| 1 | [[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/boardwalkempire_9155.jpg]] |
| 2 | |
| 3 | ->''"I '''do''' expect to have everything."'' |
| 4 | -->-- ''' Enoch "Nucky" Thompson''' |
| 5 | |
| 6 | ''Boardwalk Empire'' is an {{Creator/HBO}} SundayEveningDramaSeries set in Atlantic City, New Jersey from TheRoaringTwenties and the beginning of Prohibition into TheGreatDepression. |
| 7 | |
| 8 | Creator/SteveBuscemi stars as AntiHero Enoch "Nucky" Thompson, a [[SleazyPolitician corrupt county treasurer]] who develops his own bootlegging ring in Atlantic City in the wake of Prohibition. The series focuses on how Nucky balances his dual lives as respected public figure and underworld kingpin, and the multi-sided conflicts between the federal government, his own operations, and those of his rivals, all amongst an ensemble cast. |
| 9 | |
| 10 | "[[InNameOnly Inspired by]]" (rather than adapted from) the non-fiction book of the same name, the series was created and written by Terence Winter of ''Series/TheSopranos'' renown, and its pilot episode was directed by Creator/MartinScorsese, who also set the artistic tone of the show. HBO picked up the series for a twelve-episode first season, and it debuted September 19, 2010. A second season was announced after the pilot registered one of the highest followings in the network's history and the show completed its third season in 2012. Veteran ''Series/TheWire'' writers Creator/DennisLehane and George Pelecanos joined the creative staff in the fourth season, which was aired in the second half of 2013. |
| 11 | |
| 12 | HBO and creator Terence Winter decided to end the show with a shortened season 5. After 56 episodes, the finale was aired on October 26, 2014. |
| 13 | |
| 14 | The series won seventeen UsefulNotes/{{Emmy Award}}s and two UsefulNotes/{{Golden Globe}}s. It has also [[ShownTheirWork done its research]]. |
| 15 | |
| 16 | ---- |
| 17 | !!This show provides examples of: |
| 18 | |
| 19 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 20 | |
| 21 | [[folder:A - G]] |
| 22 | * AbortedArc: Thanks to a seven year time jump for the final season, two storylines set up in season 4 are dropped almost completely: [[spoiler:Narcisse's deal with Hoover and Rothstein's business dealings with Margaret.]] |
| 23 | * AbusiveParents: |
| 24 | ** Nucky's father is a real piece of work, having scarred his hand at age 9 for grabbing food first, forced him into an impossible fight over a baseball glove, and undoubtedly many other traumatic events. Even as he's going senile he remains as hateful as ever. Eli's wife June explicitly traces the roughness of the Thompson brothers [[FreudianExcuse back to their childhood]]. |
| 25 | ** Hans Schroeder beats his wife and children. In fact, he's so bad that Nucky sanctions a hit on him after he causes Margaret to miscarry, and [[DeceasedFallGuyGambit then paints him as a participant in the Woods Massacre]], knowing that people won't bother questioning it. |
| 26 | ** Gillian Darmody, a [[MyBelovedSmother control freak]] with [[ReallyGetsAround no sexual boundaries]], to Jimmy. Seems to be continuing down the same path in season 3 with Jimmy's son Tommy in the same role, emotionally manipulating and claiming she's his mother (instead of his grandmother), among other things. |
| 27 | ** Nelson van Alden was raised by fanatical members of a Doomsday cult. According to him, his father sold (or possibly just gave away for free) the family farm when he was a child, at the start of the supposed year of the Second Coming and when a whole year of living in poverty in a tent passed without it happening, van Alden's father blamed ''him'' for it. |
| 28 | * AccidentalMurder: |
| 29 | ** In "Gimcrack And Bunkum", Eli tries to stop George O'Neill from talking, so he swings a wrench at him... and crushes his windpipe. |
| 30 | ** In "All In", Willie, Eli's son, kills a college mate when his chemically spiked alcohol becomes a DeadlyPrank. |
| 31 | * AdvertisedExtra: |
| 32 | ** Chalky White, played by Creator/MichaelKWilliams (of ''Series/TheWire'' fame), was deliberately written as one in the first season. Once Chalky proved to be popular, it was announced that he would get a more prominent role in Season 2 (along with another minor character that the audience loved, [[EnsembleDarkhorse Richard Harrow]]), and in season 3 they both play major roles in the great scheme of things. In season 4 Chalky is arguably just as much of a main character as Nucky. |
| 33 | ** Ron Livingston as Roy Phillips in season 4. Early press made a big deal of adding him and fellow film actor Jeffrey Wright to the main cast for season 4 but ultimately Livingston appears in just half the episodes. |
| 34 | * AffablyEvil: |
| 35 | ** Nucky is quite polite and charming. [[BewareTheNiceOnes Until you cross him.]] This is in stark contrast to Rothstein, who is [[FauxAffablyEvil polite, erudite and witty, but absolutely ruthless beneath it.]] |
| 36 | ** Chalky White is the closest thing to the Black community's version of Santa Claus. In spite of the fact that he actually is a bootlegger as well as a brutal killer, he's one of the more sympathetic characters on the show. |
| 37 | ** Just like in real life, Al Capone is a gregarious guy who gets on especially well with kids, but he's also a brutal thug. |
| 38 | ** Manny Horvitz has a very avuncular personality, but he'll kill just about anyone. Jimmy also points out that his habit of calling Jimmy "boychik" isn't actually friendly. Manny's accusing him of being a snot-nosed kid trying to play grown-up. |
| 39 | ** Salvatore Maranzano is a suave, soft-spoken, easy-going mobster who tries not to take things personally, even after an assassination attempt. |
| 40 | * AfterlifeExpress: We see [[spoiler:Richard on the train to Minnesota, and then arriving at the house to meet his family. Then we see his body, still under the boardwalk in Atlantic City.]] |
| 41 | * AintTooProudToBeg: [[spoiler:Nucky]] is ultimately willing to KneelBeforeZod and [[spoiler:promise Luciano everything he owns in return for his nephew's life.]] |
| 42 | * AlasPoorVillain: |
| 43 | ** [[spoiler:Jimmy's]] death is this to a certain degree. No matter how much of a villain you feel he was in the second season, one has to admit the writers did a damn good job of generating sympathy for a character who, over the course of the season committed several murders, [[spoiler:tried to overthrow the main character, was a huge jerk to pretty much everyone around him, proved to be an incredibly incompetent leader and got his poor innocent wife killed because he was too selfish to pay back Manny money he legitimately owed him.]] |
| 44 | ** Frank Capone, a relatively temperate gangster with plenty of EvilVirtues, is horribly [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverKill gunned down]] while trying to defend his brother. |
| 45 | * AllCrimesAreEqual: Every side does this at some point. |
| 46 | * AlterKocker: Manny Horvitz, when he isn't murdering people. |
| 47 | * AmbitionIsEvil: |
| 48 | ** Nucky always wants more and he gets it through crime, but it's downplayed during the present day, as he is not too greedy nor too amoral by the standards of the story. His backstory reveals that he wanted to get ahead, and in order to become Sheriff, he delivered a 12-year-old Gillian to the Commodore so he could rape her. |
| 49 | --->'''Nucky:''' I was a bellboy. Carried people's bags. First time I was tipped a nickel, I thought the world is a marvelous place. But a dime, a dime would be better. And when I got the dime, I thought: a quarter. |
| 50 | ** By contrast, a repeated motif in the fifth season is [[spoiler:Tommy Darmody refusing to take tips from anyone, or only doing so reluctantly.]] |
| 51 | * AmoralAttorney: |
| 52 | ** Arnold Rothstein has Bill Fallon, who is very impressed by his client's eloquence and ability to commit perjury with a straight face- so much so that he comments that Rothstein would be a great lawyer. Rothstein replies that [[EvilLawyerJoke he's chosen an honest profession]]. Rothstein even loans Fallon to Nucky for his election-rigging trial. |
| 53 | ** Thorogood Junior is a weaselly little prosecutor just out of law school, trying to ride on his Daddy's reputation and perfectly willing to take a dive for bribes. |
| 54 | ** Nucky himself has Isaac Ginsburg, who helps Nucky use his bribes and connections to beat the legal system. He's eventually fired in favor of Fallon. |
| 55 | ** And George Remus, as in RealLife, is an attorney so amoral that Remus has decided to cast off the attorney job altogether and become an outright bootlegger instead - while using Remus' knowledge of law to find the [[LoopholeAbuse correct loopholes]], of course. |
| 56 | * AnalogyBackfire: Maranzano likes to compare himself with UsefulNotes/JuliusCaesar. Nucky quickly points out that Caesar was backstabbed. [[spoiler:Maranzano is betrayed by Nucky, and killed by a bunch of guys with daggers.]] |
| 57 | * AndCallHimGeorge: In "Paris Green", [[spoiler:Van Alden gets a bit too zealous in teaching Sebso a lesson during a river baptism. Sebso drowns.]] |
| 58 | -->''"Do you accept Jesus as your savior???"'' |
| 59 | * AndThatLittleGirlWasMe: Nucky's address to the Temperance League about how his family suffered terrible poverty in his childhood and how he was once forced to catch three [[ReducedToRatBurgers rats for their dinner]]. He later claims that it's a lie, but the more we see in flashbacks of Nucky's childhood, the more it seems plausible that the story wasn't completely fictional, possibly making it a DoubleSubversion. |
| 60 | * AntiHeroSubstitute: By the beginning of season five, Nucky has replaced Eddie Kessler, [[spoiler:who committed suicide when being blackmailed by the FBI.]] Kessler was affable, decent, but determined and capable in a fight -- by no means a hero, but [[ALighterShadeOfGrey one of the nicest characters in the setting]], and fast becoming a MoralityPet for Nucky. The replacement, Archie Ortiz, is silent, menacing, and viciously brutal in a fight -- even slicing the ear off a dead attacker and keeping it in his suit pocket. The implication is that Nucky [[spoiler:hates that he got personally attached to Kessler only to lose him, and has hired a bloodthirsty stoic he won't mistake for a friend.]] |
| 61 | -->'''Senator:''' Doesn't say much, does he?\ |
| 62 | '''Nucky:''' [[BeingPersonalIsntProfessional That's what I like about him.]] |
| 63 | * AntiHero[=/=]AntiVillain: Nucky goes back and forth and toes the line thanks to [[BlackAndGrayMorality the setting]] and [[ALighterShadeOfBlack his more nefarious antagonists]]. He's a self-interested criminal and corrupt politician, but he's not without his humanity. |
| 64 | -->'''Gillian:''' Mrs. Thompson said you want to be good. But you don't know how. |
| 65 | * AnyoneCanDie: It seems that with the exception of {{Historical Domain Character}}s with a known death date, anyone is up for grabs. Starting at the end of season 2 series regulars start falling fast, including [[spoiler:Angela, The Commodore, Jimmy, Owen, Gyp, Eddie, Richard, Rothstein, Van Alden, Chalky, Mickey, Dr. Narcisse and ultimately Nucky himself.]] In the last season, the tempo is accelerated until at least one regular is killed off in every episode. |
| 66 | * ApatheticCitizens: The Volstead Act is incredibly unpopular with the public. Therefore, MoralGuardians aside, bootleggers face lots of support and almost no opposition from the average civilian. The general public's only concern is with the by-product violence. In season 3, Gyp Rosetti buys out the town of Tabor Heights at $200 per citizen just to be sure everybody stays quietly in line. |
| 67 | * ArmorPiercingQuestion: Richard Harrow calmly delivers one to Paul after Paul calls him a "sideshow freak". While strangling the bastard. |
| 68 | --> '''Richard:''' Would you pay a dime...''to see this''? |
| 69 | * ArmsDealer: In season 2, Nucky engages in an Atlantic trade with the IRA, where he sells them weapons in exchange for whiskey. Hilariously, one of his partners assumes Nucky is the inventor of the [[GunsOfFiction/SubmachineGuns Thompson submachine gun]], but Nucky clarifies it's just [[NamedLikeMyName a happy coincidence]]. |
| 70 | * ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: While reviewing the profiles of a pair of killers, Halloran notes that the D’Alessio brothers have killed at least two people. O'Neill adds that they called him fat. Eli, [[spoiler:who'd recently been shot by the brothers]], says that he got off easy. |
| 71 | * ArtImitatesArt: |
| 72 | ** The first shot of "21" (the second-season premiere) shows a bottle of liquor washed up on the beach, a nod to the opening credits. |
| 73 | ** The Season 3 premiere, "Resolution", opens with Gyp Rosetti looking at the ocean like Nucky does in the credits. The episode after that, "Spaghetti & Coffee", mirrors the imagery again when Eli [[spoiler:gets out of jail]], except in this case he has no hat on and he is looking at an empty land plot rather than the ocean, highlighting how far down he has fallen in contrast to his brother. |
| 74 | ** The Season 3 episode "A Man, A Plan..." has whiskey bottles washing up onto the shore. It turns out one of Gyp Rosetti's ships lost cargo. |
| 75 | * ArtisticLicenseGeography: |
| 76 | ** There has never been a town of Tabor Heights, New Jersey. Most likely, it's supposed to be the fictional counterpart of Atlantic Highlands, which is along that coastal highway, which seems unavoidable, and was a safe haven for bootleggers during Prohibition. |
| 77 | ** In the show's depiction of Dean O'Banion's murder, a Chicago 'L' train can be heard in the background, drowning out the sound of the gunshots. In real life, the 'L' tracks at the time were a full five blocks west of O'Banion's shop. That said, there is an 'L' line that runs past the shop's location at State & Superior, but it's the State Street Subway. |
| 78 | * ArtisticLicenseHistory: For the most part, it's surprisingly averted on a period show where the writers obviously spent time doing the research into 1920s Atlantic City, but there are some exceptions. |
| 79 | ** Much of the first season's plot is driven by the election of 1920 and Nucky's anxiety over the GOP's prospects. In reality, 1920 was a strong Republican year both nationally and in New Jersey, and Atlantic City was a Republican one-party town both in 1920 and for decades thereafter. |
| 80 | ** Big Jim Colosimo was killed in May 1920. In the show, it happens in January. |
| 81 | ** Al Capone's son is portrayed as completely deaf from birth when he actually went partially deaf at age 7. |
| 82 | ** In "Anastasia," Margaret reads newspaper accounts of [[DidAnastasiaSurvive pretender Anna Anderson's claim to be Anastasia Romanov]] a good two years before those claims actually became public. |
| 83 | ** In "Nights in Ballygran", Van Alden writes with an Esterbrook "J" fountain pen, a model not available until the 1940s. Nucky uses a Parker Vacumatic fountain pen, a model not available until 1934. |
| 84 | ** "Georgia Peaches" features a painting of the Divine Mercy by Hyla that wasn't made until 1943. |
| 85 | ** 1943 is also the year in which the lullaby sung by Sigrid the Norwegian nanny in "Two Boats and a Lifeguard" was released. |
| 86 | ** A minor one happens in "21", when Nucky is arrested by the New Jersey State Police. The NJSP was indeed founded in 1921, but the first class of officers didn't graduate until December (the episode takes place in February). |
| 87 | ** In "Bone for Tuna" (1923), Gyp's right hand man Tonino vividly describes ''Film/{{Nosferatu}}'' to his boss. While the film was released in Germany in 1922, it didn't hit the States until 1929 because of its infamous copyright problems. |
| 88 | ** In "The North Star", which takes place in Season 4 (1924), J. Edgar Hoover cites Emma Goldman as an anarchist threat to America. Emma Goldman was deported in 1919 and did not gain re-entry to the USA until 1934. |
| 89 | ** People can be seen eating popcorn in the movie theater scenes. Popcorn wasn't sold in movie theatres until the forties, although they did sell candy. |
| 90 | ** A grand Irish American Society dinner in "Nights in Ballygran" is marked by a performance of the song "Carrickfergus", which is depicted as a song everyone knows the lyrics to. "Carrickfergus" wasn't popularised until the 1960s, in fact the first guy to publish the song says he learned it from Creator/PeterOToole. |
| 91 | * ArtisticLicenseLaw: Mrs. Van Alden files for divorce in a federal court. |
| 92 | * AssholeVictim: |
| 93 | ** Hans Schroeder. He is a violent, abusive alcoholic bastard who hits and mistreats his children and beats his pregnant wife so viciously she suffers a miscarriage. After accusing her of being a whore. And taking the nest egg he'd found out she had, and going off to drink and gamble it away. He's bad enough that Nucky orders a hit on him out of general principles at a time when Nucky was basically just a grafting politician, not a gangster, and definitely not a murderer. |
| 94 | ** Pretty much all the KKK members who met unfortunate endings. |
| 95 | ** The arrogant bully that is poisoned by Willie in a DeadlyPrank in "All In". Willie has clearly entered dark territory, but the audience isn't exactly broken up by the death. |
| 96 | ** In "Eldorado" very few tears were shed by the audience when [[spoiler:Dr. Narcisse]] got gunned down by [[spoiler:Luciano's]] men. |
| 97 | * AsTheGoodBookSays: |
| 98 | ** After Van Alden's TraumaCongaLine leads to him being interrogated by Al Capone for information on O'Banion, Nelson starts muttering an excerpt from the Book of Job under his breath. He makes it clear it doesn't apply directly to him though, saying unlike Job he had "failed to eschew evil." |
| 99 | ** Doctor Narcisse frequently quotes the Bible to make a point and show off his intellect. |
| 100 | * AuthorityInNameOnly: Mayor Bader is just a puppet, which everyone knows. In "Margate Sands", he raises gales of laughter [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptQKhjn0HF8 when he declares]] at a press conference that "Nucky Thompson doesn't run this city -- I do!" In the Season 4 finale "Farewell Daddy Blues," Nucky tells Bader to "get the fuck out" of his own office. Bader does. |
| 101 | * AxCrazy: |
| 102 | ** Benny, the future Bugsy Siegel, is quite unstable. Lucky and Meyer worry about him gunning people down with little cause while on a courier mission. When actually confronted with antagonists, he loses his mind and runs screaming into gunfire, firing wildly. |
| 103 | ** Gyp Rosetti is prone to killing people over minor and even imagined slights. |
| 104 | ** Dean O'Banion likes to abuse his underlings for fun, and gets offended if they don't think it's hilarious. |
| 105 | ** In spite of being a law enforcement officer, Van Alden is prone to murderous rages. |
| 106 | * BadBoss: Van Alden to Sebso, Nucky to Eddie, Madame Jeunet to Margaret, Margaret to Katy and the other girls, Eli to Halloran... they [[ExaggeratedTrope all pale in comparison]] to Gyp Rosetti. |
| 107 | * TheBadGuyWins: Considering everybody is pretty much a VillainProtagonist, this was pretty much inevitable. However, in particular, [[spoiler:Luciano and Lansky succeed forcing Nucky to hand over Atlantic City to them as well as assassinate Marazano, essentially making them the most powerful crime bosses in the United States.]] |
| 108 | * BadGuysPlayPool: |
| 109 | ** Arnold Rothstein is quite the expert. In reality, Rothstein's pool hall exploits inspired the film ''Film/TheHustler1961''. |
| 110 | ** Lucky Luciano's a pretty decent pool player, apparently having picked it up from Rothstein. |
| 111 | * BadassBoast: |
| 112 | ** A quick two sentences from Nucky from "A Dangerous Maid" are all he needs. |
| 113 | ---> '''Nucky''': I will ruin you. All of you. |
| 114 | ** Lucky Luciano delivers one on Rothstein's behalf in "Family Limitation": |
| 115 | --->'''Darmody''': Your Mr. Rothstein don't run this town-\ |
| 116 | '''Luciano''': No. He runs [[BigApplesauce New York]]. Maybe ya heard of it? |
| 117 | ** Rothstein has a menacing one in "The Ivory Tower", exposing his analytic and callous nature. |
| 118 | ---> '''Rothstein''': The moral of this story is that if I'd cause a stranger to choke to death for my own amusement, what do you think I'll do to you if you don't tell me who ordered you to kill Colosimo? |
| 119 | ** Owen gets a two-parter in "A Dangerous Maid". |
| 120 | --->'''Nucky''': What are your talents, Mr. Sleater?\ |
| 121 | '''Owen''': Making people stop.\ |
| 122 | '''Nucky''': Stop what?\ |
| 123 | '''Owen''': Whatever it is you don't want them to be doing. ''(this includes having fingers, an uncharred face, and existing)'' |
| 124 | ** Nucky parting ways with a strong-armed foe in "Margate Sands". |
| 125 | --->'''Nucky''': I see you in Atlantic City again, I'll kill you myself. |
| 126 | ** In "Two Imposters", Nucky sends Eli to cut a deal with Johnny Torrio, and gets someone else... |
| 127 | --->'''Al Capone''': We've been on the road for 18 hours. I need a bath, some chow. And then you and me sit down, and we talk about who dies, eh? |
| 128 | ** Eddie [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5IPhpCpjr8 delivers a bewildering one]] on behalf of Nucky in "Resignation" when mayor Bader doesn't kick-up a cut from an independent construction project. |
| 129 | --->'''Eddie:''' Mr. Thompson is part of everything. He is in the sky and sea. He is in the dreams of children at night. He is all that there is... forever! |
| 130 | ** Al Capone gets another one in "Erlkönig": "Everything that crawls is going to fucking pay" |
| 131 | * BadassBookworm: Doctor Narcisse is an erudite kingpin with surprisingly quick reflexes and isn't afraid to charge after a hit-squad, pistol blazing. |
| 132 | * BaitAndSwitch: |
| 133 | ** An interesting one in "The Ivory Tower". Near the beginning of the episode, Jimmy buys a necklace. Later on, he gives his wife an also expensive bracelet instead of that necklace, so it's already fishy. Then, he can't have sex with her because his son is napping in the same room. He looks frustrated, so he goes to a Broadway rehearsal. Backstage, a great-looking woman is jumping with joy when he sees her, so the audience assumes it's an old flame and Jimmy's there for a booty call. He gives her the necklace from the beginning of the episode. And then it turns out it's his ''mother''. |
| 134 | ** In "21" Mrs. Van Alden is visibly aroused after watching Nelson perform a raid of a restaurant selling illegal liquor. We cut to a shot of a headboard rhythmically pounding...from Nelson testing out the springs by pressing with his hand. However, the scene ends how you think it would. |
| 135 | ** In "Age of Reason", Lucy's water has broken, and we see Van Alden in the hospital, looking like [[PanickyExpectantFather he's shitting a brick with nerves]]. He's allowed into a hospital room...of Clarkson, the Prohibition agent who was burned in Owen's explosion. |
| 136 | ** Nucky, Eli, and Manny Horvitz pull it on Jimmy in "To the Lost": [[spoiler:Manny isn't a prisoner and Eli's really on Nucky's side. Unfortunately, Jimmy [[DrivenToSuicide doesn't care]].]] |
| 137 | ** Manny Horvitz is set for an apparent long arc in the Season 3 premiere, having become an enforcer for Nucky between seasons, and convincing him to let Manny part ways with Mickey and give him his own distillery in exchange for killing a rival. [[spoiler:He is assassinated by Richard Harrow at the end of the episode, just as he opens the door to go looking for that rival.]] |
| 138 | ** Rothstein is mad at Nucky for failing to keep his part of an arrangement and makes another agreement with his rival, Gyp Rosetti. [[spoiler:He's actually giving Rosetti a false sense of security before Rothstein puts a hit out on him.]] |
| 139 | ** "Sunday Best" opens with Eli secretly stashing unseen objects around his yard, looking suspiciously over his shoulder each time. It turns out that they're Easter Eggs. |
| 140 | ** In "Eldorado", Luciano orders a hit on "our friend", leading the audience to believe Nucky is the target. [[spoiler:It's actually Narcisse]]. |
| 141 | * BaitAndSwitchComparison: Judging from [[ToughRoom Nucky's reaction]], this joke wasn't funny even in the 20s; |
| 142 | -->'''[=McCoy=]:''' What's the difference between a catfish and an Italian? One's a filthy, scum-sucking bottom-feeder... and the other's a fish. |
| 143 | * BatmanGambit: [[spoiler:[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMbBSLWtrns The Pinkertons' scheme to wring a confession from Gillian]] required her to fall in love with one of their agents and attempt to comfort him after he seemingly commits a murder by admitting details of a murder she'd committed]]. |
| 144 | * BattleButler: Despite being a NonActionGuy, Nucky's German butler, Eddie Kessler, will defend his employer against all threats, [[spoiler:to the point of shooting one assassin and taking a bullet for him from another]]. |
| 145 | * BattleInTheRain: The finale of season 2. |
| 146 | * BecomingTheMask: When Van Alden skips town with Sigrid, his child's nanny, they pose as husband and wife. After the two-year time skip, they're a legitimate couple. |
| 147 | * BedlamHouse: The insane asylum [[spoiler:Gillian]] ends up in season 5. |
| 148 | * BedmateReveal: |
| 149 | ** [[spoiler:Angela and Mary, the photographer's wife]] in "Home." |
| 150 | ** Lucy and [[spoiler:Van Alden]] at the end of "The Emerald City." |
| 151 | ** Owen and Katy in "Gimcrack and Bunkum." Apparently, she's a screamer. |
| 152 | ** Billie Kent in Nucky's bed at the end of "Resolution". |
| 153 | * BelligerentSexualTension: In season 4, Chalky and Daughter Maitland, the new singer at his club, trade barbs and scowls until it boils over into a SlapSlapKiss. |
| 154 | * BestServedCold: |
| 155 | ** In "The Good Listener", Nucky appears to be recruiting Tonino as an informer on Luciano & Lansky. However, Tonino gets an OhCrap moment when it's pointed out to him that Nucky chose a table under a portrait of Billie Kent, suggesting he was the one who planted the bomb that killed her. [[spoiler:Next time we see him, he's a DeadGuyOnDisplay.]] |
| 156 | ** In season one Nucky humiliated Luciano and Lansky and they never forgave him for that. In season 4, Nucky and Eli humiliated Lansky again (forcing him to kneel before a freshly-dug grave). In season 5, almost 7 years later, they have finally bested Nucky and they make sure to thoroughly humiliate him before [[spoiler:agreeing to let him live in exchange for Nucky killing Maranzano]]. |
| 157 | ** Richard Harrow is devestated by [[spoiler:Angela]]'s death at the hands of [[spoiler:Manny Horvitz]] at the end of "Georgia Peaches". He waits a full year and a half, until the season 3 premiere "Resolution", before he exacts his revenge. |
| 158 | * BettyAndVeronica: Margaret and Lucy for Nucky in Season 1. |
| 159 | * BewareTheNiceOnes: |
| 160 | ** [[spoiler:The Commodore's Maid]] in "Paris Green". |
| 161 | ** Margaret in early season two ("Ourselves Alone" and "Gimcrack and Bunkum" in particular). |
| 162 | ** Sigrid, in "You'd Be Surprised". Poor schmuck just wanted his money back. |
| 163 | ** Richard Harrow is one of the nicest characters on the show. He also happens to have the highest onscreen body count of any individual character. |
| 164 | * BigApplesauce: While most of the action takes place in Atlantic City, New York is a major part of the show. Arnold Rothstein, Joe Masseria, Lucky Luciano, and Meyer Lansky make their home in NYC. Lampshaded when Rothstein has a rare moment of anger after Gyp Rosetti wipes out a convoy of Nucky's men who were transporting liquor to Rothstein in Manhattan. |
| 165 | -->'''Rothstein:''' And now, owing to your own inability to manage your own affairs in New Jersey, a state I have little interest in or affection for, you expect me to start a war? In New York? Where things ''actually matter?'' |
| 166 | * BigBad |
| 167 | ** Season 1: The D'Alessio Brothers |
