"I Saw that One Coming:" Name Most Predictable Storyline Occurences

[Liberalynn]

in television, movies, and books.

I'll start:

The men or women assigned to sit outside in a car and protect a witness or a potential victim rarely end up surviving until the end of the story. Who'd want that job? :rofl:

[Little Wing]

1. The guy who walks into a police station to report something and then

offers help is the guy who did it

[Liberalynn]

4. Clever ploy to throw them off.

;)

[Aristus]

73. That's right up there with: The guy who says he has "nothing to hide", has something to hide.

B-)

[LibraLiz1973]

2. When the victim goes to run to the door

AND IT'S LOCKED!

[Liberalynn]

6. and they can't break the windows.

[FloridaJudy]

3. Kirk, Spock, McCoy and Ensign Jones

All beam down to the planet's surface. Anyone care to underwrite Jones' life insurance?

[Liberalynn]

7. Not me.

:rofl:

[sarge43]

13. The guys back on the Enterprise are already picking through Jones' stuff. n/t

[deutsey]

69. LOL...that would be a good idea for an SNL skit...

[sarge43]

75. Thank you

"Hey you guys, stay outta his stuff. He might make it back."

"No chance man. Asshole wore his red shirt."

[SaveElmer]

23. Anyone who ignores the scary voices telling them to "Get Out"...nt

[zingaro]

28. lol yes!

My sister and I used to always call the odd-man-out on the Away Missions "fodder"

:rofl:

[EstimatedProphet]

85. Especially if Jones is wearing a red shirt.

[ironflange]

123. Family Guy did a take on this

Something like:

Kirk: Spock, Bones, Scotty, Ensign Liebowitz, and I will beam down.

Liebowitz (in a red shirt): Aw, crap.

[Debi]

5. Boy meets girl and falls head over heels

Introduces her to Dad and finds out she had a 'thing' with Dad several years before

[Liberalynn]

8. Or guy makes asks second choice to prom

after firt choice turns him down. First choice suddenly becomes available and he has to juggle them both at the prom without either choice finding out. ;)

[NewJeffCT]

10. I wonder if they'll do that in part 4, too?

Only with Harrison Ford & whoever plays his son?

[NewJeffCT]

9. the grizzled old veteran bites the dust

Like Quint in Jaws

edited to add:
Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars: A New Hope

[Liberalynn]

11. Yeah and like Jack Palance in City Slickers

[NewJeffCT]

12. Yoda in Return of the Jedi

Qui Gonn in Phantom Menace...

(I'm sensing a pattern here)

[uppityperson]

33. Yoda died?

[NewJeffCT]

46. Yes

he choked to death on the emperor's lightsaber

[Wetzelbill]

25. wow, Quint might be the ultimate grizzled old vet

Great one!!!
:rofl:

[Little Wing]

48. Costner in The Guardian. Just about everyone in Aliens

:D

[NewJeffCT]

55. Not to mention Alien - and,

And, from "Predator", you had the Bill Duke character & the Native-American ranger going down, along with everybody else. But, those two seemed the most 'grizzled' of the crew.

[jobycom]

76. That's part of the whole "mentor" archetype, or the "santa clause" motif.

Joseph Campbell and others who study story and myth have "discovered" this mentor archetype as a common element to all stories. The hero starts off as naive or uneducated in some area that the story is about to go into, and he or she needs a mentor to guide him in the right direction. The mentor then has to disappear so the hero is left to solve the problem alone. The mentor doesn't always have to die, and doesn't even always have to a person--the hero might graduate from a university, for instance, gaining the knowledge to explore ancient Egyptian ruins, but leaving behind his learning resources.

This isn't just action/thriller/horror films, either. Remember the old film "Arthur," where Dudley Moore 's butler is his mentor, and dies to leave Moore to understand life on his own.

It's also a "Santa Clause" motif, in that the younger hero looks to a provider-mentor who he has to abandon as he gets older, and often has to realize that this mentor wasn't as all-knowing as he thought.

Yeah, I have no life. Sorry.

