| 1 | [[quoteright:320:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/get_smart-tv.jpg]] |
| 2 | [[caption-width-right:320:Agents 86 and 99.]] |
| 3 | ->''"Missed it by ''that'' much."'' |
| 4 | |
| 5 | ''Get Smart'' is a spy fiction parody from TheSixties created by Creator/MelBrooks with (''not'' "and") Creator/BuckHenry. Definitely a SitCom. It starred Creator/DonAdams as CONTROL agent 86 Maxwell Smart, a [[TheFool bungling but perpetually optimistic]] secret agent who always managed to save the day and defeat the bad guys despite his own efforts. His partner, Agent 99 (Creator/BarbaraFeldon), was a [[BunnyEarsLawyer slightly daffy but far more competent]] agent who never let Max realize that she could have saved the day without his help. They received their assignments from CONTROL's hapless [[DaChief chief]] (Creator/EdwardPlatt). |
| 6 | |
| 7 | Offered a tremendous number of {{Catch Phrase}}s, largely at the insistence of star Don Adams, who knew that they would help make the show a success. The series ran from September 1965 to September 1970, a total of 138 episodes in five seasons, with the first four airing on Creator/{{NBC}} and the fifth on Creator/{{CBS}}. |
| 8 | |
| 9 | [[AC: Was {{reviv|al}}ed three times:]] |
| 10 | * ''The Nude Bomb'', a [[TheFilmOfTheSeries feature film]] released in 1980. ExecutiveMeddling hurt it; the producers wanted a titillating plot involving a bomb that dissolved clothing, allowing PG-appropriate nudity. [[CreativeDifferences The writers were so angered at the imposition that they were banned from visiting the set.]] Did not feature Feldon, who reportedly was not exactly crushed by the omission, although said omission was probably the leading cause of FanonDiscontinuity. |
| 11 | * ''Get Smart, Again!'', a 1989 Creator/{{ABC}} TV movie following the adventures of old, married, retired Max and 99. Much better received than "The Nude Bomb" (by fans of the original series, at least). |
| 12 | * A short-lived 1995 Creator/{{Fox}} {{revival}} series focusing on one of their twin offspring (played by Creator/AndyDick) following in Max's footsteps. Don Adams and Barbara Feldon were still around, except this time Max was DaChief, running CONTROL. With this run, ''Get Smart'' holds the rare distinction of being a television franchise which has aired installments on every Big Four network, and the only known one that isn't explicitly aimed [[Franchise/SesameStreet at]] [[Franchise/{{Peanuts}} children]]. |
| 13 | |
| 14 | In June of 2008, a ''Film/GetSmart'' feature film [[TheRemake remake]] was released, starring Creator/SteveCarell as Max and Creator/AnneHathaway as 99. |
| 15 | |
| 16 | ---- |
| 17 | !!That's the second longest trope list I've ever seen!: |
| 18 | |
| 19 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 20 | |
| 21 | [[folder:A-H]] |
| 22 | * ThirteenIsUnlucky: There's a RunningGag of Agent 13 making contact with Max while concealed in a cramped and uncomfortable hiding place like a trashcan or vending machine. Naturally he spends more time bitching about his working conditions than briefing Max. |
| 23 | * AbsentAnimalCompanion: Max's dog Fang only features in Season One due to the producers having trouble training his actor. |
| 24 | * AcronymConfusion: In "A Man Called Smart", Max is looking for someone known only as 'T.B.O.'. While standing at a catering truck, this exchange occurs: |
| 25 | -->'''Maxwell Smart:''' Bediyoskin told us to contact you. He even wrote your initials on a slip of paper. T.B.O. |
| 26 | -->'''Tom Orlando:''' T.B.O. can mean a lot of things. |
| 27 | -->'''Maxwell Smart:''' Oh really? For instance, give me another T.B.O. |
| 28 | -->'''Caterer:''' One T.B.O. forty cents. |
| 29 | -->'''Maxwell Smart:''' T.B.O.? |
| 30 | -->'''Caterer:''' Tomato and bacon on an onion roll. |
| 31 | * ActionGirl: 99 didn't see a lot of combat, but she could fight if the situation called for it. |
| 32 | * ActuallyNotAVampire: In "Weekend Vampire", the eponymous vampire isn't a vampire; he uses a musical {{Blowgun}} to blow two small Poison Darts that he aims at his victim's neck. But he still has a Creepy Castle and uses a coffin as a bed (and secret stairway to his underground lair). |
| 33 | * AdiposeRex: The episode "Survival of the Fattest" featured a fat Arab prince who had to maintain his weight to maintain his rulership. |
| 34 | * AgentsDating: One of the most iconic cases (and possibly the TropeMaker), with Maxwell Smart and Agent 99 dating from a certain point onwards (which is referenced with some regularity), and falling in love with each other at a certain point. Everybody in the Agency seems to know this: |
| 35 | --> '''Maxwell Smart''': [Agent 99 leans to kiss him] 99 please, nobody here knows we're dating. |
| 36 | --> '''The Chief''': [walks by] Yes, they do. |
| 37 | --> '''Maxwell Smart''': On the cheek. |
| 38 | --> [Agent 99 kisses his cheek] |
| 39 | --> '''Agent 99''': [as they walk off] Give me a little one. |
| 40 | --> [Max kisses her on the lips] |
| 41 | * AllPartOfTheShow: A KAOS plot to pass on secret information through a play leads to Max and 99 infiltrating the play as [[BadBadActing terrible actors]]. At the climax, when the Chief and several CONTROL agents move in to arrest the KAOS members, the audience laughs as it were a comedic ending. [[SureLetsGoWithThat They roll with it]], even going through two curtain calls with guns trained on each other. |
| 42 | * AlmostDeadGuy: Spoofed regularly, usually along the lines of Max leaning over to hear the dying man's LastWords. |
| 43 | -->'''99:''' "What did he say?" |
| 44 | -->'''Max:''' "He told me to get my knee off his chest." |
| 45 | * AlmostKiss: Between Max and 99, the first time he really notices her. Fang interrupts them. |
| 46 | * [[AmusingAlien Amusing Automaton]]: Hymie, who takes everything he hears literally. |
| 47 | * ArgentinaIsNaziland: The "glorious fatherland of South America". |
| 48 | ** This is also given a nod when Siegfried mentions he orders a scale working model of the plane the Red Baron uses from a hobby shop in Argentina. |
| 49 | * ArmedLegs: The sea captain in "Ship of Spies" had a gun concealed in his wooden leg. He had a spare leg that contained a hidden blade. |
| 50 | * ArtisticLicenseMusic: The title work in "Hubert's Unfinished Symphony" was performed solely on piano. |
| 51 | * AsianSpeekeeEngrish: "The Amazing Harry Hoo", played by a Caucasian man. Not to mention the villainous Craw.. er.. Claw. |
| 52 | * ArtAttacker: One villain uses "[[Literature/ThePictureOfDorianGray Dorian Gray]]" paint -- he retouches photos of his victims (adding gray hairs and wrinkles) to make them rapidly age and die. |
| 53 | * ArtificialOutdoorsDisplay: The Chief's underground office has an obviously fake window showing the Washington DC skyline which actually hides a wall safe. |
| 54 | * AscendedExtra: Larabee's only dialogue for the first couple of seasons was always something similar to "Right, Chief." Later on, his character was expanded into the only employee at CONTROL that's dumber than Max. |
| 55 | * AttractiveBentGender: Something of a RunningGag, where a beautiful woman is actually supposed to be a male spy in a very convincing disguise (examples include "Aboard the Orient Express", "Pussycats Galore", "The Worst Best Man", etc.). |
| 56 | * AutomaticDoorMalfunction: In the closing credits, Max walks through a series of doors that close automatically behind him. When the last set of doors fails to close he walks back toward them to see what the problem is. Then they close and hit him on the nose. |
| 57 | * AwfulWeddedLife: "The Farkas Fracas" has two married KAOS spies in Max and 99's apartment building. When they're not bugging Max's apartment and trying to take pictures of important papers, they're sniping about each other's spying abilities, her cooking and housekeeping skills, his fashion sense and hygiene, and the fact that he's only employed because her brother is a KAOS regional manager. |
| 58 | * BadGuysPlayPool: Kaos agent Creator/LeonardNimoy in one episode. |
| 59 | * BaitAndSwitchTimeSkip: A brief, PlayedForLaughs variant. |
| 60 | -->'''Max''': When I joined Control, the Chief had a full head of hair. |
| 61 | -->'''Agent 99''': Really? When I first started here the Chief was completely bald. |
| 62 | -->'''Max''': That's right, you started a week after I did. |
| 63 | * BananaPeel: A major clue in the black and white pilot is a rubber banana peel. |
| 64 | * BandagedFace: How Max is able to impersonate a safecracker in "Maxwell Smart, Alias Jimmy Ballantine". |
| 65 | * BattleCouple: One of the most memorable. |
| 66 | * BeAsUnhelpfulAsPossible: Agent 13 almost never gives out the information necessary for ''stopping an evil, possibly life- or world-threatening scheme'' until he's suitably complained about his cramped quarters and been asked five or six times. For example, when Max goes to him to borrow some skeleton keys, Agent 13, in order: doesn't talk to him until he inserts a penny into the weight machine he's hiding in, moans about developing claustrophobia,[[labelnote:*]]Even though - while probably just a goof - you can see a nice open room behind him[[/labelnote]] tries to give Max his weight and fortune, makes a crack at his expense instead of answering questions, demands to be paid for lending his keys, refuses to take Max's watch as collateral (forcing Max to just angrily grab the keys), ''then'' complains about having a rotten night. |
| 67 | ** Expect any civilian bystander to end up doing this if they get a speaking role. Granted, it has to do with not knowing Max is a spy, but they still come off as a major {{jerkass}} and cause a lot of problems as a result. |
| 68 | * BigLittleMan: In the pilot episode, KAOS is run by the mysterious "MisterBig" (as opposed to Siegfried). It's only when Mr Big and Maxwell Smart are in the same room do we realise that Mr Big is actually a dwarf. |
| 69 | * BloodlessCarnage: In, "The Girls from KAOS," Miss Formosa shoots her two comrades, and not only do they not bleed, they don't appear to experience any kind of pain or agony from their fatal wounds: one of them manages to shoot her in return, which kills her on contact, and again, she doesn't bleed at all. |
| 70 | ** The series lacks blood in general, actually. Sometimes it's acceptable, such as gunshots that send someone falling over quickly. Sometimes less so, such as when someone gets a knife in their back or arm and not a drop leaks out. |
| 71 | * {{Bowdlerise}}: |
