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In the unlikely event I ever become president of a company, my first order of business will be to promote the janitor to executive vice president. Then I'll call him into my office and say "All right, Herb, I want you to tell me what's going on in the company. Care for a drink before we begin? I think I have a bottle of Scotch around here someplace."
"Lower left drawer of your desk," Herb will reply, "Right behind your box of El Puffo cigars, which, I might add, are excellent." — Patrick McManus, The Good Samaritan Strikes Again
Some works of fiction live and die on rankings. The characters have their own power hierarchy, but usually you'll find that each character's power level is consistent with their rank.
Then there's the Almighty Janitor.
The Almighty Janitor is that character who is near the bottom of the scale in terms of rank, but is at the top in terms of what he can actually accomplish. Maybe he screwed up in the past, maybe he pissed off the higher-ups and has been paying for it ever since, maybe he's really lazy, or maybe he just likes his job. Often, his lowly position is the very thing that grants him access to the true levers of power. Typically, he'll never go up in rank at all, and it's a subversion when he does.
Compare Hyper Competent Sidekick, who is similar to the Almighty Janitor in terms of being the one who really gets things done, but still has to do what the boss says. The Almighty Janitor is largely immune to the whims of the higher-ups and can disregard them at will. When the Almighty Janitor does things right and people know it but he still doesn't get promoted, there is overlap with Limited Advancement Opportunities. A secretary is also a common recipient of this trope. Contrast Authority Equals Asskicking.
A Giant Mook is similar to an Almighty Janitor in being low-ranking and dangerous, but is generally at least logically employed as a soldier.
Please note that while Janitor thinks she is mighty, she is not an Almighty Janitor.
When the Janitor really is the Almighty, see Angel Unaware.
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Examples
Anime & Manga
- Naruto remains a Genin although at the time of the exams he was pulling off Jounin-level jutsus; after the Time Skip, he's still a Genin (having not been present for any exams) despite being said to be at Kage level of strength.
- So, technically, is his rival Sasuke, who, now that he's back in action after leaving Orochimaru, has taken down as many Akatsuki and former Akatsuki by himself as the whole of the Leaf Village combined (although his fight with Itachi was apparently thrown).
- According to a conversation between two examiners, Naruto and Sasuke were always recognized as powerful ninjas, what they were not recognized as were trustworthy leaders of men (for various reasons). Strength alone didn't cut it with the review board.
- Most people do recognize it's simply a technicality, and never let it get in the way of either being assigned missions higher than genin typically achieve.
- Likewise with Shikamaru. Temari commented in an episode of the anime that Shikamaru should be a jounin by now, and Asuma said Shikamaru had what it took to be Hokage. If he had his way, he probably would have never become a Chunin.
- Clare from Claymore is ranked dead last among Claymores at #47, and is treated like a piece of garbage as as result of being seen as weak. However, she ends up being one of the most powerful Claymores through pure gumption and determination and becomes capable of taking on — and winning — against Claymores ranked in the top 5.
- Speaking of Claymore, Rafaela could also qualify, despite being in the top five. Being ranked fifth implies that there are four members who are stronger than her...But this isn't actually the case! It is eventually revealed that she's actually the strongest of them (except, possibly, Alicia). She's the surviving rank 2 from the previous generation of Claymores who was considered to be on par with the number 1 of that generation. However, she has no motivation to increase her rank and is only with the organization for information on her awakened sister, Luciela.
- Blackbeard was this at the start of One Piece, serving little more then a Giant Mook under Whitebeard for decades. A while before the story starts, he is nominated to take over a vacancy as commander of the 2nd Division, but passes it up, saying he has no such ambition, and is given to Ace. Considering that the top 4 Division commanders of Whitebeard are his strongest fighters, and Blackbeard had no Devil's Fruit powers at the time, this says something about him. Subverted, as it turns out that all he wanted was the Yami Yami no Mi, killing Thatch of the 4th Division for it, then fleeing making his own crew, and captures Ace, cashing in and then becoming a Shichibukai, and revealing that he has a lot of ambitions, and this is just the start of them.
- Ikkaku Madarame of Bleach is a third officer, yet is more skilled than several of the series' lieutenants. He can perform bankai, a skill that would normally make you considered for captain position, but refuses to reveal it to anyone. The reason for this is that doing so would get him transferred out of the 11th squad, which he wants to stay in (he cannot defeat 11th squad's captain or lieutenant).
