History Main / CutLexLuthorACheck

* ''Film/SpiderManTrilogy'':
** Dr. Octopus is researching a new power source in ''Film/SpiderMan2''. In order to control it, he invents a system of mechanical arms that interface with his brain, have [[AIIsACrapshoot artificial intelligence]], are [[NighInvulnerability indestructible]], have the strength to throw cars, and never seem to need new batteries. Every aspect of the things would seem to merit a Nobel Prize, but Octavius and the rest of the world initially only treat them as a simple tool. By his FaceHeelTurn, Octavius was more obsessed with achieving his dream of creating [[ThePowerOfTheSun a living sun]] than a Nobel Prize. Justified in that the chip allowing him to have control over the mechanical arms was destroyed and it was their artificial intelligence manipulating him. [[spoiler:By the end of ''Film/SpiderManNoWayHome'', his sanity has been restored after MCU Peter built a new Inhibitor Chip for him and he manages to nab an Arc Reactor to take home, which would fulfil his original plan with much less of the destruction and danger.]]
** In ''Film/SpiderMan3'', Sandman needs to raise money for his sick daughter and turns to a life of crime. When he becomes living sand, you'd think he could strike a deal to work off his debt to society for a little government health care. It's not like a guy who can meld with sand wouldn't come in handy in any construction projects or ongoing warzones. Instead, he simply robs banks.

* Mr. Freeze's appearance in ''Film/BatmanAndRobin'' has him stealing giant diamonds and using them to both fuel his suit and build a giant freeze ray he plans to use to hold Gotham hostage in exchange for funds to further the research he needs to save his wife. Why he doesn't just ''sell the giant diamonds'' is never explained. If not that, he could have just patented the smaller ray immediately, waited for the Nobel, and wondered how many new laws in physics will be named after him. The applications are endless and he's just disproved everything known about thermodynamics. He would never again want for funds no matter what he's researching. At the end of the film [[spoiler:Batman talks him into doing just that. Oh, and giving him the cure to the early stage of the horrible disease his wife had. The stage, coincidentally, Alfred happens to have. Freeze trades the cure for a cell with Poison Ivy, since he learned she tried to kill his wife]].

* ''Film/AvengersInfinityWar'' features [[Characters/MarvelComicsThanos Thanos]] [[spoiler: successfully using the Infinity Gauntlet to wipe out half the Universe]] as he claims there aren't enough resources to support everyone. He could have simply used the gauntlet to create more resources. The problem is that Thanos is motivated by pride as much as anything else: he wants to prove his [[TheyCalledMeMad original proposed solution]] of culling half the population to save his homeworld would have worked. Increasing resources wasn't an option for him then, so he isn't interested in doing it now. In ''Film/AvengersEndgame'', when faced with hard evidence that it ''doesn't'' work, his response is [[NeverMyFault to blame the survivors for refusing to move on]] and attempt to destroy the ''entire'' universe so he can remake it as grateful to him.

* ''Series/Batman1966'':
** In "The Joker's Flying Saucer", the Joker creates a flying saucer that can (based on the Joker's comments) travel through outer space to other planets. He decides on the standard "conquer the world" strategy when he could have just sold the design to NASA for billions of dollars. Then again, this ''is'' [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} the Joker]].
** In "The Penguin's Nest", Penguin opens a hugely popular restaurant, which by all indications positively rakes in the cash. However, Penguin chooses to use it as the front for a forgery scheme instead of simply living off the restaurant's proceeds.
** Also applies to Catwoman, who if she used her intelligence productively (or, let's be honest, became a model or movie star with her looks) -- or even simply give up crime and married Bruce Wayne -- could easily become as rich as she desires.
** Batman and Robin even comment during the Minstrel's appearance that he could make a good living just by selling records.
** In "The Ring of Wax", after getting caught in one of the Riddler's wax traps, Batman notes that if the Riddler were oriented towards good, the world could be so wonderful.

