History SpringtimeForHitler / InUniverseExamples

* In ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManIntoTheSpiderVerse'', Miles purposely gets all the answers wrong on a quiz in an attempt to flunk out of Visions Academy, the private school he got enrolled in. His teacher, unimpressed, points out that getting a zero on a ''true or false quiz'' is astronomically unlikely, unless you actually ''know'' all the answers. She gives him a perfect grade.[[note]]Assuming it was a 100-question test as seen in the movie, the chances of Miles getting every question wrong by just blind-guessing each true-false question are 1 in 1,267,650,600,228,229,401,496,703,205,376. For comparison, you would have better odds of winning the real-life Powerball jackpot three times in a row than Miles had at getting every question wrong by guessing blind on his test. A FreezeFrameBonus shows that he even misspelled ''the date'' as "Decembuary 2", which likely just made the teacher suspect him even more.[[/note]]

!!!''Franchise/DanganRonpa'']]

* One [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPUgjy-Pn-4 sketch]] from WebVideo/ProZD depicts a supervillain's evil scheme to poison the water supply. Superhero Commander Fistfight informs him that the act of doing this helped the town in ''numerous'' ways, such as revealing that the funds for the supply's security system were being embezzled and the poison actually providing a decent dosage of Vitamin C despite its tendency to cause mild diarrhea. The supervillain promptly shoots Fistfight in anger... which fixes a kink in his shoulder.

* In the ''Radio/AbsolutePowerBBC'' episode "Healthy Eating", Martin's friend Roger is a tax lawyer who opens a restaurant in Devon to lose money. However, he's relying on the out-of-the-way location to achieve this, since he's too proud of his cooking to actually offer bad food. Out of sheer mischief, Martin neglects to mention this to Charles, who surprisingly decides he wants to help (he thinks) a decent, honest man with a failing business. It's only after the wheeze is successful that he learns the truth.
-->'''Charles:''' Let me get this straight. I've been slaving my guts out to get customers into this restaurant, and I've been wasting my time? You swine!\\
'''Roger:''' You! You're responsible for these ghastly punters and peasants all over my tax dodge? ''You'' swine!\\
'''Both:''' ''Martin!!''
* In ''Radio/TheNavyLark'', Sub-Lieutenant [[TheDanza Leslie Phillips]] has a reputation of having done more damage to Royal Navy ships in one peacetime year (particularly HMS Troutbridge) than the Germans did during the entirety of World War Two. So, naturally, when [[BadBoss Commander Povey]] needs a distraction to get away from his [[MyBelovedSmother domineering mother in law]], he strong-arms the Troutbridge crew into ASimplePlan: Let Phillips drive the ship and have him get intentionally into a minor nautical fender-bender, so that Povey would be compelled to go out and "investigate" (read: [[INeedAFreakingDrink have a few too many pints]]). The one time, the sole time, Povey wants Phillips to do his usual bang-up job of navigation, this trope ensues. Phillips pilots the ship flawlessly, including circling another destroyer ''42 times'' trying to ram it, failing even when the rest of the crew tries to sabotage the ship's steering to make a crash "inevitable". Then, Povey's mother-in-law gets laid up with the flu, and he is free to go. At this point, Phillips (still bringing the ship home) finally crashes full-speed into the dock.
* ''Radio/BleakExpectations:'' When BunglingInventor Harry Biscuit is turned into a (reluctant) evil zombie (ItMakesSenseInContext), he begins inventing devices for Mr. Benevolent, but his friends and family are reassured because Harry's previous inventions have all inevitably failed. Unfortunately, this time around, all of Harry's inventions work ''perfectly''.

* In ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind'''s ''Tribunal'' expansion, [[PhysicalGod Tribunal deity]] Almalexia, [[spoiler:who is also the BigBad of the expansion]], tries this by [[spoiler:sending [[PlayerCharacter the Nerevarine]] to Sotha Sil's Clockwork City to die as a martyr for her cause, which is to establish a monotheistic state where only she is worshiped and only she is the savior of the people]]. This fails, [[spoiler:she dies]], and this failure leads to the eventual fall of the Tribunal Temple entirely.

* In the ''WebAnimation/BarbieLifeInTheDreamhouse'' episode "Bad Hair Day", Barbie takes her bad hair day and tries to turn it into a full-blown fashion disaster, in hopes of giving her rival Raquelle a spot in the sun for once. Being [[ParodySue Barbie]], she instead ends up starting a fashion trend.
* In 2010, [[WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation Yahtzee]] suggested that Creator/SquareEnix were deliberately trying to tank their video game division and become a movie studio by releasing ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII'', which notoriously featured an [[NoSidepathsNoExplorationNoFreedom an extremely linear story]] and [[GameplayAutomation limited player interactivity]]. It also sold millions of copies, was beloved by fans and showered with critical acclaim.

* ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'':
** Ellen attempts to get Elliot in trouble. She is told to choose a topic to discuss for two minutes in Elliot's speech class. Her first choice? PMS. The teacher approves, and Ellen freezes up, not expecting that result. Not to mention she didn't know a single thing about PMS due to being an OppositeSexClone created by accident the night before.
** During a trading card game tournament, [[http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1876 Luke intended to lose his first match quickly]] so he could get on with his real objective but [[DoWellButNotPerfect still play well enough that it wouldn't be obvious that he was trying to lose]]. However his opponent insulted him upon seeing the first card Luke played which was very weak. This angered Luke into playing too well, to the point of winning in fact and since he was using [[CherryTapping weak cards that win took many time consuming turns]] completely screwing up his plans.
* ''Webcomic/DMOfTheRings'' features a ''D&D'' version of this: Aragorn is attempting to fall off the animal that he is riding. The GM rules that he needs to make a Riding roll to dismount. Aragorn rolls a critical failure, and assumes that this means he fell off. The GM decides that, since Aragorn was trying to fall, his failure means that he stays on the creature's back and rides it over a cliff (the in-game explanation is that his foot became entangled in the stirrups). This is discussed in the comments, where the author notes that if the player pisses off the DM enough (as Aragorn did, not long ago), anything they try to do tends to end up badly for them. This is also a BrickJoke, as earlier the DM had made a mental note to send Aragorn off a cliff.

