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Alice makes an analogy comparing someone to a well known source, often intending to sound positive. Bob then points out a further fact about the analogy, often inverting the meaning, and often painfully near the knuckle.
A common example is someone comparing two lovers to Romeo and Juliet, which suggests they've not read the ending ( or the beginning, or the middle) of the play (specifically, the fact that the play is meant to criticize young lovers who become obsessed with each other too early and quickly, without really learning anything about each other).
Compare Metaphorgotten, Sidetracked by the Analogy, Dissimile, What Did You Expect When You Named It ____?. Contrast So Was X.
Nothing to do with using a Tu-22M "Backfire" as a metaphor or simile.
When adding examples, please make sure they contain A) an analogy, and B) a backfire.
Examples:
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Anime and Manga
- In Neon Genesis Evangelion, Asuka closes the door of her room and says: "This is the impenetrable Wall of Jericho!"note In The Bible, the walls of Jericho crumble because of sound. Okay, more like a divine, sonic Holy Hand Grenade, but the point is, the walls of Jericho crumbled from practically no impact at all - the Israelites didn't even toss a pebble at it. Clearly the word "impenetrable" was grossly misapplied. The backfire there is essentially intentional. The line is an extremely oblique hint for Shinji to try something, but he fails to pick up on it.
- In the Baccano Light Novels, Isaac and Miria try to comfort Ennis by assuring her that, even if she has done some bad things in the past, she'll still be successful and well loved as long as she does good things to balance it out, "just like Al Capone!"
- In the 2003 anime version of Fullmetal Alchemist, there is a lengthy example of one of these:
Roy: You know running makes you look guilty.
Edward: We're running because we knew you'd come after us! Isn't that what every dog does when it's chased?
Roy: Yes, but a trained dog never defies the orders of its owner.
Edward: Then I'm a stray.
Roy: Really? Then maybe we'll just have to put you down.
- This is playing up a theme that was built into the setting with the phrase 'dog of the military,' as well as being a shout-out to Fullmetal Alchemist creator Hiromu Arakawa's earlier successful one-shot 'Stray Dog,' which dealt with Mad Scientists making dog-themed Artificial Humans and the rights and wrongs of their conditioned loyalty and the use of it.
- Another "named after something the person who came up with that name shouldn't want it to be like", the giant tower superweapon in Osamu Tezuka's Metropolis is named "Ziggurat", after towers said to be built by the Babylonians to show off their power, the most famous being the tower of Babel (guess what happens). What makes this especially ridiculous is that this is acknowledged in the actual movie.
- In an episode of Digimon Adventure Izzy tries to explain to Matt's father how not all Digimon are bad, saying "They're not like those pretend monsters you see in the movies destroying all those Japanese cities." He quickly realises what a bad example this is, given that the good and bad Digimon had spent the last three days having destructive battles across Tokyo.
- Toward the end of Muhyo And Roji, Page notes that a "golden thread" binds Muhyo and Roji together. Lil and Maril mercilessly mock his choice of words, noting how easily a thread made out of gold would break.
- In Bakuman。, Mashiro tells Takagi, while working on his manga despite being hospitalized, that he feels like Joe Yabuki going into his last match, and Takagi thinks to himself that Joe died in the ring. This is possibly a subversion, though, as Mashiro had earlier been shown to have been aware of how it ended, and found Joe's death admirable.
- Later on, Fukuda, after not doing as well as he'd hoped in a romance one-shot writing contest, protests that he was "the Romeo of Hiroshima," as if to imply that he had a fair amount of experience. Interestingly enough, the winner, Aoki, had never been on a date before.
- This makes some sense, since 'romance' as a genre has less to do with sexual experience than with poetic and persuasive depiction of human emotions. And a playboy is likely to have trouble with precisely the poetry part.
- In the OVA for Triangle Heart 3: Sweet Songs Forever, Elise tells her charge, the singer Fiasse, that she doesn't trust Kyouya and Miyuki to provide her adequate protection, saying that amateurs don't sing on the same stage as professionals. Fiasse then points out that anyone who likes to sing can do so together.
- In Girls Und Panzer, when the Russia-themed Pravda team has Oorai cornered in a building, they surround it and give them three hours to surrender. Nonna, vice-captain of the team, discusses this decision with her captain, Katyusha.
Nonna: You gave them time to surrender because you were hungry and sleepy, I see.
Katyusha: No, it's because Katyusha has a very kind heart! Kind like the Siberian plain is wide!
Nonna: Does that mean you have a heart made of ice, too?
Comic Books
- Watchmen had a recurring brand of door-locks from a company that was rather stupidly (but appropriately) named "Gordian Knot Locks". Guess how Rorschach got through them every time.
- Watchmen also has a character who calls himself "Ozymandias" because of the greatness of that historical figure. Ozymandias is also a symbol for futility, from a famous Percy Bysshe Shelley poem that Moore even quotes, and the end of the series suggests that Rorschach's journal could be discovered and cause his plan to fail. It's mentioned he chose it in an attempt to redeem the name, so he likely knew this, but considering what happens later on it does backfire somewhat.
- There's also Rorschach, who named himself the Rorschach inkblot test. He chooses the name because of what it represents, that there is no meaning beyond what we ourselves impose, just as the patterns of an inkblot are open to interpretation. Somewhat of a backfire in that he's named after a psychological test, and decidedly psychologically unsound later on his career after he crosses the Despair Event Horizon.
- Futhermore, Rorschach likes the black and white ink blots because they exemplify his black and white perspective on life...but the real Rorschach blots contain several multicolored cards.
- An issue of Spider-Man had Hammerhead comment on how he'd "Go out in a blaze of glory. Just like the real Scarface." It was later pointed out that Al "Scarface" Capone died in prison of complications due to syphilis.
- In another issue, Peter, who's been through hell lately, angrily tells Mary Jane that he feels like "that guy from Network". After he hangs up, MJ quietly observes to herself that the character he's talking about died in the end.
- In a meta-ironic example, when Reginald Hudlin had the Black Panther and Storm of the X-Men married (pissing off many fans), Joe Quesada gave it the heads up, and called it the Marvel Comics equivalent of "Prince Charles and Princess Diana". The thing is, Princess Diana was believed to be trapped a loveless marriage, separated in 1993, had a romantic fling with Dodi al-Fayed, heir to Harrods owner Mohammed al-Fayed, before the couple were killed in a car crash after being zealously hounded by paparazzi. Maybe Joe's trying to tell us something here...
- Inverted in Phil Foglio's adaptation of Robert Asprin's Another Fine Myth, Aahz tells Skeeve, "We'll be famous for this! Like Napoleon at Waterloo - Custer at the Little Big Horn - the Light Brigade at Balaclava..." The inversion is that Aahz presumably knows that those battles didn't end well for the named person, and thus is fully aware of what he's saying, but Skeeve doesn't know, and is genuinely encouraged by the analogy.
- Peter David's comment on Captain Marvel's Wisdom of Solomon: "God directly commands you to build no temples to other gods. Do you build temples to other gods? If you said "yes", congratulations! You have successfully displayed the Wisdom of Solomon!"
