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Cliché (from French, imitative) refers to: - an overused phrase or expression, or the idea expressed by it;
- a situation, theme or characterization which has become common;
- a thing (as a style of clothing) that has become overly familiar or commonplace. (See Cliché.)
Usually the term refers to something which both had (or aimed to have) freshness and force but whose freshness and force are lost through overuse. Thus the expression in other words, though often used, is not a cliché; it never had originality or forceful meaning. A cliché (from French, stereotype) is a phrase or expression, or the idea expressed by it, that has been overused to the point of losing its intended force or novelty, especially where the same expression was at one time distinctively forceful or novel. ...
Cliché expressions and their meanings
- Avoid _____ like the plague.
- At the end of the day, ... - In summary, ...
- The bottom line is ... - In summary, ... (a term used in business, indicating a profit or loss)
- Can't see your nose in front of your face - It's really hard to see.
- Cat got your tongue? - Why haven't you been talking?
- The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence - Anything someone else has seems better.
- Get to the calf through the cow - The best way to get to the girl is through her mother.
- Give up the ghost - to die, expire or otherwise come to an end
- Killing two birds with one stone - Completing two tasks with one process.
- Last but not least...
- Let me bounce this off of you... - To present a scenario or idea for the purpose of receiving feedback or critique
- On the same page - Two or more parties understand a situation the same way and are operating accordingly.
- Only the tip of the iceberg
- Pot calling the kettle black - When a person criticizes another for behaviours which they themselves exhibit as well
- Putting the cart before the horse - To come to a conclusion without suitably indicative evidence, or also trying to skip steps in a process or task
- Reading between the lines - Inferring information.
- Six of one, half-a-dozen of another - The result is the same in either case.
- What is coming down the pike... (or '...down the pipe') - events or happenings expected to come to pass in the near future.
- What's good for the goose is good for the gander - If something is good for one person, it follows that it's good for everyone.
- What goes around comes around - If you do something good (bad), good (bad) things will happen to you.
- Can't _____ oneself out of wet a paper bag
- A little bit from column A, a little bit from column B - An answer to an either/or question implying that both answers are correct.
- The Revolution Will Not Be Televised - Originally a song of protest against the perceived "white media" by Gil-Scott Heron, the phrase is now casually bandied about on pundit blogs and MTV .
- The more things change, the more they stay the same. - Despite the appearance of change, there is little fundamental difference between the past and the present.
- This is not your father's ____. - Despite similarities, there is a fundamental difference between the past and the present subject.
- Touch base - to briefly communicate with someone in order to allow each to assure each party that a situation or project is proceeding as all desire.
- Where there's smoke, there's fire. - If there seems to be trouble, then there is trouble.
Business refers to at least three closely related commercial topics. ...
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised is a famous poem and song by Gil Scott-Heron about the political and social turmoil of 1970s America. ...
Photo of Gil Scott-Heron. ...
A pandit or pundit(पन्दित् in Devanagari) is a Hindu Brahmin who has memorized a substantial portion of the Vedas, along with the proper rhythms and melodies for chanting or singing them. ...
This article is about a type of web application. ...
MTV (abbreviation for Music Television) is a cable television network which was originally devoted to music videos, especially popular rock music. ...
Cliché expressions in résumés/curriculum vitae Overly-used phrases to describe one's skills to potential employers. Taken from a survey of 160,000 resumes. [1] (http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/07/10/BUGGF7JA1D1.DTL) These expressions are criticised for being too vague to be of any use. Look up Résumé in Wiktionary, the free dictionary Look up Curriculum vitae in Wiktionary, the free dictionary A résumé (in North American English; also sometimes spelled resumé or resume) or curriculum vitae (in Commonwealth English; sometimes abbreviated to CV) is a document containing a summary or listing of...
Ambiguity is one way in which the meanings of words and phrases can be unclear, but there is another way, which is different from ambiguity: vagueness. ...
