Who you are gonna call, Clichebusters?

[Antiyonder]

Just thought it would be fun to list various time when a cliche is given a twist and turns out differently than expected.

Here's one I thought of:

Hey Arnold- Arnold Saves Sid.
Arnold pushes Sid out of the way of a sign therefore saving him, so then Sid decides to devote his life to serving Arnold. Arnold trys to get him to back off. Instead of coming up with a scheme to have Sid save him and getting him to be debt free, he just puts up with the service. Then Sid snaps and complains about how Arnold is taking him for granted. Later Arnold gets some ticket (I forgot what they're for) for Sid, and they make up. The End

Pretty much a good majority of the Nick Thanksgiving Specials have the main character getting a live turkey and for various reasons decides to let the turkey live and have whatever's around the house for dinner.

The Hey Arnold special not only had a different plot for the Thanksgiving Special, but the characters have a turkey dinner.


As for a cliche variation:
Generally when main characters switch bodies, their voices switch too.

As some here pointed out Lloyd In Space had a body switch episode with the switchees being Lloyd and Francine. Their voices, however, remain in the correct body.

However, Mega Man beat Lloyd In Space to the punch, with the episode Bot Transfer where Mega Man switched bodies with Snake Man.

Same with the Justice League Unlimited episode, "The Great Brain Robbery" with the characters involved Flash and Lex Luthor.

[B.W.H.]

I also have another cliche plot twist it 's also from Hey Arnold. Sid believes Stinky is a vampire after beleving he saw him to turn into a vampire and asking to participat in a blood-drive,and seeing him bite a goat in the neck. Sid goes to terminate Stinky will Arnold goes to stinky's to prove he isnt a vampireArnold then go to Stinky's house to terminate him.Stinky reveals that he was trying to pull out a loose thread from his stuffed goat project and that the bat was Stinky's pet. Once they leave his pet bat returns to him. He then explains what happened and he then laughs revealing vampire sharp teeth.

[Jaguar]

I'm laughing at the fact those were both Hey Arnold! cliches.

[Tobias]

Here's one from Family Guy:

Death is trying to get Peter to go out and kill for him.

Peter: No way, I'm not gonna do it!

Cue to five minutes later, and Peter's still sitting there.

Peter: See? I told you I wouldn't do it.

[Samurai Karasu]

Here's one from Family Guy:

Death is trying to get Peter to go out and kill for him.

Peter: No way, I'm not gonna do it!

Cue to five minutes later, and Peter's still sitting there.

Peter: See? I told you I wouldn't do it.


There are plenty of cliche busters on Family Guy but listing them all would drive us MAD!

[sockhead]

I've got another Hey Anrold one. It aired today actually. It was the episode where Wolfgang and the other fifth graders go around putting the fourth graders in garbage cans. Anyway, in the end Arnold tries to reason with Wolfgang. Wolfgang then contemplates what Arnold has said. Usually, this is the part where the bully (or whomever) puts a stop to whatever he or she is doing. Not this time. "I'm gonna put you in the trash!" :D

[Proto DUDE]

Before anyone else says it...


Freakazoid: No way, nuh uh! I'm not going into the sewer with the poo gas.

*cue commercials. Return to show. Freakazoid is watching Animaniacs*

Freakazoid: See, told you I wasn't going in the sewer!

[Rover_Wow]

Before anyone else says it...


Freakazoid: No way, nuh uh! I'm not going into the sewer with the poo gas.

*cue commercials. Return to show. Freakazoid is watching Animaniacs*

Freakazoid: See, told you I wasn't going in the sewer!

In this example (and Family Guy), the characters eventually do go whatever.

Meanwhile, here are counterexamples of other cliches:

"There's No I in Team"

PPGs: Three Girls and a Monster has Blossom and Buttercup bickering over everything (leaving Bubbles to do the stuff). All setting up the inevitable team up to defeat the monster of the day, right? Nope. Bubbles tells the monster to get out of town.
Celebrity Deathmatch: The Olsens say something like "if we team up with each other, we can defeat her (referring to "the missing Olsen twin", who'd just entered the ring)". Right after that tho, we have Missing tearing the stuffing out of the 2.


