TV Show Plot Cliches You Hate

[DMark]

Every once in awhile, even your favorite TV show has a cliche episode that makes your eyes roll.

For me, it is "twins"...one bad/one good...one dead/the other alive...same old same old. As soon as I see the story of "...and twins..." in the capsule, I dread seeing it.

Another is the "high school reunion" episodes...always the same jock/homecoming queen drama re-hashed and the "funny" fat girl now pretty, or football hero a drunk...yawn.

What are TV plot cliches you hate?

[Nava]

Another variation on twins: the boy and girl who are exactly identical except for underwear content; this usually leads to one (normally the girl) passing for the other for some reason.

The "girl (it's usually a girl) moves to new school, runs into trouble with most-popular-girls who are a bunch of braindead bimbos, but in the end she becomes super super super popular and she goes to the dance with the captain of the football team (basketball players never get laid) and everything is just SO perfect" thing; it's like they watched Grease and never understood it (plus, no braindead bimbo presidents in Grease and Tony isn't a football player). Sometimes combined with the "girl passes for her twin brother" thing.

[Lust4Life]

There'll be more, but why is it that whenever a spaceship/S.G. traveller; lands on a planet where a Human colony has been wiped out by a mysterious force there is ALWAYS a surviving little girl who ALWAYS hides away from the Humans even though you'd think that she'd run to them with both arms out.

[BlueOhio]

The "Getting Stuck Someplace" scenario. Locked in the basement, frozen food locker, bank vault, etc. As a result of the confinement, two people learn more about each other blah blah blah.

[Ronald C. Semone]

Man is introduced to a child a never knew he had.

A man and a woman who have nothing in common or, in extreme cases, hate each other are forced to work together.

[Superhal]

Cliches I hate:

1. Clip shows

2. Token episodes: Usually, if a cast is all black or all white, they have a "token" friend who is an ethnic minority. About once a season, the episode focuses on their problems. The ones I thought were most irritating were Alfonso Ribero on Silver Spoons, Al's black friend on Married with Children, Apu on the Simpsons or the white neighbors on the Jeffersons. There are some good ones though like any episode of that 70's show that features Fez.

3. Travel episodes, especially to Hawaii.

4. Resolved sexual tension. (Why did you have to marry Jeannie?!?)

5. Annoying kids that are picked because they're cute (Full House, Saved by the Bell) rather than their ability to at least have some comic timing (David Faustino.)

[Wheelz]

The "It's a Wonderful Life" and/or "Christmas Carol" dream sequence. I think the FCC required every sitcom in the 80s and 90s to do this at least once.

[MercyStreet]

"I tried this miracle hair treatment/self-tanner/pain reliever/recipe and it's utter disaster. And here comes my date/my dad/my boss/my in-laws!"

[MTCicero]

Originally Posted by BlueOhio

The "Getting Stuck Someplace" scenario. Locked in the basement, frozen food locker, bank vault, etc. As a result of the confinement, two people learn more about each other blah blah blah.

Agreed. Well, mostly. Because "Pine Barrens" is the tits.

[salinqmind]

Worse than a man and woman who hate each other but are forced to work together: man and woman realize despite all that squabbling that they are madly in love. (Hey, I have worked with some major league assholes and never ONCE did I feel any sexual tension or fall in love.)

[RikWriter]

Originally Posted by Superhal

Cliches I hate:

4. Resolved sexual tension. (Why did you have to marry Jeannie?!?)

So she could start wearing miniskirts.

[Justin_Bailey]

Originally Posted by Superhal

Al's black friend on Married with Children, Apu on the Simpsons

No way! Griff was the most important member of NO MA'AM and Apu is just awesome.

[In Winnipeg]

Foot chases where the good guy is running after the bad guy (or vice versa) and neither one can shoot worth a damn. Strangely enough, neither could hit the broad side of a barn, yet in the good guy's case, he is often a cop who has to qualify his ability to shoot.

[Annie-Xmas]

The ugly female who takes off her glasses and lets her hair down suddenly becomes beautiful.

[RikWriter]

Originally Posted by In Winnipeg

Foot chases where the good guy is running after the bad guy (or vice versa) and neither one can shoot worth a damn. Strangely enough, neither could hit the broad side of a barn, yet in the good guy's case, he is often a cop who has to qualify his ability to shoot.

Many, many (perhaps a majority) of cops can't shoot that well.

[DigitalC]

"I know you are trying to save the world but what about our relationship!!?"

