It Amused Me: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:Do it for the lulz.jpg|thumb|450px]]
{{quote|'''''Raven:''' Great bird spirit! Why? Why did you lead us into this death trap?''
'''''Bird spirit:''' No particular reason. I thought it’d be funny.''
|''[[Fables]]''}}
This is the motivation of an amoral character seeking... well, amusement. It's not that they enjoy being good or
▲This is the motivation of an amoral character seeking... well, amusement. It's not that they enjoy being good or evil -- they may not know or care about the difference -- but they do whatever they feel like without regard for others. They don't need a motivation or justification for doing anything beyond the amusement of the act itself. As a result they almost inevitably do things that are dickish, maybe even cruel, but generally not ''outright'' evil. This same character will lead you into a trap, fight you to the death... and then stop on the brink of killing you to laugh and say "Are you all right?" They won't kill the hero, because they find their attempts to save the day amusing, or are intrigued by the sheer selflessness of their thinking. They may help the hero, they may help the villain, they may do both at once or screw over both at once. They are rarely if ever a driving force behind a story, but they nonetheless play a significant role. And why do they do all this? Why do they [[Heel Face Revolving Door|switch sides so often]]? Why are they [[The Dragon|working below]] the [[Big Bad]] when they're [[Dragon with an Agenda|just as powerful and intelligent as he is]], [[Hypercompetent Sidekick|if not more?]] Why did they [[Faux Yay|make out with the hero of the same gender]]?
Because it was fun. They'd do just about anything for a lark, really.
Please note, this is different from [[For the Evulz]]. While a character who does commits evil acts [[For the Evulz]] does it because they enjoy being evil, if this character does evil things it is only because they shatter the boredom of everyday
Often such a character will be the [[Wild Card]], an [[Enigmatic Minion]], or [[Chaotic Neutral]]. A common saying of the [[Trickster Archetype]] character, the [[Eccentric Millionaire]], the [[Great Gazoo]], and the [[Screwy Squirrel]]. But be wary of the character [[Flanderization|devolving into]] [[Chaotic Stupid]].
As you may have noticed, the line dividing [[For the Evulz]] and
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* Pretty much par for the course in ''[[Death Note]]'':
** In the first chapter, Ryuk, a god of death, drops his [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|notebook of death]] in the human world because he's bored. It falls into the hands of Light Yagami, who decides to use it to try bending the world to his will because, he explains, he too is bored.
*** Light's real motivation does seem to be that he's doing it for fun. He plays far too many
** Light's primary antagonist L, a teen supergenius detective, as an [[Expy]] of [[Sherlock Holmes]] chases Light's alter ego for the lulz. Part of L's reputation, again like [[Sherlock Holmes]], is that he refuses to take on a case that doesn't interest and challenge him, even though he's leagues above the rest of the world's police.
*** L's selective behaviour is imitated by Near and Mello.
* This is arguably why [[Magic Kaito|Kaito Kid]] does things like tie-die people's underpants while they're still wearing them, use blinding pink sleeping-gas, and flip Aoko's skirt.
** And on the part of the author, this is probably why Kaito has a [[Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?|phobia of fish]] and can't ice skate.
* Why Izaya does ''anything'' in ''[[Durarara!!]]''.
* [[Trickster Mentor|Urahara]] from ''[[Bleach]]'' also has a tendency to screw with people just for the hell of it. When beginning training, he gives Ichigo a helmet and claims that Ichigo needs to yell "Take this! The power of justice! Justice armor! Justice hachimaki! Attack!" When Ichigo does so almost instantly, Urahara mutters, "Wow! I can't believe he actually said that!"
** Or the famous scene where he writes directions to Ichigo, Orihime, Ishida, and Chad outside of their houses... in blood. Scrawled underneath these directions are the words, "If you thought this was straight out of a horror movie, you have no sense of humor." Incidentally, that is ''exactly'' what they all thought.
* In ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam 00]]'', the character Wang Liu Mei is [[The Mole]] during the entire series, pretending to be a valuable ally to the heroes, but then passing information on to the villains (and vice versa). As she expresses several times, she's simply bored and wants to see the world
* The only reason the ''[[Sekirei]]'' plan exists is because someone got the bright idea of a Pokémon-style game.
