What’s hysterical are the “let’s deal with death” episodes in which the character has never been seen or mentioned before and is brought on just to die (almost a Calvinist theme). Alex’s never before seen best friend since embryonic phase who dies in your post, the kids’ grandpa on Full House, a great-aunt on Leave it to Beaver, etc…
Any episode of any series which any member of the cast plays his/her own relative (e.g. Edith Bunker as her German alter ego Judit(thah), Mike and Carol Brady as their respective grandparents), with special cringe moments if said split screen requires drag (Conrad Bain & Dana Plato on DS, Les Nesman as his mom on WKRP). Northern Exposure did an almost acceptable variant of this with Joel’s twin brother, however.
The clichè of the clueless eggs benedict and seltzer water loving white characters on many black sitcoms (Hoppy on Sanford & Son, housing supervisor who has never heard of collard greens on Good Times).
“This briefcase/paper bag/backpack/suitcase has a sandwich/underwear/schoolbooks in it! That means my kid/buddy/some stranger has the real plans/diamonds/money/drugs!” Frantic chase ensues. Revelation that kid/buddy/whoever accidentally lost/destroyed the real whatever further complicates matter. Will they find it/fix it/replace it in time? Who cares??
First obvious example that pops into my head is the episode of the Brady bunch at the amusement park. Jan’s poster and dad’s architectural designs are in identical tubes. Dad accidentally takes poster to his meeting, while Jan loses the plans on a ride. Family must hunt down Jan, then she must retrace her steps to find the plans, and finally the family runs relay across park to get plans to dad before big meeting ends and he loses the account.
Clone High did a gag about this. They had a ‘character dies’ episode. In the opening of the episode, they made a big deal over how they were going to kill off one of the Clones… ‘This isn’t one of those lame things where we introduce a new character just to kill him. A Clone is going to die!’ All the while flashing pictures of the characters: Abe, Joan, Ghandi, JFK, Cleopatra…and a character we’ve never seen before, Ponce de Leon (who looks like Luke Perry).
I don’t actually cringe and wince over this device, but I do hate it. I suppose back at the Dawn of Mankind it might have seemed unexpected and clever for an established character’s relative to be played by the same character, but now it’s boring and predictable. Not to mention stupid. Sure, I’ve seen some strong family resemblances, but not many people are identical to their great-grandmother or whoever. I always suspect the show was just too cheap to hire another actor.
Since you brought up cross-dressing, I usually dislike any plot involving a character dressing in drag and attempting to pass as a member of the opposite sex. I don’t find these plots inherently offensive, but the way they’re handled in sitcoms almost always involves the cross-dressing character to be yet another dishonest jerk and his (or occasionally her) friends, relatives, or coworkers to be fools. “Passing” around strangers or acquaintances is not too hard. It’s not even terribly difficult to fool people who know you well for a little while, especially if you don’t actually have to speak with them.
But it’s one thing to cross-dress believably, it’s another to convince people who know you well that you’re a completely different person for an extended period of time. There was a thankfully-short lived sitcom based entirely on this stupid premise: “Ask Harriet”. The main character loses his job, then wins another position at the same office by posing as a woman. Because people he saw every day for years and who just saw him fired would totally be fooled every day when he shows up in lipstick and a wig. Right.
The close cousin of this one is that Mom or the housekeeper have to leave for a few days. A few hours before she’s scheduled to come home, the house is a disaster and they work their ass off at supersonic speed to get it clean before she gets home. When she gets home and sees that the place is spotless, she gets all depressed because they don’t need her afterall. Once they see that, they run to other parts of the house and make a new mess so she can feel needed again.
I want to mention another plot device that sets my teeth on edge that’s closely related to the first I posted: the unwitting mule.
Some bad guy either: 1.) is about to be captured, so he hides the microfilm/jewels/drugs in the nearest purse/suitcase/coatpocket (belonging to our hero, of course) hoping he can recover it after he’s set free. This results in our hero being chased by feds/the mob/the KGB/etc., and wacky hi-jinx involving mistaken identities.
Or 2.) the bad guy deliberately sets up our hero taking advantage of them because they’re a tourist in a foreign land and they (the bad guy) thinks customs won’t examine them (the hero) as closely or something.
The former is how the Keatons ended up with a hairbrush containing microfilm, and the latter is how the Flintstones ended up with maracas filled with diamonds. Hilarious!! Wait, I meant Tedious!! In fact, “diamonds” and “microfilm” are two words I dread hearing most in a sitcom. They better be talking about engagement rings or libraries, or else I’m changing the channel.