| 72 | ** In the 1980's ''Get Smart'' movie ''The Nude Bomb'', Max puts his gun in his {{pants|PositiveSafety}}. It goes off, he turns around, you hear the sound of him pulling his zipper down and up again, and he then turns around again with his CatchPhrase "Missed it by ''that'' much". Oddly enough NBC dubbed in "Missed the bone by that much" which oddly sounds dirtier than the original. |
| 73 | ** The episode "Washington 4, Redskins 3" had its title changed to "Washington 4, Indians 3" for reruns and for the DVD, also curing a bit of FridgeLogic in the process. The only pro sports team, then or now, called the Redskins was the NFL's Washington Redskins. The replacement title makes more sense, evoking a game between Washington's baseball team at the time, the Senators, and the Cleveland Indians. |
| 74 | * BringTheAnchorAlong: In "The Day They Raided Knights", 99 is tied to a surfboard by KAOS agents, but manages to escapes by waddling away still tied to the board and throwing herself on a conveyor belt. Later, she knocks out a female KAOS agent who has the drop on max by hitting her with surfboard, which is still tied to her back. |
| 75 | * BrokeEpisode: CONTROL's finances always seemed to be teetering, as another source of humor. There were a few episodes where it got really bad, mainly "Cutback at CONTROL" and "Maxwell Smart, Private Eye". Though really, when ''Maxwell Smart'' is your agency's top operative, no wonder your backers get nervous about where their money's going. |
| 76 | * BunnyEarsLawyer: Max is remarkably proficient despite his GeniusDitz personality. |
| 77 | ** Possibly the most well-known example is where Max sees two leaves in the same place against a car windshield. He knows how unlikely it is two leaves would fall off a tree and land in exactly the same place, and deduces, correctly, that they slid down the hood and landed there while someone was planting a bomb in the car. |
| 78 | ** There's also one in "How to Succeed in the Spy Business Without Really Trying". A defected Siegfried comments on how nice Max's corsage smells. Max's corsage is actually fake, and he concludes, again correctly, that Siegfried's wearing a gas mask hidden in a fake nose and was lying about smelling the flower to divert suspicion away. So Max expects a gas attack and goes down to the lab to get a fake nose concealing a gas mask of his own, so he'll be ready when it comes. |
| 79 | ** In "KAOS in CONTROL" a KAOS infiltrator's gotten hold of a gun that reverts anyone its used on to a childhood mentality. Max is the one who figures out who the infiltrator is, because when he sees them they say they want to watch ''Series/CaptainKangaroo'', but he's the only one to realize ''Captain Kangaroo'' wouldn't have been on TV when they were a kid. |
| 80 | * ButThatIWouldBelieve: A RunningGag has Agent 86 make some grandiose claim, then [[InflationaryDialogue repeatedly walking it back]] with a "Would you believe..." when people call his bluff. He's never believed. |
| 81 | * TheCameo: Various stars appeared on the show, but one that stands out is Creator/JohnnyCarson doing a rare guest-acting turn as the conductor on the episode "Aboard the Orient Express". |
| 82 | * CampGay: Mr. Bob, the interior decorator from "Return of the Ancient Mariner" [[spoiler: or so it seems]]. |
| 83 | * CaptainObvious: Whoever wrote the briefing book on “Indian Attacks”… which is defined as “One or more Indians attacking”.(“Washington 4, Indians 3”) |
| 84 | * CarnivalOfKillers: "Someone Down Here Hates Me" |
| 85 | * CaptainErsatz: Comedian Joey Forman twice appeared as the Film/CharlieChan-based character, [[AlliterativeName Harry Hoo]]. |
| 86 | * CasanovaWannabe: As KAOS is well aware, Max ''thinks'' he's a Film/JamesBond-level [[TheCharmer Charmer]]. |
| 87 | * CatchPhrase: '''MANY.''' Including: |
| 88 | ** "Sorry about that, Chief." |
| 89 | ** "Missed it by ''that'' much." |
| 90 | ** "Would you believe...", a more complex one that signals a form of inverted InflationaryDialogue. For example: |
| 91 | ---> '''Max:''' At the moment, seven UsefulNotes/CoastGuard cutters are converging on us. Would you believe it? Seven.\ |
| 92 | '''Villain:''' I find that hard to believe.\ |
| 93 | '''Max:''' Would you believe six?\ |
| 94 | '''Villain:''' I don't think so.\ |
| 95 | '''Max:''' How about two cops in a rowboat? |
| 96 | *** [[spoiler: In one late episode, it was subverted in that the Chief actually HAD surrounded the building with CONTROL agents!]] |
| 97 | ** "Of course! It's X! It's obvious it's X! Uh, just one question, Chief... What is X? |
| 98 | *** At one point, the Chief actually recites that last part with him. |
| 99 | ** "[insulting crack about x]"; PunchPunchPunchUhOh; "I hope I wasn't out of line with that [insulting crack about x] comment..." |
| 100 | ** [following a statement like "We'll be in mortal danger every second of this mission."] "...and ''loving'' it." |
| 101 | *** Reversed in "Casablanca" when Max is made to take a vacation: |
| 102 | --->: '''Max''': But just remember this: you'll be left all alone without my experience and know-how. You'll be making hundreds of decisions without my advice. |
| 103 | --->: '''The Chief''': And ''loving'' it. |
| 104 | ** "Oh, Max..." [by 99, usually in a disappointed or dismayed tone after Max has fouled up yet again] |
| 105 | ** "That's the second biggest [whatever] I've ever seen." |
| 106 | ** "99, don't tell me [something bad has happened or is about to happen]" "[Statement of that explicit thing which has happened or is about to happen.]" "I asked you not to tell me that, 99." |
| 107 | ** "[[FunetikAksent Zis is KAOS. Ve do not [onomatopoeia] here]]!" |
| 108 | ** "If you don't mind, ''I'd'' like to handle this, 99." [[GladIThoughtOfIt Followed by a repetition of whatever she just suggested.]] |
| 109 | ** [after an {{Expodump}}] "Would you mind repeating that last bit?", "Which bit?", "That bit after 'Ok, now listen here, Max...'" |
| 110 | ** "Of course, the old [incredibly specific description of what just happened] trick!" |
| 111 | *** "That's the second time I've [or 'they've'] fallen for that this month/week/year!" |
| 112 | ** Variants of the following conversation: |
| 113 | ---> '''Max:''' Wait a minute, chief. Isn't this classified information?\ |
| 114 | '''The Chief:''' Yes, Max.\ |
| 115 | '''Max:''' Shouldn't we activate the Cone of Silence?\ |
| 116 | '''The Chief:''' Max, do we have to? |
| 117 | *** Common responses from Max being "I demand the Cone of Silence!" and reminding the Chief about CONTROL regulations. (The joke, of course, is that the Cone of Silence never works properly.) [[spoiler: Except once... and the Chief is trapped inside it at the time, so no one can hear him when he yells for help!]] |
| 118 | ** [after a KAOS agent meets a [[KarmicDeath karmic death]]]: [[WhatASenselessWasteOfHumanLife "If only he used his talents for good/niceness, instead of evil."]] |
| 119 | ** When Maxwell Smart is asked, "How did you do X?" or "How do you plan to do Y?" he will invariably respond, "With great difficulty." |
| 120 | * ChekhovsGunman: In ''Tequila Mockingbird'', a figure wearing a sombrero can be seen slumped against a wall before the climax. When a shootout starts, the man turns out to be the Chief when he pulls a gun. |
| 121 | * ChekhovsSkill: Early in "The Hot Line", the Chief breaks a mirror with his voice. He later uses this skill to break the glasses of a KAOS agent holding him, Max, and 99 hostage. |
| 122 | * ChemicallyInducedInsanity: In an episode, Max gets a TapOnTheHead and is diagnosed with amnesia. He's given some pills which are supposed to help. However, the doctor is actually working for KAOS and the pills ''cause'' amnesia. Every hour, just as he's starting to remember things, he has to take a pill which sets him back to square one. |
| 123 | * ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: |
| 124 | ** 99 (Barbara Feldon) not only doesn't appear in ''The Nude Bomb'', Max's dialogue (and to some extent his personality) imply that she doesn't, and never has, existed (combine that with inexplicable renaming of CONTROL to PITS, and it seems likely ''The Nude Bomb'' is in some sort of AlternateContinuity). She did return in ''Get Smart, Again'', which seemed to ignore ''The Nude Bomb'' itself. |
| 125 | ** In the 1995 series Zack's twin sister is never named, and the fact that she exists is only offhandedly mentioned twice.[[note]]Apparently, [[WhatCouldHaveBeen if the show had lasted longer]], the plan was to reveal said twin as the hidden head honcho of KAOS.[[/note]] |
| 126 | * CircusEpisode: In "The Greatest Spy on Earth", CONTROL sends 86 and 99 into a circus to look for a smuggling operation. |
| 127 | %%* CloakAndDagger |
| 128 | * ClosestThingWeGot: When The Chief and Larabee are accidently locked in a vault in ''Do I Hear A Vaults?'', Max and 99 are sent to a prison to recruit a renouned safecracker to free them. Unfortunately, they arrive right after he was executed, so they enlist an expert forger instead. |
| 129 | * CoincidentalDodge: In "Someone Down Here Hates Me", a KAOS agent posing as a surveyor asks Max for a cigarette in order to get him in position for his partner to take a shot at him. However, Max fumbles the pack as he extends to the agent, spilling the cigarettes on the ground. As he bends down to pick them up, the other KAOS agent fires, missing Max and wounding his partner. |
| 130 | %%* ComedicHero |
| 131 | * ComicBookAdaptation: Creator/DellComics did a title based on the series for several issues, with art from Creator/SteveDitko. |
| 132 | * CommercialBreakCliffhanger: These start getting prevalent right around the tail end of the second season, and just before the final commercial break of the episode. |
| 133 | * ConfucianConfusion: Lampshaded in "Hoo Done It". |
| 134 | -->'''Harry Hoo:''' As Confucius say: stick and stones may break my bone but name will never hurt me.\ |
| 135 | '''Maxwell Smart:''' Confucius said that? |
| 136 | * ConvenientlyTimedAttackFromBehind: Courtesy Agent 99 in "Hoo Done It." |
| 137 | * ComplexityAddiction: In one episode Max asks Professor Carlson, the developer of the ShoePhone and the myriad examples of overly-complicated spy gear Max carries, why not give him and 99 a regular tape recorder and camera instead of a tape recorder that is a concealed camera and a camera that is a concealed tape recorder as their mission gear. Carlson's answer, in the most deadpan, "I don't understand why you're asking me this" tone possible, is "because my mind doesn't work that way, that's why". |
| 138 | * CoolCar: It's no Aston Martin, but the Sunbeam Tiger roadster that Max drives for most of the series[[note]]except for the Season 3/4 intro, where he drives a Volkswagen Kharmann-Ghia, and the final season when he switches to an Opel GT coupe[[/note]] still looks cool enough for a spy to drive, and even has secret gadgets mounted on it on occasion. |