- Likewise, there's Ikkaku's old friend Yumichika Ayasegawa, who deliberately remains a fifth officer in the same squad. His power is equivalent to a lieutenant, and he could easily be the squad's fourth officer, but doesn't want to. Why? Because the kanji for four is ugly. (He would prefer to be the third officer, but he can't beat Ikkaku).
- Even more likewise, Yumichika duels a lieutenant who seemingly has the upper hand and keeps telling Yumichika there's no way a fifth-ranked officer could defeat a lieutenant. Yumichika swears him to silence, and then explains exactly why he is ranked as low as he is, and then shows what he can really do—something even (and especially) the other members of his squad are unaware of,
- Ichigo Kurosaki also arguably fits this trope as he is often one of the strongest characters in the series, and yet is only ranked "Substitute Shinigami" a rank not even recognized by the local authority of Kakura Town, Afo-san.
- Rukia is capable of performing shikai, and is arguably as powerful as a lieutenant. Say whatever you want about her victories being plotkai driven, she was at least powerful enough to disable Grimmjow right as he was about to blow Ichigo's head off. He broke out, but it bought enough time for Shinji to arrive and save them both. She's not even a seated officer. This is because of a request from Byakuya, knowing that if she was promoted she'd be put on more dangerous missions.
- Judai Yuki of Yu-Gi-Oh GX willingly remains in the Osiris Red dorms despite the fact that he's the best duelist in Duel Academia. At first it was because he wanted to wait until his friends graduated, but even after they did he never moved up.
- Actually, Juudai's raeson for not going up is far simpler, and never changes: he likes being in the Red Dorm. That's all.
- Speaking of Yu-Gi-Oh, Bakura from the original series may qualify vaguely (in canon, that is; Fanon regards him as a god who only loses because he's too good for the game). Though he never actually wins a single duel against a major character, in Battle City he holds his own against Yugi and Marik until each pulls out their respective deus ex; in the last season, where he finally receives his upgrade to Big Bad, he clearly has Kaiba on the ropes until he surrenders the fight because he has better things to do with his time. A classic Janitor move if there ever was one.
- Perhaps there needs to be an opposite to this as well. When the almighty person is really a one-hit kill for the main character despite all the hype of being able to take down entire score/army/world/universe with the blink of an eye. I can actually think of a few examples, and not even all from DBZ.
- AntiClimax Boss?
- Isamu Alva Dyson from Macross Plus continues to blatantly flaunt his hair-trigger temper and insubordination because he doesn't want to rise too high in rank, as he wouldn't be allowed to fly anymore as a pilot.
- In the "true" ending of the Unlimited Blade Works route of Fate Stay Night, Rin talks with Shirou after class, telling him that she has been accepted as a student at the Clocktower, and is allowed to bring him as her apprentice. This way he would be there for free but be literally the lowest on the totem pole, not even officially registered there. Despite his Reality Marble, something that, chances are, nobody else there could ever hope to obtain.
- Asato Tsuzuki from Yami No Matsuei looks (and is paid) just like a normal Shinigami, but is extremely efficient in his work and can singlehandedly control twelve shikigami, including all of the extremely powerful Four Gods.
- In Dragon Ball, Mr. Popo would apply as this given that he was able to defeat the young Goku, who at that point had defeated Piccolo Daimaō, the evil half of Kami, and amazingly, much later in the series was shown that Goten and Trunks who had both turned Super Saiyan and Mr. Popo had just about held his own against them, before becoming overwhelmed. Even though it was Filler.
- All the protagonists of Soul Eater are of this kind: Maka and Soul Eater began the series about to complete their training. However, when they failed their final test they were forced to go back to the beginning in order to improve. Black☆Star is a bottom-ranked student because he spends all his time training instead on schoolwork, but his innate assassin abilities and soul wavelength (not to mention his constant drive for self-improvement) makes him more powerful than Maka. Finally, Death the Kid became a Shibusen student even though he doesn't need to (it was an attempt to bail the other main characters out of a pinch); being a shinigami he's already as powerful as a full-fledged technician.
- The manga eventually sees some of them break out of this rut.
- As of the end of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha's third season, the Crystal Dragon Jesus of the Saint Church is studying in one of their schools as an "ordinary" elementary student.
