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Seinfeldian Conversation (view source)

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{{trope}}
{{quote|''"Nonstop. I admit, I have some sort of strange fascination: How long can two people talk about nothing?"''|'''William Riker''', ''[[Star Trek: theThe Next Generation]]''}}
 
A long, rambling, seemly improvised conversation between characters about something that is beyond pointless, like loose shirt buttons. Often, the characters will devote as much intellectual effort to it as people in a debating society, making it even more pointless. Prone to sudden, almost transition-less topic-shifts as the characters are basically talking for the sake of talking. [[Conversational Troping|Tropes may provide a good topic.]]
 
Often [[Casual Danger Dialog|happens at a time of awkward tension]], like being [[Locked in Aa Freezer]]. Sometimes follows the same beats as a [[Who's Onon First?|who's on first]] type sketch.
 
Named, of course, for ''[[Seinfeld]]'', which had this as its signature trope. The characters were always debating things like the opposite of eating tuna (Jerry suggested that eating salmon is the opposite, because they swim in the other direction; George rationalized that it was chicken salad.).
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== Anime and Manga ==
* A memorable instance in ''One Piece'' has Sanji and Luffy escorting an ill Nami up a dangerous mountain to see a doctor, while at the same time dodging a near constant stream of attacks by a species of massive carnivorous rabbits. Despite all this in, Luffy manages to rope Sanji into a rambling argument about whether or not people from snow countries have to sleep.
* Done a few times on ''[[Azumanga Daioh (Manga)|Azumanga Daioh]]''. For example, in the first [[Beach Episode]], Osaka starts talking with Sakaki about the ''kanji'' that are used to write words like "hemorrhoid", "seal", "fugu" and "dolphin".
** Then there was Tomo and Kagura's fight over Santa Claus. They conclude that he is paid by the government and flies at mach 100.
*** They were thinking what to say to Chiyo. Chiyo stopped them by saying that her father was Santa. Cue to Sakaki's fantasies...
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** It's lampshaded even further in the dub: "Will someone just get to the [[Punch Line]] already?!"
** That's what happens when a slice of life 4koma is made into an anime, see Azumanga Daioh above.
* The ''[[Bottle Fairy (Animeanime)|Bottle Fairy]]'' anime is full of this.
* ''[[Cromartie High School]]'' '''is''' this trope. The anime's shining moment is when Kamiyama and Hayashida have a long, meandering conversation about how boring they find their school, whilst the animation starts looping / rewinding itself -- just to ensure that ''absolutely nothing which'' might ''move the plot along'' occurs.
** In the first volume of the manga, Kamiyama attempts to teach some of his classmates how to have a 'normal' (ie: 'pointless') conversation. The topics range from how to eat fish to Kamiyama's meeting with an ''alien'' which lead to him being invited to ride in its spaceship; {{spoiler|the punchline is that he didn't get to because the alien ''lost its keys''}} (thus rendering the entire story 'pointless').
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** It's worth noting that Cromartie's 'legendary' 2nd-year delinquents a.k.a. The Four Great Ones [[Running Gag|(all ]]''[[Running Gag|five ]]''[[Running Gag|of them!)]] are even more skilled conductors of Seinfeldian Conversations than Kamiyama & Co.
* Every conversation between Drossel and Gedächtnis in ''[[Fireball]]'' is like this.
* ''[[Sayonara, Zetsubou Sensei-sensei]]'' features a lot of this, and a lot of it is [[Conversational Troping|concerning various tropes]] [[Leaning Onon the Fourth Wall|used throughout the show]].
* In ''[[Ultra Maniac]]'', Ayu in male form (who calls herself Ayuoh in that form) and another girl have a conversation about...how to spell Ayuoh's name.
* The characters in ''[[Tentai Senshi Sunred (Manga)|Tentai Senshi Sunred]]'' never stop talking about food, deals on food, and what household cleaning products work best. This comes mostly from the evil organization's leader and his band of monsters, bizarrely enough.
* In between slipping on banana peels and having [[Serious Business|ping-pong matches]], the cast of ''[[Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru]]'' engage in these.
* ''[[Black Lagoon]]'' has a few of these: The one that most easily stands out is Revy and Eda's conversation on [[What Would X Do?|what gun Jesus would use]].
* The prologue of ''[[Baccano (Light Novel)|Baccano! 2002: Bullet Garden]]'' goes meta when several members of the Mask Makers have a rambling conversation about rambling conversations in [[Quentin Tarantino]] flicks, which devolves into an argument over which one of them gets to be Steve Buscemi.
 