* ''Webcomic/SomethingPositive'' has an arc where a man applies for a job at Aubrey's nerd phone sex line, expecting to be rejected out of hand and gaining material for a sex discrimination lawsuit. Aubrey promptly hires him to deal with Nerdrotica's growing gay male customer base. This outcome is a bit of a subversion, as the reason he was attempting this scam is that he had been unable to get a regular job, and this was all he could figure out to do. While it isn't exactly his dream job, it's a decently-paying job, and he sticks with it.
* In ''Webcomic/Life2012'', [[http://www.cha0sden.com/Life/?comic=428 to Lex's consternation,]] [[spoiler:when he sends 'Edward' to go ask Madison out, Madison doesn't say no]].
* ''Webcomic/KarinDou4koma'': Kinka challenges Tamaryu to a TabletopGame/YuGiOh card game with the intention of going easy on her, but she ends up crushing Tamaryu because her hands instinctively cheat. Ginka--who doesn't even know how to ''play'' and makes a deck out of whatever catches her eyes--takes over to cheer Tamaryu up, but ''also'' ends up crushing Tamaryu because her great luck keeps giving her good cards.
* In 2000, Llewellyn of ''Webcomic/OzyAndMillie'' ran for president on the People With Nothing Better To Do ticket on a lark. Since he doesn't actually want the job, he then runs the most idiotic campaign imaginable -- his running mate is a stack of pancakes, and his platform centered around banning bread and selling UsefulNotes/{{Arizona}} and New Mexico to UsefulNotes/{{Mexico}} and using the money to buy British Columbia from UsefulNotes/{{Canada}}. Thanks to confusing ballots, he ends up neck-and-neck with [[UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush Bush]] and [[UsefulNotes/AlGore Gore]], and is ultimately forced to withdraw from the election in order to get out of becoming president, causing the papers to announce "CANDIDATE DOES NOT ACT LIKE TWIT: We picked the wrong one, say voters."

''[cut to Sam holding onto the captain's chair while Qwerty and Dvorak try to pull him away and Helix pries at his fingers]''\\
'''Helix:''' ''[thinking]'' This battle would be much more intense if both side weren't trying to lose.\\

* The CrackFic ''[[https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/ciaphas-cain-warmaster-of-chaos-wh40k-parody-comedy-crack.1082970/ Ciaphas Cain, Warmaster of Chaos]]'' is all about this; after Cain accidentally becomes the leader of a Chaos-rebellion against the Imperium, he routinely tries to sabotage his new planet from within so that the inevitable Imperial retribution goes as smoothly as possible. Unfortunately for him, all his ideas of "sabotage" are ''[[FascistButInefficient Imperial]]'' ideas of what's foolish, things like giving workers time-off and safety standards, and allowing Tech-priests to actually invent new technologies; others, like trying to run his soldiers into the ground with ridiculously over-the-top training fails because they have Khorne's blessings, so the training only makes them stronger. Combined with the fact that he keeps the actual Chaos-worship on the planet restrained, Slawkenburg not only survives the Imperium (and the Orks and Drukhari) but thrives as a burgeoning utopia, while Cain is regarded as one of the greatest threats to the God-Emperor's realm. He's utterly miserable the whole way through, of course.
* ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/3150783/1/Error-In-Judgement Error In Judgement]]'': Bruce Wayne attempts to run for mayor of gotham city as part of his camoflage as an incompetent wealthy hedonist.
* In ''Fanfic/TheGuyWhoCriedGrendel'', the titular NonActionGuy made a desperate charge against an [[EldritchAbomination Charnel Daemon]], hoping to distract it and buy time for his teammates to escape while the daemon was busy brutally murdering him. And then he rolled a CriticalSuccess for his knife strike and decapitated the daemon in one hit.
* ''Fanfic/HarryPotterAndTheMethodsOfRationality'' reveals that Lord Voldemort [[spoiler:''is'' this trope. Tom Riddle created the "Lord Voldemort" persona as an absurd {{Card Carrying|Villain}} PoliticallyIncorrectVillain to work out the method for playing a villain and get the stupid mistakes out of the way for his next grand role to be defeated by his "David Monroe" persona and propel "Monroe" to hero status. Sadly the Ministry was so utterly incompetent that they couldn't actually defeat Voldemort, so he unleashed "Monroe" on him... which was hampered by the ministry doing a decent job of keeping ''Monroe'' from accomplishing anything to help them. He eventually gave up and just became an EvilOverlord because it was more fun]].

* ''Fanfic/OneStepBackwardsAndThreeForwards'': Felix makes skirting along the line of flagrant disobedience into an art form, defying and challenging his father at every turn while making his feelings about Gabriel's decisions [[BrutalHonesty very clear]]. To his horror, Gabriel actually seems ''impressed'' by his son's willfulness, showing more pride in him than he ''ever'' did in Adrien. Which is a problem, since Felix ''is'' Adrien -- or at least, [[DecompositeCharacter the part]] [[LiteralSplitPersonality of him]] [[RippleEffectProofMemory that remembers]] the original reality.

* One subplot in ''[[https://m.fanfiction.net/s/5665175/12/ Red Duty, Black Honor]]'' is that the Kuchiki elders require either Rukia or Byakuya to get married. Rukia suggests to them that she marry Ichigo, figuring all of them would hate him as a candidate and would fight amongst themselves, delaying their decision. Instead...
-->'''Rukia:''' I didn't think they'd ''agree'' to it!
* In the ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' fic ''[[https://www.fimfiction.net/story/141746/roll-for-initiative Roll for Initiative]]'', Rainbow Dash is playing a game of ''Franchise/DungeonsAndDragons'' with the rest of the Mane Six. Due to a combination of reckless playing and unlucky dice rolls, Rainbow's characters get killed in rapid succession. At the next session, Dash embraces her bad luck and creates a new character: [[TheScrappy Trixie]], who she wants to die -- at which point the RandomNumberGod suddenly swings in Trixie's favor. No matter how suicidally reckless Trixie acts, she somehow walks away unscathed from every fight. It culminates with Trixie single-handedly killing a Tarrusque, then eating its life force...
-->'''Twilight:''' Rainbow, I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is that Trixie is gone forever. You can never play as her again. [...] As for the bad news, you just turned her into a goddess.
* In [[http://www.sailorenergy.net/SMMiniMangas/SMMangaChibiChibiCookiesMercury.jpg this]] ''Anime/SailorMoon'' fanart, Sailor Mercury fills a cookie jar with spicy chili cookies in attempt to make Chibi-Chibi afraid of them (so she would stop stealing them). Chibi-Chibi ends up enjoying them more, intentionally inducing a FireBreathingDiner like a dragon.

