Accidental Public Confession

"Jimena, Patricia, Patricia, Jimena, what does it matter? You know what? I would have killed to see your face at the exact moment when you heard that Patricia Longo was Jimena Benitez!"

— Guillermo, Graduados

Not necessarily confined to a villain confessing a crime, sometimes it's just information someone had wanted to keep secret or information that someone wasn't ready to share yet.

Moment of weakness: The villain has the goody-goody face on, but someone has provoked him into a moment of rage, at which point the anger does the talking and, in a Moment of Weakness, the confession of the dastardly deeds spills out along with all the vitriol. Different from an Engineered Public Confession because the villain's mental state has rendered them temporarily unaware/uncaring that there's an audience. The audience may or may not have any idea there's going to be a confession.

Thinks they already know: The most unfortunate kind of Accidental Public Confession comes from someone blithely blurting out something they thought the other party already knows.

Accidentally caught on a live microphone: "Is This Thing Still On?" Somebody doesn't realize there's a live microphone to pick up their confession. If the microphone or camera was set up on purpose then it counts as Engineered Public Confession. See also some examples in Did I Just Say That Out Loud?.

See also You Just Told Me for when the confessor is tricked into believing the other person already knows, and Engineered Public Confession for when the hero secretly arranges and records/broadcasts the confession. May overlap with Easily-Overheard Conversation. I'll Never Tell You What I'm Telling You! is a variation of this. Compare to Poorly Timed Confession.

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Example Subpages:

• Live-Action TV
• Western Animation

Other Examples:

Blurting it out in a moment of weakness:

Anime & Manga

• Fullmetal Alchemist: Edward Elric gets Father Cornello monologuing about his plans to swindle the people of Leore while using a hidden microphone to broadcast his boastful confession.
• JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable: An inverted example. Hayato thinks he has Yoshikage Kira, the Big Bad who killed and impersonated his father, beaten, but Kira manages to outsmart him, proudly boasting that luck is on his side. However, Kira forgets to leave out his name, and unbeknownst to him, Josuke is right behind him. No-Holds-Barred Beatdown ensues.
• Rosario + Vampire Capu2: After all of the chaos caused by Lilith's Mirror is resolved by Ruby, Kokoa angrily chews Ruby out for ruining everything and ends up revealing that she was the one who stole Lilith's Mirror from the academy and caused the entire mess. Ruby promptly drags her off to be punished.
  Kokoa: Me and my big mouth!
• Zombie Land Saga: In episode 2, Sakura blurts out the fact that they're zombies on stage in front of an entire audience while scolding Saki for almost blowing their cover. Subverted by the fact that their argument gradually transitions into Battle Rapping, followed by Kotaro and the other girls providing a beat and music, convincing the crowd it's just another part of their performance.

Asian Animation

• Happy Heroes: In Season 13 episode 6, Big M. and Little M. team up with the Supermen, and Smart S. carries Big M. after he has been injured by a monster. He's very moved by how much the Supermen care about him... then he says he's faced much worse when he's tried to invade Planet Xing, immediately turning the Supermen against him.

Comedy

• Inverted in the Hudson and Landry bit "Ajax Liquor Store," where a sauced customer calls up and orders liquor in large quantities:
  Clerk: Tell me, sir... are you having a party?
  Customer: Nah... I'm just tryin' to work up the nerve to go to confession.

Comic Books

• All-New Ultimates: Lana is complaining that Poey has completely disappeared, and one of her classmates mentioned in passing that he was trying to stay under the radar at his uncle's home. Then he remembered that it was supposed to be a secret. Too late, Lana goes there and starts a What the Hell, Hero? discussion with him.
• The Simpsons: In a one-shot story from a comic centered around Apu, Smithers, and Marge wondering who was painting a "space mutant" tag all-over town, while Lisa was painting the school to enter her work in the art fair. At the art fair, Lisa wonders why no one is looking at her painting and decides to go look at the other works, while she's gone, Willie sees Bart vandalizing Lisa's painting. When she sees people gathering to look at her painting, she proudly admits to creating it, and that's when she notices the "space mutant" tag. Marge's art teacher declares it the best painting in the fair and awards her a gift certificate. As suspicion falls on Lisa, she tries to explain that the mark isn't hers, which is when Bart comes in and claims the gift certificate as his since it's his mark. Needless to say, everyone's attention turns to Bart, as he tries to deny everything, Willie comes in and says the school's been vandalized with that same mark, and it bears the name Bart Simpson. Bart tries to explain that he couldn't have vandalized the school because he was busy vandalizing Lisa's painting. As the crowd chases after him, Lisa laments that she tried to get noticed only for Bart to steal all the attention again, to which Willie comforts her by saying that she won the fair and the gift certificate, while Bart got his just-desserts, and he excuses himself to paint over the tag, while a can of spray paint peers out of his back pocket.

