Traditionally, it's damsels who need saving, what with their pretty dresses, bosoms and emotions. Men, on the other hand, are theoretically strong and self-sufficient… which is why it's so satisfying whenever these tables turned. Here are seven dudes who would be dead without their infinitely more competent damsels.


1) Peeta Mellark, The Hunger Games

Has there ever been a dude who was more constantly in distress than Peeta? Here's a list of things that happens to Peeta in the two Hunger Games he enters: Stabbed in the thigh, gets blood poisoning, is only prevented from eating poison berries by Katniss, nearly killed by a Career, walks into a Force Field and momentarily dies, covered in boils from a poisonous fog, enrages a group of killer monkeys, and more. Without Katniss, he would be dead a dozen times over, and that's before Katniss sets off to rescue him in Mockingjay. About the only thing Petta is good at is baking and manipulating the audiences of the Games, which is probably good since Katniss completely sucks at that.


2) Tuxedo Mask, Sailor Moon

Although he debuted in Sailor Moon as a mysterious, dashing badass, Sailor Moon very quickly turned into the primary target of bad guys trying to get to Sailor Moon, since they knew the to heroes had the hots for each other. Tuxedo Mask was brainwashed not once but twice by Queen Beryl and the negaverse, and ordered to fight Sailor Moon. And that's not counting all the other times he was captured, kidnapped or rendered completely useless because the earth is in pain and his spirit is tied to the planet making him incapacitated as well.

3) Steve Trevor, Wonder Woman

For every time Lois Lane was captured in Superman comics, Steve Trevor was also being tied to a chair and forced to wait for Wonder Woman to save his sorry ass. Giganta, Angle Man, Gundra, Mouse Man (Mouse Man?) and more were just a few of the villains who captured Steve, although Steve was also prone to getting killed during the Silver Age, too. At one point, Psycho Pirate merged with Steve and turned into a villain named Captain Wonder. Wonder Woman eventually saved him by beating Captain Wonder savagely until the two men separated.


4) Flynn Rider, Tangled

Dashing, clever and agile, the thief Flynn Rider still managed to need saving throughout the entirety of Tangled. Whether Rapunzel is singing to distract the patrons of the Snuggly Duckling to keep Flynn from being captured, using her hair to help them down a cliff before pursuers arrive, arguing with Maximus the horse to continue to keep Flynn from being captured, the only thing keeping Flynn from the gallows is his new companion. Sure, he helped Rapunzel escape her tower, but Rapunzel actually helps Flynn escape death, so advantage: Rapunzel.

5) Iron Man, Iron Man 3

Iron Man doesn't often need rescuing, but he does rescue his CEO/gal pal Pepper Potts with some regularity. At the end of Iron Man 3, though, Tony Stark blows through nearly 50 suits of Iron Man armor to save Pepper, only to have the oil rig they and Adrich Killian are standing often collapse, Pepper fall to her death, and the Extremis-powered Killian about to turn Stark into a sardonic smear of blood. Instead, the Extremis-powered Pepper grabs an arm off some armor, punches the hell out of Killian, and blows him up, all while Tony lies on the ground and watches.


6) Fox Mulder, The X-Files

FBI Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully are pretty different, but they have one thing in common — a propensity to finding themselves in constant mortal danger. But Mulder, perhaps because of his willingness to believe and accompanying inability to think things through, more often needed rescuing than Scully. Scully rescued him from a military base in The X-Files' second episode and then managed to save his ass in a ridiculous virtual reality online game that kills people in real life in the seventh season, and dozens of times in-between.


7) Every Single Male In Buffy Summers' Life, Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Angel. Xander. Giles. Spike. If you hung out with Buffy Summers on any kind of regular basis during Buffy the Vampire Slayer and had a penis, then chances are Buffy saved your ass on multiple occasions. Angel and Spike's vampire powers don't really help, so reasonable normal humans like Xander and Giles have no chance, whether they're being accosted by giant praying mantis people or getting their butts kicked by Angel's evil version Angelus, respectively. Buffy gave Angel her blood when he was poisoned, and she saved Spike… well, it's hard to think of an episode where she didn't save Spike, especially when he had that chip in his head that kept him from committing evil. To be fair, everyone around Buffy needed saving pretty much constantly, and that occasionally included Buffy herself. But given that the main female characters were Slayers and witches, the less powered male characters were easy pickings for the bad guys.