History Main / DangerouslyGenreSavvy

* Syndrome from ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'' doesn't automatically assume NoOneCouldSurviveThat when [[spoiler:Mr Incredible falls off the cliff into a waterfall. He throws a grenade after him to make sure. And then sends down some weird scanning drone]]. Doesn't work, but full marks for effort. If he was smarter, he would have then killed his secretary after practically letting her die. [[spoiler:And not worn a cape]], and realized [[spoiler:the problem with his plan to have his hyper-intelligent, self-aware, learning killer robot roll over in defeat for him]]. In short, Syndrome is very Dangerously Genre Savvy, but he's also [[SmugSnake arrogant]] and [[LargeHam overly theatrical]], and sometimes these two traits will overrule his common sense and make him do something purely for the spectacle and/or ego boost. This leads directly to his downfall.
** One of his mooks was decently intelligent as well. The one hunting Violet used dirt to find her hiding in water, and was stopped from shooting her dead only when Dash intervened.
* In ''Disney/TheGreatMouseDetective'', when Ratigan learns that Basil is on the case, he realizes that it is inevitable that the great detective will track him to his lair. So he sets a trap for him there. And, because he's such a MagnificentBastard, he also sets up a decoy trap in the bar that fronts his hideout so that Basil will easily avoid it and be lulled into a false sense of security. Too bad he then proceeds to blow it by [[ContractualGenreBlindness not just having his pet cat eat him]]. Bonus points for realizing that crushing Basil's self-esteem and sending him into a HeroicBSOD was the most effective tactic to try.
* Creator/{{Disney}}'s ''Disney/{{Cinderella}}'' has Lady Tremaine. When she realized that Cinderella is the girl that the Prince has fallen in love with, she locked Cinderella up in the tower where no one could hear her cries and kept the key on hand. When that failed (thanks to Cinderella's mice friends), she tripped the footman carrying the glass slipper so Cinderella wouldn't have proof she was the right girl. That backfired when Cinderella reveals she carried the other half of the pair of slippers.
* Sykes from ''Disney/OliverAndCompany'' was also shown at one point to be of this trope. At one point, Oliver's friends arrived to rescue Jenny from Sykes, and attempted to infiltrate his base by disguising themselves as a Pizza Delivery. Sykes deduces that the guy wasn't actually a Pizza Delivery person because he doesn't recall ever ordering pizza that day, and arms himself with a gun.
* ''Disney/SleepingBeauty''[='s=] Maleficent and her raven are made of this. The raven figures out that Aurora was hiding in a forest cottage after seeing the fairies' streams of magic, knowing that if the good fairies are there, so is Aurora. Maleficent has Aurora fall into her trap while the fairies are leaving her alone, then captures Prince Phillip and chains him because he's the only one to break the spell. Also the story implies fairies are powerless without their wands, so [[CrazyAwesome she turns to a dragon which nearly kills him]], something that doesn't even need a wand to begin with. If not for SupernaturalAid in effect, she would've won. If you look closely after the prince plunges that sword into her chest, you'll see her lunging at him with her jaws wide open, implying that she [[TakingYouWithMe was intending to kill him as she died]].
* In ''WesternAnimation/TitanAE'', the heroes come across a regular guard Mook when attempting a TrojanPrisoner ploy.
--> "You're lying. He's not a slave and you're not traders. Look at the way he stands. He doesn't carry himself like a slave. Probably ex-military. Akrennians always threaten before asking a favor, it's tradition. And your robes are [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking made out of bedspreads]]!"
* Prince John from ''Disney/RobinHood'' has a surprising moment of being Dangerously Genre Savvy. Earlier, he and his men failed to see through Robin and Little John's [[PaperThinDisguise gypsy costumes]]. So when Prince John stages an archery tournament, he is more perceptive, seeing through Robin's stork disguise (which is actually pretty convincing) and sets a trap for Robin once his guard is down. Although, possibly he didn't so much see through the disguise as reason that only Robin Hood could have shot the way the stork did.
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirls'':
** [[AlphaBitch Sunset]] [[APupilOfMineUntilHeTurnedToEvil Shimmer]] from the first film ''tries'' to be this, but only really manages to do so as part of the backstory (explained in detail in the [[AllThereInTheManual comics]]).
** In ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirlsRainbowRocks'', [[EnthrallingSiren The Dazzlings]] are all over this. They are smart enough to go first after the human Luna and Celestia before they can stop their plan. Then, after the Rainbooms' failed attempt to stop the Dazzlings early in the film, Adagio figures out they have magic. She manages to manipulate them into arguing with each other after coaxing [[SmallNameBigEgo Trixie]] into trapping them so she and her cronies can feed on their magic, making it a NearVillainVictory.

