to misfire

Examples

• All

• Sometimes their strategies misfire, and they lose.

  Blog text (16)

• But I also think that at the same time, this message is misfiring a little bit.

  The Royal Institution

• Indeed, even our best efforts could easily misfire, at least when judged by our future preferences.

  Academic text (2003)

• I am resending this note on the chance that my first mailing misfired.

  Blog text (26)

• One of the things that was really important to me about making a Western is, Westerns in the last 20 years with the exception of, obviously, Unforgiven by Clint Eastwood and a couple of others, have generally misfired.

  3:10 to Yuma (2007)

• He meant it to advertise his abilities as an inventive, original, and virtuoso painter to visitors to his Bath studio; yet, as happened with Mrs. Delany, this intention could, like Miss Ford's own stage performances, misfire.

  Academic text (1998)

• The movie's message misfired, leaving the audience confused instead of inspired.

• During the presentation, his humor misfired, and many in the audience didn't laugh.

• The new advertising campaign misfired, attracting criticism rather than customers.

Synonyms

F

to fail

vsto misfire

898 1.0

Not succeed in doing something you wanted to do

is about failing to work as intended rather than general lack of success

M

to malfunction

vsto misfire

72 4.2

To stop working correctly, as a machine or device

applies to machines while the other covers any failure to produce results

M

to miss the mark

vsto misfire

14 5.5

Fail to do what you meant to do

focuses on failing to function properly rather than only missing an intended effect

Antonyms

F

to function

441 2.6

To work in a particular role or job

How Well

to work

∞ 1.0

to misfire

1 4.3

to fizzle

• Informal

27 5.6

to fail

898 1.0

Surface Forms

Morphology

Etymology