Tropescilloscope: Bavarian Fire Drill

Acting with authority fools others into thinking that you have it. (read more at tvtropes.org)

Film Frequency (%) Film Frequency (#)

More Tropes You Have Outlived Your Usefulness Made of Iron Decoy Protagonist No Name Given Japanese Films The Starscream Unusually Uninteresting Sight Shirtless Scene Shower Scene Really Gets Around Determinator aka: The Determinator Sadistic Choice Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy I Did What I Had to Do Romantic False Lead From Nobody to Nightmare Broken Aesop Red Shirt Random Events Plot Heroic BSoD Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking Needs Wiki Magic Love Does This Remind You of Anything? Agony of the Feet Would Hit a Girl Knight Templar Hidden Depths Be Careful What You Wish For All Girls Want Bad Boys Lock and Load Montage I'm a Humanitarian Arc Words Bloody Hilarious Word of God Eiffel Tower Effect Manly Tears Affably Evil Gorn Cold-Blooded Torture French Films Death Glare Worthy Opponent Time Skip Eyepatch of Power Screw the Money, I Have Rules! Punny Name Laughing Mad Funny Background Event Would Hurt a Child Ascended Extra Ragtag Bunch of Misfits Bond One-Liner Comically Missing the Point Slasher Smile Translation Convention Groin Attack Blackmail Rich Bitch Red Oni, Blue Oni The Mole Outrun the Fireball Colour-Coded for Your Convenience aka: Color Coded For Your Convenience Leaning on the Fourth Wall Framing Device Amoral Attorney "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue Ugly Guy, Hot Wife Honor Before Reason Spell My Name with an "S" Almost Kiss Badass Grandpa The Atoner Captain Ersatz Fiery Redhead One Steve Limit Artistic License – History Meaningful Background Event Took a Level in Jerkass Fantasy Films Sequel Escalation Large Ham Evil Cannot Comprehend Good Ghost Fiction Only a Flesh Wound Improvised Weapon Playing Gertrude Visual Pun Pragmatic Villainy Grey and Gray Morality Cool Shades Deal with the Devil Drugs Are Bad Bare Your Midriff Love Triangle Eagleland Meet Cute Captain Obvious Car Fu Dramedy Poor Communication Kills Hero Antagonist Cassandra Truth Early-Bird Cameo In the Back Adaptation Name Change Wretched Hive Those Wacky Nazis Truth in Television Bloodier and Gorier Pyrrhic Victory Animal Motifs Damsel in Distress Hollywood Law Bloodless Carnage Shout-Out Those Two Bad Guys Auto Erotica Jump Scare Stock Footage Science Fiction Films Love at First Sight Boom, Headshot! Retcon Better to Die than Be Killed Adapted Out Totally Radical Film Series Fainting Dressing as the Enemy Scare Chord Actually Pretty Funny Face Death with Dignity Back from the Dead What You Are in the Dark Ms. Fanservice Informed Ability Vomit Indiscretion Shot Crazy Jealous Guy Our Vampires Are Different Downer Ending Depraved Bisexual Corrupt Corporate Executive Deus ex Machina It's All About Me Character Development Dogged Nice Guy Adaptational Attractiveness Gold Digger Death by Sex Serial Killer Throwing Your Sword Always Works Foregone Conclusion Roger Ebert: Great Movies List Wicked Cultured All There in the Manual From Bad to Worse Toplessness from the Back Reasonable Authority Figure Whole Plot Reference Vampire Fiction Impaled with Extreme Prejudice Insane Troll Logic Chekhov's Gun Paper-Thin Disguise Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold Ominous Latin Chanting Television Movie Index The Dragon Scary Black Man Final Girl The Un-Reveal The X of Y Major Injury Underreaction Victoria's Secret Compartment Super Strength Brother–Sister Incest Dark Action Girl Mood Whiplash Ambiguous Ending Breaking