* Mother Gothel from ''Disney/{{Tangled}}'' has the foresight to know that she'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar with Rapunzel. Rather than being a cold stepmother figure to her and giving her motive to run away, she instead impersonates Rapunzel's birth mother and uses her love as emotional blackmail to keep Rapunzel in the tower forever. Gothel also gets points for realizing that Rapunzel is missing from the tower after seeing a riderless horse nearby. She ultimately fails the test, however, when she underestimates Flynn's love for Rapunzel and inadvertently allows him to [[spoiler:cut off her hair, killing Gothel in the process]].
* Thunderclap from ''WesternAnimation/TheGoodDinosaur'' makes use of this in one scene; Arlo manages to trick two of Thunderclap's cronies into thinking that his [[ThisIsMyHuman pet caveboy, Spot]] is hiding somewhere else. But Thunderclap isn't fooled, and simply [[DeathGlare stares intently at Arlo, waiting for any sign that he may have been lying]]. And it works, as Arlo reflexively gives away Spot's hiding place soon after.

* Prince John from ''Disney/RobinHood'' has a surprising moment of being DangerouslyGenreSavvy. Earlier, he and his men failed to see through Robin and Little John's [[PaperThinDisguise gypsy costumes]]. So when Prince John stages an archery tournament, he is more perceptive, seeing through Robin's stork disguise (which is actually pretty convincing) and sets a trap for Robin once his guard is down. Although, possibly he didn't so much see through the disguise as reason that only Robin Hood could have shot the way the stork did.

* Megan, the little girl kidnapped in the Film/AlexCross movie ''Along Came a Spider'' is immediately suspicious when only one person ([[spoiler: the DirtyCop Flanningan]]) has come to 'rescue' her, asking "where's the other guy?", and is not at all moved by the fact that the person trying to persuade her to come out is [[spoiler: {{female|sAreMoreInnocent}}]]. She buys herself precious time by being suspicious and running away.

