Kicked Upstairs / Live-Action TV

• Arrow:
  • Felicity Smoak is "promoted" to Oliver Queen's executive assistant, so Oliver doesn't have to run down to the Queen Consolidated IT department whenever he uses Felicity for her real job of Voice with an Internet Connection for Team Arrow. Felicity is still not happy because a) everyone now assumes she's sleeping with the boss, and b) she's a hacker not a secretary.
    Felicity: Did you know I went to MIT? Guess what I majored in? Hint — not the secretarial arts!
  • After becoming estranged from Oliver, Tommy Merlyn approaches his father about giving up his playboy lifestyle and entering the family business. Malcolm Merlyn accepts him gladly, yet when Oliver comes to visit Tommy he's sitting in an expensive corner office doing nothing at all.
    Oliver: What exactly do you do here?
    Tommy: (curtly) I work closely with my father.
• In Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Jake takes on a hopeless case that Captain Holt is convinced Madeline Wuntch wants them to fail at on purpose. When they are successful, Wuntch reveals her true motives: she wanted an excuse to "promote" Holt to head of NYPD Public Relations. Not only does this force Holt to give up his long-desired captain position, but Wuntch also attempts to foil Holt's sincere attempts to improve his new department.
• Game of Thrones: Ser Barristan Selmy's dismissal is presented in this light by the new regime; a comfortable, well-earned retirement. Ser Barristan sees it as a blatant attempt to oust him for political reasons and furiously quits on the spot while telling the entire court off.
• Elaine from Seinfeld, after having repeated problems with her mail, is finally fed up and decides to fire the mailroom clerk. But once she sees him, she's intimidated by his demeanor and appearance and, needing a reason to explain her summons, promotes him to copywriter. Unsurprisingly, he's terrible at it, so she's forced to promote him again — to Director of Corporate Development, a sinecure if ever there was one. But when Elaine informs the other copywriters of this, they're outraged that their hard work went unrewarded while he gets a cushy office upstairs, so they all quit in disgust.
• Yes, Minister:
  • In one episode, a worried Hacker contemplates his future during a reshuffle being kicked into a "useless non-job" (like Lord Privy Seal or Minister for Sport). He's also threatened with a specially-created role of "Minister for Industrial Harmony" in one episode, the position's primary responsibility being to take the blame every time there's a strike, but that probably crosses into Reassigned to Antarctica territory.
  • A running joke throughout the series is that almost every politician is terrified of being sent up to the House of Lords, it being the ultimate kiss-of-death for a political career.
    • In one episode, Hacker asks a friend what it's like to have moved from the Commons to the Lords, to which the friend sardonically replies "[It's] like moving from the animals to the vegetables."
    • Another one had a reference to a politician being kicked upstairs due to falling asleep in Cabinet. When Humphrey asks whether this is normal he is told this happened while he was talking.
    • Another example is when Hacker is set up by a rival to take the responsibility for axing his own department in its entirety. Said rival gloats: "I expect he'll be sent to the Lords. Lord James Hacker of Kamikaze..."
    • The Christmas Special "Party Games" had the Home Secretary kicked upstairs for drunkenly ramming into both a truck carrying nuclear waste and the car of a reporter, right after having been behind a "don't drink and drive at Christmas" campaign.
      Humphrey: Well, I gather he was as drunk as a Lord, so after a discreet interval, they'll probably make him one.
  • Another episode has Hacker promote a troublesome young Minster for Health pushing for smoking law reform to a position in the Treasury (where he'll simply fall into the status quo), while the Minister for Sport (who is an avid smoker and has close ties to the tobacco industry) is made Minster for Health.
  • In the episode, "The Bishop's Gambit", Sir Humphrey is offered the position of Master of Baillie College upon the current Master's retirement, which is about the same time as Sir Humphrey's planned retirement from the civil service. The only stumbling block? The Dean hates him and would block it from happening. So Sir Humphrey manipulates circumstances so that the Dean gets offered a bishopric. With the Dean out of the way, Sir Humphrey's future is now brighter and he even scored points for being "selfless" by recommending someone with whom he shares a mutual dislike.
  • One episode had Hacker punish a Foreign Office official who had been withholding vital information about recent international events from the Prime Minister and twisting Hacker's instructions to maintain a neutral Middle East policy into a pro-Arab Middle East policy by promoting him to an embassy posting... in Tel Aviv.
  • Downplayed with regards to the position of EU Commissioner. While the position is one where domestic political careers go to die (Hacker outright states that to come back to domestic politics from that you have to start your own party), the pay and perks are more than enough to make the job enticing to a sufficiently unambitious or compromised politician.
