The Klutz

He's also known for being dimwitted.

Reggie Mantle: What did the klutz do this time?
Veronica Lodge: He somehow walked into my locker door.

— Archie Comics

This is a character that everyone knows and loves. So long as they aren't involved in their plans, anyway. The Klutz bumbles, stumbles and fumbles at seemingly anything they do, but they are kept around for one reason or another. The unstated reason is that they make a great Plucky Comic Relief or a perfect mixture with The Ditz when making comical blunders because of their funnily clumsy nature, and serve as a humanizing accessory to a hero if the character in question is The Stoic.

There are varying degrees of klutziness, of course. Some characters are fairly capable with a notable tendency to trip, drop things, forget important tasks, or just plain hurt themselves with their reckless use of explosives, while others can effectively be a force of raw chaos, inducing Deus ex Machina levels of disaster that can foil even the best-laid plan. When their klutz-aura is potent enough to leave smoking wreckage and screaming victims in their usually oblivious wake, they ascend to Lethal Klutz status.

A broader supertrope covering those characters that cannot be fit into the narrower Cute Clumsy Girl/Dojikko, which combines with Ms. Fanservice, The Ditz, and The Woobie specifically to transform the character into a Moe factory. Klutziness may be the bunny ears on the Bunny-Ears Lawyer, where their clumsiness is forgiven when they possess valuable knowledge or work skills where their utter lack of grace is not such an impediment. May occasionally transform into The Millstone or Spanner in the Works, depending on how well the heroes can point the klutz at their enemy's plans, and away from their own. If the klutz is routinely The Millstone, the audience may be compelled to yell "Just Eat Gilligan!"

Often used as an excuse to inject The Pratfall and other elements of Slapstick comedy. If characters are like this due to an unexpected transformation, that's Stumbling in the New Form. Interestingly, they may actually be Graceful in Their Element— it's just not land.

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Examples:

Advertising

• Delbert the La Choy Dragon, a Jim Henson Muppet used to advertise La Choy Chow Mein, tries to convince people of how tasty and convenient his product is, causing lots of collateral damage in the process. Most often, he'll knock things over with his tail and set things on fire when using his Breath Weapon to cook the chow mein. This commercial, for example, shows Delbert absolutely demolishing an unfortunate woman's kitchen before busting a hole through the wall while leaving.
• Nipper & Gramophone's Christmas Tales: Gramophone has a tendency to be clumsy, providing much of the humour in the ads.
  From the website: But because gramophones (even excitable ones) aren’t the most agile of contraptions, his antics often end in disaster. He’s invariably disappointed when they do, but he needn’t worry. It’s his hapless high jinks that makes Nipper such a fan in the first place. [sic]
• The titular Pepsiman from Pepsiman is the heroic kind because while he is an Butt-Monkey/Chew Toy, Pepsiman would make tons of clumsy decisions, stumbles a lot before and after delivering Pepsi and usually doesn't pay attention to his surroundings in most commercials.

