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Basic Trope: A Ragtag Bunch of Misfits suddenly starts working together to become a Badass Crew.

  • Straight: With the Big Bad on the verge of destroying the kingdom, the bickering misfits suddenly put their differences aside and pull off a well-coordinated counterattack.
  • Exaggerated: Characters actually throwing punches at each other stop in the middle of their fight to turn on the Big Bad and tear him to pieces.
  • Downplayed: The misfits temporarily find a way to use their individual skills to defeat a minor threat.
  • Justified:
  • Inverted: The Badass Crew is facing off against the Big Bad and suddenly become an uncoordinated backbiting mob.
  • Subverted: The bickering misfits put their differences aside and work together, but fail to stop the Big Bad because they hadn't been practicing previously.
  • Double Subverted: The bickering misfits put their differences aside, fail to stop the Big Bad, only to have him be defeated by a lucky throw from the team Woobie.
  • Parodied: The misfits go from being bickering, backbiting losers into a precision-coordinated crew in a matter of seconds.
  • Zig Zagged: ???
  • Averted: The misfits maintain their infighting, and they attack each other as much as they attack the Big Bad.
  • Enforced: The creator of the work wants to show that you can get more things done when you work as a team. Even if the team are a bunch of idiots.
  • Lampshaded: "Just as the Ancient Prophecy foretold, the kingdom will be saved when the squabblers stop squabbling."
  • Invoked:
    • The team members intentionally fight amongst themselves so they'll be more effective against the Big Bad.
    • The Leader does a few Loyalty Missions in hopes of triggering this effect.
  • Exploited: The Big Bad picks up on this pattern and puts together a misfit team of his own to turn into a Quirky Miniboss Squad.
  • Defied: The Big Bad secretly works to stop the infighting between the misfits.
  • Discussed: "Isn't this when we're supposed to stop arguing with each other and kick the villain's ass?"
  • Conversed: "The biggest fear of any Evil Overlord is a band of rag-tag uncoordinated losers."
  • Deconstructed:
    • The misfits neglect their preparations to bicker. One of them calls out the rest of them on it and they get in an argument about that. They're still fighting when the Big Bad shows up. They barely get their act together, and depending on the tone of the story, win by the skin of their teeth, get a bittersweet victory with half their number dead, or lose with them all killed or enslaved. Even if they do win, afterwards, they still blame each other for everything that went wrong and eventually drift apart.
    • The misfits manage to get their act together, working in tandem and FINALLY managing to injure the previously-untouchable Big Bad. Turns out the fact they were misfits to begin with was the only reason the Big Bad hadn't killed them in their previous encunters: they just weren't worth the effort. He had no reason to use his full power on a bunch of ragtag imbiciles. Now they have his attention, and he shows them what he's REALLY capable of.
  • Reconstructed: The misfits finally working out their differences in the face of the Big Bad is mirrored by the Big Bad's team, that had worked together perfectly for the first part of the story, turning on itself during the final confrontation. Even if they are narcissistic, argumentative, rash, or otherwise unheroic, the misfits are still basically good.
  • Implied: We don't actually see what happened with the misfit crew, but the Big Bad's forces are unexpetedly weakened at a crucial moment, and it seems only they could've been responsible.

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