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No Sense of Humor: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:Sam the eagle 3276.jpg|link=The Muppet Show|frame|This beak was [[Stealth Pun|not made for smiling.]]]]
{{quote|'''Geordi:''' Data... I made that joke ''seven years'' ago.
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Arguably a subtrope of [[No Social Skills]] depending on the culture. May overlap with [[Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor]] and [[Sarcasm Blind]]. Also see [[Late to the Punchline]], [[Don't Explain the Joke]] and [[Cannot Tell a Joke]].
{{examples}}
== Anime & Manga ==
* Light from ''[[Death Note]]'' lacks any sort of sense of humor. Although he does make a [[Cannot Convey Sarcasm|"joke"]] about wanting to trade away half his life for shinigami wings.
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** Surprisingly enough, the original version of [[The Joker]]. In his first appearance, he was a permanently smiling psychotic gangster with ''no sense of humor whatsoever''. In his first fight with Batman, Bats is actually the one making puns, while Joker is screaming [[I'll Kill You!|"I am going to kill you!"]]
* [[Moon Knight]], also [[Depending on the Writer]]. Rather apt given that he's an [[Expy]] for [[Batman]].
* ''[[X-Men]]'': Professor X and Magneto are frequently flanderized as no-nonsense extremists. James [[Mc Avoy]]'s portrayal of Xavier in X-Men First Class is the first attempt to move away from this, although one might simply assume that as he gets older, he will get more serious. Also, Ian Mc Kellen gave Magneto a deadpan, cynical sense of humor which was expanded on by Michael Fassbender.
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* Agent K in ''[[Men in Black (film)|Men in Black]]'' quips that FBI agents are not allowed to have a sense of humor.
* This, and attempts to develop a sense of humor, are the focus of Sha Wujing's character arc in ''The Lost Empire'' (a sort of unofficial sequel to ''[[Journey to the West]]''.) He's eventually told that it's better to have no sense of humor than to have [[Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor|the sense of humor that the villains have]], and {{spoiler|he laughs for the first time at the realization that he was worried over nothing.}}
* Judge Doom from ''[[Who Framed Roger Rabbit?]]''
* In ''[[Hot Fuzz]]'' Nicholas Angel's devotion to his job above everything else has made him a first-class police officer. It's also rendered him a completely humourless, pedantic and uptight prick.
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* Pedro Camacho from ''[[Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter]]''.
* In ''[[Warrior Cats]]'', Rainflower begins scolding Crookedjaw and Oakheart for telling friendly jokes about the queens, making a (quite) boring lecture about how the queens "enjoy helping their Clan". Crookedjaw and Oakheart just roll their eyes at this.
* [[Deadpan Snarker|Asher]] in ''[[Someone Else's
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* Major Neuheim of ''[[Private Schulz]]'' is a [[Pointy-Haired Boss]], not to mention a Nazi, who is totally lacking in warmth and anything resembling a sense of humor. However, his humorlessness is itself a source of comedy.
* Played with in ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'', Colonel O'Neill has very specifically stated that [[Spell My Name with an "S"|his name is spelled with two Ls]] on several occasions; this is because there's another Colonel Jack O'Neil in the fictional version of the USAF, one with No Sense Of Humor. This is an in-joke and lampshading of the fact that Kurt Russell's version of the character in the movie (spelled with one L in the credits) was significantly less funny.
** Teal'c almost never tells a joke or laughs (unless you count his occasional plays on
* Wesley on ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' started out this way, but later became a more rounded character as he transitioned to ''[[Angel]]''.
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* Sam the American Eagle from ''[[The Muppet Show]]''.
** In one of the ''Muppet'''s "at the ball" sketches, a female dancer asked her partner, "Do you know who is the most humorless man in the world?" When he said no, she replied, "You are, Fathead!" He, of course, responded, "I don't get it."
* From ''[[Les Guignols
== Real Life ==▼
* An [[egregious]]ly cliché [[Strawman Political|blanket accusation]] of defenders of [[Dead Baby Comedy]]. It will usually be coupled with some ranting about [[Political Correctness Gone Mad]] and a bit of [[Parody Retcon]] sprinkled in.▼
* Germans are often stereotyped as having No Sense of Humor. In reality, [[German Humour]] is a bit more complicated; Germans definitely do have a sense of humour, and enjoy comedy, but their ideas about what is funny and what isn't can vary greatly from those of English speakers.▼
** And German people think the English have no humor, or at least this special "English Humour"...▼
** This trope was parodied by UN Ambassador [http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/391553/july-11-2011/tip-wag---john-lennon---german-humor Hans Beinholtz] whose sense of humour was...dry, to say the least.▼
* [[Nuns-N-Rosaries|Nuns]] can fall under this, depending on the nun.▼
* An executive for [[Looney Tunes]] once overheard a group of writers laughing at jokes being thought up for a specific Looney Tunes. The executive stormed in and asked what all the laughing had to do with the making of animated cartoons.▼
** Sounds like Ed Seltzer. He was well-known for having the sense of humor of an underripe potato. They used to use him as a sort of barometer for the quality of their ideas; if he liked it, they were off the mark. Seltzer was, in fact, the specific genesis of the cartoon "Bully For Bugs", when he barged into a brainstorming session and declared, sans all provocation, that bullfights weren't funny, and there were to be no cartoons about them.▼
* A frequent side effect of [[Asperger's Syndrome|Asperger's]] is the inability to understand humour, as well as [[Does Not Understand Sarcasm|sarcasm]], due to their being [[Literal-Minded]]. (Or they may understand it but have trouble distinguishing it from sincerity, which leads to similar reactions.) This can be subverted by Aspies themselves, who can [[What Is This Thing You Call Love?|learn to understand humour]] just as well as any other emotion.▼
** Not exactly. A sense of humour and what's funny or not is acquired; aspies, not being so naturally keen on social interaction, can often develop a rather dark sense of humour, as they do not have the same inhibitions against it.▼
*** Also, it should be clarified that "understanding humor" and "appreciating humor" are two different things. It is possible to lack an appreciation of humor for reasons other than social ineptness.▼
* The Islamic tyrant Ruholla Khomeini is famous for this, one even claiming "[[Jerkass|There is no room for play in Islam, there are no jokes, there is no fun, there is no humour]]."▼
* Attila the Hun is reputed to have had no sense of humour. Allegedly an envoy from the Eastern Roman empire who met with Attila once at dinner described it as follows: “By mixing up the languages of the Italians with those of the Huns and Goths, [an entertainer] fascinated everyone and made them break out into uncontrollable laughter, all that is except Attila. He remained impassive, without any change of expression, and neither by word or gesture did he seem to share in the merriment ….” The impression left was that Attila lacked a sense of humor and cared about nothing but power.▼
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* The warship A.I. Tag from ''[[Schlock Mercenary]]'' was originally created with no sense of humor, but has tried to learn it to better understand his opponents.
