History Main / DumbDodoBird

[[quoteright:350:[[WesternAnimation/IceAge https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/dodos.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:350:Hey, look at that. Dinner and a show.]]

Many creatures have become extinct throughout Earth's history (It is estimated that 99% of all life that has ever existed on Earth is currently extinct). But while different kinds of StockDinosaurs are usually selected for prehistoric settings, there are a variety of other species of extinct animals that come to mind when thinking of the past. One of these creatures is the dodo bird, which is kind of the poster-child when someone thinks of an extinct species.

The dodo was a flightless bird that lived on Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar that wasn't discovered until 1507. It is placed in the same family of birds as pigeons and doves (Columbidae). If you look at a baby pigeon and depictions of the dodo side by side, you might discover some similarities. Due to their isolation, they were naive towards predators and were wiped out within a few decades of their discovery, so quick in fact they were believed to have been mythical for a time. However, their images were recorded in various books about animals and various tissue and bone fragments have been discovered on Mauritius in modern times. With their rather goofy-looking appearance, they eventually became a popular animal choice in media of various sorts.

Usually a dodo in media is a comedic, dim bulb whose inability to fly often leads to jokes at their expense. Due to being extinct, they also sometimes appear alongside animals that died out a much longer time ago in pre-historic environments. They can sometimes act as {{Cloudcuckoolander}}s or TheFool. In short, Dodos are never taken seriously. But there are some cases where the trend is averted, or at least subverted, if the dodo isn't entirely stupid or out of their mind that is usually the case.

A case of HistoricalDowngrade. Technically a Subtrope to DumbDinos as dodos, being birds, are dinosaurs. See DogsAreDumb and MooseAreIdiots for other animals portrayed with similarly low intelligence. Compare TheDinosaursHadItComing for another self-inflicted extinction.