- It's worth noting that Solomon ended up building temples to other gods to keep his wives happy. Whether or not the writer remembered this, of course...
- In Flight 714, Rastapopoulos swears to Tintin that he will crush him "like I crush an insignificant spider!" Unfortunately, the spider in question proves quite adept at dodging Rastapopoulos's foot blows.
- In the MAD parody of Heaven Can Wait 1978, Tony Abbott claims that he would never hurt Farnsworth because he loved him like a brother. Like Cain loved Abel.
- In an early '80s X-Men story, Illyana Rasputin is pressing her best friend Kitty Pryde for details regarding Kitty's teenage romance with Illyana's brother Piotr, commenting, "Juliet was younger than you when she met Romeo." Kitty countered, "And look what happened to her!"
- In a What If issue in which the Avengers disband rather than be seen as supporting an increasingly corrupt US government, Captain America tries to appeal to Hercules' honor to convince him to stay with the team. Hercules glances at Cap and sadly quips, "When in Rome, eh? Rome fell, you know."
- In Java Joint, Tank says that he is "as serious as Garrison Keillor", apparently not realising that Garrison Keillor is a humorist.
Fan Fiction
Film
- In Alexander Alexander the Great feels his boyfriend Hephaistion is being less than optimistic over his plans.
Alexander: Did Patroclus stare at Achilles when they stood side by side at the siege of Troy?
Hephaistion: Patroclus died first.
- Ghostbusters: After the three are booted off the campus payroll, Venkman tries to console Ray by pointing out they don't need cushy university jobs; after all, "Einstein did his best stuff when he was working as a patent clerk."
Ray: Do you know how much a patent clerk earns!?
Venkman: No!
- Baby Mama has a scene where Amy Poehler says, "We're partners like Tom And Jerry" and Tina Fey replies, "Tom and Jerry hate each other."
- Arguably an unintentional subversion, since whenever Tom and Jerry are seen "off-screen", they're never portrayed as anything other than close friends.
- From Clue: When discussing searching for the killer and the possibility that the killer might kill whoever finds him:
Col. Mustard: This is war, Peacock! Casualties are inevitable. You cannot make an omelet without breaking a few eggs; every cook will tell you that!
Mrs. Peacock: But look what happened to the cook! (The cook was the second murder victim.)
- From The Dark Knight, talking about Batman's necessity:
Harvey: When their enemies were at the gates, the Romans would suspend democracy and appoint one man to protect the city. It wasn't considered an honor, it was considered a public service.
Rachel: Harvey, the last man that they appointed to protect the republic was named Caesar, and he never gave up his power.
- Rachel leaves an even nastier retort on the table; the name for that office was dictator.
- It's just a shame that Caesar was never appointed, he declared himself dictator. The other dictators usually served Rome successfully and saved them from whatever crisis was going on, giving Harvey the win. Though admittedly, the last two dictators preceding Caesar were of the same stripe, with virtually the same actions, except they didn't end up as corpses full of stab wounds.
- Another example is when Bruce Wayne states that [Harvey Dent] is the face of Gotham at the party, which was meant to be an analogy of the improvement of Gotham by eliminating crime and corruption. Unfortunately, after the Joker's machinations, as well as Dent's injury both physically and mentally/emotionally, the analogy ends up being twisted to mean making crime worse.
- The original script for Mystery Men has one, in which two wanna-be superheroes are arguing about why they aren't more successful:
Mr. Furious: What does Superman have that we don't have?
The Shoveller: Superman has the fact that he's Superman! Bullets bounce off him!
- In the movie Serenity, the Operative tells Mal that River is a living bad luck charm, and that keeping her would inevitably doom him and his crew. He calls River an albatross, after the poem Rime Of The Ancient Mariner, in which an albatross doomed the mariner to being lost at sea for years. Mal immediately responds with this awesome line.
Mal: The way I remember it, the albatross was good luck until some idiot killed it!
[Looks over at Inara]
Mal: Yes, I read a poem. Try not to faint.
- The Nostalgia Chick notices how the examples of love conquering the impossible referenced at the start of Don Bluth's Thumbelina backfire drastically:
Nostalgia Chick: That ended... kinda bad.
Nostalgia Chick: Al-so somewhat unfortunate...
- The same film also subverts this precise thing during Ms. Fieldmouse's song, as the ending of Romeo and Juliet was the whole reason she brought it up.
- In the 2009 Star Trek film, Spock and McCoy argue about leaving Kirk behind on a planet:
McCoy: You know, back home we have a saying: "If you wanna ride in the Kentucky Derby, you don't leave your prized stallion in the stable."
Spock: A curious metaphor, Doctor, as a stallion must first be broken before it can reach its potential.
- Used in Hoodwinked, after Boingo tricks Wolf and Twitchy into entering a pitch black cave infested with bats:
The Wolf: That bunny was worthless, not to mention he wrote the directions on an Easter egg (holds up a brightly colored Easter Egg with some illegible directions scribbled on the side in tiny text) which is very hard to read.
Twitchy: We'regonnadiehere!
Wolf: Come on, that's what they said at the Alamo!
- A similar analogy is made in Tremors 4, with a twist:
Juan: This will be our Alamo!
Hiram: We lost the Alamo, Juan.
Juan: Speak for yourself, gringo.
- This brings up the Fridge Logic of just why Juan would bring up the Alamo as an analogy for something to be defended when he's looking at it from the side of the attackers.
- The Mexican view would be "I am defending Mexican Territory from a homegrown enemy (Texans/Tu Lung/Dirt Dragons) and worse to come (Americans/Graboids)." To the Mexicans the Alamo was a hard won victory(more Mexicans died than Texans). Juan is telling them to kill all of the Dirt Dragons (or maybe to capture one or two in secret).
- Jurassic Park:
Dr. Hammond: All major theme parks have had delays. When they opened Disneyland in 1956, nothing worked!
Dr. Malcolm: But, John. If the Pirates of the Caribbean breaks down, the pirates don't eat the tourists.
- In that same movie, Dr. Hammond compares his bringing back dinosaurs to reviving an extinct species of bird. Dr. Malcolm points out that the bird species went extinct through human meddling, but dinosaurs died out naturally and thus their being brought back was throwing out the natural order of things.
- This analogy also fell flat to many viewers, who pointed out that this assumes that "nature" is a conscious, benevolent force, when really, extinctions that occurred naturally aren't necessarily any better for the environment than those caused by humans.
- Plus Disneyland opened in 1955, not 1956.
- But nice work to pick the only ride everyone has heard of for the analogy.
- Shrek tries to illustrate how ogres have hidden depths by telling Donkey that "ogres are like onions," only for Donkey to latch onto various aspects of onions that, while valid, aren't what Shrek was going for, as well as several foods with layers that otherwise have very little in common with either onions or ogres.
- Though you gotta admit, Shrek handles the analogy pretty well. He does not let it slip under Donkey's various comments and remarks. And "Not everybody likes onions" just ties in perfectly well with ogres.
- Shrek also completely misses the point in that onions don't have hidden depths at all - every layer is the same right down to the core, which is also just more onion. The onion metaphor originated in the play Peer Gynt, where it stood for the irredeemable Villain Protagonist's soul. In-universe he used the analogy because he just happened to have an onion in his hand at the time.
