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{{trope}}
So it turns out we need to have an article about the
This guy sometimes shows up in the [[Private Eye Monologue]] sort of work, but [[Urban Fantasy]] is where you really can't turn a corner without bumping into a dozen of them. Seriously, just dare to cast a fireball in some otherwise normal city and before you're halfway done, some wannabe-protagonist will jump at you from behind a corner and start throwing pithy remarks at you about how you're being cliché and violating the laws of thermodynamics.
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Well, fine, that's hyperbole, but you have to admit the guy is an [[Author Avatar|awfully convenient proxy]] to have around if you're a clever author who wants to show the world how [[Genre Savvy|clever]] you are. Not to mention he can also function as an [[Audience Surrogate]], incorporating and defusing a reader's skepticism with endless [[Lampshade Hanging]] of whatever bits of the story don't make sense. You can almost feel the enormous weight of the entire story's [[Willing Suspension of Disbelief]] on this poor guy's shoulders.
You can expect this guy to be intellectual and well-acquainted with pop culture (or at least [[Author Avatar|works with which the author is familiar]]), so he can make all the right clever references at the right time. This won't prevent them from being described as [[Informed Attribute|uneducated, bad at school, or book dumb]]; these traits are apparently all the rage for [[Audience Surrogate
The [[Trope Namer]] was a review of Steven Brust's [[Dragaera]] series by [http://www.steelypips.org/library/AuthorArchive.html ''The Library of Babel'']. And of course you're going to click that, because the "click hither and educate thyself" tone of that sentence just ''screams'' "fun."
Compare [[Lemony Narrator]].
{{examples|Examples}}▼
== Anime ==▼
▲== Anime and Manga ==
* Kyon, the viewpoint character of ''[[Suzumiya Haruhi]]''; a variation of the character type, as even though he's very [[Fauxlosophic Narration|intelligent]] and [[Little Professor Dialog|literate]], he's [[Book Dumb]] and rarely gets anything more than a B+.
** [[Unreliable Narrator|We can't determine it yet.]] In novels, there are some hints that he gets much better grades than he claims and may possibly be the top-grade student in the school, though he's already pointed out that he was jealous of Haruhi's intelligence on several occasions and he can't even keep up with Nagato and Koizumi's explanations of certain things. Although the way he talks and incorporates important historical and literary events into his narration suggests that he's fairly intelligent.
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* Lina Inverse from ''[[Slayers]]''.
* Ichika Orimura from [[Infinite Stratos]] when it comes to [[Spartan Siblings|his sister.]]
* Araragi from ''[[
* Issei in ''[[High School
== Comic Books ==
* In recent years,{{when}} this has been a fairly common practice in ''[[Spider
▲* In recent years, this has been a fairly common practice in ''[[Spider Man]]'' comic books.
* The protagonist of the mega-multi-cross fanfic ''[[Sleeping
* The narrator from ''[[
▲== Fan Fic ==
▲* The protagonist of the mega-multi-cross fanfic ''[[Sleeping With the Girls (Fanfic)|Sleeping With the Girls]]'', mainly as a device to keep the protagonist deliberately unnamed as an [[Affectionate Parody]] of the ISO Standard self-insert fic.
▲* The narrator from ''[[Marie D Suesse and The Mystery New Pirate Age (Fanfic)|Marie D. Suesse And The Mystery New Pirate Age!]]'' occasionally takes breaks from narrating the story to make fun of common cliches found in fanfics and point out logical fallacies.
== Film ==
* ''[[Kiss Kiss Bang Bang]]'' is pretty much made of [[Film Noir]] and this trope.
* ''[[Goodfellas]]''.
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== Literature ==
* When [[Stephen King]] characters tell their own stories, they have a tendency to be this way, but it's mostly light and situational cynicism on display, rather than the characters being chronic smartasses. Michael Noonan of ''[[
* The titular Percy Jackson of ''[[Percy Jackson and The Olympians]]''. It's probably common amongst [[Half
▲* When [[Stephen King]] characters tell their own stories, they have a tendency to be this way, but it's mostly light and situational cynicism on display, rather than the characters being chronic smartasses. Michael Noonan of ''[[Bag of Bones (Literature)|Bag of Bones]]'' is probably the best example.
▲* The titular Percy Jackson of ''[[Percy Jackson and The Olympians]]''. It's probably common amongst [[Half Human Hybrid|Half-Bloods]], as a coping mechanism extension of their diagnosed-as-ADHD battle instincts. After all, if you find yourself standing before Hades, God of the Dead, who's cloaked in a robe sewn together from souls of the damned, then wondering what some poor saps must've done to get themselves assigned [[Imagine the Audience Naked|to being his boxer shorts]] has got to be better than having your mind lock up in fear.
** Confirmed, as ''[[The Heroes of Olympus]]'' [[Sequel Series]] shows the point of view of multiple demigods, all of whom are various levels of smartass.
* Archie Goodwin of the [[Nero Wolfe]] books might be the ur-example.
