http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OneDimensionalThinking

Azusa: Wait! Why are we running away in a straight line!?

Karina: Oh, right! [steers the M3 to the side] Girls und Panzer der Film Wait! Why are we running away in a straight line!?Oh, right! [steers the M3 to the side]

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Logically, the fastest way to avoid something dangerous that's stuck on a straight course is to move a few steps aside of its path and let it pass by, but in fiction nobody ever seems to do this. At all.

So like a flightless version of Acrophobic Bird, characters being chased by a car, falling rocks, or anything else that travels in one direction will inevitably run straight ahead and try to outrun the threat. They appear to only be able to think in one dimension — escaping that oncoming freight train by jumping off the track just doesn't occur to them.

This looks very dramatic on camera, but Fridge Logic kicks in a little while later and you ask "Well, why didn't she enter one of the buildings instead of letting the car chase her down the freeway?"

Note that this doesn't apply when there's an actual reason that the character can't simply leap to the side: Maybe that car is cruising down a narrow alley where there is no "sideways" for the runner to go, that boulder is rolling down a tunnel with no sidepaths, or those railroad tracks are currently crossing a bridge over a hundred-foot canyon. (These highly specific examples are highly specific because they're some of the few times there's ever been a good justification for outrunning the danger.)

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Truth in Television: In real life, many animals (including humans) have a natural "herding" response to danger, so having a terrified character run directly away from an approaching threat may not be tactically sound, but it does make sense psychologically. (And if the threat is a predatory animal, simply leaping to the side wouldn't help (much) in the first place because the predator would take note and redirect its path.) Savvy military conquerors have exploited this fact for centuries to herd panicked civilian crowds to where they want them, although they need to keep the crowd in a state of panic so that no-one has a chance to consider the tactical advantages of veering off to the side. And it is the way to maximize the distance between you and the object; if you veer off, the pursuer can follow the straight line to cross less space than you can.

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See also 2-D Space, No Peripheral Vision and Blind Alley. Slower than a Speeding Bullet is a common subtrope of this. Can easily come off as Too Dumb to Live in especially egregious cases.

Examples:

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Anime & Manga

During Asuna's Training from Hell in Mahou Sensei Negima!, Evangeline uses her Malleus Aquilonis spell to suddenly send an ice boulder rolling down a mountain after Asuna. Having just been thrown out into the icy wilderness naked and now scared out of her wits, Asuna naturally tries to outrun the boulder until she luckily falls on a lower ledge.

In the Gantz manga and anime, after being caught on the train tracks, Kurono and Katou decide to try and outrun the train to get beyond where the front car will stop. Even if the train hadn't turned out to be a non-stop express , it's unlikely they would have been able to run far enough in time, and the fact that they break off an attempt to climb onto the platform in favor of running seems pretty counterintuitive. They probably would have made it up with help from the bystanders. Then again, the theme of this scene seems to be general apathy and the onlookers' interest in seeing someone die.

, it's unlikely they would have been able to run far enough in time, and the fact that they break off an attempt to climb onto the platform in favor of running seems pretty counterintuitive. They probably would have made it up with help from the bystanders. Then again, the theme of this scene seems to be general apathy and the onlookers' interest in seeing someone die. In the second Cardcaptor Sakura movie, Sakura is on a roller coaster track with the coaster coming right at her. She first tries running straight along the track rather than taking one step sideways onto the emergency walkway. Then, when it's about to hit her, she stops time.

In episode 17 of Digimon Adventure, the Digidestined first dodge the cruise liner in the middle of the desert by, sensibly, running to the side. When it it actually start chasing them, though, the trope promptly kicks in full force. Later, in Episode 49, it shows up again as they are fleeing a balled-up Waru Monzaemon.

In Tokyo Magnitude 8.0, the Tokyo Tower falls, but the characters run parallel to the direction of the falling tower rather than running off to the side.

In Angel Beats!, one of the traps in the hallways leading to Guild is a rolling boulder. Apparently, this is massively averted, as not only the resident ninja Shiina managed to find a small nook to hide from the boulder (and pull away most of the members, Hinata tackles Otonashi to the corner of the hallway, thereby evading the boulder (remember, a boulder is spherical, the hallway is rectangular, so the edges on the bottom won't be swept by the boulder). Indeed, the only casualty is the guy who kept running.

