If there is a school dance, the parents will always find a way to attend the dance in order to spy on their kid.
And of course, he never gets a normal job at McDonald’s or Burger King, it’s always at some ridiculous place like Barney’s Burger Barn or Harry’s Hot Dog Den. The uniform is absurdly embarrassing, with a huge foam hamburger or hotdog on the hat.
There’s just one cash register, and seating for about four customers. :rolleyes:
Exception to the rule of him not keeping the job: If we do see him in the job again, it will be in a Very Special Episode when the restaurant gets robbed, and the teenage son conks the robber on the head with a frying pan and saves the day.
In honour of the resurrection of this tread… it’s The “New” Ultimate Cliche Sitcom… with (almost) all the characters from the The Ultimate Cliche Sitcom (except the one who is now a “serious” actor); except they now all have kids. Maybe they all still live in the same house… they certainly all still live on the same block. More (lame and tedious) hilarity ensues… until the show is cancelled halfway through the season.
The parents have to go away for the weekend, leaving the kids with the strict instruction not to have a party! They decide to have a small party, but the people they invite bring the whole neighborhoos. Eventually, they encounter people they don’t know!
They have a close call, but get everything cleaned up right before the parents walk in!
Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!
If anyone needs any information (no matter how obscure) from the Internet, they will go on-line and find it immediately. I wish I had their search engines
Clueless character joins the army. Every military stereotype on earth is exploited. We see them at basic training where they are doing miserably. They either get kicked out by the end of the episode, as the army people realize this person would be a danger to everyone, or the episode ends with them still in the army but next week the character is back at home and the army thing is NEVER BROUGHT UP AGAIN.
I have |got| to apply some of these principles in real life. Why can’t all crises be resolved in an hour (minus time for commercials)? And the “never referred to again” would be a great policy when I screw up … and join the marines and have to quit the next day.
This is so much fun. thanks to all for reanimating a great old topic.
The Landlord is obsessed with the idea that the Attractive Single Tenants Who Just Moved In Next Door To Each Other might be Planning(or worse, having) Sex Before Marriage. Wacky Antics and Misunderstandings ensue as he invents excuses to perform “routine maintenance” or “safety inspections”, or to otherwise visit and disrupt their assumed Romantic Plans. Meanwhile, the Landlord overlooks Obvious Clues that the Seedy People Down The Hall are Up To Something Illegal. Fortunately, the ASTWJMINDTEOs manage to trick the Landlord into noticing the SPJDTHs just in time to use his Master Key to foil their Evil Scheme. The Cheerful Neighborhood Police take the Bad Guys to the City Jail, the Landlord realizes that he should not intrude into the personal lives of his tenants, everyone but the Bad Guys has a Happy Ending. Alternate beginning: The New Tenants Who Just Moved In Together are Newlyweds, but the Landlord doesn’t know(or forgets) that they are married.
With apologies if these have already been submitted and I missed them:
Our Hero realizes that he has forgotten a Christmas, Anniversary, or Birthday Present; and must go to the Insanely Crowded Shopping Center shortly before Closing Time to get it. Wacky “Guy Surrounded By Stereotyped Female Shoppers” Antics ensue.
The Guy With A Bad Reputation That No One Trusts At First turns out to be a Good Guy after all. It is discovered that The Guy Who Seemed To Be An Upstanding Citizen lied to damage the GWABR’s reputation and make himself look good.
The Tough Girl From the Streets must dress up to attend a High Society Function. Wacky Antics ensue as she tries to wear a Formal Dress for the first time. She tries to wear sneakers under her floor-length skirt. She is, of course, a Stunner when she dresses up.
The Rich Spoiled High Society Girl and the Poor But Tough No-Nonsense Girl From the Streets take an initial dislike to each other. They are forced to work together by Unfortunate Circumstances, and must use their Unique Skills together to triumph. They each realize that the other is Not As Useless As She First Thought. They become friends, or at least reach a Respectful Understanding About Each Other’s Backgrounds.
