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The ineffective deployment of More Dakka. Bullets fly left, right and centre, but no one is hit. Perhaps they've attended 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.
The opposite of Improbable Aiming Skills. See also Bloodless Carnage.
Examples:
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.
- 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?
- 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?"
- Star Trek ships have an incredible ability to miss every target they ever engage at point blank range with lasers AND homing torpedeos. I always assumed that there was a Star Wars-style EMC environment or something that caused that, because computers don't miss that often.
- This troper seems to recall shots in Star Trek landing more often than missing. They use a homemade trope instead for their dramatic tension...The Worf Barrage.
- Firefly: "I was there, son - I'm fair sure you haven't shot anyone yet."
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.
- Example two: Ed Wuncler and Gin Rummy with semi-automatic assault rifles versus three Indian 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.
- 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.
- 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.
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!"
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 black 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 (no, I Am Not Making This Up), 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.
Webcomics
- Subverted in Dr. McNinja, when 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?" Generally played straight though.
Literature
- This trope is the reason for "Try Again" Bragg's nickname in the 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.
Tabletop Games
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).
Machinima
- A Running Gag in Red Vs Blue is that Church is a truly horrendous marksman. In Chapter 15 of Reconstruction he fires eights shots at an enemy standing at point blank range and misses with every single shot.
- This is also sometimes subverted with Church actually hitting an enemy after all, but only by extreme luck. The most notable case was when he shot at the Meta only to hit a metal spinning blade. The shot then proceeded to rebound off several objects, eventually hitting the Meta in the leg.
Church: I got him, yes! Did you see that? What a shot! I'm awesome!
Washington:It only counts if you call it!
Church:Oh bullshit dude!
Comic Books
- A group of Z-grade heroes, Section 8, occasionally show up in Garth Ennis's Hitman series. The only one with anything approaching traditional superpowers is Friendly Fire, whose energy blasts will hit anything except what he aims at.
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