# Looking for examples of unreliable narrators in television shows. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 7, 2011, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811 "2011-03-07T18:25:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2011, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/41 "2011-03-13T22:53:17Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > I think “unreliable narrator” doesn’t necessarily mean literal narration. If the events shown on screen from a particular character’s point of view are not true, that should count. In Rashomon, for example, they are (in story) narrating their point of view, but what’s shown on screen doesn’t include their actual words. But there’s not suggestion in the Amber-Hallucination episodes that the vision House is conversing with is real. HE knows that she’s an artifact of his subconscious, and no suggestion is ever made that the audience should believe otherwise. Thinking about your first sentence, it seems to me that, though you have a point (though I still don’t entirely agree). Certainly House’s hallucination of sex with Cuddy, which he thought was real, was closer akin to what happened in “Three Stories,” and his dreams after being shot, than it was to the visions of Amber. That is, it was clear from the first moment that Amber was not back from the dead and that what House was interacting with was a figment of his imagination; with the Cuddy sex and the post-shooting-dream, you were initially meant to think that what was being shown on screen was “real,” only to be disabused of that notion over time. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2011, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/42 "2011-03-13T22:56:25Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > I’ve only watched the first season, but that would make sense. All throughout we’re being told that the main character is this great, popular guy and yet he’s so obviously a complete asshole. I kept wonder what in the world the writers were thinking, but it would make sense if – as the narrator – he was distorting reality. > > I suspect that the writers just had an odd idea of coolness though. I don’t recall the season, but early on in the series, JD is interrupted during his wrap-up narration by the Janitor, who comes upon him in the locker room as he is writing in his diary. Said entry is what JD was thinking about, which made it seem to me that we’re meant to think of much or all of his narration that way; and in that way, JD is clearly giving his spin or his perception. (Or perhaps just writing a story). ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2011, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/43 "2011-03-13T23:39:54Z")
How would a television series work if it was consistently unreliably narrated? Let’s use _House_ as an example. Maybe Gregory House is a relatively ordinary doctor and the other doctors on his team come up with the correct answer as often as he does. But he imagines himself to be a brilliant diagnostician and takes credit for the ideas of his team. And the show is presented from his point of view so we see him as a brilliant doctor who always outthinks everyone else because that’s how he sees things. The only way you can discern unreliable narration is if you are given two or more separate versions of an event. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/44 "2011-03-14T10:45:53Z")
Another example: Quite possibly my all-time favorite episode of South Park: [Woodland Critters Christmas.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodland_Critter_Christmas) Also from South Park: [Dances with Smurfs](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dances_with_Smurfs), [Coon vs. Coon and Friends](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coon_vs._Coon_and_Friends), [Fishsticks](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fishsticks_%28South_Park%29), and many more. I think pretty much any episode from South Park where Cartman is the main character would qualify as having an “unreliable narrator.” Gimme cookie! ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 11:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/45 "2011-03-14T11:02:12Z")
There was some one-off episode of some Amazing Stories or Night Gallery kind of show that I can’t for the life of me remember right now – I just know it must have aired some time in the late 90s. There was a middle aged, possibly British guy kind of like Edward Woodward, who started out as a narrator introducing a story but soon took up a role as an actor in the story of a drug-addled guy holding up a store with a knife or something. He introduced the episode by saying something about the power of perception, and demonstrated by convincing the druggie that he (the narrator) was holding a gun when really it was just a power drill he had happened to pick up out of a merchandise rack. Druggie: “You can’t fool me, man, that’s just a drill!” Narrator: “You don’t believe me? Fine, ask the [bystander] next to you, am I holding a drill or a gun?” Bystander, who appears to be playing along: “That’s a gun.” Druggie is finally convinced, lays down his knife, and the cops show up and are about to take him away. Narrator, feeling cocky, wants to demonstrate his point and says to the robber: “Oh, by the way, if you still had any doubt about whether this is a drill or a gun . . .” points the device at the guy – and just as he pulls the trigger, it transforms into a gun and narrator shoots the robber dead. Everyone screams. “Why did you shoot him after all?! He was giving up!” The cops now grab the protagonist, and he mutters to himself confusedly, “but I thought it really was a drill . . .?” Does that fit the OP? Anybody remember what show this was? ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/46 "2011-03-14T11:46:47Z")
[The Black Donnellys](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Donnellys) is the show you are looking for. ---
**Author:** ![dawson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac91a4/32.png) [@dawson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dawson)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/47 "2011-03-14T12:05:36Z")
What about Malcolm in the Middle or the Wonder Years? ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/48 "2011-03-14T17:34:58Z")
> [@dawson](#): > > What about Malcolm in the Middle or the Wonder Years? I never watched _Malcolm_ regularly, and the only episode of _Years_ I’ve seen is the pilot. I can easily imagine the former using the technique, though. > [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > How would a television series work if it was consistently unreliably narrated? It would look like _How I Met Your Mother_, obviously. As said above, it’s very clear that Future!Ted is not telling the whole truth to his kids: sometimes because he misremembers things, sometimes because he forgets things, sometimes because he’s deliberately lying. ---