the Fourth Wall Redshirt Army The Stinger Anachronism Stew Mercy Kill Bi the Way The Dog Bites Back Last-Name Basis Evil Is Hammy And the Adventure Continues Fan Disservice Flipping the Bird Only Known by Their Nickname Mighty Whitey Australian Movies Well-Intentioned Extremist Fanservice Extra As Long as It Sounds Foreign My Beloved Smother I Need a Freaking Drink Off-into-the-Distance Ending Death by Adaptation Defiant to the End Kubrick Stare Vacation Films Friend to All Children Disney Villain Death Failed a Spot Check Logo Joke Male Gaze Bring My Brown Pants Toilet Humour aka: Toilet Humor Artistic License – Biology Obfuscating Stupidity Badass in a Nice Suit Not So Above It All Adaptation Expansion Stalker with a Crush In Medias Res NO INDOOR VOICE Jerkass Has a Point Anti-Hero Gratuitous English The Bad Guy Wins Break the Haughty Insult Backfire Jerk with a Heart of Gold Wham Line Chewing the Scenery Irony Distracted by the Sexy Freeze-Frame Bonus 20 Minutes into the Future Villain Protagonist Small Name, Big Ego My God, What Have I Done? Manchild Setting Update The Chessmaster Adult Fear Bilingual Bonus Demonic Possession Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer Alliterative Name World of Ham Body Horror Ax-Crazy Take That! Stylistic Suck Adaptational Villainy Kill It with Fire Big Bad '80s Hair Shell-Shocked Veteran Early Installment Weirdness Danny Peary Cult Movies List Nice Job Fixing It, Villain! The Hero Dies Shown Their Work Celebrity Paradox Fire-Forged Friends Cool Guns Only in It for the Money Asshole Victim Bitch in Sheep's Clothing British Films Villain with Good Publicity Babies Ever After Bald of Evil Bottomless Magazines Wounded Gazelle Gambit Mad Scientist Narrator Made of Explodium Accidental Misnaming Bait-and-Switch Overly Long Gag Vomit Discretion Shot The Alleged Car "Shaggy Dog" Story Jitter Cam Only Sane Man Dissonant Serenity He Knows Too Much The Smart Guy Implacable Man MacGuffin Face–Heel Turn Getting Crap Past the Radar Title Drop Bland-Name Product Only One Name Advertised Extra Those Two Guys Token Minority Becoming the Mask All Men Are Perverts Beta Couple BFG Neck Snap Chekhov's Skill Police are Useless Retirony Parental Incest Adorkable Rule of Three Humiliation Conga Even Evil Has Loved Ones Bad "Bad Acting" Broken Bird Screw the Rules, I Have Money! Karma Houdini Plucky Comic Relief Fantastic Racism Expy Funny Foreigner Historical-Domain Character Scenery Porn Every Car Is a Pinto Evil vs. Evil Mr. Exposition Badass Boast "The Reason You Suck" Speech Butt-Monkey Pet the Dog Award-Bait Song Epic Movie Creepy Child Artistic License – Law Psycho for Hire Darkest Hour She's Got Legs Jerk Jock Disproportionate Retribution Hero of Another Story Morality Pet Double-Meaning Title Naked People Are Funny Broken Pedestal Spared by the Adaptation Five-Man Band Good Is Not Nice Easily Forgiven Older Than They Look All There in the Script Non-Indicative Name Blonde, Brunette, Redhead The Chick Double Entendre Henpecked Husband Tagline Anti-Villain Tranquil Fury Parental Abandonment Immune to Bullets Tempting Fate Heterosexual Life-Partners Tap on the Head Genre Throwback Improbable Infant Survival aka: Infant Immortality The Alcoholic The Oner Reckless Gun Usage Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism Not What It Looks Like Brutal Honesty Very Loosely Based on a True Story "Well Done, Son!" Guy Motor Mouth Greater-Scope Villain Your Head A-Splode Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday Improbable Weapon User Green-Eyed Monster Hate Sink The '90s Sinister Minister Aside