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!!Examples:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]
* Dodo Man, a one-shot Franchise/{{Batman}} villain from UsefulNotes/{{the bronze age| of comic books}}, had a fixation on natural history as his {{idiosyncrazy}}.
* Dodo from ''WesternAnimation/AnimalCrackers'', although he is not as dumb as he is temperamental and too stubborn to realize he's flightless.
* ''The Dodo and the Frog'' was a 1940s and 1950s Creator/DCComics series that featured a dull-witted dodo bird and a frog who continually tried and failed to take advantage of him. The duo originally ran as a feature in DC's [[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfComicBooks Golden Age]] FunnyAnimal humor title ''Funny Stuff,'' eventually taking over the title. Dunbar Dodo and Fenimore Frog eventually returned in the 1980s ''Comicbook/CaptainCarrotAndHisAmazingZooCrew''. Dunbar's employed as a cruise ship captain, while Fenimore (still nursing a grudge) occasionally becomes the monstrous giant Frogzilla.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Comic Strips]]
* Inverted in one installment of ''ComicStrip/TheFarSide'' which claims that dodos had human-level intelligence.
* ''ComicStrip/SafeHavens'':
** Samantha successfully cloned two dodos, Paul and Mary, who turned out to be paragons of stupid, self-destructive behavior. Fortunately, their descendants seem to be more levelheaded, considering the grandchildren see Paul and Mary as 'failed prototypes' and successfully negotiated to keep them out of the dodo sanctuary, to the point of filing restraining orders. [[spoiler: After Mars is terraformed, Paul and Mary decide to make their home there, raising two more chicks (With a third on the way). [[GeniusLoci Mars]], for its part, regards them as pets]].
** When life starts evolving on Mars, there was enough merfolk DNA left there to allow merfolk to appear again...except they start appearing as half-fish, half-''dodo''. (Samantha theorizes that merfolk's top halves evolve to reflect the dominant species of the time, hence these creatures, the half-human creature of Earth, and the plesiosaurs of the time of the dinosaurs.)
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/IceAge'' has a group of dodos that are preparing for the Ice Age. However, at the point they're introduced they've only gathered three melons, one of which the main trio needs to feed the human baby. They end up wiping out their entire flock right then and there just trying to defend the melons, starting with the flock's last female killing herself and the rest falling to their deaths.
* Disney's ''WesternAnimation/AliceInWonderland'' has The Dodo, who is a CompositeCharacter of the original Dodo, and another character named Pat. Despite his British gentleman demeanor, he's not too bright, as his first suggestion as to how to get the "monster" (a giant-sized Alice) out of the White Rabbit's house is to attempt to set the place on fire and "smoke the monster out".
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Literature]]
* ''Literature/AlicesAdventuresInWonderland'' is widely cited as having launched dodos back into modern popular culture. Lewis Carroll, whose real name was Charles Dodgson, had a stammer, and often inadvertently referred to himself as "Do-Do-Dodgson". As such, and as a fan of the London Natural History Museum, which includes a dodo skeleton in its collection, he began referring to himself as "Dodo" and thus inserted a dodo into his book as an AuthorAvatar. While not as dumb as subsequent appearances, Carroll's Dodo does encourage Alice and other birds (all of whom are expies of friends of Alice's inspiration, Alice Liddell) to run a "caucus race" in which anyone can run in any direction and everybody wins. This was a deliberate TakeThat to the political caucus system, which Carroll saw as unclear and indecisive.
* Invoked in ''Dodos are Forever'' by Creator/DickKingSmith, which is about a family of dodos who are smart enough to see the writing on the wall and attempt to escape their impending extinction.
* In ''Literature/DirkGentlysHolisticDetectiveAgency'', Reg takes Dirk and Richard back in time to see a dodo while explaining to them about the dangers of meddling in history; apparently the dodos only became extinct as a result of a time traveler meddling to save something else.
* In ''Literature/FantasticBeastsAndWhereToFindThem'', Dodos turn out to be magical creatures called Diricawls that possess teleportation magic. Muggles believe the "Dodos" are extinct because the Diricawls started using their powers to hide from humans once they figured out they were being hunted.
* The "Grantville Gazette" short story collections of the ''Literature/SixteenThirtyTwo'' novels include a very long-running story (One chapter per collection for long enough that the compiled chapters would make a novel in their own right) titled "Second Chance Bird" in which a bird-watcher from uptime realizes that dodos had yet to go extinct in the 1630s and stages an expedition to Mauritus to start a USE colony there in order to protect them.
* In Paul Adshead's children's puzzle book ''Puzzle Island'', the reader has a diary and a map of a mysterious island where an adventurer named Ambrose Fogarty claims to have found a male and female of 'the rarest creature in the whole world', which were believed to be extinct. Having taken the male to a location where he plans to create a breeding colony, he charges the reader with solving his puzzles to prove that they really love animals in order to find the identity and location of the female and the location of the colony. It turns out that the Dodo bird was the creature the reader had been tasked to help save, and it was hiding in plain sight all along [[spoiler:on the front cover, and you can see it by flipping the cover upside-down]].
* ''Literature/ThursdayNext'' has a pet dodo. Being famously extinct (and completely harmless) made it a popular pet once TimeTravel and cloning made obtaining one possible.
* The children's puzzle book ''Puzzle Journey Through Time'' ends with a dodo chick hatching from an egg that was left in the protagonists' magic box during their time-traveling adventures. The two kids hope that the story's TimePolice don't come back to retrieve the chick.
* ''Summer of the Dodo'' is about a girl in the late 20th century who cares for a dodo that hatches from a supposedly petrified egg, that learns to talk from watching television.