**Author:** ![Tanbarkie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a698b9/32.png) [@Tanbarkie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tanbarkie)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/49 "2011-03-14T22:43:44Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I never watched _Malcolm_ regularly, and the only episode of _Years_ I’ve seen is the pilot. I can easily imagine the former using the technique, though. > > It would look like _How I Met Your Mother_, obviously. As said above, it’s very clear that Future!Ted is not telling the whole truth to his kids: sometimes because he misremembers things, sometimes because he forgets things, sometimes because he’s deliberately lying. And occasionally when he’s bowdlerizing things. Like the time they all ate sandwiches. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/50 "2011-03-14T22:48:19Z")
> [@Tanbarkie](#): > > And occasionally when he’s bowdlerizing things. Like the time they all ate sandwiches. That’s what I was thinking of when I mentioned lying. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2011, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/51 "2011-03-14T23:50:16Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > I think “unreliable narrator” doesn’t necessarily mean literal narration. If the events shown on screen from a particular character’s point of view are not true, that should count. In Rashomon, for example, they are (in story) narrating their point of view, but what’s shown on screen doesn’t include their actual words. This is my take on things as well. If this sort of thing is acceptable to the OP, there was a two-part episode of _Cold Case_ where a number of events were dreamed or hallucinated by the main character. I didn’t regularly watch the show and I don’t know the name of the episode, but it was the one with music by Pearl Jam and was about the murder of a female cadet at a military school. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/52 "2011-03-15T01:57:26Z")
Bob’s Burgers did an episode where one of the characters invites the audience to solve the murder mystery that’s about to play out. “Hint,” she says; “it’s not me.” Stuff ensues, and the narrator eventually steps back in to argue with the audience. “The murderer was me! HA-HA!” “What? You explicitly told us at the beginning of the show you weren’t the murderer!” “That’s right! It’s a twist!” “No, it’s a lie. A lie is not a twist.” ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/53 "2011-03-15T03:50:39Z")
I don’t understand this. I posted the followed yesterday and it disappeared into nothingness: If you accept the Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis, the entire run of the TV show _St. Elsewhere_ and several dozen other TV shows actually exist only within the mind of the character Tommy Westphall, which makes him an unreliable narrator: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy\_Westphall#The\_Tommy\_Westphall\_Universe\_Hypothesis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Westphall#The_Tommy_Westphall_Universe_Hypothesis) ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/54 "2011-03-15T04:00:44Z")
Excuse me, I meant: \> . . . I posted the following yesterday . . . ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/55 "2011-03-15T05:10:32Z")
I gotta ask **Skald** , what difference does it make if the narrator is reliable or not in a work of fiction? ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/56 "2011-03-15T05:54:27Z")
It has kind of a drastic impact on how you interpret a work of fiction, doesn’t it? Unless your approach to any and all literary criticism is “Who cares, it’s all just made up anyway!” (And I have met people with that outlook.) ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/57 "2011-03-15T06:01:02Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > It has kind of a drastic impact on how you interpret a work of fiction, doesn’t it? Unless your approach to any and all literary criticism is "Who cares, it’s all just made up anyway!x (And I have met people with that outlook.) I guess I would be one them. It’s not exactly that, but I’d rather have an unreliable narrator tell me about the unwitnessed events than to leave them out. I just don’t count it in my evaluation of a novel. I did do a paper in high school on Michener’s _The Drifters_, and noted that the narrator was a character who related events he was not present to witness, or even hear about. But it didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the book (getting older and having better taste in literature did). ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/58 "2011-03-15T06:12:08Z")
- X-Files “Bad Blood” (the episode Superhal mentioned is “Jose Chung’s From Outer Space” but it’s the guest stars who are unreiable in that one) - the series finale to Roseanne - Supernatural “Tall Tales” (like the xf episode, the stories don’t match up) ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/59 "2011-03-15T08:01:51Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > I guess I would be one them. It’s not exactly that, but I’d rather have an unreliable narrator tell me about the unwitnessed events than to leave them out. I just don’t count it in my evaluation of a novel. I did do a paper in high school on Michener’s _The Drifters_, and noted that the narrator was a character who related events he was not present to witness, or even hear about. But it didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the book (getting older and having better taste in literature did). I don’t think you’re getting what “unreliable narrator” means here. What I’m thinking of are stories like Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” or Robert Bloch’s “Yours Truly Jack The Ripper,” where the it emerges that the narrator isn’t telling you all he knows, and that’s a point absolutely vital to the plot. That’s different from a narrator telling you stuff he _can’t_ reasonably know, which is what you seem to be indicating in your example. I’d call that just “spotty writing.” ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2011, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811/61 "2011-03-15T12:42:07Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > I don’t think you’re getting what “unreliable narrator” means here. What I’m thinking of are stories like Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” or Robert Bloch’s “Yours Truly Jack The Ripper,” where the it emerges that the narrator isn’t telling you all he knows, and that’s a point absolutely vital to the plot. That’s different from a narrator telling you stuff he _can’t_ reasonably know, which is what you seem to be indicating in your example. I’d call that just “spotty writing.” Ok, I think I can understand that. It probably wouldn’t affect me that much. I haven’t read the Tell-Tale for a long time, but I don’t recall anything bothering me about the narration. Or any other book. I think I’m in that category you mentioned before. I don’t do much analysis while I’m reading. When I finish a story, I’ll have an impression of whether or I not I like it, and the analysis will follow if I like it. If I don’t, forgetting is the next step. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-examples-of-unreliable-narrators-in-television-shows/573811.md?page=4)