* '''''Xellos''''', from ''[[Slayers]]''. After about fifteen episodes' worth of hunting for the Claire Bible, it turns out that he knew where it was all along. He just didn't tell Lina and the others because he found it more entertaining to watch their antics as they went on multiple wild goose chases for the better part of a season. He also is prone to "forgetting" to state key pieces of information to watch the results.
* The only reason Tsuyuri from ''[[Doujin Work]]'' stays involved with the rest of the cast is because their antics amuse her to no
* Guu of ''[[
* Urumi Kanzaki in ''[[Great Teacher Onizuka]]''. While her actual reasons for hating adults is more complicated, she states her class terrorism to be a means of "killing time". Being a child prodigy leaves her often bored with the usual lectures, leading her to spend her class time giving teachers very hard questions, sabotaging their equipment, and other pranks. She eventually stopped coming to school altogether, until brought in by Miyabi to "kill time" with Onizuka.
* In ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'', Tsukuyomi pretty much has this as her modus operandi. Unfortunately, the things that seem to amuse her are [[Sex Is Violence|excessive]] [[Orgasmic Combat|violence]], [[Psycho Lesbian|and Setsuna]].
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* In ''[[One Piece]]'', this is Mihawk's justification for destroying Don Krieg's fleet and pursuing the survivors: He was bored, and they were there. He also allows Zoro to live following their duel for the same reason: Zoro has potential to be amusing for a very long time, once he [[Takes a Level In Badass]].
* The Prince of Dogra from ''[[Level E]]''. He's the kind of guy who <s>can</s> will ''buy a planet'' and hand out advanced military tech just to play a (potentially deadly) prank on five random grade-schoolers and his second-in-command. Because he thinks it's funny.
* {{spoiler|Ronnie Suchiart}} of ''[[Baccano!]]'' cites this as the motivation for most of his actions. Very old and very powerful [[Eldritch Abomination
* Cell from ''[[Dragonball Z]]'' spiced up his [[For the Evulz]] with this. Fat Buu from the same combined it with his creator's [[For the Evulz]]. And, although he's mostly serious about being [[The Cape (trope)]] (with no cape), Son Goku himself plays the trope fairly straight (many times to his cost, such as when he [[Idiot Hero|prolonged the fight against Frieza after he turned Super Saiyan]], [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|allowing the latter to destroy Namek]] and to deploy his full power. This enabled Frieza to [[What the Hell, Hero?|waste more of Goku's then-precious time]] because he was momentarily capable to keep him in check, mostly with speed). Also, Gohan in Super Saiyan 2 form, against Cell, and others.
* ''[[Yu Yu Hakusho]]'': {{spoiler|When he discovers he's actually part-[[Youkai]], and thus one of the most powerful beings to exist}}, Yusuke promptly tells [[A God Am I|everyone to "KNEEL BEFORE ME, YOU INSECTS!"]]... before he immediately [[Deadpan Snarker|wonders why anyone would do that]], and has a good laugh at [[Oh Crap|his friends' faces]].
* ''[[Saiyuki]]'' has numerous examples. Heaven is unchanging, and therefore said to be MINDNUMBINGLY DULL, which provides the motivation for the "merciful goddess" Kanzeon to do all sorts of things, from saddling her notoriously dull nephew with the heretic monkey-like Goku in Gaiden, just for the lolz, to forcing Sanzo and his party to take the physical road to India instead of the heavenly one, which would get there infinitely faster. She says the latter is cause they need to grow over the journey, but also admits it's also because it's much more interesting that way.
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{{quote|'''Orochimaru:''' I guess that I do kind of have a goal. Let me see if I can explain it. I find it very interesting to watch things in motion; I get no pleasure when the world is still. Like a windmill that isn't turning: I suppose some might find it beautiful, even if it's immobile, but to me such a thing is truly boring. So now I want to put things in motion myself. The first step is crushing the Leaf Village.}}
** Also from the series, the [[Big Bad]] affected a goofball 'Tobi' persona for no tangible reason, especially since most of Akatsuki already knew it was fake, which can only lead to the conclusion that he did it for shits and giggles. {{spoiler|And this might be why he pretended to be Madara, too.}}
* In ''[[Sword Art Online The Movie: Ordinal Scale]]'', the heroes have to face a powerful boss called An Incarnation of the Radius, which the [[Big Bad]] unleashed via data mining, claiming it was originally intended to be the 100-Floor Boss of the Ruby Palace, back before Kayaba Akihiko (the main antagonist of the original series) turned it into a death game. However, seeing as Kayaba always intended to insert his own avatar into a game to personally battle anyone who made it to that floor, it seems he only created this boss for his own amusement.
