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Seems OK: 71/357 (19.9%)

Anime.Transformers Energon:BoxOfficeBomb.DGame of Thrones - Other Northern Houses
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: When Ramsay proudly recounts how he flayed Lord Cerwyn alive in Season 5, Roose berates him for his stupidity, pointing out that while it ensured their submission for the moment, in the long term he just gained the Cerwyn's lasting enmity and they will jump at the next chance to rebel against the Boltons. Then when the actual uprising against Ramsay occurred in Season 6, the Cerwyns were nowhere to be seen — even when Jon Snow points out that Ramsay's men only follow Ramsay out of fear and will turn on him when he is weak.
The Simpsons
  • One of the show's favorite tactics since the earliest seasons is to start off the first act with an unrelated plot. For instance, "Homer Badman"'s first act is about Homer and Marge going to a candy convention, while the rest of the story deals with Homer being falsely accused of sexual harassment and dealing with the fallout. It worked in earlier episodes because the opening plot always leads into the main plot (Homer is accused by the babysitter after he tries to pull a piece of candy he stole from the convention off of her butt). As time went on, though, the transitions between plots became increasingly abrupt and threadbare, to the point that these first-act plots could probably be cut from the episode entirely, and are used as little more than padding because the main plot can't stand up on its own. Worse, if the main plot is too weak, the audience ends up wishing they had settled for the first-act plot. For example, one common criticism of "Simpson Safari" is that the initial plot about the strike is an interesting story that deserved a whole episode, while the main plot is just the typical "The Simpsons travel to X" story.
Live-Action TVSeasonalRot.Western AnimationTheScrappy.Video Games
  • Lily, aka Yasuko Saejima, is hated by fans for being a Faux Action Girl in a series where legitimate Action Girls are few and far between, as well as her relationship with her brother Saejima that culminates in her tragically dying in his arms being seen as wasted potential due to a lack of actual onscreen development.
YMMV.A Feast for CrowsAntz
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The worker revolution that starts up once word begins to spread that Z went against the ant colony's system pretty much disappears completely after General Mandible's speech wins back the workers.
Casper
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Some people hold this reaction towards the film, feeling that it could've been much better if it had cut out all of the other sub-plots and focused solely on the relationship between Casper and Kat, with Dr. Harvey's interactions with the Ghostly Trio being the main source of comic relief.
YMMV.Code Geass
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The "Euphinator incident" is despised by many, mainly because they feel that having Euphie's plan actually go into action and horribly collapse would have been a lot more interesting than having an absurd Diabolus ex Machina crush it before it starts and cause Euphie to be killed, as having it happen and fail with Euphie still alive would give her some interesting Character Development to go through, potentially pushing her to becoming someone who, while not dark and cynical, would be a lot less cheerful and optimistic, and forced to look at things more realistically.
YMMV.Command and Conquer Tiberian seriesYMMV.Cowboys and Aliens
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Roger Ebert and others felt that the cowboy story was more interesting without aliens being involved.
    Roger Ebert: Yet I feel a certain small sadness. I wish this had been a Western. You know, the old-fashioned kind, without spaceships. Daniel Craig, cold-eyed and lean, plays a character familiar in the genre; think of the Ringo Kid or Doc Holliday, bad guys who rise to goodness.
    Harrison Ford, as the rancher, embodies the kind of man who comes riding into town at the head of his private posse and issues orders to everyone. Sam Rockwell's Doc is the kind of small businessman who has come West while seeking his fortune among hard men. All the elements are here.
YMMV.Doom
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Not only were the resources to make this movie wasted on a plot that had nothing to do with the actual game, but even the movie completely fails to take advantage of its Mars setting or give a proper explanation as to why a Martian retrovirus would change some people into superhumans but others into monsters based on how "good" or "evil" they are. And even though teleporters are established and used prominently in the movie, they aren't even what bring the creatures to Mars.
YMMV.Drawn TogetherYMMV.Elfen Lied
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Kouta's lack of memories of his time with Yuka puts a damper on their potential of reaching a decent relationship, though Kouta has good reasons for it. Yet, when he eventually regains his memories of Lucy killing his sister and father in front of him, he focuses more on snapping at Lucy and simply telling her that he 'can't forgive her', when this could have been a great opportunity to also have Kouta remember his moments with Yuka, how he loved her since childhood and get the two of them to start something up. Perhaps the deadline of 108 chapters was closing in too fast, leaving no time...?
YMMV.Freakazoid
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The show never focused on the relationship between Dexter and Freakazoid, and it was unclear whether Freakazoid was Dexter unhinged or an entirely separate character (Freakazoid himself acted like Dexter was a different person, but still considered Dexter's family his family). Likewise nothing ever came of Stephanie learning that Dexter and Freakazoid shared the same body.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • After the film builds a nice amount of tension over who the killer is, he turns out to be someone we've never heard of.
YMMV.Jupiter Ascending
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The premise in general. An ordinary girl from Earth finds out she’s queen of the Earth, which is threatened by her evil… previous incarnation’s children? However, rather than having her stepping up and trying to defend her realm, she spends most of her time getting rescued by her Love Interest before going back home to her crappy cleaning job despite the fact there are still two villains out there murdering billions of lifeforms to make a profit and live forever.
YMMV.Ozzy and Drix
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Allergies are biologically described, as what happens when the white blood cells become overprotective towards a specific thing (allergens). Knowing this fact, the episode with allergens could've been the perfect opportunity to make fun of the way governments (and cops) go to ridiculous lengths in fighting crime and terror. Instead, the allergen is just as antagonistic as every other germ in the series and the closest we get is an innocent being mistaken for the allergen.
YMMV.Prometheus
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The concept is we apparently get to contact the aliens who created humanity and the xenomorphs but then the movie explains next to nothing.
YMMV.Scrubs
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • J.D. having vasovagal syncope. It could have lead to many possibilities for a character arc for J.D. that would have been a continuation of his time in Sacred Heart for his appendectomy back in Season 1. Instead it's played for laughs, mentioned less then half a dozen times and then is forgotten.
    • Keith. While most remember Keith as Elliot's Satellite Love Interest, a look at the "My Intern's Eyes" episode where he and his "generation" of interns are introduced, has him being the POV character whose goal in the episode was to "Find the courage to talk". Had they stuck with that shyness, he probably would have made a more interesting character even if events unfolded the same way during his arc.
YMMV.Sky High 2005
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The extremely flawed Hero-Sidekick program causes the entire conflict of the film but is never resolved or even questioned. It gives terrible results in the form of heroes who become egocentric bullies who prey on the weak and sidekicks who become object of mockery and resent heroes. It is the opposite of what the school aims to achieve, and the root cause of almost all the movie's conflict, and yet the audience never learns whether or not it was abolished at the end.
    • Will's subplot in dealing with being a superhero without super powers would have been an interesting character arc for him.
    • Layla is established as a Technical Pacifist; she says she'll only use her powers nonviolently and in a situation that demands it. The one time that she nearly breaks that rule is when Royal Pain seems to have killed Will, and she marches forward with murder in her eyes. Will shows up right then, revealing that he can fly, but it would have been interesting to see Layla's plant powers go toe-to-toe with Royal Pain.
