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"You gotta be nuts, too. And you're gonna need a crew as nuts as you are! ...Who do you got in mind?"
Reuben

This is the story of a crew of expert thieves as they prepare and execute multiple very difficult heists across several movies without ever threatening anyone with a firearm. It's called Ocean's Eleven because the leader's name is Danny Ocean, and there are eleven of them (initially).

A remake of the 1960 film Ocean's 11 starring Frank Sinatra and his friends from the Rat Pack, it went on to spawn two sequels and a spinoff. Three of the first of the reboot films were directed by Steven Soderbergh. The all-women Japanese theatre company Takarazuka Revue made a stage adaptation (Star Troupe, 2011-2012 season) with women playing male roles.

The Ocean Trilogy has a large All-Star Cast that includes George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Elliott Gould, Carl Reiner, Bernie Mac, Don Cheadle, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Eddie Jemison, Shaobo Qin, Andy García, and Julia Roberts.

  • The first film, Ocean's Eleven (2001), involves Danny, an ex-con fresh out of prison, approaching his buddy Rusty about performing a monumental heist. The goal? Rob the central vault of three Las Vegas casinos at the same time, during a boxing match so that the grand total in the safe would be a little over $160 million. They gather the Eleven and come to learn that the man they are robbing, Terry Benedict, is a man whose principal crime seems to be that he's dating Danny's ex-wife Tess.
  • The second film, Ocean's Twelve (2004), deals with repercussions of their heist, as Benedict tracks down the Eleven and demands recompense in full, plus interest. Seeing as almost none of the eleven were frugal with their money, this means they have to find some other heist that will pay off an equal amount. Because they are too well known in the US, they travel to Europe and receive an offer from a legendary retired Con Man in which they steal a very famous MacGuffin. They are hounded on one side by a cocky French acrobat-thief (Vincent Cassel) who wants to best them, and a Fair Cop Interpol agent (Catherine Zeta-Jones) on the other.
  • The third, Ocean's Thirteen (2007), has a member of the eleven double-crossed by an unscrupulous land-owner, Willy Bank (Al Pacino), with whom he was collaborating on the opening of a new casino. Danny convenes his gang to ruin this casino's opening night. This time, Benedict joins forces with them, as he has his own scores to settle with Bank.
  • Ocean's 8 (2018), a spinoff (also acting as a Soft Reboot of sorts), follows Danny's ex-con sister, Debbie Ocean (Sandra Bullock), who after getting released from prison herself plans a similar $150 million heist to take revenge on Claude Becker (Richard Armitage), the art dealer who got Debbie jailed for a crime he instigated.

The films are an exercise in cool, with the focus on Gentleman Thief characters wearing fashionable suits in exotic locations exchanging witticisms over jazzy music. This goes along with the original, which was little more than an excuse to bask in the coolness of the Rat Pack.


These films provide examples of:

  • 30-Second Blackout: An electromagnetic pulse weapon used by robbers. According to dialogue, though, this is all it was supposed to do. (Note: A real EMP would have caused serious damage to any electrical systems in the blast radius.)
  • A-Team Montage: Once an Episode. Interestingly, we usually end up seeing that what they were building was merely a cover for the real con.
  • Actor Allusion: Quite a few:
  • Actually Pretty Funny:
    • In Twelve, Benedict allows Livingston to finish his stand-up set because he was enjoying his terrible jokes (you can even hear Benedict laughing in the background).
    • Also in Twelve, after Tess is released from jail, she's initially upset at Danny for dragging her into this mess, but his groveling wears her down into chuckles. She is insistent he refers to her as a "master thief", though.
  • Adam Westing:
    • Tess Ocean pretending to be Julia Roberts in Twelve.
    • The five young TV stars (Topher Grace, Barry Watson, Joshua Jackson, Shane West and Holly Marie Combs) playing poker with Rusty are portrayed as extremely dim-witted in which the simple rules of five-card draw elude them: Joshua keeps dealing the wrong direction, Holly bets by color, Shane winds up with "three pairs", and Topher triumphantly lays down a hand of "all reds" (all non-consecutive, non-paired, and off-suited). This exasperates Rusty to where when Danny shows up, they run a poker hustle on the kids to take a few thousand dollars off them for the trouble.
    • Topher Grace shows up again in Twelve as a raging burnout holed up in Rusty's hotel. A planned Thirteen cameo was scrapped, as he was tied up filming Spider-Man 3, that would have continued the Westing.
  • Affably Evil: Terry Benedict is unfailingly polite to everyone, though he's never actually friendly with anyone.
  • Alone-with-Prisoner Ploy:
    • Pre-arranged when the guy sent in to torture Danny Ocean was set up all along by Danny to show up and pretend to torture him so that he could escape.
    • Rusty's posing as a federal agent to rescue Basher from the cops would also qualify, partially subverted by being done in public (although he does send the arresting police officer off on a wild goose chase to talk to Basher alone and free him from handcuffs).
  • Already Done for You: In an early scene in Thirteen, Roman flies to Vegas to meet with Danny and Rusty on the Bank job. He assumes the crew needs his help to infiltrate the hotel and casino, but Danny lays out each area they've already successfully taken over, from gaming to staff, which is easy since Bank is a Bad Boss with plenty of staff members ready to help out. What they really need his help with is knocking out Bank's security hub to make all of their plans possible.
  • And Starring: Parodied with Julia Roberts' credits in Eleven ("And introducing Julia Roberts as Tess", when she was the highest-paid actress in history who had just won an Oscar) and Twelve ("And introducing Tess as Julia Roberts", referencing the scene where she pretends to be the actress).
  • Answer Cut:
    • At the beginning of the film, the parole board asks Danny "What would you do once released?" Cut to him gathering his lone belonging from the prison — his wedding band — and heading out to recruit the team.
    • Danny and Rusty decide to ask Reuben to finance their heist. As they leave to go see him, they posit aloud, "I wonder what Reuben will say?" Cut to Reuben shouting, "You're out of your goddamned minds!"
    • After the Bellagio heist is completed, Benedict and his crew realize that the duffel bags they thought had the vault money instead had hooker fliers, prompting the manager to ask, "I don't understand; what happened to all that money?". Cue the montage of all the remaining reveals on how the gang pulled it off.
  • Anti-Hero Team: The titular team. They're all criminals of an assorted bunch — thieves, hackers, con men, getaway drivers, etc. — but they're the audience's criminals because their targets are actual villains who have it coming to them.
  • Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: When a federal agent (really Linus's father) busts Linus on his con with Sponder, he informs her that Linus is a con man who targets older women like herself, was planning to swap Bank's diamonds with fakes, and to her abject horror, his large nose ("The Brody") is a fake.
  • Artistic License – Geography: During the Eleven planning scene, Danny introduces "the 3300 block, also known as the Bellagio, the Mirage, and the MGM Grand". In reality, they are very much not in the same vicinity; the MGM Grand sits on the corner of Tropicana and Las Vegas Blvd., a mile away from the Bellagio, and 1.5 miles from the Mirage, hardly feasible for all three casinos to share the same vault. The Planet Hollywood resort (which was the Aladdin resort at the time) actually resides in that fictional Grand location across the street from the Bellagio.
  • Ascended Extra: Denny Shields the whale (uber-producer Jerry Weintraub) has a tiny cameo in the first film, causes the second film by unwittingly bragging about the heist to two European master thieves, and makes amends in the last film when he convinces the other big spenders to leave Bank's casino. Also, the mansion seen in the last movie is one of Jerry's mansions.
  • As Himself:
    • Bruce Willis is the key to unraveling the Julia Roberts impersonation in the second film. (And, just to throw a wrench through the fourth wall, the credits end with, "And Starring: Tess Ocean as Julia Roberts.")
    • Oprah Winfrey herself congratulates Terry Benedict on television for his (involuntary) outburst of charity generosity in the third film.
  • The Atoner: Denny Shields in Thirteen. He assists Danny during the Bank Job to help make up for his role in unwittingly kicking off the events of Twelve and Toulour's grudge match.
  • Avengers Assemble: The film starts slow with Danny having to convince two of the eleven to come out of retirement — Saul for the money, and Reuben for revenge — but once he does, the rest happens very quickly and all with Danny or Rusty explaining in voiceover what each member's specialty is. They also go through a bunch of alternatives, before learning that they either retired or died while Danny was in prison.
  • Badass Boast: Given quite often, usually the robber to their victim, or attempted by the victim once they've realized they've been robbed:
    • Both are illustrated in the same, extended phone call between Rusty and Terry Benedict over the phone:
    Benedict: Who is this?
    Rusty: The man who's robbing you
    • Later:
      Benedict: Run and hide, asshole. Run and hide. If you should be picked up next week buying a hundred-thousand dollar sports car in Newport Beach, I am going to be supremely disappointed. Because I want my people to find you, and when they do, rest assured we are not going to hand you over to the police. So my advice to you again is this: run and hide. That is all that I ask.
    • Danny Ocean lays one onto Willy Bank when he threatens to send men after him, just to drive home the fact that Ocean and his crew are very much not afraid of Bank:
      Danny Ocean: First of all, I know the guys you'd hire to come after me, they like me better than you.
  • Badass Crew: Daniel Ocean's crew. The precision point schemes they pull off make them badass, but what makes them family is made clear when Reuben is hurt; they put on a heist not to make a fortune, but just to spite the guy who hurt him.
  • Badass Family: The Caldwells — Linus' mom and dad are legendary thieves themselves and save the day in Twelve and Thirteen, respectively by using their considerably strong connections thanks to their long term cover being FBI agents. Something Linus notes in Thirteen while arguing with his father about the strength of his current cover.
  • Bank Robbery: Basher is working a bank heist the night he gets nabbed by Rusty.
  • Batman Gambit: Despite Benedict believing himself to be the smartest man in a given room, Ocean's crew can constantly manipulate him and make their plans go off simply because Benedict is easily predictable.
    Benedict: How'd you know I'd go for [Bank's diamonds]?
    Danny: Because you're you and I'm me.
  • Bathroom Break-Out: Ocean's Twelve opens with Rusty doing this when he realises Isabel's current investigation has found evidence that will point directly to him. He tells her he's going to take a shower, and then jumps out the bathroom window.
  • Bavarian Fire Drill: Rusty frees Basher from police custody by pretending to be an ATF agent and ordering the cops around.
    Rusty: Go find Griggs, tell him I need to see him.
    Cop: Who?
    Rusty: JUST FIND HIM, WILL YA?!?
    • The Eleven caper contains a series of Bavarian fire drills: Culminating in a majority of the team members posing as the SWAT team sent to secure Benedict's vault, pretending to gun down Ocean's men, then waltzing out of the casino with the money in their equipment and ammo bags.
  • Becoming the Mask:
    • In Thirteen, Virgil is sent undercover to a dice-manufacturing factory in Mexico to rig the casino dice at the source. He ends up leading the workers in a strike for better conditions. Turk is sent after him (after all, their plan has a time limit), and ends up joining the protest.
    • Linus claims he's also this as "Lenny Pepperidge" in his successful seduction of Abigail Sponder.
  • Better Partner Assertion: Upon leaving prison after five years incarcerated, Danny returns to his ex-wife Tess and tries to convince her that he's a better fit for her than her new boyfriend, Terry Benedict. He's unsuccessful.
    Danny: Does he make you laugh?
  • Big Blackout: The main characters use an electromagnetic pulse to knock out power all over Las Vegas.
  • The Big Board: Danny Ocean has a hi-tech board which he uses to display various building schematics of the casino vault.
  • Big Eater: Rusty. With the exception of during the actual heist, he's typically eating something every time we see him - because you don't have time to eat properly when you're on the con. To the extent that it could be considered a Running Gag for the films.
  • Bilingual Bonus: Yen's dialogue for anyone who speaks Mandarin. For example, his interjection in Eleven when the crew sees Linus trapped in the lab after they steal the pinch is "He didn't listen to us, he's definitely in big trouble now", and when Linus in Thirteen asks Yen to vouch for Linus to seduce Abigail Sponder, his reply is "She sees you as a clown."
  • Bilingual Dialogue: In every film, Yen speaks only Chinese (except for one line), but no one seems to have any trouble understanding him, and they answer him in English, which he seems to understand.
  • Black-Tie Infiltration: Danny Ocean makes an appearance at a professional boxing match held in one of Benedict's casinos, before excusing himself to join the rest of the crew in the heist.
  • Bluff the Imposter: Subverted. Terry Benedict tries this on Linus, who's disguised as a member of the Nevada Gaming Commission. It doesn't work, since Linus also has Livingston feeding him info.
    Benedict: You new at the commission?
    Linus: Been there about two years.
    Benedict: I know Hal Lindley over there; you work with him at all?
    Linus: (Beat) Not since he died last year.
  • Blunt "Yes":
    Saul: I have a question. Say we get into the cage, and through the security doors there and down the elevator we can't move, and past the guards with the guns, and into the vault we can't open. [...] We're just supposed to walk out of there with a hundred and fifty million dollars in cash on us, without getting stopped?
    Danny: (Beat) Yeah.
    Saul: Oh. (beat) Well, all right then. (pops antacid)
  • Book Ends: The first movie starts and ends the same way, a tuxedo-clad Ocean leaving prison.
    • Clair de Lune plays twice in the first movie: At the pool party just before everyone goes inside to hear Danny's plan, and just before the end when they pull off the heist and have a quiet moment at the Fountains of Bellagio.
    • The final shot of the crew in the first and third movie is of them watching the Fountains of Bellagio before one by one walking away.
  • Brick Joke:
    • The Oprah Winfrey Show in Thirteen.
    • While discussing the plans to torment the hotel reviewer, Saul is asked if he'd go through that suffering for ten million. He says no, but he'd do it for eleven million. Guess how much money the hotel reviewer wins at the very end of the movie.
    • At the end of Eleven, Rusty, in the middle of eating yet again, presses his hand to his chest in a bout of heartburn.
  • Briefcase Full of Money: Used as a way for the con men to empty the vault: loading half the cash into duffel bags and leaving half in the vault, both rigged with firebombs, to get Benedict to negotiate. the fake SWAT team enters with duffel bags full of red light district flyers and swaps them with the duffel bags full of cash in the vault their confederates packed. The fact that the bags would weigh about 300 pounds each when full of cash, and not much less when full of low-grade paper flyers is glossed over.
  • Broken Pedestal: Toulour in Twelve after learning that his mentor had been secretly assisting Danny and company during the contest rather than his own former student.
