Clue, Evidence, and a Smoking Gun

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Sometimes deduction takes leaps of logic to come to a simple conclusion based on very minor details. Sometimes it's obvious. Sometimes however, the deductor uses his Bat Deduction skills to explain his conclusion, and then adds a Smoking Gun for good measure, making the previous deductions quite redundant.

Has some similarity with Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking but with weak arguments leading up to one strong one (and used as a deduction).

Examples of Clue, Evidence, and a Smoking Gun include:

Comic Books

  • In an issue of Young Justice, where a mysterious new girl helps the team out during a fight, then disappears. When trying to figure out who she is, this exchange occurs:

Robin: Her name's "Empress".
Superboy: Wha...? How'd you figure that one out?
Robin: It was through a series of clues and observations, with a few inferences thrown in for good measure. Oh, and there was also that... (points to the word "Empress" burned into the ground)


Literature

  • In Quidditch Through the Ages, the fictional author describes the discovery of round metal balls believed to be bludgers, and not cannonballs, based on very subtle indents made by beaters' bats, the perfect symmetry only achievable by magic, and the fact that the balls started flying around trying to hit the discoverer when removed from their case.


Live-Action TV

  • Parodied on the 1960s spy spoof Get Smart, where Max would begin to list a series of utterly nonsensical clues to the solution of an obvious mystery, and 99 would supply the smoking gun... which Max would then hastily claim was the last clue in his list.
  • In the season 2 Community episode ""Paradigms of Human Memory" (the non-recycling clip show), Abed deduces that Britta and Jeff are sleeping together from several subtle indications, and lastly: Abed saw them getting dressed together in a dormitory.
  • In "The Great Game", the third episode of Sherlock, Holmes deduces that Molly's new boyfriend Jim is gay because of vague traces of make-up, subtle hints in his clothing, and him leaving his number with Sherlock.
  • Surprisingly infrequent in Castle, where a complex series of deductions and circumstantial speculations lead to the killer. Since the police require proof beyond reasonable doubt, a last-minute smoking gun (or, sometimes, a cleverly extracted confession) is produced that seals the deal. But typically, solving the mystery points to an unexpected suspect or provides the clues necessary to establish probable cause so the police can get the evidence.
    • In "A Deadly Game", Castle and Beckett get the victim's lover, a Long Island housewife, to confess that she was having an affair. However, while a dramatic scene, the confession is unnecessary: they already have both the murder weapon and physical evidence putting the killer at the scene of the crime.
    • In "A Chill Runs Through Her Veins", Castle and Beckett identify the killer based on a chance conversation with a witness. They don't have any physical evidence or witnesses, so to close the case the authors nicely have the killer volunteer a hypothetical confession so the viewer can feel satisfied that C&B have their man.
    • In "Famous Last Words", Castle must unravel the meaning of the lyrics for victim's final hit single to solve the murder. Only then can he and Beckett confront the killer and clear the name of the innocent suspect. Except... the key physical evidence was texts sent on the innocent suspect's phone, which were far more explicit about what actually happened than the song, and which the police were already going through. This evidence on its own identified and proved who the killer was, so the business the song was only important because Castle and Beckett hadn't read it yet.


Video Games


Western Animation

Abe: He was right under my nose the whole time. He lives in my retirement home. His name is Malloy.
Lisa: Wow! How'd you track him down, Grampa?
Abe: Good question! On one of my frequent trips to the ground, I noticed Malloy wore sneakers...for sneaking. My next clue came yesterday at the museum. We felt slighted by your age-bashing, and started home. Malloy said, "I'll catch up with you." [Malloy throws a grappling hook at the museum roof and starts climbing] I couldn't quite put my finger on it. There was something strange about the way he walked -- much more vertical than usual. And finally, Malloy, unlike most retired people, has the world's largest cubic zirconia on his coffee table.

Fluttershy: Are you coughing because you have a carrot stuck in your throat? Because you need water? (Very loud cough from bunny as it points up) Because of that giant cloud of scary black smoke?? (Annoyed expression from bunny) I'll take that as a yes...

Cletus: June! We got big trouble!
Gus: A Racatan is barbecuing his way through the trolls' tree farm!
June: Ah, Ashley will take care of it.
Cletus: A fifth-level incubus is about to release a demon from an interdimensional portal!
June: Oh, that will take a week, she'll get to it. It's not a problem.
Gus: And then there's the fuster troll.
June: Okay, okay, now you guys are just acting girly. All they do is eat dandelions.
Cletus: Ashley fed it a cookie.
June: SHE FED IT A COOKIE?! You can't feed fuster trolls human food, or they -
Gus: - grow thirty feet tall and everything they touch turns to stone?
June: Uh! You guys could have mentioned that first!!

  • From the Grand Finale of Codename: Kids Next Door; the organization is taking part in a global scavenger hunt, and Numbuh One is being interviewed by a pair of rather snarky kid-reporters:

First Reporter: Numbuh One, your team is in dead last. You've been spanked by Spankulot, yelled at by Numbuh 362, and embarrassed by her little brother.
Numbuh One (annoyed): Is there a question in there?
First Reporter: Indeed there is. The world is dying to know, will you go to Numbuh 363's funeral?
Numbuh One: Wha...what do you mean?
Second Reporter: Oh, haven't you heard? Numbuh 363 is going after the item worth the most points ever!
Both Reporters: Father's pipe!!

Web Comics

  • Used in The Order of the Stick, in this strip when Dangerously Genre Savvy Tarquin explains the reasons why he is sure Nale is still present in the palace: because Nale is cautious planner and thus wouldn't leave the city without replacements for the men he lost, because Nale has a massive ego and thus wouldn't leave until he knew what Elan and Tarquin had to say about his stunt...and because Tarquin is wearing a ring of True Seeing and thus can see the invisible Nale standing right next to them. Cue massive Oh Crap.
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