YMMV.Stargate SG-1
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • When Daniel was replaced for Season 6, the writers admitted both that they hadn't initially planned on using the originally one-off Jonas character and that the character could never recover from his fandom-unfriendly original role. As a result, Jonas ended up being a fandom-controversial, Daniel-lite, politically-exiled alien whose planet struggled with inter-continental wars. However, they already had a Daniel-lite, politically-exiled alien whose planet struggled with inter-continental wars and who'd had a much friendlier, more fandom-accepted one-off episode: Nyan, who was granted asylum in Season 3, would have been Daniel's SGC research assistant for two years by the time Daniel's replacement was needed.
    • In the later seasons, the NID's investigation into the Goa'uld-controlled Trust sounds ripe for episode fodder. A cloak-and-dagger war fought behind the scenes across the entire planet? Sounds awesome. Too bad it's only ever referenced and for some strange reason the SGC just doesn't seem to care. It's also weirdly out of step with the early seasons, when even a single Goa'uld on Earth was considered a disaster. But the Trust manage to infiltrate most world governments and international corporations and General Landry acts indifferent to the NID's needs.
YMMV.The Dark Knight Rises
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Some watchers were more interested in how the rest of the country/world was taking an entire large metropolitan area being completely cut off from everything. Despite Bruce being outside of Gotham during it, it isn't really explored much.
    • Despite all the time spent setting up the cover up of Harvey Dent's crimes, after the climactic moment where Bane reveals the truth to the world...nothing really comes of it. After Blake chews Gordon out about it, it is never mentioned again. Admittingly, they had bigger issues to deal with that quickly overshadowed it, but it was disappointing that so little came of all of that build up.
YMMV.The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Many feel that the Amnesiac Hero approach could have been a good opportunity for a Jigsaw Puzzle Plot. The Memories could have been used as a way to tell this story by slowly revealing the events of what happened in the past, using Anachronic Order to allow the audience to piece the story together. However, King Rhoam spells the whole ordeal out by the end of the tutorial instead of letting the player figure out the plot on their own. As a result, the Memories never reveal any major events and only serve to showcase the characterizations of Zelda and the Champions.
YMMV.Totally Spies
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot
    • The introduction of LAMOS (League Aiming to Menace and Overthrow Spies) in Season 4 can be considered this. Only five out of the hundreds of villains the spies faced are part of it, and LAMOS only appears in 5 episodes out of 26.

This plot thread was poorly executed: 45/357 (12.6%)

Arcfatigue.Game of Thrones:
  • Arya spends all of Season 4 just walking to the Vale with the Hound, doing nothing plot relevant. Then she spends the majority of Season 5 either sweeping floors, washing corpses, getting smacked, or yelling, "Oysters, clams, and cockles!" Then the first half of her Season 6 story is filled by basically an extended Training Montage and watching the same Braavosi play several times before she decides she doesn't want to be a Faceless Man after all. She gets a few neat character moments through all of this, but her overall Character Development just makes a big loop back around to "I want to go home" and except for the Training Montage in Season 6, every cool skill she learns (especially how to change faces) is learned off-screen to make room for Filler, which hardly justifies three seasons away from any central story arc. Especially compared to the first three seasons when she was often on a tangent but was at least still connected with a variety of other characters (serving Tywin, meeting the Brotherhood, searching for Cat and Robb, befriending Gendry, etc.).
SeasonalRot.Live Action TV
  • [Doctor Who] Conversely, Season 18 is often considered an overreaction that went too far the other way. New production team producer John Nathan-Turner and script editor Christopher H. Bidmead declared their intention to make the show "less silly" and produced a season rather dour and humourless, more interested in technical and philosophical matters than an eccentric hero fighting monsters. Tom Baker often looked a shadow of his former self, forced to play the role in a way he disliked, and popular companions Romana and K9 were replaced with Adric. Of the seven stories, only "Full Circle" and "State of Decay" really felt like Doctor Who. Of the others, three ("The Leisure Hive", "Meglos" and "The Keeper of Traken") were good ideas realised in an esoteric, poorly paced and rather flat manner by the direction and script editing, and the other two ("Warriors' Gate" and "Logopolis") were esoteric and poorly paced to start with. Bidmead only lasted one season, after which the show largely reverted to a more familiar action-adventure style.
YMMV/{Blackadder}}
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: There is really nothing wrong with the premise of the first season. In fact it can certainly be argued it had more potential than other seasons, since it's actually rather ingenious. The execution left much to be desired; plot elements with potential (the ghost of Richard III following Edmund around and taunting him) were thrown out, while others were sorely underdeveloped (Brian Bloody Blessed as king Richard IV!).
YMMV.Doom II
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: While considered a great game, Doom II really doesn't take advantage of its Earth-based setting, aside from having a few levels near the middle portion that vaguely resemble cities and residential areas; since the opening act follows a "starbase" theme that could have been set on any planet, if it wasn't for the title and intermission text you wouldn't even know you're on Earth, and even the few levels that are supposed to be city areas look nothing like they're supposed to be (e.g. Suburbs just has a few wooden structures that do not look like actual houses, in a large open brown area with a large puddle of lava). One would think a game like this would have large epic battles between the Earth's military and the legions of Hell, or Doomguy going out into the wilderness every once in a while. Sadly this wasn't the case, likely due to the limitations of the original idTech engine. The 2011 version of Doom 4 was seemingly going to explore at least the former concept, before it was cancelled and re-built from the ground up. Thankfully, Doom Eternal gives the Hell on Earth formula another, more successful, try.
YMMV.Eternals
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • A complaint brought up by several reviewers is that, while the film has big ideas and themes that are interesting on their own, the movie tries to cram them all into the one narrative given with a huge cast, not allowing any single potential plot element to be given the focus needed to develop properly. It's a common belief that a Disney+ series would have allowed for more breathing room.
    • The controversial usage of Hiroshima is brought up to introduce the idea that Phastos, having been responsible for giving humanity many of its greater inventions, introduced the concept of nuclear power to humans and became dismayed when they weaponized it, to the point of giving up on humanity and their mission of protecting it. Come the next scene in the present day, he's moved on completely. Aside from attracting controversy before the film's release, some viewers were disappointed that the idea wasn't expanded upon.
    • The Eternals having lived on Earth for thousands of years. The scenes in the past are used to provide exposition or establish the characters (and, admittedly, most of them doing it successfully), but the actual plot and character development all takes part in the present.
YMMV.Evil Con Carne
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: "Tiptoe Through The Tulips" was about Hector and his allies were getting prepared for invading New Zealand as Operation Z-Day but Boskov stayed for hibernation. About nine minutes of the two-part segment consisted of being boring.
YMMV.Famicom Detective Club
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Some fans were upset over the fact that at the end of The Missing Heir, you don't get to see the reaction of characters like Zenzou, Akane or the villagers to The Reveal that the protagonist is actually a member of the Ayashiro family.
YMMV.Ghostbusters
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Between the Ghostbusters' first job at the Sedgewick Hotel and the final act where they confront Gozer's plan, there's very little ghostbusting. Plenty of scenes where they're about to 'bust or just finished 'busting, but no actual 'busting. Presumably this was to limit the number of (costly) special effects shots, but it still feels like there are a few setpieces missing from the middle of the film.
YMMV.Godzilla 2014
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Some critics feel that the Green Aesop and the nuclear geopolitics allegory that Gareth Edwards talked so much about in interviews leading up to the film's release were not as fleshed out as they should have been in the final product.
    • In one interview, he specifically characterized this film as portraying Godzilla as Gaia's Vengeance out to punish humanity. His portrayal here is a complete 180 from that.
