History Main / SpannerInTheWorks

* In Eos games' ''Weapons of the Gods'' (an rpg based on a Hong Kong comic), one of the background stories of the world has an invincible martial artist invade the heavens. He's easily curbstomping all the gods in his quest for immortality, what stops him was this...he had an extremely stupid disciple that he's fond of nonetheless. The disciple complained that he was getting hungry, the martial artist decided that it'd be alright to take a lunch break so he sends the disciple off to go herb hunting while he slaughters some divine cattle. The disciple finds some chili peppers from the fields of the sun god and show them to his master. The master is pleased and makes a beef hotpot. Unfortunately as soon as he ate it, the peppers burned with the force of the sun and so he ran around screaming, eventually falling from the heavens to crash head-first into some rocks.

** In a ''Film/DieHardWithAVengeance'', it actually isn't [=McClane=] as the villain deliberately got him invovlved. It's actually a juvenile deliquent who gives [=McClane=] his EurekaMoment.

** De Guiche: When you apply FridgeLogic, you see that De Guiche was the UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom in his own plan to [[ArrangedMarriage bully Roxane into a marriage]] with [[TheBeard De Valvert]] at Act I Scene IV: When De Guiche makes a DareToBeBadass to De Valvert, it’s only a small act, but it’s crucial because it sets a DisasterDominoes scenario that ends with De Valvert being touched by Cyrano and so unable to marry Roxane. He also destroys his own plan to BuyThemOff Cyrano when he mentions that his uncle Richelieu could correct a line or two from Cyrano’s work.

** His desire to help a human village ended with him in a position to UTTERLY screw over a fae -- [[GoodIsNotNice which he does]] so very EPICALLY. [[spoiler: The fae in question calls a [[TheWildHunt Wild Hunt]] on Quentyn, promising a wish if he survives. Quentyn barely manages to win, but it's now when the fae realizes to his horror that Quentyn is not only part of a race that's protected from the Hunt, but also under the protection of another being which doubly prohibits him. As punishment, the amount of wishes that the fae is supposed to give is tripled. The first two wishes are used to deprive him of everything he has. The third wish is a traditional "leave without taking revenge" wish...with an additional clause that forbids him from ever calling a hunt on that plane again.]]
** And then there's Squidge, who is only too happy to prove that one can ''deliberately'' be this when he ruins Rahan's prank.

** His very decision to become a Questor -- paired with the discovery of an old contract -- puts his home village in peril. The contract stated that the previous Questor was to retrieve some artifacts in exchange for land on which to build a village. The problem: the old Questor failed to do so, and now that there's a new Questor, a political faction intends to use that contract to get Freeman Downs repossessed and thus out of the picture. Quentyn's decision? Retrieve those artifacts, knowing that if he dies in the attempt, the law ensures that the contract ends with him. He knows nothing about the true scheme at work, and the opposing faction has no idea what to do now. The legal counsel sent to deliver the bad news summed this trope up rather perfectly:

They are the bane of the ClockKing. The undoing of many overconfident {{Smug Snake}}s. They are the worst nightmare of {{Manipulative Bastard}}s everywhere. They are the monster in the closet that haunts TheChessmaster every time they close their eyes. They are often the impending doom for the otherwise [[InvincibleVillain untouchable]] MagnificentBastard. Their very presence causes even [[XanatosGambit David Xanatos himself]] to [[OhCrap freeze in utter terror]], who can only watch as his master plan crumbles down into dust.

Meet the [[TitleDrop Spanner in the Works]].

** ''VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneySpiritOfJustice'': In the game's second case, [[spoiler:there's the equally complex plot enacted by Roger Retinz...one thirteen years in the making. His plan of framing Trucy Wright as revenge against her family for shaming him over [[EvilSorcerer his true colors]] involved a very meticulous setup during one of Trucy's magic shows. After conning Trucy into agreeing to pay out a ransom money over the show's cancellation, Retinz roped all three of Trucy's fellow actors, Manov Mistree and the [[TwinSwitch de Famme twins]], into playing a prank on Trucy that involved Mistree faking his death upon exiting a coffin that Trucy had just stabbed. Retinz then deceived Mistree and the de Famme twins by dragging Mistree up via pulley to be impaled by a sword planted on the nearby catwalk, then staged the scene to make it look like Trucy had accidentally killed Mistree. What he couldn't foresee was one of the de Famme twins accidentally positioning a prop on the wrong side on the stage, thus causing Trucy to stab the coffin at the same irregular angle - when time Retinz later learned about this, he returned to the scene in a desperate attempt to switch the coffin panels so the facts would line up again, inadventently sealing his fate in the process. Not helping that fact was that, also unbeknownst to Retinz, Apollo Justice was [[SuperpowerfulGenetics himself a Gramarye descendant]] who was able to see through every single one of his elaborate illusions.]]