Fan Works

• In the Spice Girls fic, Astral Journey: It's Complicated, Victoria has a meeting with Emma (the narrator) all over the fact Melanie has her grip after the health situation landed her in the hospital. Emma charms in, knowing Victoria hadn't counted on Melanie. After this, Victoria notices that not only was Emma listening, Melanie was doing so as well.
• Infinity Train: Boiling Point: Amity gets so riled up during her fight with Skara in Chapter 14 that, when Skara brings up what happened at Amity's birthday party, Amity not only confesses she did it, but outright claims she did nothing wrong, painting it as her putting Boscha in her place. Needless to say, a lot of people hear this, and Amity becomes a Broken Pedestal for a lot of people come Act 2.
• In One Girl with Ten Brothers, Linka is the first Loud to find out about Luke's sexuality because she walked into the kitchen at the same time he was having a phone conversation with his boyfriend about him coming out to the Louds.
  Luke: When is the right time to say "I'm bisexual and Sam is my boyfriend"?
  Linka: (Drops the water-glass she was carrying, alerting Luke to her presence)
• A Moth to a Flame: After reaching her breaking point after they get caught in Andrias' trap, Sasha shouts the horrible truth about Marcy... forgetting that some of the Wartwoodians next to her in the cage.
  Sasha: [Marcy] and her ancestors have been screwing things up for hundreds of centuries, and now Andrias is gearing up for a MASSIVE INVASION! ALL BECAUSE I COULDN'T SEE THAT MARCY WAS A LITTLE SLIMY TRAITOR!
• Scarlet Lady: When Marinette is announced as the new class president, Chloé Bourgeois protests that she gave out Jagged Stone CDs to the whole class, thus everyone should have voted for her. Ms. Bustier questions her about trying to buy votes.
• Shadows over Meridian: Taranee and Caleb get into a heated argument over all the recent revelations about Jade/Kage and Nerissa (mostly because Caleb refuses to believe any of it). Because they're doing this in the castle courtyard and aren't keeping track of their volume, all these sensitive details are soon known to the entire nearby crowd of both guards and rebels.

Films — Animation

• Happens in Barbie: Princess Charm School. When Delancy gives Blair the crown instead of putting it on, thus crowning the latter Princess of Gardania, Dame Devin gets mad at the former, revealing that she was the one who caused the car crash that killed the Royal Family so Delancy would inherit the throne. However, she realizes too late that she just said it in front of everybody watching the ceremony.
  Dame Devin: You useless child! Do you have any idea what you've done?! I eliminated Queen Isabella so YOU could be princess one day!!!
  [everybody gasps, having listened to what she said]
  Dame Devin: Uh, no, that's not what I meant.
  Brook: Guards, please take her away!
• Counts as one and Type 3. This is how Darla gets her comeuppance in Cats Don't Dance after all her attempts to ruin the animals' final number fail (if anything, they just make the show more spectacular). She rants to Danny how she sabotaged an earlier scene in the movie and destroyed most of the studio by flooding the stage with water, not knowing there's a stage mic on her person and she just blurted it out to the whole audience.
  Darla: I’m the star! You stupid, stupid cat! I should have drowned you all when I FLOODED THE STAGE!!!!
  [the microphone hanging over her plays back everything she said, much to the audience's shock]
  Woman: Darla Dimple?
  Englishman: I can't believe it...
• At the climax of My Little Pony: Equestria Girls – Forgotten Friendship, the Big Bad blurts out what she did to Sunset Shimmer within earshot of the rest of the Equestria Girls, then proceeds to make it clear that it was personal by screaming "I hate you!" at her. Justified in that Wallflower has become so used to erasing embarrassing moments from people's memories that she's become quite incautious about how she speaks.
• Over the Hedge: While arguing with Verne over a can of Spuddies chips in Gladys' pantry, RJ snaps and angrily but accidentally exposes himself, ranting how very close he is to getting eaten by Vincent the bear if he does not give him the food he and the others gathered. This also ties in with Liar Revealed since RJ previously told Verne that the food was for the animals in the group.
  Verne: What's going on RJ?
  RJ: NOTHING!
  Verne: Well then, let's get out of here because we have what we need!
  RJ: No, we don't!
  Verne: What are you talking about? We have more than enough!
  RJ: Hey, listen! I've got about this long to hand over that wagon load of food to a homicidal bear! AND IF THESE SPUDDIES AREN'T ON THE MENU, I WILL BE! NOW LET GO OF MY TAIL!
  Verne: What?
  RJ: LET GO!

