History Main / SubvertedSuspicionAesop

** After having a bad experience with the griffon Gilda, Pinkie Pie comes to believe she's one of the most mean people in the universe. [[{{Jerkass}} She's in the ballpark, at any rate.]] Made un-Broken by the fact that the person advising Pinkie never actually met Gilda, and the ''only'' pony she's ever remotely nice to is Rainbow Dash.
** Later subverted by "The Lost Treasure of Griffinstone" where it's revealed Gilda has a nasty temper, but is ultimately a good person at heart who just doesn't fully understand how friendship works. It ends with her making up with Rainbow Dash ''and'' befriending Pinkie Pie.
** It's played with in regard to Twilight and Zecora. Everyone is extremely suspicious of Zecora, but Twilight believes she's innocent... until a ContrivedCoincidence and case of PoorCommunicationKills causes her to change her mind and believe that Zecora cursed them, only for Zecora to turn out to be blameless. The same episode inverts the trope with Apple Bloom, who's the only pony to not suspect Zecora of wrongdoing, and she turns out to be right.
** Played completely straight with Cadance/Queen Chrysalis in the season 2 finale. It turns out she's ''worse'' than Twilight thought, and has kidnapped and replaced the real Cadence for her own nefarious plot.

* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': When [[spoiler: Zuko]] finally has their HeelFaceTurn, most of the group is open to hear their side of the story and give them a chance. Katara, however is skeptical, and doesn't trust their new teammate. The 'investigation' part of the trope comes in in the much {{lampshade|Hanging}}d individual adventures they each have with their new member. Of course, in the end, it does end up being an aesop when Katara is proven wrong.
** DoubleSubverted again in an earlier example, when the gang runs into [[spoiler:Jet]] in Ba Sing Se. [[KnightTemplar Given his previous appearance]], they're understandably suspicious, but he's very nice and only seems interested in helping them find Appa. Aang and Sokka are willing to accept his help, while Katara is still angry at him. [[spoiler:The first subversion comes when the place he leads them to turns out to be a Dai Li trap; the second subversion comes along when it turns out he's brainwashed by the Dai Li and didn't betray them willingly, and he breaks the brainwashing at the last minute to help Aang against Long Feng.]]

A reason why the trope is so often subverted would be that the writers don't want it to be a new main character, and even if the character is good, they're usually PutOnABus. But, the trope may be played straight if the show is just beginning, and the writers are using it to introduce the character. Outside of that, the trope is more often DoublySubverted than played straight. However, [[UndeadHorseTrope it's not unheard of for it to be played straight.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Archer}}'': In an early episode, Malory hires Conway Stern as a new agent. Most of the episode sees Archer and Lana becoming increasingly jealous and suspicious of him, because he's TheAce and because Archer suspects he might be planning to seduce his mother. The majority of the episode shows Conway being increasingly unfairly accused until Archer decides to kill him without evidence (with Lana going along with it because, "whatever the reason!") Then Archer starts to change his mind when Conway saves him from an ambush by a Cuban hit squad...until Conway pulls a gun on him. And then shoots another bad guy standing behind him. Archer finally accepts Conway as a friend and accepts a hug from him:

** It's played with in regard to Twilight and Zecora. Everyone is extremely suspicious of Zecora, but Twilight believes she's innocent... until a ContrivedCoincidence and case of PoorCommunicationKills causes her to change her mind and believe that Zecora cursed them, only for Zecora to turn out to be blameless. The same episode inverts the trope with Apple Bloom, who's the only pony to not suspect Zecora of wrongdoing, and she turns out to be write.

** Of course, it works a little better in that case, because [[spoiler: Harry had previously suspected Malfoy in ''every single previous book'']], and it was ''never'' him.

* Kahlan of the SwordOfTruth definitely suspects [[spoiler: Drefan Rahl]], but after rationalizing it, manages to even convince herself that said person was a good guy. Oops.

See also CassandraTruth and ProperlyParanoid.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheNewAdventuresofSuperman'': Luthor convinces Perry White that he's gone straight and is given a laboratory in the Daily Planet building. ComicBook/JimmyOlsen (correctly) believes that Luthor is lying and tries to catch him committing a crime.

** It's played with in regard to Twilight and Zecora. Everyone is extremely suspicious of Zecora, but Twilight believes she's innocent... until a ContrivedCoicidence and case of PoorCommunicationKills causes her to change her mind and believe that Zecora cursed them, only for Zecora to turn out to be blameless. The same episode inverts the trope with Apple Bloom, who's the only pony to not suspect Zecora of wrongdoing, and she turns out to be write.

* ''ThirdRockFromTheSun'' did a version of this PlayedForLaughs. Harry and Tommy thought that a group of "badasses" hanging out at the bar were up to no good even though were doing absolutely nothing suspicious. At the end, after it turned out the "badasses" wanted to rob the bar, Harry and Tommy summarized the SpoofAesop ("From now on, I look at people and make snap judgments." and noting that "don't judge a book by its cover" makes no sense "thats what the cover is ''there'' for! it tells you what is inside the book")

* Happens twice in ''WsternAnimation/KimPossible'', both times with Ron and his enemies. First was when he and Kim met Lord Monty Fiske. All the time they were helping him, Ron felt he was 'bad road', but Kim called him delirious. Turns out he was right as Lord Fiske would become his ArchEnemy Monkey Fist. The second time was when he re encountered his mutant enemy Gill, who had seemed to have returned to being a human and given up being evil. However, Ron remained suspicious despite everyone calling him crazy (and [[ProducePelting throwing rotten vegetables at him]]). It turns out that he was right as Gill wanted to become a mutant again. It was at the end of that ordeal that Ron provided the page quote.