| 168 | ** Season 2: The Commodore [[spoiler:is a subversion. Jimmy ends up being the main villain of the season.]] |
| 169 | ** Season 3: Gyp Rosetti, the most clear cut example of the series. |
| 170 | ** Season 4: A BigBadEnsemble of Dr. Narcisse and Agent Knox. |
| 171 | ** Season 5: Charlie Luciano and Meyer Lansky. |
| 172 | * BigDamnHeroes: [[spoiler:Eli and Capone at the end of "Two Imposters".]] |
| 173 | * BigScrewedUpFamily: The Darmodys; Gillian, an orphan StreetUrchin raped by Jimmy's father, the sociopathic Commodore, has been a BrokenBird for most of her life, becomes a drug addict, [[spoiler:begins an affair with a doppelganger of her son before murdering him, and is finally locked in a lunatic asylum]]. Jimmy could have had a normal life, but he became a shell of a man after returning from the war and his life is repeatedly screwed up by his own mother, [[ParentalIncest even literally]]. [[spoiler:Jimmy's son, Tommy, runs away from a potentially happy life with his adoptive mother to become a public murderer]]. |
| 174 | * BilingualBonus: Rothstein goes by the alias "Redstone" when investing. "Redstone" is an English translation of his real name. |
| 175 | * BilingualDialogue: During a business meeting, Lucky Luciano mutters an offhand comment in Yiddish to Meyer Lansky, who responds in Italian, showing their close relationship in spite of their different ethnic backgrounds. |
| 176 | * BlackAndGrayMorality: Nucky is a corrupt politician and "half a gangster", but he has generally progressive attitudes and is a nice person to those who don't interfere in his business. Van Alden is a federal agent enforcing the law, but he is clearly deranged. Prohibition, the law Nucky's flouting and Van Alden is enforcing, is seen by posterity as a terrible idea. The conflict between these two would normally give this series GreyAndGrayMorality. However, certain characters such as Arnold Rothstein and Gyp Rosetti serve to remind us that gangsters can certainly get a hell of a lot worse and a hell of a lot more unscrupulous than Nucky, significantly darkening this particular shade of conflict. The only "good" main character is Margaret, but her close association with Nucky and the power-by-proxy she gets a chance to wield send her on her own trip towards the middle of the morality scale. |
| 177 | -->'''Nucky''': We all have to decide how much sin we can live with. |
| 178 | * BlatantLies: |
| 179 | ** When Gyp Rosetti begins to take over Tabor Heights, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QS8lbfHUI3Q he claims to be D.L. Collingsworth]], a proprietor whose family goes way back, slept with UsefulNotes/GeorgeWashington and everything. Naturally, his gas station is out of gas. Seriously. That stuff coming out of the pumps? Nothing of importance. Owen can't keep a straight face and demands Rosetti drop the false pretenses. |
| 180 | ** When Nucky goes into hiding during a MobWar, a MediaScrum pesters the mayor about where he is. Bader's response that "Nucky Thompson does not control this city, I do!" is met with a [[{{Beat}} brief]] StunnedSilence, and then gales of laughter. |
| 181 | * BloodyHandprint: On the window of [[spoiler:Maranzano]]'s office when he's assassinated. |
| 182 | * BodyguardBetrayal: In "Two Imposters" [[spoiler:Gyp Rosetti's men are able to get to Nucky's hotel suite]] because one of the men guarding Nucky sold him out. Eddie warned him of exactly that possibility just a few minutes earlier because he correctly realized that none of the bodyguards had a personal loyalty to Nucky. In the very next episode, [[spoiler:Nucky gets his own back, by sending Gyp's right hand Tonino to literally stab him in the back.]] |
| 183 | * BondageIsBad: The violent thug Gyp Rosetti is into [[EroticAsphyxiation erotic self-asphyxiation]]. The season 3 finale makes it clear that he's a submissive. |
| 184 | * BondOneLiner: |
| 185 | ** A truly groanworthy one courtesy of Chalky White, following a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown on Dunn B. Purnsley. |
| 186 | -->'''Chalky:''' Purnsley be ''done''. |
| 187 | ** The assassination attempt on Manny Horvitz in season 2 has a visual one. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xzr7P9ZmIQ After Manny kills the assassin]] by sinking a meat cleaver into his head, the camera pans to show a sign behind Manny reading "FRESH KILLED MEAT". |
| 188 | * BookedFullOfMooks: When Chalky is stuck in a crowded jail cell, a fellow inmate named Purnsley keeps getting on his case, psyching himself up for a fight. Chalky eventually decides he's had enough, and he turns and addresses all the other inmates by name, revealing he's either employed or done favors for all of them. Purnsley has just enough time to realize his mistake before they beat the hell out of him. |
| 189 | * BookEnds: Gyp Rosetti's first introduced on a beach, and his death happens at a beach. |
| 190 | * BoomHeadshot: At least once an episode, typically. |
| 191 | %%* BrainlessBeauty: Lucy. |
| 192 | * BreakTheHaughty: Dunn Purnsley. It works, too, considering that in "Battle of the Century", Purnsley has become Chalky's right hand man. |
| 193 | * BrickJoke: In the second season, interim treasurer James Neary tries to convince the other aldermen (Fleming, O'Neill and Boyd) to side against Nucky saying that whoever refuses will be lucky if he ends cleaning the Boardwalk with a broom and a dustpan. Fast forward to Season 3's "Resolution", where we see briefly alderman Boyd, [[spoiler:the only survivor of the three aldermen that betrayed Nucky]], cleaning the Boardwalk with a broom and a dustpan as a delivery boy is running coffee and bagels to a rundown house where Nucky and his men are interrogating a thief caught stealing from one of Mickey's warehouses. |
| 194 | * BriefAccentImitation: Gyp's VillainousBreakdown at the end of Season 3 manifests itself in a pretty good Nucky Thompson imitation. |
| 195 | * BringMyBrownPants: |
| 196 | ** Willie poisons the hooch of the class bully, causing him to crap his pants and [[spoiler:later die]]. |
| 197 | ** Van Alden needs a men's room after nearly being executed by Al Capone, because he may have soiled himself. |
| 198 | * BrooklynRage: Al Capone is one of the most famous examples of this trope. Gyp Rosetti is a textbook example as well. |
| 199 | * BrutalBrawl: The fight scenes in the show are this. Nobody uses martial arts, the characters TrashTheSet around them and use {{Improvised Weapon}}s. A special mention goes to the fight between [[spoiler:Eli and Agent Knox]] in the season 4 finale. |
| 200 | * TheBrute: |
| 201 | ** Charlie "Lucky" Luciano ([[NotSoHarmlessVillain at this point in time anyway]]) serves as the hot-tempered and less than prudent right hand of Rothstein, though his higher aspirations quickly become apparent. |
| 202 | ** Chalky White is a ScaryBlackMan. [[TheDragon Dunn Purnsley]] is his ''scarier'' right hand. |
| 203 | * BulletproofHumanShield: Gyp Rosetti uses [[spoiler:a naked woman to shield himself from Bugsy's bullet]]. |
| 204 | * BullyHunter: Al Capone turns into one of these, at least for an episode, after his son gets bullied in school and he's unable to help. He transfers his rage onto a rival gangster who attacked his associate, delivering a fatal NoHoldsBarredBeatdown and announcing to the spectators that it was for picking on people who can't defend themselves. |
| 205 | * BullyingADragon: |
| 206 | ** Dunn Purnsley to Chalky White when they're locked up together. |
| 207 | ** Jimmy knows how brutal and unforgiving Manny Horvitz can be, but he still reneges on a debt he owes Manny and then [[spoiler:betrays Manny to Waxey Gordon]]. Jimmy should have known better but Manny kept treating Jimmy like a kid and the lecturing got on Jimmy's nerves. |
| 208 | ** Gyp Rosetti gives an insulting TheReasonYouSuckSpeech to a group of powerful and established gangsters. Pragmatic businessmen as they are, they don't escalate the conflict. [[StepfordSmiler Rothstein]], who gets described as a "smug kike midget creeping around like a fuckin' dentist with the ether," just smiles at the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJT3xZ9C5Ew tirade]]. [[spoiler:Rosetti later tries to ally with Rothstein, who betrays him. Some people don't forget, it seems]]. |
| 209 | ** Dickie and his wife seduce, trap and abuse Dunn Purnsley, Chalky's chief enforcer. |
| 210 | ** Three of Nelson's former coworkers, armed with a single blackjack, attack him in an alley in revenge for burning one of them with an iron and laying waste to their office. They all get shot for their efforts. |
| 211 | * TheButcher: Manny Horvitz is literally a kosher butcher, but he's also a vicious gangster. He's shown combining the two when he beats up a treacherous subordinate and leaves him tied upside down to a meat hook for further interrogation. He doesn't kill the guy himself though, since that wouldn't be kosher. He leaves that to Jimmy, a non-believer. |
| 212 | * TheButlerDidIt: Played completely straight with [[spoiler:Louanne's slow poisoning of The Commodore.]] Being that this is a DeadUnicornTrope (and suspicion thrown on Gillian), it plays more like a [[SubvertedTrope subversion]] of expectation. |
| 213 | * ButNotTooBlack: |
| 214 | ** It's pointed out that despite Chalky's "Onyx Club" being billed as a negro club, he only hires light-skinned dancers for the sake of the mostly white clientele. |
| 215 | ** Dunn Purnsley compliments Chalky's "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_yellow yellow]]" wife. Chalky was born to humble origins and has a much darker skin tone than his erudite wife, who has the light skin to match her station. |
| 216 | * ButtMonkey: |
| 217 | ** Lucky Luciano gets it in the first season, almost to HumiliationConga proportions. |
| 218 | ** Mickey Doyle is one to everyone. People mock him and call him stupid right to his face, but so far he's [[KarmaHoudini survived them all]]. Until his luck runs out with two episodes to go in season 5. |
| 219 | ** Eddie is one for Nucky, who seems to think that he's earned the right by protecting him during the Great War. |
| 220 | * ByronicHero: Jimmy Darmody, to a T. |
| 221 | * CallBack: |
| 222 | ** In season two's "Ourselves Alone", Margaret borrows a maid's clothes, dresses much like she did in the pilot, and coaxes her way into Nucky's office with a story much like the one she told in the pilot. She does this to rescue some cash and incriminating documents from the cops that are searching through Nucky's things. |
| 223 | ** In Season 1, Nucky tells Margaret the story of how he lost his baseball glove as a boy to illustrate what a monster his father was. In Season 2's "Two Boats and a Lifeguard", the episode in which Papa Thompson dies, Nucky has a disturbing dream that features the glove. He also says the line, "Daddy eats first," the same his father said him when he scarred his hand as a child. |
| 224 | ** The scene where people discover Jim Neary's "suicide" in season 2 is strongly reminiscent of the one where people discovered [[spoiler:Pearl]]'s in season 1, screaming woman and all. |
| 225 | ** Early in season 1, there are several moments where Jimmy looks distressed as the audience hears sounds of an oncoming train. In "Under God's Power She Flourishes," this is explained as [[spoiler:the remembering of a very traumatic event, for a nearby train shook the room when a drunken Jimmy was seduced by his mother]]. |
| 226 | ** In season one's "A Return to Normalcy", one of Richard Harrow's victims opens the door to be greeted with a shotgun blast to the face. In season three's "Resolution", [[spoiler:Manny Horvitz]] goes the very same way. |
| 227 | ** In season 3's "Resolution" we get a shot of an errand boy's legs as he climbs the stairs to serve coffee to Nucky. Four episodes later, a similar shot shows a paperboy's legs (actually a young Bugsy Siegel) as he climbs the stairs to Gyp Rosetti's hotel room [[spoiler:to kill him on Nucky's orders.]] |
| 228 | ** In "Friendless Child," Lansky tells Nucky to get on his knees, then sneers, "Now you know how it feels." This is a callback to "White Horse Pike", when Nucky and Eli had Lansky on his knees, and seasons earlier, "The Emerald City", when Chalky and Nucky did the same. |
| 229 | ** The robbery that Van Alden and Eli commit to get Capone's collection in on time is almost identical to the Woods Massacre by Jimmy and Al in the premiere episode, with two brigands getting the drop on a group of well armed men, and then a surprise triggering the frantic gunning down of the victims. The ever-present sound of a passing train is thrown in for good measure. |
| 230 | ** In the finale [[spoiler:Tommy shoots Nucky in the face the same way he shot Jimmy.]] |
| 231 | * CallForward: |
| 232 | ** From "Hold Me in Paradise": "A fortune-teller told me he would [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_G._Harding#Trip_to_Alaska_and_death die in office."]] |
| 233 | ** One of the plot threads of Season 4 is Rothstein's gambling habit and his predilection for running up huge debts at cards. In RealLife Arnold Rothstein was murdered in 1928 over an unpaid gambling debt. |
| 234 | * CallingTheOldManOut: |
| 235 | ** Richard does this for Julia, telling off her drunken father for being such a dick to her. |
| 236 | ** Nucky does it in the Old Man's funeral, no less. |
| 237 | * CameraAbuse: Blood spatters the screen more than once in the pilot. |
| 238 | * CantGetAwayWithNuthin: Van Alden, [[spoiler:dismissed from the feds and hating his new job]], poor, and bullied at work, finally succumbs to an invitation to a speakeasy in order to curry favour with his colleagues. He's spent about five minutes in there, not touching a drop, when he has a drink spilled over him and decides to leave. And ''that's'' the moment the place gets raided. |
| 239 | * CartwrightCurse: Eddie Cantor has started warning showgirls off dating Nucky after it didn't exactly turn out well for Lucy or Billie. Or his first wife, for that matter. |
| 240 | ** [[spoiler:Season 5 sees Sally join the dead girlfriends club too.]] |
| 241 | * CastingCouch: Referenced in season four, when Nucky takes home an actress who's only interested in getting a role out of Nucky and insinuates that Billie Kent did the same. [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome It doesn't work out for her]]. |
| 242 | * TheCastShowOff: |
| 243 | ** Anthony Laciura, who plays Eddie, is an opera singer, and in "What Does the Bee Do", Eddie sings beautifully at a birthday party, although [[HookersAndBlow given what else was going on]], the guests probably weren't paying too much attention. |
| 244 | ** In "Sunday Best", Nucky performs an egg juggling routine. The trope is averted immediately afterwards by Margaret, who performs a spirited but amateur rendition of "I'll Tell Me Ma." |
| 245 | * TheChainsOfCommanding |
| 246 | * ChargeIntoCombatCut: Jimmy's ''Series/{{Blackadder}}''-style flashback to going [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI over the top]] [[spoiler:during his death scene]], implying that he essentially "died" in the trenches and was never going to make anything of himself after the war. |
| 247 | * ChekhovsGun: |
| 248 | ** Jimmy's combat knife, which we see early in "Family Limitation" as he slides it into a special holster in his boot, is a ChekhovsBoomerang. He later [[spoiler:sneaks it into a meeting with local crime boss Sheridan, but it's discovered as he's reaching for it. Then it turns out this was just a distraction from the real plan to take out Sheridan with guns that they've smuggled in.]] It also appears again in "A Return to Normalcy" when [[spoiler:Jimmy uses it to slit the throat of the eldest D'Alessio while he's getting a haircut]]. It appears again in "Two Boats and a Lifeguard", when Jimmy and Richard [[spoiler:scalp Parkhurst]], and finally, in "Under God's Power She Flourishes" when Jimmy uses it to [[spoiler:kill the Commodore]]. |
| 249 | ** In "Two Boats and a Lifeguard", Nucky visits a National Guard armory and is told that they have three thousand surplus Thompson submachineguns stored in the basement. At the end of the episode [[spoiler:Nucky is making deals with the IRA]]. |
| 250 | ** Agent Sebso comments on his new shoes in "Paris Green" and takes them off before getting into the water. Some time later, [[spoiler:the priest performing the baptisms returns with the shoes to act as a witness of Sebso's murder.]] |
| 251 | ** The Commodore was apparently practising with Chekhov's Spear; the pike he is seen using in "21" comes back with a vengeance in "Under God's Power She Flourishes", when [[spoiler:he defends Gillian against Jimmy with it, stabbing him in the back of his shoulder. Jimmy gains control of it and uses his army knife to kill him.]] |
| 252 | ** The insurance policies that Rothstein had the D'Alessio Brothers, and more importantly, Mickey Doyle, sign are also used in "Under God's Power She Flourishes". Luciano reminds Mickey that there is very little reason to keep Mickey alive, as dead, Luciano and Rothstein can split the half-million. Mickey begins to plot accordingly. Then three seasons later, Rothstein tries to convince Nucky to let him kill Mickey for the insurance. |
| 253 | ** In "Battle of the Century" there is a long, lingering shot of Manny Horvitz's meat cleaver collection, conveniently embedded in a chopping block near the door. Right before Manny uses one of said cleavers to kill a would-be assassin. |
| 254 | ** The bad state of roads in New Jersey is mentioned from time to time in seasons 1 and 2. In season 2, Nucky engages in a crooked land deal that will make him a fortune when a new road is finally built. In season 3, the fact that there is only one decent road between Atlantic City and New York is the source of a massive problem for Nucky when Gyp Rosetti takes over Tabor Heights, the location of the only major gas station on the coast route, and starts to ambush Nucky's delivery trucks. |
| 255 | ** The dog Rosetti gives to Margaret ends up acting as a distraction when [[spoiler:Rosetti's men come to kill Nucky in his hotel suite]]. |
| 256 | ** When he's first introduced, Richard Harrow rattles off his impressive collection of guns. In season 3, we finally see [[LockAndLoadMontage them all assembled on his bed]]. Shortly thereafter [[spoiler:he stages a one-man assault on Gyp Rosetti's hideout armed with a rifle, shotgun and several handguns]]. |
| 257 | ** Jimmy chews gum constantly throughout the pilot episode, something he does rarely, if ever, thereafter. During the Woods Massacre, when one of the hijackers blows the brains off a man in hiding, we aren't sure whether it's Jimmy or Al... until we see the bottom of his mask shift and bob conspicuously before he removes it and we see Jimmy; thus putting the audience on notice that the protagonist is not the sympathetic, ThouShaltNotKill type. |
| 258 | ** In fourth-season finale "Farewell Daddy Blues", one of Eli's daughters is shown playing a musical saw. That saw later gets used as a weapon in Eli's brutal fight with Agent Knox/Tolliver. |
| 259 | * ChekhovsGunman: The new kid, Joe Harper, who is recruited as a general factotum by Mickey Doyle in the fifth season? Seems to be getting an awful lot of screen time for some nobody we've never met before... [[spoiler:Of course, it's Tommy Darmody, all grown up and out to avenge his family by killing Nucky.]] |
| 260 | * ChronicBackstabbingDisorder: Several characters, but Mickey Doyle in particular. |
| 261 | * CircleOfShame: Van Alden hitting his RageBreakingPoint at Faraday is immediately preceded by several grotesque closeups of the laughing colleagues surrounding him on all sides. |
| 262 | * ClickHello: ''Margaret'', of all people, in "Gimcrack and Bunkum", breaks up Nucky and Eli's fight by putting a shotgun to Eli's head. |
| 263 | * ClosestThingWeGot: Not used in dialogue, but otherwise played straight when the feds burst through a dentist's door, in order to [[spoiler:wake up and interrogate a dying, unconscious man]]. |
| 264 | * CloudCuckooLander: ''Nucky'', of all people, in "The Milkmaid's Lot", following an explosion that gave him a severe concussion. It's actually quite depressing. |
| 265 | * ClusterFBomb: Nearly every character seems to really fuckin' enjoy their blue language, but the fuckin' Commodore takes the fuckin' cake. |
| 266 | * CoitusUninterruptus: In "Blue Bell Boy", Katy answers the phone while having sex with Owen. |
| 267 | * ColdBloodedTorture: Chalky dishes out some {{Fingore}} on a KKK wizard, Van Alden is not above performing some OpenHeartDentistry, and Manny Horvitz likes to hang traitors upside down in his meat locker. |
| 268 | -->'''Chalky''' ''[after torturing a KKK leader]'' There comes a time where if a man is still sticking to his story, he's telling you the truth. We past that point about 10 minutes ago. |
| 269 | * ColdSniper: Richard Harrow. Made a Cold Sniper and a ShellShockedVeteran as well by his horrific experiences in The Great War. |
| 270 | -->'''Richard:''' ''[discussing possible ways to locate and eliminate the D'Alessio brothers]'' I could kill their mother. The sisters. And the dentist [''a civilian brother'']. That would make them stick their heads up. |
| 271 | * ComicallyMissingThePoint: When a bootlegger talks about a booby trap that he installed at his liquor warehouse, Warren Knox starts to warn him that booby traps are illegal. [[spoiler:It turns out it was all an act]]. |
| 272 | * CompositeCharacter: |
| 273 | ** In Season 1 we meet [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nan_Britton Nan Britton]], one of US President UsefulNotes/WarrenGHarding's mistresses. She reads a poem that Harding actually wrote for one of his mistresses, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Phillips Carrie Phillips]]. Also like Phillips, the character is quietly moved out of town in order to avoid a scandal until the presidential election is over. |
| 274 | ** Season 2 brings IRA big-shot John [=McGarrigle=]. While his name and eventual fate indicate a loose inspiration on RealLife Irish leader [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_McGarry SeĂ¡n McGarry]], his introduction as a funding collector in the States and his mannerisms and strict Catholic doctrine remind more of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eamon_De_Valera Éamon de Valera]], to whom actor Ted Rooney also happens to have some physical resemblance too. |
| 275 | * ConfessToALesserCrime: Eli and Van Alden are caught trying to steal Capone's ledgers to give to the FBI; the only plausible cover they can come up with is that they were trying to steal Capone's money. (This is still a "lesser" crime but not by much; Capone eventually sees through the lie but it's questionable whether they would have survived even if he hadn't.) |
| 276 | * {{Confessional}}: Margaret uses them in "The Age of Reason" and "To the Lost". |
| 277 | * TheConsigliere: Jimmy seeks the advice and counsel of the Commodore's old lawyer Leander Whitlock. |
| 278 | * ConsummateLiar: Honesty is a dangerous commodity for gangsters. For Nucky it comes with the job description, he is a master of the BastardlySpeech who can be defending the Black community and demonizing it in the next phrase thanks to [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGRepRsNH24 the montage]]. Gaston Means is even more successful, as he goes through life [[PlayingBothSides outlying everybody]]. |
| 279 | * ContinuityPorn: "Under God's Power She Flourishes". It's as if the entire episode was written to brush aside the headscratchers collected since the first season. |
| 280 | * ContrastingSequelAntagonist: Each season, the main antagonistic force has a completely different flavor to what came before. |
| 281 | ** Season 1 is the D'Alessio Brothers (backed by [[TheManBehindTheMan Arnold Rothstein]]). They're [[StarterVillain Starter Villains]] who are easily defeated when Nucky forms a truce with Rothstein. |
| 282 | ** Season 2 is a BigBadEnsemble of The Commodore, Jimmy Darmody and Eli Thompson, with a deeper focus on their personal histories with Nucky. Jimmy functions like an AntagonisticOffspring to Nucky while Eli and Nucky have a CainAndAbel dynamic. |
| 283 | ** Season 3 is Gyp Rosetti, an AxCrazy gangster who can't be negotiated with and can only be defeated through a MobWar. |
| 284 | ** Season 4 is a BigBadEnsemble of SinisterMinister Doctor Narcisse and RabidCop Agent Knox. In contrast to the preceding seasons, neither poses a direct threat to Nucky and instead they only indirectly threaten him by targeting his allies (Chalky and Eli, respectively). |
| 285 | ** Season 5 is Meyer Lansky, Lucky Luciano and Bugsy Siegel. They are the only villains (other than Rothstein as TheManBehindTheMan in Season 1) who are [[HistoricalDomainCharacter Historical Domain Characters]] throughout the series, and naturally they are destined to be SavedByCanon. |
| 286 | * ContrivedCoincidence: Van Alden happens to walk into the flower shop owned by Dean O'Banion just as Al Capone is about to kill O'Banion. O'Banion uses this to bluff Capone into leaving. Van Alden thus finds himself at the very beginning of what would become Chicago's most infamous MobWar. |
| 287 | * CoolCar: Nucky's blue Rolls Royce heralds his presence wherever he goes. The high profile of the vehicle [[DeconstructedTrope becomes a liability]] from time to time when Nucky needs discretion. |
| 288 | * CoolOldGuy: |
| 289 | ** The Commodore is still able to lift a giant elephant tusk over his head, which a man half his age couldn't do. |
| 290 | %%%%%Whitlock. Helps that he's played by [[Series/TheSopranos Dominic "Uncle Junior" Chianese]]. |
| 291 | * TheCoronerDothProtestTooMuch: Several times. Gillian is used to it. |
| 292 | ** It's lampshaded that it cost a lot of money to get the coroner to put down "natural causes" for [[spoiler:The Commodore. Understandably, since he had two knife wounds in his chest.]] |
| 293 | ** Gillian apparently had to pay again for [[spoiler:the guy she drugged, killed, and tried to pass off as Jimmy]] to be declared dead of "accidental drowning". |
| 294 | * CorruptPolitician: The series is built on these. |
| 295 | -->'''Nucky:''' The first rule of politics, kiddo: Never let the truth get in the way of a good story. |
| 296 | * CountryMatters: |
| 297 | ** In "Family Limitation", Margaret resorts to it after Lucy can't comprehend her analogy of Nucky's loss of interest in Lucy as mistress to a piano-playing rooster. |
| 298 | ** In "Gimcrack and Bumkun", Nucky refers to Gillian as a "conniving cunt". |
| 299 | * CourtroomEpisode: "To the Lost". Cut incredibly short by the metric ton of CourtroomAntics dropped at the very start of the trial - [[spoiler:Neary having "[[NeverSuicide committed suicide]]", everyone else having been intimidated by that into recanting their testimonies, van Alden on the run for murder, and Margaret suddenly ''[[SpousalPrivilege married to the defendant]]''.]] |
| 300 | * CoverInnocentEyesAndEars: In "Broadway Limited", Van Alden and Sebso burst into a dentist's office, in order to wake up and interrogate a dying, unconscious man by giving him cocaine. The man does wake up, but when Van Alden tries to interrogate him, he curses at him in Yiddish. A Jewish woman who was in the office with her son reacts with covering his ears. When Van Alden starts torturing the man, she covers the boy's eyes. |
| 301 | * CowboyCop: Van Alden. However, this is not out of a sense of moral righteousness, but out of a personal vendetta against Thompson. |
| 302 | * CrazyPrepared: |
| 303 | ** Arnold Rothstein has his employees take out life insurance policies with himself as the beneficiary, causing him to profit from their actions no matter what happens. |
| 304 | ** Bill Fallon, Rothstein's lawyer, has a drawer full of baseballs signed by Ty Cobb, in case any clients show an interest. |
