History Recap / TalesFromTheCryptS3E12Deadline

-> ''(the interior of the Crypt is designed as a bar; a skeletal waitress holding a tray walks past)''\\
'''Crypt Keeper:''' ''(tending a bar packed with skeletal customers)'' So, what'll it be, stranger? Can I interest you in a mai-''die''? Or would you prefer a rum and ''choke''? Or maybe you'd like something a little stronger. I've got just the thing. It's a nasty little ''snootfull'' about a newshound named Charlie, who needs a murder story and a drink. But not necessarily in that order. Ah, what some people won't do for a good ''stiff'' one. I call this little eye-opener: '''Deadline.'''

Charlie [=McKenzie=] was a freelance news reporter who, once upon a time, would do anything to get a story. Nowadays, his career and his life have very nearly been ruined after many years of severe alcoholism. While gulping down his woes at his local watering hole, he meets Vicki, an attractive blonde who accompanies him to his apartment for a one-night-stand. Charlie soon grows enamored with Vicki, his attraction to the girl making him feel like he's 25 again, and he even considers getting his old job back and putting the pieces of his life back together, just for her. Unfortunately, everyone from Charlie's sister Mildred to his old contacts are skeptical about his claims to give up drinking, and his former boss Phil Stone reluctantly gives him a chance to get back to work on the condition that he successfully brings in a scoop on a murder. As the clock ticks and people keep hanging up on him, Charlie becomes increasingly desperate for his story, that is, until Nikos Stavo, the owner of a Greek diner he's having coffee in, gets into a fight with his wife in the kitchen, and apparently kills her in a fit of anger. Just as Charlie finally has his scoop, his life is turned upside down when he finds out who the unlucky victim is.

!Tropes:
* AbhorrentAdmirer: Charlie has a serious case of unrequited love for Vicki, so much so that he aims to turn his life around just for her.
* TheAlcoholic: Charlie, whose drinking problem has ruined his life and his career. It's so bad that his friend Mike, a ''bartender'', advises him to cut back on the sauce.
* AllForNothing: After everything Charlie does for Vicki, turning his life around and getting on the wagon, he finds out that she had no real affection for him and was only using him to humiliate her husband. This makes Charlie snap and strangle her himself.
* AllLoveIsUnrequited: Despite his growing feelings for Vicki, Vicki herself repeatedly tells Charlie that she's had many boyfriends in the past and only wants quick sex from him, not a long-lasting relationship.
* AwfulWeddedLife: Nikos and Vicki's marriage is ''not'' happy. Nikos tells Charlie after he supposedly kills Vicki that she's been having sex with random winos she meets in bars just to humiliate him.

