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Obfuscating Disability: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:
{{quote|''"The wheelchair is for respect."''
|'''Guy Caballero''', ''[[SCTV]]''}}
Sometimes a person with an apparent disability will be more than they seem. Sometimes they will turn out not to be disabled at all. The reasons for faking a disability vary, but it is usually to cause others to underestimate them.
A particular form occurs in [[Crime and Punishment Series]] where one suspect will be obviously be ruled out because they are in a wheelchair and physically incapable of committing the crime. However, at [[The Summation]], the detective announces that the criminal is in fact the paraplegic. This is then followed by the supposed paraplegic getting up and attempting to run. Another variant, commonly used in [[Courtroom Episode
See also [[Throwing Off the Disability]], [[Pillow Pregnancy]], [[Faking Amnesia]], and [[Playing Sick]].
'''Spoilers Ahoy!'''
{{examples}}▼
▲{{examples}}
== Anime
* The first criminal seen in ''[[Detective Conan]]''. To be precise, the villain claimed to have a broken leg and couldn't walk. Just a check of hospital records revealed otherwise.
* Rachel from ''[[Tower of God]]'' was supposedly paraplegic after Ho stabbed her in the back and Yu Han Sung prevented any treament to stop Baam from climbing the tower. {{spoiler|Then she stands up and pushes Baam down the "The Wineglass", the lake their test takes place in. This is only the beginning of the [[Wham! Episode]].}}
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* ''[[Saint Seiya]]'' portrays at least two examples of this trope:
** Libra Dohko: an old man of more than 250 years old that walks using a stick (and that's actually an [[Expy]] of [[Star Wars]] Yoda), can be even more [[Badass]] than any of the younger Saints. Not to mention that {{spoiler|he actually hides his young shape intact, shelled inside his old body, ready to use if becomes necessary}}
** In the spinoff ''Saint Seiya: The Lost Canvas'', is revealed that the ancient Virgo Saint, Asmita, is in fact blind. However he absolutely doesn't need sight, as his powers and perception are in the ranges of [[Pure Awesomeness]] .
* [[Speed Grapher|Suitengu]] spends a short time pretending to be wheelchair-bound after {{spoiler|Shinzen}} shoots him in both knees. He drops the act at his earliest opportunity, as it annoyed him to act so confined.
* In one chapter of ''[[Pet Shop of Horrors]]: Tokyo'', {{spoiler|a rich businessman pretends to have had a stroke and be suffering from dementia, so that he can see how his family members acted when he seemingly wasn't watching. Because of this, he sees his wife work hard to take care of him, their child, and her in-laws, foils a plan to trick him into divorcing her, and leaves her half of his estate.}}
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== Comic Books ==
* The [[Batman]] comic, ''[[Batman: Dark Victory]]''.
* In ''[[Red Robin]]'', Tim Drake has faked getting shot through the spine to prove he isn't the title character.
* Richard Dragon in ''[[The Question]]''.
* Charles Xavier in ''[[Twisted
* In one [[EC Comics]] story, a woman pretend to have paralyzed in an accident, so as to gain control over her husband. She plays the role for three months flawlessly{{spoiler|, then when a fire breaks out in her house when she's alone, she learns that her legs have become atrophied.}}
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* In later ''[[Mistborn]]'' books, the heroine consistently suspects that an enemy warlord is using this. Not on any kind of evidence, solely because of his paraplegia. He's crippled! He must be hiding some enormous powers! Yes, she is a bit of a nutter, why do you ask?
* The killer in the [[John Dickson Carr]] novel ''The Problem of the Wire Cage'' uses his recent car accident, and its attendant injuries, to pull off a murder he seemingly couldn't have physically committed. Unfortunately, circumstances turn it into a murder NO ONE could've committed.
* In [[Robert E. Howard]]'s [[Conan the Barbarian]] story "A Witch Shall Live", Salome tossed the head of a murdered man to a deaf
* Although he has ''significant'' mental problems, Bromden in ''[[One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest]]'' is not "deaf and dumb." He got so used to people disregarding him that he gave up trying to communicate with them, and finds that being considered a deaf-mute has the advantage that staff are careless about what they discuss when he's around. He throws off the charade partway through the book and - aside from [[Mc Murphy]] - none of the patients notice because they never paid much attention to him in the first place.
* Claudius exaggerated his stutter, limp and general clumsiness in ''[[I, Claudius]]''. This ''barely'' kept him alive when he had to work for [[The Caligula]].
