What An Idiot / Live Action Films D To F

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D

• The Damned United: Having just been appointed manager of Leeds United, Brian Clough has his first meeting with the club's players, who Clough has been very publicly critical of in the past, along with the club's previous manager, Don Revie.
  You'd Expect: Clough to ask the players that they agree to start off with a clean slate, and make it clear that he intends to have them play with a less physical style than that which they employed under Revie.
  Instead: His first words to them are "The first thing you can do for me is to chuck all your medals and all your caps and all your pots and all your pans into the biggest fucking dustbin you can find, because you've never won any of them fairly. You've done it all by bloody cheating." — a sentiment which many, if not most English football fans would fully agree with, but one which is nonetheless an incredibly ill-advised thing to say to a dozen-plus people who he's going to have to work with every day. Clough's time in charge of the club never recovers from this, and it leads to him only lasting in the job for 44 days.
• Dans La Brume: A mysterious fog envelops the city of Paris and seemingly kills anyone who comes in contact with it. A mother and father must risk their lives to attempt to save the life of their young daughter, who has lived her whole life in an isolation chamber that is now running on auxiliary (read: battery) power. At one point, the parents get their hands on a pair of oxygen masks and try to go and retrieve a specialized suit that would allow them to transport their daughter to a safer location.
  You'd Expect: As both parents are scientists and rational thinkers, they would realize they need to conserve their oxygen and maybe take one of the random cars that are all around.
  Instead: Both of them end up running as fast as they can, which ends up in the mother using all her oxygen, and eventually later dying when she has to go replace the battery in her daughter's isolation chamber.
  Even Worse: After they are caught in a random explosion while retrieving the suit, neither parent thinks to CHECK and make sure the suit is still in good condition. It's not - the explosion damaged it too badly to be used.
• The Day After Tomorrow: The police officer who rallied the survivors in the library has decided that he wants to chance leading the survivors of the flood out of the city because he saw other herds of people start to form outside.
  • You'd Expect: The officer would take a vote and see how many other people are even capable of a long, hard hike in the worst blizzard in human history.
    Instead: He damn near forces as many of the survivors to accompany him as possible, with his only advise being to "bundle up" as if this is going to be a short trip. We don't even hear a word about food or potentially portable shelter they can bring with them.
    Even Worse: He's frantically being told by the son of a climataologist that this is a horrifically bad idea and that the storm is going to get worse.
    The Result: Within hours, people start to die. Within a couple of days, the entire group is wiped out before even making it out of New York state.
• Dawn of the Dead (2004): Sarah gets forced to run away from her husband who's become infected after being bitten by a zombie girl. She grabs the car keys and (barely) escapes through the bathroom window.
  You'd Expect: For Sarah to get into her car as soon as possible and drive somewhere safer.
  Instead: She pauses to look at all the chaos going on around her, giving her zombified husband a head start to chase after her. She even repeats this mistake after stopping at a traffic collision on the road when a bus driver tried to steal her car.
  Later: The mall refugees' attempt to send food to Andy in the gun store has gone awry, and Nicole has gotten herself trapped in his store. All of the men except Steve are going to rescue her and load up on ammunition, leaving Steve to wait and open the one-way fire door that is their only way back into the mall.
  You'd Expect: Even with Steve's demonstrated Jerkass, that he'd recognize that the door won't open from the outside and the men would be trapped and killed - taking the bulk of their group and all of their guns to the grave. Steve would then stay by the door and do what he is asked.
  Instead: Steve wanders off for absolutely no reason, meaning that the group is forced to bang on the door until Anna hears them. The resultant delay allows the zombies to reach the door and prevent the group from closing it, forcing them to evacuate the mall hastily and unprepared, losing nearly every member in the process.
  • Norma finds that Luda died in childbirth and turned into a zombie, but Andre tied her up and is holding his baby daughter, in denial and armed.

You'd Expect Norma to drop her gun, sympathize with the man (or pretend to), and try to reason with Andre until he comes to his senses.

Instead Norma shoots Luda, Andre shoots Norma, and Norma shoots Andre before she dies. The group loses three members in minutes and only one of them to zombies.

• Deadly Prey: A batch of mercenaries deployed by Hogan see one of their own run into one of Danton's trip wires and therefore perish.
  • You'd Expect: Them to form a strategy - or at least to silently patrol the woods and check for more trip wires.
  • Instead: They just run through the woods without even thinking to check for traps, thus making their inevitable deaths come even sooner.
• Deadpool wants to find Francis in order to cure his disfigured face and hoped to approach his old girlfriend, because she supposedly wouldn't accept his ugly look. To do so, he interrogates several associates by saying "Where's Francis?" to them but it seems that they genuinely didn't know who this Francis guy is.
  You'd Expect: For Wade to realize that they sincerely don't know who this Francis guy is and only know him as Ajax. Perhaps he should swallow his pride for once and either say "Where's Ajax?" or "Where's Francis? The guy you know as Ajax." He could probably find the guy in a much shorter time than say, 1 year.
  Instead: Out of spite for the man who disfigured him, Deadpool address the Big Bad exclusively as Francis. As a result, this caused Wade to waste a lot of time as he could't interrogate any info on someone like Francis. By the time he finally have Francis's location, he has already spent more than 1 year on finding him, enough that Vanessa would have potentially moved on and find a new boyfriend. He is very lucky that they latter case didn't happen or Deadpool would have ended on a bittersweet note.
  • In the pre-Logan short film Deadpool: No Good Deed, Wade as he roams through an alley notices an elderly bystander being mugged by an armed man.
    You'd Expect: Wade to run to the scene and rescue "Uncle Ben".
    Instead: He goes into a phone booth (in 2017?) and hurries to change into his uniform trying to imitate Superman. It takes him 70 seconds. The old man gets shot and the bad guy runs away with the victim's money. Deadpool, not knowing what to do next, picks up the old man's ice cream and eats it.
