Irony has been defined in pop culture and in life in numerous ways, and it’s almost always the ‘duh’ moment that we can speak of with a great deal of hilarity in our voice, or possibly regret that we didn’t see something coming. It kind of depends on the situation since like it or not, the irony is all about contradictions that occur when we least expect them, or at least that’s one way to put it. When thinking about how things are supposed to turn out and how we expect them to turn out, we hardly ever look to see what could possibly happen if we stay the course. Some might do this, but on average, irony tends to strike us when we don’t expect it, and when it’s least likely to be fully appreciated. Here are ten movie moments that were too ironic to miss.
10. The prisoners on Con Air were enjoying a song by a band that died in an airplane crash.
Steve Buscemi even phoned it in as the moment was happening since the convicts singing along to Lynyrd Skynyrd didn’t appear to care that they were listening to a band that had suffered in a plane crash two full decades prior. One has to wonder if the director added this in on purpose just to be amusing. But it’s also worth noting that not all of the convicts died upon crashing, though a few did.
9. Mother Goethel from Tangled unknowingly orchestrated Rapunzel’s revelation by denying her what she wanted.
Really, how in the world do you contain a young child who sees a bunch of bright lights floating in the air from her tower window? And shouldn’t Mother Goethel have been worried when she saw Rapunzel painting the royal crest, unknowingly, all over the interior of the tower? Had she taken her to see the floating lights she might have been able to spin a yarn about what they were while keep Rapunzel contained. Yes, that’s pretty dark.
8. In The Others it’s found that a woman who believes her house to be haunted is in fact the actual ghost.
Much like The Sixth Sense and a few other movies in history, the signs were all there that this was the case, that Nicole Kidman and her kids were the actual ghosts, but people tend to believe what they want, and therefore the audience likely believed that she was alive all that time. The appearance of her husband should have been a big tip, especially the way he showed up.
7. Andy Dufresne executed a rather ironic moment in The Shawshank Redemption.
Remember when the warden stated that salvation could be found within? Obviously, Andy took that to heart since the salvation that he’d been hoping for was indeed found inside… his bible. The reveal near the end of the movie was definitely a classic moment in movie history since it was a giant middle finger to the warden since he’d been so arrogant and unwilling to help Andy out.
6. In an attempt to keep his wife from dying in Revenge of the Sith, Anakin Skywalker ends up causing her death.
There was something to the thought that Anakin was too old to begin training since, despite the controversial methods of the Jedi, he had a life that he feared losing, namely his mother, and once he met and eventually married Padme this was only compounded. His love for his wife was real, but it was possessive since as a slave he hadn’t had much of anything that couldn’t be taken away. In order to stop that from happening he became what he’d been fighting against, and it broke Padme’s heart.
5. Lucius Malfoy slips up and grants Harry Potter the means to defeat his master, Voldemort, in Chamber of Secrets.
This was easy to blame on the arrogance and ignorance of Lucius Malfoy since he didn’t believe that a child stood a chance against Voldemort, and no doubt thought that Harry’s survival was a fluke. But risking a piece of his master’s soul wasn’t just Lucius’s bad call, it was Voldemort’s as well for not picking objects that could be traced, and for not keeping them in a place that might never be found.
4. One of the Cobra Kai members in The Karate Kid yells to ‘get him a body bag’ and by the time he returns in the Cobra Kai series, he ends up dying of cancer, and is placed in an actual body bag.
So yes, this one transcends movies and concludes in a TV series, but the point is that the Cobra Kai member, Tommy, did yell during the final match to get a body bag for Daniel. It’s a bit dark, to be honest, but the fact that his character said this in the movie and then ended up in his own body bag in the series after passing away from cancer is pretty ironic.
3. Tyler Durden stands firm against conformity in Fight Club by making all of his followers dress the same and essentially repeat the same litany over and over.
The’s the thing, Tyler apparently hates the system that people buy into and how it makes them conform. But then he turns around and convinces others to buy into his system of conformity, and in a sense gets a crew together not just to cause anarchy and destruction using their own system of conformity, but also to fix up his house and make it livable. Hypocrisy is a human condition without a doubt.
2. Finding Nemo ended up causing a severe rise in sales of fish despite the message being that fish being held in captivity were miserable.
This one transcends the movies since the real-world effect is that kids started wanting fish that looked like Dory and Nemo, and in the end, it was found that a lot of the fish were poorly treated since no one really knew how to take care of them. It became a gimmick when the truth of the movie is that it was adamant about showing how fish wanted to be free to swim in the big blue sea.
1. Don Corleone attempted to keep his son Michael from the family business in The Godfather, but by the end, Michael was the new Don Corleone.
Michael even made it clear to Kate at the beginning of the movie that he didn’t want anything to do with the family business. But being a dutiful son, and knowing that Fredo couldn’t handle things after Sonny’s death, he took over to keep the family safe and to maintain their strength.
Alanis Morissette had it right, it’s definitely ironic.
Rapunzel
Follow Us