* ''Series/LukeCage2016'': If a real-life nightclub could pull the headliners[[note]]Actual famous musicians making cameo appearances, like Faith Evans, KRS-One, and the Delfonics[[/note]] and crowds that Cottonmouth is able to host at Harlem's Paradise, the owner would be a multi-millionaire. But Cottonmouth doesn't seem to notice or care that he has one of the hottest clubs in all of New York City. Mariah even points out that his legitimate business interests are successful enough on their own that he doesn't need to run drugs or guns in order to be the most powerful man in Harlem.
* ''Series/IronFist2017'': Madame Gao develops a synthetic form of heroin that works by skin patch and prevents the user from building a tolerance, making each hit as strong as the first. Had she marketed her innovation to the medical industry for its usefulness in pain management[[note]]One of the biggest downsides to most painkillers is diminishing returns[[/note]], she could have made billions legally ''and'' had an easier time selling it on the streets if she so desired. And since it's not injected, it would prevent the spread of diseases from sharing needles, namely HIV and hepatitis. In short, Gao could have cornered the medical ''and'' recreational opium markets had she set her sights higher than local druglords.

* ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamSeries'': The Riddler. The man could do a lot of good legally, if not for his ego compelling him to prove he's smarter than everyone else.
** ''[[VideoGame/BatmanArkhamAsylum Asylum]]'': He's able to hide multiple Riddler trophies around the joint, and demonstrates a fairly comprehensive knowledge of Gotham's criminal element and the environs of Arkham.
** ''[[VideoGame/BatmanArkhamCity City]]'': He has a formidable and widespread intelligence network among the gangs of the city, plus manages to build and maintain various puzzles and hide his trophies despite Arkham City's isolation. He even manages to get a few puzzles and trophies inside of a secret hideout used by ''the League of Assassins''.
** ''[[VideoGame/BatmanArkhamOrigins Origins]]'': He's actually working as the head of GCPD Cyber Crimes so he can use his access to release damning information on the city's leading lights (collected by an army of informants) in order to make Gotham collapse and be reformed as a better place. He also has the logistical know-how to secretly set up dozens of relays and data packs across the city.
*** Ironically, in ''Cold, Cold, Heart'', he's suspected of releasing information about the mayor and the incoming police commissioner about their mob ties, which made the former resign in disgrace.
** ''[[VideoGame/BatmanArkhamKnight Knight]]'': Not only does he have Riddler Trophies and puzzles around the place, like usual, but he's also got a fair amount of robots, which he's capable of modifying on the fly. Plus, y'know, the massive race/puzzle tracks he's secretly built somehow. Oh, and his plotline ends with [[spoiler:him deploying a MiniMecha with an energy shield to fight Batman]].
*** Also in ''Knight'', CorruptCorporateExecutive Simon Stagg marvels at Scarecrow's idiocy, as his fear toxin could be modified for any number of pharmaceutical and/or military uses that would rake in serious amounts of cash, but he just uses it to scare people. [[spoiler:It's why Stagg tries to betray Scarecrow and ends up getting fear gassed for it.]]

