Line #54 Main/RemovingTheEarpiece


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10	A SubTrope of CuttingTheElectronicLeash.
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12	Security agents, operatives and assorted henchmen come equipped with an earpiece so they can unobtrusively stay in touch with the rest of their team. When one of them, whether he's a hero or a villain, removes it, that means he's going to disobey an order, play solo or even go rogue. In which case his teammates will urgently ask him what's going on, and won't receive an answer.
13	In more light-hearted media, the character may remove the earpiece because the person on the other side is simply getting on their nerves, [[PoorCommunicationKills thus isolating them from the team]] in a self-inflicted version of CellphonesAreUseless. Cue viewers going DarthWiki/WhatAnIdiot as soon as the character's teammates try to reach them with vital information about the plot of the week.
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15	Alternatively, a character removing his earpiece signals that what is going to be said or done is intended to remain "off the record". Compare ObligatoryEarpieceTouch.
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18	!!Examples:
19	[[foldercontrol]]
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21	[[folder:Comic Books]]
22	* In the ''ComicBook/BirdsOfPrey'' story "Manhunt" by Creator/ChuckDixon, the Black Canary ditches the earrings that allow her to receive Oracle's transmissions. Fortunately for her, she keeps the transmitter, and the receivers end up with Huntress and Catwoman.
23	* ''ComicBook/GorskyAndButch'': In a spoof of ''Franchise/TheMatrix'', Butch removes the earpiece to break the HiveMind with the other agents and make them stop finishing his sentences for him.
24	[[/folder]]
25
26	[[folder:Film]]
27	* The Brazilian movie ''Bingo: O Rei das Manhãs'' has the main character, a [[Series/TheBozoShow Bozo the Clown]] stand-in, removing the earpiece connecting him to the show's direction (while snarking "there's a critter buzzing in my ear...") so that he won't hear complaints as he goes off-script.
28	* In ''Film/Hellboy2004'', Hellboy turns off his communicator while they're searching the subway to fight the monster Sammael undisturbed. Meanwhile, TheMenInBlack on his team are massacred by Sammael clones, and he can't be reached.
29	%%* Emil Blonsky in ''Film/TheIncredibleHulk2008''.%%Administrivia/ZeroContextExample
30	* In the 2016 film adaptation of ''Literature/Inferno2013'', Agent Bouchard drops his hand radio in a public trash bin after deciding to go after Langdon on his own. [[spoiler:Ostensibly, it's because he suspects someone on his team is leaking information, but he's later revealed to have his own mercenary interests in mind.]]
31	* ''Franchise/TheMatrix'': Agent Smith does this in [[Film/TheMatrix the first movie]] while interrogating Morpheus so he can reveal that, unlike other Agents, he actively hates humans and is desperate to escape the world he's trapped in. In ''Film/TheMatrixReloaded'', his rogue status is illustrated by no longer wearing the earpiece at all. He sends it to Neo to unnerve him before they meet in person.
32	-->'''Smith:''' I've changed. I'm "unplugged". A new man, so to speak -- like you, apparently free.\
33	'''Neo:''' Congratulations.\
34	'''Smith:''' Thank you.
35	* In ''Film/MissCongeniality'', undercover FBI agent Gracie does this before initiating an oh-so-politically-incorrect interrogation session: clubbing, with pizza and beer. Remarkably enough, this works.
36	%%* James Bond in ''Film/{{Skyfall}}'': "I'll keep you posted."%%Administrivia/ZeroContextExample
37	* A secret service agent in ''Film/VantagePoint'' does this when he goes rogue.
38	* Wolverine does this in ''Film/X2XMenUnited'' when the rest of the team are discussing their plan and he realizes if it goes the way they're hoping it will, he won't get a chance to confront the guy who holds the information about his past. When they next look up, he's gone.
39	[[/folder]]
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41	[[folder:Literature]]
42	* ''Literature/AbleTeam'': Happens with [[PoorCommunicationKills fatal results]] in "Army of Devils". Carl Lyon's ActionGirlfriend has a minor injury, so he orders his helicopter to take off without her as they're about to bust a convoy of drug smugglers. Flor turns up in a commandeered helicopter, curses Lyons over the radio, then cuts off transmission before he can warn her the smugglers are armed with an RPG-7 rocket. Her helicopter flies right into a rocket and is destroyed.
43	* In ''Literature/ArtemisFowl'', Holly Short shuts off the communicator in her helmet when she is about to disobey an order to stand down.
44	* ''Literature/CiaphasCain'': Ciaphas mentions that [[ChickenWalker Sentinel pilots]] are used to operate solo missions with little input from command and as a result are even more of a MilitaryMaverick than the rest of the troops. They often experience mysterious vox failures when hearing an order they don't like.
