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Worry not - they couldn't hit the broad side of a barn!
The ineffective deployment of More Dakka. Bullets fly left, right and centre, but no one is getting hit. Their remarkable ability to expend enormous amounts of ammunition without managing to hit anyone (important) distinguishes them as honour graduates from the Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy.
Related to this is when the goodies deliberately miss their shots because they do not wish to kill anyone.
This trope is an example of Truth In Television, particularly after it was statistically analyzed in World War II. Also, after a certain "5.56x45mm isn't a manstopper!" trope started popping up again in Iraq and Afghanistan, the rule apparently became " as many as it takes to down the target." Also, back in the late 1950s, in Robert A Heinlein's Starship Troopers he points out that military histories show that it takes several thousand rounds per person to kill an enemy soldier; even under normal circumstances, in combat, accuracy goes way down. Way, way down.
This has been studied by several military historians, who came to the conclusion that men will deliberately shoot to miss in most cases, due to a deep-seated aversion to killing, even when under fire from the enemy. However, accuracy dramatically increased during the period from the Second World War to Vietnam, due to changes in the way soldiers were indoctrinated. Science Marches On, Heinlein.
The opposite of Improbable Aiming Skills. See also Bloodless Carnage.
Examples
Anime
- Trigun - Because the main character can dodge bullets and refuses to kill or seriously injure his enemies, 99% of the bullets fired in the series accomplish nothing besides property destruction. In fact, in the teaser to the first episode, a bunch of criminals unload countless rounds of ammunition into a restaurant. When they stop, the whole building's been demolished except for Vash, the stool he's sitting on, and the little bit of counter in front of him, which are all completely unharmed.
- Black Lagoon, on occasion, suffers from this trope. The best example is the gun battle between Revy and Killer Maid Roberta. Despite the fact that they fire countless rounds at each other (sometimes at near point-blank range), they only hit each other once, both times apparently only giving each other a minor wound. Of course, this was all necessary in order for them to have a fist fight. And to establish them as being roughly equal in skill; namely, that they're so good they can avoid just about everything the opponent throws at them.
- Neither the militant Library Task Force of Library War nor their pro-censorship nemesis, the Media Cleansing Committee, ever seem to hit anything despite their constant barrages of automatic weapons fire, making it one of the most peaceful (and legal!) civil wars ever depicted.
- The first episode of Burst Angel sees two opponents firing away at each other at point blank range (like, four metres) like no tomorrow, without a single hit.
- Xabungle, like many, 'many' mecha shows, uses this to a certain extreme - but subverts it with its usual comedy. Despite virtually every face character facing a hail of human-scale bullets at some point or another, the number who are wounded from it (let alone killed) can be counted on one hand. It isn't from lack of trying - they're all 'really' good at dodging on foot.
- Parodied in FLCL where Haruko manages to dodge increasingly ridiculous shots, like being completely surrounded by armed people and still dodging, or dodging a shot while inside of the gun barrel.
Film
- Battle sequences in various incarnations of Star Wars are filled with rainbows of laser fire, but rarely do any non-clone/droid characters get hit. This sometimes leads to particularly ridiculous moments where multiple Jedi characters casually converse with each other on ground zero.
- Which is still an improvement on the usual case since at least something or someone is getting hit.
- The lousy action flick Deep Rising has the good guy miss every shot while trying to blast a villain with a machine gun - from about twenty feet away. His partner shows equally crappy marksmanship when he pops up behind her suddenly - from about ten feet away.
- During the climax of Dumb and Dumber, one of the protagonists survives a shot to the chest and empties a pistol clip at the villain from a few feet away, prompting the quote: "Harry! You're alive! .....And you're a terrible shot!"
- Justified, as Harry was at the time working for the FBI. They were only trying to arrest the villian, so might as well hire a complete idiot to do the job.
- Parodied mercilessly in the film UHF in which Weird Al Yankovic as Rambo slowly stares down the man firing at him, slowly takes an arrow out of his quiver, slowly nocks it, and slowly raises his arm to shoot the arrow, only for the camera to switch to a wide cut so we can see the evil man who has been firing the uzi non-stop for about 4 minutes now is standing three feet away.