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* The tactic of a famous magician (Ching Ling Foo) in ''[[The Prestige]]'' that inspired Borden and is used as a literary device to describe his methods without actually revealing them.
{{quote|'''Borden's Memoir:''' My deception rules my life, informs every decision I make, regulates my every movement... everything in this account represents the shuffling walk of a fit man.}}
* In [[Mercedes Lackey]]'s Free Bards novel ''The Robin and the Kestrel,'' the church of the city that the heroes are visiting uses this, among other techniques, in order to enact "miraculous healings."
* The ''[[Harry Potter]]'' series has {{spoiler|"p-p-p-poor s-s-stuttering Professor Quirrell"}}.
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* Happened in an episode of ''[[Cadfael (TV series)|Cadfael]]'', when the cripple had hidden his disability-less-ness from everyone including his ''sister'', then tries to collect money after he is "healed" by touching a reliquary. He is revealed when he runs away, sans crutches.
* Used in the two-part ''[[Get Smart]]'' episode "Ship of Spies". It involves a wheelchair bound water polo player.
** ''[[Get Smart]]'' also featured Leadside, a villain in a wheelchair. He pulls off an impressive infiltration because while he is incapable of walking or standing up, the act of running is still within his power.
* ''[[The X-Files]]'', "The Amazing Maleeni." When a stage magician who made his head rotate 360 degrees as part of his act turns up decapitated, Mulder and Scully quickly believe his bank manager brother could have been his
* The "Lost Ending" to ''[[It's a Wonderful Life]]'' as seen on ''[[Saturday Night Live]]'' showed Mr. Potter was faking.
* In several episodes of ''[[Law and Order]]'' and its spinoffs;
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** Sam leaped into a blind piano player and had to pretend he was blind. The mother of the leapee's girlfriend caught him, though, and thought the character was really pretending; but when he was tested by her later, he ''was'' blind, temporarily, due to a camera flashbulb.
** He also leaped into the body of a legless Vietnam vet. To one "unfortunate" [[Nurse Ratched|sadistic orderly]], Sam looked like he was floating above the ground when he got up and walked.
* Happened in ''[[Diagnosis: Murder]]'', probably more than once, usually discovered by Dick Van Dyke's character.
* The Colonel in the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' episode "The Unicorn and The Wasp".
** In the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' serial "The Rescue", Bennett pretends to have been crippled in the spaceship crash, allowing him to murder the other crew members while disguised as the monster Koquillion.
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* ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]:'' In the last four episodes of season 2, Spike is only pretending to still need his wheelchair.
* In the Mexican soap opera ''[[En Nombre Del Amor]]'', Carlota the head villainess pretends to be paralyzed in order to not go to prison after trying to murder her niece Paloma. Doctors cannot figure out what is wrong with her. The audience may even be fooled. Carlota tries to bribe a nurse in order to get assistance in leaving the hospital- but the nurse refuses. Carlota then hits the nurse with a bottle and steals her scrubs and mask, then places the unconscious nurse on the bed and flees the hospital without incident.
* In ''[[So Little Time]]'', Riley goes to school in a wheelchair to get the attention of a paraplegic whom she has a crush on.
* A ''[[M*A*S*H (television)|Mash]]'' episode has Radar apparently hitting an elderly Korean villager with a jeep. When the uninjured man demands $50 not to report Radar to the MPs, a visiting officer susses out that he's a well-known con man known as "Whiplash Wang".
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== Western Animation ==
* An episode of ''[[Fillmore!]]'' had an exciting chase sequence when a wheelchair-bound suspect got up and ran unexpectedly. She claimed without much remorse that she never told anyone that she NEEDED the wheelchair, she just preferred it.
* One ''[[Hey Arnold!]]'' episode had Phoebe taking advantage of Helga's niceness when she broke a leg and kept the cast even after it healed.
* One episode of ''[[The Simpsons]]'' has Bart pretending to be blind so he and Homer can pull off confidence tricks.
** On another one, Bart had gone temporarily deaf as a result of a flu vaccine. When Marge is trying to explain this to principal Skinner, he [[Mistaken for An Impostor|claims that he has heard it before]], and proceeds to pull photos of Bart with several fake disabilities.
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
[[Category:Disguise Tropes]]
[[Category:More Than Meets the Eye]]
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[[Category:Disability Tropes]]
[[Category:Infauxmation Desk]]
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