History Main / SuperLoser

Usually getting superpowers or being CursedWithAwesome makes you, well, ''super'' or ''awesome''. However, some characters are just so snot-nosedly uncool no amount of [[TheUndead undeath]], [[ViralTransformation lycanthropy]], [[ArtificialLimbs cyborg implants]], or SuperSerum can change that. Maybe it's because they're too much of a JerkAss, [[ExtremeDoormat not assertive enough]] or maybe they're hopelessly {{geek}}y/{{nerd}}y/[[TheDitz ditzy]]. In any case, a certain ''[[GratuitousFrench Je ne sais quoi]]'' is required, and this character just ''doesn't'' have it.

** Due to the DarkerAndEdgier setting, magical girls easily find reasons to hate each other's guts for their fatal flaws: Madoka being a shrinking and self-doubting bystander, Mami being overly senstive to loneliness, Sayaka being blindly optimistic yet failing to comprehend whatever going wrong, and Kyouko being a selfish jerk, and ironically, Homura for being cynical liar. Through and through TragicHero stories ensue.

* Evil Ed from the original ''Film/FrightNight1985'' remained a loser after becoming a vampire, incapable of taking down the (at the time) inept Peter Vincent. His death does serve as the film's biggest TearJerker, though.
* Pearl the record keeper from ''Film/{{Blade}}.'' Which causes him to be slightly UnintentionallySympathetic to some audience members when Eric and Karen blithely fry him with some high-tech weaponry, and Karen coldly justifies this action by saying: "He moved." (Which is itself a cruel irony, since the poor thing was so disgustingly fat that he could ''barely'' move!)

--> '''Vampire''': Maybe [[YouWatchTooMuchX you've been watching too much TV]]. [[VampiresHateGarlic Garlic]] has no effect on me! Except for a little [[PorkyPigPronunciation f-f-f-f-flatulence!]]
* ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls2016'' brings us Butterfingers. A "super villain" who is comprised entirely of Butter. His FreudianExcuse is that he always wanted superpowers and that when he finally got them, he ended up with super lame ones due to a freak accident. This drives him to [[RiddleForTheAges somehow]] [[GrandTheftMe hijack Buttercup's body.]] At the climax of the episode, Buttercup (Now made entirely of Butter) uses these powers to beat Butterfingers and take her body back. He's legitimately surprised and asks her if she somehow got new powers. She responds [[TheManMakesTheWeapon "I didn't get new powers. I just figured out how to use yours."]]

* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueUnlimited'': The start of the second episode of "The Once And Future Thing" seems to make the case that villain Kronos TookALevelInBadass to escape this trope. After all, using his time suit he was able to conquer the future, pillage the past for historic artifacts and even landmarks to add to his collection, punish anyone who tried to cross him (as Chuckles found out), and had even managed to gain the respect (or at least fear) of his domineering wife. But, as said wife points out, a loser can have all the power in the world, he remains a loser. Sure enough the League find Kronos, not sleeping in one of the luxurious temples he's managed to steal as he claims, but in the same western jail cell he'd been kept in for months during the previous episode, lying in the fetal position with his thumb in his mouth for bonus points. He's still not a pushover to take down, but it becomes harder to take his whole EvilOverlord schtick as seriously anymore.

* [[ButtMonkey Merasmus the Magician]] from ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'' is an ancient wizard who is also in deep debt to multiple mafias. None of his magical powers can save him from being evicted from his house, putting up with [[AxeCrazy Soldier]] as a roommate, being framed for the [[ItMakesSenseInContext murder of Tom Jones]], being placed at the bottom of the pecking order in prison, or getting out of a cab fare.

** Being one of these was ultimately the AntiVillain Gentle's StartOfDarkness. He does so poorly academically in hero school that he was frequently held back, despite being in a school that wasn't even especially prestigious, he never obtained a provisional hero licence, despite taking the test four times, and the one rescue he attempted he botched so badly that he even injured a different hero who had arrived on the scene to make the same rescue in the process. Faced with toiling in obscurity when his dream was to be a hero worthy of being discussed in history books, he ends up [[ThenLetMeBeEvil deciding to try his hand at achieving that level of fame with villainy instead]]. When Izuku fights him, he states that Gentle was the villian that was the hardest for him to face, and it was implied that that was less due to his power and more due to [[NotSoDifferentRemark how much of himself Izuku saw in him]].

* Late in its run,''WesternAnimation/TheRoadRunner'' book from Gold Key (billed as ''Beep Beep, the Road Runner'') billed Wile E. Coyote as "the world's greatest loser."

-->''I was wrong in my earlier post about her. This is {{worth it}}. Apparently getting bitten by Markov is better than having a personal Beverly Hills plastic surgeon, Hollywood personal trainer, Cosmo makeup artist, and desperately lonely Photoshop hermit.''

Rather than become a fearsome vampire, they won't even inspire fear in old ladies... who [[ApronMatron will kick]] [[BadassBystander their ass]]. That gigantic dork who just became a FlyingBrick? Far from {{Superman}}, or even an {{Expy}}, he's just a gigantic dork with heat vision. Kind of like a [[LawsAndFormulas Law of Conservation]] for ButtMonkey status. If lucky, but only then, and not likely then, they'll escape the PretenderDiss.

