Edge enjoys living on the edge.
Some characters are just not that bright, competent, or wise. This is an index of tropes related to stupidity, absentmindedness, heedlessness, uselessness, and forgetfulness.
Compare Anti-Intellectualism and contrast Intelligence Tropes.
Tropes:
Categories:
- Abilene Paradox: A group decides to do something that none of the individual members actually want, because each member wrongfully assumes it's what everybody else wants.
- Absurd Phobia: Being easily frightened by something so mundane and harmless that it's ridiculous and illogical.
- Achievements in Ignorance: When being too stupid to understand things lets one do the impossible.
- Adaptational Dumbass: When a character who was smarter in the source material is made dumber in an adaptation.
- Adaptational Nonsapience: When a character who was smart enough to talk in the source material no longer is in an adaptation.
- Adults Are Useless: Parents, teachers, and other adult figures who are too stupid to be helpful to the children they're supposed to be looking after.
- Bumbling Dad: A father who is a clueless idiot.
- Police Are Useless: The cops are a bunch of incompetent morons who can't do their jobs right.
- Alcohol-Induced Idiocy: Getting really drunk makes one do really stupid things.
- Drunk Driver: Extra stupidity points are awarded to those who get really drunk and then drive.
- Almighty Idiot: Godlike powers zaps one of their intelligence and sanity. (Alternatively — a character who happens to have godlike power and rocks for brains.)
- Anti-Advice: Advice given out by morons can be happily ignored.
- Apathetic Citizens: The townspeople must be real idiots if they don't care about the danger right in front of them.
- Artificial Stupidity: The computer AI for a video game does amazingly stupid things like getting stuck in a door.
- Artistic License – Gun Safety: Stupidly handling guns in ways that would seriously hurt or kill someone.
- Asian Airhead: Asian character who averts Asian and Nerdy and instead is not smart enough to tie their own shoes.
- Because I Said So: Authority figures (usually of the authoritarian type) who lack emotional intelligence don't bother to explain why the rules they set should be obeyed beyond the titular answer, feeling entitled to others' unquestioning obedience.
- Belief Makes You Stupid: Radical religious belief impairs one's intelligence.
- Better Manhandle the Murder Weapon: Arriving at the scene of a crime while the murder weapon is still there... and stupidly picking up the weapon just in time to make it look like you're the killer.
- Beware the Silly Ones: Sometimes even characters who aren't that smart can be dangerous when provoked.
- Blatant Lies: Lies so obvious only an idiot would fall for them.
- Wild Card Excuse: A stupid person uses the same excuse over and over no matter what situation they're in.
- Blinded by Rage: A character is so angry that he starts making stupid mistakes, resulting in a loss.
- Blinded by the Sun: Somebody foolishly looks directly at the sun, blinding them.
- Blind Shoulder Toss: It's stupid to throw something over your shoulder without a second thought if the thing has value or it ends up hurting somebody.
- Book Dumb: Stupid when it comes to academics but brilliant when it comes to "street smarts".
- Brain Chain
- Brainless Beauty: They have a pretty face and a gorgeous body, but they have nothing going on in their head.
- Brains Evil, Brawn Good: They think their strength is good, but the smart ones are actually evil.
- Brains Versus Brawn: Intellect and strength are portrayed as opposites such that strong characters/societies are depicted as being dumb.
- Brought Home the Wrong Kid: Never trust an idiotic babysitter because they will confuse your baby for someone else's.
- The Brute: An savagely violent person or animal who lacks intelligence, sensitivity, or compassion.
- Buffoonish Tomcat: Instead of typical animals like dogs being portrayed as dumb or accident-prone in fiction, you have lovably silly, cartoony, clumsy & ludicrous felines (usually a tom-cat) who are prone to slapstick, full of or characterized by humor or are just shown to comically lacking tons of common-sense like a clown or resembling and/or in the manner of a buffoon in comedic works.
