History Main / ZanyScheme

* ''WesternAnimation/MonstersInc'' has Mike's plan to get Boo out of town before the CDA finds out.

* ''Fanfic/ADifferentSong'': Alya and Nino team up with Jessica and Aeon and attempt two of this to help Marinette and Adrien hook up. First, they try to convince the pair that they've been trapped by a supervillain who exclusively targets those whom nobody loves, hoping to force a LoveConfession out of them. When this fails, they recruit Cyrus and set up an encounter with a "superhero who spreads love" at a café. After this one fails as well, Jessica suggests that they should just let the two of them fall in love at their own pace.

* ''Series/TheMuppetShow'': They wouldn't be the Muppets if they were straightforward planners. Miss Piggy, as the most ambitious, tends to be the most likely to come up with an absurd idea to get what she wants, such as faking massive popularity in order to get Kermit to give her a raise or tricking him into taking part in a "wedding sketch" that will be an actual wedding...from which he extricates himself by summoning Lew Zealand to perform his boomerang fish act and fleeing in the confusion.

* Oh so very often on ''Radio/TheGoonShow'', which - thanks to being written by Creator/SpikeMilligan - was able to make ''perfect sense'' ([[ItMakesSenseInContext within the context of the show, anyway]]) of a plan to drain a Scottish loch by making Ned Seagoon believe it granted immortality.
-->'''Grytpype-Thynne:''' You could be the first man to break the world land speed record in a Wurlitzer[[note]]pipe organ[[/note]].\\
'''Seagoon:''' I've never heard such a ridiculous idea.\\
'''Grytpype-Thynne:''' Neither have I, but there it is.
* Almost every episode of ''Radio/TheNavyLark'' involved either; a Get Rich Quick scheme by [[CMOTDibbler CPO Pertwee]], an attempt by [[StupidBoss Commodore Povey]] to drum the crew out of the navy, [[ChivalrousPervert Sub-Lieutenant Phillips]] trying to woo [[SassySecretary WRN. Chasen]], [[OnlySaneMan Cmdr. Murray]] trying to save his career from the lot of them, or [[GambitPileup all at once]].
* Henry Aldrich of ''Radio/TheAldrichFamily'' regularly tries these when he gets into a sticky situation, invariably making things worse. For example, when his parents order him to return the West Indian straw hat he has purchased as they think it looks silly, the shop assistant points out that since he has had it monogrammed, they cannot take it back, so Henry and his friend Homer Brown try combing the phone book to find someone with the initials H.A. who wears a size 6 1/2 hat and is willing to buy a straw hat for the $3 in store credit Henry's mother thinks he received. They try to narrow the list of possible buyers by calling the newspaper, only to lead the reporter to think Henry has been robbed (or otherwise done wrong by) someone with a straw hat with the initials H.A. - which causes problems for Henry's father when he secretly decides to keep the hat for himself and goes to have it enlarged...

--> '''Evan''': And all I have to do is...

* Before Shakespeare, there was Creator/{{Plautus}}, and even ''he'' took inspiration from older sources.
* The ''CommediaDellArte'' is the TropeNamer, since the lower-class characters, or "Zanni", typically came up with schemes of this kind.

* Subverted in ''VideoGame/Persona3'': During one of the early Full Moon missions, the team is making preparations to break into the school when Junpei comments that he has everything "set to go." Because Junpei is [[IdiotHero just the sort of person who would try it]], everyone else assumes from the wording that he's rigged up some sort of bomb. His real plan is actually much simpler:
-->'''Yukari:''' An explosive? For real?!
-->'''Junpei:''' Nah, all I did was unlock a door...

* ''VideoGame/RideToHellRetribution'': In order to get through an electrified fence, the game railroads you to... steal a tanker truck from a bunch of people, drive so far to the Hoover Dam, murder anyone that gets in your way (either on foot or smashing through them with the tanker you stole), pick up an assault rifle, cross the river solely to shoot that tanker up to the point it blows up and damages the dam, which will shut down the electrified fence; the next scene shows you climbing it up now that it's no longer electrified. That's an elaborately zany process to replace simpler solutions like, 'find a switch to turn off the fence'.