- During the takeover scene in "Air Force One." The Chechan terrorists kill Marines and Secret Service agents without one of the terrorists being killed or, at least wounded, by governments agents, who are supposed to be the best-shots in the business.
- Justified in Tropic Thunder, where the protagonists, being actors in a movie, have all their guns loaded with blanks.
- In Pulp Fiction, a random gunman takes the lead characters by surprise and unloads a high-caliber revolver at them, only for him to miss every shot and get gunned down after a Beat. Jules interprets this unlikely scenario as divine intervention, and decides to give up the life of a gangster and Walk The Earth.
Literature
- This trope is the reason for "Try Again" Bragg's nickname in Dan Abnett's Warhammer 40000: Gaunt's Ghosts series. Fortunately, due to his sheer strength he is a heavy weapons trooper and usually tots a machine gun-equivalent with ammo to spare.
Live Action TV
- The A Team made this famous, with heroes and villains both firing ridiculous amounts of bullets at the climax of almost every episode, to practically no effect.
- They hit lots of glass windows, car tires, radiators, and other such things. They just never hit any people.
- Guns don't kill people. People kill glass windows, car tires and radiations. And many a Memetic Mutation too.
- Alias used it for the first season and a half — then Sydney started killing people. It's not that Sydney missed her shots though, in general she used tranquillisers.
- Any enemy on Andromeda. To be fair, in one episode, the crew of the Andromeda Ascendant were shown to be wearing "ECM Generators" that "Play hell with smart bullets".
- So... why not use the dumb ones?
- That's what the plasma shots are for. But the heroes have Plot Armor for that.
- This is worst when automated defenses are used. These will track dodging enemies, but walking straight at them is perfectly safe. These are the main ship defence weapons used by the heroes, too.
- Generally averted on Airwolf.
- Usually averted in Stargate, where the Red Shirt Army at the very least show a modicum of competence.
- Ryuutaros, who controls Kamen Rider Den-O's Gun Form, has a tendency to hold his gun sideways and dance while fighting. This causes a lot of property damage and very rarely hits the Monster Of The Week it was supposed to.
- While being chased by the laser-zapping Monster Of The Week on Red Dwarf, Lister laments "Why don't we ever meet anyone nice?" Cat asks "Why don't we ever meet anyone who can shoot straight?"
- Firefly: "I was there, son - I'm fair sure you haven't shot anyone yet."
- "Threshold" The government agents just stun the bad aliens with electronic bullets.
- Carlos Mencia once addressed the way gangstas stereotypically hold their guns (sideways, for no readily apparent reason). When taxed, one of them responded that he holds his gun like that when he shoots because it makes him look cool. He's astonished to find that the aiming guide on top of the gun lines up with his target when held the right way up. Then Mencia makes some remark about how only porn stars should look cool when they shoot.
Machinima
- On a smaller scale, Church in Red Vs Blue. A man that can point his gun at a guard, empty a full clip from less than a foot away, and still manage to completely miss.
Tabletop Games
Video Games
- Played straight in Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core when Zack not only stands still when facing a hail of bullets but TALKS ON HIS FREAKING CELL PHONE!
- Play Empire: Total War for long enough and you'll be solidly convinced the Creative Assembly are fans of this trope.
- Which is a fair criticsm, since in real-life muskets were noted for their extraordinary accuracy......
Web Comics
- Dr. McNinja generally plays this straight for the main characters, but one episode features a subversion. A Batman parody called the Beeman
 leaps at a trio of bank robbers, who open fire with automatic weapons, killing him. The Alt Text for that comic reads "How many times have frustrated Batman writers typed this out, stared at it for hours, sighed, and then deleted the script?"
Western Animation
- Quite often happens in kids' cartoon series, especially the old GI Joe.
- Homestar Runner parodied GI Joe in a commercial for the Cheat Commandos. The Commandos and their perpetual enemies, Blue Laser, are lined up only a few feet from each other and firing like crazy, but no gets hit.
