When you're on the verge of doing something awesome but back out at the last second or fail to accomplish your objectives due to cowardice.
Whether it's gaining a sizable lead during a Street Fighter match but ultimately losing or posting an inflamatory response on the forum then deleting it are two common examples of how to bottle it.
A pilot who flies a simple mission and fucks it up so badly that he almost kills himself while starting an international incident.
An example of this occurred on Tuesday March 14th 2023 when a Russian Su-27 fighter jet releases fuel as it approaches the rear of a U.S. Air Force MQ-9 drone in what the Pentagon says was "an unsafe and unprofessional intercept" over the Black Sea.
Analysis of the film footage of the incident showed such inept flying that analysts started calling the pilot “Bottom Gun” — essentially meaning that he would never be represented as a hero in a Tom Cruise Top Gun Movie.
Even though the actions of this pilot caused him to receive a medal; his “heroic efforts” also convinced NATO Allie’s to begin sending fighter jets to Ukraine.
That Russian pilot who flew the mission against our drone was Bottom Gun; what a fuck up — he’s lucky to be alive after that. He’s lucky that Drones don’t shoot back.
A phenomenon in film/television series, most notably streaming series, where the main premise is drawn out to such a point that it takes an entire season or more to get the parts of the series the audience is actually interested in seeing.
For example, if a series is titled "Surf Dracula," a majority of viewers would tune in expecting to see Dracula surfing by the first or second episode. However, the entire first season would instead be tedious padding and backstory before finally ending with Dracula surfing in the last five minutes of the season finale.
I watched "Smallville" on Netflix the other day. Dude, it was ten seasons of filler before he finally flew! Major Surf Dracula Syndrome!
Finding your way back to the truth by fixing on one verified fact and working out from there, the way you navigate by the North Star when everything around you is spinning.
Rumours were flyingeverywhere, so she went northstarring — one checked fact at a time.