Basic Trope: After losing a fight, the villain runs away.
- Straight: After losing to the heroes, Emperor Evulz runs away, the heroes either not trying or failing to stop him.
- Exaggerated:
- Emperor Evulz leaves before the fight even starts, having the heroes battle an impostor or a robot duplicate while also leaving behind a recorded message to taunt the heroes.
- Emperor Evulz takes one hit to his face, which hurts his morale so badly that he immediately makes an escape without the fight lasting any longer than a minute.
- Downplayed:
- Emperor Evulz waits until he is captured to make his escape.
- Emperor Evulz defeats the heroes in a fight, only to retreat when the latter's reinforcements arrive to save them.
- Justified:
- Evulz uses what's left of his power to somehow disable the heroes or to teleport away.
- Evulz spared the heroes before, so they believed it was only fair that they would spare him now.
- Just as they are about to finish him off, his backup arrives and they are forced to retreat or to fight them while he escapes.
- The heroes get distracted for whatever reason, giving Evulz the chance to escape.
- Evulz is Crazy-Prepared. He placed several single-use exits in the battlefield he chose on the off chance of him losing the fight.
- Inverted:
- After losing a fight to Evulz, the heroes run away.
- Despite all of the measures taken, the heroes can't stop Evulz from breaking into their base.
- In spite of the fact that fleeing, surrendering, or doing any action that is typically considered cowardly in every other situation but completely reasonable in his current one, The Rival Clay refuses to do any of those and instead attempts to fight and kill all of the forces that surround him, or at least bring some down before he goes out.
- Subverted:
- Evulz tries to run, but Bob throws a fireball at him and finishes him off before he does.
- Evulz tries to run, but Bob throws a fireball to collapse the exit, trapping Evulz in the room with him. Evulz is summarily defeated.
- Double Subverted:
- But the fireball doesn't finish him off, and he proceeds to run away.
- Parodied:
- Evulz just gets up from the ground and casually strolls away, he and the heroes giving out handshakes and waving their goodbyes.
- The battle against Evulz happened on an actual theater stage and the moment Evulz runs off (or is knocked towards) the left side of the stage and behind the curtains, everybody acts like Evulz escaped flawlessly.
- Zig Zagged: Evulz runs away, only to be captured and arrested by the police. He manages to escape custody, but the heroes catch up to him. Turns out, "Evulz" was an impostor that the real Evulz had used as a distraction to escape.
- Averted: Every enemy the heroes fight either dies at the end of the battle or is finished off shortly after.
- Lampshaded: "Remind me why do we keep letting him get away?"
- Invoked: Noticing that the heroes are distracted, Evulz slips away before they could stop him.
- Exploited: Evulz is not afraid of fighting the heroes because he knows he can run away whenever he wants.
- Defied: "Okay, we set up mines, we locked all the doors, we shuttered all the windows, we reinforced all the surfaces, and we made sure teleporting is impossible in this room. NOW let's kick his ass!"
- Discussed: "Here's hoping we don't let him run away this time."
- Conversed: "How come villains always escape so easily? Are the heroes even trying?"
- Deconstructed:
- The fact that Emperor Evulz continues to evade every attempt at apprehending him leaves the heroes demoralized and doubtful of the possibility of bringing him to justice, which results in them burning out and retiring, followed by Emperor Evulz earning his victory through attrition.
- Emperor Evulz fleeing after every instance of his defeat lead to his underlings seeing him as cowardly and weak, which either makes them defect to the heroes' side or sparks a coup that sees Evulz ousted from his position of power by his treacherous second-in-command, who uses his acts of cowardice to sway his minions' opinions in his favor.
Back to Villain: Exit, Stage Left