"Unlikely Hero"

The Simpsons: Bart Star has Bart as 2nd string QB to Nelson. In one game, a warrant has been issued for Nelson. Giving the chance for Bart to come out and shine, right? Wrong. He gets shoved into a police car instead.
Rocket Power: Otto and co. down 0-4 midway thru 2nd period (with Lars as goalie) of big game (whoever wins will play a team of NHL superstars). Sammy (who's much smaller than Lars) comes in instead. Later on, 3-4 with 12" to go. Lars' younger brother Twister puts a long shot up and it's in!!!... but it's disallowed. For once (or a couple more times), Otto and co. are losers.


"The One We Had All Along"

Family Guy: I saw this one coming. So Peter's fired the newsanchor that has replaced the original person due to play Anna in a production of "King & I"... but when the original person re-offers her services, Peter instead decides to play Anna himself (by rewriting the thing to have Anna be a cyborg).
BTW, the fact I saw it coming proves that cliche-busting itself is getting tired.


"Can't Do It"

Weekenders: Baskets For Bucks has Lor needing to sink 3 FTs from 3 to win $10k. All weekend, Lor has had a bout of inconfidence over it. OK, here we go: the third shot rolls.... off.


"The Big Standoff"

Besides the "Arnold in the bin" example above:
As Told By Ginger: Driven to Extremes sees Ginger making a long speech of sticking up for herself, her regular teacher Mrs. Zorski, and her classmates and negative talk of Mrs. Grimley (voiced by, believe it or not, Billy West), saying she's not a teacher and that she demands too much respect. Ginger then says "Speaking of demands..." but then Grimley cuts her off and hauls her into the detention hall. (Hmm... one wonders what she was going to say next... :/)


"You Go Girl!"

Doug: Patty's Pulverizers vs. the school team, baseball. Doug finally has a hit, and he represents the game winning run. Patty's at bat, and it's up and it's... caught by Roger.
RP: Here's a twist on the cliche (tho not an outright exception): Otto and Theodore are competing against each other to win the Waikikamukau. Final leg, Otto has one win, Ted one and 1/2 (tied with Otto's big sis Reggie earlier). But wait: Otto has to drag Twister (w/ broken knee) in. So, it's now Reggie (1/2 win) against Ted... and Ted ties Reg, enough to give him the win. But wait again: Ted's now claiming that he took a shortcut during that last leg, and this gives Otto and Reg the win (yes, they share it).


"The Unlikely Winner"

The Weekenders: Dead Ringer has Tino needing to quickly find another sport to play at the school picnic. His sport of choice: Horseshoe throwing. Well, after a long montage of him and rival Laird throwing horseshoes, we have the announcement of the winner... but it ain't Tino, folks. BTW, does anyone else find it odd that the ep credits show who's responsible for the ep (but not the ep's title itself)?
Hey Arnold!: Another "not quite an exception", watch how Arnold wins the neighborhood eating contest. Surprising, ain't it?


Well, what do you think of all these?

[Frank Castle]

On the episode of Clerks where Dante, Randall, Jay, and Silent Bob get locked in the freezer and rather than having flashbacks to previous episodes they keep having flashbacks of when Dante and Randall were trying to climb Leonardo tower no matter what they were talking about it always went back to that scene. There was a lot of that stupid flashback.

[MultipleSifl]

Here's a good one:
On Clone High, Joan of Ark is told she can't play on the basketball team because she is a girl so she disguises herself (poorly) as a boy and get the team to the playoffs. She keeps throwing the ball to Abe Lincoln, who can't play for squat. After a technical foul called on by the opposing team (the mascot comes in and bites off the referee's arm), she removes her bad disguise and insists that Abe shoot the free-throws. Abe gives a moving speech and the principal voids the "no-girls" rule. Joan goes to make the first shot and she misses. The second shot gets in and the cheering fans and staff congradulate Abe for making the inspiring speech, allowing Joan to win the game instead of giving Joan her deserved glory. Pretty good twist there!

[Rover_Wow]

Another "Unlikely winner" bust (which, at the same time, also makes mincemeat of the "Self-Belief" cliche):

The Weekenders: Carver's not racing in his "Lucky Shoes", despite this (or more likely, because of this), you expect him to beat the previously mentioned Laird. It's a photo finish at the line and.... nope. Laird has come in ahead by a head (no pun intended).


"Should we tell him/her?" "Yeah, I guess we should":

The Weekenders, again: "Tish's Hair" is in buns... by the final scene of course, it's reverted back to her regular hair-down style. Here's the surprise: It's not because of the gang telling her that it's the worst hair they've ever seen, rather, it's by way of seeing everyone else wearing it on the bus to school (think South Park's Pokemon parody, and you're not too far off).