* The Red Skull, in ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger'', shows quite a bit of this before he (literally) picks up the VillainBall (or, [[{{Pun}} shall we say]], the [[CosmicKeystone Villain Cube]]?) at the last moment. He expected his former Nazi superiors to call him on his plans, and eliminates them before they can report. He anticipates Erskine's attempt to replicate the Super Serum, and dispatches an assassin that's mostly successful in thwarting the Super Soldier research, leaving time for HYDRA to grow without Captain America's direct military counterattacks to Skull's resources for months. When Captain America first invades one of his many headquarters, he recognizes the threat instantly and immediately arms all the installation's self-destruct devices. He also realizes the usefulness of Dr. Zola by giving him the keys to his personal car, allowing Zola to escape so as to continue their weapons development--but also having the scientist preserve his CoolCar. This backfires when the heroes use Skull's precious vehicle [[spoiler:to catapult Captain America onto Skull's superbomber to thwart his final plans]].
** By having many installations for Cap's team to take down, the Skull's plans almost work, buying him enough time to build his DoomsdayDevice. The final base appeared to be ''thoroughly prepared'' for (or even expecting) any small-team heroics that [[spoiler:doomed Hydra's sister bases]], but unfortunately for them [[spoiler:a BigDamnHeroes moment where all of Cap's forces invade at once]] throws off the defenses faster than he anticipated. And while he didn't [[EvilOverlordList try to waste time in letting Cap hang around]], opting to immediately shoot Cap seconds after he is brought before the Skull, he is interrupted by said BigDamnHeroes moment.
* In ''Film/{{The Avengers|2012}}'', when Hawkeye fires an arrow at Loki, [[spoiler: he catches it in mid-air and smirks in Hawkeye's direction, having foiled the assassination attempt. The arrow then explodes, Hawkeye having figured Loki would catch it. You can also see what may have been Loki checking the arrow to see if it was an explosive one. Which is why it's an explosive one that he's never seen before, with a backup timer just in case he caught it]].
** The World Security Council [[spoiler: had two F-35s with nukes rather than just one, so when the first one goes down by Fury, the second one took off seconds later]].
* In ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'', [[spoiler: Zola]] exploits and invokes EvilGloating and TalkingIsAFreeAction in order to [[spoiler: stall Steve and Natasha so a missile could kill them]].
** The bad guys' whole EvilPlan could be considered one. [[spoiler:Their objective with the orbiting Helicarriers with the capacity to snipe anyone anywhere on the planet is to kill off potential heroes before they can become threats. Even if the target appears to be someone harmless like a high school student or reporter or surgeon, as they've learned from Steve Rogers that even the weakest feeblest person can turn into their worst enemy.]]
** The villains' attempt to capture Captain America makes sure all the odds are against him. They attack him in a cramped elevator, filled with a dozen {{Mooks}} disguised to look like random SHIELD agents, lock a supermagnet on Cap's arm so that he can't use his shield and gets his arm stuck to the wall, then swarm him all at once in hopes of overwhelming his great strength. When that doesn't work, they opt for just killing him with all the firepower they can muster.
** Following the use of said firepower, they do NOT fall for "NoOneCouldSurviveThat", sending a team of fully armed men, backed by military fliers, to make sure that the Cap is dead. As soon as they realize he is alive, they immediately call HQ and tell them to send the Winter Soldier after him. When sending the Winter Soldier after him, even though he's the one person who can take on Cap in single combat, he still arrives with extra men and serious firepower backing him up, including a guy packing a freaking [[GatlingGood minigun]].
* ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'' has Helmut Zemo who studied and analyzed the Avengers and plays them like a fiddle. He is also a rare breed of Genre Savvy villain who understands his own limitations and flaws and compensates for them.
** Knowing that he lacks the resources and skill [[spoiler: to track down [[TheGhost the Winter Soldier]], he frames him for a terrorist attack. This results in a massive manhunt and Bucky getting arrested which allows Zemo to find him and get in to speak with him]]
** Also seeing that no villain has ever directly defeated the Avengers, he [[spoiler: instead sows discord so that they tear each other apart]]
** Zemo is so dangerous and effective [[spoiler: he's the ONLY MCU villain [[TheBadGuyWins to accomplish his goals.]] He tears the entire group apart, disgraced and forced many of them on the run and placed the rest under heavy supervision.]]
* The Agents in ''Film/TheMatrix'' generally shoot first and don't bother asking questions at all. They're proficient in hand-to-hand combat as well but don't resort to that until their guns are empty. Agent Smith in particular shows a healthy respect for the protagonists; in the beginning he tells the overconfident police captain that the men sent after Trinity "are already dead", and later he [[spoiler: fires several shots [[WhyDontYouJustShootHim point-blank into Neo's chest]]]] when he has the opportunity.

** Zemo is so dangerous and effective [[spoiler: he's the only MCU villain to accomplish his goals. He tears the entire group apart, disgraced and forced many of them on the run and placed the rest under heavy supervision.]]

