I’m sitting here watching 24 and that damned clock ALWAYS gives me the shivers. It got me to thinking about other gimmicks used in TV shows over the years:
MAS*H: the episode “Lifetime” with it’s onscreen clock and “POV” where we see the camp through the eyes of a soldier who cannot speak
Any Quinn Martin show from the 70s with its’ Act I, II, III, IV, and the Epilogue
Police Squad!: Its’ parody of #2, how the spoken title doesn’t match the onscreen graphic, the number of trash cans smashed by Drebin equals the episode number, and how the guest star never makes it past the opening credits
Drew Carey Show: I miss the blooper/contest eps, althought the live shows got weak
Star Trek: TOS: The episode “Shore Leave” is the only ep in which the Enterprise goes into orbit to the left instead of the right.
Buffy: The Musical is an obvious one that comes to mind…
The Simpsons where the focus of the show shifts from one character to another that the first character has just interacted with, starting and finishing with Bart.
I agree with the Quinn Martin setup. I love that stuff; I wish every show had it.
My favorite TV show gimmick is when they insert a character into the continuity out of nowhere, and act as if he’d always been there. “Star Trek: The Next Generation” did it once that I know of, with a crewman who suddenly appeared on the bridge with no explanation (until the end of the episode). And “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” did it twice: for one episode with school geek Jonathan as a super-hero (one of my favorite episodes ever), and then the extended version with the character of Dawn.
Also:
2) “The X-Files” credit sequence with “The Truth Is Out There” at the end. The first episode where they changed it to read “TRUST NO ONE” was so simple and so powerful; you just knew that something really big was going to happen this episode. Of course, as with everything else in that series, they over-used it to the point where it was no longer cool.
The “Turn Off Your Lights (where applicable)” parody at the begining of MST3K. They started doing it when the “Broadcast in Stereo (where applicable)” was all the rage on the networks. Other great gimmicks from MST3K are the reminder to keep circulating the tapes at the end of every ep, and the great bit at the end of every episode where they show a bit of the movie out of context. (The Amazing Colossal Episode Guide called them “stingers.” For some reason, my favorite was from Master Ninja: “To them, it’s some kind of ritual.”)
One episode of “Friends” had a subplot where the gang had accidentally switched the TV to the Second Audio Program and couldn’t figure how to switch it back, so they had to watch everything in Spanish. At the end of the episode, over the credits, they played out a corny sit-com scene with all the dialogue overdubbed in Spanish.
Another one from “Buffy”: when they switched to the UPN, and the “Previously on Buffy the Vampire Slayer…” segment included a clip from (almost?) every episode from the first five seasons.
“Seinfeld” did an episode that ran backwards, sort of like Memento.
“Buffy” did a couple of other episodes with gimmicks - there was one with no dialogue for the majority of the episode, and another one that had no background music.
Not TV but I loved the end of A Bugs Life where, when they rolled the credits, they showed a list of bloopers as is sometimes shown in movies. However, this is a Computer Generate movie so it was hilarious.
I.ve always liked the end of each episode of DRAGNET where the announcer would tell us trial was held in such a date in the county of Los Angeles , in a moment the results of said trial.
I always liked Alfred Hitchcock’s droll introductions to his shows, complete with an indirect snarl towards the upcoming commercials. Then he’d do the closing epilogue with the same setting as the intro, but with the situation subtly different.
One of my faves was an intro he did where he talked about how human actors were becoming too hard to work with, so he was going to start using robots. He talked about how they didn’t make any demands, didn’t challenge his direction, and so forth, and provided a demonstration. One of his robots started speaking, and it was just a bunch of squeaks and squeals. Hitchcock does an aside to the camera and says “Being method actors, they’re inclined to mumble.” When the show ends, the robots do the epilogue speech in squeaks and squeals that require translation.
The MASH episode with the clock in the corner was what I first thought of when I saw this. What I particularly liked about the clock was that it showed real time, and the clock kept running through the commercials. You didn’t see it on the commercials, of course, but when the show picked up after the break you could see that time had elapsed.
