# Plot Genres You Hate, Even In Your Favorite Shows **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 8, 2014, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851 "2014-02-08T19:37:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Cartoonacy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/848f3c/32.png) [@Cartoonacy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartoonacy)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2014, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/121 "2014-02-14T18:26:51Z")
> [@Raguleader](#): > > JThere was an episode of Stargate SG1 where the team had to diffuse one of their own nukes _Defuse_. Diffuse means to spread over a large area. I’ve seen these two words confused quite often in the past few years. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2014, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/122 "2014-02-14T18:29:25Z")
> [@Cartoonacy](#): > > _Defuse_. Diffuse means to spread over a large area. I’ve seen these two words confused quite often in the past few years. If they hadn’t defused the nuke, it would have diffused itself pretty effectively. ---
**Author:** ![Bellhorn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@Bellhorn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bellhorn)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2014, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/123 "2014-02-14T20:09:12Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > … > The incompetent shooting of the bad guys. Really, you’ve got six guys with Uzis firing away at the hero as he runs for covers. And you miss every single time? And he picks off the baddies one by one with a handgun? Incompetent shooting is one thing… I just chalked it up to the fact that they’d been cornered and were a little nervous. 🙂 But what gets me is when the bad guys actually capture the good guy, and instead of just putting a bullet through the head, they tie him down, start a rotating laser that will eventually slice him into two, and then LEAVE!! The good guy always gets out of his restraints, probably from having watched James Bond movies. It’s okay to come up with inventive ways to kill, but DON’T LEAVE until he dies. ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2014, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/124 "2014-02-15T00:38:59Z")
> [@Cartoonacy](#): > > _Defuse_. Diffuse means to spread over a large area. I’ve seen these two words confused quite often in the past few years. This is why I shouldn’t go online after being awake for 26 hours.:smack: ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2014, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/125 "2014-02-15T03:56:25Z")
it’s funny because spell check doesn’t catch that type of mistake. Even grammar check wouldn’t (I think). It would have to be context/intent/meaning check. I’ll see if I can invent that tonight. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2014, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/126 "2014-02-16T07:57:18Z")
Undercover at the mental hospital. I’m really not interested in seeing Our Intrepid Heroes have to worm their way into the loony bin. I find it to be generally quite depressing. ---
**Author:** ![salinqmind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2014, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/127 "2014-02-16T15:29:09Z")
Yes, go into the mental hospital (or sometimes undercover in prison) - worm their way in, can’t very easily get back out :p! Funny how that can happen! How about the girl - your date, daughter, or dowdy friend - invited to the prom, and the characters are waiting for her to come downstairs, and there she is! Looking like a princess! Heavenly muziks playing as she floats in slow motion down the stairs, while everyone gapes, struck speechless. ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2014, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/128 "2014-02-17T18:18:37Z")
> [@Morbo](#): > > OK, for mine (character accidentally takes drugs) OTTOMH: > > Girls, Big Bang Theory, Parenthood and Six Feet Under (Same actor), Seinfeld, Friends, Frasier, TNG (Naked Time), Firefly, House, Arrested Development, How I Met Your Mother, and my favorite: [L&O: SVU](http://youtu.be/U-xYhGX0h88) **Morbo** has forgotten the best episode of all. Jack Soo, as Detective Yemana on _Barney Miller_, stoned on hash brownies. And then when asked to test the brownies for drugs, Ron Glass takes a big bite and says, “That’s hash all right.” Damn I laughed. ---