[[folder: Mythology and Religion]]
* In the ''Literature/BookOfGenesis'', Lot's daughters [[ButLiquorIsQuicker get him drunk]] [[ParentalIncest and]] [[DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale then rape him]]. They do this so that they can become pregnant, because they (erroneously) believed themselves to be the only people alive AfterTheEnd of their DoomedHometown (which was their whole world up until that point), they felt [[MandatoryMotherhood compelled to have children]] for future security, and their fiances had been killed [[TooDumbToLive because]] [[CassandraTruth they didn't believe Lot]] when he told them that God was planning to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. They used alcohol to ply their father, because although they viewed sex with him as NecessarilyEvil, they knew there was no way he'd go for it sober. (Some also think it was also motivated by a desire for retribution for offering them to be raped by the men of their town.)
[[/folder]]

* In the ''Literature/BookOfGenesis'', Lot's daughters [[ButLiquorIsQuicker get him drunk]] [[ParentalIncest and]] [[DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale then rape him]]. They do this so that they can become pregnant, because they (erroneously) believed themselves to be the only people alive AfterTheEnd of their DoomedHometown (which was their whole world up until that point), they felt compelled to have children for future security, and their fiances had been killed [[TooDumbToLive because]] [[CassandraTruth they didn't believe Lot]] when he told them that God was planning to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. They used alcohol to ply their father, because although they viewed sex with him as NecessarilyEvil, they knew there was no way he'd go for it sober. (Some also think it was also motivated by a desire for retribution for offering them to be raped by the men of their town.)

But this time, the person has an attack of RealLife common sense. No need to waste your breath asking WhyDontYouJustShootHim -- [[JustShootHim they do]]!

* One ''Webcomic/{{Nodwick}}'' strip involves the title character [[http://comic.nodwick.com/?p=494 attempting a plea-bargain]] with a Dangerously Genre Savvy EvilOverlord over the fact that she had conquered them "without rumors, signs and portents or escaped prisoners" as forewarning for them to find and stop her beforehand.

** [[AiIsACrapshoot Crazy AI Two]] is this in spades: before revealing himself for the first time he manipulates TheHero in shutting down One (AKA the only entity on Earth able to stop him). In his third appearance he manipulates his way into gaining control of the Evronian invasion force, but is prevident enough to build himself an escape starship in case his attack failed. His last appearance shows that he programmed his auditory sensors to not hear his creator's vocal password, something that would delete him.

** The Evronians: they have a formidable military, but if there's a ''minimal'' chance that a target may resist they will first infiltrate and sabotage the defences from the inside (Xerba would have never fallen had one of their infiltrators not managed to get the government to both sign a trading agreement and ''temporarily shut down the orbital defences''); they need to invade other planets because they're EmotionEaters and [[PoweredByAForsakenChild even parts of their technology are fueled by emotional energy]], so they keep around breeding stocks of their victims ''and'' are at the constant search of a sufficiently powerful and enduring energy source to power their technology; when Two infiltrated their invasion force the local commander ''noticed him immediately'' but decided to let him do his trick knowing that he would help him dealing with Paperinik, limiting himself to create a program to erase him and ''sabotage Two's escape ship''; and they pick a fight with [[PhysicalGoddess Xadhoom]] (opposite to desperately trying to kill her whenever she finds them) only when they've come up with a possible way to stop her - and use her as the energy source mentioned above.
* {{ComicBook/Darkseid}} managed this in [[ComicBook/GrantMorrisonsBatman The Return of Bruce Wayne]]. Batman has been hurled back to prehistoric times, and has amnesia to boot. Nevertheless, the readers all know Bruce will still make it home somehow, because he's Batman. As it turns out, that inevitability is exactly what Darkseid was counting on - he'd turned Batman into a bomb, so that when he made it back to his own time, all existence would be destroyed.

** The copycat above ''thought'' he was this, as he expected Diabolik to track him down and had prepared an apparently unexcapable trap for him. When Diabolik came the copycat trapped him, gloated he had won and was about to call the police on him before taking over the name of Diabolik for good... And ''then'' Diabolik replied he had forgot about Eva Kant, who was behind him.

-->Especially Wolfie, who is essentially omnipotent due to the fact that he uses his laptop to edit the story he's a charater in.

