History Main / SpeakFriendAndEnter

* ''XiaolinShowdown'': Clay does something similar to circumvent an obstacle course.

* ''SchlockMercenary'' [[http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20030413.html here.]]

Compare with ThereWasADoor, a specific subtrope where rather than simply opening a door, someone smashes through the door or wall (though actually, smashing through is simpler in the short term, and only in the long term is it more complicated). Also compare CuttingTheKnot. This strategy might be used by TheJohnHenry.

* The [[DisneyAnimatedCanon Disney version]] of ''TheHunchbackOfNotreDame'': Quasimodo and Phoebus find the entrance to the Hall of Miracles (the Gypsies' secret hideout) using the amulet Esmeralda gave Quasimodo. The amulet leads them to a large grave with mysterious writing on the lid. While Phoebus tries to decipher the writing, Quasi simply lifts it open, uncovering a staircase.

-> '''Frodo:''' It's a riddle. "Speak'' friend ''and enter." What's the Elvish word for friend?
-> '''Gandalf:''' ''Mellon. *the door opens* ''
-->--'''''[[Film/TheLordOfTheRings The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring]]''''' film adaptation

!!Examples:

[[folder:[[AC:Anime and Manga]]]]
* In ''[=~Ranma ½~=]'', Ranma gets a cursed spatula attached to his hand ([[ItMakesSenseInContext don't ask]]). It will only come off when it is "used properly". Every attempt to use it to cook results in disaster and magic energy bolts flying all over the place. Then someone realizes that the Japanese phrases "use properly" and "use fish flakes" sound identical. They sprinkle on some fish flakes and the spatula falls right off.
* ''{{Pokemon}}'' uses a variant of this trope, amazingly enough, in the second movie. "And the world will turn to Ash."

[[folder:[[AC:Comics]]]]

[[folder:[[AC:Films]]]]
* ''BedknobsAndBroomsticks'': Near the end, they realize [[spoiler: the spell they were looking for was in the child's book all along.]] This make a large part of the movie somewhat of a ShaggyDogStory in retrospect.
* In ''[[Film/TheBourneSeries The Bourne Identity]]'', Jason and Marie are trying to obtain some information from a hotel's files. Jason comes up with an absurdly complicated scheme for acquiring this information, and instructs Marie at length about the precise timing and attention to detail required before sending her in. She returns thirty seconds later, having decided to simply walk up and ''ask'' the clerk for the files after claiming to be Bourne's personal assistant.

[[folder:[[AC:Literature]]]]
* In ''[[LordOfTheRings The Fellowship of the Ring]]'', Gandalf spends hours casting opening spells and trying passwords on the door into Moria. He finally realizes that he mistranslated the inscription on the door: instead of "Speak, friend, and enter", it was "Say 'friend' and enter" All he had to do was say the elven word for "friend" and the door opened. Gandalf read the inscription aloud before, but in the common tongue, not in Elvish.
* In the parody ''BoredOfTheRings'', Goodgulf tries many passwords, before realizing that the door has a knob.
* ''Muse'' magazine's AffectionateParody of ''LordOfTheRings'' had the inscription on the door read, "[[AC:I give up my secret]]". Naturally, the door opens when the "Gandalf" character (played by Chad) [[YouWereTryingTooHard exhausts all his ideas and says, "I give up!"]]

[[folder:[[AC:Live Action TV]]]]

--->'''Lister''': Why don't we scrape away this mortar here, slide one of these bricks out, then using a rope weaved from strands of this hessian, rig up a kind of a pulley system so that when a guard comes in, using it as a trip wire, gets laid out, and we put Rimmer in the guard's uniform, he leads us out, we steal some swords, and fight our way back to the bug.
--->'''Kryten''': Or we could use the teleporter.

-->Mr. Moore: I'd say to the super, "if you tell me how tall this building is I'll give you this neat barometer."
::This is a reference to a tale of [[http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/barometer.asp similar smartassery]] on the part of Niels Bohr (in his university days).

