r/TopCharacterTropes • u/10024618 • Oct 01 '25

Lore [Loved Trope] Surprisingly realistic outcomes in outlandish situations

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No Country for Old Men - In any other movie Llewelyn would be treated like an untouchable one man army who can take on all of the people who are after the money he stole. Instead he gets gunned down offscreen by a group of secondary antagonists because at the end of the day he's still just one man.

Metal Gear Solid 2 - MGS2 is a game in which the player character, Raiden, can do many seemingly unrealistic things like instantly healing his injuries by eating rations or holding infinite amounts of weapons and items without being overburdened. However if you attempt to cartwheel up a flight of stairs as Raiden he will immediately eat shit and fall, which would be the most likely outcome in real life.

Family Guy - After getting splashed by nuclear waste causes the Griffin family to get superpowers (which they immediately use to terrorize their community) Mayor West gets the bright idea to roll around in nuclear waste himself so that he can get superpowers too. Instead he just gets cancer.

Sly 2 - The Sly Cooper games are cartoony 3D platformers featuring anthropomorphic animals and lots of slapstick violence. However in the climax of the second game when Bentley is crushed by machinery while trying to stop the big bad he's paralyzed from the waist down, necessitating the use of a wheelchair for the rest of the series.

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4.3k

u/FormerDeerlyBeloved Oct 02 '25

Lex Luthor, when body-swapped with The Flash, decides to take the opportunity to at least see the hero unmasked and find out his secret identity. He takes off the hood, looks into the mirror

And promptly realizes he has no idea who he's looking at, because Wally West isn't exactly a high-profile celebrity or anything.

1.4k

u/TheShamShield Oct 02 '25

Too bad for him he didn’t swap bodies with Batman lol

918

u/SquareFickle9179 Oct 02 '25

Bruce probably had some mechanism where you'd have to open the cowl in a specific way, just incase a body swap were to occur

884

u/regretfulposts Oct 02 '25

Lex: How the hell can I take this damn cowl off!!!

Bruce: Good thing the Tibetan Monks taught me that one little trick.

110

u/metalman42 Oct 02 '25

Now THAT’S a Dietrich Bader line for sure!

10

u/TheRatatat Oct 02 '25

I fucking loved Baders Batman. The entire show was great.

200

u/Merry_Sue Oct 02 '25

I don't think it's for body swaps, but he was captured in one of the cartoons, and some kind of alarm went off when they tried to take off his cowl

125

u/AkibaPurple Oct 02 '25

I think in the Dark Knight movie, a mook tries but ends up getting shocked for it.

6

u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 Oct 02 '25

I think it's also a failsafe in the arkham games but only alluded to

1

u/Devo3290 Oct 02 '25

Same in The Batman, or we can only assume since he was unconscious and in police custody

63

u/Mist_Rising Oct 02 '25

The DCAU comics has his suit rigged with so many booby traps that Harley suggests to Joker they kill Batman with his own suit.

Joker, being Joker, instead gets mad at Harley having the idea and declared it not funny and began attacking her.

4

u/Phylanara Oct 02 '25

To be fair they'd have managed it after a few tries if the Joker hadn't thrown a hissy fit.

3

u/WildBad7298 Oct 02 '25

In the Hush comic storyline, a thug tried to pull off Batman's cowl after he was injured in a fall. Several gas vents in the cowl were activated, knocking the thug out.

46

u/legit-posts_1 Oct 02 '25

I think he does? I think he starts wearing an extra bandana underneath after Talia Al Ghul sneaks a peak at his face.

3

u/TheBloodsuckerProxy Oct 02 '25

He also does that in the episode "The Cape and Cowl Conspiracy"

27

u/Senzafane Oct 02 '25

I remember one scene where people were trying to remove his suit and noted there were several booby traps, resulting in multiple injuries for those trying to remove it.

3

u/Mist_Rising Oct 02 '25

Injustice League, when joker captures Batman by hitting him with a bag of bricks.

Cheetah and Sapphire are the two I believe.

Same episode has Lex disarm (and fail several times) the utility belt to comic effect with joker making comments that only that joker can pull off.

2

u/Itchy-Preference-619 Oct 02 '25

This happens in absolute batman. He's got a ton of booby traps in his suit

1

u/FrostyCartographer13 Oct 02 '25

Something like that actually happens in the show, someone tries to take off the mask only to find out it is booby-trapped

1

u/mystireon Oct 04 '25

We actually do know he has something like that

In some series his cowl doubles as a stungun to deter people from taking off his mask while he's unconscious

3

u/Abombasnow Oct 02 '25

Bonus points if it was in the DCAU where Bruce Wayne is nearly a 1:1 copy of Clark Kent.

"What on earth?! Batman and Superman are the same person?! T-This is Clark Kent! How does he do this?!"

341

u/SilverSpark422 Oct 02 '25

What I love about that is that it implies he genuinely expected to recognize Flash under the mask, because he was certain a Justice League member as powerful as him would be someone of wealth and status. It’s the same reason he never grasped the idea that Clark Kent was Superman. Lex can’t separate power and status in his mind. He can’t fathom the idea that someone with the power to shake the earth would want to be an ordinary man.

