Rogue: Uh, the corpse is laughing.
Lothar: That's rarely a good sign.
Lothar: That's rarely a good sign.
So, the hero has stormed the Big Bad's lair, taken care of the Mooks, and disabled the Doomsday Device. Approaching the cowering villain, they raise their weapon of choice to deliver the Coup de Grâce... and the villain starts laughing. The hero will commonly ask, "What's so funny?", whereupon the full extent of their foe's nefarious scheme will be revealed. Contrary to appearances, the villain has the advantage.
Perhaps it is a case of I Am Not Left-Handed, and the situation is totally reversed as the villain reveals a weapon or ability they had previously concealed and uses it to defeat the hero. Maybe the villain is truly defeated, but they have another trick up their sleeve: maybe the hero cannot deal the final blow because the Love Interest is caught in a Death Trap trigered by a Dead Man's Switch wired to activate if the villain is slain. Sometimes, even as the villain dies, they Die Laughing. Maybe with their final chuckle, they taunt the hero by declaring that You Are Too Late or My Death Is Just the Beginning.
Inverted when a hero looks on the verge of defeat before revealing that they expected this all along, in which case a Big Damn Heroes moment may ensue.
Regardless of the details, this is probably bad for whoever is not laughing. It tends to prompt a realization that they have been Out-Gambitted, followed by Oh, Crap!
Literal laughter is not actually necessary for it to be this trope, just any kind of expression dissonant with the situation at hand. Will often overlap with Laughing Mad, Evil Laugh, Xanatos Gambit, "The Reason You Suck" Speech. May immediately precede The Reveal. Almost always a Plot Twist.
Close sister trope to All According to Plan. Compare Dissonant Serenity and "Oh, Crap!" Fakeout (though it is often combined with this trope; few things get across that you're not actually scared better than being unable to hold a straight face). Arguably an inversion of Thwarted Coup de Grâce. See also Cheshire Cat Grin.
Beware! By its very nature, this page contains loads and loads of spoilers. Read at your own risk!
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Dragon Quest: The Adventure of Dai: Non-laughter example in Chapter 331 "The Last Great Twist", part of the Final Battle against Dark Lord Vearn. Vearn is normally a smug, cackling villain, which has escalated to Hot-Blooded over the course of the fight. But when Dai finally has him impaled through the heart and is spamming lightning magic to slowly cook him to death from the inside out... Vearn suddenly loses all intensity and looks at Dai with an expression of pity, gently asking him to stop for his own sake. He then reveals that his entire campaign throughout the series was just a smokescreen for hiding a chain of Fantastic Nukes around the human world which are about to detonate and kill everyone, and he only lured Dai to his palace because he actually respects Dai and wanted to let him die a hero.
- Luffy and Zoro's first encounter with Buggy the Clown in One Piece has Zoro fight Buggy himself and he slices Buggy into several pieces right off the bat. Both of them are a bit puzzled why Buggy's crew proceeds to start laughing their heads off... until Buggy's disconnected hand drives a knife into Zoro's side from behind.
- Near the end of season 1 of the original Yu-Gi-Oh! anime in Yugi's duel against Ryuji Otogi (Duke Devlin), in Ryuji's game of Dungeon Dice Monsters he summons a Battle Ox to battle Yugi's Knight of Twin Swords. Yugi counters and defeats Battle Ox only for Ryuji to suddenly burst out in laughter. As it turns out, defeating Knight of Twin Swords was just a secondary goal. The real goal of that play was to create a new pathway intercepting Yugi's and lock him in as opposing pathways can't cross each other.
Comic Books
- Happens quite a bit in Asterix; thanks to their Magic Potion giving Super-Strength, the Gauls of Asterix' village are always quite eager to get into scraps with the Roman Legions, and so those not familiar with the Indomitable Gauls are always concerned when their opponents start snickering before a battle. In "Asterix And The Big Fight", the Romans prepare to attack the Gauls because they believe Getafix the druid has been rendered an invalid, and thus, no Magic Potion. Their confidence quickly dips when they see the Gauls laughing.
Legionary: O Centurion, we don't want to be awkward, but every time we attack these savages, they start laughing and make mincemeat of us...
Comic Strips
- Luann: In the strips for January 8th and January 9th 2013, T.J. grins at Ann Eiffel before telling her that her incriminating admissions (which she thought she had erased) had been backed up elsewhere.
Fan Works
- The Arithmancer: In Chapter 12 of the sequel Annals of Arithmancy, Barty Crouch Jr laughs "like a madman" after being captured by Light forces and in response to the announcement that he's to be executed, because he created a Horcrux to safeguard his life just in case that happened. After interrogating him on some of the specifics and finding out he has indeed outsmarted them all with his plan, Hermione casts a spell to put him into a perpetual coma instead to neutralize any threat he may otherwise pose.
Films — Animation
- At the climax of BIONICLE 3: Web of Shadows, most of the Toa Hordika (sans their absent leader) simultaneously launch their energy spinners at Roodaka… who completely no-sells the barrage thanks to Makuta's protection, and only responds with deep, sinister laughter.