YMMV.Half Life Opposing Force
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The idea of playing as Marines trying to stop the Xen invasion and hunt down Gordon Freeman is awesome, but that gets thrown in the bin as soon as the game starts. In fact, Shepard arrives during the height of the Marines' losing battle at Black Mesa, but gets knocked unconscious and by the he awakens the war is over and Shepard is forced to work with the Black Mesa personnel to survive. Functionally, there's little difference between Freeman and Shepard, which is a pity.
YMMV.Johnny Bravo
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The episode concept of "Witch-ay Woman" where Johnny is turned into a woman to put him in the shoes of all the women that he is always harassing is not only a great way to give him a cathartic reality check how uncomfortable women get when men like him bothers them, it would also come off as a great aesop about treating women with respect like respecting their boundaries and treating them like human beings. But sadly, it comes off as another one of those Anvilicious episodes with a misguided portrayal of feminism by making women portrayed as smart and mature while men are portrayed as dumb and immature, which ends up as Johnny not being able to understand how much of a jerk he is to women since his behavior towards them is not touched upon at all in the episode, and the only thing he seems to learn from it in the end is just that "women are smart and men are dumb."
YMMV.Jupiter Ascending
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The conflict between Jupiter and her mother is only hinted at. The opening narration states that Aleksa became bitter and cynical after her husband was murdered, implying that Jupiter grew up distant from her. Mother and daughter learning to reconnect through the events of the film could have made a good plot. Instead Aleksa is barely featured.
[YMMV.Ms Marvel 2014
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The book has teased a romance between Kamala and Bruno several times. This would be interesting, given Kamala's complete lack of romantic experience and the possibly conflicts between Bruno and her family. They even established Romantic False Leads for the both of them, and they still chose each other in the end. But even when there's nothing standing in the way of their romance, and after learning multiple lessons about how they can't just expect the other to wait for them, they don't get together or even tease the idea.
    • Originally, Kamala was often caught between her conservative upbringing and faith, and the fast life of an American teenager. She loves and respects her religion, but it also causes problems and conflicts that she must reconcile. We only get this in the first volume; after that, anything potentially problematic or difficult about her religion is unaddressed or outright defied. Her being a Muslim is no longer an issue, she receives no real bullying or hatred for it anymore, and the different cultures don't clash.
YMMV.Super Mario Odyssey
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Believe it or not, the wedding itself. When we finally get to see the wedding in the final stage of the game, it's mostly just Bowser trying to put a humongous ring on Peach than won't fit her finger at all, as well as the noticeable lack of a minister. All this to say that, despite all the work he went through, Bowser still isn't quite as close to marrying Peach as he was in other Mario adaptations before Mario's inevitable intervention, most notably Super Paper Mario.
    • Both the "boss-only" levels in the game (Cloud Kingdom and Ruined Kingdom) are among the most visually interesting ones in the whole game. Too bad they're not as full-fledged and explorative as the other levels.
    • The Brooklyn Bridge equivalent in New Donk City is inaccessible.
YMMV.The Matrix
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Cypher's Face–Heel Turn arguably comes a bit out of left field and feels as though it could have been built up a lot more. An earlier draft would explain that Morpheus has been so dead set on finding "The One" that Neo is the sixth candidate he's freed and the previous ones all died — thus giving Cypher more reason to become disillusioned with Morpheus and to betray him and want to re-join the Matrix.
YMMV.The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The subplot of Lucy being jealous of Susan is nonsensical and unneeded, but it does include a good message about being herself. However, when she uses Susan's bow and arrow rather than her own knife against the sea serpent during the climax, that message is ruined.
YMMV.{The Witches 1966}}

Random complaining: 75/357 (21.0%)

ArtisticLicenseHistory.Live Action TV
  • [Reign] The writers evidently got their ideas about Bohemia from Shakespeare. It never had a seacoast, much less merchant vessels and at the time was not even an independent nation, but merely one part of the vast Holy Roman Empire-which was'' an old enemy of France. Why they didn't just use them is a mystery.
Yu-Gi-Oh! Card Game
  • Checkmate, their intended Finishing Move card, is particularly baffling: it allows Terrorking Archfiend to attack directly. While this certainly isn't terrible, it's only 2000 damage, since Terrorking's effects are battle-destruction related. It also requires the sacrifice of another monster, which is a cost Archfiends aren't very good at paying. Mostly, the card is notable for spending an awesome name on an effect that doesn't even come close to winning you the game. Sure, you can still boost Terrorking until it has respectable enough ATK, but by then your opponent will catch on to what you're up to and make all your efforts moot with either Mirror Force or Negate Attack.
BigBad.Anime And Manga
Film.The Hobbit The Battle Of The Five Armies
  • Idiot Ball: Also, the orcs after the initial assault. Thorin Oakenshield is charging his army at the tip of a wedge, without headgear, keeping his shield as far away from himself as he can, and no single orc is ordered to shoot him? Where are Bolg's Morgul arrows when orcs really need them? Also, the eagles can just swoop in and fell the majority of Bolg's army without getting shot at. Bolg taking out one or two of them would have been awesome. The eagles did fear "great bows of yew" after all.
HilariousInHindsight.Video Games
  • Literature.Carrie
  • Lawrence D. Cohen (the writer of the 1976 movie) put together the musical adaptation in The '80s. After a limited run at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in England that got a mixed reception, it debuted on Broadway on May 12, 1988 — where it met with scathing reviews. The $7+ million production quickly became one of the biggest flops in Broadway history, as the musical closed after only sixteen previews and five shows. It became infamous enough to inspire a book written about Broadway's worst to carry the title Not Since Carrie. A number of people, however, saw a lot of potential beneath the poor production and feel that it could've worked out if it had received some polish. A heavily overhauled, off-Broadway revival eventually happened. Fun fact - the original Broadway run had Margaret White played by Betty Buckley - who had starred in the 1976 film as the gym teacher.
DisneyWestern Animation
TheScrappy.Live Action TVBayonetta
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Isla del Sol looks impressive... from the very few views you get of it. Chapter 14 is spent zooming towards the city across the sea with the skyline in the background, and then a cutscene puts Bayonetta on a roof and later the side of a building as she fights a boss there, Chapter 15 is set entirely in and on top of a skyscraper, Chapter 16 is a boss fight set around said skyscraper, and the epilogue is spent ascending beyond the planet's atmosphere. There's no chance to actually explore the very beautiful metropolis and see how it all relates to the angels' plan to resurrect Jubileus, whereas Vigrid is explored in comparatively ample detail, along with Noatun in Bayonetta 2.
Captain Planet and the PlaneteersYMMV.Charmed 1998
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The Assimilation Plot / The Evils of Free Will storyline with the Avatars was abandoned after an episode and a half of Utopia with the Avatars letting go of their perfect world on the Charmed Ones' say-so. Might count as a case of Pragmatic Villainy considering they live to try again, but almost makes you wonder if they could ever truly get it to last.
    • Witches are a rare species with magic that expresses itself as unique inherited abilities. Despite the potential for a wide array of interesting powers, most witches we see besides the Charmed Ones either have telekinesis or fire-throwing powers.