* ''The Men From The Ministry'': The protagonists are faced with an infestation of mice. One character suggests using high tech methods to get rid of them such as laser beams or ultrasonics. His secretary suggests a cat.

[[folder:[[AC:Tabletop Games]]]]

** Module I7 ''Baltron's Beacon'' has a ShoutOut to the ''LordOfTheRings'' example. A door has the inscription "Sayez Chi, Passant Avantre" ("To pass through, say who"). If the party uses magic to read the inscription they may think they need to say "who" in Common: they actually need to say "Chi", which is the word for "who" in the language the message is written in.
** First rule of lockpicking: check that the locked door is actually locked. Although this rule isn't published in any 'Dungeons And Dragons'' product that I am aware of, I learned this rule from another D&D player while playing a rogue.
** [Brackets] once included a dungeon with a nine-letter tumbler puzzle locking a door, with the riddle question "What is the mirror that shines in the darkness?" The answer was Moonlight. '''Moonlight''' is ''the mirror'' that '''shines''' [[spoiler: The moon reflects light from the sun, thus making it a mirror.]]

[[folder:[[AC:Video Games]]]]

* In the third ''[[MetalGear Metal Gear Solid]]'', knocking on the door is also the solution, contrary to anything your support team suggests, to getting through a random locked door in the enemy base.
* In ''FinalFantasyXIII'', Lightning tries almost everything to get a certain door open. Then, for some reason, she ''gives the door a hug'', and says: "I'm sorry. Please open". The door pops open, and every other door of that type opens witout a fuss from then on. This happens because [[spoiler: the doors are fal'Cie, and thus living creatures who don't respond well to being punched and knocked on.]]

* In the {{Infocom}} game ''Journey'', the characters find a gate with an inscription reading "Please only say 'gate open' to enter storage-room." [[spoiler: Clues allow the player to read this correctly as "Storage-room entrance. To open gate, say only 'Please'."]]
* In ''KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'', to choose your Jedi class, you are asked a series of questions, one of them being "You are at a locked door. What do you do?" [[spoiler:one of the choices is "knock"]]

[[folder:[[AC:Web Comics]]]]

* Another case of a character locked outside in this [[http://www.xkcd.com/530/ this]] {{Xkcd}} strip, only geekier.

[[folder:[[AC:Western Animation]]]]
* The [[DisneyAnimatedCanon Disney version]] of ''{{The Hunchback Of Notre Dame}}'': Quasimodo and Phoebus find the entrance to the Hall of Miracles (the Gypsies' secret hideout) using the amulet Esmeralda gave Quasimodo. The amulet leads them to a large grave with mysterious writing on the lid. While Phoebus tries to decipher the writing, Quasi simply lifts it open, uncovering a staircase.

In any story, there are problems. Characters need to solve those problems. Usually, they do so in the most straightforward way. But sometimes, they create an [[RobinsonGoldbergContraption extremely complex and convoluted plan]] for what should be a [[OverrideCommand simple solution]]. They may just plan it, or they may actually go through with it, but often before, during, or after, some other character points out how complicated the plan is, or what the simplest solution would be.

* In ''BattlefieldBadCompany 2'', the squad captures a Russian soldier and intends to interrogate him for information. While TheSarge goes off to talk to him, the other soldiers start talking about how effective he is at torture and betting on how long it will take the guy to break. Sarge comes back in seconds, having simply asked the guy straight-up. Apparently, he was just a Russian conscript with family in Houston, and wanted no part of the whole thing.

-> '''Frodo:''' ''It's a riddle. "Speak'' friend ''and enter." What's the Elvish word for friend?''
-> '''Gandalf:''' ''Mellon. * the door opens* ''

-> '''Gandalf:''' ''Mellon. * the door opens* ''\\
-''Film/TheLordOfTheRings: The Fellowship of the Ring'' film adaptation

* After a week-long story in the comic strip ''{{Monty}}'' where Monty thinks he locked himself out and tries all sorts of ways to coerce his cat to give him the keys (the cat gives him peas) or get the keys himself, he eventually gets stuck in the cat door. His friend Moondog walks up to him, and when Monty asks how he got inside, Moondog says the front door was open.