== Comic Books ==
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* Are you freaking ''kidding'' me! This trope is, like, [[Deadpool|my]] prime motivation! That and money, so I can pay my phone bills. For example; I once fought Bullseye in a meatsuit for this very reason... That's to say, I wasn't fighting Bullseye wearing a meatsuit, but rather I was wearing a meatsuit while fighting Bullseye... Yeah, and it was also the reason behind me [[Disguised in Drag|wearing a lolita dress]] [[Faux Yay|and wailing]] [[Ho Yay|"save me Spider-Man!"]] Heheh, that was hella funny... Oh, oh! And that time I wore [[X-Men|Jean Grey's uniform]] and... you know what, if we listed all the times I've done this, we'll be here all day... so yeah, [[Motor Mouth|anyway, as I was saying]], I wore Jean Grey's uniform and [[Blah Blah Blah]] exciting-story-of-my-life [[Shameless Self Promoter|buy all of my comics for more information about that]].
{{quote|'''Me:''' I don't even like chimichangas. [[Inherently Funny Words|I just like saying it.]] }}
* The Impossible Man is similar to Mr. Mxyzptlk and Bat-Mite, but no "shades of this"; ''everything'' he does is out of a desire to have fun. The Poppupians would have died from boredom had Galactus not devoured their world, and avoiding boredom is his sole purpose in life. In his first appearance, [[The Fantastic Four]] was able to convince him to go away by ignoring him.
== Fan Works ==
* In ''[[I Put On My Robe and Wizard Hat]]'', ''why'' exactly does {{spoiler|Urobuchi}} Shirou piss off
▲* In [[I Put On My Robe and Wizard Hat]], ''why'' exactly does {{spoiler|Urobuchi}} Shirou piss off Lancer -- who's trying to ''kill'' him -- by forcing a download of dog porn directly into his brain?
{{quote|'''Shirou''': I did it... for the lawlz...}}
* In ''[[Tiberium Wars]]'', this is the entire reason why [[Dark Messiah|Kane]] has Nod's facilities lit with dim red lights. He finds his minions' constant stubbing of toes and banging of shins against consoles to be ''hilarious''.
* Almost everything that [[Harry Potter|Harry]] {{spoiler|and Sirius}} do in ''[[Oh God,
* In ''[[With Strings Attached]]'', Brox, Grunnel, and As'taris are sadistic practical jokers. Brox's given name is, in fact, “Funny.” (The four would violently disagree with this.) Much of what Brox does is at least partially [[For the Lulz]]. Even Grunnel, who is genuinely fond of the four (at least, they're not his enemies), pulls some fairly nasty shit on them, including making them climb a hundred-foot staircase and not bothering to warn George that Ma'ar is a nympho or of her, um, tendencies during sex.
{{quote|George: I think she carved her name in me back with her fingernails.
Grunnel: Sar uses a knife on me. }}
* ''[[Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality]]
* In the chapter "Surprise Box" of the ''[[RWBY]]''/''[[The Gamer]]'' crossover ''[[The Games We Play (RWBY fanfic)|The Games We Play]]'' by Ryuugi, Jaune Arc (in his guise as the godlike tiger Faunus and martial artist Jian Bing) abruptly appears in a transport carrying General Ironwood, Professor Polendina and [[Robot Girl|Penny]]. When he explains that he's there to talk to them, not attack them, Ironwood demands to know why he's bothering.
{{quote|"What about the entertainment value?" I asked him, giving him an enigmatic smile. "Perhaps it simply amuses me to do so?"}}
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* And [[wikipedia:Coyote (mythology)|Coyote]] among Native Americans (although he varies from just being clownish to being outright evil, depending on which tribe's mythos we're talking about).
* [[The Fair Folk]]: The cheif differance between the Seelie and Unseelie courts in some stories seems to be in what they find funny and how much harm they consider acceptable, and that's if you're lucky.