* ''Spenser'' is somewhat a [[
* The protagonist of Frank Portman's "King Dork" mentally snarks his way through the book, but is usually less than stellar at speaking aloud. To wit: "By my count, I had said no more than twenty-one words to her, and that's only if you count 'um'. And my first bit of dialogue had been nothing less retarded than 'I'm cool"
* Steven Brust's Vlad Taltos in the ''[[Dragaera]]'' series who besides being an aristocrat of a sort reflects Brust's [[Author Appeal]] in being a gourmet cook. One of the first examples of this in fantasy, along with [[Chronicles of Amber|Corwin]], and indirect [[Trope Namer]].
** When Kiera the Thief is narrating in ''Orca'', she's this way as well, albeit not quite as good at it as Vlad.
* Similarly [[Glen Cook]]'s [[Garrett
** Not to mention Glen Cook's [[Black Company|Croaker]], an unrepentant [[Deadpan Snarker|snarker]].
* Sean Drummond, narrator of Brian Haig's novels, often speculates on things he'd like to say but shouldn't. Or things he did say, and shouldn't have.
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** Also, Thomas Raith, the narrator and hero of the Dresdenverse story ''Backup.'' Much better at deadpan than Harry, too.
*** If you're in for dry, deadpan, blink-and-you'll-miss-it humor, they're both actually pretty damn funny. But Harry's pretty out of touch, and most of his references are a decade old at least.
** [[Jim Butcher]] likes this trope. He also used it for his ''[[Spider
* Marcus Didius Falco - a good cook, and married to an aristocrat. Also a deconstruction of this trope; as a citizen of 1st century Rome, [[Genre Blind|he hasn't read any Chandler]] and doesn't know that private eyes are loners...
* [[Colt Regan]] does this quite a bit in between strange tangents on such subjects as the political leanings of baked goods.
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* Corwin and Merlin from [[Roger Zelazny]]'s [[Book of Amber|The Chronicles of Amber]] possibly started the trend in [[Fantasy]]. Random gets in on the action for a chapter, too, when he's telling Corwin about one of his recent adventures.
* As a dark example, ''[[Dexter]]'' somewhat fits this type, being a surprisingly charming and cheerful [[Serial Killer]].
* John Taylor from [[Simon R. Green]]'s ''[[Nightside]]'' series is like a more pessimistic [[The Dresden Files|Harry Dresden]].
* [[Sandy Mitchell]]'s [[Ciaphas Cain]] ''[[Warhammer
* Bartimaeus of ''[[The Bartimaeus Trilogy]]'' in the chapters he narrates, and even more so in the footnotes.
** In the last book of the trilogy, he even manages to snark chapters ''another character narrates'' {{spoiler|because he and Nathaniel are sharing a body.}}
* [[Warren Ellis]]'s ''[[Crooked Little Vein]]'' features a main character who tells the story from the first person and is most ''definitely'' a smartass, but subverts the rest of the trope by... well, being a typical Ellis protagonist, really.
{{quote|
* Dennis St. Michel from ''[http://menacinghouse.blogspot.com The Luck of Dennis St. Michel, Viscount Stokington]'' is one of these, usually insulting or mocking the other characters in his narration while being polite or deferential in his dialogue.
* Justified in [[Matt Stover|Matthew Stover's]] ''[[The Acts of Caine
* Thomas Lang, protagonist of Hugh Laurie's "The Gunseller" is a less well read example of this.
** "Yes, he had one arm and he taught unarmed combat. Sometimes life is like that."
* Bob Howard in the "Laundry" novels by [[Charles Stross]] is Harry Palmer as a computer geek. Who has to deal with [[Cosmic Horror]].
* [[Fight Club|Pick]] [[Survivor (
* Subverted by Betsy Taylor, the heroine and narrator of the ''[[Undead and Unwed]]'' series. She's got the tone right, but she takes the "smart" out of "smartass".
* Bella from ''[[Twilight (
** Jacob, when he narrates part of ''Breaking Dawn''.
* James "Slippery Jim" DiGriz of [[The Stainless Steel Rat]] series.
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* Delia Marshall Turner's ''Nameless Magery'' is a mix of SF and fantasy, narrated by the rather self-deprecating and earthy character of Lisane, who is quite well-educated by the standards of her own planet. Some of the humor comes from Lisane's observations about the culture of the alien planet she has crash-landed on and comparisons to the culture of her homeworld. The sequel ''Of Swords And Spells'' is narrated by Malka, who is also a bit sarcastic and tends to give herself self-deprecating nicknames like "Malka the Mighty, victorious in defeating soup", though she is not quite as snarky as Lisane.
* ''[[Rivers of London]]'', told from the ever so slightly sarcastic and opinionated POV of Detective Constable Peter Grant.
* ''[[
* Pagan Kidrouk from the [[The Pagan Chronicles]] ''bleeds'' this trope.
* [[Dashiell Hammett|"I first heard Personville called Poisonville by a red-haired mucker called Hickey Dewey in the Big Ship in Butte. He also called his shirt a shoit. I didn’t think anything of what he’d done to the city’s name. Later I’d heard men who could pronounce their r’s give it the same pronunciation. I still didn’t see anything in it but the meaningless sort of humor used to make richardsnary the thieves’ word for dictionary. A few years later, I went to Personville and learned better."]]