* ''Fanfic/TheUltimateHope'' chronicles a version of ''Franchise/{{Danganronpa}}'' where the murder game results in the trapped students befriending each other and becoming better people... much to the frustration of Junko, who'd been ''trying'' to force them to kill each other.
* ''Fanfic/WhiteSheepRWBY'':
** Qrow, believing that Jaune is the half-brother of Qrow's niece Yang, decides to sabotage Jaune and Yang's burgeoning relationship, despite muttering that this will make him "the biggest asshole." He tells Jaune that Yang (a shameless {{Tomboy}} who spends most of her free time punching things) secretly loves formal courtship. So Jaune, rather than taking Yang to an arcade or something like Yang expected, instead calls his Uncle Watts, who gets them the most expensive reservation at the most expensive restaurant in the city. It's the kind of place people go on their fiftieth anniversaries. Yang ends up enjoying being treated like a princess for once, and while Watts went way too far, the mutual embarrassment also brings her and Jaune closer together.
** The match between Teams CMEN and WJRP has this on ''both sides''. CMEN don't want to win as that would require them to show their real skills. Meanwhile, Jaune of WJRP wants CMEN to win so that Cinder (its leader) will be chosen to become the Fall Maiden (though his teammates don't know about this and fight seriously). Complicating things further, Mercury of CMEN is briefly convinced to fight seriously thanks to his girlfriend's encouragement, thus showing off his real skills. In the end, the match ends with neither team's victory due to Cinder having to rescue a drowning Jaune.
** Weiss' father Jacques sends her to negotiate with Ironwood to end the trade embargo with Vale, expecting her to fail so he can disown her and make Whitley his heir. Instead, she actually succeeds by both understanding Ironwood's motivations (keeping the White Fang from stealing more Dust) and coming up with an acceptable workaround, rather than just complaining about the lost profits and demanding he drop the embargo like Jacques would.

* Pretty much the whole point of ''Fanfic/AYoungWomansPoliticalRecord''. Tanya von Degurechaff tends to fail upwards, fail at failing or her actions have unexpected consequences that work entirely to her benefit. So far:
** She joins a minor political party for a cushy job as a party functionary. She winds up as Chancellor.
** Tanya provokes the Francois Republic with an eye towards being removed from power in exchange for a comfortable exile. The other Great Powers backstab the Francois Republic and basically tore up most of the Treaty of Triano. Notably this was a major plank in Tanya's (thought to be impossible to achieve) party platform.
** Tanya seeks to get voted out of office peacefully before the problems of post-War Germania can rear their ugly head. She starts a government enterprise to splinter her own ruling coalition (which contain radical Free Market Capitalists). She puts a man to work designing a cheap car for the masses thinking it would be a marginal profit. Instead he creates the Volkswagen Beetle, one of the most successful cars of all time.
* ''Fanfic/RogerRoger'': [[MoleInCharge Palpatine]] engineered the Separatist attack on Kamino with the idea that it would do only minor damage to Kamino's cloning facilities, and would galvanize the Republic into putting more resources into the war effort. However, Ventress puts [[TheChessmaster 711]] in charge of the attack force, and the attack does major damage to the cloning facilities, with the Republic forces only barely averting their total destruction.
* In ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/30040239/chapters/73971933 Wings]]'', [[spoiler:Lucifer's plan hinges on making sure the AltarDiplomacy he set up between hell and heaven fails by deliberately chaining Octavia into it, hence making her likely to hate her future husband before the marriage even started, and forcing concesssions from heaven. However, he neglected to think of the possibility that Octavia and her husband could end up loving each other anyways]].

** When Shoto (who, due to [[ForWantOfANail not having Izuku as a friend]], still refuses to use his fire side) comes to the agency, Izuku decides to get into a fight with him. He gets so involved and passionate about it that he convinces Shoto to learn how to use his fire side.

* ''Literature/Dive2003'': Kaz, Star, Dante, and Adrianna apply for a summer internship of diving in the Caribbean and are baffled at being chosen out of thousands of applicants. Star is graceful in the water but has cerebral palsy that hampers her movements on land, and the other three have perhaps a dozen prior dives between them. It becomes clear that they have been selected by a trio of mysterious so-called scientists who don't want expert divers snooping around a shady treasure hunt that ultimately leads to at least one murder, although the four teens set out to make the treasure hunters sorry for their choice of patsies and find the treasure themselves.
* The Leonard Wibberley novel (later adapted into a Creator/PeterSellers movie) ''Literature/TheMouseThatRoared''. Set in the years immediately following UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, it's about a minuscule European nation, the Duchy of Grand Fenwick, that declares war on the US, planning to surrender and accept a bounty of post-war aid. Instead, the dozen-man invasion force accidentally ''wins'' the war by capturing a newly-made [[WeaponOfMassDestruction superweapon]] and its creator while strolling through a Manhattan evacuated for a nuclear drill.
** In one of the sequels, ''The Mouse on Wall Street'', Fenwick has become wealthy due to part of the settlement of the aforementioned war. However, the Duchess feels that this newfound wealth is corrupting Fenwick's idyllic lifestyle, so she sets out to lose it all on the stock market by picking stocks at random (by throwing darts at the financial section of the paper). However, when other Wall Street traders notice Fenwick is investing heavily in a particular stock, the traders conclude the Duchess must have inside information and immediately invest themselves, driving the price of that stock higher and earning Fenwick even more money. [[spoiler:In the end, she sells off all the stocks for cash, has the cash shipped back to Fenwick, and secretly burns it.]]
** Really, ''The Mouse fill-in-the-scenario'' book/film series ran on this trope. In ''The Mouse'' ''[[RecycledInSpace on the Moon]]'', the Prime Minister of Grand Fenwick, desperate for indoor plumbing, tries to milk aid out of the US after their main export of wine has turned explosive by asking for cash for a space program. The US, seeing a cheap way to look like they are helping to make space international without doing something as stupid as actually helping another nation get an advantage over them in the space race by funding someone competent gives them a million dollars. Keen to top this, the Soviets send them an old rocket, which the PM plans to turn into a boiler for the new hot water system. The scientist from ''Literature/TheMouseThatRoared'' discovers how to make an anti-gravity mix out of [[ItMakesSenseInContext the explosive wine]] and without telling the PM that he is what he's doing, takes off successfully with the PM's son as co-pilot and ''[[TakeAThirdOption beats the US and Soviets to the moon]]''!

