History Main / HowDoIShotWeb

** In ''Film/IronMan3'', Tony puts Pepper Potts in the Iron Man suit to protect her from flying debris. She tries to fight their attackers, but can't figure out how to work the suit, so Tony remotely takes the suit back when she is at a safe distance. [[spoiler: Savin steals the War Machine suit and has no trouble operating it. It is revealed that the so-called terrorists bombings were really people who took Extremis and blew themselves up because they couldn't regulate their powers. When Pepper is injected with Extremis, she manages to control her powers and defeat the BigBad with them.]]

** Sesshoumaru has the ability to instantly master any weapon, especially swords. He even knows how to master swords he hasn't even touched (such as Inuyasha's Dragon-Scale Tessaiga). However, when Tenseiga gained the Meidou Zangetsuha power, Sesshoumaru struggled to master the ability. When he did finally master the ability (after a humiliating encounter with an old enemy of his father), he realised that he wasn't meant to keep the power and passed it on to Inuyasha instead. It was the only sword power in the entire story that required a compassionate heart to master instead of fighting/weapon skill or instinct, and the lesson for Sesshoumaru was that he should never wield a sword without feeling fear at the possibility of losing loved ones or without feeling compassion for even his enemies.

** Comicbook/{{Spider-Girl}} Spider-Girl didn't exactly have problems learning to use her powers, but she needed training from her [[Franchise/SpiderMan father]] and his friend Phil to really be able to master them and become a more experienced fighter.

* The Super-Skrull is a recurring ''ComicBook/FantasticFour'' villain who can use all the super-powers of that team, plus has a native alien ability to shapeshift. Nevertheless, he is always defeated, usually by the Four's ability to [[ThePowerOfFriendship work as a team]]. It's been explain in canon that one of the reasons he loses to the FF is that some of them have gotten upgraded (either explicitly or via Power Drift) since he was created. For example Sue Storm wasn't the most powerful member of the team when they copied her, so her powers are stronger than the Super Skrull's. The Thing and Johnny Storm also had power ups. Reed has stayed the same, but his real power is his brain and he is indeed smarter than Super Skrull. It must be noted that Sue Storm's original power, that is, the one copied by Super Skull, is the power to turn invisible (Sue is still called "Invisible Girl"), which at the time was roughly the weakest, dumbest and most feeble excuse for a power in the Marvel universe. Her power upgrade (which Super Skrull ''does not'' have access to) is ''the ability to create invisible force fields of any shape or size at will.'' This upgrade ended up making her one of the single most powerful (and shitfire lethal) mortals in the Marvel universe. In other words, Super Skrull's stolen powers are one-fourth ''wildly obsolete.''\\\

** The Justice League suffered a multiple bodyswap in the TPB ''Foreign Bodies''; a female villain called Psykosis was incited to do it by Cobra. It ended up with Kyle Rayner (Green Lantern) operating the body of J'onn J'onzz, J'onn taking over Aquaman's body, Aquaman in temporary possession of Wonder Woman's body, Wonder Woman in Psykosis' body, Psykosis' psyche in Flash's body, Flash in Steel's body, and Steel in Green Lantern's body. Separate to this, Superman and Batman had simply swapped bodies [[spoiler:or so it seemed; in actuality, Batman was indeed in Superman's body, but Cobra had taken command of Batman's body, leaving Superman resident in Cobra's body]]. And boy howdy, Hilarity did indeed Ensue at nearly everyone's expense before it was over. Worth noting that Batman gets an ''immediate'' grasp on Superman's powers, and starts saving the day worldwide. Only, he laments that so much power is ''distracting''.