    • In regards to Phoebe's powers in later seasons. While she wasn't as strong as Prue or Piper, the early seasons did at least put in the effort to showcase Phoebe was strong in her own right. For instance Phoebe would use martial art skills and did her best in the spell and intuition department. She'd use her intuition to at least try and help prevent the outcomes of her premonitions, her powers would always make sure they tried to do something. (In fact the Season 2 episode "The Painted World" is a good example of this) In fact in Season 3 Phoebe and Prue were the two sisters who did most of the fighting while Piper mainly froze things until getting her Molecular Combustion power. After Season 4 however Phoebe's powers stop being as active, only happening once in a while and occasionally kicking an enemy. Then after Season 6 she stops being proactive in general having to rely on Potions or hide behind Paige or Piper as they did all the work. The key difference is the early episodes used other ways to make Phoebe involved with fighting demons, even proving herself useful, in later seasons it's like she doesn't have powers at all. She never regains her levitation powers or empathy either, although some feel that's actually a fitting consequence for her repeated selfishness in Seasons 5 and 6.
    • In general, Phoebe's character derailment in the later seasons is a result of the show failing to acknowledge her Trauma Conga Line in Season Four. Her behaviour includes: distancing herself from her sisters and magical heritage, becoming increasingly self-centered, jaded and less bubbly, being obsessed with her sister's baby first and having her own baby at all costs later, and becoming disillusioned about love. This is pretty consistent with depression over losing her sister, her love/husband and her unborn baby in a short span, as well as her guilt over betraying her family and frustration over her dead husband trying to force his way back into her life. Jason breaking up with her because of magic not long after was the final straw, seeing how faster and further her derailment went afterwards. Had the show truly addressed her mental state, Phoebe would have come off as more sympathetic and could have had a character arc about healing, redeeming herself, reconnecting with her sisters and magic, and balancing her new-found maturity with her earlier optimism and carefreeness, rather than just focussing on solving her "love block" by shoehorning a love interest at the eleventh hour as if that were the solution to everything.
    • The sisters struggle to keep friends throughout the series, which is especially an issue for Piper continuously in later seasons, but the series never really resolves it. It's just Piper complaining about it over and over again, which becomes annoying as the show brings it up without doing anything about it. It also would have been interesting in of itself to see the sisters have to deal with lying to their friends or becoming more involved in the magical community if they became friends with witches. Instead, the series ends with the sisters' only friends as their family, husbands, the Morris family, Elise, and Billie with the Morris family being on the other side of the country, Elise unaware of magic, and Billie having just tried killing the sisters.
    • The series really dropped the ball when it came to the fallout from Cole becoming the Source. While Cole returning after the Source was vanquished at least meant he didn't have to die because of being manipulated by others, the result is Phoebe and the others blaming him entirely for his actions as the Source - even when the Seer outright told Phoebe that Cole's love for her helped him fight the Source's possession for longer than she expected. They do seem to be setting up Phoebe being the one who has to learn not to blame Cole for her own actions - "A Witch's Tail" is only resolved when she admits she still loves him, "Happily Ever After" has her grudgingly apologising, "Siren Song" frames her as bringing out the worst in him - "I Am Sam" does an about face to have Cole being framed as a complete villain and Phoebe as a complete victim, forcing Cole into the Designated Villain to make Paige and Phoebe look justified in their pursuit of him. Cole is essentially a victim of everyone from the Seer to the Source to eventually his wife and in-laws, with everyone else shunning him for actions that were not his fault. His return in Season 7 doesn't real make things better either, since he's given a Villain's Dying Grace which still treats him as a willing villain rather than a victim of emotional abuse.
YMMV.Cho Ren Sha 68kYMMV.Clerks II
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot. Becky's speech attacking the concept of romantic love is an intriguing point of view that she argues quite cogently; by the end of the film (within hours, in fact), she's tossed this philosophy over the side and acceded to a thoroughly conventional romantic relationship while effectively implying what she'd said earlier was all just rationalization to avoid admitting her attraction to Dante.
YMMV.Code Geass
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The worst is (possibly) the subplot involving Marianne's death. She's revealed to be inside Anya and is killed in the very next episode, even though her murder had been one of Lelouch's main motivations since the very beginning of the first season. What's more, Empress Marianne herself was part of an arguably "evil" plan and abandoned her children to build a new world for them, which flies in the face of how other characters previously viewed her as admirable and near-perfect. This really should have been better explained in order to properly reconcile both sides of her portrayal.
YMMV.Codename Kids Next Door
  • As revealed in Operation Z.E.R.O. Nigel Uno is the nephew of the KND's greatest enemy, Father. However this relationship dynamic between them is never explored or touched upon again for the rest of the series and considering Father was aware of this, it is odd it was never brought up before.
  • Despite learning that Chad never betrayed the Kids Next Door, Numbuh 1's thoughts on remaining a KND operative after turning 13 was never discussed upon. His hatred towards Chad was so personal that he refused to believe that he was a Fake Defector the whole time. He never discussed about the Teens Next Door in the Grand Finale.
YMMV.Dude Wheres My CarYMMV.FaceOff
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Many Nicolas Cage fans have wondered why he didn't play Archer in the beginning instead, so when they get their faces swapped we see Nic Cage be a crazy bastard for the other 80% of the movie.
YMMV.Father Ted
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: In "Cigarettes and Alcohol and Rollerblading" Father Jack becomes sober for the first time in the entire series. He flees the house when Sister Assumpta arrives and isn't seen again for the rest of the episode.
YMMV.Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • All of Radiant Dawn's four parts are essentially different plots; Part 1 is Daein's rebellion and independence, Part 2 is Elincia's political troubles, Part 3 is the Laguz vs. Begnion war, and Part 4 is the fight against the Big Bad. All of these loosely interconnect except Part 2; in the longest Fire Emblem game to date, it is by far the shortest arc, spanning a mere 5 chapters from prologue to endgame, and simply works to show returning characters from the first game and what they're doing, including giving them a Filler Villain disconnected from the other plots. Sure, Radiant Dawn could've been a lot shorter without it, but it also could've been a much more involved plot. Only a third or so of its returning characters get to be active through the rest of the game instead of just at the end, and the rest are doomed to be junked unless you happen to have a lot of BEXP to spare.
    • The Branded, their place in the world, and their relationship to the Gods are not examined nearly as much as they could have been. Furthermore, a conversation between Stefan and Yune reveals a major twist about the Branded that never gets brought up or discussed beyond the conversation, namely that the Branded were not originally seen as an unholy mistake until after Ashera had Yune sealed, meaning a large chunk of the world's hatred was formed on a lie. Yet it doesn't go anywhere.
    • In the first game, there's an offhand mention that the reason that the Beorc oppress the Laguz is that, once upon a time, the Laguz oppressed the Beorc. Both when this happened and the nature of this oppression are never revealed.
    • Nothing is done with the fact that all three of Ashera's champions have Branded descendants. In particular, Lehran and Dheginsea both have interesting stories about how their bloodlines became mixed that play a significant role in the current state of the world, but nothing of the sort is revealed about Soan; no explanation is given for how his bloodline was mixed into the beorc population or how that event affected the larger history of Tellius.
YMMV.Goosebumps
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: There were many books for the TV series to adapt and many fans were disappointed that certain books (i.e., Curse of the Mummy's Tomb, The first Night of the Living Dummy book, Why I'm Afraid of Bees, The Haunted School, etc.) weren't adapted into episodes of the show. A reboot of the TV series is coming up though.
YMMV.I Know What You Did Last SummerYMMV.Iron Man
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • As discussed in the Strawman Political section, they could have had an interesting plot in which Tony is forced to go to more and more extreme measures to enforce an act that would hold responsibility over all other things, something he believes in due to his own shortcomings. Instead, they decided in some books to turn Tony into a power hungry fascist and decided accountability = slavery. Also he's a war criminal now. Apparently believing in responsibility is akin to amorality.