 
== [[Comic Books]] ==
* Jesse Custer and Cassidy of ''[[Preacher (Comic Book)]]'' frequently engage in this (on [[Bill Hicks]], Laurel and Hardy, Charlie Chaplin, etc.) whenever they go out drinking.
* This is the medium that is characterized by questions in the vein of "Can [[Batman]] beat the [[Fantastic Four]] alone, or does he need [[Spider -Man]]'s help to take on the Human Torch?" If you ever met (or if you are) a comic book nerd, you know the debate will be better than any presidential election debate.
** As an example of when this type of conversation is taken to absurd lengths artist Jacen Burrows relates a story of when he was promoting his collaboration with [[Warren Ellis]] ''Scars'', a dark crime drama about a cop going through a nervous breakdown, at a convention he was asked who would win in a fight between Batman and the main character.
* This trope might as well be renamed "Bendisian Conversation" after Brian Bendis, as it has been the defining trope of his comic writing from his first self-published indie work all the way through his latest run at Marvel.
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** The "Like A Virgin" and tipping-habits discussion in ''[[Reservoir Dogs]]'' and pretty much any conversation at the bar in ''Death Proof'' are more examples. Even then the conversations serve a purpose. Mr Pink refusing to tip marks him as [[The Spock]], and White arguing with him marks ''him'' as [[The McCoy]], setting up their relationship throughout the movie. Mr. Orange spends the scene acting like the new guy trying to fit in, and he also is the one who tells their boss what's going on -- {{spoiler|he's disclosing private information}}. Lots of other little clues give insight into personalities and relationships.
* All of the [[View Askewniverse]] contains this to some degree. ''[[Clerks]]'' is almost entirely built around [[Seinfeldian Conversation]], and there's T.S. and Brodie's conversation at the cookie stand about whether or not Lois Lane could carry [[Superman]]'s baby to term in ''[[Mallrats]]''. When it happens in ''[[Dogma]]'' it's almost shocking, as it's not really Seinfeldian--the religious discussions are at least tangentially related to the plot, and most people would consider religious discussion worth a lot of thought and time. The hands-down winner, however, is ''[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsFfBB2W7IA&feature=related The Flying Car]''.
* In ''[[Stand Byby Me]]'', the characters talk about [[Furry Confusion|what Goofy is]] and [[Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny|whether or not Mighty Mouse could beat Superman]]. They are, of course, talking about tropes. No wonder that movie's so popular.
* In ''[[OceansOcean's Eleven|Ocean's Twelve]]'', upon being told they were going to be killed,the group immediately got into an argument of why the group was called "Ocean's Eleven"
* Subverted hard in ''[[Donnie Darko]]'' in which the exchange just pisses Donnie off and makes his friends all look like idiots.
{{quote| '''Sean''': We gotta find ourselves a Smurfette.<br />
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* ''[[The 40-Year-Old Virgin]]'' has many of these, though it should be noted that a lot of them were in fact ad-libbed. Some of the deleted scenes shown on the DVD display this even more.
* Mahalik and CJ have a few of these in ''[[Scary Movie]]'' 3 and 4.
* Barry Levinson's Baltimore movies - [[Diner (Film)|Diner]], [[Tin Men]], [[Avalon]] and [[Liberty Heights]] - are filled with examples of this trope (Diner in particular might be the [[Ur Example]]).
 