[Shakespeare]

92. Yup. Like Sean Connery in The Untouchables. n/t

[NewJeffCT]

95. good one

[Shakespeare]

97. AND one of the best death scenes, EVER.

That long, excruciating crawl down the hall, after he's been shot a brazillion times...

:cry:

[JoDog]

100. Or whomever's a week from retirement

or almost done with their tour of duty in a war film. Ya know, the guy who spent the opening scene reading a tender letter from his sweetheart.

[sarge43]

14. Guy and gal meet, fight about something trivial

Sucker bet they'll be steaming up the windows before the end.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

15. It's not hard to guess the ending.

Unless it's got a "special" surprise ending.

Me? I totally knew Bruce Willis was dead in the first reel.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

16. EVERYONE says that...

and 95% of them are full of shit.

[NewJeffCT]

17. I'll admit

I didn't figure it out... I was surprised at the end

[Wetzelbill]

27. I knew it like about a second before it was revealed

It hit me right then.

But yeah, everybody says they figured that out right off the bat. :)

[FloridaJudy]

29. I didn't figure out what was going on in "The Usual Suspects"

Until the last minute of the movie. Thank goodness no one ruined that for me, the way some cretins did for "The Sixth Sense" and "The Crying Game".

(spoiler alert: "Rosebud" is a sled)

[Wetzelbill]

31. I kind of figured out The Usual Suspects, but only because

I was half asleep and I kinda sorta heard my two cousins talking about it. I still didn't exactly know, but I had an idea.

I met the guy who wrote The Usual Suspects, Chris Mcquarrie at a reading in Seattle. He gave me his email, pretty decent guy.

[CBHagman]

102. Some moron, thinking aloud, almost blew gave it away.

I saw The Usual Suspects twice in the theaters (the second time to take a friend who hadn't seen it). Some guy a few seats down loudly began speculating about what was happening as the plot twists were being revealed. It was all we could do not to clap a hand over his mouth and stop him from ruining it for the rest of the moviegoers.

[Skittles]

39. not me

I guessed it from the TRAILER

[Arugula Latte]

62. Well, I knew it before the trailer came out!!

I had a premonition that there would be a Bruce Willis movie in which he would die but that fact would be kept hidden from the audience!!


:D

[jobycom]

79. I say it, and I have proof.

I was watching with my spouse, and guessed aloud. I can't remember the exact scene, but early on something odd happened (maybe it was the anniversary dinner), and I mumbled "Now that doesn't likely. Oh, I get it, he didn't survive the shooting." She still gets mad at me for that, and we don't even live together anymore! :rofl:

[ContraBass Black]

19. You know, I still haven't seen that damn movie.

Freaking spoilers.

[Lautremont]

22. I figured it out too. And I'm terrible at that.

I figured out that The Village was in the present without ever even seeing the movie, also. I still haven't. And it's not 'cause I'm so S-M-R-T. It's because that guy Night can't write a twist ending without shouting it up and down the block for ninety minutes first.

[jpgray]

30. It took me a while after the first reel to figure it out

Once I started to realize the dead kid was the only one ever to talk to him, I started to guess.

[Mad_Dem_X]

53. That was a big hint right there. n/t

[TommyO]

18. When threatened with a household intruder

the victim runs upstairs, ignoring the myriad of exit possibilities on the first floor.

[ContraBass Black]

20. The coach makes a big speech reminding everyone where they came from

What they went through, and what their name is before they can win the final competition.

[THUNDER HANDS]

21. as soon as a hot college student takes her shirt off and goes skinny dipping

she's about to die.

[Mad_Dem_X]

54. Related...

as soon as college kids start having sex with each other, they're gonna DIE soon.

[Wetzelbill]

57. I like how the killer always walks at a slow steady pace

and the victim runs away fast, keeps slipping and gets caught. It's like a sick version of the tortoise and the hare.

[Wetzelbill]

24. Kevin Spacey is the bad guy

[Mad_Dem_X]

52. well, except in L.A. Confidential

B-)

[Wetzelbill]

56. yeah he started off as the immoral guy

then his conscience evened out. That was a nice twist. It turned out Babe's owner was the bad guy. Go figure.