Averted in episode 8 of The Third: The Girl with the Blue Eye. Honoka and her tank, Bogie, find themselves on the wrong end of a stampeding herd of sand dragons. Bogie's response, rather than drive away from the dragons, is to drive off to the side and get out of their path. They aren't quite fast enough to get out without damage, but do survive nonetheless.

Lampshaded in Girls und Panzer der Film, when Rabbit Team's tank is running away from a giant Ferris Wheel . Azusa: Wait, why are we running away in a straight line!?

Karina: Oh, right! [makes a sharp turn out of danger's way]

. In episode 7 of Di Gi Charat, Gema drinks up an entire river that Dejiko kicks him into, and proceeds to chase Dejiko and Puchiko down. Puchiko realizes halfway through that he has no reason to chase her, and steps out of the way while he continues pursuing Dejiko. It makes enough sense that he traps her at the end of an alleyway, until one notices that there's a narrow opening on each side that she could have easily escaped into.

In Girls' Last Tour the girls come across machinery, including a conveyor belt. Yuri activates it while Chito is standing on it. She runs against the conveyor until Yuuri shuts it off. Then Yuuri turns it on again and repeats the process. When Chito expresses her annoyance at this, Yuuri notes that all Chito had to do was run sideways.

Comic Books

The title hero of the comic book Night Man also realizes there is space when a circle (a giant ball) rolls down a square hall. He lies down and rolls to the left, where the floor meets the wall.

Wonder Woman (1987): When Empress, Wonder Girl and Monster Girl knock down Giganta during "The Witch and the Warrior" Mustang Sally tries to escape being squashed by riding her bike in a straight line along the same trajectory as Giganta's fall. She ends up underneath her ally.

Fan Works

A lampshaded aversion in Beyond the Borders — a character who runs perpendicularly from a collapsing building is specifically noted to be doing so by virtue of not being a cartoon character.

Films — Animation

Monsters vs. Aliens. Susan ran forward away from the meteor, instead of, you know, going left or right. For that matter, she would've been fine where she was at originally, it only hit her because she ran straight into its path.

The Rule of Funny gives an interesting twist to this one in Who Framed Roger Rabbit: A way too amorous toon is running full bore towards Eddie Valiant. Instead of running away or stepping to the side, he takes the white line on the road that she's running on and directs it into the wall. Naturally, a wall pizza ensues. Eddie: Toons. Gets 'em every time.

Similar to the Prometheus example, Toy Story has Buzz Lightyear running away from a globe in a straight line. He slips on some pencils and rolls off to the side to the windowsill out of its path, but then the globe hits a lamp, which swings around and knocks him out of the windowsill.

Finding Nemo: When Marlin and Dory have to escape the sinking submarine, they swim directly away from it in the same direction it's sliding, and when they and the submarine finally hit an obstacle, they miss being crushed by luckily being just a few inches under its nose. They could have just swum sideways and avoided all that

Frozen: Kristoff and Sven would have had a much easier time escaping the ship capsizing upon them on the frozen fjord just by swerving a bit to the right; it would have barely slowed them down from reaching Anna. Instead, they ride at full speed in a straight line, right along the ship's length, barely avoiding being crushed.

Subverted in Zootopia when a sheep mook is trying to outrun a subway car. He initially pleads for the car to stop but when he realizes that isn't going to happen he flattens himself against a side wall to dodge the car as it speeds by. The sheep is left with a nasty friction burn where his belly fur used to be, but is otherwise unharmed.

Inverted in Shrek. Upon seeing Shrek approaching, a terrified mascot at Lord Farquaad's castle attempts to run away... by weaving through the entire queuing line at the entrance. Shrek simply walks straight through the ropes.

Films — Live-Action

Literature

Averted in Neil Gaiman's American Gods, where the Technical Boy is able to run down Bilquis with his limo because she was trapped on a road with a sheer, muddy climb up on one side and a sheer drop off a cliff on the other. She tried to get out of the way, but the surroundings themselves had her trapped.

Naturally, the narrator of Flatland visits Lineland, a world where this is literally true. The inhabitants of Lineland can't pass each other, and each being only ever sees two things: his two immediate neighbors' eyes/asses. Reproduction is pulled off by having sex partners sing to each other over long distances, which is handy, since at least one of a Linelander's neighbors will always be a parent or sibling.

