Serious Business/Live-Action TV: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

* The British series ''Playing for Real'' featuring the lives of the Real Falkirk Table Football Club, who lived and breathed Subbuteo.

* One episode of ''[[MacGyver]]'', a [[Dramatic Hour Long]] show, had an episode open with a girl talking extensively about the horrors inflicted upon her hobby by store owners. The topic: counterfeit baseball cards. It's a good thing MacGyver is unfailingly polite, lest he tell her to just shut up.

** Never make a weird face at a doctor or "be difficult", lest you be instantly blacklisted by your medical professional and be denied medical services for the rest of your life. ''Even from vetenarians.''

* Many reality shows where there are groups of people competing against each other to win things like money, makeover of their house, etc. While everyone does want to win as badly as the next guy, the serious business comes into play when you got some of the competitors get drastic or act dramatic in order to have a shot at winning and act like losing doesn't exist in their dictionary. And then you have the people who say they gave up everything to be on the show (quitting their job, moving away from home, etc), not even thinking about what to do in case they don't win.

** In the other vein of this example, shows about things like fashion tend to be played up way more than necessary. Shows like [[What Not to Wear]], where a person's "bad" clothing (which are rarely worse than average) and treat the woman as if she were dying from some sort of clothes cancer. And to cure this, they ridicule said person's bought possessions while throwing them out. At one point, a person featured on the show hated the hosts' advice, prompting the male host to actually leave the room for several minutes to cool off. Over clothes.

** Take into account that clothing and how you present yourself to the world can play a big part in your self-esteem and in some cases whether or not you get a job. People will make judgments on how you look when they meet you in the street. The woman who Clinton walked out on? She was in law school and dressing like a hooker – and saw absolutely nothing wrong with this. Ask yourself this: Would you hire a woman to defend you in court or take your case who looks like she just walked in from a street corner?

* [[Angel]] and Spike had a [[Blatant Lies|polite discussion]] as to who would win in a fight, [[Cavemen vs. Astronauts Debate|astronauts or cave men.]]

{{quote|'''Wesley:''' You've been yelling about this for forty minutes... do the astronauts have weapons?}}

** Of course, Your Mileage May Vary since many fans think the show would be shallow and soulless without that extra dimension.

* In ''[[Community]]'' a number of activities including [[Community/Recap/S1/E09 Debate 109|Debate Class]], [[Community/Recap/S1/E21 Contemporary American Poultry|eating Chicken Fingers ]],[[Community/Recap/S2/E04 Basic Rocket Science|flight simulators]], and [[Community/Recap/S1/E17 Physical Education|the game of pool]] are all taken dead seriously.

** Losing a pen is serious business, in Annie's book. And the entire study group's, at that.

** Paintball is such serious business to the students that both times the college tries to have a friendly game it ends up causing thousands of dollars in property damage.

** The Glee club is very, very important. [[Madness Mantra|Regionals...]]

** The show uses this so often it's practically a [[Running Gag]]; there is next to ''nothing'' that either the study group or the school in general cannot blow completely out of proportion. Someone pushing a yam off a table becomes [[Community/Recap/S3/E17 Basic Lupine Urology|a homicide investigation and trial]], the decision over whether to make a pillow fort or a blanket fort becomes [[Community/Recap/S3/E14 Pillows and Blankets|a school-wide pillow-fought civil war]]. And so on.

* On ''[[The Cosby Show]],'' Cliff takes petanque with Dr. Harmon very seriously.