The Teenaged Daughter is attending a party. She accidentally spills her (non-alcoholic, of course) drink, ruining her new party dress. She spends most of the rest of the episode complaining about it between Other Wacky Events. She remains depressed until she discovers that her drink had been alcoholic(and/or drugged) after all, and that Unspeakable Things might have happened to her had she consumed it. She learns to Be Careful About Such Things In The Future, and to be Thankful That a Minor Misfortune Wasn’t Much Worse.
Few people know that the Goofy But Loveable Dad is a War Hero; he does not like to talk about it. Dire Circumstances force him to recall the combat skills that he Swore He Would Never Use Again in order to scare off or defeat the Bad Guys. He feels guilty about it at first, but by the episode’s end he realizes that that A Man’s Gotta Do What A Man’s Gotta Do to protect his family. His Cocky Teenaged Kids learn that Dad Isn’t Such A Putz After All.
While digging through old newspaper articles(or other Old Dusty Archives) to research an assignment, one of the Attractive Protagonists discovers that the Token Homeless Man is a Decorated War Hero. He was never publicly acknowledged as a Hero and lost his pension due to Bureaucratic Ineptitude. The Attractive Protagonists must go on dates with Mind-Numbingly Boring Bureaucrats and Unattractive Whiny Secretaries in order to speed up the paperwork to restore his records and pension. Alternately, a Corrupt Bureaucrat hid his records and stole his pension. A Hottie must pretend to like him in order to trick him into confessing. Mandatory Wacky Antics occur as she contorts and makes excuses to keep the tape recorder in her Revealing Dress out of his sight(and touch) when he Gets Too Friendly On A First Date. The records and pension are restored, The Hero can now afford a home, and a Grateful Nation acknowledges the Hero at last. Of course, the Sitcom Rules must be obeyed and he is never seen or referred to again.
If the show is a hit, even if it deserves its status due to being well-written, entertaining, and well-acted, people on the SDMB will:
-Casually remark “I don’t watch shows like (insert name of show here) and (insert name of truly terrible, idiotic, cliched, moronic show)”, because everyone knows that all sitcoms are the same
-Talk about how the show has declined in quality, even if it hasn’t. If it has declined in quality, they will exercise ungodly amounts of hyperbole while describing its decline in quality
-Overquote Comic Book Guy
The square footage of the family’s home is roughly the same as their income in dollars. The kitchen is enormous and, in addition to the backstairs already mentioned, is larger than most people’s houses. Occasionally there are rooms (usually a dining room or guest room) that everybody had forgotten about before, and all houses have attics that are large enough to walk around in, neatly cluttered with antiques, and easily converted into an apartment for a child.
The house will burn down after a few seasons, probably as the result of a teenager smoking when s/he’d been told not too. Within a week the family will have moved back in, yet strangely the house and furniture looks exactly the same as it did before.
There may or may not be a toilet, but whenever the lights are turned out in the house it’s still brighter than most restaurants.
All of the furniture looks brand new. All of the women in the family wear outfits that you’d never see hanging on a rack (except for the slutty teenager, who buys her clothes at the local Goth Babe store).
Nobody ever watches TV UNLESS it’s to see the news, and then the first words they hear will be about the wacky hijinks of somebody they know.
An old character who has never been seen or mentioned before will die and make the other characters reflect on life. In recalling some of the incidents in his/her childhood, the parent will settle a seemingly irreconcilable argument that occurred earlier in the episode with their own child. (Bonus points if the old character actually arrives on the show and then dies.)
A few simple rules about dating:
*the cute guy/girl at school is ALWAYS a jerk (as are all jocks and cheerleaders, who are also stupid and require the teenager dating them to act stupid as well)
*the cute guy/girl will ONLY ask you to the dance after you’ve already made a date with a nerd
*nerds ALWAYS turn out to be nice guys/girls and the person you really should have dated to begin with (but strangely they’ll never be seen again after you figure that out)
*there are no gay teenagers, and those who are don’t date
Sometimes the family remembers that they go to church. When they do, their pastor is invariably a second-banana from a show cancelled 10 years ago.