• The Office (UK) (Original):
  • Gareth Keenan's position as 'Team Leader' is viewed and described by everyone else as a pointless, meaningless job title that someone's given him in order to get him to do something that they don't want to do for no extra pay whatsoever. However, as Gareth is a humourless jobsworth who craves any hint of authority, no matter how inconsequential, he absolutely revels in it.
  • It's also likely that this is the reason the partners of Wernham-Hogg wanted to promote David Brent to the position of UK manager, while his more competent Swindon counterpart would take over running the newly merged branches. David only doesn't get the promotion because he fails the medical exam.
• The Office:
  • Dwight Schrute, who, technically holds the title of Assistant to the Regional Manager. This job title was a meaningless honorific which seemingly involved no real duties except those delegated by Michael because he didn't want to do them himself (such as scheduling the weekend workers or picking a health care plan for the office). He retained absolutely zero extra authority and was paid the same as any other salesman, but he routinely left out the "to the" in his title and behaved as if he was second in command.
  • Gabe is initially only there to oversee the merging of regional offices, but afterwards is asked by Jo to stick around and supervise for her. His only real job is letting her know what's going on at that branch, but he has no authority whatsoever. He cannot hire people, fire people, or even perform disciplinary action. He's literally a snitch without anything resembling power.
• Arnie: Basically the whole premise: Arnie Nuvo, a longtime blue-collar employee at the fictitious Continental Flange Company, is promoted to an executive position overnight, and the series follows his fish-out-of-water situation and his sometimes-problematic relationship with his well-meaning but wealthy and eccentric boss.
• Star Trek: The Next Generation:
  • In "Rightful Heir", Kahless the Unforgettable, founder of the Klingon Empire, "returns" and is seen as a political threat by Chancellor Gowron. After Gowron proves clone-Kahless is not the strongest warrior of them all, the spiritual rebirth sparked by his return is still seen as a political threat. Instead of killing clone-Kahless and making him a martyr to his followers, Worf suggests installing him in the currently empty ceremonial but politically powerless seat of Emperor, as the "true heir" to Kahless.
  • Being kicked upstairs is basically how Dr. Beverly Crusher was Put on a Bus for the second season, as head of Starfleet Medical. Fortunately the bus ride only lasted one season.
  • In "Hollow Pursuits", Commander Riker suspects that Lt. Barclay's glowing performance reviews from his previous ship were issued as a way to foist him on the Enterprise. It turns out he really is a good engineer under the right conditions, i.e. when he isn't paralyzed by his social anxiety.
  • Trying to avoid this is how Riker ended up being Picard's XO for over fifteen years. He was repeatedly offered commands of his own, but kept turning them down because he felt being the XO of the flagship was more prestigious than captain of a small cruiser. Many people take issue with this, because he is effectively stalling the careers of those under him in doing so, with particular regard to Data. The Novelverse has him undergo a minor Heel Realization on this matter, which is how he ends up taking the post of the USS Titan.
• In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Sisko's assignment to the station is implied to be because of this mixed with Reassigned to Antarctica. After losing his wife when his ship was destroyed in battle against the Borg at Wolf 359, Sisko was burnt out and wanted a quiet, out-of-the-way command where he could finish up his tenure and retire from Starfleet. However, the Prophets decided that he was their new messiah (a long story that's actually far more complicated than that) and the whole thing turned into a Reassignment Backfire against himself.
  • After disobeying orders to stay at DS9, an admiral threatened to either court-martial Sisko or promote him, both of which he seemingly considered horrible punishments. Sisko was eventually promoted (from Commander to Captain), but continued as the station CO.
  • Most of DS9's crew seemed to be roped into this somehow. Kira was given the post as liaison officer because she was an outspoken critic of the provisional government. Quark was blackmailed into a "community leader" role. Bashir volunteered for the role,^note In hindsight, it's likely part of the reason was to try and keep his status as an Augment hidden as long as possible. and O'Brien gladly accepted the position because the Enterprise was so well maintained that he never had anything to do. Later, Ezri Dax came there because she was so overwhelmed by being newly-joined that she needed the grounding of familiar faces.^note That and the possibility that the Trill government would do to her what they did to another Dax Host that got Joined under murky circumstances.
  • This would also seem to be how Worf's son Alexander got himself posted on Martok's ship, upon which Worf happened to be serving. Certainly, he did not get there on his own merits, and neither Martok or Worf had a hand in it.