[jobycom]

80. Or "The Negotiator." nt

[EstimatedProphet]

86. Or K-Pax

:)

[Wetzelbill]

26. In sports movies, somebody gets hurt and the little scrappy guy gets in

and, surprise, he can play!!!!

[begin_within]

32. Inevitably, a fruit cart is toppled in any chase sequence

[Liberalynn]

65. And the cart owner

runs after the perp swearing and waving a piece of fruit around in the air.

[uppityperson]

34. The monster must be miles away by now.

crunch

[lildreamer316]

35. I figured out The Lake House at the beginning of the movie..

where she tries to save the man hit.
Sucked; cause I wish they'd made it a bit less obvious. I like the idea.

[NanceGreggs]

36. Man and woman meet ...

... absolutely HATE each other at first sight - you know they'll wind up together in the end.

The cop bragging about how he's only a few weeks away from retirement always dies.

[FloridaJudy]

37. Oh yeah, and in a war movie

The guy who passes around the picture of his girlfriend and talks about how they're going to get married as soon as he returns home::nuke:

[NanceGreggs]

77. Oh, ny God!

Forgot that one -- and it's an absolute classic!

[Liberalynn]

66. Except Danny Glover in the Lethal Weapon series.

[Skittles]

38. Sixth Sense

I guessed from the TRAILERS that Willis was DEAD DEAD DEAD

[swag]

131. Yeah, I guessed it out loud getting in the car to go to the theater.

From the trailers, of course.

[Recovered Repug]

40. The bad guy has a gun drawn on the good guy,

pulls the trigger, and click - nothing happens. Note: This is the only time anyone runs out of bullets a gun fight. Also, the bad guy will always reveal his plan so the good guy will be able to know how to stop it.

[TommyO]

41. Welcome to DU, Recovered!

and congratulations on your recovery!

[meegbear]

42. The butler did it!

[displacedtexan]

43. When someone tells the heroine, "The tower room has always been locked."

Naturally, the heroine makes a beeline for the tower room.

[EstimatedProphet]

44. Person can see part of the future

Person tries to stop an event in the future.

In trying to stop the event, person accidentally causes the event to happen.

Ooooooo! Who could have seen that coming?

[Liberalynn]

61. It was so totally Sandra Bullock's characters' fault

in Premonition. My baby would have been okay if it weren't for her. :rofl:

[Debi]

74. I hated the end of that movie! n/t

[Liberalynn]

78. Me too!

nt

[EstimatedProphet]

88. That's exactly what I was thinking of when I wrote that

[kwassa]

45. No one ever spots policemen sitting in their cars on stakeouts

even though they are .... just sitting in a car. For hours.

[fudge stripe cookays]

47. Woman running from bad guy...

and of course...FALLS!

Can't anybody freaking run anymore? Are they that uncoordinated? You put one foot in front of the other REALLY FAST. That's all.

[Wetzelbill]

58. oh yeah

I sorta mentioned that in a reply to the "when teenagers are having sex" theme. That is a classic! And the killer is just slowly stalking along. I mean even with the falling, how the hell did he catch up? :)

[sarge43]

72. Well, it's tough to run in high heels with Our Hero holding your

hand.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

49. The mobster goes in to talk with his boss

and he stands on the tarp in the middle of the room. Big mistake. NEVER stand on the tarp. The boss hates to get blood on his fine carpet.

[Liberalynn]

63. Ah yes I remember a scene like that in Lethal Weapon 2

and I believe Tango and Cash too.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

50. If there's violin music playing,

DON'T go into the shower!!!

[sarge43]

51. Combat situation, between battles

Private Youngin' Dead Meat is reading a letter from home or talking about his girl, BettySue. Any bets in the next scene somebody will yell "The bastards killed Dead Meat!"

[Little Wing]

59. Or the underwater variant "He never got chance to visit Montana!"

:cry:

[Dukkha]

60. that quiet moment of contemplation after the villain is killed

and then the villain suddenly lunges back for one final assault. see Carrie, Friday The 13th, Fatal Attraction, Misery, etc...