    • Crosses into They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character, but the general concept of Riri Williams is not a bad idea, Tony having a teenage protege who ends up becoming something of a Legacy Character for him when he's taken out of action. However, Riri was introduced rather awkwardly mere issues before it was announced she was going to take over, before she even met Tony, which naturally created an Audience-Alienating Premise, so there was really no way to develop and explore the idea of her as Tony's protege and successor in a convincing, acceptable manner. When Tony came back, Riri was Put on the Bus from his book, getting her own and appearing in some teen team books, but otherwise severing her connection with Tony, thus robbing her of the opportunity to develop as his protege, something that could have Rescued from the Scrappy Heap her for much of her hatedom.
YMMV.Jupiter Ascending
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The conflict between Jupiter and her mother is only hinted at. The opening narration states that Aleksa became bitter and cynical after her husband was murdered, implying that Jupiter grew up distant from her. Mother and daughter learning to reconnect through the events of the film could have made a good plot. Instead Aleksa is barely featured.
YMMV.Luigis Mansion 3
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Many fans wish that there was a special cutscene when you ran out of time during the Final Boss fight, since King Boo was trying to absorb the entire hotel into the one group painting during the final stage of the boss fight. However, the player just loses all of their health and the game runs a typical Game Over screen when you run out of time, which caused some disappointment.
    • Many players would have liked to see some kind of additional scene or alternate ending that involved Morty if the player chose to spare him.
YMMV.The Incredible Hulk 2008}}
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: A fair amount of attention is given to Betty's necklace, which is a Tragic Keepsake from her deceased mother. She thinks of selling it when she and Bruce go on the run, he convinces her not to, and at the end of the film she sends it to him as a symbol of her love for him. This memento never re-occurs throughout the MCU, despite the fact it probably could be very useful in calming the Hulk down, and as a symbol of all Bruce has lost in his life, a point of contention when Ross reappears in Civil War, or even a memento of Earth to the Hulk during his time on Sakaar. However, partially due the the movie mostly being forgotten ,the impracticality of the Hulk carrying jewelry with him at all times, and the fact that the necklace's design is utterly generic and forgettable, it's never mentioned again.
YMMV.The Naked GunYMMV.The Powerpuff Girls 1998

Hey, look at this cool fanfic idea I had!: 134/357 (37.6%)

GenderBender.Live Action TVNeverLiveItDown.Star Wars
  • Some people (Tumblr, predominately) aren't so quick to forgive Kallus after his characterization in "The Honorable Ones," never mind accept a possible redemption arc from him, mostly due to practically escorting Tua to her assassination while taunting her back in "The Siege of Lothal" (also not forgetting that he's burnt down Tarkintown, blockaded Ibaar, etc.). Most of the same people also think that the arc should've belonged to Tua or someone else that hasn't been already depicted as villainous as Kallus, although some have pointed out that this trope and arguments will likely be applied and addressed in-universe later on in Kallus's character arc.
Series.Married With Children
  • Game Between Heirs: There's an episode in which Al's Uncle Stymie, the only male Bundy to be a success in life (Al credits this to the fact Stymie was the only one who never married), left his $500,000 estate to the first male Bundy to have a legitimate son named after him. Considering that the lawyer who read the will would later marry a male Bundy and give birth to Stymie Junior to get the money, Al and the other Bundys who didn't get the money could have challenged the will under claims of undue influence.
YMMV.AliensYMMV.Alien 3
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Again, how awesome would it be to see Ripley working together with the small Hicks-Bishop-Newt family unit she developed in the previous film inside the hellhole that is Fiorina Prison? Considering that said group of characters is 1) an attractive woman, 2) a military authority figure, 3) an android, and 4) a little girl, watching those four fight for their lives in a prison full of violent rapists and criminals would arguably be scarier, in some ways, than having Ripley on her own hunted down by the Xenomorph, not to mention that their presence would make Ripley's eventual Heroic Sacrifice that much more moving, meaningful, and a satisfying conclusion to her story.
    • The fact the Xenomorph came from a non-human host and the intriguing revelation that they take on attributes of their hosts doesn't matter at all to the overall story, and aside from being somewhat skinner and running on all-fours more often than prior aliens, it's hardly noticeable in a movie so visually dark. This is especially so with the version that has it emerging from an ox, since the alien, rather disappointingly, doesn't look anything like an ox. A lot of supplementary Alien franchise media like comics, novels, and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem did further expand on this concept, however.note 
YMMV.Angel
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • "I've Got You Under My Skin" implies the Catholic Church is aware of the supernatural, with one of their nuns being able to instantly recognize Angel as a vampire just by looking at him, and for a moment it seems the series lore might include similar ideas to Constantine or Supernatural. One wonders what sorts of stories could be told if members of the Christian faith were involved in Angel's quest for redemption, or if the Catholic Church could have made a formidable adversary to Angel's branch of Wolfram & Hart in Season 5. Naturally the Church's involvement with the supernatural is never brought up again.
    • During Buffy's last appearance, she doesn't have a scene with Cordelia. It would have been nice to them part ways on good terms and have Buffy see how her former rival has grown as a person (and Wesley, for that matter).
    • More a case of 'a good plot was planned and cancellation ruined it'. Willow would have shown up in Season 6 to separate Fred and Illyria - allowing Amy Acker to play both characters. Given how good she showed herself to be in "The Girl in Question", that could have been quite exciting to see.
    • The lack of guest appearances of Xander (who could have received closure with Cordelia) and Anya (just imagine her and Fred sharing a scene) can be cause for mourning.
AsterixAvatar: The Last Airbender
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Iroh's entire past, including his journey to the Spirit World, has left fans with many questions, yet has never been touched upon in the show itself (although some of it was alluded to in supplementary books).
    • Before Season 3 aired, it was said that Zuko would begin searching for his mother in the season. Guess what never happened. (Thankfully, it was covered in the graphic novels.)
    • Koh ominously told Aang that they would meet again. This never happened onscreen.
    • The whole mistaken-kidnapping plot around Toph was resolved off-screen, including the revelation to the Gaang that she had lied about joining them.
    • Everything involving bloodbending. Despite only being the focus of a single episode, its horrific nature and backstory make it one of the most memorable plot points of Book 3. It wasn't until The Legend of Korra that the concept was explored to its true potential.
Avengers: Age of Ultron
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Even though the first Avengers film ended with the team splitting up and the different members going their separate ways, with the following films showing them having their own adventures on their own side, this film starts with the Avengers already assembled. It could have been interesting to see the circumstances in which the team finally reunited after all that time, but nope.
    • The first post-credit scene of Captain America: The Winter Soldier had Baron Strucker revealing that HYDRA is still very much active and has several bases all over the world that should keep Captain America and his friends busy. At the beginning of this movie, it's mentioned that the Avengers have spent the last few months fighting HYDRA and took care of all those bases off-screen. The war against HYDRA could have easily filled an entire movie on its own, unfortunately all we get to see of it is the assault of Strucker's base in the opening scene.
    • The film is very vague about whether the other Avengers besides Cap and Black Widow knew that Fury was still alive. Tony certainly doesn't seem too surprised to see him, and then it simply cuts to his briefing.
