"If your enemy is of a choleric temper, seek to anger him."
— Sun Tzu, The Art of War
A character deliberately insults and goads another as a calculated ploy. Possible motivations include:
- Infuriating the target so that he quits thinking straight, picks up the Idiot Ball with both hands, and charges headlong into a trap.
- A Secret Test of Character to see if the target can keep his cool under pressure. After all, If You Taunt Him, You Will Be Just Like Him!.
- Prodding a dispirited ally to make him quit sulking and get back into action.
- For an opponent who's already about to die to the hero's attacks, this might be played for drama by having them reveal something particularly shocking or pertinent to where the story's headed next through their taunting.
- Driving someone who is already behaving irrationally to go too far and thereby realize that he needs to stop and calm down.
- Snapping the target out of a debilitating mental state such as amnesia or Mind Control.
Sometimes even Cthulhu can be annoyed beyond thinking straight... but you'd better have a really good plan.
In competitive Video Games this frequently takes the form of a move or "attack" which does no damage and leaves your character defenseless against retaliation while he engages in some mocking or playful behavior such as an Ass-Kicking Pose, Dancing or a Finger Wag. Bring It!
Sometimes this is inverted as an "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight. See also Defiant to the End, Teach Him Anger, The Computer Shall Taunt You.
Compare to a Batman Gambit, of which this trope is a verbal form. Compare also Trash Talk which occurs during a competition and is more for general intimidation than calculated insults, You Fight Like a Cow which may couple this trope with a duel, Practical Taunt when the benefits are based on a gameplay system which may use this trope as justification, Unsportsmanlike Gloating which occurs after winning the fight, Volleying Insults where two characters may attempt to repeatedly use this trope on each other, Fisticuff-Provoking Comment where a particularly insulting or offensive remark results in physical violence, and Insulted Awake where the intent of the taunt is to snap the target out of a mental stupor. Bring It is when there is no subtle ploy, and the character is openly defying another one to fight.
Beware of using this on someone Too Dumb to Fool, as they may misinterpret your taunt as an Insult Backfire and react the opposite of how you want them to. Either that, or they'll simply ignore your taunt and keep doing whatever it was they were doing before you taunted them (and if what they were doing was beating the crap out of you, you only have yourself to blame). When this trope goes bad and backfires on the taunter, see Offing the Mouth.
Examples subpages:
Other examples:
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Advertising
- A Nestle's Quik commercial from 1968 had an opposing baseball catcher taunting Washington Senator slugger Frank Howard who is seen drinking a glass of Quik in the Orioles dugout:
Catcher: [condescendingly] Why, Frank! You're drinking Nestle's Quik like all the good boys do. It's so rich and chocolatey, isn't it Franky-Wanky? [as Howard comes to the plate] Hey guys! Here comes the Nestle's Quik Boy! [to Howard] Please don't hit the ball too hard, Nestle's Quik Boy! [pitcher winds and delivers; Howard sends it over the centerfield wall and is rounding the bases. As he takes home plate] Hey, Frank. How long have you been drinking Nestle's Quik?
Frank Howard: [chucking catcher's cheek] Ever since I was about your size.
Asian Animation
- My Tyrano: Together, Forever: Punon likes mocking Gocchi and Rucchi after escaping from them, either calling them names or shaking her rump at their direction. And in the valley chase scene, performing an Eyelid Pull Taunt from across a valley (even though both Gocchi and Rucchi are well out of sight).
Comic Books
- Batgirl:
- In her first confrontation with The Joker, Barbara Gordon stops him from finishing off a wounded Batman by laughing at him, thus stalling him until the police arrive.
- Later, Cassandra Cain pulls a similar trick by walking away from the Joker in the middle of a fight and saying, "Bored. You're boring." (It helped that she knew of Barbara's earlier gambit.)
- Subverted in Captain Britain and MI13. John the Skrull is a cheeky, chirpy character who keeps up a constant stream of Witty Banter and taunts even when the situation seems hopeless. He'd be a Deadpan Snarker if he was, y'know, deadpan. The Skrull invaders eventually get fed up and decide to just shoot him.
- When Boo is taken hostage in Copperhead, he taunts Brex into physically attacking him to get an opening to make an escape attempt.
- Deadpool does the same thing, only his jokes tend to be cruder and is more a result of his insanity than a tactical move.
Domino: I always forget (or just block out to spare myself the agony) what Wilson's most lethal weapon is... his mouth! He'll talk nonsense until you surrender or commit suicide.
- Fantastic Four: Reed Richards snaps his wife Sue out of the Hatemonger's Emotion Bomb mind control by hurling condescending and misogynistic taunts in order to enrage her as much as possible (the mind control could only be broken by powerful emotions that stemmed from a different source.) Of course, some fans who never actually read the story and only saw that semi-infamous panel of him bitchslapping her while yelling "Shut up!" got the wrong idea...
- Generation X: Emplate, who has the ability to suck the marrow of mutants and gain their abilities as he does so, captures the whole team. Jubilee decided to antagonize him, even giving a top ten list of why he is a loser. Emplate decided to feed from her first, which was a Batman Gambit of Jubilee's because she knew her powers are uncontrollable when she's angry. The resulting fireworks frees the team.
- Nightwing does this so much that it's more or less part of his fighting style.
- Savage Dragon also regularly taunts his opponents. The most classic example would be his fights with Powerhouse - a deadly supervillain who has a face that looks like a chicken. There about five jokes per panel.
- In Secret Wars (1984), after Molecule Man drops a mountain on the heroes, Reed Richards taunts and insults the Hulk, who is pushing himself to the limit holding up the mountain, so that anger will give him the extra strength to hang on.
- Spider-Man:
- Spider-Man is the well-known, wisecracking grandmaster of taunts and the embodiment of this trope, with various other Spider-People being similarly inclined to varying degrees. It serves the dual purpose of keeping his spirits up and annoying his enemies. Of course, if he isn't doing this then the villain will wish they just got trash-talked.
Villain: Blast it! You talk so much, you've got me confused!
Spider-Man: How about that? I've got a super-power I didn't even know about: My Spider-Speech! - Naturally, when Spider-Man and Deadpool fought, taunts played an even bigger role than physical attacks. Spider-Man effectively won the fight by rendering Deadpool speechless with the taunt, "Kids don't wear Deadpool Underoos!"
- Spider-Man 2099: Pays tribute to early entries. Spider-Man is being chased by a persistent, talkative cyborg bounty hunter, and he wonders, "Lord, I wonder if I get on people's nerves this much when I mouth off as Miguel?" This is a deliberate inversion, as writer Peter David deliberately created Spider-Man 2099 as the opposite of Peter Parker—Parker is shy in person but talkative in costume, which the 2099 version inverts.
- Ultimate Spider-Man (2000) has Spidey confront Wilson Fisk, who demands to know who he's working for, assuming him to be in the employ of some criminal underworld rival. Instead, Spidey says he's had a lot of things he's wanted to say...and it's nothing but a series of fat jokes at Kingpin's expense. This torques off Kingpin to no end and causes him to lash out physically, but Spidey, being who he is, just dodges around the room while reading off his notecards. This is a valid tactic as Ultimate Kingpin is a mountainous slab of a man, but is actually pure muscle instead of fat, to the point that even Ultimate Spidey doesn't get much mileage out of hitting him.
- Spider-Man is the well-known, wisecracking grandmaster of taunts and the embodiment of this trope, with various other Spider-People being similarly inclined to varying degrees. It serves the dual purpose of keeping his spirits up and annoying his enemies. Of course, if he isn't doing this then the villain will wish they just got trash-talked.