  • Butt-Monkey:
    • Linus. Even after pulling successful jobs with the team, he's still treated like the crew's little brother to his chagrin.
      Linus: Well, [Reuben]'s in critical condition, but he's still alive. You know, if he doesn't—
      Rusty: Is Stan there?
      Linus: Yeah, he's been there an hour.
      Danny: Stan'll tell us what's going on.
    • The poor hotel reviewer in Thirteen, played by David Paymer. The crew makes his stay a living hell in order to sink Bank's reputation; Rusty makes it worth his while in the end.
  • Call-Back:
    • When Yen is practicing in the fake vault, the gang bet on if he will "short" the jump or not. Frank later bets Livingston ten dollars he will short it when the real thing is unfolding.
    • In Thirteen, Clair de Lune playing as Rusty and Danny come to the same spot where the gang gathered at the end of Eleven.
    • In Twelve, Yen's girlfriend complains that he's the only rich Chinese guy who didn't have connections to make money in the cell phone market. In Thirteen, he's bowling with the owner of Samsung.
  • The Cameo:
    • Producer Jerry Weintraub as Denny the whale. First appears as a high-roller in Eleven, accidentally gets the guys in trouble with his bragging in Twelve and helps them out as an apology in Thirteen.
    • The young 20-something actors in Eleven: Barry Watson, Topher Grace, Holly Marie Combs, Shane West, and Joshua Jackson, all of whom are terrible at Poker. Grace appears again in Twelve.
    • Oprah Winfrey in Thirteen, who is the source of a pretty darn good Brick Joke at the expense of Benedict.
    • From Eleven, Lennox Lewis and Wladimir Klitschko playing themselves in the prize fight taking place during the Bellagio heist. They never faced each other in the ring during their actual careers; Lewis faced off against the other Klitschko brother, Vitali, in 2003, and won via stoppage.
  • Camera Spoofing: With an inverted twist. Benedict looks at what he thinks is his secure Bellagio vault, only for it to switch to a feed of the vault being robbed. Naturally, Benedict and the audience presume he was looking at a fake feed first and now he's being robbed in real-time, but it's actually the opposite: he was looking at a loop of his real, secure vault, before it switched to a video of the replica vault being "robbed". Meanwhile, Danny, Linus, and Yen patiently wait in the real vault for the rest of crew to walk in and steal the money, under the guise of being a SWAT team. For extra fun, the movie does not cheat this: attentive viewers can spot the thread that Benedict misses until it's too late; the casino insignia disappears off the mat when the feed switches from the real vault to the logo-free fake vault.
  • The Caper: Every movie features one or more of these. The central ones for each movie:
    • Eleven: Danny Ocean and his team plan to rob a shared three-casino vault that belongs to an old nemesis, Terry Benedict, who also happens to be romantically involved with Danny's ex-wife.
    • Twelve: When Benedict demands his stolen money to be paid (with interest) under threat of death, a fellow master thief named Toulour offers Danny a challenge to prove who is the greater thief: steal the Fabergé Imperial Coronation Egg before Toulour can. Should Danny's team prove successful, the wealthy Toulour will pay off their entire debt to Benedict.
    • Thirteen: After casino owner Willy Bank forces team member Reuben out of a deal and nearly kills him as a result, the crew plans to rob Bank in a roundabout way: find a way to make him lose $500 million so that it will trigger a clause for Bank's own board to kick him out. They must figure out a way to rig the casino floor on opening night and prevent the patrons from losing the money back to Bank without being detected by the casino's sophisticated gaming defenses.
  • Caper Crew: From Eleven, there is
    • Danny Ocean: The Mastermind / The Distraction
    • Rusty Ryan: The Partner in Crime / The Coordinator
    • Reuben Tishkoff: The Backer
    • Livingston Dell: The Hacker
    • Basher Tarr: The Gadget Guy, though his primary expertise is in explosives and demolition
    • Saul Bloom: The Con Man
    • The Amazing Yen: The Burglar, due to his acrobatic skill
    • Linus Caldwell: The Pickpocket / The New Kid
    • Virgil and Turk Malloy, "The Twins": The Driver / The Muscle
    • Frank Catton: The Inside Man
    • Played with in the sequels, as some roles get switched around and additional characters join the caper, expanding the roster.
  • Caper Rationalization: All three movies feature Caper Rationalizations that involve getting revenge against some really nasty individuals.
    • In Ocean's Eleven, only Reuben is in it for revenge, and Danny is there to win his wife back. The others are in it mostly for the money. Still, the guy they're robbing is pretty unlikable.
    • In Ocean's Twelve, they are in it to get money so they can pay off Benedict. Otherwise, he will have them killed. The secondary reason is to get back at The Night Fox.
    • Only in Ocean's Thirteen is their rationalization purely revenge. They do offer Willy Bank a chance to make amends and pay back what he stole from Reuben. He refuses.
  • Card Sharp: Linus facilitates this role. Also, Danny and Rusty clean out a poker school of celebrities in the first movie.
    Ocean: Cause yesterday I walked out of the joint after losing four years of my life and you're cold-decking "Teen Beat" cover-boys.
  • Casual Danger Dialogue: With over a hundred million dollars on the line, Frank bets Livingstong ten dollars Yen will short the vault jump.
  • Celebrity Paradox:
    • Tess, played by Julia Roberts, impersonates Julia Roberts—badly—to pull off the heist in Twelve. And complains that it's "too personal" to impersonate someone else who's out there somewhere. And then she has to interact with several other celebrities like Bruce Willis who know Julia Roberts. The fact that Danny Ocean, played by George Clooney, couldn't do the same implies that this is a case of One-Shot Revisionism.
    • Also in Twelve, Rusty directly references Miller's Crossing to explain a problem with one of the jobs they're doing. Albert Finney, who plays LeMarque in Twelve, was one of the stars of Miller's Crossing.
    • In Eleven, in one of the earliest scenes, Danny and Rusty walk out of the club where they've been teaching celebrities to play poker. It's very surreal to see Topher Grace and Joshua Jackson get mobbed by squealing fans, while George Clooney and Brad Pitt stroll by unnoticed.
    • In Thirteen, both Reuben and Willy Bank belong to a group of old school Vegas moneymen who have shaken Sinatra's hand. Does this mean Ocean's 11 exists in that universe?
  • Celebrity Resemblance: Tess, played by Julia Roberts, pretends to be Julia Roberts.
  • Character as Himself: Twelve had a slightly different version: Tess impersonates Julia Roberts as part of a caper. The end credits include the credit "Introducing Tess as Julia Roberts". Which was a Call-Back to the first movie's credit of: "Introducing Julia Roberts as Tess".
  • Character Tics: Rusty is seen eating something in almost every scene. Brad Pitt explains it as stemming from the fact that busy as Rusty is, he never has the chance to sit down for a proper meal.
  • Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys: When Reuben (who's Jewish) is describing why it's impossible to rob a casino.
    Reuben: They've got enough armed personnel to occupy Paris! ...okay, bad example.
  • Chekhov's Gag: Yen’s hand injury in Eleven. It later haunts him when his bandage gets stuck in the vault door during the robbery.
  • Chekhov's Gun: The black backpack the group is carrying in Twelve. Turns out that the Faberge Egg that was the objective of Toulour's challenge had been stolen by them in transit and been carried around for most of the movie, and the failed heist was just an act.
  • Chekhov's Gunman: Multiple examples:
    • On the second film, Isabel talks in her briefing early on about master thief Gaspar LeMarque, who has never been caught (but apparently retired) and taught Toulour how to steal. Gaspar is her father, is ashamed at the fact that Toulour caused so much grief to the Eleven for the sake of petty revenge, and accepts to help them if they can make Isabel meet him, which they do.
    • The elder Caldwells. On both Twelve and Thirteen early on there is a scene where Linus goes into a Beloved Smother angst-fest because Danny and Rusty talked to them and he didn't wanted them to know anything about how he was doing as a thief... and then it turns out that the FBI agents that were after the Eleven on both films were Linus' parents (mom on Twelve, dad on Thirteen) that used their roles within the government to help with the heist, mostly by falsely arresting members of the team and helping them get away, thus misdirecting the mark.
  • Chekhov's Skill: In Eleven, Virgil and his remote-controlled cars.
  • The Chew Toy: The hotel reviewer in Thirteen that gets put through hell secretly by the crew so he would give Bank's new hotel a bad review. They make it up to him afterwards.
  • Clock King: Terry Benedict is described as "a machine" in Eleven; on the casino floor at 7 p.m. every day, does business with his right-hand man and the high rollers, and is in his restaurant by 7:30.
  • Cluster F-Bomb: In Ocean's Twelve, Benedict tracks Basher to a studio, where he's recording a rap single. The song is packed full of bleeped out swears, which Basher thinks ruin the song. When Basher and the audio engineer start arguing about the censorship in the song, the swear words in their speech are covered up with the same sound effect.
    Engineer: "Well, if you want a *bleep* single on the *bleep* radio, you'll have to make some changes!"
    Basher: "Well that's *bleep* , isn't it? That's really *bleep* ."
    (Basher notices that Benedict has entered the studio)
    Basher: "Oh, *bleep* ."
  • Comforting the Widow: Played With:
    Danny: Phil Turrentine?
    Rusty: Dead.
    Danny: No shit, on the job?
    Rusty: Skin cancer.
    Danny: You send flowers?
    Rusty: Dated his wife for a while.
  • Competence Porn: The thrill in these movies is seeing how these Genre Savvy crooks manipulate and worm their way and use the Unspoken Plan Guarantee to their advantage to pull the rug under the feet of both their mark and the audience, generating suspense and thrill, as opposed to earlier heist films, in a perfectly executed heist.
  • Con Men Hate Guns: Linus chastises the Night Fox for being so crude as to use a gun in Thirteen. The Night Fox leaves it unloaded as a concession to the trope.
  • Conspicuous Consumption: In Thirteen, Willy Bank receives a gold plated and diamond encrusted cell phone as a gift. He's obviously been desiring one for a while. This is Flaw Exploitation by the protagonists, who secretly installed a small but powerful magnetron inside of it that they can activate simply by calling the phone, which shuts down the Grecko and allows the job to go on as planned.
  • Conspicuous in the Crowd: Danny Ocean attends a casino demolition headed by Terry Benedict, who owns the casinos Danny and his crew plan to rob. The entire crowd turns to watch the old building implode except for Danny, who keeps his eyes on Benedict (and on his ex-wife Tess at Benedict's side), and Linus, who's tailing Benedict.
  • Contortionist: Yen's specialty as "Greaseman" is to contort himself into small spaces so he can sneak into places like the Bellagio vault or the air ducts at Bank's hotel.
  • Cooperation Gambit: In the third film the group gets financial sponsorship from Terry Benedict in exchange for the profits. The main characters are happy with this deal, since it's not about the money this time.
  • Corrupted Contingency: The casino the team targets in Ocean's Thirteen uses an advanced anti-cheating computer. It analyzes everything in the casino down to player vitals to see if they were expecting a win. As a security feature, it reboots itself if it detects a threat to its operations. This takes only a few minutes, and the team plans to use that window to rig every game in the casino to ruin the owner, William Bank. They trap Bank in the security room by having him activate the failsafe with a magnetron they tricked him into carrying. The computer secures the doors and phones in the room so no one can leave or call to tell the dealers to stop taking bets until the system finishes rebooting. The team also tricked Bank into creating an earthquake evacuation plan which they use to get the players to leave with their winnings instead of losing it all once the system is back up.
  • Covert Distress Code: "There's water in the basement and the pilot light is out" is apparently Danny and Tess' code for "Terry Benedict has found us". Tess uses the phrase when Benedict shows up at their house in Twelve and Danny immediately tell her to hang up and drops what he's doing, making a run for the nearest train out of Dodge.
  • Confess to a Lesser Crime: Eleven ends with Danny turning himself in for parole violation so the rest of his team can make their escape after a successful heist of the casino.
  • Creature of Habit: Terry Benedict is described as "a machine" because his schedule is so very precise, which makes it easy for the group to be able to fit their plans to his routine.
  • Credit Card Destruction: Happens to Mr. Bloom at the beginning of the second film after Benedict tries to get his money back from the crew that robbed him.
  • Credits Gag: With the And Starring credit for Julia Roberts in her appearances. In Eleven, the cast roll call during the closing credits ends with "And Introducing Julia Roberts"; in Twelve, she's credited with "Tess as Julia Roberts".
  • The Crime Job: In-universe; the gang in Twelve is aghast that Terry Benedict refers to them as "Ocean's Eleven" and noted that since everyone had a part to play, no one person could claim credit and that their caper in Eleven would be internally known as "The Benedict Job".
  • Crossword Puzzle: Subverted. Frank Catton fills in a crossword with details of an overheard conversation while in an employee breakroom. But he's not distracted, he's taking notes covertly for later nefarious deeds.
  • Crushing Handshake: Frank Catton does this to a car salesman in order to get a discount.
  • Cryptic Conversation:
    • Humorously deconstructed in Danny and Rusty meet up with an informant, with Linus insisting on tagging along. Before the meeting, they tell Linus that the informant only discusses business in a certain code and they don't have time to teach him, so he'll just have to play along:
      Informant: So, business?
      Danny: Business.
      Rusty: A doctor, who specializes in skin diseases, will dream he has fallen asleep in front of the television. Later, he will wake up in front of the television, but not remember his dream.
      Informant: (speaking to Linus) Would you agree?
      Linus: (thouroughly confused)
      Danny: If all the animals along the equator were capable of flattery, then Thanksgiving and Halloween... would fall... on the same day.
      Rusty: Mm.
      Informant: Yeah.
      Informant: When I was four years old, I watched my mother kill a spider... with a tea cozy. Years later, I realized it was not a spider — it was my Uncle Harold.
      Linus: ...Oh, let the sun beat down upon my face, stars fill my dreams.
      Rusty: (facepalm)
      Linus: I am a traveler in both time and space, to be where I have been.
      (moments later, outside the restaurant)
      Rusty: Kashmir?
      Danny: Is that your idea of making a contribution?
      Rusty: We hadn't even started. We ain't even got to the terms yet.
      Danny: We came this close to losing that.
      Linus: Hey, I don't even understand what happened in there. What did I say?
      Danny: You called his niece a whore.
      Rusty: A very cheap one.
      Linus: What?
      Danny: She's seven.