| 305 | * CreatorThumbprint: Producer Terrence Winter wrote and Steve Buscemi directed one of the most acclaimed episodes of ''Series/TheSopranos'', [[Recap/TheSopranosS3E11PineBarrens "Pine Barrens"]]. You can definitely see this reflected in all of the scenes of intrigue that this series features in the same location. The very first episode seems particularly reflective of the influence, as it similarly features a criminal who against all odds, remains NotQuiteDead. |
| 306 | * CrimeAfterCrime: Van Alden flees to Chicago and assumes a fake identity when [[spoiler:his murder of Sebso]] is uncovered. When his new wife suspects that his MysteriousPast has caught up with him, she [[spoiler:gets a baseball bat and clubs the guy half to death... although while she was out of the room, Van Alden had found out he was really an irate customer who bought a faulty iron off him. He survives the battering, but they decide to finish him off so the cops won't take an interest and discover who he is. This means then ending up having to become a mob enforcer for Dean O'Banion and owing a debt to him.]] |
| 307 | * CriminalProcedural: Hardcore, organized crime flavor. The series explores the criminal ventures and opportunities opened in the wake of the Volstead Act in New Jersey, New York and Chicago. |
| 308 | * CutPhoneLines: When [[spoiler:Gyp Rosetti's men attack Nucky in his hotel suite]] they first cut the phone lines. It gives [[spoiler:Nucky and Eddie]] a few minutes of advanced warning and probably saves their lives. |
| 309 | * CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: Eddie Kessler, Nucky's bumbling assistant is often treated as a ButtMonkey by Nucky and the other gangsters. However, he risks his life twice to successfully protect Nucky when assassins come after him. Eventually Nucky realizes that he shouldn't take him for granted. |
| 310 | * DadTheVeteran: Julia's father is a ShellShockedVeteran and TheAlcoholic. Also Jimmy's father, the Commodore. |
| 311 | * DamnItFeelsGoodToBeAGangster |
| 312 | * TheDandy: Nucky wears very colorful suits through the series. At the end of the third season, he starts wearing more somber outfits and discards his lapel flower to avoid getting noticed. |
| 313 | * DangerouslyCloseShave: In the season 1 finale, Jimmy kills Leo D'Alessio by slitting his throat while he's having a shave at the barber's. |
| 314 | * DarkestHour: The final episodes of season 3 for Nucky Thompson; [[spoiler:he loses his dragon, the other gangsters deny him any support in his war against Rosetti-Masseria and Nucky has to go on the run when Rosetti [[AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs assaults his HQ at the Ritz]], plundering Nucky's desk as a [[BattleTrophy war trophy]] to make a point about the ownership of the city. When all seems lost, Chalky and Al Capone level the odds and Nucky outmanoeuvres everybody.]] |
| 315 | * DatedHistory: Inverted. The show presents Nan Britton's claim that Warren G. Harding was the father of her child as true, even though the historical consensus at the time was that he wasn't. However, DNA testing done in 2015 proved that she was telling the truth. |
| 316 | * TheDeadHaveNames: |
| 317 | ** Jimmy reads off the names of Atlantic County's WWI fallen at a memorial dedication ceremony in "Gimcrack & Bunkum". |
| 318 | ** In season 1 Jimmy is visibly pissed when people refer to Pearl as "the whore." |
| 319 | * DeadGuyOnDisplay: In the second episode of season 5, [[spoiler:Tonino Sandrelli]] (implied to be the guy who set the bomb that blew up Babette's on Rosetti's orders) is dumped on Meyer Lansky's doorstep with his throat cut, [[CreepySouvenir an ear sliced off]], and a "Greetings from Havana" postcard pinned to him with a knife, just in case they were wondering who sent the message. |
| 320 | * DeadlyPrank: Will Thompson feeds an obnoxious college student milk of magnesia in "All In" in order to induce diarrhoea. It kills him. |
| 321 | * DeadpanSnarker: |
| 322 | ** Nucky has a clever quip for just about any situation. |
| 323 | ** The new Federal prosecutor assigned to Nucky's case, Esther Randolph. |
| 324 | ** Margaret also has her moments. |
| 325 | ** Rothstein has them too, usually at the expense of one of his employees. |
| 326 | * DeathByDisfigurement: Pearl shoots herself a few days after having her face slashed, due to the fact her scar renders her unemployable by the brothel. |
| 327 | * DeathByFlashback: We suddenly get a lot of insight into [[spoiler:Jimmy]]'s backstory in the couple of episodes before his death. The same also happens to [[spoiler:Nucky throughout the final season.]] |
| 328 | * DeathByIrony: [[spoiler:Maranzano, who idolised Julius Caesar, is betrayed and murdered by a gang of men with knives.]] Given it was arranged by Nucky, who'd earlier pointed out the irony of [[spoiler:modelling your career on a man who was stabbed in the back]], this was almost certainly intentional. |
| 329 | * DeathByRacism: |
| 330 | ** In "Gimcrack and Bunkum", Jackson Parkhurst, one of the Atlantic City bigwigs who insulted Jimmy and hit him with his cane also is shown bragging about his military experience which consisted of slaughtering Native Americans (about whom he makes racist comments). At the end of the episode [[KarmicDeath Jimmy and Richard scalp him]]. |
| 331 | ** The Klansmen who shoot up Chalky's distillery and kill three of his people in the Season 2 premiere meet an ugly end in the season finale. |
| 332 | ** When Mrs. Pastor ponders the loaded suggestion of Dr. Narcisse about lynching Purnsley, the men of the good doctor lynch her instead. |
| 333 | * DeathGlare: Chalky almost always wears a long-faced scowl. After aiming his death glare at a soulful singer with whom he has disagreed, his expression notably softens, revealing the [[BelligerentSexualTension sexual tension beneath the belligerence]]. |
| 334 | * DeceasedFallGuyGambit: Done in the pilot, and numerous times afterward. |
| 335 | * DecoyProtagonist: [[spoiler:Jimmy turns out to be this after two seasons as the show's co-lead along with Nucky.]] |
| 336 | * DeadlyBath: |
| 337 | ** [[spoiler:Gillian kills Roger in a bathtub in a perverse effort to gain closure for Jimmy's death.]] |
| 338 | ** [[TheHunterBecomesTheHunted Inverted]] offscreen during an attempt on [[spoiler:Masseria's]] life at a Turkish bath. [[spoiler:Owen]] discusses it as the perfect place for a sneak attack, but he gets killed instead. |
| 339 | * DefeatMeansFriendship: Dunn Purnsley is given a severe beatdown for taunting Chalky in jail. Episodes later, he makes a surprising comeback as Chalky's right hand man. Subverted in that this newfound loyalty wears thin by the start of season 4. |
| 340 | * DeliveryGuyInfiltration: Rothstein's plan to off Gyp Rosetti in Season 3. It involves Bugsy Siegel entering the house posing as a delivery boy with a package for Rosetti, while Rosetti is in the midst of some BDSM. He fails to kill Rosetti (who used the woman he was getting BDSM from as a HumanShield), but does end up killing four of Rosetti's men. |
| 341 | * DemocracyIsBad: A thought consistently expressed by many of the powerful characters, with some [[DemocracyIsFlawed room for reform]]. Nucky made a living by exploiting and invoking it before becoming a gangster; his agenda could be summed up as "not voting Republican is worse". |
| 342 | * DemotedToExtra: Several characters suffer this. |
| 343 | ** Van Alden is arguably the best example, going from being in nearly every episode and being one of the show's most central characters to appearing in only half or less of the episodes of seasons 3 and 4. |
| 344 | ** Margaret gets it even worse in season 4, appearing in only 4 episodes. Lucky Luciano is also knocked down to 4 episodes. Many of the recurring characters make more appearances than either of them in season 4. |
| 345 | ** Willie and Dr. Narcisse both get this pretty badly in season 5 after both having had huge roles in season 4. Most likely this was due to the reduced 8 episode order for the season. |
| 346 | * DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment: "Two Imposters" |
| 347 | -->'''Gillian''': What an unexpected surprise.\ |
| 348 | '''Gyp''': Ain't all surprises unexpected? |
| 349 | * DescriptionCut: |
| 350 | -->'''Eddie Kessler''': (to Margaret) Nucky is a very nice man.\ |
| 351 | '''Nucky''': (to Luciano) You tryin' to sass me, you greasy cocksucker? |
| 352 | ** The beginning of "Margate Sands" mixes a bloody MobWar and the [[BlatantLies reassuring words]] of [[AuthorityInNameOnly Mayor Ed Bader]] about everything being under control in Atlantic City. |
| 353 | -->'''Ed Bader:''' Let's get something straight, [[BlatantLies Nucky Thompson doesn't run this city. I do!]]\ |
| 354 | ''[After a long beat, all the reporters immediately break out in laughter]'' |
| 355 | * DestroyTheAbusiveHome: Nucky sets his childhood house on fire in "Home". The idea that this is an end to anything is subverted by the act that it seems to [[spoiler:trigger Teddy's later obsession with fire.]] |
| 356 | * TheDeterminator: Meyer reveals that he repeatedly refused to give up his lunch money to Lucky's childhood gang despite getting a beating each time. [[DefeatEqualsFriendship This is how he met and earned the respect of Lucky.]] |
| 357 | * {{Deuteragonist}}: Jimmy in the first two seasons, Chalky in season 4. |
| 358 | * DidntThinkThisThrough: Nelson and Eli go over their half-assed plan to steal the incriminating ledgers from Capone while standing outside Capone's office. As the glaring holes in their plan become apparent, Van Alden growls, "This has not been thought through." |
| 359 | * DirtyCop: The rule rather than the exception. |
| 360 | ** Everyone in the Atlantic City PD, apparently, including Sheriff Eli Thompson. |
| 361 | ** Agent Sebso is a Dirty Prohibition Agent. |
| 362 | ** Another prohibition agent, Stan Sawicki is on Nucky's payroll. |
| 363 | ** The Tabor Heights police. The local sheriff is bribed to look the other way when Nucky's trucks stop for gas. After Gyp Rosetti takes control of the town, Nucky discovers that rather than avenge the death of their former sheriff, they simply are intimidated into taking Rosetti's side. The new sheriff switches allegiance back to Nucky, though, after Rosetti's forced to return to New York. |
| 364 | ** The New York City drug cops. They beat up Lucky and tell him that they can trump up any charge they wish or simply kill him unless he does as they say. [[spoiler:It turns out that they're on Rothstein's payroll anyway and helping him steal Lucky's heroin stash]]. |
| 365 | * DirtyOldMan: The Commodore, who is known to have a taste for underage girls. ''Very'' underage girls, having evidently [[spoiler:raped the then 12-year-old Gillian.]] Just about every other older man in the show also qualifies. |
| 366 | * DisposingOfABody: |
| 367 | ** After his wife assaults a man and he finishes him off, [[spoiler:Van Alden goes to a florist who owes him a favour, North Side mob boss O'Banion, and asks for help with this.]] |
| 368 | ** Dunn Purnsley has to do this in "New York Sour" after an assignation with a talent agent's wife takes an unexpected turn. |
| 369 | * TheDitz: |
| 370 | ** Nan Britton actually thinks that President-elect Harding will divorce his wife and bring her and their love child to the White House. TruthInTelevision, as the real Britton really was that obsessed with Harding and continued to believe that he loved her until her death in 1991. |
| 371 | ** Deputy Halloran is rather thick. |
| 372 | ** Mickey Doyle is equal parts a SmugSnake and Ditz, often cackling at his little witticisms and machinations, but just as often completely out of the loop on simple things. |
| 373 | * TheDogBitesBack: |
| 374 | ** Ray Halloran betrays Eli to the feds after Eli has him beaten. Ironically, Eli had him beaten because he incorrectly thought that Halloran had talked to the feds. |
| 375 | ** Mickey Doyle attempts to work out a deal with Van Alden after getting pushed around once too many times by his criminal associates. |
| 376 | ** After being [[spoiler:raped by the Commodore at the age of thirteen]], Gillian Darmody gets her revenge years later after [[spoiler:the Commodore has a stroke. She beats him mercilessly and eventually goads Jimmy into killing him]]. |
| 377 | ** Rose Van Alden is not pleased with her husband [[spoiler:impregnating Lucy Danzinger and intending to pass off the child to Rose as abandoned. She slaps and bites him before storming out.]] Two episodes later, [[spoiler:she serves him with divorce papers]]. |
| 378 | ** Tonino asks clemency for his cousin, [[BaitTheDog which is apparently given]], but [[AxeCrazy Gyp Rosetti]] brutally kills the man anyway. In the Series 3 finale [[spoiler:Tonino gets even and backstabs Rosetti]]. |
| 379 | * DomesticAbuse: Margaret loses her baby due to a particularly brutal beating. |
| 380 | * DontExplainTheJoke: |
| 381 | ** "Big Jim" Colosimo is never going to get it. |
| 382 | ** Happens a few times with UsefulNotes/AlCapone as well. |
| 383 | --->'''Torrio:''' ''[discussing a meeting with George Remus]'' [[Myth/ClassicalMythology Romulus]] couldn't make it.\ |
| 384 | '''Al:''' That his partner?\ |
| 385 | '''Torrio:''' ''[FacePalm]'' |
| 386 | * DontLookAtMe: Richard Harrow doesn't much like being looked at with his mask ''on'', but is mortified to be seen with it off. Inverted when he rips it off while choking Julia's father for insulting him and her, giving him a good close-up look at his RedRightHand. His usual shyness gets an IronicEcho in the season three finale when, after rescuing Tommy from Rosetti's men, he doesn't want Julia to look at the ''good'' side of his face, because it's splattered with blood. |
| 387 | * DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale: The final season treats Eli's encounter with Sigrid as him cheating on his wife June. Eli doesn't even remember the encounter and it's shown Sigrid got him drunk to the extent he couldn't give proper consent. |
| 388 | * DownerEnding: Pretty much every season ends with a mix of this and BitterSweetEnding with each succeeding finale so far leaning more and more in favor of being a DownerEnding. By the end of the series, the main characters, with a few notable exceptions, are either dead, in prison, or otherwise completely broken. |
| 389 | ** Season 1: [[spoiler:Nucky and Rothstein are able to come to an agreement and make peace. Nucky and Margaret are able to move forward with their relationship. However, unknown to Nucky a conspiracy to take him down is brewing between The Commodore, Eli and Jimmy.]] |
| 390 | ** Season 2: [[spoiler:Jimmy, having lost his wife and killed his own father, makes up to Nucky by helping him tie up the last loose ends of the conspiracy and goes willing to his death when Nucky kills him, finally crossing the line into becoming a gangster. Eli is going to prison for his part in the conspiracy. Margaret, unconvinced by Nucky's lies about becoming a better man gives his land away to the church.]] |
| 391 | ** Season 3: [[spoiler:Nucky defeats Gyp Rosetti and takes back control of Atlantic City but has lost Margaret, seemingly for good. Richard saves Tommy but has to kill many men to do so and feels that he can not be with Julia and Tommy because of what he has done.]] |
| 392 | ** Season 4: [[spoiler:Basically, a pure downer ending. Richard fails to kill Narcisse, killing Chalky's daughter by mistake, is shot and eventually dies alone under the boardwalk. Gillian is most likely going to prison for life if not receiving the death penalty. Eli murders agent Knox, leaves for Chicago and can not return to Atlantic City. In the wake of his daughter's death Chalky is left completely broken, having lost everything.]] |
| 393 | ** Season 5: [[spoiler:Nucky loses all his Atlantic City holdings to Luciano and company, he tries to make up for his sins by leaving money from his take in the Mayflower stock to Eli and Gillian but ultimately he is killed by Tommy Darmody on the boardwalk.]] |
| 394 | * TheDragon: Numerous examples. |
| 395 | ** CoDragons: Lucky and Meyer, to Rothstein. |
| 396 | ** DragonWithAnAgenda: [[spoiler:A whole cabal of them form in season 2, with Jimmy, Al, Meyer, and Lucky working together on a heroin deal under the noses of their bosses, who are in turn trying to screw over each other.]] |
| 397 | * DramaticIrony: |
| 398 | ** In season 2, Eli wrongly suspects Ray Halloran has been talking to the feds, so has him beaten up to intimidate him. This incentivizes Halloran to betray Eli to the feds for real. |
| 399 | ** In season 5, [[spoiler:undercover federal agent Mike Malone forces Van Alden and Eli to try to steal Capone's ledger, the key to getting Capone convicted of tax evasion. When the scheme goes bad, Malone is ordered to get the two men to name their employer: himself. When Van Alden attacks Capone and begins a frenzied confession, Malone kills him to preserve his cover, saving the life of the man he's trying to bring down. For this apparent loyalty, Malone is given the ledger]]. |
| 400 | * DrivenToSuicide: |
| 401 | ** Poor Pearl. |
| 402 | ** Jess Smith. Smith is a HistoricalDomainCharacter who did in fact commit suicide on May 30, 1923. The show does a nice job of alluding to later rumors that Smith might have been murdered. |
| 403 | ** [[spoiler:Poor put-upon Eddie...]] |
| 404 | ** In season 5 [[spoiler:Margaret's boss, Mr. Bennett commits suicide right in the middle of the office, because the Great Depression is destroying his company]]. |
| 405 | * DrivingADesk: Very noticeable during Nucky and Eddie's wild ride to the hospital in "Two Imposters". |
| 406 | * DropDeadGorgeous: |
| 407 | ** In the premiere episode, Mickey's gang of bootleggers put their distillery beneath a morgue to hide the smell. The only body we see is a fully nude young woman. |
| 408 | ** Gyp Rosetti uses a red-headed waitress as a naked BulletproofHumanShield when Benny Siegel comes knocking. |
| 409 | * DroppedABridgeOnHim: |
| 410 | ** Owen's death in season 3 takes place off-camera. We don't learn that the hit had failed until his body is returned to Nucky in a box. |
| 411 | ** The show skips right over the death of [[spoiler:Arnold Rothstein]] between seasons four and five, and his funeral is mentioned in passing in the first episode of the fifth season. |
| 412 | ** After spending a good portion of season four establishing [[spoiler:Sally as a romantic partner for Nucky who holds her own in his world, her part in season five is largely reduced to a few phone calls before she's unceremoniously killed midway through]]. |
| 413 | * DudeWheresMyRespect: Nucky's tendency to take people for granted and his unwillingness to throw anyone a bone alienate some of his most competent underlings, who feel rightly underappreciated and call him out on it. Eventually Nucky begins to treat his brother Eli and his put-upon servant Eddie with fairness, if not due gratefulness. |
| 414 | * DullSurprise: Jimmy and Angela get accused of this. |
| 415 | * DumbassHasAPoint: In "What Does The Bee Do?" Eli comments about Jimmy's weird relationship with his mother. This is the first time anyone in the series has noted it out loud (although Angela obviously notices it too). |
| 416 | * DumbMuscle: Eli is widely seen as this for Nucky, something he despises. And then there is Deputy Halloran, who is ''Eli's'' DumbMuscle... and seems totally OK with that. |
| 417 | * DutchAngle: In "Havre de Grace" Roy Phillips is shot this way right after he reveals himself to be a Pinkerton agent arresting Gillian for murder. |
| 418 | * DyingAsYourself: |
| 419 | ** [[spoiler:Richard, always so wary of taking his mask off, does so as he dies. In his DyingDream, his face is restored.]] |
| 420 | ** In addition, [[spoiler:after entire seasons of pretending to be someone else, using a different name, and denying what was always his true calling, Van Alden goes out in a suicidal attack on Al Capone, roaring his true name and true identity in the mobster's face. A DyingMomentOfAwesome if ever there was one]] |
| 421 | * DyingDream: The last scene of Season 4 finale "Farewell Daddy Blues", played as a ShoutOut to TropeMaker "Literature/AnOccurrenceAtOwlCreekBridge". [[spoiler:Richard Harrow, after a botched hit on Dr. Narcisse leaves him mortally wounded, escapes the city and travels to the country to reunite with all his loved ones. Then [[DyingAsYourself his disfigured face suddenly looks normal again]] and we see his corpse beneath the Atlantic City boardwalk.]] |
| 422 | * TheDyingWalk: [[spoiler:Richard walked away from the gunfight where he was mortally wounded to the place beneath the boardwalk where he first spent a night with Julia, and died alone there.]] |
| 423 | * EarlyFilms: |
| 424 | ** In Season 1, Jimmy takes his family to watch a Creator/FattyArbuckle movie and Lucy goes alone to see Creator/JohnBarrymore in [[Film/TheStrangeCaseOfDrJekyllAndMrHyde1920 the 1920 edition of]] ''Literature/TheStrangeCaseOfDrJekyllAndMrHyde''. Later Eli and his buddies watch a vintage porno. |
| 425 | ** Margaret's family watches ''[[Film/TheKid1921 The Kid]]'' early in Season 2. |
| 426 | * EndOfAnAge: This is a main theme of season 5. The Roaring Twenties are over and the Great Depression is in full swing. Prohibition is losing popularity and savvy businessmen are betting on its repeal within a few years. In Chicago, Al Capone is at the peak of his power but the Treasury Department is preparing the tax evasion case that will send him to jail and end his reign as Chicago's criminal overlord. In New York, Luciano and Lansky are laying the groundwork for a coup that will end the reign of old-world "Moustache Pete" mob dons and forever change the nature of organized crime in America. In the middle of all this, Nucky is trying not to get killed while he prepares one more big deal that will hopefully secure his legacy. |
| 427 | * EnemyMine: Nucky suggests cooperating with Esther Randolph to take down Attorney General Daugherty. |
| 428 | * EntendreFailure: Nucky's young lawyer in the second season, when he is offered apple pie. |
| 429 | -->'''Chip''': Cherry is more my liking. A la ''mode'', if you catch my meaning.\ |
| 430 | '''Nucky''': ...I don't, actually. |
| 431 | * EqualOpportunityEvil: |
| 432 | ** Nucky does business with Italians, Jews, Irish, and Blacks. Many of the gangs he does business with are also willing to go beyond their cultural boundaries for the sake of profit. |
| 433 | ** Rothstein's lieutenants are the Italian Lucky Luciano and the Jewish Mayer Lansky, who are best of friends and just like their mentor have no hang-ups about doing business with other ethnicities. They make a point of it when they set up "The Commission", as it's pointless to limit profit opportunities by excluding other groups. |
| 434 | * EroticAsphyxiation: Gyp Rosetti is a fan of being strangled while having sex. When surprised ''in flagrante delicto'' by an assassination attempt, he fights his way out wearing nothing but a belt around his neck. In the legend that follows the event, people have mistaken it for a dog collar. |
| 435 | * EstablishingCharacterMoment: The show is excellent at giving these to its numerous characters: |
| 436 | ** We first meet Nucky Thompson during his speech to the Temperance League. It introduces him as a highly-regarded politician, an excellent storyteller, and, as we find out from his following conversation, a [[ConsummateLiar complete liar]]. |
| 437 | ** Jimmy Darmody is first shown literally on the outside looking in at Nucky. He also shows his limp, the first hint of his war scars. |
| 438 | ** Margaret Schroeder is first seen at the Temperance League as well - a young Irish wife and mother with suffrage leanings and a bit of hero-worship for Nucky. |
| 439 | ** Also in the pilot, Johnny Torrio's young driver is standing in the cold and amiably shooting the breeze with Jimmy. His name is UsefulNotes/AlCapone. He's on the bottom rung at this point, but with an [[FromNobodyToNightmare eye on advancement]]. |
| 440 | ** The WhosOnFirst conversation between Van Alden and Sebso introduces Sebso as a hapless sidekick and Van Alden as TheUnfunny. |
| 441 | ** [[IneffectualSympatheticVillain Eli Thompson]] behaves like a blustering bully living in his brother's shadow during a political dinner. |
| 442 | ** Lucky Luciano gets his at the gangster dinner when he mouths off to Nucky in front of Torrio and Rothstein, establishing him as a HotBlooded guy with a HairTriggerTemper. |
| 443 | ** Arnold Rothstein doesn't get his true moment until "The Ivory Tower", telling Frankie Yale a story about how he met a man who swallows and regurgitates objects and wagered that he could not do so with a pool cue ball, knowing that it was slightly larger than other pool balls and would choke him to death. This establishes Rothstein's love of gambling, attention to every detail, and total ruthlessness. |
| 444 | ** Chalky White is introduced in an flashy suit, commanding Eddie to tell Nucky that he doesn't have all day. This establishes Chalky's position as a powerful black man who must nevertheless bow to white authorities like Nucky. |
| 445 | ** "The Ivory Tower" introduces Gillian Darmody by pulling a BaitAndSwitch. Jimmy sneaks off after arguing with his wife to see a beautiful showgirl, giving her a necklace as a gift. Is it his girlfriend? Nope, it's his mother! |
| 446 | ** In "Home," Richard Harrow is first seen when Jimmy meets him in the hospital, meek and awkward. Then he starts listing the arsenal of firearms he owns and detailing his [[ColdSniper sniper exploits]]. |
| 447 | ** "Home" also introduces Meyer Lansky, who gives a very articulate (but dishonest) business proposition, handles a failed attempt very gracefully, and muses about the future importance of the petroleum industry. This all establishes him as a shrewd and business-minded gangster. |
| 448 | ** "Ourselves Alone" introduces Owen Sleater, a [[TheCasanova very charming]] Irish gangster eyeing up Margaret during a business dinner between Nucky and John [=McGarrigle=]. He gets a second establishing moment when he skips off to the pub and brutally executes an IRA traitor. |
| 449 | ** "Peg of Old" introduces Asst. U.S. Attorney Esther Randolph, who marches into Van Alden's office, completely takes it over, and removes him from his duties. |
| 450 | ** Season 3 antagonist Gyp Rosetti's first scene in "Resolution". After a mechanic is inadvertently condescending to him, Gyp beats him to death. |
| 451 | * EtTuBrute: |
| 452 | ** Hilariously lampshaded in Season 2 finale "To the Lost". |
| 453 | ---> '''Nucky''': Et tu, Eli?\ |
| 454 | '''Eli''': What?\ |
| 455 | '''Nucky''': [[Creator/WilliamShakespeare Shakespeare.]] ''Theatre/JuliusCaesar''.\ |
| 456 | '''Eli''': [[ComicallyMissingThePoint There was a character named Eli?]] |
| 457 | ** Doubles as DespairEventHorizon for Jess Smith, when he realizes his ChildhoodFriend Daugherty planned his downfall. |
| 458 | ** Narcisse turns Purnsley against Chalky [[spoiler:and the plan almost comes to fruition despite Chalky eventually realizing the betrayal]]. |
| 459 | ** After gaining her trust, Nucky sold out a 12-year old Gillian to the Commodore, and his own soul in the process. |
| 460 | * EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: |
| 461 | ** Jimmy has a very [[ParentalIncest complicated relationship]] with his mother. |
| 462 | ** Eli and Nucky loved their mother, but she was too weak to protect them from their father. |
| 463 | ** Implied with Gyp Rosetti, as ''enduring'' someone is a big feat for him. He's the only man in a family full of hen-pecking women who bicker with him constantly but clearly have no fear of his HairTriggerTemper. He even forces Tonino to attend his Easter dinner so he isn't left alone with them. |
| 464 | * EvenEvilHasStandards: Nucky clearly takes pity on Margaret Schroeder and is enraged enough by her husband's abuse that [[spoiler:he orders a hit on him, though he also uses the husband as a fall-guy in the process]]. |