| 139 | * CorruptCorporateExecutive: In the short-lived 90's revival, right after the end of the Cold War and before the War on Terror, KAOS didn't have anything to be but an evil, mostly-legitimate business out to rule the world through financial domination. |
| 140 | ** In ''Get Smart, Again'' KAOS has been taken over by a corporate raider... who turns out to be a publisher, out to use the WeatherControlMachine to create massive bad weather so people will have nothing to do but read his books and publications. |
| 141 | * CovertGroupWithMundaneFront: Max pretends to be in the greeting card business. |
| 142 | ** And if anyone asks about the fistfights/gunfights/knife fights near his apartment, Max tells his neighbors that he actually works for the Internal Revenue Service. |
| 143 | * CrazyJealousGuy[=/=]ClingyJealousGirl: Max or 99 become one of these whenever the other is assigned to be a HoneyTrap. |
| 144 | * CrazyPrepared: Max apparently keeps plastic lips on his person at all times, just in case some beautiful KAOS killer tries to kiss him with poisoned lipstick. |
| 145 | * CurtainCamouflage: Subverted and double-subverted in "Dear Diary": The first time Max notices a pair of feet under a curtain, he tackles it, but it turns out that it was just an empty pair of shoes and that someone is hiding behind the ''other'' curtain. Later, when 99 notices another pair of feet, Max tackles the other curtain, only to find there's nobody there and the shoes did in fact belong to someone hiding behind the first curtain. |
| 146 | * CyanidePill: "It will kill in nine seconds." "But how do I get them to take it?" |
| 147 | ** In one episode, KAOS and CONTROL have pretty much captured all the agents from the other team. Max and Siegfried meet to discuss trading. As they strip themselves of their weapons, Max pulls out a Cyanide pill, says it's "Raspberry flavored this month," and offers Siegfried a taste. Siegfried counters that he has a suicide ''ring'': If he takes it off, his wife will kill him. |
| 148 | ** In another episode Max admits he's taken Cyanide Pills, but "only two or three times, as a favor to the Chief." |
| 149 | * DangerouslyGarishEnvironment: In an episode, there is a disco-type place full of colourful lights and spirals, but it turns out that the songs they play there have subliminal messaging and encourage high school students to do the bad things mentioned in the songs like "[[SerialKiller Kill, kill, kill]]" and "[[FlippingTheBird Flip off the dean]]". |
| 150 | * DarkerAndEdgier: |
| 151 | ** Compared to other sitcoms at the time. While the series was never violent or bloody, nonetheless it was a sitcom in which ''people got killed'', sometimes at the hands of the heroes. [[OnceOriginalNowCommon That doesn't seem unusual today]], but it wasn't something that really happened on 60s televiion. |
| 152 | ** One particular episode that stands out is “Island of the Darned” while itself a spoof of Literature/TheMostDangerousGame it plays the [[HuntingTheMostDangerousGame human hunting]] elements surprisingly straight. Despite possessing several jokes (especially at the beginning) the majority of the episode involves Max and 99 on the run through the jungle from a sociopathic hunter, who wants to kill them and mount their heads on his wall, with the danger they are in played one hundred percent straight. To stay alive they’re forced to resort to several noticeably more brutal and dirty tactics than normal, such as building a concealed spike pit to skewer one of the hunter’s heavies, which at the end leads to 99 wondering if they’re really any better than the people they fight. Max disagrees. |
| 153 | * DatingCatwoman: The scene between the Chief and KAOS agent Mary Jack Armstrong in "Survival of the Fattest" reveals they had this relationship back when he was an agent, though they're now AmicableExes. |
| 154 | * DeadpanSnarker: Max, of course. |
| 155 | -->'''The Chief:''' All right, Max, I'll tell you, but I don't want you to worry about it. I've sent 99 on a top-secret mission. At this very moment, her life may be in jeopardy. |
| 156 | -->''beat'' |
| 157 | -->'''Max:''' Okay, now tell me the part you don't want me to worry about. |
| 158 | * DeathInTheClouds: In "Closely Watched Planes", Maxwell Smart manages to lose the courier he's protecting on an airplane in mid-flight. DaChief is not amused, and puts Max on the next flight so he can solve the mystery or become the next victim. |
| 159 | * DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment: |
| 160 | -->'''Siegfried:''' Twenty years I've been with [KAOS]- stealing, robbing, lying, killing, murdering... |
| 161 | ** And from "The Laser Blazer": |
| 162 | --> '''Chief''': Let's see it. |
| 163 | --> '''Max''': See what? |
| 164 | --> '''Chief''': The blazer you brought back from Hong Kong. |
| 165 | --> '''Max''': The blazer I brought back from Hong Kong? |
| 166 | --> '''Chief''': That blazer is the secret weapon you were sent to Hong Kong for. |
| 167 | --> '''Max''': That blazer is the secret weapon I was sent to Hong Kong for? |
| 168 | --> '''Chief''': That's no ordinary blazer. |
| 169 | --> '''Max''': That's no ordinary blazer? |
| 170 | --> '''Chief''': It's a laser blazer. |
| 171 | --> '''Max''': It's a laser blazer? Do you know what you're saying? |
| 172 | --> '''Chief''': I'm positive! I keep hearing it twice! |
| 173 | * DesignatedGirlFight: Usually, if there's a female KAOS agent, it's 99 who has to fight her (such as Zelinka in the pilot "Mr. Big"). This is averted on at least one occasion, though, when 99 punches and knocks out a male enemy agent. |
| 174 | * DisappearingBox: The Chief is captured in this way in the episode "A Spy For A Spy". |
| 175 | * DisintegratorRay[=/=]EnergyWeapon: Every so often laser weapons show up in the show. While they're ''called'' lasers, they more often act like disintegrator beams, utterly destroying whatever they hit leaving no residue or trace. |
| 176 | * DisguisedInDrag: Charlie Watkins, a CONTROL agent who appeared in a couple episodes, is a MasterOfDisguise who specializes in disguising himself as a woman. In reality, he's played by an actress with a man's voice dubbed over. |
| 177 | * TheDitz: Larabee is the proto-TheDitz. |
| 178 | * DIYDisaster: Maxwell Smart would have cars with crossed wiring, so a button meant to operate one thing instead operated another. His apartment was also crosswired that way. This turned out to be a subversion, since only Max knew which switch did what, meaning he alone could effectively negotiate his own home. |
| 179 | %%* DoggedNiceGuy: Max. |
| 180 | * DontSneakUpOnMeLikeThat: After 86 and 99 got married, he'd occasionally make the mistake of sneaking up on her to give her a kiss, only to get karate chopped. |
| 181 | * DoorFocus: Maxwell Smart usually does this after forgetting an important item for his mission or the directions to his destination. |
| 182 | * DoorJudo: Done at least twice. Once when Maxwell Smart and 99 are trapped in a corridor with two villains trying to break down the doors on either side. Our heroes open each door in turn so they knock themselves out, where we find that CONTROL agents know this as the "Double Door Deception Trick." Another time, Smart and the Chief are breaking into a cabin from opposite ends, when KAOS agents simultaneously open each door. Smart and the Chief run past each other and out the opposite doors, and the two KAOS agents shoot at them - missing and shooting one another instead. |
| 183 | * DoubleStandard: Played for laughs, like everything else. In the tie-in novel ''The Ghastly Ghost Affair'', Max and 99 are assigned to locate a convention for KAOS assassins so CONTROL can capture and reeducate those numerous enemy killers. Max points out the Chief means brainwash them, but the Chief says when the other side does it, then it's brainwashing. When ''their'' side does it, it's reeducation. |
| 184 | * DrivingADesk: A literal example in ''The Nude Bomb'' - Max has a high speed chase in a car disguised as an office desk. |
| 185 | * DrowningPit: One episode revolves around a villain who uses a booby-trapped water-fillable phone booth to kill people. Leading to the priceless line "I'm sorry, sir, your party has been drowned." |
| 186 | * DruggedLipstick: Once a bad girl wears some and tries to kiss Max; once 99 wears some and uses it to knock out (not kill) a bad guy who was about to kill her and Max. |
| 187 | * DrugsCausingSlowMotion: A scene in Season 2, Episode 13, "Perils in a Pet Shop," where Max and the KAOS agent shoot each other with [[TranquilizerDart tranquilizer darts]] that slow their responses and they end up fighting in slow-motion. |
| 188 | * DuelingScar: Siegfried has a large scar on his cheek, revealed in TheMovie to be from a duel with his brother in Heidelberg. |
| 189 | * EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: The first episode, besides being the only one filmed in black and white, lacks a lot of the later silliness. It portrays Max as a somewhat accident-prone, but still fairly intelligent and capable secret agent: he sees through the disguise of the KAOS base, singlehandedly wins a fight with three {{Mooks}}, and the KAOS boss appears to be genuinely impressed such a renowned agent was assigned to bring him in. The chief is openly fond of Max, and declares Max is LikeASonToMe. |
| 190 | * EasySexChange: By implication. In ''Get Smart, Again!'' Max is surprised to learn that Marcus Hottentot used to be Marcia Hopkins. ("Looks like he changed more than his NAME.") |
| 191 | * EmergencyImpersonation: "The King Lives?", where a king who's a dead ringer for Max is shot, forcing Max to impersonate him while the real article recovers. |
| 192 | * EnemyMine: In one episode ("Spy, Spy, Birdie"), Max and Siegfried team up against a man conspiring to destroy the world, since if he succeeded they would have nothing to fight about and would be out of a job. |
| 193 | * EnslavedTongue: Maxwell Smart is given lying pills to foil any possible interrogation. Of course, he takes it at an inappropriate time and suddenly lies about every slightest fact, including his own name. |
| 194 | * EvenEvilHasStandards: Parodied when a KAOS agent says that he may be a murderer, but he's no Peeping Tom ([[ItMakesSenseInContext when it comes to birds at least]]). |
| 195 | ** And when a doctor about to give Smart a lethal injection tells his nurse to sterilize the hypodermic: "I may work for KAOS, but I'm still a doctor!" |