- Parodied in an episode of Twisted Toyfare Theatre when Spider-Man says "You'd actually hit something if you aimed lower", physically pushes Duke's gun down, resulting in a dead Cobra trooper and everyone staring in shock.
- Several episodes of The Boondocks showcased this. It should be noted that at least one Spear Carrier level character has been shot in scenes that would otherwise be pure examples of the trope.
- Example: Two pissed off Black guys take semiautomatic guns, point it at each other (one is directly against the cheek, the other directly up the nose) and fire for about three seconds, completely missing.
- Even when they were looking away while firing in sheer terror, something should have connected, unless they jerked the guns totally out of the way. Of course, it was used to demonstrate the idiocy of pulling out a weapon over nothing, and then unfairness (or prudence?) when a pair of cops plug them despite their having made up (and sworn off violence? Can't recall.)
- Example two: Ed Wuncler and Gin Rummy with semi-automatic assault rifles versus three Middle Eastern store owners with handheld automatics. None of the gunmen are hit, Huey and Riley took cover and are apparently OK, and the one policeman? He got hit, but he was OK. In fact he managed to stand up and get shot again.
- Another amusing example of this was the Gangstalicious episode, where Riley discovered his hero was not only not gangsta, but also gay. Gangstalicious' jilted ex-lover and his crew tried to execute a naked, tied-up 'Licious, only to empty their guns from six feet away and miss. The Latino banger in the group lamented, "Man...we suck."
- In the same episode Gangstalicious and his rival E-Dirt get into an argument in a club. They pull out their guns and... each of them proceeds to accidentally shoot himself.
- The Diniverse version of Batman frequently swung down to kick automatic-weapon-toting enemies, inexplicably not being hit by the massive amounts of lead coming his way. Bullets coming his way seem to vanish into the aether milliseconds before they should rightfully swiss-cheese him.
- Dr. McNinja referenced this directly, with more logical results.
- On the flip side of the coin, at the climax of the 1989 movie Batman, Batman is attempting to kill the Joker. His Batwing is well equipped with weapons and an advanced targeting system... and he still misses. The Joker then shoots him down with a simple revolver... albeit one with a very long barrel.
- And this was... suddenly inverted? in The Dark Knight Returns, where Batman tight-ropes over two buildings and two guys with automatics unload on him. He gets hit. A lot. Right in the three-inch-thick steel chest plate he wears under the bright yellow Bat-Symbol.
- Gotham Knight has some fun with this, where Bats tries to run straight at Deadshot while the latter is blazing away with a two-barrelled automatic Arm Cannon... and connects. Cue Deadshot quipping about how this was the first time he had ever seen anyone try to dodge his bullets by running at them.
- In Zixx, during the virtual reality/game sequences, the heroes will often be chased by mooks ineffectively spraying laser fire at them. It tips over from Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy to outright A Team Firing when the heroes are pinned down, with nowhere to turn and nothing to defend them, with enemy lasers still going in wild directions around their general vicinity, long enough for them to panic, work out a plan, and get out of there without being hit once.
- Lampshaded in Stroker And Hoop where Hoop explains that he "always aims just slightly above the head" to avoid actually killing someone. This lampshade then leads to a subversion where Hoop manages to actually kill someone despite aiming slightly above their heads.
- Subverted in another episode where the only time Stroker and Hoop actually manage to shoot someone is when their guns discharge after being dropped.
- This trope runs rampant in the animated GI Joe. The only exception is when shooting at a manned vehicle, wherein the people inside get to escape before the vehicle is destroyed... often making their escape before even coming under fire, let alone the vehicle actually taking any damage.
- True tale: There was exactly one episode from the 1990s version where a character didn't get out of the vehicle before it got hit. Destro was more or less fine, although rather shaken up(little wonder, as he'd just had his Dominator shot to pieces underneath him.) The delicious irony of that moment? This Troper was watching it at the age of 8 or 9, one morning at a babysitter's house before school, and said babysitter's husband had just finished an annoyed spiel about how the characters always manage to get out in time. Cue Dominator blasting and Destro finding himself in the wreckage of what had just been his tank/helicopter. Cue a boy not yet 10 just looking at the guy with one eyebrow raised, not even saying a word.