* A dodo appears in ''The Peacock Party'', a sequel to ''The Butterfly Ball'', in the poem "The Dodo's Dream", which portrays it as not necessarily stupid, but definitely ''weird''. The illustration shows the dodo bursting through an elephant-shaped teapot (legs through the bottom, head through the spout/trunk) while surrounded by surreal dream imagery.
* The ''Franchise/DoctorWhoExpandedUniverse Literature/NewSeriesAdventures'' novel ''The Last Dodo'' is about an alien who collects specimens of nearly-extinct species, including the eponymous bird.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
* ''Series/TheGoodies'': In "Dodonuts", Bill buys the world's last dodo from a pet shop and then attempts to teach it to defend itself against Tim and Graeme. However, he quickly learns that the bird has no survival instincts whatsoever.
* In ''{{Series/Primeval}}'', dodos are one of the few [[PrehistoricMonster creatures]] to come out of the time anomalies that are entirely harmless in themselves. Unfortunately, they also carry parasites that [[EverythingTryingToKillYou are viciously infective and deadly to humans]].
* Averted in ''Series/KamenRiderZeroOne'' with the Dodo Magia, who is a hyper-advanced AI reprogrammed to be an ultra-efficient assassin that grows more powerful (and deadly) as it learns!
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Music]]
* The Neil Innes song "Say You're Sorry Again" proposes a lover's quarrel and refusal to make up as the real reason for the dodo's extinction.
* The ''Music/DaveMatthewsBand'' song "Dodo" features a verse about the last of these birds.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Puppet Shows]]
* ''Film/SesameStreetPresentsFollowThatBird'' has the Dodo family, a DysfunctionalFamily of the highest degree whose disapproval of Big Bird's imaginary friend kickstarts the movie's plot.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
* In one ''TabletopGame/{{Dragonlance}}'' supplement, a [[CloudCuckoolander gnomish]] explorer attempts to locate the last surviving specimens of an {{Expy}} of the dodo bird in the lands of a primitive society. He shows them a picture. [[spoiler: They assume he's asking them to hunt it ...]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Video Games]]
* ''VideoGame/SlyCooperThievesInTime'' has a Dodo guard, that attacks by swinging its' beak, throwing rocks, and rolling eggs. Each time it lands a hit that's not a counter-attack, it does a HappyDance.
* ''VideoGame/PocketGod'' has dodo birds as one of the animals featured, and are one of the few animals incapable of eating the Pygmies.
* ''VideoGame/BreathOfFireIII'' has a Dodo bird as part of its BossBonanza.
* Dodo Bird appears in both ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaSymphonyOfTheNight'' and ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaPortraitOfRuin'' as a rare enemy what appears in one room and tries to run away from the player. In former, it dies from practically one hit, though the latter one has more health and is an undead enemy.
* You can find a dodo egg in ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaLordsOfShadow2'' which you can hatch to get a dodo what will fly to the nearest secret.
* ''VideoGame/PlantsVsZombies2ItsAboutTime'': One of the zombies in the Frostbite Caves (which takes place during the Ice Age) is the Dodo Rider Zombie, an imp riding a dodo that's normally grounded but [[AirborneMook "flies"]] when it encounters ice floes. It's actually not as dumb as it seems, considering that the Imp managed to train it as a mount and ''teach it to fly''. Hilariously, its Almanac Entry has the imp proclaim that [[ThisIsGoingToBeHuge dodos are going to be the future of transportation]], while everyone else tells him that there's no future in them.
* In the Distant Marsh stage from ''[[VideoGame/SoulSeries Soulcalibur IV]]'', you can spot dodos roaming around.
* A bar owner in ''VideoGame/AviaryAttorney'' is a dodo, but she's no more or less intelligent than any of the other civilians. When the protagonists are looking for information from her patrons, she's usually able to direct them.
* ''VideoGame/ArkSurvivalEvolved'' has dodos among the many extinct animals wandering the game's IslandOfMystery. They're prey for all the game's carnivores, completely defenseless, and very, ''very'' slow. Their dossier page states that they're possibly the dumbest creature the author has ever seen and that the only reason they survive is by adapting to [[ExplosiveBreeder reproduce incredibly quickly]], hence why they are so common despite constantly being eaten by dinosaurs and humans.
** As of the 'Ark: Fear Evolved' Halloween event, the game has also implemented Zomdodos (undead Dodos) and the [=DodoRex=], which has the appearance of a large, feathered Tyrannosaurus with a head shaped like a Dodo's.
* The second ''VideoGame/ZooTycoon'' game has dodo birds as one of the adoptable species when the ''Extinct Animals'' expansion pack has been installed. They aren't dumb per se, but they are very cheap and easy to exhibit.
* The ''[[VideoGame/DontStarve Don't Starve: Shipwrecked]]'' DLC has the Doydoys, passive mobs which are clearly meant to be dodo birds.
* ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountryTropicalFreeze'' has Dodos as enemies in the Lost Mangroves.
* Subverted in ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}''; the multi-headed birds Doduo and Dodrio invoke this trope in name, but otherwise have little in common with dodo birds beyond being flightless. As of this writing, there still isn't a "proper" dodo Pokemon.
* The Kulu-ya-Ku of ''VideoGame/MonsterHunter'' is a Bird Wyvern that's like a [[CluckingFunny Yian Kut-Ku]] mixed with a dodo bird. The trope is subverted because, while it is [[TooDumbToLive rather ditzy]], it's both smart and dextrous enough to use tools (in this case, using its specially developed forelimbs to grip rocks to use as bludgeons, shields and throwing weapons) which is usually a sign of higher intelligence in animals.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Comics]]
* In ''Webcomic/LeagueOfSuperRedundantHeroes'', Franchise/{{Batman}} {{Expy}} Flying-Fox Man has had numerous ComicBook/{{Robin}} Expy sidekicks ... {{ahem}}... "crime-solving junior partners" who are named "Dodo". And tend to get themselves killed often.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'' "Steve and Snot's Test-Tubular Adventure": Stan brings home Daren, a dodo cloned by the UsefulNotes/{{CIA}} that has to be repeatedly saved from [[TooDumbToLive killing itself]]. The first time Stan introduces Daren, it coats itself in oil, breads itself, and sits in a pan on the stove after lighting the burner.
* ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' has Yoyo Dodo in one of their most famous cartoons, "WesternAnimation/PorkyInWackyland", who looked nothing like the real thing (being green with a little red/pink umbrella on his head), and is a RealityWarper of the highest order.
* Yoyo's son, Gogo Dodo, is a regular character in ''WesternAnimation/TinyToonAdventures'', to the point where he's in the theme song! Like his father, he looks nothing like the real thing.
* The ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'' intro theme talks about "finding a dodo bird" and has the accompanying animation of the two brothers finding one on top of a tall mountain. They eventually do spot one that Dr. Doofenshmirtz had hatched from an egg with one of his inventions in "Last Train to Bustville".
* In part 2 of the ''WesternAnimation/SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'' episode "The Main Man" guest-starring Lobo, one of the many animals the Preserver collected when they were on the brink of extinction was a dodo bird. The artificial yellow sunlight in the dodo's home recharged Clark's powers.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheMrMenShow'':
** Mr. Grumpy sometimes refers to other characters as "dodo birds." A few examples:
--->'''Mr. Grumpy:''' Don't encourage these dodo birds! Just get on with the game.\\
It's invasion of the dodo birds!
** In the U.S. version of the episode "Music," he asked this question, which is along the same line, about Miss Sunshine's piano playing:
--->'''Mr. Grumpy:''' Does she have to play like such a looney bird?
* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/ThePenguinsOfMadagascar'' has the penguins accidentally clone a dodo bird which turns out to be a FearlessFool and repeatedly gets himself killed, forcing the penguins to clone him over and over. Which is actually TruthInTelevision (and even mentioned on the show), as part of the reason dodos went extinct is that there were next to no predators on their island, and therefore they evolved no defenses and were oblivious to how dangerous humans were when they first showed up.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones'':
** In one episode, Fred buys a talking dodo bird named Doozy as a birthday present for Wilma. Like the ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' example above, Doozy looks nothing like a real dodo. [[NotInFrontOfTheParrot He is also more similar in behavior to a parrot]].
** The series frequently mentions dodo eggs, most notably in "The Twitch", where an allergic reaction to them leads to the titular AccidentalDanceCraze.
* ''WesternAnimation/OggyAndTheCockroaches'' has one in the episode "Oggy and the Dodo Bird" that follows Oggy home.
* In ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'', two dodo birds are seen chasing down a Crazy Frog knockoff in [[spoiler:the Void]].
* ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible'': In "The Twin Factor", Drakken uses a mind-control chip on Shego to replace her usual insolent attitude with placid obedience. At one point, he amuses himself by sending her to [[SnipeHunt look for a dodo bird]].
* A time-travel episode of ''WesternAnimation/WildKratts'' shows the Kratt brothers going back in time to early 17th century Mauritius to see dodo birds. In a case of ShownTheirWork, the dodos themselves are portrayed as intelligent, but clueless about the dangers brought to their island by humans due to being isolated from predators and therefore evolving no defenses.
* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'' that takes place at Niagara Falls, when Timmy is falling over the falls, [[TheDitz Cosmo]] turns him into a loon, as he believes it's Canada's national bird. [[note]]When this episode was made, Canada didn't have a national bird yet, though when a poll was made for one later, the common loon was among the top five options.[[/note]] He proceeds to turn himself and Wanda into dodos, as he believes it's Canada's national extinct flightless bird. Wanda immediately recognizes the danger of being turned into a flightless bird while falling down a waterfall and demands that Cosmo does something. He decides to give them both mustaches.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Real Life]]
* Dodo birds likely were not stupid at all; they were pigeons, and pigeons are highly intelligent, even by bird standards. They certainly couldn't fly, as mentioned, but that has no bearing on their brains. They became extinct because of CripplingOverspecialization, having been outcompeted by other species (in particular pigs), due to having no predators (or competition) before those species arrived.
** Interestingly, while the media portrays dodos as [[TheFool skittish fools]], in real life they were closer to being {{Fearless Fool}}s; dodos lived on an island with no predators, so they had no idea that humans and the invasive species they brought with them were dangerous.
** While many people believe that dodos were eaten into extinction by people, records made by sailors showed that the flesh of the dodo was very tough and filled with oil, making them inedible to humans. And while they didn't have predators, they still fought with each other over food and territory and mates and were fairly large and muscular birds, so they weren't helpless against animals that attacked the adults. Most of the destruction was done to the eggs and young, preventing dodos from replenishing their numbers until they died out.
* Some have argued that dodos got their name as an invocation of this trope, coming from a root word meaning "simpleton". It's now suggested that dodos, being pigeons, had a call that sounded like the soft "doo-doo, doo-doo" of a pigeon. So it's more likely that dodos were [[PokemonSpeak named after the sounds they made]].
[[/folder]]
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The dodo was a flightless bird that lived on Mauritius, an island east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean that wasn't discovered until 1507. It is placed in the same family of birds as pigeons and doves (Columbidae). If you look at a baby pigeon and depictions of the dodo side by side, you might discover some similarities. Due to their isolation, they were naive towards predators and were wiped out within a few decades of their discovery, so quick in fact they were believed to have been mythical for a time. However, their images were recorded in various books about animals and various tissue and bone fragments have been discovered on Mauritius in modern times. With their rather goofy-looking appearance, they eventually became a popular animal choice in media of various sorts.

