History Main / AntiMentor

* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'': Applejack and Rainbow Dash serve as this in the episode "Non-Compete Clause". While normally good teachers, their [[CompetitionFreak competitive nature]] makes them unable to teach the students the lessons on cooperation as they end up constantly arguing with one another instead. In the end, though, it works out with the students [[AntiAdvice assuming the duo were showing them what cooperation isn't in order to give them the idea of what it is]]. Twilight was able to figure out the truth, and it shows that in the end, the two don't get any better.

-->[[spoiler:'''Peter B.''']] Hey, go easy on the kid. [[SelfDeprecation He had a terrible mentor!]]\\

-->[[spoiler:'''Peter B.''']] Hey, go easy on the kid. He had a terrible mentor!\\

* ''Literature/CradleSeries'': Lindon soon learns that no one in the Sacred Valley has any idea what they're doing. Practically ''everything'' they do to advance their sacred arts is horrendously wrong, hamstringing their own development to the point that no one in the Valley has reached Gold-stage in centuries, which the outside world considers the first stage of real sacred artists. Their cruelty towards Lindon ends up working in his favor, as they refused to teach him all these things that would have seriously crippled him.

* Tondemon Higashi from ''Battle Club'' like Genma below is a played with example. He led Swan Academy to eight successive all-Japan championships but is shown to be SecretlySelfish and shown to be something of a JadedWashout. Kuniko Mukoda StartOfDarkness was a wrestling prodigy like his first student Ginkakuji Tamami. However, he saw her as little more than a PoorMansSubstitute and never believed that she could make it. He quickly planned on replacing her upon meeting Tamami’s daughter.

** Ranma's father Genma is a played with example. Most of the time he is actually a very competent teacher of martial arts who does know how to instruct and motivate, although quite a SinkOrSwimMentor (and generally a jerk, morally speaking). However, his attempt to teach the "Cat Fist" technique was a fiasco that left Ranma mentally traumatized for life, because Genma didn't [[StoppedReadingTooSoon bother reading the full manual]] on how to teach that technique which warned that it was dangerous and stupid.

* The Leviathans to all the various Citadel races in ''FanFic/IncompatibleSystem''. By giving the Citadel races eezo technology, they locked them out of the ''far'' more powerful WIMP TechTree (eezo destabilizes violently when exposed to WIMP fields, to the point where even a few milligrams could level a city).

-->'''Peter B.''' Aim with your hips! Look where you want it to hit! Square your shoulders! Don't forget to follow through! Don't shoot off your back foot!
-->'''Miles:''' That's too many things!
-->'''Peter B.''' Then stop listening to me!
-->'''Miles:''' That's the best idea you've had all day!

* Interesting case in the biopic ''Film/SearchingForBobbyFischer'' - trainer Bruce Pandolfini (who was the main advisor of the film!) comes over as a {{Jerkass}} who is ultimately responsible for prodigy Josh Waitzkin resigning chess, by hammering on the fight part of chess. He has a point, but his pupil is more into fun and the clash of personalities lets everything go south.
* ''Film/{{Whiplash}}'': Draconian music conductor Terence Fletcher turns out to be one of these for young jazz drummer Andrew Neiman, and indeed his last protege [[spoiler:who was ultimately DrivenToSuicide by him.]] In his mind, anyone who isn't capable of being great as he determines it is absolutely worthless to him and he shows no issue in breaking them completely and tossing them aside. In Andrew's case, [[spoiler:it's ultimately a subversion: Fletcher's teaching methods mean his performance at the end is practically perfect. [[BittersweetEnding However, that talent comes at the cost of basically everything in Andrew's personal life.]]]]
* ''Film/StarWarsTheLastJedi'': [[BigGood Luke Skywalker himself]] turns out to be one of these for Rey, since at this point [[CynicalMentor he's sufficiently broken by the failure of his Jedi Temple that he doesn't really want the Jedi to continue.]] Of the three lessons promised to her, they make it to two before he throws her off his island, out of fear that she'll end up [[TheDarkSide like his last pupil, Kylo Ren.]] [[CharacterDevelopment The whole thing's an important lesson for Rey, though, as she gains enough confidence in her own abilities to step up for herself.]]

-->'''Tony Stark:''' Sorry I took your suit. I mean, you had it coming. Actually, it turns out it was the perfect sort of tough-love moment that you needed, right? To urge you on, right? Wouldn’t you think? Don’t you think?
-->'''Peter:''' Yeah, yeah. I guess.
-->'''Tony Stark:''' Let's just say it was.
* Tina Harwood in ''Film/IcePrincess'' is a variant of this. She’s actually a really good figure skating coach, but when Casey manages to become almost as good as Gen (Tina’s daughter who she’s been [[StageMom grooming and training]] since birth) in less than a year, Tina tries to push her out of skating so she won’t be a threat to Gen, first by subtly discouraging her from competing and then just straight up sabotage. When Gen quits in disgust at Tina’s behaviour, and because she knows she’ll never be as good as Tina wants her to be, she does become a genuine mentor to Casey.