* ''Film/PacificRim'': After several years of being curbstomed by [[HumongousMecha Jaegers]] over and over, the {{Kaiju}} adapt to their tactics enough to cripple the Jaeger Program and whittle down the available pilots and mechas.

* Megan, the little girl kidnapped in the AlexCross movie ''Along Came a Spider'' is immediately suspicious when only one person ([[spoiler: the DirtyCop Flanningan]]) has come to 'rescue' her, asking "where's the other guy?", and is not at all moved by the fact that the person trying to persuade her to come out is [[spoiler: {{female|sAreMoreInnocent}}]]. She buys herself precious time by being suspicious and running away.

** In ''Series/PowerRangersZeo'', Prince Sprocket caught onto the pattern that when a monster grows, it ends up being destroyed by the Rangers and their Zords, so he uses it as a UriahGambit to get rid of Gasket and Archarina. However, despite losing the battle, the two somehow survived in an example of SparedByAdaptation as their Franchise/SuperSentai counterparts were destroyed after growing.

* {{Lampshaded}} in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48r4IQTB3NE this]] Creator/TheWeatherChannel commercial, when Jim Cantore, notable for showing up where big storms are going to happen, [[BusmansHoliday goes to the beach for a vacation]], ''everyone'' starts running for the hills, with one shopper filling his cart with bread and making a run for it and a dog barking at him as if saying "please, go away".

** And then you have Wrestling/JohnMorrison doing [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_v6A2x01yu4 this]].

* ''Webcomic/TheAdventuresOfDrMcNinja'' has 80s action movie star Frans Rayner, who invented all ninja movie tropes since they were based on his true story. However, he doesn't quite get it until [[spoiler:he comes back in the ''Army of One'' story, and invokes the ConservationOfNinjutsu by cloning the Doctor for a one-on-one-hundred fight.]]
** Doc realized what Frans was doing, and [[spoiler:switched sides, thus dividing the ninjutsu between them ''again.'']]

---> '''Tarvek:''' You know, perhaps we should have discussed this.

** Colonel Glass provides a textbook example [[http://www.spinnyverse.com/index.php?id=521 here]], complete with a ''ShoutOut'' to this very site. The ''SlasherSmile'' is just the icing on the cake.

** While a lot of the bigger and more series enemies can qualify, such as Adam planning to use the Initiative's WrongGenreSavvy tactics against them to make an army of demon/human/cyborg creatures like him, [[BiggerBad The First]] takes the cake. Once it realises the order of the universe has been unbalanced by Willow it sets out to murder all the potential slayers, knowing that killing Buffy or Faith will just make another who might be even more of a pain in the ass. It makes a single swift move to kill the Council of Watchers before they can even make a move and hunts down any allies or survivors, with Giles and Wesley being the only known survivors. While Buffy and her friends are still unaware of its involvement it tries to talk Willow (arguably the strongest threat it faces) and Dawn into committing suicide by pretending to be their loved ones, both so that they are no longer a threat and to make Buffy unstable. Even once it's been found out it still continues to spread discord and fear by impersonating people that they don't know are dead. THEN it takes the already unstable Spike and turns him into a sleeper agent while using him to let out possibly the single most dangerous creature seen and siccing it on the vulnerable potentials first to make them nervous and liable to leave Buffy so they become easy targets. The only reason The First fails is because [[TheDragon Caleb]] spends so much time trying to get his hands on a weapon only a slayer can use, which is used against them.

* Basilisx in [[WebAnimation/SuperMarioBrosZ]] is aware that Mario will automatically collect any power-up that he touches, so he throws TWO Poison Mushrooms at Mario during the fight.