- "(I have good) communication skills" - 12.6 percent of surveyed résumés.
- "(I am a) team player" - 7.2 percent
- "(I have good) organizational skills" - 5.5 percent
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- This phrase is also used as the title of collections of entries from the annual Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest of prospective opening lines for bad novels. This sentence was also the opening line of Madeleine L'Engle's classic children's fantasy novel, A Wrinkle in Time (1960).
- Suddenly...
- And they lived happily ever after.
- Princess and dragon tales.
- Once Upon A Time.... standard opening line of many childrens stories, fairy tales, fables, folktales, legends, myths, etc.
Open Directory Project: Literature World Literature Electronic Text Archives Magazines and E-zines Online Writing Writers Resources Libraries, Digital Cataloguing, Metadata Distance Learning Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Classicism in Literature The Universal Library, by Carnegie Mellon University Project Gutenberg Online Library Abacci - Project Gutenberg texts matched with Amazon...
Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton (May 25, 1803 – January 18, 1873) was an English novelist, playwright, and politician. ...
Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton (May 25, 1803 - January 18, 1873) was an English novelist, playwright, and politician. ...
A novel is an extended work of written, narrative, prose fiction, usually in story form; the writer of a novel is a novelist. ...
Paul Clifford is an 1830 book by the English author Edward Bulwer-Lytton. ...
1830 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ...
This article is about the comic strip, the sequential art form as published in newspapers and on the Internet. ...
USPS stamp featuring Snoopy as the World War I Flying Ace This article is about a comic strip character. ...
Peanuts book cover Peanuts was a syndicated comic strip written and drawn by American cartoonist Charles M. Schulz. ...
Charles Monroe Schulz (November 26, 1922 – February 12, 2000) was a 20th-century American cartoonist best known for his Peanuts comic strip. ...
The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest is a tongue-in-cheek contest that takes place annually and is sponsored by the English Department of San Jose State University. ...
Madeleine LEngle (b. ...
A Wrinkle in Time is a childrens fantasy novel by Madeleine LEngle, written in 1962. ...
Princess and dragon is a generical story common to many fairy tales. ...
Clichés in business & advertising - For all your ____ needs.
- And much, much more!
- For only ___ easy payments of $____!
- But wait! Order now and you also get ___!
Cliché humor - A person makes a painting which gets messed up (by pets or weather), making it look disorderly with a lot of stains, and yet manages to become popular as abstract art.
- An alien invader who lands on Earth, causing a lot of mess and mischief, but is revealed as an alien child who gets taken back by his parents at the end.
- Whenever a character goes fishing, he will eventually catch any of the following as result of "error": a can, a boot, or a tire, and in some cases, a book of clichés.
One of Kandiskys most famous paintings Yellow Red Blue (Kandinsky 1925) Abstract art is now generally understood to mean art that does not depict objects in the natural world, but instead uses shapes and colours in a non-representational or non-objective way. ...
Aliens are foreigners to their surroundings. ...
See List of film and television clichés by general subject and List of movie clichés by genre Film refers to the celluloid media on which movies are printed Film is a term that encompasses motion pictures as individual projects, as well as the field in general. ...
Most clichés are equally applicable to film, television or cartoons. ...
In many films it can be observed that with relative frequency that certain plot idioms, gimmicks, and clichés are repeated time and time again. ...
Cartoons - Cartoon characters can fall from any height, walk on thin air until they look down, be hit with any object, be burned, have their bodies mangled and twisted into any shape, and have every tooth in their mouth knocked out and seconds later appear without any sign of any injury (see Chuck Jones or Tex Avery cartoons).
- A villain will usually pretend to give up and/or turn good in order to lead the naive and trusting good guys into a trap.
- If the main character is a kid, the father is usually depicted as senile or lacking competence (sometimes both parents).
- Cartoon characters almost always wear the exact same clothing all the time. This is often parodied (by some cartoons themselves) showing the inside of their closets actually having several identical sets of clothing. This is also the case with some non-animated cartoon characters (such as Ernest P. Worrell).