- In Kim Possible neither Shego with her green plasma whatevers nor Duff Killigan and his exploding golf balls appear to do any damage at all ever, except to the background.
- More because Kim Possible is a cheerleader-ninja with Badass Normal dodging skills. And because it's pretty hard to hit a target like a person with a golf ball, even exploding ones.
- For all that they're programmed and trained war robots who've been through millenia of combat, the Transformers seem to have an awfully hard time hitting anything.
- In the latter half of the G1 two-parter "Dinobot Island", the Decepticons not only succeed in hitting the Autobots, but essentially pin them all to the ground with a sustained round of gunfire. Apparently they just had their guns set to 'ticklefight'... at least, until the movie.
Real Life
- The (in)famous Hawthorne Inn Shootout, which occurred in the Chicago suburb of Cicero in 1926. Al Capone's greatest rival, Dion O'Banion, sent a motorcade full of gunmen to directly assault Capone's headquarters. In all, over 1,000 shots were fired but no mobsters died (in fact, the only casualty turned out to be an innocent bystander).
- Pretty much embodies battlefield tactics from the 17th century to the mid 19th century. The average infantryman of the period had a gun that was troublesome and slow to reload, as well as literally being unable to hit the broad side of a barn at 200 yards. Most muskets were made with sights little more than a little bit of metal at the end of the barrel, the remainder without any at all. Instead of the popular "ready, aim, fire", "aim" was replaced by another word along the lines of "point your gun in a general direction" or omitted altogether. Rather than rely on any sort of individual marksmanship, massed fire was relied on to overcome these inherent disadvantages, and so a soldier was incessantly drilled and trained like an automaton to fire as fast as the man next to him.
- Any attempt at accuracy was further bodged by the enormous amounts of smoke black gunpowder would produce. After more than a few volleys of men doing this, the battlefield was shrouded in gray-black smoke.
- Supposedly what separated First World soldiers from Third World enemies... although this has been unfortunately averted, and not simply by heavy volumes of fire that by chance happen to hit. (I'm not speaking of "Black Hawk Down" either.)
- As a product of studies conducted since WWII, which revealed either the 'reluctance' or 'lack of skill' plus 'shooting-under-stress' factors cited above (depending on which experts you believe), modern training practices for professional militaries now train weapon-handling drills into soldiers' rote-memory as a matter of course... though even with knowledge of proper aiming techniques, marksmanship standards do tend to suffer in nominal peacetime, when bureaucracy and cost-cutting measures often mean troops aren't allowed enough live ammunition or range-time to establish/maintain proficiency.
- This was the subject of a Ron White anecdote. He saw a shootout on CNN where a large amount of LAPD officers were firing on a man hiding behind his Suburban. After the shootout was over, the man still hadn't been shot. In fact, not even the Suburban got hit.
- This Troper recalls an anecdote (archived on the Darwin Awards site) where, during The Troubles in Northern Ireland, military intelligence agents and plainclothes police got into a shootout due to mistaken identity. Over 100 rounds were fired, and no one was hit.
- The NYPD is quite infamous for its poor overall marksmanship, hitting what they shoot at less than a third of the time, over all ranges. The closer the range, the more accurate they are, but even then accuracy is abysmal.
- This is one of the modern military strategies- powerful machine guns, operating on a More Dakka concept, lay down enough suppressive fire to keep the enemy in hiding long enough for air support to show up.
- Suppressive fire in general is expected to not hit whatever it's firing on - it's to force the enemy to not return fire, stop them from moving into the cone of fire's direction, or just plain scare them to keep their heads down. Suppressive fire is also generally utilized for the purpose of soldiers just getting closer and flanking the suppressed enemy so they can (very reliably at such ranges) shoot them.
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