• Death Note (2017):
  • L sends twelve FBI agents to investigate the suspects. One of them ends up tailing Light. Not wanting to kill innocent people or upset law enforcement, Light decides to leave them alone. Mia and Ryuk then persuade him to kill them.
    You'd expect: Light would get a little concerned that Mia might want to get rid of the FBI agents and keep the Death Note with him at all times until the FBI agents stop following him.
    Instead: He leaves the Death Note in his backpack, which is up in his room. Mia then takes advantage of this when Light is downstairs watching the news, steals the Death Note, and kills the FBI agents herself.
    You'd Then Expect: Light would realize that Mia must have taken the Death Note, since she went upstairs, and ask her what had happened. Besides, Light must have read the rules of the Death Note. Chances are, Light would know that shinigami are not allowed to help cause or prevent deaths that are written on the Death Note, except when a name is written down for the former situation.
    Instead: He believes that Ryuk wrote the names of the FBI agents. This allows Mia to take advantage of his accusation and continue to write names behind his back.
  • After being threatened by L, Light decides to kill him. To do so, he decides to use L's friend, Watari, to find the name and then spare him by burning the page that includes his name afterwards, which can only be done once.
    You'd Expect: Light would keep an eye on his Death Note at all times during the two-day period. That way, if Watari can't find the name in time, he can burn the page without a problem.
    Instead: He leaves the Death Note in his room. While L is yelling at Light for controlling Watari, Mia quietly steals the Death Note, takes the page including Watari's name out of it, and writes Light's name on another page. This causes Watari to eventually die.
  • At the same time, L realizes that Light is coming after him by trying to find his name.
    You'd Expect: L would realize that Watari has some slight knowledge about his name and would make sure that Watari's face can't be found anywhere.
    Instead: He doesn't think about this possibility. This allows Light to control Watari and (unintentionally) kill him.
  • Eventually, Mia betrays Light and decides to kill him if he doesn't give the Death Note to her.
    You'd Expect: Mia would use the Death Note to control Light to do so.
    Instead: She only writes that Light would die at midnight. Because Light can move freely, he was able to stop her.
  • Afterwards, Light writes Mia's name on the Death Note that states that she will die if she takes the Death Note. Once the get on the ferris wheel, Light tells Mia that if she takes the Death Note, she would never see him again.
    You'd Expect: Mia would get suspicious about what Light told her and would ask him about what he means about that before taking the Death Note.
    Instead: She takes the Death Note without hesitating. This allows Light's plan to stop her to unfold. Only then does she realize that Light wrote her name on the Death Note and that she was going to die because of what she had just done.
• Death Race: Hennessey wants Frankenstein's car armed to explode remotely, in case the final race goes in a direction she doesn't like. Frankenstein's pit crew is run by a head mechanic with such a strong attachment to the vehicle he voluntarily remains in prison after his sentence finished to keep servicing it.
  You'd expect: Prison technicians to sneak into the workshop during off hours and rig the car's munitions to cook off - there's a canister of napalm right there in the driver's compartment. If an external device had to be used, make it as unobtrusive as possible, and do anything to make the modification hard to notice.
  Instead: The Dragon waltzes in during the final race's prep time and orders the pit crew out, before affixing simplistic bomb made of shiny aluminum that looks nothing like the rest of the car to the center of the undercarriage, while the car was still lifted for repairs. One wonders how he thought it wouldn't be found.
• Deep Impact: President Tom Beck knows a killer chunk of space rock is going to hit Earth and secretly builds underground cave shelters for America's best and brightest. This leaves the matter of everyone else in the country...
  You Would Think: He would talk with his top men and at least give everyone else a list of suggestions on how they might improve their odds of surviving the disaster. Even if it was just a lot of "Duck And Cover" bullcrap, it would be better than nothing. Plus, he knew the rock was going to hit the East coast, so he could just tell the Americans to head westward.
  Instead: He pretty much tells the rest of America he's written them off as not worth saving and that he's just going to save his own ass and those of the elite. The meteor final falls, causing far less damage then anticipated. Beck, in all likelihood, will not be reelected considering how many people will be righteously pissed off at him.
• Deuce Bigalow: When Antoine comes home at the end of the first film, he taps on the fish tank like he always does, and it shatters because the glass hasn't had time to set.
  You'd Expect: Deuce to feign innocence and ignorance of what happened, blame the tank makers or some other plausible scapegoat, and say he knows a guy that could fix it for a fair price.
  Instead: Deuce immediately admits to man-whoring (which obviously tips Antoine off that Deuce broke and replaced the tank), and says he knows a guy that could fix it but he's a bit expensive.
• The Devil Wears Prada: Miranda Priestly is the editor-in-chief of Runway magazine and a Bad Boss. Even so, she's established as a smart woman who clawed her way to the top. While she's trying to fly back from Miami to New York, a hurricane hits. She wants to get home to see her daughters' recital.
  You'd Expect: Miranda would accept that she's not getting home in time for her twin girls' recital. Hurricanes kill people!
  Instead: She calls Andrea, her new junior assistant, and expects her to find a private jet and pilot to take her home in time.
  Predictably: Andy fails because no one with any common sense will fly in the middle of a hurricane. Miranda of course goes Never My Fault and tells off Andrea for telling a pilot to risk his life for the editor of Runway.
• Die Hard: Early on, following the advice someone he met while arriving in L.A., John McClane takes his shoes off and walks barefoot in the Nakatomi building to relieve some tension. During this, Hans Gruber and his men take over the building, and McClane is forced to sneak out but unable to get his shoes back on, forcing him to remain barefoot. When John kills the first of Gruber's men he attempts to take his shoes, but to his chagrin finds out that they are too small to fit him.
  You Would Think: That John would continue doing this with any future members of Gruber's team that he'd manage to kill until he found a pair of shoes that he'd be able to wear.