* Mysterio in ''VideoGame/SpiderMan2'' is able to build things like a working jetpack, a fleet of [=UFOs=], and ''anti-gravity robots''. Even ''one'' of those things could make him rich beyond the dreams of avarice. Instead, he uses them to act out because a superhero is more popular than he is.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheBatman'', the Riddler subverts this trope by starting out as a legitimate scientist who wants to help the world with his intellect-enhancing inventions. Unfortunately, his co-worker and the girl he liked would end up sabotaging it in front of their first potential investors and him taking the fall (according to her, she found him unstable due to him losing his temper at a condescending investor who reminded him of his abusive dad.) Riddler does not take it well when Batman spells it out for him (Riddler assuming it was the businessman who did it.) This leads Eddie to go on a RoaringRampageOfRevenge in becoming Riddler. Batman even lampshades the whole thing when he tells Robin to not untie her, with the implications being she is going to be arrested:
-->'''Batman:''' One last riddle, Robin. When is a villain not ''the'' villain?
* ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'':
** Played with in "[[Recap/BatmanBeyondS1E5TheWinningEdge The Winning Edge]]". Unlike Bane, who only used Venom for himself to commit crimes, Chappell manages to convert Venom into an easily usable dermal patch that he begins marketing as a performance-enhancing drug to teenagers. However, he still does this illegally through black market means, presumably because it's unlikely a Venom-based compound would ever be made legal.
** Mr. Freeze's appearance in "[[Recap/BatmanBeyondS1E7Meltdown Meltdown]]" averts this. It's mentioned that he is wealthy and puts his fortune towards making amends to the families who were hurt by his villainous actions in the past. Unfortunately, it all [[GoneHorriblyWrong Goes Horribly Wrong]]...
** Zig-zagged with this version of Spellbinder, a psychologist who uses sophisticated mind-control devices to hypnotize people into stealing for him. Aside from the fact that he's invented all this hypnotic equipment but can't think of anything better to do with it than trick people into stealing for him, he probably doesn't even make a profit on his crimes. However, in his introductory episode "[[Recap/BatmanBeyondS1E9Spellbound Spellbound]]", Spellbinder goes on a rant which indicates that this may be more about revenge than greed. It takes another turn in "[[Recap/BatmanBeyondS2E8HookedUp Hooked Up]]" when Spellbinder gets wiser and begins marketing his equipment as virtual reality generators [[LotusEaterMachine that allow people to live out their fantasies]]. He "markets" it like a drug pusher and is taken down by Batman for it. It's unlikely that there would be any actual law against using the tech on willing people itself, but there would be for coercing other people (especially minors) into committing crimes for him.
** Inverted with Shriek, who starts out in [[Recap/BatmanBeyondS1E10Shriek his introductory episode]] as a brilliant yet impractical engineer who specializes in sonics. For his market debut, he develops a suit that can generate and direct sound waves for demolition purposes. However, his boss, CorruptCorporateExecutive Derek Powers, has the reaction upon seeing the suit in action of "dynamite's cheaper" -- his invention isn't practical and ''couldn't'' turn a profit if put on the market (the validity of Powers' claim is unknown, as the actual costs of creating and using the suit aren't shown to the viewers). He promises Shriek to continue funding his experiments if he takes care of Batman instead. Shriek is later seen to have invented some astonishing devices that would rake in millions, such as a gadget that selectively blocks loud noises (imagine the applications if you live near a construction site; maybe it's not cost-effective but the show never goes into this), but his boss still forces him to act as a personal killing machine. Afterward, Shriek becomes deaf and thus somehow invents a device that appears similar to headphones that can reverse deafness for as long as it's worn by the person, but by this point, he's too obsessed with getting revenge on Batman to care about making money.
** In another episode, a talented weapons designer loses his high-paying job at a defense contractor. It's heavily implied that although he could easily find another job, it wouldn't bring in as much money as he and his family had grown accustomed to having. Instead, he goes into business as a corporate mercenary/saboteur, which apparently pays pretty well [[WretchedHive in Gotham]].
* ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' explores the concept with some of its reoccurring villains.
** Temple Fugate loses everything in appeal for twenty million dollars against his company at the end of the DistantPrologue of "[[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesE25TheClockKing The Clock King]]". Seven years later, he has enough money to buy bombs, cool GadgetWatches, an AbandonedWarehouse SupervillainLair ''to his real name'', and can throw off a clock valued at $6,000. As Batman has never heard of Fugate before their first meeting, it's implied that Fugate didn't need to resort to crime to get all that OffscreenVillainDarkMatter, as his skills could make his fortune by legal means again. In addition, he never suffers MotiveDecay; all he wants is to humiliate Mayor Hill, and then kill him. Money no longer matters to him, only revenge -- he organizes a BankRobbery but leaves all the money in the vault. After he is arrested, he uses his talents for the government as a BoxedCrook.
** Notably, Nygma had a similar motivation as Fugate starting out -- in [[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesE40IfYoureSoSmartWhyArentYouRich his introductory episode]], he's initially a software engineer who develops a smash hit title, but his boss [[StealingTheCredit takes credit for making it]] and unceremoniously fires Edward, asking "[[TitleDrop If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?]]" and prompting Nygma's StartOfDarkness.
** Averted in the spinoff comic ''ComicBook/TheBatmanAdventures''. The Riddler signs a deal with some out-of-town businessmen who find that the device he's used to [[DoNotAdjustYourSet hijack broadcasts]] can be the basis for a super-advanced cell phone which makes him millions. He finds an outlet for his ongoing urges by sending Batman riddles without actual crimes attached.
** In "[[Recap/TheAdventuresOfBatmanAndRobinE14RiddlersReform Riddler's Reform]]", the Riddler signs a contract with a toy company, using his genius for riddles and puzzles to design puzzle toys and the notoriety he earned as a criminal to pitch them in TV commercials. It almost works for him... but [[AlwaysSomeoneBetter the compulsion to outwit Batman]] is too great, and he decides that the only way he could enjoy his new life is to lure Batman into a death trap and get rid of him altogether. Unfortunately, this doesn't work, and Riddler goes back to prison.
** The Penguin is sane enough to admit associating with criminal riffraff is pretty distasteful anyway and he'd make much more profit with a [[BadGuyBar skimming-off-the-top grey market nightclub]]. Subverted in that he still doesn't turn his act around in the end.

* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'':
** Shown in "[[Recap/JusticeLeagueS2E3And4TabulaRasa Tabula Rasa]]". After Lex Luthor goes to prison, he leaves his business in the hands of his loyal minion Mercy Graves, who puts [=LexCorp=] back in the black by cancelling his MadScience projects and concentrating on making a profit. Lex is not grateful in the least, being still obsessed with taking on the Justice League. When Mercy goes to walk out on him, Lex points out that's she's hardly immune to the [[GoodIsBoring thrill of transgression]].
** That said, it is completely and utterly ''defied'' by Lex, who apparently did this during his presidential candidacy. When confronted by the Question about it in "[[Recap/JusticeLeagueUnlimitedS2E9QuestionAuthority Question Authority]]", amid giving the poor faceless hero a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown, Lex points out he had no interest whatsoever in any of the legitimate power, authority, or money being president would bring him, and in fact [[EvilIsPetty merely did it to annoy Superman]].
---> '''Lex:''' "President"?! Foolish, faceless man; my campaign is a farce! A small part of a much grander scheme. ''[chuckles]'' "President"...? do you know how much power I'd have to ''give up'' to be President? That's right, conspiracy buff. I spent 75 million dollars on a fake Presidential campaign, ''all just to tick Superman off!''

* ''WesternAnimation/SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'': Lampshaded when Lex Luthor discovers kryptonite and plans to use it against Superman -- one of his researchers insists that possessing such a rare and unusual substance must have a more practical application.
* ''WesternAnimation/SupermanTheatricalCartoons'': "WesternAnimation/TheMechanicalMonsters" has a villain who invented remote-controlled mechanical robots that he was using to rob banks and jewelry stores. Too bad there wasn't any other way to get wealthy with such advanced labor-saving technology, eh?

* {{Deconstructed|Trope}} in ''WesternAnimation/SupermanDoomsday'' -- Lex Luthor finds a cure for muscular dystrophy and orders his assistant to turn it into an expensive, lifelong treatment.

* ''VideoGame/BatmanTheTelltaleSeries'': The Children of Arkham invent a ''truth serum'' and use it to expose the mayoral candidates of their sleaziness. The thing is that in real life, ''truth serum does not exist''; billions have been wasted trying to come up with something that could expose the truth out of professional liars, and the best thing they could achieve was a serum that suppressed the ability to come up with an unprepared lie on the spot; the serum in the game is capable of forcing a person's suppressed unconscious to blab. If the Children of Arkham took the time to refine the formula and remove that pesky ''eventually turns you into an insane supervillain'' side-effect, they could easily sell the patents for ''trillions'' and achieve their goal of acquiring vengeance by simply suing whoever wronged them, as the ''world's'' broken justice system would get a major software patch with the truth serum.