| 465 | * EverybodyDiesEnding: By the end of the series finale only [[spoiler:eight of the 21 characters to be billed in the opening credits]] over the course of the show haven't been killed. Two of them - [[spoiler:Luciano and Al Capone]] - are historical and can't have their fates rewritten and another [[spoiler:two (Lucy Danziger and Roy Philips)]] were extremely minor in the scheme of things and by the time of the finale hadn't appeared in years. Even more strikingly, only [[spoiler:two notable characters]] that appeared in the pilot are still alive in the end: [[spoiler:Eli and Margaret]]. |
| 466 | * EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep: The Commodore. |
| 467 | * EveryScarHasAStory: |
| 468 | ** Nucky tells Margaret how he got the burn scar on his hand: his father held a hot poker to it because Nucky started eating dinner before him. |
| 469 | ** An indirect explanation in "William Wilson": Daughter tells Chalky that her mother hit an abusive client with a jar of lye, but it didn't stop him strangling her to death. [[spoiler:We later see her tending to the horrific chemical burns on Valentin's chest.]] |
| 470 | * EvilSoundsRaspy: Richard Harrow has a gravelly, flat voice as a result of injuries inflicted during the war (check the scar on his throat). Serves to emphasize his both dangerous and shy nature. Jack Huston came up with the voice by stuffing his mouth with cotton balls, not unlike Creator/MarlonBrando did for ''Film/TheGodfather''. |
| 471 | * EvilParentsWantGoodKids: Touched on a few times in the final season. Specifically with [[spoiler:Chalky and his daughter; Eli and Willy; and Al Capone and Sonny.]] |
| 472 | * ExactWords: |
| 473 | ** While speaking of Jimmy as if he'd been her husband, Gillian claims that they "met as children." This is a very misleading statement, but technically correct. Because Gillian gave birth to Jimmy while still a juvenile, they did first "meet" as "children." |
| 474 | ** When Nucky talks to Jimmy and his cohorts about resigning as County Treasurer and stepping back, he says they can have "Atlantic City and all that goes with it". This includes the Black strike he immediately convinces Chalky White to instigate as soon as he leaves the room. |
| 475 | ** Daughter Maitland tells Chalky that Valentin took her in after her mother was strangled to death by a client. [[spoiler:He ''was'' the client.]] |
| 476 | * EyeScream: |
| 477 | ** Richard Harrow lost his left eye and the entire left side of his face in war, leaving nothing but an empty eye socket he conceals with a tin mask designed to mirror the good side of his face. |
| 478 | ** [[spoiler:Big Jim Colosimo is shot through the back of his head and out his eye, causing gore to splatter over the camera.]] |
| 479 | ** Richard blasts [[spoiler:Manny Horvitz]] through the left eye in revenge for his part in [[spoiler:Angela's]] death. |
| 480 | ** [[spoiler:Nelson Van Alden gets shot through the back of the head and out his left eye right in front of the camera. There are also a couple of lingering shots on his corpse afterward too, showcasing the wound.]] |
| 481 | * FaceDeathWithDignity: |
| 482 | ** [[spoiler:Jimmy]] goes to his execution pretty calmly. He doesn't even take a gun with him. |
| 483 | ** [[spoiler:Chalky makes a deal with Narcisse to give up his vendetta against him and work for him, if he'll back Daughter's singing career. In their next scene, Narcisse leaves Chalky in an alley with his men, who all pull out their handguns. Chalky simply says "Alright then," then closes his eyes and smiles as Daughter's voice in his head sings him to his end.]] |
| 484 | * FacialDialogue: |
| 485 | ** When Mrs. Pastor suggests that Dunn Purnsley should be lynched, a single look between Dr. Narcisse and his driver is all that his entourage needs to pull the car over and lynch her. |
| 486 | ** Lucky and Meyer often communicate non-verbally with one another. |
| 487 | * FacialHorror: Richard Harrow wears a tin mask after losing his left eye and the whole left side of his face to a terrible war wound. |
| 488 | * FakeGuestStar: |
| 489 | ** Anatol Yusef (Meyer Lansky) is billed as a guest star, despite being as prominent to the main plot and having as much screentime as Vincent Piazza (Salvatore Luciano), who ''is'' main credited, from the second season. |
| 490 | ** Creator/CharlieCox (Owen Sleater) appears in all but the first episode of season 2, but doesn't get main credits billing until season 3. |
| 491 | * FakeIrish: [[invoked]] Mickey Doyle is a Polish man who is using an assumed Irish name. |
| 492 | * FakeoutMakeout: |
| 493 | ** Jimmy does this on the boardwalk with Angela when he spots Nucky walking with Waxey Gordon and Herman (though Angela doesn't realize his motives). |
| 494 | ** When Billie Kent auditions for the cinema, she plays the role of a girl who has a charming young criminal jump in her cab and kiss her to avoid being recognized by the pursuing police. |
| 495 | * FallenOnHardTimesJob: |
| 496 | ** [[spoiler:Van Alden]] becomes a lowly door-to-door iron salesman. To make matters worse, he's singularly unqualified for the job. Fortunately, he accidentally becomes a mob enforcer for Dean O'Banion. |
| 497 | ** Gillian falls from [[MissKitty a Madame who rules a classy establishment]] to an autonomous whore who barely has any furniture left in her sordid place. |
| 498 | ** Margaret is reduced to working for a meagre salary as a secretary in a shady investment broker's office, helping her boss scam their clients. |
| 499 | * FamilyRelationshipSwitcheroo: Gillian [[spoiler:raises Jimmy's son as her own after his mother and then father both die]], which seemingly everyone around her finds incredibly creepy. Especially the ones with suspicions about her relationship with her real son. |
| 500 | * FamilyThemeNaming: |
| 501 | ** The D'Alessio brothers are named after popes. |
| 502 | ** The names of all the Thompson men begin with an 'E' and come from the Bible. |
| 503 | * FanDisservice: |
| 504 | ** The pilot features a distillery in a mortuary. The naked corpse of a young woman is shown with huge autopsy scars. |
| 505 | ** Pearl, high on laudanum, comes downstairs in her lingerie to strut her stuff for the johns, [[spoiler:while sporting a ghastly facial wound full of stitches.]] She's not a good earner, and subsequently commits suicide. |
| 506 | ** Despite there being no overtly nasty images, [[spoiler:Van Alden and Lucy having sex]] will still likely just make you feel dirty. |
| 507 | ** Gillian sharing that she used to kiss Jimmy's "little winky" while changing his diapers. Good luck finding her sexy after that. [[spoiler:Made closer to Squickier in Hindsight as it's a major hint that she has actually had sex with her son...]] |
| 508 | ** A naked, heavily pregnant, loudly sobbing Lucy in "A Dangerous Maid". |
| 509 | ** After his assassination attempt, Gyp Rosetti has been having some kinky sex and is striding around completely naked - [[spoiler:except for a belt around his neck and covered in the blood of his sex partner]]. |
| 510 | * {{Fanservice}}: |
| 511 | ** There are lots of scenes with naked women and women in lingerie. Many of these scenes are justified by being set in brothels. Al Capone has his headquarters in a brothel for a while, while the Artemis Club serves as Gyp Rosetti's base during his gang war with Nucky. |
| 512 | ** Pretty much every female main character has shown her breasts at least once. |
| 513 | ** There are many sex scenes involving the main characters. |
| 514 | ** And for the ladies, Lucky Luciano and Gyp Rosetti go full frontal. Not to mention all the men in gorgeous period clothes and states of undress. |
| 515 | * FanserviceExtra: Many, many hookers and strippers. |
| 516 | * FauxAffablyEvil: |
| 517 | ** Manny Horvitz behaves like a friendly AlterKocker at calm moments, but when angered (which [[HotBlooded happens a lot]]), becomes a brutal sadist. |
| 518 | ** Gyp Rosetti likes to joke around. When he's not taking extreme offence and killing people over imagined insults. |
| 519 | ** Gaston Means is an extremely polite, courteous and soft-spoken southern gentleman, a combination he uses to advance his criminal schemes. |
| 520 | ** Gillian Darmody is an EvilMatriarch who conceals and furthers her nature with friendly and proper ladylike manners. |
| 521 | ** Valentin Narcisse is soft-spoken and likes to sound civilized and cultivated, but his [[DastardlyWhiplash moustache twirling villainy]] is quickly put into play. |
| 522 | * FBIAgent: Season 4 introduces the Bureau of Investigation (it won't be called the Federal Bureau of Investigation until 1935) and its newly appointed acting director J. Edgar Hoover. They are called in when the corruption among the Prohibition agents of the BIR becomes too rampant. |
| 523 | * FinaleCredits: Or a lack thereof. Series finale "Eldorado" skips the long opening title sequence of Nucky staring into the ocean, and instead has a scene where he goes skinny-dipping in the Atlantic. |
| 524 | * FingertipDrugAnalysis: One of Lucky Luciano's heroin buyers does this in "Two Imposters" |
| 525 | * {{Fingore}}: |
| 526 | ** In "Anastasia", Chalky unrolls some intimidating carpenter's tools in front of the local Ku Klux Klan leader, and after some unspecified torture (which he kept going for ten minutes after getting the information he wanted) he leaves the man's finger and ring with the police. |
| 527 | ** Owen Sleater's victim Del Grogan in "Peg of Old" attempts to stop a garrote. It goes about as well as expected as Owen's garrote cuts through two of Del's fingers. |
| 528 | * FinishHim: "Under God's Power She Flourishes" |
| 529 | --> '''Gillian''': Finish it, goddamn you! |
| 530 | * FinishingEachOthersSentences: A very dark version in the last words traded between [[spoiler:Knox and Eli]]: |
| 531 | -->[[spoiler:'''Knox:''']] I'll tell you what I am. I'm a man who's going to--\ |
| 532 | [[spoiler:'''Eli:''']] ...Fucking ''kill you!'' |
| 533 | * FiveFingerFillet: Jimmy expertly plays the game with his old trenchknife in "Family Limitation," establishing him as a PsychoKnifeNut who's still not over the war. Capone's unfamiliarity with the game tips Jimmy off that he wasn't really in the war. |
| 534 | * TheFlapper: Billie Kent. |
| 535 | * FluffyTheTerrible: When a [=BoI=] agent pokes fun at the names "Nucky, Mickey and Lolly" by comparing them to [[Literature/TheTaleOfPeterRabbit Flopsy and Mopsy]], Hoover is quick to remind him that he's talking about murderers. Chalky - who is left unmentioned - also qualifies. |
| 536 | * ForcefulKiss: Nucky to Billie after she angrily berates him for beating up an actor friend in a fit of jealousy. She tries to push him off, but he insists on the kiss, and she quickly yields to him as they lay on the bed. |
| 537 | * ForegoneConclusion: The fate of the historical characters is pretty much sealed. Also becomes ItWasHisSled. |
| 538 | ** UsefulNotes/WarrenGHarding will become President and die in office. |
| 539 | ** UsefulNotes/AlCapone, Charlie "Lucky" Luciano and Meyer Lansky will all survive and become organized crime bosses running Chicago and New York. "Big Jim" Colosimo, Joe Masseria, Dean O'Banion, Frank Capone and Arnold Rothstein will be murdered. Any attempts on their lives will fail if they happen before their historical dates of death. |
| 540 | ** Also, Johnny Torrio will get sick of the underground rat race and retire to Italy, leaving the Chicago Outfit to Al Capone. Any threats to his life or power will fail before his retirement. |
| 541 | * {{Foreshadowing}}: |
| 542 | ** In the season three finale, when Dunn Purnsley angers Al Capone by taking a whizz on his car, he comments that it'd be a terrible thing to kill a man with his dick in his hands. Poor, poor [[spoiler:Gyp Rosetti.]] |
| 543 | ** Early in Season 4, Richard flinches and cannot put down the family dog, who is old and dying. In the Season 4 finale, Richard similarly flinches when he's tasked with shooting Narcisse, with disastrous consequences. |
| 544 | * FortuneTeller: Gillian and Harding's wife are assiduous of them, and so far [[PropheciesAreAlwaysRight they have always been right]]. |
| 545 | * FreudianExcuse: |
| 546 | ** Gillian Darmody is a conniving and vile character with few redeeming traits, but being an orphan with a [[RapeAsBackstory tragic backstory]] -in which Nucky was an enabler- accounts for her wretchedness. The show plays it for empathy a few times. |
| 547 | ** Tragically, Gillian is a recursive one for Jimmy, as [[FreudianExcuse her behavior]] prevented him from having a normal life, despite the efforts of Nucky, a decent ParentalSubstitute. This is taken to a logical conclusion in Season 2 when Jimmy revolts against his parental figures. |
| 548 | ** Eli's wife traces the roughness of the Thompson brothers back to their abusive father. |
| 549 | * FriendlyTarget: [[spoiler:Loveable GenkiGirl Billie Kent,]] who never hurt a fly and was showing signs of actually becoming something of a MoralityChain, gets pointlessly blown up in a botched hit by [[spoiler:Gyp Rosetti.]] |
| 550 | * FromCamouflageToCriminal: Jimmy and Richard are both hardened by their war experience and turn to a life of crime afterwards, proving themselves much more competent and deadly than most of the thugs they encounter. |
| 551 | * FullFrontalAssault: Gyp Rosetti chases Benny down a hall, blasting away, while wearing nothing but a belt around his neck. |
| 552 | * GambitPileup: The season three finale is a three-way chess game between Nucky, Rothstein and Joe Masseria, with Gyp Rosetti caught in the middle naively thinking he's fighting a straightforward MobWar. [[spoiler:Nucky trades his new distillery for Rothstein's help in getting Masseria to cut Rosetti loose, and Rothstein buys Masseria's consent with a share of his new heroin business (swindled out of Lucky Luciano). Nucky then has Masseria's retreating army ambushed and slaughtered by Chalky and Capone, and clues the feds in to Rothstein's plan to get the distillery up and running.]] He's only [[DidntSeeThatComing wrongfooted]] when he shows up at Rosetti's HQ to find [[LateToTheTragedy Richard Harrow has already killed everyone]] in a completely unrelated act. |
| 553 | * TheGambler: Arnold Rothstein is a consummate high-stakes gambler and approaches life like a game. |
| 554 | * TheGamblingAddict: |
| 555 | ** Margaret's husband Hans Schroeder gambled away her nest egg. |
| 556 | ** Arnold Rothstein's love of poker has mostly been portrayed as representative of his business savvy; he claims to only gamble on games he can win, and he's ''very'' good at poker. However, Nucky observes the depths he sinks to when he's on a losing streak (Meyer has to step in and whisper "perhaps it's best that people not see you like this" before he'll step away from the table), and concludes that he doesn't want to do business with someone who clearly ''doesn't'' KnowWhenToFoldEm. |
| 557 | * GilliganCut: In "Family Limitations", Margaret asks Eddie whether Nucky is a nice man, which Eddie confirms he is. Cut to Nucky in his office insulting Luciano. |
| 558 | * GoingByTheMatchbook: After sinking a meat cleaver into the head of his would-be assassin, Manny Horvitz finds the man's matchbook in his pockets and finds it's from Atlantic City, cuing him into Jimmy being the one who hired the man. |
| 559 | * GoingColdTurkey: Gillian breaks her heroin habit in "William Wilson", but not without suffering first. |
| 560 | * GoingPostal: FBIAgent Nelson Van Alden is forced to flee to another state after he already committed a murder and adopts the identity of George Mueller, an unassuming door-to-door salesman who is treated like garbage by all his colleagues, including his boss. Since they [[MuggingTheMonster know nothing of his past]], they persist in antagonizing and humiliating him until inevitably he hits his RageBreakingPoint. He assaults the biggest jerkoff of the bunch with a clothes iron and smashes the place up before leaving for yet another career change, this time becoming a gang member. His former colleagues pursue him ''[[TooDumbToLive again]]'' and end up getting murdered for it. |
| 561 | * GoldDigger: |
| 562 | ** Played with Margaret, a fairly sympathetic variant. She gets along with Nucky well enough but doesn't really seem to love him all that much. Her story is a deconstructive RagsToRiches tale, the Season 1 finale makes clear that she goes back to Nucky because he's rich and the Season 3 finale [[spoiler:reverses it]]. |
| 563 | ** Lucy follows the trope pretty closely in season one. She's only with Nucky because he buys her pretty things and pays her for it, and throws fits when he takes up with Margaret. |
| 564 | ** Annabelle, like Lucy, is another gold-digging serial mistress. |
| 565 | * GondorCallsForAid: After Babette's is blown up, Nucky summons his associates and asks for their help in the upcoming war against Rosetti-Masseria but he's considered a liability by the other gangsters, who turn their backs on him. |
| 566 | * GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion: Averted in Season 3. One of the women in Margaret's health class reveals that she induced a miscarriage by drinking tainted milk. And in the Season 3 finale "Margate Sands", Margaret herself has her pregnancy aborted. |
| 567 | * GorgeousPeriodDress: The setting makes sure that everyone gets their share of this, but Margaret really ices the cake. |
| 568 | * {{Gorn}}: Many grisly murders throughout the run of the show. |
| 569 | * GoryDiscretionShot: Averted constantly. There are, however, a few straight uses scattered about. |
| 570 | * GoshDangItToHeck: Warren Knox, including the possibly-tongue-in-cheek line "Darn it! Darn it to heck," in reaction to a suspect who isn't cooperating. |
| 571 | * GrammarCorrectionGag: "Mueller" (aka Van Alden) is asked by his wife "When you will be home?" Dodging the question, he angrily corrects her grammar in a patronising tone instead. |
| 572 | * GrammarNazi: Nucky. |
| 573 | * GreasySpoon: The gas station diner in Tabor Heights that Gyp Rosetti turns into his office. |
| 574 | * GreedyJew: In the course of warning Lucky away from Rothstein and Lansky, Joe Masseria claims that Jews have no heart and are all about business, whereas Italians are passionate and work for their families. |
| 575 | * GreenEyedMonster: Gillian is jealous of Richard Harrow for finding love with a woman and taking Gillian's son on domestic outings, like a real family. She makes increasingly insulting comments about the romance and eventually fires him. |
| 576 | * GunStruggle: Richard in the season three finale. |
| 577 | [[/folder]] |
| 578 | |
| 579 | [[folder:H - M]] |
| 580 | * HadToBeSharp: A gangster doesn't get to Manny Horvitz' age if he is not tougher than the majority. |
| 581 | * HandshakeOfDoom: In "Marriage and Hunting," Dean O'Banion is in his flower shop one evening when a customer asks for something that can get him out of hot water with his wife. O'Banion suggests chrysanthemums and agrees to a full refund if the trick doesn't work; the two shake hands... only for O'Banion to realize that the "customer" doesn't seem keen to let go. [[spoiler: Then the other two customers in the shop draw guns; with Frankie Yale hanging onto his hand, O'Bannion can't draw a weapon or run, leaving him helpless as the hitmen empty their revolvers into him.]] This actually happened, by the way. |
| 582 | * HairTriggerTemper: |
| 583 | ** Charlie "Lucky" Luciano. From the moment he first opens his mouth, it's clear he's got a chip on his shoulder. |
| 584 | ** Gyp Rosetti, "a man who can find an insult in a bouquet of roses" is constantly raging for one flimsy reason or another. Displayed in his very first appearance, where he beats a man to death for a moment of inadvertent condescension. He also snaps angrily when Eddie Cantor inadvertently interrupts him. |
| 585 | ** Al Capone. By season 5, has a raging cocaine addiction and is surrounded by yes-men. He swings wildly and unpredictably between gregarious and murderous. He even screws with one of his men by pretending to be offended at something innocuous he says, just to watch him squirm. |
| 586 | ---> '''Capone:''' It's too easy! Hahahahaha! |
| 587 | * HandicappedBadass: Richard Harrow. |
| 588 | * HappilyMarried: |
| 589 | ** Eli married his wife at 20 and has never looked at another woman. He feels very terrible with himself for drunkenly sleeping with Sigrid. |
| 590 | ** Subverted with Arnold Rothstein, who is never seen pursuing other women outside of his apparent sweet marriage with Carolyn. When Nucky calls him "dead below the waist", A.R. retorts by claiming he's just discreet. Much later, he tells Margaret not to worry because he's a married man, but eventually his widow reveals that Arnold humiliated her and had several mistresses. |
| 591 | * HaveAGayOldTime: |
| 592 | ** "For weeks I have him worried / but now he's feeling gay" |
| 593 | ** "I'm going to Cuba / where everything's gay" - "King Tut-Tut-Tut was always gay" |
| 594 | ** At the end of a phone call, Andrew Mellon says, "And now our intercourse is concluded." |
| 595 | * HazyFeelTurn: |
| 596 | ** Eli and Jimmy, conspiring with The Commodore to overthrow Nucky. But especially Eli, who flips back and forth between Jimmy and Nucky constantly in Season 2. |
| 597 | ** [[spoiler:Van Alden may be conspiring with Nucky in exchange for supporting Lucy and their daughter, and he turns his back on the feds after being exposed as Sebso's murderer.]] |
| 598 | * HeatWave: The season two finale, with the unspoken implication that AStormIsComing... sure enough, it ends with a BattleInTheRain. |
| 599 | * HeroAntagonist: Van Alden starts out as one, but his insane KnightTemplar streak and growing moral corruption dump him from Hero status. In the second season, Assistant US Attorney Esther Randolph is a more straight example. |
| 600 | * HeWhoFightsMonsters: World War I turned Richard and Jimmy into this. Van Alden was sliding towards it before [[spoiler:his daughter was born]]. |
| 601 | * HighClassGloves: Gillian wears them to a night out at Chalky's club in "Acres of Diamonds". |
| 602 | * HistoricalDomainCharacter: Loaded with them. In fact, almost every politician and many of the criminals the main characters interact with are Historical Domain Characters, as are other minor characters like Eddie Cantor and Theodore "Houdini's brother" Hardeen. However, most of the main characters are aversions. Nucky Thompson and the Commodore were loosely inspired by real people, and the other main characters -- Margaret, Van Alden, Eli, Jimmy -- are entirely fictional. |
| 603 | * HistoricalInJoke: |
| 604 | ** Al Capone claims to have served in the famous "Lost Battalion" and says he got his facial scars in the war. Jimmy later calls him on it. In reality, Capone did not serve, but did indeed pass his scars off as war wounds. |
| 605 | ** Van Alden moves to Cicero at the end of season 2, which historically savvy viewers will know will soon be the place where Al Capone first makes a name for himself. |
| 606 | ** Blink and you'll miss it, but the poker chips on Rothstein's desk in "To the Lost" are from The Brook, his infamous high-stakes casino. |
| 607 | ** Meyer's young lackey "Benny" is better known in real life as Bugsy Siegel. Benny's bizarre behavior is a reference to Bugsy's infamous temper and his irrational behavior in Las Vegas, which would eventually get him killed. |
| 608 | ** Jess Smith is remembered today only because of his well-timed, high profile suicide at the worst of the Harding administration scandals in 1923. Most authors defend he was murdered [[HeKnowsTooMuch to keep him quiet]]. The show compromises between the two theories, as Smith manages to thwart an assassination, only to commit suicide after realizing he was betrayed by Daugherty, his only friend. |
| 609 | * HitmanWithAHeart: |
| 610 | ** Richard Harrow. Kind of, anyway. He dreams of love with a prostitute, makes a genuine connection with Margaret and her children, and keeps a scrapbook of happy families, but at other times is quite the sociopathic murderer. Richard's Season 4 arc involves him growing a heart for real. |
| 611 | ** Owen Slater is something of a PunchClockVillain. In spite of being an IRA triggerman turned gangster, he's a pretty decent guy. Notably he's shocked when [[spoiler:Nucky executes Rowland Smith after assuring him a job]]. |
| 612 | * HoistByTheirOwnPetard: In "Margate Sands", [[spoiler:Gillian is forcibly drugged with her own heroin that she uses to murder people, preventing her from knowing who took her grandson]]. |
| 613 | * HolierThanThou: The fact that Agent Van Alden is very religious only serves to make him that much more menacing. |
| 614 | * HoneyPot: |
| 615 | ** The episode "William Wilson" [[spoiler:reveals that Daughter Maitland, Chalky's new singer and mistress, is actually spying on him for Dr. Narcisse.]] |
| 616 | ** [[spoiler:Roy Phillips is sent to seduce Gillian so that she'll confess to a murder]]. |
| 617 | * HotBlooded: Lucky Luciano, in contrast to the [[TheStoic unflappable Arnold Rothstein]]. |
| 618 | * HookersAndBlow: |
| 619 | ** Pearl, a prostitute, introduces Jimmy to opium. |
| 620 | ** 'Hookers and Booze' are the period equivalent in Atlantic City. All visiting dignitaries expect to be lavishly treated to both whenever they swing by. Lucky and Meyer are only just discovering heroin in season two. |
| 621 | ** In Season 4 Gillian is prostituting herself to support a heroin habit. |
| 622 | * HookerWithAHeartOfGold: Pearl. Averted by Gillian, who is quite ruthless. |
| 623 | * HopeSpot: Nucky has started offering these to pretty much everyone he intends to kill or have killed. |
| 624 | -->'''Nucky''': ''[to Manny; regarding a thief]'' Untie him. ''[Nate starts to relax]'' Oh, but before you do, put a bullet in his fucking head. |
| 625 | ** Lampshades this, sort of, in "Blue Bell Boy": [[spoiler:he's reasonably nice to Rowland Smith for the entire 24 hours that they're stuck in the kid's basement, hiding from the cops, and even offers him a cigarette. When Rowland turns around, however, Nucky shoots him in the back of the head, and when Owen says "I thought we were letting him go," Nucky coldly asks "why would you think that?"]] |
| 626 | * HowWeGotHere: The pilot. |
| 627 | * HumiliationConga: Nelson Van Alden, from mid-season two onwards, gets thoroughly punished for his sins. [[spoiler:His wife finds out about his secret child and divorces him, Lucy blows town, he's identified as a murderer and loses his job at the Bureau, he flees to Chicago and begins a new life with the nanny, he's bullied at his new job, his "wife" attacks a man she mistakenly thought was blackmailing him and he has to finish the guy off, he gets in debt to Dean O'Banion in return for them covering it up, he spectacularly quits his job and becomes a bootlegger, and Al Capone demands he work for him.]] |
| 628 | * HunterTrapper: A pair of wise, understanding ones and their tough dog makes Richard reconsider [[spoiler:killing himself in the woods]]. |
| 629 | * TheHyena: |
| 630 | ** Capone brays with laughter a lot before Torrio tells him to grow up and take things seriously. |
| 631 | ** Mickey Doyle's high-pitched giggle is hard to miss, especially since he is often the only one laughing. |
| 632 | * HypocriticalHumor: While discussing a possible gang feud, Van Alden grimly states, "I refuse to be ruled by fear." Just after he says this, his wife snaps at him, and he hops to his feet with a meek, "Yes, dear!" |
| 633 | * IdiotBall: |
| 634 | ** Lucky Luciano dealing to people he doesn't even know, and who Meyer has repeatedly warned him against contacting. Compounded by the fact that [[spoiler:Arnold Rothstein and/or Joe Masseria had ''bribed the cops in question''.]] So he loses his heroin and he looks like a total idiot in front of [[spoiler:the two major gang bosses in New York]]. |
| 635 | ** Not only does he look like an idiot, but he proves [[spoiler:Rothstein]] right - he's learned ''nothing'' from Rothstein all these years; he's a shallow, hotheaded kid who won't listen to good advice. |
| 636 | ** Nucky grabs it firmly in the first half of the third season in the form of [[LoveMakesYouStupid Billie Kent]], something Rothstein is quick to confront him about. Nucky's business take a nosedive in the process. In Season 4 he recognizes Chalky going down the same road and obliquely cautions him about it. |
