History PoliceAreUseless / AnimeAndManga

* ''Manga/SpyXFamily'': Ostania's police are obsessed with rooting out spies from their enemy nation of Westalis. They are ''barely'' effective at that, and ''completely'' ineffective at everything else. The people are terrified of both spies and the secret police hunting them, resulting in people being reported on suspicion of everything, including being an unmarried woman over thirty. It's mentioned that a large number of Westalis spies were caught recently, but it's made clear that this was largely because they arrested so many people that they had to get ''some'' spies in the bargain. Not to mention that Nightfall, one of those captured spies, shows up later, meaning they couldn't even keep hold of the actual spies they did get. It's to the point that every conspiracy, terrorist plot, and assassination attempt shown in the manga is actually thwarted by a ''Westalis'' agency, because they know better than anyone that WarIsHell and don't want to go back to that. In fact, ''Anya'', the ''four year-old girl who thinks spies are cool'', has a better track record of resolving terrorist plots than the secret police.

* [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in ''Manga/{{Gantz}}'': Although police and SWAT teams are quick to respond to scenes of carnage that are noticed by civilians, all Gantzers and the aliens they fight are InvisibleToNormals which prevents them from doing anything or realizing what's happening. Even in cases where they confront aliens they ''can'' see such as the Shorty Alien who attacks Kurono's classroom, normal humans not wearing Gantz suits are MadeOfPlasticine anyways while almost all aliens.

* In ''Anime/GundamBuildDivers'', the administration for the Gunpla Battle Nexus Online game have proven themselves to be completely useless in dealing with the Mass-Divers affecting the game. Even with video proof of their actions, according to the data logs themselves, these people weren't actually cheating or illegally modding the game. This infuriates [[TheAce Kyoya Kujo]] so much that he effectively forms a vigilante team of sorts with the sole purpose of hunting down the man enabling this so the administration ''can'' punish him!

* ''Manga/SpyXFamily'': Ostania's police are obsessed with rooting out spies from their enemy nation of Westalis. They are ''barely'' effective at that, and ''completely'' ineffective at everything else. The people are terrified of both spies and the secret police hunting them, resulting in people being reported on suspicion of everything, including being an unmarried woman over thirty. It's mentioned that a large number of Westalis spies were caught recently, but it's made clear that this was largely because they arrested so many people that they had to get ''some'' spies in the bargain. Not to mention that Nightfall, one of those captured spies, shows up later, meaning they couldn't even keep hold of the actual spies they did get. It's to the point that every conspiracy, terrorist plot, and assassination attempt shown in the manga is actually thwarted by a ''Westalis'' agency, because they know better than anyone that WarIsHell and don't want to go back to that.

* ''Manga/DetectiveConan'':
** The police certainly mean well, and they seem generally competent at dealing with street-level crime. But they still end up relying on a high school kid to solve every murder case in town. Most cases involve the cops missing obvious clues, which Conan has to point out to them, and then standing around dumbfounded at the end while Conan reveals the killer's identity. On the rare cases when they do make an arrest on their own, it's usually the wrong guy, and then Conan has to save the accused by finding the real culprit.
** Subverted in the second case of the Osaka Double Mystery when Heiji Hattori's father rips into him over not stopping a second murder despite the police making the same failure, only for it to turn out that he already knew who the murderer was and was using Heiji as bait in a BatmanGambit to catch the perp of a far earlier crime.
** Inspector Yamamura is the poster boy for police incompetence, but, to Conan's chagrin, is elevated to the rank of Inspector solely on the basis of having closed some cases Conan actually solved behind the scenes.
** The Nagano police is an aversion. While not as good as the high school detectives, they are often very close to capture the culprit, but they would need more evidence to catch them.
** Another aversion: Some individuals from the FBI, CIA or Public Security Bureau are very competent in what they are doing and are crucial in dealing with the Black Organization. Few of them are on the level of Shinichi himself.

* In ''Anime/TheIdolmasterCinderellaGirls'', the police make a mess of two situations - the first one is when Rin is assisting a crying boy, and they assume Rin is harassing the boy, and the second one is when they attempt to apprehend the producer after he's repeatedly spotted near Rin's school.

* ''Manga/OnePiece''
** Most Marines are completely incapable of stopping the main heroes or any other more notorious criminals running around. The Straw Hats and The Whitebeard Pirates seem to do a better job helping distressed citizens. However, it’s justified, because most of said criminals can turn into elemental forces at will, have SuperStrength and SuperSpeed or are otherwise beyond the ability of normal soldiers to handle. Only people who can fight them are others with similar abilities (mainly other criminals like the Staw Hats). Whitebeard, on the other hand, is TheDreaded whose sole name and declaration of ownership of an island is enough to keep it out of harm’s way. This trope is also subverted by most of the Marine officers, who posses superpowers or are {{Badass Normal}}s themselves and proved they are more than competent when it comes to chasing down the criminals.
** For the most part, law enforcement in high positions of power such as the admirals or [=CP9=] are every bit as effective as the other spotlight characters, the main differences is out of anyone else, the marines have the largest disposable mook army which is what makes this trope take effect more often than not and that mooks are usually the ones sent to deal with problems not directly affecting the higher-ups. One major straight aversion comes in at the end of Ennies Lobby where one slightly above average marine mook with rust powers manages to destroy one of Zoro's swords permanently (something no one has done since Mihawk). He still got beaten about as quickly as any mook but he still landed a surprising and permanent blow to one of the most powerful members of the main crew.

