Tropescilloscope: Informed Ability

A character reputedly has a certain ability or attribute, but the audience never sees it. (read more at tvtropes.org)

More Tropes Frame-Up Artistic License – Gun Safety "The Reason You Suck" Speech Bunny-Ears Lawyer Pretty in Mink A Father to His Men Bloody Hilarious Aside Glance Anyone Can Die Be Careful What You Wish For Put on a Bus Serial Killer No OSHA Compliance Dirty Cop I Have Your Wife Hair-Trigger Temper Central Theme You Killed My Father Slasher Movie Leave the Camera Running Sexy Discretion Shot Vomit Discretion Shot Zombie Stories The End... Or Is It? Say My Name Heroic Sacrifice Black Best Friend Blatant Lies Creative Closing Credits More Dakka Self-Deprecation Plucky Comic Relief Overly Long Gag Not Quite Dead There Is No Kill Like Overkill Knife Nut The Cavalry Camera Abuse French Films Scary Black Man Psychological Thriller The Stoic Silence Is Golden Drowning My Sorrows Precision F-Strike Smoking Is Cool Mythology Gag Screw the Money, I Have Rules! Guns Akimbo Downer Ending Only One Name Funny Background Event Needs Wiki Magic Love Irony Lampshade Hanging Framing Device Colour-Coded for Your Convenience aka: Color Coded For Your Convenience Contrived Coincidence Too Dumb to Live Big Eater Small Name, Big Ego Room Full of Crazy Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking Time Skip Artistic License – Geography Laser-Guided Karma Eyepatch of Power Homage Intergenerational Friendship Sinister Minister Token Minority Malevolent Masked Men Brutal Honesty Drives Like Crazy Manly Tears Femme Fatale Big Applesauce In the Back Chekhov's Gunman Vacation Films Developing Doomed Characters Bloodier and Gorier The Chessmaster The Un-Favourite aka: The Un Favorite Artistic License – Military Betty and Veronica From Nobody to Nightmare "Well Done, Son!" Guy Humiliation Conga Does Not Like Shoes Sacrificial Lion Film Noir Index Mighty Whitey Here We Go Again! No Antagonist Distracted by the Sexy Sanity Slippage Politically Incorrect Villain All There in the Script Christmas Movies Index Never Trust a Trailer aka: Trailers Always Lie Rewatch Bonus Stylistic Suck Establishing Character Moment Wretched Hive Four-Temperament Ensemble Posthumous Character Faux Affably Evil Music Stories Aww, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other Redemption Equals Death Gainax Ending The X of Y Morality Pet Took a Level in Jerkass Novelization Bilingual Bonus Dirty Coward The '80s Scenery Gorn No Ending All Just a Dream Older Than They Look folderlabel Henpecked Husband Ungrateful Bastard Historical-Domain Character Shell-Shocked Veteran Broken Pedestal Very Loosely Based on a True Story Blood from the Mouth Dark Reprise Redshirt Army Gold Digger Gratuitous English Rule of Cool Comically Missing the Point The Stinger How We Got Here Funny Foreigner Fun with Acronyms Superhero Belligerent Sexual Tension Heterosexual Life-Partners Ambiguous Disorder Half the Man He Used to Be Final Girl Left the Background Music On Better to Die than Be Killed Naïve Newcomer One Steve Limit Real Life Affably Evil A.I. Is a Crapshoot An Axe to Grind Villain Opening Scene The Starscream Parental Substitute Hoist by His Own Petard Your Head A-Splode Defiant to the End Cassandra Truth Air-Vent Passageway The Sociopath Cruel and Unusual Death Faking the Dead Neck Lift Big Fancy House Jerkass Hong Kong Films Bolivian Army Ending Broken Bird Cool Shades Kick the Dog And I Must Scream Public Domain Feature Films Berserk Button Destination Defenestration Unresolved Sexual Tension Arranged Marriage Dirty Old