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Didn't See That Coming: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:TzeentchDidntSeeThatComing.jpg|link=Warhammer 40000 (Tabletop Game)|
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** Someone who is especially good at this kind is probably [[Crazy Prepared]].
# '''Unknown Unknowns:''' Then there are the unknown unknowns, or even unknowable unknowns. These cannot be prepared for, planned for, or in any way anticipated. They are the bane of all well laid plans. This can often be a [[Genre Shift]], for example, and the character was in the dark because of [[The Masquerade]]. The mage being surprised by the space alien, for instance, or [[The Mafia]] [[Death Note (Manga)|not expecting]] [[Psychic Powers]]. [[Deus Ex Machina|Acts of God]] and [[Outside Context Villain|Outside Context Villains]] tend to fit in here, unless characters are aware that they are a [[Cosmic Plaything]], and even then it's hard to know what you don't know, except that you don't know anything.
# '''Unknown Knowns:''' It happens. Sometimes the plotter knows a given [[The Fool|person]], event, or variable is present... but doesn't see how it could ''[[Pride|possibly]]'' impact their foolproof plans and proceeds to [[Not Now, Kiddo|dismiss it]] or [[Mistreatment
** In [[Mystery Fiction]], these people are the suspects and facts that are quickly [[Beneath Suspicion|discarded in favor of the high profile suspects]]. However, add up all the background chatter and the motivations for why [[The Butler Did It|it was the butler]] becomes incredibly obvious.
** [[The Dog Bites Back]]
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== Comic Books ==
* Frequent ''[[Fantastic Four (Comic Book)|Fantastic Four]]'' the [
* ''[[Infinity Gauntlet|The Infinity War]]'' has a resurrected Magus employ a complicated scheme to {{spoiler|seize all the Infinity Gems from Warlock and his Infinity Watch}}. Because the plan is too complicated requiring all his attention, the Magus literally ''doesn't see'' the {{spoiler|combined efforts of [[Doctor Doom]] and Kang interfering with his plan.}}
* The [[Satan]] [[Captain Ersatz]] from [[J Michael Straczynski]]'s graphic novel ''[[Midnight Nation]]'' literally says this line word for word {{spoiler|after [[The Hero]] with the [[Meaningful Name]] of Gray turns down his offer, chooses self sacrifice, and turns the [[Balance Between Good and Evil]] right against him, something which thousands of predecessors before him had all failed to do}}.
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* In ''[[Mystery Science Theater 3000]]'', Crow ''did'' know that breaching the hull of the Satellite of Love would result in dangerous decompression... yet he still somehow thinks tunneling back to Earth is a good idea and is taken by surprise when it doesn't work.
{{quote| '''Crow:''' Whooooooooooa I didn't expect this! [...] Wow, this ''is'' confusing! Mike! You wanna hand me me my calculations? ''[The wind happens to blow Crow's calculations right into his face.]'' Thank you. ''[Reading.]'' Well, look at that. "Breach hull--all die." Even had it underlined.}}
* In [[Pirates of the Caribbean]]: At World's End, A [[Not
{{quote| '''Elizabeth:''' [[Sarcasm Mode|Elizabeth Swann]]. <br />
'''Barbossa:''' Hector Barbossa.<br />
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** Unknown Known 2: threatening a star fort without considering that there may be vehicles on board...vehicles the Soul Drinkers used to take over the artillery piece.
** Unknown Unknown from later in the book: {{spoiler|a Daemon Prince of Tzeentch was running the whole thing as a [[Xanatos Gambit]], and turned up to take the Soulspear for himself}}.
* The ''[[
{{quote| ''Bugger.''}}
* A Type 4 blows up the [[Big Bad]] Storm King's [[Xanatos Gambit]] in [[Tad Williams]]' fantasy epic ''[[Visual Novel/Memory Sorrow And Thorn|Memory Sorrow And Thorn]]''. Specifically, he didn't care who showed up for the final ritual to {{spoiler|unite the Three Swords and reverse time so he could return to Osten Ard}}, but one of those people turned out to have been primed to figure out his weakness at the very last second, and another happened to be carrying the [[Chekhov's Gun]] necessary to defeat him afterwards.
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* In ''[[From Russia With Love]]'', Kerim gives a speech on this trope:
{{quote| This is a billiard table... And you have hit your white ball and it is traveling easily and quietly towards the red. The pocket is alongside. Fatally, inevitably, you are going to hit the red and the red is going into that pocket. It is the law of the billiard table. But, outside the orbit of these things, a jet pilot has fainted and his plane is diving straight at the billiard room, or a gas main is about to explode... And the building collapses on you and on top of the billiard table. Then what has happened to that white ball that could not miss the red ball, and to the red ball that could not miss the pocket? The white ball could not miss according to the laws of the billiard table. But the laws of the billiard table are not the only laws.}}
* ''[[
** Subsequently, Tony falls to a type 3 -- {{spoiler|he's not in a caper novel, [[Genre Shift|he's in a time travel book]]. He's prevented from murdering the professor via 1) time/space travel [[Big Damn Heroes|getting the heroes there on time]] and 2) future technology [[Cool and Unusual Punishment|permanently removing his capacity for physical violence]] -- he ends up with catastrophic failure of coordination any time he tries to hurt someone.}} The [[Genre Shift]] is too much for him.