* ''Webcomic/StandStillStaySilent'' is basically kicked off by a convoluted one of these disguised as a GetRichQuickScheme -- with added LightmareFuel. First, get some seed money together, somehow (read: "charm governmental bureaucracy to fund you rather less than you'd hoped by lying about the extent of your mission goals"). Second, provision and equip some [[WeAreTeamCannonFodder more qualified]], [[BunnyEarsLawyer bold]] [[RagtagBunchOfMisfits adventurers]] (poorly) to go out into the [[PostApocalyptic Silent]] [[DeathWorld World]] to [[AdventurerArchaeologist appropriate treasured artefacts]] and, maybe, information. [[TemptingFate With luck, they'll bring their own food and gear to help defray costs]]. Three, have them survive over winter collecting loot... somehow. Four, [[PointOfNoReturn get them back]] just before spring and things [[ForbiddenZone out there]] [[OurMonstersAreDifferent really get dangeous]]... somehow. Five, sell books and/or other treasures you "forget" to properly disclose for big money under the table... somehow. Six, profit... while ''somehow'' avoiding fraud, theft, reckless endangerment or manslaughter charges. [[MissingStepsPlan Spot the holes]]? This isn't going to go quite according to plan, is it?
* Both parodied and subverted in ''Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick'', where Elan initially had an unknown scheme to get Thog and himself back to their respective teams. It is known that this involved [[NoodleImplements Thog dressing like a leprechaun, and filling a wooden alpaca with potato salad]], but they ended up getting a ride from someone else.
** His EvilTwin brother Nale is little better, and devised a Zany Scheme to kill Elan that involved, among other things, Thog on rocket skates (with only an 84% chance of having [[AnvilOnHead an anvil land on him]]).
* In ''Webcomic/PvP'', referred to as "Wacky Adventures". At one point Cole, who's upset that he always gets cast as the disapproving conventional one, insists on taking part in one - when Francis comes up with a sensible and risk-free plan to get the information they need, Cole then insists that they instead concoct an unnecessarily zany scheme to achieve the same goal.
* Basically the entire, continuously evolving plotline of ''Webcomic/TriangleAndRobert'' is an infernal machine powered entirely by Schemes both Zany AND Wacky. Plus the occasional Beam of Pure Chocolate.
* The [[http://www.insecticons.com/insecticomics/v2/144.html Zany Scheme]] arc of ''Webcomic/{{Insecticomics}}'' features Thrust trying to come up with...well, see trope name. Dreadmoon isn't impressed.
* ''Webcomic/TerrorIsland''. Sid and Stephen's scheme to get the other to buy groceries is getting more and more zany.
* In ''Webcomic/NoRestForTheWicked'', Perrault is proposing a scheme to get Red and November inside the locked gate: he tracks down the owner, convinces him that robbers are about to attack, persuades him that his only safety is leaving open the gates so the robbers will plunder the place and let him escape -- whereupon Red [[CuttingTheKnot chops through the gate]].
* Aubrey from ''Webcomic/SomethingPositive'' comes up with these on a regular basis. Her friends have a standing rule stating that "the person who accidentally inspires one of Aubrey's schemes is the one who has to help her until it either blows up in her face, or she loses interest."
* ''Webcomic/EerieCuties'': This is Cessily's schtick, in her attempts to gain popularity [[AllGhoulsSchool at Charybdis.]] As noted by the cast page: [[http://www.eeriecuties.com/cast/ "she's got a bajillion of 'em, all of them terrible".]] While Laura is noted as being "her hapless sidekick". They aren't kidding. Some of the plans they come up with are just [[http://www.eeriecuties.com/strips-ec/my_next_plan plain]] [[http://www.eeriecuties.com/strips-ec/football_field weird.]]
* Sam Starfall from ''Webcomic/{{Freefall}}'' absolutely ''loves'' these, though he has been known to take the more direct route on occasion.
** In [[http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff1700/fc01691.htm this comic]], Sam plans to get past the guard shack using "a coffee pot, half a ream of paper, and three fully automatic hot glue guns". When he finds there are no guards in the guard shack and the gate is open, he just runs past noting "those poor guards missed out on a beautiful, complex and unnecessarily dangerous escape plan."

* ''Webcomic/SluggyFreelance'' details Zany Scheme "Operation Hidden Herald" [[http://sluggy.com/comics/archives/daily/20010930 here]]. It includes sub-schemes like "Operation Run-Around-Willy-Nilly" and "Operation Look-I'm-Tom-Cruise."
-->'''Riff:''' How are we going to get the keycard from Gwynn?\\
'''Torg:''' I'll seduce her (...) I know I don't have much of a chance of seducing Gwynn, but if I pulled it off, wouldn't I be cool?\\
'''Sasha:''' You want this whole operation to hinge on acting cool?\\
'''Riff:''' ''I want to try! I want to try!''

** Catalina has a habit of making zany plans. For example, her plan to convince everyone that Elliot isn't gay involves [[http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1741 tackle-kissing him in the hallway,]] and [[http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1742 pretending that they're on again off again lovers.]] This only succeeds because, throughout all of this silliness, Elliot manages to come across as the [[http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1745 kind of guy who would openly admit if he was gay.]] No one actually believes Catalina, as everyone seems to know that she's gay, and has a girlfriend. Thankfully [[http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=1746 Elliot talks her out of making an "ultimate apology plan."]]

* [[TheChessmaster King Urtica]] of ''{{Webcomic/Exiern}}'' is not above doing [[http://exiern.com/comic/being-silly/ convoluted schemes with a chance of failure.]]
--> '''[[RebelliousPrincess Princess Peonie]]''' : You made [[GenderBender Tiffany]] my guardian so I can make her into a girl?
--> '''[[MagnificentBastard King Urtica]]''' : You think I asked a [[WildCard barbarian of questionable loyalty and uncontrolled temper]] to guard you for your safety?
--> '''[[PraetorianGuard Neils]]''' : Oh that's a relief. We thought you had gone a bit loopy. ''[to Peonie]'' No offense little one but I rather have him endanger your life for an evil scheme than just because he's being dumb.

* Generator's latest Zany Scheme in the ''Literature/WhateleyUniverse''? Using her powers to create shoulder angels to torment Phase, because Phase was peeking at Generator's roommate in the bathroom. It goes FromBadToWorse
** [[spoiler: Eventually, the entire school was nearly wrecked.]]
** Note that, previously, she was involved in an actual 'NoodleIncident', she animated a stuffed cabbit doll as part of an epic chase, she later rigged that cabbit with enough weaponry to rip a man's arm off, she's obsessed with ''Franchise/HelloKitty'', and she's a trap! Zany Schemes are her forte. (Oh, and don't forget what she had to go through to go to a lesbian hot-tub thing. Even if she's not a lesbian.)
** Don't forget when she decided she needed to wear the school's 'pacifist' and 'ultra-violent' armbands, and just switch off on different days.
* WebVideo/TheNostalgiaCritic is always busy coming up with these for the Website/ChannelAwesome staff- such as invading the micro-nation of [[WebVideo/{{Kickassia}} Molassia]] or [[WebVideo/SuburbanKnights searching for magical gauntlets in urban Chicago]]. The site members are now familiar and tired of his plots but they can't complain, or else they're fired. And they kinda enjoy it, even though they won't admit.
** Also deconstructed with the Critic. With Kickassia at least, it's heavily implied that he wanted power because he's miserable with his usual life.
* One [[Franchise/TouhouProject Walfas]] [[http://www.walfas.org/flash/nitori_flash.swf flash]] was about [[GadgeteerGenius Nitori]] intentionally creating a problem just so she could solve it and become a hero. The problem in question was the imminent collision of a ship and an iceberg (sound familiar?) which she attempts to solve by giving Shiki's hat and stick and one of [[CuteGhostGirl Youmu's]] swords to CatGirl Chen, then tossing her overboard so she could destroy the iceberg. She then realizes that Chen (a cat) [[OhCrap can't swim.]] [[spoiler: Luckily, it was AllJustADream.]]
* In ''WebVideo/UltraFastPony'', Rarity comes up with a convoluted scheme to ruin Fluttershy's modeling career. Said plan involves building a fence, ignoring a blue-bellied pelican, and dancing a polka. Also, Rarity got a bit distracted while she was coming up with the scheme, so instead of punishing Fluttershy, the plan culminates in punching Rainbow Dash.