- Bullying a Dragon: Yes, let's antagonize the guy who we just saw beat the crap out of another guy; it's not like he'll beat us up too, ya know.
- Bumbling Henchmen Duo: The villain's main subordinates are a pair of idiots.
- Bumbling Sidekick: This person is way too stupid or inept to be a competent sidekick.
- But Thou Must!: An idiot tries passing off the same answer to a question as different answers.
- Stupidity Is the Only Option: The only way the plot can advance is through a character making a boneheaded mistake.
- Callousness Towards Emergency: Someone is clearly in danger, but the one who could help them is too stupid to be helpful in addition to being a Jerkass.
- Cannot Spit It Out: A stupid person can't say something important when it matters.
- Cannot Talk to Women: In typical romance, whenever a female is present, this guy turns into a babbling idiot.note
- Cannot Tell Fiction from Reality: Being unaware about what differences reality and fiction make.
- Childhood Brain Damage: A character's stupidity was likely caused by them getting hit on the head as a baby.
- Closed Circle: Not always due to stupidity, but often this happens when the characters only stay in a dangerous situation because the plot demands it.
- Cloudcuckoolander: They're not always seen as total goofballs that are foolish and nutty, but often this kind of person has a rather... bizarre and sometimes nonsensical outlook on life.
- Clueless Chick-Magnet: A guy who doesn't realize he's a Chick Magnet.
- Clueless Deputy: This guy isn't really much of a threat to criminals...
- Inspector Lestrade: Where this detective is good at getting the pieces of a problem, they are lacking in skills with observation because of their sheer incompetence.
- Clueless Detective: Don't count on this idiot to solve the crime for you.
- Comical Overreacting: They overreact too much, even at the most slightest of problems.
- Comically Cross-Eyed: In fiction, a cross-eyed appearance marks the sign of a dimwit.
- Comically Missing the Point: They're not smart enough to see the actual point of what is happening or what was said.
- Cornered Rattlesnake: It's a sign of stupidity if one thinks that person they've got cornered wouldn't actually fight back in self-defense.
- "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: The characters figure out too late that they didn't have to go through an Idiot Plot.
- Counting to Potato: Stupid people don't know beans about counting numbers.
- Credit Card Plot: What happens when an idiot is given a credit card? They max it all out on junk of course.
- Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: They may be generally incompetent, ineffectual, and/or not very bright, but they are quite competent at fighting when push comes to shove.
- Culture Blind: How does this dumbass not know the basics of cultural norms?
- Curiosity Killed the Cast: The plot kicks off because some idiot thought it would be a good idea to explore something suspicious-looking.
- Damsel Fight-and-Flight Response: She had the upper hand on the villain and could've killed him right then and there, but she ran away like a moron instead.
- Damsel Scrappy: They constantly get themselves in danger because they're too dumb to take care of themselves, thus nobody likes them because of this.
- Delayed Reaction: They take a long time to realize something everyone else has long since gotten, and therefore a long time to react appropriately.
- Depending Upon the Undependable: Yeah. Smart idea to hire this incompetent fool to perform a task. It's not like he's liable to screw it up for everyone.
- Devil in Plain Sight: A minority of characters can tell that an Obviously Evil character is, well, evil; but the majority believe they're trustworthy.
- Deus Exit Machina: The most powerful characters never seem to be there when it really matters.
- Dick Dastardly Stops to Cheat: Why bother maintaining success when you can just stop to do something evil right when things are going well for you?
- Didn't Think This Through: Stupid people aren't good at coming up with well-thought-out plans.
- Digging Yourself Deeper: An attempt at explaining away an offensive statement leads to more offensive statements.
- Ditch the Bodyguards: Bodyguards that can't keep track of their clients have to be real idiots.
- The Ditz: They are so stupid, you'd wonder how they're able to care or managed to survive for themselves.