[Arugula Latte]

64. America's Funniest Home videos: If it involves a kid and a bat,

someone's gonna get it in the crotch.

Bank on it.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

67. If a bad guy is being chased, he always

climbs UP something--a water tower, the Statue of Liberty (cf. Norman Lloyd in Saboteur), the rigging on a stage set--and then falls or jumps to his death

The trusted friend to whom you confide your suspicions about the bad guys turns out to be one of the bad guys (cf. Max von Sydow in Minority Report)

Then there's the one that Siskel and Ebert called "the talking killer"--If a bad guy has a good guy cornered with a gun, he starts telling the good guy his life story, about how misunderstood he is and why he is justified in resenting the good guy. This self-pitying spiel lasts just long enough for the cops/cavalry/superheroes/James Bond to arrive.

[jobycom]

82. "The Incredibles" spoofed that last one.

They had a couple of scenes where the heroes discuss "monologuing." In one scene, the bad guys does it, the hero makes a momentary escape, and the bad guy says "You sly dog! You got me monologuing!"

[deutsey]

68. The mass murderer/bad guy finally dies and everyone relaxes a moment and

then, OH NO!, he's not really dead after all and somehow sneaks up from behind and grabs the hero/heroine before being killed again!

[fudge stripe cookays]

90. Ooh! And a good pairing with that one...

the hero/heroine SHOOTS the bad guy, and horrified by their own descent into violence, they TOSS THE GUN DOWN.

Now the evil one revives, and they are left with NADA to defend themselves. That one makes me crazy!! How hard is it to hold on to the freaking gun? In fact, put it to the guy's head and deliver a coup de grace, fer cryin out loud.

[NewJeffCT]

96. One that drives me crazy is when

the good guy (or innocent) comes home and they sense something amiss. Rather than turning on the lights as they enter the house, they fumble around in the dark while the bad guy sneaks up on them.

[Beausoir]

70. The hooker with a heart of gold.

[RedStateShame]

71. 3 most over-used plot devices of the past 10 years

1) Oh, they're already dead. (See The Sixth Sense, The Others, etc.)

2) Oh, they're the same person. (See Fight Club, High Tension, etc.)

3) Hey, the backup police squad has made it inside the same house where the hero is trying to track the bad guy. Oh, they're in the wrong house. (See Silence of the Lambs, Saw II, etc.)

[soleft]

83. Mayor (authority fig)won't cancel big event despite warnings

Jaws, the Volcano movie that Tommy Lee Jones wasn't in, Titanic

[underpants]

91. Cell phones

"Silence" was a pre-cell phone movie. Had they had cell phones the entire suspenseful ending wouldn't have happen. She would have just been outside waiting for all the cops to show up and he would have been down in the cellar completely oblivious to what was going on.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

111. To Item No. 2), add

Identity.

[jobycom]

81. The camera lingers on a likable character too long at the end of a happy scene

And the character dies in the next scene.

[jobycom]

84. The villain can't just shoot the hero. He has to devise an elaborate death trap

from which the hero emerges. It doesn't matter how ruthless the bad guy is, either. He can shoot thirty people at point-blank range without a moment of hesitation or discussion, but as soon as he has the hero at gunpoint, he hesitates, starts talking, then devises an elaborate scheme from which the hero has the chance to escape.

Imagine how short Bond films would be if the villain just shot Bond the way he shoots everyone else. SNL did a skit on that, long ago.

[fudge stripe cookays]

93. Or the sharks with laser beams...

from Austin Powers! Scott Evil keeps saying, "Dad, just let me shoot him!"

[Left Is Write]

115. Scott Evil tried to explain that to his dad, but it just didn't work.

[Lisa]

128. and also the villain cannot resist bragging about his evil plans

Not only does this give the good guys long enough to come up with a plan and/or pull off a rescue, but they now have the vital knowledge to foil the villain.

And why is it that any death machine devised by a supposedly-intelligent bad guy have an obvious weakness (exposed wire that can be cut or pulled out, a big red "Abort" button, etc.?