* In ''Fanfic/FarceOfTheThreeKingdoms,'' when Zhuge Liang's isn't using KillItWithFire, he's using one of these. They include building a replica of Stonehenge and hotboxing it, and performing an exorcism with tortellini. They always seem to work somehow, possibly because he's (in-universe) the CreatorsPet.
* WebVideo/MrBallen has a RunningGag where he exaggerates the typical [=YouTuber=] directive to "hit" or "smash" the Like button into scenarios that depict the action of clicking as comically abusive, as if the button were a real person. These range from simple pranks all the way up to murder, and some are multi-step plots that would require extensive planning and/or correct timing to pull off.

'''Bloo:''' [[InsistentTerminology Eh, they're really more like hare-brained schemes.]]\\

-->'''Robot Devil:''' Ah, my ridiculously circuitous plan is one quarter of the way complete! [[EvilLaugh Muahahahaha! Waaahahahaha haaa!]]

* ''WesternAnimation/HollyHobbieAndFriends'': The "Hey Girls," the group formed by Holly Hobbie and her friends, often hatch them, though they often turn out to be both inspired and work out well.

-->'''Marge:''' Homey, what are you going to do?\\

-->'''Homer:''' The only antidote to a zany scheme, is an even ''zanier'' [[CounterZany scheme]]!
-->'''Nerd:''' Why does it have to be zany?

-->'''Homer:''' It's time for Operation: Crazy Plan!

-->''"We're going to war with these PC people once and for all! Butters, I'm going to need 200 pregnant Mexican women and some taco launchers."''

* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales2017'' Weaponized and exploited by Flintheart Glomgold during the Lunar Invasion of Duckburg. The Lunarians' plans counter every defense Scrooge and the gang have to the point where [=McDuck=] and Co. have nothing to fight with, until Glomgold, in an Enemy Mine situation due to the events of the invasion, decides to take charge. His scheme is so ridiculously convoluted that the Lunarians are driven back and the invasion is thwarted because their leader has no idea how to counter Glomgold's seemingly assinine and inane actions.

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[[quoteright:350:[[Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/zany.png]]]][[caption-width-right:350:This image crops out the guy on rocket-propelled roller skates.]]

* [[Franchise/TouhouProject Reimu Hakurei]] in ''Manga/TouhouIbarakasenWildAndHornedHermit'' does this nearly OnceAnEpisode due to the manga's portrayal of her [[{{Flanderization}} overplaying her greed]]. Given her status as being in PerpetualPoverty when it comes to donations all these schemes are either interrupted by [[HermitGuru Kasen Ibaraki]] or backfire against her.

-->'''Mike''': Okay, I have a plan. Using mainly spoons, we will dig a tunnel under the city and release it into the wild!
-->'''Sulley''': [[FlatWhat Spoons.]]

* ''Film/ItShouldHappenToYou'' stars Gladys Glover who wants to be a ''somebody''. How does she achieve this? By plastering her name across billboards in all of New York City, that's how.
* In ''Film/LibeledLady'', Connie Allenbury is suing Warren Haggerty's newspaper after the paper prints a false story about her breaking up a duke's marriage. So what does Haggerty do? He gets his girlfriend to marry a reporter, then pays the reporter to seduce Connie, thus essentially framing her for breaking up another marriage and nullifying the libel suit.

* In the "everybody did it" ending of ''Film/{{Clue}}'', Mr. Boddy set up a BatmanGambit-version of one of these. The man was an information broker who controlled a large network of spies and informants who would gather and extort classified government information, using them to blackmail officials, figureheads, and other related individuals for personal gain. However, some of his agents threatened to go rogue and expose him, so Mr. Boddy organized them to come to his house in the guise of servants and locals. None of them knew one another was one of Mr. Boddy's agents, as they had never personally met. He also brought in six of his blackmail victims, each of whom had personal reasons to kill one of the agents. The only exception was Professor Plum, who had reason to kill ''Mr. Boddy'' himself. Boddy expected this, so he swapped places with his butler, using him as a SacrificialLamb since none of the victims had ever actually met him in person. Once all of his errant agents were killed by the blackmail victims' hands, Mr. Boddy would continue to blackmail them to ensure his identity, business, and crimes remain a secret. The crazy part is that the whole scheme ''actually works'', and Mr. Boddy would've gotten away with it, [[spoiler:had one of the victims not been an undercover FBI agent.]]

* ''Film/AVeryHaroldAndKumar3DChristmas'' centers on Harold and Kumar trying to find a replacement Christmas tree for the one they destroyed. Their first plan of getting one from a tree lot is reasonable enough, but once that fails they try to steal one from a Christmas party [[spoiler: at a mobster's apartment]], and a church.

