Name A 60's TV Story Cliche (1 Viewer)

[Professor Echo]

Amnesia.

Lone juror.

Gypsies.

 

[jimmyjet]

i guess one would need to come up with something that was more particular to the 60s than any other decade.

hippies ?

 

[FanCollector]

Evil lookalike.

 

[Peter M Fitzgerald]

Temporary blindness.

Framed!

Weird day, but it was all a dream... or was it?

Pitted against the super-computer.

Treasure hunt.

A dour Soviet V.I.P. delegation visits.

Brainwashed.

Trapped with a ticking time bomb.

Runaway heiress who's after some 'kicks' (a.k.a. 'poor little rich girl')

Idolized by a little kid.

An Arab potentate visits.

Trapped alone in a ghost town/abandoned area.

Haven't seen her since she was a skinny kid... now she's a knockout.

Prey of a master hunter ('The Most Dangerous Game' plot).

Uneasy 'survival truce' with a foe ('The Defiant Ones' plot).

One-by-one murders at the reading of a will ('Ten Little Indians' plot).

Reunited with an old flame, but it can't last.

Held hostage by a psychopath.

Meeting a non-stereotype 'native' who graduated from Harvard and speaks better English and has better manners than anyone who's ever lived.

Stuck working with a nerdy novice who proves him/herself by the end.

Person is unknowingly a plague carrier (the 'Typhoid Mary' plot)

Forgotten enemy soldier thinks the war is still on.

 

[High C]

Wow, that's a pretty copious list, Peter. Well-done.

I can't add much, but I'll try.

***
Is she or isn't she? (Spy, alien, etc.)--Closely tied to and often interacting with Man on the Run With a Secret (which stretched into the 1970s with the Incredible Hulk)

Being menaced by operative from thinly-veiled Soviet or Soviet-bloc country

Two dates for the same event

Job requires you to romance/take to dinner/show sights to/protect beautiful client or somesuch while wife/significant other seethes

 

[Richard V]

Hip teacher "understands" troubled students.

 

[Frank Soyke]

Helping the ugly duckling find beauty only to have her become arrogant and unappreciative

 

[Frank Soyke]

Having to keep up the rouse of being in college cause you didn't tell your parents you dropped out months ago...a close relative of the pretending to go to work although you have been fired storyline.

 

[JoeDoakes]

Someone saves someone else's life, with the saved person vowing to become the slave of the saver (Andy Griffith and Brady Bunch at least.

 

[JoeDoakes]

Temporary blindness.

Framed!

Weird day, but it was all a dream... or was it?

Pitted against the super-computer.

Treasure hunt.

A dour Soviet V.I.P. delegation visits.

Brainwashed.

Trapped with a ticking time bomb.

Runaway heiress who's after some 'kicks' (a.k.a. 'poor little rich girl')

Idolized by a little kid.

An Arab potentate visits.

Trapped alone in a ghost town/abandoned area.

Haven't seen her since she was a skinny kid... now she's a knockout.

Prey of a master hunter ('The Most Dangerous Game' plot).

Uneasy 'survival truce' with a foe ('The Defiant Ones' plot).

One-by-one murders at the reading of a will ('Ten Little Indians' plot).

Reunited with an old flame, but it can't last.

Held hostage by a psychopath.

Meeting a non-stereotype 'native' who graduated from Harvard and speaks better English and has better manners than anyone who's ever lived.

Stuck working with a nerdy novice who proves him/herself by the end.

Person is unknowingly a plague carrier (the 'Typhoid Mary' plot)

Forgotten enemy soldier thinks the war is still on.

Maybe people could list where the plot occurred. I can't think of the Ten Little Indians plot anywhere but Scooby Doo (Night of Fright is no Delight), and I can't think of the Most Dangerous Game plot except in Gilligan. I can't think of the non-Stereotyped native plot anywhere other than the Beverly Hillbillies. However, the Enemy Soldier plot showed up both in Gilligan and in Hawaii Five-O.

 

[High C]

Someone saves someone else's life, with the saved person vowing to become the slave of the saver (Andy Griffith and Brady Bunch at least.

Odd Couple too. A lot of these tropes made it into the 1970s.

 

[Rob_Ray]

Wife dons a wig to add some spice to the relationship and then gets jealous when the ruse works too well: From I Love Lucy: The Black Wig to All in the Family with Gloria and Mike.

The Rashomon device of different characters retelling the same story in flashback, with wildly different versions. The Dick Van Dyke Show.