Man Roaring Rampage of Revenge As the Good Book Says... Easily Forgiven The Chick Recap / RiffTrax aka: Riff Trax Movies Sequel Hook Retired Badass What the Hell, Hero? Horror Comedy Crazy-Prepared War Is Hell Cat Scare Taking the Bullet The Ace Casting Gag Villain with Good Publicity Shipper on Deck I Need a Freaking Drink Auto Erotica Danny Peary Cult Movies List Spiteful Spit What You Are in the Dark Roger Ebert: Great Movies List Anachronic Order Grievous Bottley Harm Dumb Blonde Aluminum Christmas Trees Take a Third Option Insistent Terminology I'm a Humanitarian Woman Scorned Mugging the Monster Dark Action Girl Enemy Mine Not What It Looks Like Random Events Plot Break the Haughty Authority Equals Asskicking Not Using the "Z" Word Red Eyes, Take Warning Amusing Injuries Early-Bird Cameo Wham Line Victoria's Secret Compartment Dissonant Serenity You Have Failed Me Shoot the Shaggy Dog Sealed Evil in a Can Taking You with Me She's Got Legs Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome Japanese Films Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane Stalker with a Crush Retcon Spanner in the Works MacGuffin Wrong Genre Savvy Slap-Slap-Kiss Screw This, I'm Outta Here! All for Nothing Dies Wide Open Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism Parental Neglect Dramedy Visual Pun No Good Deed Goes Unpunished Bar Brawl Gorn Lock and Load Montage Stealth Hi/Bye Names to Run Away from Really Fast Sadistic Choice The Hero Dies Artistic License – History Big Brother Instinct Improbable Weapon User Punch-Clock Villain Bait-and-Switch Depraved Bisexual Shower Scene Anachronism Stew The Oner I Just Shot Marvin in the Face Madness Mantra Blonde, Brunette, Redhead Bound and Gagged Cowboy Cop Cool Old Lady In Medias Res Obviously Evil Peek-a-Boo Corpse Coming-of-Age Story Police Brutality Badass Bookworm Flipping the Bird Mr. Exposition Bad Boss Reasonable Authority Figure Stuff Blowing Up My Beloved Smother Crazy Jealous Guy No-Sell Cold-Blooded Torture Rule of Funny Bitch in Sheep's Clothing Hypocritical Humor The Lancer Even Evil Has Standards Foil All There in the Manual Get Out! Motor Mouth Getting Crap Past the Radar Laughing Mad Fatal Family Photo Men Are the Expendable Gender Reality Is Unrealistic Eagleland Police are Useless Even Evil Has Loved Ones The '60s Title Drop Call-Back The Mole Horror Films Deadpan Snarker Narrator Fire-Forged Friends Vampire Fiction The Alleged Car Jerk with a Heart of Gold Green-Eyed Monster Paper-Thin Disguise Silent Movie The Mafia Covers Always Lie Chewing the Scenery Hypocrite Continuity Nod Sci-Fi Horror Toilet Humour aka: Toilet Humor Brick Joke German Films Soft Glass Sequel Escalation Diabolus ex Machina Off-into-the-Distance Ending Determinator Pun aka: Incredibly Lame Pun Hero Antagonist Never Trust a Trailer Adaptational Badass Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping Calling the Old Man Out Darker and Edgier Not So Different Batman Gambit Smug Snake Dual Wielding Meaningful Name Married to the Job Extreme Doormat Overprotective Dad Neck Snap Cool Guns Epic Fail Expy Death Seeker Hate Sink Exact Words Only Known by Their Nickname Epic Movie Eldritch Abomination Jump Scare Affectionate Parody Loophole Abuse "Awesome McCool" Name Improbable Infant Survival aka: Infant Immortality Due to the Dead World of Ham Throwing Your Sword Always Works Pretty Little Headshots Retirony Awesome, but Impractical Show Within a Show Rousing Speech Action Prologue Russian Films Nice Guy Humans Are Bastards "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue An