r/TopCharacterTropes • u/BlackHandKUR • Aug 17 '26

Hated Tropes [Hated Trope] Nerdy characters who don’t understand nerdy things

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There are too many examples of movies and tv fumbling basic nerd knowledge but the one that particularly bugs me is whenever we have nerdy characters not understanding basic DnD lore or mechanics.

Big bang theory is probably one of the worst offenders when it comes to not understanding nerdom but how they do dnd is especially insulting. They don’t understand any of the basic concepts, lore, mechanics or even how races look. Theres a scene where they do a steamy dnd thing and they describe an orc with multiple arms and breasts. Not a single part of that was even remotely close to correct and Sheldon being the atypical rule lawyer type should know that.

Abed from community isn’t much better. Either he doesn’t know the rules or fragrantly allows his players to ruin a session. There is never a mention of initiative, contesting rolls, or scaling. Pierce, a naked hermit of a character, over powers a high level fighter then charms a high level creature to pose this great threat to the party. What?

Stranger things, and possibly the one the gets me the most, off the rip we have a character who misses a fireball attack by rolling low. That’s not how fireball works, that not how fireball has ever worked. Fireball is an AoE spell where everyone in its radius has to have a save to have the damage halved. These are kids that name the monsters after DnD creatures yet they don’t know the difference between fire bolt and fire ball?

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u/TheOriginalSamBell Aug 17 '26

and IT Crowd

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u/Majin_Nephets Aug 17 '26

The IT Crowd isn’t really that much better, tbh. Most of the actual nerd-related humour is still basically “lol aren’t nerds weird?”, it just has more range to its humour than just that, unlike TBBT.

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u/Leg0z Aug 17 '26

I don't know why you're getting downvoted. Both The IT Crowd and The Big Bang Theory feel like theatre kids making fun of actual nerds, which they don't understand at all.

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u/TheRealStandard Aug 17 '26 edited Aug 18 '26

IT crowd feels like its making fun of nerds while being written by nerds. A lot of the shows punchlines aren't just "ha they are nerds"

It also pokes fun at corporate culture and Matt Berrys amazing character too.

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u/NewCobbler6933 Aug 18 '26

The com in “sitcom” stands for comedy though