Glance The Cavalry Pun aka: Incredibly Lame Pun Artistic License – Military Evil Laugh Fingore Calling the Old Man Out Took a Level in Badass Revenge Demoted to Extra Brainless Beauty More Dakka Intrepid Reporter Race Against the Clock Sexy Discretion Shot Plot Hole He Who Fights Monsters Thriller Call-Back Faux Affably Evil The Power of Love Action Prologue Police Brutality Politically Incorrect Villain Attempted Rape Fate Worse than Death Bar Brawl Blatant Lies The Ace Why Don't You Just Shoot Him? Superhero Black Best Friend Break the Cutie For Want of a Nail Killed Mid-Sentence Nice Hat For the Evulz Your Cheating Heart Biopic Horror Comedy Affectionate Parody Not Quite Dead No Antagonist Sequel Hook Shut Up, Hannibal! Taking the Bullet Psychopathic Manchild Spanner in the Works Sassy Black Woman Wham Shot Accidental Murder Karmic Death Big Damn Heroes Neck Lift An Aesop Loads and Loads of Characters The Un-Favourite aka: The Un Favorite Riddle for the Ages The Stoner Offscreen Moment of Awesome Establishing Character Moment Romantic Comedy Animal Title Index Why Did It Have to Be Snakes? Dull Surprise Heel–Face Turn All Just a Dream Mooks No OSHA Compliance Adaptational Badass Exactly What It Says on the Tin Corpsing Based on a True Story Catapult Nightmare Bury Your Gays Put on a Bus Bolivian Army Ending Recap / RiffTrax aka: Riff Trax Movies Black Comedy Despair Event Horizon Suddenly SHOUTING! Mr. Fanservice Hoist by His Own Petard Bad Boss Does Not Like Shoes Camp Gay My Greatest Failure Sealed Evil in a Can Armor-Piercing Question Fun with Acronyms Index of Film Westerns Public Domain Feature Films Zombie Stories Product Placement Suspiciously Similar Substitute Coming-of-Age Story Soft Glass Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass Training Montage Woman Scorned Femme Fatale Half the Man He Used to Be Our Zombies Are Different Deliberately Monochrome Ambiguous Disorder Earn Your Happy Ending Sole Survivor Big Bad Duumvirate Parental Neglect Manipulative Bastard Red Herring You Have Got to Be Kidding Me! Expository Hairstyle Change Gender Flip A.I. Is a Crapshoot Married to the Job Protagonist Title Missing Mom Unreliable Narrator Animated Credits Opening Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping Awesome, but Impractical Evil Brit Rasputinian Death Rape as Drama Disguised in Drag Determinator What Happened to the Mouse? Unusual Euphemism The Great Depression In Name Only Chekhov's Gunman Wrong Genre Savvy Driven to Suicide May–December Romance Action Girl Spiritual Successor The '70s Epic Fail Cruel and Unusual Death Arch-Enemy Curse Cut Short Gory Discretion Shot Red Eyes, Take Warning Humans Are Bastards Alas, Poor Villain Make It Look Like an Accident Ironic Echo Belligerent Sexual Tension Moment Killer Bowdlerise Names to Run Away from Really Fast Kick the Son of a Bitch Foreshadowing Book-Ends Madness Mantra Credits Gag Pimped-Out Dress An Arm and a Leg Lampshade Hanging The Quiet One Sir Swears-a-Lot Reality Ensues Say My Name Rousing Speech Man on Fire Brick Joke Evil Is Petty Berserk Button Drives Like Crazy Pre-Asskicking One-Liner Up to Eleven Composite Character No-Holds-Barred Beatdown Race Lift Cool Old Guy Rated M for Manly Evil Plan Did Not Get the Girl Line-of-Sight Name Dirty Coward The Smurfette Principle Conspicuous CG Developing Doomed Characters Yandere Guns Akimbo Serious Business Hypocrite O.O.C. Is Serious Business Death by Irony Mythology Gag timeperiod Not So Different How We Got Here It's Personal Soundtrack Dissonance Big Eater Documentary Betty and Veronica Twist Ending