| 637 | * IfOnlyYouKnew: Alby Gold, Nucky's jailmate for a short time, confides to the big shot that he is a bootlegger with a still in his basement arrested for selling five cases, almost an entire week's job to him. |
| 638 | * IHaveAFamily: Invoked by [[spoiler:Angela]] when facing a loaded gun. It starts to work until she offers money, which hardens Manny back up. |
| 639 | * IHaveManyNames: |
| 640 | ** Salvatore "Sal" "Charlie" "Lucky" Luciano - born Lucania. Called "Toto" by Masseria. Lampshaded by Jimmy in "Georgia Peaches". |
| 641 | ** Margaret Catherine Sheila Schroeder née Rohan. Called "Peg" by her family. "Mrs. Thompson" by the end of the second season. |
| 642 | * IJustWantMyBelovedToBeHappy: Richard delivers a rescued Tommy to Julia, who is appalled that he's covered in blood. When her father [[FriendshipMoment tells him he'll try to talk her round]], Richard cuts him off and implies that now Tommy's safe with her, he's not going to stick around to be a bad influence. |
| 643 | * TheImmodestOrgasm: In "Gimcrack and Bunkum", Margaret wakes up to a scream in the middle of the night. Her maid, Katy denies hearing anything. As it turns out, it was her, while having sex with Owen. Margaret figures out very quickly what the noise really was, and later takes Katy aside to warn her that she and Owen need to be a lot more discreet due to the presence of children in the house. |
| 644 | * INeverGotAnyLetters: Angela's relation with Jimmy strains while he is in Chicago because Van Alden is intercepting their mail. |
| 645 | * IWillFightNoMoreForever: |
| 646 | ** Nucky tells Jimmy and the rest of the plotters this in "Two Boats and a Lifeguard", announcing that he's stepping down and out of the way. It's a ploy to let their guard down while he immediately starts plotting with Chalky White and the IRA. |
| 647 | ** At the end of season 4, [[spoiler:he tells Sally, "I want out." In season 5, with a repeal of the Volstead Act on the horizon, he prepares to get into the liquor game legitimately, likely hoping that he can leave most of his criminal activities behind. Unfortunately for him, it's far, far too late.]] |
| 648 | * IgnoredEpiphany: Nucky, lampshaded by Lucy: "They raised him to be a good Catholic boy. And sometimes he starts thinking he should change or he's going to go to hell. But all I have to do is this" *spreads her legs* "and he comes right back to me." |
| 649 | * ImpaledPalm: Nucky gets this in the second season after he blocks an assassin's bullet with his hand. This was the same hand that his abusive father had deliberately burnt him on as a child, injuring the other side of the hand at that time. When receiving treatment, Nucky acknowledges the symbolism, calling it "stigmata". |
| 650 | * ImprobableAimingSkills: Richard's [[spoiler:rampage through Rosetti's men.]] BoomHeadshot, reload, repeat. |
| 651 | * IncestSubtext: Jimmy and Gillian's relationship is shown to be increasingly Oedipal as the show goes on until "Under God's Power She Flourishes," when it's revealed that [[spoiler:they already had sex years ago, subverting the trope]]. In the same episode, Jimmy takes it to its [[ChildSupplantsParent logical conclusion]] by [[spoiler:killing his father, the Commodore]]. |
| 652 | * InTheBack: |
| 653 | ** How [[spoiler:Gyp Rosetti]] meets his end. |
| 654 | ** [[spoiler:Daughter Maitland ends Chalky's fight to the death with Dunn Purnsley by stabbing Dunn in the back]] ("The Old Ship of Zion"). |
| 655 | * IncomingHam: Michael K. Williams as Chalky White in the pilot episode. He even gets special camera work for his one appearance and his one line. |
| 656 | -->'''Chalky:''' Tell Nucky I ain't got all day! |
| 657 | * IndirectKiss: Gillian and Jimmy get a creepy one in "Gimcrack and Bunkum" in which she takes a cigarette out of her mouth and puts it in his. This is a gesture which would generally be in a romantic/sexual context and not between a parent and child, which is probably underscored by the fact that other characters have SmokingHotSex in the same episode |
| 658 | * IneffectualSympatheticVillain: Eli, in season one. He becomes [[TookALevelInJerkass pretty reprehensible]] in season two. By the time season three hits, he's done a HeelFaceTurn and become Nucky's OnlySaneMan. |
| 659 | * TheInfiltration: In Season 5, Treasury Agent Mike Malone has infiltrated Al Capone's inner circle as Mike D'Angelo. |
| 660 | * InheritedIlliteracyTitle: "Bone for Tuna," after a farewell note that Nucky gives Gyp Rosetti. He's trying to say "Buona Fortuna", Italian for "Good luck". The intended courteous deference becomes a ComplimentBackfire, since it enrages Gyp on his way out of Tabor Heights. |
| 661 | * InLoveWithTheMark: [[spoiler:Maitland rescues Chalky from the assassination she helped orchestrate]]. |
| 662 | * InsistentTerminology: Dr. Narcisse with respect to his title and his unusual name for Black people, the "Libyans". |
| 663 | * InvoluntaryCharityDonation: At the end of Season Two, Nucky signs over the valuable highway land to Margaret as a legal maneuver. Margaret, wracked by Catholic guilt, proceeds to sign the land over to the Catholic church. By Season Three, their already wobbly relationship has been wrecked by this. |
| 664 | * InterruptedIntimacy: |
| 665 | ** In the pilot, Nucky is having sex with Lucy, when he gets called away because of business matters. Lucy is not happy about this. |
| 666 | ** In "The Ivory Tower", Jimmy's wife is about to perform oral sex on him, but they're interrupted by their son waking up. |
| 667 | ** In "To the Lost," Jimmy and Richard barge in on Neary boning his secretary. They shoo her away, then force Neary to type a forged confession at gunpoint, before shooting him in the head and staging his death to look like a suicide. |
| 668 | ** In "Bone for Tuna", Mickey is getting ready to enjoy a blowjob from a hooker only for her to turn the lights on, revealing an unhappy Richard Harrow, displeased at Mickey for wrongly taking credit for Richard's killing of Manny Horvitz. Mickey doesn't even have time to pull his pants up before Richard hustles him out. |
| 669 | ** Gyp is cavorting with a waitress in "You'd Be Surprised" when Bugsy Siegel comes in to assassinate him. The waitress winds up taking the bullet. |
| 670 | * InterruptedSuicide: [[spoiler:Richard Harrow]] is about to shoot himself in the woods but is interrupted by a dog. Some hunters who own the dog figure out his intentions and indirectly talk him out of it. |
| 671 | * InvulnerableKnuckles: |
| 672 | ** Usually played straight, pretty much every brawl includes someone being punched very hard in the face with bare fists, and no one ever seriously hurts their hands doing this. |
| 673 | ** Averted in "Blue Bell Boy" twice. First with Owen who is seen shaking his right hand in pain after punching Roland Smith and again with Al Capone who has visibly bloody knuckles after delivering a NoHoldsBarredBeatdown. |
| 674 | * IOwnThisTown: Nucky Thompson owns Atlantic City, as did the Commodore before him. Nucky venturing into organized crime makes him face dangerous challenges from newcomers but also gives him a stronger and unprecedented grip. |
| 675 | -->'''Nucky:''' If you wanna be a gangster in my town, then you'll pay me for the privilege. |
| 676 | * UsefulNotes/TheIrishRevolution: Being fought during the time frame of Seasons 1 and 2. IRA leader [=McGarrigle=] solicits financial support from Nucky, and Owen Sleater hunts down an IRA traitor in Atlantic City. The June 1921 ceasefire threatens an arms deal Nucky is trying to set up with the IRA. |
| 677 | * IrisOut: Last shot of the pilot, in a nod to early silent films. |
| 678 | * IronicNickname: As if Albert White wasn't ironic enough already, everyone calls him "Chalky". |
| 679 | * ItGetsEasier: [[spoiler:These are Jimmy's last words to Nucky, and it proves true. After executing Jimmy, Nucky becomes much more ruthless and cold-blooded, casually ordering the execution of a thief and executing another thief himself, both times after assuring the thieves that he'd spare them]]. |
| 680 | * ItWorksBetterWithBullets: Nucky's rather ungrateful response to Margaret after she chases [[spoiler:Eli]] off with an unloaded shotgun before he can [[spoiler:throttle Nucky to death]]. |
| 681 | * IWantMyMommy: Dramatic-UsefulNotes/WorldWarI veteran Jimmy Darmody tells a story about a German soldier stuck on barb wire for hours, who kept calling for his mother ("mutti") after Jimmy mortally wounded him. |
| 682 | * JackBauerInterrogationTechnique: In the third episode Van Alden kidnaps and tortures a wounded and moribund felon / witness to get information. His dark side mostly goes downhill from there. Later on, he tortures Agent Sebso to get information out of him. |
| 683 | * TheJeeves: Eddie Kessler, Nucky's butler, is stuffy, well-dressed and behaves with GermanicEfficiency. He's also devoted to Nucky, in spite of Nucky's temper. He notably asserts very passionately to Margaret that the charges against Nucky are false, in spite of the fact that Eddie knows firsthand that Nucky is a large-scale bootlegger. |
| 684 | * JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Nucky can be quite abrasive towards the people around him, but he gets a few PetTheDog moments to show that he's not ''that'' bad of a guy. |
| 685 | * {{Jerkass}}: Nucky, Van Alden, the Commodore, Mickey Doyle, Lucky Luciano... it's BlackAndGrayMorality, what do you expect? |
| 686 | * JerkassHasAPoint: Gillian, in a fit of anger, rages, "Why does a man get to do anything he wants?" Considering what the Commodore [[RapeAsBackstory did to her]], it's a justified point. |
| 687 | * {{Joisey}} |
| 688 | * JumpingOutOfACake: Lucy does this for Nucky at Nucky's birthday party. |
| 689 | * KansasCityShuffle: Torrio, Capone, and Jimmy pull one in "Family Limitation". While Jimmy [[spoiler:makes sure that Sheridan and his men find the combat knife he snuck past them, they replace the coat-check girl with one of their hookers. She slips them their guns, and they take out Sheridan and his men in one fell swoop, complete with an excellent Pre-Ass Kicking One Liner from Jimmy.]] |
| 690 | * KarmaHoudini: A running gag for Mickey Doyle through the majority of the show. In spite of backstabbing people multiple times, playing musical allegiances, and suffering from fairly serious incompetence that leads to serious losses, and having an obnoxious personality, he manages to survive countless mass assassinations and mob wars. In season 3, Eli straight up asks him, "How the fuck are you still alive?" [[spoiler:Ultimately he's gunned down in the final season during a hostage exchange gone wrong]]. |
| 691 | * KarmicDeath: |
| 692 | ** Hans Schroeder being beaten to death after abusing his kids and inflicting such extreme abuse on his wife that she miscarried. |
| 693 | ** [[spoiler:Gyp Rosetti escapes Nucky but gets backstabbed by Tonino, his terrorized second in command. For added {{irony}}, Tonino apologizes while doing the deed and all but states a motif hated by Gyp; NothingPersonal.]] |
| 694 | * KickTheDog: |
| 695 | ** Rothstein once tricked a man into choking to death on a cue ball for his own amusement. |
| 696 | ** Gyp Rosetti kicks and shoots dogs like there's no tomorrow. Almost every scene with him ends with a kicked or dead dog. |
| 697 | ** Gillian's most evil act is her [[spoiler:cold-blooded murder of a lover to get Jimmy's inheritance]]. However, her condescending behavior toward Richard Harrow's romance and her insults about him being half of a man are more in the vein of this trope. |
| 698 | * KickTheSonOfABitch: |
| 699 | ** In "What Does the Bee Do", it might seem cruel to [[spoiler:brutally and continually slap an 80 year old man who's suffered a stroke]]. When the man is The Commodore and the attacker is [[spoiler:Gillian Darmody, finally enacting revenge for his rape of her twenty-odd years previously]], it's hard to find much fault. |
| 700 | ** Nucky's [[spoiler:beatdown of Eli]] in "Gimcrack and Bunkum". |
| 701 | ** Jimmy [[spoiler:throwing Mickey Doyle off the balcony of Babette]]'s in "Two Boats and a Lifeguard". |
| 702 | ** Nucky arranging the murder of Hans Schroeder in the pilot. It was brutal but given that how despicable Schroeder was, its difficult to see his beatdown as anything other than Karma. |
| 703 | ** Doctor Narcisse has Dickie's wife murdered in "Resignation" to show what a cold-blooded kingpin he is, but the fact that she had willingly participated in what amounts to sexual assault makes her hard to sympathize with. |
| 704 | * KilledMidSentence: |
| 705 | ** [[spoiler:Jimmy]] - reassuring his assailant that ItGetsEasier, for added awesome points. |
| 706 | ** [[spoiler:Gyp Rosetti]] gets backstabbed while yelling the song "Barney Google with the Goo Goo Googly Eyes". Oh, the [[UndignifiedDeath indignity]]. |
| 707 | ** [[spoiler:Van Alden]] gets one hell of an exit in "Devil You Know", shot through the head while strangling Al Capone. |
| 708 | --> I am [[spoiler:NELSON, KASPAR, VAN ALDEN.]] I am a sworn agent of the United States treasury. And I swear by Jesus our lord that justice will RAIN down upon you if it is my LAST--" |
| 709 | * KilledOffScreen: The seven-year TimeSkip from 1924 to 1931 skipped, among other things, the murder of Arnold Rothstein in 1928. Meyer Lansky makes an offhand reference to A.R.'s funeral when he meets Nucky in Havana. |
| 710 | * KneelBeforeZod: |
| 711 | ** After finding that his brother Eli has come crawling back after chickening out of his attempt to depose him, Nucky twists the knife further. When the traitor is sobbing and begging to be taken back, Nucky says they'll sort it out, but there's something the traitor needs to do for him first. The traitor replies "Anything, Nuck!" Nucky tells him "I need you to get on your knees. Bend down to the ground, and kiss my fucking shoes". He then slaps him around and berates him some more and provokes a full-on brawl between them. |
| 712 | ** [[spoiler:Lansky]] forces [[spoiler:Nucky]] to kneel before him to even past affronts and to underscore that the Young Turks have taken over the underworld from the old guard. |
| 713 | * TheKlan: The Klan are a problem for Nucky Thompson because he gets a lot of his political support from the Black community and the Black gangster Chalky White is one of Nucky's main associates. In season one, when one of Chalky's people is lynched, Nucky allows him to torture a Klan leader for information. In season two, the Klan has its revenge when they attack Chalky's liquor warehouse and kill four of Chalky's men. When Chalky kills one of the Klansmen in self defense, Nucky has to pull a lot of strings so Chalky is not tried and executed for murder. However, the Klan has little power in Atlantic City so they are never too serious a problem for Nucky. |
| 714 | * KnightTemplar: Van Alden, who cares more about catching Nucky than about enforcing the law for good if we look at his treatment of the dying, bleeding witness. |
| 715 | * KnowWhenToFoldEm: A major theme in the final season, paired with the gambler's conceit. Torrio advises Nucky to quit while he's ahead, before being forcefully retired like A.R. and many others. The crash of '29 and the prospective repeal of Prohibition make Nucky stay in the game for a last round. |
| 716 | * KosherNostra: Arnold Rothstein, Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel and the fictional Manny Horvitz. |
| 717 | * LadyMacbeth: Gillian is this in Season 2 for her son, Jimmy, with a side of TheConsigliere. She's the one who encourages him to stick to his guns and [[spoiler:go through with his assassination of Nucky]]. |
| 718 | * LaserGuidedKarma: |
| 719 | ** Liam, the {{Mook}} that [[spoiler:slashed Pearl's face]] is [[spoiler:shot in the face by a facially disfigured Richard Harrow]]. |
| 720 | ** [[DomesticAbuse Hans Schroeder]], who [[spoiler:beats Margaret so badly she miscarries, being beaten to death himself]]. |
| 721 | ** Parkhurst in "Gimcrack and Bunkum". Disrespects Jimmy and bludgeons him with his cane, but is reverent of Native American artifacts. Gets [[spoiler:''scalped'' by Jimmy and Harrow]]. |
| 722 | * LateToTheTragedy: When Nucky finally gets round to StormingTheCastle in his war with Rosetti... he finds that someone's already done exactly that. Namely [[OneManArmy Harrow]], who went in to rescue Tommy. |
| 723 | * LawOfInverseFertility: Mrs. Van Alden wants desperately to get pregnant but can't. Meanwhile [[spoiler:Nelson knocks up Lucy with one unfortunate encounter]]. |
| 724 | * LawfulStupid: Van Alden. He believes that by getting rid of Nucky, the only gangster boss in the series who actually has a decent side to him, that "This Sodom will be cleansed," Sodom being Atlantic City. However, in Season 2 he starts learning hard lessons about corruption and unenforceable laws. |
| 725 | * LaxativePrank: GoneHorriblyWrong. Willie Thompson spikes a college bully's drink with milk of magnesia (which he made himself in the chemistry lab). After spending all night in the bathroom, he's found the next morning sprawled dead on the floor, bleeding from the mouth and nose... and everybody knows it was Willie who supplied the booze. |
| 726 | * LetMeTellYouAStory: Occurs a lot. The journalists waiting for Nucky outside jail in "Ourselves Alone" {{lampshade}} his tendency toward this. |
| 727 | * LetsGetDangerous: |
| 728 | ** Meyer Lansky is small, cool and cerebral, but when two thugs try to rob Benny Siegel within earshot of Meyer's door, he steps out and guns one of them down, then gets into a gunfight with the second. |
| 729 | ** In "You'll Be Surprised," Sigrid reveals that she understands that Van Alden is a criminal on the run, but has rather psychotically rationalized him into a victim. When a fed comes snooping around their apartment, she [[spoiler:smashes him on the head and immediately volunteers to hold his legs while Van Alden finishes him off.]] |
| 730 | * LetThePastBurn: When Nucky's father's ill health forces him to move out of the house his son grew up in, it's given away for free to Damien, one of Nucky's associates who's starting a family. Damien is incredibly grateful and has the place renovated, but when Nucky visits the place to see if a new paint job will help him forget the years of brutal abuse his father gave him, he douses the empty house in turpentine and throws in a match, handing a wad of cash to the astonished new owner as he walks away. |
| 731 | * LibationForTheDead: In "To the Lost". This doubles as a TitleDrop as well as ThrowItIn. |
| 732 | * ALighterShadeOfBlack: By the third season, VillainProtagonist Nucky Thompson had [[TookALevelInJerkass taken a level in jerkass]] and embraced his role as a gangster to a degree that he was no longer clearly the Gray in the BlackAndGrayMorality framework. So, he was given an opponent in Gyp Rosetti, a brutal sociopath with a HairTriggerTemper, against whom Nucky looks like a saint in comparison. |
| 733 | * LightIsNotGood: The scene in which Van Alden [[spoiler:drowns Agent Sebso]] is filled with much light and Christian-based imagery. Van Alden's fundamentalist religious views and [[KnightTemplar severe self-righteousness]] also play into the trope. |
| 734 | * LiteraryAllusionTitle: Several: |
| 735 | ** "The Ivory Tower" refers to a novel of the same title by Henry James, which Margaret reads in the episode. |
| 736 | ** "The Emerald City" comes from Literature/LandOfOz books; Margaret reads one to her children in the episode. |
| 737 | ** "What Does the Bee Do?" comes from a children's poem by Christina Rossetti. Emily recites it in the episode. |
| 738 | ** "Two Impostors" refers to a line from Creator/RudyardKipling's "If" (If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster / And treat those two impostors just the same). Eddie Kessler quotes the poem in German in the episode. |
| 739 | ** "Erlkönig" refers to a poem by Creator/JohannWolfgangVonGoethe. Part of the poem is recited in the episode by Eddie and Agent Knox. |
| 740 | ** "The Old Ship of Zion" refers to a Christian hymn of the same title. Daughter Maitland sings it in the episode. |
| 741 | ** "Golden Days for Boys and Girls" refers to a newsmagazine Nucky read as a young child. A phrase in it comes back to him many years later. |
| 742 | * LockAndLoadMontage: Richard, in the penultimate episode of season three. |
| 743 | * LonelyAtTheTop: Nucky is without family other than a father and brother that hate him, and he doesn't even seem to have many friends. The emotional connections he makes are few and far between. |
| 744 | * LoveableRogue: |
| 745 | ** Owen has aspects of this in season three. He's a gangster, a MadBomber, and a romantic cad, but he's shown to genuinely care about [[spoiler:Margaret]]. |
| 746 | ** In "Blue Bell Boy," Roland Smith plays this role to the hilt in an attempt to charm Nucky and Owen into not killing him. Nucky seems to admire the kid, but Owen has his doubts. Ultimately [[spoiler:Owen warms up to the kid, but Nucky guns him down without warning. He was never going to spare him]]. |
| 747 | * LoveDodecahedron: The Darmody household. Jimmy is married to Angela, but also has [[IncestSubtext a very weird relationship with his mother]], and falls in love with a prostitute, Pearl, in Chicago. When he brings Richard back home with him, Richard falls (albeit chastely) in love with Angela, while Angela begins an affair with her friend Louise, and Jimmy continues to have affairs on the side. |
| 748 | * LukeIAmYourFather: The WildMassGuessing wasn't so far off the mark - [[spoiler:the Commodore is Jimmy's father]]. |
| 749 | * MafiaPrincess: Margaret fulfills -and struggles with- the role. |
| 750 | * MaleFrontalNudity: |
| 751 | ** Lucky Luciano, briefly in "Family Limitation". |
| 752 | ** Gyp Rosetti in "You'd Be Surprised", [[FullFrontalAssault fending off an assassination attempt]] [[InterruptedIntimacy that interrupted his play time with a waitress]]. |
| 753 | * TheManBehindTheMan: |
| 754 | ** Nucky is this in-universe. His only official position is Treasurer of Atlantic County, New Jersey, but he controls not just the city but the entire New Jersey Republican Party. |
| 755 | ** It's common knowledge that Daugherty pulls the strings of InvisiblePresident Harding. |
| 756 | * {{Mangst}}: Nucky suffered from childhood abuse, survived a dead wife and an infant son. Season 3 adds [[spoiler:the death of Billie Kent]] to the mix. He's not without feelings, but rarely complains about his misfortunes, pities himself for them, or lets others do it. |
| 757 | * MatchCut: "White Horse Pike" has a match cut from a car's headlight to the light from a movie projector which Hoover is using to show a newsreel about Marcus Garvey. |
| 758 | * MathematiciansAnswer: In season one. |
| 759 | -->'''Mrs. [=McGarry=]:''' Of what nature [is Nucky's offer]? Financial? Domestic? Sexual?\ |
| 760 | '''Margaret:''' Yes. |
| 761 | * MeaningfulBackgroundEvent: [[spoiler:[=McGarrigle=]'s]] murder. |
| 762 | * MeaningfulName: Richard Harrow, a badass ShellShockedVeteran with horrific facial scars, is both harrowed and harrowing. |
| 763 | * MeetCute: |
| 764 | ** In "Two Boats and a Lifeguard", while on the beach, Angela sees a woman arguing with a police officer who tells her to cover up because she's showing too much leg. As the conversation grows heated, Angela intervenes, and hits it off with the woman. Apparently Angela's gaydar was pretty good. |
| 765 | ** Richard Harrow meets Julia Sagorsky because her father has to be helped after losing a boxing bout at the American Legion. |
| 766 | * MeleeATrois: |
| 767 | ** Season One is Nucky vs. Rothstein vs. the U.S. Prohibition Agents (Namely, Agent Nelson Van Alden.) |
| 768 | ** Season Two is Nucky vs. Jimmy vs. the U.S. Attorney's office. |
| 769 | ** Season Three is Nucky vs. Gyp Rosetti vs the US Attorney General. And there are independent conflicts brewing in New York (Masseria vs. Lansky/Luciano vs. Rothstein, to a degree) and Chicago (Capone vs. O'Banion) to boot. |
| 770 | ** Season four is Nucky/Chalky vs. Narcisse vs. The Bureau Of Investigation (Namely, [[spoiler:Agent James Tolliver.]] |
| 771 | ** Season five has Van Alden/Eli vs. Al Capone vs. The Bureau Of Internal Revenue. Namely, [[spoiler:[[TheMole Mike D'Angelo.]]]] |
| 772 | * MexicanStandoff: |
| 773 | ** In "The Age of Reason", it's Luciano and Lansky against Jimmy, Richard, and Horvitz. |
| 774 | ** In "Spaghetti & Coffee", a very similar scene takes place with Owen and Eli up against Gyp and the Tabor Heights PD. |
| 775 | ** In "Margate Sands", the tension between Capone and his Chicago gangsters and Chalky and his African-American gangsters comes to a head. Nucky and Eli solve this problem by mediating with shotguns. |
| 776 | * TheMistress: |
| 777 | ** Nan Britton is Warren Harding's. |
| 778 | ** Chanteuse Billie Kent is Nucky's in Season 3. |
| 779 | * MobWar: In season 3 a full-on war erupts between [[spoiler:Nucky and Rosetti]]. By the time it is over, close to a hundred people are dead. We also see the beginnings of the Chicago mob war that will result in the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre, and Luciano, Lansky and Siegel's slow-burn war against Joe Masseria. |
| 780 | * ModestyBedsheet: |
| 781 | ** Margaret wears a nightie for sex with Nucky in numerous episodes. |
| 782 | ** Esther Randolph has the bedsheet version in "Battle of the Century" when she's talking to Clifford post-coital. |
| 783 | * MoeGreeneSpecial: |
| 784 | ** Considering Terence Winter's [[AuthorAppeal love of all things]] ''Film/TheGodfather'', it's unsurprising that this trope pops up a number of times. The preeminent example is probably Jim Colosimo's death in the pilot - shot through the eye so that the blood spatters the camera. The assassination attempt on Torrio is shot similarly to the attempt on Vito Corleone's life. |
| 785 | ** [[spoiler:Nelson Van Alden]] gets an ''incredibly'' gruesome Reverse Moe Greene, shot in the back of the head with the exit wound removing most of the side of his face. |
| 786 | ** Getting shot in the cheek, just below the eye, is a recurring theme. Richard recounts shooting a sniper in this way and does so again to the gangster who slashed Pearl. This also happens to the paper boy in Tabor Heights that walks into Benny Siegel's failed assassination attempt on Gyp Rosetti, [[spoiler:Jimmy himself, and ultimately Nucky]]. |
| 787 | * TheMole: |
| 788 | ** Agent Sebso. |
| 789 | ** Herman was one for Waxey Gordon. Emphasis on was. |
| 790 | * MoralGuardians: The Woman's Temperance League. |
| 791 | * MoralityPet: |
| 792 | ** Played with Margaret who is one for Nucky depending upon how moral you think she is. Her relatively HappilyAdopted children provide a straighter example. |
| 793 | ** Al Capone has his deaf son. |
| 794 | ** Jimmy has Richard Harrow, a disfigured and awkward veteran, who Jimmy got laid and introduced into gang life. |
| 795 | ** Tommy and Angela serve as Richard's. |
| 796 | * MoreGun: |
| 797 | ** The Klansmen use a truck-mounted heavy machine gun to shoot up Chalky's warehouse. |
| 798 | ** Al Capone gets in on the action with a Maxim gun in the season 3 finale to kill Masseria's men. |
| 799 | * MostWritersAreWriters: Narcisse is a playwright of highbrow, didactic works about the improvement of the African people. Audiences seem to find them a bit tedious. |
| 800 | * MrFanservice: Jimmy Darmody, Lucky Luciano, Owen Sleater, Meyer Lansky, and for those who like slightly older guys, Chalky White. |
| 801 | * MsFanservice: Lucy seems to have difficulty keeping clothes on. Then there's Gillian Darmody and her topless revue. Billie Kent has nude scenes in each of her first two episodes. |
| 802 | * MundaneUtility: Richard Harrow is a highly capable ColdSniper. In "Resolution", he uses his sharpshooting skills to win prizes at the fair for Tommy. |