Arm and a Leg Disney Death An Aesop Chiaroscuro Race Against the Clock Psycho for Hire Eureka Moment Let's Get Dangerous! Demonic Possession Closed Circle Book-Ends Big-Bad Ensemble Driven to Suicide My Greatest Failure It's Personal Actor Allusion Deus ex Machina Rule of Three Intrepid Reporter Failed a Spot Check Fatal Flaw Improbable Aiming Skills He Who Fights Monsters 20 Minutes into the Future Protagonist Title Cool Car Mistaken for Gay Asshole Victim Parental Abandonment Why Did It Have to Be Snakes? The Atoner Catapult Nightmare Disappeared Dad Fingore Freeze-Frame Bonus Jerkass Has a Point Villainous Breakdown Instant Death Bullet Market-Based Title Heroic BSoD La Résistance Jitter Cam Hollywood Law Evil Laugh She Cleans Up Nicely "Shaggy Dog" Story Fiery Redhead Abhorrent Admirer Ghost Fiction Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene Australian Movies Heel Realization Make It Look Like an Accident Black Comedy Rape It Will Never Catch On Oh, Crap! Red Right Hand Romantic Comedy Girl-on-Girl Is Hot Vitriolic Best Buds Babies Ever After Combat Pragmatist Bond Villain Stupidity Not So Stoic Obstructive Bureaucrat Logo Joke Your Cheating Heart Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass Dramatic Gun Cock Obfuscating Stupidity Catch-Phrase Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep" Alas, Poor Villain The Quiet One Thriller Reckless Gun Usage One-Word Title Missing Mom Italian Films Crapsack World True Companions And the Adventure Continues Broken Aesop Drill Sergeant Nasty Good Is Not Nice Captain Obvious The Bad Guy Wins You Have Outlived Your Usefulness NO INDOOR VOICE Love Triangle Bury Your Gays Meaningful Background Event Heroes Want Redheads Fourth Date Marriage Evil Cannot Comprehend Good Villain Song Adaptation Name Change Ambiguously Gay Nice Job Breaking It, Hero! The Vamp Fanservice Extra Happily Married Action Survivor Mexican Standoff Animal Motifs Black Dude Dies First Every Car Is a Pinto I Want My Beloved to Be Happy Handicapped Badass Recycled IN SPACE! Kill 'em All Whole Plot Reference It Can Think Scare Chord Butt-Monkey Earn Your Happy Ending Nothing Is Scarier Abusive Parents Daylight Horror Dutch Angle Have a Gay Old Time Only Sane Man Parental Incest Villain Protagonist Attempted Rape Punny Name Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday Darkest Hour Meet Cute Adaptational Attractiveness Deal with the Devil Bring My Brown Pants Mood Whiplash Immune to Bullets Mad Scientist After the End Animal Title Index Camp Gay What Happened to the Mouse? Bald of Evil A Date with Rosie Palms Made of Explodium Shout-Out Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy Red Oni, Blue Oni Sir Swears-a-Lot Works Set in World War II Toplessness from the Back Slashed Throat Fantastic Racism Body Horror Insane Troll Logic Badass Boast Never Found the Body All Girls Want Bad Boys Costume Porn Karma Houdini Adaptational Heroism The Dog Bites Back Male Gaze Suspiciously Similar Substitute Anguished Declaration of Love Bowdlerise Rich Bitch Evil Is Petty The Film of the Book Mundane Made Awesome Bittersweet Ending Naked People Are Funny Tempting Fate Face Death with Dignity Celebrity Paradox Anti-Hero Fake Shemp Bi the Way For Want of a Nail Would Hurt a Child Hooker with a Heart of Gold This Is Gonna Suck Leitmotif Vomit Indiscretion Shot Index of Film Westerns Drugs Are Bad Properly Paranoid Groin Attack The Alcoholic Important Haircut Shirtless Scene Big "NO!" Nice Hat Apocalypse How Boom, Headshot! Arch-Enemy The Voiceless Exactly What It Says on the Tin Reality Ensues