Films — Live-Action

• In Bad Girls from Valley High, Danielle works at the elderly home where Drew is also working. While there, she is assigned to look after an old lady whom she believes is catatonic. Danielle, Tiffany and Brooke use this opportunity to raid the old lady's cupboard and eat her box of chocolates. At the end of the film, Mrs. Witt (the old woman who Danielle was meant to be caring for) shows up and reveals that she was Charity's grandmother. Also, while she had been briefly unable to speak due to a stroke, she had very good hearing and sight and overheard Danielle bragging about Charity's murder.
• At the end of Big Fat Liar, Jason Shepherd has teamed up with all of the people Marty Wolf has either mistreated or abused in order to put Wolf through the wringer. At the end, Jason confronts Wolf and demands he admits to plagiarizing Jason's essay for his movie, and Wolf, at the end of his rope, screams YES, he did it. He finds out too late that the whole confrontation was being filmed and shown live to the rest of Hollywood's bigwigs, finally vindicating Jason once and for all and sending Wolf's career right down the toilet.
• A Few Good Men: Col. Nathan R. Jessup angrily admits to ordering the code red in this famous speech.
• Godmothered: Eleanor accidentally turns on a microphone and tells all of Mackenzie's coworkers that Mackenzie has a crush on Hugh Prince.
• In Legally Blonde, Elle starts out Chutney's interrogation rather comically as she has no idea what she's doing. That quickly changes when she finds an inconsistency in the story. She catches Chutney off guard and Chutney reacts with an unintentional confession.
• In the German post-war Black Comedy Rosen für den Staatsanwalt, a peddler recognises a prosecutor working in a court in Kassel as a former Wehrmacht prosecutor who had pushed for an (unsuccessful) death sentence for him immediately the end of the war for stealing some military issue chocolate. In order to silence the peddler and keep him from ruining his post-war career, the prosecutor has him arrested, and all evidence of the death sentence destroyed. The peddler, in a fit of rage, proceeds to some more chocolate from a shop and lets himself get tried for theft in the prosecutor's courtroom. The prosecutor, completely exhausted by the whole debacle, drifts off during the hearing and, upon being asked, absentmindedly proposes the death sentence for him again, exposing his own guilt.

Literature

• In Making Money, Pucci Lavish confesses the crimes of her family not because she is angry, frustrated, scared, or other similar emotion. She just affirms the accusations on pure pride, not caring if she was damning her family because she wanted to speak and be listened too. The police cannot even get a word in to tell her to stop and she is to be arrested.

Theater

• One of the running jokes with Njegus, Baron Zeta's assistant in The Merry Widow (2014 Met production) is this mixed with Did I Just Say That Out Loud?. Particularly involving the fact that the Baron's wife is having an affair.
• Near the end of The SpongeBob Musical, Plankton gets into an argument with Karen, and blabs about his evil plan to convince the citizens of Bikini Bottom to evacuate so he can hypnotize them en masse.
  Plankton: Is it so wrong that I wanted to get lucky with one evil scheme?! ...They all heard me say that, didn't they?
  Karen: They did.

Video Games

• World of Warcraft: In the "Reckoning" cinematic, Saurfang tricks Sylvanas into revealing her real motivations to the entire Horde while delivering her a "The Reason You Suck" Speech. Even though he dies in the duel, Sylvanas loses the already flimsy trust of her people. Even her own royal guard is put off by her response.
  Saurfang: You cannot kill hope. You tried in Teldrassil. You failed. Hope remains! You sent us to kill each other at Lordaeron. You failed! Here we stand! You! Just! Keep! Failing! The Horde will endure! The Horde is strong!
  Sylvanas: The Horde is NOTHING! You are ALL NOTHING!

