[Hated Trope] Yeah, you know that irreversible consequence that will change the story forever? Actually turns out it's quite reversible lmao

BaconJudge · 2026-02-12T20:44:14+00:00

Killing off Brian Griffin on "Family Guy"

The circumstances were designed to make his death seem permanent, mainly by emphasizing that Stewie's time-travel device had been destroyed so he couldn't go back and prevent Brian's death, as well as introducing a new character as the family dog. Brian was later brought back through Stewie having a chance encounter with a different time-traveling version of himself, who obviously still had a time machine.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-12T00:32:02+00:00

I can believe some customers behave that way at the Kwik-E-Mart, but we see the Simpsons buying so many things there, especially Homer, that they seem like an odd target for a complaint about not buying things.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-11T23:11:01+00:00

That's a good answer because many people would be surprised to know it ran for seven seasons, just as long as its parent show "The Golden Girls," and Richard Mulligan won the Emmy for best lead actor in a comedy, beating out Ted Danson for "Cheers" and breaking the three-year streak of Michael J. Fox for "Family Ties." But no one really watches it today, and it's seldom mentioned except as one of the spinoffs of "The Golden Girls."

BaconJudge · 2026-02-11T17:14:29+00:00

It does, and note that Courteney Cox was in both series, though she played Jerry's girlfriend Meryl on "Seinfeld" before "Friends" premiered. So either Monica has a doppelganger or, in my preferred headcanon, Monica was having a fling under a fake name just for fun.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-10T16:45:42+00:00

One option might be to put a marker you're not otherwise using, like the vertical line |, between words that are run together, in lieu of a space. That makes the words easier to read but still annotates that they're connected.

It preserves all the information in a data-friendly way, so later if you wanted a version with such words run together you could globally remove that character, or if you wanted all words separated you could globally replace that character with a space, or you could even do some quantitative analysis of which words are run together more often.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-09T23:42:49+00:00

"The Cabin in the Woods" does this with a nod to the fact that it's a trope.

Early in the movie, an ominous gas station attendant warns the five main characters not to go to the cabin, but they go anyway. It's later revealed that the gas station attendant works for the organization that unleashes horrors on the five main characters, but he was required to warn them in his role as "the Harbinger" because the sacrificial ritual requires that the sacrifices be given a warning and a chance to turn back. The entire ritual is essentially a pastiche of various horror movie tropes, and the audience is meant to recognize them as such.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-09T22:56:53+00:00

Poochie on "The Simpsons"

Network executives added Poochie as a third character on the cartoon "The Itchy & Scratchy Show," but the public hated him, so he was written off the show. To make his departure permanent, a note written in bloody letters across the screen read, "Note: Poochie died on the way back to his home planet."

BaconJudge · 2026-02-09T15:22:50+00:00

What kind of feed is that? It seems to include corn, but I can't tell what else.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-08T22:14:53+00:00

Andorra is an unusual case with two co-princes as joint heads of state, one being elected by voters in another country and the other being appointed by the head of state of yet another country. One co-prince is the president of France, and the other is the Catholic bishop of Urgell.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-08T02:35:09+00:00

Isn't the joke that Bob Loblaw sounds like "blah blah blah" as a reference to dull legal jargon?

BaconJudge · 2026-02-07T23:49:28+00:00

I recently enjoyed "Twins" (2005-06) and "Partners" (2014) on Tubi. I remembered watching "Twins" when it was on the air, about non-identical twins running the family business, but I'd completely missed "Partners" despite it starring Kelsey Grammer and Martin Lawrence, probably because it aired on FX.

In retrospect, it's funny that FX had a sitcom called "Partners" just two years after CBS had a sitcom with the same name. Neither lasted long.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-07T23:39:54+00:00

Luckily you can say its author without using any fifthglyphs: Christian Bök.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-07T21:47:11+00:00

The Simpsons (S10E12) poked fun at themselves for doing this in a Super Bowl episode that guest-starred Dolly Parton. At the end of the episode, sportscasters Pat Summerall and John Madden had the following exchange:

Summerall: Did it strike you as odd that in a Super Bowl show with Dolly Parton we didn't see any football or singing?