| 196 | * EverybodyDidIt: Sometimes, a search for a [=KAOS=] agent will lead to a whole episode with few or no guest stars besides [=KAOS=] agents such as "[[spoiler:Bronzefinger]]," where all three of the suspects Max is investigating are apparently [=KAOS=] agents (although they want to defect), and so is their boss, who had the Chief assign Max to the case in the first place. |
| 197 | * EvilInc: KAOS is a Delaware corporation for tax purposes. |
| 198 | * ExactWords: Hymie, regularly. |
| 199 | * {{Expy}}: |
| 200 | ** Writer Alan Spencer loved this series growing up and 20 years later created ''Series/SledgeHammer'', a similar concept with a Film/DirtyHarry-type policeman instead of a secret agent. A ShoutOut in Sledge's pilot episode has a suspect in room 86 of a motel. |
| 201 | ** In the show, [[Series/TheAvengers1960s KAOS agents Snead and Neal]]. Also Harry Hoo, a dead ringer for Charlie Chan. |
| 202 | * EyeScream: When held hostage by KAOS agents, with the one covering them wearing glasses, Max makes up a story that a special note is needed as part of a code, knowing the Chief can sing a GlassShatteringSound. Playing along, Chief sings the note, and the lenses of the KAOS agent's glasses shatter right up against his eyes, obviously distracting him enough in such agony to allow Max to tackle him. 99 notes that was a horrific, albeit necessary, tactic, but Max of course [[ComicallyMissingThePoint misses the point]] of the comment. |
| 203 | * FacePalm: The Chief grasps the bridge of his nose with his fingers whenever Max does something egregiously stupid. Max is puzzled that the Chief seems to get headaches so frequently whenever he's around. |
| 204 | * FakeDefector: Both Max and Siegfried have pretended to switch loyalties to the other side. |
| 205 | * FakeOutMakeOut: Known at CONTROL as Emergency Park Procedure R-17. |
| 206 | * FanGame: Not a video game, but somebody made the system for a [[http://getsmartnow.wikidot.com/ Get Smart TTRPG]]. |
| 207 | * FictionalCounterpart: CONTROL and KAOS. |
| 208 | * FlirtingUnderFire: In a late episode, Max and 99 are caught in a death-trap with no apparent means of escape. Thinking they are about to die, Max realizes that he's in love with 99 and declares that if they could get out he'd marry her. She immediately thinks of a way to escape and they get married a few episodes later. |
| 209 | * {{Flynning}}: Whenever Max gets into a sword fight, as in "Leadside" and "A Man Called Smart". |
| 210 | * AFoggyDayInLondonTown: London is depicted with fog so thick in the "That Old Gang of Mine" episode that Max and 99 can barely see where they are going. At one point, they meet someone in what appears to be a foggy backstreet but it turns out to be a hotel room. |
| 211 | * TheFool: However as The Nude Bomb lampshades, while he's an IdiotHero who's BornLucky, Smart does have some smarts, enough to figure out the SecretIdentity of the masked BigBad. |
| 212 | * FlockOfWolves: In "The Double Agent", Smart is assigned to infiltrate a KAOS cell which turns out to consist entirely of other double agents (FBI, CIA, Naval Intelligence and Scotland Yard), the real KAOS man who founded it having since died. |
| 213 | * FriendlyEnemy: Max's "good friend and bitter enemy" Siegfried. |
| 214 | * FriendsRentControl: It is never really explained how Max can afford a luxurious duplex on a government salary. (When 99 is impersonating a society girl, the Chief even suggests that she pass it off as her apartment because it looks more like a place where her cover identity would live.) |
| 215 | * FunWithAcronyms: Subverted, as CONTROL and KAOS don't actually stand for anything. |
| 216 | ** The third Spy network the ACB (Atrocities, Cruelties, Brutality) does stand for something, but not the main two. |
| 217 | *** This is really only supported by Smart's reasoning that anything so Atrocious, Cruel and Brutal must be the work of ACB. |
| 218 | ** There is also the mercenary spy organization FLAG, which stood for '''F'''ree'''L'''ance '''A'''gents Amal'''G'''amated. They admit it's quite a stretch. |
| 219 | ** Played straight in [[Series/TheManFromUNCLE "The Man from YENTA"]], where Max and 99 meet up with Jewish/Israeli Agent 498. YENTA stands for Your Espionage Network and Training Academy. |
| 220 | ** In ''The Nude Bomb'', CONTROL is instead named PITS, for the ''Provisional Intelligence Tactical Service''. |
| 221 | * GadgetWatches: Max's cumbersome shoe phone gets replaced with a wristwatch communicator. |
| 222 | * GarbageHideout: In "The Decoy", Agent 13 (the agent who is always stationed inside unlikely objects) is hiding inside a trash can: |
| 223 | -->'''Maxwell Smart:''' What are you so grouchy about today?\ |
| 224 | '''Agent 13:''' ''[hiding in a trash can]'' Because I didn't sleep a wink last night, that's why. Every time I dozed off somebody dropped garbage on me. |
| 225 | * GenreShift: Played with in one episode, when Max gets into a fight with a KAOS film director on a movie studio; in the western set the fight is a {{bar brawl}}, in the oriental set the fight is a karate match, and in the medieval set it's a swordfight complete with {{flynning}}. |
| 226 | * GlassShatteringSound: Da Chief uses his voice to break a mook's glasses. |
| 227 | * GlassSmackAndSlide: In one episode, Max's apartment gets booby-trapped because someone is out to kill him. This includes an invisible bulletproof wall that comes down from the ceiling. When Max sets it off, he later walks into it and his face becomes mushed on the glass. |
| 228 | * {{Glamour}}: Simon the Likeable. |
| 229 | * GotTheWholeWorldInMyHand: the KAOS crest is a vulture perched atop the world. |
| 230 | * GovernmentAgencyOfFiction: CONTROL |
| 231 | * GrievousBottleyHarm: On the occasions when Max wants a sharp broken-off bottle as a weapon, [[MadeOfIndestructium the bottle refuses to break.]] |
| 232 | * GuileHero: While Max does have occasional [[BunnyEarsLawyer moments]] of [[LetsGetDangerous genius]], ''99'' fits this trope to a T. Max was ([[RuleOfFunny usually]]) the better hand-to-hand combatant, but 99 almost always had a good idea to hand. |
| 233 | * {{Hammerspace}}: The only way poor Agent 13 could ''possibly'' have fit into some of those hiding places. |
| 234 | * HeelFaceDoorSlam: Two episodes ([[spoiler:"Hoo Done It"]] and [[spoiler: "Bronzefinger"]]) have multiple kooky but affable murdered guest characters be [=KAOS=] agents who were trying to defect. |
| 235 | * FunnyRobot: Hymie has NoSenseOfHumor but gets a great deal of laughs from being too LiteralMinded and [[DoesNotKnowHisOwnStrength not knowing his own strength]]. He tends to malfunction a lot too, adding more laughs. |
| 236 | * HastilyHiddenMacGuffin: Max has to smuggle some plans hidden in a tooth cap in the "The Whole Tooth and..." episode and when he is nearly caught by KAOS agents, he puts it on the tooth of sleeping man at a train station. After he and 99 take care of the agents they discover the man was a convict being transported to prison and spend the rest of the episode trying to get in and retrieve the plans. |
| 237 | * HisNameIs: In "Ironhand", the titular villain becomes the new head of [=KAOS=] and the informant who tells Max this, blurts the name without saying "his name is" first because he believes he'd be killed before saying the name if he did that. Unfortunately, Max didn't understand the name and the informant, upon trying to say it again, learns in the worst way he's right. |
| 238 | * HollywoodMagnetism: Siegfried used a giant magnet to pull the entire Seventh Fleet to his island. |
| 239 | * HumanHeadOnTheWall: Maxwell Smart has an OhCrap moment when the VillainOfTheWeek is into HuntingTheMostDangerousGame, and has a plaque [[PrematurelyMarkedGrave already set up for Max's head]]. |
| 240 | * HuntingTheMostDangerousGame and EgomaniacHunter, parodied yet still treated with a surprising amount of seriousness ("Island of the Darned"). |
| 241 | [[/folder]] |
| 242 | |
| 243 | [[folder:I-P]] |
| 244 | * ICantHearYou: The Cone of Silence is meant to keep anything said while it's lowered strictly confidential. This it does very well, provided that the other guy in the Cone is the guy you want to keep secrets from. Nevertheless, it does have its uses; in one episode, Smart mentions he likes when the Chief uses the Cone in hot weather, because it's twenty degrees cooler inside. |
| 245 | ** Max is meeting his contact in a record store, so he plays a record up high in case they're being bugged. They end up shouting so loudly everyone in the store can hear what they're saying. |
| 246 | ** In ''Get Smart, Again!'' the Cone of Silence has finally been ditched and replaced with Hover Cover, which involves standing on a rooftop between three hovering helicopters (causing the participants to get blown off their feet) and the Hall of Hush which only leads to a WallOfBlather. In the end the Chief tosses the CONTROL regulations in his waste bin and insists Max just talk to him normally. |
| 247 | * IceCreamKoan: The inevitable result whenever Max tries to be deep, either delivering something that's meaningless, or forgetting the saying he was going for halfway through. |
| 248 | ** Actually has plot utility in "The Wax Max," where trying to sound philosophical and failing results in him giving a password that makes a carnival employee think Max and 99 are KAOS couriers. |
| 249 | * IdenticalStranger: Used a couple of times. |
| 250 | ** In one instance KAOS was seeking to replace CONTROL agents with their doppelgangers ("The Spy Who Met Himself"). |
| 251 | ** Another has Max come across a {{Ruritania}}n king who looks just like him ("The King Lives", and revisted in the "To Sire With Love" two-parter). |
| 252 | ** Yet another episode has him and 99 impersonating their criminal doppelgangers to get a dying crimelord to tell them where he stashed his loot ("The Secret of Sam Vittorio"). |
| 253 | * IDontPayYouToThink: In "Smart the Assassin," Devonshire tells someone "KAOS doesn't pay you to think, you men were sent here to ''obey''." |
| 254 | * ImminentDangerClue: In "Die, Spy", CONTROL and KAOS have a temporary truce for the funereal of double agent. The Chief and Siegfried are about to share a limo back from the funeral when Max notices two leaves wedged together on the windscreen of the car. As the odds of two falling leaves landing in exactly the same spot are millions to one, he realises the leaves must have been pushed together when someone opened the bonnet; probably to plant a car bomb. He stops Siegfried and the Chief from entering the car, and while they are arguing, the car blows up. |
| 255 | * ImprovisedLockpick: |
| 256 | ** DoubleSubverted when Max has to get the Chief's phone from a locked box. Max goes to a special hidden file cabinet and pulls out a piece of paper. He goes to the wall safe and uses the paper to open the combination door to the safe... then gets a hammer from the safe and bashes the locked box with it so he can get to the phone inside. |