    • The film sketches out the barest hint of an arc for Captain America. At the end, he seems to view Kosovo-style interventionism as a affirmation of SHIELD/America's place in the world and redemption for SHIELD's actions during Captain America: The Winter Soldier. But it's majorly glossed over in the film, left mostly to incidental details like the Sokovian murals with dollar signs over the Avengers' faces and Captain America's vision of bloodshed after Ultron remarks he can't live in a world without war. As a result of this dearth of dramatic material, he has little to do other than be the Standardized Leader. Although it's known there exists a longer cut of the film and that Joss Whedon was unhappy with the Marvel Creative Committee's Executive Meddling, so perhaps it was a victim of editing.
YMMV.Blade II
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The Blood Pack was created to hunt and kill Blade, but the only time we see them, they have to team up with Blade against the Reavers. An entire movie featuring Blade being hunted instead of being the hunter would have been an interesting plot.
    • It's also a shame that Jared and Nyssa never really get to talk to each other except at the end, given that they're siblings.
Breaking Bad
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Mike has a granddaughter, Kaylee. Mike mentors Jesse. Jesse loves kids, having a strong Big Brother Instinct. It would have been cool to see the two develop a bond, especially after Mike's death.
    • Gus' mysterious past. First, the DEA is unable to find any information about his past in Chile. Second, in the flashback when the cartel kills his business partner, Don Eladio specifically says that Gus is only alive because "I know who you are." Considering how Gus is in no way a kingpin at this point, this implies something significant about his past. Creator Vince Gilligan has said that he deliberately left Gus' background mysterious, likening it to the contents of the briefcase in Pulp Fiction.
    • Surprisingly, Jesse and Walter Jr. never share a scene together during the series. Given that Walter Jr. is Walter's son and Jesse could be seen as Heisenberg's son, it surely would have been interesting for the two to meet.
    • A frequently noted missed opportunity is that Walter White never interacted with his customers. If he did, Walter would have to confront the real life consequences that comes with supplying a highly damaging & addictive substance to vulnerable individuals for his benefit.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Xander had all the puzzle pieces to have a character arc regarding his vampire hatred; with what happened to Jesse being the catalyst for it and close proximity to two "reformed" vampires being obvious places of growth. Instead Jesse is never brought up after the pilot, the potential trauma Jesse's death may have caused goes unexamined and Xander continues indiscriminately hating Angel and Spike right to the end, regardless of the status of their souls and their actions. The comics somewhat fix this, as it does have Xander briefly admit to having some trauma over Jesse, and he later does seem to get over his vampire hatred by starting an Odd Friendship with Dracula and becoming Vitriolic Best Buds with Spike. It is, however, still mostly an implied arc that isn't examined too in-depth.
    • While Angel would make the occasional guest appearance after getting his own show, none of his crew ever appeared. Imagine Buffy and co. seeing how Cordelia and Wesley have grown as people since they knew them, or meeting Gunn, Fred and Lorne.
    • Season 7 has a lot of wasted potential:
      • Many fans still argue that the big redemption story of Season 7 was given to the wrong character. Jonathan had been part of the show from the beginning, so it would have been great to see him repent for his being part of the Trio and finally become a hero in his own right. But instead he's abruptly killed off, and the redemption story goes to Andrew, who we'd only just met last season and hadn't done nearly as much to earn it.
      • Unfortunately the writers' hands were forced by the actors not being available, but "Conversations With Dead People" was originally intended to feature the First Evil taking the forms of Halfrek and Jesse to taunt Anya and Xander respectively. Amber Benson also declined to return for an actual Willow/Tara conversation, not wanting fans' last memories of the character to be of an evil doppleganger.
      • Several moments in Season 7 implied that at some point, Buffy would again be forced to choose between saving Dawn and the world, and this time would choose differently, most notably Joyce telling Dawn "Buffy won't choose you" in "Conversations With Dead People". In the end, nothing of the sort ever happens.
      • Faith's return happens too late for any questions surrounding her redemption to be properly resolved. The Scoobies almost immediately accept it and trust her, even mutinying against Buffy in favor of Faith one episode after her return. Her Attempted Rape of Xander in Season 3 is also never addressed, although it's not like most shows of the time (or even today) ever acknowledge that for what it is.
      • The idea of a split between the Scoobies and the Potentials, with the Potentials preferring Faith's leadership, could have made an interesting arc, but the mutiny is resolved and Buffy ends up back in charge after just two episodes.
      • Angel's return in the Grand Finale is nothing more than a cameo, as he doesn't interact with anyone except Buffy and doesn't participate in the Final Battle, despite his history with the First Evil. Once again, the writers' hands were forced by the network limiting crossovers with Angel.
Captain America: Civil War
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Age of Ultron ended with the Avengers forming an almost entirely new team, consisting of Cap, Black Widow, Vision, Scarlet Witch, War Machine, and the Falcon. Their next appearance here only has Cap, Black Widow, Scarlet Witch, and Falcon participating in the opening mission before the team splits up onto opposing sides which disbands the new Avengers, meaning we never get to see the full new lineup fight together as a team before breaking up.
    • The Reveal that Bucky Barnes is not the only product of HYDRA's Super-Soldier program, but there are five more elite enhanced soldiers who are described by The Winter Soldier himself as even stronger than he is, and that all of them together possess abilities that would allow them to take over a country within a day if given the order. These soldiers could've turned out to be Captain America and The Winter Soldier's toughest opponents yet and provide a convenient means for Iron Man and Captain America to drop their hostilities to team up and fight them, but instead Baron Zemo kills them all off while they are in stasis, effectively eliminating them as a threat. Tropes Are Not Bad in this case, since they were deliberately set up as a Red Herring, it enhanced Zemo's better qualities and helped deliver the Nothing Is the Same Anymore premise of Phase 3.
    • Multiple characters warn Tony that Ross will turn on him, constantly telling him to "watch his back", with the implication that Ross may start imprisoning all the Avengers and not just the ones who sided with Steve, but while Ross does refuse to listen to Tony when he discovers proof that Bucky was set up, he still allows Tony to leave unhindered and unfollowed (by Ross's men anyway) and tries to call him when Steve shows up to break out his team from their prison.
    • The movie does a rather good job at adapting the debate between Tony and Steve over how superheroes should be handled, removing many of the things that didn't work in the comic and making sure Both Sides Have a Point...but the debate is never really resolved; in fact, it's more or less forgotten after the airport battle so we can focus on the Bucky subplot, and isn't even the reason Cap and Iron Man fight in the climax. One could make the argument that the Sokovia Accords are actually superfluous to the movie as a whole, as ultimately they have little to do with why the characters end up fighting each other. The plotline surrounding Bucky and Zemo drives the majority of the film, and it could easily exist without the Accords.
YMMV.Code Geass
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Remember when C.C. entered in contact with Suzaku during the first season, which caused the two to black out several times and C.C. realized something important about him? It's never brought up again within the story but, according to the staff, Suzaku was apparently meant to either have a Geass power that gave him increased physical abilities or at least the potential for acquiring one.
    • The faction of Britannian nobles who wished to turn traitor and join the Black Knights. The only thing we get out of them is a conversation between Zero and Diethard. We then get a scene where Darlton arrests them and that's it, and they are never mentioned again.
YMMV.Codename Kids Next Door
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The KND "Splinter Cell" arc foreshadowed an internal civil war in the KND between the extremist Splinter Cell that believes all adults must be destroyed vs. the more moderate faction that believes only the evil adults should be stopped. It is also revealed that the Splinter Cell had been kidnapping KND scientists for unknown reasons. However, near the end of the series, it turns out that the Splinter Cell is just an front for the KND scientists, who fake their kidnappings so they have more free time to watch their favorite science fiction shows as well as manage "the Galactic Kids Next Door", the workings of which were left very vague in the end. However, a teaser animatic featuring the original cast and produced by Mr. Warburton suggests that a civil war plot expanding upon the working of the GKND may be on the way. Still, many fans would've preferred this plot without the GKND.