Self-Deprecation Chiaroscuro Redemption Equals Death Woman in White Empathic Environment Novelization No Ending No Good Deed Goes Unpunished Big Fancy House Dumb Blonde Blood from the Mouth Mind Screw No-Sell Oh, Crap! Unresolved Sexual Tension Dramatic Irony Fatal Family Photo Military and Warfare Films Peek-a-Boo Corpse Department of Redundancy Department Crazy-Prepared Authority Equals Asskicking Canadian Movies Mama Bear Left the Background Music On The Place Flashback Costume Porn Historical Hero Upgrade Overprotective Dad The Cameo Curb-Stomp Battle Malevolent Masked Men Film Noir Index Diabolus ex Machina Christmas Movies Index Slashed Throat Leave the Camera Running Frame-Up Dropped a Bridge on Him Works Set in World War II Camera Abuse Amusing Injuries Gilligan Cut Crapsack World Casting Gag Silent Movie Homage Country Matters A God Am I I Just Shot Marvin in the Face Happily Married Evil Sounds Deep Closed Circle The '50s Dramatic Gun Cock Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep" Extreme Doormat Take a Third Option Never Trust a Trailer aka: Trailers Always Lie Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane The Voiceless Action Genre The Ghost Dwindling Party Rule of Symbolism Obviously Evil Aluminum Christmas Trees The Faceless Improbable Aiming Skills Loophole Abuse Kids Are Cruel Cool Old Lady Important Haircut Adaptational Heroism And I Must Scream Dutch Angle A Date with Rosie Palms The Reveal Smug Snake Same Language Dub Big "NO!" Call-Forward Author Avatar Offscreen Teleportation Obstructive Bureaucrat You Killed My Father German Films Cloudcuckoolander Intergenerational Friendship Papa Wolf Mundane Made Awesome Continuity Nod Shipper on Deck Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene Cat Scare La Résistance Beware the Nice Ones Naïve Newcomer Skewed Priorities Faking the Dead Slap-Slap-Kiss Fourth Date Marriage Mistaken for Gay Hair-Trigger Temper The Big Guy Jerkass Genre Savvy Artistic License – Physics Beard of Evil This Is Gonna Suck Dirty Cop Action Survivor Cool Car Let's Get Dangerous! Hope Spot Trailers Always Spoil Once More, with Clarity! Lighter and Softer Parental Substitute Adaptation Dye-Job Red Right Hand Catch-Phrase Punch-Clock Villain Hooker with a Heart of Gold Enemy Mine Reality Is Unrealistic As the Good Book Says... Music Stories Villain Opening Scene Villain Song Apocalypse How Pretty in Mink I Want My Beloved to Be Happy A Father to His Men Punctuated! For! Emphasis! Vitriolic Best Buds As Himself All for Nothing Off with His Head! Dark Reprise Hypocritical Humor Never Trust a Trailer Evil Counterpart Historical In-Joke Fake Shemp Dark and Troubled Past True Companions Batman Gambit Spiteful Spit Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right! Due to the Dead Anyone Can Die Laser-Guided Karma Real Life Match Cut Rule of Funny Not Even Bothering with the Accent Ass Shove Abhorrent Admirer Pre-Mortem One-Liner The Musical The Load Sports Stories After the End Pragmatic Adaptation Bond Villain Stupidity Everyone Has Standards The Vamp Arranged Marriage Exact Words Defrosting Ice Queen Star-Crossed Lovers Adaptation Distillation Big-Bad Ensemble Didn't Think This Through Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique War Is Hell Silence Is Golden Dual Wielding Stepford Smiler Ungrateful Bastard Never Found the Body Manic Pixie Dream Girl Combat Pragmatist Gone Horribly Right Domestic Abuse Too Dumb to Live Eureka Moment Disney Death Beauty Is Never Tarnished Fanservice Horror Films Mystery and Detective Films Creator Cameo Death of a Child Imagine Spot