Imagine Spot Manchild Man on Fire Big Damn Heroes Genre Throwback Translation Convention Adorkable Fate Worse than Death Unreliable Narrator Romantic False Lead The Cameo BFG Deconstruction The Ditz Domestic Abuse Stepford Smiler Offscreen Moment of Awesome Hero of Another Story Knight Templar Stock Footage As Himself Ripped from the Headlines Based on a True Story Mind Screw Meaningful Echo Empathic Environment Brother–Sister Incest Deliberately Monochrome Adult Fear Poor Communication Kills Biopic As You Know Twist Ending Re-Cut Line-of-Sight Name Evil Brit Bad "Bad Acting" Lighter and Softer Children Are Innocent Credits Gag Dropped a Bridge on Him Badass Normal I Did What I Had to Do My God, What Have I Done? Video Credits The Brute Eiffel Tower Effect Same Language Dub Made of Iron Training Montage Disproportionate Retribution Military and Warfare Films Those Two Guys Killed Mid-Sentence Ascended Extra Does This Remind You of Anything? Impaled with Extreme Prejudice Pragmatic Villainy Damsel in Distress Disguised in Drag Advertised Extra Television Movie Index Badass in a Nice Suit Brainless Beauty Everyone Has Standards O.O.C. Is Serious Business Sole Survivor Accidental Murder The '50s Honor Before Reason Ms. Fanservice Bland-Name Product No Name Given Spiritual Successor Almost Kiss Dark Is Not Evil Mama Bear Dwindling Party Tap on the Head Kids Are Cruel Genre Savvy No-Holds-Barred Beatdown May–December Romance Character Development The Remake Artistic License – Physics Real Life Writes the Plot Those Two Bad Guys Serious Business B-Movie Martial Arts Movie Ominous Latin Chanting Up to Eleven Sassy Black Woman Wicked Cultured Really Gets Around Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas The Smart Guy Award-Bait Song Why Don't You Just Shoot Him? Big Bad Duumvirate Determinator aka: The Determinator The Lost Lenore Defrosting Ice Queen Hidden Depths Alpha Bitch Evil Plan Manipulative Bastard Corpsing Extremely Short Timespan Amoral Attorney The Load Bloodless Carnage Fantasy Films Totally Radical Country Matters The Great Depression Dogged Nice Guy Break the Cutie Offscreen Teleportation Red Herring The '90s Bottomless Magazines The Ghost In Name Only Daddy's Girl Not Even Bothering with the Accent Badass Longcoat Ass Shove The Big Guy Tranquil Fury Karmic Death Decoy Protagonist Bond One-Liner Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique Big Bad Mercy Kill Evil-Detecting Dog Anti-Villain Film Noir Bare Your Midriff Heel–Face Turn Fat Bastard '80s Hair Chekhov's Skill Stealth Pun Revenge Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds Evil Is Hammy Hope Spot Worthy Opponent Corrupt Corporate Executive Interrupted Suicide Ugly Guy, Hot Wife Rule of Symbolism Despair Event Horizon Dressing as the Enemy Beta Couple The Reveal Adaptation Distillation Science Fiction Films Undying Loyalty Black and Gray Morality Double Entendre Setting Update Death by Adaptation Author Avatar One-Man Army Flashback Grey and Gray Morality Male Frontal Nudity Adults Are Useless Ax-Crazy Artistic License – Law Running Gag Ragtag Bunch of Misfits Death Glare Freudian Excuse The Faceless Tagline Pyrrhic Victory Punctuated! For! Emphasis! Didn't Think This Through Once More, with Clarity! No Celebrities Were Harmed Dull Surprise Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right! Conspicuous CG Historical In-Joke Death of a Child Captain Ersatz Artistic License – Biology Nice Job Fixing It, Villain! Last-Name Basis Demoted to Extra Dying Moment of Awesome A God Am I Only in It for the Money Take That! Never