Anime & Manga

• Misuzu from Air is exactly this. Much of the comic relief lies in her tripping and falling on her face whenever she starts running.
• Osaka of Azumanga Daioh.
  • Chiyo oftentimes as well.
  • Kimura's Wife displays traits of this as well as an All-Loving Hero. Now that's a combination you don't see very often.
• Dr. Tearju Lunatique from Black Cat to a very small extent. She trips several times, and each time she has some sort of strange food or something that stains/burns that always lands on Sven. She ruins two of his Fedoras in the course of one chapter (once with a substance that's supposed to be eggs, and again with scalding hot tea). Sven even questions how the hell she managed to trip over her own feet when attempting to carry the tea.
  • Her expies in To Love Ru Darkness, as far as we've seen, including apparent inability to walk properly if something NSFW would happen otherwise.
• Black Lagoon:
  • The Loveless family maid Roberta is completely inept in any housework. She's using the job as a cover, being a former FARC guerrilla fighter and international terrorist.
  • Greenback Jane from her self-titled arc is another big example, though she's nowhere near the unstoppable badass Roberta is.
• Lilika from Burn Up! Scramble. Especially when drunk.
• Miranda from D.Gray-Man went through a lot of jobs thanks to this.
• Daisuke in D.N.Angel is another male example, and an odd one. Given that he's a bit of a ditz at times, he has a tendency to trip or not watch where he's going. That being said, he's been trained since he was a young child to be a Phantom Thief, so he normally can perform an aerobatic save — but he doesn't want people to know his "weird" background, so he often purposefully flubs it at the last moment.
• Nyu, the innocent split personality of Ax-Crazy Lucy in Elfen Lied.
  • Another example from Elfen Lied would be Kisaragi, Kurama's "clumsy secretary." Lucy rips her head off and uses her body as a shield in the first 6 minutes 30 seconds.
• Tohru Honda from Fruits Basket. The whole reason she discovers the Sohma curse is because she trips and grabs onto Kyo while trying to stop Kyo and Yuki from fighting, followed by panicking and running into Shigure and Yuki. In the manga at one point, she tries to break a watermelon with her bare hands, just to cause herself a lot of pain. Tohru seems prone to spacing out and/or not knowing what's going on.
  • Tohru's mom, Kyoko, is also a good example, the best is example is a flashback, when she hits Tohru in the head with a cabinet. This could also be an example of Tohru's cluminess and ditziness, as she just simply giggles. Though she still sends Kyoko into a state of panic.
  • Kisa Sohma would fall into this category too.
• Mai's mother in Futari wa Pretty Cure Splash★Star, explained as being due to a lack of sleep — she works as an archaeologist of the non-adventuring kind, and frequently pulls all-nighters.
• In GaoGaiGar, one member of each pair of the "Dragon Brothers" (and according to Super Robot Wars, the Dragon Sisters) is very bad at landing when launched into battle (see here).
  • Funny thing is, it is usually the Red Oni counterpart who is prone to crash-land, as proven with the Dragon Brothers. But for the Dragon Sisters, it's the Blue Oni who is the one to crash-land.
  • However, in the actual show, KouRyu (the "red" one) never has to land, but has a great deal of comical trouble maneuvering in space.
    • AnRyu crashing is from Super Robot Wars W.
  • Actually, in the aforementioned scene in FINAL, both of them crash-landed. AnRyu simply had a more spectacular one, more akin to EnRyu's kind of "landing" as opposed to the simple "thud" that KouRyu experienced. Given that they were both falling in from orbit and had likely been tossed away by Puranus, though...it's kind of understandable.
• Jinpei in Gatchaman, through a combination of his young age and tendency to leap before he looks.
• A repeatedly lampshaded trait of Eto "Careless Hachibe" Hachibe from Iono the Fanatics. She desperately tried to hide it using her side, but alas, clumsiness is just one of those things that are really to control.
• Isabelle of Paris: In the first episode, Isabelle gets her Pimped-Out Dress stuck on a chair while trying to show off to her big sister Geneviève.
• Katri, Girl of the Meadows: Katri, being a child, is prone to slipping up whenever she's working at a Big Fancy House as a maid. Her first employers were harsh, but her second ones, the Kuuselas, were more benevolent and told her it wasn't a problem.
• Mischievous Twins: The Tales of St. Clare's: On her first day of school, Allison accidentally sets fire to a fifth-former's research papers. That, and her inability to follow the rules, makes her not well liked amongst the rest of her peers.
• Koyomi, the protagonist of Modern Magic Made Simple. Her only magical skill is summoning falling basins, and she tends to get herself into trouble even when that's not happening.
• My-HiME gives us a rare villainous example in Nagi, who often likes to perch on top of buildings or trees and will often fall from those same places.
• Sancho and Pedro from The Mysterious Cities of Gold, who bear the brunt of the physical comedy and whose Gold Fever regularly leads them into obvious traps that blow up the building they're standing in.
• Naruto starts out as a klutz in the beginning of his series.
  • Tobi is one as well intentionally.
• Pokémon: The Series:
  • Dawn's Piplup is a mon version of this. When it tries to stretch itself up in ego, it falls over. It'd be quite a bit more liked if it weren't used so damn often.
  • Better examples are Ash's Gligar (who has a tendency to crash into Ash prior to evolution) and Misty's Psyduck (which is dopey and would either win or lose depending on what particular antics it's doing).
• Akane Tendo of Ranma ½ is the klutz in spite of being a Tsundere with greater-than-average strength and martial arts training (if severely outclassed by every other fighter in the series). She gets teased for it a lot, even in the threat of her Hyperspace Mallet. Unlike some other examples, though, she usually learns from her mistakes —for example, when she tried to learn rhythmic gymnastics, she made a mess of everything and tripped over her own feet... but by the end of the week she was pretty good at it, and by the end of the manga she pulls off feats of near-superhuman agility.
• Yomiko Readman of Read or Die, although she is outclassed by Joker's assistant Wendy's Cute Clumsy Girl antics.
• Dino from Reborn! (2004) takes this to extremes: when his fellow mafia family members are present, he's especially skilled and all-around awesome. Without them, though, he gets so clumsy that he can't even eat a simple meal without getting it on himself, or walk up or down stairs without tripping and falling (mostly onto Tsuna for added effect.) When the series shifts into action territory, however, this trait seems to be all but written out of the plot.
• Louie from Rune Soldier Louie to the point where the first volume of the US DVDs is called "Enter the Klutz".
• Sailor Moon: Yuuichirou, the guy who works with Rei at the shrine, is klutzy.
• Amelia from Slayers manages to be a formidable magic user, in spite of general klutziness and sometimes being The Ditz.
• Kiara the Amaranthine from There, Beyond the Beyond, despite being the most sought-after magical artefact in the world, trips over her own feet quite often.
• Kotetsu T. Kaburagi from Tiger & Bunny is not known for his grace. Even on active superhero duty. Especially on active superhero duty.
• Taiga Aisaka from Toradora! is an unusual case; she's not particularly clumsy in the sense of tripping over, dropping things or bumping into people (she's actually remarkably athletic), but she's capable of acts of startling carelessness. Most notably, she not only put a love letter in the wrong boy's bag, she actually forget to put the letter in the envelope!
• Donquixote "Corazon" Rocinante, the brother of Donquixote Doflamingo, from One Piece. He is shown setting himself on fire while trying to light a cigarette, tripping over nothing, or, in one instance, setting himself on fire while tripping over nothing.
  • Spandam is notably clumsy. Shortly after he's introduced, he accidentally knocks over a ladder and drops a can of paint all over himself. In his first present-day appearance, he spills coffee all over himself, while talking with his subordinates before taunting an old enemy of his.

Comic Books

• Archie from Archie Comics. When Jughead was invited to an Andrews family reunion, he notices that the clumsiness is a trait that is shared among Archie's entire family.
• In the 2015 Archie reboot, it arguably goes past just "clumsiness" and into superhumanly bad luck. Case in point, he somehow manages to set ice cream on fire.
• Awkwardman from the Inferior Five. He's been known to bump his head on panel borders and knock over the laws of perspective when he falls. That's right, this man is so clumsy that the conventions of the medium and physics both topple before his fumbling.
• The Flash: At least one version of his origin gives this explanation for just how Jay Garrick got exposed to that heavy water that gave him super-speed. See, one night in a high school chemical lab, Jay decided to light up a cigarette, and managed to knock over some vials. In his attempt to catch them, he knocked over several more, resulting in a very large cloud of mixed gases and goodness-knows-what-else which very nearly kills Jay. Mercifully, his gaining super-speed cures Jay of his clumsiness.
• G.I. Joe:
  • Wildcard literally accidentally breaks everything he touches without fail. Sooner or later, it will happen.
  • Tripwire trips over air and his shaky hands can't keep a grip on anything for long... unless he's handling explosives, that is.
  • Bazooka has been shown repeatedly tripping and pratfalling while carrying a live LAW rocket launcher and firing it in the bargain. Very nearly a Lethal Klutz in the movie, where his habit of tripping, falling, and firing off rockets very nearly kills Shipwreck during the intro.
• This is one of the many ways in which Gaston Lagaffe makes a mess of things.
• Klak from Pocket God is very clumsy, which often leads to his death. In fact, he dies the second-most often in the series; behind Nooby.
• Disney Ducks Comic Universe: Fethry Duck is an incredible example, capable of causing immense damage through it. He also knows he's this, and has taken advantage by working as a demolition worker or, in one memorable occasion, having himself hired by the villains of the story to sabotage them.
• Clark Kent is often written as this, particularly in All-Star Superman. His clumsiness is entirely affected, of course, because it makes him look incompetent and therefore not Superman, and it allows him to subtly use his powers while still disguised (for instance, stumbling into someone to push them out of the way of a falling object).
• Mad Magazine artist Don Martin created Captain Klutz, a superhero who earned his name through sheer accident. He was an impoverished schlub who tried to commit suicide by jumping out his tenement building window but got caught up on the way down in some laundry—namely a pair or red long johns, a yellow towel and a handwashing glove. He then landed on top of a fleeing bank robber who called him a Klutz. The police asked who he was, and dazed he replied "I'm a klutz, Captain." The officer took it as a word switch and christened him Captain Klutz.
• Wonder Woman Vol 1: "Glitch" categorizes the entire alien species of Ytirflirks, that had once enslaved his own people, as lumbering klutzes. While they are certainly not as sprightly or agile as "Glitch" he seems to be overstating things when they're met as they're really only clumsy in comparison to "Glitch" or Diana.

