I came upon the term Passive Aggressive in the Woody Allen film Husbands And Wives, and it occurred to me that all I know about it is what I learned from that film. It’s a great trait in a fictional character, as a Passive Aggressive “fosters chaos” and provides a constant stream of new conflict for the protagonists to overcome.

• The passive-aggressive man

From Wikipedia:

In the psychoanalytic theory of transactional analysis, many types of passive-aggressive behavior are interpreted as “games” with a hidden psychological payoff, and are classified into stereotypical scenarios with names like “See What You Made Me Do” and “Look How Hard I’ve Tried”.

What works in fiction is not so great IRL however.