| 257 | ** Max wears a hairpin solely for this purpose, much to 99's amusement. |
| 258 | * IncrediblyLamePun: Many of the episodes' titles. |
| 259 | * InflationaryDialogue: Maxwell Smart is a big fan of these. It usually starts with him telling something impressive. As the other party finds it hard to believe, he changes it to a slightly less impressive, asking if they'd believe that. As they don't, he changes it to something lame. In later episodes, they STILL don't believe him, and he changes it to something that is somehow even lamer. |
| 260 | * InkblotTest: In "All in the Mind," Smart is given this test and sees every picture as a man and a woman either hugging or kissing. When called on this, he gives the "You're the one with the dirty pictures" response. |
| 261 | * InstrumentOfMurder: Different episodes had a gun hidden in a violin, and a double-barrelled flute that acted as an airgun. |
| 262 | * IntentionalWeightGain: In "Survival of the Fattest (season 1, episode 15), KAOS kidnaps a prince before he is to receive his weight in gold — the money required to keep his country solvent — and proceeds to slim him down (using an electrified exercise bicycle). In the end, he didn't make it back up to 300 pounds, but they gave him the gold anyway, and the whole country went on a diet. |
| 263 | * InTheBack: A knife in the back is a common way KAOS targets get disposed of. |
| 264 | * InconvenientDarkroomIllumination: A running gag, as Max is guilty of opening the door to the darkroom, ruining the process, a few times. Once they even inverted it: CONTROL has created film which you can process in full light. Max walks in, sees them working on the film, and turns the lights off. ''That's'' what destroys the negative. |
| 265 | * IntimidatingRevenueService: There are a couple of gags where the Bureau of Internal Revenue are portrayed as torturers worse than any intelligence agency. |
| 266 | * InvincibleIncompetent: Max. He once disarmed an atomic bomb by getting his tie stuck in the timer. |
| 267 | * InvisibleWall: Max has one in his apartment. Ostensibly it's used to protect him or anyone else from all forms of attack, but most of the time it's there for him to run into. |
| 268 | * {{Invisibility}}: In "One Nation Invisible", a Dr. Canyon invents an invisibility spray. |
| 269 | * {{Irony}}: In an episode when the Chief gets demoted and Max ends up in his position, Max comments on the former Chief's work with the line "Give a man an inch, and he immediately thinks he's a ruler." The irony is such a statement only applies to Max himself. |
| 270 | * ItWasntEasy: Maxwell Smart uses a variation of this as one of his many catch phrases. When asked, "How did you do X?" or "How do you plan to do Y?" he will invariably respond, "With great difficulty." |
| 271 | * ItsACostumePartyISwear: In "The Day Smart Turned Chicken", KAOS trick Max into showing up at an embassy function in a chicken suit with a false tip, to discredit him as a court witness. It backfires when Max realises that the man who identified him at the embassy did so while the chicken mask was still on, and so must have been a KAOS plant. |
| 272 | * IveHeardOfThatWhatIsIt: One of Max's ''many'' catch phrases is "The X! Of course, the X! Just one thing... what is X?" |
| 273 | * UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper: In "House of Max", Jack the Ripper is an animated wax dummy. |
| 274 | * JailBake: 99 bakes dentist tools that into a cake in the "The Whole Tooth and..." episode so Max can retrieve nuclear power plant plans hidden in the tooth cap of a prisoner. |
| 275 | -->'''Max''': You baked dental instruments into the cake? That's a fantastic idea, 99. Where did you get it?\ |
| 276 | '''99''': It's not so fantastic, Max. It's an old trick, really. People have been baking things into cakes for years.\ |
| 277 | '''Max''': You know, a horrible thought just struck me, 99.\ |
| 278 | '''99''': What?\ |
| 279 | '''Max''': What if somebody thought of baking a file into a cake? Why, it could disrupt our whole prison system! |
| 280 | * JapaneseRanguage: The Craw... err Claw talks like this, which makes it difficult to get his name across. |
| 281 | * JustPlaneWrong: In "Closely Watched Planes", CONTROL couriers are being disposed of by surreptitiously giving them too much coffee, and then dumping them through a trap door out of an airplane. A commercial passenger jet would have serious airflow out of the plane when a hole is opened in the fuselage, but no such suction happens when the trap door is opened. |
| 282 | * KiddieKid: In one episode, a weapon is meant to regress people's minds into the mind of an eight-year-old, yet when the Chief is hit with it, he takes a nap. Eight-year-olds don't usually take naps unless they're sick or sleep-deprived. |
| 283 | * KindaBusyHere: Probably the TropeMaker. |
| 284 | * KnifeThrowingAct: Max is going undercover in a circus when his identity is blown. The circus strongman seizes him while the knife-thrower chucks his knives, but as he's trained himself to just miss the target they miss Max and stick in the arms of the strongman holding him. Max naturally responds with his CatchPhrase, "Missed me by that much!" |
| 285 | * KnightOfCerebus: |
| 286 | ** With a few exceptions[[note]]Siegfried, The Craw, Simon the Likeable, and others[[/note]] the majority of the KAOS agents were played straight and menacing, with little if any comedy derived from them. |
| 287 | ** One agent that really stands out is Hans Hunter from “Island of the Darned”. For a parody of an EgomaniacHunter, he is a surprisingly dark villain, especially for this series. A [[TheSociopath Sociopathic]] mad man with a passion for [[HuntingtheMostDangerousGame hunting people]], he’s introduced chasing another agent like an animal, before killing the helpless man. He then has his body stuffed and sent back to CONTROL. Capturing Max and 99, he reveals he plans to kill Max and mount his head on the wall with his other hunting trophies. The majority of the episode involves Max and 99 on the run from this deranged lunatic, and being forced to use several surprisingly dirty tactics to survive. |
| 288 | ** Mr. Greer is also particularly sadistic in the scenes where he tells 99 and Max they're about to watch each other die. Max is still too injured to walk properly at this point, they both have a gun pointed right at them, and neither of them can make a move without their spouse being killed. They really are seconds away from death when the Chief shows up. |
| 289 | * LaughTrack |
| 290 | * LazyMexican: In an episode taking place in Mexico a showdown with a bad guy takes place while a man is taking a siesta in the background. It turns out that it's the Chief in disguise giving Max some invisible backup. |
| 291 | * LeaveBehindAPistol: At the end of "The Decoy", the head of a [=KAOS=] team rebukes a subordinate for letting [=CONTROL=] accomplish their goals, hands him a pistol, and menacingly orders him to do the honorable thing. Unfortunately for him, his subordinate thinks that the honorable thing is to shoot his boss and take over the group to save himself. |
| 292 | * LetsGetDangerous: When it's do or die and the fate of the world is in the balance, the usually-bumbling Max can become ''unstoppable''. |
| 293 | * LikeASonToMe: While under the influence of TruthSerum in the episode "Smartacus," the Chief tells Max this is the only reason he hasn't fired him. |
| 294 | ** The Chief also says this regarding Max in the episode "The Mess of Adrian Listenger". After he says this, Max adds, "More than that, the Chief is like a father to me!" |
| 295 | * LiteralSurveillanceBug: |
| 296 | ** CONTROL once developed a spy fly, which Max accidentally swatted. |
| 297 | ** A bee gets into the Chief's office. When Max requests the Cone of Silence, the bee gets trapped along with Max and the Chief, and they can't hear each other talk due to the buzzing. Max then assumed it was a snooping KAOS bee. |
| 298 | * {{MacGuffin}}: Since it's the spy genre, it's inevitable that a lot of episodes would revolve around a secret weapon, or secret formula, or secret documents, or secret treasure stash... |
| 299 | * MadLibsCatchPhrase: "That's the second [adjective]est [noun] I've ever seen!" and "This is KAOS! We don't [action] here!" |
| 300 | * MallSanta: One CONTROL agent is disguised as one. So it's [[SarcasmMode completely inconspicuous when Max sits on his lap in order to get information from him.]] |
| 301 | * ManchurianAgent: Max briefly becomes one in one episode, when KAOS brainwashes him as part of a plan to kill the Chief. Since Max and the Chief play chess at a club frequently, and the Chief always wins, they make the trigger word "checkmate". However, this time around, it happens to be the time Max brings a book of chess strategies and takes an excruciatingly long time with his turns, resulting in the undercover KAOS agent frustratingly yelling out "checkmate" himself - so Max shoots ''him'' instead due to the ExactWords of his brainwashing[[labelnote:*]]"I will draw my revolver, and shoot to kill" - it's never specified he shoots the Chief, just implicitly whoever says "checkmate"[[/labelnote]]. Max and the Chief seem to figure out what happened offscreen, though the final scene shows Max still has the reflexive urge to shoot people when he hears the word "checkmate". |
| 302 | * MatchCut: "Don't Look Back" has a cut from Max pounding his fist on a table to a judge banging his gavel. |
| 303 | * MeaningfulName: 86 is slang for "get rid of, throw out" and comes from New York State Liquor Code 86 which allows a patron to be refused service or "removed from the premises". Mel Brooks has also noted that 86 is restaurant slang for "take it off the menu", usually for cases when they're out of ingredients. As Smart is usually out of braincells, the number made sense for his designation. |
| 304 | ** The reason why the third spy network was called ACB is as easy to see as Creator/{{ABC}}. |
| 305 | ** Inverted in the case of Fang. Co-Creator Buck Henry has stated that he insisted that the dog's agent number NOT be K-9. |
| 306 | * MirrorRoutine: A rather unconvincing one when Max has to converse with another CONTROL agent in a department store by pretending to try on clothes. |
| 307 | * MistakenForCheating: Max harbors Dr. Canyon in his apartment while 99 is away on assignment in the episode "One Nation Invisible". However, the good doctor was invisible when first Max met her, and he didn't realize she would turn out to be a sexy scientist. Naturally, 99 comes in and discovers the suddenly-visible Dr. Canyon in their bed and jumps to conclusions. |