* Near the end of ''BedknobsAndBroomsticks'', they realize [[spoiler: the spell they were looking for was in the child's book all along.]] This make a large part of the movie somewhat of a ShaggyDogStory in retrospect.

** In the parody ''BoredOfTheRings'', Goodgulf tries many passwords, before realizing that the door has a knob.
** Parodied in [[http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=680 this strip]] of ''DMOfTheRings''.
** ''Muse'' magazine's AffectionateParody of ''LordOfTheRings'' had the inscription on the door read, "[[AC:I give up my secret]]". Naturally, the door opens when the "Gandalf" character (played by Chad) [[YouWereTryingTooHard exhausts all his ideas and says, "I give up!"]]

* In the first episode of ''HeadOfTheClass'' Dr. Samuels gives the class an assignment: how do you measure the height of a building using a barometer? After several explanations, he asks the new sub Mr. Moore how he would do it.

** This is actually a reference to a tale of similar smartassery on the part of Niels Bohr (in his university days). {{Snopes}} [[http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/barometer.asp has more]].

* •There was an episode of The BBC Radio Sit Com ''The Men From The Ministry'' involving an infestation of mice. One character suggests using high tech methods to get rid of them such as laser beams or ultrasonics. His secretary suggests a cat.

** Module I7 ''Baltron's Beacon'' has a ShoutOut to the LordOfTheRings example. A door has the inscription "Sayez Chi, Passant Avantre" ("To pass through, say who"). If the party uses magic to read the inscription they may think they need to say "who" in Common: they actually need to say "Chi", which is the word for "who" in the language the message is written in.
** First rule of lockpicking: check that the locked door is actually locked. Although this rule isn't published in any D&D product that I am aware of, I learned this rule from another D&D player while playing a rogue.

* In ZorkGrandInquisitor in Hades, the player is tasked with answering a bunch of questions on the Hades Hotline telephone before he/she can call a shuttle. It's made especially confusing (the Hotline strives for "customer dissatisfaction") by the fact that, for example to press 6, you need to press 2, and to press 4, you need to press 0. The puzzle is doable, and there are only 5 questions, but it can also all be overriden if the player [[spoiler: casts "Kendall" to simplify the instructions.]]
* The InteractiveFiction game ''Bureaucracy'', written by DouglasAdams, has a puzzle that consists of a locked door in an apartment complex. The way to get the door open is to do something no experienced adventure game player would ever think of trying, but someone faced with the same situation in RealLife would probably have no trouble finding the answer. [[spoiler: Simply knock on the door, and the person inside lets you in.]] It's that kind of game.

* In FinalFantasyXIII, Lightning tries almost everything to get a certain door open. Then, for some reason, she ''gives the door a hug'', and says: "I'm sorry. Please open". The door pops open, and every other door of that type opens witout a fuss from then on. This happens because [[spoiler: the doors are fal'Cie, and thus living creatures who don't respond well to being punched and knocked on.]]
* Near the start of the {{Infocom}} adventure ''Leather Goddesses of Phobos'', the player is captured by aliens and thrown into a cell. The way to escape is [[spoiler:simply to open the door - it's not locked]]. Many players were stuck for weeks on this point.
** Lampshaded in-game as well - the other prisoner admits he never thought to try it.
* In the {{Infocom}} game "Journey", the characters find a gate with an inscription reading "Please only say 'gate open' to enter storage-room." [[spoiler: Clues allow the player to read this correctly as "Storage-room entrance. To open gate, say only 'Please'."]]
* In KnightsOfTheOldRepublic, to choose your Jedi class, you are asked a series of questions, one of them being "You are at a locked door. What do you do?" [[spoiler:one of the choices is "knock"]]

* In ''TheFairlyOddParents, Timmy, Chester, and AJ are sent to a military school, where they are forced to conquer an obstacle course. One obstacle is a sixty-foot climbing wall covered in spikes. While Timmy and Chester are in awe of what they seemingly have to climb, AJ comes up with a simpler solution - walk around it.
* [[XiaolinShowdown Clay]] does something similar to circumvent an obstacle course.