** Ironically subverted by [[spoiler:Obadiah Stane,]] the film's villain, [[PossessionImpliesMastery who is able to match Iron Man blow for blow when he gets his own suit of armor]], despite having never been shown to have any training of his own. However, [[spoiler:he relies heavily on a targeting computer; when Iron Man disables that, he quickly proves unable to hit him with missiles from about ten feet away. Nor does Stane know about the dangers of his armor freezing up if he flies too high, a problem Iron Man had already dealt with earlier in the film and that he now exploits when Stane makes the same mistake he did. His proficiency is somewhat justified in that the Iron Monger suit was designed as a mass produced weapon that Stane could later sell to the military; It's implied that it's designed to be very easy to use as opposed to the specifically calibrated Ironman suit Stark has.]]
** Stark didn't have much trouble operating his original "escape" suit either, despite not having much -- or any -- practice with it (but he designed and programmed it, so he knew how it was ''supposed'' to respond). Since Stane's suit is just a bigger and beefier copy of Stark's original plans, presumably there was something about the original design that made it fairly idiot-proof. That said, the entirety of the Mk.1 suit's armaments were a flamethrower, a manually-fired missile, fists and a manual start rocket boost. The flamethrower requires next-to-no aiming capacity and the missile ''missed''... thank goodness for SplashDamage. Meanwhile Stark couldn't stop himself from constantly adding upgrades and modifications that certainly would have made his own suit more complex and fiddly. (Not to mention PerpetualBeta.)
** Hilariously played straight in ''Film/IronMan2'' where the various corporations and countries (including NorthKorea) tries to replicate the Iron Man suit, only to be met with disaster each time. Justin Hammer's own demonstration even shows that, without proper knowledge, simply ''turning to the left'' can potentially snap your spine in two due to the hydraulics turning the torso too far. [[spoiler: Subverted with Rhodie though, who not only managed to steal one of Tony's suits, but thoroughly beat Tony into the ground with it. Granted Tony was piss drunk, but that's still rather impressive. It's implied that Rhodie only ever saw the suit, never actually wore it.]]

* This is the entire premise of the show ''TheGreatestAmericanHero''. The hero ''lost the manual'' in the first episode. It's worth noting that Ralph ''finally'' got a replacement super-suit instruction manual in one episode. [[spoiler:He loses it when, experimenting with shrinking powers, he gets startled by an ant and returns to normal size... leaving the manual microscopic.]]

** The rambunctious Kamina steals the Gurren and, confident that he has access to new powers, attempts to combine with the Lagann as the head. It fails pathetically and hilariously. They eventually get it to work, though, through determination.

** {{Kamen Rider Super-1}}'s powers were meant to be controlled remotely. When the base (and machines) went kablooey, he had no idea how to activate his transformation, and it took ''six months'' of study at the Shaolin Temple to be able to Zen up his transformation (it... uh, makes more sense in context).
** KamenRiderKuuga has to learn how to use the abilities of each form, usually with help from his friends. He also tends not to ''have'' a new form until it reveals itself to him. The [[TransformationTrinket Arcle]] actually ''does'' come with a manual, but it's translated only a very small amount at a time, and the Grongi ain't gonna wait for Yuusuke to figure out how the shiny suit works.
** KamenRiderFaiz was not meant to have the armor but is one of few who can use it. There are a lot of features Takumi doesn't know about until he stumbles onto them. In one episode, Delta summons a rocket bike. Takumi summons the one he never knew he had by entering the same code. [[spoiler: It gets destroyed in the same episode as he's not as good with it as his opponent is with his own. Of course, he still has a CoolBike.]] ''Why'' Takumi is one of the few who can use it is something else nobody knows at first, and is a doozy when revealed.

** Also, KamenRiderV3 has to figure out all of his abilities due to Riders 1 and 2 being killed before they can teach them to him. (They get better.)

* VideoGame/KingdomHearts3D: [[spoiler: Lea receives training to use a Keyblade, then pulls a BigDamnHeroes in the climax to save Sora... with his Eternal Flames. After Sora is woken up, Lea reveals that he couldn't get his Keyblade to materialize.]]
** Lea: [[spoiler:[[TemptingFate Must be in the snap of the wrist, or somethin'...]]]]

The name comes from Website/SomethingAwful's randomly renamed and [[WhatDoYouMeanItWasntMadeOnDrugs incredibly nonsensical]] "FYAD" subforum, where it originated as a quotable quote from somebody playing the ''VideoGame/{{Half-Life}}'' mod ''Natural Selection'' and trying to figure out the alien faction's special abilities (shooting webs). In his frustration, he posted [[TropeNamer "how do i]] [[MemeticMutation shot web"]] repeatedly. It got quickly transposed to Spidey [[RuleOfFunny because it's funnier when he says it]]. It has since spread wide across the Internet, as such things are [[MemeticMutation wont to do]].