- In Avatar:
Neytiri: You have a strong heart, no fear, but stupid! Ignorant like a child!
Sully: Well, if I'm like a child, then maybe you should teach me.
- From the Disney version of The Jungle Book, when discussing the idea of letting Mowgli stay in the jungle...
Bagheera: The jungle is not the place for him.
Baloo: I grew up in the jungle. Take a look at me!
Bagheera: Yes, just look at yourself! Look at that [black] eye!
- From The Other Guys:
Terry: If we were in the wild, I would attack you. Even if you weren't in my food chain, I would go out of my way to attack you. If I were a lion and you were a tuna, I would swim out in the middle of the ocean and freakin' eat you! And then I'd bang your tuna girlfriend.
Allen: Okay, first off: a lion? Swimming in the ocean? Lions don't like water. If you'd placed it near a river or some sort of fresh water source, that'd make sense. But you find yourself in the ocean, twenty foot waves, I'm assuming it's off the coast of South Africa, coming up against a full-grown, 800 pound tuna with his twenty or thirty friends? You lose that battle. You lose that battle nine times out of ten.
- A rare dramatic example occurs in X Xx 2: State Of The Union: Secretary Of Defense General Deckert has the President at gunpoint as part of the former's plan to overthrow the U.S. Government. The President asks why Deckert is doing this, to which he responds with a Thomas Jefferson quote...
General Deckert: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots."
President James Sanford: "... and tyrants." That's the end of the quote.
- From Wonder Boys:
Crabtree: It's not a total loss! What about when Hemingway lost all those stories?
Grady: He was never able to reproduce them!
- In Happy Gilmore when the titular golfer says he's going to beat his opponent.
Shooter McGavin: Yeah, and Grizzly Adams had a beard.
Lee Travino: Grizzly Adams DID have a beard.
Shooter: I eat pieces of shit like you for breakfast!
Happy: You eat pieces of shit for breakfast?
- In The Pentagon Wars the Major General defends the weapons of the military before Congress.
Major General Partridge: I'm not going to sit here and tell you the Paveway never missed.
Madame Chairwoman: It missed by a mean distance of five miles, and nearly fifty percent of the time.
Major General Partridge: You know, in baseball, a guy that hits .400 is considered pretty damned great.
Congressman #1: In baseball, the losing team isn't killed by their opponents.
- Done in Rio:
Rafael: Come back! You're like Juliet and he's your Romeo. Well, they both die at the end, but still!
- In Contact, when the National Security Adviser, Kitz, asks the protagonist, Ellie, why she adamantly believes that the aliens are good intentioned:
Ellie: We pose no threat to them. (Them being hostile) would be like us wanting to exterminate some microbes on an anthill.
Drumlin: Interesting analogy. And how guilty would we feel after obliterating some microbes?
- From The Trip, where Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon review various restaurants:
Rob: *describing a drink* Tastes of a childhood garden.
Steve: Well, it's got a bit of alcohol in it, so it tastes— Was there a lot of alcohol in your garden as child? I'm sorry, Rob.
- Life of Pi features this gem, when Pi's father Santosh announces that they are leaving India for Canada.
Santosh: We will sail like Columbus.
Pi: But Columbus was sailing for India!
Literature
- From the Discworld book Pyramids: "I knew the two of you would get along like a house on fire." Screams, flames, people running for safety...
- The same gag is reused in Men at Arms ("Dwarfs and trolls get on like a house on fire. Ever been in a burning house, miss?") and The Wee Free Men ("I can see we're going to get along like a house on fire. There may be no survivors.")
- Another commonly-reused Pratchett joke is the backfire of "the light at the end of the tunnel". Usually "the light is an oncoming train" but there have been variations, including (appropriately enough) "the end of the tunnel is on fire."
- All of these are really examples of deliberate reversal of the analogy. This one actually seemed like an error by a character: "Light a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day. Set him on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
- In The Truth, on being told he and his fellow beggars will be paid a dollar a day for selling newspapers, the Duck Man remarks that by their standards, "We could live like kings on a dollar a day." Arnold Sideway starts rattling off a number of unpleasant ways that famous kings have met their end, to which Duck Man patiently replies "No, Arnold, that's dying like kings."
- In Sourcery, the monarch of Al-Khali is fond of romantic poetry, comparing women's features to goats on a mountainside and other Purple Prose analogies. He's left a bit speechless when a woman actually makes him stop and explain just what it is, exactly, that he finds goat-like about her.
- In Hogfather, Teatime threatens a security guard by claiming to be the man's worst nightmare. The guard immediately starts recounting several alarming nightmares he's suffered, none of which have much to do with an assassin threatening to stab him. Which the guard doesn't think is all that frightening of a dream, although he might've changed his mind when it actually happens to him.
- Good Omens: The four Horsemen of the Apocalypse have messed up the world's computer systems and the world is about to end. The text notes that it's often been said that civilisation is two meals away from barbarism, and what's going to happen next will make barbarism look like a picnic: hot, nasty, and eventually given over to the ants.
- The "tragic lovers metaphor" is a running gag in Connie Willis' To Say Nothing Of The Dog. The guy using them doesn't get that particular girl in the end (and both parties are clearly better off for it).
- One Russian story tells of a dog who told another dog that he was going to be famous like Laika. For those unfamiliar with the history, Laika was the first dog in space... and died up there. Sure enough, the dog dies at the end of the story while saving a young boy.
- Margaret Atwood:
You fit into me Like a hook into an eye A fish hook An open eye
- The Ogden Nash poem "The Romantic Age," about a lovestruck teenage girl who:
Presses lips and tosses head,
Declares she's not too young to wed.
Informs you pertly you forget
Romeo and Juliet.
Do not argue, do not shout;
Remind her how that one turned out.
- In a scene in Gone with the Wind, Dr. Meade argues that General Johnston cannot be dislodged from the Kennesaw Mountain.
Dr. Meade: The mountain fastnesses has always been the refuge and the strong forts of people since the ancient times. Think of - think of Thermopylae!
Rhett: They died to the last man at Thermopylae, didn't they, Doctor?
- In Dave Barry's second novel, Tricky Business, a series of events lead up to an ordinary band member named Wally deciding to go after a group of dangerous drug dealers with nothing than a bottle opener to save some other passengers. He explains that it's like when the passengers on one of the 9/11 planes who refused to stand by and let the terrorists win. His friend points out that all of the passengers on that plane also died. On the other hand, it was implied that Wally did remember the fates of the passengers and was just being brave.
- Twilight. Edward quotes lines of Romeo and Juliet into Bella's ear. Remember what happened to them? note It's worth noting that him saying the lines was not supposed to be a spontaneous romantic gesture, as he was saying the lines over the actor.
- Bella also constantly broods over R&J and compares it to her own problems.
- Which makes no sense. She compares Jacob to Paris even though Jacob is her friend whereas Paris was some random business associate of Juliet's father. Her problems pale in comparison but neither her nor the author sees that...