Comic Strips

• Blondie (1930): Dagwood Bumstead is known for this trait. His boss once gave him a check because he did not mess up things all day. Cue him messing up this immediately.
• Clumsy Carp from the comic B.C.. In one strip, Peter and Thor are watching Clumsy approach from far away, across a flat plain that's totally featureless... except for one small rock, which he duly trips over. Peter turns to Thor and says "Pay up." He's also charged five times the standard admission to an antiques show in one strip. He has tripped over beaches. Beaches.

Fan Works

• Hetalia: Axis Powers fanfic Gankona, Unnachgiebig, Unità: One word...Italy. Not that Italy can't move without crashing or falling, but still.
• Lucy's Secret: Lynn, apparently, becomes very clumsy whenever she's injured, meaning that she can't have pranked Lucy with a bowl of water, since Lynn currently has a broken ankle and thus would have stumbled around and woken Lucy up.
• Neither a Bird nor a Plane, it's Deku!: Despite his Kryptonian Super-Reflexes and Super-Speed, Izuku is rather klutzy. Bakugou used to sneer at him for being unable to dance the Batusi. As a teenager, he doesn't watch where he's going and crashes into Kendo Rappa. He also trips from nervousness on his way to the U.A. Entrance Exam.
• Mayor Joe Biden from Miraculous: The Phoenix Rises, who trips and falls down a very short flight of stairs after giving a speech to the school.
• Among the Mobile Suit Gundam Wing fandom, Duo has a reputation as being clumsy, despite being quite known for agility (both in and out of his Gundam) and never once tripping or breaking something important in-series.

Films — Animation

• The titular Arthur of Arthur Christmas is constantly tripping over things. Wearing oversized slippers for most of the film doesn't help.
• A Bug's Life: For most of the film, most of Flik's good intentions just backfire constantly and few things go well for him.
• Disney's Hercules, specifically as a teenager, due to his Super-Strength combined with an adolescent's typical clumsiness. Even after completing his training to become a hero, Herc still retains some of his flaws, and makes a lot of mistakes in his battles, such as losing his sword. The TV series based on his teen years use this as a recurring theme.
• Ratatouille: Linguini's whole first night in the kitchen is filled with him bumbling around and crashing into everything in sight—he almost kills Rémy when he accidentally knocks his glass jar into the river. He's somehow more graceful when Rémy is controlling him like a crazy puppet. That said, when he's waiting on rollerskates at the film's climax, he proves himself to be very adept at the job.
• Jeremy the crow from The Secret of NIMH, though he seems a much better flier than walker.
• In Turning Red, Mei initially isn't very coordinated falling over (or nearly so) three times within the first three minutes of the film. She is especially so in her giant red panda form bumping into and knocking down everything within reach the first couple times she transforms.
• WALL•E: The titular WALL•E has a tendency for falling down things. Having treads doesn't help.

Films — Live-Action

• In A Boy Called Po, the titular autistic boy is so accident-prone that at one point a CPS worker visits his home to see if his father is beating him.
• The titular character of Eddie the Eagle is extremely accident prone managing to knock over an entire ski team and fall down a 70m ski jump slope. Notably, the real life Eddie "The Eagle" Edwards was nicknamed Mr. Magoo by the press for his clumsiness.
• Godmothered: Eleanor blows up a pumpkin patch and crashes into Hugh Prince on a sled among other things, all by accident.
• Godzilla of all creatures, particularly during the Showa era. During his rampages and monster fights, the King of the Monsters frequently loses his footing and tumbles to the ground (often taking out a building or two in the process).
  • This was all too common in the actual filming of such scenes, particularly in the first movie; stunt actors would often topple over due to the awkwardness of the toe spread.
• Chunk in The Goonies. Mikey even uses Chunk's clumsiness to break the Treasure Map from its frame. "What'd you break this time, Chunk?"
• Corporal Jonathan Kent from Gunless is extremely clumsy. In his first appearance, he gets his glove caught in Sean's door and can't extract it. Later, he wreaks havoc on the dance floor by wearing a dress sword at the company dance.
• Gang-du from The Host (2006) is constantly falling flat on his face. Notably, it ends in tragedy when he tries to drag his daughter away from a giant monster, falls over, gets back up and grabs what he thinks is her hand but is really another girl's.
  • Nam-il is just as clumsy, even though he criticizes his brother for being a screw-up. He's just as likely to trip up, and he drops a molotov cocktail he intended to throw at the monster.
• Hot Shots! Part Deux had an extended Plank Gag with President Benson striking everyone except Gerald Ford with a shovel... and Ford still manages to fall down while standing still.
• Miss Prism from The Importance of Being Earnest is this, especially as played by Margaret Rutherford. There's a moment in the film where she gets her watch chain tangled with her eyeglass chain holder and Cecily either hides a giggle, or Dorothy Tutin is Corpsing and they threw it in
• At the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Elsa Schneider turns into a major klutz at the worst possible time. After crossing a forbidden boundary with the Holy Grail, she loses her balance due to an earthquake and she drops the grail. She sprints after it but in her haste, she clumsily trips and knocks the grail into a crevice. This sets up a Take My Hand! moment where she tries to reach it while holding onto Indiana. Her hand comes up inches short and she falls to her death. Had she been less reckless, she might’ve recovered the grail before it fell into the chasm in the first place.
• In Kenny & Company, Kenny and Doug try to keep Sherman out of their workshop because he breaks everything he touches.
• Charles from The Lady Eve suffers five pratfalls over the course of the film.
• Seymour in both The Little Shop of Horrors and its recursive adaptation Little Shop of Horrors. In the original, he's a Lethal Klutz.
• Jo from Please Turn Over often acts without concentrating, which leads to trouble:
  Edward: Girl!
  Jo: What?
  Edward: "What"? Look! Look what you've done!
  Jo: Well, I'm sorry, I wasn't concentrating.
  Edward: Exactly. Exactly. That's your trouble, your entire trouble. You never concentrate and look what happens. Nasty soggy paper! An' I haven't even read it.
• Cadet (later Officer) Fackler in the Police Academy films. Oddly, most of his mishaps inflict injury on people other than himself.
• Safety Patrol:
  • Scout is constantly injuring people or triggering Disaster Dominoes while trying to show off his dedication to safety.
  • Within the space of two minutes, Chief of Security Penn pours an entire pitcher of water on his boss's arm while trying to fill her cup, accidentally breaks a pull-down chart by pulling too hard on the cord, and then falls out the window into a dumpster.
• Star Wars' Jar Jar Binks, on his own admission: "Messa... clumsy."
• Wendell of Tricky People can't even play with a Newton's cradle without making a complete mess of his boss's desk.
• John in Feuer und Eis {Fire and Ice) on the ski slopes in Aspen, as told by narrators Suzy Chaffee and John Denver throughout this scene.