* ''WesternAnimation/SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'' starts out with a very interesting subversion in "[[Recap/SupermanTheAnimatedSeriesS1E1To3TheLastSonOfKrypton The Last Son of Krypton]]". Lex Luthor is going to use a giant mech, something which was ''stated'' to cost millions of dollars to make, to make money illegally. However, Lex isn't going to use it to rob the banks or other such schemes, he's secretly selling it to terrorists (who are paying him a ''billion'' dollars), knowing that the US government will later hire Luthor to design a better mech to fight the one the terrorists "stole". [[SpannerInTheWorks Superman ruins that scheme]]. The whole premise seems like a sly riff on the [[WesternAnimation/SupermanTheatricalCartoons Fleischer cartoon]] mentioned further down the page.
* In the ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'' episode "[[Recap/JusticeLeagueS1E8And9InjusticeForAll Injustice for All]]", the League's battles with Luthor's Injustice Gang all revolve around money. Lex has brought them together with cash, he almost breaks them up when they ask for more money, and in the end, Batman brings the chaos to an end. How? He gets the Ultra-Humanite to ambush Lex by doubling Lex's offer. This allows the Humanite to achieve his main goal -- funding opera on a PBS expy. Not ''all'' [[ViewersLikeYou Viewers are Like You]]!

* ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'': A very clever subversion occurs in "[[Recap/BatmanTheAnimatedSeriesE24FearOfVictory Fear of Victory]]", in which the Scarecrow combines both legal and illegal methods to make money. He bets against famous professional and college athletes, and then secretly dopes them with his fear toxin. When the athletes lose their competitions, the Scarecrow makes a huge amount of money for betting against the odds. The Scarecrow uses the money to pay for the chemicals and other paraphernalia he uses in his more dangerous schemes, making "Fear of Victory" one of the rare times when we actually ''see'' where OffscreenVillainDarkMatter might come from. Notably, Batman and Robin only discover the Scarecrow's plans when Robin is accidentally doped with fear toxin along with his college football playing-friend. Still somewhat played straight in that his toxin would be absolutely invaluable for numerous government and military applications and he'd likely make an order of magnitude more money in licensing it out for legitimate research than ripping off bookmakers with it.

* This overlapping with RevengeBeforeReason is the downfall of Adrian Toomes, aka The Vulture, in ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManTheAnimatedSeries''. Norman Osborn's attempt at buying Toomes' company out from under him was based entirely on Osborn's claims that Toomes' experiments in anti-gravity flight were failures that would end up bankrupting the company. At that point, however, Toomes had ''finished'' a fully-functional anti-gravity personalized flight suit. If he'd just flown it over to the board meeting and shown it off, Osborn would have been thrown out of the building and Toomes' company would have been rolling in money. Instead, Toomes took up the identity of the Vulture to assassinate Osborn for trying to take over, which cost him everything.

* In [[Webcomic/TheLastMechanicalMonster]], this is discussed in regards to the villain of "WesternAnimation/TheMechanicalMonsters" (as mentioned below in this article), and at the end of the comic, [[spoiler:when Sparky leaves the patents to his inventions to Lillian, she uses them to make a fortune which she uses to rebuild the library and help the neighbourhood]].

* In ''Fanfic/TransformersMHA'', Mr Black is TheTeamBenefactor of [[NonMagicalFaction MECH]], a secret villain organisation composed of {{Muggles}} where he uses his brilliance to create technology that grants superpowers to [[UnSorcerer Quirkless]] criminals, allowing them to easily contend with some of the Top 10 Pro Heroes that Japan has to offer. Considering that the world of ''My Hero'' is a world where EveryoneIsASuper, such technology would have no doubt revolutionised Hero Society.

** In the first ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles1'', Syndrome nicely averts this trope, mentioning during a monologue that he was able to finance the construction of his island base and Omnidroids by selling inventions across the world.

[[folder:Films -- Animated]]

** Inverted with Shriek, who starts out in [[Recap/BatmanBeyondS1E10Shriek his introductory episode]] as a brilliant yet impractical engineer who specializes in sonics. For his market debut, he develops a suit that can generate and direct sound waves for demolition purposes. However, his boss, CorruptCorporateExecutive Derek Powers, has the reaction upon seeing the suit in action of "dynamite's cheaper" -- his invention isn't practical and ''couldn't'' turn a profit if put on the market (the validity of Powers' claim is unknown, as the actual costs of creating and using the suit aren't shown to the viewers). He promises Shriek to continue funding his experiments if he takes care of Batman instead. Shriek is later seen to have invented some astonishing devices that would rake in millions, such as a gadget that selectively blocks loud noises (imagine the applications if you live near a construction site), but his boss still forces him to act as a personal killing machine. Afterward, Shriek becomes deaf and thus somehow invents a device that appears similar to headphones that can reverse deafness for as long as it's worn by the person, but by this point, he's too obsessed with getting revenge on Batman to care about making money.

