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How can I find an abandoned Missile Silo?

Let me tell you a story about a horse while I diffuse this missile...

  • I'm trying to find TV shows (or films) that contain a particular trope that I noticed while watching some old 1980's shows lately. Namely shows where the main character provides a sort of running narration throughout. I was watching the pilot episode of Macgyver on Netflix yesterday and noticed that during the beginning of the episode, the main character (Macgyver) was narrating a story about an encounter with a Palomino horse in voiceover while on screen he was diffusing a missile in central Asia (http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=09UlB17cgKw#t=26s of what I'm referring to). It made me realize -or recall- that this was a pretty commonly used trope in 1970's and 1980's TV, where the main character would narrate or provide voice over commentary while we watched whatever they were doing on screen. I know Quantum Leap did this a lot and if I recall correctly, I think Magnum P.I. did it too. What I'm looking for are other examples of TV shows that did this (or films). Are there any current or more recent TV shows that do this? I haven't noticed any recent examples of it myself so I'm curious as to why it's a trope that has been largely abandoned (if it has). Do current TV viewers see it as breaking the fourth wall?

  • Answer:

    http://ask.metafilter.com/240434/Let-me-tell-you-a-story-about-a-horse-while-I-diffuse-this-missile#3487368: "Shawshank Redemption" I guess I wouldn't count this one because the narration in Shawshank is mainly Morgan Freeman's character Red talking about or narrating the events that happened to another character, Andy Dufresne. In the shows I'm talking about, the main character is narrating events that happened to themselves, or providing commentary on their own character.

katyggls at Ask.Metafilter.Com Visit the source

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Veronica Mars? Perhaps Clarissa Explains it All? (I can't 100% remember if CEIA did this) also you're http://www.thefreedictionary.com/defusing the missle, not diffusing it...

arnicae

"Burn Notice". The voiceovers generally start "When you're a spy..."

rmd1023

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083466/ did / satirized this.

The Deej

Along the lines of The Waltons, mentioned above, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094582/ was the same way. Kevin Arnold in voiceover was an adult (voiced by Daniel Stern, best known as the second burglar from Home Alone), while he was still a child in the show. I didn't watch it, but it's possible the Chris Rock autobiographical show http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0460637/ was the same.

Sunburnt

TedW

Shawshank Redemption

PuppetMcSockerson

The Deej

Dexter features voice over by the lead character, probably because the character is a psychopath and the audience would struggle to understand his motivations (or lack of) without his commentary.

Ness

Goodfellas has voiceovers from both Henry and Karen Hill. (Interesting point, if you haven't caught it already: make note of when Karen's last VO is. I think it's significant.) I'm pretty sure Arrow (on the WB) does this. There's a brief VO from Oliver Queen at the start—the same every episode, just to set up the premise—but outside of that the show doesn't use VO narration.

DevilsAdvocate

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