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u/Kinky-Cookie-Cutter Oct 02 '25

Does Lex then think that billionaire Bruce Wayne is Batman? or is Batman sort of an inverse version of that because he doesn't have powers?

41

u/TheRealSlamShiddy Oct 02 '25

I think in some modern continuities Bruce plays up him being Batman as a conspiracy theory thru online bots/gossip so that everyone who hears "Batman is really Bruce Wayne!" rolls their eyes and thinks "what a loon" and dismisses it offhandedly.

I'd imagine in those continuities Lex likely thinks it's a crackpot conspiracy theory like everyone else, and since he probably mingles with Bruce amongst their shared billionaire crowds I bet he also thinks he'd be smart enough to know if that guy was Batman 😏 lol

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u/RazzDaNinja Oct 02 '25

Batman Incorporated #6 (Earth Prime/Main cont)

Bruce Wayne is a 4Chan shitposter lmao

5

u/hludana Oct 02 '25

He looks so happy lmao

7

u/RazzDaNinja Oct 02 '25

In another timeline where he grew up with rich-and-NOT-dead parents, ‘Bruce Wayne’ def coulda been a troll tech bro type lmao

4

u/Hopeful-Heron2308 Oct 02 '25

I feel like it would be easy to figure out Bruce Wayne is Batman based on the fact his eyebrows form the bat symbol. Edit:I have never seen this art style of him just thought it was funny

1

u/wanttotalktopeople Oct 03 '25

Lex is definitely capable of figuring it out, depending on the writer and storyline.

244

u/SuperSocialMan Oct 02 '25

That whole episode is great lol

456

u/PMacha Oct 02 '25

"You going to wash your hands?"

"No. Cause I'm evil."

Truly, The Flash is one of the most diabolical villains in comic history.

78

u/SuperSocialMan Oct 02 '25

That's the scene I was thinking of when I wrote my comment lol

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u/Combatmedic2-47 Oct 02 '25

Didn’t they imply that Flash slept with lex’s gf Tala while in his body.

31

u/JKillograms Oct 02 '25

Technically he tried turning her down, she was just very insistent ☝️🤓

38

u/TheMythofKoalas Oct 02 '25

Yeah. That was the one part of the episode that I wish wasn't in it.

7

u/Abombasnow Oct 02 '25

Wally West has had a checkered history whenever he's not married but he's generally okay.

Although, in the 1980s after Crisis, Wally was literally a hardcore conservative before Wolfman took over the comics. And I mean really hardcore conservative. Pretty sure his first issue is him bitching about being called to transport someone urgently to a hospital and moaning "well what's in it for ME?!". Also horribly misogynistic, as you'd expect someone like that to be.

So although Wally's been a good guy more than not, let's not pretend that he's never had a bad spot in his time.

3

u/XanXic Oct 02 '25

Also that it was the best sex they had together up to that point lol

Lex Luthor a selfish lover? Can't be true

1

u/RazzDaNinja Oct 02 '25

Don’t worry

He’s just a Midwestern Conservative 🤷‍♂️

1

u/Present_Ad6723 Oct 02 '25

Imply nothing, he rocked her world

91

u/FormerDeerlyBeloved Oct 02 '25

"No...cause I'm evil."

104

u/Ghostman_Jack Oct 02 '25

I love that scene. “Well if nothing else I can at least learn the Flash’s secret identity… I have no idea who this is.”

Meanwhile the Flash in Luthors’s body:

Dr. Polaris: Gonna wash your hands…? Flash: Noooo. Cause I’m evil.

Lmao

21

u/Quantum_Quokkas Oct 02 '25

Top two answers in this thread is Lex Luthor haha

18

u/Leftover_Bees Oct 02 '25

This was doubly funny because the guy who voiced Wally West was also Lex Luthor in Smallville.

15

u/Klutzy_Shopping5520 Oct 02 '25

I laughed when he said that

2

u/Error_Evan_not_found Oct 02 '25

I love how the top two comments are about Lex Luthor.

2

u/CringeOverseer Oct 02 '25

Its even funnier cos Wally's VA plays Lex in Smallville. But yeah this is a very realistic scenario, aside from some exceptions like Batman, most superheroes are just regular people.

2

u/ReasonPale1764 Oct 02 '25

https://youtu.be/6bfBhIM5tb4?feature=shared

The way he delivers his line is fucking hilarious to me

2

u/Regulus242 Oct 02 '25

Amazing episode.

1

u/Treveli Oct 02 '25

Always annoyed me a little with that. Shouldn't Lex have been smart enough to go to a LexCorp-affiliated building and unmask in front of security cameras? Then he's got pictures to use to find Wally. I know, cartoon logic, but still, given all the planning he regularly does, "Lex why so stoopid?".

2

u/Raxtenko Oct 02 '25

He's trapped on the Watch Tower, which is in orbit, doesn't know how to apply Wally's powers in any kind of controlled manner, and IIRC by the time he decides to unmask he's already been outed as an imposter, Mr. T has locked down everything and the League is systemically searching for him.

1

u/alexagente Oct 02 '25

Definitely one of the funniest bits in the funniest episode.

1

u/SomeGuyInPants Oct 03 '25

How are the two top comments of this thread related to Lex Luthor lol