History Main / WeatherReportNarration

->''"It was one of those nights when the sky came down and wrapped itself around the world."''
-->-- Opening words of ''The Big Kill'' by Creator/MickeySpillane

Weather Report Narration is when some of the first words in a story are a comment on the weather. Seen a lot in {{Literature}}, but also shows up in FilmNoir detective stories when the narration begins "The rain was making a jazz drumbeat against my office window when the dame with the case walked in...", or something similar.

"ItWasADarkAndStormyNight" is the best known example and, by now, a subtrope by itself. AStormIsComing is when this is employed as OminousForeshadowing.
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!!Examples:

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[[folder: Anime And Manga ]]

* Literally the first words heard in ''Anime/KikisDeliveryService'', from Kiki's (father's) transistor radio, are a weather forecast.

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[[folder: Comic Books ]]

* Early in ''ComicBook/TheLongHalloween'', Selina Kyle remarks, "It's hot. Years from now, when it gets hot at night, people will say 'Its hot, but not as hot as the night Johnny Viti got married.'"
* The first line in ''ComicBook/SinCity'': "The night is hot as hell".

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[[folder: Fan Fiction ]]

* ''FanFic/AncientLanguages'' opens with, "It was a Tuesday morning, the sky was black, and the earth seemed to tremble with the mighty rumbling of the thunder. The rain was coming down in sheets, and the wind whipped the trees around like they were twigs."
* ''The Last Kiss Goodbye'' (a ''[[Series/StarTrekVoyager Voyager]]'' uber fic) opens with "It was one of those hot LA days when the sun reached down and casually smacked you around the head till you were drenched in sweat like a second rate palooka after a ten-round bout." Not to be outdone, the following night is "one of those cold LA nights when the fog swept in from the ocean and wrapped this tawdry harlot of a town in a thick blanket to hide its phony glitter from the rest of the world." But as the protagonist points out, Hollywood is full of cliches.

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[[folder: Film ]]

* Inverted in ''Film/{{Amelie}}'', the (more technical than usual) weather report is the final line of the film's TalkyBookends:
-->''September 28, 1997. It is exactly 11 a.m. At the funfair, near the ghost train, the marshmallow twister is twisting. Meanwhile, on a bench in Villette Square, Felix Lerbier learns there are more links in his brain than atoms in the universe. Meanwhile, at the Sacre Coeur, the nuns are practising their backhand. The temperature is 24 degrees, humidity 70%, atmospheric pressure 990 millibars.''
* Played with in ''Film/ThrowMommaFromTheTrain''. Larry Donner suffered writer's block to the point that the only thing he had written for his new novel was, "The night was..." He kept trying variations:
-->"The night was dry. Yet it was raining."
-->"The night was hot and wet..."
-->"The night was moist..."
** The fact that Owen Lift's badly written story, "Murder at My Friend Harry's" began, "The night was humid...," nearly caused Larry to have a migraine. And Momma Lift's ''perfect'' suggestion, "The night was sultry" gives Larry impetus to throw her off a speeding train.

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[[folder: Literature ]]

* In ''[[Literature/NineteenEightyFour 1984]]'': "It was a bright, cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen".
* ''Literature/TheJungleBook'':
** "Mowgli's Brothers", and thus the book itself, begins, "It was seven o'clock of a very warm evening in the Seeonee hills when Father Wolf woke up from his day's rest..." (One does wonder why Kipling mentions the specific time, since wolves presumably don't have clocks.)
** "Her Majesty's Servants", begins: "It had been raining heavily for one whole month--raining on a camp of thirty thousand men, thousands of camels, elephants, horses, bullocks, and mules all gathered together at a place called Rawalpindi."
* "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel" from William Gibson's ''Literature/{{Neuromancer}}''.
** Parodied by Neil Gaiman's ''Literature/{{Neverwhere}}'': "The sky was the perfect untroubled blue of a television screen turned to a dead channel." Because by the time Gaiman was writing, [=TVs=] didn't show static if there wasn't a signal.
* ''Literature/{{Uglies}}'' begins with "The early summer sky was the color of cat vomit." [[{{Squick}} And then describes the diet said cat would need to get all the colors right.]]
* "Red Wind" by Creator/RaymondChandler:
-->''There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.''
* In ''Literature/ToKillAMockingbird'', a few paragraphs in you have, "Somehow, it was hotter then: a black dog suffered on a summer's day; bony mules hitched to Hoover carts flicked flies in the sweltering shade of the live oaks on the square."
* Creator/JKRowling seems to be pretty fond of this; instead of just telling you that x months have passed, you get a lovely description of Scottish weather patterns.
* ''Discworld/WyrdSisters'' parodies this. The narration begins with and keeps mentioning a storm, but in fact the storm is treated as a sentient background character (this ''is'' Discworld, after all).
* "It's Raining Annie" opens ''Literature/AnnieOnMyMind''. [[WordOfGod The author says]] this was the first line written as well.
* The second sentence of ''[[http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/parsons/castle/castle.html The Castle of Wolfenbach]]'':
-->The evening was cold and tempestuous, the rain poured in torrents, and the distant thunders rolled with tremendous noise round the adjacent mountains, whilst the pale lightning added horrors to the scene.
* ''Literature/TheNameOfTheRose'' starts with "It was a beautiful morning at the end of November" (if you discount the prologue).
* ''Literature/AnEncounterAndAnOffer'' has the first few paragraphs telling you all about the day's dreary weather.