Web Animation

• Gossip City: Karen accidentally revealed her affair partner Kenny during an argument with the MC, her friends and her husband. Karen's husband divorced her after that and took custody of their son Tommy.
• Manga-Waido:
  • In "She thought she was getting me into trouble but...", Hina blurts out she would have never broken the plates Yuki left on the table if she knew they belonged to Haneda-san. Much to her dismay, the entire cooking club was within earshot, earning herself said woman's wrath.
    Hina: I don't know! I thought these were the plates that you brought! I dropped them just to get back at you! If I had known that they were Haneda-san's plates, I wouldn't have…
  • "The son of a government official burned down my doghouse": The government official's wife blurted out about how she's going to pay her debts after he quits his job. She covered her mouth upon realizing what she said, but it was too late. Turns out the wife, named Reiko, was a shopping/gambling addict who often borrowed from her relatives whenever she ran out of money.
• Revenge Films: A mom ended up blowing her plan to have her daughter Katie take the fall for her sister Ali when the bookstore owner said the thief was bigger.
• Sekai no Fushigi: After finding out that Hayato was actually the son of a rich family and became a CEO in the middle of her wedding with Mr. Iroki, Rika blurts out that she wouldn't break up with him if he said he was rich. Iroki was not pleased with this but marries her anyway to force her into a modest life.
• SparkTales: In "Attending Sister's Wedding with New Partner: Unbelievable Outcome!" when Lisa and Noah attend Cecil and Lisa's wedding and she chews the groom for agreeing to have an affair with Leona despite her instigating it in the first place, the latter tauntingly asks the former if she's still upset over having Cecil stolen from her, with Cecil's parents within earshot. The couple gets understandably angry at the lovebirds for covering up their affair.

• In Steve And Carlos: Carlos presumably found the fridge Steve turned into a car, and Steve mentioned offhandedly that he hopes Carlos doesn't find out he did something to the Coffee Maker as well. Carlos proceeds to ask what he did to the Coffee maker.

Webcomics

• In Bob and George, the Helmeted Author disguises himself as George, and blows up Proto Man's weapons cache, with Proto Man still inside. Still acting as George, he's questioned by Dr. Light, who doesn't seem shocked or even at all concerned with what's happened, prompting Helmut to scream, "BUT I JUST (BLEEP)ING VAPORIZED HIM!!!" Cover blown.
• Tom in El Goonish Shive does it — with the quirk that while it still fits in the 'accidentally revealed publicly something he doesn't want known' department, the confession is proof against itself being true: Susan ends up more-or-less inadvertently baiting him into yelling that he is a fantastic liar. Well, a liar he might be, but a fantastic one wouldn't have unraveled so in the face of a mark spotting a mistake...
• My Impossible Soulmate: Chiaki has a public meltdown in a part of the Grand Arcane Library where she very loudly confesses that she has a crush on her best friend Fumiko. Thankfully, no one in the GA Library knows who Fumiko even is.
• There's a bit in The Order of the Stick where Vaarsuvius, faced with Elan and his evil twin Nale and no way to tell them apart, gives a little speech that culminates in a flat assertion that Nale just isn't smart enough to pull off a good con — at which point Nale blurts out "Oh, yeah? So, what, you think you could have come up with something more clever than Nale did?" Vaarsuvius blasts him with lightning and replies, "Apparently."
• Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic: "How dare you accuse me of petty theft?! What my daughters and I have planned is nothing less than high treason!"

Thinks the other party already knows:

Anime & Manga

• Moffle from Amagi Brilliant Park accidentally reveals his frustration with love in episode 8 while disguised as Seiya. He gets angry at some girls for saying his apology wasn't sincere, and rants about how they know nothing of love and its suffering. Then he mentions watching the girl he's loved for over ten years married off to a guy he absolutely hated. Then being asked to watch over their child later. Isuzu immediately asks if he was referring to Latifa, his niece, but Moffle immediately brushes it off, stating it was just a hypothetical scenario.
• Fullmetal Alchemist: This is how Ed finds out that Maes Hughes is dead.
• Hitomi-chan Is Shy with Strangers: Yuu and Hitomi thought Kaoru had told Angelica about the hotel, and in their efforts to tell her it was Not What It Looks Like, they let slip that they slept in a hotel room where there was only one bed. Angelica had no idea before, but she sure has the wrong idea now!