It’s not really a “gimmick” like the ones discussed, but I was really taken by an episode of Kolchak: The Night Stalker in which there’s a monster that can imitate anyone. One key element of the monster’s behavior is that it doesn’t talk. At the climax of the episode, Kolchak confronts someone he thinks is the creature, and that person spoke to him. It created just the right element of insecurity. They never mentioned this detail in the show, but somehow it registered with me.
Holy bubba batman! Cal, you dog. I don’t know if it’s any reason for your username, but I just watched MST3K The Movie last night and your name hit me like a ton of bricks. Excellent choice!
I like on-going themes, but only if they are kept fresh, quick, and actually add to the show.
Good example
All of the Norm entrances on Cheers.
"Jack Frost nipping at your nose, Mr. Peterson:
“Yeah, now let’s get Joe Beer nipping at my liver.”
Great throwaway lines that don’t take away from any plot and add to the comic nature of the show.
Bad example
On the first season or so of Murphy Brown, whenever someone came into the bar, an insanely bright light would shine in. The entire bar would stop what they were doing and shout out “Close the door!”
This one sucked because it interrupted flow, added nothing to the plot or characters, and served to irritate rather than entertain.
One thing I loved about that was the fact I had subtitles on over it, and the subtitlers had carefully done everything in Spanish. Instead of “ALL: <insert Spanish words>” it became “TODO: <insert Spanish words>.”
And who can forget the classic WKRP IN Cincinnati episode where they play softball? I can see Les running around in slow motion while you hear his childhood Kreutzer violin lesson on the soundtrack as plain as day.
And, of course, gimmick extraordinaire: the last episode of “Newhart”.
If you’re talking about the episode “Conundrum”, then you are talking about one of the finest examples of dramatic irony every to grace television. I seem to remember watching that episode and screaming at the screen, “He’s a bad guy, y’all! Bad! Guy!”
St. Elsewhere: Howie Mandel’s character gets shot & is clinically dead; as the other doctors try to revive him, Mandel visits purgatory, hell & heaven and runs into a host of previous characters - patients & former doctors - who had died during the course of the series.
The Simpsons: The “Run Lola Run” takeoff episode. (Not to mention the chalkboard & couch gags in the opening credits sequence.)
Cheers & Frasier: the offscreen characters Vera & Maris.
Seinfeld: Elaine pushing Jerry (“Get…OUT!”); Kramer bursting through the door to Jerry’s apartment; and George’s infamous alter ego…
Malcolm in the Middle: My personal favorite, the ep in which Malcolm & Reese want to go bowling. The story split screens and we see how differently the night would have gone depending on which parent takes them to the bowling alley.
It’s not a sitcom, but on the old Late Night with David Letterman, I remember a show during which the picture on screen rotated clockwise, so that at the half hour mark the picture was upside down, then continued to rotate until it was right side up again at the end.
I believe Letterman also did a show in which all the voices were overdubbed into Spanish, and English subtitles were included.
Photopat, I remember that Letterman show! It was interesting to watch, that’s for sure. He also used such things as the Thrill-Cam (a camera riding on a wire down to Dave’s desk), and the Dancing Waters.
I always liked the way the phone was answered by the receptionist (Allyce Beasley?) on Moonlighting. Instead of “Good morning, Blue Moon Investigations,” she would answer with these great long poems, a different one each time. As Mullinator pointed out about such things, they were great throwaways that didn’t take away from the plot, but added to the comedy.
I don’t know if it counts as a gimmick or a running gag, but on “Murphy Brown” Murphy had a different secretary on every show, culminating in one episode where Carol, Dr. Robert Hartley’s secretary from “The Bob Newhart Show”, served as Murphy secretary. That was pretty funny.
The Murphy Brown secretary gag even crossed over to Seinfeld when Kramer moved from New York to Hollywood and got an acting job playing Murphy’s secretary for one episode.