45	* ''Literature/DateALive'': Shido has to date Spirits and make them fall in love with them to stop them from hurting people and destroying the world. He is assisted in this task by a MissionControl council who say advice into his earpiece. During his first date with Tohka, their advice is contradictory and pretty much useless, so he turns his earpiece off and starts speaking from his heart, which yields better results.
46	* ''Literature/HiveMind2016'': Amber does this occasionally to take a conversation off-the-record, such as talking to the Hive Politics team about Blue Upway.
47	* On at least two occasions in ''Literature/IslandsInTheNet'', Laura Webster pulls off her [[GogglesDoSomethingUnusual videoglasses]] and sets them aside so she can talk privately.
48	* In ''Literature/{{Mockingjay}}'', Katniss does this when [[spoiler:the Capitol is attacking a hospital and she is ordered to leave the area]]. Afterward, Haymitch visits her and orders her to leave her earpiece in or he'll have her put in an unremovable "head shackle" communicator that only he can unlock, and if she gets out of ''that'', he'll have an audio-transmitting device surgically implanted in her ear.
49	* PlayedForLaughs in ''Redemption Games'' when Literature/JohnRain does this because he's exasperated by his talkative partner Dox, who's unable to stop himself providing a running commentary when he's supposed to be doing counter-surveillance. Dox has checked that no-one has followed them onto the airliner they're currently on, but the ProperlyParanoid Rain taking this extreme move shows he's clearly thinking YouTalkTooMuch.
50	* In ''Literature/SpeakerForTheDead'', Ender removes his two-way earpiece during a private conversation, and accidentally causes a temporary shutdown of the galactic communication network, since the person on the other end was an artificial intelligence who ran the internet and was just that shocked Ender would do that to her.
51	* ''Literature/VorkosiganSaga'': Bel Thorne does this in ''Mirror Dance'' when Admiral Naismith's clone -- er, ''brother'' -- shows up and ''almost'' passes himself off as the original with a new assignment.
52	[[/folder]]
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54	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
55	* ''Series/{{Arrow}}'': In "[[Recap/ArrowS1E18Salvation Salvation]]", [[VoiceWithAnInternetConnection Felicity Smoak]] is trying to track down the VillainOfTheWeek who is murdering people live on the internet. Oliver Queen rushes to the address she gives [[YourPrincessIsInAnotherCastle only to find no one there]]. He loses his temper and shouts "Find the right address now!", just as Felicity witnesses the victim being shot dead. Felicity's response is to [[HeroicBSOD tear out her earpiece and run away]]. Diggle then picks up the earpiece to let Oliver know what happened.
56	* In ''Series/TheATeam'''s Season 5 ''Film/JamesBond'' {{Homage}} episode "[[Recap/TheATeamS5E11TheSpyWhoMuggedMe The Spy Who Mugged Me]]", Murdock (posing as a 007-type spy) does this when he starts making out with the villain's girlfriend. In doing so, he leaves poor Face to spend the night out in the rain.
57	* In the ''Series/{{Bones}}'' episode "[[Recap/BonesS4E13FireInTheIce Fire in the Ice]]", when Booth is being interrogated on suspicion of murder, Agent Perotta removes her earpiece to indicate that she (not Dr. Sweets) is the one asking the questions from that point forward.
58	* In ''Series/TheCloser'', Brenda removes her earpiece when a DA tries to use it to tell her how to run her interview. When she is asked to wear one so Taylor can instruct her, she "forgets" to put it in altogether.
59	* ''Series/Halo2022''. In the pilot episode, Master Chief tells Kwan Ha that he doesn't remove his helmet because all of his diagnostic, command and control systems run through it. When he later does a DramaticUnmask, it doubles as this trope because we cut to his superiors demanding to know why he's broken contact. Things go from bad to worse as they then try to reassert control over him.
60	* This happens in the episode "[[Recap/NCISS02E01 See No Evil]]" of ''Series/{{NCIS}}''. "Bait" does the same thing, with a student removing Gibb's earpiece.
61	* In ''Series/TheNewsroom'', Sloan Sabbith does this when going off the rails while covering the Fukushima Meltdown in "Bullies". Don Keefer is distinctly unhappy, and her "going rogue" has consequences that resonate through the rest of the first season and into the second.
62	* ''Series/PersonOfInterest'':
63	** In several episodes, John Reese loses access to his earpiece -- generally because he's undercover with a gang and they all ditch their mobiles in preparation for some form of crime, which is certainly a wise precaution in the age of GPS tracking. However, Reese does play the trope straight in "[[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E21 Many Happy Returns]]" when Finch tries to stop him getting involved in a domestic violence case.