- Supergirl: In the beginning of Red Daughter of Krypton, Lobo pushes Supergirl's buttons over and again in order to make her so irrationally angry that she can't fight effectively. He succeeds in driving her utterly mad... and then he finds out it was a spectacularly bad idea.
- Superman:
- Superman Reborn: When Mr. Oz realizes someone's missing, Doomsday, Prophecy and Tim Drake are all in their cells laughing at him.
Tim Drake: Someone got out! You hear me?! Someone got out!
- In The Phantom Zone, Supergirl enjoys taunting and mocking Faora before engaging with her and defeating her decisively.
Faora Hu-Ul: This planet... shall fall... before my might...!
Supergirl: You think so, Faora— with those looks and no personality?
Faora Hu-Ul: Supergirl!! Then this attack upon my beauty was your doing! I shall scratch your eyes out for this, you—
Supergirl: Save the threats for another night, Sweetcheeks.
- Superman Reborn: When Mr. Oz realizes someone's missing, Doomsday, Prophecy and Tim Drake are all in their cells laughing at him.
- X-Men: In the Proteus saga, Cyclops notes Wolverine is suffering psychologically from the villain's reality-warping attacks. Fearing Wolverine might become permanently gun-shy, Cyclops taunts him into attacking him. After a brief fight (where Cyclops manages to skillfully avoid Wolverine's attacks) that is interrupted by Phoenix, Cyclops reveals his reasons for provocation, which have successfully broken Wolverine out of his funk.
Fan Works
- In Asuka Quest, Asuka manages to get the drop on Lorenz Kihl as Demi-Adam with a long, colorful, and creative rant about how he is a horrible being who should never have been born. Notably, this occurred after her opponent insulted her vocabulary.
- In The Beacon Civil War, Jaune does this to Weiss with terrible love poetry. It Makes Sense in Context; Jaune is known for being an Abhorrent Admirer to Weiss, and he knows she hates his displays of affection.
- Cripps the Pink from A Brief History of Equestria took the Unicorn title of "Lady" to mock the Unicorns with the fact that she was an Earth pony with Unicorn heritage.
- Climbing Out: After he's captured, Rumble uses this to mess with his captors and drive everyone crazy.
- A Force of Four: While fighting Wonder Woman, villainess Badra gloats that she'll go after her mother and daughter next. One second after charging into a reckless rage, Wonder Woman realizes she fell for it.
Wonder Woman wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. "Expect no help from your patron. I've dealt with all his lackeys before, and beaten them. As I beat you."
"Then deal with me a second time," said Badra. "If I get done with you soon enough, perhaps he'll let me help the boys deal with your daughter. And your mother."
A second after she had done it, Diana realized she'd been goaded too well. She should have harnessed her fury, and tried a move with more finesse.
Instead, she just charged, with a war-cry on her lips and a face twisted in hate. Badra managed a sidestep, no easy feat considering Diana's velocity, and swung a knee into her abdomen. - In Fragmentation, ComStar suffers from this as a feint to distract them away from Executive Outcomes' activities in the Free Worlds League. A group of heavily armed pirates (in actuality an EO Taskforce disguising themselves) captures several ComStar HPG centers, something none of the Successor States would even dare risk, and their leader, a man clad in black with a bandana covering his face demands the 'return of Princess Buttercup'.
- In The Galactic Knightmare, Magalor invokes this on Marx by asking the armless beast for a high five. This causes Marx to charge at him, letting him dodge and sending Marx crashing into Yamikage.
- In Hellsister Trilogy, Supergirl's evil duplicate sees through Kara's attempts to lure her into a literal death dimension, so Supergirl baits her further by calling her a pathetic weak copy and revealing the Legion of Super-Heroes killed her lover Mordru.
Kara stopped at the warp-gate and looked behind her. Satan Girl had stopped as well, less than a mile behind her. To her credit, she wasn't stupid. She knew that Supergirl was leading her on. And, having Kara's memories, she knew where she was headed.
sent Satan Girl.
mocked Kara, smiling like a teacher tutoring her most backward pupil.
The villainess didn't budge. she sent.
, asked Kara.
Satan Girl's expression of hatred, which was about the only one she owned, intensified. she began, and that was all she could get out.
sent Kara.
At that, Supergirl knew she had succeeded. - Here Comes the New Boss: One of the uses for Bearskin's rage aura is preventing enemies from running, if you can handle them furiously attacking you instead. (Which the Butcher usually can.) Taylor uses it to stop Hookwolf from escaping and revealing her to Kaiser.
- Kara of Rokyn: A common tactic used by Kara during her wrestling stint, albeit sometimes it backfires.
When she faced Kara, Jasmine was all business. "I'm gonna knock you outta your panties, babe," she snarled as they circled.
"Glad somebody reminded you to wear yours," retorted Kara. That got to Jas. They closed and started pulling hair. - In the case of the four in The Keys Stand Alone: The Soft World, "I shall make myself an easy target so you will attack me, I will defeat you, and I will take all your stuff."
- This is how Korosensei saves Supergirl from her Face–Heel Turn caused by her red kryptonite infection in this story
based from season 1, episode 16 of the latter series.
Supergirl: WILL... YOU... SHUT... UP... ALREADY?!
Korosensei: Why? Am I bothering you by talking to you? Am I distracting you somehow? Make you lose focus? Messing up your concentration? Getting on your nerves, perhaps? I think you might just feel upstaged that I might beat you. - The Last Turn: Turing knows the city doesn't have enough troops to beat an army accompanied by a Master Shockomancer in a straight fight, but he also knows that the mage is a recent turncoat and not popular. With a tirade of insults, he succeeds in goading Zipzap into leading a reckless charge into the city — where Turing uses his control of the city to collapse the gates and the central tower on them, wiping out almost the entire attacking army and narrowly missing Zipzap himself.
"Come in and face me like a warlord, caster!"
For one shocked second all was silent outside. Then Turing heard a roar of rage and saw Zipzap sprint through the open gates, the entire army of stabbers and pikers behind him. - The Mountain and the Wolf: The Wolf's main tactic is to insult his enemies and destroy them in melee combat when they charge in blind rage, ranging from the Mountain to Petyr Baelish and even the Night King. Unfortunately, he has the same effect on his allies (without appearing to consciously try to do so), who restrain themselves from punching him with some difficulty, and even his most sincere compliments end up causing Your Approval Fills Me with Shame.
- Inverted in New Look Series: Joe's New Look an unwillingly crossdressed Joe accidentally flashes his panties at Big John, who isn't amused and takes it as a provocation. It's all a mistake; surely the last thing Joe intended was to appear in the field of battle wearing his girlfriend's clothes.
- In The Night Unfurls, this is done to Morgan by Kyril in Chapter 8, remastered version, who grabs Grace in the forearm and pulls her in close to him. As Morgan intends to claim ownership of Grace beforehand, this predictably attracts his attention because the two seem close. Kyril would then have an excuse to get rid of Morgan, which is what happens in Bar Brawl Cock Fights anyways.
- In Nightmares Are Tragic, Princess Luna taunts the Nightshadow with a "The Reason You Suck" Speech, claiming to pity it. This enrages the demon to the point that it devotes all of its attention to attempting a Mind Rape of Luna – and loses sight of the fact that the Element Bearers are summoning the Rainbow of Harmony against it, which is exactly what Luna intended.
