History Main / TheFamilyForTheWholeFamily

'''Keep in mind that this trope is ''not'' "Villains who are not very evil." This trope concerns villains who are ''willing'' to commit heinous crimes, but are simply incapable of doing so because of their incompetence.'''

* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheLittleMermaid1992'' did this, with Ariel and one of her sisters having to fend off a pair of bumbling saltwater crocodile thieves while they were "beached" (that is, grounded) at the palace.

* An episode of the ''WesternAnimation/TheLittleMermaid'' TV series did this, with Ariel and one of her sisters having to fend off a pair of bumbling saltwater crocodile thieves while they were "beached" (that is, grounded) at the palace.

** ''Home Alone 3'' asks for a lot more WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief, as its bumbling idiot villains aren't small-time cat burglars, but instead professional international espionage specialists.

What do you do when you need some big, tough guys to menace the heroes, but don't want to risk having them actually, you know, ''hurt'' anybody? You call in The Family for the Whole Family. They're not the scary, make-it-look-like-an-accident mobsters seen in [[TheMafia Mafia]] movies; they're the [[HarmlessVillain harmless]], [[IneffectualSympatheticVillain ineffectual,]] and very, ''very'' [[StupidCrooks stupid mobsters]] that are a staple of family-oriented comedies. No matter how many of them are in their group, you can be sure of two things: there will only be one shared gun among them (if they thought to pack any weapons at all), and they'll always forget that there's a trigger on it when they want to threaten someone.

-->-- '''Cicci''', ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' ("Badda-Bing, Badda-Bang")

* The Air Pirates in ''Anime/PorcoRosso'' aren't very skilled, either. Curtis was more dangerous than the whole bunch of them.
** The pirates seem less effectual than they actually are because we only ever see them fighting Porco, who is quite possibly the most skilled ace in the Mediterranean. At the beginning of the film, the Mama Aiuto Gang manages to heist a cargo ship and take a group of schoolgirls hostage. Given, the girls proceed to walk all over them, but that illustrates their latent honorable tendencies.

* Surprisingly, [[Anime/{{Pokemon}} Team Rocket]] is only on the border of this. Sure, the TerribleTrio are G-rated {{Harmless Villain}}s, but every once in a while you're reminded that they're the oddballs of a larger and much more dangerous syndicate. In fact, Jessie, James, and Meowth are very lucky to still have their job!
-->'''Max''': All those Team Rocket guys, and us only having three to deal with? We're lucky.

[[folder:Film]]

* The ''MagicKid'' movies, starring teen-aged fight choreographer T.J. Roberts.
* The Mob movie spoof: ''Creator/JaneAusten's Mafia!''
* The idiot burglars Harry and Marv from ''Film/HomeAlone'' are a classic example, though also somewhat of a {{deconstruction}}. Although they are incompetent enough to fall into Kevin's ill-conceived traps, the traps don't actually stop them, but instead just piss them off. Although they originally just wanted to loot the house of its valuables and weren't interested in hurting Kevin, their focus ends up shifting from robbing the house to getting revenge for all the pain that the kid has put them through. Eventually they ''do'' catch him, and he is only saved from their wrath by a neighbor coming up behind them and [[TapOnTheHead knocking them out with a shovel]].
* The idiot kidnappers from ''Film/BabysDayOut''.
* The mafia mooks in ''Film/ManOfTheHouse''.
* ''Film/ThreeNinjas''; a movie series where NINJAS are effortlessly defeated by children, who realistically, would get slaughtered like helpless puppies. Particularly pathetic in the case of Tum-Tum, the youngest of the group, who looks to be about only five years old. Sure the ninjas in the films weren't exactly of the finest order (wearing black outfits in broad daylight, among other things), but still the idea that a small child can beat up legions of grown men, trained to be dangerous combatants, gets a little ridiculous really quickly. He even rated second place on [[https://www.cracked.com/article_16433_6-supposed-action-heroes-you-could-probably-take-in-fight.html 6 Supposed Action Heroes You Could Probably Take In A Fight]].
--> ''You know what happens when a 5-year-old performs a flying kick against a grown man? The kid falls on his barely- out-of-diapers ass. Why does this happen? Physics. It's the law and everyone knows you can't fight the law, especially if you weigh 30 pounds and stand 3-feet-tall.''