| 803 | * MuggingTheMonster: Two thugs try to mug Jimmy of his winnings after leaving a card game. They know that he's armed, but didn't realize that he's just as handy with a trenchknife. |
| 804 | * MurderByMistake: In the Season 4 finale, [[spoiler:Richard accidentally kills Maybelle White when she walks in front of his scope as he's targeting Narcisse, right in front of Chalky. Richard is so shaken by this that he blankly walks out of the Onyx Club while security rains gunfire upon him.]] |
| 805 | * MurderIsTheBestSolution: |
| 806 | ** Pretty much all of the gangsters who Jimmy associates with in the second season endorse this, and it borders on a life philosophy for Al Capone and Manny Horvitz. Well showcased when [[spoiler:they all recommend killing Nucky, whereas Jimmy wants him imprisoned (and Richard categorically refuses to kill him)]]. |
| 807 | ** Gyp Rosetti talks his way out of his own [[YouHaveFailedMe permanent retirement]] by successfully convincing Masseria that killing Arnold Rothstein and Nucky Thompson instead is the most sensible and economic decision in these uneasy times. While Masseria is initially skeptical about Nucky and Gyp makes a point about encroachment, when Gyp fails to deliver, it doesn't take long for Masseria to get rid of him. |
| 808 | * MyGodWhatHaveIDone: In "Farewell Daddy Blues", [[spoiler:Richard is appalled when he accidentally shoots Maybelle White instead of Narcisse. He doesn't have to live with it for long, though, as he takes a bullet while fleeing the scene.]] |
| 809 | * MyLifeFlashedBeforeMyEyes: [[spoiler:Jimmy has a flashback to the war when he's shot.]] |
| 810 | * MysteriousPast: We don't know the specific reason for Eddie Kessler's unparalleled loyalty to Nucky other than that Nucky "stuck up for him" as a German immigrant during the war. We don't really know ''anything'' about Kessler, and neither does Nucky, as he realizes when [[spoiler:Eddie gets shot while protecting him. We learn a bit more about him in season four -- he fled his family in Germany after being caught extorting money.]] |
| 811 | [[/folder]] |
| 812 | |
| 813 | [[folder:N - R]] |
| 814 | * NationalStereotypes: |
| 815 | ** In universe, Nucky takes advantage of Hans Schroeder's German origins to use him as a fall guy. Use of slurs about any ethnic group and their mother is rampant. |
| 816 | ** Eddie Kessler, Nucky's German butler, is as [[GermanicEfficiency meticulous and precise]] as you'd expect a German to be. |
| 817 | ** Norweigan-born Sigrid is religious but pragmatic, cheerful and very liberal, especially when compared with TheFundamentalist Van Alden. She is also [[ComicBook/TheMightyThor handy with a hammer]]. |
| 818 | ** Nelson Van Alden is a native-born American of Dutch extraction. His joyless personality and fervent faith are typical Dutch Calvinist stereotypes. |
| 819 | ** Margaret's French boss at the dress store is a snooty, elitist FrenchJerk. |
| 820 | ** A minor plot point in the first season has Nucky struggling to recruit little people to play Leprechauns and get green beer for the Saint Patrick's Day celebration. In a later episode, the Irishman Owen Sleater jokes that all Irish people will clean your shoes if you leave them by your door, referencing the stereotypes of the time that they're all servants. |
| 821 | ** Lansky and Rothstein are calm, cultured cerebral Jews who care about business first. And there are complete opposites in Benny Siegel and Manny Horvitz. |
| 822 | ** Italians Salvatore Luciano, Al Capone, and Gyp Rosetti are impulsive, violent and loudmouthed but they are contrasted with Johnny Torrio and Joe Masseria. |
| 823 | * NeighbourhoodFriendlyGangsters: |
| 824 | ** Nucky is a neighbourhood friendly powerbroker and kingmaker who eventually becomes a gangster while keeping his VillainWithGoodPublicity image and his magnanimous regalities, mostly aimed at the upper classes. |
| 825 | ** Chalky White is half gangster / half social leader. His community looks up to him as a pillar of the community, though some criticize him for only helping them as much as it benefits him. |
| 826 | ** When Gyp takes over Tabor Heights, he first beats the sheriff into submission, but afterwards instead of merely relying on intimidation, he buys off the locals at $200 per head, which given his [[RuthlessForeignGangsters nature]] is a magnanimous gesture. He even enjoys himself with a reassuring NewEraSpeech where he reminds everybody of ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSPPxhYxF8k the importance of reading!]]''. Played with as everybody gets the [[AnOfferYouCantRefuse implication]] and he cancels Bible Camp. |
| 827 | * NewYearHasCome: Season 3 premiere "Resolution" is set on Dec. 31, 1922. Parties are had. |
| 828 | * NeverLearnedToRead: Chalky, who was born a poor, Black working man, in contrast to his classically educated family. Dunn Purnsley is also illiterate. He insinuates that Chalky can't read, but can't actually prove it by pointing out that Chalky gives the wrong title for the book he's "reading." |
| 829 | * NightSwimEqualsDeath: Played with in the opening scene of the finale: Nucky strips off all his clothes and swims far out into the ocean at first light, ducking under the water in the final shot. It's left ambiguous whether this is a flash-forward to his death or simply a recreational swim. [[spoiler:Later on, he tells Eli he'd been for a swim out of nostalgia, as he used to do it as a kid. He had considered swimming out too far, but decided to return instead.]] |
| 830 | * NippleAndDimed: In-story, the dancers can't show their nipples in Nucky's strip club, The Old Rumpus. |
| 831 | -->'''Margaret:''' Do the women take everything off?\ |
| 832 | '''Nucky:''' They have to leave little pasties on their...\ |
| 833 | '''Margaret:''' Nipples?\ |
| 834 | '''Nucky:''' Yes, those. |
| 835 | * NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: [=McGarrigle=], the Sinn Féin big shot in "Ourselves Alone" is a transparent {{expy}} of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eamon_de_Valera Éamon de Valera]]. However, he's somewhat older at this point in history than his historical counterpart was, and diverges from him in "The Battle of the Century" where the real de Valera is mentioned and [[spoiler:[=McGarrigle=] is murdered by his colleagues for seeking to make peace with Britain]]. |
| 836 | * NoHoldsBarredBeatdown: |
| 837 | ** Jimmy dishes one out to a photographer after misunderstanding his son and thinking that the photographer was having an affair with Angela. In reality, Angela was with the photographer's wife, although the photographer did suggest a threesome. |
| 838 | ** Dunn Purnsley gets one after picking a fight with Chalky in a cell full of guys who owe him a favor. |
| 839 | ** Gillian dishes one out on the Commodore after his stroke. |
| 840 | ** Purnsley gives one to a patron after he slashed the face of Chalky's daughter's boyfriend. |
| 841 | ** Al Capone gives one to an O'Banion mook after the mook gave one to one of his henchmen the night before. |
| 842 | ** Meyer Lansky beats an anti-Semite to death in an alley after the man insults Arnold Rothstein during a poker game. |
| 843 | ** Narcisse gives one to Daughter Maitland, though most of it is offscreen. |
| 844 | ** The season 4 finale [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kr5jSg58Hf4 features one]] with [[spoiler:Eli crushing Knox's skull with a vase]]. |
| 845 | * NothingPersonal: |
| 846 | ** Nucky tries to point this out, but Gyp Rosetti is not a man who gets swayed by it. |
| 847 | --->'''Nucky''': I learned a long time ago not to take things personally.\ |
| 848 | '''Gyp''': Everyone's a person, though, right? ''(later)'' Nothing's personal? What the fuck is life if it's not personal?! |
| 849 | ** After surviving a hit, Maranzano says that he doesn't take such things personally, but this time Nicky retorts that nothing is more personal than a man trying to kill you. |
| 850 | * NotAfraidToDie: Darmody and Harrow. Averted with Meyer Lansky. |
| 851 | * NotNowKiddo: Nucky's servant Harlan overhears him talking to his lawyer about Van Alden, and Nucky snaps at him for eavesdropping. When he starts to say he's worked for Nucky for years, Nucky cuts him off with a thank you for not joining the strike. When he mentions his church, Nucky curtly thanks him for his prayers. Just as he's leaving the room, Fallon catches on that Harlan wants to say something about Van Alden, and gives Harlan the chance to reveal that he and his entire congregation witnessed Van Alden drown his partner. |
| 852 | * NotQuiteDead: Hey, remember [[spoiler:those drivers Jimmy and Capone massacred at the end of the pilot? Turns out one of 'em ain't dead yet.]] |
| 853 | * ObfuscatingStupidity: |
| 854 | ** Agent Eric Sebso pretends to be extremely incompetent to hide the fact that he is corrupt. |
| 855 | ** Mickey Doyle is not as stupid as the others think. When his Italian partners are laughing and talking about him behind his back, he knows that it is time to [[spoiler:switch sides and set them up to be killed]]. |
| 856 | ** After Nucky is arrested, Margaret goes to his office pretending to be a poor, pregnant woman who needs Nucky's help and is utterly confused by the fact that he is not there. The state police searching his office are completely fooled by the act and take pity on her. She uses the opportunity to retrieve his ledgers. |
| 857 | ** Warren Knox, a new Prohibition Agent introduced in Season 4, acts like an incompetent hired on the basis of nepotism, [[spoiler:but reveals himself to actually be very calculating. After learning of a liquor warehouse protected by a booby trap, he allows his partner to get killed by the trap and then coolly executes the remaining guard, leaving all the liquor for himself. Later episodes reveal that Knox is working for J. Edgar Hoover to take Nucky Thompson down]]. |
| 858 | * OddFriendship: Hotheaded and loud-mouthed Lucky Luciano with impeccably-polite businessman Meyer Lansky. TruthInTelevision. |
| 859 | * AnOfferYouCantRefuse: Nucky sends Chalky and Purnsley to strongarm Eddie Cantor into working a play with Billie Kent. They do it in an unusual passive-aggressive [[WickedCultured way]], obviously amused by [[ScaryBlackMan how terrified he is of them]]. |
| 860 | * OffingTheAnnoyance: In season 3, [[AxCrazy Gyp Rosetti]] has a habit of doing this. The real problem is that his definition of "annoyance" can include virtually ''anything''. His EstablishingCharacterMoment comes when a GoodSamaritan helps him fix his car, but (completely unintentionally) appears to be patronising Rosetti for not knowing a simple expression. Rosetti lets him finish helping and then beats him to death with a tire iron. |
| 861 | * {{Oireland}}: Discussed in-universe. Eli and Nucky are Irish-Americans who idealize their homeland and buy into oirish stereotypes, and have been called on it by actual Irish people. |
| 862 | * OminousPipeOrgan: The classic Toccata plays after Richard Harrow does his first assassination. A definite VisualPun given Harrow's resemblance to Literature/ThePhantomOfTheOpera. The scene then segues into a screening of ''Film/DrJekyllAndMrHyde1931'' [[DiegeticSwitch where the music is playing]]. |
| 863 | * OminousWalk: |
| 864 | ** The show seems to like giving them to Richard and Jimmy, who both have notable ones in "A Return to Normalcy" and "To the Lost". |
| 865 | ** Nucky has one in "The Emerald City" and another in "Ourselves Alone". |
| 866 | * OneDialogueTwoConversations: In "Two Boats and a Lifeguard", Nucky takes Owen aside to demand to know what Owen was doing at the time Nucky was shot, when he was supposed to be on duty. Owen claims that he was visiting an old friend and lost track of time. Nucky, suspicious, pointedly asks him if that friend was from Ireland, by any chance. Owen [[OhCrap panics]], because while he did indeed visit with (and kill) an acquaintance from Ireland that day, he also [[spoiler:had sex with Margaret (herself an Irish immigrant) afterwards]], and thinks Nucky's found out about that, and is about to have him killed. Luckily for Owen, Nucky clarifies that he's asking about the assassination, and Owen gives a sigh of relief when Nucky brings up approaching the IRA for a business deal. |
| 867 | * OneDrinkWillKillTheBaby: Averted thanks to DeliberateValuesDissonance; Eddie Cantor brings a heavily pregnant Lucy a bottle of hooch to cheer her up. |
| 868 | * OneLastSmoke: [[spoiler:Rowland Smith]] thought Nucky was offering him a cigarette as a fellowship gesture. It was actually this. |
| 869 | * OneManArmy: Richard Harrow stages a one-man assault on the Artemis Club to rescue Tommy. |
| 870 | * OneSteveLimit: Averted; the supporting cast contains both Eddie Kessler, Nucky's German valet, and vaudeville star Eddie Cantor. |
| 871 | * OnlySaneMan: |
| 872 | ** Nucky, at times. Meyer Lansky, at others. |
| 873 | ** In season three, ''Eli'' becomes this particularly when he's the only one who realizes that trusting the Tabor Heights police Mickey paid off may not be a foolproof idea after Gyp burns the incumbent sheriff. He decides to scout out the road ahead of a shipment headed to Rothstein, and finds Gyp and his henchmen preparing to ambush the convoy. Unfortunately, his attempts to flag down the convoy as it reaches town fall on deaf ears due to the drivers taking Mickey's word to "not stop under any circumstances", so Eli can only listen from a distance as Gyp's men gun down the drivers and steal their trucks. |
| 874 | ** Johnny Torrio is this for the Chicago crowd, [[spoiler:which doesn't bode so well when Torrio starts to relinquish control of the organization to Capone.]] |
| 875 | * OOCIsSeriousBusiness: |
| 876 | ** In "You'd Be Surprised", after a shipment of booze gets repeatedly delayed, Rothstein's smiling "poker face" finally cracks, and he snarls angrily at Nucky. |
| 877 | ** With her business in the red and running out of options, the StepfordSmiler Gillian delivers a PrecisionFStrike to her employees. |
| 878 | ** The only thing that gets past Meyer's cool façade is Charlie Luciano's life being threatened. In "Ourselves Alone", he shouts at Jimmy and Charlie to quit fighting in his place of business, and in "Margate Sands", he shouts at Charlie to stop trying to kill [[spoiler: Rothstein]] for selling them out. |
| 879 | ** During an argument that divides Lansky and Luciano's partnership, Luciano digs into Lansky with an anti-Semitic slur, despite repeatedly defending Lansky's Judaism in the past. |
| 880 | ** Hoover forcing George Remus to drop his [[ThirdPersonPerson third person shtick]] for the first time ever shows that this young agent is a hardass and means business. |
| 881 | * OpenHeartDentistry: |
| 882 | ** Van Alden takes a gunshot man to a dentist, but all he's interested in is using the dentist's cocaine to keep the man alive long enough to give him a name. |
| 883 | ** Samuel, a medical student still two years from graduating, is forced to treat Eddie Kessler's gunshot wound. He states himself that he has no idea what to do, but manages to get his way through it. |
| 884 | * OrphanageOfFear: Gillian's backstory before running away to Atlantic City to become a StreetUrchin. Whether her life was better or worse for Nucky not sending her back is something she still seems unsure about... which speaks to how hellish the orphanage must have been. |
| 885 | * PapaBear: Richard takes a paternal interest in Tommy. When Julia's father starts manhandling him, Richard tells the man quite flatly that he'll kill him if he keeps it up. Later, [[spoiler:Richard stages a rescue of Tommy from Gillian and Gyp Rosetti's men]]. |
| 886 | * ParentalIncest: [[spoiler: Jimmy and Gillian, with Gillian initiating. Alcohol was involved, but there were hints of attraction on both sides even before the reveal...]] |
| 887 | * ParentalSubstitute: Several generations in a row; |
| 888 | ** Nucky was resented by his bitter and abusive father, and latched onto the powerful, wealthy Commodore at an early age in his attempts to find appreciation and success. |
| 889 | ** Jimmy, the Commodore's own son, grows up respecting Nucky far more than his absent and barely-acknowledged biological father. |
| 890 | ** Jimmy's son Tommy has, by turns, his grandmother Gillian and minder/bodyguard Richard, though Richard would rather it was himself and Julia, and Gillian would rather it was [[ParentalIncest Gillian and Jimmy]]. [[spoiler:By the end of season three, he's been left in Julia's care.]] |
| 891 | * PassedOverInheritance: [[spoiler:The Commodore never changed his will after finding out his faithful maid Luann had been poisoning him. Jimmy tears up the will, after checking that it all goes to him/his son if the will isn't found.]] |
| 892 | * {{Patricide}}: Jimmy kills his own father. |
| 893 | * PayEvilUntoEvil: |
| 894 | ** Chalky and his father's carpentry tools are set loose on a Ku Klux Klan leader to see if the Klan was involved in his friend's lynching. Eventually Chalky is satisfied that they weren't...and then keeps going for another ten minutes. |
| 895 | ** When the Klan attack Chalky's business in "21" and an entire season goes by with Nucky refusing to allow Chalky vengeance, Jimmy and Richard deliver the three Klansmen to Chalky in "To the Lost" as leverage to convince Chalky to end the strike. |
| 896 | * PerfectPoison: Averted. Jimmy eats a cookie poisoned with arsenic and it causes him to vomit. The Commodore is being poisoned with the arsenic for much longer, but it also just makes him really sick. The poison is discovered before it has a chance to kill him. |
| 897 | * PetTheDog: |
| 898 | ** Nucky with Margaret, especially when he visits her at the hospital at the end of the pilot. |
| 899 | ** Van Alden buys Lucy a record player after she becomes depressed and suicidal due to months of isolation (at his insistence) while she's pregnant. It's actually an equally humanizing moment for both of them. |
| 900 | ** Al has a soft spot for kids, both his own son and Jimmy's son Tommy. |
| 901 | ** Frequently subverted with Nucky's liberal attitudes toward all people and races. He deals with the Black community, but only because it's profitable. He hired Eddie Kessler in spite of the bad reputation that Germans had after the Great War, but he uses this fact to shame and guilt him. He supports women's suffrage, but only because he thinks he can control their votes. |
| 902 | ** Julia's father's reaction to Richard showing up on his doorstep with Tommy, covered in blood. He calmly orders Julia to take Tommy to his late son's room (something that had previously caused him to become violently angry) and has a lucid discussion with Richard. He might be a drunken asshole, but he keeps his composure when blood's been spilled. |
| 903 | ** Mickey [[BaitTheDog plays with it]] when he slaps Willie Thompson for trying to steal a box of booze but finally reconsiders and allows Willie to take it anyway. While Mickey sounds like he's taking pity on the kid, it's left ambiguous if [[JerkWithAHeartOfJerk Doyle is only being nice to avoid Eli's wrath]]. |
| 904 | * PeerPressureMakesYouEvil: In "Peg of Old", Jimmy most likely would not have [[spoiler:ordered Nucky's death]] if Al, Eli, Lansky, Luciano, and Gillian hadn't been pressuring him to do so. Overlaps with TheChainsOfCommanding, as he discusses with Gillian how he had to be seen to be decisive. |
| 905 | * PhonyVeteran: Al Capone, although he stops making such claims after Jimmy calls him on it. |
| 906 | * PinkertonDetective: The agency is involved in a lengthy sting operation against [[spoiler:Gillian, to trick her into admitting her guilt in a murder]]. |
| 907 | * PlotArmor: Throughout the show, Nucky survives ''six'' assassination attempts, sometimes by luck and sometimes by the vigilance of his minions. [[spoiler:His armor finally runs out in the final scene of the finale]]. |
| 908 | * PoliceAreUseless: |
| 909 | ** Unless you are the VillainProtagonist, then they're excellent tools. The Prohibition Agents are just as prone to corruption, many are incompetent and they are prevented from pursuing non-alcohol related crimes. |
| 910 | ** The Tabor Heights police. Eli notes that the portly local sheriff was turned down for a job in Atlantic City. He shrugs when Rosetti's men invade the town, asking, "What could I do?" His replacement vows revenge, but Nucky's men are dubious of his chances. It turns out [[spoiler:he and the rest of the police force simply swapped sides]]. |
| 911 | ** Esther Randolph's attempts to get Nucky and Rothstein into jail fail due to their deep political connections. |
| 912 | * PoliceBrutality: |
| 913 | ** While Nucky is the boss of Atlantic City, the police department is glorified muscle for his criminal empire, with his brother as the Sheriff. |
| 914 | ** Two New York cops beat information out of Lucky, telling him they can do whatever they want because they're the law. [[spoiler:It turns out that they're shaking Lucky down on behalf of Arnold Rothstein]]. |
| 915 | ** After Nucky and Daugherty fall out, two agents from the Department of Justice punch and arrest Nucky. |
| 916 | * PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Averts it just as much as ''Series/MadMen''. Casual domestic abuse, racial slurs, midget boxing, and [[UncleTomfoolery a band in blackface]] feature just in the pilot. A Black man shooting a white one in self defense still faces a lynching no matter how well connected he might be, and never mind the fact that the white man in question was a Klansman who had just killed a bunch of Chalky's men. |
| 917 | * PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: Pretty much everyone (with the exception of [[EqualOpportunityEvil Nucky]]), especially the Commodore, Senator Edge and Joe Masseria, who is very insistent about the untrustworthiness and [[GreedyJew greed of the Jews]]. Partial example in Rosetti, as he HatesEveryoneEqually. |
| 918 | * PopCulturalOsmosisFailure: Happens to Nucky several times, since the people around him aren't as educated as he is. |
| 919 | ** When Mickey Doyle says that he changed his name: |
| 920 | --->'''Nucky''': "[[Theatre/RomeoAndJuliet A rose by any other name...]]"\ |
| 921 | '''Mickey''': What's that supposed to mean?\ |
| 922 | '''Nucky''': Read a fucking book. |
| 923 | ** When he sees Chalky being harsh with his underlings: |
| 924 | --->'''Nucky''': [[Literature/UncleTomsCabin Simon Legree]].\ |
| 925 | '''Chalky''': I don't give a fuck they agree or not. |
| 926 | ** When he talks about Eli about Eli's betrayal: |
| 927 | --->'''Nucky:''' Et tu, Eli?\ |
| 928 | '''Eli:''' What?\ |
| 929 | '''Nucky:''' Shakespeare. ''Theatre/JuliusCaesar''.\ |
| 930 | '''Eli:''' There's a character named Eli? |
| 931 | * {{Ponzi}}: An excellent HistoricalInJoke--one of Nucky's friends in the first season is a client/victim of the TropeNamer, the infamous [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Ponzi Charles Ponzi]], seller of "international reply coupons". |
| 932 | * PowerTrio: Luciano, Lansky and Siegel form a solid one in the thirties, with [[BigBadDuumvirate the first two men acting as equals]] and Bugsy as a [[TheDragon loose cannon]]. |
| 933 | * PragmaticVillainy: A pretty big theme of the show, as certain bootleggers (e.g. Nucky, Rothstein and Torrio) argue for rational and business-minded decisions, while others (e.g. Gyp Rosetti and "Mustache Petes" like Maranzano) make decisions based on impulse, emotion or honor. |
| 934 | * PreAssKickingOneLiner: Chalky ain't building no damn bookcase. |
| 935 | * PreemptiveDeclaration: In "Belle Femme," poor Billy Winslow is on the victim end of one from Sebso. |
| 936 | -->'''Sebso:''' You shouldn't have done that.\ |
| 937 | '''Billy:''' Done what?\ |
| 938 | '''Sebso:''' Tried to lunge for my weapon.\ |
| 939 | '''Billy:''' What are you talking about?\ |
| 940 | '''Sebso:''' You lunged at me, tried to commandeer my gun.\ |
| 941 | '''Billy:''' [[TooDumbToLive What?]]\ |
| 942 | '''Sebso:''' ''[produces gun]'' That's why I killed you. ''[shoots him in the chest]'' |
| 943 | * PreMortemOneLiner: |
| 944 | ** When Jimmy and Al Capone assassinate Charlie Sheridan and his men. |
| 945 | --->'''Jimmy:''' I think you'd agree that Greek Town belongs to us now. ''[shoots Charlie in the head]'' |
| 946 | ** Also, from "The Emerald City". |
| 947 | --->'''Lucien D'Alessio:''' (''While Jimmy is loading his gun.'') Oh, oh fuckin' tough guy. [[YouWouldntShootMe Are you gonna shoot me for mouthin' off]]?\ |
| 948 | '''Jimmy:''' I wasn't going to, but you kinda talked me into it. ''[shoots Lucien in the head]'' |
| 949 | ** Owen's got one in "Peg of Old" after garroting a traitor to death: |
| 950 | --->''"Led me on a merry chase these five months, you traitorous fuck!"'' |
| 951 | ** Richard and Jimmy get a tandem one before Richard blows Neary's brains out: |
| 952 | --->'''James Neary:''' Nice fellas. Fuckin' confession signed at gunpoint.\ |
| 953 | '''Jimmy''': It's not just a confession.\ |
| 954 | '''Richard''': It's a suicide note. ''[shoots Neary in the mouth]'' |
| 955 | ** [[spoiler: ''Nucky'', [[NonActionGuy of all people]], before finishing off Jimmy.]] |
| 956 | --->''"I am not seeking forgiveness."'' |
| 957 | * PrecisionFStrike: |
| 958 | ** Margaret goes from zero to CountryMatters when she's finally had enough of Lucy. |
| 959 | ** She also drops an F-bomb to Nucky when she's finally had enough of his patronization, and [[DoubleStandard he takes offense at a nice girl using that kind of language]]. |
| 960 | ** Richard, who rarely swears, says "I don't fuckin' believe this!" when it's revealed they've caught Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano (and by proxy, Arnold Rothstein) working with Nucky. |
| 961 | ** Gillian drops an F-bomb at her employees, showing how pressure she's under between her declining business and her denial over Jimmy's disappearance. |
| 962 | ** Meyer Lansky is usually excessively polite but when it comes to his loose cannon of an apprentice and friend, Benny Siegel, he has some just for him. |
| 963 | * PrettyLittleHeadshots: Generally averted. However, in his first on-screen kill, Richard Harrow gives the guy who disfigured Pearl a MoeGreeneSpecial from across the street, and at first the rest of the cafe's patrons only notice because the bullet shatters a water jug being carried by a passing waiter. The victim remains seated at his table, with his head slumped back and blood running from his nose and a dainty new red birthmark under one eye. |
| 964 | * PrisonRape: After [[spoiler:Agent Knox's attempt to bring Nucky down fails, he tells Eli that he's going to send Willie to prison where he'll be raped. [[RelativeButton This pushes Eli into a homicidal rage]].]] |
| 965 | * ProfessionalKiller: Subverted by Gaston Means, who double-sells the services of professional assassins he claims to know for quite a large sum. It turns out that he does the job himself and completely bungles it. |
| 966 | * PromotionToOpeningTitles: Gretchen Mol (Gillian) and Jack Huston (Richard Harrow) for Season 2. Mol also gets the [[AndStarring "with"]] credit. |
| 967 | * ProtagonistJourneyToVillain: The show starts out with Nucky Thompson already long established as a CorruptPolitician and mastermind behind a criminal operation which soon turns to bootlegging when Prohibition legislation is passed. However, much of season 5 focuses on a younger version of Nucky growing up in Atlantic City and his turn to criminality to advance himself by making a DealWithTheDevil with the Commodore to contrast with the present day collapse of Nucky's empire. |
| 968 | * ProtestSong: The "Stand Up For Prohibition" song sung by the Atlantic City Women's Temperance League towards the end of "Nights in Ballygran". |
| 969 | * PsychoForHire: The D'Alessio Brothers seem to enjoy killing a ''little'' too much. |
| 970 | * PsychoKnifeNut: Archie Ortiz, Nucky's Cuban bodyguard in season 5, prefers his switchblade. He collects the ears of the men he kills. |
| 971 | * PsychopathicManchild: |
| 972 | ** Al Capone, before getting called on it. |
| 973 | ** Gyp in season 3 is a particularly brutal example. |