- In Warhammer 40,000/A Song of Ice and Fire crossover The Phoenician of Blood and Fire, one of Balerion's favorite pastimes is sending insulting letters to Robert Baratheon. As a result, Robert hates him as much as he hates the Targaryens, if not more.
- Snape's Worst Nightmare: During the Quidditch game between the Potter-Weasley team and the Slytherin Quidditch team, Isabella Weasley does this to Snape every time she causes the Slytherin Seeker to crash on the ground. She does it three times - the last one after catching the Snitch and giving them a crushing victory.
- Son of the Sannin: Neji tries to do this to Sasuke when they face each other in the Chunin Exam preliminaries by bringing up the Uchiha Insurrection. This proves to be a very bad idea, as an enraged Sasuke beats him so badly that he nearly has to be hospitalized. The only good thing to come out of it was that it marked the start of his relationship with Karin.
- Sword Art Online Abridged:
- Strategically used by Kirito, right as Kayaba is about to leave, to get him to agree to a duel to the death for the fate of the players instead of simply stranding them again; by then, Kayaba's too pissed off about the repeated taunting to figure he's being had and decides skewering Kirito would be "therapeutic" enough to be worth it.
- This is all that Asuna does with Oberon in Fairy Dance. There is some tactical thinking here, like with Kirito and Kayaba, but mostly she just really doesn't respect him.
Asuna: Oh, yeah, whatcha got planned? You get a clown? Heh, I suppose you wouldn't want the competition.
Oberon: Laugh all you like—
Asuna: (bluntly) I will.
(beat)
Oberon: (through gritted teeth) Laugh all you like, but you and I both know you have no way of escaping this!
- In Team 8, Sasuke attempts to do this with Naruto by mocking Hinata. He realizes too late it was an spectacular miscalculation.
- The Ultimate Evil: During their first duel, Valmont mocks Jackie about Captain Black whom he injured with the Dragon Talisman. Jackie's resulting anger makes him attack Valmont recklessly, and the crime lord gains the upper hand. A while later, Jackie returns the favor when he reaches Valmont who's escaping on a barge with the gold stolen from Fort Knox. Jackie mocks Valmont while tossing the gold overboard, making Valmont blast a hole onto the barge and sink it.
- In crossover fanfiction The Vampire of Steel, Supergirl baits Zol-Am into a personal duel by stating he's frightened to fight her.
- Vow of the King: When Ganju challenges Ichigo to a fight, Ichigo lies that he banged Ganju's sister Kukaku, in order to make him angry and sloppy.
- Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series:
- Joey steals Bandit Keith's "In America!" catchphrase. Keith goes berserk.
- Also from The Abridged Series, Yami taunting Kaiba by making fun of his voice and motives.
Yami: Hey everyone, look at me! I'm Seto Kaiba! I have a dragon fetish and I sound like Brock from Pokemon! Screw the rules, I'm in love with Nurse Joy!
Kaiba: That's it, Mutou, you're f**king dead.
Films — Animation
- In Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker, Batman (Terry McGinnis) delivers an epic Boring Insult to the Joker. He successfully drives the clown over the edge by laughing at him and calling his attempts to make the original Batman laugh silly. After all, the only thing worse for a comedian than a Tough Room is The Heckler. For all his snark about others' failings, being trash-talked at is the one thing the Joker won't tolerate. It is a brilliant Ironic Echo to Joker's own taunting of the original Batman after finding out his identity, mocking him for being "a little boy in a play suit crying for mommy and daddy," with the insult being thrown right back at his face. The Smug Snake Monster Clown façade crumbles and only the monster remains from that point on.
- In Igor, Dr. Schadenfreude does this to Eva to goad her into hitting him, which will activate her dormant evil bone and turn her into an unstoppable monster.
- In Megamind, the titular character deliberately uses Titan's short temper to get punched across a square towards the hidden weapon that can turn him back to normal.
- Over the Hedge: RJ taunts Vincent by eating a Spuddie at the climax to trick him into lunging over the hedge and into the range of the Depelter Turbo.
- In Turning Red, in the climax, Mei tries to distract her transformed and out-of-control mother Ming by dirty dancing in front of her while the rest of their family tries to prepare and perform the ritual that will banish the panda spirit and return Ming to normal. It works, perhaps a little too well.
Films — Live-Action
- The titular game in BASEketball basically involves trying to psych someone out to prevent them from making a basketball shot.
- In Blazing Saddles, this is how Bart and the Waco Kid lure two KKK members into a trap: "Hey, Where da White Women At?"
- Spoofed in Duck Soup. Groucho insults the Ambassador Trentino, in order to provoke Trentino into hitting him, so that he can have the Trentino deported; the insults backfire (no, not that way), and Groucho ends up slapping the ambassador. On multiple occasions. Leading to a declaration of war.
- During the climax of Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives, Tommy lures Jason into his trap by taunting him, saving his Love Interest in the process.
- Happy Gilmore: Shooter hires a heckler who taunts Gilmore for many holes. After Gilmore is thoroughly riled up, he ends up venting on Bob Barker, who cleans his clock effortlessly.
- Hustle (2022): The antagonist basketball player Kermit Wilts repeatedly taunts Bo Cruz to infuriate him and throw him off his game. A big part of Bo's training is about learning to shrug off the insults.
- Scream VI: When faced with the killers and learning how their motives are tied to avenging Richie Kirsch, the killer from Scream (2022), Sam begins to taunt the ringleader by insulting Richie, calling him pathetic and noting how his girlfriend did most of the killing. This provokes one of the Ghostfaces into attacking in a rage, which breaks the standoff they were in and gives Sam's group a chance to fight back.
- Marlowe: The mob sends their enforcer, Winslow Wong, against the private eye Phillip Marlowe. Knowing he doesn't stand a chance against Wong in a straight fight, Marlowe runs away while insulting Wong over and over, making Wong angrier and angrier. Eventually, the chase leads to a skyscraper's balcony. Marlowe calls Wong gay, which enrages him so much that he attempts a flying kick. Marlowe dodges it, causing Wong to go over the edge and fall to his death.
- In the movie version of M*A*S*H, after Frank and Hot Lips have sex, Hawkeye relentlessly asked Frank questions about the experience to taunt him. It works, as Frank attacks Hawkeye and is later taken away in a straitjacket.
- Towards the end of Men in Black (1997), Jay figures out the best way to get "Edgar"'s attention is by stomping on cockroaches.
Jay: [feigning ignorance] Oh, I'm sorry, was that your auntie? Then that must be your uncle over there! (stomps on another roach) Well, well. Big, bad Bug got a bit of a soft spot, huh? What I can't understand is, why you gotta come down here bringing all this ruckus! Snatching up galaxies and everything. My attitude is: don't (stomp) start nothing, won't (stomp) be nothing!
- Monty Python and the Holy Grail :
- The trope namer is French soldier, although he doesn't seem to have much motive other than to amuse himself at the expense of the silly kuhniggits.
French Soldier: Now go away or I shall taunt you a second time!
- It is referenced while fighting the killer rabbit, when Sir Galahad suggests taunting it, saying it may become so cross it will make a mistake.
- The trope namer is French soldier, although he doesn't seem to have much motive other than to amuse himself at the expense of the silly kuhniggits.
- John Banning in The Mummy (1959) tricks Mehemet Bay to sic the mummy Kharis on him (and consequently, into his trap) by visiting him under a friendly neighbour guise (revealing that he survived the original attempt at his life), acting snooty and being dismissive about the Karnak religion, which Bay is a follower of.