    • It isn't until much later in the movie, after Linus is rescued from prison by his mother that he figures out that all the nonsense phrases he'd heard really were just nonsense; a Lost in Translation con that Danny and Rusty (along with the informant) played on him, partly as a practical joke, and partly because they didn't want him screwing up their negotiations.
  • Cultural Translation: At the end of Eleven, as Danny is leaving the jail, he tells Rusty, "Ted Nugent called. He wants his shirt back." In other versions, the reference is changed to Elton John.
  • Cunning Linguist: Linus mentions that Benedict is fluent in several languages, is approaching fluency in Japanese, and in the second film, speaks to Yen in Chinese.
  • Cunning People Play Poker: Danny and Rusty display their conning skills, and their ability to work together, when they trick a group of novice gamblers out of their cash over a game of poker.
  • Curse Cut Short: In Ocean's Twelve, Basher is complaining about the censorship of his music, and the bleeps over the soundtrack playing exactly match up with his swear words. He then interrupts himself to tell someone to turn off the censor machine.
  • Cutting the Knot:
    • When Virgil is racing his RC car against Turk's monster truck, it's a relatively tight race until Turk finds the obvious way to win: run over the RC.
    • The Bellagio vault is said to be ingenious in design, but the crew finds an appropriate way to deal with it: blow the locks off from the inside.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Basically just about everyone in these movies, but especially Danny, Rusty, and Reuben.
  • Death Trap Tango: When François "Night Fox" Toulour recounts stealing a Fabergé Egg, he's seen using a Capoeira-style dance routine to evade the museum's assorted security lasers.
  • Decoy Convoy: In order to win the challenge imposed onto them by Gentleman Thief Toulour "The Night Fox", Ocean's Eleven must steal the Faberge Imperial Coronation Egg from a museum where it is being exhibited. Once almost the whole group has been captured and things look bleak, it is explained that the Faberge Egg arrived to the museum on one of these (the "official" convoy being a number of armored trucks and police escort and the real convoy being a man carrying it on a backpack in a bullet train alongside a few plainclothes bodyguards)... and the Eleven had stolen it while it was en route, meaning they had already won the challenge shortly after Toulour had made it, and the whole film up to that specific point had been them going through the motions in order to distract him from this fact.
  • Demolitions Expert: Basher, master of power-cutting and safe-blowing explosions.
  • Description Cut:
    • When Danny and Rusty go to recruit Livingston:
      Danny: How are his nerves?
      Rusty: OK. Not so bad that you'll notice.
      [cut to Livingston being a neurotic, skittish control freak while working surveillance with the FBI]
    • Played with in Twelve. Linus is complaining about how his father likes to mock him about little things, and he can't quite find the words to express his annoyance, saying "it's a...it's a..." Cut to Tess giving Danny an actual "slap in the face."
  • Detective Mole: Both elder Caldwells are legendary thieves and con people who happen to have built a career as law enforcement agents as their cover. Considering that they use said covers' seniority to arrest members of the Eleven at some point of the latter two films and keep them away from other law enforcement officers (and thus help their main con), they could be considered Mole in Charge as well.
  • Did the Earth Move for You, Too?: Done when the manmade earthquake hits the Bank, causing a pheromone-drunk Abigail (who's fooling around with a disguised Linus) to ask what happened:
    Abigail: What was that?
    Linus: You felt it too?
  • Disproportionate Retribution:
    • Benedict is feared because of his tendency to completely destroy the lives of anybody who wrongs him, and everybody related to them as well. While doing recon on him, Linus informs Rusty that Benedict not only had the last guy who cheated in his casino put away for ten years, but he also had the bank seize the guy's house before bankrupting the tractor dealership of the guy's brother-in-law. As Reuben describes Benedict:
      Reuben: He'll kill you, and then he'll go to work on you.
    • Invoked in Thirteen when the group goes to Benedict for help in their revenge heist.
      Benedict: That monstrosity that Bank calls a hotel casts a shadow over my pool. Break him. Break him in half.
    • And once he starts insisting that he wants Bank's diamonds (which the Eleven tell him is just not possible):
      Danny: And what happens if we don't get them?
      Benedict: Do you have your affairs in order?
    • Toulour tosses Benedict at the gang in Twelve (which is a threat to the eleven and their entire families) just because his mentor Gaspar agreed with some random guy that the Bellagio heist was one of the greatest heists ever.
  • Divorce Is Temporary: Danny tries to patch things up with Tess, who divorced him out of shame after his conviction. He wins her back while committing even more crime.
    Tess: You are thief and a liar.
    Danny: I only lied about being a thief. I don't do that anymore.
    Tess: Steal?
    Danny: Lie.
  • The Dreaded: As mentioned above, Benedict is terrifying because of his penchant for Disproportionate Retribution. However, it goes beyond that; Linus mentions that he's as smart as he is ruthless. When faced with losing his money, he immediately arranges for a SWAT team while keeping Rusty on the phone for as long as possible, and has the authorities chase down the escape van. When he realizes that there's more to the heist than it appears, he goes straight for Danny and clearly doesn't believe his story. What he didn't realize was that they planned for him to act this way. Even though the movie ends on a positive note, it's revealed that Terry sent some of his enforcers to follow Danny, Tess, and Rusty. This pays off in the opening of Ocean's Twelve, when he personally tracks them all down (and bombs Rusty's car!) and demands his money back... with interest. When he becomes the crew's backer in Ocean's Thirteen, they're all wary of him and know he'd betray them and planned accordingly. The fact that he deals with all of this with almost complete Tranquil Fury makes it even more unnerving.
  • Dressing as the Enemy:
    • The surprise tactic by which the team escapes with the money in the first film? Coming in as the SWAT team summoned to apprehend them, faces concealed by their police helmets, then walking out with the loot in their equipment bags.
    • Revisited in the second film, when the crew is arrested and hauled off by "FBI agents" who are led by his con-artist mother.
    • Used again in the third film, when Linus get hauled off by an "FBI agent" who is his own con-artist father, who's evidently been maintained the ruse for some time.
  • EMP: Basher uses an EMP generator called a pinch to cause a power outage at the casino so Danny and Linus can get past the security lasers. He even describes the device as "a bomb...but without the bomb." Assuming that such a device could be built, the rapid restoration of power is a Artistic License – Physics/Artistic License – Engineering double-header. Not to mention the additional effects that would certainly kill people given the loss of power would also affect anything with an engine and anyone on any kind of life support (e.g. pacemakers).
  • Egocentric Team Naming: In Twelve, the main cast is upset that they are being called "Ocean's Eleven" because the name is centered on Danny Ocean. This example is unusual in that it wasn't Danny who came up with the name.
  • Embarrassing Tattoo: In Thirteen, Rusty mentions he got a tattoo for Isabel in a spot where his doctor recommended it was better to leave it be than trying to get rid of it.
  • The End... Or Is It?: The end of the first movie leaves it open as to whether the crew is really safe from Benedict's retaliation. Turns out, they're not. Of course, it also shows that Danny and Rusty were well aware that Benedict was watching them.
  • End of an Age: A recurring motif in Thirteen, as several characters at various points ruminate on how casinos and heists in Las Vegas have changed with the times.
  • Enemy Mine: In Thirteen Benedict joins the crew in taking down Bank because Bank is an annoying rival. It's also a subversion. While he does genuinely want Bank taken down, Benedict sees this team-up as a chance to simultaneously screw over Danny and company in retaliation for the previous two films.
  • Establishing Character Moment:
    • In his parole hearing, Danny converses with thinly veiled snarkery and even thinner veiled implications he's already itching for a job as soon as he gets out. Danny is nothing if not a thief who loves to steal and loves to snark (so much so that a technical advisor informed the filmmakers to tone it down in the opening scene, as some of his original dialogue would cross enough lines to get him denied for parole). The bitterness in his voice talking about Tess leaving him also betrays that he has very much not turned the page on that, and it's actually his revenge motive for robbing Terry Benedict.
    • In contrast to Danny's dapperness once released, Rusty is first shown outside nonchalantly eating nachos even while wearing a suit (while also revealing a tattoo on his hand and forearm). He may look the part, but he also has a more casual demeanor than Danny.
    • The first time we see Reuben, he brings up his past with Danny and Rusty and advises them against their heist. This establishes him as a Mentor Archetype who refuses to get his hands dirty.
    • Frank is seen dealing cards in Atlantic City under an assumed name, establishing him as The Mole.
    • Turk and Virgil are introduced bickering and trying to show each other up. They have no other gear of communication.
    • We first see Livingston as a Nervous Wreck Mission Control working with the feds, where he awkwardly trips over a dog leash.
    • Explosives expert Basher is fed up with an incompetent crew and is excited to work with "proper villains". He also lives up to the "expert" part by fusing something explosive from what Rusty hands him in two seconds, while handcuffed. Basher's memorable accent, or Don Cheadle's attempt at one, is also very much established.
    • There's acrobatic and then there's The Amazing Yen. When Danny first sees him with his troupe, he's not that impressed until Yen backflips from one pole to another, ensnaring it upside down. Danny is very impressed.
    • Saul is introduced when he notices Rusty tailing him, establishing him as an Older and Wiser con-man.
    • Linus first appears pickpocketing on a train, before being pickpocketed himself by Danny, establishing him as an ambitious crook who still has a lot to learn.
  • External Combustion: Rusty nearly meets this fate in Twelve.
    Rusty: (on the phone while making a beeline for his car) I'm surprised to get a call, thought I'd be dead before I heard the sound that killed me.
    Benedict: Well, I've been asked to show some restraint, otherwise you would've gone out one morning, gone out to your favorite car, of all the 17 that you own, and as soon as you turn on the ignition—
    (car explodes 10 feet from Rusty)
    Benedict: You got two weeks. (hangs up)
    Rusty: (long beat) ...Huh.
  • Everything Is Racist: Exploited in the first film when Linus, disguised as a Nevada Gaming Commission agent, "confronts" Frank about his true identity as an ex-convinct. A play-acting Frank claims that he's being singled out for being black before angrily lunging at Linus, giving Linus an excuse to bump against Terry Benedict and pickpocket codes they need to break into the vault. If you watch closely you'll see Linus furtively nod at Frank to confirm he got the codes.
  • Evil Is Petty:
    • In Twelve, Toulour sets up the entire gang to be targeted by Benedict (and knowing Benedict's reputation, this would also include their families) simply because his mentor didn't automatically tell some random person in a conversation he wasn't even involved with that he was the greatest thief in the world. Danny calls him out on it, but Toulour naturally doesn't care.
    • Tess points out to Benedict that he got his money back from the insurance company and he's demanding interest from Danny and his crew just because they got away with it. In Thirteen he agrees to bankroll the Eleven's heist before deciding to force them to steal Bank's diamonds both because Bank is a rival in the hotel industry and especially because Bank's new hotel is casting its shadow over the Bellagio's pool. Benedict's vindictive streak's also why the crew correctly anticipate that even with all debts settled after the previous film, Benedict simply won't be able to pass up the chance to try and screw them over again.
    • In Thirteen, Bank showcases how much of a dick he's in general by being rude to everybody, but at one point he threatens to fire his personal secretary (who is one of the few people on the face of the planet that doesn't hates his guts) if she can't get him a super-limited-edition, made-by-order (which takes months to get filled) cell phone by yesterday. And then he gets bored after reading a couple of sentences of the letter she put on the box of said phone when she does manage to get it (with a little help of the Eleven, unknown to her), which exalts him as the best boss ever and that she's thankful of working for him, and shreds it. That cell phone ends up being an important step in his eventual doom, though.
  • Evil Virtues: Benedict may be terrifying, but Linus also describes him as a machine. He's very well-organized, works hard all day at the office, speaks multiple languages - including Japanese lessons to better appeal to his new clientele - and is such a competent businessman that he runs the three most successful casinos in Las Vegas. He makes the effort to remember the names of his employees, most of whom seem loyal to him. He's patient, methodical, and cunning. It's just that the crew are able to predict what he'll do and plan around it. In contrast, Willy Bank in Ocean's Thirteen is a corrupt Smug Snake who doesn't respect anyone and is easily fooled despite having far more technological advantages than Benedict. Danny even mocks Bank's threats toward him, saying, "I know the guys you'd hire to come get me, they like me better than you." That line definitely wouldn't have worked on Benedict.
  • Exact Eavesdropping: One of the final parts of the Eleven heist is getting Tess to watch an audible surveillance feed of Benedict, escorting Danny out of the premises, willing to accept to a money-for-Tess trade.
    Tess: You of all people should know that in your hotel, there is always someone watching.
  • Exact Words:
    • In regards to the heist in Eleven: "We're just supposed to walk out of there with a hundred and fifty million dollars in cash on us, without getting stopped?"
    • Also at the end of Eleven when Tess asks how long Danny will be in prison after turning himself in for parole violation, he answers "three to six months, I guess." Shortly after, the film cuts "three to six months later" where he is being released.
    • In Thirteen, Roman is certain that the Greco security system is so sophisticated, it's all but impossible to shut it down "short of walking in there with a magnetron". So the crew eventually plants one on Bank via a phone so he literally walks in there with a magnetron.
    • In Thirteen, Danny finds a pit boss stealing from the hotel to snag for his con, and to keep their connection vague, only tells him that the opportunity for his part will show itself, and asks "'Nuff said?" When Frank shows up on the floor handling a dominoes game called "Nuff Said", the pit boss understands who he will be working in concert with.
  • Expy: Willy Bank for Donald Trump back in his The Apprentice days. Both are real estate moguls with massive Vegas hotels named after themselves and rivals borne of aggressive business dealings.
  • Failsafe Failure: Subverted in Thirteen, where the team finds out that the Greco security system automatically shuts down and reboots when it detects a threat to itself, and a side effect of the reboot is that it locks down the control room and cuts off communications for several minutes. They use this to lock Bank inside his own control room, leaving him unable to stop the team's plans.
  • Fallen-on-Hard-Times Job: Several members of all the teams are stuck here at the movies' beginnings. Saul is attempting to retire in Florida and Rusty is resorting to teaching young actors how to play poker; both are clearly bored out of their minds. The Malloys are in Utah and similarly "having trouble filling the hours." Frank is working under a false identity because he's been blacklisted by the Gaming Board. Livingston is moonlighting for the FBI. Basher may still be in the business but the crew he's running with is nowhere near as competent as he'd like. Even Reuben, the most well-off of all of them, is clearly depressed about having his casino bankrupted by Benedict.