  Instead: McClane does not think to do this again at all. It's understandable if he's being fired at or being chased by Gruber's men since he'd be more focused on not dying, but he even forgets this during one good portion of the film where he isn't being hunted down and is in a room with 2 goons he's just killed: while he throws the body of one out the window to alert Al, he takes whatever he can from the other including some explosives he was going to use for Hans and his cigarettes, but for some reason not his shoes. And later on one of Gruber's men proceeds to shoot out several pieces of glass, causing McClane's unprotected feet to get completely cut up.

• District 9: Aliens come to Earth, malnourished and unguided. They're taken from their ship, set up in a temporary camp which degenerates into a slum, and are constantly exploited by the private corporation responsible.
  You'd Expect: The governments of the world would take an interest in preventing the abuse of these aliens, considering that they're 1) sapient and at least as intelligent as us and 2) capable of building technology that makes us look like cavemen in comparison. They're also bigger and probably a fair bit stronger. Clearly, treating them badly will not end well for us in the long run, and in case anyone happens to briefly forget about their existence and/or their technological prowess, their giant spaceship has been floating over the skies of Johannesburg ever since they arrived 20 years ago.
  Instead The private corporation turns the aliens into slaves in everything but name. They're restricted in where they can eat, where they can work (and what work they can do), and forced to live in slums. Their unhatched eggs are confiscated and destroyed. They are subject to being evicted from their dwellings without notice. They are required to take on human names, speak English (or understand it, anyway), and abandon any trace of their own culture. These requirements are published on the company's website, where anyone can go look them up. The world's governments apparently don't give a crap, and are instead placated by the nifty new gadgets that the company is turning out.
  The Result: One of the scientist aliens, Christopher Johnson, along with his son, has gotten tired of being oppressed and has been secretly building a small ship to fly back to the main spaceship and use it to get help from their homeworld, and thanks to a human bureaucrat being accidentally sprayed by a healing alien nanomachine liquid that's now unintentionally slowly turning him into one of the aliens, he's also forced to help Christopher get back to the spaceship or be subjected to experimentation from the very corporation he works at: thanks to their ability to operate the alien weaponry that the corporation and local warlords have been hoarding but haven't been able to get to work they ultimately succeed, Christopher leaves in the spaceship for his homeworld and Earth is all but screwed when the aliens return en masse.
• In Doc Hollywood, Dr. Stone has had to perform community service in a small town while he waits for his car to get repaired after wrecking it, all the while dealing with the fact that he's had to push back a major job interview in the process. When the car finally gets fixed, he prepares himself to reach Los Angeles and win his gig. Just as he's driving to part ways with the town, he catches wind of a couple he had met earlier in the movie about to deliver a baby on the side of the road. Naturally, since he's grown close to the townsfolk, he decides to be a Good Samaritan and pull over to help them with the delivery.
  You'd Expect: For Dr. Stone to pull the car off to the side of the road away from any potential traffic, like any human being with common sense would do.
  Instead: He stops the car in the middle of the road, facing completely sideways.
  The Result: His actions end up costing his car again when a semi truck driver passes through the road and is unable to slam his brakes in time to prevent t-boning Dr. Stone's vehicle.
• Don't Go in the Woods: Peter and Ingrid are faced with something happening in the woods.

You'd Expect: Peter and Ingrid to leave things up to the police and their recruits.
Instead: Peter and Ingrid take matters into their own hands, running off into the wilderness... alone.
* In Drag Me to Hell, Christine has a cursed button in a blank envelope. Tomorrow, a demon will drag whoever owns this button to hell, so she needs to give it away to someone else. Unfortunately, she's accidentally switched it with an envelope containing a silver quarter.
You'd Expect: She would check the contents of the envelope to determine that it really does contain the button. Getting bodily dragged to hell is not something you want to be careless with. In the very least, she should at least notice that the item in the envelope she keeps fidgeting is too heavy and made of metal, and thus is not the button.
Instead: She digs up Mrs. Ganush's grave in the middle of a rainstorm, and shoves the wrong envelope into the corpse's mouth. By the time she finds out she left the button in her boyfriend's car, it's too late.
Result: She gets dragged off to Hell, and cue Downer Ending.

• Dragonheart:
  • The king was an evil tyrant and a dragonslayer who met his end while slaughtering peasants and burning their village. His son, Einon, was mortally wounded in the process of trying to steal his father's crown from his corpse. His mother, Queen Aislinn, and mentor, Sir Bowen, take the dying prince to see the dragon that would later be given the nickname "Draco". Draco observes right away that Einon is a manipulative brat and every bit as evil as his father, and voices his reservations about granting their request to heal him. Aislinn and Bowen swear on Einon's behalf that he wouldn't be like his father.
    You'd Think: That Draco would refuse to help Einon, depose Aislinn as queen, and install someone of sounder mind and moral character to take over rule. Einon's word isn't worth its weight in his own spit, and Draco can see that Stockholm Syndrome has Bowen and Aislinn wrapped tight around Einon's finger, whether they realize it or not.
    Instead: Draco makes Einon swear the oath with his dying breath, takes him at his word, and shares his heart with him, restoring the prince to life and granting him a portion of the dragon's power.
    Result: Einon uses his newfound power to become more monstrous than his father had been through extortion, torture, murder, and even rape.
  • A despondant Bowen concludes that this was the dragon's doing, and returns to the lair to confront him.
    You'd Expect: Draco to meet Bowen at the cave entrance, disarm him, and then pin him down until he listens to reason. He does just that in a later scene, proving that he is capable of it.
    Instead: Draco vacates. An enraged Bowen develops a grudge against Draco, abandons the Old Code, and takes out his revenge by hunting dragons into near-extinction, leaving Draco as the Last of His Kind and screwed out of his afterlife when the movie catches up with him.
• One prime example from Dumb and Dumber: Harry and Lloyd, the two eponymous idiots, are stranded in the middle of nowhere with no money and no motor scooter, wondering when/if they’ll ever catch a break. Just then, a bus arrives carrying a group of bikini models on a national tour looking for two “royal boys” to grease them up.
  You’d Expect: Harry and Lloyd to gladly accept their invitation and board the bus.