- In Mystery Men, Mr. Furious falls into an existential funk just before the climactic battle. Since his powers are (supposedly) fueled by his rage, his teammates start belittling him in an attempt to get him into a fighting spirit. Unfortunately, it doesn't work.
- In No Name on the Bullet, no one has ever convicted John Gant of murder, because he always goads his targets into drawing first.
- The film version of Red Dragon.
- Subverted in Red Eye, as calling Jackson Rippner by "Jack" doesn't particularly bother him. He just finds it mildly annoying.
- In Serenity, Mal attempts to goad The Operative, to which he replies "You can't make me angry." Later on in the film, during the chase sequence, The Operative shoots Mal In the Back, to which Mal replies "You shot me in the back! I haven't made you angry, have I?"
- SHAZAM! (2019): Having learned that Sivana is vulnerable when separated from all seven Deadly Sins, Shazam taunts Envy (the only one currently bound to Sivana) out to fight and maneuvers it into taking a blast of transformation lightning. He then easily defeats his now-depowered foe.
- Sonic the Hedgehog (Film Series): Sonic’s favourite battle strategy is to drive his opponents up the wall. Memorable quotes include:
Okay, we really gotta talk about your new look. It’s like Professor X meets the Monopoly man! And what kind of genius shows up to Siberia in a convertible?
For a guy named "Knuckles", you are really bad at punching.
Nice action figure, Eggman! Does it do anything or just stand around looking ugly? - The Star Trek films:
- In Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Kirk ensures that Khan will follow him into the Mutara Nebula (which will negate many of Khan's current tactical advantages) by making it a dare and stomping on Khan's sense of superiority ("I'm laughing at the superior intellect.")
- Also used in Star Trek: First Contact. After the Borg have taken over most of the Enterprise, Picard stubbornly refuses to activate the self-destruct sequence and evacuate the ship. In one of Patrick Stewart's finer moments in acting, Lily proceeds to taunt Picard until Picard loses it and delivers a furious tirade against the Borg, which in turn makes him realize his hatred of the Borg is affecting his judgment.
- Used by a much younger alternate-universe Kirk in Star Trek (2009) as a way of getting Spock to prove himself unfit to command the Enterprise. It was slightly more successful than intended - Spock came very, very close to throttling Kirk.
- Dark side characters in the Star Wars universe are often seen taunting their opponents. In the Expanded Universe, this becomes an explicit technique of lightsaber fighting called "Dun Möch." Palpatine apparently failed his lessons.
- Obi-Wan does it to Ventress constantly in the Star Wars: The Clone Wars pilot movie.
- Sounds like any Jedi could've just countered with "How appropriate, You Fight Like a Cow."
- Will Smith as Deadshot appears to be doing this to El Diablo in the second trailer to Suicide Squad (2016). After seeing just what El Diablo can do, he immediately apologizes for fear of being on the wrong end of those powers, which is Played for Laughs.
Deadshot: I was just tryin' to get you there. No hard feelings, right? We good?
- This Is the End: Franco spews some taunts at McBride and his followers as he's being ascended to heaven. Naturally, this gets both him disposed from the Rapture and eaten alive.
Franco: Go to hell, McBride! Fuck you! Ha, ha! Suck my dick!
- Thor (2011):
- After Thor provokes war with the Frost Giants, Loki negotiates a way out. As they leave, a very large Frost Giant says to Thor, "Run back home, little princess". It's immediately lampshaded by Loki, who knows exactly what's coming: "Damn".
- Later in the same movie, the new, more humble Thor hesitates to attack Loki...until Loki threatens Jane Foster.
- Total Recall (2012): Lori taunts Melina about how she had slept with Melina's boyfriend Hauser. As a result, Melina breaks cover to shoot at her, and almost gets herself killed.
- The electric ghost Sammi Curr in Trick or Treat is defeated when Eddie taunts him to materialize the police car he is driving, which soon falls into the biggest collection of his weakness: the sea.
- In True Romance Dennis Hopper taunts Christopher Walken with some demographic facts about Sicilians which this particular Sicilian doesn't really care for. The result is that Walken and his mooks stop torturing him and go straight to killing him, which plays out as a victory.
Live-Action TV
- Angelus does this to the Beast in the Angel episode "Salvage". Indeed, whenever he's unleashed, his favourite games are always headgames.
- This is the main tactic used on the "Bad Girls Club". One girl will taunt another, usually putting her face within inches of the other's, goading the other into throwing the first punch. The rules of the show say whoever throws the first punch may be voted off.
- In Black Books, Bernard does this to a gang of violent skinheads for the very simple reason that he wants to be beaten up and thus have a legal excuse to delay completing his tax return. His taunts provoke only bewilderment until he picks on their football fandom.
Bernard: Which one of you bitches wants to dance? Hey, you know when you're doing your usual threesome thing you do on a weekend, and the moonlight's bouncing off your heads and your arses and everything, does that not get a bit confusing? Right. This is you, okay? [He prances about] Tra-la-la! Millwall! That's the one! Do you know this chant? Er, 'Millwall, Millwall, you're all really dreadful, and your girlfriends are unfulfilled and alienated...'
- Booth attempts this in Bones to try and incriminate her father (using a false identity).
Max Keenan: You're just trying to make me angry so that I'll hit you. Twenty-five years ago, that would've worked.
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
- Buffy does this to the Mayor in "Graduation Day". She goaded him in giant snake mode to a roomful of explosives, escaped and hit the detonator.
- In the season two finale, Angelus does this to Buffy. It doesn't work like he hoped.
Angelus: No weapons, no friends. No hope. Take all that away, and what's left?
Buffy: -catches his sword with her bare hands when he lunges at her- Me. - Buffy does this when captured by Faith in "Enemies". Ostensibly this is so Faith will kill Buffy instead of torturing her to death. Turns out Buffy is a Play-Along Prisoner and wants to get Faith to reveal the Mayor's plans during her Evil Gloating.
- In an episode of Chuck, Chuck aggravates Casey to get him riled up enough to defeat his sensei.
- Serial killer Nate Haskell had a habit of doing this to Ray Langston on CSI. He knew Ray was fighting becoming He Who Fights Monsters and wanted to get him angry. After Haskell kidnaps Ray’s ex-wife, Ray finds where he’s holding her, and Haskell keeps taunting Ray even after Ray cuffs him. It leads to Ray giving in to his anger and shoving Haskell over a stairway railing to his death.
- Dexter taunts a killer by using his real name — it's unclear whether he is trying to affect his judgement or just piss him off. Either way, it doesn't work. "You think calling me that is an insult? I take it as a compliment. It reminds me how far I've come."
- Doctor Who: In "Remembrance of the Daleks", the Seventh Doctor goads Davros into using the Hand of Omega, thereby destroying Skaro (or maybe not). He was presumably going to use it anyway, but it gave the Doctor a chance to imply Davros was using the Daleks to compensate for being impotent.
- In "The Vampires of Venice", Rory tries insulting Francesco to get him away from Amy but nothing works, that is until he insults Francesco's mother.
- The same thing popped up yet again in an episode of ER. Dr. Kovac wanted to keep an abusive husband away from his wife (the patient), but she refused to identify him as her attacker. In order to have him certified as a "danger to others", Kovac went into detail about his wife's injuries, explaining the kind of force necessary to cause them and what a big tough guy the man must be until the man snapped and punched him in the face. Kovac admitted the tactic probably wouldn't work for very long because he so obviously baited the man.
- Game of Thrones:
- Oznak zo Pahl, the champion of Meereen, taunts Daenerys' army by haranguing them and pissing at them. To damage the morale of the defenders, she permits Daario to engage him.
