History BetterThanItSounds / LiveActionTV

* [[spoiler:''{{Babylon 5}}'']]: A war-hero, a cynical Russian lesbian, a recovering alcohlic police chief and a bunch of other people start a fight with God and the [[CosmicHorror Devil]], win, destroy the world government and take over the entire galaxy. None of that was hard. Meanwhile, the expies of Hitler and the new Moses get married.

* [[spoiler:''{{Sherlock}}'']]: A sociopathic manchild teams up with a mentally damaged Army doctor. TheyFightCrime.

* [[spoiler:''I'd Do Anything'']]: Women complete for the right to wear a corset in front of thousands of people and die horribly at the hands of [[{{Torchwood}} Owen Harper]], while children compete to play a miserable orphan.

* [[spoiler:''Pizza'']]: Italian-Australian pizza delivery guys regularly find themselves dealing with the sorts of subjects and people [[SuzumiyaHaruhi Haruhi Suzumiya]] would be happy to meet.

* [[spoiler:''{{Supernatural}}'']]: A sad couple drive around. [[TheyFightCrime They Fight Monsters]].

** Or: A group of geek and a hot geek blow stuff up in the name of science.

** Or: An angry {{Momma's Boy}} wants to pull the plug out of a drain. His brother recruits a diverse group of people to try and stop him. They all end up dying in the end.

* [[spoiler:''NorthernExposure'']]: A New York doctor goes to [[WhereTheHellIsSpringfield Springfield]], Alaska. He tries to leave. Hilarity ensues.

*** [[spoiler:The First Doctor (seasons 1-4)]]: A grumpy old man goes on educational adventures through space and time, with the first lesson being to not be an asshole. He is accompanied by his granddaughter, two of her teachers, Cressida, a downed pilot, a temple acolyte, a security agent from an empire built on slave labor, a teenager, a sailor, and a [[MadScientist Mad Scientist's]] secretary.

*** [[spoiler:The Tenth Doctor (seasons 28-30/series 2-4 and 2009 specials)]]: The personification of BewareTheNiceOnes travels with a few successive companions until he has to [[spoiler:neuralyze one]]. He travels alone from then on.

* [[spoiler:''Roswell'']]: Dawson's Creek with Aliens.

* [[spoiler:''TheBigBangTheory'']]: LOL Aspergers.
** Alternatively, RedDwarf IN PASADENA!
** Or better yet, two nerds who live across the hall from a hottie. One of them has a crush on the hottie, the other is an asexual jerkass.
* [[spoiler:''Big Brother'']]: A random mixture of people are kept in a house, like rats in a cage for around three months, and have to complete tasks. Swearing and fights ensue.
* [[spoiler:''BigWolfOnCampus'']]: A [[PerkyGoth hyperactive goth]], a hairy football player, and a tough girl go on adventures together.

* ''[[spoiler:ABitOfFryAndLaurie]]'': Sketch show where almost all roles are played by two really tall Oxbridge guys.

* [[spoiler:''BlackBooks'']]: The weird life and misadventures of a drunk who owns a bookshop, his {{Cloudcuckoolander}} assistant / punching bag and their best (and only) friend.

* [[spoiler:''{{Bottom}}'']]: Two brainless alcoholic perverts beat each other up on a regular basis.

* [[spoiler:''Breaking The Magician's Code: Secrets of Magic Finally Revealed'']]: Renegade from an AncientTradition pisses off a lot of people by [[StopHavingFunGuys spoiling their secrets to the world]].

* [[spoiler:''BuffyTheVampireSlayer'']]: A super-strong cheerleader, a Jewish computer nerd witch, a goofy slacker, and the school librarian fight undead (mostly) [[MonsterOfTheWeek monsters of the week]] while their personal lives turn into a soap opera. Beloved people die with depressing regularity.
** Later joined by a fake little sister, a thousand-year-old ex-vengeance demon, a once-evil blond British vampire, and a bunch of teenage girls who may or may not someday have superpowers.

* [[spoiler: ''{{Castle}}'']]: Mystery author butts into murder investigations much to annoyance of uptight police officer. {{UST}} ensues.

* [[spoiler:''{{Charmed}}'']]: [[strike:Three]] [[strike:Four]] [[strike:''Five'']] '''[[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters LOADS OF]]''' women get magical powers and use them to kill on a regular basis, while still trying to lead normal lives. Each one dies repeatedly, but only one ever gets KilledOffForReal.
* [[spoiler:''{{Cheers}}'']]: A group of people meet at a bar every night.
* [[spoiler: ''{{Chuck}}'']]: An UnluckyEverydude accidentally becomes a MagicalDatabase and [[TheyFightCrime fights crime]] with the help of a hot blonde CIA agent and a grumpy male NSA agent.