- Ditzy Genius: An generally intelligent character that has his/her idiotic moments in certain other aspects.
- Ditzy Secretary: How can someone as stupid as her have the job of a secretary?
- Dogs Are Dumb: Dogs, stereotypically in fiction or non-fiction, are very simple-minded creatures.
- Do Not Taunt Cthulhu: Pissing off an all-powerful entity never ends well.
- Don't Touch It, You Idiot!: An phrase told to an idiot by a genius about them touching world-destroying devices.
- Doofy Dodo: Dodo birds get portrayed as stupid almost as much as dinosaurs are.
- Dope Slap: Someone gets slapped for being an idiot.
- Dramatic Slip: In chase scenes, the really stupid characters always fall down and can't get back up for some reason.
- Dumb and Drummer: The drummers for musical groups are stereotyped as brainless.
- Dumbass Has a Point: A stupid character manages to make an excellent point.
- Dumbass DJ: They're not good at being top class DJs.
- Dumbass Teenage Son: Teenage boys in fiction are rarely, if ever, portrayed as being intelligent.
- Dumb Blonde: Blonde hair is a sign of stupidity.
- Dumb, but Diligent: Stupidity doesn't preclude persistence.
- Dumb Dinos: If you wanna know how dinosaurs went extinct, it's cuz they were Too Dumb to Live.
- Dumber Than They Look: Despite having a smart-looking appearance, this character is actually dumb.
- Dumb Is Good: Stupid people are nice and good-natured, while smart people are mean or even evil.
- Dumb Jock: He's a great athlete, but pathetic in anything intellectual.
- Dumb Muscle: Brawny characters tend to be lacking in brains.
- Easily Impressed: Stupid, naive characters are impressed by literally anything, no matter how unimpressive it really is.
- Easily Swayed Population: A group that instantly believes something without bothering to think it over.
- Eating Pet Food: Stupid characters get pet food confused for people's food.
- Either "World Domination", or Something About Bananas: When an idiot translates another language, they'll come up with an absurd translation of it.
- Enraged by Idiocy: A character who has absolutely no patience for stupid people.
- Eskimos Aren't Real: An idiot that actually believes that real things, such as ponies or Hawaii, don't exist.
- Exhaustion-Induced Idiocy: Fatigue leads to idiotic behavior.
- Explaining Your Power to the Enemy: One-way stupidity screws you over is by telling your enemy how your abilities work and what weakens them.
- Explosive Stupidity: When you leave explosives in the hands of idiots, they'll get themselves killed in the process.
- Failed a Spot Check: How did they not notice that important detail that's right in front of them?
- Fan Dumb: Fans taking their passions to idiotic levels.
- Fat Idiot: Fat people are rarely intelligent in fiction.
- Feigning Intelligence: An stupid person that pretends to be smart in order to impress people, and fails at it.
- I've Heard of That — What Is It?: A stupid person who asks what something is after acting as if they knew already.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: Inversely, when a smart person pretends to be stupid to deceive people.
- Fell Asleep Driving: Here's a hint: if you ever feel exhausted, do not drive.
- Fish Eyes: One way to spot an idiot is if their eyes are never focused.
- The Fool: A stupid person who always survives danger through dumb luck.
- Fearless Fool: Plus they're too dumb to realize the danger they're in when charging into a fight.
- Forgot About His Powers: When a character is suddenly too stupid to realize they could use their powers to help themselves.
- Forgot I Could Change the Rules: An authority figure stupidly forgets they can change the rules when the situation calls for it.
- Forgot I Couldn't Swim: Stupidly throwing oneself into a situation while forgetting that you can't actually handle it.
- Forgotten Phlebotinum: Useful techniques that never get used again because the cast is either too dumb or forgetful to remember them.
- Forgot to Feed the Monster: Moronic villains or Jerkasses starve their pets/minions to death by forgetting to feed them.
- Game Show Goofballs: Game show contestants or panelists who have single-digit IQ scores.
