or villains, tend to drive smaller vehicles in movies and TV. The obvious caveat here is that the tiny vehicle must still be able to go fast. Otherwise, you'd see Vin Diesel and Daniel Craig puttering around on mopeds and unicycles.













The Matrix, Marlon Brando in The Wild One, RoboCop & Judge Dredd, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia... And this collage could continue forever- Trinity from, Marlon Brando in, RoboCop & Judge Dredd, Country Mac from...









It's easy to see why. Badasses are risk-takers who go it alone in the face of danger. They don't need seat belts or airbags or pillars A through C. As a movie director, why waste twenty minutes on annoying backstory, dialogue, and character development when you can just put your reckless action star on a motorcycle for 30 seconds and show us how little of a fuck they give. I completely get the motorcycle movie trope. What I don't get are the badasses who do it in real life.













because they ride fixies and I refuse to cycle with 19th century tech. I wouldn't want to tangle with any of these guys: Outlaws & Hell's Angels for obvious reasons, East Coast White Trash because they ride fixies and I refuse to cycle with 19th century tech.







Let me reiterate that: I don't understand the badasses who ride motorcycles.



I do understand the non-badasses who ride motorcycles. You really enjoy the sport of motorcycling, you accept the inherent risks that come with that hobby, and you putter away into the dawn's early light with some friends from the local motorcycle club. Sounds like a fun time.



But badass outlaw motorcycle gangs have a different goal in mind when they putter away on their Harleys. They're looking for mischief and mayhem. They're out there to break laws and crack skulls. They're constantly starting beefs and initiating turf wars. They're firebombing rival biker bars and packing heat everywhere they go. The motorcycle is their modern-day Destrier , carrying them into battle like the cavalry of old. And for this task, the motorcycle is exceptionally ill-suited.











One small problem with the modern outlaw's vehicle of choice... it's got a bit of a stability issue.