And since 'tis the season to be jolly (well, almost)... the "Grinch" moral: "Christmas isn't really about presents, it's all about family and friends":

Dexter's Lab: The final lines of dialog of the Christmas short go something like (Dexter, seeing all the damage his little Santa chase has caused) "Isn't Christmas really about family?" (beaten-up Santa) "No: presents." Let's hope that the virtual remake that is the upcoming Jimmy Neutron ep "Holly Jolly Jimmy" doesn't take this cynical twist.

[Tim Vee]

And since 'tis the season to be jolly (well, almost)... the "Grinch" moral: "Christmas isn't really about presents, it's all about family and friends":

Dexter's Lab: The final lines of dialog of the Christmas short go something like (Dexter, seeing all the damage his little Santa chase has caused) "Isn't Christmas really about family?" (beaten-up Santa) "No: presents." Let's hope that the virtual remake that is the upcoming Jimmy Neutron ep "Holly Jolly Jimmy" doesn't take this cynical twist.


They ripped that off from the South Park pilot "The Spirit of Christmas"
To wit:
Stan: I've learned the true meaning of Christmas today-
Cartman: Yeah, ham.
Stan: No, not ham you fat ****!
Kyle: Love?
Stan: No. Presents. Don't you see Kyle? Presents.

[DianaGohan]

Uh, Rover Wow, how come you keep putting spoilers in all of your posts? you don't need to really. Oh, here's a cliche buster

Futurama: "Less Then Hero"- When the Evil Zookeeper kidnapps Leela's parents, he demands that the New Justice Team steal a jewel for him or else he'll kill Leela's parents. Normally, the cliche would be they steal the jewel, almost give it to him but then he tries to kill Leela's parents anyway, they save both the jewel and Leela's parents and throw the Zookeeper in jail. Here, they just give the jewel to the Zookeeper and he gives them back Leela's parents. Sounds simple, but you wouldn't see it in regular super hero shows.

Aqua Teen Hunger Force: "Super Bowl" This falls under the "Pick Between 2 People who want to go to something cliche". Here, Meatwad wins two tickets to the Superbowl and both Shake and Carl want to go with him. In the end though, Meatwad picks them over his imaginary friend Boxy Brown. But the real cliche busting comes when we find out that Meatwad didn't even go to the game with Boxy, but rather a farm and that the tickets were at the house the entire time.

Sealab 2021: "Splitsville" This falls under the "Two Characters who aren't getting along have to solve they're diffrences in order to survive cliche". You see, Debbie and Quinn have split up and are now dating other people. However, they are the only ones who can save Sealab when the chemical tank is beginning to blow and only giving them a minute to save Sealab. They get over they're diffrences. Now, this would normally be the part where the two save the day just in the knick of time and realize how stupid they were for arguing. Instead though, they start to "get it on" and the timer clicks down and Sealab blows up anyway. Cliche-buster there.

[Rover_Wow]

Listen Diana, I use spoiler boxes for a reason: Just in case there are guys like that donkey in the anime forum.


Aqua Teen Hunger Force: "Super Bowl" This falls under the "Pick Between 2 People who want to go to something cliche". Here, Meatwad wins two tickets to the Superbowl and both Shake and Carl want to go with him. In the end though, Meatwad picks them over his imaginary friend Boxy Brown. But the real cliche busting comes when we find out that Meatwad didn't even go to the game with Boxy, but rather a farm and that the tickets were at the house the entire time.

Meanwhile, on The Weekenders, clichebuster meets copout.

Tino has 2 "Tickets" to a concert. After about 11 minutes of deliberating which of the other 3 in his gang to take, he decides to take Carver along. Here's the bustout: those "tickets" were passes redeemable for 2. 2 x 2 = 4 = Tino can take them all along (and he does).


And in light of AntiYonder's post saying:


Pretty much a good majority of the Nick Thanksgiving Specials have the main character getting a live turkey and for various reasons decides to let the turkey live and have whatever's around the house for dinner.

The Hey Arnold special not only had a different plot for the Thanksgiving Special, but the characters have a turkey dinner.


How about Valentine's then?:

Pretty much every Valentine's Day ep of every show has to feature someone giving out Valentine cards and/or someone dating.
The Wild Thornberrys' Valentine's Day ep doesn't feature either of these. Oh sure, Deborah planned a date for the evening, but look what happened to that!