My Fault Bullying a Dragon Improvised Weapon Eye Scream Villain Ball And Starring Death by Irony Death by Sex Super Strength Slasher Smile Our Zombies Are Different Unusual Euphemism Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer Adaptation Dye-Job Guile Hero Cluster F-Bomb Annoying Younger Sibling Our Vampires Are Different Pay Evil unto Evil The Smurfette Principle You Have Got to Be Kidding Me! Foregone Conclusion Not So Above It All Moment Killer Alliterative Name Back from the Dead Blood Knight Adapted Out Race Lift Greater-Scope Villain Film Series Curb-Stomp Battle Becoming the Mask Plot Hole Large Ham Kubrick Stare Pimped-Out Dress Kick the Son of a Bitch Shown Their Work Unwitting Instigator of Doom Suspiciously Specific Denial Call-Forward The Dragon Insult Backfire Sports Stories Blackmail Spared by the Adaptation Cain and Abel Mooks Unusually Uninteresting Sight Rated M for Manly Evil Sounds Deep Card-Carrying Villain Early Installment Weirdness Gone Horribly Right Evil Counterpart N-Word Privileges Genre Shift Only a Flesh Wound Outrun the Fireball Suddenly SHOUTING! Chuck Cunningham Syndrome Wounded Gazelle Gambit Adaptation Expansion Hell Is That Noise Wham Shot Evil vs. Evil Ambiguous Ending Riddle for the Ages Documentary Badass Grandpa Department of Redundancy Department Five-Man Band Truth in Television Rape as Drama Straight Gay Implacable Man Papa Wolf Light Is Not Good Actually Pretty Funny Would Hit a Girl Canon Foreigner Deliberate Values Dissonance As Long as It Sounds Foreign Scenery Porn Animated Credits Opening From Bad to Worse Playing Gertrude Together in Death Gory Discretion Shot Reality Has No Subtitles Non-Indicative Name He Knows Too Much Cat Fight Antagonist Title Did Not Get the Girl Disney Villain Death Creator Cameo Maybe Ever After Black Comedy Noodle Incident Canadian Movies Spell My Name with an "S" A Minor Kidroduction The Un-Reveal Trailers Always Spoil Cool Old Guy Bavarian Fire Drill Refuge in Audacity timeperiod Author Appeal Gender Flip Hollywood Darkness Beauty Is Never Tarnished Accidental Misnaming Breaking the Fourth Wall Product Placement Love at First Sight Word of God Agony of the Feet Manic Pixie Dream Girl Double-Meaning Title Rasputinian Death Well-Intentioned Extremist Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil Action Girl Mr. Fanservice Face–Heel Turn Major Injury Underreaction The Place Pre-Mortem One-Liner It's All About Me The Hero Kill It with Fire Leaning on the Fourth Wall Adaptational Villainy Friend to All Children Off with His Head! Unspoken Plan Guarantee For the Evulz Yandere The Casanova Ironic Echo Chase Scene Idiot Ball Storming the Castle Fish out of Water Beard of Evil Mystery and Detective Films The Power of Love Skewed Priorities Red Shirt Screw the Rules, I Have Money! Famous Last Words Historical Villain Upgrade The Stoner British Films Pragmatic Adaptation Dramatic Irony All Men Are Perverts Creepy Child Crucified Hero Shot The Dreaded Loads and Loads of Characters Gilligan Cut Those Wacky Nazis The '70s Armor-Piercing Question Shut Up, Hannibal! The Musical Star-Crossed Lovers Fanservice Age Lift Dark and Troubled Past Jerk Jock Action Genre Arc Words Fainting Chekhov's Gun Ship Tease Foreshadowing Took a Level in Badass Car Fu Cloudcuckoolander Monumental Damage Informed Ability Soundtrack Dissonance Pre-Asskicking One-Liner Historical Hero Upgrade Match Cut Composite Character Woman in White The Bully Curse Cut Short Facial Horror Beware the Nice Ones Fan Disservice Pet the Dog Psychopathic Manchild Expository Hairstyle Change