- Oberyn's "You killed my sister" rant during his duel is used this way, though it is also useful for creating a spectacle since Oberyn wants the world to know.
- To get the Mercy Kill he desires, The Hound resorts to pressing his companion's Berserk Button to get a revenge-kill. Arya doesn't fall for it and leaves him to die.
- A frequent tactic of immortals in Highlander: The Series during sword fights. Usually it’s the evil ones and it usually just makes Duncan more determined to win.
- An episode of Law & Order used essentially the same tactic, provoking a suspect that had beaten the system (by having the single source of DNA thrown out of the case) into assaulting one of the victims' brother by biting him, in order to get a DNA sample from the blood when the suspect hurt his hand.
- A version seen in the Life episode "Everything... All the Time"— though it's likely popped up in lots of other Police Procedurals— is when the protagonist, in need of an excuse to hold someone for questioning, provokes them into attacking, then arrests them for assault.
- The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: As he is being tortured to death by Sauron, Celebrimbor turns the tables on Sauron and mocks him as a Beyond Redemption destroyer of all that is good while Celebrimbor anticipates Heaven and being beyond Sauron's grasp.
- Star Trek: The Original Series:
- In the episode "This Side Of Paradise", Kirk deliberately insults Spock in order to anger him enough to throw off the influence of mind-controlling spores.
- He also taunts Rojan, in the episode "By Any Other Name", saying that his woman (Kelindra) favours Kirk over him. This is done to heighten Rojan's reactions and force him to acknowledge that trying to travel to the Andromeda galaxy in an emotion-filled human body was a mistake.
- Star Trek: The Next Generation:
- In "Family", Jean-Luc Picard is successfully taunted by his estranged elder brother, Robert. Robert has complex reasons for disliking Jean-Luc, including envy and a clash of values, but when his constant needling finally provokes a fistfight, he reveals that he partly did it for Jean-Luc's own good: He needed the catharsis since he was freshly dealing with the trauma of having been assimilated by the Borg.
- In "Samaritan Snare", Picard recounts that the reason he has an artificial heart is because he was taunted into a bar fight just after he graduated the academy. Much later, "Tapestry" explored the incident further, with Q apparently giving him the chance to do it over in the midst of a near-death experience. The crucial difference is that while the original young Picard allowed the taunting of the Nausicaans to start a melee, the mature Picard chose to keep his friends and himself out of danger. Q then forwards him to the "present-day" following from that choice, where Picard has been unnotable and never been promoted past lieutenant. Picard takes the point.
- Stargate SG-1:
- We have Colonel Jack "Of COURSE I dare mock you" O'Neill.
- Eventually rubs off on Daniel Jackson. Vala can be good at this too, as can Mitchell. None of them can quite reach Jack's level, though.
- In the episode "Folsom Prison Blues" (S02, Ep19) of Supernatural, Agent Henriksen tries this when interrogating Dean.
- In Survivor: Gabon, one contestant attempted a two-part strategy of doing this and then getting the Hidden Immunity Idol off an ally to blindside everyone else. It worked right up until he learned it was a fake idol - after playing it.
Music
- The Texas A&M University fight song, "The Aggie War Hymn", deliberately calls out rival University of Texas. So this trope zig-zags during sporting events where it's played, considering at any moment, it could be a close game, or either school could be completely smoking the other.
- The Scottish folksong "Baron O' Brackley" features this. The baron is raided by a rival clan, but refuses to fight on the logical grounds that he's horribly outnumbered. His wife insults his manhood, and he goes out to face them. Just as planned.
- P.D.Q. Bach: "Echo Sonata for Two Unfriendly Groups of Instruments" has a brass section, rather than properly echo a woodwind section, do everything it can to screw with their concert-mates, like playing completely different riffs, ignoring cues, and musically calling out "Nanny Nanny Boo-Boo". The woodwinds finally respond to the brass's dragging out their lines by pulling guns on them, which gets the brass to cooperate... until they get in one last insult by refusing to play their last note. The woodwinds good-naturedly finish it for them.
Myths & Religion
- Older Than Dirt example from The Bible; Elijah approaches the priests of Baal and challenges them to a contest. Each will build an altar to their respective god and ask him to call down fire to consume the offering; whoever gets an answer is worshiping the true god. Elijah lets the priests of Baal go first, and they spend a good chunk of the afternoon calling out to Baal to no effect. As evening draws near, Elijah starts to mock Baal's seeming inattentiveness; perhaps Baal is busy, or off on a journey, or taking a dump, and thus can't hear his priests. Once the priests gives up, Elijah takes his turn and gets God's answer after a simple prayer
Professional Wrestling
- After seeing Colt Cabana talk his way into a match with World Champion Jay Lethal at Supercard Of Honor X, Silas Young decided to try and get War Machine to put their Tag Team titles on the line by questioning Raymond Rowe's manhood.
- Hijo del Dos Caras turned his match around with Cuervo in WWC by grabbing a Puerto Rican flag, rubbing his butt on it, and then threatening to break its pole over his knee. His antics later lead to a flag match against Ray Gonzales.
- One time in 2005, Chris Masters was guarding Edge and Lita. John "Bradshaw" Layfield appears in the parking lot and mocks Masters on the TitanTron, calling him names like "orangutan" and "monkey". Enraged, Masters runs out to the parking lot to confront him. JBL says he fell for it, then in the ring, Rey Mysterio Jr. sneaks in and attacks Edge and Lita.
Sports
- A common tactic in various sports when one player attempts to provoke another one into doing something stupid. There tends to be a fine line, because the taunting itself can get penalized if it's too blatant or caught. A famous example of the above tactic gone somewhat wrong was made during the final match of the 2006 FIFA World Cup. Italian player Marco Materazzi taunted his French counterpart, Zinedine Zidane, by insulting Zidane's sister. While it did work (Zidane got a red card), the reason it worked was that Zidane gave Materazzi a headbutt to the chest.
- Also on sports, whenever the audience has a reason to insult the opposing team they will chant to unsettle them. Even more to gloat once things are headed towards a victory (the Standard Snippet is "Na na, na na na naaa, hey hey hey, GOODBYE."). In hockey, the home crowd also likes to chant the visiting goaltender's name once he concedes a goal (or especially if he gives in many).
Tabletop Games
- Standard tactics in Before I Kill You, Mister Spy... (formerly James Ernest's Totally Renamed Spy Game, formerly Before I Kill You, Mister Bond...) — the spy cards are worth more points if you can pull off a successful taunt before the kill.
- Dungeons & Dragons:
- Kender in Dragonlance are infamous — among other qualities — for the ability to get any creature able to understand them riled up.
- The Taunt spell could enrage opponents and cause them to attack you in melee combat (which was useful if they were more effective at ranged combat).
- Weaponized by the bard spell Vicious Mockery, which causes psychic damage to the target of the insult. If done right, a high-level bard could kill a dragon by insulting it to death.
- Unlike Chess, you're allowed to do this in Game of the Generals.
- GURPS has the "Rapier Wit" Advantage which allows a character's witty remarks to leave an opponent mentally stunned. Critical failures, however, push the opponent over the line from "exasperated and wide open" to "infuriated and dangerous."
- Magic: The Gathering features this as an effect on some cards (as seen in the page image), and there is even a keyworded ability, "Goad", that forces a specific creature to attack (another player than the one who goaded it, if possible) when its turn comes. Due to the way combat works in Magic, a creature that's forced to attack will give the target the freedom to block it with any of their available creature or creatures they have on the board — and kill it if the defender has better stats, making the implementation an example of the Blinded by Rage variant of the trope. As such, Goad is a somewhat unconventional way to get rid of enemy creatures that are useless in battle but have strong passive or activated abilities, which the opponent would never send into combat otherwise.
