Mistaken for Badass: Difference between revisions

* Sakaki of ''[[Azumanga Daioh]]'' is looked up to by fellow classmates due to her looking "cool" and "mysterious". In actuality, she's just very shy.

* Mara Shin of ''[[Dorothy of Oz (manhwa)|Dorothy of Oz]]'' has a four million dollar price on her head for allegedly killing Selluriah, the Witch of the East. However, Mara is actually just a normal high school kid who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and got blamed for it because a hysterical soldier accused her of it after finding her standing over Selluriah's dead body and wearing her magical boots. It also doesn't help that she allows Abee and Number 50 to escape from some Eastern soldiers who want them dead for being Western spies, or that she helps wayward scientist Dr. Nedbar escape from [[Axe Crazy|Tick Tock]] with the Witch of the South's newest and deadliest creation. Or that she travels with three supposedly dangerous escaped biological experiments, all of whom are incredibly loyal to her and will lay down their own lives to protect her. The fact that she doesn't have very good control of her powers in her witch form contributes a bit to the mess as well...

* ''[[Holyland]]'': Yuu just wants to be left alone. However, being forced to take down bullies that try to have their way with him leads to developing a reputation as a fearsome bully hunter and in turn leading more punks to fight him.

* Furuichi in ''[[Beelzebub]]'' is somewhere between this and [[Action Survivor]]. ''Yes'' his best friend is the biggest delinquent in all Japan, but Furuichi can't fight to save his life.

** Also, being [[Genre Savvy]], Furuichi knows that this rep is still going to bite him more than be helpful. He knows he's the [[Butt Monkey]].

* Seiji from ''[[Midori Days]]'' is badass but his [[Bromantic Foil]]'s constant rumor mongering make it hard for Seiji to get a girlfriend.

 

== Comic Books ==

* One from [[The Adventures of Tintin]]. In a deadly game of cat and mouse between the protagonist's ship and a submarine, Captain Haddock accidentally gets the ship stuck going astern (backwards). When this results in a torpedo barely missing the ship, the villain's marvel at the captains tactical genius.

 

 

* [[Rango]] spun a lot of tall tales about his alleged prowess, but when the hawk attacked Dirt, Rango's wild chase and dumb luck had the townspeople assuming he was actually fighting off something five times his size and doing a great job of it.

* The Soviet comedy film ''Diamond Arm'' tells the story of [[The Ditz]] (played by the famous Soviet clown turned comic actor Yuri Nikulin) who, due to a series of coincidences, was mistaken by a smugglers' gang for a fellow smuggler, and had diamonds hidden inside a fake injury cast on his arm by them. [[Hilarity Ensues]].

* The basic premise of the film ''[[If Looks Could Kill]]''.

** Amazingly, they manage to take on said drug lord in multiple skirmishes while firing ''blanks''.

* Pretty much the entire plot of the Chris Farley movie ''[[Beverly Hills Ninja]]''.

 

== Literature ==

* Lenny in ''[[The Stingray Shuffle]]'' drives erratically because he is high on marijuana. The ex-KGB agents following him mistake his driving for elite evasion techniques, and assume he must he former CIA or Mossad.

* "[[The Brave Little Tailor]]". "Seven in one blow!"

** Or so he claims... He actually shows distinctly badass qualities throughout, including dueling various [[Super Soldier]]s, aliens and daemons successfully.

** This is actually averted. Ciaphas is one of the best swordsman and pistol shots in the Imperial Guard because he practices obsessively, even by Imperium standards. It's one of the few instances where Ciaphas actually acknowledges his own abilities. He still claims a lot of his survival is luck, but he does have the physical abilities to back that up.

* Harry Flashman in the ''[[Flashman]]'' novels by George Macdonald Fraser. Although many characters met by the protagonist know him (or come to know him) to be a cad and a coward, his reputation among society at large is that of a brave and honorable man.

** Flashman ''lives'' for this trope. He can run away from a battle and hide in a cesspool, then show up weeks later and be hailed as a hero for being the lone survivor. He encourages this sort of thing, but all he really has to do most of the time is keep his mouth shut.

* The ''[[Dorothy of Oz (manhwa)|Dorothy of Oz]]'' example above was cribbed from [[The Wonderful Wizard of Oz]] where the Munchkins assumed that Dorothy must have been an insanely powerful Munchkin sorceress to call up a storm and squish the East Witch with her house. Compounding this misunderstanding was that Dorothy was the size of a adult Munchkin and wearing her blue and white gingham dress. In Oz, Munchkins favor blue, and ''only'' magic users wear white. That's ''why'' they [[Gonna Need More Trope|called the North Witch for help.]]

* Invoked by Rand in [[The Wheel of Time]]: Tam gave him a [[Master Swordsman|heron-marked]] sword at be beginning of his adventures, but he had next-to-no training. Throughout the first book pretty much everyone he met openly doubted that someone so young could be a blademaster, but troublemakers didn't want to risk being wrong.

* A common theme in [[Tom Sharpe]] novels, especially some of the Wilt series in which Wilt comes to the attention of the police who investigate him, find nothing but are sure they're missing something so investigate the entirely innocent school teacher more and more urgently until they eventually make a career-ruining mistake which they blame on Wilt outsmarting them rather than themselves getting obsessed over nothing.

* ''Don Quixote, USA'' has the narrator/protagonist a Peace Corps Volunteer trying to help the insurgents on a Caribbean island. He [[Stop Helping Me!|accidentally '''sabotages''' their operations]] so thoroughly that a Soviet agent, looking into whether it'd be worth Moscow's while to fund them, concludes, "At last I meet an American agent who makes no errors. My compliments." The American, meanwhile, thought the Russian was a Swiss banker.

 

== Live-Action TV ==

* An episode of [[Monk]] has him going undercover as a famous hitman. In a meeting with a mobster, he leans over to straighten one of the henchman's ties and everyone reacts like he's making a threat. Of course, Monk being Monk, he really did just want to straighten out the tie.

* [[Burn Notice]] did an episode about a doctor being harassed by a drug dealer so Michael and crew make it look like he's ex-Special Forces.

 

== Theater ==

 

* ''[[Girl Genius]]'' has Moloch von Zinzer, veteran armor crewman and [[Action Survivor]]. The results of his devotion to the cause of "not being killed" were [http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20080917 taken as evidence] of some secret knowledge:

{{quote|'''Violetta''': ''You've'' [[McNinja|trained in the way of smoke]]?}}

 

== Western Animation ==

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Narrative Devices]]

[[Category:Action Adventure Tropes]]

[[Category:Mistaken for Index]]

[[Category:Example as a Thesis]]