| 974 | * {{Pun}}: Nucky prompts for one by asking a little person for a dollar. The little person grudgingly replies, "Sorry, I'm a little short!" and rolls his eyes while walking away. |
| 975 | * PunchClockVillain: Owen, the IRA hitman, is a pretty friendly and laid back guy in spite of occasionally killing people either for Nucky or the Cause. |
| 976 | * PunnyName: Albert "[[IronicNickname Chalky]]" White, the black mobster, has three names meaning "white." |
| 977 | * ThePurge: The opening scene of the season three finale, showing the turning tide of the MobWar after the arrival of TheCavalry in the form of [[spoiler:Al Capone.]] |
| 978 | * PutOnABus: Lucy blows town in Season 2 after popping out Van Alden's baby. Rumor has it this was partly due to the actress not working well with the crew. |
| 979 | * QuitYourWhining: Nucky sits in the bar, moping over the state of his life, as a drunken Sally gets increasingly more irritated in the background. [[spoiler:Then, with no warning, she socks him in the mouth, knocking him out of his seat.]] Cue SlapSlapKiss. |
| 980 | * QuizzicalTilt: Harrow will do this in reaction to violence, showing his detachment. He does it as he regards a crying, panicky fourteen-year-old boy, right before shooting him as well as when Al callously suggests that he kill Nucky. |
| 981 | * RaceAgainstTheClock: Nucky delivers the ultimatum of "You have 48 hours" to Jimmy in "The Ivory Tower". |
| 982 | * RageBreakingPoint: Van Alden finally getting fed up with his salesman colleagues' mockery is truly [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tg_CsBxBRwQ a sight to behold]]. |
| 983 | * RageBreakingPoint: In "A Dangerous Maid", Nucky is shown as largely successful at containing his rage at the Commodore for betraying him (as well as encouraging others to to do so). He is even able to keep his temper when he and Margaret go on a double date with Mayor Bader and his wife, and sees the Commodore at the same restaurant he had chosen, eating with Nucky's former cronies. However, when the Commodore orders a dish Margaret had wanted, and the restaurant was consequently out of it, Nucky [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech lets the Commodore have it]] (and throws his dinner on the floor). |
| 984 | * RealityIsUnrealistic: |
| 985 | ** This may be an explanation for the appearance of Richard Harrow's facial prosthetic. They looked much more true to the wearer's face in reality than what's seen on the show. |
| 986 | ** This also applies to his wounds themselves. You might think nobody could survive that with the medicine of the time, but there are people who have survived ''a lot worse'' types of facial injuries. |
| 987 | * RedHerring: Gyp's erotic asphyxiation fetish. When first introduced, he allows himself to be strangled to the point of blackout. However, when [[spoiler:Gillian tries to murder him, she doesn't simply strangle him into unconsciousness, instead relying on her syringe of heroin again - and she fails]]. |
| 988 | * RedOniBlueOni: |
| 989 | ** Al Capone's hotheadedness compared with Jimmy's rationale. |
| 990 | ** Luciano and Rothstein, as well as Luciano and Lansky. Luciano's always the Red. Luciano even makes a joke about it when he temporarily trades roles with Lansky. |
| 991 | ** Richard is the Blue to Jimmy's Red. |
| 992 | * RefugeInAudacity: Al executing [[spoiler:the last of the D'Alessio brothers]], stepping over the corpse, picking up an apple from the dropped bag of groceries, and biting into it. |
| 993 | * RelativeButton: James Tolliver knows [[spoiler:Eli's family means more to him than anything, that's how he coerced him into cooperating in the first place.]] Yet he still taunts him with [[spoiler:his son's impending PrisonRape before he's got him in cuffs. Tolliver only proved his partners were right when they said he had a death wish, as it provokes Eli into beating him to death.]] |
| 994 | * RelativeError: New York gangster "Lucky" Luciano and Atlantic City gangster Jimmy Darmody quickly develop a mutual dislike of each other. So when Luciano meets a stunning redhead who introduces herself as "Mrs. Darmody", Luciano quickly makes the moves on her, assuming she's Jimmy's wife. When his boss Rothstein calls him up, he's quite amused, telling Luciano he didn't bang Jimmy's wife, he banged Jimmy's ''mother''. Who later on even helps out her boy with luring Luciano into a trap. |
| 995 | * RememberTheNewGuy: |
| 996 | ** Gyp Rosetti gets shades of this. It's eventually explained that Nucky started their business arrangement during the two-year gap between seasons two and three. |
| 997 | ** After a long TimeSkip, Salvatore Maranzano is introduced in the Season 5 premiere, at which point he is the most powerful gangster of New York in the wake of his triumph in the Castellammarese War. |
| 998 | * ReplacementGoldfish: In "Ging Gang Goolie", Gillian takes a new lover, a fair-haired young man who vaguely resembles Jimmy. She tells him that he reminds her of someone and decides to call him "James." It later turns out that [[spoiler:she really needed him to stand in for Jimmy's corpse so she could take control of his inheritance]]. |
| 999 | * ReturningWarVet: Jimmy and Richard for WWI. Paul Sagorsky for the Philippines. |
| 1000 | * RevealingHug: In the first-season finale, Jimmy makes a tearful plea to Angela to rebuild their relationship. She agrees, but her empty stare when they hug reveals mixed emotions. Later in the episode she confirms it by getting an ImportantHaircut referencing her departed lover. |
| 1001 | * RightThroughHisPants: The sex scene between Nucky and Sally Wheet in "The North Star". |
| 1002 | * RightThroughTheWall: Will Thompson has to listen to his uncle having sex with Sally Wheet ("The Old Ship of Zion"). |
| 1003 | * RiseAndFallGangsterArc: |
| 1004 | ** The first season features Jimmy Darmody starting out as a ShellShockedVeteran of World War I who can barely hold down a job as [[VillainProtagonist Nucky Thompson]]'s driver - only to eventually reinvent himself as a successful gangster, a friend to [[YoungFutureFamousPeople certain rising stars in the nascent Mafia]], and a protégé to the Commodore. However, the second season begins throwing obstacles in his path, and in time, his impetuousness, ambition, and aggression gradually end up undermining his criminal career and destroying almost everything he loves. Season 2 ends with Jimmy knowingly walking into a trap set by Nucky and [[SuicideByCop allowing himself to be gunned down]]. |
| 1005 | ** The series as a whole covers and consists of Nucky Thompson's arc. From corrupt powerbroker to bootlegger and then full-fledged gangster, until his eventual demise. |
| 1006 | * RoaringRampageOfRevenge: |
| 1007 | ** Pretty much all of "Margate Sands", which consists of Nucky getting back at literally everybody who wronged him up to that point. Richard Harrow also does one that episode, as he [[spoiler:shoots up a bordello guarded by Rosetti's men in order to rescue Tommy.]] |
| 1008 | ** After Frank Capone is gunned down by Chicago police officers, Al starts murdering random cops in broad daylight and makes plans to kill O'Banion, who he suspects is responsible for Frank's death. |
| 1009 | * TheRoaringTwenties |
| 1010 | * RousingSpeech: Jimmy pulls one out of nowhere in "Gimcrack and Bunkum" during a Memorial Day ceremony. |
| 1011 | -->'"'Mr. Thompson just said some impressive things about me, but they're not true. I'm no one's idea of a hero, least of all mine. When people ask me what I did [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI over there]], what I tell them is 'I made it back'. We fought for the idea that democracy was worth saving. We fought for our mothers, for our sons, for our wives. We fought for America, and I believe it was worth it. (pauses for applause, then holds up the list of names) These are all brave men."'' |
| 1012 | * RuleOfDrama: Basically the entire second season. |
| 1013 | * RuleOfThree: Three main characters, [[spoiler: Angela, The Commodore and Jimmy]] die at the end of season 2 in just as many episodes in a row. |
| 1014 | * RunningGag: In season 3, there's Gyp Rosetti's dog Regina, and her constantly shifting ownership. She's introduced in the first scene of the season in the ownership of a good Samaritan that Gyp bludgeons to death with a tire iron. Later, Gyp shows up at Nucky's black tie party holding the dog, having apparently adopted her. After getting angry, he storms off and leaves the dog behind, to Margaret's annoyance. We later find out that the Thompsons have reluctantly adopted her. When Gyp takes over Nucky's office, he takes Regina back and orders her fed. |
| 1015 | * RuthlessForeignGangsters: |
| 1016 | ** The crooks from out of town are all more ruthless than the local Atlantic City hoods. Arnold Rothstein is the most dangerous but he's reasonable and nuanced enough to downplay it sometimes. Gyp Rosetti, also from New York, is a classic example; a most violent, unpleasant and confrontational gangster who tries to take over the protagonist's turf and operation. |
| 1017 | ** Maranzano and Masseria are both native Italians, "Moustache Petes" who are more traditional and conservative than the younger American mobsters like Luciano. Their mutual desire for absolute control causes the massive Castellamarese War. [[TheDreaded Masseria is also one of the few people that]] [[AxeCrazy Gyp Rosetti]] is afraid of, with Gyp frequently having to talk Masseria out of killing him for his screwups. |
| 1018 | [[/folder]] |
| 1019 | |
| 1020 | [[folder:S - Z]] |
| 1021 | * SandNecktie: Gyp Rosetti buries Franco, a mouthy underling up to his neck in sand with the tide coming in. When Tonino, who is the guy's cousin, pleads with him not to leave him there, he obligingly smashes his head in with a shovel instead. |
| 1022 | * SarcasmFailure: When Sigrid nags Nelson again about the plumbing, he angrily claims that he got the president of the Roebuck company to personally send a crack team of men to fix the problem. She believes him, forcing to him to state that it was sarcasm and storm out. |
| 1023 | * SatelliteLoveInterest: |
| 1024 | ** Mary, Angela's girlfriend that she sees while Jimmy's forced to flee Atlantic City. All their conversations seem to be about are Paris and how they'll flee there together, dragging Jimmy and Angela's son along, mind you, and be together forever. When Mary later abandons Angela the same day they were supposed to elope, Angela goes home and seems to reconcile with Jimmy, though an apologetic postcard from Mary makes her cut her hair out of spite. |
| 1025 | ** Billie Kent's entire role seems to have been to entice Nucky with the prospect of a carefree life. She's not as damaged as Lucy, but neither is she as morally uncompromising as Margaret. Beyond her professional ambitions, we don't get much of a clue as to why she's getting mixed up with Nucky. |
| 1026 | * ScaryBlackMan: Chalky and Purnsley both know how to play it. |
| 1027 | * SceneryPorn: The incredible recreation of the Atlantic City boardwalk. |
| 1028 | * ScrewTheMoneyIHaveRules: Margaret in the third season finale when [[spoiler: Nucky tries to get her to come back by holding a wad of money at her]]. |
| 1029 | * SecretTestOfCharacter: After Eli has a suspicious outburst at dinner, Nucky tests him by quoting his embarrassing teenage love poem. Eli just laughs it off, revealing to Nucky that he's not just in a prickly mood. |
| 1030 | * SeductionAsOneUpmanship: In season 1, "Lucky" Luciano develops a feud with rival gangster Jimmy Darmody, then decides to seduce Gillian Darmody in the belief that she's Jimmy's wife. His boss Arnold Rothstein has to inform him that she's Jimmy's ''mother'' (she had him when she was 14). Not only that, she's completely loyal to her son and later helps him lure Luciano into a trap. |
| 1031 | * SelfHarm: Agent Nelson van Alden of the Burau of Prohibition is a deeply puritanical man who self-flagellates when he finds himself obsessively attracted to Margaret Schroeder. |
| 1032 | * SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: |
| 1033 | ** Nucky, Rothstein, and Lansky are prone to it. |
| 1034 | ** The two hunters that Harrow meets in the woods: |
| 1035 | --->"You're an easily bamboozled individual."\ |
| 1036 | "Aw, lay off your pontificating." |
| 1037 | ** Gaston Means. Just for example, instead of "your shoelace is untied", he says "Your left shoelace is in a state of dishabille[[labelnote:*]]French word for "undress"[[/labelnote]]." |
| 1038 | ** Doctor Narcisse likes to go out of his way with cultured circumlocutions. |
| 1039 | * SexualKarma: Crazed psychopath Gyp Rosetti also happens to be into EroticAsphyxiation. |
| 1040 | * ShellShockSilence: The aftermath of the restaurant explosion intended for [[spoiler:Nucky and Rothstein, which only succeeds in killing Billie.]] |
| 1041 | * ShellShockedVeteran: Jimmy is not the same guy since he volunteered to serve in [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarI The Great War]]. Richard Harrow is even more messed up. |
| 1042 | * ShooOutTheClowns: In "Two Imposters", the second-last episode of season 3, we see Eddie Kessler as well as Margaret and the kids get shunted out of the picture to focus on the season finale's coming bloodbath. |
| 1043 | * ShootTheDog: A literal example occurs when Richard Harrow's sister asks him to put down her ailing dog, but Richard has become averse to killing and makes her to it instead. |
| 1044 | * ShootTheHostageTaker: Harrow does it when [[spoiler:one of Rosetti's men holds Tommy hostage]]. |
| 1045 | * ShoutOut: |
| 1046 | ** Among the many stylistic flourishes of Martin Scorsese's that the show mimics, there are several instances when background music is used repeatedly, either within the same episodes or across several. Many times different versions of the same songs are used. This is something that Scorsese does in his films quite often. |
| 1047 | ** The season 1 finale does two in the same scene; [[spoiler: the deaths of the remaining D'Alessio brothers resembles the deaths of the rival dons at the end of ''Film/TheGodfather'' in how they're shown during the midst of the main character doing something seemingly benign (Nucky is giving a speech on crime, Michael at the christening). Furthermore, one of the D'Alessio's deaths (the one killed by Al Capone while returning home with groceries) is staged to resemble the death of Steve Buscemi's character Tony Blundetto in ''Series/TheSopranos.'']] |
| 1048 | ** Nucky compares Chalky to [[Literature/UncleTomsCabin Simon Legree]], upon seeing Mr. White chiding his underlings, but Chalky doesn't "[[PopCulturalOsmosisFailure give a fuck they agree or not]]." |
| 1049 | ** In the second episode, the Commodore humiliates his servant, by asking her opinion about politics and finance, just to prove his point: women shouldn't be allowed to vote. There is a very similar scene in ''Literature/TheRemainsOfTheDay''. |
| 1050 | ** Margaret reads ''Literature/TheWonderfulWizardOfOz'' to the children, and Richard Harrow compares himself to the Tin Woodsman. |
| 1051 | ** Gyp's right-hand-man Tonino tells him about seeing ''Film/{{Nosferatu}}'' in the theater. The film actually hadn't been released in America at this point in history, however. |
| 1052 | ** During Bugsy Siegel's assassination attempt on Gyp Rosetti, the camera looking down on the deaths and the cinematography as a whole mirror several moments of the shootout scene of Scorsese's ''Film/TaxiDriver'', even the music is reminiscent. The influence is also present in the Season 3 finale when, like Travis Bickle, [[spoiler: Richard unleashes a carnage on a bordello to rescue a minor he deeply cares for]]. |
| 1053 | ** Gyp references ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barney_Google_and_Snuffy_Smith Barney Google]]'' and sings the theme song in the final episode of Season 3. |
| 1054 | ** The second-to-last scene of Season 3 has a DoorClosesEnding homaging the one from ''Film/TheGodfather'', with a gender reversal as [[spoiler: Margaret is the one who closes the door on Nucky]]. |
| 1055 | ** The demise of Frank Capone, mercilessly gunned down next to a car and mourned over at the morgue, is very reminiscent of Sonny Corleone's ambush at a tollbooth by machine gun-wielding gangsters. This one goes full circle, since the death of Sonny Corleone is generally supposed to be inspired by the RealLife death of Frank Capone. |
| 1056 | ** The address casually referred to by O'Banion is on Racine Avenue, which is clearly intended to remind the viewer of Jimmy Malone's residence in ''Film/TheUntouchables''. |
| 1057 | ** The true identity of [[spoiler: Mike D'Angelo is Mike Malone]], evoking Jimmy Malone in ''Film/TheUntouchables''. He's also a real person, although he probably didn't kill anyone for Capone. |
| 1058 | ** The historical assassination attempt on Johnny Torrio is staged like [[Film/TheGodfather the assassination attempt on Vito Corleone]]. Both kingpins are ambushed by running gunmen who at first are only seen from below the waist, absorb numerous bullets at close range and are brought down to the ground in the presence of a disconsolate relative, and in both cases the target is not killed, only sent to the hospital. |
| 1059 | ** Eli and Knox fighting messily and dirty with household implements to the death is very reminiscent of [[Series/TheSopranos Tony Soprano]] [[Recap/TheSopranosS4E9WhoeverDidThis fighting with and killing Ralph Cifaretto]]. The antagonist hurts or threatens our antihero's loved one, Tony's horse/Eli's son. It ends the same with Tony/Eli killing the other by strangling and bashing their head on the ground while rage crying. |
| 1060 | ** While rehearsing her opening argument against Nucky Thompson, Esther Randolph describes Thompson as "a man who orders up murder the way you or I order coffee" -- a description given by the prosecutor at [[Series/TheSopranos Corrado "Junior" Soprano's]] [[Recap/TheSopranosS4E12Eloise trial]]. |
| 1061 | * ShownTheirWork: The producers spent millions painstakingly recreating 1920 Atlantic City in modern-day Brooklyn. As with HBO's earlier series ''Series/{{Carnivale}}'', the writers have put much time and effort into creating an entire world in the show and doing the proper research into real life figures. |
| 1062 | ** Eli has a book on public speaking by "Dale Carnagey", who not long after changed his name's spelling and is now remembered as Dale Carnegie. |
| 1063 | ** Michael Stuhlbarg researched Arnold Rothstein so thoroughly that the writers often asked him how Rothstein would handle a situation. |
| 1064 | ** The conversation between Nucky and Harry Daugherty about how Warren Harding would take the nomination at the 1920 Republican convention is almost exactly what the real Daugherty actually said at the time. |
| 1065 | ** The play Eddie Cantor gives to Lucy to read, which gives its title to the episode "A Dangerous Maid", was [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Dangerous_Maid the first play]] by [[Music/GeorgeGershwin George]] and Ira Gershwin. |
| 1066 | ** The cyclone that Daugherty and Smith reminisce about in "A Man, A Plan" really did [[http://www3.gendisasters.com/ohio/13318/washington-court-house-oh-tornado-sep-1885 rip through their home town in 1885]], and poor 10-year-old Mary Shackleford was an actual casualty. |
| 1067 | ** "The Good Listener" has a scene where a reporter is quizzing Al Capone about how gangsters are portrayed in movies. That was taken from [[http://variety.com/2014/tv/news/boardwalk-empire-revisits-varietys-1931-interview-with-al-capone-1201305823/ an actual interview]] Capone gave to Variety in 1931. |
| 1068 | ** In the last season, after the seven-year TimeSkip to 1931, Luciano is shown with a scar and a droopy right eyelid. It's only acknowledged once, and Luciano gives only a vague and dismissive wisecrack in explanation. What happened was that in 1929, someone--Luciano never said who--abducted him, beat and stabbed him, and dumped him in Staten Island. The scar and the droopy eyelid were the results of that attack. |
| 1069 | * ShutUpHannibal: Margaret's response to Lucy's attempts at a BreakingSpeech. |
| 1070 | * ShutUpKirk: Nucky to Margaret in "Paris Green". He points out Margaret never said "no" when he was helping her and reveals his knowledge about trying anti-conception. He also refuses to feel guilty about the death of Hans Schroder, who was beating her, the children, made her miscarry and did all of that with a smile. |
| 1071 | * SiblingRivalry: Eli is jealous of Nucky, his AloofBigBrother, and wishes people would bow to him the same way they do to Nucky. To Eli's exasperation, most just ignore or outright mock him. |
| 1072 | * SiblingsInCrime: Nucky and Eli, the D'Alessio Brothers gang. |
| 1073 | * SiblingYinYang: Nucky is single and a womanizer (at least initially), EqualOpportunityEvil, and is pretty much a NonActionGuy relying on intellect and charm; Eli is married with a large family, is a PoliticallyIncorrectVillain, and relies more on brute force than smarts. |
| 1074 | * SickbedSlaying: Nucky arranges for the hospitalized gangster who survived the first episode's massacre to be silenced, but this is prevented by federal agents, although the gangster still ends up dying. |
| 1075 | * SilentCredits: |
| 1076 | ** Occurs after the end of the season 4 finale, where [[spoiler:Richard dies]]. |
| 1077 | ** [[spoiler:Chalky has Daughter's rendition of "Dream a Little Dream" on his mind]] as he faces the bullets. After he dies and the credits roll, all we hear is the soft scratching of a finished record. |
| 1078 | * SingleMomStripper: Gillian. |
| 1079 | * SirSwearsalot: Many, but in particular the Commodore and Chalky, to the extent where Chalky can be jarring, considering the actor previously played [[Series/TheWire Omar Little]], who made it a point ''not'' to swear. |
| 1080 | * SlapSlapKiss: "The North Star" has two examples: |
| 1081 | ** A drunken Sally gets tired of waiting for Nucky to make a move, so she punches him and they tussle before falling into each other's arms. |
| 1082 | ** Chalky gets into an argument with Daughter Maitland, culminating in them grappling briefly and then passionately kissing. |
| 1083 | * SlashedThroat: A ''lot''. It seems to be Jimmy's calling card. |
| 1084 | * SleazyPolitician: All of them. |
| 1085 | * SlidingScaleOfShinyVersusGritty: Like ''Film/GangsOfNewYork'', 1920 Atlantic City is surprisingly clean. Along with generous helpings of LivingInAFurnitureStore and GorgeousPeriodDress, the show is dripping with elegant RoaringTwenties[[BuffySpeak ness]] |
| 1086 | * SmokingHotSex: |
| 1087 | ** In "Family Limitation", Gillian and Luciano smoke after having sex. |
| 1088 | ** In "The Age of Reason", Nucky tries to smoke after an unsatisfying session of sex with Margaret, but his lighter doesn't work. |
| 1089 | * SmugSnake: |
| 1090 | ** Mickey Doyle, a smirking schemer prone to giggling. |
| 1091 | ** Thorogood Junior likes to bring up [[{{nepotism}} his powerful father]] and is rather too pleased with himself despite the fact that his part in Nucky's plan involves his convincingly seeming like a total incompetent (which doesn't really require any acting from him). |
| 1092 | * TheSociopath: Most of the gangsters, frankly. Special mention to Gyp Rosetti, [[ExaggeratedTrope who tops them all]]. |
| 1093 | * SonOfAWhore: Jimmy Darmody. Gets really squicky when you factor in that Gillian was ''fourteen'' when she had him, father-figure Nucky was the one who pimped her out, and that his father is [[spoiler:the Commodore (who had to have been in his ''sixties'' even then]]. And no, you should not say a single ill word about his mother. |
| 1094 | * SoundOnlyDeath: In a season five meeting between Luciano and [[spoiler:Masseria]], Charlie steps into the bathroom and the camera follows him. He pretends to wash up while we hear the sounds of Tonino and Benny Siegel coming in and gunning down Masseria in a hail of bullets. When he steps out, Masseria is lying in a pool of blood and he asks Benny and Tonino what took them so long. |
| 1095 | * SoundtrackDissonance: |
| 1096 | ** Almost all the final act of the pilot, first with a comedic number by Eddie Cantor taking place while a gang of bootleggers attack the members of a rival gang, and later with an opera playing as [[spoiler: Jim Colosimo is shot in the head and Eli beats Margaret's abusive husband to death]]. |
| 1097 | ** Cheery music interrupts Lucy's screaming as she gives birth. |
| 1098 | ** Considering that the show's theme music is "Straight Up and Down" by The Brian Jonestown Massacre, the soundtrack is (historically) pretty damn dissonant from the get-go... |
| 1099 | ** The song that plays in the Artemis Club as [[spoiler:Richard slaughters his way through Rosetti's men]]? "What I'll Do", a rather soft and upbeat song. |
| 1100 | * SparingTheFinalMook: In the first season Chalky captures and detains two of the D'Alessio brothers (foot soldiers being used by the season's BigBad, Arnold Rothstein) and a kid named [[YoungFutureFamousPeople Meyer Lansky]], who is working as a messenger for Rothstein. The D'Alessios soon get themselves killed due to [[OffingTheMouth shooting their mouths off]] at their captors, but Nucky chooses to spare Lansky, in part so he can [[SpareAMessenger carry the tale back to Rothstein]]. |
| 1101 | * TheSpeechless: Lucky's heroin buyer, due to a knife-wound in the neck. [[spoiler:Turns out that he's an undercover cop who can speak just fine]]. |
| 1102 | * SpiritualSuccessor: |
| 1103 | ** To ''Series/TheSopranos'', a criminal procedural series revolved around New Jersey & New York in which creator Terence Winter served as co-showrunner and one of the main writers. Several actors [[note]] those of Nucky, his father, Whitlock, Torrio, Leo D'Alessio, Tonino, Bader and Chalky [[/note]] played major to minor roles in ''The Sopranos''. [[http://www.indiewire.com/article/why-the-boardwalk-empire-finale-reminded-us-so-much-of-the-sopranos-finale-20141028 The many similarities between the two series finales didn't go unnoticed]]. |
| 1104 | ** To other HBO period dramas such as ''Series/{{Deadwood}}'' and ''Series/{{Carnivale}}'', with its lavish production values, use of foul language, and nudity. The notion than prohibiting intoxicant substances is a total failure that generates more problems than it solves and empowers the underworld draws a lot from ''Series/TheWire''. In-house HBO director and producer Tim Van Patten is always present in all these projects. |
| 1105 | * SpousalPrivilege: One of the many CourtroomAntics Nucky plays to get his election fraud case dismissed is to marry Margaret explicitly to cloak her in the privilege, especially when the charges against him also include the hit he ordered on her abusive ex-husband. |
| 1106 | * StalkerWithACrush: Agent Van Alden to Margaret Schroeder. He steals her hair ribbon for some late-night ribbon sniffing and requisitions her immigration file to peruse in his free time. Even after his boss calls him out on his seeming obsession with the Schroeders, Van Alden still stops by Margaret's house and uses the opportunity to get details about her from her neighbor. Let's not forget about the time he [[spoiler: whips himself while staring at a picture of her in which she was only 16 years old]]. |
| 1107 | * StartMyOwn: Rosetti takes over the [[ChokepointGeography strategic chokepoint]] Tabor Heights to force Nucky into selling him liquor directly rather than have Rothstein acting as a middle man. However, Gyp soon realizes that he can start his own smuggling operation from there, supplant Nucky as Rothstein's main supplier and expand to the rest of New York. Rosetti is doubly delighted, as this makes Thompson [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness obsolete]]. |
| 1108 | * StartOfDarkness: Season five mixes flashbacks to the start of Nucky's career in with the events of the 1930s. The penultimate episode shows his real moment of crossing the line: [[spoiler:Lindsay quits the Commodore's service when he's told to hush up the family of a child he's sexually abused, and it probably isn't the first time. Nucky steps in, purely to advance his own standing in the Commodore's service.]] |