* Joked about in an exchange from the ''Literature/NewJediOrder: Enemy Lines'' duology,. Wedge Antilles is commanding the defense of a strategically important planet. He knows they can't hold it forever, so the strategy is to string along the enemy commander as long as possible by waging battles over unimportant goals, and make the [[ScaryDogmaticAliens Vong]] commander's moves predictable. However, during one of those battles, reinforcements for Wedge arrive ahead of schedule, resulting in the near-total annihilation of the Vong fleet along with their commander. This results in the SortingAlgorithmOfEvil spitting out a far more competent leader to replace him, who will not be easy to predict, along with an even larger fleet.
-->'''Wedge:''' Tycho, we're about to achieve a tremendous victory we don't want.\\
'''Tycho:''' We'll put that in your biography. General Antilles was so good he couldn't fail when he tried to.
* The Creator/OHenry story ''The Cop and the Anthem'' focuses on a hobo who intentionally tries to get arrested so as to go to jail during the winter by committing various petty crimes, all of which he fails to get arrested for. In the end [[spoiler:when he contemplates cleaning up his life, a cop asks him what he's doing, and he responds "Nothing" which results in his being arrested for vagrancy and spending three months in jail]].
* In ''Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Parliament'', by Paul Gallico, the heroine of ''Mrs. 'Arris Goes To Paris'' decides to run for Parliament on the platform of "Live and let live". The (fictional) Center Party nominates her as part of a back-room deal, on the assumption that her candidacy is a joke and couldn't possibly succeed. Of course, she wins.
* The first book of the ''Literature/JesseStone'' series by Creator/RobertBParker has the aldermen of Paradise, Massachusetts, attempting the same gambit by hiring the self-destructively alcoholic Jesse Stone to be the new police chief, believing he will be easy to control. [[spoiler:Unfortunately for them, he sees the new job as his last chance before his life gets completely ruined (as well as being self-aware enough to be suspicious that they hired him after he was drunk for the interview), and takes the opportunity to bring down their entire right-wing militia and swing the rest of the police force to his side.]]
* The first Literature/JackReacher novel, ''Killing Floor'', features this trope. [[spoiler:The chief of detectives in Margrave, GA, Capt. Finlay, was going through a messy divorce when he interviewed for the job, and looked utterly incompetent. Since the Mayor and Police Chief are involved in the plot that's the centerpiece of the book, he's hired. Unfortunately for them, he's quite competent.]]
* In the Creator/GordonKorman book ''Radio Fifth Grade'', the school bully begins reading stories on the school's student-run radio show as part of an English project -- horrific stories about pet kittens violently fighting each other. The student running the show is too intimidated to say they're terrible. When he finally gets the courage to say so, the bully admits he was intentionally writing bad stories and ''wanted'' someone to say so, so he could stop writing them.
* The Creator/PGWodehouse story ''Peril at the Tee'' involves two crappy golfers playing a round with each other. As the consequences of winning would be to neither's liking, both of them attempt to throw the game. However, the methods they employ actually improve their technique. As an example, one of them is wearing a tight-fitting jacket, figuring it will restrict his swing into total ineffectiveness. Instead, it ends up correcting his chronic overswing.
* In another P.G. Wodehouse story an honourable young man comes to believe there is insanity in his family. He must therefore end his engagement (since he cannot condemn the woman he loves to marriage with someone who may go mad), but cannot say why in order to protect his family. He decides to behave outrageously so that his fiancee will break off the engagement herself or her family forbid it. Everything he does to this end causes him to be admired all the more for manly frankness. It being Wodehouse, the fact that this potentially tragic scenario [[spoiler:ends happily for everyone]] is possibly the most pointless concealment of a spoiler in the history of TV Tropes.
* Emil of Lonneberga frequently gets sent to the tool shed as punishment for pranks. His little sister Ida eventually gets jealous, and decides that she wants to go to the tool shed, too. However, most of her attempted pranks backfire into nice actions, and when she eventually manages to commit one, it (of course) gets blamed on her older brother.
* In Don [=DeLillo=]'s ''Literature/{{Libra}}'', the Kennedy assassination is portrayed as a plot set in motion by an ex-CIA agent who intended it to fail so that the United States would be steered into a war with Cuba. Due to postmodernist confusion, somewhere along the line the "failing" part fell out of the equation, but the facts are so fractured and disjointed that no one will ever know for certain how that happened.

* ''Literature/EndersGame'': Tired of being built into a hero and having the fate of all humanity on his shoulders, Ender opts to win the final test by crossing the MoralEventHorizon, believing his superiors will never let him take command on a real battlefield after he does. Turns out that not only was this ''exactly'' what his superiors were hoping he would do, but [[spoiler:the "test" was actually a real battle being fought by humanity without Ender's knowledge, and he just unknowingly won the war for the humans, committing genocide against the buggers in the process]].
* Percival Everett's novel ''Erasure'' has this after an avant-garde black novelist sells out. Infuriated by the roaring success of awful ghetto fiction that turns black people into caricatures, he writes ''My Pafology'', the true story of Van Go Jenkins, a youth in the ghetto. He intended it to be a blatant parody: the book itself is incredibly awful, reproduced in its entirety and written completely in Ebonics. And then it hits the bestseller list and people start wanting to meet the (completely fictional) author who wrote such a "raw and stunning work." Oops.

* Canadian political satire ''The Best Laid Plans'' by Terry Fallis follows Daniel Addison, a Liberal Party political strategist who wants to leave politics and start teaching at his alma mater. Daniel attempts to destroy his credibility by convincing Angus [=McLintock=], his new colleague/landlord, to run for Parliament for the Liberals even though he is considered unelectable (and doesn't actually ''want'' to be elected, and is only running in order to get out of teaching an English course to first-year engineering students, his most hated class) in the strong Conservative riding where they live. (Exacerbating the hopelessness of the Liberal cause is that the incumbent Conservative MP is also the nationally popular Minister of Finance.) Even though Angus refuses to participate in the campaign, or indeed to let Daniel do much, he [[spoiler:wins by a narrow margin after the incumbent gets caught doing something very stupid three days before the election, rendering ''him'' unelectable in the riding. Upon learning he was elected, Angus admits he never wanted or planned to become an MP. When he rolls with his election, he follows his head and rejects "politics as usual", and]] becomes popular with the voters.
** The sequel, ''The High Road'', averts this trope [[spoiler:by having Angus actively run for re-election, and win a close contest]].
* In ''Literature/{{Pyramids}}'', protagonist Pteppic is about to graduate from the Assassins' Guild school, but he realizes that he can't kill, so he attempts to fail his exam stylishly by aiming his crossbow at some completely random spot and firing. The shot richochets a couple times and hits the (dummy) target anyway, and the examiner passes him with a personal aside that he disapproves of these flashy modern methods.
* ''Literature/DirkGentlysHolisticDetectiveAgency'':
** Dirk plans to make a completely wrong prediction of the contents of a university exam as part of a scam. He intentionally cultivates a reputation as a psychic by [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial firmly denying]] that he is one, and dismissing rumors of the contrary as lies. Which rumors? The ones he started, of course. This is all so he'll get a chance to "prove" he's not psychic by predicting what will be on the exam, writing it up, having it sealed, and then revealing it after the exam has taken place. Then he fakes a family illness that requires raising a lot of money, and people start giving him "donations" for a peek at the predictions. In reality he just took a wild guess with the bare minimum of research, which he figures will be close enough to retain his mystique while avoiding any problems. Instead it turns out he was exactly right. To the very comma. He winds up going to jail.
** By the sequel, his attempts to be a PhonyPsychic becoming all too genuine are a RunningGag, as he tries to make vague pointless predictions and gets them all right. This ends with him standing on a rooftop, shaking his fist at the sky and yelling "Stop it!"
* In ''Literature/GoodOmens'', Newton Pulsifer's [[WalkingTechbane ineptitude with electronics]] is such that when he tried to put together a joke electronics kit that wasn't ''supposed'' to do anything, the result [[AchievementsInIgnorance started picking up Radio Moscow]].
* Double subverted in the ''Series/{{Psych}}'' novel ''A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Waste'' as a former high-school enemy of Shawn and Gus, now a millionaire, wants Shawn to use his "psychic" gifts to pick out good investments. Shawn does, but every investment goes bad and the guy reveals that he planned it this way in order to expose how Shawn is a fake psychic. This backfires on him, however, as his loyal assistant, who had believed Shawn's predictions, lost all his money investing in them and discovering that his boss did all this for a prank makes him murder the man.
* In ''Literature/{{Warbreaker}}'', Lightsong plays a game that he doesn't know the rules to, but manages to win every time. He considers trying to throw the game, but realizes that would be identical to what he was already doing.