* ''Literature/AlicesAdventuresInWonderland'' is widely cited as having launched dodos back into modern popular culture. Lewis Carroll, whose real name was Charles Dodgeson, had a stammer, and often inadvertently referred to himself as "Do-Do-Dodgeson". As such, and as a fan of the London Natural History Museum, which includes a dodo skeleton in its collection, he began referring to himself as "Dodo" and thus inserted a dodo into his book as an AuthorAvatar. While not as dumb as subsequent appearances, Carroll's Dodo does encourage Alice and other birds (all of whom are expies of friends of Alice's inspiration, Alice Liddell) to run a "caucus race" in which anyone can run in any direction and everybody wins. This was a deliberate TakeThat to the political caucus system, which Carroll saw as unclear and indecisive.

The dodo was a flightless bird that lived on the island of Mauritius, east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean that wasn't discovered until 1507. It is placed in the same family of birds as pigeons and doves (Columbidae). If you look at a baby pigeon and depictions of the dodo side by side, you might discover some similarities. Due to their isolation, they were naive towards predators and were wiped out within a few decades of their discovery, so quick in fact they were believed to have been mythical for a time. However, their images were recorded in various books about animals and various tissue and bone fragments have been discovered on Mauritius in modern times. With their rather goofy-looking appearance, they eventually became a popular animal choice in media of various sorts.