 
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** The [[Johnny Maxwell Trilogy]], also by [[Terry Pratchett]], makes heavy use of these as well.
** The UU wizards do this pretty much constantly, only Ridcully, Rincewind, the Librarian, and Ponder's group ever seem to do anything but this trope (and eating, of course).
* [[Post Modernism|Postmodern]] novel ''Bear V Shark'' is an extended discussion on, well, [[Exactly What It Says Onon the Tin]]. The entire thing is like a very long [[Seinfeldian Conversation]].
* The [[Post Modernism|postmodern]] novel ''[[White Noise (Literaturenovel)|White Noise]]'' features a lot of bizarre, rambling, misinformation-laden conversations on topics like "When was the last time you brushed your teeth with your finger?", parallels between [[Elvis Presley]] and [[Adolf Hitler]], and whether rats are classified as "rodents" or "vermin"; they frequently take a [[Wiki Walk]] from one pointless topic to another. (Much of the dialogue in that novel is either this or [[Contemplate Our Navels]].)
* Zach and Lucien of ''Character Issues''. Their conversational topics range from aliens to the proper plural of walrus. For the record, they decide that it's {{spoiler|"walri"}}.
* Any [[Neal Stephenson]] written conversation featuring a member of the Waterhouse family is prone to this - possibly the best example is a conversation on the foundation of banks and fiat currency in the middle of the Great Fire of London during ''[[The Baroque Cycle]]''.
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== [[Live Action TV]] ==
* Like the above mentioned, pretty much all of ''[[Seinfeld]]''. It literally begins and end with this trope.
** It's a show about nothing! No, seriously. It's a [[Slice of Life]] [[Sit ComSitcom]]... [[Fridge Logic|which now that I think about it, is an oxymoron]].
** A Jerry Seinfeld special saw Jerry having a [[Seinfeldian Conversation]] ''about'' Superman ''with'' Superman. It's every bit as bizarre as you'd think.
* ''[[Everybody Loves Raymond]]'' has several of these. One prominent example is when Frank and Marie Barone argued for a full two minutes about what "fork split" on the side of a package of English Muffins means. Frank insisted that it instructs you not to cut the muffin, but to split it with a fork. Marie insisted that it meant that they already split it for you at the factory with a fork. At the end of the argument, Frank refused to eat the muffin, because it was cut with a knife, and thus Marie had "killed the crannies and smushed them into the nooks." Marie retaliates by splitting apart Frank's newspaper with a fork.
** And then there was the episode where they were fighting over who invented the lawn. "Nobody invented it, it's grass!"
* ''[[House (TV series)|House]]'' has several of these between House and Wilson. In season 2's episode "Clueless", they were sidetracked from discussing a patient's illness by debating whether or not a music room and a conservatory are the same thing.
* They happen with delightful frequency in ''[[Gilmore Girls]]''. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=az4LMRpggig Where did all the anvils go?] Where indeed.
* ''[[The West Wing]]'' does this almost as much as ''Seinfeld'', although the content of the pointless conversation in question is usually high-intelligence. This happens most often on the part of President Bartlet, who takes great pleasure in torturing the rest of the characters with his inane ramblings and trivia and analyses and getting away with it, because he's the president and no one can tell him to shut up.
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'''Leo:''' ''[entering]'' Excuse me, am I interrupting something important?<br />
'''Josh:''' I can't ''begin'' to tell you how you're not. }}
* Seen on ''[[Cheers]]'' many times, usually as Sam and Diane walked around the bar talking about the main plot while Cliff and Norm engaged in inane bar talk such as what movie has the most sweat (''[[Cool Hand Luke]]''), or whether [[Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner (Animation)|Wile E. Coyote]] is the Antichrist.
* The black comedy ''[[Rescue Me]]'' often abuses this, usually with something most people wouldn't find as proper conversational material.
* More than a few ''[[Monty Python's Flying Circus]]'' shorts go on about something random like the sound of words without end, until they finally [[Drop the Cow]].
* ''[[Babylon Five|Babylon 5]]'' did this a few times to play up the idea that "life goes on" even in space. One notable instance was when a [[Allergic to Routine|very bored]] Garibaldi dragged Sinclair into a conversation about getting dressed in the morning. Garibaldi got distracted and couldn't remember what he did first with his pants, and wanted to know what Sinclair did.
{{quote| '''Sinclair''': ''(sighs)'' Fasten, then zip. You?<br />
'''Garibaldi''': Fasten, zip!<br />
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* ''[[Lost]]'' has had several of these, often involving Hurley. The episode "Catch 22" saw Charlie and Hurley pursuing a downed parachutist through the jungle while discussing who would win a race between [[Superman]] and [[The Flash]].
* ''Rove'', an Australian late night talkshow host, is all about this trope in interviews. He usually quickly passes over major things in the interviewee's life for bizarre little tidbits. He also had a game called ''20 Bucks In 20 Seconds'', where he asked a range of odd little questions aimed at spawning this (which evolved into ''Final Five'', which is the same idea but fewer questions and no time limit).
