< Weapon for Intimidation

Weapon for Intimidation/Playing With

Basic Trope: Alice intimidates Bob with either a real weapon that Alice doesn't intend to use or with one that's totally useless (i.e. an unloaded or toy gun).

  • Straight: Bob is successfully intimidated by the "gun" that Alice is pointing at him and is willing to do whatever he is told or runs off in terror.
  • Exaggerated: Alice successfully intimidates an entire gang of violent thugs armed with machine guns with a finger in a coat pocket that she pretends to be a gun.
  • Inverted: Alice intimidates Bob with a real, loaded gun that she wouldn't mind using, and Bob isn't scared
  • Justified: Alice would use a loaded gun if she had one, but has to get by with an unloaded or fake gun due to outside circumstances.
  • Subverted: Bob isn't scared. May notice that Alice's "gun" isn't real or isn't usable, if applicable.
  • Doubly Subverted: Bob finds a fake or unusable item more scary than the genuine article.
  • Parodied: Bob is scared by the sight of something that is more than obviously completely harmless that Alice threatens to hurt him with.
  • Deconstructed: Alice brandishes her "gun," believing it's enough to intimidate Bob and get the job done, but then finds herself completely outmatched when Bob surprisingly whips out a machine gun and fires.
  • Reconstructed: Once Alice uses her wits to get Bob right where she wants him, she puts her "gun" to Bob's head, and Bob completely submits.
  • Zig Zagged: Alice pulls out a real gun which Bob thinks is a fake and counters by pulling out a fake gun of his own, which scares Alice.
  • Averted: Alice fires a bullet in Bob's leg to get her message across.
  • Lampshaded:

Carl: Uh, Alice? That gun isn't even real!
Alice: Yeah, but Bob doesn't know that!

  • Enforced: It's a family movie and Alice threatening someone with a loaded gun seems way too harsh and unsympathetic for a character in such a movie and not as funny.
  • Invoked: Someone leaves a empty gun for Alice to use in her breakout of the Tropia Jail.
  • Defied: Alice is unaware that her gun is loaded while she is under the impression that it's a fake or empty.
  • Discussed: "Guns make too much noise, which would attract too much attention. You wouldn't want to fire one if you could avoid it."
  • Conversed: "You know, in this kind of show the gun is always fake"
  • Played For Laughs: Alice is a Know-Nothing Know-It-All and Stupid Crook, and the trope is Subverted.
  • Played For Drama: Alice is so down on her luck that she turns to crime to get by, but doesn't even have enough money to get a gun with all its components in tact, let alone bullets to fire it... but that doesn't stop her from trying to rob Bob.

Maybe this gun is carved from a bar of soap and covered in shoe polish... but do you know that for sure? Why don't you just hold your hands above your head and follow me right the way and no one gets hurt...

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