 

[Gary OS]

The Rashomon device of different characters retelling the same story in flashback, with wildly different versions. The Dick Van Dyke Show.

Gilligan's Island did this with the 1st season episode about Gilligan's lost diary.

 

[Peter M Fitzgerald]

Maybe people could list where the plot occurred. I can't think of the Ten Little Indians plot anywhere but Scooby Doo (Night of Fright is no Delight), and I can't think of the Most Dangerous Game plot except in Gilligan. I can't think of the non-Stereotyped native plot anywhere other than the Beverly Hillbillies. However, the Enemy Soldier plot showed up both in Gilligan and in Hawaii Five-O.

'Ten Little Indians' plot: Wild Wild West - "Night of the Tottering Tontine", Get Smart - "Hoo Done It", The Avengers - "The Superlative Seven"

'Most Dangerous Game' plot: Jonny Quest - "The Dragons of Ashida", Get Smart - "Island of the Darned", The Outer Limits - "Fun and Games", Star Trek - "Arena"

'Non-stereotyped native' plot: The Wild Wild West - "Night of the Two-Legged Buffalo", The Fugitive - "Dossier on a Diplomat", The Rifleman - "The Indian" (though from 1959)

 

[JamesSmith]

The "girl always dies" motiff on Bonanza and other westerns.The widower motiff on Bonanza, My Three Sons, Courtship of Eddie's Father, and a few other programs. Jrhree

 

[Rob_Ray]

Bonanza and My Three Sons ushered in an era of widows and widowers in the early sixties. Everyone from Jed Clampett to Lucy Carmichael was a widow or widower. It was quite chic to be widowed in those days!

 

[BobO'Link]

Forgot wife's/husband's birthday/anniversary.

Takes attractive client/old flame to lunch and wife stalks them (possibly in disguise) 'cause she's jealous and wants to see just *what* they're up to!

Wife wrecks car and tries to keep it from hubby who is actually understanding because *he* wrecked it first.

Husband goes on fishing/hunting/convention trip and wife connives to tag along.

Guy next door/friend buys wife a expensive gift and our hapless husband helps by hiding it at his house where *his* wife finds it ant thinks it's for *her*.

The "cool" kids invite the "regular" kid to a party but none of his friends are invited. Now the friends hate him. Of course he figures it all out just in time.

A kid is told not to wear the ring/shirt/coat/necklace/earrings/etc. to school but does it anyway to show off. The item is lost/stolen/damaged and they hide this until the requisite confession to understanding parents who give a lecture on responsibility.

A letter gets mailed by accident and has to be retrieved to avoid dire consequences.

When you play hookey cool things happen at school but your time is a disaster. Of course it all works out in the end. (this one goes *way* back)

 

[Carabimero]

There was the plot about saving a life...Andy saved Gomer and then they used the same plot for Sergeant Carter saving Gomer. That one jumped into my mind when I saw the title of this thread.

 

[dhammer]

Soup operas: would be comas and a newly discovered identical twin, who is usually evil. Apparently these things happen to everyone.

Science fiction: The solution to just about every problem is to reverse the polarity. I should try that. Next time I take my car to the mechanic I will ask him if he reversed the polarity.

 

[Professor Echo]

Temporary blindness. Framed! Weird day, but it was all a dream... or was it? Pitted against the super-computer. Treasure hunt. A dour Soviet V.I.P. delegation visits. Brainwashed. Trapped with a ticking time bomb. Runaway heiress who's after some 'kicks' (a.k.a. 'poor little rich girl') Idolized by a little kid. An Arab potentate visits. Trapped alone in a ghost town/abandoned area. Haven't seen her since she was a skinny kid... now she's a knockout. Prey of a master hunter ('The Most Dangerous Game' plot). Uneasy 'survival truce' with a foe ('The Defiant Ones' plot). One-by-one murders at the reading of a will ('Ten Little Indians' plot). Reunited with an old flame, but it can't last. Held hostage by a psychopath. Meeting a non-stereotype 'native' who graduated from Harvard and speaks better English and has better manners than anyone who's ever lived. Stuck working with a nerdy novice who proves him/herself by the end. Person is unknowingly a plague carrier (the 'Typhoid Mary' plot) Forgotten enemy soldier thinks the war is still on.

Hilarious list, Peter! I'm still laughing. Add I SPY to the list of THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME cliche. Great responses from everyone. I only mentioned the 60's so as not to drag down the thread title, but of course other eras are welcome too, particularly the 50's-70's.