r/TopCharacterTropes • u/BagOfSmallerBags • 1d ago

Characters [Loved Trope] The one random episode that doesn't follow the main characters

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Heated Rivalry Episode 3 "Hunter": The show stops following Hollander and Rozanov's love story to follow another hockey player, Scott Hunter, and his romance with a smoothie store employee.

The Last of Us S1E3 "Long Long Time": Joel and Ellie need a car. So to explain why there's a car waiting around for them to use, they show us an incredibly heartbreaking love story lasting 20 years between two men Joel knows. They have a car.

Doctor Who S3E10 "Blink": With no explanation given, this episode begins with a character we've never met, one Sally Sparrow, poking around an abandoned building. Our lead character, The Doctor, is glimpsed seemingly randomly on TVs. What is going on? Did that statue just move!?

MythicQuest S1E5 "A Dark Quiet Death": Rather than continuing to follow our lead characters as they develop an MMORPG, we flash back many years to witness the history of a couple who start a videogame company, and how over the years the pressure to drive sales causes them to give up on their artistic integrity.

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u/StatementLeast9919 1d ago

Ted Lasso 2x9 - 'Beard After Hours'

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u/DoubleStrength 1d ago

Apparently the writers only had enough planned for 10(?) episodes, but the higher ups wanted them to stretch it out to 12.

Which is why we have Beard After Hours and the Christmas episode as two seemingly random filler eps.

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u/GamingTatertot 1d ago

I love that Christmas episode so much. Seeing all the players at the Higginses is just incredible

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u/WaveHigh 1d ago

And Roy, Keeley, and Phoebe's quest for a dentist.

Oh, and the guy from season 1 episode 1 that wanted an 'ussie' with Ted showing up at a Christmas dinner with his family.

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u/danielxplay22 1d ago

Loved that the ussie guy showed up in the season 3 finale before Ted leaves England

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u/randomisperfect 1d ago

Ussie guy is actually an immortal angel. No, I will not elaborate

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u/DoubleStrength 23h ago

I'm sad he didn't get a look in during s4

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u/Jozu_D_Unbreakable 20h ago

I’m pretty sure he is in it when Roy and Keeley are running through the streets

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u/thrilliam_19 18h ago

“Phoebe, I’ve spent most of my life in locker rooms. I promise you I’ve smelled worse.”

breathes

“….I think you’re dying.”

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u/monkeyboyhero 22h ago

Is that the one where Hannah Waddington belts out a song in the street? I knew she was a singer before I saw it and was still amazed!

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u/kamduna 1d ago

More tv shows need filler episodes. Explore side character’s lives. Get into some world making. Throw in a beach episode. I’m tired of all shows having 8 episode seasons

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u/Winterhorrorland 23h ago

YES. People have complained about filler episodes but I'm honestly just happy to get more episodes out of a show, and sometimes it ends up being great because they have to stretch their legs a bit

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u/gconnolly24 23h ago

My favorite example to bring up is “the box” in b99. It was so clearly a bottle/filler episode to shave budget but it was so well done and engaging it’s in my top 5. “That’s three oh damns.” As is beard after hours.

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u/LiamtheV 22h ago

ITS ALREADY IN A PATIENT’S MOUTH, SON

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u/gconnolly24 16h ago

“God I love this job”

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u/vanderZwan 21h ago

The problem with filler episodes is usually a lack of budget for it. Like, in animation it's often clip shows. Or, if the series is based of a manga or (comic) book, has a serious dip in writing quality because the main author isn't involved. Or worse: both.

If the series is original, or involves the original author, and has the budget for it, the filler is much more likely to be great.

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u/Kumquatelvis 1d ago

The Beard episode introduced me to A Girl Like You by Edwyn Collins. And while I'd heard Helllo by Dragonette before, that same episode really made it stand out to me.

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u/bomingles 20h ago

I know Beard After Hours divides opinion but I absolutely love it, maybe helped because I watched the series late so I binged it instead of weekly releases.

Usually executives demanding extra episodes would surely lead to disaster, in this case it was just 2 fantastic episodes. Christmas with the Higgins family was so heartwarming too.

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u/slayer_of_waspiz 1d ago

How are the fillers some of the best in the season 

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u/Mastodan11 1d ago

Half of the season was made up and rewritten as they went along, due to Jason Sudeikis having a bit of a crisis as his relationship with Olivia Wilde broke down and she got with Harry Styles. Script rewrites each night.

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u/Dinosaur802 1d ago edited 1d ago

That is genuinely my favorite episode of the entire show. The whole thing feels like a fever dream, especially as he goes from one misadventure to the next.

Though at this point I will probably never rewatch 'Louie', it kind of reminds me of that show; there's a few episodes where a bunch of weird, dream-like things happen in a row and you're kind of just left wondering if what you saw was real or not, and yet it was quite emotionally impactful, much like this episode.