[MultipleSifl]

I still don't see why a description of an episode needs a spoiler. Maybe you just love spoiler boxes! :p

[Yash]

Here's a clichebuster that's become a cliche itself.

Someone gives a long, inspiring speech about people, and then those people hang their heads down in shame. Now, you'd expect them to forgive each other and make up, but instead... they just do the same thing they did before.

[Rover_Wow]

Here's a good one:
On Clone High, Joan of Ark is told she can't play on the basketball team because she is a girl so she disguises herself (poorly) as a boy and get the team to the playoffs. She keeps throwing the ball to Abe Lincoln, who can't play for squat. After a technical foul called on by the opposing team (the mascot comes in and bites off the referee's arm), she removes her bad disguise and insists that Abe shoot the free-throws. Abe gives a moving speech and the principal voids the "no-girls" rule. Joan goes to make the first shot and she misses. The second shot gets in and the cheering fans and staff congradulate Abe for making the inspiring speech, allowing Joan to win the game instead of giving Joan her deserved glory. Pretty good twist there!

Actually, this is sort of cliche: the person who deserves all the credit not getting the credit:
* I saw an ep of Angry Beavers a few weeks back where Norb and Dag run over a rival football team with the team medical car, and at the end of the game, a bunch of fans run down and carry it off the field.
* One ep of IM Weasel ends with the baboon bitter that he did all the work on some bridge... and yet the weasel won a huge prize.
* Homer Simpson jams rod in space shuttle, but that ain't him getting a parade and getting on the cover of Time...

Apropos cliche busting and The Simpsons, here's another one I saw coming:
Homer runs out of hospital as that doctor guy's about to give him and dad anaesthetic. Apparently, Homer has fears over a kidney transplant. Later on, he sees how cowardice that was and he heads back to hospital. Okay, who else saw it coming? By which I meant "Homer running out of the hospital again".

[Duke Psychology]

And since 'tis the season to be jolly (well, almost)... the "Grinch" moral: "Christmas isn't really about presents, it's all about family and friends":

Dexter's Lab: The final lines of dialog of the Christmas short go something like (Dexter, seeing all the damage his little Santa chase has caused) "Isn't Christmas really about family?" (beaten-up Santa) "No: presents." Let's hope that the virtual remake that is the upcoming Jimmy Neutron ep "Holly Jolly Jimmy" doesn't take this cynical twist.



That Dexter one cracks me up all the time. the way jolly old St. Nick says "the presents" is hilarious.

[Rover_Wow]

After two weeks of no activity, I found another cliche buster. It busts the "Vengeance is mine" cliche. These 3 pictures say it all (OK, captions might be needed):
http://haa.phpwebhosting.com/multimedia/frames/hvp/12.jpg
Harold loses to Patty in arm wrestling at school

http://haa.phpwebhosting.com/multimedia/frames/hvp/73.jpg
Later on, a well-trained Harold's in the final of an arm wrestling tournament, and he's up against Patty again. He's gonna take back that embarassing defeat and win it all, right?

http://haa.phpwebhosting.com/multimedia/frames/hvp/76.jpg
Nope. Patty beats him again and wins it all.

[Rover_Wow]

Clichebusting has gone so mad on The Simpsons, it's gotten to the point where when something actually does go to cliche, it's suprising.
Example: the one with the hunky guy with Bart and a fight at Sea World. My memory's hazy on it, but I do remember after the fight, hunky was with this homeless guy complaining that he had prepared a ham back home (for him and Bart), and it would spoil. This homeless boy chimed up, "Please don't talk about food" for something like it. Now, at the time, I expected them to just walk away from each other without being paired up (their situations fit like a glove)... but Bart decided to pair the two up, so there you go.

[Alex Toon]

A cliche repeated so many times: The Unlikely winner. That was on the Steve Harvey Show last night. Instead of Romeo or Lydia (played by Lori Beth Dinburg) winning the election for class president, Lidya's rival Heather wins the election

[DianaGohan]

Another cliche buster:

In the Aqua Teen Hunger Episode of "The The" Frylock finally moves out of the house after Shake makes it a complete dump. But both are miserable without the other: No one comes to Frylock's house warming party (well except the Moonintes, who just crashed it and take his food), and meanwhile Shake and Meatwad are miserable at the house, where Shake's chickens and Styrophom fires have made everyone near blind and produced a posion cloud around the house. Frylock then comes back for a visit. The cliche would be that he moves back in with the Teens and everything turns out okay. What happens is that Shake's ***wholeness causes him to stay moved out. His response to ever moving in again? "Hell no!" Now that's cliche busting.