* [[spoiler:''{{CSI}}'']]: An entomologist, a former stripper, a gambling addict, and a group of nerds and geeks perform obscure activities in a lab to musical accompaniment. TheyFightCrime.
** Also known as "Mythbusters: The Drama"
* [[spoiler:''CSIMiami'']]: Suave supercop visits crime scenes, cracks one liners, and plays with his sunglasses in a series of 5-minute shorts.
* [[spoiler:''CSINewYork'']]: A former Marine and 9/11 widower, a wisecracking cop, a Greek-American with a stalker problem and some other geeks and nerds solve crimes in NewYorkCity.

* [[spoiler:''DadsArmy'']]: A group of bungling old men and a mummy's boy try to fight the Nazis but repeatedly screw everything up.

* ''[[spoiler: {{Dallas}}]]'': Three millionaire businessmen live in one house. One of them gets shot.

* [[spoiler:''DeadliestWarrior'']]: Two groups of guys hit stuff with other stuff, all the while arguing about which of the sides they represent is better at hitting stuff. Then a fight happens.
* [[spoiler:''DeadLikeMe'']]: An apathetic virgin with a death certificate gets press-ganged into collecting the souls of newly departed when not hanging out in a diner with her dysfunctional co-workers. Post-it-notes are SeriousBusiness.

* [[spoiler:''DealOrNoDeal'']]: Game show in which a mysterious unseen banker tries to buy off contestants to leave with less than the maximum prize. Contestant must find out how much money their prize is worth through reverse elimination of other values, held in briefcases.

* [[spoiler:''DueSouth'']]: A Mountie and his deaf, lip-reading dog are sent to clean up the streets of America... ''politely.''
* [[spoiler:''TheDukesOfHazzard'']]: A family fights a corrupt government with a jumping car in a town that won't let the Civil War die.

* [[spoiler:''EliStone'']]: A lawyer has prophetic visions that take the form of crowd songs.

* [[spoiler:''FarScape'']]: Primitive scientist and escaped criminals use a big flying creature to run and hide from the military.
** An astrophysicist descends into madness with the aid of an ex-military woman with no sebaceous gland, a plant posing as a blue buddhist, a tentacled samurai who wants to be a farmer, a frog dictator who farts helium, a colourless nymphomaniac plague-carrier, and a reptillian S&M addict who spends his time in and outside the astrophysicist's brain.
** An all-American guy gets stuck with a bunch of weird highly advanced aliens, the events of the universe begin to revolve around what he does, and his life just really really sucks.
** Guy chooses between Earth and a really hot chick. It is not really a difficult choice.

* [[spoiler: ''{{Firefly}}'']]: A pair of bitter war veterans, a prostitute, a [[HeroicSociopath mercenary with an ugly hat]], a [[WrenchWench cute mechanic]], a Hawaiian-shirt wearing pilot, a preacher with a MysteriousPast, a socially inept medical genius and the [[{{Moe}} cutest little]] [[AxCrazy psychotic]] [[WaifFu killing machine]] ever all get together on a ship. [[TheyFightCrime They]] [[strike: Fight]] [[TheyFightCrime Do Crime!]]
** Alternatively, a western...[[RecycledINSPACE IN SPACE!]]
** Or (as the show's creator explained it): Nine people look out into the blackness of space and see nine different things.

* [[spoiler: ''ForeverKnight'']]: [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampires Vampire with a conscience]] works as a night cop, dates a mortician, and goes through a series of partners and captains. Also, he [[IHateYouVampireDad kills his vampire sire]], [[OnlyMostlyDead who goes on]] to host a late-night radio show of some sort.
** This also all takes place in {{Toronto}}.

** Naturally, you have to leave out his absurdly cute female driver, otherwise it just sounds too good.
* [[spoiler:''{{Frasier}}'']]: A psychiatrist, on getting a new job, moves in with his dad and his dad's Jack Russell terrier. His brother, who drops by often, gets a crush on a nurse despite already being married. Craziness ensues.
* [[spoiler:''The Fresh Prince of Bel Air'']]: A street-smart teen moves in with his rich relatives. The lives of all involved are [[MemeticMutation flipped, turned upside-down.]]
* [[spoiler:''{{Friends}}'']]: Spoiled brat, hapless paleontologist in love with said brat, second-rate soap opera actor, DeadpanSnarker who hates his job no-one knows what it is, chef with OCD, and DreadfulMusician {{Cloudcuckoolander}} deal with weird daily life and drink lots of gourmet coffee.
* [[spoiler:''{{Fringe}}'']]: A DHS agent, a mad scientist, and a high-school dropout solve mysteries with dubious scientific techniques.