* ''[[ItsIt's Always Sunny in Philadelphia]]'' frequently features the gang engaged in a heated argument about a ludicrous topic in an inappropriate moment, such as discussing the difference between "bears" and "twinks" while in a business meeting.
* Some seasons of ''[[Last of the Summer Wine]]'' love this trope, especially the second Foggy run. Their version typically has the three main characters speaking in turn as though in a conversation, but they're actually all monologuing on different unrelated subjects and ignoring the other two.
* Andy and Maggie engage in this sort of conversation regularly on ''[[Extras]]''. In fact, in might be said that this is pretty much what their whole relationship is built on.
* Happens often in ''[[Red Dwarf (TV)|Red Dwarf]]''. One example is the discussion between Cat and Lister about who out of Wilma Flintstone and Betty Rubble is more attractive.
** Well, I'd ''go'' with Betty... but I'd be thinking of Wilma.
* The Brazilian Sitcom ''Os Normais'' had this as its main source of humor. One memorable exchange between the main characters, the engaged Rui and Vani, during a day washing their car, somehow ended with a female alien that could shoot lasers from its genitalia.
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* ''[[Curb Your Enthusiasm]]'', which is basically Seinfeld if it just focused on George (who was based on [[Larry David]], ''Seinfeld'''s co-creator).
* Appears in ''[[Friends]]'', with conversations about why [[Donald Duck]] wears a [[Modesty Towel|towel]] after showering, or why there isn't a superhero named Goldman.
* French comedy series ''[[Kaamelott (TV)|Kaamelott]]'' wishes to marry this trope. Most of the humor of the show involves characters of the Arthurian legends involved in day-to-day routine and such dialogue. Example exchange between two minor characters:
{{quote| '''Ywain''' : Oh. All right then. There's really a LOT of people there. ''(speaking about people who showed up to pull the sword out of the stone)''<br />
'''Gawain''' : Maybe two or three of them just showed up to clean the place up afterwards.<br />
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* ''[[Dead Like Me]]'' had a few of them, one in particular involving Mason and Roxie discussing having a bird as a pet. It gets very heated.
* In a Halloween episode of ''[[Bones]]'', Cam dresses up as Catwoman. When Brennan compliments her on her costume, she says something about how Catwoman is "the strongest of all the woman superheroes" (though Catwoman spends more time as an [[Anti-Hero]] than anything else). Since Brennan habitually dresses up as Wonder Woman for Halloween, she takes offense at this, and spends the rest of the episode singing the praises of Wonder Woman to anyone who will listen (i.e., Booth).
* ''[[NCIS: Los Angeles]]'' loves this trope.
** The original ''[[NCIS]]'' as well. While most crime shows jump directly from the intro part with the victim to the main characters arriving at the crime scene, the ''[[NCIS]]'' characters almost always spend a few minutes at their desks, talking about something irrelevant, before they get called to the crime scene. Whatever they happened to be discussing is also usually brought up again before the episode is over.
* ''[[Peep Show]]'', as a [[Sadist Show]], uses inept and neurotic characters to make its Seinfeldian Conversation extremely uncomfortable.
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'''Mike:''' Is it an invisible whip? }}
* [[Nakama|The Scoobies]] in ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' frequently find themselves in this trope, though they rarely last for more than a brief amount of time. Indeed, the first time Willow and Oz said more than a few words to each other was when Oz described how the other animal crakers are jealous of the monkey, being the only one allowed to have pants.
* Used frequently on ''[[Homicide: Life On the Street]]'' with the Detectives often cracking Jokes at crime scenes or wondering about the correct pronounciation of "Araber".
* Used on ''[[Oz]]'' occasionally with moments such as the Conversation about Gay puppets serving as the best Humour moments
* Happens very often on ''[[My Name Is Earl]]'', when Randy and Earl are about to go to sleep, Randy asks Earl his opinion on something ridiculous, and once Earl responds, Randy will continue the conversation, such as in the below example.
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'''Randy''' : That's who I had. }}
* Done a few times on [[Blossom]]. One specific example that comes to mind is a conversation between Blossom and Six about how people on tv never seem to need to use the bathroom. This discussion ends when Six announces that she has to go to the bathroom.
* In one episode of ''[[Star Trek: theThe Next Generation]]'' Data tries to engage in small talk, or as he calls it, "non-relevant conversation." When the ''Enterprise'' reaches Arkaria Base, he hits it off with small talk master Commander Calvin Hutchinson, prompting the page quote.
* Usually done with nerd topics in ''[[The Big Bang Theory]]''. In one episode they start talking about who the most genuinely heroic character in the [[Marvel Universe]] would be, going along the lines of the doctor who gives Wolverine his prostate exam. A few minutes after more plot-relevent events happen, Raj tried to bring the topic back up and Leonard dismissed it as his new question being rather stupid. Raj replied, "We are talking about probing the hinies of superheroes... there are no stupid questions."
 