  • Famed In-Story: A variation in Thirteen (which also overlaps with The Dreaded). Bank takes the meeting with Danny early on in the film because associates whose opinions he values warned him to treat Ocean seriously. Considering what Danny and company did to Benedict and Toulour in the preceding movies, their warnings are justified (not that Bank ultiamtely heeds said warnings).
  • Fandom Rivalry: In-universe: The distraction for swapping the MacGuffin out is a staged fight between two of the Twelve, one wearing a Boston Red Sox hat, one wearing a New York Yankees hat, one of Baseball's most fierce and bitter rivalries.
  • Fatal Flaw: Pride and ego for Toulour, Bank, and even Benedict. In Toulour's case, it's implied one of the reasons LeMarque covertly assists Danny during Twelve is to teach his former pupil a badly needed lesson about his out-of-control ego.
  • Faux Affably Evil: Willy Bank in Thirteen, especially when he's muscling Reuben out of his share of the casino.
    Reuben: [sarcastically] You gonna throw me off the roof now?
    Bank: I don't want to.
  • Finishing Each Other's Sentences: Danny and Rusty sometimes don't have to speak in complete sentences to have a conversation.
    • Taken to a somewhat hilarious extreme in Twelve, where they seem to have an entire conversation about what con to run in four words.
    Rusty: Yeah?
    Danny: But...
    Rusty: Right.
    Danny: What?
  • Fire Alarm Distraction: The crew runs a variation of this in Thirteen with a manual tremor that makes Bank's casino feel like it's experiencing an earthquake, causing an evacuation, as they need to prevent the patrons of losing their winnings back to Bank once the gang loses the ability to rig games undetected.
  • First-Name Basis: Due to their previous relationship, Isabel calls Rusty by his real name, Robert. Benedict also does the same in Twelve, but with more malicious intent.
  • Five-Second Foreshadowing: When Bank's new Samsung phone receives a call inside the Greco security room, Greco Montgomery is stunned and says no phone should be able to receive any signals due to the room's sophisticated safeguards. Five seconds later, the servers begin to fritz and shut down since the crew planted a magnetron inside said phone.
  • Fixing the Game:
    • Danny finds Rusty teaching poker to celebrities. As soon as Danny sits down, the two of them rook the kids for a couple grand. Just for fun.
    • The third film shows what happens when you try to cheat at one of Willy Bank's casinos. Although, Bank's not as imaginative in this regard as Terry Benedict.
  • Foreshadowing:
    • In Eleven, Saul's rant during the part where the initial plan is unveiled.
      Saul: I have a question. Let's say we get into the cages we don't have access to. And down the elevator we can't move. And past the guards with the guns. And into the vault we can't open—
      Rusty: All without being seen by the cameras.
      Danny: Right, I forgot to mention that.
      Saul: (Beat) Well, say we do all that. Are we supposed to just walk out of there with a hundred and fifty million dollars in cash on us—without being stopped?
      (everyone slowly turns to Danny)
      Danny: ...Yeah.
      Saul: ...oh. Well, all right then. (quietly pops an antacid)
    • Reuben's introductory scene in Eleven, which establishes that Benedict bought out his casino and forced him out of Vegas. While it is important for establishing Reuben's motive for joining the caper, it's also end up being very important for setting up the plot of Thirteen (as it's what leads to Reuben's ill-advised partnership with Willy Bank in the hopes he can re-establish himself in Vegas).
    • In Eleven when Danny is asked if he has to choose between Tess and the money, which will he pick, he retorts that if everything goes to plan, he won't be the one making that choice. Come the end it's Benedict who is made to choose.
    • During the prep in Eleven, Danny calls for building a copy of the vault. When asked if it's for rehearsal, he says "something like that". The vault is only seen being used once to rehearse Yen's jump, but that wouldn't have necessitated an exact copy of the vault to practice. Until the reveal that the footage Benedict was seeing is pre-recorded.
    • When Benedict tracks down the team in Twelve, he makes cryptic comments to Tess (other parties are looking for Ocean's 11) and Rusty (that Benedict wanted to kill them all, but was asked to show restraint). He also manages to find all of them suddenly and simultaneously after 3 years of fruitless searching. All these clues make Rusty conclude someone in the thieving community's working with Benedict and sold them out. But they don't know who might have, as all their associates follow the unspoken rules of conduct and are trustworthy. As it turns out, they were sold out by an associate (Denny Shields), albeit accidentally.
    • In Twelve, Isabel tells her boss that the Egg was once stolen by the most famous thief in history, but the reason no one knows this is because his wife made him give it back. So how does Isabel know this? Because she's his daughter.
    • About halfway through Twelve, Rusty visits Isabel in what seems like a half-assed attempt to get his phone back and persuade her to join the team. Some of Rusty's statements don't make any sense, to both Isabel and the audience. Once the true heist is revealed, you realize that Rusty was giving her clues that the eggs had already been switched, they'd already stolen the real one, and that the team planned to "fail" all along. He was being deliberately cryptic because he knew the Night Fox had them under surveillance.
    • In Thirteen, when talking about the absolute nightmare the crew plans to put the (completely unwitting and entirely innocent) Five Diamond Award reviewer through, Saul says it's so awful he wouldn't do it willingly for ten million dollars. They use one of their slot machine tricks to give him an eleven million dollar jackpot as compensation for his role in the heist.
      • Early in the film, Roman mentions that in order for Bank to take the bait at the gaming expo, they need to use someone "he really despises". When they need that and a benefactor, the gang turns to Terry Benedict.
      • Tolour showing up at the Bank and surveilling the crew partway through the film. How did the Night Fox know the crew was back in Vegas and what they were up to? On the first viewing, it is plausible that Tolour has kept tabs on Danny and company since Twelve. He did, after all, infiltrate the Bellagio at the end of the previous film and it's been established he has the resources to locate and surveil the crew. If he was keeping tabs, he would've had plenty of advance warning of the Bank Job (as it took Danny 6 months to prep it). However, that Toulor doesn't arrive in Vegas, let alone appear on-screen, until after Danny strikes the Enemy Mine with Benedict is a clue that the Big Bads of the first two films have joined forces.
  • Formula-Breaking Episode: Eleven and Thirteen follow the classic three-act structure of a heist movie (gather the team, prepare the plan, execute the plan). Twelve takes a more experimental approach, often pushing the heist to the backburner in favor of character interactions, flashbacks and non-linear storytelling, and copious Lampshade Hanging and meta gags, as well as more visual flair just to show off Soderbergh's ability to do so. The radical departure of Twelve makes it the only one of the Danny Ocean trilogy to received a mixed reception with critics and audience ratings on Rotten Tomatoes.
  • Freestate Amsterdam: Subverted in Twelve where the robber gang meets a local contact in an Amsterdam cafe and has a conversation so bizarre they seem to be on drugs. Turns out they're just messing with one character's head.
  • Freeze-Frame Bonus: If you look closely at the article Danny is reading before he meets up with Frank, it reveals that Terry plans to demolish the "Xanadu" - which we see happen - and replace it with the "Angkor Wat Casino and Resort."
  • Freudian Trio:
    • Heroes: Linus Caldwell (Id), Rusty Ryan (Ego), and Danny Ocean (Superego).
    • Villains: Id: Toloure or Billy Bank if he's feeling irritable; Ego: Bank (huge one); Superego: Terry Benedict (or, nominally, Gaspar LeMarque).
  • Friends All Along: Danny Ocean turns out to be old friends with the huge bruiser Benedict hires to beat him up.
  • Friendship Denial: The two Malloy twins have this exchange:
    Turk: Watch it, bud.
    Virgil: Who you calling "bud", pal?
    Turk: Who you calling "pal", friend?
    Virgil: Who you calling "friend", jackass?
    Turk: Don't call me a jackass!
    Virgil: I just did call you a jackass!
  • The Friend Nobody Likes: Businessman Denny Shields by the time of Thirteen. Danny and company haven't forgotten (or forgiven) his role in accidentally setting off the events of Twelve by pissing off Toulour. They're only working with him again because they needs his whale connections for the Bank Job (though to his credit, Shields is genuinely remorseful for nearly getting them all killed and is eager to make up for it).
  • Full-Name Ultimatum:
    • In Eleven, Danny asks Saul if he's sure that he's up to the demands of his role in the heist. Saul immediately shuts him down with one of these.
      Saul: If you ever ask me that again, Daniel, you will not wake up the following morning.
    • Terry provides a dark version of this in Twelve, when he personally calls and threatens Rusty, whose real name is Robert Charles Ryan.
  • Gambit Roulette: The plans of the main characters match this trope quite well, requiring everything to interlock absolutely perfectly. However, they have to adjust the plans several times due to unexpected variables.
    • In particular, the heist in Twelve relies on a Gambit Roulette within a Gambit Roulette, with a third Gambit Roulette thrown in for good measure. By the end of the film, the plan becomes so circuitous that it crosses some kind of gambit event horizon.
  • Gentleman Thief: Averted by the protagonists, subverted by the Night Fox, and played straight by Gaspar LeMarque.
  • Genre Blind: Reuben at the beginning of Thirteen when he partners with Bank. Despite Danny's concerns and the long list of other business partners Bank's screwed over, Reuben doesn't take those warnings seriously because of airtight business contracts and because he and Bank are old school Vegas businessmen. Realizing how badly he misjudged the situation and Bank — and just how out of touch his well-honed business instincts have become with modern Vegas — is just as much of a catalyst for his heart attack as Bank's betrayal.
  • Gilligan Cut: In Eleven.
    Rusty: I wonder what Reuben will say.
    [cut to:]
    Reuben: You're outta your God damn minds!
  • Give Me Back My Wallet: In Eleven, Danny watches Linus pick someone's pocket on a train. Later, Linus discovers that Danny has picked his pocket in turn and replaced the wallet with a note complimenting him and offering him a job. Later Linus does Danny one better by lifting a plane ticket that Danny had placed on a table, snatching it in the one second where Danny lifts his hand to call a waitress for the check (The motion can be barely seen on the bottom of the screen if you know to look for it)..
  • Glad I Thought of It: Used when Danny and Rusty are discussing whether Saul will join their team.
    Danny: You could ask him.
    Rusty: Hey, I could ask him.
  • Good-Times Montage: Done in Thirteen when the team is successfully rigging the games with Bank cut off for three minutes, with a musical interlude over everyone in the casino winning big.
  • Grand Staircase Entrance: Tess is introduced this way in the first film. Linus claims that watching her do this every day is the best part of being tasked with establishing Benedict's routine.
  • Hand Wave: In Thirteen, to explain the absence of Julia Roberts and Catherine Zeta-Jones, Danny repeats the phrase "It's not their fight!" numerous times within the first ten minutes of the film. However, this turns out to be just to cover up the fact that they're going through rough patches in their relationships with Danny and Rusty; Danny and Rusty were too embarrassed to tell anyone.
  • Handcuffed Briefcase: As part of the con in Eleven, the briefcase that holds the "jewels" is handcuffed to one of the titular eleven, until it is turned over to Benedict. When the briefcase is taken down to the casino vault, it is placed on top of the cart carrying The Amazing Yen. When Yen opens the cart, the briefcase almost falls to the floor — which would trigger the alarm — but he manages to grab the handcuffs.
  • Hey, Wait!: In Eleven, Livingston is stopped after bugging the casino's camera system... because the other employee noticed that he dropped his portable TV (which, unbeknownst to the employee, is what he's using to view the camera feeds).
  • Hidden in Plain Sight: How the team smuggles the explosives into the Bellagio vault, disguised as jewels. When Benedict checks "Lyman Zerga"'s briefcase, he removes the insert with the expected "jewels" and checks only the lining. Yen later plants them on the vault locks and inserts the transmitter pins.
  • Honor Among Thieves: A major plot point in the second film. Team Ocean correctly conclude that someone in the thieving community sold them out to Benedict. It's the only way to explain how he suddenly and somehow managed to find them all of them after 3 fruitless years of searching. But this ironically doesn't do them much good, because they know none of their closest associates would violate this Trope. It was a thief, but not one they know personally.
  • Hollywood Atlas: In order to steal the Pinch, the crew breaks into the generically-titled "California Institute of Advanced Science." This is actually the Gillespie Neuroscience Research Facility at University of California Irvine. However, it's about a 4 hour drive there from the Las Vegas Strip, so at least it figures into the timing of the story.
  • Hollywood Density: At no point in the movie does anyone bring up or address the fact that $160 million would weigh roughly a ton and a half if it's all in C-notes, and more if it includes a mixture of smaller bills. This is far more than eleven men could possibly carry in one trip unless they're all bodybuilders.
  • Hollywood Heart Attack: Saul, posing as a rich European businessman, fakes a heart attack. His act is deliberately theatrical and dramatic in order to distract the casino's security staff and draw attention away from the rest of the team's efforts to break into the casino vault.
  • Hollywood Law: Especially in the first film, there is a fictitious Nevada Gaming Commission lawnote  stipulating that casinos in the state must hold in reserve enough cash to cover every chip in play on its floor. No such law is in place specifically because such a large concentration of cash would be a prime target for thieves. If the casino ran out of physical money to reimburse players cashing in chips, they would simply start making payment negotiations for checks or electronic transfers — and don't forget the government gets a cut of any and all casino winnings, which they collect from the casino itself before chips are cashed in.
  • Hollywood Science: Pretty much everything involved with the Pinch. A real Z-pinch is far too big to fit in the back of a van (it's more like a two story building), requires a much greater power source than car batteries, and doesn't generate anywhere near enough of an EMP to cause a city-wide blackout. A real Z-pinch has been known to occasionally interfere with sensitive electronics like cameras and computers... located right next to the Z-pinch inside the laboratory. The only thing that could take out Las Vegas in such a manner seen in the film is an actual nuke.
  • Hustling the Mark: Danny and Rusty hustle a group of actors who are complete amateurs at poker.
  • Hypocritical Humor: From Twelve, Roman is on the telephone with a woman whom he assumes is Danny's assistant. He finishes the call by saying, "And tell him having a sexy female assistant is such a terrible cliche." After he hangs up, Roman's own sexy assistant enters.
  • "I Know What We Can Do" Cut: All of the group's planning is done like this.
  • I Take Offence to That Last One: Played With:
    Tess: You're a liar and a thief.
    Danny: I only lied about being a thief. Besides, I don't do that anymore.
    Tess: Steal?
    Danny: Lie.
  • Idiot Ball: Much of the heist in Twelve seems to be doomed to fail, due to boneheaded mistakes and desperate improvising. Especially when Rusty doesn't tell the others about Isabel, when the crew steal part of the Night Fox's art collection and let themselves be caught on security cameras, and pretty much everything involving Tess. It's not until the end do we find out that they knew they were under surveillance, stole the egg days before, and that their botched heist and arrests were a huge distraction.