Literature

• Julia Larwood in the Hilary Tamar books, to the point that when her friends are trying to locate her after a wild night out, a bartender in a nightclub remembers her as "the woman who dropped things".
• Bella Swan from Twilight always makes a point of discussing her klutzy tendencies. Which, conveniently, hides all her injuries from her altercations with vampires.
  • Spoofed to hell and back with the extravagant clumsiness of Belle Goose in the Harvard Lampoon's parody, Nightlight.
• Prince Rhun in The Chronicles of Prydain: The Castle of Llyr. As Fflewddur put it, "If there were a field with one stone he'd trip over it!" And get back up with a smile on his face.
• Penlan from Sandy Mitchell's Ciaphas Cain novels.
  "Penlan?" Kasteen looked thoughtful for a moment. "Isn't she the one they call Jinxie?"
  "Yes." I nodded. "But she's not nearly as accident prone as she's supposed to be. I'll grant you she fell down an ambull tunnel once, and there was that incident with the frag grenade and the latrine trench, but things tend to work out for her. The orks on Kastafore was as surprised as she was when the floor in the factory collapsed, and we'd have walked right into that hrud ambush on Skweki if she hadn't triggered the mine by chucking an empty food tin away..." I trailed off, finally listening to what I was saying. "You know how troopers tend to exaggerate these things," I finished lamely.
  • But the troopers want to be near her; they think she soaks up all the bad luck in the vicinity.
• Harry Potter:
  • Neville Longbottom in the early books, due to his near-constant nervousness.
  • Tonks. She nearly failed her Auror's exams because of her poor stealth skills, and passed only because of her handy Voluntary Shapeshifting abilities.
• Jackie Rodowsky, a regular charge of the Baby-Sitters Club, and nicknamed "the walking disaster".
• Fitz Kreiner from the Doctor Who Expanded Universe. He's not as cartoonishly clumsy as some of these examples, but no other character in the Eighth Doctor Adventures is anywhere near as clumsy as he is. One gets the impression that if there's a possible obstacle, he finds and trips over it, and if there isn't one, he just trips over his own feet instead. He once got a Twisted Ankle climbing on a rock wall, which ended up serving as a plot device to split him up from the main group, and to make matters worse, he attempted to kick someone with his injured foot. And he's admitted himself he's rather uncoordinated.
• Sachar in Oblomov, who regularly breaks stuff.
• Sidney Rampulsky in the Macdonald Hall series. He is so bad that the assistant headmaster orders him to learn ballet in the neighbouring girl's school to learn some coordination. He tries so hard to get out in one session that his klutziness gets even worse and he single-handedly destroys the gym!
• Nijel the Barbarian in the Discworld novel Sourcery. If he was lost in a trackless wasteland, you could find him by putting something delicate and precious on the ground, and hurrying back when you heard the crash.
• The "Mémoires des Sanson" show Charles-Henri Sanson as one. He botches several executions and make a fool of himself in front of the ladies.
• As British statesman Lord Chesterfield wrote about them in Letters to His Son: "He is at a loss what to do with his hat, when it is not upon his head; his cane (if unfortunately he wears one) is at perpetual war with every cup of tea or coffee he drinks; destroys them first, and then accompanies them in their fall. His sword is formidable only to his own legs, which would possibly carry him fast enough out of the way of any sword but his own. His clothes fit him so ill, and constrain him so much, that he seems rather, their prisoner than their proprietor." (letter 83)
• In The Last Superhero, Orville Wagner and his wife had to get out of superheroing because they tended to hurt people and property using their powers of Super-Strength and Super-Speed respectively.
• Furguson, an adolescent werewolf from the Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I. series, is so clumsy that he contracted lycanthropy when he tried to lay his passed-out-drunk Hairball uncle on the couch and scratched himself on the guy's claws.
• Kea's Flight: Gabria Laud, one of the rems, has such poor motor skills that she almost loses her balance every time she tries to change direction while walking.
• Bounders: On Earth, Jasper is made fun of for his clumsiness, among other ADHD symptoms.
• the secret lives of Princesses: Princess Miss Hap. Exiled to an island for breaking all she touches and some princes.
• In Rosaleen among the Artists, Katie's husband Pete is a shipping clerk who's always hurting himself in various minor accidents, like dropping crates on his feet. He spends so much time laid up that it's hard for the family to make ends meet.