- Edward also mentions how magically wonderful imprinting is, comparing it to A Midsummer Night's Dream and apparently missing the Unfortunate Implications in the play — namely the rape/threats of rape and the fact that Demetrius would spend the rest of his life brainwashed into loving Helena.
- In Eclipse, Bella compares herself to Cathy of Wuthering Heights and her love for Edward to Cathy's love for Heathcliff... seemingly forgetting that there is actually an Isabella in the same novel who does marry Heathcliff... to disastrous results.
- In the same book, Bella claims that she's fascinated with Catherine's and Heathcliff's romance because "nothing can keep them apart — not her selfishness, or his evil, or even death" when just the opposite actually happens in the novel. Everything, especially her selfishness and his evil, keeps them apart — the lovers never get together and die miserable, painful, lonely, tragic deaths.
- It is quite amusing though how Bella, and therefore Smeyer both completely miss the points of the texts they compare them to. Whereas Twilight asserts finding true love in your teens with a stranger is possible, Romeo and Juliet may be a SATIRE of this notion.
- A once famous one analyzed in Vanity Fair. There was an old metaphor of romantic love describing a guy as a strong, solid tree, and a woman as a vine clinging to it. Since this actually means that the vine is slowly killing the tree, Thackeray refers to the heroine as a "tender little parasite" to add to the idea that the heroic Dobbin finally marrying her is a Bittersweet Ending at best, Downer Ending at worst.
- Happens to Otto Von Bismarck (of all people) in George McDonald Fraser's Royal Flash when he explains his visions for Germany's future to Flashman:
Bismarck: Germany must have its Napoleon, if it is to have its ...
Flashman: ... Waterloo?
- A Series of Unfortunate Events has this gem.
Mr. Poe: You're so paranoid about Count Olaf. Remember at Professor Montgomery's house? You were convinced a visiting scientist was Olaf.
Violet: But he was Olaf!
Mr. Poe: That's not the point!
- In something of a diversion from the rest of the series, in this instance, he turns out to ACTUALLY BE RIGHT.
- In Betrayed, when Zoey meets with her boyfriend Erik after he returns from a trip, he greets her as his "Desdemona". Aphrodite quickly comments that if she's his Desdemona, she'd better not cheat on him or he'll strangle her at night. Given that Zoey was seeing her human boyfriend on the side while flirting with a teacher and that like Othello and Desdemona, Erik and Zoey are in an interracial relationship... yeah
- "Zlata's diary" is a A diary written by a girl called Zlata, who lived in Sarajevo during Bosnian War and was 11 in 1991, when the war started. As her diary became known, people began to compare her with Anne Frank, who also had a diary. This was not reassuring to her, because:
Zlata: People compare me to Anne Frank. That scares me, I don't want to suffer her fate.
- She's being disingenuous, then, because she compares herself to Anne Frank in the context of the diary, before anyone knows about it, and gives the diary a name, in imitation of Anne Frank. She began writing it, she notes at the outset, in the hope that someone would eventually publish it, just like Anne Frank's diary was published— although she does hope she will live to see it published.
- This is part Be Careful What You Wish For, part bad translation. In original the second sentence sounds like: "And this fact [[comparison with Anne Frank]] now instills fear in me, fear to suffer her fate." The point is precisely that when she started her diary (before the war), she willfully compared herself with Anne, meaning the "published diary" part - and now the "didn't survive the war" part sounds more relevant.
- The title of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged is in some ways. In the myth of Atlas, Heracles holds the sky for Atlas while Atlas picks the apples of the Hesperides (only a god or Titan could pick them.) Heracles then tricks Atlas into holding up the sky again, but in some versions of the myth Heracles then builds the Pillars of Heracles to hold the sky and relieve Atlas of his punishment. This is the opposite of Rand's Objectivist philosophy, as Heracles's building the pillars was purely altruistic. Heracles had already gotten what he came for, but at seeing Atlas having to hold the weight of the sky (again), he does not tell Atlas "to shrug" as Francisco does in the book, Heracles instead helps Atlas.
- During the events of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, while Harry attends his career consultation meeting with McGonagall in which Umbridge (after having Dumbledore ousted from the school) is also present, Umbridge makes more than one attempt to disparage Harry's desire to become an Auror, eventually stating he "has as much chance of becoming an Auror as Dumbledore has of ever returning to this school", to which McGonagall responds, "A very good chance, then."
- In Richard Armour's "Twisted Tales of Shakespeare", a satire on high-school and college lit textbooks, Armour plays with this trope in a chapter on Shakespeare's sonnets: "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Hot? Sweaty? Fly-infested?"
- Which is done in the original sonnet; the entire point of it is that the love interest is better than a summer's day, because while a day in summer sounds lovely, many things, like heat and poor weather, ruin the experience.
- In "Alice's Birthday", a book from the Alice, Girl from the Future series, Alice wants to save a planet. To give her more confidence, Gromozeka reminds her of Joan of Arc, who rescued France. Alice succeeds, but is captured in the process. While she awaits her trial she remember that the actual Joan of Arc was executed. Except she wasn't in that continuity, but Alice doesn't know that yet...
- Referenced in Yendi, when Vlad observes that Kragar's analogy that life is like an onion doesn't work for him. Kragar says it's because you can peel layers from an onion, but they're all the same until there's nothing left. This notion didn't work for Vlad, because he grew up working in a restaurant and knows you chop onions, you don't peel them. A zigzagged example, because Vlad then explains how he thinks life is like an onion because sometimes there's a bad spot on one, but you can cut it out and the rest is fine.
- In Q-in-Law, a Star Trek novel, Picard is entrusted to perform a wedding of Keran and Sehira, a son and daughter, respectively, of the leaders of two rivaling clans. He is very pleased with the task, and compares the pair with Romeo and Juliet. Guinan points out that there was a tragic ending. Sure enough, Keran ends up blowing up a fighter that Sehira flies. She is just fine, though, thanks to Q.
Live Action TV
- In Smallville, Reckoning, Chloe notes that Clark and Lana are practically like Ken and Barbie...then as an afterthought, add they the producers broke them up later.
- In Malcolm in the Middle, when the principal at Francis's Military School is cutting their TV privileges, he tries to rally the others to resist.
Francis: Come on, guys, let's stand up. This will be our Alamo!
[the other guys just look at him]
Francis: Okay, bad example.
- In a Lower Deck Episode of Stargate SG-1, Felger says, "We're kinda like the intellectual Butch and Sundance of the SGC," to which Samantha replies, "Butch and Sundance got cornered and killed by the Bolivian Army."
- In the British Queer As Folk about the, umm, homosexual Heterosexual Life Partners Vince and Stuart:
Hazel: You two are like a married couple these days.
Stuart: Except that we never have sex.
Hazel: Like I said, married couple.
- Joe on NewsRadio insists on making his own components for every device he fixes rather than buy "any of that mass-produced garbage." When an impatient Bill asks Joe to just give up and buy the piece in question, Joe answers, "Did Thomas Edison give up?" Bill points out that "Thomas Edison wasn't trying to invent something that was readily available in a variety of stores near his home."
- On The Daily Show, discussing changing racial demographics in America:
Larry Wilmore: That's what happens when you have a melting pot. The stew gets darker.
