Sleuth 101 was an Australian mystery game show which aired on the ABC for one series of eight episodes in 2010. Hosted by Cal Wilson, each episode revolved around a murder mystery that must be investigated by a celebrity guest detective, usually a comedian, with varying degrees of success.
Sleuth 101 provides examples of:
- Added Alliterative Appeal: In "Late and Live":Cal: Was it the velvet-voiced veteran who turned vicious villain, or did the needy, nerdy Nigel noose the neck of the nubile newsreader? Did the producer reduce her to death, or did Judy the dubious jester jealously rid her of breath?
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: In "Inside Chef", one of the suspects is underworld hitman and caterer Harry "The Hatchet" Donelli, currently serving 25 years for murder, grievous bodily harm and aggravated assault with a zucchini.
- Asshole Victim: Nearly all of the victims to some extent. Kyle Bowman in "Murder in A Sharp" especially stands out: he was cheating on his wife Abby with Lily Allen (and had cheated on two previous wives with his PA before going on to marry them as well), and he was going to screw over his longtime bandmate Barry. However, the death itself turns out to have been an accident, resulting from his bodyguard pushing him over during a relatively minor argument. Subverted in "Still Life", in which the victim is initially identified as a notorious con-artist with the blood of the son of two of the suspects on her hands, but she turns out to be the victim of a Kill and Replace by the actual con-artist.
- Bait-and-Switch Comparison: In "Delete Cache", when a user-created character from the MMORPG Sirius Nine makes a magazine's "Top 10 Sexiest Women in the World" list, between Megan Fox and Paris Hilton.Nazeem: I can't believe a two-dimensional character even made that list.
Gill: I can. Exotica is beautiful.
Nazeem: I was talking about Paris Hilton. - Basement-Dweller: Michelle Quinn in "Family Assorted", still living with her parents at the age of 39. To her credit, she seems to do more than her fair share of the cleaning.
- Beneath Suspicion:
- In "Murder in A Sharp", Frank Woodley fails to figure out the clues and accuses Ian the bodyguard because he's the least likely suspect. He's right.
- In "Late and Live", we see Johnny Velvet react to the sound of Rachel's death as she starts reading the midnight bulletin. He killed her 25 minutes earlier, when she was rehearsing and didn't know he was recording her.
- Blunt Metaphors Trauma: In "Performance Enhancing Death", Mick does this a lot, at one point telling Colin that he told the board, "You can take a horse to water, but you know, try taking a cow there and see what happens to the milk."
- …But He Sounds Handsome: In "Delete Cache", Gill talks up a character in Sirius Nine, Exotica, in the flashbacks, but quickly confesses to Claire that she was her player.
- Cannot Tell a Joke: Bill Quinn, the victim in "Family Assorted", messes up reading a Christmas cracker joke to the family and laughs at it even though his mangled version doesn't make sense. Specifically, he asks "What's "E.T." stand for?" instead of "What's "ET" short for?" (the answer being "Because he's got little legs.")Bill: It's funnier my way. You stand on your legs, don't you?
- Chalk Outline: Played for laughs a couple of times when Cal shows the detective around the crime scene.
- In "Family Assorted": "This is Bill's favourite chair. This is his favourite lamp. This is his favourite chalk outline."
- In "Murder in A Sharp": "This is Kyle Bowman's own recording studio. He died conveniently inside that red outline."
- Clueless Detective: Adam Richard, Julia Morris and Hamish Blake each failed to solve their cases, though in Julia's case the killer had done a lot to establish an alibi. Most of the successful detectives weren't much better, such as Dave O'Neill and Frank Woodley resorting to Metagaming. Claire Hooper perhaps subverted this the most, doing a good job of putting together the motive and the method of the murder, even picking up on some of the incidental Foreshadowing (an explanation of a Trojan virus, which was supposed to parallel how the poison was slipped to the victim.
- Conviction by Contradiction: A few of the clues in "Still Life": The killer is impersonating a former nun (who was the actual victim), but doesn't know her Bible very well. She gives "God helps those who help themselves," as a Bible quote (which the show attributes to Benjamin Franklin), and when Detective Hamish Blake asks her about her favourite commandment, she answers with The Golden Rule. She's also shown crossing herself with her left hand when the victim's body is discovered. Hamish doesn't pick up on any of this.
- Cowboy Cop: Dave O'Neill claims to be playing a violent 1970s detective, eager to brute force a confession from someone whether they did it or not.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Bridget in "A Tan to Die For", crushed in a sunbed.
- Dead Star Walking: The victims included veteran actors such as John Wood, Frankie J Holden and Mark Mitchell.