    • There's also the matter of the 1/362 Ship Tease. Despite Operation: I.T. showing how close they were and Operation: G.I.R.L.F.R.I.E.N.D. all-but-confirming that Rachel has feeling for Nigel beyond friendship, it was never resolved. The trope comes in with after Lizzie dumped Nigel, which looked like it was foreshadowing that he would end up with Rachel. You can imagine how many fanfics have centered around them getting together.
    • Some fans were hoping that more would've came from Numbuh 1's report in "Operation: A.R.C.H.I.V.E.S.", especially since the ending indicated that there was at least some level of truth in it.
    • In most fiction, adults hate teenagers far more then they do small children and teenagers hate being bossed around by adults. Instead of being complete allies to the adults, it would have been interesting if the teenagers were a more independent group that battled both adults and kids.
YMMV.Deadpool Kills the Marvel UniverseYMMV.Death Note
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Due to the uniqueness of the Japanese justice system (described under Values Dissonance), the idea that any of Light's victims were wrongfully convicted doesn't ever get mentioned. If it did, it would've thrown an extra layer of grey onto Light's actions.
    • Light defends his usage of the Death Note by citing how wars have ceased entirely since the rise of Kira. Aside from this one comment, the intriguing prospect of Light using the note to end global wars is never elaborated upon.
    • During his incarceration, Light theorizes that another Kira might be controlling him. This is actually a very interesting concept and would've turned the entire series on its head if it had been true.
    • The rivalry between Mello and Near is only slightly touched upon.
    • The whole idea of Mello being Near's split personality in the drama.
    • Light becoming a megalomaniac after just his first couple of kills robbed the story of a potential drama from seeing a more nuanced Protagonist Journey to Villain as he steadily rationalizes his increasingly heinous actions.
YMMV.Frankenstein
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Oh, come on, a race spawned from the Creature and a man-made Bride would have been awesome. But, alas, Frankenstein had to destroy her body before she could be awakened. Though Shelley was probably more concerned with her story's message than a rad story.
YMMV.Jurassic Park
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The Sequel Hook about the dinosaurs who have somehow escaped Isla Nublar and are going on a reign in terror across Costa Rica. Crichton abandoned this when he wrote The Lost World, having Marty briefly mention them being wiped out, and the filmmakers of the sequel movies contented themselves with the characters going back to the islands.
YMMV.Mighty Morphin Power Rangers
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • Tommy, the team's Sixth Ranger, started out as evil but eventually turned to the side of good. Later on, Lord Zedd would recruit an entire team of Dark Rangers, who eventually turned good. Yet Zordon never recruits them as a second-team (either a back-up or a team to protect Stone Canyon) that would use the suits from Gosei Sentai Dairanger.
      • Some fans felt that giving Tommy more angst at being forced into evil and making him The Atoner could've given his character a bit more depth and made both occasions of him losing his powers all the more impactful. It is brought up on occasion a few times whenever Tommy gets brainwashed for the plot of the day or when an evil clone is made at one point but not for anything longterm and things are always back to the feel-good by the next episode.
    • Many fans feel this way about the aforementioned Dark Rangers never actually fighting the Power Rangers.
    • "Switching Places" is pretty disappointing as a "Freaky Friday" Flip story, not least because Billy and Kimberly switching bodies has no impact at all on the fight scenes later. At the very least, they could have messed with the Transformation Sequence to have one or both of them say the wrong animal at first, Like Gokaiger did years later.
    • If they had kept Scorpina around, she would have been in "The Wedding" 3-parter, happy to see Rita return and becoming her Maid of (Dis)honor, and have a dance with the reluctant Goldar. With that said, the two would have developed a relationship together not unlike their Zyuranger counterparts.
    • Also, they could have reused the Power Eggs plot, which would configure into Rita's revenge on Zedd.
    • In Season 3, the Rangers gain armor, and at the end of said season, the Command Center is destroyed, but rebuilt at the start of Zeo. This would've been a perfect time to use the suits and updated Command Center from the movie to replace each respective one...but unfortunately, due to the decision to film the movie in Australia, they had to be left behind, meaning that not only was the chance to include them in canon lostnote , but we also had to deal with the glitter insteadnote .
    • If Austin, Walter, and Thuy stayed a little longer, then Jason, Zack, and Trini would have been given a proper send-off like they've done with Kimberly in season 3. We would have also seen them interact with their future replacements and not suffer from being Demoted to Extra. Lastly, Tommy would officially be promoted to leader after the power transfer.
YMMV.Mr MenYMMV.Ms Marvel 2014
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: At Kamala's defeat of the Inventor, a cop warns Kamala to be careful because there's things lurking on Jersey City's street worse than a half bird man. However, we never see any of these home grown threats, and instead, Kamala is always fighting external villains, who are often times connected to some greater event happening in the Marvel universe.
YMMV.Ouran High School Host Club
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The very first episode demonstrates that the Host Club doesn't mind flirting with boys as well as girls (when they first believe Haruhi is one), though this is never brought up again as the Host Club is never visited by homosexual boys, which could have made for some fun moments. That is, apart from Episode 23 which plays with this as the customers believes Kasanoda to be gay for requesting Haruhi.
YMMV.Ozzy and Drix
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • The fact that Hector was a relatively normal boy left a lot of unanswered questions as to how the body and mind, and their respective characters, would be different if the host had a chronic condition or mental disorder. Doubly jarring since Ozzy did travel to Christine's body at one point, where we saw how the lifestyles of those inside bodies differed depending on the biological sex of their host, meaning examining other bodies while still having Hector as the main hub would have been possible. And of course, it being for younger audiences, the onset of sexual maturity and everything it entails wasn't explored (though Hector does experience a small growth spurt and some G-rated side effects of puberty).
YMMV.Pacific Rim
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • There's enough room to do a film or two on those first four attacks and on the Golden Age of Jaeger combat. Of course, given that the Golden Age stock footage resembles scenes from It Came from Beneath the Sea (attacking San Francisco, arguing about toxic blood disposal) you could argue that that movie has already been made.
    • The cult of Kaiju worshipers, who could have made very good secondary villains. Imagine an entire subplot following a different division of the Jaeger program dedicated to stopping terrorist members of the Kaiju cult from attacking Shatterdomes from the inside. It's tangentially addressed, at least — there seem to be a lot of troops around inside the Hong Kong Shatterdome carrying small arms that don't seem to do much on-screen, but considering that there is a definite Kaiju cult around, it's possible that's what they're there for.
YMMV.Ready Player One
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The book is famous for its heavy focus on properties from the 1980s and 1990s despite in taking place in 2044. It could've had commentary about effects of reboot culture, the current obsession with nostalgia and how future society is still focused on the same entertainments from over half a century prior, but instead it only talks how awesome old shows and movies are. It also could have talked about the shallow nature of nostalgia, that the only reason old properties remain popular in 2044 isn't because people naturally like it but because its the key to winning Halliday's fortune and control of the OASIS.
YMMV.Resident Evil 2
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: With an outbreak of the T-Virus infecting just about the entire population of Raccoon City, the game initially looks like it'll be about exploring a city overrun with zombies. Instead, the action swiftly moves to the police station, which looks more like a creepy art museum, and feels like a rehash of the Spencer Mansion from the previous game. It wouldn't be until Resident Evil 3: Nemesis before players got the opportunity to run around the city's zombie-filled streets in greater depth.
