“ | Fool of a Took! Throw yourself in next time, and rid us of your stupidity. | „ |
~ Gandalf to Peregrin Took after he accidentally makes loud noises. |
“ | 300 years of peace and harmony undone by one colossally...incredibly...stupendously stupid sloth! | „ |
~ Shangri Llama angry at Sid for accidentally destroying Geotopia. |
“ | I was stupid. So stupid. | „ |
~ Sayaka Miki before her transformation into a witch. |
Dimwits or Heroic Idiots are heroes who rarely (if ever) use their heads, appear to have no wisdom, little to no thought capacity or even have no intelligence or common-sense at all (the former definition would be better classified as brainless). These characters are usually depicted as extremely ignorant, unintelligent, simple-minded and are often very likely to ruin their own plans or bother people for their cluelessness. However, this is what they lack in the brain and common sense, they are more than making up for in the heart (well, most of them). These heroes follow very few or no orders mostly because they don't seem to understand a word that is said so they do the opposite of what is said without thinking. They are the complete opposite of Masterminds, which are considered the most intelligent and resourceful characters.
However, some of these heroic idiots can be considered NOT particularly dim-witted nor ignorant, as some like Mordecai, Mr. Satan, Courage the Cowardly Dog and Katsuki Bakugo can often be considered more careless, silly and sometimes, clumsy or feeble-minded as opposed to outright dumb. However, it is rare for idiots to reach the heights of characters like Patrick Star or Billy, Beavis & Butt-Head or Gus Turner in terms of massive stupidity.
The difference between intelligence and wisdom is that intelligence is the ability to use knowledge to solve complex problems, whereas wisdom is based on using judgement to deal with practical situations in order to come to better long-term outcomes. So there are characters who have great wisdom but are otherwise not very intelligent (Shonen heroes like Goku and Yusuke Urameshi are capable of being rather wise despite their lack of book smarts and general intellect and common sense). Although, there are some dimwitted heroes who can be shown to have great high-level intelligence whenever they're focused on solving missions, because of this, it is also possible for there are characters with high intelligence but have very little common sense or poor judgement. A dimwit who has shown signs of intelligence must be classified as either Wise or Genius since it is impossible for a character to be both a dimwit and a mastermind at the same time.
This is a common trope, especially if it applies to the protagonist, known as Idiot Hero. Check out Idiot Hero on tv tropes. If the hero is generally very intelligent, but has areas, especially regarding common sense, can be rather dumb, clumsy or weird, then check for Ditzy Genius on tv tropes.
Their evil counterparts are dimwitted villains, but it is also possible for an On & Off dimwit to have their stupidity lead them to commit acts so questionable that they cause controversy and can be interpreted as villains.
Characters that only pretend to be dumb do not count (e.g. Pomni, Stanley Pines, Bugs Bunny and Perry the Platypus). That is an example of trickery.
NOTE: Do not add these sorts of characters to Villains Wiki if their crimes are a result of them being more ignorant than malicious and they are not met with lasting infamy within the work (e.g. Homer Simpson and SpongeBob SquarePants). In order for a heroic dimwit to count as a villain, they must commit serious crimes and cause harm to the point where their insanity also causes them to voluntarily become dangerous and malicious (e.g. Beavis and Butt-Head, Peter Griffin, Stan Smith, Lumpy, Gus Turner, Crash Bernstein and Beelzebul).
Nevertheless, they still have the possibility of qualifying as Pure Good as long as their limited knowledge does not interfere with their moral agency and the said hero meets all criteria (e.g. Po, Emmet Brickowski, Forrest Gump and Yuji Itadori).
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