* The [[Big Bad]] of ''Tantalize'' (a ''[[Twilight (Literature)|Twilight]]'' knockoff), had a pretty good plan and executed it well, but got well and truly screwed by something he never anticipated: {{spoiler|''three'' of his [[Five-Bad Band]] were secretly werepeople who betrayed him, killing his fourth and last ally in the process.}} To be fair, [[Ass Pull|the readers didn't see it coming, either.]]
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== Live Action Television ==
* Pretty much every episode of ''[[Leverage]]'', starting with Episode 1.
* In an episode of ''[[The Sarah Connor Chronicles]]'' a local gangster discovers that Sarah is a fugitive and tries to blackmail her. To make sure she would play along, he sends one of his henchman to kidnap her children. Since Sarah's "daughter" is actually a [[Deceptively
* An episode of ''[[Star Trek Deep Space Nine]]'' featured the return of a bunch of hyper-intelligent, genetically engineered "friends" of Dr. Bashir's, who, upon thinking on the Dominion war situation, decide it was in the best interest of all involved if the Federation surrendered or was defeated quickly and the Dominion won (which would save billions of lives in the long run, and end in a galaxy-wide rebellion to overthrow it). They go to give the Dominion some classified Starfleet tactical data, but are stopped when one of their own tells on them. Dr. Bashir rubs it in, explaining that if one person can uproot their brilliant plan, then maybe their calculations might become nil due to the uncalculatability of human nature.
** A very subtle double example, as the payoff is in an earlier episode: the Dominion worked out the ''exact same'' projections, and had a counter to it: {{spoiler|When they won, they were going to purge Earth, as an example.}}
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== Tabletop RPG ==
* On the one hand, Game Masters are very often on the receiving end of PC ADD (not AD&D, though the similarity is telling) and are often forced into [[Railroading]] the plot. On the other, PC's can be struck by a ''very'' creative GM who gleefully goes [[Off the Rails]] with them and reprimands misbehavior [[Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies|creatively.]]
* This happens quite a bit to the Thousand Sons Chaos Space Marine chapter in ''[[Warhammer 40000]]''. [[Xanatos Gambit|They plan any action they take for years, carefully plot out every single possibility...]] Then their rivals, the Space Wolves, just run in and beat the shit out of them when they least expect it. You'd think they'd learn by now.
** One example took place in the Gothic War. Chaos runs in and has the Imperial Navy on the ropes, they're clearly winning with their plans falling perfectly into place. Then out of the blue the Ork pirates which have been pestering the Imperial decide it might be fun to attack Chaos for a while.
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== Web Originals ==
* In ''[[The Salvation War]]'', this is the downfall of several figures in the story, not least of which include the antagonists {{spoiler|Satan and Yahweh}}, while in contrast much of human military tech shown in the story is concerned with trying to prevent this. In particular, [[Four
* Despite all of the completely ludicrous things they managed to pull off in [[Doctor Horribles Sing Along Blog|Dr. Horrible]], I still don't think anybody was expecting Bad Horse to be an ''actual'' horse.
* In the "40K Rejects" series by Mini War Gaming dot com, in Episode 3 (''The Tale of an Ork''), Captain Slaughter and co. are looking for the five Ork Shokk Attack Guns. They capture several Orks in combat, and Slaughter interrogates them one by one. The first few are gibbering idiots, but the third is quite articulate. His intelligence and knowledge intrigue Slaughter, who is subsequently shocked to discover that {{spoiler|the Ork is actually "the Warboss in disguise"!}}. Slaughter's reaction to it is priceless:
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== Real Life ==
* The submarine USS San Francisco one ran smack into a [
** Apparently, the captain and crew should seen that coming if they were doing their jobs right (the captain ended up relieved of duty). So that would this a case of unknown knowns.
* During [[World War I]], the Austro-Hungarian battleship ''SMS Szent István'' was torpedoed and sank by two Italian torpedo boats that ''just happened to pass in the area''. This goes under Unknown Knowns category, as the Austro-Hungarians knew that the Italians used motor torpedo boats and considered them a threath due their tendence to attack their fleet in the harbours, they just didn't expect them to be able to torpedo a battleship in the middle of the sea in spite of a destroyer and torpedo boat screen (and in fact thought it had been submarines until the Italians started bragging).
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[[Category:Plot Twist]]
[[Category:Didnt See That Coming]]
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