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    Movie/TV clichés

    Funerals only ever take place when it's raining.

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      Movie/TV clichés

      Funerals only ever take place under grey skies and when it's raining.

      Conversely, weddings only ever happen when the sun is out.

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        Movie/TV clichés

        There's always one character in the pilot episode who dies suddenly at the end in a 'cliff-hanger'.

        It's never the character you'd like to see get killed off.

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          Movie/TV clichés

          Any procedural will feature at least one stock tight-lipped "strong professional woman" who wears trouser suits, doesn't have a personal life so it doesn't interfere with her career, feels unappreciated because of her gender and carries herself like someone with a bad case of piles.

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            Movie/TV clichés

            I've re-read this thread in its entirety and am amazed to realise that after two years and twelve pages we've missed the hoariest movie cliché in history:

            When a woman (never a man) stumbles upon a corpse she will inevitably let out an ear-piercing scream.

            This is not only emotionally unlikely but, I think, physically impossible. Immediate shock leaves one gasping for breath, not emitting operatic howls. And why the gender gap? Why do we never hear Harrison Ford's or Bruce Willis's keening wails?

            It's a truly weird one with, so far as I can tell, absolutely no basis in reality whatsoever.

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              Movie/TV clichés

              We've got company!

              I've noticed that referring to actual house guests as "company" - the original meaning of the term - is not very common any more. It's something my parents or grandparents might say, but I don't think I ever have.

              But it's still a staple of screenwrites. I guess the screenwriting software has a hotkey that just sticks that phrase in.

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                Movie/TV clichés

                http://tvtropes.org/

                ...is an entertaining site to spend a lunch hour visiting for this kind of thing.

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                  Movie/TV clichés

                  You can't fire a gun at anyone. You must fire a gun at anyone while flying in slow-motion at an angle.

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                    Movie/TV clichés

                    Crusoe wrote: http://tvtropes.org/

                    ...is an entertaining site to spend a lunch hour visiting for this kind of thing.
                    It's dangerously addictive.

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                      Movie/TV clichés

                      Yes, enter at your own risk: I got lost for a year in there once.

                      My own personal bête noire among standard (TV or) film clichés is the way in which when the protagonist finally reaches their head-to-head confrontation with the antagonist, it almost always comes down to an actual physical fight. It doesn't matter whether they've started out armed with swords, ray-guns or semi-automatic assault rifles, or if they're in a tank, on horseback or aboard a star destroyer — when the good guy has his designated showdown with the villain, he'll inevitably end up defeating him after a hand-to-hand scrap, with helmet, armour etc. invariably removed to allow their dirt-smeared physique to be on display and their noble features to emote to the camera in a suitably manly and heroic fashion. This applies even if the bad guy has all sorts of technically superior martial arts skills, as in the movies these are no match for a good solid American punch in the jaw of course.

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                        Movie/TV clichés

                        You're in a car that's landed in a river or canal and is sinking fast, the water surging inward. You'll soon escape, but first you have to wrestle with the seatbelt, which won't loosen until a suspense-building five seconds has passed.

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                          Movie/TV clichés

                          During which you attempt to scream, releasing bubbles of precious air.

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                            Movie/TV clichés

                            "I told you, I'm retired now".

                            "The doc told me her operation would cost $50,000. Where the hell am I going to get that kind of money?"

                            "I see that friend of yours had a little 'accident'. Funny thing about accidents - you never know when they might happen."

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                              Movie/TV clichés

                              To some extent, all of these show that writing for TV and film is much harder than it appears. It's difficult to do anything new and original within the confines of what is commercially viable. That means writing that anyone, regardless of what they've seen or read before, can understand.

                              Better writers than I can probably explain this further.

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                                Movie/TV clichés

                                This explains why some shows/movies (Spooks and Hustle would be prime examples, though to be fair both are whimsy) are 100% cliche.

                                I would nominate both, along with expensive sci-fi flop Outcasts, for Most Cliche-ridden Visual Entertainment Award.