Jon Stewart: Unless, of course, you're talking about a Tuscan stew, which uses white beans.
Wilmore: But the stew still gets darker.
Stewart: Unless, and I don't want to split hairs here, but there could be some kind of a cream base-
Wilmore: What's up with you, Emeril? Did you miss lunch?
- Mainstream Republicans showed the Tea Party coalition a clip from The Town to gain their support, which is pretty weird choice in itself, given the pitch: "I need your help. I can't tell you what it is, you can never ask me about it later, and we're going to hurt some people," but Jon then examines the characters' roles in the rest of the film.
"Hey! You know the violent unstable borderline sociopath from The Town, who's useful in a pinch but whose suicidal single-minded mania will ultimately be his downfall? That's you guys. And the guy who's stuck in an uneasy alliance with you but doesn't really like you and ultimately saves himself by walking away from you as you are dying? That's us. So. Do we have your vote?" I'm going to assume that most of the Tea Party coalition has not seen the whole movie.
- In one episode of Mock the Week, Frankie Boyle discusses Sarah Palin's pitbull analogy:
The lesson is, keep the analogy short. "I'm like a pitbull, I'm tenacious." Yeah, that's good. "I'm like a pitbull, if you leave me in the room with a child I'll kill them." NO, PALIN! Keep the analogy short! "Once I get a hold of you you're gonna have to stick a finger up my arse to make me let go." NO, PALIN!
- In an episode of My Family, Ben learns his daughter was nearly assaulted by a member of royalty she had been set up with on a blind date. He compares the situation with the opera "Don Giovanni" where where the titular lecherous noble was impaled with a sword by the father of a girl he tried to rape. However, Susan (who convinced Ben into listening to Don Giovanni in the first place) corrects him saying it was Don Giovanni who killed the father. Cue Ben having an utterly hilarious look on his face for about a minute.
- A variant from the first episode has a perfectly valid analogy being used by someone who missed the point of it and thus screws it up. Ben's assistant Brigitte criticises him for not making the time to treat his own family, comparing him to the the story of the cobbler's children who had no food. When Ben corrects her, she replies, "That makes no sense, their dad was a cobbler."
- The Brit Com Coupling has done this several times. Usually with Jeff making an analogy and then Patrick translates into something that makes even less sense.
- Dr. House loves to use farfetched metaphors in his practice, so his colleagues frequently try to imitate him, only to usually backfire:
Lisa Cuddy: She's already on a respirator, the machine is breathing for her... I can do whatever I want to her lungs. If you're playing catch in the living room and you break your mother's vase, you might as well keep playing catch. The vase is already broken!
James Wilson: Except, that room can't breathe without that vase.
- In The OC, Ryan tried to convince his girlfriend Lindsay to patch things up with her estranged father:
Ryan: Alright, look. Luke Skywalker was happy to find his dad, right? Even if he turned out to be Darth Vader.
Lindsay: Ryan, Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader fought each other with lightsabers until one of them died.
- Later, there was this exchange
-
Kirsten: Well didn't you use that Luke Skywalker/Darth Vader thing?
Ryan: She poked a serious hole in that analogy.
- Considering if Luke didn't make the reconciliation attempt he would have neither been able to redeem his father, and more importantly, not been able to kill the Emperor, maybe that should be an example of a backfire of an analogy backfire.
- In Charmed, "The Seven Year Witch":
Piper: All tragedies, I might add.
- Subverted in Dollhouse, one of Echo's engagements had her as a safe cracker. When asked by her partners why they never heard of her if she's so good, she asks if they've ever heard of Bonnie and Clyde. Thinking she messed up the analogy, they pounce on the 'mistake'- only to have her counter the counter. Bonnie and Clyde didn't try to be the best, they tried to be famous. And they died.
- 3rd Rock from the Sun:
Dick Solomon: I want ceaseless joy and never-ending passion like Romeo and Juliet. Mary Albright: They both wound up dead. Dick Solomon: Antony and Cleopatra. Mary Albright: Dead. Dick Solomon: That couple from Wuthering Heights. Mary Albright: Insane and dead. Dick Solomon: F. Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda. Mary Albright: Drunk, insane and dead. Dick Solomon: Sigfried and Roy. Mary Albright: (beat) Okay, that's one.
- The Mighty Boosh: "You cannot make milk into cheese!"
- In The Big Bang Theory, when Leonard and Howard try to pick up girls, but are unsuccessful:
Howard: You're weighing me down! I'm a falcon who hunts better solo.
Leonard: Fine, I'll sit here, you take flight and hunt.
Howard: Don't be ridiculous, you can't just tell a falcon when to hunt!
Leonard: Actually, you can. (beat) There's a whole sport built around it. (beat) Falconry.
- In another episode, after a month-trip to Antarctica as well as Sheldon learning that his friends falsified his report in an attempt to "prove" his theory, the latter being deeply hurt by the action, Penny tried to cheer him up by citing how Kirk tried lying to Spock that the woman that died in the Star Trek film wasn't his mom. This analogy didn't work, and had Sheldon breaking down further because, thanks to that Antarctica trip, he not only missed Comic Con, but also the new Star Trek film.
- In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Best of Both Worlds", Picard, shortly before being abducted and assimilated by the Borg, has this conversation with Guinan:
Guinan: Trouble sleeping?
Picard: It's something of a tradition, Guinan - Captain touring the ship before a battle.
Guinan: Hmm. Before a hopeless battle, if I remember the tradition correctly.
Picard: Not necessarily. Nelson toured the HMS Victory before Trafalgar.
Picard: No, but the battle was won.
- CSI: Crime Scene Investigation: on finding an intact brain several metres from the victim's head, Greg remarks "it's hard to crack an egg without breaking the yolk". Greg is either bad at making analogies, or really bad at cracking eggs.
- On the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode Space Mutiny, the hero lambasts his love interest for putting herself in danger to save him from the evil forces who have mounted a nearly-successful takeover of the ship.
Rider: I wish your father could control you as well as he does this ship!
Crow: You mean have a mutiny on me?
- In the Doctor Who arc "City of Death", there's this exchange between Romana and a hard-nosed cop Duggan:
Romana: You should go into business with a glazier. You would have a very symbiotic relationship.
Duggan: What's that supposed to mean?
Romana: I merely meant that you tend to leave a lot of broken glass behind.
Duggan: You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs.
Romana: If you made an omelet, I'd expect to find a pile of broken crockery, a cooker in flames, and an unconscious chef!
- In "Voyage of the Damned", the Doctor finds himself on a spaceship called the "Titanic". (Although it turns out that the name might have been intentional.):
The Doctor: Titanic. Um...who... thought of the name?
Host: Information: It was chosen as the most famous vessel of the planet Earth.
The Doctor: ...Did they tell you why it was famous?
- "She was like a candle in the wind...unreliable."
- In Lost In Austen, Bingley, who thinks Amanda is a lesbian, steers his attentions towards Jane. Darcy does not see this as being anything resembling "love" (as Bingley was previously consumed with Amanda), but Bingley remains steadfast:
Bingley: I am invulnerable, like Ajax.