* In ''[[Film/ANewHope Stars Wars: A New Hope]]'', when the Death Star is beset by Rebel fighters near Yavin, Darth Vader rightly suspects that they are a legitimate threat and responds accordingly by scrambling his personal fighter squadron to deal with them while Grand Moff Tarkin arrogantly dismisses the attack as harmless. As a result, Vader comes within a hairsbreadth of saving the station while Tarkin is killed for his stupidity.
** Earlier on, one of the admirals discussing the stolen Death tar plans warns that despite how unlikely it would be, the rebels could conceivably find an exploitable weakness in the death star. [[CassandraTruth He is, of course, ignored.]]
* In ''Film/TheForceAwakens'', while The New Order shares the Empire's love for giant space lasers, the Starkiller's [[AttackTheWeakPoint weak point]] is extremely well shielded. Also, the Grand Moff Tarkin expy evacuates the station when the situation becomes dangerous, avoiding his predecessor's mistake.

** Earlier on, one of the admirals discussing the stolen death star plans warns that despite how unlikely it would be, the rebels could conceivably find an exploitable weakness in the death star. [[CassandraTruth He is, of course, ignored.]]

* In ''Film/TheNuttyProfessor'', realizing [[SuperpoweredEvilSide Buddy Love]] is taking control of his life, Sherman decides to stop taking the weight loss formula and rebuild his confidence [[spoiler: Unfortunately, Buddy anticipated that and spiked Sherman's diet-shakes with the formula]].

** On the other hand, if a veteran player expected a chest to be a [[ChestMonster Mimic]] and told the new players to open it, yet it turned out to contain precious treasure, their savviness backfires miserably and turn them into WrongGenreSavvy.

* ''TruckBearingKibble'' (which is very much like ComicStrip/ThePerryBibleFellowship in its humor) has [[http://truckbearingkibble.com/comic/2008/07/14/down-to-the-wire/ this cartoon]] which either features a puppeteer very dedicated to his art, or a puppet who knows that to TakeAThirdOption is sometimes the better choice.

* [[spoiler: Salem]], the apparent BigBad from {{WebAnimation/RWBY}}, shows signs of this in her speech. She is aware of humanity's ability of [[{{Determinator}} drawing power from hope and overcoming seemingly impossible problems]]. She is also aware of the power that a [[BadassAdorable smaller, more honest soul can possess]]. She is [[ChessMaster already planning]] to [[DivideAndConquer crush them all]].

But this time, the person has an attack of RealLife common sense. No need to waste your breath asking WhyDontYouJustShootHim -- they do!

** Janus Valker is a ''professional'' HeroKiller, who divides superheroes between those who think he won't shoot and those who think they can [[BulletCatch stop his bullets with his hands]]. He has a formidable robot that can easily overpower and kill any superhero and programmed to attack them as soon as they start gaining the ''mentality'' for it, before they can become strong enough to defeat it. His ''other'' robot is programmed in such a way it will kill both the criminal he's hunting down ''and'' Rat-Man (making it look like an accident), and if incapacitated it will explode with enormous strength. The only reason Rat-Man survived long enough to [[spoiler:make Valker pull a HeelFaceTurn]] is a combination of dumb luck and his rare moments of genre savvyness (such as when he used the fact the memetic ChuckNorris [[ItMakesSenseInContext always shows up to bring him on missions whenever he opened a book]] to ''[[SummonBiggerFish sick him on the hero-killing robot]]'').

** Janus Valker is a ''professional'' HeroKiller, who divides superheroes between those who think he won't shoot and those who think they can [[BulletCatch stop his bullets with his hands]]. He has a formidable robot that can easily overpower and kill any superhero and programmed to attack them as soon as they start gaining the ''mentality'' for it, before they can become strong enough to defeat it. His ''other'' robot is programmed in such a way it will kill both the criminal he's hunting down ''and'' Rat-Man (making it look like an accident), and if incapacitated it will explode with enormous strength. The only reason Rat-Man survived long enough to [[spoiler:make Valker pull a HeelFaceTurn]] is a combination of dumb luck and his rare moments of genre savvyness (such as when he confronted Valker and ''stole his gun'' before Valker could ask him what kind of superhero he was and shoot him, or used the fact the memetic ChuckNorris [[ItMakesSenseInContext always shows up to bring)