| 308 | * MotorcycleJousting: In "The Mild Ones", Max has to infiltrate a biker gang called the Purple Knights. The initiation test is jousting with mops on motorcycles. |
| 309 | * MurderousMannequin: The animated wax dummy of UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper in "House of Max". |
| 310 | * MyHorseIsAMotorbike: The medievel-themed biker gang which jousted on motorbikes. |
| 311 | * MysteryEpisode: One episode is about Max and 99 trying to figure out which person on a boat is the serial killer. The serial killer is known for making a tapping noise, but everyone on the boat makes a tapping noise. |
| 312 | * NearMissGroinAttack: In the ''Series/GetSmart'' movie ''The Nude Bomb'', Agent 86 accidentally fires his gun while [[PantsPositiveSafety stowing it in his pants]]. He [[{{Beat}} hesitates]], discreetly checks, and repeats his {{Catchphrase}}, "Missed it by ''that'' much." |
| 313 | * NebulousEvilOrganisation: KAOS |
| 314 | * NewspaperThinDisguise: Max hides his face behind an upside-down newspaper when meeting another agent who also hides behind an upside-down newspaper. |
| 315 | * NoFullNameGiven: The Chief's first name is given as Thaddeus eventually, but his last name remains a mystery. |
| 316 | * NoNameGiven: |
| 317 | ** Agent 99 -- it's a running gag. |
| 318 | *** In one episode [[spoiler: where she was about to marry a KAOS agent]] Agent 99 says her name is Susan Hilton... then later when Max calls her Susan tells him that was an alias. |
| 319 | *** In another episode Max calls her by a name and 99 replies he never used that name for her... "if only that was my name!" |
| 320 | *** When Max and 99 are married, when they're about to say 99's name, [[TheUnreveal the camera cuts away to Admiral Hargrave snoring on the floor when it's said]]. |
| 321 | *** In one episode where 99's mother appeared, she was addressed as ''Mrs.'' 99. |
| 322 | *** And in the last season, the Smarts being married at least a whole year, someone asks Max why he called her '99'; he matter-of-factly replies "I don't know her name." |
| 323 | *** In the sequel, 99 has been elected to Congress... and her name is STILL withheld from the viewers. |
| 324 | ** Initially, we never learn the names of Max and 99's twin children. It wasn't until the sequel series in 1995 that we learn their son is named Zachary (or "Zack" for short), but their daughter's name is still a mystery to this day. |
| 325 | * NonIndicativeFirstEpisode: The first episode was filmed in black-and-white; all the other episodes were in color. |
| 326 | * NoSell: The basis of one of the running gags. |
| 327 | -->'''Max:''' "All right, I'm used to dealing with (insult referencing the KAOS agent's imposing physical stature and lack of intellectual prowess)." |
| 328 | -->(''Max lands several blows on the KAOS agent to no apparent effect''.) |
| 329 | -->'''Max:''' "Hey, I hope I wasn't out of line with that (insult referencing the KAOS agent's imposing physical stature and lack of intellectual prowess) remark." |
| 330 | * NoSenseOfDirection: Max once got lost in UsefulNotes/ThePentagon. Then again, The Pentagon has a total of ''17.5 miles (28.2 km) of corridors'' with a ''very'' confusing layout, so for once Max probably deserves a break for that. |
| 331 | -->'''Max:''' But even if they do get a man into the Pentagon, that's not saying he'll be able to get out. I remember one of our own agents was lost in there for three days.\ |
| 332 | '''Chief:''' Three days? Max, no agent could be that confused.\ |
| 333 | '''Max:''' Well, let me see now. I went in there on a Thursday... |
| 334 | * TheNotSecret: Just about all of CONTROL's and KAOS' "top secret information" is common knowledge to the other. |
| 335 | -->'''Max:''' If you couldn't find CONTROL, how did you know where to find me?\ |
| 336 | '''Albert Pfister:''' Oh, I telephoned KAOS, and they gave me this address. |
| 337 | * NotSoFakePropWeapon: In "Hurray for Hollywood", Max and 99 go undercover as stage actors to find out how KAOS is smuggling scientific information out of the country. But KAOS learns the new actors (if one indeed can call Max an "actor") are CONTROL agents and therefore plots to kill Max by putting real bullets in the stage prop gun used in the play. |
| 338 | * TheNudifier: It's in the title of ''The Nude Bomb''. |
| 339 | * ObfuscatingDisability: The crippled Portuguese polo player in "Ship of Spies". Who "isn't crippled, isn't Portuguese, and probably isn't even a polo player." |
| 340 | * ObliviousMockery: |
| 341 | -->'''Max:''' But even if they do get a man into the Pentagon, that's not saying he'll be able to get out. I remember one of our own agents was lost in there for three days.\ |
| 342 | '''Chief:''' Three days? Max, no agent could be that confused.\ |
| 343 | '''Max:''' Well, let me see now. I went in there on a Thursday... |
| 344 | * OffscreenTeleportation: The climax of "Island of the Darned" has Max and 99 escaping from their pursuers on a bridge over a precipitous gorge, which is portrayed as being the only way across. Once they are across, the villain who's been hunting them's somehow gotten to the other side ahead of them. No explanation's attempted. |
| 345 | * OneHeadTaller: Barbara Feldon was taller than Don Adams, requiring the use of every trick in the book to create the illusion of the opposite. As a side effect of this, Agent 99 is one of the very few women in SpyFiction to wear practical footwear, as she almost never appears in high heels. |
| 346 | * OnlySaneMan: The poor Chief. Even 99 [[GreenEyedMonster had her moments]]. |
| 347 | * OrientExpress: "Aboard the Orient Express" |
| 348 | * {{Parody}}: Get Smart was purportedly a parody of ''Series/TheManFromUncle'', itself supposedly a parody of James Bond movies (ironically, James Bond was originally meant to be a parody itself, of even earlier so-called "serious" spy films). And according to some quarters, Get Smart was in turn parodied by WesternAnimation/InspectorGadget! It's a chain of parodic proportions! |
| 349 | * PantsPositiveSafety: Max puts his gun in his pants. It goes off, he turns around, you hear the sound of him pulling his zipper down and up again, and he then turns around again with his CatchPhrase "Missed it by ''that'' much". |
| 350 | * PinkMeansFeminine[=/=]RedIsHeroic: In a combination of these two tropes, 99 has a red revolver. No other CONTROL or KAOS agent has a special-looking or oddly-colored gun, unless it's a gimmick weapon. |
| 351 | * PlayingDrunk: Max has to pretend to be an alcoholic in one episode. He is issued a pill to keep under his tongue that absorbs all the alcohol he drinks. As he puts it, "I'll look drunk, act drunk, even smell drunk, but I'll be stone sober!" Then he accidentally swallows the pill, causing all the alcohol it absorbed to be introduced into his system at once. |
| 352 | * PoisonRing: Max has one loaded with a paralysis drug. |
| 353 | * PoisonedChaliceSwitcheroo: Between Max and Mary Jack Armstrong in "Survival of the Fattest", both openly aware the other is doing it. Mary wins by distracting Max and then not actually switching them, tricking him into switching them "back". |
| 354 | * PoliceAreUseless: A standard joke is while CONTROL and KAOS are in open combat, the police and nearly every other professional not involved in the area will be ''completely'' oblivious to it and utterly uninterested in helping Smart or his colleagues. |
| 355 | ** For instance, one episode has Max trying to cross a street and facing a storm of attackers. When he tries to tell a police officer, all the cop can say that Smart was jaywalking and dismisses any gunshots as a matter for the Homicide department. |
| 356 | ** In another episode, there is a gunfight in a hospital and the Chief is wounded. When 99 tries to get a nurse to help, that nurse completely ignores the shooting and demands to know the man's insurance information before doing anything. |
| 357 | * PoliceCodeForEverything: CONTROL has codes for just about every possible scenario, up to and including alien invasion. Just make sure you've memorized the right codes and don't accidentally call in that code when you want something else, like Max did in one episode. |
| 358 | * PreciousPuppies: Fang aka Agent K-13. |
| 359 | -->'''Buck Henry''': While writing the pilot episode, it took all the restraint I could muster to keep from calling Fang 'Agent K-9'. |
| 360 | * PrisonEpisode: In "The Not-So-Great Escape" two-parter, CONTROL agents are being kidnapped and held in a KAOS prison (located in New Jersey). Max goes undercover as a KAOS official, but after getting found out, he leads repeated breakout attempts. |
| 361 | * PrisonerExchange: In "A Spy for a Spy", Max and Siegfried kidnap important members of each other's organizations, and then try a traditional swap. When they double-cross each other, and continue abducting each other's staff, it escalates to the point that they eventually kidnap all the agents of the other side except each other. Max and Siegfried then hold a meeting, and try to exchange employees according to their own organizational deficiencies. |
| 362 | * TheProfessor: Carlson. |
| 363 | -->"Hidden inside the tape recorder is a [[SpyCam tiny camera]]. And hidden inside the camera is a tiny tape recorder." |
| 364 | -->"Why not just take pictures with the camera and record conversations with the tape recorder?" |
| 365 | -->"Because my mind doesn't work that way!" |
| 366 | * ProperlyParanoid: Sometimes Max gets paranoid, believing that anyone and everyone could be an agent of KAOS. Thing is, just about anyone ''could'' be an agent for KAOS, and often is. This was most pronounced in the episode where KAOS put a quarter million bounty on Smart's head, which then got increase to a hafl million dollar bounty. |
| 367 | * ProstheticLimbReveal: In "Little Black Book Part 2" Max uses the old false hands in the chain trick to make his captors think that he has been chained to a wall, and then when they leave he gets out easily. |
| 368 | * PublicSecretMessage: The Chief (disguised as a singing waiter) communicates a message to Max and 99 by slipping code phrases into the song he is singing. |
| 369 | * PunchClockVillain: This also came up in one of the books, when it turned out that KAOS' sinister "Doomsday Plan" was in fact [[spoiler:the "Dooms Day Plan" -- that is, a retirement party for longtime KAOS agent Arthur Dooms]]. |
| 370 | * PunchPunchPunchUhOh: Max is infiltrating a camp of desert nomads when he bumps into a massive guard |
| 371 | ---> '''Max''': "Where I come from, we have a saying. 'The bigger they are, the harder they fall.'"\ |