- General Failure: Militaries shouldn't have such an utter moron as a commanding officer.
- Genius Ditz: Stupid character who is actually quite knowledgeable in a certain fieldnote .
- Genre Blindness: Too stupid to realize how their genre of fiction really works out.
- Contractual Genre Blindness: Characters make stupid mistakes on purpose because that's just the role that they're given.
- Reality Show Genre Blindness: How in blazes do these morons auditioning for this well-known reality show not know how this show works?
- Global Ignorance: Not knowing about other countries marks a sign of stupidity.
- Good Is Dumb: Heroic characters are prone to boneheaded mistakes.
- The Guards Must Be Crazy: Idiotic guards either suffering from Genre Blindness or are simply Too Dumb to Live.
- Gullible Lemmings: Moronic citizens support the Obviously Evil villain.
- Guns in Church: A moron brings a weapon to a place where they'd get in serious trouble for doing so.
- Hanlon's Razor: An act of apparent malice might actually be mere idiocy.
- Harmless Villain: Villains (other than being not so threatening), can be too stupid and silly to impose a threat.
- Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: Similar outcome, except that a genuine villain that fails persistently because of their buffoonery, incompetence, gullibility, klutziness, or self-destructive foolery getting the better of them as it prevents them from causing any harm that makes you easily sympathize for them because of their failures.
- Hate Dumb: Detractors taking their hatred to idiotic levels.
- Historical Character Confusion: When used to show the character doing it is an idiot.
- Holding Back the Phlebotinum: Unless there's a good reason for it, withholding a powerful weapon or ability when it could help you is just a plain boneheaded move.
- Holding Both Sides of the Conversation: Character pretends to be talking to someone who is not there, poorly done attempts at this fool only the really dense characters.
- Honor Before Reason: Sticking to your moral code is noble and all, but doing so in a way that screws you and other people over shows a lack of intelligence and/or good judgment.
- Horrible Judge of Character: Too stupid to realize that someone is obviously not a good or in some cases bad person.
- Hot on His Own Trail: A stupid character follows his own footprints/trail thinking it's someone else's.
- Humans Are Morons: Humanity is the stupidest of all sapient species.
- Idiot Ball: Temporarily taking a level in dumbass because the plot needs it.
- Conflict Ball: Characters go at each other's throats for face-palmingly dumb reasons or no reason at all.
- Distress Ball: Character endangers themself by being uncharacteristically stupid.
- Hero Ball: The Hero screws himself over through sudden stupidity.
- Out of Sight, Out of Mind: The clueless heroes think throwing out the Artifact of Doom and/or the villain will instantly save the day.
- Villain: Exit, Stage Left: The villain escapes after being defeated because the heroes just stand there like idiots and let him.
- Third Act Stupidity: Character suddenly loses their intelligence at the end of the story in order to drag out the ending.
- Villain Ball: Villains always lose because they can't be evil in a smart and competent way.
- Bond Villain Stupidity: He could've killed the hero right then but instead, like an idiot, decides to either stick him in an easily escapable trap or doesn't make sure he's dead.
- Cut Lex Luthor a Check: The villain doesn't seem to be smart enough to realize that he could make money off his evil inventions, instead he wastes them on petty crime.
- Just Between You and Me: The villain thinks it's a smart idea to reveal his whole plan to the hero since it may look like the hero is about to die; 'boy was he wrong.
- Revealing Cover-Up: You can tell how stupid a villain is by how bad they are at hiding confidential information.
- Idiot Hero: The Hero/The Protagonist is either dimwitted, ignorant, addled, and/or a total moron.
- Idiot Houdini: Stupid people can get away with things on the basis that they didn't know any better.
- Idiotic Partner Confession: When you tell a stupid person something another character isn't supposed to know, of course, they're gonna blurt it out to everyone.
- Idiot Plot: This plot can't go anywhere without the characters sacrificing their intelligence.