* In some of the stories from [[Stanislaw Lem|Stanislaw Lem's]] ''[[
* The titular character of the ''[[Maximum Ride]]'' series. Somewhat justified in that she tends to use sarcasm as a coping mechanism to deal with her screwed up life. And she's a teenager.
* Alcatraz Smedry is a
* Janet Evanovich's [[Stephanie Plum]] character is all over this.
* Gemma from ''[[A Great and Terrible Beauty]]'' does this. It frequently gets her in trouble, as what she's thinking is pretty damn funny, so she cracks a smile, usually at the worst time possible.
* Anything, and I mean ''anything'' written by [[Terry Pratchett]]
* R from ''[[Warm Bodies]]''. Justified, as he has trouble actually making legible words with his mouth (he is a zombie, after all), so most of the snarky dialogue we get from him is simply his train of thought.
* While generally the opposite of this trope, [[
{{quote|
== Live
* ''[[Veronica Mars]]''.{{context}}▼
* ''[[Dexter]]'' is just as much a smart-ass on TV as in the books, if not more so. There's even a subversion in one episode where Dex's internal monologue becomes external for a line; the only one who notices, of course, is [[Secret
▲* ''[[Veronica Mars]]''.
* ''[[Burn Notice]]'' has Jeffrey Donovan's character Michael Westen consistently snarking about his situation and environment, though he walks the line between
▲* ''[[Dexter]]'' is just as much a smart-ass on TV as in the books, if not more so. There's even a subversion in one episode where Dex's internal monologue becomes external for a line; the only one who notices, of course, is [[Secret Chaser|Doakes]].
▲* ''[[Burn Notice]]'' has Jeffrey Donovan's character Michael Westen consistently snarking about his situation and environment, though he walks the line between [[Firstperson Smartass]] and [[Deadpan Snarker]] with stylish aplomb.
** Upon rigging a club with C4, Michael walks in on the club owner/drug distributor with a business proposal, drinks his alcohol and acts pretty much like he owns the place... while holding a dead man's switch. If he is injured and lets go, the place will explode. As this happens, he narrates:
{{quote|
* George of the [[Mundane Afterlife]] [[Dramedy]] ''[[Dead Like Me]]''.
== Video Games ==
* The main character of ''[[Discworld|Discworld Noir]]''.
* Phoenix Wright of the ''[[Ace Attorney]]'' series fits the description as well.
** Any playable character in any of the Ace Attorney games is this trope, because it's probably the best way of handling their [[Only Sane Man]] status.
* Garret from the ''[[Thief]]'' series is at least an FPS smart ass.
* Kyle Hyde from ''[[Hotel Dusk: Room 215]]'' is a quite a smartass - and it even seeps into his dialogue with other characters, but he's also arguably the [[Only Sane Man]] in the titular Hotel.
* ''[[Touch Detective]]'''s heroine, Mackenzie.
* ''Shirou'' of ''[[Fate/stay
* Squall Leonhart of ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'' acts like this a few times. He's fairly mild about it, though. [[Character Exaggeration|Ramped up]] in ''Dissidia'', where he prefers to let his gunblade do the talking, but don't you go and get the impression that he doesn't think less of you. He does. Oh my, he does.
* Your character in ''[[Kingdom of Loathing]]'' often acts this way, as part of the game's general style and sense of humor.
* Even Mario's bro [[
* Hisao Nakai of ''[[Katawa Shoujo]]'' is quite snarky in his narration.
* [[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
* Zombie, the narrator and [[Supporting Protagonist]] of [[Hanna Is Not a
▲== Webcomics ==
* ''[[Homestuck]]'' straddles this and [[Lemony Narrator]]
▲* Zombie, the narrator and [[Supporting Protagonist]] of [[Hanna Is Not a Boys Name]] [http://hanna.aftertorque.com/?p=264 pulls this off pretty well].
▲* ''[[Homestuck]]'' straddles this and [[Lemony Narrator]] -- it's told in second person and usually clearly from a certain character's point of view, but sometimes comes across more of an omniscient narrator, particularly when it [[Breaking the Fourth Wall|Breaks The Fourth Wall]]. And either way, it is inevitably [[Deadpan Snarker|very]] [http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=002375 sarcastic].
== Web Original ==
* Most of the narrators in the [[Metro City Chronicles]].
* Phase, in the webfiction ''[[Whateley Universe]]''. Phase is a superpowered mutant rather than a PI, but in the stories in which she is the narrator, she is a [[Deadpan Snarker|snarky]] commentator, very intellectual, well read, even for a teenager who has been to all the 'right' private schools, far too knowledgeable about food (even if she's spent her life as the heir to billions eating the finest food anywhere), and still associates with the other rich kids at the [[Super
** Oh, and she reads [[TV Tropes]]. "Xanatos Gambit?" "Xanatos Gambit." And has an intelligence network that the CIA would envy.
* Gaven Morren of ''[[The Tale of the
* ''[[
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