[EstimatedProphet]

87. Something will happen which will kill Kenny

After which the kids will yell "Hey! They killed Kenny! You bastards!"

[underpants]

89. The stuttering guy in "Pearl Harbor"

I knew that he would be the one who had to come in and announce that they were under attack

The weirdest part is that I remembered it by the time we FINALLY got around to the attack

[KG]

94. sitcom story line: 5yrs into a family centered sitcom, when the kids are about to leave the nest

the wife get preggers. the announcement is always followed by the line 'how'd that happen?'

[NewJeffCT]

98. another sitcom staple

No pregnancy is ever normal/routine. The woman is trapped somewhere & can't get to the hospital; or the woman has the baby unusually early; or its twins and a surprise; or something bad happens; etc.

[sarge43]

104. And another TV staple

Dueling bachelor parties: The bride's is a fun filled, action pack hoot with a Chippendale. The groom's a painful disaster. Examples, Wings (Joe/Helen); Cheers (Fraser/Lilith); ST: DS9 (Worf/Dax)

[NewJeffCT]

99. The bad guy kills his henchman in cold blood for failing to kill/capture the hero

Just saw it last night in the Kevin Costner "Robin Hood" when Nottingham killed his henchman for getting the treasure stolen.

[billyskank]

101. In a cheap horror movie, the girl who has sex is first to die.

The one who stays chaste lives to the end of the film.

[NewJeffCT]

103. The "plain" girl is turned into a hottie by movie's end

"Romancing the Stone" with Kathleen Turner

"She's all That" with Rachel Leigh Cook

and I'm sure there were dozens of others.

[fudge stripe cookays]

105. Harper Valley PTA

Breakfast Club (Ally Sheedy)

Ermmm...trying to think of some others....

[sarge43]

106. "....there were dozens of others."

The standard by which all others are measured: Now, Voyager.

[NewJeffCT]

107. I had thought the original "makeover" movie was

"Cinderella"

- but, I stand corrected, as "Cinderella" was 1950 and "Now, Voyager" was 1942. I consider myself pretty informed on movies (see all my replies in this thread), but I had honestly never heard of that one.

[sarge43]

108. Check it out. Classic Bette Davis over-the-top.

You've seen the cliche of the guy lighting two cigarettes and passing one to his lady love? Now, Voyager.

[Left Is Write]

113. Another cliche: The "plain" girl wears glasses and puts her hair up.

When her glasses are removed and her hair let down, boom! Instant hottie.

The implication, of course, that girls who wear glasses are not attractive. :D

[NewJeffCT]

116. I love women in glasses

mmm, glasses. If only my wife would wear her glasses all the time...

[Twillig]

120. The Brady Bunch did it first and totally destroyed it for all time--

But nobody making movies gave a toss.

(Remember Marsha's hopeless friend? Sans glasses, cool clothes, loosened hair--Voila! Greg and Pete's eyes jump outta the sockets! Marsha devastated!)

[NewJeffCT]

109. the cop gets suspended/barred from working on a case

but, continues working on it

Beverly Hills Cop
Dirty Harry

[billyskank]

112. In fact he will be unable to solve the case until he gets suspended

"I will have your badge for breakfast!"

Also, it will be necessary during the investigation to visit at least one strip club.

[hedgehog]

121. Hey that comes from real life!

Here in Oswego County (population 123,373), several undercover sheriff's deputies spent many evenings staking out the goings on at what I think is the county's only strip club. It took two years of forcing themselves to sit through the shows, but they finally caught someone exchanging money for drugs!had to visit

[Left Is Write]

114. I think that's happened to every cop on every soap opera too.

ETA: the suspended cop is always the one to crack the case.

[smitty]

110. High speed automobile chases where one (or both) cars

hit a row of garbage cans or a fruit cart and just miss a woman pushing a baby carriage.