* Cyrille Le Paradox, The villain of ''Videogame/SlyCooperThievesInTime'', was already a successful crime lord with an excellent cover identity as an art collector and probably would have been fine had he not wanted to mess with time in order to beat the Cooper Clan. Instead not only did he nearly cause a TimeCrash but he ends up exposing himself as a criminal and getting arrested, with Sly yelling at him for his short-sightedness.
* ''VideoGame/BatmanTheTelltaleSeries'': The Children of Arkham invent a ''truth serum'' and use it to expose the mayoral candidates of their sleaziness. The thing is that in real life, ''truth serum does not exist''; billions have been wasted trying to come up with something that could expose the truth out of professional liars, and the best thing they could achieve was a serum that suppressed the ability to come up with an unprepared lie on the spot; the serum in the game is capable of forcing a person's suppressed unconscious to blab. If the Children of Arkham took the time to refine the formula and remove that pesky ''eventually turns you into an insane supervillain'' side-effect, they could easily sell the patents for ''trillions'' and achieve their goal of acquiring vengeance by simply suing whoever wronged them, as the ''world's'' broken justice system would get major software patch with the truth serum.

* Mr. Freeze's appearance in ''Film/BatmanAndRobin'' has him stealing giant diamonds and using them to both fuel his suit and build a giant freeze ray he plans to use to hold Gotham hostage in exchange for funds to further the research he needs to save his wife. Why he doesn't just ''sell the giant diamonds'' is never explained. If not that, he could have just patented the smaller ray immediately, waited for the Nobel, and wondered how many new laws in physics will be named after him. The applications are endless and he's just disproved everything known about thermodynamics. He would never again want for funds no matter what he's researching. At the end of the film [[spoiler:Batman talks him into doing just that. Oh, and giving him the cure to the early stage of the horrible disease his wife had. The stage, coincidentally, Alfred happens to have. Freeze trades the cure for a cell with Poison Ivy, since he learned she tried to kill his wife]].[[note]]This explanation does not take into account the actual difficulty in selling diamonds. Mr. Freeze would not be able to find anyone to take them off his hands because of their size making them too distinctive. By the same token, he can't have them cut down into smaller diamonds: diamond-cutting is a specialised and highly-skilled job within the already-exclusive diamond industry, and even '''if''' there was an unscrupulous cutter willing to do the job and keep silent about the diamonds, the difficulty in selling becomes one of unclear provenance - the people who buy and sell diamonds wouldn't be willing to risk their professional reputation on some dubious stones.[[/note]]

** In "[[Recap/SouthParkS5E6Cartmanland Cartmanland]]", he receives an inheritance and buys a failing amusement park, just so he could enjoy all the rides by himself, without having to wait in queues. Being told that nobody is allowed in [[ForbiddenFruit makes everybody really want to get in]], so when Cartman is finally forced to let people in in order to offset the cost of hiring security and repairmen, it becomes a huge hit. But because the park is now full, Cartman has to wait in queues again (no owner privileges?), so he no longer wants it and sells it back, whereupon the IRS takes away all the money he makes, that he owes in taxes, penalties, and lawsuits.
** In "[[Recap/SouthParkS7E9ChristianRockHard Christian Rock Hard]]", he founds a Christian rock band after making a 10-dollar bet with Kyle on who can receive a platinum album (awarded for 1 million sold copies) first. He does sell the required amount, but loses the bet on a technicality (Christian music has a different set of awards in the ''South Park'' universe -- instead of silver, gold, and platinum; it's [[TheThreeWiseMen gold, frankincense, and myrrh]]), throws a tantrum, insulting both his audience and band members and ruins his career.

