History Main / StockShticks

!This trope is [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=16775946940.62452400 under discussion]] in the Administrivia/TropeRepairShop.

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->''"Did you ever notice how men leave the toilet seat up?...[ChirpingCrickets]...That's the joke."''
-->-- '''[=McBain=]''', ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS6E18AStarIsBurns A Star is Burns]]"

The stand-up comedy shticks that've been used, referenced, parodied, and satirized so much that they're tropes of their own, and possibly even cliches. Overlaps with StockPhrases and AcceptableTargets to some extent.

Often a case of SeinfeldIsUnfunny ([[TropeNamer literally]], in some cases) if a perfectly serviceable joke is ruined by sheer overexposure. Others fall victim to ValuesDissonance (see: most racial humour). May also be {{Outside Joke}}s if they're based solely on the listener's ignorance. Often cause listeners to think, "NeverHeardThatOneBefore!"

Another form is BottomOfTheBarrelJoke, when the comedian uses a raunchy or off-color remark as low-effort "humor." There's also StockJokes, for all the specific jokes and punch lines we've all heard a million times, as well as StockParodyJokes about a certain work.

Even if it's followed with a {{Rimshot}}, [[ToughRoom unruly audiences]] have been known to respond with a CollectiveGroan, or, if the comedian keeps it up too long, ProducePelting.

----
!!Shticks:

* Starting off an act with "I just flew in from ______, and boy are my arms tired!"
* "Say 'good night', X!" "Good night, X!"
* "A funny thing happened to me on the way to..."
* "What's the deal with airline food?"
** "Why are the peanuts so hard to get into?"
** "[[Creator/PattonOswalt The food on airlines is BULLSHIT!]]"
** While [[NeverLiveItDown it's associated with him]], Seinfeld himself only ever did that shtick to make fun of how cliched it was.
** In [[Series/{{Seinfeld}} the show proper]] itself, there is no mention of airline food, especially in the episode "[[Recap/SeinfeldS2E9TheDeal The Deal]]". The closest reference to the shtick is in the season 8 episode "[[Recap/SeinfeldS8E22TheSummerOfGeorge The Summer of George]]", when George is invited by a guy to play frolf (a portmanteau of frisbee and golf), he has to choose to between frolf, and Jerry, whom George imagines him saying "What's the deal with airplane peanuts?", to which George picks frolf.
** Airline food is starting to become more of a rarity in real life and while most airlines still serve drinks or a a small snack like peanuts or pretzels, they usually don't serve actual meals anymore (some do but not for free or only for first class passengers). Ten years from now some younger audiences will hear this shtick and ask [[WhatAreRecords "What is airline food?"]] It's still a big spectrum with lots of variance. One surprising airline on the opposite extreme of that spectrum is El-Al: It installs expensive missile defense systems [[TheresNoKillLikeOverkill on board all of its planes]], [[CrazyPrepared something no other airline does]], and yet, it still has enough spare money to offer free hot meals for ''all'' passengers on ''all'' flights. Given the average Israeli's tastes and El-Al's relatively palatial fleet choices[[note]]On a Tel Aviv to Paris flight, for example, Air France will only offer your typical intra-European fare - Narrow-Body A320, Overhead TV, Business Class is little more than Economy with prioritized service and a table replacing the middle seat. El Al, however, handles the Paris route with their long-haul 777s (plus the occassional 747 or 787) - the same 777s they use for Trans-Atlantic flights - half the time, and even the 737s and 767s they use the other half have an actual business class.[[/note]], that's not gonna change soon.
* [[WhiteDudeBlackDude "White people go like this, but black people go like this!]]"
** The nasal white-guy voice that black comics use.
*** Music/{{Eminem}}, struggling to get taken seriously as a white rapper, started rapping in the stereotypical nasal white-guy voice to make fun of his own whiteness and used it on his early material like ''Music/TheSlimShadyLP''. He dropped it after his work on Music/DrDre's ''2001''.
*** Latino comics go even further, making white men sound effeminate or even AmbiguouslyGay.
** "White people have no sense of rhythm."
** "[[{{WesternAnimation/Futurama}} The people under the yellow sun be like this, while the people under the red sun be like this!]]"
** "When I order fast food, nobody speaks English!"
* "How does the man who drives the snowplow get to work in the morning?"
* "Why does my VCR always flash '12:00'?"
** [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Krusty the Klown]] lampshades this in "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS9E15TheLastTemptationOfKrust The Last Temptation of Krust]]" (and the airline peanuts example above) during an act where he bashes his fellow standup comedians.
--->'''Krusty''': These comics today! "Ooh, look at me, I can't program my VCR, I can't open a bag of airline peanuts, I'm a freaking ''[[TooIncompetentToOperateABlanket moron]]!"''
** In the ''WebAnimation/StrongBadEmail'' "12:00", Bubs and Strong Bad decide the best solution to this problem is to duct-tape a working alarm clock to the VCR.
* "Why are there instructions in Braille on the drive-through ATM's?" (Actual reason: they use the same interface as the walk-up [=ATMs=]. Not to mention blind people can sit behind the driver and be driven to the ATM.)
* [[RunningGag "What's the deal with airline food?"]]
* "[[MarsAndVenusGenderContrast I just can't understand women at all. No guy can.]]"
* "All men are stupid." (oddly, this is mostly used by male comedians, notably Creator/TimAllen)
** [[DirectionlessDriver "Men don't ask for directions."]]
** "Men are simple; women are complex."
** Parodied in ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS6E18AStarIsBurns A Star is Burns]]" with Rainier "[=McBain=]" Wolfcastle's "Why do men leave the toilet seat up?...[[DontExplainTheJoke That's the joke]]."
* "[[PsychoExGirlfriend My ex is an asshole.]]"
* "[[RussianReversal In Soviet Russia]], comedy stands you up!" (originally the shtick of Yakov Smirnoff)
* "Kids these days..."
** "[[TheNewRockAndRoll The music these kids listen to...]]"
** "[[PhoneaholicTeenager Kids are so spoiled with all these electronic toys...]]"
** "Have you seen the clothes these kids wear?"
** "Bike helmets and seatbelts and sunscreen are garbage! [[WhenIWasYourAge When I was a kid...]]"
* "Hollywood is so messed up - sex is rated R or X/NC-17, and explosions are fun for kids!"
* "[[OutsideJoke Why don't they just make the planes out of the black box material?]]" [[labelnote:Because...]][[WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddparents It would be too heavy to fly]], and an unbreakable plane [[NotTheFallThatKillsYou wouldn't help all those poor breakable folks inside anyway]].[[/labelnote]]
** This joke has the dubious distinction of being so dumb and overused that Creator/DouglasAdams claims it made him want to never write comedy again.
* "If [[Series/GilligansIsland the Professor]] could build a radio transmitter out of [[BambooTechnology bamboo and coconuts]], why couldn't he fix the damn boat?" [[labelnote:note]]In an early episode, he almost did fix it, but the glue he used caused the entire boat to fall to pieces--so after that, fixing it was no longer an option. And [[JustEatGilligan guess whose fault it was]]?[[/labelnote]]