  Instead: Harry comically misses the point and directs them to a town where there may be said royal boys. The models then shrug and drive off.
  However: Lloyd admonishes Harry: “Do you realize what you’ve DONE?!” Lloyd then runs to catch up to the bus and apologize for Harry’s misguiding.
  You’d Then Expect: Lloyd to tell the models that he and Harry are boarding.
  Instead: He directs them the OTHER way, confusing the models even more.
  But Let’s Be Honest: You’d expect plenty of stupidity from a movie with a title like this, and you won’t be disappointed there.

E

• During the titular event in Earthquake, a man has to run inside a house to turn off a ruptured gas line.
  You'd Expect: He would dispose of his lit cigarette first.
  Instead: He does not. The house goes boom.
  • Again, during the big earthquake, people crowd an elevator.
    You'd Expect: They would stay out of it until the shaking stopped.
    Instead: They do not. The elevator goes boom with very unconvincing blood spatter effects.
• Election sees a paranoid teacher put in charge of counting the votes in the class election. Much to his horror, he sees that his least favorite student Tracey Flick has won, but the election was Decided by One Vote.
  You'd Expect: He'd simply erase one checkmark for Flick and replace it with one for her opponent. It's not unheard of for someone to change their mind in the voting booth, after all. He also could have just stuffed the papers in his pocket. It's not like they'd frisk him.
  Instead: He casually tosses two votes for Flick into the trash can, taking no effort to disguise or bury the papers they're written on. Naturally, the papers are discovered and his voter fraud is caught.
• In Elf, Buddy, a human raised by elves at the North Pole, detects that the Santa Claus working at Gimbels is an imposter and confronts him for an interrogation.
  You'd Expect: Buddy to ask a question that the real Santa Claus would most likely know so he can put the Gimbels Santa on edge. He could remind him why he was sent to New York City in the first place or grill him on the whereabouts of his biological father, especially considering he's on the naughty list.
  Instead: He asks the Gimbels Santa what song he sang for him on his birthday. Naturally, the Gimbels Santa replies with "'Happy Birthday' of course!"
• Enter the Void: Oscar is holed up in a Tokyo bathroom with no way out and the cops on the other side of the door.
  • You'd Expect: Him to do basically anything else but what he does. He could try hiding, pretending to surrender, tricking them and more.
  • Instead: In order to scare them off, he tells them he has a gun.
  • As a Result: While Japanese officers aren't as trigger happy as other cops around the world, it's still an invitation for them to open fire.
• In Evil Dead (2013) there are several moments:
  • Eric has just found a mysterious bundle in the cabin's basement. Said basement had dozens of mummified, mutilated cats hanging from the ceiling and the bundle was wrapped in a garbage bag that had been tied up in barbed wire.
    You'd Expect: Eric would leave the clearly ominous thing alone or even just leave it for some other time since he's supposed to be there as part of a group effort to help Mia.
    Instead: He painstakingly cuts it open to see what it is.
  • Upon cutting it open, he sees it's clearly a Tome of Eldritch Lore. It's bound (badly) in nerotic flaps of Genuine Human Hide, and inside it is filled with a combination of horrific illustrations of demons and mutilated corpses, interspersed with deranged scribbled warnings that had have been added by some prior reader. He eventually reaches a part where several words have been painstakingly scribbled over, with large printed warnings to leave them alone.
    You'd Expect: He'd get freaked out and leave things well enough alone, because this is some creepy shit.
    Instead: He painstakingly etches out the blanked words, reading them aloud as he does, and opens a gateway for the Deadites to come through.
  • The entire reason they've come to the cabin is to be there to help Mia get through her addiction and they've suggested that they should even stop her if she tries to leave.
    You'd Expect: For them to agree that someone should at least always be around to keep an eye on her since she's going to be in horrible shape and probably not rational.
    Instead: No one notices that Mia is huddled and walking in circles in the pouring rain.
  • From the start of the movie, the people who stopped the last Deadite attack had the book, clearly knew exactly what it did and given that they took the time to tie a girl to a stake, set it on fire and bundle the book in barbed wire, they clearly weren't in a hurry.
    You'd Expect: If for some reason they had to leave the book in the cabin, unguarded, then they would put it in something that no one could get open with an hour's work like a safe. You'd also expect it to be put somewhere very hard to see.
    Instead: They left the book covered by just the wire and bag, and in clear view on the desk.
• In Evolution, General Woodman is preparing to use napalm bombs against the invading aliens, when he receives a call from Dr. Allison Reed, who claims to have "important information" relating to his plan. Previously, Allison had walked out on him in response to his behaviour towards the main characters.
  You'd Expect: Woodman to at least hear her out, regardless of whatever she did in the last few hours.
  Instead: He doesn't take the call. The bombing goes ahead, and it causes the aliens to all fuse into a gigantic amoeba-like creature. Turns out that Allison was calling to warn him that excessive heat causes the aliens to rapidly evolve. Luckily for Woodman, the heroes manage to destroy the creature, however it's implied that he'll receive a hefty demotion as a result of his screwup.

F

• Face/Off
  • The Walsh Institute is keeping Castor Troy alive, in a coma. They decide to carry out a surgery that causes Sean Archer to receive Castor's face.
    You'd Expect: That afterwards, they keep the comatose Castor under the watch of armed guards 24/7, and also restrained to his hospital bed.
    Instead: The people at the Institute decide that Castor is not enough of a flight risk to justify even restraining to the bed, even though Castor is a cop killer, and even have a phone in the same room as Castor's bed. Hence, when Castor wakes up, it's easy for him to call his cronies, so that he can force Dr. Walsh to give him Archer's face.
  • Earlier, before he undergoes the surgery, Archer is told by Miller that the mission he is undertaking is a black bag operation (classified, strictly off the books, no paperwork), meaning he cannot tell his boss Victor Lazarro or his wife and daughter that he is about to receive Castor's face. Archer seems skeptical and a bit reluctant at first to carry out such a mission, thinking that there are a number of ways that something could go wrong, one of which appears to be "what if Castor comes out of his coma?".