- Ignorant About Fire: A character's clumsiness or idiocy makes them ignore the dangers of fire.
- Ignorance Is Bliss: A common phrase that means if you don't know about something, you don't worry about it.
- Ignorant of Their Own Ignorance: This character is too stupid to realize that they're stupid.
- I Just Shot Marvin in the Face: Don't ever let a stupid person handle guns; they don't know anything about or don't care about gun safety.
- I'll Never Tell You What I'm Telling You!: The idiotic villain tells you what you want to know despite claiming that he's not telling you anything.
- Improbably Low I.Q.: An IQ level that is so low that it's not possible for this person to actually function properly in real-life.
- I'm Thinking It Over!: Having to think over a situation that could save your freakin' life shows tremendous density.
- Incompetent Guard Animal: An guard animal that is so inept or too lazy at protecting or doing its job.
- The Ingenue: A naive young woman who unwittingly causes trouble.
- Insane Troll Logic: An incredibly idiotic and nonsensical logical fallacy.
- Insufferable Imbecile: Rude people who lack brains.
- It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time: That so-called "good idea" you had turned out to be a really stupid mistake.
- Juggling Loaded Guns: Idiots using guns incorrectly because it's funny.
- Just Eat Gilligan: The solution to a problem is plainly obvious, but nobody appears to be smart enough to realize this.
- Kindhearted Simpleton: Not the brightest characters around, but they're so sweet and very likable.note
- The Klutz: When sheer clumsiness can be prone to comical silliness, foolery and stupidity, mainly because of moving and/or handling things in careless, clueless, or awkward ways as a sign of being awkward and useless at whatever they're doing.note
- Know-Nothing Know-It-All: A character who constantly brags about the knowledge that they obviously don't have.
- Lawful Stupid, Chaotic Stupid: Stupidity lies on both sides of the Order vs. Chaos spectrum.
- Chaotic Stupid: Being so devoted to anarchy & nonsense kills common sense.
- Lawful Stupid: Being devoted to following the rules without stopping to really think about it.
- Stupid Evil: Doing evil things without rhyme, reason, or any sense of self-preservation.
- Stupid Good: A character who's so pure-hearted and idealistic that they are hilariously easy to take advantage of.
- Stupid Neutral: People who don't pick good or evil make some really dumb choices as a result.
- Leeroy Jenkins: He doesn't know the meaning of the words "planning", "caution", "restraint", "stealth", or "subtlety". Actually, all he does know is "charge in and whack things", every symptom of impulsive behavior.
- Left Your Lifesaver Behind: Stupidly putting yourself in danger by forgetting to bring your weapon with you.
- Lethally Stupid: So stupid they could get themselves or other people killed.
- Lethal Klutz: Same ideal but with clumsiness instead.
- Like Is, Like, a Comma: A true sign of stupidity is using 'like' in every other word.
- Literal-Minded: So stupid that they take everything too literally.
- Love Makes You Dumb: Falling in love makes one do irrational or boneheaded things.
- Made Out to Be a Jerkass: You stood up to the Jerkass who made your life hell... but idiotic onlookers think you're the one being mean.
- Manchild: Adults with childlike personalities are dumb and naive.
- Maniac Tongue: Characters who stick out their tongues all the time are likely not all that bright in the head.
- Mental Handicap, Moral Deficiency: Characters with abnormally low IQ are more likely to be depicted as evil.
- Mercy Lead: Think letting your enemy have a head start is a smart idea? Think again, moron!
- Metaphorgotten: An analogy that starts ranging from being understandable to completely nonsensical and inane.
- The Millstone: A character whose sheer stupidity is detrimental to everyone around them.
- Miss Conception: Someone is too stupid to understand how people get pregnant.
- Missing Steps Plan: An plan with only starting and ending steps, and nothing bringing them together.
- Misspelling Out Loud: Truly stupid people don't know how to spell words properly.