* There're a couple of myths ''invented'' for this purpose in Australia. Because apparently [[Australian Wildlife|the real wildlife]] [[Everything Trying to Kill You|wasn't scary enough already]], they decided to tell tourists that the trees were infested with [[Drop Bear|carnivorous koalas]] and the only way to ward them off was to put Vegemite behind your ears. This is one of the only forms of [[
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** And that's when he's being "nice". When he's feeling mean towards you or, heaven forbid, you begin to ''bore'' him, he'll summon demons at you, give you potentially horrid mutations, enchant your enemies' weapons, or get really creative and make all stairs to leave the current level move around and slide away from you when you try to flee. Also, throwing a bolt of divine lightning at you is considered a "good" effect, and he has a ''chance'' of sheilding you from it (it's "good" because your enemies get zapped too... assuming you were fighting something that was more of a threat than a bolt of lightning).
* The Corwids of ''[[Zeno Clash]]'' combine this with [[Funny Schizophrenia]], and incidentally a [[Double Subversion]] of [[Insane Equals Violent]] -- [[Chaotic Stupid|they do whatever they want]], whether it's walking in one direction for as long as possible or killing and eating whoever passes by. Right now they're in the "killing and eating" phase.
* The Umgah of ''[[Star Control]] II'' are essentially intergalactic pranksters. Their favorite targets are the [[Lovable Coward]] Spathi, whom they like to scare the pants off of
** They wanted to drop an asteroid in an ocean as a "prank" on the Thraddash, but the Ur-Quan conquered both species and spoiled this fun. The Thraddash are the ones who nuked themselves into stone age in several of their civil wars and are proud of this.
**
** When you rescue their entire race from [[Mind Control]], they gladly
* ''[[Mana Khemia]]'': Flay's motivation for [[Crazy Awesome|everything he does]], from forming the [[True Companions|workshop]] in the first place to founding an Evil Syndicate and taking over half the world before being stopped by Alchemy Man, [[
* It's arguable if Smilin' Jack had any ulterior motives in [[Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines|VTM: Bloodlines]] or if he did it all simply for a good belly laugh.
** He had the same reasons as the rest of the anarchs for the results. The ''methods'' made it an [[Overly Prepared Gag]].
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* [[Video Game Cruelty Potential|The player. Often. In almost any game.]]
** When the player starts doing this online against other players when the game is not a [[Player Versus Player]] type, then this falls into [[Griefer]] status.
*
** This seems to be the ''modus operandi'' for most of the Daedric Princes (though some mix it with [[Orange and Blue Morality]]). In [[Oblivion]], Molag Bal, Daedric Prince of Corruption, uses the player to corrupt the soul of an honorable paladin [[For the Evulz|just because he can]]. Meanwhile, Boethia, Prince of Plots, organizes a brutal tournament for the player [[For the Lulz|for no real reason; he's just bored]]. And if [[Mad God|Sheogorath]] is involved, chances are this trope will be invoked. Or not, it depends on his mood, really. When he gives you the Wabbajack, it's probably just because he wants to see what you'll do with it.
* The [[Big Bad]] in ''[[Mother 3]]'' falls into this trope. {{spoiler|Porky ruins the lives of many people and corrupts the rest of the island's population, along with making mechas out of the animals and pulling the seven needles to summon a dragon that could destroy everything, just because he was bored and needed a giggle.}}
* The Storm Titan, the one that invented the most chaotic magic in the Spiral, from [[Wizard 101]] destroys the world of Celestia after he allied with them to stop Morganthe. Why, because like his brand of magic, he can destroy you just as easily a help you. It's likely that in the war of the ancients he's the one that threw the first punch
* Happy Chaos in ''[[Guilty Gear|Guilty Gear Strive]]'' uses his [[Reality Warper|near-limitless magic abilities]] to cause chaos and conflicts, then sits back and watches how people react, intervening from time to time just to make events last a little longer, because he enjoys the drama.
== Webcomics ==
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* In ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'', Uncle Time is an [[Odd Job Gods|Odd Job God]] with this attitude.
** Bun-bun can veer into this too if he's in a good mood, especially with his "friends", whom he has come to grudgingly care about a tiny little bit. [[For the Evulz]] is a better characterisation for many of the things he does, though.