    You'd Expect: Archer to disregard Miller's instructions and tell his family and the director that he is about to get Castor's face with a special surgery. That way, there is someone who knows who Archer really is in the event something happens to Tito or Miler.
    Instead: He never does. Castor comes out of his coma, makes the doctor give him Archer's face, then kills Dr. Walsh, Miller, and Tito by burning down the Institute, before going to the prison to taunt Archer that with everyone alive who knows who he really is dead, he'll be stuck in prison for the rest of his life. It is hence impossible for Archer to prove who he really is until he breaks into his own house to tell Eve that he and Castor have different blood types.
• The Fanatic: Hunter breaks free from the restraints Moose put on him and stabs his eye out and shoots the fingers off his right hand.
  You'd Expect: Hunter to restrain Moose, call the cops, and claim self-defense against a man who committed a home invasion.
  Or: Hunter to just shoot and kill Moose. California has Stand Your Ground laws,^note Both at the time of updating this page and at the time the movie is set. and this is clearly a case where he would be in the right of said law.^note Aside from the fact that Moose had killed Hunter's maid earlier (granted, there isn't any indication Hunter knows that, but still), he is technically breaking and entering, and is clearly a threat to Hunter and his son. Plus, given how Hunter has treated Moose so far, it's clearly not like he would have that much of a problem pulling the trigger. Then again, Hunter is both horrified and remorseful for blowing off Moose's fingers and stabbing his left eye, which may have something to with why he chose not to end Moose's life.
  Instead: He inexplicably lets him go.
  End Result: The police cannot link Moose to the murder of Hunter's homekeeper and arrest Hunter instead, who didn't murder her.
• In Fantastic Four (2005), the titular team successfully defeated Dr. Doom by having Johnny use supernova on him and Ben spraying him with water afterwards. Doom is frozen after this.
  You'd Expect: Given he's living metal, frozen or not, precautions would be taken to make sure he doesn't cause trouble again.
  Instead: He's shipped back home and left unguarded, apparently under the assumption that he's stuck that way forever. Naturally, he returns in the sequel.
• Fantastic Four (2015):
  • In the 2015 reboot of the Fantastic Four movie, Ben Grimm receives a telephone call at 3:00 in the morning from Reed Richards, who is by his own admission drunk out of his mind. Reed asks him to accompany him in an unauthorized joyride on the dimension travel device he just finished inventing.
    You'd Expect: Him to say "It's three in the damn morning. Go to bed." and hang up the phone.
    Or: Him to say "I'll be right there.", head to the Baxter Foundation, and talk Reed out of said joyride.
    Instead: He agrees to accompany him. Guess what happens. Just guess.
  • Once they reach the alternate dimension, they survey the landscape and notice a strange green energy nearby.
    You'd Expect: Victor to take a few pictures and call it a day.
    Instead: He goes down to take a closer look.
    You'd Then Expect: When he starts approaching the energy, someone to say "Don't Touch It, You Idiot!".
    Instead: Nobody does.
    The Result: The energy reacts explosively, and in their escape three of their number and the person who guided them back in are irreversibly mutated while the fourth is thrown into the energy and presumed dead for a year.
  • Eventually, on a return trip to the alternate dimension, they find Victor has inexplicably survived and promptly bring him back to receive treatment.
    You'd Expect: Dr. Allen, who knows he's dealing with a man who has noted anti-government beliefs and in fact believed that the military would hijack the project at the first opportunity, to apologize for leaving him behind and promise to help him as much as they can.
    Instead: He makes a statement that effectively amounts to, "Haha! We let the military hijack the project at the first opportunity!"
    The Result: Victor goes on a rampage throughout the facility, killing him, Dr. Storm, and many other unnamed personnel.
  • Victor goes on a rampage throughout the facility, killing many people by making their heads explode. He then comes across the Fantastic Four.
    You'd Expect: Victor to explode their heads.
    Instead: He fights them the old fashioned way.
    The Result: The Fantastic Four are able to stop his plans and kill him.
• Fargo:
  • Wade has been informed that his daughter was kidnapped (unaware that it was due to his son-in-law Jerry attempting to swindle a lot of cash out of him) and he is given specific instructions to let Jerry give some ransom money.
    You'd Expect: Wade to follow the orders and entrust Jerry with the ransom.
    Instead: He tries to do it himself and demand his daughter's release, which results in one of the criminals, Carl Showalter, killing him. Wade's justification is that since his son-in-law is pretty incompetent, he should handle the situation, but even that falls flat because Wade basically put himself in harm's way.
  • Carl isn't really the brightest bulb either. Earlier in the movie, he and his partner-in-crime Gaer Grimsrud have successfully kidnapped Jerry's wife but are puled over by a cop since the car they are driving has no tags (Carl realizes he forgot to put them on) and Carl attempts to make the cop go away.
    You'd Expect: For Carl to show the cop his license and cooperate in order to make the cop leave him and Gaer alone.
    Instead: He attempts to bribe the cop, leading him to almost being arrested. He also almost sees the kidnapped victim, forcing Gaer to murder him.
  • At the very beginning of the film, Jerry is in debt and needs money from his father-in-law Wade to get out of it.
    You'd Expect: He'd explain the situation to his wife Jean, and stage her kidnapping to avoid any trouble.
    Or: If he's worried Jean wouldn't approve of such a shady act, he could claim loan sharks are after him and secretly send her and their son away to stage their kidnapping. He could even convince her to keep it a secret from Wade by telling her the less people know the better.
    Instead: He comes up with the HORRIBLY thought through plan of hiring two Trigger-Happy psychos (one of whom looks like death incarnate), and tells them to kidnap his wife.
    The Result: Things go From Bad to Worse as Jerry's plan falls apart before his very eyes, resulting in the deaths of a number of people including Jean.
• The Fate of the Furious features cyberterrorist Big Bad Cipher, who needs a top level driver as part of her Evil Plan.