64	** PlayedForLaughs in the fourth season episode "[[Recap/PersonOfInterestS04E07 Honor Among Thieves]]" when Sameen Shaw flirts with the Number of the week -- a professional thief -- to get into his gang and, just possibly, [[AllGirlsWantBadBoys into his pants]]. Root listens in via earpiece and provides a running commentary (and her own [[LesYay flirtatious remarks]]) until Shaw shuts her off. Something similar happens when Finch starts PlayingCyrano with Reese in "[[Recap/PersonOfInterestS02E05 Bury the Lede]]".
65	* Every once in a while, someone on ''Franchise/StarTrek'' removes their [[CommLinks combadge]] to similar effect. Since it's also an emblem, it can be a sort of TurnInYourBadge. Plus, it's a TrackingDevice.
66	** Worf does this several times in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' and ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', removing his combadge to indicate that what he's doing is not Starfleet-sanctioned -- first when K'Ehleyr is killed, a second time when he leaves Starfleet to participate in the Klingon civil war, and in ''Deep Space Nine'' when he challenges Gowron's authority.
67	** Picard does this in ''Film/StarTrekInsurrection'' by removing the captain pips on his collar.
68	** In ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'''s "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS07E16InterArmaEnimSilentLeges Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges]]", Dr. Bashir and Admiral Ross have such an off-the-record discussion after removing their combadges.
69	** Done very seriously by Chakotay in the ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' relaunch novels -- he disappears into the wilderness without his commbadge. It's not just that he's cutting ties with Starfleet -- he's basically abandoning his ''life''.
70	* ''Series/{{Treadstone}}'': In the pilot episode, an ex-journalist is [[HiddenWire wired up]] by the CIA for her meeting with a North Korean general, but the general removes the wire and dunks it under a running washroom tap. The agent checks afterwards, but the reporter has put the wire back in place to make it look like a malfunction.
71	* In the opening credits of ''Series/TheWire'', you see someone putting on an earpiece and later taking it off.
72	[[/folder]]
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74	[[folder:Video Games]]
75	* 47 does this at the end of the prologue of ''VideoGame/HitmanAbsolution'' after killing his former contact and deciding not to turn over the girl she was trying to protect to the Agency.
76	* In ''VideoGame/HorizonZeroDawn'', after meeting Sylens Aloy removes her Focus whenever [[spoiler: she visits Rost's grave]], which is notable because there isn't any other time she's not okay with him prying into what she's doing.
77	* Jack does this in ''VideoGame/MadWorld'' when he tires of working for the Bureau, cutting off his [[VoiceWithAnInternetConnection link to Amala]]. [[spoiler:He later crushes it.]]
78	* ''VideoGame/{{Overwatch}}'': In Sombra's premiere animation, she [[https://youtu.be/Og5-Pm4HNlI?t=3m58s takes out]] her earpiece when face-to-face with the corporate executive her team supposedly came to assassinate, in order to hide from the others that she intends to blackmail instead of kill their target for her own purposes. When she's done "negotiating", she puts it back in and claims that the target escaped.
79	* [[spoiler:Sam Fisher]] cuts out his subdermal implant connecting him to Third Echelon at the end of the Xbox, [=PS2=] and Wii versions of ''VideoGame/SplinterCellDoubleAgent''.
80	[[/folder]]
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82	[[folder:Web Animation]]
83	* ''WebAnimation/RedVsBlue'': A flashback to Locus and Felix's bounty hunter days had them going after a corrupt nightclub owner in his own club. Locus comments that the music is too loud, meaning their comms will be useless, and Felix promptly drops his earpiece in the toilet. He pays for this during the shootout upstairs, when Locus tosses a gas grenade after giving him a warning over their comms, and gets gassed along with the mooks they're fighting. At the end of the episode, the two of them argue about this, with Felix pointing out that Locus did say their comms would be useless, and Locus saying Felix didn't have to remove his earpiece in the first place.
84	[[/folder]]
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86	[[folder:Western Animation]]
87	* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'':
88	** When trying to deal with [[GovernmentConspiracy Cadmus]], Superman is bound by regulations and rules he set up himself. After he learns from Huntress that the Question has been captured by Cadmus and is being interrogated (tortured), he decides to take her advice and do things "off the books." No visual cue is given at that point, but he later gives his earpiece to Huntress so she can call the League and get emergency evacuation and medical aid for the injured Question. (She no longer has an earpiece of her own, having been expelled from the League in an earlier episode.)
89	** When the sociopathic clone of Supergirl leads an attack on the Watchtower, Amanda Waller (who authorized the attack) realizes that the League was framed and tries to issue a recall order. Galatea is too eager for a chance to kill Supergirl and the League to bother with trivialities like a direct order to stand down, so she removes her earpiece, crushes it and smugly comments to Supergirl, "Wrong number."
90	* ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice2010'': Superboy does this when he feels like going for a ride with Sphere instead of listening to Batman's briefing.
91	[[/folder]]

Context Main / RemovingTheEarpiece