Comic Strips

• A Running Gag in Foxtrot is one of the kids (usually Peter) accidentally blurting out a ton of apologies for some wrong they've done...only to realize their parents didn't know about this. Cue "Oh, Crap!". One of the most notable examples would be when Peter returned home from school after decking another student who insulted his blind girlfriend Denise. When his mother gets a call from school shortly after he arrives, Peter immediately belts out a dozen apologies for what he did...only for it to turn out that they were calling to say they had found a wallet Peter had lost. Uh oh...

Films — Animation

• The Little Mermaid: Triton asks Sebastian about Ariel being in love. Sebastian thinks he knows that she is in love with a human, and blurts it out.
  Triton: Let's see, now... Oh, who could the lucky merman be? (notices Sebastian just outside the door) Come in, Sebastian.
  Sebastian: (inhales deeply) I mustn't overreact. I must remain calm. [walks up to Triton; squeaky voice] Yes...? (clears throat) Uh, yes, Your Majesty?
  Triton: Sebastian, I'm concerned about Ariel. Have you noticed she's been acting peculiar lately?
  Sebastian: Peculiar?
  Triton: You know, moaning about, daydreaming, singing to herself... You haven't noticed, hmm?
  Sebastian: W-well, I-I-I...
  Triton: Sebastian...
  Sebastian: Hmmm? (Triton gestures for Sebastian to come closer; the crab nervously obeys)
  Triton: I know you've been keeping something from me...
  Sebastian: (loud gulp) Keeping... something?
  Triton: About Ariel?
  Sebastian: (trembling) A-A-A-Ariel?
  Triton: In love?
  Sebastian: (hyperventilates) I TRIED TO STOP HER, SIR! SHE WOULDN'T LISTEN! I told her to stay away from humans! They are bad! They are trouble! They are...
  Triton: Humans?! WHAT ABOUT HUMANS?!
  Sebastian: Humans? (chuckles nervously) Who said anything about humans?

Films — Live-Action

• In Dirty Dancing Baby's father assumes that Baby's boyfriend Johnny got Penny pregnant and left her alone to get an illegal abortion. It was in fact her sister's boyfriend, the seemingly more respectable Robbie. Johnny knows this, but doesn't bother trying to defend himself by accusing Robbie. Unfortunately for Robbie, he assumes that Johnny did, making him out himself when talking to said father.
• From Kinky Boots: Lauren, who has been falling in love with Charlie but makes nice with his wife anyway mentions with sincere appreciation that he put his house up for mortgage in order to save the factory. Nicola didn't know, and is less than pleased he kept it from her. Lauren is mortified; she had no idea Charlie hadn't discussed it with Nicola first.
• O Brother, Where Art Thou?: Homer Stokes tries to out the Soggy Bottom Boys as escaped convicts, but to do so he has to publicly admit — at his own campaign rally no less — to being a member of the Ku Klux Klan and that he encountered them when they disrupted a lynch mob he was personally leading. He's arrogant enough to think the people of Mississippi will be okay with this, that they knew already, and that they'll care more about the Soggy Bottom Boys being criminals. They are not, did not, and do not, meaning Stokes accomplishes nothing but pissing off his constituents and getting run out of town.
• A chilling version occurs at the beginning of Once Upon a Time in the West. Frank and his men have just finished massacring a family, only to exit the house and find a small boy staring at them.
  Mook: What do we do now, Frank?
  Frank: You mean, now that you've told him my name?

Real Life

• This story from Not Always Learning has the teacher talk about adoption and uses one of her students as an example. The entire class, and the student, are shocked into silence because not even the student had known about being adopted.

Video Games

• In Paper Mario 64: Tubba Blubba's Heart keeps going on and on, assuming Mario has learned things he has not. Mario denies knowing every last one of them, which doesn't stop him from rambling on and on about all his secrets.
• Happens to Tails in Sonic Adventure 2:
  Eggman: You thought you could trick me with that fake Emerald , didn't you?
  Tails: So... how did you know it wasn't the real one?
  Sonic: Tails!!
  Eggman: Heh, because you just told me, Fox-boy.