* ''Film/{{Americathon}}'': The plot is about a US President, played by John Ritter, trying to save the United States from ''foreclosure'' with a telethon.
* ''Film/MatrimonysSpeedLimit'': Marian's boyfriend Fraunie breaks off their engagement after he's ruined by the stock market. She has tons of money but he won't take a bailout. So she hits on a wacky scheme: fake a telegram that tells him he'll get an UnexpectedInheritance if he marries that day. What she doesn't account for is the fact that a 12 noon deadline might lead Fraunie to marry ''someone else''.
* ''Film/TheWizard'' has two for the price of one: Corey (Fred Savage of ''Series/TheWonderYears'' fame) scheming to get his brother Jimmy to California in order to prove that he doesn't belong in a home, and Haley scheming to get money to get them there, while also suggesting that Jimmy enter a video game tournament at Universal Studios Hollywood.
* In ''Film/PlanB'', Bruno wants to get back together with his ex Laura after seeing her with a new boyfriend named Pablo but his initial plan of just asking her to get back with him doesn't work, so what's his [[TimeForPlanB Plan B]]? Proving to Laura that he's better for her than Pablo? Sabotaging her interactions with Pablo? Getting Pablo to fall for another woman? Nope -- ''obviously'' the best possible back-up plan for him is to [[FauxYay seduce Pablo himself]] so that he'll break up with Laura.
* In the first ''Film/HighSchoolMusical'' movie, Chad and Taylor, along with their respective teams, the Wildcats and the school nerds, cook up a plan to drive Troy and Gabriella away from each other and the upcoming musical so they can focus on their own competitions instead, the upcoming Championship game and the Academic Decathlon. Namely, Troy's teammates exploit his [[WellDoneSonGuy desire of approval from his father]] by reminding him of East High's legacy of basketball triumphs and his dad's role in it, and Troy, feeling the pressure, is forced to lie and say that Gabriella and the musical are only distractions, while Taylor and the other nerds film the moment with a webcam they hid in the locker room and show it to Gabriella, making her assume Troy doesn't really care for her. The whole thing works a [[GoneHorriblyRight tad too well]] and causes Troy and Gabriella to feel way too downhearted to properly focus on anything, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone much to the regret]] of the Wildcats and the nerds.

** This was also par for the course in Wodehouse's Literature/BlandingsCastle series, as well as a number of his one-offs.

* Pops up a few times in the Franchise/StarWarsExpandedUniverse, particularly in the Literature/XWingSeries. Rogue Squadron proves surprisingly adept at coming up with unorthodox solutions to military problems, so much so that Wedge Antilles founds Wraith Squadron specifically to encourage such outside-of-the-box thinking. He succeeds beyond his wildest expectations, resulting in stunts like converting a shuttle's smuggling compartment into a makeshift boarding pod to capture an enemy warship, breaking into an enemy base by starting a BarBrawl and disguising themselves as the shore patrol detail taking the losers home, and disguising themselves as stereotypical tourists as part of a plot to infect an enemy crew with a highly unpleasant but ultimately non-lethal disease.

* The ''Literature/{{Jennings}}'' books more or less run on Zany Schemes, usually initiated and largely performed by Jennings himself in order to avoid getting told off by a teacher. Sometimes the schemes are pulled off without a hitch, sometimes they work but in a different way than intended, or end up not mattering because of some outside circumstances that nobody could have predicted, and sometimes they fail spectacularly.
* Several of the chapters in ''Literature/WinnieThePooh'' revolve around these, most notably Rabbit's plans to kidnap Roo and "unbounce" Tigger and Pooh's plans to steal honey and catch a "Heffalump".
* Several sub-plots of Literature/KillTimeOrDieTrying revolve around this trope. Examples include a scheme to steal urine for a pregnancy test and a campaign to swing a student council election in favour of the candidate willing to give the club a club-room. The war-cry of WARP lampshades this trope: 'Bad idea?' *dramatic pose* 'How bad?'.
* ''Literature/CharlieAndTheChocolateFactory'' turns out to have this as its jumping-off point. Willy Wonka doesn't have a family, nor anyone to serve as his heir, and he doesn't want the factory he created and loves dearly to fall into the hands of an adult who would change the way things are done. His solution is the Golden Ticket contest: five tickets are hidden in five Wonka Bars, which will be found by five random children. He will then escort said children on a tour of his factory, and at the end he'll pick the kid he likes best to become his heir, the tour serving as a SecretTest of their worthiness. Unfortunately, the world is full of bad children -- poor Mr. Wonka winds up having to deal with a tour group consisting of four {{Spoiled Brat}}s and one good kid. Luckily, his [[TheWonderland wonderland]] runs on LaserGuidedKarma...

* In ''Literature/PleaseDontTellMyParentsIHaveANemesis'', Penelope Akks is secretly Bad Penny, a teenager supervillain, who her parents believe is a separate person harassing her. Her plan for establishing herself as a hero involves copying herself into a robotic duplicate, having a staged fight where she wins over "Bad Penny", and then to fess up to her parents, who will cotton onto the robotic duplicate quickly, in hopes that they'll be so impressed by her honesty that they'll overlook the whole villainy thing.
* ''Literature/AngelaNicely'':
** In “Tiger Trouble!”, Angela wants Miss Darling to win the Teacher of the Year award, so she decides to have Laura dress as a tiger and have it look like Miss Darling scared the tiger away.
** In “Problems, Problems!”, Angela decides to get Molly the new girl noticed by writing, “Kiss Me!” on a sign, and having her stick it to Miss Boot’s back.

