Count Dooku

You guys need to develop a radar for irony.

fujishig

Stupidity abounds (not necessarily here) so my irony detector is way way off this year.

On a related note, I do feel like a bunch of shows basically "Homer Simpson" a character and make them so dumb that it takes me out of the show (maybe this didn't originate with Homer, and I just associate it with him... maybe Woody on Cheers? But Homer definitely started off kinda slow and then it just got worse and worse).

edited to add: actually I never understood why the trope is named after Ned Flanders instead of Homer. I realize Ned got dumber too but I always thought Homer did it first.

milo bloom

Yeah, Flanderization bothers me more on something like the Simpsons than the sliding timescale ever does.

Homer was a dope but lovable in the early years, but as it went on he started approaching special needs kind of dumb.

Coral

My problem is that Al always complains about Peggy not cooking and he's always starving (ie. many references to it plus when food is presented, he fills up) - and even though he has some money for the kids to take when he gets home from work - he never grabs a bite from a burger joint or someplace before coming home?

Coral

Didn't Frasier make decent bank when he was a psychiatrist in Boston on Cheers?
And radio hosts could make good money if they have a large audience.

But I agree in general - many shows have characters living lives way above their means (ie. house/condo, clothing, other expenditures).

A couple things I always found funny (but doesn't ruin the show for me - I just accept it) is that people in sitcoms always have their lights on in every room.
The other thing is that they never seem to take their shoes off when they enter their home... just tracking dirt inside all the time. The kids will even run upstairs with their shoes on and lie down on their bed - no issues.

Count Dooku

And they always open wrapped presents by lifting the top off the box instead of having to rip off the paper! And their to-go coffee cups are always empty!

Paff

I always liked that they were just as dumb in 2011 as they were in the 90s, yet when watching shows like Teen Mom and Jersey Shore, they suddenly seemed more intelligent in comparison.

The only thing Mike Judge got wrong about Idiocracy is the timeline; it will happen WAY sooner.

Josh-da-man

This is, like, literally, every sitcom and some dramas that run for more than four or five seasons.

Characters' quirks, neuroses, and personality traits get amplified to the point where they consume the character. Kelly Bundy and Joey Tribiani get dumber, Phoebe gets loopier, Ross gets creepier, Ted from HIMYM gets needier, Fonzie can fix anyting by snapping his fingers, etc.

fujishig

We're Asian so we take off our shoes, but I thought that some people just wipe the dirt off and leave their shoes on in the house?

The above their means thing is, I guess, necessary mainly because most people don't want to watch sitcoms that parallel real life where people are struggling to pay rent in a tiny apartment (not to mention how boring it would be to shoot in such a place). Even a show like Roseanne that focused on relative lack of money, they had a pretty large house.

Decker

Lots of shows have it so people all gather around one side of a table but nobody ever did it more glaringly than Taxi. It’s because there is a table on the right side of the soundstage and it always looked so unnatural.

Coral

Yea, I always find it funny when characters squish together around a table even though there's this big gap where no one sits.

I don't know anyone who leave their shoes on when entering a house on a frequent basis whether it's summer or winter. The only time is when you go it to get something real quick and go back outside. Wiping your shoes doesn't get rid of all the dirt - there's always something. And shows do that in the winter time, characters coming inside with their shoes after they've been out in the snow. Wiping your shoes/boots doesn't dry your shoes and it will leave a mess inside.

Count Dooku

When I was growing up in Ohio, we always took our shoes off when it was raining or snowing but usually left them on when it was dry. Here in Texas where it is always dry, I know people who leave their shoes on, but I take mine off in my home.

Nick Danger

Imagine a three-camera sitcom where the kids run onstage from the "outside" door, and then stop for 60 seconds to untie their shoes before they say their lines. Nope nope nope.

Hokeyboy

My go-to favorite on this was some CW show -- I think it was Arrow -- and the hacker chick was trying to break into some file/network (whatever) and shrieked in deep concern about the "military-grade encryption".

The camera panned over to her laptop screen.

It was a Java case statement...

GoldenJCJ

Not that I endorse shows wasting time on characters removing their shoes but I believe it is possible to take your shoes off and talk at the same time. And as someone who doesn’t untie their shoes when he takes them off, it literally takes all of 5 seconds to take your shoes off when you get home.

Now, spending a few minutes watching character find their shoes in a pile and sit down while putting them back on before they exit the scene is a different story.

milo bloom

As far as shoes go, I know that when watching any anime that shows them taking off and putting on shoes, it never slows down the scene, it always feels organic to the rhythm of the scene.

The Questyen

Every post in this thread is just nitpicking. If anything mentioned so far actually ruined the show for you (which is the thread question) I don't know how you manage to make it through anything.

Count Dooku

I've never been able to enjoy an episode of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air with the question of why Uncle Phil ddn't pick Will up at the airport gnawing at me.

Nick Danger

I did stop watching Numb3rs because of the dumb math. I have no problem with ninja turtles or a radio made of coconuts, but the premise of Numb3rs is that the guy is smarter than I am. It's just a matter of good writing: Doctor Who and CSI pulled that off every week.

As to your larger point . . . I can't manage to make it through anything. I've almost given up on TV shows.

movieguru

Soap operas do this all the time. One character has a baby, then suddenly the baby becomes 3 to 6 years old between a few episodes. Then the child disappears off screen for a few years and comes back as a college graduate while the parent characters only aged a few years. Then this post graduate "child" has a child of their own. and the cycle repeats. So the original parent character went from being in their late twenties to having a grandchild that has graduated from college while only aging 10 years themselves during that time. Half the parents and their adult children look like they are being played by actors/actresses that are nearly the same age. Sometimes the "child" is being played by an actor that is older than the one that is playing the parent.

movieguru

And whenever they go to their regular coffeehouse. bar or restaurant, no other customer is ever sitting at their regular table or seat. You would thing that the couch at Central Perk would be the most desirable section for customers to want to sit at, but no matter what time any of the six friends went there, that section was always available unless they wanted to make that the plot point of the scene.

Count Dooku

Just saw an episode of Family Ties where Mallory was setting the table and she placed the cloth table mats down so they all overlapped to keep them on the one side of the table.

For some reason when people are already seated sitcom style, or when the table is already set that way and they just sit down, it is not so striking, but watching someone set it up makes it jump out as weird.

Coral

Not everything posted was something that ruined the show (ie. not taking shoes off) - it was just a funny quirk we've accepted.

Coral

I think I remember an episode where they poked fun of that. They walk into the coffeehouse and see the couch is taken, and they leave in a confused state.

Michael Corvin

It would be a very short thread if we went strictly by the intent of the thread.