* [[spoiler:''Hell's Kitchen'']]: A British chef insults aspiring cooks' food.

* [[spoiler: ''Series/{{Heroes}}'']]: A whole bunch of people with superpowers play recreational sports with the IdiotBall.
** The XMen minus the tights, and with [[YourMileageMayVary somewhat]] better dialogue.
** A time traveller, a flying man, a healer, a split personality, a telepath, an IntangibleMan and a precog painter try to stop an exploding man and a guy who eats brains without actually eating them.

* [[spoiler: ''{{Highlander}}: The Series]]'': The enduring battles between people who emanate lightning after getting their heads cut off.

* [[spoiler:''{{House}}'']]: Crippled Doctor can't decide if he's {{Batman}}, {{Sherlock Holmes}}, or [[FriedrichNietzsche Nietzsche]]; solves medical mysteries to keep the crushing ennui at bay only to find that VictoryIsBoring.

* [[spoiler:''HowIMetYourMother'']]: A man tells his bored teenaged children stories about himself when he was younger. Evidently there's nothing good on TV in the future.

* [[spoiler:''{{Hustle}}'']]: Rich, dishonest people are robbed in [[XanatosGambit highly creative ways]].

* [[spoiler:''JeevesAndWooster'']]: Incredibly tall man repeatedly prevents his almost-as-tall employer from marrying. His reward usually comes in the form of destroying the garments of his employer.

* [[spoiler:''JonathanCreek'']]: A nerdy magician's assistant and a dysfunctional journalist with a crush on him solve mysteries.

* [[spoiler:''LifeOnMars'']]: A policeman gets run over and wakes up in 1973. [[HeterosexualLifePartners His boss]] is a misogynistic, racist homophobe, he himself may or may not be hallucinating everything, and he's being stalked by Sadako's English cousin.

* ''[[spoiler:[[TwentyFour 24]]]]'': A government employee has a really bad day.
** Alternatively: A man who takes his work too seriously repeatedly goes a whole day without eating or sleeping.

* [[spoiler:''{{Babylon 5}}'']]: A war hero, a cynical Russian, a police chief named after an Italian revolutionary, and a bunch of others start a revolution and fight the [[CosmicHorror ultimate evil]] only to realize it's not so simple...
** Got a better one: ''{{Cheers}}'' on a space station, or ''{{ER}}'' minus the hospital. You figure it out.
** The UN in space, with lizards and peacocks.
** A sci-fi series almost entirely without cute kids or robots.

*** This troper feels that the bunch of teenage girls is actually NOT better than it sounds.

*** [[spoiler:The Ninth Doctor (''series'' 1)]]: An angry, bitter man destroys a girl's place of employment and then befriends her.
*** [[spoiler:The Tenth Doctor (series 2-4 and 2009 specials)]]: The personification of BewareTheNiceOnes travels with a few successive companions until he has to [[spoiler:neuralyze one]]. He travels alone from then on.
*** [[spoiler:The Eleventh Doctor (series 5-present)]]: An angry absent-minded professor travels around making mistakes and getting out of trouble...badly. He fixes them, however.

** [[spoiler: StarTrekDeepSpaceNine]]: A commander who never quite got over the death of his wife in the worst military loss his government ever had, a beautiful young woman with dark spots whom he keeps calling "old man," a hot-headed genius engineer, and an ambitious doctor straight out of medical school go where extremely ugly aliens have gone before and stay there. They meet a former freedom fighter and a security officer who sleeps in a bucket.

** [[spoiler: StarTrekEnterprise]]: An Iowa farm boy who's dreamt of space travel all his life, his Southern-accented chief engineer/best friend, an uptight British munitions officer, a black helmsman, a gorgeous Japanese linguist ([[FakeNationality played by a Korean]]), a gregarious alien doctor and a stoic-yet-beautiful alien commander travel space at the beginning of humanity's efforts. They meet nasty aliens and get caught up in a lot of headache-inducing time stuff.

* [[spoiler:''Cash Cab'']]: In [[strike:Soviet Russia]] New York, [[InSovietRussiaTropeMocksYou taxi pays YOU!!]]

* [[spoiler:''{{Raven}}'' ]]: A guy who can turn into a bird guides kids on a quest to become the best warrior.

* [[spoiler:''{{Supernatural}}'']]: Two gorgeous brothers with major-league Daddy issues seek out monsters and kill them in various nasty ways, using things as diverse as salt-filled shotgun shells, barbed wire, and circular saws. Lots of sex is had along the way. A really great car and lots of eighties rock, apocalypses, and angst are also involved. The world really really sucks, but it's funny anyway.
** Alternate, less-detailed version: A sad couple drive around.