  • In the three-part Season 2 opener, Kira Nerys risks war with Cardassia to rescue legendary Bajoran freedom fighter Li Nalas. Minister Jaro informs her she is being removed from her position as Bajoran liaison officer to Deep Space Nine, reassigned to the capital and replaced with the man she rescued. When Commander Sisko protests, Jaro informs him that she's not being punished; this is in fact a promotion in recognition for her heroic act, even if no-one else sees it that way. Turns out it's actually Li Nalas who's being Kicked Upstairs, as Jaro is planning The Coup and wants to make sure this potential rival leader is well away from the capital.
• In Babylon 5:
  • Londo is given a post as adviser to planetary security. He recognizes that the promotion is actually "a leash" intended to force him to return to Centauri Prime where he can be watched and kept under control.
  • Londo only got the job of Centauri Ambassador on Babylon 5 in the first place because nobody else wanted the job. It got him out of the way of the hub of Centauri political power, and nobody expected him to survive the job very long given the fate of the previous Babylon stations.
  • Vir got the job of Londo's attache because his family wanted to get rid of him, presumably because of his unpopular progressive political views. He says at one point that his uncle told him that he and Londo were "made for each other." When Londo's star was on the rise the government actually tried to replace Vir to cover their ass over the insult of assigning him in the first place; Londo had to threaten to resign to prevent it.
  • Sinclair gets reassigned as ambassador to Minbar after his manipulation of EarthGov rules and regulations made him too many political enemies on Earth. This leads to the ultimate Reassignment Backfire when he goes back in time 1000 years to become the Minbari religious figure Valen and sets up their entire culture—leading to the Earth-Minbari War which started the whole business. ^note Sinclair was written out of the series as actor Michael O'Hare was suffering from severe mental illness. Series creator J. Michael Straczynski offered to suspend production to allow O'Hare time to be treated but O'Hare didn't want to risk the jobs of everyone else on the show. Straczynski promised to keep quiet about the real reason O'Hare left until after O'Hare died, finally revealing the secret eight months after O'Hare's death.
• In Battlestar Galactica, even though he was technically kicked sideways, William Adama was given command of the Galactica specifically because the ship was about to be retired, along with Adama's career. However, the Cylon attack changed all of that...
• In the first episode of The Brittas Empire, incompetent new leisure centre manager Gordon Brittas explains to the assistant manager that the way to get rid of a problem employee is to write a glowing reference and recommend him for a managerial position at a different leisure centre. She deadpans "Is that how it happens?"
• Richard's promotion in Gilmore Girls was of this kind, stoking his fears of becoming obsolete. Instead of going through the motions, he decided to retire from this position. It didn't take and after a stint as an independent consultant, he was back with his original company. According to Richard, it was an established procedure at that company. Rather than keeping him in that position, it was part of a track that would end with him being forcibly retired, i.e. it was a slow, ignoble way of firing him.
• In The Thick of It, MP Julius Nicholson tries to get involved in the government's public relations activities, treading on the toes of the press officers whose job it is and who actually know what they're doing. He antagonises everyone with his mad policy ideas, to the point where they start to believe he is actually unhinged and dangerous. He is promoted to the position of "Blue-Sky Thinker" to the Prime Minister... a meaningless job title given to him to make him think he has some actual power and to keep him quiet.
  "I'm spending half of my time now dealing with that rubbish that Nicholson's putting out there... If he does stick his baldy head 'round your door and comes up with some stupid idea about "Policemen's helmets should be yellow" or "Let's set up a department to count the Moon," just treat him like someone with Alzheimer's disease, you know? Just say "yes, that's lovely, that's good, we must talk about that later," okay?" — Malcolm Tucker
  • Though this was somewhat ironically subverted when Nicholson inherited a peerage, thus entering the House of Lords, which is typically treated as this trope — except it turns out that as a member of the party with a permanent seat in the British Parliament, this actually does come with a lot more power than everyone had previously assumed, meaning that Nicholson actually was able to exert genuine influence where he hadn't been able to before.
• In From the Earth to the Moon, Joe Shea, director of the Apollo Space Program, is "promoted" to Washington to assist in making policy in the wake of the Apollo 1 fire, but it's really a move to keep him out of the way of the congressional investigation into the accident. Once he's in his new job, he realizes he has no responsibilities and eventually moves on to the private sector. It's dramatized but pretty much historically accurate.
• In The Shield this is Vic's final fate. In exchange for his confession, he stays out of prison — provided he puts in three full years writing reports at a desk.
  Olivia (unmoved): It's suit and tie here. Lunch hour, go home and change.