- Suzaku from Code Geass is one of the top two knightmare pilots in the entire world and controls an unstoppable Super Prototype, but is treated like dirt by the Britainia military because of the fact he is Japanese. This continues even after he is knighted by his love interest and only changes after he is made one of the twelve highest ranked warriors in Britainia.
- Mirielle's hair stylist from Noir gives excellent information on the happenings of international organized crime.
- Kyon of Suzumiya Haruhi shows us how The Janitor would be as a kid. Without the evil.
- The most powerful character in
this show almost every show is a girl who spends her whole day in the Literature clubroom.
- Gauron from Full Metal Panic, as further explained in the Light Novels. One Amalgam member explained that with his skills, he could have easily been promoted to commander. However, due to the fact that he had cancer, and that most of Amalgam's members had a hard time getting along with him (with them even making him the butt of a joke where they called him "Mr. Iron" — a metal that isn't able to amalgamate with Mercury, therefore indicating he "isn't one of them"), they never promoted him to that rank. Instead, they allowed Gates (who was obviously less competent and skilled) to take that position. Despite the lack of rank, however, Gauron still managed to be a very powerful, wealthy terrorist.
- Sōsuke, as well. Despite being insanely competent and skilled, saving the day countless times, he remains a sergeant for the entire series. Partly explained by how lacking in motivation he has to move up in rank, and how he just plain doesn't care. In one instance, he's shown to have actively underperformed because he didn't want to be promoted to being under Mao.
- The janitor in Fumoffu after Sōsuke and Issei fed him his pet koi, whom he saw almost like a grandaughter. He then commences to attack Sōsuke and Issei, one an experienced soldier and the other a very talented martial artist, and not only are they unable to defeat the janitor in combat, they are overwhelmed by his superiority.
- Negi of Mahou Sensei Negima is technically still working under a "provisional" magic license and hopes to eventually become a full mage. Despite the fact that he's an absolute genius at spell development, has defeated/proved himself more competent than a number of high level mages, and is probably one of the top ten most powerful people alive.
- His father Nagi would count academically, as he dropped out of magic school. However, he was the leader of the Ala Rubra through sheer magical power.
- Although all of the Kurogane Five from Shin Mazinger are badass enough to take on giant robots on foot, Kiku is the one that takes the cake. A little old cleaning lady with super speed and can tear you apart with Razor Floss without even the slightest effort.
- In the Dengeki Daisy manga, the eponymous "Daisy", a former cutting-edge software engineer and an accomplished super-hacker, is the school janitor. Also rather quite almighty.
- In Darker Than Black, the incredibly Bad Ass superpowered ninja protagonist, feared throughout the underworld as "The Black Shinigami", can usually be found working at a menial job as part of an undercover assignment. This can lead to... amusing situations. For instance, once, when he was working as a waiter, he got attacked by a violent drunk with a broken bottle who didn't want to pay his tab. Hei's dodging skills were so epic that someone nearby decided that, "It's true - all Chinese People are martial arts masters..."
- Detective Conan: Conan is just a kid (in appearance, at least), and nobody ever listens to kids. Once he has solved a crime, he usually has to resort to his tranquilizer wristwatch and voice-changing bow tie in order to relay his deductions through a handy Sock Puppet.
- One episode of Sgt Frog has Private Tamama become the new Platoon Leader. When the old Platoon Leader Sergeant Keroro complains that a lower-ranking officer shouldn't be allowed to lead a platoon, it's pointed out that he (technically) follows this trope, as he is outranked by Sergeant Major Kululu.
- In RosarioPlusVampire the bus driver appears to be far more knowledgeable and respected by the other staff than one might expect. He doesn't actually show any almighty powers or fighting skills aside from, apparently, being able to drive his bus literally anywhere, but he's impressive enough that some fans have promoted him to one of the three Demon Lords.
Comics
- In the Hawaii issues of the comic Ninja High School the janitor was, while not the best fighter, definitely a formidable combatant and stronger than the main character, a very skilled ninja herself, for quite awhile.
- Superman: Clark Kent is a pretty good reporter and by all appearances nothing else. But when he or a friend or a planet or a universe or a multiverse is placed in danger he cuts loose and reveals (to the reader) that he's the alternate identity of Superman. Perhaps making him the ultimate example of this trope.
