Stupid Crooks: Difference between revisions

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{{quote|''"I did '''not''' rob a bank; if I had robbed a bank, everything would have been great... I '''tried''' to rob a bank is what happened, and they got me... I misspelled a note."''|'''[[Woody Allen|Virgil Starkwell]]''', ''[[Take the Money and Run]]''}}

* In the pilot episode of ''[[Dead Like Me]]'', one of George's first experiences with the reapers is with Mason at a bank, where we meet Bret, the hapless bank robber. Bret stumbles through a prepared announcement he wrote up before entering the bank and gets upstaged by one jealous wife of the bankers. However, he [[Subverted Trope|miraculously manages to get away with the bank's money.]]

** Meanwhile, Mason is oftentimes the dumbest of the team of reapers and is the only one who looks to earn his money through theft and criminal misdeeds, while the others hold down jobs on the side. Usually, his stupidity and crimes are unrelated to the other, but one occasion stands out where, after previously giving away all of his possessions when he incorrectly assumed he was finally going to the afterlife, he was caught stealing tips left on tables at Der Waffle House, where the gang ''always'' meets and hangs out, and is immediately kicked out and barred from coming back to the diner by the group's usual waitress Kiffany.

* ''[[The Whitest Kids U' Know]]'' once did a skit about a group of would-be bank robbers who repeatedly fail the same criminal plot over and over for many different reasons, ranging from not being able to read the bank's blueprints, bringing friends from out of town along to the robbery, and posting plans to rob the bank on a blog (along with a hyperlink to the bank's website wherever the word "bank" is used).

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6p5ORHRnXs#t=03m37s This sketch] from ''[[Jam]]'' features a man holding up a convenience store in order to ''buy'' a pack of cigarettes. Apparently, the gun he points at the store clerk was to make sure that he got back change. The clerk tells the man with the gun that he doesn't need to pay for the cigarettes, and the man thinks of this as some sort of unexpected thrill.

** Not to mention the guy who tries to hold up an off license with a gun hidden in his stomach which he fires... out through his own spine, killing himself and the man behind him in the queue.

* An episode of ''[[Knight Rider]]'' dealing with car theft has a "false alarm" as two crooks attempt to steal the pimped-out K.I.T.T., and quickly prove not to be the professionals Michael is looking for: They're trying to break in using a Philips-head screwdriver instead of a flat one, and [http://www.atylia.com/images/catalogue/porte-manteau-design-nova-noir-450.jpg this kind] of coat hanger.

** In many other episodes as well, KITT confused and scared the crap out of random bumbling petty criminals who tried to steal/sabotage/damage him, more for the entertainment value than for anything related to the plot.

** [http://www.dumbcrooks.com/old-dumbcrooks-site/ Dumb Crooks] (Last Update: June 2005)

** [http://www.electricferret.com/bozo/ Bozo Criminal of the Day] still updates every weekday, except holidays

* The [[Darwin Awards]] also includes some. This being the Darwin Awards, most of the [[Stupid Crooks]] mentioned there manage to kill or injure themselves in the process of proving themselves worthy of that site and this trope.

* Most issues of [http://www.newsoftheweird.com/archive/ News of the Weird] have two or three entries under Least Competent Criminals.

== Video Games ==

* ''[[Fallout 3]]'' has Mel, an ineffective would-be mugger that the player character can find in a random encounter. He demands that the player give all his/her money to him in a very unassertive tone, stammers, and otherwise shows himself to be nothing short of pathetic. If the player has a high enough Perception skill, he can notice that Mel's gun [[Weapon for Intimidation|isn't even loaded]]. If engaged in combat, Mel is a totally unarmed pushover.

** There are also Vicky and Vance, a pre-war petty-crime duo styling themselves as Bonny and Clyde-like duo, except not nearly as competent or famous (at least before their deaths, when they drove through a completely unrelated shootout). And then there are Pauline and Sammy, two extremely small-time crooks styling themselves after Vicky and Vance (thus copying two copies) who want to gain infamy by robbing all the casinos on The Strip. With Vance's never-fired gun. Against all of The Strip's combined security.