- Mook Depletion: A side effect of a villain killing off his minions.
- Moose Are Idiots: Moose tend to not be very intelligent creatures in fiction as much as dogs are.
- Moral Pragmatist: Someone is doing evil, but doesn't realize that they're hurting their own goal.
- Ms. Red Ink: This woman's not smart enough to handle finances properly.
- Mugging the Monster: A character picks a fight with someone who turns out to be way more powerful than them.
- Naïve Animal Lover: You may mean well in trying to help an animal, but not taking into account how dangerous it could be to you shows a lack of common sense.
- Naïve Everygirl: An innocent young woman who's very gullible and oblivious to mature culture.
- Naïve Newcomer: Newcomers are inexperienced and have trouble fitting in.
- Nerds Are Naïve: Nerdy and geeky characters are portrayed as being Super Gullible and ignorant of the world around them outside of their hobbies and interests.
- Never Recycle Your Schemes: An "mastermind" never bothers to reuse or even revise their failed plans, regardless of the circumstances behind the failure — instead, they start from scratch every single time.
- "No" Means "Yes": An idiot never recognizes when someone really means it when they say no.
- No Peripheral Vision: A character fails to notice anything that isn't directly in front of them, as if they're wearing blinders.
- Nobody Ever Complained Before: It sure took this person long enough to get wise about how unacceptable their behavior is.
- Nobody's That Dumb: Don't express disbelief that anybody could be stupid enough to perform an incredibly ill-advised action. You will inevitably be proven wrong.
- No One Else Is That Dumb: The more subverted and deconstructed version of this, where smart characters ask a question in order to make sure to see if they can recognize the not-so-bright characters as their friends by confirming their idiocy to do so.
- Not a Zombie: Genuine idiots would never survive a Zombie Apocalypse, they'd assume the zombies were still living people.
- Number Two for Brains: The Lancer (or The Dragon) is an imbecile.
- Oblivious to Hints: Subtlety is completely lost on this guy — if you want him to understand something, you have to tell him exactly what point you're trying to get across.
- Oblivious to Hatred: Characters that are too dumb to realize that someone hates them.
- Oblivious to Love: Characters that are too dumb to realize that someone has a crush on them.
- Oblivious to His Own Description: Someone who is so stupid they can't recognize themselves in the mirror.
- Open Mouth, Insert Foot: Somebody doesn't think through what they're saying.
- Oven Logic: The person is stupid enough to think that swapping two components (such as temperature and time) will yield the same results.
- Pair the Dumb Ones: Two characters get together because they are both dumb since Ignorance Is Bliss.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Only an idiot would fall for this disguise or actually think it would work.
- Phlebotinum-Induced Stupidity: The substance that drives the plot has the side-effect of impairing higher cognitive functions.
- Ping Pong Naïveté: A character oscillates between trusting and not trusting someone who shouldn't be trusted.
- Planes, Trains, and Imbeciles: Everybody that works in the travel industry is idiotically unhelpful.
- Player-Exclusive Mechanic: A mechanic in a video game that only humans can use because programming the AI to be capable of it would be too damn hard (or make the game too damn hard).
- Plot-Sensitive Snooping Skills: A character who tries to secretly gather information will be exactly as successful at it as the plot needs them to be.
- Pointy-Haired Boss: The boss is a complete moron.
- Poor Communication Kills: Failure to communicate important information with your friends and family is a boneheaded move to make.
- Popular Is Dumb: The popular kids in school are as dumb as grass.
- Powerful, but Incompetent: A character that has great power or ability, but is too dumb to actually accomplish anything with it.
- Recognition Failure: You know someone is stupid if they don't even recognize a renowned celebrity.
- Reed Richards Is Useless: Not smart enough to realize that they could use their awesome powers or gifts to help people.
- Remembered I Could Fly: An idiot is in danger, and they remember that they have powers to help them at the last minute.
