User blog:CrashBash/Crash's Top 10 Turnabouts

Robot Wars may be a TV show first and a competition second, but the competition is still very real. You have two or more robots really fighting it out for a place in the next round, the final of a major tournament or even just bragging rights. Some battles are extremely tight, resulting in very close judges decisions. Others are complete mismatches. And others still start a complete mismatches...only to end very VERY differently.

Sometimes, I like to use video game analogies to describe Robot Wars. Often it's compared to games where you use strategy and take advantage of an opponent's specific weakness - like Pokemon or Fire Emblem. But in this case, the most appropriate game series to talk about is Ace Attorney. And why not? Sometimes, there's a battle going clearly in the favour of one robot, and then...OBJECTION! Suddenly, the losing robot pulls something out of the bag at the last possibly moment and completely turns the battle around out of nowhere. Whilst these aren't perhaps as common as an Ace Attorney case, they're still brilliant to see, and they're certainly fun to watch.

HOLD IT!, I hear you cry. How does one even judge what makes a Turnabout? Well, I've decided to set up three very important rules.
 * 1) The robot who eventually lost has to be winning for a good chunk of the fight. Even if it's winning for about half the fight and then its opponent dominates the second half, that's fine. For example, TR2 vs Carbide doesn't make this list because whilst Carbide started the stronger, TR2 dominated the vast majority of the battle after Carbide's weapon died in a matter of seconds. That's not really long enough.
 * 2) The battle has to be of a decent length in order for me to effectively judge if it's a good turnabout. Iron Awe's victory over Bigger Brother certainly counts as a turnabout and a major shock, but since the battle was over within seconds, it's hard to really judge what could have been.
 * 3) The battle HAS to end, and this is important, with the robot making the turnabout BEATING the opponent. It has to be involved significantly with the defeat. Judges decisions do count, but no failed turnabouts (like, for example, most of Wild Thing's battles) or battles decided when the winning robot just broke down (like Pussycat vs Fluffy).

Got that? Good. Now then, court is now in session. All rise...