* The Rat Pack, particularly in ''RobinAndTheSevenHoods'' and the original ''Ocean's Eleven''.

* ''Film/{{Bushwhacked}}''.
* ''ComicStrip/{{Dennis The Menace|US}}: TheMovie.''

* The sharks in ''WesternAnimation/SharkTale''.

* ''WesternAnimation/OneHundredAndOneDalmatians'' has Horace and Jasper, the pair of bumbling, oafish criminals hired by Cruella [=DeVille=] to help with her plans to make a Dalmatian-fur coat.
* The bank robbers in Film/BMXBandits.

* The well-documented [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Sesame_Street_Gangsters criminal underbelly]] of ''Series/SesameStreet''.
* The Tony Pajamas sketches from ''Series/TheAmandaShow'' {{parody}} movie gangsters.
** Instead of shooting Tommy Guns, the rival gang throws eggs and donuts through the window.
* ''Series/MontyPythonsFlyingCircus'' had Luigi Vercotta, and in one episode, the Piranha Brothers.

[[folder:Theater]]

[[folder:Webcomics]]

* Many episodes of ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones''.

* The Crooks in ''WesternAnimation/COPSAnimatedSeries'' are supposed to be a mafia organization, but since stealing is basically the only crime you're really even allowed to show on a kid's cartoon, they spend most of their time (unsuccessfully) robbing and burglarizing rather than racketeering and legbreaking.

* The Air Pirates in ''Anime/PorcoRosso'' aren't very skilled, either. Curtis was more dangerous then the whole bunch of them.

* The Oedo Family in ''Manga/{{Gokusen}}''. The town's people loves them, the grandfather utterly loves his granddaughter, and they are ready to help anyway they can. Did I mention they are one of the most powerful yakuzas in Japan?
* The Wong Family in ''Manga/RosarioPlusVampire'' employs numerous powerful and intimidating monsters, they were founded by one of the Three Dark Lords, and they're currently headed by the most powerful SwordAndSorcerer BattleCouple around. They throw a ridiculously lavish and flamboyant welcome party when the heir brings home friends, and Inner Moka notes them to be "a noisy bunch". Overall, they're more cheerful than you'd expect.
* ''LightNovel/BodaciousSpacePirates'': They rob tourist yachts and take on bounties for odd jobs. Really, the whole "space privateer" thing has already been bogged down by the local bureaucracy, making teenage girls the perfect star-system neighborhood tax collectors... And then they kidnap a multibillionaire heiress so she can dump her hipster fiancée and get married to her girlfriend. And take down a prototype battlespace fortress.

* The Wong Family in ''Manga/RosarioToVampire'' employs numerous powerful and intimidating monsters, they were founded by one of the Three Dark Lords, and they're currently headed by the most powerful SwordAndSorcerer BattleCouple around. They throw a ridiculously lavish and flamboyant welcome party when the heir brings home friends, and Inner Moka notes them to be "a noisy bunch". Overall, they're more cheerful than you'd expect.

* ''Film/ThreeNinjas''; a movie series where NINJAS are effortlessly defeated by children, who realistically, would get slaughtered like helpless puppies. Particularly pathetic in the case of Tum-Tum, the youngest of the group, who looks to be about only five years old. Sure the ninjas in the films weren't exactly of the finest order (wearing black outfits in broad daylight, among other things), but still the idea that a small child can beat up legions of grown men, trained to be dangerous combatants, gets a little ridiculous really quickly. He even rated second place on [[http://www.cracked.com/article_16433_6-supposed-action-heroes-you-could-probably-take-in-fight_p2.html 6 Supposed Action Heroes You Could Probably Take In A Fight]].