** ''Anime/PokemonTheSeries'' is in love with this trope, probably to ensure that TheMainCharactersDoEverything. One early episode involves Ash and his friends helping a lone Officer Jenny investigate the disappearance of over a dozen children who've been missing for three days. That's right, a ''lone'' Officer Jenny who, apparently, hasn't done squat since the children vanished. (Neither have the ApatheticCitizens, for that matter, about the children or the Pokémon who've spent those three days losing energy.) Eventually, the children are found--[[FailedASpotCheck in a public park]]. [[EpicFail Where they've been for the last three days.]] [[SarcasmMode Great work, everybody.]]

* [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in ''Anime/{{Monster}}'': The police are useless because the criminal they're chasing is just that good. He's so thorough in covering up his crimes that it takes roughly half of the series to prove that he even exists, let alone responsible for any murders.
* In ''Anime/NinetyOneDays'', the cops in Lawless have pretty much all been paid off by TheMafia to look the other way, most notably Agent Scusa from the Federal Bureau of Prohibition. When an actually competent lawman, Agent Delphy, arrives in town to clean up, the Vanetti family orders a hit on Delphy's wife and child. They narrowly survive, but the shock of the attack causes him to suspend his investigation, giving the mafia families free reign over Lawless once again.
* Discussed and subverted in ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia''. Police officers are often neglected and looked down upon because they don't wear flashy costumes and legally cannot use their Quirks to stop crime, making them underwhelming at best in a world where EveryoneIsASuper. However, they still help heroes with investigative and legal work, are responsible for dispensing the law after villains are arrested, and prove invaluable for logistics work like keeping civilians out of the line of fire. All Might, the greatest hero in Japan and possibly the world, tells Midoriya that being a police officer is as noble and important a position as any hero because of this.

** The ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'' anime is in love with this trope, probably to ensure that TheMainCharactersDoEverything. One early episode involves Ash and his friends helping a lone Officer Jenny investigate the disappearance of over a dozen children who've been missing for three days. That's right, a ''lone'' Officer Jenny who, apparently, hasn't done squat since the children vanished. (Neither have the ApatheticCitizens, for that matter, about the children or the Pokémon who've spent those three days losing energy.) Eventually, the children are found--[[FailedASpotCheck in a public park]]. [[EpicFail Where they've been for the last three days.]] [[SarcasmMode Great work, everybody.]]

* ''Manga/CityHunter'' doesn't have useless cops. Their problem is that they're limited by the law and Japanese conventions, so there are things that only Ryo (who is a criminal) can do.

* Discussed in ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia''. Police officers are often neglected and looked down upon because they don't wear flashy costumes and legally cannot use their Quirks to stop crime, making them underwhelming at best in a world where EveryoneIsASuper. However, they still help heroes with investigative and legal work, are responsible for dispensing the law after villains are arrested, and prove invaluable for logistics work like keeping civilians out of the line of fire. All Might, the greatest hero in Japan and possibly the world, tells Midoriya that being a police officer is as noble and important a position as any hero because of this.

* Discussed in ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia''. Police officers are often neglected and looked down upon because they don't wear flashy costumes and legally cannot use their Quirks to stop crime, making them underwhelming at best in a world where EveryoneIsAsSuper. However, they still help heroes with investigative and legal work, are responsible for dispensing the law after villains are arrested, and prove invaluable for logistics work like keeping civilians out of the line of fire. All Might, the greatest hero in Japan and possibly the world, tells Midoriya that being a police officer is as noble and important a position as any hero because of this.

* In ''Anime/NinetyOneDays'', the cops in Lawless have pretty much all been paid off by TheMafia to look the other way, most notably Agent Scusa from the Federal Bureau of Prohibition. When an actually competent lawman, Agent Delphy, arrives in town to clean up, the Vanetti family orders a hit on Delphy's wife and child. They narrowly survive, but the shock of the attack causes him to suspend his investigation, giving the mafia families free reign over Lawless once again.

** Meanwhile, the Japanese police aren't exactly useless and are competent, but they're pretty ineffective at dealing with the sudden rash of explosions and massacres that occur during the Tokyo arc.

** Most marines are completely incapable of stopping main heroes or any other more notorious criminals running around. Straw Hats and Whitebeard Pirates seem to do a better job helping distressed citizen. However, it’s justified, because most of said criminals can turn into elemental forces at will, have SuperStrength and SuperSpeed or are otherwise beyond ability of normal soldier to handle. Only people who can fight them are others with similar abilities (mainly other criminals like Staw Hats). Whitebeard, on the other hand, is TheDreaded whose sole name and declaration of ownership of an island is enough to keep it out of harm’s ways. This trope is also subverted by most of the marine officers, who posses superpowers or are {{Badass Normal}}s themselves and proved they are more than competent when it comes to chasing down the criminals.
** For the most part, law enforcement in high positions of power such as the admirals or [=CP9=] are every bit as effective as the other spotlight characters, the main differences is out of anyone else, the marines have the largest disposable mook army which is what makes this trope take effect more often than not and that mooks are usually the ones sent to deal with problems not directly affecting the higher ups. One major straight aversion comes in at the end of Ennis Lobby where one slightly above average marine mook with rust powers manages to destroy one of Zoro's swords permanently (something no one has done since Mihawk). He still got beaten about as quickly as any mook but he still landed a surprising and permanent blow to one of the most powerful members of the main crew.

** Inverted in ''Anime/DragonBallZ'': The police and local law enforcement are ''always'' portrayed as being utterly useless in dealing with all of the [[TheWorldIsAlwaysDoomed threats to the Earth]], but that is only because their opponents have [[CharlesAtlasSuperpower become so powerful]] that silly little things like [[ImmunetoBullets guns]] and [[RedshirtArmy tanks]] can't even [[OneManArmy scratch them]].