Darcy: Ajax cut his own throat in a fit of pique.
- Bingley eventually becomes rather nervous around Amanda, leading Jane to marry Collins...which drives Bingley to drink.
- That '70s Show:
Kelso: Man, having no parents would be cool. Like the Lord of the Flies! Eric: Kelso, did you ever finish Lord of the Flies? Kelso: ...no.
- Analogies often backfire in The Thick of It, and most spectacularly in the Drama Bomb episode where Malcolm gets fired. The script features a running theme of theatre-related metaphors:
Marianne Swift: Malcolm, we get it, you're still the star of the show.
Malcolm Tucker: Warm them up, tell them Olivier's on his way but in the meantime here's An Audience With Peter fuckin' Bowles... what happened, did you get heckled off?
Steve Fleming: The show's over, it's curtains...
- In The Office US, Michael's analogies almost always backfire, but in one case he backfired (executive) Ryan's when Ryan wanted him to leave designing the ad to the advertising professionals:
Ryan: It's not part of your job. It's like, maybe you can cook, but that doesn't mean you should start a restaurant.
Michael: Well, actually I can't cook and I am starting a restaurant: Mike's Cereal Shack.
- Done excellently in the Boy Meets World episode where Topanga moves to Pittsburgh. Since Cory is reading Romeo and Juliet at the time, he keeps proclaiming that he and Topanga will be fine just like them...until Mr. Feeny tells him to skip ahead to the end.
- In Blackadder Goes Forth, the interrogation of a suspected German spy:
Darling: Look, I'm as British as Queen Victoria!
Blackadder: So your father's German, you're half-German, and you married a German?
- The pitch reel for The Muppet Show compares it to (among others) Sesame Street, Laugh In ... and Turn-On.
- In Breaking Bad, Jesse is somewhat prone to this, since he's smart but not overly educated:
Jesse: What's the point of being an outlaw when you got responsibilities?
Badger: Darth Vader had responsibilities. He was responsible for the Death Star.
Skinny Pete: True dat. Two o' dem bitches.
Badger: ...Just sayin'. Devil's advocate.
- In a Quantum Leap episode, Sam warns a mobster that he could end up like Jimmy Hoffa, but since at the time of the story, Hoffa wasn't famous for being whacked, the mobster replies something like, "You mean become head of the teamsters?" and takes that as a positive goal.
- In the Ellen episode "What's Up, Ex-Doc?", Ellen attempts to explain to Spence's father that Spence no longer wants to be a doctor; using the same elaborate baking analogy that Spence had used with her about leaving out a vital ingredient and having to throw out the entire mixture. However, Spence's father, who is a baker, points out that there is a very simple fix to the situation she describes that would save the mixture.
- In Falling Skies, the protagonist is a former history teacher in a world six months after an Alien Invasion. He is captured by a gang of racist outlaws, and their leader strikes up a conversation with him. The outlaw thinks the protagonist is stupid for thinking the aliens can be defeated (they have already wiped out most of the major cities and much of the population of Earth). The protagonist compares this invasion to many others throughout our history where the locals have managed to repel the invaders, specifically referencing The American Revolution. The outlaw is quick to point out that this analogy is very wrong given the enormous technological and numerical gap between the "skitters" and humans. His analogy is more appropriate, that of Native Americans defending against invading Europeans with a much smaller success rate.
- Spaced: Tim's justification for getting back with his ex-girlfriend by comparing it to Daisy's desire for a holiday meets a snag.
Tim: This is something that I've always wanted! You have things you want — you're always going on about going to Asia and seeing the Taj Mahal.
Daisy: I do want to go to Asia! I do want to see the Taj Mahal! The difference is, the Taj Mahal didn't sleep with its boss behind my back and break my heart!
- In Bottom, when Richie and Eddie are on a camping holiday, and Richie is bemoaning the difficulties they're facing:
Richie: Honestly! Alexander the Great never had this trouble!
Eddie: Yeah well, he wasn't a complete dickhead, was he?
- From According to Jim, when Jim's brother-in-law dates a girl Jim doesn't like, Jim (on separate occasions to his wife and his brother-in-law) makes up a hypothetical scenario of himself dating Osama bin Laden as a comparison. Too bad for him this trope haunts him when his target audiences think differently (his brother-in-law considers the possibility of turning bin Laden in for cash reward, and Jim's wife asks Jim if his relationship with bin Laden is serious).
- Young Blades: When D'Artagnan says that a woman wears his compliments "like silk," Jacqueline points out that silk is spun by worms.
- An exchange between Bernard and Sir Humphrey in Yes, Prime Minister:
Bernard: Well I can’t accept that, Sir Humphrey, no man is an island.
Sir Humphrey: I agree, Bernard, no man is an island, entire of itself, and therefore, never send to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee, Bernard.
- On The Cosby Show, Cliff once compared himself to Old Yeller, who protected the family. His wife pointed out that Old Yeller was shot.
- Two examples from M*A*S*H:
Major Burns: Aw, how come I always have to be the Indian, and not the good guy?
Colonel Potter: I am one-fourth Cherokee.
Major Burns: How.
- In the second example, a patient is claiming to be Jesus Christ. Colonel Flagg shows up, wanting the soldier either in combat or imprisoned for faking.
Colonel Potter: It takes more than a sound body to make a stallion run. It takes a sound heart, and a sound mind.
Colonel Flagg: It also takes a rider who's not afraid to go to the whip!
- Twice in the same episode of USA High when first Bobby tries to give Lauren a motivational speech and uses Vincent Van Gogh as an example...only to be reminded that he cut his ear off. Ashley then tries with this example.
Ashley: I once fell off a horse and a man came up to me and said 'young lady, you better get right back on'. Of course this horse was on a merry-go-round...
- In one Happy Days episode, Richie suggests escaping from a predicament by disguising themselves in women's clothes. Fonzie balks, arguing that Davy Crockett could have escaped from the Alamo that way but instead stuck it out. However, he concedes the point when Richie points out that Crockett died at the Alamo.
- An extended one in Scrubs season five, when Elliot quickly loses her new job at a different hospital, and refuses help from her friends. Carla maintains the opinion they have to help her. When Turk says Elliot didn't want their help, Carla comes with an analogy about JD refusing help, and Turk immediately finds a reason why JD wouldn't want their help. And it only goes south from there. For the record, Elliot really didn't want help and managed to get her old job back by herself, so Turk's initial point was valid.
Carla: Guys, listen. We really need to help Elliot.
Turk: Baby, she said she didn't want to be helped.
Carla: If JD were drowning and he told you he didn't want you to save him, would you do it?
Turk: That depends: what if there are hot chicks at the pool? Maybe he want one of thém to jump in and save him.
Carla: Let's say there's no women.
Turk: There's always women at the pool, baby.
Carla: Fine, he's in a pond.
JD: Oh, I would never swim in a pond. They're infamous for serpents.
Turk: You could swim at the Y[MCA] on tuesdays, men only.
JD: Have you been to the Y on men night? Not me...
Carla: Okay fine! Turk's the one who's drowning!
JD: Why did you have to go there?
Carla: Oh my God!