Many creatures have become extinct throughout Earth's history (It is estimated that 99% of all life that has ever existed on Earth is currently extinct). But while different kinds of StockDinosaurs are usually selected for prehistoric settings, there are a variety of other species of extinct animals that come to mind when thinking of pre-history. One of these creatures is the dodo bird, which is kind of the poster-child when someone thinks of an extinct species.

The dodo was a flightless bird that lived on the island of Mauritius, east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. It is placed in the same family of birds as pigeons and doves (Columbidae). If you look at a baby pigeon and depictions of the dodo side by side, you might discover some similarities. Due to their isolation, they were naive towards predators and were wiped out within a few decades of their discovery, so quick in fact they were believed to have been mythical for a time. However, their images were recorded in various books about animals and various tissue and bone fragments have been discovered on Mauritius in modern times. With their rather goofy-looking appearance, they eventually became a popular animal choice in media of various sorts.

* ''Literature/Alice'sAdventuresInWonderland'' is widely cited as having launched dodos back into modern popular culture. Lewis Carroll, whose real name was Charles Dodgeson, had a stammer, and often inadvertently referred to himself as "Do-Do-Dodgeson". As such, and as a fan of the London Natural History Museum, which includes a dodo skeleton in its collection, he began referring to himself as "Dodo" and thus inserted a dodo into his book as an AuthorAvatar. While not as dumb as subsequent appearances, Carroll's Dodo does encourage Alice and other birds (all of whom are expies of friends of Alice's inspiration, Alice Liddell) to run a "caucus race" in which anyone can run in any direction and everybody wins. This was a deliberate TakeThat to the political caucus system, which Carroll saw as unclear and indecisive.

A case of HistoricalDowngrade. Technically a Subtrope to DumbDinos as dodos, being birds, are dinosaurs. See DogsAreDumb and MooseAreIdiots for other animals portrayed with similarly low intelligence.

[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
* Manga/PandoraHearts has Dodo, a giant black dodo bird who is one of the guardians of the Doors of the Abyss.
[[/folder]]

* ComicBook/DouweDabbert encounters the last of the dodos in the arctic (ItMakesSenseInContext) and spends his next adventure in the Caribbean trying to find the dodo a mate. They eventually find a nest of eggs on a deserted island, so for all we know, dodos might actually still be around.

* In ''ComicBook/TheSandman'', Luz the dodo is one of the DreamPeople in Barbie's DreamLand battling the Cuckoo, who she's [[MistakenIdentity mistaken]] for by Barbie's neighbors. [[spoiler: She turns out to be TheMole, and the "Cuckoo" isn't even a bird here.]]

* In ''ComicStrip/SafeHavens'', Samantha successfully cloned two dodos, Paul and Mary, who turned out to be paragons of stupid, self-destructive behavior. Fortunately, their descendants seem to be more levelheaded, considering the grandchildren see Paul and Mary as 'failed prototypes' and successfully negotiated to keep them out of the dodo sanctuary, to the point of filing restraining orders. [[spoiler: After Mars is terraformed, Paul and Mary decide to make their home there, raising two more chicks (With a third on the way). [[GeniusLoci Mars]], for its part, regards them as pets]].

