Captain Obvious / Literature

All examples of Captain Obvious found in books not of the comic or manga persuasion are here!

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• A book called 100 Things You Aren't Supposed To Know is, well, a list of information that is apparently suppressed from the public knowledge. #37 was "Work kills more people than war," which, if you consider basic mathematics, is like saying "time kills more people than sharks" since there is always, always, always work going on somewhere in the world and war isn't usually happening and nowadays, won't claim explosive numbers of casualties.
• Alexis Carew: "You're a girl." Said to Alexis no less than four times by surprised ratings and midshipmen she's introduced to on HMS Merlin (there aren't any other women in the Fringe Fleet). The first time, she answers with mock surprise and the line, "I do believe you're right! Do you think anyone else has noticed?" Then turned on its head when she tries to head it off with Dudgeon, the ship's "carpenter" (essentially chief of maintenance and damage control), by introducing herself with, "I'm a girl."
  Dudgeon: Well and I can see that, can't I? I'm not blind.
• Hans Christian Andersen:
  • In "The Emperor's New Clothes", the kid who points out that the emperor is nekkid plays this role. Apparently, Andersen took inspiration from his own childhood, where as part of a poor family he saw the procession of the King of Denmark and loudly, indignantly exclaimed "Why, he's nothing more than a human being!"
  • In "The Nightingale", Andersen opens the story by explaining that "In China, you know, the emperor is a Chinese, and all those about him are Chinamen also."
• In the Artemis Fowl series, demons have lived in a different dimension from ours for thousands of years, only learning of human customs and culture through one trashy romance novel, which they take as a sort of Bible. Nº1, a young demon/warlock we first meet in The Last Colony, was particularly interested in the human world, so when he finally gets transported there, he takes great pleasure in pointing out the meaning of human expressions, despite the fact that every other character around him (and the readers) know very well what they mean. It's pointed out that Nº1 does this as a way of coping with stress.
• Car magazine AutoWeek frequently features quotes stating the painfully obvious accompanied by a picture of a Captain America lookalike in their "But Wait, There's More..." section.
• A Bad Case of Stripes features the specialists claiming that Camilla doesn't have chicken pox, mumps, measles, or a sunburn... which is pretty obvious because none of those cause Involuntary Shapeshifting.
• The Butterfly Kid: where Chester points to Michael Kurland as an example of Whitehead's statement that "It requires an unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious." So he keeps pointing to the obvious everyone has overlooked.
• Robert J. Sawyer’s Calculating God, during First Contact:
  “You’re an alien,” I said. Ten years of university to become Master of the Bleeding Obvious...
• C. S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia: In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the entire race of Dufflepuds are prone to this, with such astute observations as water is powerfully wet. Especially the Chief, with things like, "Getting dark now; always does at night." And all the others encourage him constantly.
  The Chief: That's a spear, that is.
  The Others: That it is, Chief, that it is. You couldn't have put it better.
  