| 372 | ''Fires off a judo chop, two body blows, and a punch to the jaw that have no effect'' |
| 373 | ---> '''Max''': "Haven't heard of that one, eh? Well, maybe you know this one. 'The quality of mercy is not strained...'" |
| 374 | * PunkInTheTrunk: In "Maxwell Smart, Private Eye," Max and 99 are transporting a DefectorFromCommieLand to a secret hideout. She hides in the trunk while they drive around for three hours to make sure they're not being followed. Despite their efforts, KAOS agents already know the location and are waiting for them when they arrive. |
| 375 | [[/folder]] |
| 376 | |
| 377 | [[folder:Q-Z]] |
| 378 | * RacialFaceBlindness: An Asian KAOS villain, The Claw, keeps kidnapping blonde women because to him all Americans look alike. Later, a CONTROL computer can't tell the difference between several Taiwanese women. |
| 379 | * ReadingTheStageDirectionsOutLoud: Max does this when he tries to infiltrate a KAOS-run play. |
| 380 | * RecycledINSPACE: The animated ''WesternAnimation/InspectorGadget'' was basically ''Get Smart'' with wacky gadgets and a [[AdultsAreUseless little girl to save the day]]. Inspector Gadget was even voiced by Don Adams. |
| 381 | * RedShirt: Boy howdy but CONTROL has some ''terrible'' turnover rates. So many episodes get started with an agent or two getting offed by whatever the current evil scheme's about. |
| 382 | * ResignationsNotAccepted: Not from KAOS, that is. |
| 383 | * {{Retcon}}: Siegfried was not orignally KAOS' leader, just one of its' high-ranking agents, like Max [[note]] In fact, unlike CONTROL, KAOS didn't have a set leader and was shown to have different leaders in different episodes. Part of that was them being killed/arrested by Max and 99 so the episodes can have a triumphant ending, however. [[/note]] However, it seems that the [[Film/GetSmart movie]] and other sources pretty much establish him as the group's leader. |
| 384 | * {{Revival}}: In 1995 a revivial starring Andy Dick |
| 385 | * RoadTripAcrossTheStreet |
| 386 | * RobotBuddy: Hymie |
| 387 | * RunningGag: Quite a few, but the Cone of Silence (used almost once an episode) deserves special mention. |
| 388 | * {{Ruritania}}: Max is a dead ringer for King Charles of Coronia - leading to an elaborate WholePlotReference to ''Literature/ThePrisonerOfZenda''. |
| 389 | %%* SafetyInMuggles |
| 390 | * ScoobyDoobyDoors: In "The Impossible Mission", Max and 99 (both dressed as Creator/CharlieChaplin) do this routine while being chased by a couple of KAOS mooks. |
| 391 | * SealedOrders: PlayedForLaughs. The government stops using sealed orders because none of the agents are able to break the wax when it's time to open them. |
| 392 | * SeadogPegLeg: In "Ship of Spies", the captain of the ship has a peg leg which makes a distinctive "clip-clop" sound when he walks -- but so does practically everything else on the ship. |
| 393 | * SensoryOverload: The villain of "Spy, Spy, Birdie" hates noise so much he wears red earmuffs everywhere and is constantly admonishing people not to "shout" even if they were speaking normally. His goal is to destroy modern society, thus returning the world to a quieter time. |
| 394 | * SequelEpisode: King Charles of Coronia, first introduced in "The King Lives?", returns in the "To Sire with Love" two-parter. |
| 395 | * ShaggyDogStory: |
| 396 | ** [[spoiler: The episode "Double Agent" where Max puts on an elaborate charade of being thrown out of Control and going bad so he can infiltrate a KAOS cell. In the end he finds out the only actual KAOS member in the group is long dead and everyone else are infiltrators from various intelligence agencies themselves.]] |
| 397 | ** [[spoiler: Also "The Secret of Sam Vittorio", where Max and 99 are assigned to use their resemblance to a pair of bank robbers to get their boss to divulge where he his all his loot. In the end it turns out the banks he robbed went broke in the Great Depression, and there never was any loot.]] |
| 398 | * SherlockScan: Max may be TheDitz, but he can nonetheless correctly deduce that, say, a bomb has been planted in a vehicle by the position of leaves on the windshield, or that a villain is planning an attack using knockout gas based on a comment he makes about how a flower smells. |
| 399 | * ShoePhone: Trope namer, from Smart's literal shoe phone. And then taken up to eleven with the introduction of things such as suit phones, stapler phones, nasal spray phones, sandwich phones, and pistol phones, among other absurdities. One has to wonder how much of CONTROL's R&D budget goes go finding strange places to find cellphones. |
| 400 | * ShoutOut: |
| 401 | ** A couple of KAOS agents involved in the episode "Run, Robot, Run" are clearly [[{{Expy}} expies]] of the main characters of ''Series/TheAvengers1960s'' spy series. |
| 402 | ** In "The Reluctant Redhead", KAOS agent Gruvnik was apparently traded from [[Series/TheManFromUncle THRUSH]]. |
| 403 | ** In "Hooray For Hollywood", two of the CONTROL agents assisting in the capture of the villains are named Karvelas (after Robert Karvelas, who played Agent Larrabee) and Szathmary (after Irving Szathmary, the series' music composer). They'd used this same gag a few episodes earlier in "The Relucantant Redhead" too. |
| 404 | * SignedUpForTheDental: A few mooks. |
| 405 | * SleptThroughTheApocalypse: Larabee apparently remained at CONTROL headquarters after it was shut down sometime after the cancellation of the original series until Max picked him up partway through ''Get Smart, Again'', having failed to notice that CONTROL had been disbanded. He did this because he had been given an executive order to remain at his post. This order had been issued by President Nixon. The movie takes place at either the very end of the Reagan administration or the very beginning of the G. H. W. Bush administration. |
| 406 | * SlowDoors: In the final credits Max leaves CONTROL headquarters and all the doors that opened in the TitleSequence slam shut behind him, except the last one. When Max goes to close them manually, they shut on his nose. |
| 407 | * SmartBall: Let's face it, for an IdiotHero, Max certainly has his moments of brilliance. When he does, it's generally a [[Awesome/GetSmart moment of awesome]] by default. Bonus points for the pun: When Smart is on the ball, he can be quite impressive. |
| 408 | * SpringtimeForHitler: In order to infiltrate a KAOS plot, The Chief orders Max to play at a KAOS gambling hall and lose money. The plan was to make it seem like Max was in dire need of funds, and that a significantly large sum would make him defect to KAOS. Unfortunately, try as he might, Max kept on winning money on slot machines and poker games. |
| 409 | * SpyCam: Parodied in an episode where Professor Carlson, a Control scientist, is giving Max and 99 equipment for their next assignment. |
| 410 | --> '''Carlson''': We've developed this special equipment. Inside this camera is a hidden tape recorder. And this tape recorder actually conceals a hidden camera! |
| 411 | --> '''Max''': May I ask you a question, Professor Carlson? |
| 412 | --> '''Carlson''': Certainly. |
| 413 | --> '''Max''': Eh, why hide a tape recorder in a camera and a camera in a tape recorder? Why not just take pictures with the camera and record with the recorder? |
| 414 | --> '''Carlson''': Because my mind doesn't work that way, that's why. |
| 415 | * SpyDrama: A spoof of one, anyway. |
| 416 | * SpySpeak: Several gags can often be described as "fun with signs/countersigns", starting from the first episode, where Max is supposed to identify Agent 99 by the phrase "New York Mets win double header", on a day when the Mets actually ''did'' win a double header, so everyone is saying this. |
| 417 | * StiffUpperLip: The British spy in "Aboard the Orient Express" holds a fairly casual conversation before mentioning that he has a knife in his back, which is quickly followed by him collapsing and dying. |
| 418 | * StrangeMindsThinkAlike: In ''The Nude Bomb'', Max's co-agent starts to ask him something, but he interrupts her and explains that while he understands, it's a firm rule of his never to have sex with his co-workers during a mission. It turns out that, yes, that was exactly what she was going to ask for. |
| 419 | * SurpriseMultipleBirth: Max and 99's twin children in "And Baby Makes Four: Part 2," though the title sort of gives it away for the viewer. |
| 420 | * SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute: Agent 13 for Agent 44, and Dr. Simon for Dr. Steele. In "Ice Station Siegfried" there's also Agent Quigley for Max. |
| 421 | * SwappedRoles: When Max is temporarily made Chief, the real Chief goes back to his old job as Agent Q. He then plays the bumbling fool Max usually is. |
| 422 | * TakeMeInstead: In "The Spirit is Willing", Les Vogel begs his boss to shoot him instead of his accomplice/lover Ann after they get caught selling [=KAOS=] secrets to Max. |
| 423 | * TakeThat: In "[[Series/MissionImpossible The Impossible Mission]]", Max does a parody of the OncePerEpisode scene of looking over agents' photos to pick his team. One of the ones Max sees is of Music/TinyTim, which he immediately rips into tiny pieces. |
| 424 | * TalkingTheMonsterToDeath: See WarriorTherapist trope below. |
| 425 | * TenLittleMurderVictims: "The Amazing Harry Hoo" has Max and Hawaiian detective Harry Hoo stuck on an island with the attendees of a birthday party, who all start dying one after the other. |
| 426 | * TheTapeKnewYouWouldSayThat: One episode has Max receive his orders from the Chief on a prerecorded message. It replies to a couple of things Max says. |
| 427 | * TemporarySubstitute: "Ice Station Siegfried", where Maxwell Smart is replaced by Bill Dana's CIA Agent Quigley for an episode. |
| 428 | * ThisPageWillSelfDestruct: Inverted in the episode named (what else) [[Series/MissionImpossible "The Impossible Mission"]]; the tape message from the Chief is ''supposed'' to self-destruct, but instead most of Max's surroundings blow up, leaving the tape recorder intact. Max tries to break the tape recorder, which is loudly repeating its message, [[MadeOfIndestructium but it is apparently indestructible.]] |
| 429 | * ThrillerOnTheExpress: "Aboard the Orient Express" |
| 430 | * TinyGuyHugeGirl: Don Adams was two inches shorter than Barbara Feldon. In one retrospective interview, Feldon joked that she was the only actress in Hollywood who had calluses on her ankles, since she would roll her ankles, throw out her hip, bow her head, anything she could do to make the height difference less obvious. |
| 431 | * TitleDrop: Often at the end of the episode's intro. |
| 432 | ** Averted and Lampshaded in "Strike While the Agent is Hot": |