- Deadline News: Rachel Timms in "Late and Live", strangled with a microphone cable while reading the news. Or rather, while she was rehearsing, 25 minutes before she was supposed to go on air, which was recorded by the killer to give himself an alibi.
- A Deadly Affair:
- In "Delete Cache", the victim was cheating on his girlfriend with another character in Sirius Nine, apparently unaware that her player was his workmate.
- In "Inside Chef", Stacy Henshaw had cheated on her husband with Ramsay and killed him to keep it quiet.
- In "Performance Enhancing Death," Dan Kinsman was having an affair with a teammate's girlfriend. The teammate killed him.
- Subverted in "Murder in A Sharp", where Kyle Bowman's long history of infidelity has nothing to do with the murder.
- The Ditz: In "Murder in A Sharp", Barry is complaining about all the abbreviations and acronyms he doesn't understand. "And what's this one? B-A-R-R-Y?"
- Dumb and Drummer: Barry in "Murder in A Sharp", who states that he was never offended by the constant drummer jokes he heard because he never understood them.
- Glasses Pull: When Colin Lane lists the TV detectives he intends to emulate, he mentions David Caruso in CSI: Miami just because he wants to do this a lot. "I brought those glasses in specially, for that joke, and I wish I hadn't have bothered."
- Hurricane of Euphemisms: In "Delete Cache", Claire asks Torben about his comment that "Cache would be taken care of", and he admits that he was planning to fire him that week. "He was gonna be... eighty sixed. He was gonna be fired. I was gonna fire him. I was gonna let him go. I was gonna put him out to pasture. I was gonna show him the keys to the door. I was gonna give him his pink slip. I was gonna show him the exit." He interrupts Claire twice during this.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Kyle Bowman in "Murder in A Sharp", stabbed with his own ARIA award.
- Just a Stupid Accent: In "Delete Cache", Torben speaks with an unconvincing Scandinavian accent. Detective Claire Hooper sees through it and gets him to admit that he's from Broadmeadows.
- Kill and Replace: In "Still Life", Nikki Gleason killed Bea O'Malley and stole her identity in an attempt to fake her own death.
- Logic Bomb: In "Delete Cache", Torben reminds the others that the first rule of Think Tank is "No negativity." When Gill points out that that rule is negative, he makes a note to make new rules for Think Tank.
- Metaphorgotten: From Frank Woodley in "Murder in A Sharp", in his interrogation of Barry.Frank: Revenge is a meal best served hot. But after that, then there's the just desserts. I'm very very happy with that Barry. I think that was terrific. I'd feel a little bit more impressed with myself if I hadn't stolen it off the woman from Murder, She Wrote
- Narrowed It Down To The Guy I Recognise: When Dave O'Neill couldn't figure out any of the clues, he invoked this trope, assessing how famous each of the suspects' actors are before accusing Marjorie because she's played by Denise Drysdale. He's right.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed:
- The victim in "Inside Chef", Ramsay McGordon. Also Stacy Henshaw for Tracey Grimshaw
- The victim in "Performance Enhancing Death," Dan Kinsman is based on football player Ben Cousins.
- Noodle Implements: In "Performance Enhancing Death":Rebecca: I need to know how I would lodge a complaint.
Mick: If this is about that video with the inflatable woman and the pig carcass... - Obfuscating Stupidity: Frank accuses Barry of this in "Murder in A Sharp". He probably isn't.
- Obnoxious In-Laws: Pat in "A Tan to Die For", the victim's prospective mother-in-law.
- Reverse Whodunnit: Referenced by Frank Woodley, when Cal asks him if he ever guesses who the murderer is in crime shows before it's revealed. Frank replies, "Sometimes, particularly if I'm watching Columbo, because they actually show you the murder at the start."
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: Sometimes the guest detective figures it out for reasons unrelated to the actual clues.
- Self-Poisoning Gambit: The killer in "Delete Cache" pulls this, poisoning the coffee while hiding an antidote to the poison in the donuts, knowing that the victim, a vegan, would be turned off by the fact that they were cooked in animal fats.
- Stalker with a Crush: In "Late and Live", Nigel for Rachel, which leads Detective Julia Morris to accuse him of the murder. She's wrong.
- Summation Gathering: Each episode ends with one, on the same set as the crime scene.
- That Came Out Wrong:
- In "Family Assorted", Michelle explains why she was crying the night of the crime. "It's hard with Ally and Steve married and happy and... and... it's just me and the Dustbuster. (Beat) I mean, that came out wrong."
- In "Murder in A Sharp":
Cal: Will the murderer of Kyle Bowman please reveal themselves? But not in a weird way. - Trophy Violence: In "Murder in a Sharp", the Victim of the Week is Kyle Bowman; a rockstar stabbed to death with his ARIA award.