- Superman is also highly intelligent, capable of probably holding any professional level employment.
- Not actually a janitor, but in a similar line of business: Dilbert features the "World's Smartest Garbageman," who fits neatly into this trope. He is smart enough to glance as a few pieces of metal and in an instant figure out how to make them ignore the laws of physics.
- The title character in the comic strip Frazz is an elementary school janitor who's smarter and more erudite than some of the teachers, and possibly the school principal.
- He's also a songwriter who gets at least a meaningful amount of royalties — it's somewhat implied he may not even actually need a day job, let alone as a janitor.
Films
- In Bruce Almighty the title character meets a janitor who turns out to be God.
- Bruce Campbell's character, Ash Williams, in the Evil Dead trilogy is Bad Ass personified, but his job is being a lowly salesperson at S-Mart. ("Shop Smart! Shop S-Mart!")
- Steven Seagal's character in the film Under Siege is a former Navy SEAL working as a ship's cook. His backstory involves striking a commanding officer after a bad mission, and losing his security clearance, etc.
- The Trainman of The Matrix Revolutions. Conductor for the train station program who looks like smelly hobo but is effectively a god in his world and can defeat even Neo with just a flick of his wrist.
- While Neo gets used to the new setting's code. He doesn't, by the way.
- In the movie Good Will Hunting, the main character is a janitor at a college campus who, without any higher education, is capable of solving questions that are impossibly difficult for the actual
students professors there.
- The character Moses in The Hudsucker Proxy was a mysterious and overly powerful Janitor. He actually stopped time at one point.
- Strictly speaking, he wasn't ever supposed to do that.
- There was another janitor too, Aloysius, an evil version of this trope.
- The Toxic Avenger is about a janitor who essentially becomes The Hulk.
- The janitor in Disturbing Behavior who pretends to be mentally impaired while plotting to root out the evil taking over the high school.
- Bill the Electrician in the excellent House II: The Second Story makes a cameo as an example of this trope.
- Please! Electrician and Adventurer!
- Subversion/averted in the movie Sky High: Everybody at the school has super powers (so presumably the janitor would, too) — except the bus driver, who's the only person to have two super-powered parents and not have any powers of his own.
- Although he does lay the smackdown upon the Big Bad's hench-thing towards the end. With a broom.
- In The Breakfast Club, Carl might only be the janitor, but as the self-proclaimed "eyes and ears of the institution", he knows quite a lot about what goes on around the school.
- The Stupids: "IN THE NAME OF THE LLOYD!"
- In Kung-Fu Hustle we encounter three undercover masters of Kung Fu as a submissive baker, a gay tailor and a sweating coolie. The trope is slightly subverted, as five other, even more proficient masters, shed their lowly — or at least quite unlikely — fake identities of e.g. blind street musician, yellow-bellied landlords or asylum inmate.
- The Beast willingly checked himself into the asylum because he ran out of worthy opponents to challenge and kill. Which makes him a very scary Retired Badass and Sealed Evil In A Can... or rather, Sealed Evil On the Can as he's seen found reading the papers on the john when his cell door is picked open.
- In The Hunt for Red October, the whole defection plot by the senior Russian officers is nearly derailed by the cook and his pistol.
- Subverted in that the cook was a GRU officer planted aboard the ship specifically for this purpose.
- In Brazil, the independent plumber is portrayed as an absurdly competent vigilante handyman. The fact that he is shown saving the main character in the dream sequence at the end of the film probably counts as a subversion of this trope, though.
- In UHF, the janitor's television program is pretty much the only reason Weird Al's television channel begins to get high ratings. However, the janitor didn't want to have his own show unless he keeps the role of janitor.
- In Zac Efron's new 17 Again, a magic janitor grants the wish of Mathew Perry to relive his youth.
- Zatoichi films star a man named... Ichi. Zato is his title, the lowest of four ranks in the official blind people guild that existed in Japan at the time. So the title in Japanese means Low-ranking Blind Person Ichi. He eeks out a living as a lowly blind masseur, which was pretty much the one job they had for blind people in Japan back then. Ichi is, as you already know, also invincible. Between his sword and his wit, it is rare for anyone in the movies to get the upper hand on him, let alone beat him.
Literature
Live Action TV
- This page cannot exist without mention of the true Almighty Janitor from Scrubs (pictured), who is so devious, underhanded and omniscient it borders on a superpower.