If the actor/actress playing the father/mother has ever been on another hit-series, their obnoxious friend from college will usually be another alum from said series.
No family member ever takes off their shoes, socks, or switches into a baggy T-shirt & gym shorts after coming home from work/school.
The show is set in Minnesota/Wisconsin/Michigan/New York, yet strangely it only snows once a year.
Grandparents are always actors who were ditzy and or sex-obsessed female characters on shows from the '70s (Polly Holliday, Betty White, Jean Stapleton) who are now either obsessed with sex or hypercritical. Grandfathers are usually the stars of 1970s shows (Tom Bosley, James Garner, the late Gordon Jump or the later Carroll O’Connor) who are now annoyed by their wife and want to fix everything. Bonus points if you can reunite a couple from a 70s sit-com with major bonus points if its Tom Bosley and Marion Ross.
Somebody somewhere went to school with or is the cousin of a 4th tier entertainer (Robert Goulet, Wayne Newton) and can promise their services for a local charity event.
Ex husbands, no matter how fat, unattractive, or working class they are, always marry bimbos half their age.
How can you have forgotten the episode where the main character gets to perform a song at a wedding/play/etc?
(Always figured it was a contractual obligation, “Main Character gets to perform a three and a half minute song per season to show how multitalented [s]he is.”)
I’ve always called this The Linda Lavin Syndrome .
BTW, whenever I’ve lived in the house with young children they thought nothing of running stark naked through the home (especially at the most embarassing times) but became more modest when they get older. Sit-coms are the reverse: little children run through the house in GAP Kids fashions, but when they turn into cute teenagers suddenly they have to walk through the house in nothing but a towel at least five times a season (with bonus points if they get trapped outside naked).
Ahh, sitcom memories. Does anyone remember the sitcom in which…
…Our Heroine flashes back to getting drunk at last year’s (insert name of holiday here) party and waking up next to a stranger or a despised coworker? Then she resolved to never do that again but does so anyway this year, waking up next to the same man?
…a blue-collar guy tries to memorize famous names and cultural references in order to impress a Classy Well-Educated Gal and winds up humiliating himself? Then he almost loses her until she realizes that he meant well and a good heart beats under the rough edges? Double points if you remember the episode where the a BC Gal tries the same thing to impress a Classy Guy.
…a Classy Well-Educated Gal tries to memorize sports trivia, power tool nomenclature, and the History of Muscle Cars in order to impress A Cute Blue-Collar Guy and winds up humiliating herself? Then she almost loses him until he realizes that she meant well and a good heart beats under the polished upper-class facade? Double points if you remember the episode where the Upscale Guy tries the same thing to impress a BC Gal.
…people who didn’t live in large cities were depicted as unwashed, uneducated, drunken, paranoid rednecks with fake southern accents who were just itchin’ to git drunk and shoot somethin’?
…a Rich Upper-Class Guy/Girl gets tired of social climbers, backstabbers, users, gold diggers, and Endless Snooty Parties; eventually finding True Love with a Girl/Guy From The Wrong Side Of The Tracks over the objections of their families?
…the Annoying Kid had vital information, but the grown-ups wouldn’t listen?
…the Stereotyped Blonde Bimbo who had been saying the solution to This Week’s Dilemma for the entire episode, but no one would ever take her seriously?
…the New Age Fruit Loop was right about something paranormal, but no one would listen?
…everyone assumed that the beautiful blonde female genius was an airhead?
…all of the men were disastrously incompetent at cooking and cleaning, and all of the women were disastrously incompetent at repairing anything and with power tools in general?
…all of the beautiful/handsome people were either super-mega-ultra-geniuses or dumb as a bag of rocks, but never in between?
…a man and a woman who despised each other got trapped in a small space together, or accidentally handcuffed to each other? Then they Worked Out Their Differences because they had to cooperate to escape, found out that it was All A Misunderstanding, and became friends? Bonus points if you can remember the episode that strongly implied that they had also Fooled Around.
…there was a Misunderstanding and someone dressed(or undressed) for a different type of party than they expected?