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"Mature Content Warning!" |
| “ | Shut up and take the pain! | „ |
| ~ Barnes tormenting his soldiers |
Bob Barnes is the main antagonist of Oliver Stone's 1986 Vietnam War film Platoon.
He is a brutal and extremely violent Sergeant in the US Army, known for his horrifically disfigured face that he gained after surviving seven shooting injuries. In the film, he and his platoon are deployed to the jungles of Vietnam in order to fight the Viet Cong, where his psychopathic nature is heavily contrasted with the compassionate and pacifistic nature of fellow Sergeant, Elias Gordon.
He was portrayed by Tom Berenger.
What Makes Him Pure Evil?[]
- Upon discovering three soldiers had been killed by the Viet Cong, Barnes and his platoon completely destroy a nearby village he suspects of aiding the enemy, raiding the population and burning the village down.
- During this raid, Barnes personally kills a total of four villagers onscreen, including the village chief's wife simply for talking back to him. He then holds the chief's young daughter at gunpoint for information.
- Also during the raid, Bunny gangrapes one of two prepubescent girls after beating a one-legged man and his elderly mother to death. Since Barnes is Bunny's boss and the one personally leading the raid, this makes the former at least partially responsible for the latter's crimes.
- He shoots Elias and leaves him for dead, hoping to avoid a court martial.
- He tries to kill Taylor for that same reason in the final battle before he is knocked unconscious by an air strike, allowing Taylor to finally kill him once and for all.
- While there are some scenes that indicate Barnes cares for at least some of the men in his platoon, in truth his relationship with them is basic pragmatism at best (especially considering he betrays Elias and Taylor for self-serving purposes) and flat-out subverted at worst. For instance:
- Gardner's death. Barnes doesn't in any way try to help or mourn the man at all, aggressively telling him to "shut up and take the pain" out of annoyance for his screaming, and then openly calling him a "lump of shit" after he dies. Barnes then threatens to make Junior suffer, but only because he can't afford to have "cowardly idiots" in his unit getting others killed by falling asleep on watch.
- When Sandy and Sal are killed by a claymore in a bunker, Barnes has a sad look on his face out of not grief, but rather stress as the loss of soldiers could make him lose the war. It's the same when he comes across Manny's corpse, and later when Wolfe accidentally causes friendly fire with the radio; his anger is him lashing out due to his own increasing personal losses rather than genuine comradeship. It doesn't help that Barnes never mentions these men's death again afterwards.
- When Junior fakes jungle rot in an attempt to leave the war early, Barnes threatens to torture him with a centipede and even calls him the N-word.
Trivia[]
- Despite being Pure Evil, Dale Dye (who played Captain Harris in the movie and was Oliver Stone's real-life military advisor) said on the DVD commentary that Barnes was something of a tragic character, being so broken by war and understanding that his war crimes were so unforgivable that he ultimately became a death seeker, hence the several battle scars and why he goads Chris and his allies into killing him in the end.
External Links[]
- Bob Barnes on the Villains Wiki.