* ''Literature/DungeonCrawlerCarl'': Most of the game guides vary between "not very good at their jobs" and "actively screwing over the crawlers." Donut theorizes that they hate their jobs and are taking it out on the crawlers. Mordecai mentions financial incentives to make the guides do their best, but apparently those aren't particularly effective. Special mention goes to Frank and Maggie's guide ([[spoiler:who told them the only way to advance was to murder other crawlers, leading to the death of their daughter]]), and Meadow Lark's guide (who seems mostly good at her job, but [[spoiler:once she becomes a manager she just checks out and treats the whole thing as a vacation]]).

* ''Franchise/StreetFighter'': Dan Hibiki serves as a fighting mentor for Sakura and Blanka. However, both of his students are much better fighters than he is, and Sakura even tells him that his fighting style sucks in ''VideoGame/PocketFighter''.
** The ironic thing is in ''VideoGame/PocketFighter'', the ending happens after Dan beats Sakura so in that case Dan's fighting was superior.

* ''DungeonCrawlerCarl'': Most of the game guides vary between "not very good at their jobs" and "actively screwing over the crawlers." Donut theorizes that they hate their jobs and are taking it out on the crawlers. Mordecai mentions financial incentives to make the guides do their best, but apparently those aren't particularly effective. Special mention goes to Frank and Maggie's guide ([[spoiler:who told them the only way to advance was to murder other crawlers, leading to the death of their daughter]]), and Meadow Lark's guide (who seems mostly good at her job, but [[spoiler:once she becomes a manager she just checks out and treats the whole thing as a vacation]]).

Alternatively, the teacher may actually be good at what it is that they are teaching but terrible at teaching it. In these cases, they just don't know how to get their lessons across.

* ''Literature/HarryPotterAndTheChamberOfSecrets'': A famous wizard, Gilderoy Lockhart, is hired by Hogwarts School to teach the students Defense Against the Dark Arts. However, when he begins teaching, it quickly becomes apparent that he's rather incompetent, while passing his failures off as "accidents". That he's revealed to have stolen anonymous witches and wizards' feats in order to become famous doesn't help. This was actually {{invoked|Trope}} by the headmaster, Dumbledore: when questioned by staff about why he was hiring so incompetent a teacher, he said there were many things Lockhart could teach the students; how ''not'' to act, for instance.

* Peter B. Parker in ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManIntoTheSpiderVerse'' is ultimately a failure of a mentor to [[KidHero the hero, Miles Morales.]] Though he's actually a pretty accomplished Spider-Man, he sucks at teaching the skills, and ultimately gives up on Miles two-thirds of the way through the film. The third act is then Miles trying to save the day in spite of that.

* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'': Applejack and Rainbow Dash serve as this in the episode "Non-Compete Clause". While normally good teachers, their [[CompetitionFreak competitive nature]] makes them unable to teach the students the lessons on cooperation as they end up constantly arguing with one another instead. In the end, though, it works out with the students assuming they showing them what cooperation isn't in order to give them the idea of what it is. Twilight was able to figure out the truth, and it shows that in the end, the two don't get any better.

* On ''WesternAnimation/BigMouth'' pretty much every Hormone Monster depicted so far is one of these. While they encourage sexual activity, they also tend to try to push their kids to become juvenile delinquents. Nick, Andrew, and Jessi in particular are prone to complaining that their Hormone Monsters are more of a hindrance than a help.

* ''Webcomic/MobPsycho100'': Arataka Reigen is a famous esper who has the young Shigeo Kageyama (aka Mob) as his disciple, who has great esper powers. In reality, Arataka is a ConMan who has no powers and [[MoochingMaster only uses Mob to manage real spirits]]. Subverted since Arataka is a father figure for Shigeo, teaching him to [[ComesGreatResponsibility use his powers correctly]] and [[HumbleHero not think they make him a better person]].

* The Protheans to all the various Citadel races in ''FanFic/IncompatibleSystem''. By giving the Citadel races eezo technology, they locked them out of the ''far'' more powerful WIMP TechTree (eezo destabilizes violently when exposed to WIMP fields, to the point where even a few grams could level much of a city).

