Paranoia Gambit: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

{{quote|''"Take that cup of coffee, for instance. Maybe this morning when you weren't looking, I poured in a jar of my own urine while it was brewing. Or maybe I didn't. Anyone else, [[Telepathy|you could read their mind and find out]], but [[Consummate Liar|with me you'll never know]]. So I think I'll have a very nice day, in fact.

 

A variant of the [[Batman Gambit]] which is usually played for comedy. Alice tells Bob that she will "get him". Bob freaks out and goes to great lengths to avoid falling victim to her plans. In the end, it turns out that Alice wasn't going to do anything to him and that her whole plan was to just sit back and let his paranoia make him do stupid things to himself.

 

 

{{examples}}

* ''[[Liar Game]]'': Akiyama kept 24 hour surveillance on Nao's opponent to mess up his judgements. He did absolutely nothing else to the man until an hour before collection time...

* ''[[Code Geass]]''' first season has Lelouch pull off one against Jeremiah. You know which one I'm talking about: "Also, Orange". Specifically, he spoke what appeared to be a codeword to an enemy combatant; it doesn't mean anything but the Britannians don't know that and devote precious counter-intelligence resources to finding it out. The fact that Jeremiah got demoted for unwillingly helping Lelouch escape due to the latter's [[Compelling Voice]] (again, the Britannians don't know about that so they thought it was from blackmail related to the "codeword") was just a nice bonus.

* This is L's tactic in ''[[Death Note]]'', to apply the pressure of [[Paranoia Fuel]] and watch for a [[Revealing Coverup]]. It does work, but not as successfully as he'd hoped; he counts the small victories until he has to concede defeat.

 

* In ''[[Archie Comics]]'', Jughead does this at least once to Reggie.

* Subverted in a ''[[Batman]]'' story, in which a criminal becomes convinced that his new next-door neighbor is a disguised Batman trying to pull one of these him. Eventually, the guy snaps and attacks his neighbor... whereupon the ''real'' Batman shows up.

** The ''Grendel'' series used a similar subversion, following a criminal and snitch's descent into paranoid madness, for fear that the original Grendel is stalking him. Grendel does show up at the end, but only because something completely unrelated reminded him of the (''very'' petty) snitch.

* One ''[[Heavy Metal (animation)|Heavy Metal]]'' story involved the protagonists tricking the villain into giving up critical information by placing him in a realistic simulation where he thought he'd won. When they reveal this to him, he's informed he'll be left trapped in a hyper-realistic simulation for the rest of his life. As they leave, one of the protagonists reveals to the other that all she did was ''tell'' him he was trapped in a simulation.

 

 

== Film ==

 

== Literature ==

{{quote|Only once, in the entire history of witchery on the Ramtops, had a thief broken into a witch's cottage. The witch concerned visited the most terrible punishment on him.

She did nothing, although sometimes when she saw him in the village she'd smile in a faint, puzzled way. After three weeks of this the suspense was too much for him and he took his own life; in fact he took it all the way across the continent, where he became a reformed character and never went home again. }}

** Also from ''[[Discworld]]'', the short story ''The Sea and Little Fishes''. Granny Weatherwax does this to the entire Witch community merely by smiling and offering to help kindly.

* One of the characters in [[Diana Wynne Jones]]' ''[[Dark Lord of Derkholm]]'' performs one of these ''on himself'', though not intentionally. He just knows that his sister, Shona, is mad at him for letting their mother put a spell on her, and he remembers very clearly the way she waited patiently for days to take revenge on one of their siblings when she was younger. He never stops to think that maybe she's matured since then, and all this distracts him from fulfilling his mission, which was tough enough already.

* In the [[Isaac Asimov]] story ''The Acquisitive Chuckle'', a rich collector's business partnership goes bad, and as the partner leaves, he snaps his suitcase shut in a suspicious manner and chuckles "acquisitively". The collector freaks out and his life goes downhill as he frantically searches through everything he owns to try to find out what valuable item his partner stole from him. Years later, his lawyer confronts the thief and asks him what he took. His answer? "Only his peace of mind, sir."

* ''[[Holes]]'': After Stanley has learned to no longer expect water from the vengeful Mr. Sir, Mr. Sir surprises him by refilling his canteen that day. But then he takes it to his car and gives it back a minute later, still full. Then he waits for Stanley to drink from it. When he's so thirsty he can no longer bear it, Stanley pours the entire contents of the canteen, refusing to drink from it thanks to his suspicion.

 

* The ''[[Everybody Loves Raymond]]'' episode "Getting Even" has Debra pulling this on Ray.

* Megan does this in an episode of ''[[Drake and Josh]]''. It works hilariously. At the end of the episode, she does something to Drake and Josh anyway. That's just her doing things to them for the hell of it again, just like she always does. It's that type of behavior that made the gambit work in the first place (she actually told them she ''wasn't'' going to do anything [[Cassandra Truth|and let her past actions speak for themselves.]])

** Specifically, Six acts as if he was planted by Two's superiors and is sending them cryptic messages questioning his loyalty; Two not only tears his hair out trying to follow the trail, but pushes away one colleague after another as untrustworthy. At the end, when Six points out that a loyal man would have ''left it alone'':

{{quote|'''Two:''' Don't tell them. Don't report me.

'''Two:''' * taking the phone* I have to report a breakdown in control. Number Two needs to be replaced. * beat* Yes, this is Number Two reporting. }}

* [[Almighty Janitor|The Janitor]] has done this to JD once or twice in ''[[Scrubs]]''.