  • Idiosyncratic Wipe: In the first movie, Danny has just managed to talk Rusty into joining his scheme with his "the house always wins" spiel. They get into an elevator, the doors close—and that turns into a wipe to the next scene, where Danny and Rusty are at Reuben's telling him about their plan.
  • Ignored Aesop: At the end of Twelve, an exasperated Benedict grudgingly confirms that if Toulor's check clears, all debts between him and Ocean's Eleven are settled — but he doesn't trust Danny not to come at him again down the road. Reuben argues Danny's done and not holding a grudge. If anything, he argues that events of the film have proven the dangers of holding on to grudges and vendettas in their line of business. Nobody wins. Ironically, the crew will ignore this in the next film to exact vengeance on Reuben for Bank's betrayal. Likewise, Benedict also ignores Reuben's Aesop and it ends up costing him $76 million and destroys his reputation for Disproportionate Retribution. Likewise, Toulour — who was disguised as a groundskeeper outside and heard all this — also ignores the warning and ends up getting humiliated by the team again.
  • Implied Answer:
    Danny: Ten oughta do it, don't you think?
    Rusty: [Stares in silence, not looking at Danny]
    Danny: You think we need one more?
    Rusty: [Silence]
    Danny: You think we need one more.
    Rusty: [Silence]
    Danny: All right, we'll get one more.
    Rusty: [Blinks]
  • The Infiltration: Eleven involves an intricate plan which requires numerous small infiltrations of the casino, all in order to carry out the biggest infiltration at the end.
  • Innocently Insensitive: Exploited. When "confronting" Frank about his real identity, Linus (disguised as a Nevada Gaming Commission agent) "accidentally" uses the term "colored" to describe people who are black, which by 2001 was already considered deeply offensive due to its ties to Jim Crow culture. This gives Frank an excuse to furiously lunge at Linus, in turn giving him a chance to pickpocket vault codes from Terry Benedict.
  • Insane Troll Logic: Done deliberately in-universe as part of the heist in Eleven. Frank's reaction to his identity being revealed by Linus disguised as a Nevada Gaming Commission agent? It's clearly because he's racist.
  • Instantly Proven Wrong: In Twelve, the gang gripes at their crew being called "Ocean's Eleven" while Linus tries to stick up for Danny being their leader.
    Linus: When you have a problem, who do you go to?
    Everyone: Rusty.
    Danny: Thanks, Linus.
  • Involuntary Charity Donation: As payback for an attempted double-cross by Benedict in Ocean's Thirteen, the crew donates his entire share of the profits to charity. The film ends with Danny, Rusty, and Linus watching Benedict talk to Oprah about his sudden burst of generosity.
  • It's Been Done:
    • A variant, as Danny and Rusty pitch the central heist: "It's never been tried." Reuben gets a wonderful recap of the top three attempts, each illustrated with a period-piece flashback and his own sarcastic commentary.
      Reuben: This guy actually tasted fresh oxygen before they grabbed him. Of course, he was breathing out of a hose for the next three weeks. Goddamn hippy.
    • Benedict suggests the crew cut the power to The Bank for their heist like they did to him, but Basher notes that the safeguards are different and adds that "you don't run the same gag twice, you do the next gag."
  • It's Personal: This comes up in all three films.
    • In Eleven, Danny doesn't deny that Benedict's relationship with Tess is part of his motivation for the heist. Plus, Danny and Rusty use Reuben's dislike of Benedict to get him to bankroll them.
    • In Twelve, Benedict was going after each member of the group even though insurance covered what the crew stole. Benedict's demand for them to repay him with three years' interest was simply for his own revenge.
    • In Thirteen, Bank nearly killed Reuben and the team took it quite personally. Terry Benedict just hates Bank personally which is partly why he agrees to bankroll the scheme. Getting revenge on Danny and company for besting him during Twelve is also what brings Toulour back into play when Benedict enlists him.
  • Jerkass: The antagonists (the first one, Terry Benedict, threatened to (and conceivably could) kill everyone while the second one, Toulour, sicced Terry on the band of thieves because a friend of the heroes unknowingly insulted mentor) but especially Willy Bank, who screwed over Reuben by taking advantage of his connections, cutting him out of their hotel's partnership, and on top of all that he renamed the hotel after himself. It doesn't help that the Ocean & Co. have to go to Terry for financial aid in the middle of their revenge plot.
  • Just Got Out of Jail: Ocean's Eleven opens with Danny being released on parole after a prison sentence.
  • Kansas City Shuffle: All three films depend heavily on this to pull off their heists.
    • It's the lynchpin to the heist's success in Eleven. After all, who would be looking for a SUCCESSFUL bank heist pulled off by Danny Ocean inside of a FAILED bank heist that wasn't pulled off by Danny Ocean?
    • Twelve less so, as they had won against Toulour before they'd even begun the real heist, they were really just doing it For the Lulz for him and actually to reunite LeMarque with his lost daughter Detective Lahiri.
    • In Thirteen, when Benedict demands the team steal Bank's five-diamond hotel awards, the team makes a big show to him that the concrete below the awards case is too thick to drill through, so they'll have to make a physical swap. When Linus confirms the swap during the heist's exit strategy, Benedict signals Toulour to steal the diamonds off Linus so Benedict can have them to himself. Except they're fake; Linus had installed holds in the roof of the hotel above the awards case and set charges at the base so they could winch the diamond case out of the hotel via helicopter.
  • Karma Houdini: The gang, outside of a brief spot in jail in the second film, never see any real retribution for their crimes. However, that's more attributable to Rule of Cool than anything.
  • Karmic Thief: The team targets two unscrupulous casino owners and a thief.
  • Kick the Dog:
    • Tolour in Twelve messes with Danny's wake-up call just to be a jerk.
      Rusty: Oh. (disgusted) Oh! He's mean... He's just mean-spirited.
    • In Thirteen Bank's first moment comes when he reveals he's screwing Reuben out of his share of the casino. He has plenty more throughout the movie. For example, his right-hand-woman, Abigail Sponder, manages to secure a mobile phone Bank wanted. She shows real delight in being able to get it for him, and sends it to him along with a note saying that it's a thank-you present for all the opportunities he's given her. He starts reading the note and rips it in half, obviously bored. And the act that makes the Eleven truly decide to come gunning for him is when Danny decides, as part of the "shook Sinatra's hand" code, to give him a Last-Second Chance to restore Reuben's money and Bank tosses it back to Danny's face, telling him that he hopes Reuben dies.
  • Knows a Guy Who Knows a Guy: Danny uses this trope after The Caper comes off successfully to throw off suspicion. When Benedict demands to know if Danny is responsible, Danny says he knows a guy he did time with who knows anyone who could have pulled off such a heist. Benedict just thinks he's being played and hands him over to the police for parole violation.
  • Lame Rhyme Dodge: Inverted. Rusty is talking to a bartender, only it's too loud in the bar for them to hear each other. Rusty begins the conversation with something like, "Longest night of my life" When the bartender looks up, wondering what Rusty said, he says, "I'm running away with your wife," and the bartender just nods and smiles.
  • The Lancer: Rusty constantly backs up and serves as a foil to Danny.
  • Large Ham:
    • Andy Garcia is lucky he didn't chip a tooth on the scenes set in a vault. It contrasts his cold, aloof persona for most of the movie up until then.
    • Al Pacino, the Big Bad of the third movie, is a semi-large ham, which is still pretty subdued for Pacino.
    • Basher while impersonating the American stunt man in the third movie.
  • Laser-Guided Karma: Seems to befall everyone who tries to pull one over on Danny.
  • Laser Hallway: The laser grid in the second film. Laser security is based on the beam hitting a photoreceptor and an alarm going off if the beam is interrupted. With the beams going all over like that, there is nothing to receive the beam.
  • Leitmotif: Several of Saul's scenes in Eleven are accompanied by Quincy Jones's version of "Blues in the Night".
  • Leno Device: Terry Benedict appears on Oprah at the end of Thirteen.
  • Let Me Get This Straight...:
    Saul: I have a question, say we get into the cage, and through the security doors there and down the elevator we can't move, and past the guards with the guns, and into the vault we can't open...
    Rusty: Without being seen by the cameras.
    Danny: Oh yeah, sorry, I forgot to mention that.
    Saul: Yeah well, say we do all that... uh... we're just supposed to walk out of there with $150,000,000 in cash on us, without getting stopped?
    [pause as everyone turns to look at Danny]
    Danny: Yeah.
    Saul: [nervously] Oh. Okay.
  • Lie Detector: Two systems show up in Thirteen.
    • Livingston has to pass a polygraph test as part of a scam, and spoofs the system by keeping a thumbtack in his shoe and pressing his foot down on it while answering the calibration questions. The person administering the test points out that if he didn't have the machine he would've sworn that Livingston was lying, but the machine passes him.
    • The sophisticated computer system "The Greco" tells if a person was cheating at the games by reading various body signals. It is fooled when the rigged slot machine gives the giant jackpot to a random woman who didn't know about the con.
  • Long Game: Ocean's Twelve uses this as a premise. The film's central action is a showdown between Danny Ocean's crew and Francois "Night Fox" Toulour as a competition to steal a Russian Faberge egg. However, Gaspar Le Marque, Toulour's mentor, is the one playing the "long con". An explanation— Le Marque tips off Ocean's crew about the egg's location prior to its arrival at a museum, giving the crew time to steal it and switch it with a fake. Toulour steals the fake and gloats at his seeming victory until Danny and Tess Ocean arrive to tell him the truth. Le Marque has now discredited Toulour, Ocean now has the money needed to repay Terry Benedict from Toulour, and Le Marque reunites with his daughter, Europol agent Isabel Lahiri. Lahiri had been tracking Le Marque and Toulour during her career.
    • He actually set the entire thing in motion when he did not disagree when an acquaintance called Ocean the greatest thief in the world during a conversationwith Le Marque and Toulour. This led to Toulour's need to prove himself to his mentor and set the game in motion with Ocean's crew.
  • Lost in Transmission: Virtually the canonical example, when Rusty is coaching Linus on conning.
    Rusty: [giving instructions to Linus] Don't use three words when one will do; don't shift your eyes. Look always at your mark, but don't stare. Be specific but not memorable; be funny but don't make him laugh. He's gotta like you, and then forget you the moment you've left his sight. And for God's sake, whatever you do, don't, under any circumstances —
    Livingston: [off screen] Rust, can you come here a sec?
    Rusty: Sure thing. [leaves]
    Linus: ...
  • Lovable Rogue: Danny Ocean and friends. They're all charismatic in their own way and generally likeable, pleasant people when off the clock. It helps that everyone hates Terry Benedict anyway, and Willy Bank is such a scumbag that even Benedict hates him.
  • A MacGuffin Full of Money: As a caper film, it uses this, though it differs from most thief caper films in that it was very specific money.
  • Make It Look Like a Struggle: A variation: Benedict puts Danny Ocean in a room with a thug named Bruiser. Turns out Bruiser is a friend of Danny's, and he beats on the furniture to make it sound like he's beating the crap out of Danny while Danny himself escapes the room and joins in the heist (while paying Bruiser a couple million from his eventual cut as compensation). Later on, Benedict returns to the room and Bruiser hits Danny for real, making his alibi complete. The latter part takes a couple of tries for Bruiser to get right:
    [Benedict leaves the room the first time]
    Danny: All right—
    [Bruiser wallops him with a punch]
    Danny: [bent over in pain] Oww! Jesus! [slams fist on a desk in pained frustration] Bruiser, not until later!
    Bruiser: Sorry, Danny, I forgot.
    Danny: [sympathetic pat] It's OK.
  • Male Gaze: In Thirteen the camera is almost always in position to get a good view of Sponder's cleavage.
  • Man Bites Man: Not shown, but a security guard in Thirteen is decoyed away from his post by a fake phone call from his son's school, claiming that his kid just bit the lunch lady. Again.
  • Mathematician's Answer: Danny Ocean is at his hearing to determine if he is fit to be released from prison.
    Male Examiner: You have a history of arrests, but you have never been successfully charged. Is there a particular reason you chose to commit this crime, or a reason you simply got caught this time?
    Danny: My wife left me. I fell into a self-destructive pattern.
    Female Examiner: If released, do you think you would fall into a similar pattern?
    Danny: She already left me once. I don't think she'd do it again just for kicks.
  • Meaningful Background Event:
    • When Rusty is at the bar drinking away the headache of just how bad the celebrities are at poker, Danny walks behind him, glances at him, and continues to the back poker room.
    • The foreground to be exact, but when Rusty is on the phone with Benedict in Eleven, an eagle-eyed viewer will notice before Benedict the Bellagio logo on the vault floor disappears when the crew replaces it with the spoof footage.
  • Meaningful Name: Thirteen's Big Bad is a greedy casino owner whose surname is Bank.
  • Meaningless Villain Victory: In Thirteen, Terry Benedict (as the one helping fund the Bank heist) managed to obtain what he wanted (Willy Bank's humiliation), but his cut of the heist and his reputation as a man who makes all of his enemies pay if they double-cross him is lost because the team donates the cut's money to a homeless kids' camp and he cannot do anything about it without risking being painted as a monster by the media.
  • Mischief for Punishment: One of the many elements of the heist requires that Danny Ocean be detained by casino security while the heist is being executed in order to provide him with an alibi as well as putting Benedict's mind at ease.
  • Mission Control: Livingston Dell. Danny Ocean too, supposedly, but it didn't quite turn out that way.
  • Mock Millionaire:
    • In the first movie, Saul passes himself as "Limon Zerga,", an international arms dealer. He's referred to as such in Rusty's pre-heist plan as "the Boesky," a con-man's term for someone pretending to be a wealthy man with inside information.
    • Done again in Thirteen with Yen pretending to be a Chinese billionaire named Mr. Weng. When Bank's assistant points out that Weng doesn't come up on their standard background checks, Weng's assistant (Linus) points out that they work hard to keep his name out of such checks. On a dare, Linus suggests that Mr. Bank try to build something larger than two stories in China's Tianjin province and see if Mr. Weng's name comes up then. They maintain the image of a wealthy Chinese industrialist by having "Mr. Weng" prefer pai gow to other games.
  • Model Planning:
    • In the first movie, they build an exact replica of the vault they're robbing, to practice. And then for Camera Spoofing as a crucial component in the actual caper.