- Not to mention he is the king of lies and is mighty enough to domineer over both Dr. Cox and Dr. Kelso.
- Plus he can make people do things with his mind.
- He also made a key that opens ANY LOCK EVER.
- Dr. Kelso did on at least one occasion tell the janitor that he was worthless and more or less unnecessary, and could be fired on a whim, but while it dealt a blow to his self-esteem he didn't appear particularly concerned about his job.
- Probably because the mean words hurt his feelings, but logic dictates that Kelso was in fact not only wrong but backwards. Kelso's job as chief of medicine appears to involve no medicine at all and consist of things Ted could do sufficiently well to run the hospital if necessary. The Janitor's job is to keep the hospital clean; while this is not a job that requires a lot of training it is one that the doctors are unlikely to do themselves, and therefore without him there is no hospital.
- And since, as stated dozens of times in the show, the number one killer in hospitals is infection, his job of keeping everything clean and sanitized means he's conceivably saved more lives than many of the doctors. Certainly more than Doug.
- He also once travelled faster than the speed of sound but you must never ever ask him how.
- He also doesn't believe in the moon, thinking it's the other side of the sun. A statement which is probably now correct...
- When House was a child in Japan, he witnessed doctors asking for medical advice from what looked to be a literal Almighty Janitor. It turns out the guy was a medical genius who dressed like a janitor because he was a Buraku (an untouchable). House says this is the reason he became a doctor. The man wasn't liked, but he was respected; "Because he was right."
- House himself is technically a "lowly infectious disease guy" who happens to be able to diagnose patients no-one else can.
- Subverted in the season 4 premier where, after the ducklings have all quit or been fired, House starts using the janitor to bounce ideas off of, even having him pretend to be "Dr. Buffer" and deal with the patient's family. Hilarity Ensues.
- Corporal Walter "Radar" O'Reilly practically ran the 4077th M*A*S*H.
- Early episodes depicted him as possessing genuine telepathic (and possibly precognitive) powers, but these were abandoned about midway through the first season — and with good reason, as they were a case of Adaptation Decay: the original book's Radar simply had oversized ears and extraordinarily acute hearing.
- The Janitor of Black Hole High is a time-traveling observer from the even more distant future than all the other time traveling observers from the future in the series.
- Closer in tone to Frazz than most of these examples: Overton from Living Single. If he's not the smartest of the regular cast, he's definitely the wisest. And a wizard with a wrench, to boot.
- Ye Olde Tyme Parody TV Show Police Squad! had Johnny the Shoeshine Guy. Inspector Drebin would consult him about "the word on the street"; Johnny would say "I don't know nuthin'!", whereupon the Inspector would slip him a twenty and get detailed insider info about the Bad Guys' operations. And in a running gag, after the Inspector left, someone else would come up and Johnny would give them detailed information using the same procedure. The persons in question included a surgeon asking how to perform open-heart surgery, a priest wanting to know about the Afterlife, a fireman needing instructions on how to put out a warehouse fire, Dr. Joyce Brothers needing to know about mental health, baseball manager Tommy Lasorda needing tho know how to handle his pitching staff, and TV music host Dick Clark asking about new musical trends (and getting his supply of anti-aging cream).
- Eureka has Henry Deacon, the simple mechanic who knows everything about everything. Need a crash course in quantum physics? Call Henry. Temporal theory? Give Henry a ring. How about a quick list of any of the town's supergeniuses who might possibly know something he doesn't? He can tell you. This is only subverted midway through Season 3, where he is named the town's Mayor-elect in a surprise write-in ballot.
- A lot of characters on Eureka could qualify as this, considering it is an entire town of Mad Scientists. Take Vincent for example. He seems to run a simple restaurant, but is so good at his job that no customer has ever been able to request a meal that he cannot provide. Taggart, who everybody sees as being a nut, is actually probably the greatest trapper and animal expert in the world. Even Fargo, the resident Butt Monkey, is a genius capable of building a sentient house despite being treated as little more than a lab assistant by most of the other residents.
- Really, even Sheriff Carter. He may be one of the few town residents who is not a genius, but he is the guy the geniuses call on to fix things when disaster looms.
