Villainy 101: Jail Breaks – What NOT to Do

Well … I’m back.

And I’m still alive too.

Oh, you don’t know who I am?

That’s just the way I like it. I’m the Spy. I’ve spent the past several weeks … months … years—I don’t know really—locked up in a dungeon in the Academy of Ultimate Villainy. At last—long last—I’ve managed to escape and return to you.

As you might have expected, the Villains stole all my recent notes and recordings, but there’s one thing they couldn’t take.

The knowledge locked up inside my noggin.

After spending so much time in the company of so many Villains, I’ve got enough to write a bestseller … or at least help you write yours.

Today, I figured I’d talk about jail breaks and what not to do. And yes, I learned most of this through experience. Painful experience.

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4 Things You Shouldn’t Do When Trying to Escape the Dungeons

I’m sure you’ve all seen the movies. The hero gets captured and thrown into prison, but there’s just no getting this guy down! All the way, he’s throwing out those cutting quips and brilliant one liners that reveal the guards for the incompetent nincompoops that they are—and the guards just grunt and growl and slam the door in his face, maybe punch him in the stomach, but that’s about as far as they take it.

Yeah. Not true.

The guards may be incompetent nincompoops—we’ve already heard a lecture from Dr. Sinestra on the Proper Procedure for Hiring Evil Henchmen due to the fact that most villains do hire incompetent nincompoops—but they usually have a temper. A very bad temper.

It’s best not to get them angry.

It pretty much always ends in failure. Before you can successfully break out of the dungeons, you need to have some idea of the lay of the land, which passages lead where, what time the guards come around, how many guards there are. The usual stuff.

Remember, there’s always a pattern. Depending on the security level, that pattern may take you an extremely long time to discover. But there’s always a pattern hidden somewhere. And if you find the openings in the pattern, you’ve taken a huge step toward breaking out.

If you ever get thrown into the dungeons at the Academy of Ultimate Villainy, know that you’re going to be stuck there for a long time before you find any sort of a pattern. They change their guards constantly, vary the routes, change the times that they bring you food—if they bring you food, that is—and do everything in their power to leave you confused, disoriented, and unaware of what is happening elsewhere.

It’s almost impossible without outside help.

Patience is the key to success.

Occasionally, the opportunity arises to communicate with your fellow prisoners and try to enlist their help in your escape. You’ll want to be very careful when you do this. A casual word to the wrong person … they rat you out to the guards … and presto … your escape plans are foiled for at least the next year.

And maximum security dungeons, like the AUV, tend to have at least one or two moles among the prisoners …

Yeah, I learned that the hard way.

Anyway, if you do manage to enlist the help of fellow prisoners, make sure you actually give them what you promised. And don’t promise anything you can’t or won’t give them. The last thing you want to do is betray the folks who help you.

Because if your escape goes wrong … and you wind up locked in the dungeon again … you’ll want some folks on your side.

Not angry prisoners you betrayed.

I know. It seems like a no-brainer. But you won’t believe how many jail breaks are foiled simply because the escapee couldn’t wait to taste the fresh air of freedom and forgot to close the door to his prison cell.

If you’re a guard, and you’re walking down a corridor, bored at the end of a long day of walking down corridors, and you see a cell door closed … chances are, you won’t take a second look.

But if you see a cell door open … well, that’s just the jolt of adrenaline you need to wake you up and send you running to sound the alarm and find the escapee.

Like I said, bad idea.

I don’t care how pressed you are for time … you always have time to close the cell door.

Hope that was helpful, folks! Be watching for more posts from the Academy of Ultimate Villainy.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to buy a hamburger … sweet juicy goodness with all the fixings … and fries. Lots of fries. My mouth’s watering just thinking about it.

Dungeon food leaves a lot to be desired.

The Spy, signing off