Deconstructed/Parodied/somethinged in Dr. Seuss' "The Zax", a short tale in his book The Sneetches and Other Stories. A creature called a North-going Zax and another called a South-going Zax run into each other, and both refuse to go around the other since it would require them to move, very slightly, in a direction different than they're used to. Their refusal to compromise means they basically stand glaring at each other forever while a highway overpass is built over their heads.

Live-Action TV

In the bad TV mini-series 10.5, a bicyclist tries to outrace the Space Needle as it breaks from its base and comes crashing to the ground... when he could have easily biked all of six feet to either side of or behind the base, and avoided the whole problem.

Subverted in an episode of The Big Bang Theory, where Sheldon, who shown as afraid of hospitals, dodges a gurney carrying a sick person by ducking into a nearby door. Unfortunately for him, the room is an isolation ward for a patient with a highly infectious disease.

Appears in an episode of Criminal Minds, where a serial killer runs over people with a truck. What makes it worse is that he's a serial killer, so he has done this repeatedly without anyone just running off the side of the road.

Doctor Who: In "The Ghost Monument", this is Ryan, Graham and Angstrom's response to a spaceship crashing in their direction.

In the Game of Thrones episode "Battle of the Bastards", Rickon runs straight away from Ramsay, who is shooting at him with arrows, rather than run in serpentine fashion to make it harder for Ramsay to hit him, which gets him killed. This is a rather egregious example, since Ramsay is firing his arrows at great distance in a high arc, with seemingly several seconds between loosing the arrow and impact.

In the pilot episode of Lost, Jack, Hurley, and Claire run from the plane's falling wing. None thinks to run sideways out of its path.

An appearance of this trope in MacGyver (1985), episode "Fire and Ice" almost suggests that there is a mystical force that compels people to run in a straight line in front of oncoming objects. A man hit by a truck at the beginning of the episode would have been perfectly safe if he had not gone out of his way to run in front of the truck.

Midsomer Murders: In "Shot at Dawn", a woman being chased by a hay baler attempts to flee directly away from it. Granted that turning may not have helped as the baler was being steered, but she could have at least tried, as it would have taken time for the baler to turn.

Star Trek: In Star Trek: The Original Series "Balance of Terror", the Enterprise flies directly away from the Romulan ship's blasts rather than trying to evade. However, the angle at which the weapon is fired is above the center of the screen, while in the next shot, it's in the center, suggesting the attack can both maneuver and keep up at warp. Justified in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode New Ground, where the Enterprise is deliberately holding position in front of the speeding Soliton Wave so as to be able to disperse it. Also inverted, since to get into that position, the Enterprise has to take a rough ride through the wave. Although dialogue suggests the wave is too big to fly around, special effects suggest it is no bigger than the Enterprise. Played hilariously straight in an episode of Star Trek: Voyager, in which Chakotay is running from the bad guys, and he stays on a winding path instead of just cutting across the grass. Justified in an episode of Star Trek: Enterprise. The crew learn that a highly radioactive Negative Space Wedgie is heading straight towards them, and it's going faster than the ship can. They proceed to evacuate the whole crew into heavily-shielded areas to survive. They do consider the idea of simply getting out of its way, but it's too large for them to try to get out of its way before it hits them, and going too fast to outrun.

In Walking With Monsters, a fish is being chased by a sea scorpion. Despite the fact that the fish can swim, but the sea scorpion can only walk on the bottom of the ocean, the fish tries to go faster than the scorpion. It takes the appearance of a larger scorpion for the fish to finally swim up where neither scorpion can get it.

A bicyclist is pursued by a car at night on Major Crimes, eventually being knocked down and dragged to his death across the roadway. Although he does turn on to another street in an attempt to evade the vehicle, it never seems to occur to him to veer onto the safety of the sidewalk.

Music

Radiohead's music video for "Karma Police" features nothing but a long, straight road, a car, and a man on that road running away from the car. He never once thinks to run off either side of the road. However, the expected outcome of such a chase is subverted, since the car actually slows down to match the man's running speed. The man later gets revenge on the car by lighting a trail of gasoline leaking from it, which inverts the trope when car's unseen driver exhibits One-Dimensional Thinking by driving backwards on the road in a futile attempt to escape the flames.

Tabletop Games

This is/was prevalent sometimes in Dungeons & Dragons. In cases where the players get in a minor fight and the DM decides it's not worth drawing a map, or when they go Off the Rails into a space the DM hadn't mapped, everything tends to become one dimensional, since all you generally know is everyone's distance from you.

Video Games

Web Comics

Western Animation

Real Life