History Main / AdaptationalWimp

** More generally, the "no punching" rules imposed by the MoralGuardians of the time ended up making many of the heroes and villains look unusually ineffective. Hawkman and Solomon Grundy were probably [[IncrediblyLamePun the hardest hit]] given that they were all about melee combat in the comics.
* In the 2010 ''BlackPanther'' cartoon, [[UnfortunateImplications every non-black character]] is either evil, stupid, or both. The Juggernaut in particular is depicted as being quite [[TookALevelInDumbass a good deal dumber than usual]], at one point being described by the other characters as basically brainless.

* A non-comic adaptation example: Simon Belmont in ''WesternAnimation/CaptainNTheGameMaster''. Granted, around 1990 the ''Castlevania'' games hadn't given Simon much in the way of character development. He was pretty much a BadassNormal who defeated Dracula twice in the NintendoHard Castlevanias, using only a (at that point, not all that special) whip to boot. In the TV series he was reduced to TheDragAlong. It's hard to believe the bumbling, narcissistic Simon of the TV series could possibly have gone up against someone as threatening as Dracula even once and survived.

* A non-comic adaptation example: Simon Belmont in ''WesternAnimation/CaptainNTheGameMaster''. Granted, around 1990 the ''Castlevania'' games hadn't given Simon much in the way of character development, but seriously, he went from a BadassNormal who defeated Dracula twice with just a whip in the NintendoHard Castlevanias to TheDragAlong in the TV series. It's hard to believe the bumbling, narcissistic Simon of the TV series (who even loses fights with his whip) could have gone up against Dracula even once.

* Donald Gennaro in ''JurassicPark''. In the novel, he goes along with Muldoon to catch the Tyrannosaurus, manages to fend off a Velociraptor attack, intimidates a ship captain with {{Technobabble}}, and survives to the end. In the film, he becomes a DirtyCoward who dies a particularly embarrassing death.

** Elemental bending is a lot less impressive than it was in [[AvatarTheLastAirbender the original cartoon]]. For example, in the show earthbenders could create and manipulate relatively simple objects like stone carts, they could open holes in the earth to swallow foes, or bring up pillars of stone to throw their enemies around. In the movie, they just chuck rocks.
** In the show, firebenders could easily create fire from their own body heat. In the movie only the greatest firebenders are capable of this - for most of them they can only use their bending abilities if there's an existing source of flame, like a campfire or a torch.

* In a manga adaptation of ''MegaManZero'', Zero (a bonafide Badass) is turned into a wimp who tend to get scared by things. Well, only halfway; here it only manifests as CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass, but still.

* A non-comic adaptation example: Simon Belmont in ''WesternAnimation/CaptainNTheGameMaster''. Granted, around 1990 the ''Franchise/Castlevania'' games hadn't given Simon much in the way of character development, but seriously, he went from a BadassNormal who defeated Dracula twice with just a whip in the NintendoHard Castlevanias to TheDragAlong in the TV series. It's hard to believe the bumbling, narcissistic Simon of the TV series (who even loses fights with his whip) could have gone up against Dracula even once.

* A non-comic adaptation example: Simon Belmont in ''WesternAnimation/CaptainNTheGameMaster''. Granted, around 1990 the ''Franchise/Castlevania'' games hadn't given Simon much in the way of character development, but seriously, he went from a BadassNormal who defeated Dracula twice with just a whip in the NintendoHard Castlevanias to TheDragAround in the TV series. It's hard to believe the bumbling, narcissistic Simon of the TV series (who even loses fights with his whip) could have gone up against Dracula even once.

** While {{ComicBook/Aquaman}} has always been at his best around open water, he still has super strength and resilience even on land. ''Super Friends'' downplayed this to the point of him being almost completely defenseless out of water. This led to the popular belief that he was the most useless member of the team, with many viewers considering him TheScrappy.
** More generally, the "no hitting" rules imposed by the MoralGuardians of the time ended up making many of the heroes and villains look unusually ineffective. Hawkman and Solomon Grundy were probably [[IncrediblyLamePun the hardest hit]] given that they were all about melee combat in the comics.

* Five words: JenniferGarner as Film/{{Elektra}} [[Film/{{Daredevil}} Natchios]].

[[caption-width-right:350:[[LiveActionTV/TheState ...and Aquaman, you...go talk to some fish.]]]]

[[WesternAnimation/{{Superfriends}} [[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Aquamanjjj_2486.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:350:[[LiveActionTV/TheState ...and Aquaman, you...go talk to some fish.]]

* A number of ''{{Franchise/Superman}}'' games, including the notorious ''VideoGame/{{Superman64}}'' suffer from downplaying Superman's powers in order to provide some risk for the player character. The problem is that they go too far into this trope and also remove the ''fun'' of playing as a ridiculously powerful character like Superman.

* A number of ''{{Franchise/Superman}}'' games, including the notorious ''Superman64'' suffer from downplaying Superman's powers in order to provide some risk for the player character. The problem is that they go too far into this trope and also remove the ''fun'' of playing as a ridiculously powerful character like Superman.

* In the video game franchise, ''Franchise/MortalKombat'', Stryker was one of the best characters in the game. In the film ''Film/MortalKombatAnnihilation'' he gets killed off screen, with the only mention of him even existing being an offhand remark by one of [[TheBigBad Shao Kahn]]'s henchman about how easy he was to kill. Rumor has it this was a direct response to the fandom's widespread dislike of the character brought about by his status as a TierInducedScrappy.

* In the 2010 ''BlackPanther'' cartoon, [[UnfortunateImplications every non-African American character]] is either evil, stupid, or both. The Juggernaut in particular is depicted as being quite [[TookALevelInDumbass a good deal dumber than usual]], at one point being described by the other characters as basically brainless.

* MNightShyamalan's ''TheLastAirbender'' suffers from this on two major fronts:

* A number of ''{{Superman}}'' games, including the notorious ''Superman64'' suffer from downplaying Superman's powers in order to provide some risk for the player character. The problem is that they go too far into this trope and also remove the ''fun'' of playing as a ridiculously powerful character like Superman.

** Similarly, GreenLantern's ring was used in a much more limited fashion in the early seasons. Eventually, this too changes with the writers [[LampshadeHanging lampshading]] the matter by having his fellow Lantern Katma Tui lecture him on his unimaginative use of the ring.
** There's also WonderWoman very belatedly getting the full powers of her lasso unlocked, finally bringing her up to par with her standard comics incarnation.

** While {{Aquaman}} has always been at his best around open water, he still has super strength and resilience even on land. Super Friends downplayed this to the point of him being almost completely defenseless out of water. This led to the popular belief that he was the most useless member of the team, with many viewers considering him TheScrappy.

This character has been the victim of [[AdaptationalWimp Adaptational Wimpification]]. Just to be clear, as with the inverse trope AdaptationalBadass, this is not about characters who simply suffered a minor power decrease. This is also not the case when a RetCon decides the character DidNotGetTheGirl or something similar. This is specifically for those characters who went from actually useful to... decidedly less so.

* MNightShyamalan's TheLastAirbender suffers from this on two major fronts:

* In the 2010 BlackPanther cartoon, [[UnfortunateImplications every non-African American character]] is either evil, stupid, or both. The Juggernaut in particular is depicted as being quite [[TookALevelInDumbass a good deal dumber than usual]], at one point being described by the other characters as basically brainless.