* ''Radio/OurMissBrooks'': There must be a course in zany schemes over at Madison High School. Everybody has had one in the works, one time or another. These are just a few examples. Remember, all [[ItMakesSenseInContext make sense in context]].
** In "Two Way Stretch Snodgrass," Miss Brooks hatches a scheme to waylay Strech's transfer by having Mr. Conklin and her masquerade as the [[DumbJock dim athlete's]] equally dim parents.
** One of Walter Denton's schemes is a monstrous April Fool's Day joke, in "Wild Goose." He imitates a radio quizmaster, tricking Mr. Conklin into thinking he's won a TV from Sherry's Department Store. Cue Miss Brooks chasing down the stream of notes Walter left, in vain pursuit of the elusive television set.
** Mr. Conklin, pompous though he may be, isn't above the general zaniness either. In "The Big Jump," he plans to jump off the roof (onto a firemen's parachute) as part of a civil defense drill. He chickens out, and volunteers Miss Brooks to act as his stunt double.
** Mrs. Conklin gets into the act in "Non-Fraternization Policy." She's working to derail Mr. Conklin's newly imposed Islamic-style separation of the sexes at Madison.
** Even Mr. Boynton take part. "Clay City English Teacher" sees him try to imitate Sam Spade in an effort to lure Miss Brooks away from the eponymous teacher.
** Goody-two-shoes Harriet Conklin has a zany scheme now and again. In "New Girl", she tricks the titular girl's mother into believing Mr. Boynton is a serial killer.
** To Mrs. Davis, zany schemes are old hat. Perhaps her SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome, at least as far as zany schemes go, occurs in the [[TheMovie cinematic]] [[GrandFinale series finale]]. Mrs. Davis brings about Miss Brooks' HappilyEverAfter through some clever manipulation of Mr. Boynton and his mother.
* The plot of many episodes of ''Series/HappyEndings''. Lampshaded in "The Ex Factor" when Penny meets Pete's friends, and is shocked when they are able to avoid such things. Notable is "Fowl Play Date" when Penny and Brad accidentally kill Alex's parrot and have to cover it up.
* ''Series/TheHoneymooners''. Ralph Kramden is practically the TropeNamer.

* The standard for this type of plot is ''Series/ILoveLucy.'' In one episode, Ricky is able to recognize and subvert the Zany Scheme in its infancy by asking Lucy directly, "What's up?"
* Very prominent on ''Series/PerfectStrangers''.
** {{Lampshaded}} at one point when Balki mentions that whenever Larry tries to impress his boss, lie to his girlfriend (usually claiming to match the talents of some guy he perceives as a rival), or says, "I have a plan!", Balki puts a dollar into a cookie jar. Apparently, he'd been able to buy a small mansion with his savings.
*** They lampshade this frequently in later seasons:
-->'''Larry:''' Don't worry everyone, I have...
-->'''Everyone:''' DEAR GOD.
-->'''Larry:''' ...a plan!!!
* Louis Stevens breathed this trope on ''Series/EvenStevens''. A few of them involved trying to buy hot sneakers from a shady salesman, making the neighbor kid look like a genius so he could meet his favorite news anchor and rent out his house as a bed and breakfast while his parents were away in order to afford to go skiing for a weekend his best friend Alan Twitty was almost certainly expected to be involved.
* Common on ''Series/SavedByTheBell''.
* Subverted in the ''Series/RedDwarf'' episode "Rimmerworld":
-->'''Lister''': There's got to be a way out. There hasn't been a prison built that could hold Derek Custer. Why don't we scrape away this mortar here, slide one of these bricks out, then using a rope weaved from strands of this hessian, rip up a kind of a pulley system so that when a guard comes in, using it as a trip wire, gets laid out, and we put Rimmer in the guard's uniform, he leads us out, we steal some swords, and fight our way back to the 'Bug!
-->'''Kryten''': Or we could use the teleporter.
* Frequently played with on ''Series/TheDrewCareyShow'', where Lewis and Oswald eventually lost any chance of convincing Drew to go along with their plans ("Okay, we'll call that plan, 'The Idiot Plan,'" "If by any chance my plan fails, ''don't do your plan''").
* ''Series/ICarly'': Not [[Series/Zoey101 relied]] on as much as [[Series/HannahMontana other]] [[Series/DrakeAndJosh shows]] in its [[{{Sitcom}} genre]]. One however, was [[{{Jerkass}} Sam]] and [[ButtMonkey Freddie]] rescheduling Carly's interview with a private school headmistress to her apartment, setting up a mini-golf course inside Spencer's apartment, inviting 2 dozen kids over, and getting the kids to think she had a prize hidden on her, done to sabotage Carly's chances of being admitted to the school so Carly wouldn't leave them.
** The episode "iHave My Principals". After having Principal Franklin guest on iCarly which resulted in him being fired, two of the [[SadistTeacher meanest teachers]] take his place. After the new co-principals create a reign of terror at the school, the iCarly gang connives with all the students. They hatch a plan to have an all-out schoolwide rebellion in order to prove to the school superintendent that their previous principal is much better than the new ones.
** Subverted in "iScream on Halloween" where Carly explains a complicated scheme to gain access to the locked door of Apartment 13-B, but Sam just picked the lock.
*** Not too complicated, from what she said it sounded like the old "distract them long enough to get the necessity" scheme.
** {{Defied|Trope}} in "iWant My Website Back". Mandy comes up with a plan to get iCarly.com back from Nevel. As soon as she mentions it involving three zebras, Sam shuts her up.

-->'''Blackadder:''' Am I jumping the gun, Baldrick, or are the words "I have a cunning plan" marching with ill-deserved confidence in the direction of this conversation?
-->'''Baldrick:''' They certainly are sir!
-->'''Blackadder:''' Well, forgive me if I don't do a cartwheel of joy; your record in this department is hardly 100%. So what is it?
-->'''Baldrick:''' We do nothing
-->'''Blackadder:''' Yup, it's another world-beater.

