History Main / YouCantMissIt

* The "giving directions by now-demolished landmarks" variant was used as the joke in one strip of ''[[http://joshreads.com/?p=1219 Pluggers]]'':

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Madagascar}}'': When Marty escapes from the Central Park Zoo and walks through New York, he asks a a police horse for directions to Grand Central Terminal.

[[quoteright:202:[[Webcomic/{{XKCD}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/address.png]]]]

* ''Radio/WaitWaitDontTellMe'' once reported on plans to build a 45-meter-tall [[https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna22027201 giant moose]], complete with built in restaurant and conference rooms, in a little-frequented corner of northern Sweden. Their conclusion was that it would me mainly useful for giving directions.

* In ''[[Film/StarTrekVTheFinalFrontier The Final Frontier]]'' when asked how to get to Turboshaft 3, Scotty gives Kirk, Spock, and McCoy directions that end with Scotty telling them they can't miss the Turboshaft.

* Inverted in "VideoGame/DungeonSiege" . When Legion Overseer Ibsen Yamas gives the quest to reinforce Fortress Kroth, he says "Just follow your nose through the ice cave and you'll get there soon enough." However, after the ice cave, the player and the party must fight through a crystal cave, a forest full of bandits, a zombie-infested swamp, a steampunk underground Goblin fortress, rid a difficult waterlogged dungeon of enemies, clear some Temple Ruins of floating skeletons and beholders, and finally emerge in a scrubland... only to find your path to Fortress Kroth blocked by the Necromancer Gresh. Once he is dead, his barriers disappear and the fort is open.

* ''Film/{{The Borrowers|1997}}'': The greedy Ocious P. Potter rudely asks a receptionist for directions to a room in the building and she replies by giving him a lot of complicated instructions, ending with "walk quickly." Later on, [[KidHero Pete Lender]] politely asks for the same thing and this time she says "Take the elevator to the top and walk straight ahead -- you can't miss it."

* John Goodman's character in the 1997 film version of ''Film/{{The Borrowers|1997}}'' rudely asks a receptionist for directions to a room in the building and she replies by giving him a lot of complicated instructions, ending with "walk quickly." Later on, the KidHero politely asks for the same thing and this time she says "Take the elevator to the top and walk straight ahead -- you can't miss it."

-->'''Marty:''' Uh-huh. Thanks a lot, officer.

* In one election for Mayor of Rio de Janeiro, there was a TV ad featuring a woman asking a neighbor for directions. After the neighbor gave overly complicated directions, the woman asked for some easier way and the suggestion was voting for Cesar Maia for Mayor. Note: That was the election where he won his first term as Mayor of Rio de Janeiro.

[[folder:Films -- Animation]]

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

-->'''Mr. Tyler:''' You go back down that road for half a mile, then first left, it's in a deplorable state of disrepair I'm afraid, I've written numerous letters to the council about it, are you ''civil servants'' or ''civil masters'', that's what I asked them, after all, who pays your wages? then second right, only it's not exactly right, it's on the left but you'll find it bends round toward the right eventually, it's signposted Porrit's Lane, but of course it isn't Porrit's Lane, you look at the ordinance survey map, you'll see, it's simply the eastern end of Forest Hill Lane, you'll come out in the village, now you go past the Bull and Fiddle -- that's a public house -- then when you get to the church (I have pointed out to the people who compile the ordinance survey map that it's a church with a spire, not a church with a ''tower'', indeed I have written to the Tadfield ''Advertiser'', suggesting they mount a local campaign to get the map corrected, and I have every hope that once these people realize with whom they are dealing you'll see a hasty U-turn from them) then you'll get to a crossroads, now, you go straight across that crossroads and you'll immediately come to a second crossroads, now, you can take either the left-hand fork or go straight on, either way you'll arrive at the air base (although the left-hand fork is almost a tenth of a mile shorter) and you can't miss it.
* ''The Literature/{{Discworld}} Mapp'' explains that navigating by asking people where you are never works. Either the person isn't from around here, despite the fact they are walking a dog, or they know where they are in such detail that they can't pass this information on in any useful form:
-->"turn where you get to where the boot factory used to be, no, tell you what, it'll save you some time, go along where the viaduct was, you can't miss it, then turn right only it's really straight ahead, and kind of jiggle past the main road and ... no, I tell a lie, what you do is, you go back down here until you get to where you can see the old hospital was, only you can't no more 'cos they've taken the sign away, and..."