[[folder:Web Comics]]

See also TerribleTrio, NeighbourhoodFriendlyGangsters and ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything. Contrast QuirkyMinibossSquad, HarmlessVillain, BadButt. When the bad guys at least ''try'' to shoot people but fail miserably, that's ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy.

** The StarterVillain Mafia of Cooks do seem to rob people and drive non-Mafia restaurants out of business, but they also do things like punch barrels dressed as old ladies to scare people. And while they're happy to [[WouldHurtAChild wallop Hat Kid if she lets them]], Hat Kid and her trust umbrella are more than a match for any Mafia goons. They later show up in [[TheLostWoods Subcon Forest]], but as ''victims'' to the far more dangerous inhabitants of the Forest.

* An episode of the ''WesternAnimation/TheLittleMermaid'' TV series did this, with Ariel and one of her sisters having to find off a pair of bumbling saltwater crocodile thieves while they were "beached" (that is, grounded) at the palace.

[[folder:Films]]

[[folder: Web Comics]]

* The Crooks in ''WesternAnimation/{{COPS}}'' are supposed to be a mafia organization, but since stealing is basically the only crime you're really even allowed to show on a kid's cartoon, they spend most of their time (unsuccessfully) robbing and burglarizing rather than racketeering and legbreaking.

[[quoteright:350:[[Disney/OneHundredAndOneDalmatians https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/horace_and_jasper_6.png]]]]

* ''Disney/OneHundredAndOneDalmatians'' has Horace and Jasper, the pair of bumbling, oafish criminals hired by Cruella [=DeVille=] to help with her plans to make a Dalmatian-fur coat.

* An episode of the ''Disney/TheLittleMermaid'' TV series did this, with Ariel and one of her sisters having to find off a pair of bumbling saltwater crocodile thieves while they were "beached" (that is, grounded) at the palace.

* ''Anime/BodaciousSpacePirates'': They rob tourist yachts and take on bounties for odd jobs. Really, the whole "space privateer" thing has already been bogged down by the local bureaucracy, making teenage girls the perfect star-system neighborhood tax collectors... And then they kidnap a multibillionaire heiress so she can dump her hipster fiancée and get married to her girlfriend. And take down a prototype battlespace fortress.

What do you do when you need some big, tough guys to menace the heroes, but don't want to risk having them actually, you know, ''hurt'' anybody? You call in The Family for the Whole Family. They're not the scary, make-it-look-like-an-accident mobsters seen in [[TheMafia Mafia]] movies; they're the [[HarmlessVillain harmless]], [[IneffectualSympatheticVillain ineffectual,]] and very, ''very'' [[StupidCrooks stupid mobsters]] that are a staple of family-oriented comedies. No matter how many of them are in their group, you can be sure of two things: there will only be one shared gun among them all, and they'll always forget that there's a trigger on it when they want to threaten someone.

** The Nyakuza from the Nyakuza Metro DLC. Sure, their leader, the Empress, is definitely more intimidating than anyone in the Mafia of Cooks, but the rest of the organization are a bunch of adorable CatFolk who mostly banter about food trucks, the bizarre layout of the Metro system, and various other form of LampshadeHanging. [[spoiler:[[SubvertedTrope Then Hat Kid actually crosses the Empress]], [[NotSoHarmlessVillain and it turns out the Nyakuza is a competent and ruthless criminal organization when they put their minds to it]].]]

* The StarterVillain Mafia of Cooks from ''VideoGame/AHatInTime'' do seem to rob people and drive non-Mafia restaurants out of business, but they also do things like punch barrels dressed as old ladies to scare people. And while they're happy to [[WouldHurtAChild wallop Hat Kid if she lets them]], Hat Kid and her trust umbrella are more than a match for any Mafia goons. They later show up in [[TheLostWoods Subcon Forest]], but as ''victims'' to the far more dangerous inhabitants of the Forest.

* The original ''[[Series/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]]'' series featured a group of gangsters who [[CoolAndUnusualPunishment torture their victims]] by [[TickleTorture tickling them with a feather]].

* ''Webcomic/ThirtyTwoKickUp'' has the Tierney gang, who's lowest level goons are useless idiots.