* Lois and Hal from ''Series/MalcolmInTheMiddle'' actually have a standard protocol for when Hal ends up doing something complicated and stupid. The rules, established when Hal and Craig enter a competition involving a game that is ''so very clearly not VideoGame/DanceDanceRevolution'' and rapidly become obsessed, include freezing the joint bank account and the provisions that Hal still has to go to work and can not, under any circumstances, involve their sons.
** The boys rely on these pretty often to try to get out of whatever trouble they've caused, with the plans usually being formulated by Malcolm.
* ''Series/{{Seinfeld}}'': Kramer and Newman are prone to these, alone or working as a team.
** One good example is when Kramer and Newman get the idea to take their money-back bottles to another state because they're worth more money there.
* An episode of ''Series/TheBigBangTheory'' has Sheldon coming up with a fake cousin, including creating a blog and Facebook page and hiring an actor to play him, to [[FawltyTowersPlot cover a small lie]] Leonard told Penny.
** Elaborating, Leonard told Penny he couldn't go to a performance of hers because he had a work-related seminar to be at, which Penny accepted as a valid reason. Sheldon noted afterwards that this lie could easily be found out by the simple method of tracking down the event in question and discovering that neither Leonard nor Sheldon were scheduled to attend. Never mind that Penny would not investigate this lie so thoroughly, even if she could. In response, Sheldon told Penny that they weren't going to a seminar, they were in fact going to a drug intervention for Sheldon's fake cousin, with blog and Facebook page detailing a descent into addiction and despair.
* ''Series/StargateAtlantis'' did this one episode. When the Asurans held the city, [=McKay=] had the team plant C4 explosives in the shield generators, supposedly so that when the shield activated it would essentially take itself down. However, he blabbed the whole plan to Woolsey, who can't resist the Asuran mind probe.[[spoiler:Here's the good part. That was actually part of the plan. The real plan was to have the Asurans find the C4, and thus overlook the crystals that turned the entire shield into a giant anti-replicator wave of doom that saved them all. I call this one Zany Scheme and BatmanGambit in one.]]

* ''Series/TopGear'': It's never just "How easy to drive is this this Ford Fiesta?" it's "Could this Fiesta evade bad guys while driving through a shopping centre? Could it do a beach assault with the Royal Marines?" The really zany schemes are just for their own sake, such as "Buy a cheap car and turn it into a boat", inevitably preceded by the words "[[CharacterCatchphrase How hard]] [[WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong can it be?]]"

* On ''Series/{{Hyperdrive}}'', [[spoiler:Teal]] constructs an intricate plan that falls somewhere between Zany Scheme and GambitRoulette involving chocolate, knockout gas, and the purchase of a planet, [[spoiler:just so she can get a date with Commander Henderson.]]
* In Series/TheOfficeUS episode, "Frame Toby", Dwight has a talking head moment at the end of the episode where he describes his perfect crime. His description of the crime however, qualifies it as this:
-->'''Dwight:''' I break into Tiffany's at midnight. Do I go for the vault? No. I go for the chandelier. It's priceless. As I'm taking it down, a woman catches me. She tells me to stop. It's her father's business. She's Tiffany. I say "no". We make love all night. In the morning the cops come and I escape in one of their uniforms. I tell her to meet me in Mexico but I go to Canada. I don't trust her. Besides, I like the cold. Thirty years later I get a postcard. I have a son, and he's the chief of police. (in an aside: ''This'' is where the story gets interesting.) I tell Tiffany to meet me in Paris by the Trocadero. She's been waiting for me all these years. She's never taken another lover. [[BaitAndSwitch I don't care. I don't show up. I go to Berlin.]] ''That's'' where I stashed the chandelier.
* Happens a lot in ''Series/OnlyFoolsAndHorses''. Likely most episodes in fact, although some, like the 'Peckham Spring' episode pretty much come to mind here.
* In the Brazilian TV series, ''Series/CityOfMen'', our protagonists use schemes for everything from getting our main character's sister and a gang leader together using notes and candy to avoiding the wrath of gang members by making a map of the favela. These plans often backfire.
* Incredibly common on ''Series/DesperateHousewives'', from all four leads.

* A staple on ''Series/ThreesCompany'' and a major plot point in the entire series, including the fact that Jack must pretend to be gay so he can live in the same apartment with two attractive girls.

* When in episode 2.02 of ''Series/WhiteCollar'', "Need to Know," Neal Caffrey requires $10,000 in cash on short notice, his associate Mozzie accesses one of Neal's secret caches through a pre-arranged zany scheme that involves various NoodleImplements which Mozzie acquires from FBI Peter Burke, refusing to explain their purpose until each is deployed.
* ''Series/{{House}}'' did this in an episode, in which Rachel swallows a coin and House and Wilson device a crazy plot to make sure Rachel won't be harmed while preventing Cuddy from finding out. Ultrasounds, fake cancer children, fake radiation leaks, and several illegal procedures ensue. [[spoiler:The kid poops it out fine later, though by that point, House and Wilson had concluded that she'd never swallowed it]]
* Maeby from ''Series/ArrestedDevelopment'' comes up with a few of these to "rebel" against her parents.
-->'''Maeby''': ...I'll walk up to my mom and say "I met this really cute guy" and she'll walk by and see us totally making out!
-->'''George Michael''': [[KissingCousins ... but we're cousins]]
-->'''Maeby''': That's what makes it funny!

* In ''Series/{{Community}}'' this happens quite frequently. It's the reason why a plan to get chicken fingers expanded into a racketeering empire.
-->'''Jeff:''' If we say we disapprove, we'll just drive her further into his hemp-braceleted arms. We need to be smart, we need to hatch a scheme.
* Cory and Shawn on ''Series/BoyMeetsWorld'' were fond of coming up with these, though this diminished in the later seasons as the characters grew up and the show [[CerebusSyndrome got more serious]].
* This trope combined with IndyPloy is pretty much standard operating procedure for Crichton on ''Series/{{Farscape}}''.
* Zany Schemes pop up all over the place on ''Series/{{Chuck}}''. Pretty much ''everything'' Lester does to boost sales or just plain slack off qualifies. Even the much more serious Sarah and Casey are NotSoAboveItAll.
** Chuck's plans on spy missions are often...unorthodox to say the least.
--> '''Sarah:''' [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments "Chuck, are you about to disarm a nuclear bomb with a box of fruit juice?"]]