**Author:** ![installLSC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/54ee81/32.png) [@installLSC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/installLSC)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/129 "2015-07-27T18:31:22Z")
> [@erysichthon](#): > > The storyline I dread involves the appearance of a mentally handicapped character. This character is depicted as saintly, doesn’t do anything inappropriate or awkward, and is essentially a non-handicapped person who talks slowly or haltingly. He/she teaches the regular cast members important lessons about kindness and tolerance and so forth. One of the many reasons to love “Night Court” was they flipped this on its side: Whether it was Bull’s blind girlfriend (played by Elayne Boosler) or the little person District Attorney (played by Daniel Frishman), they’d play “different” characters who could be as crass or sleazy as anyone else on the show. ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/130 "2015-07-27T19:28:40Z")
Best take on “disarming the bomb” I ever saw was this. The good guy couldn’t do it so he switched the crystals on the indicator lights to make the bad guy think it was disarmed. Bad guy leaves, boom. Can’t remember which show it happened on, though. ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/131 "2015-07-27T21:12:48Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > That’s been done but for the life of me I can’t remember an example. MacGruber plays with colored wires a bit (probably the SNL skits are better, not the crappy movie). Now that this thread has been resurrected, [Archer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K_WmV50e7c) had a riff on this on the episode “Skytanic.” > [@F.U.Shakespeare](#): > > In the 1970’s, it seemed that every sitcom had to do a mediocre [Rashoman](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashomon_effect) episode. The folks at _It’s Always Sunny_ did this very well in their epsiode [Who Got Dee Pregnant?](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1636180/?ref_=ttep_ep7) ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/132 "2015-07-27T23:19:46Z")
> [@Wile\_E](#): > > I am going to add the “you’ve been shot! I need to dig out the bullet!”. . . But, miraculously, they always get better once the bullet is out and once the crisis is over they don’t even need to be hospitalized. It’s amazing how these gut shots and chest wounds never hit organs or major blood vessels. In Master and Commander: The Far Side, the doctor digs around in his own body and removes the musket ball himself — with the help of a mirror — and can even play the cello again. > [@salinqmind](#): > > I hate the Troublesome Little Sister. NCIS has pulled this three times. Once with a diplomat’s daughter, once with an undercover agent and once even with a younger sister — McGeek’s. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2015, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/133 "2015-07-27T23:46:44Z")
I can’t remember if it was in an actual X-Men comic, or a parody, but: Cyclops is disarming a bomb, being guided by someone on a radio. He’s told to “Cut the red wire.” Next panel is a POV shot, looking through Cyclops’ red crystal visor… ---
**Author:** ![MacSpon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@MacSpon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacSpon)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2015, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/134 "2015-07-28T00:08:51Z")
The most absurd/fun take I’ve seen on the cut-the-red-wire cliche was in a Japanese detective series, _Galileo_: The detective (a physics professor who gets called on to solve ‘oddball’ crimes) is disarming a bomb set by an old mentor of his. Each stage of disarming requires him to solve a new logic puzzle. But the final stage is a simple red-wire-or-blue-wire choice, which the detective – who is the ultimate logician – can’t possibly solve logically. With no other options, he has to leave it to luck; so he calls out to the female sidekick (who is, of course, tied to the bomb), “What’s your favourite colour?” And she answers…“Pink!” So then he looks again, and dammit, there _is_ a pink wire, hidden behind the first two. He cuts that one and disarms the bomb. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2015, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/135 "2015-07-28T00:23:22Z")
I don’t like the Knocked Up By Evil --\> Magical Abortion plotline in scifi/fantasy shows. Angel did it, Charmed did it. Legend of the Seeker did it. I know there are more I’m forgetting. You want to do that plotline, fine, but don’t make her magically un-pregnant (or do a time-redo) in the end - let’s see what the character does if she actually has the evil entity’s child. But no, that only happens in movies, not shows where they’d have to deal with it for more than 90 minutes. I also tire of Wait, The Kid’s Mine?? plotline. How can it come as an utter shock to anyone that a woman he’d had sex with X time ago who has a kid who is 9 months minus X time ago that _maybe_ he’s the kid’s father? But it’s always “but but, how could I ever suspect that your son who is seven years and three months old might be mine just because we slept together 8 years ago??” ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2015, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/136 "2015-07-28T01:43:22Z")