- All cartoon characters are capable of producing a match from thin air than can be lit on any surface. When they do so, they usually stumble on a "surprise" sight, such as loads of explosives.
- When a bomb goes off in a cartoon character's face, they usually are blackened by the ashes, but are otherwise unharmed.
- A cartoon character who is suddenly scared (or who falls) will lose his hair which is revealed as a wig and him/her as bald.
- Cats are usually stupid and villainous while dog and mice are smart and good (see Tom and Jerry).
- Any object is found to be conveniently located within arm's reach upon its mention.
Charles Martin Chuck Jones (September 21, 1912–February 22, 2002) was an American animator, cartoon artist, screenwriter, producer, and director of animated films, most memorably of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts for the Warner Brothers cartoon studio. ...
Frederick Bean Tex Avery (February 26, 1908 – August 26, 1980) was an animator, cartoonist, and director, famous for producing animated cartoons during the Golden Age of Hollywood. ...
Ernest P. Worrell was a character portrayed by American actor Jim Varney in a series of television commercials and later in a television series and a series of motion pictures. ...
The phrase Tom and Jerry has a several meanings: Tom and Jerry was originally a pairing of names from Pierce Egans Life in London, or Days and Nights of Jerry Hawthorne and his elegant friend Corinthian Tom. ...
Anime - Anime male heroes almost always have more or less spikey hair (or at least a fancy one).
- If an anime character has long white hair, there is a very big chance that he/she is a villain (bigger chance if he/she dresses in black).
- Most anime females are teenagers or adults who are younger than thirty.
- Anime characters all eat and/or like Japanese food, no matter their nationality and culture, even if they live in Middle Age Europe or are outer-space aliens. Same is with sake.
- Sexual excitement causes rapid nosebleed in anime males.
- In anime, main female characters are almost always lousy cooks while younger females or the male heroes cook much better than them.
- If an anime male character wants to sneak/steal at night, his best disguise will be a scarf covering his hair and tied under his nose.
- Westerners and Japanese look just alike in anime. If not, the Westerners are usually more realistically drawn or just have lighter-colored eye pupils. Japanese have a greater array of colors for their hair and eyes.
- In anime romance, the male lead will usually end with the hottest-tempered girl. If the lead is female, she will usually end with the coolest-tempered boy who'd reveal his soft side.
- A crucial moment in an anime battle, for example the punch that wins the fight, is shown from three different angles in slow motion before the attack actually connects.
- Male anime characters, no matter how powerful or skilled they may be in combat, can never avoid getting hit by an angry girl who is romantically involved with him.
A scene from Cowboy Bebop (1998) Anime (アニメ) is Japanese animation, sometimes billed in the west under the portmanteau Japanimation. ...
For the historical era, see Middle Ages. ...
Sake barrels at Itsukushima Shrine Sake (酒; pronounced IPA: SAH-KEH in Japanese, but often IPA: SAH-ki by English speakers) is a Japanese alcoholic beverage, brewed from rice. ...
Nosebleed as a result of fracture through a rugby impact. ...
Slow motion is an effect resulting from running film through a movie camera at faster-than-normal speed. ...
Sport - Sports coaches are usually:
- Rueful of how an injury cost him/her a pro career (Rodney Dangerfield pokes fun at it in Ladybugs as he kisses up to his boss to get a soccer coaching job), or
- A has-been athlete, usually drunk (e.g. Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own). Probably a standard set in Brick's character in the Tennessee Williams play and movie Cat On A Hot Tin Roof.
- The talented kid who refuses to play will usually have a scene with the coach where they throw a basketball back and forth, speaking only when they have the ball. The athlete will eventually drop the ball and walk away silently (after failing repeatedly or being mocked by his playing mates).
- Underperforming or underdog athletes will come up big when it really matters, despite going against a juggernaught-like team.
- An athlete can easily spot his loved one in a crowd of thousands of people.