Visual Novels

• The third Ace Attorney uses this trope to win a case. Furio Tigre, the perpetrator of the game's third case, has what seems like an airtight alibi (if it weren't so obviously full of lies) against the poisoning of the culprit: computer genius, gambling addict, and debtor Glen Elg. His downfall comes when Phoenix Wright beats him at his own game: he claims a small green plastic bottle, recently found to bear Tigre's fingerprints, contained the potassium cyanide that killed Elg. Tigre dismisses this as a joke:
  Tigre: The cyanide bottle was brown and made of glass! That cheap piece of trash don't look nothin' like it!

Accidentally caught on a live microphone:

Anime & Manga

• Booty Royale: Never Go Down Without a Fight!: In chapter 30, TV host Hatsumi Hime gets annoyed at protagonist Misora Haebara and bugs her purse, hoping to get some blackmail material. She doesn't, at least initially,^note later she records Misora having sex with her girlfriend Akira but she does accidentally record Misora getting kidnapped by a recurring villain and is able to phone her location in to the police when she realizes the horrible fate he has planned for her.
• In Fullmetal Alchemist Edward does this to the priest who is fooling the townspeople about his philosopher's stone and his ability to bring the dead back to life, he hides a microphone in his office while he rants his evil plans.
• Regularly Played for Laughs in Monkey High!, where Haruna becomes so overwhelmed by her feelings for Macharu that she focuses solely on him - apparently forgetting all of the people nearby to hear her admit just how Not So Stoic she is. At least one instance was on a game show, and the TV crew were so impressed that she and Macharu were given pillows as prizes for it.
• During the Enies Lobby Arc of One Piece, the Big Bad Spandam accidentally triggers the Buster Call on Enies Lobby, but quickly justifies his mistake by saying he's willing to sacrifice as many of the World Government soldiers as he wants for the sake of justice... and his promotion. Then stating that the "idiot" soldiers are better off dead anyway for failing to stop the Straw Hat Pirates from reaching the main building. His prisoner Robin then points out that his speaker Den Den Mushi has been off hook for his entire rant and was broadcast live across the entire base. Spandam sheepishly attempts to cover himself up by saying that this is Straw Hat Luffy talking, fooling absolutely no one.

Comic Books

• Spider-Men II: A non-verbal case. Miles unmasked himself, thinking that he was alone with Peter, but they were photographed from a distance. He does not know about this other Miles Morales, but when he saw those photos... the other Miles Morales knew about him.

Fan Works

• In LadyBugOut, Chat Noir confronts Ladybug about her blog, complaining about how it's "making him look bad." When she attempts to leave, he grabs her arm, knocking her yo-yo out of her hand in the process before launching into a blistering rant about how she's "defying destiny" by rejecting his advances. What he doesn't realize is that when he knocked her yo-yo away, it snapped open and started recording, broadcasting the confrontation live on her blog and revealing to the public the true nature of their relationship.
• In With This Ring, while discussing Orange Lantern's candidacy for Justice League membership, Wonder Woman puts a call from him on speaker without him knowing so the rest of the League could hear. So everyone ended up finding out the harrowing details of the second CADMUS clone and him calling them out on missing it.
• The Kim Possible fic You Kissed a Synthodrone features a complex twist on this after it's revealed that the Kim who went to prom with Ron at the end of "So the Drama" was actually a synthodrone copy of Kim. After the real Kim escapes and establishes what's been going on while she was locked up, ends up coming face-to-face with Ron while he thinks she's the synthodrone after it's been reprogrammed to not be a threat. Listening to Ron confess his deeper feelings to what he believes is the synthodrone, including how he both wants to be part of Kim's future and accepts the need to step aside if she chooses someone else, Kim ends up thinking about everything he's told her and decide that she wants to give a deeper relationship a shot on her own.