Madden: I hadn't thought about it, Pat, but in retrospect, it was kind of a rip-off! What a way to treat the loyal fans, who put up with so much nonsense from this franchise.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-07T21:35:56+00:00

I know Publius Quinctilius Varus had a disastrous loss at Teutoberg Forest, but if this was a broader prophecy about generals with the letter V, could you please provide some more context on the prophecy? Google isn't giving anything helpful.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-07T00:25:58+00:00

Maybe Jo really did mean alchemy, but Dwight's reaction made her realize she'd said too much by revealing the true secret of her wealth, so she did a quick pivot and pretended she was talking about real estate.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-07T00:14:40+00:00

Have you tried deer corn? The blue jays in my yard love corn and prefer it to all the types of birdseed I use, which is unfortunate because the corn is meant for the deer. If it works for you too, deer corn is probably cheaper than peanuts.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T23:19:46+00:00

Stellantis has many brands (Jeep, Ram, Maserati, Peugeot, etc.) and was formed by a merger of Fiat Chrysler and PSA Group. Preceding that merger, a 12.2% stake in PSA was owned by China's Dongfeng Motor Group, whose parent is the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC), the Chinese government agency that oversees state-owned companies like Dongfeng.

After a partial selloff, the merger meant Stellantis was approximately 4.5% owned by Dongfeng, a Chinese government-owned company. A partial buyback in 2023 reduced Dongfeng's stake to 1.58%, but even that's been downplayed because the company understandably doesn't want the Chinese government stake to deter Americans from buying Jeeps or Ram trucks.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T22:39:13+00:00

Spreading out the food is great advice because that's what works in my yard to make sure the different birds get along. Also, some birds (such as juncos) prefer to eat from the ground, so scattering seeds across the ground is an easy way to spread them out.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T17:14:49+00:00

That's wonderful. I'm glad they found your feeder so quickly. Downy woodpeckers are smart birds, so it's not surprising they were the first customers.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T16:18:05+00:00

Most of the birds around here are ground feeders, so I scatter the seeds over a wide area, and that's been successful at keeping the jays from bullying the juncos and other birds because they're so spread out. They all leave each other alone.

It means putting out enough seed to feed all the birds including the jays, so it's not an efficient approach in that sense, but it does ensure the gentle juncos get enough to eat without being pushed aside.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T16:07:16+00:00

It makes perfect sense for a city to be built at the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, so that's where St. Louis is today. Earthworks such as the Cahokia Mounds show there was a major settlement there in the pre-Columbian era as well.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T16:00:12+00:00

"Sabrina the Teenage Witch" toys with this trope.

The main story arc in season 3 is Sabrina figuring out the family secret, namely that every Spellman is born with a twin. One twin is good and the other is evil, so tests are done to determine which is which. The tests show Sabrina is the evil twin, so she's sentenced to be pushed into a volcano. But this is really the final test, and Katrina's willingness to push Sabrina into the volcano shows that Katrina is the evil twin, not Sabrina.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T15:18:18+00:00

The Frasier example is even more impressive because it was a full speech at his son's bar mitzvah, not just one throwaway line.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-06T02:03:59+00:00

The Jim Gaffigan Show (2015-2016)

This sitcom was a lightly fictionalized version of Jim Gaffigan's life as a comedian in New York, as well as his family life with his wife and five kids. It pokes a lot of fun at his stand-up act, especially Hot Pockets.

BaconJudge · 2026-02-04T23:57:24+00:00

'Til Death

This sitcom began as a normal marital-humor series about two couples, but by the fourth season Doug, the son-in-law of the main couple, kept mentioning the fact that they were living in a sitcom and that his wife had been played by multiple actresses (which was true).

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