  The Chief: Visible we are. And what I say is, when chaps are visible, why, they can see one another.
  The Others: Ah, there it is, Chief. There's the point. No one's go a clearer head than you. You couldn't have made it plainer.
• Chrysalis (RinoZ): When Anthony's "gravity bomb" is raging, dragging in (and crushing) a whole crowd of monsters, whipping up tremendous winds, pulling on all the grass and trees, and howling all the while, Anthony sends Morrelia a warning message to "Hold on! You don't want to fall into that!"
  Morrelia: [You think?!]
• In The Dilbert Principle, Scott Adams lists Master of the Obvious as one of the roles to take in a meeting. The Master of the Obvious gets lines such as "You need customers in order to have revenue!" and "We want a win-win solution."
• Discworld:
  • The heads of the Feuding Families Selachii and Venturi have to be this whenever they speak to each other due to an edict that they speak only on subjects they couldn't possibly disagree on. Leading to their conversations including phrases like "I see we are standing up."
  • For some reason, dwarves tend to be Phrase Catchers for people pointing out that they're dwarves. In Feet of Clay, Vetinari shows he's not feeling especially clever:
    The Patrician stirred, and looked at Cheery through watery red eyes. 'Tell me, young man, are you a policeman?'
    'Er... just started, sir.'
    'You appear to be of the dwarf persuasion.'
    Cheery didn't bother to answer. There was no use denying it. Somehow, people could tell if you were a dwarf just by looking at you.
  • Done by Tiffany of all people in The Wee Free Men: "And then there was the headless horseman! He had no head!"
• In Duumvirate: Billy & Howard, the twins have vastly different ideas of what is and isn't obvious, occasionally leading to this trope being named.
• The First Law
  • Grim is The Quiet One and a Terse Talker. Dogman notes that when Grim does make an observation, it's usually something that didn't need saying in the first place.
  • In a short story in Sharp Ends, Friendly is sent to beat some money out of a destitute man who has been destroyed by his debts. Friendly, who is not without sympathy, considers the desperate man's position for a moment and tells him that he should probably not have borrowed the money in the first place.
• John Feinstein's book, A Good Walk Spoiled, about the PGA Tour. Scene: Davis Love III, in a tense match late in the Ryder Cup, is approached by his captain Tom Watson:
  "We really need this match," [Watson] said ... Love didn't answer right away because the first thought that came into his head wouldn't have sounded very good: "No shit, Tom."
• The Ambassador in The Great Explosion also has this unusual turn of mind. When an officer turns in an estimate of planetary population based on the number of strongholds they see from space, he replies that this says nothing at all about what they CAN'T see. How do you know there aren't some underground? "We haven't seen any." "He says we haven't seen any!"
• The Harry Potter books have a few (most are lampshaded in-universe, however):
  • Harry saying "Ghosts are transparent." (What makes this obvious is that he says it in the sixth book, long after ghosts had been introduced; why he said it made sense in context but still got him told "Ah, I see six years of magical education have not been wasted on you." On the other hand, he had been specifically asked about the differences between ghosts and inferi, so this may have been justified.)
  • Cedric: The cup is a portkey. This after he and Harry have just been whisked away by it in a very distinct and recognisable manner.
  • The Chinese translation says that Slughorn is saying Ron's name wrong when we can all tell that from the dialogue.
  • The source of "You can't break an Unbreakable Vow." Harry snarks that he'd worked that much out for himself, and asks what happens if you DO break it. "You die."
  • Ron: "Hermione, Neville's right... you are a girl...". She lets him live.
• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
  • In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, this is humanity's hat.
    One of the things that Ford Prefect had always found hardest to understand about human beings was their habit of continually stating and restating the very, very obvious. As in: "It's a nice day," or "You're very tall," or "So this is it. We're going to die."
  • From The Restaurant at the End of the Universe:
    Zaphod: (speaking into a phone) Will you please tell us where you are?
    Marvin: I'm in the car park.
    Zaphod: The car park? What are you doing there?
    Marvin: Parking cars, what else does one do in a car park?
    Zaphod: Okay, hang in there, we'll be right down. (puts down the phone and turns to everyone else) Come on, guys. Marvin's in the car park. Let's get on down.
    Arthur: What's he doing in a car park?
    Zaphod: Parking cars, what else? Dumdum....
• The Hollows: In A Fistful of Charms, after Rachel meets Rex:
  "It's a cat," I said, winning the Pulitzer Prize for incredible intellect.
  (and then, after Jax says he wants to keep her):
  It's a cat. Boy, you couldn't slip anything past me tonight.
• Humanx Commonwealth: Colette disses Ethan for being this trope in Icerigger, for such brilliant demonstrations as remarking "Stuck" after trying and failing to open a jammed door.
• The Hunger Games: In Catching Fire, Peeta runs head-first into an invisible force field that stops his heart. CPR revives him, and the first thing he tells Katniss is, "Careful, there's a force field up ahead." He probably had even his enemies laughing with that one.
• In If It Had Happened Otherwise, J.C. Squires, "If It Had Been Discovered in 1930 That Bacon Really Did Write Shakespeare": Mr. G. K. Chesterton... as usual, seeing the obvious long before anyone else...
• Justified with Jeeves in Jeeves and Wooster: sometimes he has to be Captain Obvious just to get things through Bertie's head. From the short story "The Ordeal of Young Tuppy" (after Bertie receives a telegram from Tuppy):
  Bertie: I will read it to you. Handed in at Upper Bleaching. Message runs as follows: 'When you come tomorrow, bring my football boots. Also, if humanly possible, Irish water-spaniel. Urgent. Regards. Tuppy.' What do you make of that, Jeeves?
  Jeeves: As I interpret the document, sir, Mr. Glossop wishes you, when you come tomorrow, to bring his football boots. Also, if humanly possible, an Irish water-spaniel. He hints that the matter is urgent, and sends his regards.
  Bertie: Yes, that's how I read it, too. But why football boots?
  Jeeves: Perhaps Mr. Glossop wishes to play football, sir.
  Bertie: Yes. That may be the solution.
  • And later in the same conversation:
    Bertie: What is an Irish water-spaniel?
    Jeeves: A water-spaniel of a variety bred in Ireland, sir.
    Bertie: You think so?
    Jeeves: Yes, sir.
    Bertie: Well, perhaps you're right.
• The Kane Chronicles: In The Throne of Fire, Sadie calls Carter this twice. First, after he comments that "The Duat is a strange place.", and second to herself when he points out that the crew of Ra's sun boat don't look happy with them.
• In the second Midnighters book, Madeleine accuses Dess of being one.
  Dess: You're a mindcaster.
  Madeleine: And you have a fine grasp of the obvious.
  