[Kutjara]

117. Oooh, I've got a million of 'em:

-Renegade cop breaks all the rules, but gets results (instead of just fired).
-Plucky underdog overcomes all odds and wins through.
-Early suspect (to whom all evidence clearly points) is innocent.
-Moody private eye has dark wartime secret that accounts for moodiness.
-Car chase always involves at least one car spiraling high in the air due to some pointless ramp.
-Parent and child with discordant personalities learn to see things the other's way, shortly before parent dies.
-Person with vital clue is murdered just before they can reveal it.
-Any diagnosis made before the final five minutes of show is wrong.
-Important character lapses into coma just as the actor playing them begins negotiating a new contract.
-Slew of new characters appear in sitcom and are given all the funny lines. Spinoff alert!
-Show makes heavy reliance on "flashbacks." Shark jump ahead!
-Nobody ever goes up to the old Davidson house, but the clowns in this movie will.
-Small group of teens are in great peril but elect to split up for no good reason.
-Any confident, assertive woman is really a psycho bitch from hell.
-Any character that is happy, successful and in love is going to die of cancer.

[KamaAina]

122. A million and one...

-Any diagnosis made before the final five minutes of show is wrong.

The legal/courtroom analog: Any suspect accused with more than, say, twenty minutes left in the show is innocent.

[rosesaylavee]

118. Heroine home alone and the electricity goes out...

As she lights a candle, hears an unexpected noise somewhere in the house. Follows noise with candle flickering, calling out as she goes, "who's there?"

Hate stupid characters who have no survival sense.

[gollygee]

119. What's that Meg Ryan/Nicolas Cage movie about angels

that she was going to get hit but a truck or something.

[Mendocino]

124. The first Bond Girl always dies after having sex with 007. Lesson: be second or third.

When people are being pursued on foot, they will stop to look back to see how close the chaser is.

Cabot Cove, charming rustic seaside village (pop.106) has a murder per week. Moral, if you see Jessica Fletcher, run away!

Non stars in monster/freak animal films will die terrible deaths. Like the suit in Jurrasic Park. May has well had "Dino Fodder" tatooed on his forehead.

War films almost always have someone with a Brooklyn or Boston accent, a big innocent blond kid from a cornbelt state, a short/slight ethnic type who tells all the jokes, and a southerner who is either quite pious and spouts scripture, or a real Bubba hellraiser. All will die.

Guns will jam and cars will not start, at all critical moments.

If you are a criminal being chased in a big city, go to the subway, draw attention to yourself by jumping the turnstile, squeeze through the closing door. Cops will never catch you. Buses are a different story.

[lukasahero]

127. Bond anecdote

I was traveling with my boss last fall and he had just seen the latest Bond movie. He said something to the effect of "And of course the Bond girl dies" and this guy sitting across from us went ballistic - "Some of us haven't seen the movie - how rude of you to give that information away" and on and on and on. I turned to my boss and said "If this guy hasn't figured out that the Bond girl HAS to die so there can be a new Bond girl in the next movie, he's a few cards short of a deck." (My boss was mortified! I was laughing my a$$ off.)

[Akoto]

125. "The away team will consist of Spock, Bones, and Ensign Rickey."

Guess which survives? ;)

Ah, I love Family Guy.

[Coventina]

126. The security guard eating the lettuce sandwich will get a bonk on the head

or worse.

[Lisa]

129. the longer the camera lingers on the scary monster, the more likely it will turn out to be "good"

If the creature is visible for longer than a split second, there's a good chance that it will end up trapped/injured and the audience will start feeling sorry for it. You know this is coming when, after only showing up in brief glimpses or shadows, the camera suddenly focuses on it for an extended period of time. (And if it's a human that has somehow been transformed, e.g. into a werewolf, vampire, zombie, mutant, or cyborg -- it will either break free of the spell, or reveal itself to have been playing along with the bad guys so as to be able to do the right thing in the end, before it dies.)

[Lisa]

130. chase scenes usually involve zigzagging through several different cities

For example, as soon as a car is being pursued, it will likely swerve down Lombard St. in San Francisco, or through Chinatown (scattering piles of baskets, roast ducks, etc.) even though the film isn't set anywhere near there (or even in California).