  You'd Expect: That with her level of resources - which include a full team of master hackers and an untraceble Cool Plane that serves as her base of operations - it would be little trouble for Cipher to find someone who fits the bill and would willingly do the job without having to be coerced into it.
  Instead: She decides to recruit Dominic Toretto, forcing him to work for her by threatening his ex-girlfriend Elena Neves and his child with her.
  The Result: While the threat is able to ensure Dom's immediate co-operation, it also means that he's secretly working and scheming against Cipher right from the get-go. Come the film's third act, he breaks free of her hold with the help of the Shaw family and wrecks her entire operation, and she's forced to ditch her plane in order to escape.
  Bonus Idiocy: Throughout the film, she's openly trying to corrupt Dom - the same man who nearly murdered a guy who got his father killed - into his old, darker self. As if the most logical outcome of that course of action wouldn't be her getting beaten to death with a socket wrench.
• In Feast, a plan has been devised that requires a corpse to be used as a distraction, and bomb, for the monsters to facilitate an escape plan. Just before the plan starts the 'corpse' regains consciousness, Bozo hesitates while Boss Man decides to continue as planned. The monsters go for the bait before they decide, and they blow her up as planned. Big Man asks if Bozo will agree not to tell the others about Harley Mom being alive.
  You'd Expect: The guy to say 'sure, no need to burden the others' since it was WAY too late to change the plan either way.
  Instead: When a distraction presents itself he gets into a fight Big Man that ends in the death of Heroine.

• Ferris Bueller's Day Off:
  • Dean Rooney is Ferris's Sitcom Archnemesis. He's noted that Ferris has been absent for nine days, and confirms with his mother that he hasn't been sick for all those times. The problem is that as he's trying to break the news to her and bust Ferris for playing hooky, the computer starts bringing down his number of absences to two. Turns out Ferris hacked into the computer using his birthday present and erased the evidence. Then Ferris's girlfriend Sloane is excused from class because her "father" called saying that her grandmother died and they need to make funeral arrangements. While Rooney is cowed into believing this is true thanks to Cameron helping Ferris deceive the dean, Rooney gets suspicious when he sees Sloane frenchkissing who he thinks is her dad before they take off in a Ferrari. His attempts to get in touch with Sloane's family and the funeral home are dead ends. Rooney confides in Grace that this smells of a Ferris Bueller scheme.
    You'd Expect: He would call in Ferris's sister Jeanne and explain that she's not in trouble, he just wants to know if Ferris is likely to be Playing Sick. It's revealed that Jeanne knows her twin brother best and is perfectly aware that he faked an illness. Jeanne also does go to see Mr. Rooney and asks Grace when he'll be back, to relate her own suspicions that Ferris is playing hooky, but by then Mr. Rooney had already left. She could agree to go on her senior lunch break to check on Ferris at home, and report back. In fact, Jeanne does this on her own and would have busted Ferris if her mother hadn't been in a meeting for an important real-estate deal.
    Instead: He takes off on own, shortly before Jeanne comes in to talk to him and relate her suspicions, to see if Ferris is at a local pizza place and then if he's at home.
    The Result: After mistaking another teenager (a girl) for Ferris, and getting mauled by the Bueller dog for sticking his head through the doggie door, Rooney breaks into the house. This wouldn't be a problem if Jeanne weren't at home trying to dial her mother and reveal a Sleeping Dummy has taken her brother's place, and she mistakes him for an intruder when they encounter each other. Jean kicks him in the jaw enough times to knock him out and calls the cops, forcing Rooney to leave. He drops his wallet and finds out that due to parking illegally on the curb, his car got towed. While he does seem to bust Ferris when the latter returns home, Jeanne is mad at Rooney for getting her arrested and scaring her to death; she covers for her brother and reveals to Rooney that she found his wallet. Cue the dog mauling him again.
  • Speaking of said arrest, Jeanne calls the police and hides under her bedsheets. The police do come offscreen though the 911 operator thinks that she's making it up.
    You'd Expect: They'd check the house just to be sure. Jeanne can relate that she kicked the "intruder" in the jaw, several times and he happened to leave his wallet.
    Instead: They arrest Jeanne for "making a phony call" and dial her mother to pick her up, though the sergeant sympathetically says that something must have frightened her. To make matters worse, Mrs. Bueller thinks that Jeanne was skipping school and making up a story. Jeanne is understandably pissed off at this as she drives them home and tries to catch Ferris after spotting him on the road heading home.
    The Result: Jeanne finds Rooney's wallet when they return home but realizes that her parents are so dumb that they still wouldn't believe her. She's so mad that she covers for Ferris because now she hates Rooney as much as he does.
• At the climax of A Few Good Men, Kaffee spots a fatal contradiction in Colonel Jessep's testimony, and asks why, if Jessep's men always follow his orders, no questions asked, he was worried enough about the deceased marine Santiago to order him transferred off the base, even though he had ordered that no-one was to touch Santiago.
  You'd Expect: Jessep to say that he did so simply as a precautionary measure — and considering that Santiago apparently ended up being set upon and killed by two fellow marines, it was a precaution that was entirely justified. On top of that, Santiago was not adjusting well to the base's environment, so there was no good reason for him to remain there.
  Alternatively: Just invoke the Fifth Amendment and refuse to testify, knowing that he's covered his tracks well enough to ensure that any resulting investigation is highly unlikely to turn up any evidence.
  Instead: He undergoes a Villainous Breakdown, and delivers a self-aggrandizing speech to the court — even after the judge tells him he doesn't need to answer Kaffee's question — before finally proclaiming upon further badgering from Kaffee that he did order that Santiago be subjected to a "Code Red" punishment that inadvertently resulted in his death.
• Field of Dreams: Towards the end of the movie, Ray's brother-in-law Mark is worried about how he converted his cornfield into a baseball field and is watching "nothing" since he can't see the ghost baseball players or the game in session. The bank may foreclose on Ray and ruin their livelihoods. Ray's daughter Karin says, "It's not nothing." Meanwhile, Ray finds he can't sell the farm in good conscience when Terrence Mann tells him that people will come to watch the games.