- Retroactive Idiot Ball: Something that is introduced in a later installment retroactively makes an action a character took in an earlier installment dumb.
- Revenge Before Reason: A character pursues a grudge at the expense of all notions of sanity or self-interest.
- Reverse Telescopic Vision: Stupid characters always look through the wrong ends of telescopes and binoculars.
- Rich in Dollars, Poor in Sense: A character who's extremely wealthy and extremely dumb.
- Runs on Ignorance: This thing literally can't function except around stupid people.
- Sanity Has Advantages: Those who are intelligent and reasonable fare better than those who are not.
- Sarcasm-Blind: Someone who is oblivious to sarcastic remarks.
- Schmuck Bait: Being either foolishly gullible, stubborn, or short-sighted enough to fall for an obvious trap or scam without any second thoughts that come across as so obvious towards other characters.
- Seemingly Profound Fool: Everyone thinks this guy is a genius, but he's really a dumbass or just a naïve fool.
- Selective Obliviousness: A character intentionally ignores anything they wish to remain unaware of...
- I Reject Your Reality: ...even at the expense of all notions of logic and objective truth.
- Selective Stupidity: Manipulative Editing done to make people appear stupid.
- Sidetracked by the Analogy: Don't try using metaphors with idiots, they just won't get them.
- Simple-Minded Wisdom: Wisdom that is lacking refined any kind of worldly knowledge, subtlety, tastes or is just told in a basic way.
- Simpleton Voice: Showing dopey characteristics by having the vocals of an idiot, moron, or just the dialect of a silly sounding character usually characterizes themselves as one (This along with the Stupidly Long Filler Sound helps out this main factor as well.)
- Skewed Priorities: An idiot only thinks of the less important things.
- Smart Jerk and Nice Moron: An well-meaning moron that is often paired with a smarter but meaner character.
- Stating the Simple Solution: The characters are faced with a problem with a blindingly obvious solution... apparently the "blinding" part was literal, because only one guy can see the solution, and has to go out of their way to tell everyone else what it is.
- Stop Drowning and Stand Up: A character ends up in the water and blindly panics until they're informed that the water is far too shallow for them to actually drown in.
- Stranger Safety: A stupid person always trusts complete strangers; never mind that that stranger could be an ax murderer or a thief.
- Strategy, Schmategy: When a character says "Tactics are for the weak!", they should've thought that through.
- Stupid Crooks: Criminals who are completely incompetent and have no idea what they're doing.
- Stupid Evil: A villain does bad deeds without considering the bad consequences of doing so.
- Stupid Future People: In the future, everyone will be really dumb!
- Stupid Sacrifice: A character performs a Heroic Sacrifice that was completely unnecessary.
- Stupid Scientist: A scientist whose pursuit of knowledge serves as a demonstration of their lack of it.
- Stupid Surrender: A character throws in the towel while they're not even losing.
- Stupidity-Inducing Attack: A combat technique that actively reduces the victim's intelligence.
- Stupidly Long Filler Sound: The classic 'ol: "Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..."
- Suicidal Overconfidence: These guys make a habit out of Mugging the Monster.
- Sunk Cost Fallacy: A character continues to pursue an unworkable strategy because if he stops, he feels it will mean all his previous effort was for nothing.
- Super Gullible: Characters so stupid or naïve that they'll believe anything they're told, no matter how many times they get tricked, manipulated or were misguided.
- Surrounded by Idiots: The sentiment of a smart person being frustrated by his colleagues' relative lack of intelligence.
- Suspect Is Hatless: A character isn't smart enough to properly describe the suspect of a crime they just witnessed, instead giving a vague, nonesense description that doesn't narrow down to anyone.
- Swallow the Key: It's very stupid to swallow the key to a door you just locked because you would not be able to use the key again to unlock it later. Usually used in classic cartoons, however.