• For the first season of Due South, Fraser reports to the incredibly incompetent Superintendent Moffat. In S2:E2 Vault, he finds out there's been a change.
  Fraser: Superintendent Moffat. Did he...Uh, did he retire?
  Ovitz: Promoted. The man spends seven years in that office, doesn't make one valuable contribution. One day he slaps a Mountie hat on a Mickey Mouse doll and...
• The "winner" of the US version of Whose Line Is It Anyway? can be viewed as this: the points don't matter, so it's ultimately a decision to veto someone for the final game.
• On Stargate SG-1, there was a Jaffa named Her'ak who first showed up as First Prime of the minor Goa'uld Khonsu who turned out to be a Tok'ra operative and was killed for it. Her'ak later reappeared as First Prime of Anubis, and Jack O'Neill accused him of "failing upwards".
• In Rome, Caesar attempted to do this to Brutus by assigning him as the Governor of Macedonia. However, it backfired as Brutus saw through what Caesar was trying to do and felt betrayed as he rejected it.
• Farscape: When last seen in the series, Commandant Mele-on Grayza—who up to that point had proven to be utterly incompetent trying to recapture Moya and her crew, consistently ignored and overruled her Reasonable Authority Figure first officer Braca, and was wholly inept handling the Scarrans politically—was about to commit suicide by Scarran and let her entire Command Carrier go down with her, before Braca stepped in and forcibly removed her from command (needless to say, none of the soldiers whom she ordered to gun Braca down made a move to obey). When next she appears in the Peacekeeper Wars miniseries, she's been elevated to a council position and is apparently the lover of Grand Chancellor Maryk, commander of all Peacekeeper forces, but clearly has no power aboard the ship and isn't even taken particularly seriously as an adviser (though given her track record...). And then she murders Maryk when she believes he's faltering and seizes control anyway, leading the Peacekeeper fleet into the apocalyptic final battle. She seems to have learned her lesson, though: although initially intent on continuing the engagement when Crichton fires the wormhole weapon, she's the first commander to order her ships to stand down when she realizes that continuing to fight is hopeless.
• The Flipside of Dominick Hide after his rule-breaking time travelling in the first instalment, Dominick is kicked upstairs for the sequel to curb his impetuosity. Sadly all it does is make one of his students want to emulate him.
• In The Good Wife, once Peter Florrick is elected Governor of Illinois, Marilyn Garbanza is brought in as part of his ethics committee. Eli Gold, his campaign manager and image consultant, recommends that he get rid of her, not because of any ethics problems but because of his past sex scandals involving women on his staff. Obviously, firing her would look bad, so Peter tells Eli to invoke this trope. Eli informs Marilyn that she has been promoted to the head of the Transit Authority ... Board (yes, he keeps making that pause, as he's just invented the position). Marilyn, however, is not an idiot and immediately realizes what's being done to her. She tells Eli that they will regret this decision. Later, though, Peter decides to bring her back, but she makes sure that the ethics committee stays with him in order to be on top of things.
• M*A*S*H
  • This is the ultimate fate of Major Frank Burns, resident incompetent surgeon and wannabe commander after his adulterous affair with Major Margaret Houlihan is ended by her getting married to someone else. After having a mental breakdown that leads him to accost a general's wife mistaking her for Margaret, he is ^note at least according to his words promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, cleared of all criminal charges, and given a job stateside — in his home state — in a Veteran's Hospital to keep him out of anyone's hair. Hawkeye is furious as he'd love to get assigned stateside as well.
  • Burns himself threatened Corporal Klinger, who was bucking for a Section 8 discharge by cross-dressing to try and convince everyone he was crazy, with a promotion to Sergeant if he kept up with his antics. It worked (for as long as Burns was in command at the time anyway). ^note When Klinger later gave up trying to get a Section 8 and stopped dressing in drag, he did get a deserved promotion to Sergeant.
  • Several seasons earlier, this is the fate of crazy two-star General Steele played by Harry Morgan (who, ironically, became a series-regular as Colonel Potter). After he charges Captain Pierce with insubordination,^note Hawkeye refused to let him use a helicopter needed to evac a dying soldier to instead scout out a new place to move the unit to. he disrupts the court martial hearings by accosting the African-American pilot with demands for a musical number, since it's "in his blood", and then promptly launches into a song himself and dances on out of the hearing when the pilot is too stunned to reply. The next we hear, he's been sent back stateside, bumped up in rank to a three-star general, and given a cushy desk job.