Films — Animation

• Counts as one and Type 1. This is how Darla gets her comeuppance in Cats Don't Dance after all her attempts to ruin the animals' final number fail (if anything, they just make the show more spectacular). She rants to Danny how she sabotaged an earlier scene in the movie and destroyed most of the studio by flooding the stage with water, not knowing there's a stage mic on her person and she just blurted it out to the whole audience.
  Darla: I’m the star! You stupid, stupid cat! I should have drowned you all when I FLOODED THE STAGE!!!!
  [the microphone hanging over her plays back everything she said, much to the audience's shock]
  Woman: Darla Dimple?
  Englishman: I can't believe it...
• In The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, when Victor Quartermaine fails to kill the titular monster, he tries to tell the chief of police that "The beast isn't actually dead yet" while he's presiding over a festival with a megaphone. The chief promptly repeats what Victor has said to him in pure shock, not realizing he has shouted it through the megaphone. Cue a prolonged pause from the townspeople, followed by widespread panic.
  Chief of Police: Oops.
• In KikoRiki. Team Invincible, just a few minutes before Wally's news report, he accidentally left one of cameras on, which filmed the two robbers that framed Pin and Chiko coming into the studio to show Boss their stolen items while gloating how well their show works as a distraction, which was later shown during the Julien Show marathon.

Films — Live-Action

• Happens at the end of The Adventures of Ford Fairlane. Julian Grendel, the antagonist, reveals his diabolical plan involving a Condom Factory front operation to Ford Fairlane while standing backstage at an event. During his tirade, Zuzu Petals stands behind him with a microphone, which broadcasts the confession to a crowd outside.
  "I even pissed in the punch bowl!"
• In A Face in the Crowd (1957). the downfall of Larry 'Lonesome' Rhodes is caused by an opened mike allowing the TV public to learn of his evil nature.
• In the musical version of Hairspray (2007), Velma Von Tussle purposes rigs the election of Miss Teen Hairspray pageant so that her daughter Amber would win. Instead, Inez Stubbs becomes the first black female to win Miss Teenage Hairspray, thereby permanently integrating the program. Velma pulls Amber aside and says it's impossible, since she has the vote cards, and pulls them out of her blouse. Unfortunately for her, Wilbur and Edna Turnblad have the active TV camera pointed directly at her at the time.
• In Johnny English Reborn Simon Ambrose attempts to reassert control over Johnny (who has been fighting the effects of the mind-control drug to avoid shooting Shang Ping, the Chinese Premier), and ends up outing himself as the mastermind of the attempted assassination in this manner:
  Ambrose: Listen to me. This is Simon Ambrose (mic has conveniently activated) and I order you to shoot Shang Ping.
• Also from Kinky Boots: Charlie's wife Nicola confronts Charlie when she discovers that Charlie has mortgaged the house rather than sell the ailing shoe factory he inherited from his father. When Nicola screams and kicks out Lola the Drag Queen, Lola scampers and drops the prototype boot. Purely by accident, the dropped boot lands on the factory's PA system switch. So the entire staff hears Charlie's impassioned speech, wherein he tells Nicola that he can't just abandon the factory because he grew up knowing these people. Charlie shouts that he doesn't actually enjoy making people redundant and that he has to try saving the factory. He tells her that if she can't get that, then she may never get Charlie Price. As a result, the entire factory gains new respect for the kid they scoffed at for trying to help the factory with no idea how to make shoes.
• Max Keeble's Big Move: A rather hilarious example happened shortly after Jindrake finished his first telerecorder school announcement: When doing the announcement that requires all of the student body and faculty/staff meet at the auditorium for a special, mandatory announcement, he is dressed like either the President of the United States or probably the Governor of California with the Capitol Building seen behind him from the window. Shortly after Jindrake apparently cuts the transmission, he then takes off the suit, revealing that it was actually a fake, velcro-strapped bodysuit while bragging about himself in a manner similar to a Movie reviewer in an editorial column in the local newspaper, and revealing that even the background was actually fake, a makeshift curtain, all of which was caught on-feed to the students and to their uproar, up until Mrs. Rangoon, his secretary, revealed that the camera's red light was still operating. Max uses this to expose his plan on using most of the school budget to build a football field to make himself superintendent.
• In Mister Roberts, Morton leaves the mike to the ship's PA switched on when screaming at Roberts. This lets the crew know the truth about Roberts' strange behaviour and that Morton is really the one to blame.
• In The Monster Maker, Maxine learns about Dr. Markoff's true scheme when she overhears a confrontation between Markham and Lawrence because Markoff has left his office intercom on.
• In Stag, Dan—while Bound and Gagged on the couch with Serena—accidentally knocks Jon's video camera off the coffee table. It hits the floor and starts recording: capturing the words of everyone in the room as the debate the merits of murdering Serena and framing her for the other deaths. In the epilogue, Dan mentions that the tape became the main piece of evidence in the subsequent trial.