** Later inverted with the case of Zecora, since everyone except Apple Bloom is suspicious of her. She's innocent.

* In the SuperFriends episode "Professor Goodfellow's G.E.E.C.," the professor's machine works flawlessly and automates every part of human existence for every person in the world, as the professor offers a free subscription to the service to anyone who wants one. The only skeptics are the Super Friends, who spend the better part of the episode convinced that the machine will fail, only to be proven wrong again and again, and thus, [[CassandraTruth unable to convince anyone]]. When the machine does fail, it's only due to a slight, easily repaired oversight, yet the professor sees the error of his ways anyway and dismantles the machine.

** When her mother found a new boyfriend and the guy blew up on Buffy for not following his rules, several of her friends blamed Buffy's distrust on daddy issues (as in, the guy was technically taking over her father's position, which Buffy couldn't accept). No, him being a sociopathic robot was more to blame.

* ''ThirdRockFromTheSun'' did a version of this PlayedForLaughs. Harry and Tommy thought that a group of "badasses" hanging out at the bar were up to no good even though were doing absolutely nothing suspicious. At the end, after it turned out the "badasses" wanted to rob the bar, Harry and Tommy summarized the SpoofAesop ("From now on, I look at people and make snap judgments.")

* Less trust-based than compassion based, but in ''LegendOfTheSeeker'' at one point, a young man asks [[TortureTechnician Mord-]][[TheBaroness Sith]] Cara to lend him a horse so he could go bury his dead brother with his family. She denies his request at first, but a look from Kahlan reminds her of the latter's urging her to be compassionate, so she lets him take the horse...only to find out two scenes later that he just wanted it so he could steal the treasure the recently-killed enemy soldiers had hoarded.

* ''MyLifeAsATeenageRobot''

* {{Chuck}} had an episode where an enemy bomber had infiltrated their base, and they didn't know who he was. The Middle Eastern man makes a big deal about how they shouldn't assume that he's the bomber just because of his ethnicity. Then at the end it turns out that it ''was'' him and he was playing the race card to avert suspicion.

* The BaileySchoolKids series seems to come close to this, but always ultimately opts for MaybeMagicalMaybeMundane at the end.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheNewAdventuresofSuperman'': Luthor convinces Perry White that he's gone straight and is given a laboratory in the Daily Planet building. JimmyOlsen (correctly) believes that Luthor is lying and tries to catch him committing a crime.

* Every other episode of ''CourageTheCowardlyDog'' has a sinister, ill meaning stranger come and plan to harm Muriel and Eustace who ignore Courage being distrustful... and having been right about such instincts every previous time.

* Not surprising, seen in TheSimpsons. Marge becomes suspicious of Otto's ex-fiance Becky, thinking she is trying to kill Marge and steal Homer. There turns out to be a perfectly logical explanation for all of the evidence, of course, and Marge apologizes.

* An episode of ''{{CSI}}'' had two missing boys from a neighborhood where a paroled child molester lived. Pretty much everybody is suspicious of him for obvious reasons, but they let him help in the investigation (his house was burned down so he had nothing better to do anyway). After spending most of the episode dodging whether or not he did or didn't have anything to do with the missing boys, and seemingly leading toward AnAesop that people can be redeemed or the like, but the actual truth turns out to be that [[spoiler: he ''did'' take the boys into his house after finding them hurt and scared and really ''didn't'' have any intentions of harming them, but he did give them a "sample" of liquor and as one of the boys died, he was held responsible because he didn't do anything about their injuries and didn't call anybody.]]

* An episode of {{CSI}} had two missing boys from a neighborhood where a paroled child molester lived. Pretty much everybody is suspicious of him for obvious reasons, but they let him help in the investigation (his house was burned down so he had nothing better to do anyway). After spending most of the episode dodging whether or not he did or didn't have anything to do with the missing boys, and seemingly leading toward AnAesop that people can be redeemed or the like, but the actual truth turns out to be that [[spoiler: he ''did'' take the boys into his house after finding them hurt and scared and really ''didn't'' have any intentions of harming them, but he did give them a "sample" of liquor and as one of the boys died, he was held responsible because he didn't do anything about their injuries and didn't call anybody.]]
* In the same vein as the above, ''DesperateHousewives'' had a new neighbor move onto the lane with his sickly sister. After he helps Lynette out with an issue her son was having, she goes to his house with a cake in thanks. While there, she discovers a wall of photos of shirtless young boys. He explains that he's a swim coach, but she still has her suspicions. Since this followed her being held hostage, it's suggested that she's merely suffering PTSD or something similar, but she's already told the local gossips. Eventually, things escalate to Wisteria Lane's residents protesting outside his house. The stress causes his sister to go into cardiac arrest and she dies. Lynette goes to him to apologize and finds that he's moving. Before leaving, he implies that his sister was what was keeping him from actually doing anything with the boys. However, there is some ambiguity in his statements, hinting that he may only be saying this to get back at Lynette for how her actions led to his sister's death.

-->-- ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible''\\