- This exchange from The Muppet Show between Rowlf and George Burns:
Rowlf: Oh listen, I can play in any key. I'm another Jascha Heifetz.
George Burns: Jascha Heifetz played the violin.note For those unfamiliar with the show, Rowlf plays the piano.
Rowlf: No one'll know the difference, George.
- A rare deadpan comic turn from George Hearst, Deadwood's resident Big Bad with No Sense of Humor, to a sycophantic associate;
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Anya does this all by herself due to her natural Brutal Honesty, when Dawn thinks she might be a potential superhero.
Dawn: Everything's different for me now.
Anya: That's because you're a part of something larger. Like being swallowed. By something larger.
[Dawn flees upstairs]
Xander: Nice job with the "getting swallowed" analogy.
Anya: Well, it is a mixed bag, you know. If she gets to be the Slayer, then her life is short and brutal. And if she doesn't, then it smells of unfulfilled potential. My swallowed analogy looks pretty sweet right now, doesn't it?
- Perennial loser Al Bundy of Married... with Children was prone to both this and Metaphorgotten, but possibly the crowning glory for the simplicity of it all:
Al: Just remember. "Al" is the first word in "Alamo". (Cue giant cheers from audience)
Peg: Honey, we lost the Alamo. (Cue equally giant laughs from the audience)
Music
Newspaper Comics
- In a Dilbert comic, the Pointy-Haired Boss used an apple to represent the company's "core values". Dilbert pointed out that the apple's core is the part you throw away and added "maybe the stem can represent our loyalty to the company".
- Dilbert was actually very fond of this. In commentary, Scott Adams wrote that all analogies are bad.
- Another one
 .
- Yet another one has the PHB tell Asok that interns are as important to a company as minks are to a coat. Asok pointed out that minks do not enjoy the benefits of a coat.
- In Fox Trot, Peter once used The Metamorphosis as an example to Jason, who had been transformed into a girl (it was All Just a Dream), commenting on how well things had worked out for Gregor Samsa. Jason says that Gregor starved to death, abandoned by his family. It then transpires that Peter
had never actually finished was still on the first page of the book.
Radio
- Hello Cheeky had this, which isn't so much 'exposing another fact about the analogy' as 'exposing the way the analogy couldn't possibly work':
Tim: Did you know that if the entire population of China started marching past your window right now, due to the immensely high birth rate in China, the procession would never end?
Barry: ...But how could they if they were mar—
Tim: Shut up.
Barry: They're marching! They can't—
Tim: No. Shut up, Barry.
Theatre
- Older Than Steam: At the beginning of Act V of William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, recently married lovers Lorenzo and Jessica recite to each other a poem comparing themselves to other famous lovers. However, the stories of all the other lovers they mention end in deception, death, or both. It may not be obvious to modern audiences and, as Shakespeare never has anyone call Lorenzo and Jessica on this, it may not have been caught by the audience of his day. Still, it counts.
- It may not count, because it may be entirely deliberate: it is easy to read the scene as evidence that their marriage is not working out.
- In Reefer Madness: The Musical, Jimmy and Mary compare themselves to Romeo and Juliet, not having read the ending. Mary dies because of Jimmy, and Jimmy is arrested for her murder. It's surprisingly tragic for such a funny movie.
- Mary unintentionally makes the comparison more apt as she's dying: "We are just like Romeo and Juliet; we're happy, young, and ? (cough) ? hemorrhaging blood..."
- The Drowsy Chaperone has the song "Love Is Always Lovely in the End", in which the singer, Mrs. Tottendale, is blissfully oblivious to the fact that every couple she mentions in the song (Romeo and Juliet, Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, (Samson and Delilah) had an unhappy ending. Her butler tries to point this out to her, to no avail.
- Bye Bye Birdie:
Kim: Miss Alvarez, I'm coming with you!
Rosie: Kim, don't be ridiculous! You're only fifteen!
Kim: Juliet was fourteen when she left home.
Rosie: And look what happened to her!
- Dream Girl:
Georgina: Well, what do you think I am, some kind of a jellyfish that's just going to sit and let you—
Clark: If you'd ever tangled with a jellyfish you'd know they're anything but submissive creatures.
- In the musical adaptation of Frankenstein, Victor sings a song where he proudly and excitedly calls himself "the modern Prometheus" (the subtitle of the source material novel). Henry Clerval quickly points out he should neither want nor strive to end up like Prometheus and that if he proceeds with his insane plans, "Your fate will be the same as his!"
- The point, ofcourse, is to show two incompatible worldviews against each other. The myth of Prometheus has been interpreted throughout ages either as going against divine plan and suffering the price, or as fighting against all odds for the betterment of all mankind, regardless of the risks to oneself.
Video Games
- In the very first case of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, Larry Butz insists he and his late ex-girlfriend were like "Romeo and Juliet, Cleopatra and Marc Anthony!", and Phoenix thinks, "Didn't they all die?"
- In the third case of the second game, Moe the Clown insists that he saw clearly the defendant that night as he has eyes like a hawk, and Phoenix thinks "Umm... Don't birds have terrible night vision?".
- And in the fifth case of the third game, Godot says that "a cornered fox is more dangerous than a jackal". Phoenix counters that a cornered fox is "scared and petrified", which catches the prosecutor off guard for a moment before he can recover.
- In the bonus case of the first game, Angel Starr compares a rookie detective to a fresh white cheese (just go with it), and the judge says that then he himself is then, "seasoned, yellow, and sharp as a tack!" Ema cheerfully pipes up, "I bet you smell, too!"
- May occur in a flirtatious exchange between Commander Shepard and Ash Williams in the original Mass Effect. The latter quoted Whitman's "O captain! My captain!" line, and the former was quick to point out that the captain is "fallen cold and dead" in the poem. Which is kind of Harsher in Hindsight when the sequel came out, due to Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome.
- In the final part of Ghost Trick, Sissel is prompted to possess a fountain and spray "as if your life depended on it!"
- Grim Fandango features Manny's rival, Domino Hurley, giving Manny a minor "The Reason You Suck" Speech, all while ranting that Manny should act more like him. This culminates in Domino shouting, "If you just adopt the proper attitude, just look what can happen to you!" He's then immediately ground into powder by the pair of crushers he didn't notice advancing towards him.
Webcomics
- Parodied in this Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal strip.
- Used straight in this Partially Clips strip.
- Parodied in this XKCD strip.
- As well as this one.
- This one illustrates the problem with asking "if all your friends were jumping off a bridge, would you do it?" (If all your friends are jumping off a bridge at the same time, there's probably a good reason for it).
- Used straight in this Casey and Andy strip.
- Used doubly in this Misfile. Explaining a female-figured suit of armor as "you're my Joan of Arc" runs into the problem that not only was Joan of Arc killed, but she dressed as a man. (Emily points out both in one sentence.)