Mklthd had always hated crowds ... and they had always hated him.
— Flavor text for Jeering Homunculus
- In Munchkin, there's a card named "Divine Intervention", which lets all Clerics gain a level. That level can be the one that makes them win the game. If that happens, any cleric who reached Level 10 this way get to taunt the other players mercilessly. And the rules even encourage taunting them if you win this way, because it's just unlikely to ever actually happen.
- Mutants & Masterminds has the Taunt feat, which lets you do this. Not that there's anything stopping you from mouthing off, but this lets you use it in combat a la Spider-Man. And it's only one character point.
- Savage Worlds: The Taunt skill can be used in combat to put an opponent at a disadvantage (Intimidation can be used similarly). In Deadlands this has a special significance in duels, as each gunslinger tries to goad the other (by either taunting or intimidation) into reaching for their gun first, which not only gives them a penalty to their shooting roll but also puts them on the wrong side of the law.
- This is a somewhat easily missed but perfectly valid use of the Intimidation skill in Spirit of the Century; there's even a related "Infuriate" stunt for it that gives an explicit bonus to attempts to rile people up rather than simply frighten them. Presumably, to eliminate this potential point of confusion, the later Fate Core System rules rename the skill to Provoke and explicitly define it as the skill of eliciting negative emotional responses in general — be those fear, anger, shame, or whatever — and getting one's way by basically being a jerk to people.
- As stated in the Films folder, Sith characters from Star Wars tend to taunt a lot (except Darth Maul, who doesn't talk much). In the old Hasbro-licensed tabletop fighting game "Epic Duels Game", a few attack or special cards are named after banter lines from the movies. Dooku's most powerful attack cards are simply called "taunting", and they indeed deal a high amount of direct damage. Christopher Lee's tongue must be just that sharp.
- Weaponized by Wulfrik the Wanderer in Warhammer Fantasy. "Cursed" by the gods with immortality and a gift of tongues, now he has to wander the world fighting the strongest champions the enemy has to offer, and does so by hurling the crudest insults he can think of at them, and Chaos magic not only translates it into their tongue but makes them take the insult so badly they can't refuse the challenge. And since Wulfrik is a nine-foot-tall Horny Viking straight from the best Heavy Metal album cover, said taunts get very crude indeed, such as this one, delivered to a dwarf king:
Wulfrik the Wanderer: Face me if you dare, stunted whelp, or do you lack even an Elven maid's courage? I thought the Sons of Grungni were great warriors, but perhaps you are no true Dwarf. Indeed, maybe you are instead some breed of bearded goblin, though in truth, I have seen a finer beard on a Troll's back-side."
Visual Novels
- Ace Attorney:
- This could be said to be something that Apollo Justice adds to the series. While Phoenix provokes his foes into a Villainous Breakdown by finding the flaws in their story; Apollo can use his special power to identify his foes' weakness like this.
- And throughout the whole Ace Attorney series, any time the villain of the day seems to have the upper hand, they will mercilessly taunt the player character, thinking they have them completely beat. The character then either goes into a panic since they're backed into a corner, or they go silent or taunt right back when they see a flaw from the bad guy they can exploit.
- This trope is also Prosecutor Simon Blackquill's primary method of controlling the courtroom in Dual Destinies. He also used it while searching for the Phantom during his time in jail. 'Just try to retrieve your identity, you bloody butcher!'
- The more comedic version that runs the same circles as the trope namer is the petty and childish "No, You"-type fights between the prosecution and defence in the first half of the last case.
- Artificial Nexus: When he isn't gloating, the Big Bad Prometheus is talking down the protagonist Susan and mocking her, calling her useless and idiotic. Given that she accidentally gave him the means to take over her body, he's at least partially correct about some of it.
- In Double Homework, Dennis tries to make the protagonist lose face by taunting him in the hopes that he’ll do or say something he regrets.
- Tohsaka in Fate/stay night irritates Caster into not noticing that she and Shirou have circled her and Kuzuki to make for more favorable fights. Kuzuki notices but doesn't do anything about it.
Web Animation
- In If the Emperor Had a Text-to-Speech Device, Tzeentch utilizes cheap insults and clever word-twisting to win Magnus over to his side, using the sorcerer's own pride and hatred of the Emperor's other children, especially Leman Russ.
- Madness Combat: Hank pulls a subtle one, impressively so considering the series has no spoken dialogue. When he first encounters a Soldat, bio-mechanical cyborgs, he dramatically points to his own eye to make fun of them for their own lack thereof. Naturally, they open fire on him.
- Imperial Fist VS Iron Warrior is a Warhammer 40,000 fan-animation, showing a verbal altercation between an Imperial Fists Space Marine and an Iron Warriors Chaos Marine. Instead of a heated exchange between two mortal enemies however, it's more like an argument between playground bullies.
- RWBY:
- Neo, being mute, uses cheeky gestures and facial expressions to taunt her opponents. Even her fighting style utilizes this, as she tends to block and evade to frustrate her opponents' attempts to hit her, all with a smirk on her face.
- During the Vytal Festival Tournament, Weiss and Yang are set up against two members of Team FNKI from Atlas. Neon Katt, a cat faunus dressed like she just got back from a rave/roller derby, spends much of the fight calling Yang overweight to throw off her accuracy. If only she spent as much time and effort actually trying to defeat Yang properly... or watch where she was going.
- When Cordovin discovers the woman piloting the stolen airship is Maria in "Stealing from the Elderly", she threatens her Sitcom Arch-Nemesis. Maria not only defies her but starts munching cashews over the comm-link to provoke Cordovin into using her giant mech-unit. Maria smuggling cashews onto a flight once in the past is how their feud began.
Maria: You hear that Cordo? [loudly crunching on cashews with the radio to her mouth] That's the sound of me not caring! [maniacal laughter]
- As things start going south in Atlas, the titular team faces against the kingdom's elites Ace-Ops, led (at that point) by Harriet Bree, who can either overpower or outspeed any of RWBY girls individually, so Ruby triggers her competitive nature by proclaiming her team to be the best in Atlas. Ruby then spends most of the fight using her own speed/teleportation ability to evade an infuriated Ace-Op, while her teammates take out Hare's one by one before eventually coming to their leader's aid.
Webcomics
- Angel Moxie double subverts this. The girls manage to get Tsutsumu furious during their battle, but he realizes he's losing his control and takes a moment to calm himself down. Then it turns out that was their plan - he was vulnerable while he was collecting himself
- Erfworld:
- Parson deliberately offends Ansom's (excuse me, Prince Ansom's) traditionalist sensibilities by dismissing the concept of royalty as "obsolete," and then provokes him further by declaring that Stanley's attunement to the Arkenhammer makes him Ansom's "superior".
- He also has his troops sing a filthy song about the Jetstonians carefully crafted from the most obscene things he can get past Erfworld's built-in "boop" filter.
- Edith of Godslave mocks Turner when he tries to attack her in the same manner yet again, calling him a one-trick pony. Unfortunately for her, he promptly changes his tactic.
- In Girl Genius during the fight agaisnt the revenant Andronicus Valois the Jagers start taunting him to keep him distracted while other characters prepare attacks that might actually be able to stop him.