* BattleDiscretionShot: Vicki and Nikos' fight in the kitchen is presented as Charlie listening in on the struggle and slowly making his way to the kitchen.
* BittersweetEnding: Vicki receives LaserGuidedKarma for her horrid treatment of her husband, and Nikos is free of having a whore for a wife, but while Charlie does get his murder story to the news company, he throws away his entire life and gets thrown in the nuthouse to do so.
* BreakingTheFourthWall: Charlie spends the episode talking to the viewers about himself and his problems. The end of the episode implies, since he's locked in an asylum, he's been talking to open space the whole time after losing his mind.
* CoolAndUnusualPunishment: Charlie says that once his time in the asylum is over, he's apparently been sentenced to write a book about his double life as a reporter and a criminal.
* DespairEventHorizon: Once Charlie discovers the truth about Vicki, he instantly loses all faith in himself. He strangles her to death, calls his boss to report his crime, and relapses on alcohol as he makes the call, deciding that nothing matters anymore.
* EveryoneHasStandards: Mike, a bartender who makes a living by selling booze to customers, can't stand to watch Charlie (his friend and one of his best customers) destroy himself and cuts him off for his own good.
* ExactWords: Charlie repeatedly says that he'll do ''anything'' to get a story. Including making the story's elements happen himself.
* {{Foil}}: Charlie is one to Dale Sweeney, the ImmoralJournalist from [[Recap/TalesFromTheCryptS3E10MourninMess two episodes ago.]] While both of them are boozing newsmen who live pretty crappy lives, Charlie has a lot more decency and morality in his heart, not resorting to underhanded means to get his stories (at first). Their roles in their love lives are also reversed, with Dale kicking one night stands out of his place, and Charlie becoming obsessed with the woman who only wants one night stands with him.
* {{Foreshadowing}}: Vicki tells Charlie early in the episode that she doesn't want anything permanent with him, having had a lot of boyfriends and saying that long-term romances don't work for her. Towards the end, we learn from Nikos, her husband, that she's been going to several bars and having sex with the wino patrons just to humiliate the poor guy.
** Her voice can also be heard in the diner's kitchen as she and Nikos argue, further proving her relation to him.
* ForWantOfANail: Had Mike not directed Charlie to Nikos', Charlie wouldn't have found out Vicki's true self/motives.
* FourthWallPsych: The end of the episode reveals that Charlie's been narrating not just to the viewers, but the empty space in the asylum where he was locked up.
* FramingDevice: Charlie sitting in a dark room telling his story to the audience. The ending reveals the room to be a cell in the asylum where he's been locked up.
* GreasySpoon: Nikos' Grill, where owner Nikos attacks Vicki and allows for Charlie to overhear, potentially giving him his murder story.
* HowWeGotHere: The end of the episode reveals that it was a retelling of how Charlie got himself committed into an asylum for his murder of Vicki.
* ImmoralJournalist: Downplayed. Charlie's a genuinely good guy who suffers from a drinking problem that's ruined his life. He genuinely wants his old job back and decides to do so for Vicki's sake. The worst thing he does is strangle Vicki after he finds out the truth about her, doing so in a mix of sorrow and insanity.
* INeedAFreakingDrink: As Charlie's deadline ticks away and each of his old contacts say they can't help him get a murder story, he struggles to remain sober and gains extensive cravings for a drink. Even his closing line of the episode is him saying that he needs a drink right about now.
* ItAmusedMe: Vicki's revealed to be a two-timing whore who has been bar-hopping and having sex with one wino after another just to watch her husband squirm.
* {{Jerkass}}: Vicki, the woman who Charlie vows to reinvent himself for, is revealed to be the two-timing wife of a man she routinely taunts, laughs at, and humiliates, primarily making him squirm by picking up and having sex with drunken winos.
* KarmaHoudini: Even if he isn't the one who actually killed Vicki, Nikos doesn't get punished for his fight with her in the cafe's kitchen.
* KavorkaMan: Charlie admits that in spite of his rampant drinking, he's never had any problems getting a woman. He admits he's been with a bunch of hookers, had a few girlfriends, and was even married a couple of times. Overtime however, he says that they all drifted away, so women didn't seem as important to him as his job. That changes when he meets Vicki, who he says makes him feel "special".
* LaserGuidedKarma: For screwing around with dozens of bums, winos, and drunkards to humiliate her husband, Vicki is strangled by the latest wino she picks up.
* LoserProtagonist: Charlie, once a well known reporter who rubbed elbows with mayors, senators, and sports stars, is now a bum whose alcoholism has visibly ruined his life. Half of the characters, including his ''sister'', treat him as a drunken deadbeat and refuse to stick their necks out for him anymore. When he falls in love and vows to get his life back in order just for the "lucky" woman, he finds out that she's an adulterous wife who was solely using him to humiliate her husband. He snaps, strangles the woman to death, and blabs about what he did to the newspaper company, putting himself in an asylum.
* MistakenForProstitute: When Charlie and Vicki first meet, the former assumes she's a prostitute, given how she's hanging around a sleazy, skid row bar in a revealing outfit. It's later revealed that she is indeed a whore (though not officially employed, since these are her husband's words) who has been going from bar to bar to have sex with the drunken bums therein solely to humiliate her restaurant owner husband.
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: Nikos is left horribly distraught after he thinks he strangled Vicki, even though she was humiliating him by sleeping with random winos.
* NiceGuy: Mike the bartender, who considers Charlie to be not just one of his best customers, but also his friend. He tries to help Charlie get over his drinking problem by giving him coffee, advising him to clean himself up, restricts his access to the booze supply, and announces to the whole bar that Charlie's going on the wagon, whereupon all the other customers applaud him.
* NoirEpisode: Considering the protagonist is a newspaper journalist who has a fling with an attractive blonde, and tries to search for a good murder story to write about, you can bet that shades of the trope are in this episode.
* NotQuiteDead: Charlie discovers Vicki, revealed to be Nikos' unfaithful wife, unconscious on the diner's kitchen floor. When she stirs awake and she recognizes him, Charlie finishes her off himself, having been broken by this reveal.
* ObliviousToHints: Charlie just doesn't seem to get the hint that Vicki doesn't want a genuine romance with him, just a few cheap romps in the sack.
* ProsceniumReveal: The episode begins with Charlie sitting in a room and narrating the episode to the audience. The end of the episode reveals he's stuck in a straitjacket and locked in an asylum after going nuts and murdering Vicki.
* RaceAgainstTheClock: Charlie is left under a strict deadline to get his murder scoop, and the stress nearly makes him relapse.
* RecoveredAddict: Charlie vows to get on the wagon for Vicki, but he spends a good amount of time fighting the urge for a stiff one.
* SanitySlippage: Charlie finds out that Vicki is Nikos' tramp of a wife, and Charlie was just another in a long line of random men she's been sleeping with just to humiliate Nikos. The revelation utterly ''destroys'' Charlie, so he finishes her off himself and reports his own murder to his boss, which ends up with him getting committed.
* SelfFulfillingProphecy: Charlie, after fruitlessly searching for a murder story, ultimately commits the very murder he was hoping to write about.
* SiblingRivalry: Charlie's sister Mildred has grown to resent her brother, since he only comes to visit her when he needs money. Money from her disability pension that he mostly spends on booze.
* SpannerInTheWorks: Mike is the one who sends Charlie over to Nikos' Grill, where he hears the fight that ultimately triggers the climactic twist.