** It would have ended the series. Also, it seems that everybody forgot about the reunion movies, where the castaways ''did'' get off the island.
** The radio wasn't made out of coconuts or bamboo. They used the same radio, presumably retrieved from the boat, for the whole series. It might be a stretch that the batteries lasted for that long, but the professor never cobbled together a radio out of nothing.
* Parodied in the ''WebAnimation/HomestarRunner'' cartoon "Halloween Fairstival", where Bubs' stand-up act at the "Ha-Ha-Halloween Comedy Club" consists entirely of cliched stand-up comedy jokes: "[[http://www.homestarrunner.com/ween04.html Women can't drive! And, airline food! I mean, humminah-what?]]"
** Atleast he got Strong Mad to laugh.
* Pretending to explain the joke to someone in the front row.
** Soaking up as much applause as possible, commenting that it helps stretch out their act (which stretches out their act even more).
* "How do you like my clothes/hairstyle?" (while sporting an OutdatedOutfit or bad hair)
* "The people in my religion/ethnicity/region are INSANE."
* "[[AwfulWeddedLife Take my wife... ''please!'']]"
** Which is so famous ''as'' a Stock Shtick that it's possible to forget that it was originally meant to sound like it means "my wife, for example", and some people seem to think it's an example of an OrphanedPunchline.
* "Marriage is an institution, but who wants to live in an institution?" Though attributed to [[Creator/TheMarxBrothers Groucho Marx]] on many sites, it's really an old vaudeville joke that was overused to death.
* [[ObnoxiousInLaws Interfering mothers-in-law]] as AcceptableTargets.
--> '''Creator/JasperCarrott:''' I don't like the whole tired old comedy schtick about mothers-in-law. I get on very well with mine. In fact I've just bought her a house. [[DoubleSubversion In Iran]].
* "But seriously, [[WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb what's the deal with airline food?]]"
* "...and then I got off the bus"/"pull back and reveal" (a form of TomatoSurprise). [[https://youtu.be/TZNnjz-ZNrE?t=13 Deconstructed]] by Creator/StewartLee and Creator/RichardHerring.
* A ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}} cartoon referenced StockShticks when Dilbert entered a stand-up competition 'with the mandatory categories; UsefulNotes/DanQuayle, Flatulence and the [[MattressTagGag warning labels on mattresses]]'
* Speaking of which: [[MattressTagGag the warning labels on mattresses]].
* "Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, I'll be here all week." Said after a joke that didn't go over. Also commonly used akin to the {{rimshot}} by [[LamePunReaction people saying lame puns]].
** "Tip your waitress/servers." "Try the veal."
* Kids saying the darndest things. Summed up by Creator/StewartLee as "Some of the things kids say are mad though. It's like they can only understand the world from the perspective of a child"
* "Why are cabbies such bad drivers? And why are they all Middle Eastern or South Asian immigrants?"
* A comedian starting their act with 'I'm [name of comic], just in case you were thinking that [name of other celebrity that comic resembles] has let themselves go recently'
* "So, did you hear about [[BuffySpeak this [insert news story or pop-culture phenomenon] thing]]?" (Done to death by Jimmy Vulmer on ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'': "Did you see this? Did you hear about this?")
* "Anybody here from out of town?"
** "''[[ComicStrip/{{Garfield}} Anybody]]'' here?!"
* "So a guy walks into a bar..."
** [[LiteralMinded "He says, 'Ow.' "]]
* [[WhiteDudeBlackDude "A priest and a rabbi..."]]
** A priest, a rabbi, and an ostrich walk into a bar. The bartender says, "What is this, some kinda joke?"
* Stock heckler putdowns include:
** "I remember my first drink as well"
** "It's a shame when cousins marry"
** "There's a bus leaving in ten minutes time, why don't you be under it?"
*** "[[Series/TheGoldenGirls There's a man leaving in ten minutes. Be under him.]]"
** "Looks like there's a village missing its idiot"
** "I've heard better jokes from [inanimate object/animal/unintelligent person/something the heckler doesn't like]!"
** (In response to "Do you know..." question) "No, but maybe if you hum a few bars, I could fake it."
* [[OverusedRunningGag Seriously, what is it with airline food?]]
* FunnyForeigner: While laughing with other ethnicities has become less accepted since the 1980s poking fun at white people from other countries (dumb obese Americans, [[BritishStuffiness stuffy Englishmen]], [[FrenchJerk arrogant Frenchmen]], [[AllGermansAreNazis evil Germans]], [[ThriftyScot thrifty Scots]],...) is still very common. Especially when using the appropriate accents.
* Due to his global fame and overexposed private life of Music/MichaelJackson was also a popular and easy topic for comedians from the 1980s on until the late 2000s. Many jokes would revolve around his face lifts, childlike behaviour or supposed paedophilia. After his death this shtick [[NeverSpeakIllOfTheDead has more or less disappeared]].
* Sending [[ArtisticLicenseSpace a space mission to land on the sun]]-- at night, of course. [[InsaneTrollLogic Then, it'll be safe.]]
* "Excuse me, sir/madam, are you in show business?"
** "No."
** "Then get your feet off the stage!"
* PedophilePriest jokes, usually [[CrossesTheLineTwice to be more vulgar]], they especially use the phrase "fucking boys".
* A motto that drugs are good and religion is bad (overlaps with PedophilePriest jokes).
* Creationist museums or creationism in general is like ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones''.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPuu_VE7KOA If we built a wall to keep the Mexicans out, who would build it?]]
* Asking a tall person, "How's the weather up there?".
* Taking the "Slow Children Playing" sign [[RulesOfTheRoad literally.]]
* Anything about Music/KeithRichards being a massive drug user.
----
->''({{Rimshot}})''
-> [[TheStinger Thank you! I'll be here all night, folks! Don't forget to tip your waitresses! And try the veal!]]
----