- BoBoiBoy Movie 2: Retak'ka goes from seeming to suffer from BoBoiBoy Solar's light beam attack to laughing, before turning to face the blast head-on and tell his opponent to give him back more of his original power. Solar realises this too late, and Retak'ka leaps forward to grasp him by the neck, shortly before absorbing his power completely.
Films — Live-Action
- In Captain America: Civil War, when Everett Ross asks Helmut Zemo how it feels to see his plan fail so miserably, Zemo smiles and asks, "Did it?" The implication is that the existence of the Accords and the rift between Iron Man and Captain America means Zemo has won. Of course, he hasn't… but someone else has.
- Toward the end of Die Hard, when Hans has Holly at gunpoint and orders McClane to drop his gun, he brings up the "Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker" thing from before. This gets McClane laughing, which in turn gets Hans laughing, while Holly looks back and forth at them in sheer disbelief. Hans is laughing because he thinks he has McClane dead to rights, and of course McClane is laughing because of the loaded gun he has taped to his back.
- Doctor Strange (2016) has the main character fight off a number of the villain's henchmen and effectively banish them to various parts of the world using a set of portals. He then manages to subdue the villain, Kaecilius himself with a device. There's a few minutes conversation between Strange and Kaecilius and then Kaecilius starts chuckling, which naturally prompts Strange to ask what's so funny.
Kaecilius: I just noticed... you're missing your sling-ring. [Strange gets stabbed in the back by one of the henchmen who returned via portal]
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Early in the movie, Indiana Jones confronts the villainous Lao Che. After Indy takes a drink, Lao Che makes a demand.
Lao Che: And now, you give me the diamond.
Indy: Are you trying to develop a sense of humor, or am I going deaf?
Lao Che: [holds up a vial]
Indy: What's that?
Lao Che: Antidote.
Indy: To what?
Lao Che: [starts laughing] The poison you just drank, Dr. Jones. - Predator: After Dutch incapacitates the title creature, it activates a device on its wrist and starts laughing at him. Dutch realizes the device is a Self-Destruct Mechanism and starts running...
- The Princess Bride. Happens during the trope-naming scene for I Am Not Left-Handed. Twice!
Inigo: I admit it: you are better than I am!
Man in Black: Then why are you smiling?
Inigo: Because I know something you don't know. - In Total Recall (1990), Richter's forces riddle Quaid with bullets. Then the latter gets up and starts laughing loud to the shock of his opponents. Turns out the Quaid they shot was just a projection. Moments later, Quaid exploits this to humorous effect:
Quaid: [looking away from mooks] Hu-ha-ha-ha! You think this the real Quaid? [mooks turn away to find him] IT IS. [Quaid whirls around and shoots them]
Literature
- A Certain Magical Index: Inverted and Exploited by Touma in book 2, when he faces the reality-warping alchemist Aureolus Izzard. After witnessing the power of Touma's Anti-Magic right hand Imagine Breaker, Izzard cuts off Touma's arm, apparently securing his victory. However, by this point Touma has figured out two things: first that Izzard's apparent Spell Construction is just to help him focus, and his power is actually controlled by his thoughts; second that he has no idea what Imagine Breaker is or how it works. Touma then makes a Slasher Smile and begins laughing like a maniac while pretending Izzard's attacks are no threat to him at all.note This psyches out Izzard enough that it starts making his attacks genuinely weaker, and by the time Touma is in punching range he's so afraid that the stump of Touma's arm turns into a dragon and attacks him.
- In the second Jack Blank book, The Secret War, the heroes successfully stop Speedrazor and his cohorts from attacking a train. While they are discussing their distrust of the Secreteers, Speedrazor laughs uproariously but is spitefully knocked out before he can divulge anything. Later on, it is revealed after interrogating Speedrazor more than half the book later that they were sent to destroy the train by a Secreteer, Obscuro, who had undergone a Face–Heel Turn.
- Inverted in Sherlock Holmes The Norwood Builder: Towards the end, a bloody fingerprint is found on the wall, matching Holmes' client and sealing his doom. Sherlock says "It is final." but Watson catches the gleam in his eye and realizes that it's not final the way the villain thinks it's final...
- He spends the next in-universe hour or so milking it for all its worth with gusto
Live-Action TV
- Cheers: When it appears that Harry the Hat has conned Coach, Sam, Norm, Cliff, and another conman out of a bunch of money (including Coach's life savings) Coach has his head in his hands, shaking. Then it turns out that he's not crying, he's laughing. "Coach, what are you laughing at?" Coach responds "That!" and points to the back of the bar, where Harry reappears. He and Coach set up a con within a con within a con in order to con the other con artist out of his money.
- Played for Laughs in the first paintball episode of Community, where Chang opens his jacket to reveal a paint bomb after being tagged by Jeff.
- Doctor Who: A heroic example is Martha's sniggering in "Last of the Time Lords" while she kneels before the Master, who's all posed to murder her in front of (nearly) everyone she holds dear. He naturally asks what's so funny, and she proceeds to explain just how Out-Gambitted he really is.