  You'd Expect: Mark would focus his concern and anger on the adults in the area. Karin is a kid who from his perspective may not know better.
  Instead: He physically grabs Karin, hurting her.
  The Result: When Ray understandably shouts at Mark to let go of his daughter, they tussle and Mark accidentally tosses Karin to the ground from the bleachers. She lays unconscious. Mark with a My God, What Have I Done? expression says they need to get a doctor, and Archie Graham's ghost steps off the field, becoming his elderly physician persona and giving up his chance to play to save Karin.
• In The Fifth Element, bad guy Zorg, after watching numerous Mooks fail to get the four stones he's after, decides to hunt them down himself. He walks in on Leeloo holding a box that he assumes holds the four stones. He orders her to give him the box. She throws it to him and tries to escape, whereupon he fires blindly into the duct system she hid in.
  You'd Expect: Zorg to make sure Leeloo's dead, then check the box to see what's inside before leaving, especially since Leeloo gave the box up without a fight and this isn't the first time he's been handed a box that he thought had the stones in them.
  Instead: He plants a bomb for no discernible reason, heads back to his ship, leaves, and only then looks inside the box. Unsurprisingly, the stones aren't in there.
• Final Destination: In every movie, one of the characters has a Premonition about him/her and his/her friends dying at whatever place they are currently at, the character suggests they should get out of there before they end up killed, and after they get of the place, one of them ends up dead in strange circumstances eventually, leading to the main characters trying to cheat death.
  You'd Expect: That our heroes would be careful when using sharp objects, avoid going to risky events, stay indoors, stay off work, etc.
  You'd Also Expect: They would also make sure that the person who's next on Death's list is supervised at all times until they can find away to avoid his/her death and then try to figure to break Death's Design.
  Instead: They do everything but the above.
  • In Final Destination 2, Kimberly Corman and Thomas Burke arrive near a dentist where Tim Carpenter has just had a dental check-up, and Kimberly notices that there are pigeons nearby.
    You'd Expect: Kimberly would keep her mouth shut about the pigeons.
    Instead: Kimberly screams about the aforementioned pigeons, and it causes Tim to go stomp around them. One of the pigeons accidentally causes a construction worker to drop a glass pane.
    So now you'd expect: That either Kimberly, Burke, Nora, or one of the construction workers would shout "Move!", thus ensuring Tim's safety.
    Instead: They stand there looking shocked as the glass pane crushes Tim. Way to go, Kimberly.
  • In Final Destination 4, George attempts to commit suicide several times, but none of his methods work. Nick and Lori find out about this after saving Janet.
    You'd Expect: The two of them would put two-and-two together and realize that you can't commit suicide if it's not your turn. After all, the noose just kept breaking. Even if they can't seem to figure that out, at the very least, learn that people that are saved are just skipped.
    Instead: They think that saving Janet ended Death's design. Not long after, another person on Death's list dies and George is soon run over by an ambulance when their guard is down.
• The Fly II: Bartok and Co. bring Martin who entered an active phase of his mutation back to their base. He already doesn't look human and they know that his father in his later mutated form was dangerous enough to cripple a man with a spit.
  You'd think: They'd place him in a bunker like one the mutated dog was kept in and keep him under 24/7 video surveillance with a team of armed security guards at hand.
  Instead: They place him in a common lab with a single scientist observing him. Needless to say, he escapes rather easily and returns in a Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
• Frankenstein: It's a sad lookout when the monster with the supposedly abnormal brain ends up being the most intelligent character in the movie.
  • The Monster has risen, and Frankenstein, the doctor and Fritz are trying to control him... except Fritz has a torch in his hand and the Monster is afraid of fire and getting more riled by the moment by its presence.
    You'd Expect: They'd get the bloody torch out of there.
    Instead: They let Fritz get even closer with the bloody torch, agitating the Monster further.
  • Fritz has been abusing and antagonizing the Monster, enraging him.
    You'd Expect: Doctor Frankenstein to sternly admonish Fritz to stay as far away from the Monster as possible.
    Instead: Fritz keeps screwing with the Monster until the Monster hangs him with his own whip. And then is completely berserk.
  • Frankenstein and the other doctor have subdued the Monster, and believe he may be dead. The other doctor has promised to dispose of him quickly.
    You'd Expect: They'd get some gasoline, find a clear patch, and immedately incinerate the Monster then scatter the ashes just to be sure, if for no other reason than to prevent any diseases from the dead body parts from a myriad of corpses.
    Instead: The other doctor places the Monster on the gurney again and decides he's going to have him some dissectin'. The Monster snaps his neck.
  • The Monster has escaped and comes across a young girl playing in a field.
    You'd Expect: That faced with a rotting, scarred, lumbering creature, she would scream and run with all speed to find a responsible adult (which, given the caliber of the adults in this film would entail her running straight into another movie...)
    Instead: She asks "would you be my friend?" and gives him a bouquet of flowers. He ends up accidentally causing her death by drowning.
  • The Monster is on the loose, and is believed to be coming towards the Frankenstein estate, where Henry Frankenstein is about to be married to his fiancee, Elizabeth, and may even be in the house.
    You'd Expect: Henry would make sure that at least an area code was between Elizabeth and the Monster, would not leave her alone, and certainly make sure there was an escape route for her in case of trouble.
    Instead: He locks her, alone, from the outside (ensuring she can't get out) in a ground-floor room with big glass windows, perfect for the Monster to walk right through to terrorize her.
  • Frankenstein is leading his section of the angry mob on their search to find The Monster. He hears something and wants to investigate.
    You'd Expect: Frankenstein would go back and make sure that at least some of the mob came with him.
    Instead: He shouts to them, and when he doesn't get a response, climbs up the hill alone where the Monster layeth down the smack upon him.
• Freaks of Nature: Stuart Miller has a bunker projected specifically to guard against creatures like Petra (a vampire) and Ned (a zombie).