- In Grrl Power, minor villain For Whom The Death Tolls uses his pretentious name, ominous-looking costume, and obnoxious personality to goad opponents, because his Adaptive Ability only works to counteract attacks on him and is useless if his opponent doesn't fight.
- In Gunnerkrigg Court, Jones starts badmouthing Antimony's father, in order to make Annie angry so Jones can better "assess her character". This doesn't work very well — at most, it makes Antimony marginally irritable and (rightly) suspicious of her intentions. Annie reacts more viciously when such things are said in context where they make sense, however.
- In Moon Crest 24, Aleck taunts Drake. It gets as close to a "Come at me bro!" without saying it verbatim.
- Vaarsuvius (or V) from The Order of the Stick has a long history with this trope.
- Vaarsuvius does this to outsmart Nale. Elan's Evil Twin Nale briefly took Elan's place in the party, until Elan catches back up to them and V walks in on the two fighting. Nale tries to use the Kill Us Both trick to get out the Spot the Impostor situation, which frustrates Elan into proclaiming what a Dead Horse Trope that particular trick is. V agrees, and says that such a dumb trick is exactly the sort of thing Nale would do. Nale (who is guilty of both being a Smug Snake and having a serious Small Name, Big Ego problem) immediately blows his cover by trying to defend his plan, which earns him a magical bolt of lightning in the face from V.
- Later V falls victim to it when another customer in a magic shop intentionally provokes them. It turns out to merely be an elaborate ploy to have V identify themself so that the other "customer" can serve V with divorce papers.
- Later still, during a period where V is working to overcome the Fatal Flaw or Pride, V averts this by refusing to give in to anger when Zz'dtri tries to taunt V by saying how V couldn't win their fight without help. For about a panel V is furious and clearly considers abandoning the tactics that had all but handed V the victory, but then reconsiders and ignores Z's little verbal jab.
- Hwaryun from Tower of God taunts a Costume Copycat impersonator of Viole by calling him a stinking pig until he tries to bash her brains out. Tries.
- Weak Hero:
- Teddy gains his advantage in battle by taunting his opponents beforehand, riling them up and shaking them mentally so that he can more effectively take them down. Unfortunately for him, he's not prepared for it when Gray turns the tables and taunts him before their showdown.
- After Wolf expresses his intention to quit the Union, Donald taunts him into a fight by calling him a dog and then effortlessly beats him down, putting him back in his place.
- Eunchan's introduction has him mocking two bullies he finds out in the street, all for the purpose of making them lower their guard so he can get in some quick hits and scare them off.
Web Originals
- Atop the Fourth Wall's Linkara pulls this on Lord Vyce in order to get him to come and fight him again.
- In the Black Jack Justice episode "No Justice", Jack is being questioned by mobster Chick Mason and his flunkies Monk and Hak. Jack spends as much time as possible insulting Dumb Muscle Hak to provoke him. He's initially thwarted because Mason can keep him under control. Then Jack insults his mother and sends him into a blind rage, during which he ignores his boss to attack Jack. It is at that point Jack reveals he slipped out of his handcuffs ten minutes ago and proceeds to beat down Hak, Mason, and Monk in quick succession.
- In Fate/stay night [Unlimited Blade Works] Abridged, Archer tries to indicate that he wants Lancer to hit him with his most powerful attack as part of a plan. When Lancer fails to pick up the hint, he switches to goading Lancer into getting angry enough to use said attack anyway by disparaging his pride as a hero, trying to embarrass him with Baby Talk, and, because Lancer is Irish, insulting potatoes.
- Jayuzumi uses his soundboards for this purpose on a fairly frequent basis. How good-natured the insults are tends to vary.
- Happens on two separate occasions in Survival of the Fittest with the same characters: Tyson Neills and Bobby Jacks. The first time around, Tyson taunts Bobby in an attempt to provoke a fight with Troy McCann (to raise his 'street credit'). The second time is on the island itself, in an attempt to make him lose his cool and do something stupid. It backfires, Bobby does lose his temper, but in the midst of his rage kills Tyson.
- Little One of Tales From My D&D Campaign takes this approach to all his interactions the evil Kua-Toa. From getting Angel to write insults in Kuar on his shield to decorating that same shield with teeth taken from dead K Ts to dropping a fishing line in the water he suspects to be occupied by KT warriors, he goes to great lengths to make sure the K Ts are as pissed off with him as possible. Perhaps the best is when, after slaughtering a KT patrol, he cuts the heads off, stakes the bodies upside-down, then sticks the head back on top of the whole affair (i.e., the K Ts have their heads up their behinds.)
- Done by some of the mouthier heroes in the Whateley Universe. Chaka has pulled this successfully both times superpowered ninjas slipped into Whateley Academy. She got the leader annoyed enough to make a major mistake. Both times. Phase pulled it off against an unbeatable, unkillable demon who had just crushed her like a bug. Literally. She managed to stall it long enough for help to show up, banishing the demon and keeping her from a Fate Worse than Death.
Western Animation
- Aladdin does this plenty of times in Aladdin: The Series, especially to Abbis Mal.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender:
- In "The Deserter", when facing Zhao, who is a very powerful firebender but has a lousy temper and poor self-control, Aang repeatedly insults his bending and combat skills until Zhao loses control and starts sending out wild blasts that set his entire fleet on fire.
- In "The Day of Black Sun, Part 2", Azula wastes the heroes' time during the eclipse by mocking Sokka about Suki.
- In Ben 10: Ultimate Alien episode "Too Hot to Handle", after P'Andor's thugs capture Kevin, they demand that he finish what he started by using the Taydenite to free P'Andor from his containment suit, and resort to this when Kevin tries to refuse.
Kevin: How stupid do you think I am?
Surgeon: Stupid enough to get caught.
Buzz: Stupid enough to pass off a million bucks.
Hammer: Stupid enough to take us on.
Buzz: Come on you lousy freak!
Hammer: What are you, afraid?
Surgeon: Your little girlfriend would put up more of a fight!
[An angered Kevin absorbs the Taydenite and turns his arms into blades as he charges at the thugs, only to end up slashing P'Andor's containment suit, much to Kevin's horror]
P'Andor: Also, you're stupid enough to do that. - DC Animated Universe:
- Batman: The Animated Series:
- Robin does this all the time.
- Extremely rare example from the original Batman himself: In "Mad Love", he taunts the Joker by saying that Harley had come closer to killing him than he (the Joker) ever had. Then Batman grins and calls him "Puddin'", Harley's pet-name for the Joker. He also pulls this stunt on Harley Quinn. After she tells him her plan of killing him so the Joker will love her, he actually breaks into laughter (delivered in the most haunting, chilling chuckle by Kevin Conroy), telling her the Joker only cares about himself and mockingly informing her that he's played the same mind games on her with countless other people — she's just the only one to fall for it.
- Justice League:
- "Only a Dream" has another Batman example, where he relentlessly mocks and taunts Dr. Destiny as he closes in, disrupting Destiny's focus and making it harder to bring his full psychic power to bear.
- "Wake the Dead" sees Aquaman act like a Politically Incorrect Hero to goad Shayera out of her funk to no avail.
- Batman: The Animated Series:
- He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (2002): In "Sky War", Skeletor eats Ambrosia and becomes even stronger that He-Man. He-Man starts insulting him by calling him ugly and other things. Enraged, Skeletor gives him a savage beating. He-Man endures it and explains he tricked Skeletor into overexerting himself so the Ambrosia would wear off faster.