 
== Music ==
* ''Trapped in the Drive Thru'' by [["Weird Al" Yankovic]], based on Trapped in the Closet. Particularly the first part (of three).
 
 
== Radio ==
* In ''[[The HitchhikersHitchhiker's Guide to Thethe Galaxy]]'', when Zaphod's about to plummet to his death, Ford tries to engage him in a conversation about the etymology of one of Zaphod's exclamations.
* Pretty much the entire series of little-known cult radio classic ''Vic and Sade'' consists of deadpan, often absurd dialogue revolving around small-town life.[http://http://vicandsade.net/episodes.cgi Check it out.]
 
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== [[Video Games]] ==
* Quite a number of skits in [[Tales Series(series)]] can be like this.
* Most conversations in ''[[Touhou]]'' are this, mostly due to ZUN's incorrigible desire to include as many [[Shout-Out|Shout Outs]] and mythology references as physically possible.
* [[Battlefield: Bad Company (Video Game)|"So, you're saying that the rainbow sprinkle is the way forward with the jelly doughnut?"]]
* In keeping with its realism, the [[Brothers in Arms]] series has a number of these between your squad. These include a discussion of the donuts at Fort Bragg and a [[Cavemen vs. Astronauts Debate|argument over who is coolest between]] [[Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny|Batman or Superman]]
 
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* [[Blur the Lines]] [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshades]] this before playing is straight (warning: link is [[Squick|highly NSFW]]) [http://www.blur-the-lines.com/?p=127\].
{{quote| '''Rick:''' Is this like a "Seinfeld'' monologue, or do you expect an answer?}}
* The appropriately named strip "[http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0764.html Small Talk]" from ''[[The Order of the Stick (Webcomic)|Order of the Stick]]'' is nothing but panel-length clips of conversation between the side characters while the more central protagonists exchange information in the background.
** ...one panel of which [[Leaning Onon the Fourth Wall|leans on the fourth wall]]:
{{quote| '''Malack:''' --so then I said, "I don't care that you were late, Acolyte Prilak, I'm not going to repeat the conversation we all ''just had''."<br />
'''Durkon:''' Aye, why should everyone need ta listen ta tha same thing o'er again?<br />
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* Done frequently on ''[[Sealab 2021]]'', where the characters tend to get so engrossed in their [[Seinfeldian Conversation]] that they fail to notice little things like the fact that Sealab is about to explode. (See [[Somebody Else's Problem]].)
* Many other [[Adult Swim]] shows strive on Seinfeldian Conversations.
* ''[[The Boondocks]]'' has a similar example were Gin Rummy and Ed Wuncler III talking about the value of things like text-messaging before robbing a bank (which they do consider mundane, since they won't be arrested despite screwing up so bad, since [[Screw the Rules, I Have Money|Ed's grandpa owns the police]]). This was probably done to as an [[Homage|homage]] to ''Pulp Fiction'', and is even more obvious considering Rummy is [[Actor Allusion|voiced by Samuel L. Jackson]].
** Also in an episode in which Rummy railed against the sillyness of hands free bluetooth phone devices, between Ed talking to a woman on his bluetooth, while the pair went about robbing houses in the middle of the night.
* The short-lived animated series ''[[Spy Groove]]'' featured the main characters, Agent 1 and Agent 2, getting into conversations like this, such as who would be peanut butter and who would be jelly on a sandwich.
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