    • The second movie features the team planning a job using a model of the Galleria D'Arte di Roma.
  • Money to Burn: Happens here too, but rather than inside a casket in an oven, it happens during a shootout when it gets caught in the crossfire courtesy of a explosives the Eleven had planeted in the bags previously.
  • Money Fetish: Saul sees the casino vault full of tens of millions in cash: "That's the sexiest thing I've ever seen."
  • Moral Disambiguation: The trilogy starts out as a group of charismatic and morally flexible thieves led by Danny Ocean robbing a slightly more detached and equally morally flexible casino owner, Terry Benedict, with Ocean's Twelve involving Benedict trying to retaliate with help from a rival of Ocean's. Ocean's Thirteen sees Ocean and Benedict team up against Benedict's rival, the downright smarmy casino owner Willy Bank, who betrayed Ocean's mentor Reuben Tishkoff in an unsavoury deal. Benedict finances Ocean's heist due to Bank's new casino casting a large shadow over the pool of one of Benedict's casinos. Benedict is shown throughout the trilogy to be much more benevolent of an employer than Bank, even if only out of pragmatism. Likewise, Ocean is shown to be extremely charismatic and not without his own standards.
  • Motive Rant: Early on in Eleven, before the crew is even assembled.
    Rusty: I need a reason. And don't say money. Why do this?
    Danny: Why not do it? Because I just left the joint after losing four years of my life and you're cold-decking Teen Beat cover boys. Because the house always wins. Play long enough, you never change the stakes, the house takes you. Unless, when that perfect hand comes along, you bet big, and then you take the house.
    Rusty: ...been practicing that speech, haven't you?
    Danny: Little bit. Did I rush it? I felt like I rushed it.
    Rusty: No, it's good, I liked it. Teen Beat thing was harsh.
  • My Card: Danny Ocean slips his card to Linus after watching him pickpocket a stockbroker. The card has his name embossed into it, but nothing else is printed on it - no address, no telephone number, no clever motto. (The directions for Linus to follow are hand-written.) So presumably either Danny spends a lot of time jotting his details on his own cards, or he only gives them to people who already know how to get hold of him...
  • Mythology Gag: The scene where the shootout leads to half of Danny's loot being torched by explosives is almost certain homage to the climax of the original, where Ocean's loot is burned with Bergdorf's body.
    • There was a running gag in the original movie of one of the Eleven trying to build a house of cards and seeing it collapse. In the remake, the Amazing Yen can be seen sitting on Reuben's diving board actually succeeding at the task in question.
  • N+1 Sequel Title: Ocean's Eleven is followed by Twelve and Thirteen
  • Never Recycle Your Schemes: In Thirteen, Benedict suggests the crew cut the power to Bank's casino to access his diamond vault like they did to the Bellagio in Eleven. Basher dismisses the idea saying they "never run the same gag twice. You do the next gag!"
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Linus' stunt during the theft of the pinch leads directly to Yen's hand getting broken.
  • Nice to the Waiter:
    • Subverted when Linus notes that Terry Benedict, remembers the name of virtually everyone of his staff and their personal details as well — we soon see him arriving at work and greeting the doorman by name, as well as asking about the man's family, though this is more to show that Benedict is a Control Freak rather than being generous. Further cementing this is that he only begins his Villainous Breakdown when he feels he is no longer in absolute control of the situation.
    • Subverted in Thirteen by Bank, who is openly rude to his staff - even his right-hand woman - all of which makes it easy for the crew to find helpers breaking his new hotel.
  • No Endor Holocaust: Danny's crew uses an electromagnetic device to shut off all electricity in Las Vegas for 30 seconds. Realistically, we should be looking at pacemakers going haywire, car crashes in the thousands, hospital equipment failing, and God help them if any planes were flying low over the city when it happened. Yet the sequels still only refer to them as thieves, not as the most successful and high-tech terrorists of all time. note 
    • They follow it up by causing a localized earthquake in the heart of the Strip for Ocean's Thirteen, severe enough to send the Bank's clients and employees scrambling for the exits. Not a safe bet to say nobody got trampled during the evacuation, especially since the "quake" lasted longer and was more intense than they'd initially intended.
  • The Nondescript: Discussed by Rusty while giving instructions to Linus about how not to be conspicious:
    Rusty: Don't use three words when one will do; don't shift your eyes. Look always at your mark, but don't stare. Be specific but not memorable; be funny but don't make him laugh. He's gotta like you, and then forget you the moment you've left his sight. And for God's sake, whatever you do, don't, under any circumstances—
  • Noodle Implements:
    • The various characters and scenarios Rusty foresees needing for the job in Eleven. A little research can explain these terms.
      Rusty: Off the top of my head, I'd say you're looking at a Boesky, a Jim Brown, a Miss Daisy, two Jethros and a Leon Spinks, not to mention the biggest Ella Fitzgerald ever.
    • A similar thing happens in the second movie, with the remaining team members going over all the possible plans with code names like "Lemony Sue" and "Bundle of Joy," but dismissing them all as insufficiently manned.
      Basher: Hell in a Handbasket?
      Linus: We can't train a cat that quickly. Besides...
      Everyone: Not enough people.
  • Noodle Incident:
    • When Danny and Rusty are leaving lunch with Reuben, after he initially turned them down.
      Reuben: Look, we all go way back and uh, I owe you from the thing with the guy in the place and I'll never forget it.
      Danny: That was our pleasure.
      Rusty: I'd never been to Belize.
    • Whatever scam got Danny sent to prison. Rusty and Danny discuss it in front of Rusty's poker class as "Incan Ceremonial Headmasks". ("Is there any money in those?" asks a student. "There is if you can move them," Rusty says, pointedly staring at Danny.) We're never sure if "Incan Ceremonial Headmasks" is code for something — knowing this crew, it may well not be.
    • The reason why it's absolutely beyond the pale to mention that Tess looks like Julia Roberts. When Linus brings it up, Rusty shuts him down in no uncertain terms, and makes it clear that there is a reason but he won't be divulging it under any circumstances.
  • No Name Given: The hotel reviewer in Thirteen. He's credited only as "The V.U.P.", which he sarcastically calls himself at one point.
  • No Sparks: Danny strongly suspects his ex-wife Tess doesn't love her current boyfriend Terry Benedict (the guy whose casino he's trying to rob). So he asks her if he makes her laugh, and Tess points out that at least he doesn't make her cry, basically admitting that she doesn't love Terry, but shutting down Danny's criticism through a cutting reminder of why she and Danny broke up.
  • Non Violent Initial Confrontation: Danny and Benedict first meet at a restaurant and politely trade banter.
  • Not His Sled: Whilst obviously differing significantly from the original, the film still manages to use this, with the heart attack now being part of the plan.
  • Not Me This Time: At the end of Twelve, Reuben insists to a disbelieving Benedict that if he gets robbed again, it won't be Ocean's 11 doing the thieving. They consider the feud closed and all debts settled and have no interest or desire to run afoul of Benedict again. Ironically, they do in a sense end up robbing Benedict again in Thirteen, but there Benedict was just asking for it.
  • O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
    • Benedict at the beginning of Twelve when he tracks down the entire crew. Instead of killing them all in revenge as they'd expected, he instead shows restraint (at least by his standards) and gives them a window to repay their debt. It clues in Danny and company that something else is going on here namely that Benedict struck a bargain with Toulour and is honoring the terms the Night Fox set in exchange for providing the crew's locations.)
    • When Reuben is hospitalized, the gang gathers on what to do. The Malloy twins finally get on the same page, volunteering to get close to and kidnap Bank, Livingston offering to kill him, and Basher saying he'll help dispose of the body. Finally, it's Frank who concedes they give Bank a chance to right his wrong, but is notably in Tranquil Fury about what Bank did in the first place.
      Basher: That's the rules for someone who understands the rules, which Bank don't, cause he already broke 'em. So he don't get the chance.
      Frank: For Reuben...think we give him a chance.
    • Danny and company calling in Roman for a consultation on the Bank Job's pre-planning during Thirteen. Roman even lampshades it in-universe, noting that they must be really stuck if they've had to bring him in.
  • Obstacle Exposition: Given by Saul during his rant:
    Saul: I have a question. Let's say we get into the cages we don't have access to. And down the elevator we can't move. And past the guards with the guns. And into the vault we can't open—
    Rusty: All without being seen by the cameras.
    Danny: Right, I forgot to mention that.
    Saul: [Beat] Well, say we do all that. Are we supposed to just walk out of there with a hundred and fifty million dollars in cash on us—without being stopped?
    [everyone slowly turns to Danny]
    Danny: ...Yeah.
    Saul: Oh. Well, all right then. [quietly pops an antacid]
  • Offscreen Moment of Awesome: The theft of the pinch. Played for Laughs.
  • Oh, Crap!:
    • Linus's and Frank's ploy in Eleven to take the elevator codes off Benedict:
      Linus: [to Benedict] Sir, you of all people know that we at the NGC have always supported the hiring of colored— [Oh Crap face]
      [Frank lunges at Linus, who bumps into Benedict and swaps folders with him]
    • Essentially the reaction of everyone in Twelve—Basher appears to literally say this—when Benedict catches up with them.
    • A two-fer in Thirteen with Linus when the FBI barges in on him and Abigail ("Oh dear God!"). At first, it seems like he's panicked that he's been busted, but then it's revealed it was out of embarrassment that his dad walked in while he had his pants down.
      Bobby Caldwell: I'm just glad your mother didn't have to see that.
  • Once More, with Clarity: Eleven does this to show how the crew pulled off the robbery, though not without a major plot hole. There is no explanation for how the fliers, that were used to simulate the money, got into the vault. It's not as if a casino would actually store those inside its vault in the amount required for that diversion.
  • One Head Taller: Linus' dad and Linus to his mom.
    • Obliquely referenced when Saul objects to Tess' relationship with Terry Benedict on the grounds that "she's too tall for him".
  • Oral Fixation: Rusty is almost always eating something during his scenes. It may be a second to finish up or he'll eat through the whole scene. This helps establish Rusty's very cool and casual personality.
  • Outside-Context Problem: In Twelve, Basher, Turk, and Linus are desperately attempting to have Tess Ocean pretend to be Julia Roberts, but as they enter the hotel, BRUCE WILLIS just happens to be in the lobby and sees her go in. He proceeds to spend the rest of his screentime poking holes in the already-flimsy con the remaining crew is trying to pull.
  • The Perfect Crime: Theme of all three films.
  • Pheromones: In Ocean's Thirteen, Linus uses a powerful pheromone that makes Abigail Sponder go crazy for him, successfully distracting her and buying time for the other team members.
  • Pet the Dog:
    • We briefly see Bruiser cashing out at The Bank. Danny let him know the games would be rigged so he could get in on the action.
    • The "Susan B. Anothony" at the airport: rigging a slot machine so the Five Diamond reviewer they tortured would finally have something good happen to him.
  • Phlebotinum Bomb: The "pinch", which releases an EMF pulse that causes a momentary blackout in Las Vegas.
  • Pillow Pregnancy: Tess does this during Twelve while posing as Julia Roberts. After she's arrested she uses the "bump" pillow to sit on in the jail cell.
  • Plot Hole: The duffel bags of hooker ads magically appears in the vault elevator. Danny and Linus don't carry them in. Yen couldn't fit them into his small case (nor could they get them up to the elevator, which was stopped), and the security guys carry them out before the fake SWAT team gets there. The creators even admit in the audio commentary that there's no logical explanation for how they got there.
  • Plunger Detonator: Used when Reuben's old building is blown up.
  • Pop the Tires: In Eleven, the fake getaway van is brought down by shooting the tires.
  • Precision F-Strike:
    • Some of Yen's only dialogue in English.
    • Also the final conversation with Benedict in Ocean's 13
      Terry: You think this is funny?
      Danny: Well, Terry, it sure as shit ain't sad.
    • Reuben gets one as well early in Eleven, noting that even if somehow Danny and Rusty were able to get into the vault and walk out with $100+ million, "you're still in the middle of the fucking desert!"
  • Product Placement: Done as a plot point in Thirteen. Willy Bank is craving the newest high-end Samsung phone that won't roll out for months and demands to have the first one produced. Yen has a connection to the president of Samsung and pulls strings for the gang to anonymously gift one to Willy under the guise of Abigail Sponder having obtained it for him. It's actually a decoy with a magnetron inside so that Bank can unwittingly lock out the Greco security system.
  • Properly Paranoid: Willy Bank installs The Greco Player Tracker in his hotel, which measures pupil dilation and heart rate to detect if wins are fake or legitimate. Might seem like overkill... except Danny Ocean and his gang are planning to rig every game in the casino, and The Greco is the only thing stopping them.
    • Also from Thirteen, Team Ocean's Enemy Mine with Benedict. Danny and company know that while they and Benedict may share a common goal of ruining Bank, they can't trust him and he's likely going to find a way to screw them over as payback for the first two films. Their vigilance pays off as Benedict and Toulour team up (and without realizing Danny and company are onto them).
  • Pseudo-Crisis: In Eleven, Yen is tasked with sneaking into the vault, jumping to avoid the sensors in the floor, then placing explosives on the door to let the other robbers in. During the last bit, he gets his hand stuck, leaving him without cover, right as the guys are on the other side of the door about to blow it. After playing it for all the suspense they can... the detonator's batteries are dead. Then, once that's been resolved, they blow the door open... and find their inside man safe inside, wondering what took them so long. The screenwriters added this scene (and the bit of Yen injuring his hand earlier) because they felt the heist was going too well to that point and didn't want to lull the audience into thinking everything would go off without a hitch.
  • Purely Aesthetic Glasses: Linus often makes use of these in his pickpocketing. He usually uses large frames to make him look even younger and unassuming.
  • Put on a Bus: Tess and Isabel simply aren't included in the third film, though at least Danny gives a Hand Wave to the fact that he kept them out of it on purpose.
  • Pyrrhic Victory: Benedict in Thirteen: he managed to get one of the things he wanted (humiliate Bank), but his cut of the heist's loot is gone and so may be his reputation as a man who makes anybody who angers him pay with interests because the Eleven picked up on the fact that he hired Toulour to double-cross them and get Bank's diamonds, so they gave all of Benedict's cut away to an orphan camp and he can't do anything about it without the threat of the press painting him as a monster.
  • Realistic Diction Is Unrealistic: Lampshaded after Danny's Motive Rant.
    Rusty: Been practicing that speech, haven't you.
    Danny: Little bit, did I rush? I felt like I rushed.