It could all be redeemed if they included a scene wherein the bad guys actually DO reclaim the microfilm, but have no idea how to extract the information because they don’t possess any equipment to read microfilm, nor do they know what kind of equipment you might use to read microfilm. The episode ends with the bad guys trying to jam the microfilm into an old Viewmaster that they found in the garage.
A good example where this actually works was the episode of Frasier where the new station manager was gay and everyone knows except Frasier. One of the funniest episodes of that show.
Frasier also managed to make a fairly funny episode containing a number of stupid devices, including “big lie made to protect feelings of romantic interest” and “characters pretend to be gay”, yet that still worked for me. It was the one where Frasier drags his dad Martin to the opera, where Martin meets the (single) mother of Frasier’s new flame. He’s been cautioned not to do anything to blow Frasier’s chances with the woman, so when mom makes a pass at him he says “Thanks, but I’m gay”. An elaborate deception follows, involving Niles pretending to be Martin’s lover.
What made this work for me was that a fair part of the action was set at the opera house or involved discussion of the opera. At the very beginning of the episode Frasier explains the plot of the opera they’ll be attending (which involves, of course, a lot of identity deception and even a woman pretending to be her father’s mistress), and Martin complains about how stupid such stories are. So the episode’s gag is more “Character finds himself acting out a plot that he’s already dismissed as stupid and implausible” than the usual “Wacky hijinks ensue after a lie is told.”
Apologies if this has been covered - it’s a pretty long thread, and I tried to scan all the posts, but I didn’t read every word.
Anyway, the device that often makes me uncomfortable is the “Protagonist finds self in awkward social situation, and in a futile attempt to ease his embarassment with humor, continues to say more and more inappropriate things, and eventually completely and utterly humiliates self.” I notice this a lot on The King of Queens. I think that show has its moments, but when they start having the characters make these achingly embarassing, inappropriate comments, I can hardly stand to watch it.
The Lucy syndrome. Totally implausible, unnecessary plot twists. Ending up on a ledge outside one’s own apartment, “crashing” wedding dinners, trying to fool the damn BRIDE by taking pictures at someone else’s wedding. Stupid, Stupid, Stupid, Stupid.
In the late 80’s, I seem to recall every sitcom having a baby being delivered in an elevator.
If my memory serves, “Night Court” did it, possible “Gimme a Break”, and “Doogie Howser” did it (with Vinny trapped in an elevator with his pregnant spanish teacher. Vinny learns that he can learn a language by speaking in Pig Latin over the phone with Doogie).
A variation on this is when the father and a friend agree to take care of the baby, take it to a public place then either leave without it, or accidentally pick up a different baby and bring it home (it’s always a baby of the opposite sex and the switch is discovered during a diaper change).
A lot of shows have a plot where the characters learn that they’re going to be getting some money (they find out that they were left money in a will, or won the lottery). The characters proceed to buy lots of expensive items, then finds out that they weren’t in the will afterall, or only won a small amount of money.
Another annoying plot is when a character gets fed up with the ill mannered poor person, only to have them keel over and die. The character feels bad, but the whole story eventually comes out at the funeral, and the “mourners” give the main character a standing ovation for finally getting rid of Scrooge.
Most shows also have the episode where a friend helps out with a garage sale and accidentally sells some rare item that wasn’t meant to be sold. The main character gets excited about how much money was made until they realize that the precious thing is gone, then both friends jump through hoops to get it back.
This one’s so hoary that I recall seeing an episode of What’s Happening!! in the late seventies where something like this happens to the gang, and they decide it would make a good plot for their favorite TV show. They write it up and send it in where it’s rejected. Later, they see an episode of the show that clearly seems to be based on their idea. They try to raise heck with the show’s producers, who trot out scripts with the same plot for various shows back into the 1950s.
Wedding episodes where something out of the ordinary happens, either good or very bad. Like the “Roseanne” episode where Dan has a heart attack at Darlene and David’s wedding. Or “Everybody Loves Raymond” where it seemed like several people were conspiring against Robert and Amy’s wedding including her weird brother and Marie.
Humiliation is common fodder for sitcoms and I couldn’t agree with you more. The more the character is humiliated, the more embarrassed I get. I’ve never understood why mental torture of an otherwise sympathetic character is considered funny by many.
Oddly enough, I have no problem with physical humor (and find it occasionally very funny if well done). Perhaps it’s because physical humor is usually presented in a cartoonish manner whereas the mental anquish seems much more real and therefore triggers my sense of empathy.