** ''VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneySpiritOfJustice'': In the game's second case, [[spoiler:there's the equally complex plot enacted by Roger Retinz...one thirteen years in the making. His plan of framing Trucy Wright as revenge against her family for shaming him over [[EvilSorcerer his true colors]] involved a very meticulous setup during one of Trucy's magic shows. After conning Trucy into agreeing to pay out a ransom money over the show's cancellation, Retinz roped all three of Trucy's fellow actors, Manov Mistree and the [[TwinSwitch de Famme twins]], into playing a prank on Trucy that involved Mistree faking his death upon exiting a coffin that Trucy had just stabbed. Retinz then deceived Mistree and the de Famme twins by dragging Mistree up via pulley to be impaled by a sword planted on the nearby catwalk, then staged the scene to make it look like Trucy had accidentally killed Mistree. What he couldn't foresee was one of the de Famme twins accidentally positioning a prop on the wrong side on the stage, thus causing Trucy to stab the coffin at the same irregular angle - by the time Retinz learned about this, he attempted to switch the coffin panels, but by then his fate had already been sealed. Not helping that fact was that, also unbeknownst to Retinz, Apollo Justice was [[SuperpowerfulGenetics himself a Gramarye descendant]] who was able to see through every single one of his elaborate illusions.]]

** Larry gets to do this again in the manga. Simply by being arrested on suspicion of killing Bright Bonds (based on calling him and demanding that he get out of his ex-girlfriend's life), he derails the killer's plan to [[spoiler:use him as an alibi, because ''she'' gets called in to prove ''his'' alibi, and through contradictions in her testimony, gets implicated as the murderer]].
** ''VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneyDualDestinies'' has one in the first case that only pays dividends in the last: Ted Tonate, a bomb disposal specialist who noticed that the bomb involved with one of his cases had been rearmed, and warned everyone in court to evacuate before it exploded. [[spoiler: The phantom had secretly rearmed the bomb in order to blow up evidence against him. Not only does Tonate's testimony alert Phoenix to the fact an outside party was involved, two of the people in the courtroom at the time of the bombing (and thus potential casualties) are Athena Cykes and Simon Blackquill, who end up being crucial witnesses when the Phantom is eventually dragged to court.]]

** ''VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneySpiritOfJustice'': The DLC case shows that Larry Butz's still got it; thanks to messily sneaking into a wedding reception because he was hopelessly infatuated with the bride, he [[spoiler:not only screwed with the whole "time travel" theme and coverup that was attempted, his general interference also forced the culprit to enact his plan and murder his accomplice much earlier than intended, completely derailing everything and making it possible for the culprit to get caught]].

* GrandSlam: Only when the CaperCrew is preparing their break-in do they discover that the diamond company has installed the new "Grand Slam 70" safe system: an alarm triggered by any sound detected near the safe room by means of a sensitive microphone listens for sounds while the safe and its environs are secured. This happened after Anders left Rio, so he could not have known about it.

** Sulu in ''Film/StarTrek2009''. By "leaving the parking brake on", he delays the ''Enterprise''[='s=] warp to Vulcan, sparing the ship from the ''Narada''[='s=] assault

* Lord Farquaad in ''WesternAnimation/{{Shrek}}''. By sending the fairy tale creatures to Shrek's swamp, he is the reason Shrek sets out to find him in the first place. He sent Shrek to get Fiona so Farquaad could become king in exchange for his swamp leading to Shrek and Fiona meeting. Fiona falls in love with and marries Shrek, which foils the plans of every subsequent villain in the series[[note]]Fairy Godmother and Prince Charming's plan to have Charming marry Fiona and Rumpelstiltskin's attempt to seize the kingdom from Fiona's parents, just to clarify[[/note]].

* ''WesternAnimation/TheBadGuys'': [[spoiler: Marmalade's plan to frame the Bad Guys for his own heist via their FalselyReformedVillain scheme is exposed because of Diane, who figured out his scheme and broke the group out of jail. Her managing to cause Wolf to HeelFaceTurn for real also consequently leads him to chain off the rest of the group's turn later on, saving him and Diane from Marmalade and destroying his operation from the inside out. Additionally it is Diane's stolen ring that fully ruins Marmalade and gets him framed as the Crimson Paw.]]

They are the bane of the ClockKing. They are the worst nightmare of {{Manipulative Bastard}}s everywhere. They are the monster in the closet that haunts TheChessmaster every time they close their eyes. Their very presence causes even [[XanatosGambit David Xanatos himself]] to [[OhCrap freeze in utter terror]], who can only watch as his master plan crumbles down into dust.

* ''Film/{{SWAT}}'': [[BigBad Alex Montel]] kills his uncle Martin Gascoigne for sticking his hand in TheSyndicate's till, then takes Gascoigne's car to the airport to catch his flight home. On the way, he's pulled over by a motorcycle policeman because he has a tail light out. The officer then discovers there's an arrest warrant linked to the license plate and detains Montel "until we can verify who you are." {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d by an FBI agent after Montel's identity is discovered:
--> "We've been lookin' for this guy a long time. Busted tail light brings him down? That's amazing."

->''A common mistake people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.''

** For ''Hold-up'', former prison comrade of Grimm [[FatBastard Lasky]] has been stalking Grimm for a while, knows his gang robbed the bank and chases them relentlessly after the heist. In addition, it turns out Lise (the girlfriend of Grimm's friend and accomplice Georges) doesn't love Georges and grew feelings for Grimm. Grimm didn't expect this, and it becomes a thorn on the side of their getaway from the heist over time (what Grimm calls "the human factor").