- Jackie Chan Adventures: In "Bullies", Valmont gets his hands on the dragon talisman, which provides the power of combustion, which he uses to rob Fort Knox. Jackie follows him, and remembering his own struggles with his Berserk Button (Captain Black's injuries by Valmont) throughout the episode, decides to press Valmont's Berserk Button by tossing gold overboard, while sarcastically asking things like "How much is this gold worth? A new Ferrari?" Valmont loses it, fires at Jackie in a rage, and proceeds to sink his own raft.
- Jumanji: The Animated Series: In "No Dice", Peter and Judy stomp, kick and insult the board to get it to suck them in to help Alan after he steals the dice. It seems to be aware of what they're attempting, and so does nothing up until Peter gets genuinely mad and throws it into garbage while lamenting that if they don't get the dice back, no one will ever be able to play it again.
- The Karate Kid (1989): In the episode "My Brother's Keeper", Kala insults his guard to make him come back so that Kala can steal his spear to cut himself loose.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: In "A Canterlot Wedding - Part 2", the villain traps Twilight Sparkle in a cave and taunts her until Twilight is attacking with magic. Not only does the magic ricochet all over the place, but Twilight attacks the pony that the villain has been masquerading as. However, this ends up backfiring, as Twilight breaks open an exit and is able to free both herself and the other pony.
- The Powerpuff Girls (1998): In "Makes Zen to Me", Mojo Jojo unsuccessfully tries to taunt Buttercup during her meditation session.
Mojo: You cannot defeat me. Green is not your color. You look fat in that dress.
- SpongeBob SquarePants: The episode "Texas" has SpongeBob and Patrick deliberately insult Sandy's titular home so she can chase them to the surprise party they have planned for her. Unfortunately, it worked too well, and Sandy's out for their blood.
- Star Wars Rebels:
- In "Droids in Distress", Zeb has the upper hand in his bo-rifle duel with Agent Kallus, until Kallus claims he personally ordered the use of disruptors during the massacre of the population of Zeb's homeworld, causing Zeb to get really angry and fight sloppier, leading to Kallus coming very close to killing him. "The Honorable Ones" confirms that Kallus was lying to demoralize Zeb: while he was involved in the Lasat genocide, he didn't make the call for the use of disruptors and didn't expect such a massacre.
- In "Trials of the Darksaber" Kanan — playing the Warrior Therapist — does this to Sabine during their practice duel, to get her to spill the hang-ups that are preventing her from giving her all to the training.
- In "Zero Hour", Kallus does this to Governor Pryce while she's in the middle of a Villainous Breakdown, causing her to order him Thrown Out the Airlock — which is exactly what he wanted, as it gives him the perfect opportunity to escape the Chimaera and join up with the rebels.
- Steven Universe: In "Earthlings Part 2", Peridot laughs at Jasper during her fight with Smoky Quartz whenever she gets beaten up or humiliated in some way. This makes Jasper madder and madder and causes her to make more mistakes during the fight. She eventually gets so mad, she fuses with a corrupted gem to get a power boost. She's still easily defeated, and only managed to infected herself with corruption in the process.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003): While he doesn't often use it against his enemies, Michelangelo, in true sibling fashion, knows that taunting is a hugely effective weapon against Raphael, and will always use it when fighting him. This tactic backfires horribly once when Mikey makes Raphael so angry that he nearly caves his head in with a blunt instrument. Naturally, Raph is horrified at his action and spends the episode learning An Aesop about self-control.
- When Cyborg, Beast Boy, and Starfire have evil Doppelgangers of themselves made in Teen Titans (2003), the Doppelgangers start taunting the heroes they were based on. Beast Boy's Doppelganger managed to get him to cry Berserker Tears.
- In Transformers: Animated, Prowl has Bumblebee use his greatest weapon against Blitzwing to force him into his angry personality, whose corresponding vehicle mode is ground-based instead of flight-capable, and make him crash mid-flight:
Bumblebee: What, my stingers? My turbo-speed?
Prowl: Your obnoxious personality.
Real Life
- During World War I, Italy's (in)famous Warrior Poet Gabriele D'Annunzio did it twice:
- First, the Bakar Mockery: he led a trio of MAS (basically, motorboats with a pair of torpedoes strapped on the sides) into the most guarded harbor of the Austro-Hungarian empire, fired torpedoes at the moored ships (ineffectively, as the Austro-Hungarian admiralty had placed torpedo nets in case the Italians managed to elude the surveillance) and left numerous bottles with mocking messages in them in an attempt to lure the fleet to give chase... And get in an ambush. On the short term it failed, apparently, because the Austro-Hungarians were too shocked by what had just happened to come out, but on the long term the Austro-Hungarians lost their flagship when they replied with a large-scale raid and the ship ran in the crews of the MAS that had supported D'Annunzio;
- Second, and most famous, the Flight Over Vienna. The Austro-Hungarians had recently launched a bombing raid on Milan as a warning. D'Annunzio led a squadron over Vienna (believed to be outside the range of contemporary bombers. Except the Italians had something with more then enough range) and dropped leaflets, some with a horrible poem written by D'Annunzio himself (horrible enough it was too difficult to translate into German) and most with a message that can be summed with "You bombed Milan believing yourself invulnerable. You're not, be grateful we're too civilized to bomb Vienna to rubble and you should surrender before we change our minds". Austro-Hungarian morale plummeted after that, especially because the whole squadron got away with it.
- Al-Qaeda wants their enemies (which are far bigger than they are) to be stretched thin, unable to focus, and spend their funding like there is no tomorrow. To this end, they are making attacks that basically amount to mere taunts in its scale of damage. Considering the length of The War on Terror and the sorry economic state of said enemies, it seems to have been Crazy Enough to Work.
"[It is] easy for us to provoke and bait this administration. All that we have to do is to send two mujahidin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaeda, in order to make the generals race there and cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses [...]"
- In Iraq, during the early months of the invasion and occupation, coalition troops routinely lured insurgents out of cover and into reckless, bullet-spraying charges by insulting their manhood. As they were charging headlong into a few DOZEN machine guns when they did this, it routinely went badly for the insurgents.
- In schools around the world, this is how bullies work - many zero-tolerance policies either punish both people involved or give a greater punishment to the person who throws the first punch. So they want you to throw the first punch so you get in more trouble than they do.
- The page quote comes from Sun Tzu. The future founder of the Han Dynasty, Liu Bang, took this to heart, using it a lot in battles against his famously irritable rival Xiang Yu.
- When Xiang Yu captured Liu Bang's father and (from across a ravine) threatened to boil him alive, Liu's response was "Send me a cup of the soup!"
- That same taunt was part of an exchange that led Xiang Yu to shooting an arrow at Liu Bang, which struck him in the chest. His response was to shout "Ow, my foot!" Probably a subversion, since having their leader struck in the chest would easily demoralize the army in question, and Liu Bang couldn't afford to have that.
- This is the core of the American Atheists billboard campaigns. Come up with something controversial, put it on a billboard, release a press statement, wait for Bill O'Reilley and the Catholic League to get infuriated and say something equally press-worthy.
- This is the only tactic of trolls.
- This is very common in Poker, to the point where it has acquired the name putting someone "on tilt." It's actually risky to the insulter because it can be a clue as to what you want the person to do (or, even worse, provoke a fight).
- The use of skirmishers in traditional (i.e. formation-based) warfare followed this trope: Skirmishers would range in front of an army in a scattered formation and pelt enemy melee infantry formations with javelins, arrows, sling stones, and other light missiles. This would cause undisciplined enemies to break formation and charge the skirmishers, who would feign retreat back to their own lines where friendly infantry could deal with the enemies who broke formation.