- Handicapped (literally by the loss of a hand) former Canadian super spy Adderly was banished to the Department of Miscellaneous Affairs, which handles jobs too insignificant to be dealt with by anyone else. Only slightly impaired by his prosthetic, he insisted on running amuck as a Cowboy Cop.
- In one episode of The Big Bang Theory, Sheldon recruits a janitor to act as a silent grunt for his physics bowl team, but it turns out that this Janitor is from Ruritania and actually was a high-level physicist there. Sheldon ignores him anyway.
- Joel Robinson of Mystery Science Theater 3000. Not only was he a genius inventor capable of creating robotic life capable of independent thought AND humor, but "he did a good job cleaning up the place."
- But his bosses didn't like him, so they shot him into space.
- Las Vegas: Mike Cannon is an engineer, MIT graduate, and Hollywood Nerd. He starts the series as a valet. He's called in to help the actual security staff several times during the first season. Despite his initial reluctance — due to actually liking being a valet, and the potential pay cut — he eventually becomes full-time security staff. In the final season, he's actually promoted to head of security.
- Played with in Lie to Me, whose Ria Torres is discovered by Lightman working at an airport as a TSA agent, with naturally developed Living Lie Detector abilities rivalling that of her future boss.
- Jennifer from WKRP in Cincinnati is an example of this; despite being a mere receptionist, she is the highest-paid employee at the station, arguably the most competent person in the entire outfit, and untouchable by anyone, including the REAL boss.
- Lenny Bicknall from MI High and his replacement Frank London. International superspies forced to masquerade as a school caretaker.
- Lewis from The Drew Carey Show. Of course, he's a janitor at a pharmaceutical company whose innovations are so extreme they're getting into biotech...
- Arguably, Lester Freamon in The Wire qualifies. He's intensely clever and competent, and got shuffled off to the Pawnshop Division for offending someone, rather than lacking ability. Which he proves, when he's palmed off on Daniels.
- Sir Humphrey Appleby of Yes (Prime) Minister, despite being anonymous to the population at large and describing himself as a "humble functionary", is effectively running the country from behind the scenes by the end of the series.
- Dr. Krogshøj from Riget is, despite his status as a low ranking doctor, one of the most powerful people on the Kingdom Hospital thanks to the effort he puts into digging up dirt on every other employee. Thankfully, he only does it so Justice Will Prevail.
- On Fringe, Olivia has trouble readjusting after her return from "over there." Nina Sharp refers her to Sam Weiss, the man who "helped put (her) back together" after she got her cyberarm. As it turns out, Sam Weiss is a bowling alley attendant.
- In an episode of Freaky, a troublemaking student discovers too late that the school caretaker is some kind of supernatural being who commands an army of floor buffers. Said troublemaker ends up a permenant stain on the floor of the school gym.
- Star Trek: Thoughout the TNG/DS 9/Voyager era, Boothby the gardner knows all the cadets and gives many of them advice. He seems to be able to spot the ones who have leadership potential and Picard is seen trusting his counsel when he begins an investigation on Red Squad. In Voyager, when species 8472 creates a simulation of Starfleet Academy, the creature in charge of the project takes the role of Boothby.
- Merlin himself from Merlin. He appears to be a normal boy (and servant to Arthur), but he in fact is quite skilled in magic and can probably kick most people's butts.
Tabletop Games
- GURPS I.O.U. features a janitor who will clean up any mess the students get into, up to and including a nuclear holocaust. He will also be able to provide anything the student might need, in exchange for a small donation to the Janitor's Retirement Fund.
Video Games
Web Animation
- Red Vs Blue. While not as competent as some of the others on this page, Church was supposed to be promoted to the rank of Captain after the death of Captain Flowers. However Sister was the one bringing the message and since she took a long time to arrive and then apparently forgot to mention this to Church, he remained a Private and is officially only the acting leader of the Blue team.
- Well, really he's only better by comparison as he's practically the only one in Blood Gulch that's neither Too Dumb To Live or impossibly lazy; he still wouldn't be considered a good soldier by regular standards because of, among other things, his increasingly bad aim and horrible temper.
- Combined with the fact that technically, he isn't even alive anymore. In fact, he was never alive, he's just an AI, so it's unlikely he even could be promoted.
Real Life
- In many schools, the janitors really do get paid more than the teachers.
- If you ever saw the sorts of messes that a janitor had to clean up in some schools, you'd understand why.