- A Tale Told by an Idiot: When the dumb one tries explaining what actually happened with... results.
- They Just Don't Get It: Characters that simply don't perceive obvious implications of what has been said by another.
- Thinks of Something Smart, Says Something Stupid: A character says something stupid, despite thinking of something smart to say.
- Too Dumb to Fool: An character who proves that they are immune to deception by virtue of not even getting the point the liar's trying to make.
- Too Dumb to Live: Characters so stupid that it's amazing they haven't gotten themselves killed or defeated yet (or it's not surprising if they do get themselves killed or defeated).
- Took a Level in Dumbass: They weren't always this stupid in the past.
- Too Incompetent to Operate a Blanket: Characters that unusually have problems with doing a simple task with a mundane object(s) out of sheer incompetence.
- Treacherous Spirit Chase: An hallucination and/or delusion of a lost, loved one leads another character into peril.
- Unintentionally Karmic: A well-meaning but somewhat clueless and ditzy Nice Guy who’s efforts to help a Jerkass ends in well-deserved bad luck for the jerk.
- Useless Protagonist: The Protagonist either has no skill whatsoever or is completely inept at everything.
- Upper-Class Twit: A character who's high on the social ladder... and not so high in common sense. Living proof that money can't buy intelligence or wisdom.
- Upside-Down Blueprints: A character can't tell that they're looking at a set of plans wrong and follows them anyway, resulting in an upside-down construction.
- Useless Without Cell Phones: Lacking common sense when it's not related to using cell phones.
- Valley Girl: Women (usually teenage girls) that are more concerned with fashion than intelligence or any kind of acumen and also have an annoyingly exaggerated form of a California accent and always uses the word "like" as if it's a comma.
- Varying Competency Alibi: A character is proven innocent when they're shown to be too competent or incompetent to do.
- Viewers Are Morons: TV network executives seem to think their viewers are complete morons.
- Virginity Makes You Stupid: Lacking sexual experience impairs one's intelligence or common sense.
- Violation of Common Sense: A situation where the proper course of action involves doing something a sane person would most likely be unwilling to do.
- We Want Our Idiot Back!
- What an Idiot!: Doing incredibly stupid things that no sane person would actually do.
- Chained to a Bed: When sexual restraints respond with pervs going beyond what is openly said, shown, and what is proper and are usually done for no good reason.
- Have You Told Anyone Else?: Someone has just acquired some information that, if spread, could be very dangerous to a morally bankrupt individual or group... So naturally, the threatened individual or group is the first one they share the information with. No points for guessing what happens next.
- 1-Dimensional Thinking: They could've just solved the problem if they went a different way.
- Once is Not Enough: No, you can't just whack the monster once and be done with it.
- What Were You Thinking?: The Stock Phrase used to call an idiot out on their idiocy.
- Who Would Be Stupid Enough?: Whenever someone asks who would fall for something so obvious an idiot will always fall for it or would do something anyone would be aware of or just wouldn't do with the mentality with common sense, an imbecile would always fall for it.
- What Could Possibly Go Wrong?: Overconfidence that everything will go as planned, which leads to things going wrong (usually the moment this question is asked out loud) because the planner didn't think to take precautions in case anything did go wrong.
- "Where? Where?": Failing to realize that people who are shocked at seeing you are reacting to you.
- With Catlike Tread: Being loud while you're doing stealth for a purpose/reason is very fallible and not the smartest move to make when doing so.
- Working-Class People Are Morons: Poor commoners who aren't very bright or well-educated.
- Half-Witted Hillbilly: Characters from rural areas are stereotyped as being backward, ignorant, or stupid.
- Wrong Restaurant: Stupid people try to buy food or other things at restaurants/businesses that obviously don't sell them.
- Your Brain Won't Be Much of a Meal: A brain-eater finds stupid people repulsive.
- Youth Is Wasted on the Dumb: Children and teenagers can be really stupid.