** In its earliest appearances, Mitsuhama Computer Technologies were depicted as a front for the yakuza. Eventually, the writers caught on that a billion-nuyen criminal organization is hardly going to use a ''trillion''-nuyen triple-A MegaCorp as a cover. This was retconned in later editions to show that Mitsuhama had several prominent Yakuza ''daimyo'' as capital investors in the company's initial formation, giving them a large, but not a majority, stake in the corporation.

* The villains of ''WesternAnimation/Cars2'' attempt to discredit alternative fuels so that they can keep on selling their oil. Except that the only alternative fuel that had ever been shown on camera is Filmore's organic gasoline, which wasn't being sold outside Radiator Springs. If Axelrod and the lemons had stuck with selling their oil legitimately, they would still have had plenty of time to get crazy rich before any alternative fuel could be produced in sufficient quantities to threaten the oil industry.

A subtrope of MisappliedPhlebotinum, with a degree of StupidEvil. Compare ReedRichardsIsUseless, ScrewTheRulesIHaveSupernaturalPowers, and DickDastardlyStopsToCheat. Contrast RichGenius, VisionaryVillain, and PragmaticVillainy. See also ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder and SanityHasAdvantages for the possible [[JustifiedTrope justifications of this trope]]. Can end up leading to BoxedCrook when put into practice.

** Dr. Octopus is researching a new power source in ''Film/SpiderMan2''. In order to control it, he invents a system of mechanical arms that interface with his brain, have [[AIIsACrapshoot artificial intelligence]], are [[NighInvulnerability indestructible]], have the strength to throw cars, and never seem to need new batteries. Every aspect of the things would seem to merit a Nobel Prize, but Octavius and the rest of the world initially only treat them as a simple tool. By his FaceHeelTurn, Octavius was more obsessed with achieving his dream of creating [[ThePowerOfTheSun a living sun]] than a Nobel Prize. Justified in that the chip allowing him to have control over the mechanical arms was destroyed and it was their artificial intelligence manipulating him.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'', Aperture Science developed several technologies that, with proper application, would have revolutionized the world. Just one, the portal gun, could have, in an instant, solved nearly every transportation and logistical problem on the planet, enabled CasualInterstellarTravel, and incidentally made the company trillions. They also developed BrainUploading, [[AIIsACrapshoot true AI]], HardLight, some really amazing hardware to prevent [[NotTheFallThatKillsYou injury from falling]], and a variety of other things. But they were so into testing all their inventions that they never marketed them publicly, instead marketing and shipping them to ''themselves'' for even '''more''' testing. It also doesn't help that they ignored even the most basic of safety standards, to the point where their facilities would have given [[NoOSHACompliance OSHA inspectors]] a heart attack. Then they were all [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters killed by the AI]] that they put in charge of the facility, which happened around the same time as the [[VideoGame/HalfLife2 Combine invasion of Earth]].

** Dr Kyudai Garaki had managed to create a method to duplicate Quirks and apply them to others even without [[BigBad All For One]] to help. Present Mic points out that he would've revolutionized modern medicine if he wasn't using this to create the monstrous [[HumanoidAbomination Nomus]], as he had access to rare [[HealingFactor Regeneration Quirks]] and could've instead used them to heal patients easily without having to worry about quantity.

* ''VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneyDualDestinies'': [[spoiler:SissyVillain Florent L'Belle designs his own brand of high-end clothing and cosmetics which are exclusively for his personal use. They're actually quite ingenious (such as the hair dye that can be easily washed out and reapied), and as such are in quite high demand and many stores want to sell his products, but he refuses since the filthy, unwashed masses are unworthy of them in his eyes. He also ''advertises'' his products all over TV and magazines, purely to rub it in everyone's faces that they will never be able to have them. This has understandably left him flat broke, so he commits murder in order to steal a giant gold nugget (which as it turns out was pointless since the gold had already been stolen by someone else decades ago) instead of just, you know, ''selling his highly desired products''. In ''[[VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneySpiritOfJustice Spirit of Justice]]'', his products have apparently started being sold to the general public, presumably because he's in jail and thus isn't in charge of the brand anymore. They are selling well enough that even overseas countries have them in stock]].