** Joshu Higashikata in ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureJoJolion'' gets a very cool and versatile Stand that lets him manifest nuts and bolts onto things to attach or disassemble them, but Joshu himself is a dorky otaku with zero social skills, develops crushes on girls that cross into creepy obsessions complete with violent jealousy toward guys they talk to, and is pretty openly seen as a whiny manchild by his own family, even if they do still care about him. Even his design is basically an outlandish ''Jojo'' take on a classic nerd look, with a bowtie, suspenders, and his weird, goofy haircut.

Usually getting StockSuperpowers or being CursedWithAwesome makes you, well, ''super'' or ''awesome''. However, some characters are just so snot-nosedly uncool no amount of [[TheUndead undeath]], [[ViralTransformation lycanthropy]], [[ArtificialLimbs cyborg implants]], or SuperSerum can change that. Maybe it's because they're too much of a JerkAss, [[ExtremeDoormat not assertive enough]] or maybe they're hopelessly {{geek}}y/{{nerd}}y/[[TheDitz ditzy]]. In any case, a certain ''[[GratuitousFrench Je ne sais quoi]]'' is required, and this character just ''doesn't'' have it.

** Being one of these was ultimately the AntiVillain Gentle's StartOfDarkness. He does so poorly academically in hero school that he was frequently held back, despite being in a school that wasn't even especially prestigious, he never obtained a provisional hero licence, despite taking the test four times, and the one rescue he attempted he botched so badly that he even injured a different hero who had arrived on the scene to make the same rescue in the process. Faced with toiling in obscurity when his dream was to be a hero worthy of being discussed in history books, he ends up [[ThenLetMeBeEvil deciding to try his hand at achieving that level of fame with villainy instead]]. When Izuku fights him, he states that Gentle was the villian that was the hardest for him to face, and it was implied that that was less due to his power and more due to [[NotSoDifferent how much of himself Izuku saw in him]].

Since this happens often with [[OurVampiresAreDifferent vampires]], see also/compare YourVampiresSuck. Do not confuse with SuperZeroes, who are merely incompetent instead of uncool.

Since this happens often with [[OurVampiresAreDifferent vampires]], see also/compare YourVampiresSuck. Do not confuse with SuperZeroes, who are more incompetent than uncool.

* ''Manga/OnePunchMan'' gives us Saitama, who somehow managed to break all the limits of human abilities through casual exercise and determination and became an InvincibleHero (the title refers to his ability to destroy monsters that ''the Justice League'' would find problematic with a single (half-assed) punch, he is just '''that''' strong). The comedy (and some of the drama) of the story then is that Saitama just doesn't look or act like a proper hero would, being bald, plain-looking and perpetually bored while having very little recognition, many haters and no money. It doesn't help that he seems to have more problem dealing with everyday annoyances than actual supervillains (ex. A RunningGag is that he has more problems trying to kill a little regular mosquito when he easily destroys a humanoid monster-mutant mosquito earlier in the manga).

** In fact, it's pretty much a given that almost any vampire in this show, unless he's the BigBad or part of the show's PowerTrio, is going to be one of these.

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* Actually ''weaponized'' by Literature/TheSupervillainySaga's Gary Karkofsky a.k.a Merciless: The Supervillain without [=MercyTM=]. Despite gaining the cloak of a deceased superhero that grants all of the man's powers, Gary remains the same incredible dork that he was in his normal life. This results in him being constantly dismissed, ignored, or belittled by the city's supervillain population. Gary then proves utterly ruthless in his aversion of the ThouShallNotKill rule of superheroes. By the sixth book, everyone thinks he's using ObfuscatingStupidity but, no, he really is that lame.

** Being one of these was ultimately the AntiVillain Gentle's StartOfDarkness. He does so poorly academically in hero school that he was frequently held back, despite being in a school that wasn't even especially prestigious, he never obtained a provisional hero licence, despite taking the test four times, and the one rescue he attempted he botched so badly that he even injured a different hero who had arrived on the scene to make the same rescue in the process. Faced with toiling in obscurity when his dream was to be a hero worthy of being discussed in history books, he ends up deciding try his hand at achieving that level of fame with villainy instead. When Izuku fights him, he states that Gentle was the villian that was the hardest for him to face, and it was implied that that was less due to his power and more due to how much of himself Izuku saw in him.

Yeah. Fiction doesn't always play that way.

* As seen in the page image, Evil Ed from the original ''Film/FrightNight1985'' remained a loser after becoming a vampire, incapable of taking down the (at the time) inept Peter Vincent. His death does serve as the film's biggest TearJerker, though.

** Arthur Winkings from ''Literature/ReaperMan'', AKA Count Notfaroutoe, is an excellent example of the vampire type. He was a pudgy, middle-aged, average Ankh-Morporkian whose life in the wholesale-fruit industry was interrupted when he inherited a crumbling old castle in Uberwald... and with it, the curse of undeath. His wife Doreen wholeheartedly embraced the upper-crust image of vampirism, despite [[VampireVannabe not being an actual vampire]] (jokes are made about Arthur being too old to be interested in biting his wife's neck) and [[FatGirl not having the figure for the typical revealing vampiress outfit]]. Arthur, meanwhile, complains a lot about having to wear evening dress all the time, Doreen not letting him bite the necks of young women, and the difficulty of trying to build a dungeon and vault when you live in a row house, not to mention even his bat-form is too fat to fly properly.

** Young witches on the Discworld tend to find that being a witch doesn't solve any of the problems they expect it to. [[GranolaGirl Magrat Garlick]], [[FatGirl Agnes Nitt]], and [[ExtremeDoormat Petulia Gristle]] all remain fairly un-cool despite their magical talents, although [[CharacterDevelopment maturity often cures what witch powers won't]].