    Rusty: No, it was good, I liked it. Teen-beat thing was a little harsh.
  • Reality Is Unrealistic:
    • In Twelve, the priceless Fabergé Egg is transported to Rome by a courier walking on-foot to a train station and guarded by only a couple of guys, while the decoy is sent via heavy security with a ceremonious display. It's very similar to how the Cullinan Diamond was transported from South Africa to England in 1905, and that method was even more risky.
    • In Eleven, Reuben notes the closest robberies of a Vegas casinos were simple smash-and-grab jobs (which Linus attempts to joke about during the planning scene). In reality, successful Vegas casino robberies were indeed as simple as dashing in and demanding money from the tellers at gunpoint before security could stop them.
  • Real Life Writes the Plot:
    • When trying to cast Yen, the crew looked for anybody who had the right acrobatic skills. They decided to hire Shaobao Qin, who had no acting experience and couldn't speak English, which is why he only speaks Chinese in all three films.
    • During Twelve, Bernie Mac's screentime was reduced as he was working on another project. He also got sick, which reduced his role even further. In addition, Julia Roberts was pregnant with twins, which meant that her role had to be reduced.
  • Real Men Wear Pink: Briefly toyed with in Thirteen when Rusty and Danny Ocean watch Oprah and get a little choked up.
  • Red Herring: All throughout Eleven, the audience is fed signs that geriatric Saul Bloom is in failing health as the caper is coming, leading to his heart attack in the Bellagio as it's happening, briefly misleading the audience that it's legitimate. Then Rusty shows up as the on-site medic.
  • Refuge in Audacity: Practically all their heists rely on this in some form or another:
    • In Eleven, the gang actually ransoms Benedict's own money against him, and then manage to smuggle the money out of the vault by posing as a SWAT team. They even use an EMP bomb to black out all of Las Vegas for several seconds.
    • In Twelve, Linus' mother arrives posing as an FBI agent and pulls rank Isabel, setting the entire gang free right in front of her due to Isabel illegally obtaining forged arrest warrants.
    • In Thirteen, the gang creates an artificial earthquake under Bank's casino to get all of the gamblers to evacuate. Linus' father also poses as an FBI agent to manipulate Bank and Sponder.
  • The Remake: The first movie remakes the original but spawns its own original sequels.
  • Remake Cameo: From the original Ocean's 11, we have Angie Dickinson and Henry Silva, appearing as themselves at the fight.
  • Repeating So the Audience Can Hear: Used when Ocean is on the phone with his parole officer.
  • Replaced the Theme Tune: Notable use for a franchise trilogy, in which no score, theme, or motif carries over from one movie to the next, although they're all generally based in big-beat-style jazz ("Caravan" and "Clair de Lune" do briefly pop up in Thirteen as a callback). Composer David Holmes wrote a completely new score for each movie.
  • Replaced with Replica:
    • Twelve had them intend to do this to the Coronation Egg before Toulour stole it, and failed, except not. They actually did it en-route to the museum.
    • Played with in Thirteen, where Linus swapped the Five Diamond awards for fakes, only to have Toulour steal them from him. He actually didn't. He had been there to plant bombs around the case so the entire thing could be stolen. Toulour actually stole the fakes. Again.
  • Revenge Before Reason: Invoked by Saul during Thirteen when they're trying to figure out how to fullfill the impossible terms (steal Bank's Five Diamond Awards) Benedict demanded in exchange for his funding. Saul warns Danny that this is why revenge jobs don't work in their line of business. You don't walk away when you should know better and you back yourself into a corner where you'll end up in jail or dead. While Saul has a point, nobody wants to bail (least of all Saul himself).
  • Rewatch Bonus:
    • Not uncommon with the genre, but Eleven in particular shows its hand with the heist a few times before The Reveal, which can be spotted on a rewatch: without calling attention to it, the Bellagio logo disappears when the feeds are switched, and, when the viewer is listening for it, can clearly make out Rusty's voice as the SWAT leader talking to Benedict and Livingston as the 911 operator.
    • Danny and Rusty are quite the master manipulators. Pay attention to not only how they manipulate their marks in their heists, but also their crew members into joining them and doing their part in the heists, Linus in particular.
    • There's a lot of infodumping in the opening scene with Roman Nagel in Thirteen, but a viewer who watches it again after knowing how the con goes down will see Danny, Rusty, and Roman figure out every single step in pulling it off.
  • Running Gag:
    • Rusty is eating something almost every time he's on screen. Pitt said the idea behind this was that Rusty was so busy he didn't have time to eat otherwise.note 
    • In the first film Linus is often shown chewing gum to emphasize his youth and inexperience.
    • People apparently understanding Yen even though he's speaking rapid-fire Chinese and him understanding them even though they're speaking English. Benedict is the only person who speaks to him in his native language.
    • In Twelve, characters are stopped in their tracks whenever they broach the subject that Tess looks exactly like a very famous actress.
    • The third film has Linus arguing with his father over whether or not his prosthetic nose is actually necessary his cover.
  • Scenery Porn: Numerous lovely shots of Las Vegas and Europe.
  • Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: Both the good guy and the bad guy pull this.
    Bank: This town might have changed, but not me. I know people highly invested in my survival, and they are people who really know how to hurt in ways you can't even imagine.
    Danny: Well, I know all the guys that you'd hire to come after me, and they like me better than you.
  • Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Willy Bank's belief that his riches allow him to go against the code amongst guys who "shook Sinatra's hand", thus giving Reuben a heart-attack, are what sets of the plot of the third movie.
  • Screw the Rules, I'm Famous!: What the Night Fox's motive for breaking what Danny calls "Rule Number One" (never out a thief's identity) boils down to in Twelve. As a legendary cat burglar, a solo act without any support crew, and the protégé of the similarly legendary Gaspar Lemarque, he believes himself the greatest thief in the world, so when "an annoying American businessman" suggests that a bunch of low-lifes could somehow be his equal, if not better, he chooses to violate that rule solely to maneuver that crew of low-lifes into a position where they would have to take his challenge to see who truly is the best, or die. Luckily, the Night Fox's mentor knows his protégé all too well, and was able to help Danny and the rest of the team win the competition before it even started.
  • Secret Legacy:
    • The sequels use this with Linus' parents. In Twelve, his mother appears as a police officer, takes over the investigation of his crime, breaks him in the interrogation room, and we are treated to a stunning reveal in the cars on the way out of the station. In Thirteen, his father turns up and pulls a very similar stunt. In both cases, the twist works only because we don't know who these police officers are and they are introduced as if their credentials are valid.
    • Isabel's father was a thief who taught her everything he knew. She later becomes a cop and starts using that knowledge to catch thieves, including the famous Gaspar LeMarque. In the end, she finds out that LeMarque is her father.
    • A blink-and-you'll miss it moment in Thirteen gives away Linus' father's identity. As Linus is being arrested by him in his day job as an FBI agent, Abigail calls him "Agent Caldwell". Before that, they take great pains not to mention his name, even when he picks up his office phone.
  • Secret Test of Character: Danny getting red-flagged and Rusty "replacing" him with Linus to trigger the vault was always part of the plan, but they made it look organic to everyone else to make sure Linus was up for the task, with Danny even noting Linus had his trust after pulling it off. When Linus asks why they simply didn't tell him he'd be helping with the vault, Danny just responds that would've been no fun.
  • Seinfeldian Conversation: In Ocean's Twelve, upon being told they were going to be killed, the group immediately got into an argument of why the group was called "Ocean's Eleven".
  • Self-Deprecation: The crux of Topher Grace's cameo in Twelve as a raging burnout.
    Topher Grace: I totally phoned in that Dennis Quaid movie!note 
  • Sequel Goes Foreign: Ocean's Twelve went to Europe, justified by the title gang being too high profile to work in the USA without raising alarms. Not that it stopped them in Ocean's Thirteen.
  • Sequencing Deception: In Ocean's Twelve, there's a segment where we see Ocean's team and a rival thief both trying to steal a MacGuffin, but find out that the rival got there much earlier and the Macguffin is gone.
  • Serious Business: In ''Ocean's Thirteen, Reuben insists that Bank won't betray him because "We both shook Sinatra's hand, and there's a code amongst guys who shook Sinatra's hand". In the face of Bank's sudden but inevitable betrayal, Reuben is more horrified by Bank saying "Screw Sinatra's hand" than he is by the betrayal itself. In the end, Danny concludes his Kirk Summation with "You shook Sinatra's hand. You should know better Willie".
  • Setting Update: The original was made in, and set in, The '60s.
  • Shout-Out:
    • In the elevator, Linus hits the floor buttons 1, 1, 3, and 8
    • Basher tells the others his original plan to knock out the casino's power can no longer work:
      Basher: So unless we intend to do this job in Reno, we're in barney. (the others look blankly at him) Barney Rubble - trouble!
    • When Danny and Tess both lie to Terry that their meeting was just coincidence, Terry quips, "Of all the gin joints in all the world."
    • In one scene, Terry is denying the request of a "Mr. Levin" to attend the boxing match, saying that he should just watch it on cable and that "surely he must have HBO." This is a nod to Gerald Levine, the chairman of Time-Warner, of which HBO is a subsidiary, as is Warner Brothers, who distributed the film.
    • The password Saul gives to the courier with the briefcase is "ya vas liubliu," which is the same Russian phrase Danny Velinski taught to Louis Sedgwick in The Great Escape. It means "I love you."
    • There are two shout-outs to The Godfather in Thirteen, one subtle and one overt.
      • At his initial meeting with Willy Bank (played by Al Pacino), Ocean uses the line "What I want, what's most important to me...", the exact same line that Michael Corleone (also played by Pacino) says in his iconic meeting with Sollozzo.
      • When they think that they have run into an insurmountable block and their revenge against Bank has failed, Reuben calls Ocean to his room for an explanation. Reuben's lines are a word-for-word recreation (With substituted names) of when Vito Corleone asks Tom Hagen for an explanation, and Tom tells him that his son Sonny has been murdered.
  • Side Bet: While watching Yen practice: "Ten says he shorts it." "Twenty!" Later, when the real deal comes up, the side bet gets a callback: "Ten says he shorts it." "No bet."
  • The Silent Bob: Yen. Being Chinese, he doesn't know English (yet somehow the others are just OK with his Mandarin...). And most of the times where he does speak, swearing will be involved.
  • Sky Heist: In Thirteen, a secure case full of diamond necklaces is hauled out of a casino's roof via helicopter.
  • Squick: Used In-universe in Eleven, Rusty gets a case of this when he pays off the stripper for getting him the keycard for Benedict's casino.
    Rusty: Thanks. Say hi to your mother for me.
    Stripper: Say it yourself. She's on in five minutes. [leaves]
    Rusty: [Beat] [pulls face, leaves]
  • Slow Electricity: In Eleven, when they use the EMP, there is the obligatory shot of the lights going out block by block.
  • The Smurfette Principle: Tess in the first movie. She and Isabel are both Never a Self-Made Woman; Tess is the whole reason the heist is taking place in the first movie; Isabel is both Rusty's love interest and Gaspar's daughter.
  • The Snack Is More Interesting: A running gag is that Rusty is almost always snacking on something, showing his nonchalance. Justified, according to Brad Pitt, who explained that Rusty is working odd hours for the heist and needs to get meals whenever he can.
  • Snipe Hunt: Rusty sends a detective out to "Go find Griggs," as a distraction while he's recruiting Basher in the guise of an FBI agent. This is also an example of the Bavarian Fire Drill, as Rusty brazenly walks into the police crime scene and walks off with their bombing suspect.
  • Something That Begins with "Boring": The 20 questions version with the Molloy twins.
    Turk: (continuing an obnoxious conversation about whether he's thought of something yet) Okay, just ask your questions.
    Virgil: Are you a man?
    Turk: Yes, nineteen.
    Virgil: Are you alive?
    Turk: Yes, eighteen.
    Virgil: Evel Knievel.
    Turk:...shit.
  • Sound-Effect Bleep: Used extensively in a scene from Twelve, when Tarr is seen in the recording studio; both on his rap song and in his conversation with the recording engineer about the song sounding lifeless with extensive censorship for radio play.
  • Special Guest: Eddie Izzard (as Roman Nagel) and David Paymer (as the "Very Unimportant Person") are given the billing of "Special Guest Stars" in the credits of Thirteen.
  • Speech Impediment: Livingston speaks with a slight stutter.
  • Spotting the Thread:
    • From Eleven, Benedict figures out after the fact what happened when he realizes the vault in the surveillance feed isn't his vault; a few days before the heist, the Bellagio had its insignia produced on the mat at the vault entrance, a detail that was missing in the replica used by the crew to fool Benedict and his staff.
    • In Twelve, Bruce Willis feels something is amiss with "Julia" and tries to poke holes in her story about why she's there when she's supposed to be home and very pregnant. He and Isabel finally find the thread when Isabel asks for an autograph: Tess signs it with her right hand; Julia Roberts is left-handed.
  • Steal the Surroundings: In the sequels, this is done once straight and once as a variant.
    • In Thirteen, a secure case full of diamond necklaces is hauled out of a casino's roof via helicopter.
    • In Twelve, the team need line-of-sight to a specific window for a heist at a house built on pylons; the window's too low, so they raise the house until it lines up. (Granted, they only moved the surroundings, they didn't keep them, but it's certainly related.)
  • Stealing from the Hotel:
    • Danny makes a wisecrack about stealing the towels from his casino hotel room, when in reality he's planning on ripping off the whole casino chain.
    • In Thirteen, a pit boss has made it a habit to swipe and pawn off silverware from the high roller villas at The Bank that are made of actual gold. Danny uses this as friendly leverage for his cooperation in their conning of Bank, noting that instead of blackmail, they'll help him get richer.
  • Stealth Insult: A subtle instance in Thirteen when the team trolls Toulour with the fake Five Diamond Awards. They've beaten the master thief for a second time...by pulling the exact same trick they used in Twelve — and the Night Fox fell for it again. You can't really blame Toulour for erupting in an angry French tirade upon realizing this.
  • Stolen MacGuffin Reveal: In Twelve, the Egg was stolen before the events of the movie, and the whole movie was a plot to return the original.
  • Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
    • The aftermath of the Bellagio job is what forces the team to shift operations to Europe during Ocean's Twelve. Such a recent, high-profile heist still has the attention of American law enforcement and it's thus still too hot and dangerous for them to perform any major jobs in the United States. However, this then gets subverted in Thirteen. It should have also made it still too dangerous for them to come back to Vegas and to hit another major casino-hotel. It could be justified by enough time having passed in the interim and the Caldwells being embedded in the FBI and thus able to deflect any attention or keep an eye out for trouble (which is indeed what happens when Spooner gets suspicious about Yen and Linus).
