Basic Trope: A weak point on an otherwise powerful character.
- Straight: Emperor Evulz is Nigh-Invulnerable, but a spot on his back is incredibly weak.
- Exaggerated: Hitting his back at all kills Emperor Evulz.
- Downplayed: While Emperor Evulz does have a weak spot on his back, it’s only a bit less strong than the rest of him, so knowing this weakness was no help to the heroes.
- Justified:
- Emperor Evulz's back was horribly damaged prior to his villainous career, and there was no way to fix it.
- Emperor Evulz had to choose between an impenetrability salve and a Metcalfe potion… while there was a spot that he couldn't reach with the former, he appreciated the pain associated with the latter even less.
- Inverted:
- Hitting his back makes him stronger.
- He's physically weak everywhere except on his back.
- Subverted: Emperor Evulz had grown past that weakness by the time the heroes fought him.
- Double Subverted: ...but in the process of removing it, he got a new weakness on his feet instead.
- Parodied:
- Emperor Evulz' back has a big "WEAK SPOT" sign on it.
- Bob is told Emperor Evulz' bad back is his "Achilles' heel" and says, "But it's his back, not his heel. Why do you call it that?"
- Zig-Zagged: Emperor Evulz had a weak spot on his back when the heroes first encountered him, but he’s since grown past that weakness. However, he’s ended up getting a new weak spot on his feet since. Except that was a lie, as he gets stronger when hit on his feet, and the weakness part was a lie told by one of Emperor Evulz’s spies. But his feet ARE a weak spot; the damage just doesn’t set in until a few minutes after they're hit.
- Averted:
- Emperor Evulz fights regularly and takes as much damage as one normally would.
- Emperor Evulz is completely invulnerable, with no weak points.
- Enforced: The creators don't want Emperor Evulz to be an Invincible Villain, so the weak point was created.
- Lampshaded:
- After defeating Emperor Evulz, Bob says to Alice, “So why do all the villains we face always have one spot where they’re extra vulnerable? By now there should have been a villain without one...”
- Emperor Evulz’s weak spot is his Achilles tendon.
- Invoked: Emperor Evulz is a robot, and was deliberately designed with that weak point on his back on the off chance of betrayal.
- Exploited: The heroes attack Emperor Evulz in his weak spot, defeating him easily.
- Defied: Emperor Evulz puts special armor on his back before battling the heroes so they can’t hit him there.
- Discussed: "So you hit him in the back and he goes down?" "That's about right."
- Conversed: "When the heroes learned Emperor Evulz's back was weak, that's when I knew he was going to come out as an Anticlimax Boss."
- Deconstructed: The weakness is one of the only things they know about Emperor Evulz, and people mock him for it.
- Reconstructed: Emperor Evulz enhances every other part of his body so he's known for that, too.
- Implied: Before the battle, Bob predicts it will take hours, if not days. The battle happens offscreen. It lasts only a few minutes.
Main pages are my Achilles' Heel. That's why I spend so much time on Playing-With pages.