  Dess: You've been mindcasting this to me while I was asleep.
  Madeleine: I expect that you must earn top marks at school, young lady. There are always rewards for those who state the obvious frequently and with conviction.
• Neverwhere: Richard Mayhew. "Oh, you're awake", he tells Door, who is awake. He immediately hates himself for this.
• The Redwall installment Salamandastron features a scene with The Pigpen begging not to be given a bath; "That stuff's water - it's all wet!"
• Some of Count Olaf's comments in A Series of Unfortunate Events. One example in The Penultimate Peril is when Klaus mentions the 'unfathomable question' in Native Son, Page 581, and Count Olaf points out that that is the five-hundred and eighty-first page.
• A Song of Ice and Fire:
  • Hallis Mollen is flanderized into this. Lampshaded by Catelyn's narrative, after a description of a large crowd gathered in revelry and ritualised combat: "A tourney", said Hal, unnecessarily.
  • This exchange from A Storm of Swords, names removed to avoid spoilers.
    -(after getting shot by a crossbow bolt) You shot me.
    -You were always quick to grasp a situation, my lord, that must be why you're Hand of the King.
  • Sandor Clegane occasionally strays into this territory while delivering very cynical Brutal Honesty. Mainly because the people he's being honest at rather need the caps lock, bold, italic and underline approach to get it through to them that the world doesn't work along fluffy-wuffy, feel-good story tropes.
• Star Wars Legends: Shadows of the Empire; during a Big Damn Heroes moment.
  Enemy Commander: There seems to be a slight problem, my prince.
  Prince Xizor: So I noticed. Why are your ships blowing up, Commander?
• Many characters in The Super Dictionary become this, given that they are supposed to be adults, yet talk in a way meant to teach grammar to first-graders.
  Ted Trapper: This is a picture of my aunt.
  Teri Trapper: Then she must be your mother's sister, or your father's sister, or your uncle's wife.
  • "When Catwoman is awake, she is not sleeping."
  • As Hawkgirl flies over a mountain range, she realises that mountains and fields are, in fact, not the same thing. (Though in fairness, the mountains were apparently not marked on her map.)
  • The book also points out that Comet and Krypto are not the same, as one is a horse and the other is a dog.
  • The most famous example is also a Captain Obvious Aesop. Lex Luthor took forty cakes. That's as many as four tens. And That's Terrible.
• The Trumpet of the Swan:
  When they were hungry, they ate. When they were thirsty—which was a great deal of the time—they drank.
• Twilight (2005).
  Aro started to laugh. "Ha, ha, ha," he chuckled.
• The Twits: "To one side there is The Big Dead Tree. It never has any leaves on it because it's dead."
• Isaac Asimov's "Victory Unintentional": The robots are very young, and their naivete makes it difficult to read the intentions of the Jovians, so they take turns reaching minor epiphanies and explaining the obvious conclusion to the other two. The last epiphany they have is that nobody remembered to explain to the Jovians that the ZZ were robots, not humans.
• Tom Ward, the protagonist of The Wardstone Chronicles is also prone to this, but in the 8th book we see that even Satan himself does this:
  "She is trapped in the dark for eternal torment. Eternal! That means it will go on forever!"
• Warhammer 40,000: Mulenz, a supporting character in the Ciaphas Cain short story The Beguiling, was like this, to Cain's mild annoyance. "No wonder they made him an observer, I thought, nothing gets past this guy."
• The Witch of Knightcharm: Rosa Montaldo, a student witch who is nice enough but has trouble with social interactions, winds up in this territory on occasion. For instance, she reminds a classmate named Emily that it's a bad idea to stop in the middle of the lethal obstacle course that they've been made to race through. (Emily had almost been killed by a different racer and had paused to recover).

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