                                Sci-fi and fantasy bring their own perils of course, adding imaginary devices, concepts and names to the mix:

                                "Tomorrow, we make haste for Gondor, but must avoid the eye of Sauron."

                                "Reverse the polarity if the neutron flow!"

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                                  Movie/TV clichés

                                  "Well met stranger. Join me in a flagon of ale, or perhaps a flask of wine."

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                                    Movie/TV clichés

                                    Thanks to NCIS, we can now experience the wonder of a camera endlessly rotating around a small group of people standing around talking in a succession of jump cuts (adhering to the 'count to 5 before there's an edit' rule). This is to ensure that viewers can be swept along by the urgency of the story (or 'you losers can't be trusted to maintain any interest in this so we'll do it for you via jiggly, constantly moving camerawork', as it's known).

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                                      Movie/TV clichés

                                      There's a storm coming.

                                      Also, "There's a war coming" is just about as common and often used as a plot turn/cliffhanger. I couldn't find a supercut of that, however, and don't have the technology to make one.

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                                        Movie/TV clichés

                                        Sits wrote: "Well met stranger. Join me in a flagon of ale, or perhaps a flask of wine."
                                        That's not so much a cliche as essential to the genre. Most fantasy of that kind is more or less a rip-off of Tolkien.

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                                          Movie/TV clichés

                                          I've read somewhere that the most common phrase in movies is 'Let's get out of here.'

                                          It's good for lots of scenes. Bad guys in a heist gone wrong. Star-crossed lovers eloping in the middle of the night. People deciding to go home from a dismal karaoke night.

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                                            Movie/TV clichés

                                            At least that's a phrase that real people actually say sometimes.

                                            I can say, without any fear of contradiction, that I've never said or heard an actual human say "There's a war/storm coming" or "we've got company," except in a very literal sense.

                                            Come to think of it, I've never heard those used literally either. In the first case it's "I think it's going to rain," or maybe "The weather map shows a storm coming in from xyz" and it's said matter of factly, not with gravitas. For the war bit, it's just "I'm afraid this is going to turn into a real war." Or "we might end up going to war there." And "company" was a term for "visitors" or "guests" that I haven't heard anyone use in any context in about 30 years.

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                                              Movie/TV clichés

                                              Do you reckon someone could write an entire screenplay using cliches and tropes?

                                              It would be funny if you did it in such a way that twisted the cliches.

                                              The X-Men find a sex-tape and show it to Professor X who can;t understand what he's seeing. "There's Storm coming!" says Wolverine pointing at the screen.

                                              A football boss gets off the phone and turns to his second in command. "Good news, Davy Boy, we've got Kompany!"

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                                                Movie/TV clichés

                                                Half of the great Police Squad was TV clichés ("he'll do his boxing in State Penitentiary now"); the other half was punnery and sight gags.

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                                                  Movie/TV clichés

                                                  I love Jongudmund's suggestion.

                                                  Another device which just plain pisses me off. Maybe it's unreasonable and would actually be the case:

                                                  Something momentous, sudden and massive is happening outside, such as a mushroom cloud rising on the horizon, or a vast alien spacecraft casting a huge shadow.

                                                  An outdoor scene, people (a large number of them) are going about their daily existences when all as one, stop, turn and stare in I silent collective awe. No one fails to notice for a moment until the person next to them tugs their arm and alerts them. No one says "What the fuck is that?" or "Oh shit!" as would almost certainly be the case. Well, I would.

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                                                    Movie/TV clichés

                                                    G-Man's right about Police Squad, and I think the eternal daftness of the punnery and sight gags stand the test of time better than the cliche-tickling (the cop shows they'd have been taking off being before my time).

                                                    I've noticed "tropes" (which usually just means cliches) taking off in the "discourse" (which usually just means "discussion") around culture in the last couple of years or so. Used to be a Will Self word, pretty much, but then "stores" used to be called "shops" where I'm from, and it was all fields around here before everything became iconic.

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