Music

• In Daniel Amos' album Horrendous Disc, the title track is a surreal dream where a musician's abusive relationship with his wife gets broadcast for all the world to see.
  He's killed his wife with words,
  confident it's private rage,
  when up goes the curtain and he's on the stage.

Radio

• The Goon Show: thanks to a dimly lit jail cell, and an unintentional game of Telephone...
  Bloodnock: (whispers the escape plan, thinking he's telling it to Seagoon) Did you get that?
  Eccles: (a world-famous idiot) Yup, I got it.
  Bloodnock: Curse, the wrong idiot! Well, you may as well tell Seagoon now.
  Eccles: Okay. Now; when the water comes in...
  Bloodnock! Whisper, you fool!
  Eccles: Whisper, you fool! Oh, right. It's a secret. (spends a minute whispering the plan, complete with ridiculous onomatopoeic sound effects) Got that?
  Jail Guard: I certainly have.

Video Games

• In Digital Devil Saga 2, this is essentially what led to the Earth turning into a deserted wasteland as shown in the backstory. Sera's scientist friend Serph Sheffield shows his true manipulative nature by murdering Heat O'Brien, not noticing that Sera saw the whole thing while currently connected to the machine that lets her speak with God. Needless to say, God didn't take this lightly and in anger turned the Sun black as punishment.
• After getting smashed at the Sky Bridge in Freedom Planet 2, Captain Kalaw continues to play his role up until your character calls him out for turning on the world while being the Battlesphere champion. He breaks kayfabe to vent his frustrations about his role as Champion while the camera he brought for self-glorification is still live, and is ignorant of its continued operation until your character points it out; he goes back in character to try to talk away the sudden tone shift before fleeing, but with the possible exception of Milla, nobody buys it. He drops out of the story after that, only to appear again in the ending.
• Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty had a variation: Raiden, after learning from Otacon in an optional codec call, that the rumors about the Big Shell being a big cover-up are all true, and especially that Solid Snake said that Raiden was a weak, simple-minded, stubborn fool, exploded about it and insulted Snake, not realizing that Snake was right next to Otacon while angrily insulting Snake until Otacon told him. Also counts under Engineered Public Confession.

Visual Novels

• In Iori's route of Scandal in the Spotlight, the protagonist decides to agree to a sleazy producer's Scarpia Ultimatum to keep Iori from being dropped from a big upcoming media event, which could damage his career. The producer has her meet him in an unused broadcasting booth while Revance is making a live appearance elsewhere in the studio and aggressively tries to pump her for blackmail material he could use against the band before moving on to sexual assault. Neither of them realizes that, somewhere along the way, one of them accidentally flipped a switch and everything they've said was clearly heard in the studio where Revance was doing their live broadcast.

Web Animation

• Gossip City: My husband and daughter kicked me out of the house without even knowing what I did for them - when Leon and Mamoru revealed that they chatted with Miki through an online game, Miki dismisses all the stuff she told them as a joke, especially that she was going to scam Kobayashi out of her money. Angered by her stepdaughter's lack of remorse, she kicks the brat out of her house.

Web Comics

• In BACK, whilst backstage during an episode of Crannie's Challenge and having an argument with Knook, Crannie reminds Knook of Abigail's world-ending nature. Unfortunately (and operating under the logic that Crannie must be on TV) the production crew had sent a cameraman backstage, causing the entire thing to both be broadcast to both Daggum and King Dang.
• In Commander Kitty, this trope ends up working against the heroes when MOUSE accidentally spoils the entire plan because he defaults to "speaker" mode.

Real Life

• An example of this happened in Real Life when then UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown was finished talking to a woman voter and then rushed off to his car and muttered to himself that she was a "bigoted woman". While his mic was still on. For the whole of a television audience to hear. Whoops.
• In 2012, President Obama was caught on an open microphone telling Russian President Dmitry Medvedev he would have more "flexibility" to negotiate on missile defense after the November election [1].
• Donald Trump's infamous Access Hollywood tape.
• Richard M. Nixon's 'Smoking Gun' tape, from the Watergate Scandal

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