- The big final game of the season is always decided on the last play, with the clock running out (or in baseball, with two outs in the bottom of the 9th).
- In any kind of racing competition the villain is more focused on attacking the hero than with winning the race (obviously leading to his doom).
Rodney Dangerfield in 1997 Rodney Dangerfield (November 22, 1921 – October 5, 2004), born Jacob Cohen, was an American comedian and actor, best known for the line I dont get no respect and his monologues on that theme. ...
Tom Hanks in February 2004 Thomas Jeffrey Hanks (born July 9, 1956) is an American actor famous for playing notable roles in many popular and critically acclaimed movies. ...
Thomas Lanier Williams (March 26, 1911 – February 25, 1983), better known by the pen name Tennessee Williams, was a noted playwright. ...
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is a play by Tennessee Williams. ...
A view of the playing field at Busch Stadium in St. ...
Video games - Gun bullets are slow, and do extremely little damage while handheld weapons do about thrice damage (except in realistic simulation games).
- In an RPG, the players can search people's homes and take their belongings without them doing anything against it (see Final Fantasy games).
- NPCs who are not enemies tend to just stand there, looking, or walking forward and back.
- It is impossible to run away from a boss.
- If the game is a series, the hero will always have to confront an evil double.
- There are always convenient appliances to help the hero move forward, even in villain hideouts (spoofed by The Lost Vikings).
- A boss always has considerably bigger stamina and is physically bigger than other enemies, even if he/she is a normal person.
- There are always several chances...
- No matter what the initial goal in an RPG is, sooner or later, the heroes will end up having to save the whole world.
- In an RPG, the plot usually begins at the hero's house as he wakes up, or he is sent out on an errand and ends up stumbling upon the plot. That plot usually also involves the hero's village catching on fire. (See Breath of Fire)
- The main protagonist of an RPG is usually always silent, yet other characters seem to think he is talking.
- The RPG hero must collect some sort of artifact, usually crystals, to stop the villain's evil plan (see the first Final Fantasy games). Shortly after gaining the last artifact, the Villians will then steal them all, using them for whatever purpose you were trying to stop them from doing anyway.
- All RPG shopkeepers look alike (see Baldur's Gate).
- In many cases, few of the enemies use projectile weapons, and those that do are very bad shots.
- Caves are bound to be an issue sooner or later, despite how uncommon they are in real life- same for deserts and, to a lesser extent, large factories.
- Any food can recover ridiculous amounts of health.
RPG is an abbreviation with several different meanings: Rocket propelled grenade (from Russian Ruchnoj Protivotankovy Granatomiot) RPG-7 Soviet Cold War rocket propelled grenade launcher RPG-29 Modern Russian rocket propelled grenade launcher RPG programming language RPG, a band from Richmond, Virginia. ...
American box art for Final Fantasy I. Final Fantasy (Japanese: ファイナルファンタジー Fainaru Fantajii) is a popular series of role playing games produced by Square Enix (originally Square Co. ...
NPC can stand for: National Paralympic Committee, equivalent to the National Olympic Committee National Peoples Congress of the Peoples Republic of China National Provincial Championship, New Zealands principal domestic rugby competition Nauru Phosphate Corporation, located in Nauru Non-deterministic polynomial-time complete Non-player character or non...
Flag Ship from the video game Gorf In video games, a boss (sometimes called a guardian) is a particularly large or difficult computer-controlled character that must be defeated at the end of a segment of a game, whether it be for a level, an episode, or the very end...
From left to right: Olaf, Baleog and Erik The Lost Vikings is a side-scrolling action game which was developed by Blizzard Entertainment (then known as Silicon & Synapse) and released in 1992 by publisher Interplay Entertainment. ...
Flag Ship from the video game Gorf In video games, a boss (sometimes called a guardian) is a particularly large or difficult computer-controlled character that must be defeated at the end of a segment of a game, whether it be for a level, an episode, or the very end...