  You'd Expect: He would tell them to piss off or at the very least, have a weapon in hand to keep them at bay if they try anything funny.
  Instead: He promptly hits on Petra, telling her that they will have to breed in order to survive the alien invasion (given she is a vampire, its unlikely this would worked either)
  The Result: Stuart is immediately killed by Petra and Ned.
• Freaks: Cleopatra, the circus trapeze artist, has married the midget Hans for the fortune he inherited so that she can poison him for it and then run off with her lover Hercules, the circus strongman. At the wedding reception, Hans's friends start a "Join Us" Drone of "one of us" and pass a cup to her.
  You'd Expect: Cleopatra, despite her uneasiness at the one of us chant of Hans's friends, to just play along with it or be a Stepford Smiler and pretend she's touched by their gesture. This would not be hard for her to do; after all, she should try and stay on the freaks' good side until she gets Hans's money.
  Instead: She loses it when they pass the cup at her and calls them FILTHY! SLIMY! FREAKS!. This immediately makes the freaks (and Hans, for that matter) suspicious of her and, when Hans does get sick thanks to Cleopatra's poisoning, they quickly figure out what Cleopatra and Hercules' plans are, and it does not end well for them. At. All.
• Freaky Friday (2003): Anna is getting bad grades in her English class. When her mother Tess confronts her about it, Anna explains that her teacher hates her because he used to date Tess and is Not Good with Rejection. The teacher literally told her this.
  You'd Expect: Tess would at least consider that Anna wouldn't make up such an outrageous lie. She ought to hold a parent-teacher conference with the guy to get to the bottom of this.
  Instead: She confiscates Anna's bedroom door as punishment, refusing to believe her.
  The Result: When mother and daughter switch bodies, Tess gets spontaneous Adult Fear and a Jerkass Realization when she finds out the teacher was one of her high school exes. He bluntly says he's punishing Anna for the crime of existing and her mother turning him down. Only then does Tess take action, telling the teacher while in Anna's body that she's reporting him to the school board if he continues with this unconscionable behavior, and he is such a creepy guy. It's implied that she'll go Mama Bear after they're switched back.
• Friday the 13th: In Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday, the FBI has managed to kill Jason by luring him out into the open with an attractive agent, then blow him up with an airstrike.
  You'd Expect: Given that they clearly know Jason has superpowers and has come back to life on several occasions, and they're not taking any chances, they'd take whatever was left of him, and throw it into a pit full of thermite. Problem solved. Series over. Or if they wanted to know more about him, they could ship them off to a place like Area 51, with tons of security and the resources to properly study him.
  Instead: They send his remains to a nearby ordinary morgue for ordinary people with an ordinary coroner and only two guards.
  The Result: Granted neither tactic would have actually worked, since Freddy Krueger was planning on resurrecting Jason, and he can apparently do so even if Jason's heart has been destroyed. Plus, Jason can apparently posses you without any outward signs or you having to eat his heart (as he was implied to have done Roy Burns and Tommy Jarvis). But the government couldn't possibly have known either of these things.
• In Fright Night (1985), horror movie show host Peter Vincent is facing down Jerry Dandridge. Vincent knows full well that Jerry is a real vampire, and attempts to use a crucifix to stall him in front of a window to be killed by the rapidly approaching morning sun. However, because until that case Vincent has had no previous experience with the supernatural, he doesn't immediately realise that this only works if he truly believes in the crucifix's holy power (even though he learned this from a previous failed attempt to use a crucifix against Jerry).
  You'd Expect: Jerry, who is privy to this information (and knows that Vincent is too, having told him himself), to keep his trap shut about it, and use his superhuman powers to overpower Vincent.
  Instead: Jerry mocks him, then loudly proclaims "YOU HAVE TO HAVE FAITH FOR THAT TO WORK, MISTER VIN-CENT! RE-MEM-BERRR?" then stands there laughing. Vincent promptly has faith, and manages to hold Jerry in place where he's nearly killed by the sunlight.
• From Justin to Kelly: Brandon takes bets on the hovercraft basketball competition, and runs afoul of the beach cop who keeps on pursuing him. She catches him with a wad of money in his hands
  You'd expect: Him to keep his mouth shut, and make up something about where he got the money from. As far as said cop knows, he earned the money legally, and if she doesn't have reason to act, she can't do anything.
  Instead: He asks if gambling on hovercraft basketball is legal. He gets in trouble yet again.
• The Fugitive has Samuel Gerard seeing Dr. Richard Kimble in Cook County Jail from behind his back as he is walking down the stairway.
  You'd Expect: He should sneak on him quietly while he is going the stairs and catch him from behind. Pretty easy, huh?
  Instead: He just shouts his name out loud while he's not much far from him by the stairway. This results in Gerard nearly getting arrested by two police officers that Kimble say that he's a criminal, and losing him again.
• Full Metal Jacket: Although R. Lee Ermey defined the Drill Sergeant Nasty trope with his character Gunnery Sgt. Hartman, the climax at the end of the first half of the film proves that he was a failure in the end. Take "Pvt. Pyle"'s suicide, where Joker finds him in the bathroom, holding his rifle, and has it fully loaded. His loud shrieking of the Marine Corps Prayer garners the attention of GySgt. Hartman.
  You'd Expect: That, upon discovering that the mentally shattered Pyle is holding a fully loaded rifle, Hartman would send Joker get a hold of some military police to come and defuse the situation, and in the meantime try to keep Pyle calm. As it is, he could quite easily shoot the two of them dead, after which he would be free to butcher the rest of the squad.
  Instead: Hartman doesn't do that, and just calmly asks for the rifle. Pyle fails to comply and takes aim at Hartman... who taunts and speaks down to him more, even when it's clear that the guy needs serious help. But after asking him, "What is your major malfunction, numbnuts? Didn't mommy and daddy show you enough attention when you were a child?!", Hartman is shot dead by Pyle. Only the fact that Joker is the closest thing Pyle has to a friend stops him from going on a killing spree, and he instead takes his own life.

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