YMMV.Richie Rich
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The business school for rich kids only appears for one scene in the film. Overall, the only purpose the scene serves is to make it clear to the viewers that Richie is unable to properly hang out with other rich kids as friends after school. One does have to wonder though how different this movie would have turned out if the film focused more on the business school setting of Richie's life rather than going the "rich kid befriends normal kids" route.
YMMV.Sayonara Zetsubou-senseiYMMV.Super Mario Odyssey
  • Peach denying the chance to marry Mario, as this could have been an opportunity to explore Mario and Peach's relationship past it being simply the implied romance it's always been.
YMMV.The Legend of Korra
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Fans generally agree that keeping the Fire Nation Out of Focus in Korra, after a whole series of being the Evil Empire, was a smart decision. Notably, none of the four main villains is a firebender. Otherwise, however, many fans argue that the Out of Focus was so excessive it turned into a waste of potential. Korra sets foot on the Fire Nation only once during the entire series, that is at the island of the Fire Sages. Zuko is the former member of the Gaang still alive who gets the least screen time. His daughter Izumi is the new Fire Lord but talks only once to express her refusal to mobilize her armies in a preemptive attack. General Iroh II, Izumi's son, gets some screen time as leading The Cavalry on two occasions, but he isn't really fleshed out as a character. Even worse, none of them appears on screen at the same time (except a scene where Zuko and Izumi are sitting together as background characters and don't talk). It's implied that the Fire Nation reformed to a peaceful and isolationist country, or that Zuko overgrew his trauma caused by Ozai and became a good father, but the series doesn't really show how exactly the Character Development of the Fire Nation and its inhabitants went.
    • One interesting bit of lore that was never developed is the implication that as nations become more industrial and more distant from nature, the birth rate of benders drops. This was shown in the Original Series with the Fire Nation having the lowest ratio of benders of the Four Nations, while the deeply spiritual Air Nomads were all airbenders. This could've been a source of conflict for characters like Tenzin, the White Lotus, Unalaq, or even the Red Lotus that modernization and mechanization of the Physical World were robbing it of its connection to the Spirit World.
    • Some people have pointed out one idea that was underdeveloped was that Republic City is essentially the architectural equivalent of the Avatar—just as the Avatar is the Four Nations distilled into one person, the city performs the same function just on a larger scale. While there is division within the city as can be expected in any place where large groups of people live, the citizens of Republic City all chose to live there, and proudly continue to do so. Making the city a Melting Pot of cultures a proper plot point could've been used to make statements about assimilation and diaspora. It could've also been used to cast Korra as a kind of Superhero who must constantly protect Republic City—and what it stands for—from ever-constant calamities.
YMMV.The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • While it's understandable that Ganon would be too far gone from humanity to be any more than a Generic Doomsday Villain, his backstory doesn't go anywhere beyond mentioning that he's a continuously reincarnating Ancient Evil. There's absolutely no explanation as to how Ganondorf degenerated into a smoky mass of evil energy, and the resemblance of Ganon's cyborg form to Ganondorf has no impact on the story nor is touched upon.
    • Despite the game offering several monster masks at Kilton's shop that make the corresponding enemies not notice you and each Hyrule culture and faction having a signature outfit, Sheikah included, the game does not have any kind of Yiga outfit that can be found, in their hideout or otherwise. In addition to being a visually appealing outfit option, it would be nice to have another stealth outfit that had a Yiga-proof effect, which could either make the hideout segment of the DLC easier or just keep Yiga from spawning on the overworld and prevent disguised Yiga assassins from attacking you. Besides, it'd be pretty funny for the Yiga to be so secretive that they don't even know each other's identities, and that's why they buy costumed Link being a member.
    • The Champions' Ballad DLC seemed determined to make bosses repeatable content within the player's save file, finding a way to allow Link to rematch the Blight Ganons and making the new boss at the end available for rematches as well. Doing so not only allows the player to fight them again for fun and challenge, but also to get another chance to take Compendium photos of them. It's a nice fix... but they didn't invent a way to rematch Master Kohga, despite one trial taking you back to the Yiga hideout. As it is, Kohga is now the only boss who cannot be rematched or photographed after the initial fight, and since the DLC otherwise seemed determined to correct this problem, it stands out more that they still left one boss as a one-time thing.
    • The Xenoblade Chronicles 2 sidequest has very little to do with the game that it was meant to advertise, with the only real ties being Rex's Salvager Set as a reward (which is actually very weak) and its very loose ties to salvaging as seen in XC2. As such, the quest doesn't do much to make the game seem attractive to the uninitiated. It could have easily been an opportunity for more Mythology Gags to give new players a better "feel" for XC2 and advertise it more effectively, such as providing Pyra's Aegis Sword as a reward along with the Salvager Set, or cameo appearances from various characters and enemies (for example, having a random Nopon or even Azurda as the quest-giver).
YMMV.The Nanny
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Given how the show ends as Niles and C.C. get married and C.C. finds out that she's expecting their baby, it probably would've made more sense to make Niles and C.C. an expectant couple both as a way to write Lauren Lane's pregnancy into season 5 and as a way to show Niles and C.C. relationship as parents with them possibly falling in love later. This, in turn, could also have been used to spur Fran and Maxwell into acknowledging their feelings for one another and officially become a couple.
YMMV.Third Rock from the Sun
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: In Season 1, the Solomons discover that their last name means that they can easily pass for a Jewish family. They never wind up committing to Jewish culture, however, and they abandon it by Season 2, beginning to celebrate Christmas.
YMMV.Totally Spies
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot
    • In "Totally Busted!", we learn about the spy gene, meaning the girls' parents used to be spies. It would've been the perfect opportunity to explore the mothers' past as spies; doing so would have given them a reason to put an end to the girls' spy careers as well as some much-needed Character Development throughout the course of the special.
      • Hell, we barely get to see the spies' families. If the show devoted more time to showing and fleshing them out, "Totally Busted!" wouldn't have been needlessly forced and mean-spirited.

I can't believe the writers completely disregard everything that was already set up in the trailer: 2/357 (0.6%)

NeverTrustATrailer.Live Action Films
  • Silent Hill: Revelation 3D. The trailer has many misleading bits, including the implication that the Seal of Metatron causes reality shifts, the careful editing to make Pyramid Head look like a threat (it's not a spoiler to point out he's an ally of the protagonist in this film), and a trailer-exclusive line where Dahlia tells Heather "You were chosen to destroy the demon," which is not the plot of the movie - though the confusion is understandable.

Poor examples that need elaboration: 1/357 (0.3%)

From YMMV.Malcolm in the Middle
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Having an episode introducing Piama in some capacity would've gone over well (while still maintaining a surprise with them being married), given how she suddenly appeared out of nowhere and was already married to Francis.

When I first saw it, I was sure I'd missed an episode. I felt the same when I rewatched it, but it turns out that this really was Piama's first appearance. Looking back on it, however, I'm pretty sure this was completely intentional. Piama's very first appearance is when Francis comes home for Hal's birthday, and surprises everybody by announcing he's been married for an entire month. The family responds with a resounding "What the heck?!"

And the thing is, this is also exactly how the audience reacts. Our introduction to Piama is precisely the same as how the family reacts to her. So yeah, this was an intended audience reaction.

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