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u/decoy_octopod 1d ago

At this point so many of my favorite artists have been exposed as truly terrible people that I’m now actually interested in revisiting their work. A lot of these films and shows had a profound effect on me and I’m curious how I’ll interpret them and/or if I can enjoy them under this new context

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u/UwasaWaya 11h ago

Man, the emotional rollercoaster of thinking about two of my former favorites, Louis CK and Neil Gaiman, is rough. I haven't been able to revisit their stuff, aside from showing a friend an episode of Sandman.

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u/decoy_octopod 10h ago

Yep, those were two of several I was thinking of. I dunno, Gaiman’s books meant so much to me, it almost feels inhumane/psychopathic to just tell myself, “ok, this art is no longer meaningful to me.” I haven’t revisited yet, but I’m going to someday

Meanwhile, I have two close friends who are obsessed with Gaiman, have tattoos of his quotes, and outright refuse to believe the allegations. When I bring them up they just stare blankly and say, “oh that? yeah, everyone’s got some rumors floating around about them…” and there’s this sense of shame, like they think they’re standing up for themselves by standing up for Gaiman

So (for me, at least) I think it’s important to just fully acknowledge an artist’s transgressions if you’re going to willingly engage with their art. But it doesn’t make you a bad person just because a bad person made something that affected you

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u/UwasaWaya 10h ago

I feel you. I'm more aligned with you, but it's not that I'm telling myself something is meaningless, is just that I can't not think about that while I'm reading it. It's like a mosquito in my ear.

I remember buying a book for an RPG setting a while back that I'd wanted forever, Maze of the Blue Medusa, and then about a week later the creator was accused of sexual assault by several women. It always sat in my head that I basically put money directly into his account right before whatever expenses he paid for court. Obviously I couldn't have known, but it's still not pleasant to think about.

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u/decoy_octopod 9h ago

Right, there’s a dozen other conversations to be had about this, like paying for their work vs pirating vs getting secondhand. What if, like Gaiman, their work and what they preach is so directly hypocritical to who they actually are? Does that devalue the message? Is it possible to appreciate well-written women characters by someone who abused women? What about Roald Dahl, a beloved children’s author who was incredibly antisemitic? Does it change his stories, will you not be able to read them to same, or can you still get lost in the world? And how is Chris Brown still selling out arenas and one of the top-streamed artists?

The answers aren’t black and white and will be completely different person to person. We’re in the early days of a new era where art is strongly connected to artists and it’ll take a long time to figure it out

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u/UwasaWaya 9h ago

It's definitely complex, and something I think about often. I don't begrudge anyone for enjoying such things, we all have to find our bearings in a very nuanced and often fucked up world. I'm sure that there are plenty of people who helped build the parts of the phone I'm typing this on who would make the people we're talking about look like saints.

We're all just doing our best.

Thanks for the chat, I hope you're having a good day.

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u/cwebsterz 1d ago

You should check out the film After Hours - sounds like you’d dig it since this episode is wholly based on it!

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u/Oneb3low 14h ago

The episode is also a lot like Atlanta S3 E8 "new jazz".

One of the main characters takes a "space cake" in Amsterdam and goes on a surreal and thought provoking journey.

As pointed out by another commenter, the Scorsese film "After Hours" seems to be direct inspiration for these episodes

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u/DrQuestDFA 1d ago

My first thought too. And it introduced me to the delightful song “Hello” by Martin Solveig and the Dragonette

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u/GoldenGuy444 1d ago

Episode gets slept on, it's incredible

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u/As_smooth_as_eggs 1d ago

One of my favorite episodes for sure.

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u/Powerful_Mix_9392 23h ago

As a football fan, the ending scene with the pub boys invading the Richmond pitch fills my heart with joy

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u/insanetwit 1d ago

Based after the Scorcese film "After Hours"

Such a fun episode

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u/atarwerdi96 1d ago

Unironically my favorite Ted Lasso episode.

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u/c0rps3wh0r3 1d ago

this was the first one that came to mind for me. i was watching ted after my brother recommended it to me and he said there was a "weird episode" in season 2. i watched it, absolutely adored it, called him to talk about the few episodes i had watched, just to find out he didn't like this one haha. i thought it was so creative and so well done

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u/Busy-Tax-147 23h ago

I actually loved how weirdly different that episode felt, even if it came out of nowhere. Beard deserved a whole night of chaos after dealing with everyone else's nonsense.

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u/llOneXll 1d ago

I just came to say hello

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u/Agitated_Display7573 18h ago

Shut Up Thierry Henry

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u/s_other 1d ago

Second lowest rated Ted episode, and honestly I agree. Very much not my cup of vile garbage water.

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u/BangkokRios 20h ago

Beard is one of the main characters.

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u/jmlovs 16h ago

This one had me so stressed. I actually thought they might kill him off.

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u/doctorfonk 14h ago

This is one episode I think I don’t actually care for this trope.