* [[SeinfeldIsUnfunny "What's the deal with airline food?"]]

!This trope is [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/addpost.php?discussion=16775947770.44807600 under discussion]] in the Administrivia/TropeRepairShop.

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[[quoteright:296:[[Webcomic/FreeCow https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/cowfood2real.png]]]]

** Airline food is starting to become more of a rarity in real life and while most airlines still serve drinks or a a small snack like peanuts or pretzels, they usually don't serve actual meals anymore (some do but not for free or only for first class passengers). Ten years from now some younger audiences will hear this shtick and ask [[WhatAreRecords "What is airline food?"]] It's still a big spectrum with lots of variance. One surprising airline on the opposite extreme of that spectrum is El-Al: It installs expensive missile defense systems [[TheresNoKillLikeOverkill on board all of its planes]], [[CrazyPrepared something no other airline does]], and yet, it still has enough spare money to offer free hot meals for ''all'' passengers on ''all'' flights. Given the average Israeli's tastes and El-Al's relatively palatial fleet choices[[note]]On a Tel Aviv to Paris flight, for example, Air France will only offer your typical intra-European fare - Narrow-Body A320, Overhead TV, Business Class is little more than Economy with prioritized service and a table replacing the middle seat. El Al, however, handles the Paris route with their long-haul 777s (plus the occassional 747 or 787) - the same 777s they use for Trans-Atlantic flights - half the time, and even the 737s and 767s they use the other half have an actual buisness class.[[/note]], that's not gonna change soon.

*** Music/{{Eminem}}, struggling to get taken seriously as a white rapper, started rapping in the stereotypical nasal white-guy voice to make fun of his own racial difference and used it on his early material. He dropped it after ''Music/TheSlimShadyLP''.

** In [[Series/{{Seinfeld}} the show proper]] itself, there is no mention of airline food, especially in the episode "The Deal". The closest reference to the shtick is in the season 8 episode "The Summer of George", when George is invited by a guy to play frolf (a portmanteau of frisbee and golf), he has to choose to between frolf, and Jerry, whom George imagines him saying "What's the deal with airplane peanuts?", to which George picks frolf.

** [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Krusty the clown]] lampshades this (and the airline peanuts example above) during an act where he bashes his fellow standup comedians.

** Parodied in ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' with Rainier "[=McBain=]" Wolfcastle's "Why do men leave the toilet seat up?...[[DontExplainTheJoke That's the joke]]."

* "Marriage is an institution, but who wants to live in an institution?" Though attributed to Groucho Marx on many sites, it's really an old vaudeville joke that was overused to death.

* "...and then I got off the bus"/"pull back and reveal" (a form of TomatoSurprise). [[https://youtu.be/TZNnjz-ZNrE?t=13 Deconstructed]] by Lee and Herring.