Live-Action TV

• Angel: Wesley in his early post-Buffy appearances. For the love of god, don't let him near an axe.
• Bill Dance, host of Bill Dance Outdoors, and arguably a contender for the trope codifier in real life, is known just as much for his bloopers as he is for his professional angling [1].
• Chuck Bartowsky. He gets the team into as many scrapes as he gets them out of. Whether this trait will be overcome by the neo-Intersect remains to be seen.
• D.I. Humphrey Goodman from Death in Paradise. Nary an episode goes by without him tripping or knocking something over. In his very first episode, he falls out of a window.
• Susan Mayer of Desperate Housewives. Sometimes her accidents actually steer the plot.
• Dick Van Dyke. Sometimes.
• Doctor Who:
  • Ryan Sinclair, companion of the Thirteenth Doctor, has dyspraxia.
  • The Doctor himself, as portrayed by Matt Smith, is plenty clumsy and awkward. Steven Moffat has a very funny bit in his Doctor Who Magazine column about the utter madness of writing a script where Matt runs around with a flaming torch. And Steven Moffat calls him out on this in one panel.
    "How can you drop something upwards when you're sitting still? [...] He's clumsy when he's not in motion!"
  • The Second Doctor could also manage a fairly impressive display of clumsiness as part of Patrick Troughton's general tendency towards clowning and physical comedy.
    Two: (to Jamie) Now do be quiet, there's a good chap. And for heaven's sake, don't knock into anything.
    [Immediately knocks something over, forcing Jamie to catch it]
• Family Matters: Steve "Did I do that?" Urkel is infamous for causing disasters everywhere and destroying Carl's property as a result of his outright clumsiness.
• Fraggle Rock has Traveling Matt. His explorations are usually punctuated by him tripping over or walking into something. His puppeteer Dave Goelz said this was to make his "Outer Space" segments more interesting.
• Frasier: Niles Crane is so uncoordinated he once hit himself in the face with a coin he tossed. His reaction was to flail about so much he knocked over several decorative objects on the way. In the final season, Daphne gently tosses a banana to him which causes him to flail and fall backwards in such a dramatic way he knocks his father's gun off the table causing it to misfire and damage several pieces of furniture.
• George Bird from Friends and Neighbours (1954) isn't the most coordinated, often doing things such as tripping over vacuum cleaners and collapsing a card table.
• Captain Parmenter in F Troop, who pratfalls on a regular basis. As it did for Maxwell Smart, it also came in handy on occasion (particularly when dealing with a double).
• Game of Thrones: Jaime, thanks to instinctively reaching for things with his golden hand. Most characters politely pretend not to notice.
• The George Lopez Show had a Recurring Character named Accidental Amy (played by executive producer Sandra Bullock).
• Get Smart: Max's clumsiness has actually saved him (and the whole of CONTROL more than once) in many occasions from KAOS.
• Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor from Home Improvement. Oh oh oh oh oh oh OH.
  • In one episode he overly polished the wooden floor in the basement for his eldest son's birthday party, causing his son's girlfriend to slip and injury herself. When they get to the hospital, it's revealed that he knows the name of the vast majority of the hospital staff due to the amount of times he's visited. When his son asks about it, the nurse shows him a thick folder saying that's only for the times he's been in that month. Tim also comments it's the first time he's been to the hospital without being injured himself, only to walk into a door and break his nose.
• Parodied in iCarly, where the titular Show Within a Show airs a joke trailer for a movie starring a teenage heroine who "falls down a lot for no reason."
  • A Take That! for the example just below?! Or maybe to Nick alumna Amanda Bynes in What a Girl Wants?
• LazyTown: Milford doesn't even know which side of the hammer to use to hammer a nail. Frequently seen with fingers covered in bandages from trying to do chores for Ms. Busybody.
• Thomas in the "Story of Everest" sketch from Mr. Show, who knocks over his parents' thimble collection repeatedly.
• Adam Savage of MythBusters is known and loved not just for his science, but his tendency to hurt himself repeatedly.
  • And if Adam isn't hurting himself, chances are colleague Tory Belleci is.
    • If he isn't too busy hurting Grant Imahara.
  • "Let's egg him on until he hurts himself. That's always fun."
• Chevy Chase's parody of Gerald Ford on Saturday Night Live portrayed the president as a clumsy fellow who broke and dropped things, knocked things over, did pratfalls, and generally acted befuddled.
• Scrubs had Julie, one of J.D.'s girlfriends of the week (played by Zach Braff's girlfriend-at-the-time Mandy Moore). It comes as a bit of a surprise when Elliot predicts J.D. to be the one who eventually screws up their relationship. (Surely enough, he does.)
  • J.D. and Elliot do have this as well, though Julie just takes it to the extremes.
• Jas in So Awkward is bright, upbeat and endlessly optimistic. She is also incredibly clumsy, to the point where she worries that she might be too clumsy to be a bridesmaid and worries about accidentally demolishing the wedding. Her father Mr. Salford is, if anything, even worse, to the point that the headmistress Mrs Griggs keeps desperately moving objects out his way whenever he visits her office.
• Male example: Jack Tripper from Three's Company, who'd usually trip on the sofa.
  • Chrissy's cousin Cindy is even more of one.
• Deputy Andy Brennan from Twin Peaks. He's by far the clumsiest person in the town, although it occasionally helps the protagonists get the clues to further their investigation.
• War and Peace (1972): Pierre has several moments of clumsiness. Countess Rostov amusingly notes that whenever Pierre visits, he will knock into a table in the hall.
• The West Wing:
  • Sam Seaborn. Both verbally and physically.
    Congressman Reeseman: I heard the 'clang' and the 'ow' and I figured it must be Sam Seaborn.
  • CJ Cregg. Her first appearance on the show involves her crashing on a treadmill when trying to read her pager.
  • Klutziness is one of President Bartlet's Bunny Ears, the other him being a nerd.

Music

• Parodied in the Country Music song "I Break Things" by Erika Jo. She admits to being a klutz who "make[s] things snap and fall apart"... including other people's hearts.