- This troper goes to a certain high school in Texas, where the head janitor is Louie Ortega [1]
 Bass player of the Texas Tornadoes, whose records have gone gold, and who holds a Grammy. Also, he can solve any problem, and open any door.
- According to many Ninja legends, these elite warriors and spies would hide in plain sight by dressing as commoners, including gardeners, field workers, and housekeepers, since these would be the last people suspected of having the ability to tie your ankles behind your head with their pinkies.
- Even more an example of this trope: one theory to the origin of Ninjas is that they originated as commoners who fought against, and later for, local Lords, using weapons made from farm equipment, and careful tactics due to lacking armor and proper equipment.
- One U-Boat used a cook as spotter, since even without binoculars he could see better than trained spotters with binoculars.
- Do you know what was the only official title of Deng Xiaoping during the late part of his life? Honorary Chairman of the Chinese Federation... of Bridge Players, which did not stop him from ruling China behind the scenes: forget the chessmasters: I present you the almighty card player!
- Well, considering that the Chinese-made Precision bidding system threw the world of Bridge for a loop for many years, a bridge player views this as Fridge Brilliance — who else would be able to run a country than the leader of a team coming up with such a brilliant system?
- And, if the ability of computers to master the game is used as a metric, bridge (along with Go), is actually a more complex game than chess, so the Bridgemaster would be a more fearsome opponent.
- Albert Einstein: revolutionized the world of physics and our understanding of the universe while working as a clerk in the Swiss Patent Office.
- Oddly, "Clerk in a Patent Office" in the late 19th and early 20th century was actually considered a moderate prestige, middle-class job in Western Europe and America, not a "bottom rung" job as it is today. Socially, it ranked right about the level of an accountant or law clerk. The reason was that one had to know a lot about science (as it was known at the time) to be able to weed out actual innovations from junk applications. Nowadays, however, patents have been given to the occasional perpetual motion and infinite energy devices, so it's clear the job requirements have slipped a bit.
- Keep in mind that Einstein could have become the president of Israel, and declined: to refuse to become Head of State is the mark of a true Almighty Janitor
- Court clerks, especially the Clerk of the Supreme Court of the United States, could be considered as a form of an Almighty Janitor. Though officially a clerical position, they have the power to decide which cases get heard.
- Peter Adkinson, president of Wizards of the Coast, tended to refer to himself as janitor as a long-running inside joke.
- Former Chicago White Sox owner Bill Veeck frequently called himself the team's "custodian", claiming that the fans were the real owners.
- In the U.S. Army, the greenest of officers outrank even the most veteran of groundpounders, but will nonetheless usually defer to the judgment of the soldiers who are in the field, have seen combat, and know what the hell they're talking about.
- Joseph Stalin, in a way, started off as one of these; the other members of the Politburo of the newly-formed Soviet Union gave him the role of "General Secretary" because, from their point of view, it was a menial functionary position within the Cabinet with little relevance to the political moving-and-shaking of the government. Stalin, however, discovered that this allowed him to staff the key positions in the Soviet government with people who were loyal to him and/or consequently owed him favours; when the inevitable power-struggles came after Lenin's death, Stalin had a power-base to work with that the key theorists and political figures of the party, such as Trotsky, didn't. We all know how that worked out.
- Memetic Mutation to some degree— this is why head of communist parties that have some kind of Stalinist heritage are called general secretaries.
- There's actually a very good chance that your immigrant janitor or cab driver was actually an accredited electrical engineer or doctor back in their home country. Unfortunately they found out that the institution that issued their certification wasn't accredited in the US or Europe, so they couldn't legally practice. Yet in spite of this, most still consider themselves way better off than they were back home.
- The are other cases when their certifications are accredited, but as a condition of living there, they were not allowed to practice.
- Tom Petty (of The Heartbreakers) once worked at the University of Florida. On the music faculty? No. Workaday administrative drone? Nope. Student assistant? Not quite. He was a groundskeeper.
Web Comics
Web Original
Western Animation
- Avatar: The Last Airbender: The Order of the White Lotus. A secret society of people seeking truth, beauty, and enlightenment. Their most prominent members are a tea-addicted old general, a Cloudcuckoolander, a deserter Firebender who lives in a swamp, the greatest swordmaster in the world, the worlds most powerful non-Avatar waterbender, and a random old guy who lives in a desert. Every one of them is awesome.