[[folder:Real Life]]
* There's the urban legend of how NASA spent millions of dollars developing a pen that could write in zero gravity, while the Soviet Cosmonauts just used pencils.
** Of course, the reason why NASA ''didn't'' use pencils is because they create free-floating waste (powder from the lead, or heaven forbid you actually try to erase). Getting rid of said waste in zero gravity is rather tricky, and could build up in important components.
*** I'm guessing it wouldn't cost millions to come up with a countermeasure for that.
** NASA never spent anything on the research to begin with, it was [[http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.asp a private company that afterwards sold the pens]] to the USA and USSR for several dollars a piece.
[[/folder]]

<<|NarrativeDevices|>>

** NASA never spent anything on the research to begin with, it was a private company that afterwards sold the pens to USA and USSR for several dollars a piece.

Compare with ThereWasADoor, a specific subtrope where rather than simply opening a door, someone smashes through the door or wall (though actually, smashing through is simpler in the short term, and only in the long term is it more complicated). Also compare CuttingTheKnot.

[[Film/TheLordOfTheRings http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/The_Doors_of_Durin.jpg]]
[[caption-width:240:[[TheLordOfTheRings The Doors of Durin, Lord of Moria.]] You know what to do.]]

* In ''AustinPowers: The Spy Who Shagged Me'', Austin and Felicity are about to be thrown at a LavaPit. Austin makes up an elaborate plan to escape. Felicity decides to [[ShowSomeLeg flash the guard]], [[DistractedByTheSexy who then promptly falls into the pit]].

* In ''ZorkGrandInquisitor'', playing as Brog, you come across a complicated puzzle based on a three-ways chess game, with the Skull of Yoruk protected in a wire mesh that will open if it's solved. If you try to solve the puzzle, Brog just moves one piece back and forth on each board, which does nothing. The only option is the simplest one: smash the machine with a plank and take the Skull.
** Also, while in Hades, the player is tasked with answering a bunch of questions on the Hades Hotline telephone before he/she can call a shuttle. It's made especially confusing (the Hotline strives for "customer dissatisfaction") by the fact that, for example to press 6, you need to press 2, and to press 4, you need to press 0. The puzzle is doable, and there are only 5 questions, but it can also all be overriden if the player [[spoiler: casts "Kendall" to simplify the instructions.]]

* In the third ''[[MetalGear Metal Gear Solid]]'', this is also the solution, contrary to anything your support team suggests, to getting through a random locked door in the enemy base.

** What kind of ''language'' is Japanese?
*** It has a pretty limited number of distinct syllables, making homonyms more common than English speakers are used to.
**** He may have been asking why the word "properly" is made of the syllables for "fish" and "flake."
***** Because it has a pretty limited number of distinct syllables, making homonyms more common than English speakers are used to.
****** Even in English, the directions could easily have said "Use with [[DolphinsDolphinsEverywhere purpose]]."

** First rule of lockpicking: check that the door with a lock is actually locked. Although this rule isn't published in any D&D product that I am aware of, I learned this rule from another D&D player while playing a rogue.

* In the first episode of ''HeadOfTheClass'' Dr. Samuels gives the class an assignment: how do you measue the height of a building using a barometer? After several explanations, he asks the new sub Mr. Moore how he would do it.

[[caption-width:240:The Doors of Durin, Lord of Moria. You know what to do.]]

-''TheLordOfTheRings: The Fellowship of the Ring'' film adaptation