Tabletop Games

• Dungeons & Dragons:
  • Extremely obscure example: Derider Fanshaen, an NPC of the Greyhawk setting, introduced in the 1980s. Painfully clumsy to the point that she had to be let go from her early adventuring party when she managed to destroy a number of valuable (and fragile) magic items. She later was relieved of certain duties when training for the priesthood of Pelor because she kept destroying glass objects that the temple had a difficult time affording to replace. It got so bad that at one point in canon fluff, she actually started to half-believe that glass and crystal objects had a mind of their own and were jumping off tables in her presence just to screw with her. At the same time, she is not someone to mess with: she's one of the most powerful clerics in the city of Greyhawk, so she can smite you to oblivion if you threaten the city. Also one of the ruling oligarchs of Greyhawk, meaning she's politically as well as magically powerful^note They're also the first organization that she's worked with that can absorb the fiscal cost of her clumsiness — when she accidentally tipped over a tray of expensive glassworks in the presence of the Lord Mayor, she shrank down in shame, guilt and fear. He merely laughed and had another set brought in.. And still one of the nicest people around. It's taken to the point where her Dexterity stat is listed at 4, and a description of her quarters in another supplement entirely still emphasized that all the potion containers in her treasure inventory were made of metal, not breakable glass or ceramic.
  • Must be a cleric thing in general. The 3.5 iconic cleric, Jozan, is depicted as being a klutz when it comes to anything more dexterous than bashing things and dodging (though he is pretty good at that). His complete inability to successfully sneak around quietly, in particular, causes some issues. Alhandra and Lidda needle him about his klutziness occasionally, much to his embarrassment in the former situation and annoyance in the latter.
  • Depending on character build, Dexterity is a not-uncommon Dump Stat for clerics in D&D. Almost every other stat is useful — Wisdom is important for spellcasting, Strength for when they join the fighter in melee, Intelligence for more skills/proficiencies, Constitution to help tank heavy blows as a front-liner... Even Charisma can be useful, depending on edition. Combined with few skills that use Dexterity, being The Medic, and a habit of wearing heavy armor, it's almost safe to let Dex suck when everything else demands attention too.
• The Clumsy trait is usually Played for Laughs in Rocket Age, but when things become tense it can quickly become Played for Drama.
• There is a "Klutz" and "Complete Klutz" disadvantage in GURPS.
• Setback in Sentinels of the Multiverse can be pretty clumsy - not so much from a lack of coordination as being Born Unlucky. His cards include one where he's shown accidentally stepping on some of Bunker's powersuit tech, another one where he's fallen off a roof and landed on top of Cosmic Omnitron, one where he's making a fumbling attack that damages his opponent and himself equally...