Seen most recently (by me at least) in Flash Forward. Drives me up the freaking wall and makes the women look like utterly selfish bitches.

[Acsenray]

When someone is ill and his or her family is hiding the diagnosis, the unwell person "really" knows something is wrong. I was relieved that this week's Mad Men didn't fall into that rut.

[Surly Chick]

Any "very special episode" of any teen show where the main character either sex for the first time or has a friend killed in drunk driving accident.

[Reverse]

Two characters are talking, then a third character shows up behind a door or something and overhears part of the conversation. The third character then proceeds to draw wildly inaccurate conclusions based on the bit of the conversation s/he heard and drama ensues.

[BobLibDem]

Sword fights. 'Nuff said.

Sports scenes where the game is decided by a last second TD, or a bottom of the ninth homer, or that penalty shot called with no time on the clock (which isn't technically possible, IMHO)

Bad guys who can't hit the hero despite their advanced weaponry and superior numbers.

The tough cop whose partners always wind up getting killed.

The lard ass detective who runs like Jesse Owens when after a perp, generally catching him after scaling an 8 foot chain link fence.

Funny guys who shag the ladies who are way too hot for them.

[Annie-Xmas]

Fat guys married to hot babes.

[melodyharmonius]

Originally Posted by Annie-Xmas

The ugly female who takes off her glasses and lets her hair down suddenly becomes beautiful.

This. Or the tomboy working on the car cleans up good but still sits like a boy.

Oh, and the teen hunk who is friends with the fat girl but doesn't want to date her because he'll be made fun of.

[BrainGlutton]

Any show that starts with someone walking in on the aftermath of some event, and then all the other characters tell their own self-aggrandizing versions of what happened.

[Ponch8]

One of the main characters meets a close relative he never realized he had (e.g., Homer's half-brother Herb Powell on The Simpsons, and Hank Hill's half-Japanese half brother on King of the Hill). These relatives appear in no more than one or two episodes and then are completely forgotten.

[PSXer]

Herb Powell never appeared again because he became rich so he was too good to talk to the Simpsons anymore

Hank's brother never appeared again because he lived on the other side of the world

[Tom Scud]

Originally Posted by DMark

For me, it is "twins"...one bad/one good...one dead/the other alive...same old same old. As soon as I see the story of "...and twins..." in the capsule, I dread seeing it.

There was an episode of BUFFY that handled this trope very well indeed (primarily by setting it up as an "evil twin" story and then revealing that it was not so).

[melodyharmonius]

Originally Posted by Tom Scud

There was an episode of BUFFY that handled this trope very well indeed (primarily by setting it up as an "evil twin" story and then revealing that it was not so).

SPOILER:

Are we talking about the Xander split?

[BobLibDem]

Originally Posted by DMark

For me, it is "twins"...one bad/one good...one dead/the other alive...same old same old. As soon as I see the story of "...and twins..." in the capsule, I dread seeing it.

I make an exception to this rule for The Dukes of Hazzard, where Abraham Lincoln Hogg was of course the polar opposite of Jefferson Davis Hogg.

[needscoffee]

When one person is deceiving the other person in the relationship about who they really are, and s/he's about to tell the other person, but is interrupted, and doesn't bother trying again, and then the other person discovers it on their own, gets pissed off, and finally the deceiver convinces them of their true love.

[osme]

The husband leaving his pregnant wife at home while he races to the hospital or having a baby in an elevator.

[BobArrgh]

Witty quip, followed by one of [putting sunglasses on or taking sunglasses off].

[Bosstone]

Originally Posted by BobArrgh

Witty quip, followed by one of [putting sunglasses on or taking sunglasses off].

YEEEEEEEAHHHHH

yeah

[Tom Scud]

Originally Posted by melodyharmonius

SPOILER:

Are we talking about the Xander split?

That one.

[Markxxx]

I'm not a fan of any dream sequences.

[madmonk28]

Any seen where they disarm a bomb while the clock ticks down. This is a scene that is supposed to be dramatic, but we all know they will succeed (unless it is a guest star) with 001 left on the clock.

[Acsenray]

Yeah, do real bombs have countdown clocks anyway?

[vertizontal]

I thankfully haven't seen this one in a while, so maybe the concept is on the shelf for now, but I used to get very annoyed about the scenario where the guy would somehow get talked into having dates with two different women at the same restaurant. Hilarity ensued as he would constantly get up and run between tables to try and get away with it.