    • The crew actually didn't make Benedict any poorer from the Bellagio heist, as insurance recouped what was taken. His demand that the team pay back what was stolen, with interest, is purely revenge-driven.
  • Swiss-Cheese Security:
    • The Bellagio; despite Danny's intonation that it's borderline impossible, they actually have a relatively easy time breaking in due to this trope. It was actually this trope that allowed the casino to sign off on the heist, since it in no way bears any resemblance to robbing an actual Vegas casino:
      • Danny and Rusty are able to obtain the blueprints to the vault from an office archive. Obtaining those in real life would be a touch more difficult.
      • Most of the plan involves infiltrating the personnel areas through the casino itself. For precisely this reason, counting rooms and vaults, and the measures protecting them, are typically not connected to the casino floor, but in areas accessible and even only known by high-level staff.
      • Casino surveillance are also sophisticated to levels on par with federal buildings. It would take a little more than a tap from Livingston, even with an on-site connection, to be able to control as much as he does.
      • A crucial part of the con involves Saul, as Lyman Zerga, being able to watch his valuables in the "eye in the sky" room, where a faked heart attack runs a distraction for Linus to get inside the elevator without detection. Casinos prevent this by limiting who can access surveillance rooms and the like to specific people, and even high-ranking executives may not be able to get into these rooms without weeks of pre-approval screening.
      • The Bellagio also has a low enough presence of guards, cameras, and countermeasures like "man traps" that the crew can generally get anywhere undetected. Real-life casinos make it nigh-impossible for someone to sneak somewhere they shouldn't be without getting spotted by someone or running into an entryway requiring a level of identification they would not possess. Rusty and Danny mention this during the planning, but it's much more numerous than portrayed.
      • The pinch knocks out the power to the casinos on the block, causing 30 seconds of blindness that allows Danny and Linus to access the vault with the laser grid powered down. Casinos have multiple layers of 'UPS' (uninterrupted power supply) where one kicks in as soon as another is knocked out so that even a blackout or surge would be unable to actually take down the electricity in the building (being in Vegas, a desert climate with a LOT of power in use, engineers have carefully thought through any such blackout scenario).
      • The Bellagio's vault is heralded as the most ingenious ever designed, yet the doors can be taken down by a simple explosive charge.
    • The plan to "rob" The Bank is to have the whales on the floor win and cash out a half-billon dollars in the matter of minutes where owner Willy Bank can't interfere. The dealers are simply amazed, but not suspicious, of the sudden (rigged) massive winnings in front of them, while the casino happily cashes out everyone, no questions asked, even when and after an earthquake has pummeled the hotel. In real life, dealers and pit bosses would certainly be on high alert over so much money being won simultaneously, and cashiers are not obliged to cash out if they have a rightful suspicion it was not won legitimately.
  • Take That!: Terry's sarcastic advice to not pay cash for an expensive Newport Beach sports car is undoubtedly a dig at Kevyn Wynn's kidnappers, who were apprehended when one attempted to buy a Ferrari in Newport Beach with cash.
  • The Team Benefactor: Reuben. All he does is provide the initial investment and snark.
  • Television Geography: Ocean's Twelve partly takes place in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The iconic scene at the train station, which we're supposed to think is Amsterdam Central train station, however doesn't feature Amsterdam Central train station, but was shot in Haarlem train station—because while Amsterdam Central train station looks pretty on the outside, the inside looks completely generic (at least at the time the movie was shot - it's been thoroughly renovated since) while Haarlem train station's interior and tracks look/(ed) majestic.
  • Theme Naming:
    • Roman's personal nemesis is named Greco. "Clearly, you've never served time in a British boarding school."
    • Also Linus' alter ego's surnames in Twelve and Thirteen: Snackwell and Pepperidge, respectively.
  • Thieves' Cant: In Ocean's Twelve, Danny and Rusty engage in this with their contact Matsui. A confused Linus decides to get in by quoting the lyrics to Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir". The others inform him that he just called Matsui's niece a whore, but later admit that the whole thing was just an elaborate prank.
  • This Is Gonna Suck:
    • Saul does a non-verbal variant in "Eleven" when he pops an antacid in his mouth after the difficulty of the caper is explained to him.
    • Rusty's reaction in Thirteen when the crew realizes the only man who can bankroll them is old friend Terry Benedict.
      Rusty: I was really hoping to avoid that this time.
  • Those Wacky Nazis: When Reuben (who's Jewish) is describing why it's impossible to rob a casino.
    Reuben: They've got enough armed personnel to occupy Paris! ...okay, bad example.
  • Throw the Dog a Bone: At the end of the third film, the hotel reviewer who had a horrible experience as part of the plan is set up to win the jackpot at an airport slot machine, courtesy of Rusty.
  • Tiny Guy, Huge Girl: Referenced when Saul objects to Tess being Benedict's girlfriend on the grounds that she's too tall for him. Presumably Saul finds this trope disagreeable.
  • Title Drop:
    • Happens one film too late:
      Benedict: Apparently, I'm not the only one looking for Ocean's Eleven.
    • Teased a little in Thirteen with Yen's big roulette bet. He puts money down on three numbers: 11, 12, and 13.
  • Token Good Teammate: Linus.
    Linus: Am I the only one here who feels funny about stealing from a handicapped guy?
  • Tranquil Fury: Danny in Twelve after Toulour reveals his motive for selling them out to Benedict (and calling Toulour out for endangering a lot of people's lives just to soothe his wounded ego). Even with the reveal later that Ocean's 11 had won the contest before it even began, Danny's cold anger during this performance almost certainly isn't entirely feigned.
  • Trojan Horse:
    • In Eleven, the team smuggle Yen into the vault inside one of the cash boxes, alongside explosive devices that are made to look like expensive jewels. And then smuggle most of the team both in and out in the SWAT vehicle.
    • Used twice in Thirteen. First to sneak a camera and computer connection into the baddy's office and later to get a magnetron into the computer core.
  • True Companions: Danny's crew. Especially notable in Thirteen, where in the beginning much of the team wants to drug, kill, and bury Willy Bank when he betrayed Reuben and caused him to go into shock.
    • Rusty even walks out on a heist as he was breaking into the vault when he got a call saying his friend was in trouble.
  • Trumplica: Willy Bank, from back in The Apprentice days.
  • Unfolding Plan Montage: Rusty explains to Benedict how the money will be transferred and the transfer goes off.
  • The Unintelligible: Yen, who mostly speaks rapid-fire Chinese. The only words he ever says in English are "where the FUCK you been?" and "shit."
  • Unspoken Plan Guarantee: Both averted and played straight simultaneously. In each film the audience gets to see the gang plan their heists, and see them set up and put together the various facets, so we always know what the gist of the plot is going to be... but there's always something big hidden from the audience - the same big thing that masterfully outwits the villain in the climax. Easily missed hints might appear earlier and totally go over the audience and the villain's head, and things that look like setbacks are almost always revealed to be totally planned. The end result is a con played on both the audience and the villain at the same time, where they think they know everything that's going on only to find that there was an ace in play the whole time they didn't see.
  • Unknown Rival: Toulour is this for the first half of Twelve, as Ocean's 11 don't know who sold them out to Benedict or why.
  • Unwinnable Training Simulation: In Eleven, a trial run of the burglary plays like this.
  • Unwitting Instigator of Doom:
    • Denny Shields, the businessman who suggests the Bellagio Job to Danny in Eleven, is indirectly responsible for the events of Twelve. During a trip to Europe, he boasts about Danny and company's exploits and brilliance to LeMarque and Toulour, which earns the latter's jealousy and sets off his grudge match. It gets somewhat subverted later, when it's revealed LeMarque was actually using Denny as an Unwitting Pawn to kick off his own plan.
    • Despite not being the Big Bad or even the supporting antagonist of Thirteen or at least not until the team-up with Tolour reveal, Benedict is still indirectly responsible for the events of the third film. By buying out Reuben's casino prior to Eleven, he leaves Reuben bitter and angry about being run out of town. This is what leads to Reuben's ill-advised partnership with Bank in the hopes he can re-establish himself in Vegas. This partnership also allows Bank to entrench himself in Vegas, meaning Benedict ends up stuck with one of his biggest rivals figuratively and literally casting a shadow over his own casino.
  • Viewers Are Geniuses: If you don't pay attention (and sometimes even if you do) you probably won't understand what exactly the gang is doing for what reason.
  • Villain Decay:
    • Terry Benedict is a very intimidating Big Bad in the first movie, but by the third has become an eyeroll-worthy irritant that the gang is forced to put up with and don't take too seriously. The gang knew Benedict would betray them over the diamonds, and had planned accordingly.
    • Toulour, who goes from being the Big Bad of Ocean's Twelve to Benedict's lackey in Thirteen.
  • Villain Team-Up: Benedict and Tolour secretly join forces in Thirteen to try and screw over Team Ocean while they're trying to bring down Bank.
  • Villain with Good Publicity: Danny takes what would have been Terry's take from the Thirteen plot and donates it (in his name) to a children's charity sponsored by Oprah, leaving Terry with no choice but to go on her show and publicly accept her gratitude for his "selfless act."
  • Villainous Ethics Decay:
    • Reuben bemoans Benedict's for Disproportionate Retribution targeting an enemy's friends, contrasting that "In the old days they'd just whack you."
    • The third part points out again and again that there is a code of honor and camaraderie amongst members of Vegas' old guard (those who were around to shake Frank Sinatra's hand) and Willie Bank gives absolutely zero shits about it, even not-so-subtly threatening to murder Reuben to get his share of the casino. Danny makes clear as he brings down Willie's entire life that he really should have abided by that code when he had the chance.
  • Vitriolic Best Buds:
    • Danny and Rusty. Danny's whimsical "let the chips fall" style contrasts Rusty's cautious and detailed style, as a result they occasionally have inevitable personality conflicts. They never stop having each other's backs though.
    • The Malloy Twins are a more direct example. They do nothing but argue. Poor Linus was driven crazy within minutes of being stuck in a van with them bickering.
  • Viva Las Vegas!: Ocean's Eleven and Ocean's Thirteen are about pulling a heist/con on a Las Vegas casino owner, the former for profit and the latter for revenge.
  • Waistcoat of Style: Terry's is an antique kimononote  fabric.
  • Wait Here: When part of the crew goes to steal the "pinch", Danny expressly tells Linus to wait in the van. He can't take the bickering of the Molloys and leaves, which leads to... complications.
  • Was Just Leaving: Happens to Danny when Terry Benedict walks in on Danny talking to Tess at a restaurant.
  • Waxing Lyrical: In Ocean's Twelve, Ocean and Rusty start talking Thieves' Cant with Matsui. Linus tries to join the conversation... by reciting Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir". It translates to calling the contact's niece a cheap whore. Or so they claim; in reality they're just playing a prank on him.
  • Weapon for Intimidation: In Ocean's Thirteen, the Night Fox reappears to relieve Linus of the diamonds he'd just stolen. Linus hands them over and chides the Night Fox for being so uncouth as to simply threaten him with a gun. Just before departing, the Night Fox tosses him the gun to show that it's unloaded. He does have some standards.
  • "Well Done, Son" Guy: Linus Caldwell. Danny hooks him in the first movie by promising that after this heist "dad'll be trading on his name"; in the second movie he's upset that his mom helps to bust him out of prison and that his dad knows this, as he will never let Linus live it down and in the third movie he finally gets a part in on one of his dad's schemes after being doubted by him through the whole movie. Then again, it's pretty hard to outdo an experienced thief who's legitimate/cover job is an FBI agent.
  • Where's the Kaboom?: Used for comedic/suspenseful effect: Danny and Linus are reduced to doing this when they try to blow the charges inside the vault door, which is actually a good thing, as Yen is currently stuck near the door and struggling to get free. Doubles as an Ironic Echo when Linus repeats with only light ribbing what Danny told him earlier about focus.
    Linus: You know, you lose focus in this game for one second...
    Danny: I know, and somebody gets hurt. You don't hear Yen complaining.
  • Word-Salad Humor: In Twelve, the conversation between Danny, Rusty, Linus, and Matsui is a collection of gibberish that everyone understands — except Linus.
    Rusty: A doctor, who specializes in skin diseases, will dream he has fallen asleep in front of the television. Later, he will wake up in front of the television, but not remember his dream.
    Danny: If all the animals along the equator were capable of flattery, then Thanksgiving and Halloween would fall on the same day.
  • World of Ham: The thieves many times are bigger than life or forced into hammy impersonations. The villains are even worse (including Al Pacino in full "HOO-AH!" mode). And the second movie has Bruce Willis As Himself, profusely enjoying it.
  • Written-In Absence: The scene in Twelve where Frank is in the bathroom during a meeting was added to cover Bernie Mac's illness, as he really was in the bathroom.
  • Xanatos Gambit:
    • A classic version in the second film. The heroes had won the contest before the heist even started. Everything else was just window dressing.
    • In Thirteen, Benedict sets up his Enemy Mine with Danny and company as this. If the team brings down Bank, his biggest rival is ruined. If they don't bring down Bank, then at least they'll have thrown a wrench in his opereations for the immediate future (and if they get caught, they'll take all the blame and punishment). In either scenario, Benedict's also ensured they won't be able to retrieve the Five Diamond Awards as he demanded in exchange for his funding. Either the team will fail to penetrate Bank's security measures, or they'll get mugged by Toulour on the way out. The plan only fails because Danny and company correctly anticipate that Benedict wouldn't be able to pass up the chance to screw them over.
  • Xanatos Speed Chess: The team has to do this at least once in all three films when something doesn't go according to plan.
  • X Called; They Want Their Y Back: Danny's response to Rusty's snark about his clothes (a tuxedo) as he's leaving prison for the second time. Danny clearly has to take a moment to think of a comeback.
    Rusty: I hope you were the groom.
    Danny: Ted Nugent called. He wants his shirt back.
  • Your Costume Needs Work: Piling on the meta Julia Roberts gag in Twelve, the Night Fox scoffs that Tess doesn't even look like Julia.

 
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Alternative Title(s): Oceans Twelve, Oceans Thirteen

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We Just Walk Out w $150M?

Saul runs through Danny's complicated plan, wondering if this will all work. Danny gives a simple answer.

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