* Immortals in ''[[El Goonish Shive]]'' apparently do for their own amusement a lot of things that humans take too seriously - sometimes for a good reason, sometimes not.
**
** Pandora, who remained in "too powerful, too bored, too mad" phase for centuries, set out to make the world a better place for her son (as she sees it, at least), to which end she thoroughly demolishes the current status quo and sets the world on the ears. But if she's stirring magical chaos, why do it randomly, if there's a lot of bonus entertainment to be had? Or, [http://www.egscomics.com/egsnp.php?id=303 in her own words]:
{{quote|'''Pandora''': (looming in an intimidating manner) Now, then. [[Super Empowering|I have given you power]], and ''more'' than ''that'', [[Spirit Advisor|I have given you ''knowledge'']]. More than I have shared with a mortal in many a score.
'''Pandora''': And now? ''I want something in return.''
'''Sarah''': Uh... W-what's that?
'''Pandora''': (with crazy grin) {{spoiler|''{{smallcaps|[[Punctuated! For! Emphasis!|Don't. Be. Boring.]]}}''}} (vanishes) }}
* Donovan in ''[[Dominic Deegan]]'' reveals that his [[My Hovercraft Is Full of Eels|comically poor grasp of the Orcish language]] was just a front; he knew how to speak the language perfectly for roughly twenty years, but insisted on the mangled version because he thought it was funny (and that he was a bard, as being funny is the reason bards do ''anything'').
* Coyote from ''[[Gunnerkrigg Court]]''. Comes with being a [[Trickster God]], as mentioned above under Mythology.
* King Radical from ''[[The Adventures of Dr. McNinja]]''. His two goals in life seem to be making Cumberland a more ''radical'' place, and messing with Dr McNinja's head. Why? For fun.
* ''[[8-Bit Theater
** [[Actually Pretty Funny|"Heh. That was funny, wasn't it."]]
* Some of the stuff that Belkar does in ''[[The Order of the Stick]]'' is [[For the Evulz]], and some of it is this. He particularly likes messing with other people's heads in harmless but disturbing ways. Often, he'll do something that people don't expect from him just because it will confuse them. See [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0620.html here].
** Xykon also entertains himself in ways that straddle the line between this trope and [[For the Evulz]]:
{{quote|'''Redcloak:''' But if you've known all this time
'''Xykon:''' Because I'm BORED! }}
== Web Original ==
* [[Image Boards|4chan]] and its associated... things (e.g. ''Encyclopedia Dramatica'') are the ones who coined the term "for the lulz". [https://web.archive.org/web/20130929025320/http://ohinternet.com/Rules_of_the_Internet Let's just leave it at that].
* Sean from ''Ronin Dojo Community College DX'' explains that he does things "for the lulz". Of course, what he does is smash popular games in front of a webcam [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|so people on the internet can say "lol"]], but that's [[Serious Business]].
* The trolls who prank call Ghost during every ''single'' episode of [[True Capitalist]] Radio just to hear him rage and rage... and rage.
== Western Animation ==
* "The Twins" from ''[[Superjail]]''.
* Season 4 Megabyte in ''[[
{{quote|'''Bob''': Why Megabyte? Why do this?
'''Megabyte''': (laughs)
* King Bumi, from ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'', actually stated that the reason he screwed with Aang so much is "Mostly because it's fun messing with people!"
* [[Carmen Sandiego]] steals the hardest things in the universe to steal just to prove she can. The TV versions have it explained this way: She likes the challenge of detective work and outwitting people, but criminals aren't the brightest critters. The people actually worth challenging were other detectives, but she couldn't do that as a good guy; time for a [[Face Heel Turn]], then. She considers her most glorious caper not to be stealing the Eiffel Tower, a country's entire gold supply, or anything of actual value... but having managed to steal her own detective records from ACME itself.
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== Real Life ==
* [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3328480/Otto-the-octopus-wrecks-havoc.html Meet Otto the octopus], who will do
** When you spend your entire life in an aquarium, you have to make up your own amusement. Of course, it's also possible that Otto is attempting different ways to escape his
*** Escaping the tank by ''juggling the crabs''? That must be one heck of a plan.
**** "Release me or the herms get it!"
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Stock Phrases]]
[[Category:Motivation Index]]
▲[[Category:It Amused Me]]
[[Category:The Jerk Index]]
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