- Darths & Droids author-comment:
"Most roleplayers have little to no practical experience in military strategy and tactics. So when it comes to playing massed combat situations, one way to decide what to do is to take guidance from historical military campaigns. Emulating the victor is the easy way. If attempting to defend an impossible position with bowmen and knights on foot against Genoese crossbowmen and tens of thousands of armoured, mounted knights, make sure you are heavily outnumbered. If attempting to repel a force of cavalry and men-at-arms with longbowmen on St Crispin's Day, make sure you are vastly outnumbered. If defending a hospital stockade against Zulus, make sure you are enormously outnumbered. You can choose a different, and more creative, path by doing the opposite of what the losers did. If you field an overwhelming force against a paltry number of defenders, whatever you do, make sure the defenders are not English!"
Web Original
- Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog
Penny: You're not really interested in the homeless, are you?
Billy: No, I am, but... It's a symptom. You're treating a symptom, and the disease rages on, consumes the human race. The fish rots from the head, as they say. So what I'm thinking is, why not cut off the head?
Penny: ...Of the human race?
Billy: It's not a perfect metaphor...
- It's actually a very good analogy, although Penny doesn't know it - Dr. Horrible, being a supervillain, wants take over the world; that is, replace the current leadership; that is, metaphorically cut off the head.
- She did, in fact, know that—not about the supervillain part, but about changing the system and thus, the leadership. Unfortunately, he was speaking rather quickly, and he was talking about cutting off the head of the human race, so metaphor or no metaphor, that's... a bit grim.
- Zero Punctuation has had a few, such as this one from his Assassins Creed II review:
"In heaven the food is Italian, the police are British, the platformers are French (with a pop-up of Prince of Persia: Sands of Time), and the shooters are Croatian and it's all run by two international software giants and an electronics corporation. In Hell the food is British the shooters are Canadian and I forget the rest..."
- This is an analogy backfire when you realize that the Prince of Persia series, the Assassins Creed series, the Tom Clancy games, and Far Cry 2 were all made by Ubisoft Montreal.
- I think the point of this analogy was to point out that nobody likes the Italians...
- Me and My Dick:
Joey's Heart: "What do all of history's greatest lovers have in common? Romeo and Juliet! Anthony and Cleopatra! Jack Dawson and Kate Winslet's character! Joey: "All the guys die horribly first." Joey's Heart: "Uh eh- BAD EXAMPLE. How about Spider-Man and Mary Jane?" Joey: "Oh yeah they worked out PERFECTLY."
- Vision of Escaflowne Abridged gives us a great set of these from Dornkirk. The conversation goes like this:
Emperor Dornkirk: Listen, you can't bake a cake without breaking a few eggs!
Hitomi: Yes, you can. My Grandma used to make me vegan cake all the time!
Dornkirk: You can? Oi, Folken! Did you know you can bake a cake without breaking any eggs?
Folken: Yes my lord, yes you can.
Dornkirk: Do you think that means we should stop killing people?
Folken: No my lord, I think you just need a better metaphor.
Dornkirk: Right! Now listen, you can't test cosmetics without killing a few bunnies!
Hitomi: Yes! Yes, you can!
Dornkirk: Oi, Folken! Did you know -
Folken: Omelet, my lord!
Dornkirk: Folken says you can't make an omelet without killing a few bunnies.
- This failbook post.
- During the Two Best Friends Play video of Heavy Rain, Matt calls Heavy Rain "The God Of War of video games", because of all the quick time events it has.
- A parody of "The Creation of Man" has Thunderf00t giving the finger to God, with semi-prominent apologists in the place of angels. The shroud, however, is still in the shape of a brain...
- Analogy backfire is major theme of the political cartoon commentary site A Good Cartoon, whose title is actually sarcastic; it takes cartoons arguing one perspective and then discusses why its visual elements suggest it would be better used to argue the opposite perspective, and analogy backfire is one aspect of this.
Western Animation
- Eek! The Cat tried to cheer some people up by saying they're like a nearby campfire, but the campfire is going out.
- Rugrats:
Didi: So when do you plan to finish this great invention? Stu: Did Mozart's wife ask him how long it would take to finish his requiem? Didi: Stu, Mozart died without finishing his requiem.
- The Simpsons:
- Chief Wiggum: Fat Tony is a cancer on our city! He is the cancer, and I am the... what cures cancer?
- Homer: It's like David and Goliath, but this time David won!
- In Freakazoid, Lord Bravery argues with his wife and mother-in-law about his unsucessful superhero career: "You think Superman started right at the top?" "YES!"
- In the South Park episode "Damien", Stan is trying to convince Jesus not to give up during his boxing match with Satan.
Stan: What would Nancy Kerrigan do? Huh? Nancy Kerrigan wouldn't give up! When things were looking their darkest, Nancy Kerrigan fought to be the BEST! She wouldn't stop until she was Number One! Nancy Kerrigan wouldn't settle for second best! She wouldn't quit until she brought home the gold!
Kyle: Stan!
Stan: What?
Kyle: Nancy Kerrigan got the silver, dude. She came in second.
Stan: Really?
Kyle: Yeah, dude.
Stan: Oh... Never mind, Jesus. Nancy Kerrigan sucks.
- Pinky And The Brain did this, although the roles were switched from what you'd expect.
Pinky: Egad Brain, brilliant! Oh, wait, no, you've never play basketball in your life.
Brain: Pish posh. Remember when everyone told Michael Jordan he couldn't play baseball?
Pinky: They were right, Brain.
- Played with in Beast Wars. Silverbolt compares Blackarachnia to the planet Venus, presumably intending that it be equated to beauty. It backfires because she immediately sums it up as "hot, poisonous, deadly," three traits that describe her rather well, and gets subverted when she thanks him for the compliment. Silverbolt takes a minute to realize she's completely misinterpreted his comparison, positively or not.
- On The Critic, Marty is chosen for the school play.
Marty Sherman: But I can't act!
Drama Teacher: That's what a young Steve Guttenberg said to me, but look at him now! No, wait... look at him four years ago.
- Batman The Brave And The Bold: In "Cry Freedom Fighters!", Plastic Man declares that he is "as patriotic as Benedict Arnold!".
- King of the Hill, when Bobby is trying to teach Peggy how to ride a bike:
Peggy: Oh, just give me the freaking thing.
Bobby: But you haven't even heard the part about balance.
Peggy: Bobby, I'm sure riding a bike is just like swimming. You hold your breath and kick like crazy. [Tries to ride away and quickly crashes]
Bobby: Mom, are you ok?...You don't know how to swim, do you?
Peggy: Not so much.
- Pepper Ann uses the Romeo And Juliet analogy as she tries to help her sister and her boyfriend see each other. Nicky points out that Romeo and Juliet ended up dead. Pepper Ann lists off other famous couples that met unfortunate ends, and Nicky shoots each one down.
- Phineas in Phineas And Ferb decides to make a romantic boat ride around Danville Harmor for Baljeet and his friend Mishti in "That Sinking Feeling"... leading to the very obvious conclusion that he and Ferb had watched Titanic and completely overlooked the tragedy of the ending. Sure enough, the ship ends up getting damaged and sinking. Good thing they had plenty of life preservers.
- In the same episode, Candace wishes her relationship with Jeremy could be more romantic, like in Romeo and Juliet, but "without all the dying."
- There's one episode of Batman Beyond that has an exchange that goes along the lines of:
Scientist: You can't just come in here like you own the place.
Real Life
The issue was promptly dropped.
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