* It comes up a great deal in ''Series/{{Grimm}}'' when trying to cover up the Wesen aspect of a crime, bringing to justice a Wesen whose crime cannot be adjudged by 'secular' law, or shielding a Wesen who may be technically guilty, but is not morally culpable.
* In ''Series/WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong'', the guys don't really want to get up to get a beer from the fridge. So they simply make a hole in the fridge, connect tubes and use vacuum systems to suck the cans from the fridge directly to the couch in the living room.
* The foundation for almost everything in ''Series/RaisingHope'', ranging from Virginia pawning her engagement ring, then buying it back, pawning it back to get back the items she used to buy it back in the first place, then re-pawning it again...; to Burt faking his own kidnapping to get a break from the family, which itself was secretly masterminded by Maw Maw; to the family plotting a complicated "heist" in order to break Maw Maw out of a nursing home; to Burt and Virginia stealing Jimmy and Sabrina's coffee, wallets and remote controls, and (slightly accidentally) bursting a water main in their house and finally, inviting Sabrina's ex-boyfriend Wyatt over for dinner - ''and move in'' - in order to create some sexy chaos a and tension when they believe Sabrina and Jimmy's intimate life is on the rocks.
** Lampshaded in the fourth season episode "Extreme Howdy's Makeover" where Sabrina pulls a Zany Scheme of her own. When exposed, Virginia observes:
-->'''Virginia:''' You believed in your husband ''so much'' that you lied to the people you love and manipulated everyone around you in the most convoluted way possible.
-->'''Burt:''' That's just what you would have done.
-->'''Virginia:''' ''(tears of joy)'' I know!
** Also lampshaded by Maw Maw in the fourth season episode "Dysfunction Function":
-->'''Maw Maw:''' ''(wearing a pirate costume)'' Are you doing one of your crazy plans where you dress up in costumes... and leave me out of it?
-->'''Virginia:''' No, Maw Maw, but if it turns into one of those, we'll let you know.
* ''Series/LastOfTheSummerWine:'' Pretty much every episode.

* ''Series/LazyTown'': Robbie comes up with one nearly every episode.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Newspaper Comics]]
* Before WesternAnimation/{{Popeye}} was introduced, most of the stories in Thimble Theater were about Castor Oyl's schemes to get rich quick. Popeye was added to the cast when Castor needed someone to help him sail to a casino near Africa.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Opera]]
* ''Theatre/TheMarriageOfFigaro'' teems with zany schemes. To stop the Count getting his aristocratic hands on Susanna, for instance, she and her fiance Figaro decide to outwit him by arranging an assignation between her and the Count but sending the page Cherubino dressed as a girl in her place. When the plan is rumbled they hit upon a new one: this time neglected Countess will disguise herself as Susanna and meet her own husband in the garden. Hilarity ensues, to the accompaniment of some of the most meltingly beautiful music ever written.
** The aria that Tim Robbins plays over the prison loudspeakers in ''Film/TheShawshankRedemption'' comes from the ''Marriage of Figaro''. It is Susanna and the Countess composing a fake love letter to the Count. This gives Red's line, 'I don't know what those two Italian ladies were singing about, and I don't want to know,' a certain irony. They sound so angelic that it's probably lucky he didn't learn what they were really up to.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Puppet Shows]]
* ''Series/KingdomAdventure'': Eventually, [[TheDragon Pitts']] attempts to get Keena's watering can degenerate into this—for starters, he thinks the watering can is magical, but it's ''not''. His bumbling guards further complicate matters.
* ''Series/TheMrPotatoHeadShow'': In one episode, Mr. Potato Head thinks that his rival is trying to hire away his star singer, so he sets out to give her the variety-show episode she wants, and everything else she wants, too...without letting her know why. She ends up thinking he's fallen in love with her. HilarityEnsues.
** Most of the characters' plans are relatively simple, but insanity always follows, regardless.
* ''Series/TheMuppetShow'': They wouldn't be the Muppets if they were straightforward planners. Miss Piggy, as the most ambitious, tends to be the most likely to come up with an absurd idea to get what she wants, such as faking massive popularity in order to get Kermit to give her a raise or tricking him into taking part in a "wedding sketch" that will be an actual wedding...from which he extricates himself by summoning Lew Zealand to perform his boomerang fish act and fleeing in the confusion.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Radio]]
* ''Radio/OurMissBrooks'': There must be a course in zany schemes over at Madison High School. Everybody has had one in the works, one time or another. These are just a few examples. [[ItMakesSenseInContext They all make sense in context.]]
** In "Two Way Stretch Snodgrass," Miss Brooks hatches a scheme to waylay Strech's transfer by having Mr. Conklin and her masquerade as the [[DumbJock dim athlete's]] equally dim parents.
** One of Walter Denton's schemes is a monstrous April Fool's Day joke, in "Wild Goose." He imitates a radio quizmaster, tricking Mr. Conklin into thinking he's won a TV from Sherry's Department Store. Cue Miss Brooks chasing down the stream of notes Walter left, in vain pursuit of the elusive television set.
** Mr. Conklin, pompous though he may be, isn't above the general zaniness either. In "The Big Jump," he plans to jump off the roof (onto a firemen's parachute) as part of a civil defense drill. He chickens out, and volunteers Miss Brooks to act as his stunt double.
** Mrs. Conklin gets into the act in "Non-Fraternization Policy." She's working to derail Mr. Conklin's newly imposed Islamic-style separation of the sexes at Madison.