* ''WesternAnimation/IceAge'' has a group of dodos that are preparing for the [[TitleDrop Ice Age]]. However, at the point they're introduced they've only gathered three melons, one of which the main trio needs to feed the human baby. They end up wiping out their entire flock right then and there just trying to defend the melons, starting with the flock's last female killing herself and the rest falling to their deaths.

* ''WesternAnimation/ThePiratesInAnAdventureWithScientists'' has Polly, a Dodo bird that acts as the Pirate Captain's PirateParrot. She becomes quite important to the film's plot after a scientist recognizes her for what she is. Smarter than most examples, though.

* The Dodo in the original ''Literature/AlicesAdventuresInWonderland'' novel is an AuthorAvatar for Creator/LewisCarroll, alongside The White Knight in the second book. Is possibly the TropeCodifier as the inclusion of the Dodo in literature so soon after its extinction led to a renewed interest in the creature.
* ''The Ice-Cream Cone Coot and Other Rare Birds'' has a creature called a Dollarbill Dodo, which is made from a dollar.
* ''The Bad Child's Book of Beasts'' has a poem about the Dodo bird.
* In Creator/HowardWaldrop's short story "The Ugly Chickens" a researcher discovers that the dodo survived the extinction of the native population in the form of a flock owned by a farmer in the American backwoods.
* ''Dodos are Forever'' by Creator/DickKingSmith is about a family of dodos who are smart enough to see the writing on the wall and attempt to escape their impending extinction.

* In ''VideoGame/AnimalCrossingNewHorizons'', the airport is ironically run by two dodo brothers, [[MeaningfulName Orville and Wilbur]]. They both avert the "dumb" part though.

[[folder:Web Animation]]
* Marzipan of ''WebAnimation/HomestarRunner'' has a long-running interest in preserving endangered species. In the cartoon of the same name, Homestar sets out to catch her the unbelievably endangered dodo-like bird called the "Yello Dello."
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Original]]
* Dodar, the dodo in the title of ''WebOriginal/DodoReactions'', hugely averts this and is a rather intellectual {{Deadpan Snarker}}. Ironically he is the only dodo in the entire cast.
[[/folder]]

Please Note: The Dodo in question does not need to be stupid to qualify for this page. Even a reference to the dodo bird is enough.

The dodo was a flightless bird that lived on the island of Mauritius, east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. It is placed in the same family of birds as pigeons and doves (Columbidae). If you look at a baby pigeon and depictions of the dodo side by side, you might discover some similarities. Due to their isolation, they were naive towards predators and were wiped out within a few decades of their discovery. However, their images were recorded in various books about animals, and with their rather goofy-looking appearance, they eventually became a popular animal choice in media of various sorts.

* The Dodo in the original ''Literature/AlicesAdventuresInWonderland'' novel is an AuthorAvatar for Creator/LewisCarroll, alongside The White Knight in the second book.

* In ''ComicBook/TheSandman'', Luz the dodo is one of the DreamPeople in Barbie's DreamLand battling the Cuckoo, who she's [[MistakenIdentity mistaken]] for by Barbie's neighbors. [[spoiler: She's turns out to be TheMole, and the "Cuckoo" isn't even a bird here.]]
* ''The Dodo and the Frog'' was a 1940s and 1950s Creator/DCComics series that featured a dull witted dodo bird and a frog who continually tried and failed to take advantage of him. The duo originally ran as a feature in DC's [[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfComicBooks Golden Age]] FunnyAnimal humor title ''Funny Stuff,'' eventually taking over the title. Dunbar Dodo and Fenimore Frog eventually returned in the 1980s ''Comicbook/CaptainCarrotAndHisAmazingZooCrew''. Dunbar's employed as a cruise ship captain, while Fenimore (still nursing a grudge) occasionally becomes the monstrous giant Frogzilla.