* Third Character of ''[http://www.jaydenandcrusader.com/ Jayden and Crusader]'' is a particularly violent atheist with no sense of humour at all.
* [[The Comically Serious|Frank]] from ''[[Two Guys and Guy]]''.
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== Western Animation ==
* [[Batman]] in ''[[Batman: The
* Adult Ben, as seen in the ''[[Ben 10]]'' episode "Ben 10,000".
* Optimus Prime in ''[[Transformers Prime]]''. It's stated that all Primes are like this—the Matrix of Leadership, which contains the accumulated wisdom of all past Primes, gives them a sense of responsibility, dignity and gravitas that leaves little room for goofing around.
* Lemongrab of ''[[Adventure Time]].'' He tries, though. He really does try... but he fails horribly.
* Zane in ''[[Ninjago]]'' is noted at trying to understand humor but seems to fail.{{spoiler|The reason for this is that he is a [[Ridiculously Human Robot]] that normally has all of his emotion switches off, including humor.Its sadder then it sounds.}}
▲== Real Life ==
▲* An [[egregious]]ly cliché [[Strawman Political|blanket accusation]] of defenders of [[Dead Baby Comedy]]. It will usually be coupled with some ranting about [[Political Correctness Gone Mad]] and a bit of [[Parody Retcon]] sprinkled in.
▲* Germans are often stereotyped as having No Sense of Humor. In reality, [[German Humour]] is a bit more complicated; Germans definitely do have a sense of humour, and enjoy comedy, but their ideas about what is funny and what isn't can vary greatly from those of English speakers.
▲** And German people think the English have no humor, or at least this special "English Humour"...
▲** This trope was parodied by UN Ambassador [http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/391553/july-11-2011/tip-wag---john-lennon---german-humor Hans Beinholtz] whose sense of humour was...dry, to say the least.
▲* [[Nuns-N-Rosaries|Nuns]] can fall under this, depending on the nun.
▲* An executive for [[Looney Tunes]] once overheard a group of writers laughing at jokes being thought up for a specific Looney Tunes. The executive stormed in and asked what all the laughing had to do with the making of animated cartoons.
▲** Sounds like Ed Seltzer. He was well-known for having the sense of humor of an underripe potato. They used to use him as a sort of barometer for the quality of their ideas; if he liked it, they were off the mark. Seltzer was, in fact, the specific genesis of the cartoon "Bully For Bugs", when he barged into a brainstorming session and declared, sans all provocation, that bullfights weren't funny, and there were to be no cartoons about them.
▲* A frequent side effect of [[Asperger's Syndrome|Asperger's]] is the inability to understand humour, as well as [[Does Not Understand Sarcasm|sarcasm]], due to their being [[Literal-Minded]]. (Or they may understand it but have trouble distinguishing it from sincerity, which leads to similar reactions.) This can be subverted by Aspies themselves, who can [[What Is This Thing You Call Love?|learn to understand humour]] just as well as any other emotion.
▲** Not exactly. A sense of humour and what's funny or not is acquired; aspies, not being so naturally keen on social interaction, can often develop a rather dark sense of humour, as they do not have the same inhibitions against it.
▲*** Also, it should be clarified that "understanding humor" and "appreciating humor" are two different things. It is possible to lack an appreciation of humor for reasons other than social ineptness.
▲* The Islamic tyrant Ruholla Khomeini is famous for this, one even claiming "[[Jerkass|There is no room for play in Islam, there are no jokes, there is no fun, there is no humour]]."
▲* Attila the Hun is reputed to have had no sense of humour. Allegedly an envoy from the Eastern Roman empire who met with Attila once at dinner described it as follows: “By mixing up the languages of the Italians with those of the Huns and Goths, [an entertainer] fascinated everyone and made them break out into uncontrollable laughter, all that is except Attila. He remained impassive, without any change of expression, and neither by word or gesture did he seem to share in the merriment ….” The impression left was that Attila lacked a sense of humor and cared about nothing but power.
{{reflist}}
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