| 1109 | * StatingTheSimpleSolution: ''Eli'', of all people, suggests that killing is how the new coalition of gangsters deals with [[spoiler:Nucky]]. |
| 1110 | * StealingFromTheHotel: Mentioned in the song "Old King Tut": |
| 1111 | -->Three thousand years ago, King Tutty reigned you know,\ |
| 1112 | He must have travelled greatly in his time.\ |
| 1113 | For in his tomb out there, was gold and silver ware,\ |
| 1114 | From big hotels of every land and clime. |
| 1115 | * StepfordSmiler: |
| 1116 | ** Gillian Darmody always smiles and acts casually cheerful to everyone to survive and get what she wants. She remains the concubine of the man who raped her as a child until she momentarily [[BeneathTheMask drops the act]] to enact her revenge. Even afterwards, she pretends that they're still good friends. In all other aspects of her life, she behaves as the smiling hostess even when she's talking gritty business and outright threatening people. |
| 1117 | ** Arnold Rothstein is almost always smiling. When he's amused, he smiles. When he's confused, he smiles. When he's irritated, he smiles. Even when he's chewing someone out ''over the phone'', he smiles. |
| 1118 | ** Eli's wife June is emotionally fragile, covering up the stress of having eight children and an uncertain future by smiling. When Margaret suddenly draws back the curtain and talks about all the family dysfunction, June simply cannot process it. She just pauses for a moment in silence, then changes the subject and starts smiling again. |
| 1119 | * StiffUpperLip: Eddie Kessler doesn't mention that he's been [[spoiler:shot in the stomach, because Nucky needs him. When he starts to pass out, he apologizes]]. |
| 1120 | * TheStinger: [[spoiler: "A Man, A Plan" ends with a devastating one: a flashback to an earlier encounter between Margaret and Owen when she tells him she's pregnant with his child. Right after the scene where she discovers he's dead by Masseria's hand.]] |
| 1121 | * TheStoic: |
| 1122 | ** The unflappable Arnold Rothstein, who always wears a smiling poker face. |
| 1123 | ** Richard Harrow rarely betrays his emotions openly, and always speaks in a slow, low tone. This partially the result of his injuries and partially the result of the damage they've wrought on his personality. |
| 1124 | ** Meyer Lansky as well (who also picked up the smiling habit from his boss), in contrast to Luciano's hotheaded ways. |
| 1125 | * StormingTheCastle: [[spoiler:Richard Harrow coming to rescue Tommy from Gillian's place, overrun with Rosetti's men in the middle of a MobWar.]] |
| 1126 | * StraightEdgeEvil: |
| 1127 | ** Rothstein doesn't drink, eats only simple fare, and uses some of the least profane language in the series. He also does not carouse openly with women, though he claims to Nucky that he's simply discrete with his affairs. |
| 1128 | ** Van Alden could probably also be seen as this / FamilyValuesVillain with a dose of religious fanaticism and hypocrisy. |
| 1129 | ** Remus shuns gambling and doesn't drink alcohol. Downplayed in that Remus isn't above enjoying ladies of company. |
| 1130 | * StreetUrchin: A child shoplifter and grifter young Nucky is tasked with catching [[spoiler:turns out to be Gillian]]. The grim prospects of [[spoiler:being a young girl in such a life]] are a ForegoneConclusion. |
| 1131 | * StylisticSuck: Dr. Narcisse's play is stiff and preachy, with shoddy production value. Audience members are on the verge of nodding off. |
| 1132 | * SuddenlySignificantCity: As Arnold Rothstein puts it, Atlantic City is an extension of Nucky Thompson; a convenience of geography and supply. [[BigAppleSauce New York]] and not Jersey is the place where things "actually matter". The sudden prominence of the city is a credit to Thompson's ingenuity and resourcefulness. |
| 1133 | * SuddenSequelDeathSyndrome: [[spoiler: Manny Horvitz is killed off abruptly in the first episode of season 3 by Richard Harrow as revenge for Angela's death]]. |
| 1134 | * SuicideByCop: [[spoiler:It's implied in the season 2 finale that Jimmy knew he was walking into a trap and went unarmed so that someone would kill him]]. |
| 1135 | * SurroundedByIdiots: |
| 1136 | ** Rothstein's reaction after the D'Alessio brothers fail to kill Nucky, only succeeding at killing an innocent bystander in the process. |
| 1137 | ** Almost anyone's reaction when they have to speak to Mickey Doyle. |
| 1138 | * SurprisinglySuddenDeath: In the middle of a tense standoff, [[spoiler:Mickey is doing his usual wheedling when he's shot out of the blue, triggering a shootout that also takes out Arquimedes.]] |
| 1139 | * TantrumThrowing: Taken to the extreme when Van Alden loses his temper at Faraday and assaults a colleague. He takes his remaining anger out on the desks and office equipment, sending everyone else scrambling for cover. Then calmly retrieves his hat and coat, and leaves. |
| 1140 | * TarotMotifs: Gillian gets a reading in episode 3, including the High Priestess (a woman with significant power), the Moon (mystery and danger), and the Knight of Swords (a hot-tempered man). The tarot deck used as the prop, however, was [[AnachronismStew first published in 1985.]] |
| 1141 | * ATasteOfTheLash: Self-inflicted by the [[KnightTemplar pious]] agent Van Alden: the most obvious reason are his [[SevenDeadlySins <a-hem> impure thoughts]] caused by a photo of a 16-year-old Margaret. [[CasualKink He keeps staring at the photo while he flogs himself,]] though. |
| 1142 | * TeenPregnancy: Gillian gave birth to Jimmy at the age of 13. In-universe Luciano mistakes her for Jimmy's wife. |
| 1143 | * TeethClenchedTeamwork: Gangster groups are all rivals in the same business, so when they team up, it often results in this. Capone's and Chalky's gangs even come to blows while allied with Nucky. |
| 1144 | * TheTeetotaler: |
| 1145 | ** Margaret is one when the series starts but begins to drink as she is corrupted by "the good life". |
| 1146 | ** The Temperance League, of course, is a legion of teetotalers. |
| 1147 | ** As was true historically, Arnold Rothstein is one, drinking tea or milk when others imbibe, allowing him to be sharp when engaged in gambling or other activities. |
| 1148 | ** As expected, given his values and dedication to his job, Van Alden starts out as one, but "gives into temptation" in this and other aspects toward the end of the first season. Even after [[spoiler:becoming a bootlegger, he's still not much of a drinker, however]]. |
| 1149 | * ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill: |
| 1150 | ** [[spoiler:Frank Capone]] is gunned down by a small army of men, a couple of whom are using ''shotguns'', all of whom empty their weapons into him. It's like a Roaring Twenties version of Murphy's death from ''Film/RoboCop1987''. |
| 1151 | ** In season 3, rival crime boss Gyp Rosetti puts out a hit on Nucky Thompson by [[spoiler:blowing up an entire restaurant on the Atlantic City boardwalk in the hopes that Nucky would walk inside in time. It instead claims the lives of everyone who was already dining inside and numerous bystanders, including Nucky's mistress Billie Kent.]] Rosetti's backer Joe Masseria later chews him out about this pointless massacre. |
| 1152 | * TheyCallMeMisterTibbs: Narcisse insists on being addressed as "Doctor Narcisse" rather than "Mister Narcisse." |
| 1153 | * ThickerThanWater: |
| 1154 | ** The Commodore uses this to [[spoiler: tempt Jimmy into betraying Nucky.]] |
| 1155 | ** A topsy-turvy example with Nucky and Eli. At the beginning of the show, Eli serves as his older brother's right-hand man. [[spoiler: Later, Eli's jealousy causes him to betray Nucky, but then he tries to play the brother card when he pleads for Nucky's mercy. Even after coming to blows, Nucky ultimately forgives him enough to spare him and even sets him up with a low-level job after he gets released from prison. By the end of the season, Eli is the only man who Nucky trusts anymore However, Eli is forced to betray him to save his son from prison]]. |
| 1156 | * ThirdPersonPerson: George Remus, [[WhosOnFirst much to Al Capone's confusion]]. Everyone finds it insufferable, but only J. Edgar Hoover has managed to make him cut it out. |
| 1157 | * ThrowingTheFight[=/=] FixingTheGame: Rothstein is worried that he'll be exposed as the fixer behind the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Sox_Scandal Black Sox Scandal]] of 1919. |
| 1158 | * TimeSkip: |
| 1159 | ** Season three skips ahead two years, to the time when Capone began moving out of Torrio's shadow, Luciano and Lansky began expanding, and the scandals of the Harding administrations were being revealed. |
| 1160 | ** Season five takes place in 1931, seven years after the events of season four. |
| 1161 | * TimeshiftedActor: Season 5 contains flashbacks through Nucky's life, where we see Nucky and Eli as kids (played by Nolan Lyons and Oakes Fegley) and young adults (played by Marc Pickering and Ryan Dinning), and younger versions of Ethan Thompson, the Commodore (played by Ian Hart and John Ellison Conlee), and others. |
| 1162 | * TitleDrop: Occurs in several episodes. |
| 1163 | * ThievesGuild: Luciano deposes the old Mustache Pete's order and sets up "The Commission", a new governing body of the American Mafia made up of peers, with the five families of New York and the bosses of Chicago and Buffalo functioning as a board of directors who would mediate conflicts between members. |
| 1164 | * {{Tomboy}}: Young {{street urchin}} [[spoiler:Gillian Darmody]], as seen in the season five flashbacks. |
| 1165 | * TooDumbToLive: |
| 1166 | ** One of the [[spoiler: D’Alessio brothers]] taunts the mobsters that have them tied up. Jimmy unceremoniously caps the mouthy one in the head, and Chalky strangles the other one to death with his bare hands. Lansky winces, expecting the inevitable result, and does not make the same mistake. |
| 1167 | ** [[spoiler: Sally]] apparently thinks it's a valid strategy to point a gun at 10+ armed soldiers who attempt to detain her. |
| 1168 | * TookALevelInBadass: Season 3 ups the ante for the Thompson brothers, who have to personally tackle deadly threats and become BashBrothers in the process. |
| 1169 | * TrademarkFavoriteFood: Arnold Rothstein's milk and cake, which he eats in lieu of sophisticated vices like drinking, smoking and expensive meals. Nucky says that he eats like a child. |
| 1170 | * TragicDropout: Nucky thinks that Jimmy joined the Army because he "couldn't hack it at Princeton". As "Under God's Power She Flourishes" reveals that while he actually was kicked out of Princeton, he was also [[spoiler:running away from his mother, who raped him the night before he decided to enlist]]. |
| 1171 | * TrailersAlwaysLie: The next episode previews often take lines of dialogue out of context, or clip parts of them off completely. |
| 1172 | * TwistedEchoCut: In "21" Nucky is delivering an impassioned speech to a Black church congregation promising to protect them from Klansmen--then, after a cleverly disguised cut, Nucky is shown in a near-identical setting telling a racist white church congregation that the "coloreds" will be taught a lesson. |
| 1173 | * TwoFaced: |
| 1174 | ** Richard Harrow. After the events of the season three finale, he appears [[RuleOfSymbolism with blood streaked across the "good" side of his face and none on his tin mask.]] |
| 1175 | ** [[spoiler: Agent Clarkson is badly burned on the right side of his face when he's caught in the explosion of Mickey Doyle's bootlegging warehouse, courtesy of Owen.]] |
| 1176 | * UglyGuyHotWife: |
| 1177 | ** Sigrid is an attractive young woman, while Van Alden has a mug that "you don't forget." |
| 1178 | ** [[HotGuyUglyWife Inverted]] with Gyp Rosetti. |
| 1179 | * UndyingLoyalty |
| 1180 | ** Eddie Kessler to Nucky Thompson, partially explained by Nucky employing him during WWI in spite of his German heritage. |
| 1181 | ** Richard Harrow to Jimmy Darmody and by extension, Angela. [[spoiler:Literally. He avenges Angela's death and transfers his loyalty to Jimmy's young son.]] |
| 1182 | * TheUnfavorite: Both Thompson brothers believe themselves to be. "Home" reveals that their father is quite disapproving of the successful but LonelyAtTheTop Nucky, seeming to prefer his younger and more traditional family-man son, Eli. Later, however, Eli learns that their father believes that he's incompetent and needs Nucky to look after him. |
| 1183 | * VillainBall: Played with in "21". [[spoiler: The KKK member who has Chalky at gunpoint talks and gives someone else time to shoot him. Chalky watches the klansmen fleeing, then just before they get into cover aims and shoots one in the neck.]] |
| 1184 | * VillainousBreakdown: After a crushing defeat, Gyp starts singing the theme song to ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barney_Google_and_Snuffy_Smith Barney Google]]'', to the confusion of his remaining men. |
| 1185 | * VillainousDemotivator: Gyp Rosetti brutally murders one of his own men (for one of the slights that exist only in his deranged mind) ''in front of the man's cousin''. |
| 1186 | * VillainousMotherSonDuo: James Darmody teams up with his (very young) mother Gillian in their plot to take over Atlantic City from Nucky Thompson in season 2. The Darmody family history is ''very'' sordid and tragic. Gillian was [[RapeAsDrama pimped out as an innocent teenage girl]] to the Commodore by Nucky, resulting in [[ChildByRape Jimmy's conception]]. Gillian herself would later initiate a sexual encounter with Jimmy during a drunken night at his college. To complete the entire Oedipal drama, Gillian egged him on to kill both the Commodore, Jimmy's biological father, as well as Nucky, Jimmy's adopted father figure. |
| 1187 | * VillainousRescue: [[spoiler: Al Capone]] at the end of season 3. |
| 1188 | -->I've been on the road for 18 hours. I need a bed, some chow, and then you and me, we sit down and talk about who dies, huh? |
| 1189 | * VillainProtagonist: Nucky, Jimmy, Eli, Lucky, Lansky, Owen, Harrow, Chalky, Gillian, and Dunn. By the end of season 2 even Van Alden becomes one. |
| 1190 | * VillainWithGoodPublicity: |
| 1191 | ** As far as the people are concerned, Nucky is a pillar of the community and a social celebrity in Atlantic City. In season 3 he also becomes a philanthropist and a Knight of the Church, albeit involuntarily. |
| 1192 | ** Harry Daugherty, the massively corrupt campaign manager of Warren Harding and US Attorney General, boasts about outmatching Nucky in this regard, cautioning Thompson that he would lose badly in a battle of image and credibility. |
| 1193 | * VomitIndiscretionShot: |
| 1194 | ** Eli violently expelling his stomach contents after a St. Patrick's Day dinner. |
| 1195 | ** The Commodore, after drinking medication and being unable to eat breakfast. |
| 1196 | ** Jimmy after [[spoiler:eating a poisoned cookie.]] |
| 1197 | * VorpalPillow: Deconstructed. Eli attempts to murder a semiconscious, hospitalized witness with a pillow, but it takes forever, it wakes up a patient in an adjoining bed (separated by a curtain), and he eventually has to quit with the witness still alive when Van Alden comes in. |
| 1198 | * VoteEarlyVoteOften: |
| 1199 | ** We don't see this in Season 1, even as Nucky gets more and more anxious over the local 1920 elections, but in season 2 Nucky is charged with election fraud. In jail, he and Chalky discuss how they spent election night giving out money to anyone who would vote for their candidates. |
| 1200 | ** Season 4 shows us election campaigning Chicago-style. During a municipal election in Cicero, Al Capone gathers various gangsters and hired thugs and armed with bats and pipes they go to a rally for an opposition candidate. They beat up the candidates supporters but let enough of them get away to spread the word about what happens to those who support the wrong candidate. A later episode shows us Election Day where the Capones try to stop a group of workers from voting. It quickly escalates into a melee and this time the gangsters are outnumbered. This culminates in Frank Capone being shot dead by police. |
| 1201 | * WallBangHer: Nucky has sex with [[spoiler:Sally Wheet]] this way in "North Star". |
| 1202 | * WantingIsBetterThanHaving: One of the motifs of the series. Season 2 opens to the tune of the song "After you get what you want (you don't want it)" and Nucky acknowledges it as a factor behind his unquenched thirst. |
| 1203 | -->'''Nucky:''' I recall that I was once [alive, before Prohibition] Till then, I was a simple, run-of-the-mill crook... a corrupt city official. And I was happy. Plenty of money, plenty of friends, plenty of everything. Then suddenly, plenty wasn't enough. |
| 1204 | * WeCanRuleTogether: Lansky talks his way out of a hail of bullets by proposing this to Jimmy, Harrow, and Horowitz; he and Luciano, along with them, will [[spoiler: team up against both Nucky ''and'' Rothstein, and take over]]. |
| 1205 | * WeHaveToGetTheBulletOut: Chalky's [[TheMedic medical student son-in-law]] has to operate on a gunshot [[spoiler:Eddie Kessler]] on a kitchen table with bootleg whiskey for anaesthetic. |
| 1206 | * WellIntentionedExtremist: The Prohibition agents- one even says specifically that he doesn't care about all the graft and corruption Nucky is responsible for; just that he gets nailed for trafficking liquor. |
| 1207 | * WhamEpisode: The last three episodes of Season Two. |
| 1208 | ** In "Georgia Peaches", having survived an assassination attempt that Jimmy encouraged to avoid repaying the $5,000 debt owed to him, Manny [[spoiler: goes to Jimmy's house to take care of Jimmy only to find Angela and her lover present and ends up murdering both of them]]. |
| 1209 | ** In "Under God's Power She Flourishes" we find out in a flashback that [[spoiler: Jimmy slept with his mother and that's why he enlisted in the army. In the present storyline Jimmy murders the Commodore. Also Van Alden's murder of Agent Sebso is discovered and he goes on the run]]. |
| 1210 | ** The season finale, "To the Lost", tops it all off when Jimmy [[spoiler: tries to make amends with Nucky and when that fails, goes on a suicide run]], Nucky [[spoiler:allies himself with Manny Horvitz and kills Jimmy]]. And Margaret [[spoiler: marries Nucky, then signs over the deeds of land to the church]]. |
| 1211 | ** "Margate Sands", for season three: [[spoiler: Richard pulls a one-man RoaringRampageOfRevenge to get Tommy back, leaving him with Julia and Paul. Rothstein sells out his proteges, sending Luciano to prison and Lansky into further debt to Masseria, and steals Nucky's distillery. Nucky plays the long con on Rothstein, selling him out to Esther Randolph, and orchestrates a massacre of Gyp and Masseria's men. Gyp Rosetti, the BigBad of the season, goes down at the hand of his lieutenant, Tonino]]. |
| 1212 | ** The Season 4 finale, "Farewell Daddy Blues": [[spoiler: Eli mercilessly beats down and kills Agent Tolliver, Richard accidentally kills Maybelle, an "anonymous" tip from Nucky leads to the discovery of Jimmy's body which royally screws up Gillian's defense strategy in her murder trial, Richard loses the will to live and dies from a gunshot wound, Dr. Narcisse is now cooperating with the [=BoI=], Johnny Torrio gets shot and turns the reins over to Al, Eli moves in with Al's outfit, and a grief-stricken Chalky remains at his mentor's house. Holy shit.]] |
| 1213 | ** In the Season 5 episode "Devil You Know", [[spoiler:both Van Alden and Chalky are killed. Van Alden attempts to steal Al's ledgers and fails. When Al confronts him, Van Alden snaps and tries to kill him, only to be shot in the head from behind. Chalky, after cornering Narcisse, makes a deal with him where in return for him sparing Narcisse's life, Narcisse will publish Maitland's record album. Chalky is then gunned down by Narcisse's men. Meanwhile, Nucky has had enough and decides to take the fight directly to Luciano.]] |
| 1214 | * WhamLine: |
| 1215 | ** "Havre de Grace": |
| 1216 | --->'''Roy:''' [[spoiler:I need you to listen carefully. I'm with the Pinkerton Detective Agency. These men are my associates and are witnesses to your confession to first-degree murder.]] |
| 1217 | ** "El Dorado" |
| 1218 | --->'''Nucky:''' Who are you?\ |
| 1219 | '''Joe Harper:''' [[spoiler:Tommy Darmody.]] |
| 1220 | * WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Regina, the dog that keeps changing owners throughout season 3, is last seen with Gyp before his outfit occupies the Artemis club. [[spoiler:Gyp's outfit is slaughtered, Gyp himself is backstabbed]], and we never find out what happened to the dog. |
| 1221 | * WhenEldersAttack: |
| 1222 | ** Jackson Parkhurst, the handicapped racist investor who whacks Jimmy across the skull with his cane, bloodying him up for apparent disrespect. |
| 1223 | ** Even at his advanced age and suffering from partial paralysis, the Commodore manages to [[spoiler: skewer Jimmy with a spear]]. |
| 1224 | * WhereDaWhiteWomenAt: Dunn's taboo fling with a white woman ends pretty terribly for all parties involved. Doctor Narcisse notes how the world will readily accept the woman's story that he raped her. |
| 1225 | * WhoNamesTheirKidDude: |
| 1226 | ** A grateful Margaret announces her intention to name her unborn child Enoch, to which Nucky replies that [[HarsherInHindsight he can't think of something more cruel]]. |
| 1227 | ** Daughter Maitland was too young to remember her real name when she was adopted by Dr. Narcisse, so he simply named her Daughter. When Oscar Boneau hears that this is her name, he remarks: "Had me a bluetick coon once and didn't call him Hound." For the rest of the episode, he calls Daughter "Bluetick". |
| 1228 | * WhosOnFirst: The scene in the pilot where all the major gangsters are arriving at the hotel. Sebso doesn't know who anyone is and mistakes "Nucky" for "Lucky", Rothstein for Colosimo ("does that man look big to you?") and doesn't know what a concierge is. |
| 1229 | * WickedCultured: |
| 1230 | ** Nucky Thompson wears expensive suits and hits all the fashionable night spots as a fixture of the speakeasy community. |
| 1231 | ** Doctor Narcisse dresses well and speaks with excessive erudition. In spite of his constant Bible quotes, he's a power player in the underworld. |
| 1232 | * WifeHusbandry: A particularly dark example is [[spoiler:Dr. Narcisse and Daughter Maitland. It's revealed that he killed her prostitute mother and then raised her like a daughter to worship him. Although it's not clear whether they ever actually have sex, their interactions behind closed doors have clear sexual undertones]]. |
| 1233 | * WildCard: Tonino Sandrelli, in a "cowardly mook-for-hire" kind of way. He first works for Gyp Rossetti, and by season five is running as a double agent between Luciano/Lansky and Salvatore Maranzano. He admits to Nucky how desperate and scary it is to work for a bunch of people he doesn't trust, and looks like he's going to turn his coat yet again, [[spoiler:but his past treachery comes back to haunt him: one of the jobs he did for Rossetti was the hit on Babette's that killed Billie.]] |
| 1234 | * WorthyOpponent: Richard seems to regard Owen Sleater as this in "A Dangerous Maid". |
| 1235 | -->'''Owen:''' Why did you not shoot me?\ |
| 1236 | '''Richard:''' I may yet. |
| 1237 | * UsefulNotes/WorldWarI: Barely fifteen months in the past when the show starts, and frequently referenced. Jimmy Darmody and Richard Harrow are veterans with PTSD, Al Capone lies about being in the Lost Battalion ("He got so lost he thought Brooklyn was in France!"), and Nucky reminds his German valet of how Nucky stood up for him during the recent wave of anti-German sentiment. In "To the Lost" we get a brief flashback of Jimmy in a trench in France, going over the top. |
| 1238 | * WritersCannotDoMath: In "A Return to Normalcy", Margaret sees the tombstone of Nucky's first wife, Mabel Thompson which says that Mabel was born in 1884 and died in 1913. However, in "What Jesus Said", there's a flashback to 1884, where Nucky first meets a young Mabel, who looks around 10 years old. Terence Winter [[http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/boardwalk-empire-creator-terence-winter-on-nuckys-fate-and-the-series-finale/2 joked]] that "somebody made a mistake on the tombstone". |
| 1239 | * WouldHitAGirl: |
| 1240 | ** Manny Horvitz goes to Jimmy's house after Jimmy tries to have Manny killed (rather than repay the $5,000 he legitimately owes Manny), and ends up killing Angela and her lesbian lover (the latter by accident due to mistaking her for Jimmy). |
| 1241 | ** Richard suggests killing the D'Alessio brothers' female family members to flush them out, and seems perfectly comfortable with the idea. However, [[spoiler:he makes a distinction between the murder of Angela and the murder of Jimmy. He takes vengeance for Angela, whom he seems to have loved, but does not for Jimmy, saying that he was a soldier who simply died in battle]]. |
| 1242 | ** After Sally punches him in the face twice, Nucky declares that he wouldn't hit a woman, but she makes it plain that she's going to keep punching him, so he pops her in the mouth. |
| 1243 | ** Doctor Narcisse has one woman murdered in his presence and savagely beats another one. |
| 1244 | * YiddishAsASecondLanguage: Due to the location and time period, there are many Jewish characters who speak Yiddish as either a secondary or primary language. Some of Rothstein's gangsters, Agent Sebso and Manny Horvitz are all examples. Lucky Luciano also reveals that he can speak Yiddish, apparently from doing business with Jews like Rothstein and Lansky. |
| 1245 | %%* YouCanLeaveYourHatOn |
| 1246 | * YoungFutureFamousPeople: |
| 1247 | ** In the pilot, Nucky meets the crime dons of Atlantic City, New York and Chicago at a restaurant while Jimmy waits outside with one of Jim Colosimo's thugs. After a rather long conversation, the thug identifies himself as UsefulNotes/AlCapone. |
| 1248 | ** Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky start out the show as young upstarts still in the service of Arnold Rothstein. |
| 1249 | ** Meyer Lansky's yelping assistant who irritates Jimmy in "Ourselves Alone" is Benny "Bugsy" Siegel. |
| 1250 | ** Season 4 introduces J. Edgar Hoover who is only 29 and has just been appointed as the acting director of the relatively unknown Bureau of Investigation. |
| 1251 | ** "The Good Listener" gives us both Joe Kennedy -- just thinking about getting into the alcohol import business which would make his fortune -- and Elliot Ness -- giving a press conference on his first day of the job -- in the space of one episode. |
| 1252 | * YouShallNotPass: Dunn Purnsley bellows for the striking restaurant workers to "hold the line!" against strikebreakers. It's a valiant effort, but the strikebreakers have bats. |
| 1253 | * YouWouldntLikeMeWhenImAngry: Nelson Van Alden is a stiff and repressed man who who snaps ''very'' hard when pushed to the brink on several occasions. |
| 1254 | * YouWouldntShootMe: Lucien to Jimmy. His response: "I wasn't going to, [[PreMortemOneLiner but you kinda talked me into it.]]" |
| 1255 | * YourApprovalFillsMeWithShame: Chalky White's daughter spurns her straight-laced boyfriend, saying that she wants to marry someone interesting, like her father. White is furious. When she chances to see her father deliver a horrifying NoHoldsBarredBeatdown, he sneeringly asks if she still finds him "interesting." |
| 1256 | * YourHeadASplode: |
| 1257 | ** An unfortunate rum-runner who takes a shotgun to the face in the pilot. |
| 1258 | ** To a lesser extent, [[spoiler: Sheridan, who had one of his Mooks cut up Jimmy's squeeze at the time as a warning regarding Torrio's move into Greek Town. Jimmy's response? Blasting Sheridan's brains all over the wall in his hotel's lobby]]. |
| 1259 | [[/folder]] |
| 1260 |
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