* ''WesternAnimation/IceAge'' has a group of dodos that are preparing for the [[TitleDrop Ice Age]]. However, at the point they're introduced they've only gathered three melons, one of which the main trio need to feed the human baby. They end up wiping out their entire flock right then and there just trying to defend the melons, starting with the flock's last female killing herself and the rest falling to their deaths.

* The children's puzzle book ''Puzzle Journey Through Time'' ends with a dodo chick hatching from an egg that was left in the protagonists' magic box during their time traveling adventures. The two kids hope that the story's TimePolice don't come back to retrieve the chick.

* A dodo appears in ''The Peacock Party'', a sequel to ''The Butterfly Ball'', in the poem "The Dodo's Dream", which portrays it as not necessarily stupid, but definitely ''weird''. The illustration shows the dodo bursting through an elephant shaped teapot (legs through the bottom, head through the spout/trunk) while surrounded by surreal dream imagery.

* ''VideoGame/ArkSurvivalEvolved'' has dodos among the many extinct animals wandering the game's IslandOfMystery. They're prey for all the game's carnivores, completely defenseless, and very, ''very'' slow. Their dossier page states that they're possibly the dumbest creature the author has ever seen, and that the only reason they survive is by adapting to [[ExplosiveBreeder reproduce incredibly quickly]], hence why they are so common despite constantly being eaten by dinosaurs and humans.

** Mr. Grumpy from sometimes refers to other characters as "dodo birds." A few examples:

* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/ThePenguinsOfMadagascar'' has the penguins accidentally clone a dodo bird which turns out to be a FearlessFool and repeatedly gets himself killed, forcing the penguins to clone him over and over. Which is actually TruthInTelevision (and even mentioned on the show), as part of the reason dodos went extinct is because there were next to no predators on their island, and therefore they evolved no defenses and were oblivious to how dangerous humans were when they first showed up.

* Disney's ''Disney/AliceInWonderland'' has The Dodo, who is a CompositeCharacter of the original Dodo, and another character named Pat. Despite his British gentleman demeanor, he's not too bright, as his first suggestion as to how to get the "monster" (a giant-sized Alice) out of the White Rabbit's house is to attempt to set the place on fire and "smoke the monster out".

Many creatures have become extinct throughout Earth's history (It is estimated that 99% of all life that has ever existed on Earth is currently extinct). but while different kinds of StockDinosaurs are usually selected for prehistoric settings, there are a variety of other species of extinct animals that come to mind when thinking of pre-history. One of these creatures is the dodo bird, which is kind of the poster-child when someone thinks of an extinct species.

* A time-travel episode of ''WesternAnimation/WildKratts'' shows the Kratt brothers going back in time to early 17th century Mauritius to see dodo birds. In a case of ShowingTheirWork, the dodos themselves are portrayed as intelligent, but clueless about the dangers brought to their island by humans due to being isolated from predators and therefore evolving no defenses.

* ''WesternAnimation/IceAge'' has a group of dodos that are preparing for the [[TitleDrop Ice Age]]. However, at the point they're introduced they've only gathered three melons, one of which the main trio need to feed the human baby. They end up driving their entire species to extinction right then and there just trying to defend the melons, starting with the last female killing herself and the rest falling to their deaths.

* ''VideoGame/ArkSurvivalEvolved'' has dodos among the many extinct animals wandering the game's IslandOfMystery. They're prey for all the game's carnivores and very, ''very'' slow. Their dossier page states that they reproduce incredibly quickly, hence why they are so common despite constantly being eaten by dinosaurs and humans.

* The second ''VideoGame/ZooTycoon'' game has dodo birds as one of the adoptable species after the ''Extinct Animals'' expansion pack has been installed. They are cheap and easy to contain.