| 433 | ---> '''Madame Verna:''' Intercept Maxwell Smart at his apartment and get that book back. And then… |
| 434 | ---> '''Kaos Agent:''' Then what? |
| 435 | ---> '''Madame Verna:''' Then, eradicate Smart. |
| 436 | ---> '''Kaos Agent:''' You sure have a way with words. |
| 437 | * ToBeContinuedRightNow: Before the third season, episodes would be wrapped up before a final humorous scene after a commercial break. However, starting early in the third season, many episodes would have a cliffhanger before the final break, which would be resolved immediately when the show's final scene resumes. |
| 438 | * TortureIsIneffective: A retired spy living at an Old Spy Home is tortured for the whereabouts of his diary, in which he has written down many secret things, but he successfully resists. |
| 439 | ** 99's mother is captured by KAOS agents and tied to a rack. The torture is ineffective because she doesn't know anything about CONTROL, and she thinks the rack is a chiropractic device. |
| 440 | * TyrantTakesTheHelm: In "The Hot Line", the Chief is demoted to Agent Second Class and Max takes his place. Max assures 99 the position won't go to his head, but of course it does. |
| 441 | * UltimateJobSecurity: Max does not fear being fired. If he is, CONTROL's seniority regulations will force the Chief to promote Larabee into Max's job. |
| 442 | * UndercoverAsLovers: When Max have to go undercover at a hotel on short notice, 99 suggests that they use the "Honeymoon Cover". Max makes a counter-suggestion that they go undercover as the "Travelling Salesman and Farmer's Daughter" |
| 443 | * UnifiedNamingSystem: CONTROL vs KAOS are the two opposing spy organizations. |
| 444 | * TheVamp: If there's a female KAOS agent, she's probably one of these. 99 also talks about "vamping" targets. |
| 445 | * VicePresidentWho: In "One Nation Invisible," the Chief asks Max who he thinks could walk through [=KAOS=] headquarters without attracting any attention, and Max guesses the vice-president. |
| 446 | * TheWallsAreClosingIn: Max and 99 fall into and escape this trap in "Dr. Yes". It was in a mobile home, so the trap was portable, too. |
| 447 | * VisualPun: A bunsen burner phone makes an appearance in an episode. A hotline, as Max lampshades. |
| 448 | * WeatherControlMachine: The Hottentot Formula in GET SMART! AGAIN! |
| 449 | * WeddingEpisode: "With Love and Twitches", Maxwell Smart marries Agent 99. The wedding is complicated by Maxwell Smart ingesting a formula that would make his chest break out in to a rash that was actually a treasure map. KAOS agent disrupt the wedding, but they're beaten and the bride walks to the altar on schedule. |
| 450 | * WeirdTradeUnion: Both CONTROL and KAOS agents have unions. KAOS agents have a better union, or at least one able to give them better benefits. This becomes a plot point a number of times. Imagine CIA agents going on strike for greater benefits! |
| 451 | * WeHaveToGetTheBulletOut: In "Physician Impossible," a KAOS agent gets shot in the shoulder. His associates hatch a scheme to kidnap a doctor in order to remove the bullet. |
| 452 | * WhereDoYouThinkYouAre: Again, "This is KAOS! We don't [action] here!" |
| 453 | * WhyDoYouKeepChangingJobs: In "The Tequila Mockingbird", Valdez is the mayor of Miraloma, Mexico -- as well as the Chief of Police, superintendent of schools, coroner, librarian, dogcatcher, city clerk, justice of the peace, tax collector, the saloonkeeper, and the head of the tourist bureau. Also, the town torturer. |
| 454 | * WholePlotReference: |
| 455 | ** "[[RearWindowHomage Greer Window]]" has Max convalescing at home, and takes up [[WindowWatcher spying on nearby Greer Industries]] out of boredom. |
| 456 | ** "Film/{{Casablanca}}" evokes the feel of the film when Max decides to defy the Chief's orders and go to the titular city. |
| 457 | * WimpFight: In the 1989 TV movie, a sidekick and a {{Mook}} grab decorative swords to fight each other, but they can barely lift them above waist level. |
| 458 | ** TruthInTelevision: Unlike actual swords for combat, which tend to be only a few kilograms at most, decorative swords can be as heavy as the particular maker likes. |
| 459 | * UntoUsASonAndDaughterAreBorn: In "And Baby Makes Four" 99 gives birth to a son and daughter. |
| 460 | * WindowWatcher: Max in "[[RearWindowHomage Greer Window]]". |
| 461 | * WithMyHandsTied: Played with in one episode, where Max and his friend Sid are shackled by their hands in front of a deathtrap. Max frees himself by releasing the fake hands that were bound by the shackles. |
| 462 | -->'''Sid:''' "Oh, the old false-hands-in-the-chain trick!" |
| 463 | * WordAssociationTest: In "All in the Mind," Max takes one of these tests, and associates each word with its opposite, including words that weren't meant to be part of the test. |
| 464 | -->'''Dr. Braam''': Very good.\ |
| 465 | '''Max''': Very bad.\ |
| 466 | '''Dr. Braam''': Stop.\ |
| 467 | '''Max''': Go.\ |
| 468 | '''Dr. Braam''': (after covering Max's mouth) All right.\ |
| 469 | '''Max''': All wrong. |
| 470 | * WorthyOpponent: Hinted between Siegfried and Max: whenever the two meet, Siegfried always gives Max a formal salute to which he replies (usually damaging his ShoePhone in the process). Then again, maybe Siegfried does this to trick Max into breaking his phone, as he explicitly counted on Max breaking his shoe phone at least once when on a submarine. |
| 471 | * YellowFace: |
| 472 | ** Most notably, Leonard Strong as "The Craw". |
| 473 | ** Also Joey Forman as "Harry Hoo", though somewhat justified in that it was a parody of Film/CharlieChan. |
| 474 | * YellowPeril: Two examples: |
| 475 | ** Dr. Yes, an over the top parody of ''Film/DrNo''. |
| 476 | ** Partially subverted with The Claw: in a spoof of AsianSpeekeeEngrish humor, {{Cloudcuckoolander}} Max keeps mis-hearing the villain's name as "The Craw" even though no one else has trouble hearing it as "The Claw". |
| 477 | * YesMan: Dr. Yes (a parody of Film/DrNo) had four of these, two scientists and two mooks, each of whom would say "Yes" in a different foreign language. Any time Dr. Yes gave a command or made a statement, the four would reply "Jawohl", "Oui", "Da", "Si". |
| 478 | * YiddishAsASecondLanguage: The entire show can be taken as a riff on Jewish stereotypes of the time being applied to the spy genre - almost everything from the name of the robot (Hymie) to Max's "Would you believe...?" is, in essence, taken straight from the Yiddish-speaking Borscht Belt comedians (though Adams had already used the "Would you believe...?" shtick for his character on ''The Bill Dana Show''). No surprise at all, given that the show was created by Creator/MelBrooks. |
| 479 | * YouAreNumberSix: Both agents, but applies to 99 much more than 86, given that the former's real name is never said once in the whole series. |
| 480 | [[/folder]] |
| 481 | |
| 482 | !!The 1995 sequel series provides examples of: |
| 483 | |
| 484 | * BananaPeel: Zach finds one at the scene of KAOS's latest crime, takes it to his father's office for his debriefing, and discards it on the floor when he's done. His father's secretary points out that it ought to be picked up before someone slips on it, then moments later slips on it herself. |
| 485 | * BerserkButton: The villain from "Passenger 99" had been gravely injured in a bomb test and the subsequent operation left him with a metallic back resembling the shape of a turtle shell. Being called "the Turtle" pisses him off to no end. |
| 486 | * BigBad: The enigmatic KAOS Chairwoman. She's always off in her headquarters away from the main characters, but she oversees the operatives they end up facing. |
| 487 | * DatingCatwoman: Zach's love interest in "Wurst Enemies" turns out to be the daughter of Siegfried, and she's fully participating in her father's revenge scheme. After being rescued, Zach admits it was still a decent date overall. |
| 488 | * EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: Agent 66 previously dated the Turtle's brother and never returned his record albums. During the course of a mission, the Turtle tries to kill her while screaming, "My brother loved those albums!" |
| 489 | * EvilInc: Kaos Inc. with the goal of "[[TakeOverTheWorld total global economic domination]]". |
| 490 | * GenerationXerox: |
| 491 | ** Zach Smart is a bumbling CONTROL agent who has romantic tension with his glamorous female partner, Agent 66. |
| 492 | ** In one episode the villain turns out to be the daughter of Siegfried. This leads to a lovely ShoutOut, when she tells him for years she thought her father was really a [[Series/TheLoveBoat doctor on a cruise ship]]. |
| 493 | * HiddenInPlainSight: Agent 9 is literally nine-years-old. She's tasked with gathering intel in situations where a child's presence wouldn't be considered unusual. |
| 494 | * HonoraryUncle: One of Max's colleagues from the original series makes a cameo appearance and is addressed by Zach as "Uncle Agent 13". Considering that [[Series/TheManFromUncle Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin]] had the numbers 11 and 12 respectively, this also makes him an [[{{Pun}} Honorary U.N.C.L.E.]] |
| 495 | * MadScientist: The Brain. |
| 496 | * ManchurianAgent: In one episode, Agent 66 is brainwashed to assassinate the foreign dignitary she's assigned to protect. |
| 497 | * MegaCorp: KAOS, Inc. |
| 498 | * NotSoDifferentRemark: While detaining him, Jessica (Siegfried's daughter) tells Zach he's no different than her father: someone who lies to her about his true identity and job. |
| 499 | * RunningGagged: Facing Siegfried once again, Max tries to bluff his way out with the old ButThatIWouldBelieve gag by claiming Naval destroyers are on the way. Having gone through this gag so many times over the years, Siegfried interrupts him and points out the well-established formula. |
| 500 | -->'''Siegfried:''' I know. Then I say I don't believe it, then you say something else again, then I say I don't believe it again, and we're right back to where we started.\ |
| 501 | '''Max:''' And I thought my wife knew me. |
| 502 | * StevenUlyssesPerhero: The Brain's real name is Brian. |
| 503 | * TakeThat: Siegfried's big return involves aiming a nuclear missile at an American city. He only tells Max that it's where the greatest minds in the country are. |
| 504 | -->'''Max:''' Well, at least Washington is safe. |
| 505 | * WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Though Max and 99's son is a main character, their daughter never appears, nor is she even given a name like Zach was. A mention in "Passenger 99" makes it clear she still exists, but the show ended before her full status could be explained. |
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