RPG is an abbreviation with several different meanings: Rocket propelled grenade (from Russian Ruchnoj Protivotankovy Granatomiot) RPG-7 Soviet Cold War rocket propelled grenade launcher RPG-29 Modern Russian rocket propelled grenade launcher RPG programming language RPG, a band from Richmond, Virginia. ...
Breath of Fire is a RPG series produced by Capcom. ...
RPG is an abbreviation with several different meanings: Rocket propelled grenade (from Russian Ruchnoj Protivotankovy Granatomiot) RPG-7 Soviet Cold War rocket propelled grenade launcher RPG-29 Modern Russian rocket propelled grenade launcher RPG programming language RPG, a band from Richmond, Virginia. ...
American box art for Final Fantasy I. Final Fantasy (Japanese: ファイナルファンタジー Fainaru Fantajii) is a popular series of role playing games produced by Square Enix (originally Square Co. ...
Baldurs Gate is a fictional city in the world of Forgotten Realms, a Dungeons and Dragons campaign setting. ...
Alternate meanings: Cave (disambiguation) The outside world viewed from a cave A cave is a natural underground void large enough that some portion of it will not receive daylight. ...
A dune in the Egyptian desert Desert in California In geography, a desert is a landscape form or region that receives little precipitation. ...
A factory (previously manufactory) is a large industrial building where goods or products are manufactured. ...
See also: Internet phenomenon Adobe Photoshop is a bitmap graphics editor (with some text and vector graphics capabilities) published by Adobe Systems. ...
Drew Curtis (b. ...
Screenshot Fark. ...
The original image Every time you masturbate… God kills a kitten is the headline of an image created in 2002. ...
Admiral Ackbar is a fictional character in the Star Wars movies and novels. ...
Admiral Ackbar is a fictional character in the Star Wars movies and novels. ...
The infamous phrase is a piece of subtitled dialogue from the introduction to Zero Wing. ...
Usenet is a distributed Internet discussion system that evolved from a general purpose UUCP network of the same name. ...
Bert is Evil is the name of a heavily mirrored web site, founded by Dino Ignacio, which featured Bert, a Muppet character on the American childrens television program Sesame Street. ...
A manipulated image of Bush holding a Polish flag and wearing a cap with its coat of arms. ...
An example of a Leet web browser (Text instead of GUI) in Leet language on a Leet language version of Google Leet (often also leetspeak, leetspeek, or l33t) from the phonetic form of the word elite, is a cipher, or novel form of English spelling. ...
Microsoft Corporation, (NASDAQ: MSFT) headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA, was founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen. ...
NASCAR logo The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) is the largest sanctioning body of motorsports in the United States. ...
An Internet phenomenon is akin to a fad, in which something relatively unknown becomes increasingly popular, but usually for a short duration of time. ...
For other usages see Theatre (disambiguation) Theater (American English) or Theatre (British English and widespread usage among theatre professionals in the US) is that branch of the performing arts concerned with acting out stories in front of an audience using combinations of speech, gesture, music, dance, sound and spectacle — indeed...
Sir Tom Stoppard OM (born July 3, 1937) is a Czech-born British playwright, famous for plays such as The Real Thing and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, and for the screenplay for Shakespeare in Love. ...
The Real Inspector Hound is one of Tom Stoppards best-known short plays. ...
- Give it a hundred and ten percent
- Take it one game at a time
- Backs against the wall (especially before any elimination games)
- Swing and a miss
- He shoots, - he scores!
- There's no "I" in a team
- A commanding six-shot lead (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22commanding+six-shot+lead%22) (in reporting golf results).
Golfer teeing off at the start of a hole Golf is an outdoor game where individual players or teams play a small ball into a hole using various clubs. ...
Related topics A list of English proverbs is provided at Wikiquote:English proverbs. ...
In many films it can be observed that with relative frequency that certain plot idioms, gimmicks, and clichés are repeated time and time again. ...
Most clichés are equally applicable to film, television or cartoons. ...
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