* Much like [[WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom Danny]], Sam had trouble controlling her new powers in the first story of the FanFic/FacingTheFutureSeries. On top of that, her [[ImaginationBasedSuperPower main power]] can sometimes be used like spiderwebs.

-->'''Tucker:''' Be careful where you point that ''thing''!).

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII''. After his defeat at Nibelheim, Sephiroth is inactive for 7 years, trapped in Mako until he returns with Jenova's powers. There's some debate on whether that comes down to Sephorith learning how to control Jenova or ''the other way around'', but WordOfGod has said that Jenova was not in control. Although that Word of God was released 10 years after the original game.

** Touma Kamijo has no idea how [[AntiMagic Imagine]] [[PowerNullifier Breaker]] works. Throughout the series, he slowly learns its limitations, and eventually figures out how to pull a CatchAndReturn with it.
*** To be fair to Touma, almost ''nobody'' knows how Imagine Breaker works. Aleister Crowley is the only one who has hinted that he knows how it really works (and he has no particular desire to explain it to anybody else).

* ''Film/IronMan''

** In ''JLA: Year One'', everyone's powers (and their related ''[[NightmareFuel body parts]]'') are stolen by a villain. He seems to instantly know how to work each individual power, but the villain primarily relies on Green Lantern's ring, the flashiest and most "powerful" of the abilities. By overlooking the benefits of each different power [[ThisLooksLikeAJobForAquaman Aquaman is able to overpower and kick his ass.]]

** Hilariously played straight in ''Film/IronMan2'' where the various corporations and countries (including NorthKorea) tries to replicate the Ironman suit, only to be met with disaster each time. Justin Hammer's own demonstration even shows that, without proper knowledge, simply ''turning to the left'' can potentially snap your spine in two due to the hydraulics turning the torso too far. [[spoiler: Subverted with Rhodie though, who not only managed to steal one of Tony's suits, but thoroughly beat Tony into the ground with it. Granted Tony was piss drunk, but that's still rather impressive. It's implied that Rhodie only ever saw the suit, never actually wore it.]]
** In ''Film/IronMan3'', Tony puts Pepper Potts in the Ironman suit to protect her from flying debris. She tries to fight their attackers, but can't figure out how to work the suit, so Tony remotely takes the suit back when she is at a safe distance. [[spoiler: Savin steals the War Machine suit and has no trouble operating it. It is revealed that the so-called terrorists bombings were really people who took Extremis and blew themselves up because they couldn't regulate their powers. When Pepper is injected with Extremis, she manages to control her powers and defeat the BigBad with them.]]

** Hilariously played straight in the second film where the various corporations and countries (including NorthKorea) tries to replicate the Ironman suit, only to be met with disaster each time. Justin Hammer's own demonstration even shows that, without proper knowledge, simply ''turning to the left'' can potentially snap your spine in two due to the hydraulics turning the torso too far. [[spoiler: Subverted with Rhodie though, who not only managed to steal one of Tony's suits, but thoroughly beat Tony into the ground with it. Granted Tony was piss drunk, but that's still rather impressive. It's implied that Rhodie only ever saw the suit, never actually wore it.]]

** Ironically subverted by [[spoiler:Obadiah Stane,]] the film's villain, who is able to match Iron Man blow for blow when he gets his own suit of armor, despite having never been shown to have any training of his own. However, [[spoiler:he relies heavily on a targeting computer; when Iron Man disables that, he quickly proves unable to hit him with missiles from about ten feet away. Nor does Stane know about the dangers of his armor freezing up if he flies too high, a problem Iron Man had already dealt with earlier in the film and that he now exploits when Stane makes the same mistake he did. His proficiency is somewhat justified in that the Iron Monger suit was designed as a mass produced weapon that Stane could later sell to the military; It's implied that it's designed to be very easy to use as opposed to the specifically calibrated Ironman suit Stark has.]]

* When Scott Lang from ''[[WesternAnimation/AvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes]]'' first tries to use Hank Pym's ComicBook/{{Ant-Man}} gear for a bank robbery, he finds out by chance that the helmet allows communication with insects. Also, when he tries to use Pym Discs to make the stacks of money pocket sized, he accidentally makes them shrink smaller than microscopic size instead.