We call those “Very Special” episodes. As in, “Tonight on NBC, a Very Special ‘Diff’rent Strokes.’” This way you know which episodes to not bother watching.
I’m too am tired to death of the mis-understanding that is allowed to go on cliché, Gangster. For the love of all that’s holy, people, just speak up as soon as someone is obviously misunderstanding something. It really isn’t that hard. I guess writers would actually have to come up with plots and stories if they did away with that one, though.
Ah, dammit, I got mixed up. It’s not the clip-shows that are the Very Special episodes - those are the episodes when a comedy gets all artificially serious and buzz-killing. Sorry. Well, the clip shows aren’t really worth watching, either.
A gift which has to be unwrapped on camera will always have the lid wrapped separately from the box.
The hero is alone, surrounded by dozens of bad guys wanting to kill him, and they obligingly attack him one at a time.
Any character shown coughing earlier in the movie will die of some horrible disease by the end.
Mine’s on the counter, if I bother to get it out.
The thing is…I practically never see anyone do this IRL and that’s why I mentioned it. Most folks just get frozen veggies from a bag and boil them in a pot.
Thought of another one - people knowing every phone number off by heart, especially the numbers of people they’ve just met or departments of some office. I’ve got about three phone numbers in my head, and they’re for people close to me who’ve had the same number for years and years.
Watch The Colbert Report sometime, if you already don’t. He sends this up pretty regularly. Whenever he talks about “the Internets,” he pulls out a laptop and types spastically without looking at the keyboard.
You know, I USED to be able to remember anyone’s phone number if I said it to myself a couple times. Then I got a cell phone, programmed everyone’s number into it, never had to remember them and now I can barely remember my own phone number. Of course, hitting middle age probably has something to do with that too… :eek:
You must not hang out with people who really enjoy cooking. I chop fresh veggies on my island nearly every day. The texture of frozen ones usually grosses me out.
SITUATION:
Character is driving in a car, usually on the run or actively being chased. Engine starts to sputter. Character looks at fuel gauge on dashboard, which reads “E” and has a flashing orange light next to it. Character taps gauge with fingers, to no effect.
QUESTIONS FOR CHARACTER:
Did you just now notice the flashing yellow fuel light, or did the fuel drop from 1/4 tank to bone dry in the last 15 seconds?
Why, exactly, are you tapping the fuel gauge? The problem isn’t that your gauge says “empty,” it’s that your car is sputtering.
Also, have you noticed that about 75% of the time when a bad guy runs out of bullets in his handgun, he hurls it at the good guy as a desperation weapon? Meanwhile, when the good guy runs out of bullets, he either wisely puts the gun away for future use, or drops it, knowing he’ll be able to find another. :dubious:
That cliche amuses me. Whenever I look at my car’s dashboard and notice a needle pointing near “E,” I’ll tap it just for kicks. I did it this morning with the wiper fluid.
I’ve only seen the “tap the fuel gauge” cliche is in old Looney Tunes, actually. And it always happens in old-fashioned biplanes, not in cars. I can understand if a pilot in an exposed cockpit might actually have to worry about those gauges freezing up.
Marginally funny story - when we bought a new(er) car, my husband ran out of gas on the first tank. He had always had cars with fuel gauge warning lights; I had never had a car with a fuel gauge light. He was waiting for the fuel gauge light to come on, and I was waiting for him to fill it up, not anticipating what he was anticipating.
Hated cliche: in a sports movie, the hero and the villain (or “heroes and villains”) will only meet in the finals.
Take The Karate Kid. Our hero, Daniel, must fight his nemesis, Johnny, at the karate tournament. Luckily, their dramatic confrontation happens when they both make it to the very last round of the single-elimination tournament. I suppose, if they’d wound up matched in Round 2 on one of the little side-mats with about seven people watching, it wouldn’t have been as “dramatic.” More plausible, though.
This is such an ingrained cliche that it gets projected onto the real sports world. A good case: how many casual sports fans know that the USA hockey team’s dramatic victory over the USSR in the 1980 wasn’t the gold medal game, and in fact the team still had to play another game afterwards? How many sports fans remember that the game the Red Sox lost on Bill Buckner’s error wasn’t the last game of the series?
Ebert calls these Idiot Plots, and I hate them with a passion as well.
I also hate it when characters in romances or romantic comedies do horribly creepy stuff, like follow the object of their affection around all the time, stand outside his/her house, etc., and never get called on it.
Another facet of this cliche is the stereotypical horror movie, which always always always requires that the characters do foolish and stupid things, otherwise the plot would fizzle utterly and the movie is all of a sudden fifteen minutes long.