* ''Manga/MobPsycho100'': Arataka Reigen is a famous esper who has the young Shigeo Kageyama (aka Mob) as his disciple, who has great esper powers. In reality, Arataka is a ConMan who has no powers and [[MoochingMaster only uses Mob to manage real spirits]]. Subverted since Arataka is a father figure for Shigeo, teaching him to [[ComesGreatResponsibility use his powers correctly]] and [[HumbleHero not think they make him a better person]].

* ''VideoGame/StreetFighter'': Dan Hibiki serves as a fighting mentor for Sakura and Blanka. However, both of his students are much better fighters than he is, and Sakura even tells him that his fighting style sucks in ''VideoGame/PocketFighter''.

** Subverted by FridgeLogic. Every single bad thing that happened throughout the entire movie could have been avoided if Peter had just listened to Tony.

** The ironic thing is in VideoGame/PocketFighter the ending happens after Dan beats Sakura so in that case Dan's fighting was superior.

A common subversion of this is when the mentor (usually an EccentricMentor) gives a lesson that seems outlandish (like WaxOnWaxOff), but said lesson becomes useful later, especially to better understand the ''real'' lessons.

* Tondemon Higashi from ''Battle Club'' like Genma below is a played with example. He led Swan Academy to eight successive all-Japan championships but is shown to be SecretlySelfish and shown to be something of a JadedWashout. Kuniko Mukoda StartOfDarkness was a wrestling prodigy like his first student Ginkakuji Tamami. However he saw her as little more then a PoorMansSubstitute and never believed that she could make it. He quickly planned on replacing her upon meeting Tamami’s daughter.

** In "Guide to Shyness", Cookie decides to teach a bunch of shy students how to have "Cookie Confidence". He makes them to a lot of insane things he himself did, like slam-dunk a basket ball using a gigantic overpowered trampoline, use a mop-bucket slingshot, and dig tunnels through the school. Eventually, his student get fed up and turn against him when he tries to make the fight a psychopath, ironically displaying the very confidence he'd worked to teach them in telling him off.
** "Guide to Tutors" has Ned dealing with multiple bad tutors. One is a loudmouthed NerdyBully; One is a MotorMouth who can't stay focused; And one is a JerkJock who is willing to just give Ned the answer for a date with his friend Moze. Eventually, his science teacher Mr. Sweeney is the one to be Ned's tutor once Ned expressed his problems. Meanwhile, Mose herself was mentoring a class of fifth graders. Despite being a good teacher, she failed to teach her class anything because they were [[DistractedByTheSexy so attracted to her]]. She could only get them to learn by making herself hideously ugly.

* ''WebVideo/DontHugMeImScared'': The "teachers" of each episode attempt to teach the main characters about something they should in theory know tons about, like a computer teaching, well, about computers. However, these lessons never teach the characters anything, are full of inconsistencies, poor logic and BlatantLies, and succeed only in scaring or manipulating the characters into following their personal agenda. In some cases, such as "Creativity", they are actually taught ''not'' to be creative and punished when showing actual creative ability.

* On ''WesternAnimation/BigMouth'' pretty much every Hormone Monster depicted so far is one of these. While they encourage sexual activity, they also tend to try to push their kids to become juvenile delinquents. Nick, Andrew and Jessi in particular are prone to complaining that their Hormone Monsters are more of a hindrance than a help.
* ''WesternAnimation/EarthwormJim'': In one episode, Jim finds a sword the claims to be a legendary sword wielded by great heroes and offers to teach Jim how to be one. Near the end of the episode however, the sword admits that nobody that ever wielded him ever won a fight. Finding this out, Jim immediately discards the sword.
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'': Applejack and Rainbow Dash serve as this in the episode "Non-Compete Clause". While normally good teachers, their [[CompetitionFreak competitive nature]] makes them unable to teach the students the lessons on cooperation as they end up constantly arguing with one another instead. In the end though, it works out with the students assuming they showing them what cooperation isn't in order to give them the idea of what it is. Twilight was able to figure out the truth, and it shows that in the end, the two don't get any better.

* Peter B. Parker in ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManIntoTheSpiderVerse'' is ultimately one of these to [[KidHero the hero, Miles Morales.]] Though he's actually a pretty accomplished Spider-Man, he sucks at teaching the skills, and ultimately gives up on Miles two-thirds of the way through the film. The third act is then Miles trying to save the day in spite of that.

* ''Manga/MobPsycho100'': Arataka Reigen is a famous esper who has the young Shigeo Kageyama (aka Mob) as his disciple, who has great esper powers. In reality, Arataka is a ConMan who has no powers and [[MoochingMaster only uses Mob to manage real spirits]]. Subverted since Arataka is a father figure for Shigeo, teaching him to [[ComeGreatResponsibility use his powers correctly]] and [[HumbleHero not think they make him a better person]].