* Oh so very often on ''Radio/TheGoonShow'', which - thanks to being written by Creator/SpikeMilligan - was able to make ''perfect sense'' ([[ItMakesSenseInContext within the context of the show, anyway]]) of a plan to drain a Scottish loch by making Ned Seagoon believe it granted immortality.
-->'''Grytpype-Thynne:''' You could be the first man to break the world land speed record in a Wurlitzer[[note]]pipe organ[[/note]].\\
'''Seagoon:''' I've never heard such a ridiculous idea.\\
'''Grytpype-Thynne:''' Neither have I, but there it is.
* Almost every episode of ''Radio/TheNavyLark'' involved either; a Get Rich Quick scheme by [[CMOTDibbler CPO Pertwee]], an attempt by [[StupidBoss Commodore Povey]] to drum the crew out of the navy, [[ChivalrousPervert Sub-Lieutenant Phillips]] trying to woo [[SassySecretary WRN. Chasen]], [[OnlySaneMan Cmdr. Murray]] trying to save his career from the lot of them, or [[GambitPileup all at once]].
* Henry Aldrich of ''Radio/TheAldrichFamily'' regularly tries these when he gets into a sticky situation, invariably making things worse. For example, when his parents order him to return the West Indian straw hat he has purchased as they think it looks silly, the shop assistant points out that since he has had it monogrammed, they cannot take it back, so Henry and his friend Homer Brown try combing the phone book to find someone with the initials H.A. who wears a size 6 1/2 hat and is willing to buy a straw hat for the $3 in store credit Henry's mother thinks he received. They try to narrow the list of possible buyers by calling the newspaper, only to lead the reporter to think Henry has been robbed (or otherwise done wrong by) someone with a straw hat with the initials H.A. - which causes problems for Henry's father when he secretly decides to keep the hat for himself and goes to have it enlarged...

[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
* Within the tabletop gaming fandom, these are typically referred to as "PC plans" or "PlayerCharacter plans" - those that don't boil down to "murder anything that makes my paladin's DetectEvil go off bing", anyway (and even some of those qualify, if the plan to pull off the murdering is weird enough). The patron saint of these plans, [[Blog/ThingsMrWelchIsNoLongerAllowedToDoInAnRPG Mr Welch]], for example, records in his famous list that he's been banned from attempting to use 20,000 pigeons as flying piranha, using armadillos as substitute cannonballs, bribing dragons with tummy rubs, fielding octogenarians in frontline combat, appointing a sabre-tooth tiger as his second in a duel, and ever making any plan that hinges on the medicinal value of dire wombats.

[[folder:Theatre]]
* In ''Theatre/{{Thirteen}}'', Evan comes up with a few of these to get his friends into an R-Rated movie.
--> '''Evan''': And all I have to do is...
* [[OlderThanSteam Dates back]] at least to Creator/{{Shakespeare}}. Consider ''Theatre/MuchAdoAboutNothing''. In fact, it's hard to find a Shakespeare play that ''doesn't'' contain at least one. Even the tragedies are usually caused by Zany Schemes GoneHorriblyWrong (or [[ManipulativeBastard ingeniously pulled off by the villain]]).
* Before Shakespeare, there was Creator/{{Plautus}}, and even ''he'' took inspiration from older sources.
* The ''CommediaDellArte'' is the TropeNamer, since the lower-class characters, or "Zanni", typically came up with schemes of this kind.

[[folder:Video Games]]
* Subverted in ''VideoGame/Persona3'': During one of the early Full Moon missions, the team is making preparations to break into the school when Junpei comments that he has everything "set to go." Because Junpei is [[IdiotHero just the sort of person who would try it]], everyone else assumes from the wording that he's rigged up some sort of bomb. His real plan is actually much simpler:
-->'''Yukari:''' An explosive? For real?!
-->'''Junpei:''' Nah, all I did was unlock a door...
* Given the NoodleImplements the player often had to work with during the heyday of AdventureGames, the solutions to many puzzles often became a Zany Scheme. ''Especially'' the more comically-minded series like ''VideoGame/MonkeyIsland'', ''VideoGame/KingsQuest'' or ''VideoGame/QuestForGlory''.
* ''VideoGame/RideToHellRetribution'': In order to get through an electrified fence, the game railroads you to... steal a tanker truck from a bunch of people, drive so far to the Hoover Dam, murder anyone that gets in your way (either on foot or smashing through them with the tanker you stole), pick up an assault rifle, cross the river solely to shoot that tanker up to the point it blows up and damages the dam, which will shut down the electrified fence; the next scene shows you climbing it up now that it's no longer electrified. That's an elaborately zany process to replace simpler solutions like, 'find a switch to turn off the fence'.
* In ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'', the [[LizardFolk Argonian]] race has something of a cultural knack for coming up with these. It is likely linked to their BlueAndOrangeMorality (what is "zany" to a human may not be to a tree-worshiping lizard) and their [[LanguageEqualsThought unusual thought processes]] (their native language, Jel, has no past or future tense verbs, leading Argonians to think and live "in the now").

* ''Series/TopGear'': It's never just "How easy to drive is this this Ford Fiesta?" it's "Could this Fiesta evade bad guys while driving through a shopping centre? Could it do a beach assault with the Royal Marines?" The really zany schemes are just for their own sake, such as "Buy a cheap car and turn it into a boat", inevitably preceded by the words "[[CatchPhrase How hard]] [[WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong can it be?]]"

* In the first ''Film/HighSchoolMusical'' movie, Chad and Taylor, along with their respective teams, the Wildcats and the school nerds, cook up a plan to drive Troy and Gabriella away from the upcoming musical so they can focus on their own competitions instead, the upcoming Championship game and the Academic Decathlon. Namely, Troy's teammates exploit his [[WellDoneSonGuy desire of approval from his father]] by reminding him of East High's legacy of basketball triumphs and his dad's role in it, and Troy, feeling the pressure, is forced to lie and say that Gabriella and the musical are only distractions, while Taylor and the other nerds film the moment with a webcam they hid in the locker room and show it to Gabriella, making her assume Troy doesn't really care for her. The whole thing works a [[GoneHorriblyRight tad too well]] and causes Troy and Gabriella to feel way too downhearted to properly focus on anything, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone much to the regret]] of the Wildcats and the nerds.