* In Literature/TheHollows novel ''A Fistful of Charms'', Rachel is in a small town and is given directions to the local magic store that includes such useful landmarks as "the church that burned down two years ago".
* Erma Bombeck once wrote a joke about asking a gas station attendant directions on how to get to a baseball field. The guy starts into the complicated turn left turn right you've gone too far, only to have her say that they're already at the last landmark. The guy says that's cause she's here already, the baseball field is behind the station. What a wisenheimer.
* Parodied in ''Literature/DaveBarrySleptHere'', in which the old route from Europe to the East is described: "cross the Alps on foot, then take a sailing ship across the Mediterranean to Egypt, then take a camel across the desert, then take ''another'' sailing ship ''back'' across the Mediterranean, then change to the [[UsefulNotes/NewYorkSubway IRT Number 6 Local]] as far as 104th Street, and then ask directions."
* ''Literature/TheCurseOfTheBlueFigurine'': Referenced in the sequel ''The Drum, the Doll and the Zombie'', when a very frustrated Professor Childermass has just gotten a set of directions from a gas station attendant and preempts the expected line with "Don't you ''dare'' tell me I can't miss it!".

* ''Series/MontyPythonsFlyingCircus'':
-->'''Chris Quinn/Michael Ellis:''' Oh, where do I go to complain?\\
'''Lift Operator:''' Straight on, then left, then right past the thing, then up the little stairs, then right past the bit where it's gone all soft, down the wobbly bit, left past the nail, past the brown stain on the wall to your right, and it's the door marked "exit" straight ahead of you on the left.
* Subverted on ''Series/LittleBritain'':
-->'''Ray [=McCooney=]:''' Oh, we're easy to find. When you see the hanging tree, take a left. When you come to the old well, take a right. If ye pass the scarecrow, YE'VE COME TO FAR!... Yeah that's right, opposite IKEA.

** "The Unquiet Dead":

** In "Daleks in Manhattan," when Martha and the Doctor volunteer to do a tunnel clearing project in the sewers for Mr. Diagoras, Diagoras says, "Turn left. Go about a half a mile. Follow tunnel 273. The fall's right ahead of you. You can't miss it." Of course, there is no tunnel collapse -- it's a ruse invented to lure more Hooverville residents into a position to be captured and converted into Dalek-Human hybrids.
** Also happens in the ''Doctor Who Adventure'' Game TARDIS, when the Doctor tries to direct Amy to the Drawing Room. Supposedly, it's "half a mile down the corridor, left, then right, then right again, then the third right, past a weird swirly thing, left, then the other left, through the sun room, past a green door, right, along a wall until it becomes slimey, down a lift to the third floor and straight ahead."

* In Series/TopGear, the cast used a navigation service to plot a route between 2 towns without using the major highway. The route they got was ridiculously long, and including going through Cork in ''Ireland'' and going through ''France''. Then they printed up the directions.

[[folder:Theater]]

[[folder:Web Comics]]

'Cross a drawbridge out of order,\\

--> '''Girl:''' There's a shortcut no one knows about down a back road no one uses,\\
Past a gatehouse no one's living in, 'cross a drawbridge out of order,\\
By the long way takes an hour; this'll cut off near a third of it!\\

* The opening number of the musical ''Plain And Fancy'', which is actually titled "You Can't Miss It," has Pennsylvanians offering the main characters confusing directions that might or might not take them to Bird-in-Hand.

* In one election for Mayor of Rio de Janeiro, there was a TV ad featuring a woman asking a female neighbor for directions. After the neighbor gave overly complicated directions, the woman asked for some easier way and the suggestion was voting for Cesar Maia for Mayor. Note: That was the election where he won his first term as Mayor of Rio de Janeiro.

* In ''Manga/SoulHunter'', a hideously complicated aerial maneuver is called out (and part of it is the ClassicCheatCode "up up down down..."), but it pays off in the end because the guy giving the instructions was TheChessmaster.

* The ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' short "There Auto Be a Law" had a RunningGag of a man in a complicated overpass asking a hamburger stand attendant for directions to the main road. The attendant keeps giving him different directions, ending each time with "you can't miss". At the end of the cartoon, the attendant confesses that he doesn't know how to get out of the overpass, and that he opened the stand to keep from starving to death.

:: Later, they realize that this is the correct answer: if the spaceship was on its way to the Moon, with only a few thousand miles to go, it would be within a few degrees of the Moon in the sky.