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[[folder: Live Action TV ]]

* ''Series/OurMissBrooks'': "Radio Bombay" begins with a conversation about the weather.
* ''Franchise/{{Dragnet}}'' almost always mentioned the current weather in UsefulNotes/LosAngeles at the very beginning of the episode.

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[[folder: Music ]]

* Paris's ''The Hate That Hate Made'' features the lyrics, "June 6 in the time of 6 o'clock/hot summer night in the city of hard knocks/two black brothers took a walk on the south side/could have been any brother lookin' for a dope ride".
* Music/EmersonLakeAndPalmer's "Karn Evil 9: First Impression Part One": "Cold and misty morning I heard a warning borne on the air..."
* Parodied in Music/TomWaits' ''Emotional Weather Report'', which ([[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin true to its title]]) intertwines weather descriptions with descriptions of the narrator's emotional state.
* The whole song of "Summer in the City" is a weather forecast: Hot, Humid, and miserable during the day, cooler and less oppressive at night.

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[[folder: Poetry ]]

* One of the [[EnforcedTrope rules]] of proper {{Haiku}} construction is that the second line contain a reference to the season.

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[[folder: Radio ]]

* Almost all of Garrison Keillor's "Tales from Lake Woebegon" and "Guy Noir, Private Eye" on ''Radio/APrairieHomeCompanion''.
* ''Radio/TheGoonShow'', "Dishonoured" (remade as "Dishonoured Again") begins with Creator/PeterSellers narrating: "It can be cold in UsefulNotes/{{London}} - damn cold. On such a night as this 80 years ago a ragged idiot staggered into a fog-laden Limehouse area."
* Every episode of ''Cape Cod Radio Mystery Theater'' begins with the words, "It's a foggy night on old Cape Cod."

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[[folder: Other ]]

* Including a line about the weather is traditionally part of the opening paragraph when writing (paper) letters to someone in Japan. Here, it's less whether outside it's sunny or rainy or whatever and more about the season - references to the state of the cherry blossoms or whether the cicadas are out are more in line. For an example, check the pre-credits monologue of Nodoka's letter to her Student Council President predecesor Sokabe-sempai in ''Manga/KOn'' (season 2, episode 7).

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->''It was one of those nights when the sky came down and wrapped itself around the world. ''

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* Creator/JKRowling seems to be pretty fond of this, instead of just telling you that x months have passed, you get a lovely description of Scottish weather patterns.

* ''Radio/OurMissBrooks'': "Radio Bombay" begins with a conversation about the weather.

* ''Radio/OurMissBrooks'': "Radio Bombay" begins wit a conversation about the weather.

* Literally the first words heard in ''KikisDeliveryService'', from Kiki's (father's) transistor radio, are a weather forecast.

* Including a line about the weather is traditionally part of the opening paragraph when writing (paper) letters to someone in Japan. Here, it's less whether outside it's sunny or rainy or whatever and more about the season - references to the state of the cherry blossoms or whether the cicadas are out are more in line. For an example, check the pre-credits monologue of Nodoka's letter to her Student Council President predecesor Sokabe-sempai in ''KOn'' (season 2, episode 7).

* ''Literature/TheNameOfTheRose'' starts with "It was a beautiful morning at the end of November" (if you
discount the prologue).

* [[Literature/AnEncounterAndAnOffer]] has the first few paragraphs telling you all about the day's dreary weather.

* ''Literature/TheNameOfTheRose'' starts with "It was a beautiful morning at the end of November" (if you discount the prologue).

* Early in ''TheLongHalloween'', Selina Kyle remarks, "It's hot. Years from now, when it gets hot at night, people will say 'Its hot, but not as hot as the night Johnny Viti got married.'"