[control-z]

Originally Posted by Reverse

Two characters are talking, then a third character shows up behind a door or something and overhears part of the conversation. The third character then proceeds to draw wildly inaccurate conclusions based on the bit of the conversation s/he heard and drama ensues.

That was every episode of Three's Company. And yet I still watched for the T&A, the Roepers, and Mr. Furley.

[KRC]

Mentioned earlier, but I'll elaborate: The one where the pregnant woman and the teenage doofus get stuck in an elevator. Something about being stuck in a sit-com elevator always causes pregnant women to immediately give birth and it also causes teenagers who can't find their own behinds with a road map and a flashlight to suddenly develop obstetrical skills.

[Yllaria]

Originally Posted by madmonk28

Any seen where they disarm a bomb while the clock ticks down. This is a scene that is supposed to be dramatic, but we all know they will succeed (unless it is a guest star) with 001 left on the clock.

I thought Galaxy Quest lampshaded that nicely.

[melodyharmonius]

Originally Posted by Yllaria

I thought Galaxy Quest lampshaded that nicely.

I agree.

[Marley23]

Originally Posted by madmonk28

Any seen where they disarm a bomb while the clock ticks down. This is a scene that is supposed to be dramatic, but we all know they will succeed (unless it is a guest star) with 001 left on the clock.

Except in Goldfinger. Otherwise, yes, very lame. Particularly if someone has to call a bomb tech by phone and ask which wire to cut. I don't know if anyone has tried that one with a straight face in ages.

[Wheelz]

It's the very beginning of the episode, but the main character is already in the midst of a predicament. Characters we've never seen before are discussing events we didn't see happen. What the hell? Did I set the Tivo wrong?

Nope. There's a sudden freeze frame and a caption reading "Two Days Earlier," and we then get to see what leads up to the predicament. That opening scene will come around again three-quarters into the episode or so, with no real reason why we already saw it before.

Non-linear storytelling like this can be effective if done well, but usually it's just a sign of lazy writing, when they can't come up with an interesting way to begin the story.

[Morbo]

"NO! There's no WAY you're going to get me to <go to that place / wear that costume / pretend to be that person> so FORGET IT!"

::quick cut to the person doing exactly that, with laugh track::

[Leaffan]

Kirk, Scotty, Bones, Spock and Ensign Leibowitz beam down to a planet..........

[Swallowed My Cellphone]

A version of the twin thing: Prince and the Pauper episodes in which unrelated lookalikes trade places.

[Skott]

Shapeshifters. I can't stand shapeshifters. And it seems like every single sci-fi or fantasy show has to have at least one. The main part that's usually annoying is that the audience knows that the evil shapeshifter has infiltrated the good guys and the writers attempt to string it out as long as possible. Then there's the inevitable "Which one is the real one?" or "I know you're not X because although you were able to copy them in every possible detail, you left out..."

Ironically, among my favorite shows are Fullmetal Alchemist and Lost, although Lost dealt with the shapeshifting satisfactorily (at least for me) since

SPOILER:

the Smoke Monster could only take the form of someone who was dead, and quite possibly someone he had to have actually had physical contact with

I decided not to watch Battlestar Galactica because they introduced Cylons disguised as humans in the mini-series and I really didn't want to have to deal with "Spot the hidden cylon" for the rest of the show. I later saw an episode of Robot Chicken that confirmed my fears.

[cmkeller]

"Death solves the romantic triangle." This may only be on Desperate Housewives, but I get sick of seeing ot over and over again - person has two lovers (one likely married to), has reasons can't dump one and stay with other, suddenly a disaster kills one, voila, now free.

I guess George's finacee's death on Seinfeld is a similar version of this just without another woman involved, just George's not really wanting to marry her anymore.

[Acsenray]

Originally Posted by Skott

I decided not to watch Battlestar Galactica because they introduced Cylons disguised as humans in the mini-series and I really didn't want to have to deal with "Spot the hidden cylon" for the rest of the show. I later saw an episode of Robot Chicken that confirmed my fears.

It really became one of the best character development bits in the series. Seeing what happened to those who found out they were not what they thought they were, and their differing reactions.

[bouv]

The wedding episode where everything possible goes wrong with the wedding.

Bride and/or groom don't show up on time, the church burned down, the reception has no food and/or music, etc...and 9 times out of 10 someone will fall face-first into the wedding cake. Why, sitcom writers, WHY?!