- In Class of the Titans, the school janitor Mr. Suez turns out to be Zeus, King of the Gods.
- In the animated movie ''The Rescuers'', the co-protagonists are a beautiful Hungarian diplomat... and a bumbling janitor who somehow gets talked into going with her on a rescue mission. He gets considerably more badass in the sequel. (They're both mice, like the rest of the Rescue Aid Society.)
- "Yohnny the Yanitor" from Dexter's Laboratory held his own against a rather battle-skilled kid scientist because of the constant mess he created. Though he lost, so to speak, he had some badass skills for a janitor.
- The Fairly Oddparents pays tribute to this concept. Timmy makes a wish that backfires, and Denzel Crocker ends up as a buff, brilliant janitor instead of the hunched, looming teacher.
- In another episode when Timmy wishes everyone in the world was super but then later wished that there were no superheroes, turning everyone normal except the supervillains, the only way to defeat the supervillains is for all the kids and other "normal" people, including a janitor, to team up and use their "normal people powers" to defeat them.
- Denzel Crocker actually plays this trope straight, even outside of the episode in question; in spite of being portrayed as an incompetent elementary school teacher, you still have to take into account that he's done everything from creating a functional portal to Fairy World, discovering cold fusion (before someone hit the Reset Button on the universe), and creating a functional rocket with embezzled school funds. Oh, and let's not forget that he's always right about Timmy's fairy godparents.
- Flying Rhino Junior High has Buford, the a former CIA agent, now custodian of the titular school. His expertise is usually called upon to help the students deal with "The Phantom's" latest reality-warping attack on the school. In one episode, a running shoutout to James Bond, he gets to supply the four main students with spy gadgets.
- Futurama: "Scruffy. The Janitor." Who is really not almighty at all, but just as lazy and incompetent as the rest of the crew, but owns three times as much stock in Planet Express as any other employee except for Dr. Zoidberg — who, while not a janitor, also fits this trope because he is considered worthless by his coworkers and yet actually owned 51% of the company until he traded his stock to "That Guy" (Steve Castle) for a sandwich.
- "Ya didn't even refridgerate it, ya spineless lobsta!"
- "You had to bring SPINES into this! {sobs}"
- Hong Kong Phooey: "Is it Penry, the mild-mannered janitor? Could be!"
- Agent Dark Booty from Invader Zim is a borderline example. He's a high-ranking member of a secret society dedicated to protecting humanity from paranormal threats, and Dib's contact in the group. We never actually got to see him in action before the series ended, but the indications up to that point are that he really is or was as much of a Badass as that indicates. His day job? Janitor at a NASA facility.
- One episode of Kim Possible featured the school janitor who was actually Canada's greatest secret agent, working undercover. The ending implied that his replacement was another nation's greatest secret agent.
- Moville Mysteries features a school janitor who is a former archeologist and adventurer. He devoted his life to keep contained an evil elder god named Polipotanaketl which he accidentally released some years before.
- ReBoot. After becoming an adult and surviving the games, Enzo becomes an incredibly strong fighter, both physically and mentally. However he is still technically a Guardian cadet because he never had the chance to attend the Guardian academy.
- The Janitor from Recess. One episode had the kids discover that he was a math genius, whereupon he got scouted by the military and by NASA— only to point out that if being a genius were his job, that would take all the fun out of it, so he'd rather be a janitor.
- While not exactly as low as a Janitor and technically high ranking, Optimus Prime of Transformers Animated is in charge of a group of lowly Space Bridge repairmen after screwing up somehow when he was applying for the Elite Guard, respected only by his team. He lacks self-esteem and wants to be a hero more than anything. He's working on it. This has led some to call him "Maintenance Prime", after an insult given to him by Sentinel Prime.
- And Bulkhead, a big low level rube who is 100% big guy... and the universe's greatest space bridge expert. He was at least working on a space bridge at the beginning of the series, which was his life-long dream anyway, but if it weren't for a certain screw-up with Sentinel, he would probably be much higher up.
- Also Prowl, another member of Prime's crew, who happens to be one of the most badass Ninjas on Cybertron. His reasons for being held back were a combination of early life pacifism, and a Heroic BSOD after his master died.
- I wonder if Batman Beyond qualifies. Terry is, after all, officially (and de facto) Wayne's errand boy.
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