Video Games

• Cal-Vina in Agarest: Generations of War Zero is so clumsy that Routier specifically — and very seriously — asks Eugene to make sure he never holds a knife. As she says:
  Routier: "You see, my brother is awfully clumsy. So much so that it is, at times, mistaken for a strange sort of skill."
• Shurelia from Ar tonelico: Melody of Elemia starts off as a somewhat cold Ladyof War, but after you actually get her into your party and put her into a costume other than the Linker suit, it becomes apparent that she's incredibly clumsy. She will actually fall over after casting spells, and gets lost repeatedly in the course of the game. In spite of all of this, she's probably the smartest character in the game. Jacqli from the second game will also almost fall over while casting spells.
• Bear & Breakfast: Implied when Margaret sternly tells Hank not to lose the quest notebook again when she gives it to him before his morning trek. Anni and Will, on the other hand, give her knowing looks, to Hank's embarrassment.
• Many characters from the Carmen Sandiego games:
  • The photographers in the 1995 Carmen Sandiego: Junior Detective Edition. It's no wonder they can never get a full photo of the villain and have to send bits and pieces at a time.
  • The ICK brothers from Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego and Where in the U.S.A. Is Carmen Sandiego? both from 1996. They're pretty much your typical Bumbling Janitors, complete with frogs in their overalls and Garden Hose Squirt Surprises.
• In Coffee Talk Episode 2: Hibiscus and Butterfly, Officer Jorji tends to drop his "lucky" lighter whenever he leaves the café, so he asks you to return it to him the next time he visits.
• Though all Dead Rising characters besides Frank have limited screentime, Paul does a good job of looking The Klutz. His post-miniboss-fight cutscene goes without saying, but even during the fight, the easiest/least damaging way to get a chance to attack him is to wait for him to get bowled over by one of his own explosives.
• Anthony the pageboy, one of Eternal Darkness's Chosen, is a protagonist example. Let's see, he reads a cursed scroll he was meant to take straight to the king, knocks open a coffin containing the body of a priest who was killed by Bonethieves, drops a vase (which turned out to contain a component for Magick, so no problem there), potentially stabs himself... yeah, it's hard to think of a hindering flaw as cute rather than worrisome in a Lovecraft Expy work. The only thing that would keep him from getting himself killed is that thanks to the curse he spends his chapter gradually turning into a zombie and therefore unable to die normally or significantly injure himself.
• In Dot's Home, Hank often drops his wallet and, in other times, forgets that it was with him the whole time, to Evelyn's frustration.
• Final Fantasy:
  • Final Fantasy VII:
    • Yuffie is... interesting. During the Bahamut Sin fight in Advent Children, she leaped from building to building, effortlessly catching the her shuriken no matter what happened to it in flight, and even doing crazy acrobatics. In Dirge of Cerberus, she set off a flash bomb, darted in and dragged away someone who should be much heavier than her in the space of a few seconds, and virtually disappeared. After that, she spent most of her appearances in said game falling over and hurting herself. She seemed to vary from ditzy to deadly competent in the original game, too. Maybe she just doesn't use her ninja agility until it's needed? Or perhaps she's just Obfuscating Stupidity?
    • Selphie in Final Fantasy VIII plays it straight with an obligatory Crash-Into Hello.
  • Rikku in Final Fantasy X falls on her rear end so many times it becomes a plot point in an Final Fantasy X-2 sidequest.
• Arthur in Fire Emblem Fates is infamously unlucky, this trope being a big reason. His roster descriptions in both English and Japanese pertain to his tendency to trip and fall over for no reason, and it comes up several times in his Supports.
• Good Job!: You play as a particularly clumsy new employee prone, and actively encouraged in-game, to causing absurd amounts of property damage if it means getting the job done as fast as possible — indeed, it's all but stated that the only reason they get promoted instead of fired is because the CEO is their father.
• Idol Manager: Some idols have the "Clumsy" trait, which gives a bonus to their comedy factor at the price of a penalty to their dancing skills.
• In I Was a Teenage Exocolonist, Nomi-Nomi often doesn't watch where they're going and bump into others because their brain is often distracted.
• Neverwinter Nights: In gameplay, Linu would be a competent cleric if her A.I. weren't problematic. However, every conversation you have with her mentions some bit of chaos that she caused through clumsiness, usually by way of Disaster Dominoes (e.g. spilling a drink in a bar and causing a Bar Brawl that destroyed most of the building.)
• In Pokémon, there is an ability that certain Pokemon^note Buneary, Lopunny, Woobat, Swoobat, Golett, Golurk, Stufful, and Bewear as their second Ability; Audino, Toxel, Fidough, and Capsakid have it as their Hidden Ability can have that is actually called Klutz. Appropriately for the trope, it is one of the less useful abilities in the game, preventing Pokemon with it from being able to use their held items. The only Pokémon the Klutz ability is considered good on at all is Lopunny, both because they get moves that capitalize on the few advantages to the ability there are (one of which involves forcing the Ability on the opponent's Pokemon), and because their statistics make them rather bad at anything else.
• In Potion Permit, Matheo always drops his notes whenever he gets chased by a bear, prompting the Chemist to pick them up for him.
• In Rising Angels, Zuri, the ship's security officer, has a reputation for accidentally breaking things. This is a plot point, because when a critical item gets destroyed and she had access to it, she's accused of breaking that too. She didn't — it was sabotage by someone else.
• Seek and Destroy (2002): An interesting vehicular example is Jevons, a tank from Seek and Destroy 2002, aka Combat Choro Q. When excited (usually by the delivery of big news) he has a bad habit of forgetting to hit his brakes and crashing off screen. Also doubles as the game's Woobie, since his crashes usually end up with him getting injured. Fortunately, the damage is rarely very serious, tending towards more Amusing Injuries with him puttering back on-screen sporting a little bandage.
• In The Sims 3 and The Sims 4, it's one of the many personality traits. A clumsy Sim will occasionally trip when walking (and sometimes even when standing idly), if on a treadmill, they're more likely to fall off, items they use are more likely to break, and if a clumsy Sim proposes, they'll drop the ring.
• Super Mario Bros.: As a male example, Mario's brother Luigi tends to display this feature, especially in the RPGs, the Luigi’s Mansion series, and to some degree in the Super Smash Bros. series which actually has this present in gameplay: one of his special moves has a chance of misfiring and another ends with him turning upside down in midair and landing on his head (Mario's version of the attack lands him on his feet). This seems to be the reason Mario is considered the better jumper. Luigi might jump higher, but Mario's more coordinated and can stick the landing.
• Tales of Symphonia: Colette is such a klutz that some of her attacks are essentially her falling on someone (with an added bonus effect of stealing their items). Her tendency to stumble and fall on the exact thing the party was looking for (a rare book, the off switch for a trap) leads her companions to call it a "divine clumsiness", which doesn't preclude her being just plain clumsy at times — the room in which the game begins has a Colette-shaped hole in the wall.
  • Another wall that Colette leaves a Colette-shaped hole in is still there in the second game and used as the town's tourist attraction (an NPC suggested it be used for such a thing in the first game). This place is one place that IS reasonable to trip, as it is at the end of a steep downward slope.
  • At one point, in Welgaia, she trips into a deactivated machine, turning it on. Not only that, but later in the game she manages to trip and fall over despite being able to fly. That's an achievement in itself.
    • After the scene where she turns on the machine, she gets an actual title for being clumsy. She can wear it, as well.
  • By the time the second game rolls around, she's learned to use her clumsiness as a cover; she sometimes knocks people over so they won't get hurt by something else (for example, a rampaging garuda).
• In The Walking Dead: Season One, Lee can embody this if the player mucks up responses to different situations, with some truly epic fails on his part. There's only traces of it if the player is good at getting things done, but he will slip in certain distasteful puddles if you so much as brush up against them - typically because he's badly injured or otherwise weak.

Visual Novels

• Doki Doki Literature Club!: Sayori is this. Just like all the girls in the game, she's cute. She also happens to be really clumsy. Her clumsiness is attributed to her terrible depression.

Web Comics

• Paollo, heir apparent of Majestan in Archipelago and City of Somnus is wonderfully clumsy. We don't get to see it much in the first story, since he spends most of it in a dungeon, but in City of Somnus Paollo's mounting a kirin like he's a sack of potatoes, his laughable attempts at throwing a pebble and the numerous times he ends with his face in close contact with the ground are shown in all their adorable glory.
• Gwynn from Sluggy Freelance sometimes gets like this when she takes off her glasses.
• Bird Boy: Bali in the opening pages falls flat on his face — twice. Plus once on his butt
• Proud, noble and powerful Yeon from Tower of God is capable, but on two occasions she burnt up her entire team, and when their strength was measured, she slipped and barely touched the measuring plate with her knuckles while bumping her head against the machine. She still got in third place and was first place at the time.
• Vincent the Lucario in the Pokémon fanfic Random Doom.
• In Wapsi Square, both Monica and Tina are a bit on the clumsy side.
• Sweet Bro, of Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff fame, has problems with tasks such as walking down stairs, pouring milk, putting spoons in drawers, using rulers, and putting boots on.
• Undying Happiness: A lot of humor comes from the fact that Keisuke's Healing Factor and immunity to pain tends to make him reckless and clumsy, leading to him suffering all sorts of Bloody Hilarious injuries (and then having to cover them up).
• Mocha, one half of the titular duo from Milk And Mocha, is noticeably clumsy at times, especially when compared to their significant other.

Web Original

• Mackenzie Blaise of Tales of MU tends to trip when startled. She's very easily startled.
• Jamie in Twig is often this due to his poor reaction times stemming from his Super-Intelligence, which gives his massive data recording, retention, and processing ability but also causes delayed reaction times as he takes everything in.
• The Kindhearted Simpleton T37 in Ranzar's Tanktoons is an example of this, being quite clumsy for a light tank and often doing things that annoy, inconvenience, or injure the much more capable but eternally long-suffering Hellcat. In one notable instance, he managed to parachute upside down. Onto Hellcat. He never means ill, though, and always does his best to make it up to Hellcat afterwards. Fans also like T37 for his exuberance and occasional incompetence.