* YouHaveToBelieveMe: Charlie telling Phil and Mildred about how he plans to get sober is treated as him CryingWolf, given how he's made the same empty promise many times before.

->'''Crypt Keeper:''' ''(fills up a glass of beer)'' Poor Charlie. I bet he wishes that he'd killed the story instead. ''(cackles and slides the glass down the counter, where it shatters)'' Perhaps now they'll let him write for the paper's ''horror''-scope column. Care for another drink? ''(pulls out a half full glass of beer and a shrunken head)'' Or should I just put a ''head'' on this one? ''(dumps the head into the glass; he cackles)''

* CaptainObviousReveal: Nikos' wife, who has been getting into flings with drunken bums in bars just to humiliate him? Vicki, the blunt and careless woman who Charlie's been obsessing over all episode. It was left completely obvious as to how she told Charlie she didn't want anything long-term relationship wise.

Charlie [=McKenzie=] was a freelance news reporter who, once upon a time, would do anything to get a story. Nowadays, his career and his life have very nearly been ruined after many years of severe alcoholism. While gulping down his woes at his local watering hole, he meets Vicki, an attractive blonde who accompanies him to his apartment for a one-night-stand. Charlie soon grows enamored with Vicki, his attraction to the girl making him feel like he’s 25 again, and he even considers getting his old job back and putting the pieces of his life back together, just for her. Unfortunately, everyone from Charlie's sister Mildred to his old contacts are skeptical about his claims to give up drinking, and his former boss Phil Stone reluctantly gives him a chance to get back to work on the condition that he successfully brings in a scoop on a murder. As the clock ticks and people keep hanging up on him, Charlie becomes increasingly desperate for his story, that is, until Nikos Stavo, the owner of a Greek diner he's having coffee in, gets into a fight with the wife in the kitchen, and apparently kills her in a fit of anger. Just as Charlie finally has his scoop, his life is turned upside down when he finds out who the unlucky victim is.

-> ''(the interior of the Crypt is designed as a bar; a skeletal waitress holding a tray walks past)''
->'''Crypt Keeper:''' ''(tending a bar packed with skeletal customers)'' So, what'll it be, stranger? Can I interest you in a mai-''die''? Or would you prefer a rum and ''choke''? Or maybe you'd like something a little stronger. I've got just the thing. It's a nasty little ''snootfull'' about a newshound named Charlie, who needs a murder story and a drink. But not necessarily in that order. Ah, what some people won't do for a good ''stiff'' one. I call this little eye-opener: '''Deadline.'''

* TheAlcoholic: ''Charlie'', whose drinking problem has ruined his life and his career. It's so bad that his friend Mike, a ''bartender'', advises him to cut back on the sauce.

* KarmaHoudini: Even though he isn't the one who actually killed Vicki, Nikos doesn't get punished for his fight with her in the cafe's kitchen.

* TheWoobie: Nikos Stavo, owner of the diner where Charlie finally appears to get his story. He reveals that Vicki is his unfaithful slut of a wife, who has been going around and having sex with pathetic winos just to humiliate him. He's even in tears when he explains everything to Charlie, a clear sign of the heartbreak this woman put him through.

* {{Jerkass}}: Vicki, the woman who Charlie vows to reinvent himself for, is revealed to be the two-timing wife of a man she routinely taunts, laughs at, and humiliates him, primarily making him squirm by picking up and having sex with drunken winos.

* ImmoralJournalist: Charlie's a genuinely good guy who suffers from a drinking problem that's ruined his life. He genuinely wants his old job back and decides to do so for Vicki's sake. The worst thing he does is strangle Vicki after he finds out the truth about her, doing so in a mix of sorrow and insanity.

* GreasySpoon: Nikos' Grill, where owner Nikos he attacks Vicki and allows for Charlie to overhear, potentially giving him his murder story.

* {{Foreshadowing}}: Vicki tells Charlie early in the episode that she doesn't want anything permanent with him, having had a lot of boyfriends and saying that long-term romances don't work for her. Towards the end, we learn from Nikos, her husband, that she's been going to several bars and having sex with the wino patrons just to humiliate the the poor guy.

* BattleDiscretionShot: Vicki and Nikos' fight in the kitchen is presented as Charlie listening on the struggle and slowly making his way to the kitchen.