When a character (usually female) is captured by the
Big Bad or seen in a suspicious place by other characters. Also used as a (bad) pickup line.
The traditional wording is "What's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?"
Examples:
Film - Live Action
Film - Animation
Literature
- Inverted in the Robert A Heinlein novel The Number Of The Beast, when a dissection of a dead female alien who had been posing as a male human leads to the discovery that her legs each had two knees, one bending forward and one bending backwards. Cue the quip, "What's a nice joint like you doing in a girl like this?"
Live-Action TV
Magazines
Music
- Bob Dylan: "What's a sweetheart like you doing in a dump like this?"
- The Spanish band Burning references the line in the song "¿Qué Hace Una Chica Como Tú En Un Lugar Como Éste?"
- Frank Zappa loved this line and used it in at least five different songs.
- John Schneider's "What's A Memory Like You(Doing In A Love Like This)"
Newspaper Comics
- In a cartoon by Swedish artist Beverloo:
Girl at party: What a nice girl like me is doing at a place like this? I'm a hooker, of course!
- A Garfield comic had this exchange:
Garfield: What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?
Arlene: But this is a nice place.
Garfield: Like I said... What's a girl like YOU doing in a place like THIS?
Theatre
- There was a musical revue in the 1970s called "What's a Nice Country Like You Doing in a State Like This?"
- City of Angels:
Stone (to Bobbi): "Let me take you away from all this," is that the routine? "What's a nice kid like you, et cetera?" What is a nice kid like you, et cetera?
Video Games
- Upon linking up with the mole in Fallout's Final Dungeon:
“What's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?”
“Uh heh…
Waiting desperately for someone to use that pathetic line on me.”
- Guybrush says this to De Singe in Tales Of Monkey Island Chapter 1: Launch of the Screaming Narwhal: "So, how'd a dazzling urbanite like yourself wind up in a sleepy pirate island like Flotsam?"
Western Animation