* In ''The Report Card'' by Andrew Clements, the main character Nora is a genius, but deliberately gets Ds on her report card, partly because she doesn't want to stand out, but also partly because she feels that report cards are a poor way of measuring the talent of students and is trying to prove a point. This strategy works great for her, until a man named Dr. Trindler has her take an I.Q. test. She tries the same tactic, not realizing that on this test answering just enough questions to get what would be considered a D on a school test is enough to make her a certified genius. She then later has to admit that she only got most of ''those'' questions wrong by doing so deliberately, revealing that she's far more intelligent than even what the test revealed.
* ''Literature/SergeStorms''':
** In ''The Stingray Shuffle'', a bookstore is really a front for a cocaine distribution ring hiding drugs in copies of a single obscure book, only for their constant ordering of new copies to get the book reprinted and back in the public eye. The "bookstore" staff the have to deal with the author coming for a book-signing, accompanied by camera crews and legitimate readers who want to buy autographed copies of the books.
** In ''Shark Skin Suite'', two law firms involved in a lawsuit against crooked bankers are secretly both business partners with the bank, and the plaintiffs' firm tries to throw the case by doing things like leaking information, assigning inexperienced or eccentric lawyers to try the case, keeping good witnesses off the stand and having bad witnesses testify. To their exasperation, the trial still goes in the plaintiffs' favor because their lawyers are far better than anyone realized (and eventually have VigilanteMan Serge providing behind-the-scenes help) and the defense lawyers are complete morons who make one mistake after another.
* In ''[[Literature/MythAdventures MYTH Inc in Action]]'', Guido and Nunzio infiltrate the Possiltum army to try and slow its aggressive expansion down. They get assigned to run a supply depot, where they use teamsters to ship things (which turn out to be faster and cheaper than the army's internal logistics division), send summer gear in response to a unit that had requested winter gear (turns out, the order was six months old so they needed summer gear by that point), sent propaganda material to a unit that requested toilet paper (considerably improving the unit's morale), and refused to do any paperwork (considerably increasing the amount of actual work they accomplished).
* A variation in the Olivia Goldsmith novel ''The Bestseller''. Gerald Ochs Davis Jr. is the son of a powerful publisher who part-owns Davis & Dash Publishing. He has dreams of being a great writer but can't quite make it. So he regularly cooks the records to take the sales of other novels and attribute them to his own books so they appear to sell better. For his latest, he decides on ''A Week in Firenze'', reasoning that no one will miss any numbers from a novel about a bunch of old ladies vacationing in Italy written by a first-time author. Gerald is as shocked as everyone when ''Firenze'' is soon topping the bestsellers lists. It doesn't take long for the auditors to realize something is off about Davis & Dash claiming the biggest hit of the season isn't selling more than 30,000 copies and Gerald's scam is exposed with his own father firing him.
* ''Literature/TheLostMetal'': Due to investing in electrical companies right before Elendel's electrification, Wayne is now one of the richest men in the Basin. Believing that he is definitely ''not'' the kind of person to be trusted with money, he sets out to spend all his funds... only for everything he tries to end up making him even more money. For example, he tells his accountants to spend money on buying a lot of homes for poor people, and his affordable housing initiative ends up being a major moneymaker.

* In ''Literature/{{Tytania}}'', a weak planet sends a starfleet against the almighty Tytania empire just to not surrender without a fight and do it on more or less profitable terms. They assign the [[ObfuscatingStupidity worst officer]] they have as the admiral, but he somehow manages to win the battle. HilarityEnsues. Well, it doesn't turn out to be fun, eventually.
* A variation of this can be found in ''Literature/FullMetalPanic'', where Sōsuke ''purposefully'' is very curt and detached from people so they won't be friends. It always fails, and he constantly ends up with a [[MagneticHero bunch]] of unwanted TrueCompanions that all ''really'' like him.
* ''Manga/{{Doraemon}}'' has a humorous example of this. [[ButtMonkey Noby]]/[[TheChewToy Nobita]] uses one of Doraemon's gadgets and meets a goat-like alien. Because using this particular gadget literally forces extra-terrestrials to come, a good reason as well as a crazy amount of hospitality is needed. [[KillAllHumans We wouldn't want them getting any]] [[EarthShatteringKaboom ideas.]] Realizing that they need to make their guest as comfortable as possible, they serve him all of the good food they've got, only to discover that the only thing [[ImpossiblyDeliciousFood he absolutely LOVES to eat]] are Noby's failed tests. He soon returns with friends who demand another one, which he gladly says he'll bring....only he doesn't because by some unforeseen miracle [[GoneHorriblyWrong he]] [[GoneHorriblyRight passed.]]
* In ''Manga/FunTerritoryDefenseByTheOptimisticLord'', the first goal of Van Nei Fertio after getting a back-water village as a territory is to DoWellButNotPerfect because if he does poorly, he will die, but if he's too prosperous too quickly, he will gain the attention of all the local powers, including his father who exiled him, and all will see him as a threat. Not only does he have to deal with a bandit attack ''as he arrives'' but when he's beaten the bandits, those that ran off come back being chased by a legion of beasts known as "armored dragons" and defeating said beasts in self-defense immediately draws the attention of all the local powers. It's only because his country's own king gets to him first, thanks to his neighbor's own ArrangedMarriage ploy, that he's able to weather the storm.

* In one episode of ''Anime/PowerStone'', a number of characters have been sent to work as slave labour in the mines to pay off their gambling debts. Falcon and Gunrock come up with a plan to rescue them by losing everything and being sent as well. [[GilliganCut Cut]] to them holding massive piles of cash.