'''Sinclair:''' Yes. Come on.

'''Garibaldi:''' There are some days I love this job. }}

* Ben uses this to wonderfully creepy affect in the ''[[Lost]]'' episode "The Whole Truth"

{{quote|'''Ben:''' Wow, you guys have some real trust issues, don't you? Guess it makes sense she didn't tell you, what with you two fighting all the time. Of course, if I was one of them - these people you seem to think are your enemies - what would I do? Well, there'd be no balloon, so I'd draw a map to a real secluded place like a cave or some underbrush - good place for a trap - an ambush. And when your friends got there, a bunch of my people would be waiting for them. Then they'd use them to trade for me. I guess it's a good thing I'm not one of them, huh? You guys got any milk?}}

* Used in an episode of ''[[NCIS]]'' as retaliation for black ink on the binocular eyepieces. Ziva's increasing paranoia over what Tony will do for revenge leads her to do such things as throw away her lunch when she finds out he picked up the order. {{spoiler|The payoff comes when Tony does get her just before the credits by rigging her desk chair to collapse.}}

* The [[Trope Codifier]] in TV may be the episode "The Impractical Joke" of ''[[The Dick Van Dyke Show]]''. After Buddy gets a friend to play a practical joke on Rob, Rob decides that the best revenge is to make Buddy increasingly paranoid about what Rob's revenge will be.

 

== Newspaper Comics ==

** All three Fox siblings have fallen for this at some point. Another strip has Jason hiding in the garbage after playing some prank on Paige. Peter and Paige then talk about how they love it when their little brother punishes himself.

* [http://images.ucomics.com/comics/ga/2009/ga090305.gif This Garfield comic. ]

 

== Video Games ==

* ''[[You Don't Know Jack]]'', starting in volume 3, has a category known as Impossible Questions, mind-bendingly difficult questions which are worth a game-breaking $20,000 to whoever can get one right (or a game-breaking loss of $20,000 for whoever gets one wrong.) One of the Impossible Questions is from a category called "It's a Dog!" The question is "What has four legs, barks, and is a common household pet?" Awkward silence from the contestants. (The answer really is "a dog.")

 

* In ''[[Freefall]]'', Sam Starfall's reputation for pulling these off is so well-known that it works even when he doesn't actually have a plan.

* Pintsize ''tries'' to do this once in ''[[Questionable Content]]'', but the rest of the cast are too [[Genre Savvy]] to fall for it.

** Interestingly, Miho may have done him a favor, since Largo's heightened paranoia allowed him to intercept one of Erika's crazier fanboys before he could reach her. Whether [[Magnificent Bastard|Miho]] planned this or even realized it after the fact is never explained.

* In ''[[The Last Days of Foxhound]]'', Psycho Mantis and Ocelot tend to pull this ploy on each other with various degrees of success.

* [[Hive Mind|Think Tank]] in ''[[Sequential Art (webcomic)|Sequential Art]]'' [http://www.collectedcurios.com/sequentialart.php?s=563 used it when playing a wargame] to beat Pip in an [[Boring but Practical|embarassingly simple]] way.

* Doubly subverted in the series beginning from [http://www.absurdnotions.org/page44.html this] ''[[Absurd Notions]]'' strip.

* In [http://www.viruscomix.com/page508.html this] ''[[Subnormality]]'' strip, a harassed and undertipped waitress psyches two businessmen into thinking she messed with their free coffee.

* In ''[[Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic]]'' the Drow Queen [http://yafgc.net/comic/0070-a-quick-promotion/ poisoned a Grey Elf representative] on a meeting and chose to [[Surprisingly Elite Cannon Fodder|send Arachne instead of herself]] to the next one. Knowing this, Arachne decides to [http://yafgc.net/comic/0075-dressing-down/ give] some wine as a "peace offering" from her Queen to the replacement Grey Elf rep. Naturally, [[Hilarity Ensues]].

 

== Web Original ==

* In ''[[Unreal Estate]]'', Kisei does this to {{spoiler|the man who had her father killed, promising to come back and kill him on a Wednesday. "Maybe next week, maybe 20 years from now." She has no intention of coming back.}}

 

== Western Animation ==

* Despite this basically being 2/3 of Batman's M.O., one episode of [[Batman: The Animated Series|the animated series]] features the Riddler pulling an epic one.. Sort of. His origin episode revolves around him going after Mockridge, the man who cheated him out of the profits for a game he designed due to him being 'work-for-hire'. Batman and Robin manage to save him, but the Riddler gets away and hints he will eventually return to finish the job. The episode ends with a terrified Mockridge in his mansion, locking every door and window in the place, checking every shadow, and getting into bed with a loaded shotgun at his side while Bruce muses on the situation:

{{quote|'''Bruce''': [[Pyrrhic Villainy|Mockridge may have his money, but he won't be sleeping well]]. "How much is a good night's sleep worth?" Now THERE'S a riddle for you.}}

 

== Real Life ==

* If you're a guy and you have friends who are guys, ''never'' leave a beverage behind in a room with them. Either they will put some foul substance in said beverage and you will drink it, or they will pull one of these on you and you'll end up pouring the beverage down the toilet.

* Some terrorist groups sometimes report the bombs they planted - in vague terms. Evacuation of a large public place and related panic (especially if the threat turned out to be real) causes plenty of terror, even without killing civilians.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Revenge Tropes]]

[[Category:Comedy Tropes]]

[[Category:The Plan]]