- In The Good Place, when Eleanor gloats about why Michael's plan failed, he acts like what she's said is useful and encouraging...because now that's she identified why he failed, he's ready to erase her memory and give his plan another go.
- In Star Trek: The Next Generation, young Picard starts to laugh, seemingly without any reason, after a Nausicaan has stabbed his heart. Picard survives, but his heart has to be replaced by an artificial one. Many years later, this artificial heart brings Picard into a potentially lethal situation, and in what may or may not be limbo, Q offers Picard the bargain that he will live if he goes back in time (replacing his younger self) and prevents the situation that got him the artificial heart in the first place. Picard does just that, but discovers that this has steered his live into a completely different path—an unbearably boring one. After Picard has learned his lesson about not regretting your past choices, Q allows him to go back in time once again and restore the original timeline. And this time, Picard actually has a reason to laugh when he gets stabbed.
- VR Troopers: This is the reaction of some monsters who No-Sell the standard finishing move.
- Electrobot laughed when the laser lance impaled him but fell off of his perch, when he realized what had happened he got up, PISSED, but was quickly cooled off by the finishing move.
- Mechanoid laughed off the VR Double Team and the laser lance impalement and finisher at first. Subverted when more power was used resulting in him shouting "Woah! Woah! Woah!" over and over again in surprise.
- Fanbot was unharmed by everything in the book, the double team, the laser lance (the impalement and slashing), at most distracting him briefly enough to allow Kaitlin to escape to safety. The VR Technobazooka, otherwise reserved for aerial assaults, was required to finish the job.
Tabletop Games
- An old joke among tabletop gamers are variants on "When the DM is smiling, you should start worrying."
Video Games
- Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped: In the cutscene you get after you step onto Neo Cortex's boss-stage button, Cortex and Uka Uka meet you in the warp hole, and Cortex... laughs. He says this was the part where he's supposed to be angry with you, but...
Uka Uka: Now that you've gathered all the crystals, all we have to do... is take them from you!
- Dirge of Cerberus: After a brief but seemingly equal match against Chaos Vincent, Weiss gives out a hearty laughter before summoning a miniature avatar of Omega and use it to achieve his One-Winged Angel form for the proper battle.
- In the Injustice 2 story mode, Green Arrow and Black Canary infiltrate Gorilla City, overpower Grodd's allies, and then defeat and cuff Grodd himself...at which point Grodd starts laughing, which Green Arrow notes is never a good sign. Cue Brainiac's spaceship appearing in the sky.
- Some Ace Attorney trials go this way. Prove something important and the prosecution will be smiling afterwards. It either means A) that you just screwed yourself over, B) that they already knew this and was toying with you or C) that they still have to reveal their best evidence.
- In The Bouncer, this prefaces the True Final Boss after enough New Game Plus runs. Dauragon, who has been fought twice already— once when he deliberately fights with one hand behind his back, and then with both arms— gets back up, driven wild by the adrenaline, sheds his top, and thanks the heroes for introducing him to the indulgence of fighting for the sake of fighting.
Webcomics
- Exterminatus Now: After raiding Morth's stronghold, killing his cultists, messing up his daemon-summoning ritual (it summoned a different one), Eastwood shoots Morth half a dozen times after he injects himself with daemonic ichor. Eastwood is all ready to leave, until Rogue points out Morth's body is laughing, right before he ascends to daemon princehood.
- The Order of the Stick:
- Lampshaded in #810: Nale and Sabine have Durkon at their mercy, and Nale notices a smile on Durkon's face in spite of Nale's apparent victory. He fails miserably in an attempt to defy the trope by noting that since he knows what Durkon is up to, he is in a better position to counter it. Eventually it turns out that Durkon is expecting to meet Malack, a powerful cleric with a grudge against Nale, who promptly enters the scene and almost kills Nale in the ensuing turn.
- A lesser example is when an evil druid has protected his treants against every form of damage except sonic. When Durkon summons the mother of all thunderbolts four miles out to sea, the druid tells them not to panic as the lightning lights up the area, not seeing Vaarsuvius smiling wanly. Four seconds later, we get to see why.
- Lampshaded in #810
Western Animation
- Batman: The Animated Series. In "Mad Love", Harley Quinn has captured Batman and is going to drop him into a tank of piranhas to prove her love for The Joker. She's freaked out when Batman, famous for being The Stoic, starts laughing at her, mocking the idea that The Joker regards her as anything but a tool, so he'd never believe she had killed his greatest foe. This is all a Batman Gambit to get Harley to fetch the Joker, giving Batman a chance to escape.
- In Invader Zim, when Zim breaks up with Tak, she starts laughing uproariously before she reveals her Irken appearance.
- In Ninjago, General Kozu, who's been captured in Ninjago City, does this when a portal (ostensibly one created by the world's heroes) appears. Moments later, his boss, the Overlord, lands in Ninjago City and turns everyone in the city evil, effectively taking over the world within minutes.