> [@Mollie\_Magill](#): > > I hate the psychic or UFO episodes. It seems like every drama in the seventies had one. Miami Vice had one. Enhhhh. OTOH, the “Vampire” episode of Starsky & Hutch is comic genius. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2015, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/137 "2015-07-28T01:51:37Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > I don’t like the Knocked Up By Evil –\> Magical Abortion plotline in scifi/fantasy shows. Angel did it, Charmed did it. Legend of the Seeker did it. I know there are more I’m forgetting. > > You want to do that plotline, fine, but don’t make her magically un-pregnant (or do a time-redo) in the end - let’s see what the character does if she actually has the evil entity’s child. But no, that only happens in movies, not shows where they’d have to deal with it for more than 90 minutes. To Angel’s credit, the second time they did that plot line, they followed it all the way through to its conclusion. Of course, that conclusion was Connor, so… ---
**Author:** ![justmeetee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/898d66/32.png) [@justmeetee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/justmeetee)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2015, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/138 "2015-07-28T17:42:55Z")
> [@Dallas\_Jones](#): > > And the bomb must have color-coded wires. Do you cut the red wire? Is that the hot one? What if they wired it the other way on purpose and the blue wire is the one to cut? Red or blue? Which to cut? We are out of time, dammit! As the timer ticks down to 1 second and they guess right. > > For once I’d like to see them open up a bomb and find that every wire, every fucking wire, is the same color. Do I cut the black wire or the other black wire? Yes, yes, YES. And the bad guy going to the top of any thing to get away. Have always wondered if it was some kind of secret mandate from law enforcement in hope the sheeple will be brainwashed into these things to make them easier to catch. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/139 "2015-07-29T06:02:03Z")
Y’know, it’s actually pervasive enough that it might as well _be_ a full genre, and not just a plot style, but…the “we must not only prevent this technology/science from falling into The Wrong Hands, but we must prevent it from being _developed_, or even known to _exist_, at _all!_” It seems to be a development or a close relative to the classic Mad Scientist “I will use my fantastic ray machine/organ transplantation/electrical light bulb for the betterment of humanity—oh no, it’s gone out of control, I should never have Tampered In God’s Domain!” plot. Y’know, [“Caveman Science Fiction.”](http://dresdencodak.com/2009/09/22/caveman-science-fiction/) Obviously, from my kind and gentle tone, you can infer my general level of respect for that kind of luddistic, shortsighted, elitist, hypocritical, provincial story and moral. And I will admit, on some level, I can at least intellectually _understand_ that place of anxiety over a changing world, and the fundamental inability to control, or even _know_ exactly every possible consequence of your actions in life, with perfect confidence and safety; the desire to “keep the genie in the bottle,” and let life go on the way it always has. “It’s a dangerous business, going out your front door,” and all that. But damnit, it doesn’t make those kinds of stories any less irritating to sit through. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2015, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851/140 "2015-07-29T07:10:41Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > A baby being born somewhere outside of a hospital, especially if it’s somewhere ridiculous like in an elevator or in a mountain cabin. > [@Baker](#): > > This is the one I came in to mention. Without even trying I can think of three “baby in the elevatior shows” _All in the Family_, _Benson_, and _Night Court_ did it. Any others? It was well-handled in _Cheers_. Lilith had been carrying Frederick for nine and a half months at that point and had an episode of false labour. Her doctor casually and rather rudely told her, after she asked for reassurance, to just go home. In the cab ride back (she later described - the birth was not depicted in any way), she went into genuine labour and delivered, tolerating the pain by biting down on one of the driver’s fuzzy dice. _Star Trek: TNG_ depicted a baby being delivered in the _Ten-Forward_ lounge. [It’s also been done for entirely comic effect](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytkcj6Iq3Uo) in a _Kids in the Hall_ sketch. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/plot-genres-you-hate-even-in-your-favorite-shows/680851.md?page=8)