Discussion Main / InformedFlaw

• In Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL, people constantly comment on how bad a duelist Yuma is, more so in the dub, where Astral comments how "I once saw you lose to a vending machine." While Yuma isn't the Invincible Hero that previous protagonists in the past have been (he has lost to both Kaito and Shark) his record is still rather good (likely better than any standard, real-life player of the OCG) and like other protagonists, has defeated entities of god-like power, even without Astral's help at times. (Maybe even especially without Astral's help. Some of his worst battles have occurred when Astral was incapacitated or hurt.)

Yuma is Invencible Incompetent, not this. His frequent dueling misplays during his victorious on-screen duels are on-screen.

Removed:

• Ranma ½ has the title character insulting Akane by saying that she's flat-chested. In most media, especially swimsuit episodes, Akane seems to be on the high end of average. Its just that most other females of her age group like female Ranma, Nabiki, Kasumi, Kodachi and Shampoo are incredibly stacked. Likewise with Ranma's appraisal of Akane's martial arts ability: she's one of the best martial artists in Nerima, able to pummel a horde of schoolboys unconscious everyday. Almost everyone else who hangs out with Ranma is better.

Nearly every time Akane's bust size is mentioned, it's either by Ranma or Shampoo, deliberately trying to push her buttons. And Ranma's appraisal that Akane isn't on his level as a martial artist is completely accurate. He doesn't call her weak, he calls her "weaker than him." In either cases, the narrative always portrays Ranma as being unfair, insensitive, and/or deliberately insulting. Not this trope, in other words.

However, most of the time, it's a result of careless rewrites.

Statements like this are best avoided in a trope description. It is impossible to know what causes this phenomenon "most of the time" without doing a great deal of research. So what we're left with is the author's arbitrary conjecture about what "usually" is the case, stated as if it were an indisputable fact.

Removed:

• Bella in Twilight constantly complains about how she's unattractive, dumb, weak, and has no self-esteem whatsoever. That doesn't stop her from becoming one of the most popular girls in school, squeezing herself into a love triangle with a vampire and werewolf, suddenly gaining just the right vampire powers to fend off her enemies, and having no problems controlling her bloodlust despite it being rampant in all vampires, all with minimal effort.
  • She is also, apparently, depicted as being rather good looking in the movies. Mary Sue strikes again.
  • Averted when Alice comes into town and accuses Bella of being so stupid it's a wonder she hasn't accidentally killed herself because of it. Stupidity (life-threatening so) is an often shown but rarely mentioned flaw of Bella's.

The first example is apparently an Unreliable Narrator, not an Informed Flaw. The second example is just an aversion.