* In the ''VisualNovel/{{Ace Attorney Investigations|MilesEdgeworth}}'' manga, Randolph Miller's three hires to watch over the painting -- Monet Kreskin ([[{{Nepotism}} his niece, who knows nothing about art]]), Dick Gumshoe (the series's CluelessDetective), and Thomas Bester (a private detective possibly even worse than Gumshoe, [[SmallNameBigEgo but more conceited]]) -- seem to be poor choices, because none of them know much about art, but then it turns out that [[spoiler:Randolph sold the painting and wants to both stage its theft and kill Max Arden, the only other one who knows the truth]]. Then again, the failure of the plan is largely because Gumshoe's involvement brings in the much more competent Edgeworth, rather than any of the three being more competent than Randolph expected.
* In an episode of ''Anime/{{Hyouka}}'', Oreki attempts to convince Chitanda that he'd just gotten lucky with his theory-making (stating that theories can stick to anything) by playing a game with her. He follows an intercom announcement calling a student to the staff room for something happened at a shop the day prior to an explanation that's logical but likely too complicated to be correct. [[spoiler:His theory was that the student had purchased merchandise at the shop with a counterfeit 10,000 yen bill that had been given to him as payment (this had been a problem that was talked about on the news recently), and then felt guilty and wrote an apology letter (which is why the announcement was read using the date instead of "yesterday"), leading police to turn up at the school (thus the announcement only being read once, as the school officials were nervous, and him being called to the staffroom instead of the chairman's office.]]
* ''Literature/DateALive''[='=]s [[OriginalVideoAnimation 13th episode]] dedicates its first half to Shido attempting to botch his date with Origami in the worst way possible as a means to get her off his back. To wit: he asks her to dress up in a SchoolSwimsuit with [[AnimalEaredHeadband dog-eared headband]], "kneel like a bitch" and accept him leading her with a leash. ''She does exactly that.'' When he breaks down in tears and apologising, she responds with "Woof~". In other words, it fails epically because Origami is THAT much of a [[StalkerWithACrush devoted love interest]] with [[ShamelessFanserviceGirl a disregard for public opinion]] and [[TheComicallySerious a blunt attitude]], dumbfounding everyone in the process.
* An early episode of ''Anime/PokemonTheSeries'' has a trainer who needs a Paras to win battles in order to evolve into a Parasect in order to make an experimental medicine. Since it's for a good cause, Ash tries to deliberately let the Paras win. Unfortunately, his opponent is so pathetic that it loses even as Pikachu and Squirtle hold back, and his third choice, Charmeleon, makes his disobedience known.
* ''Billionaire Girl'': [[spoiler:In the last chapter, Yukari tries to lose her money by making investments with higher-than-usual risk. She actually makes a profit]].
* In ''Literature/TheSagaOfTanyaTheEvil'', Tanya writes the recruitment notice for her rapid-response flight mage wing with plenty of emphasis on both extreme danger and low pay of the job in the hopes of dissuading recruits, which will make the brass give up on the idea and give her a nice safe desk job away from the front lines instead. Unfortunately, the Empire's populace is firmly convinced that WarIsGlorious, and the notice comes off as DareToBeBadass instead. Afterwards, she puts the recruits through an absolutely horrific TrainingFromHell, hoping that they all wash out. Every recruit passes the training, and they are so capable that she and the newly formed wing are sent out constantly into the most dangerous situations since the brass are (rightly) convinced they are up to the challenge.
* ''Manga/CaseClosed'' has a case where Heiji and Kazuha are arguing over whether to see a baseball game (Heiji's preference) or a theatrical production (Kazuha's preference). They make a bet, with the person who successfully solves a particular murder case getting their way. Heiji takes the bet seriously at first, but after seeing Kazuha at the point of tears, changes to trying to give her hints instead. Unfortunately, he puts too much effort into it and solves the case himself.
* In one chapter of ''Manga/KaguyaSamaLoveIsWar'', Kashiwagi's boyfriend comes to Maki for advice on an anniversary present. Maki, hoping to make the two of them break up so she can have him for herself, suggests that he get her a tacky heart necklace. Kashiwagi ends up loving the gift so much that they end up getting to first base in the middle of the hallway.
* In ''Manga/DrStone'', [[CowardlyLion Ginro]] was against joining the voyage to discover the cause of the mass petrification due to how dangerous it is. However, he ''also'' wants to impress all the girls, so he decides to fake a change of heart by attempting to swim for the ship after it's already too far away to reach, and claim that he totally would've joined the voyage if they hadn't left without him. Unfortunately for him, the ship's crew notices him and sends out a boat to drag him aboard anyway.
* This is, as it turns out, the origin of Dragonslayer, Guts's signature {{BFS}} in ''Manga/{{Berserk}}''. It was created by the smith Godot, as a form of protest when his lord told him to make a sword capable of killing dragons. As he thought the challenge was stupid, because dragons don't exist (well, he thought so, anyway), he proceeded to design and forge an equally stupid weapon. The result was a sword so absurdly massive and heavy that most men couldn't even ''lift'' it unassisted, much less use it in a fight. However, as it turned out, when Dragonslayer was put in the hands of a man who ''was'' strong enough to use it in a fight, it is a terrifyingly effective weapon, able to shred plate armor and slice through giant monsters.
* A recurring gag in ''Isekai Tensei, Ore ga Otome ge de Kyuuseishu'': the male protagonist has been sent to the world of an otome game, that he hates. He hopes to finish the game without getting entangled in any romance with the male love interests; but to do so, he must keep his [[RelationshipValues affection levels]] below the threshold where the romance route will kick in. So he takes part in game events intended to win over the characters, and sabotages them... but being a comedy, he often ends up raising their affection unexpectedly.
* Similarly, in ''Literature/TrappedInADatingSimTheWorldOfOtomeGamesIsToughForMobs'', the protagonist Leon reincarnates as a nameless NPC in an Otome Game, and wants to live a normal life in peace and quiet. Unfortunately, his attempts to get demoted by doing bad behavior, and to shift fame and glory onto the game's five capture targets instead of himself, all end up backfiring, leading to him being promoted. The former, due to having one of the most powerful aristocrats in the Kingdom backing him, and the latter because of said capture targets' HonorBeforeReason stubbornness and the appreciation of their families [[BribeBackfire for the bribes Leon sends them]].

* Suicide TabletopGame/{{Chess}} is pretty much the same thing -- you must capture an opponent's piece if able and you win the game by losing all your pieces.