[Zorak Masaki]

When a superhero dies, you'd expect the hero to celebrate right? Well, in the Justice League episode "Hereafter", when superman dies, Lex Luthor shows up at the funeral, not to gloat, but to mourn superman as well.

[lostrune]

When a superhero dies, you'd expect the hero to celebrate right? Well, in the Justice League episode "Hereafter", when superman dies, Lex Luthor shows up at the funeral, not to gloat, but to mourn superman as well.

superhero = Superman
hero = Lex Luthor
villain = Mercy
supervillain = LexCorp's accountants

I follow ya! :D

[Zorak Masaki]

superhero = Superman
hero = Lex Luthor
villain = Mercy
supervillain = LexCorp's accountants

I follow ya! :D

Ooops,,i meant "you'd expect the VILLAIN to celebrate",,little glitch there<G>.

[Rover_Wow]

A cliche repeated so many times: The Unlikely winner. That was on the Steve Harvey Show last night. Instead of Romeo or Lydia (played by Lori Beth Dinburg) winning the election for class president, Lidya's rival Heather wins the election

Lori Beth, that's the chick who did Vital Info on All That, right?
Meanwhile, here's a clichebuster I encountered this morning.
KND, "Pirate: Pirates Invade Repository and Treats Extracted": Number 3 throws gumballs onto ground ahead of chasing pirates. They roll over them in comical fashion, right? Nope, they drop down and pick up the gumballs to eat.

[Zorak Masaki]

In the spirit of the season, the gift of the magi parody on futurama where its revealed that zoidberg bought the hair of amy and leela which they sold to buy combs for each other.

[Rover_Wow]

As some here pointed out Lloyd In Space had a body switch episode with the switchees being Lloyd and Francine. Their voices, however, remain in the correct body.

That someone being yours truly. It's kind of disorienting tho, if you tuned in during the first break, and you heard Lloyd saying "I'm a teenager" over and over (and you'd think "No duh"), but after a minute or so, then you realise that they've switched. The ep is titled "Lloyd Changes His Mind", BTW, if you're interested.

[Rover_Wow]

OK, not exactly since I saw it a year or more back.
Futurama. The one with the beauty paegeant.
Normally you'd expect the non-regular character to be more evil than the regulars think. But Bender turns out to have stolen the paegeant crown and not his "not-so-evil" twin. Nonetheless, things return to status quo (in fact, I have this feeling that many of the cliches here, like the "moving back in" cliche stem from requiring a return to the status quo) when Bob Barker fingers the twin for the crime.

[Rover_Wow]

So Flem (or was it Earl?) has teamed up with Chicken to skate in an ice skating tourney. Red doesn't like the partner, and he has a lead pipe (a sly reference to the Kerrigan scandal... BTW, it's a smoking pipe).
Now, one would expect Red to break the partner's knee by tapping on it with the pipe (the "paltriness" cliche). Not even. All he does is touch the guy's leg with the pipe.

[Antiyonder]

To put us in the holiday mood:

Kim Possible "A Very Possible Christmas" avoids 3 cliches in one show:

1. Character looking for the perfect gift.
A. Ron's idea of a gift is making sure Kim gets to be with her family.

2. Characters not grasping the true meaning of Christmas.
B. The characters don't go through the meaning of Christmas lecture.

3. Other December holidays are non-existent.
Kim's Happy Channukah to Ron was a nice touch, given the episode "Ron The Man".


Then there is the main character who needs to be visited by the 3 ghosts in the style of "A Christmas Carol".

1. Aqua Teen Hunger Force- "Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from the Future" has Carl visiting his past, not because he's a greedy old miser, rather his past recently gets involved with the war between man and machine (Carl doesn't remember, because the war was only a prophesy at the time. But in the future, the past occured).

2. American Dad- "Best Christmas Story Never" has Stan getting a visit from the Ghost Of Christmas Past, but the story as many posters stated goes into a Back To The Future mode.

3. Sabrina The Animated Series- "Sabrina the Animated Series" while Gem does the end up being nice at the end of the episode, she didn't show any dissapointment of her grave (which was heavily invested in).


While the Power Puff Girls Christmas episode doesn't have Princess calling the 24 hour truce, we do see the other villains on good behavior at the start of the episode.