Maybe Ever After Historical Villain Upgrade Artistic License – Geography Black Dude Dies First Extremely Short Timespan Drill Sergeant Nasty Freudian Excuse Heel Realization Cluster F-Bomb Hong Kong Films Dark Is Not Evil Never My Fault Alpha Bitch Gainax Ending Here We Go Again! Italian Films Annoying Younger Sibling Recycled IN SPACE! Slasher Movie The Lancer Video Credits Cat Fight Meaningful Echo Refuge in Audacity Fatal Flaw Unwitting Instigator of Doom Properly Paranoid Idiot Ball Leitmotif The Dreaded "Awesome McCool" Name Roaring Rampage of Revenge The Ditz The Casanova Stealth Hi/Bye Artistic License – Gun Safety Deadpan Snarker Disappeared Dad N-Word Privileges Covers Always Lie Suspiciously Specific Denial Death Seeker Light Is Not Good Smoking Is Cool It Will Never Catch On Show Within a Show The Brute Not Using the "Z" Word Precision F-Strike Knife Nut Market-Based Title Famous Last Words Eye Scream No Celebrities Were Harmed Badass Normal Badass Longcoat Daylight Horror Dying Moment of Awesome Hell Is That Noise Russian Films Ripped from the Headlines Central Theme Bullying a Dragon Pay Evil unto Evil Cowboy Cop Insistent Terminology A Minor Kidroduction Real Life Writes the Plot Sanity Slippage Card-Carrying Villain An Axe to Grind Stealth Pun Screw This, I'm Outta Here! Men Are the Expendable Gender Destination Defenestration Canon Foreigner Kick the Dog Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds Crucified Hero Shot I Have Your Wife Darker and Edgier Interrupted Suicide Together in Death Kill 'em All Mexican Standoff Anguished Declaration of Love Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil Re-Cut Antagonist Title She Cleans Up Nicely Reality Has No Subtitles It Can Think Even Evil Has Standards Nothing Is Scarier Bound and Gagged Dies Wide Open Fat Bastard Noodle Incident Anachronic Order Straight Gay Stuff Blowing Up Author Appeal Aww, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other The '60s Deliberate Values Dissonance Ship Tease Chase Scene Martial Arts Movie As You Know Eldritch Abomination Rewatch Bonus Facial Horror Hollywood Darkness Black Comedy Rape B-Movie Genre Shift Blood Knight Room Full of Crazy Four-Temperament Ensemble Girl-on-Girl Is Hot Creative Closing Credits Nice Guy Storming the Castle Adults Are Useless Mugging the Monster Ambiguously Gay Male Frontal Nudity Daddy's Girl Bunny-Ears Lawyer Heroes Want Redheads Villain Ball The Bully Air-Vent Passageway Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome Drowning My Sorrows The Remake Scenery Gorn Grievous Bottley Harm Dirty Old Man Psychological Thriller One-Word Title The Film of the Book Evil-Detecting Dog Taking You with Me One-Man Army Actor Allusion Instant Death Bullet folderlabel Big Applesauce Bittersweet Ending The Stoic Fish out of Water Shoot the Shaggy Dog Sci-Fi Horror Meaningful Name What the Hell, Hero? Badass Bookworm Villainous Breakdown Film Noir Rule of Cool The Mafia Sacrificial Lion Retired Badass And Starring Chuck Cunningham Syndrome The Sociopath Black and Gray Morality Foil The '80s Running Gag Not So Stoic There Is No Kill Like Overkill Age Lift Big Brother Instinct Cain and Abel Children Are Innocent The Lost Lenore The End... Or Is It? Pretty Little Headshots Contrived Coincidence Posthumous Character Guile Hero You Have Failed Me Nice Job Breaking It, Hero! Monumental Damage Undying Loyalty Have a Gay Old Time Bavarian Fire Drill Handicapped Badass The Hero Unspoken Plan Guarantee Get Out! Heroic Sacrifice Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas Abusive Parents Deconstruction