* A hilarious example occurs in the "Harley and Ivy" arc of ''[[ComicBook/TheBatmanAdventures Batman: Gotham Adventures]]''. [[AmbiguouslyGay Gal pals]] Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy hear about an upcoming stupid action movie themed around... well, them. Naturally pissed off, they head to Hollywood to stop it, but Ivy sees how much money the flick is budgeted for and decides to [[RunningTheAsylum take over]]. The two don't plan to release it -- Poison Ivy's just [[MoneyDearBoy in it for the money]] and Harley likes seeing the Batman actor blow up "over and over and over again" -- but after they're sent back to Arkham, the film's backers release it anyway. It quickly becomes a smash hit. (Harley even ''wins an Oscar'', attending the ceremony with a police escort.) Of course, the only reason the movie was released was because the company had no choice due to all the money Harley and Ivy sunk into it, and the reason it was a hit was because people thought it was supposed to be a parody of overblown action movies and considered it epic.
* This has happened in ''ComicBook/ArchieComics'' a few times:
** One ''ComicBook/JosieAndThePussycats'' story had their sponsor Mr. Cabot lamenting the Pussycats' success, having sponsored them because he thought they'd lose money and he'd get a big tax loss. He tries to sabotage both the Pussycats themselves and the seniors' club he owns by having the Pussycats play there, expecting them both to lose money and give him a big tax loss. Unfortunately, the Pussycats are a hit, and Mr. Cabot's club gets a six-month waiting list for people to join, earning Mr. Cabot another huge fortune.
** In another story, Jughead tried to prove that people would believe anything. To prove it, he makes up a pamphlet with bogus stock tips and puts it with Mr. Lodge's morning mail, expecting Mr. Lodge to follow the tips, lose a fortune and prove his point. The first tips earn Mr. Lodge $60,000 and get him out of another company right before it crashes, which Jughead dismisses as a fluke. Following through on the rest of the tips earns Mr. Lodge a grand total of over $2 million.
** In yet another story, Reggie lost a game of tennis to Archie and started complaining, and Veronica called him out as a sore loser. So, he decides to purposely lose a game against Archie, and act graciously. But he just ''can't seem to lose a game'' afterwards, no matter how badly he plays. Eventually, he breaks out in a fit over ''winning'' at another game of tennis.
* In the ''ComicBook/MortadeloYFilemon'' book ''El Tirano", the titular pair of agents are given the mission to eliminate a fascist dictator (a parody of Augusto Pinochet), but their constant failures actually stop murder attempts from other people (not to mention [[RightHandVersusLeftHand screwing with each other's attempts]]). When they are told they have to protect the man so that he is taken to Spain and judged for his crimes, they try, but their attempts at protecting him subsequently send him to the intensive care wing at the closest hospital.
* This is the RunningGag for the ''ComicBook/{{Asterix}}'' story, "Recap/AsterixAndTheLaurelWreath": to try and get into Caesar's palace to steal his laurel wreath (it's a long story), they get the bright idea of selling themselves as slaves from a vendor called the House of Typhus. Finding out they actually got bought by a common Roman patriarch and not Caesar, they try to get themselves thrown out; first by serving up a [[CordonBleughChef deliberately grotesque dinner]] (the family's son demands they be kept, because it works as a HideousHangoverCure), and then by waking them all up in the middle of the night by banging pots and pans and claiming it's a Gaulish tradition to throw celebrations like this (the inspired family promptly throws their own raucous all-night party, which keeps the Gauls up all night).
* In the Vertigo limited series ''Cruel and Unusual,'' disgraced TV producer Bobbie Flint has been [[ReassignedToAntarctica put in charge of the sleazy network owner's privatized jail,]] and is appalled by the inhumane conditions; prisoners are stored in silos, guards constantly beat prisoners and no one cares, and the owner won't spring for a new electric chair despite the old one setting ''two out of three prisoners on fire.'' She comes up with an idea; host the nation's first televised execution (of an obviously insane prisoner) to let the public see how bad it is and start the outrage machine. Unfortunately, it has the opposite effect... and Jail TV is born.
* One issue of ''ComicBook/MarvelAdventures Spider-Man'' sees Peter get roped into trying out for the baseball team, and he discovers that he's a natural outfielder, much to his shock. Turns out all the years of fighting bad guys as Spider-Man have honed his muscle memory to the point where he can't ''not'' move fast and catch projectiles.
* ''ComicBook/{{Nightwing}}'': When Nightwing is falsely implicated in the death of Blockbuster (who was really killed by Tarantula), the recently promoted Captain Rohrbach (his FriendOnTheForce) hides a witness statement and assigns the case to Detective Patitz, a ShrinkingViolet recent transfer from Robbery Division who has never investigated a homicide. However, Patitz is a skilled investigator who quickly builds a case against Nightwing after all.
* In ''ComicBook/RisingStars'', Randy Fisk, an ex-super hero, gives up his cape and runs for president. But fails several times in a row. In one season, he is losing so badly in the polls that he just gives up and decides to just spend the rest of his campaign wearing his costume and catching criminals. By coincidence, the two other candidates have sabotaged themselves and the voters get to choose between two criminals and one super hero. ...He wins.

'''Ratbert:''' ''[dancing around]'' How am I doing?\\

* One ''ComicStrip/Blondie1930'' comic strip featured a wealthy person coming to the company playing a game of golf with Dagwood and Mr. Dithers. Mr. Dithers tells Dagwood to do poorly in the game so the newcomer will look good. Dagwood accidentally plays a great game.
* An arc of ''Tank [=McNamara=]'' had sports fanatic Sweatsox coaching a Little League team, and learning that to advance to the playoffs, his team had to '''lose''' the current game. So, tied in the bottom of the ninth, he sent the most out-of-shape boy to bat. Sweatsox, with a smirk, thought, "I've forfeited." The boy, however, managed to get his first hit of the year, winning the game, and was carried off on the shoulders of his cheering team; Sweatsox was furious -- and his wife said sarcastically, "That's the ''trouble'' with kids these days. They got no sense of ''values''." (Sweatsox did at least have the grace to look ashamed of himself when she said that.)
* ''[[ComicBook/WhizzerAndChips The Bumpkin Billionaires]]'' was a long-running UK comic strip clearly inspired by ''Series/TheBeverlyHillbillies'', and entirely based around this trope. The title family won a huge sum of money, and quickly discovered that they hated being rich... and so each strip would detail a new scheme of theirs designed to lose as much money as possible, much to the despair of their bank manager. Of course, their schemes were destined to fail, often resulting in the family ending up even richer.

* The CrackFic [[https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/ciaphas-cain-warmaster-of-chaos-wh40k-parody-comedy-crack.1082970/ Ciaphas Cain, Warmaster of Chaos]] is all about this; after Cain accidentally becomes the leader of a Chaos-rebellion against the Imperium, he routinely tries to sabotage his new planet from within so that the inevitable Imperial retribution goes as smoothly as possible. Unfortunately for him, all his ideas of "sabotage" are ''[[FascistButInefficient Imperial]]'' ideas of what's foolish, things like giving workers time-off and safety standards, and allowing Tech-priests to actually invent new technologies; others, like trying to run his soldiers into the ground with ridiculously over-the-top training fails because they have Khorne's blessings, so the training only makes them stronger. Combined with the fact that he keeps the actual Chaos-worship on the planet restrained, Slawkenburg not only survives the Imperium (and the Orks and Drukhari) but thrives as a burgeoning utopia, while Cain is regarded as one of the greatest threats to the God-Emperor's realm. He's utterly miserable the whole way through, of course.
* In the second ''Manga/LoveHina'' arc of ''Fanfic/SleepingWithTheGirls'', the main character walks several of the local girls through how in worlds that run on the RuleOfFunny, such as theirs (a romantic comedy universe), plans will almost always fail because it's funnier that way, even if you are planning to fail. If you are planning to fail, you will almost inevitably succeed.
* In ''Fanfic/{{XSGCOM}}'', [[spoiler:while negotiating with the goa'uld System Lords, Weir wants to avoid going to war with Ba'al, so she tries to make a request that they will refuse by demanding that the goa'uld cede them every star system within two and hundred and fifty light-years of Earth. They go for it, and Earth inadvertently becomes an interstellar empire]].