• At the end of The Unit, Colonel Ryan receives an unwanted promotion to General after enacting a successful but reckless plan to stop a domestic terrorist group.
• In Borgen, Birgitte arranges for Jacob Kruse to get an EU Commissioner post when she discovers that he's disloyal to her, which is superficially an honour but actually puts a stop to his political career. Unfortunately, it doesn't work.
• Cosmos 2014 shows Humphry Davy doing this to Michael Faraday out of professional jealously when Faraday creates an electric motor and becomes the toast of the scientific community. Davy assigns him to work on glass optics to keep Faraday from showing him up again, since Faraday is no good at it. (Decades later, a souvenir from this failed effort allows Faraday to make one of his greatest discoveries.)
• The final episode of Law & Order: UK ends with the possibility of this happening to DS Ronnie Brooks. Having been accused of making an error during a murder investigation, his superior officer suggests calming the furor by transferring him to a position that is technically more senior, but would involve nothing but desk work. He recognizes the move for what it truly is and is genuinely hurt that this is the thanks he gets for years of dedicated service. The episode ends with Ronnie having not yet decided whether to take the new job or retire—and the series with Brooks' portrayer deciding to leave the show, so Ronnie's fate is completely up in the air.
• In Hill Street Blues it happens twice, once when Capt. Furillo complains in public about a police enforcement program ordered by the mayor which he considered to be useless, and is moved to a liaison office fer the chief of police. Later, Ray Calletano is relieved of command and given an assignment of Hispanic Liaison to the Chief because his precinct is becoming a powder keg of racial turmoil.
• Mike Milligan's promotion to a desk in Fargo was not intended this way, but that's how he perceives it, as he didn't ask for it and it involves none of the things he enjoys and is good at.
• On Silicon Valley, Hooli CEO Gavin Belson believes in this philosophy, having picked it up from studying Japanese management techniques. He implements it with the company's worst performers, technically promoting them but removing all their responsibilities, believing they will become ashamed of how little they are contributing to the company. The problem, though, is that he does not employ Japanese salarymen, but rather Silicon Valley programmers who are all too happy to get paid to come to work and do absolutely nothing while waiting for their stock options to vest. Big Head has this happen to him; he finds a whole group of people like him just playing hackeysack on the building's roof. And eventually, after too many conflicts with the Hooli board, Gavin winds up joining them.
• The Wire:
  • While serving on Mayor Royce's detail, Herc catches Royce in the act of receiving a blowjob from his secretary. Valchek gives tips to Herc on how to turn the situation into an opportunity. The opportunity is that Royce bribes Herc with a promotion to Sergeant and a transfer off the security detail as a reward for his silence.
  • In season 4, a string of promotions are going on. Carcetti orders the promotion of Cedric Daniels to Colonel, seeking to groom him to replace Burrell as Commissioner. He also has to reward Valchek a promotion, so he makes sure it's one that strips Valchek of any real influence: Deputy Commissioner of Administration. (Valchek gets the last laugh, though—Daniels ultimately leaves the Police Department because he refuses to play games with crime statistics for Carcetti's successor, and Valchek ends up Commissioner himself.
• Patriot: The peaceful and wealthy city of Luxembourg's police department is extremely chauvinistic, so it assigns all of its female police detectives to a division that never has anything to do: Homicide. It's derisively called the Department of Skirts and Stockings by hot-shot detectives in the Financial Crimes division, where all the action is.
• In Political Animals, after learning that Secretary Elaine Barrish Hammond is planning to run a primary campaign against him, President Garcetti tries to head her off by nominating her to the Supreme Court to replace an outgoing Justice. Since it would be a lifetime appointment, she would have been prevented from running against him. She declines.
• In Elementary, a cop-turned-professor and old enemy of Sherlock becomes an obstacle for Detective Bell, so Sherlock coerces him into taking a job that pays significantly more than a professor's salary, but with none of the prestige.
• Played with in Lucifer. Lt. Pierce turns down Chloe for union rep because, as he later reveals, he considers it "a job for has-beens". He gives the job to Dan, who has no idea what a backhanded gesture it is.
• Saturday Night Live: In the season 28 (2002-03) episode hosted by Ray Liotta, there's a sketch about a Barney & Friends-esque TV show where one of the show's child castmembers (Rachel Dratch) has grown boobs during her hiatus and the director (Jimmy Fallon) and the actor in the Barney-esque costume (Liotta) trying to do the show despite the actress's breasts bouncing and the ensuing Accidental Innuendo. In the end, the director resolves the situation by "promoting" her to "the show captain".