--->'''Krusty''': I can't program my VCR, I can't open a bag of airline peanuts, I'm a freaking ''[[TooIncompetentToOperateABlanket moron]]!''

* Sending [[ArtisticLicenseAstronomy a space mission to land on the sun]]-- at night, of course. [[InsaneTrollLogic Then, it'll be safe.]]

-->'''Krusty''': I can't program my VCR, I can't open a bag of airline peanuts, I'm a freaking ''[[TooIncompetentToOperateABlanket moron]]!''

-->'''Krusty''': I can't program my VCR, I can't open a bag of airline peanuts, I'm a freaking ''[[TooIncompetentToOperateABlanket moron!''

-->'''Krusty''': I can't program my VCR, I can't open a bag of airline peanuts, I'm a freaking ''moron!''

Another form is BottomOfTheBarrelJoke, when the comedian uses a raunchy or off-color remark as low-effort "humor." There's also StockJokes, for all the specific jokes and punch lines we've all heard a million times.

* Creationist museums or creationism in general is like ''WesternAnimaton/TheFlintstones''.

** "Tip your waitress\servers." "Try the veal."

** Airline food is starting to become more of a rarity in real life and while most airlines still serve drinks or a a small snack like peanuts or pretzels, they usually don't serve actual meals anymore (some do but not for free or only for first class passengers). Ten years from now some younger audiences will hear this shtick and ask [[WhatAreRecords "What is airline food?"]]
*** YMMV on that one. While this describes [[WeAllLiveInAmerica intra-U.S. flights]] accurately, it's still a big spectrum with lots of variance. One surprising airline on the opposite extreme of that spectrum is El-Al: It installs expensive missile defense systems [[TheresNoKillLikeOverkill on board all of its planes]], [[CrazyPrepared something no other airline does]], and yet, it still has enough spare money to offer free hot meals for ''all'' passengers on ''all'' flights. Given the average Israeli's tastes and El-Al's relatively palatial fleet choices[[note]]On a Tel Aviv to Paris flight, for example, Air France will only offer your typical intra-European fare - Narrow-Body A320, Overhead TV, Business Class is little more than Economy with prioritized service and a table replacing the middle seat. El Al, however, handles the Paris route with their long-haul 777s (plus the occassional 747 or 787) - the same 777s they use for Trans-Atlantic flights - half the time, and even the 737s and 767s they use the other half have an actual buisness class.[[/note]], that's not gonna change soon.

** In [[Series/{{Seinfeld}} the show proper]] itself, there is no mention of airline food, especially in the episode "The Deal". The closest reference to the shtick is in the season 8 episode "The Summer of George", when George has to choose to between frolf (a portmanteau of frisbee and golf), and Jerry, where George imagines him saying "What's the deal with airplane peanuts?"

*** YMMV on that one. While this describes [[WeAllLiveInAmerica intra-U.S. flights]] accurately, it's still a big spectrum with lots of variance. One surprising airline on the opposite extreme of that spectrum is El-Al: It installs expensive missile defense systems [[TheresNoKillLikeOverkill on board all of its planes]], [[CrazyPrepared something no other airline does]], and yet, it still has enough spare money to offer free hot meals for ''all'' passengers on ''all'' flights. Given the average Israeli's tastes and El-Al's relatively palatial fleet choices[[note]]On a Tel Aviv to Paris flight, for example, Air France will only offer your typical intra-European fare - Narrow-Body A320, Overhead TV, Buisness Class is little more than Economy with prioritized service and a table replacing the middle seat. El Al, however, handles the Paris route with their long-haul 777s (plus the occassional 747 or 787) - the same 777s they use for Trans-Atlantic flights - half the time, and even the 737s and 767s they use the other half have an actual buisness class.[[/note]], that's not gonna change soon.

* Due to his global fame and overexposed private life of Music/MichaelJackson was also a popular and easy topic for comedians from the 1980s on until the late 2000s. Many jokes would revolve around his face lifts, childlike behaviour or supposed paedophilia. After his death this shtick has more or less disappeared.