* In ''Fanfic/NeitherABirdNorAPlaneItsDeku'', Izuku gets into a spat with Kendo Rappa over a Beebo plush and meekly tries to back out. Unfortunately, they're both egged on into playing the TestYourStrengthGame for the doll. Izuku tries his hardest to just lose and get it over with, [[DoesNotKnowHisOwnStrength but his lovetaps alone are stronger than Rappa's casual punches]]. After being pushed to go all-out, Izuku utterly wrecks the machine, prompting Rappa to challenge him to arm wrestle instead. At this point, Izuku is fed up with him and crushes Rappa [[OneSidedArmWrestling so badly]] that Rappa's arm flips around 180 degrees.
* In ''FanFic/TheGuyWhoCriedGrendel'', the titular NonActionGuy made a desperate charge against an [[EldritchAbomination Charnel Daemon]], hoping to distract it and buy time for his teammates to escape while the daemon was busy brutally murdering him. And then he rolled a CriticalSuccess for his knife strike and decapitated the daemon in one hit.
* Pretty much the whole point of ''FanFic/AYoungWomansPoliticalRecord''. Tanya von Degurechaff tends to fail upwards, fail at failing or her actions have unexpected consequences that work entirely to her benefit. So far:
** She joins a minor political party for a cushy job as a party functionary. She winds up as Chancellor.
** Tanya provokes the Francois Republic with an eye towards being removed from power in exchange for a comfortable exile. The other Great Powers backstab the Francois Republic and basically tore up most of the Treaty of Triano. Notably this was a major plank in Tanya's (thought to be impossible to achieve) party platform.
** Tanya seeks to get voted out of office peacefully before the problems of post-War Germania can rear their ugly head. She starts a government enterprise to splinter her own ruling coalition (which contain radical Free Market Capitalists). She puts a man to work designing a cheap car for the masses thinking it would be a marginal profit. Instead he creates the Volkswagen Beetle, one of the most successful cars of all time.
* In the upcoming ''Fanfic/ThePokemonSquad'' episode "Fifty Shames of Gray", RM and Brock write a TrollFic based on ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents''. However, the fic [[SleeperHit becomes so much of a smash success]] that it ends up getting a ''movie deal''!
* ''FanFic/TheUltimateHope'' chronicles a version of ''Franchise/{{Danganronpa}}'' where the murder game results in the trapped students befriending each other and becoming better people... much to the frustration of Junko, who'd been ''trying'' to force them to kill each other.

* ''Fanfic/OneStepBackwardsAndThreeForwards'': Felix makes skirting along the line of flagrant disobedience into an art form, defying and challenging his father at every turn while making his feelings about Gabriel's decisions [[BrutalHonesty very clear]]. To his horror, Gabriel actually seems ''impressed'' by his son's willfulness, showing more pride in him than he ''ever'' did in Adrien. Which is a problem, since Felix ''is'' Adrien -- or at least, [[DecompositeCharacter the part]] [[LiteralSplitPersonality of him]] [[RippleEffectProofMemory that remembers]] the original reality.
* ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/3150783/1/Error-In-Judgement Error In Judgement]]'': Bruce Wayne attempts to run for mayor of gotham city as part of his camoflage as an incompetent wealthy hedonist.

* In ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/30040239/chapters/73971933 Wings]]'', [[spoiler: Lucifer's plan hinges on making sure the AltarDiplomacy he set up between hell and heaven fails by deliberately chaining Octavia into it, hence making her likely to hate her future husband before the marriage even started, and forcing concesssions from heaven. However, he neglected to think of the possibility that Octavia and her husband could end up loving each other anyways]].

* ''Literature/TheBlackDahlia'': A zigzagged trope for the boxing match. Bleichert has a plan to take a dive in the boxing match against Blanchard in order to gain enough money that he can pay to put his dementia-suffering Nazi father into a home for two or three years. He realizes he can beat Blanchard and plans to win the fight clean before losing cleanly to a KO...in the exact round he was supposed to take a dive.

** Since Endeavour hates music playing during office hours, Izuku rigs his MP3 player to the agency's PA so it will start playing music the next morning. Endeavour dislikes it... but when he sees the mood and productivity have improved, he approves of it.

* The whole point (initially) of ''[[http://archiveofourown.org/works/39310749 Not That Kinda Fired]]'': fed up with working for [[{{Jerkass}} Endeavour]] as an analyst but unable to quit due the ironclad contract he signed, Izuku, seeing Endeavour's number two Burnin' firing an intern for flirting with her after she had already made clear she didn't like it, decides to get fired... But anything he does gets him more appreciated by Endeavour (that eventually considers him the one person he'd trust with supervising his wife Rei's mental health assessment alongside Burnin' and Shoto), start dating Burnin' (what she ''really'' hates is people getting handsy and flirting with her during work hours, and Izuku did neither, being too intimidated by Burnin' to try. That, and he read his cheesy pick-up lines from a card, which she found quite EndearinglyDorky), and improve his working condition when Burnin' is around as the triplets from accounting try and force him to fill their paperwork and has them do their own job. The fact that, aside for his "get me fired" stunts he does an ''amazing'' work (and during Rei's mental health assessment he [[spoiler:uncovered a villainous plot to create knock-off Nomou]] where Endeavour himself and Burnin' had failed to notice the hints) only increase Izuku's tenure and decrease his chances of getting fired.

** The Boss has tried to fire Wally on a few occasions, but the company is staffed by similar-looking bald people the Boss tend to mistake for Wally.
** This is [[ProfessionalSlacker Wally's]] problem -- he wants to leave the company, but by getting fired, because that way he can get a generous severance package. Thus, he acts as incompetently as possible. The problem is that the company is manned by the [[TropeNamers trope-naming]] PointyHairedBoss, so everything Wally does either gets the [=PHB's=] approval or is completely ignored. Oddly, this is based on someone ''Dilbert'' creator Scott Adams worked with, and he said, "This wouldn't have been much fun to watch, but he was one of the most brilliant people I've met, and completely committed to his goal." In the later Dilbert treasury ''What Would Wally Do?'', Adams briefly mentions in his intro that said colleague did ultimately succeed in losing his job.

* ''WesternAnimation/ABugsLife'': Letting Flik go to find help was only supposed to keep him out of the way...