Western Animation

• The Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan: Nancy. A psychic even pointed this out once while attempting to read the bumps on her head, most of which were obtained through Nancy's own klutziness. In another episode, Mr. Chan instinctively calls out to Nancy when he hears someone crashing into a lamp. (It was Stanley, who's also rather clumsy himself.)
• Amphibia has Marcy Wu, which mostly has to do with her limited attention span and tendency to not look where she's going. In her introduction alone, she managed to accidentally light herself on fire three times, one of which was when there wasn't even any fire around. And in the series' final battle, she somehow manages to end up tripping on the only piece of debris around while in the vacuum of space.
• Animaniacs: In the "Presidents" song, the desciption of Gerald Ford says that he "fell down a lot."
• Cyberchase: Digit is a major case of this to the point it's the series main Running Gag.
• Futurama: Amy Wong is described even by the other characters as a "klutz from Mars" and gives precisely the same scream every time she falls over. In the early seasons, Amy doing a pratfall was pretty much a Once an Episode occurrence.
  • In one of the DVD audio commentaries, the writers mention this trait was given to Amy to see if such slapstick humor could be funny if inflicted on a cute female character. (As opposed to The Simpsons, where Bart and Homer were the primary focus of physical gags.)
• George, George, George of the Jungle... WATCH OUT FOR THAT TREE!
• Goofy is well known for being one of the earliest animated klutzes. It's the trait that has characterised him relentlessly wherever he appears and was always played for laughs in many shorts and future appearances he's made.
• In He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983), a running gag is that Orko messes up many of the spells he attempts. He also seems to spend quite a lot of time bumping into things, or breaking Man-At-Arms’ equipment even when he’s not using magic.
• Handy Manny: Pat the Hammer is not only clumsy, but he can break things, too.
• Hey Arnold!: Eugene is not just extremely clumsy, but is also just a bad luck magnet in general. In one episode it was revealed that he was born on Friday the Thirteenth, which explains a lot.
• Jellystone!: Wally Gator is most frequently seen in or around the hospital after having had some sort of accident (in one episode he is seen in a full-body cast) or coming down with some other strange malady (in another he is seeing Yogi about a growth on his neck that looks like Wally's own face).
• Lilo & Stitch: The Series has an experiment named Woops, who is this trope. He's actually important to the story in his first and only appearance.
• My Little Pony:
  • The original Applejack. It's a main part of her backstory for the toys, and she got a song in the UK about how "silly" she is. Not so much in the cartoon, though. The one big spill she ends up in is Firefly's fault.
  • My Little Pony Tales has Clover.
  • My Little Pony (G3) has Minty.
  • My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
    • The title goes to fan-favorite Derpy Hooves, who has been seen dropping furniture on people, accidentally pulling the plug out of an apple-bobbing tub, accidentally smashing holes in the roof of a building she was getting ready for a party, and creating a hole in the floor by sitting down too hard.
    • Rainbow Dash is often crashing into things or accidentally breaking them, often as a result of being Too Fast to Stop.
    • Sweetie Belle is so clumsy she can burn juice.
    • Gentle Giant Troubleshoes Clyde supplants even Derpy — his cutie mark, an upside-down horseshoe, means that his special talent is klutziness. Unfortunately, being an absolutely massive stallion, he has caused quite some damage, to the point of being considered a wanted outlaw in Appleloosa and environs. With the aid of the Cutie Mark Crusaders, he learns to channel his klutziness as a rodeo clown.
• Nature Cat: The titular character usually trips over something, bumps into things without looking, gets into many hijinks, and one of his catchphrases doesn't always end well for him and the others. He's also quite endearing while at it, so he can be best described as a Cute Clumsy Cat.
• Pocket Dragon Adventures: Sir Nigel's brother Chumley is far more gifted as a talented painter, than an explorer.
• PAW Patrol: Marshall has this as his defining trait, generally involving things like getting his head stuck in stuff and crashing into the elevator.
• Roary the Racing Car: Tin Top always crashes, generally in a tangled heap of disconnected parts.
• Scooby-Doo: Daphne. Other cast members sometimes sarcastically refer to her as "Danger Prone Daphne".
• The Simpsons:
  • One episode has Mayor Quimby's nephew charged with putting a waiter in the hospital for his inability to say the word "chowder" without a French accent. Later on, it turns out that the waiter was actually injured because he's a klutz of epic proportions and had a humongous accident in the kitchen after Quimby's nephew left. When the waiter tries to refute this, he has another epic klutz episode right there in the courtroom.
  • In another episode, president Gerald Ford and Homer walk to his home they both trip and fall flat on their faces.
• The Smurfs (1981): Clumsy Smurf. Has a clumsy streak since it is also in his name and it seems like he was born with being this trait while he is the Kindhearted Simpleton as well.
• SpongeBob SquarePants:
  • "Stanley S. SquarePants" features SpongeBob's cousin, Stanley, who was mailed to SpongeBob's house when his father got fed up with him. Most of what he touches explodes in a mushroom cloud.
  • SpongeBob himself has shades of this too, especially in later seasons.
  • Patrick in "No Hat For Pat", when he was hired to be the entertainment at The Krusty Krab.
  • Fred is usually this to an Chew Toy status due to how many accidents he has been through.
• Star Wars Resistance: Kazuda Xiono frequently displays a distinct lack of grace that occasionally leads to him falling down, or falling down the stairs, especially in high-stress situations like fights. Really, he's better off being dropped in the cockpit of the nearest functional starfighter if you want him to be useful in a fight.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987): Irma is really a klutz tending to step on people's feet and often addressed as this by others including Bebop and Rocksteady.
  • Her 2012 incarnation also has her moments of clumsiness, but not nearly as bad. Maybe because she's actually a Kraang spy in disguise.
• Total Drama: Tyler is a Lovable Jock and Iron Butt Monkey whose defining traits are that he is terrible at sports and frequently gets injured due to his lack of coordination and accident-prone nature.
• Work It Out Wombats!: It hasn't been demonstrated in the series, but the official social media pages for the series say JunJun tends to trip over his big bird feet.

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