History Series / TheUnit

The show was a mixed bag, dealing with a variety of issues involving UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror and generic soap opera stuff involving the wives, who spend most of their time together trying not to kill each other when they are not getting in and out of trouble or being dragged kicking and screaming into the cloak and dagger world of their husbands

(a beat followed inevitably by a sailor breaking pool cue over his head)

* InterserviceRivalry: Exploited by Bob in order to purposefully start a brawl with some seamen on leave.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

** "Last Nazi" The stranger calls himself "The man who knows the colour of your shootinghouse door, which there is no door" a reference to the movie ''Film/{{Ronin}}'', where the CIA agent challenges a fake claiming experience with the SAS to tell him the colour of the "boathouse door," to see if the man laughs him off or takes him seriously.

** Molly, who had a secret past which was never mentioned beyond that one episode. It does have [[FridgeBrilliance a surprisingly solid]] justification; the man who said he'd come looking for her only specifically knew her married name and that her husband was in the Army, which, as he put it, was enough information to find her. Shortly thereafter, however, the families of the Unit members are all uprooted and moved to another state under false identities; Molly's secret past would no longer have any way of finding her, since she, for all intents and purposes, doesn't exist anymore.

The show was a mixed bag, dealing with a variety of issues involving UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror and generic soap opera stuff involving the wives, who spend most of their time together trying not to kill each other when they are not getting in and out of trouble or being dragged kicking and screaming into the cloak and dagger world of their husbands.

Not to be confused with [[Series/DoctorWho UNIT]].

** Justified in that by being in the Army, the team is not legally allowed to act as law enforcement unless they get special dispensation to. A couple of times they lock horns with ICE and the FBI who are investigating the people the team are trying to infiltrate.

* CIAEvilFBIGood: The FBI are generally honest hard workers trying to protect the people. The UsefulNotes/{{CIA}}, which features a lot more prominently given the 303rd's counterterrorism missions, zigzags. The case workers and other field operatives are basically good, if very results-oriented, while the people in Washington are generally {{Obstructive Bureaucrat}}s.
** [[spoiler: Beyond the bureaucrats, there are of course some CIA agents who are part of season 2's coalition of mostly unnamed bad guys. 'Certain elements' are alluded to that were part of the plot to have the unit disbanded and charged with treason. It's not specifically stated who is running the scheme, and it's probably the NSA or indeed some unnamed agency, but 'certain elements' of the CIA are involved.]]

* StockFootage
* TelevisionGeography
** Goes deeper into CaliforniaDoubling territory in a bunch of episodes.

* WhatCouldHaveBeen: A fifth season was planned, in which the following arcs would have been introduced.
** Bob suffers a CareerEndingInjury, goes to work for the CIA and constantly has to battle the VA medical bureauccy to get continuing treatment for his injuries.
** Jonas needs Mack's help in covering up his own injury, so he can continue to operate, and not have to retire.
** TheBrigadier Ryan is attempting to get himself demoted back to Colonel, so he can resume command of the Unit.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: The show gets away with a surprising amount of subversive ideas for something on network television instead of cable.
** Not to mention violence. The "heroes" in this show are seen doing things that even JackBauer might hesitate doing.

* HeroicBSOD: In order to play up how prestigious and difficult the Unit is to get into, one {{Ranger}} recounts the story of another, one of their best, who attended Selection, washed out, and was "never the same".

The series revolves around the missions of an elite special forces team, the 1st Special Actions Group under their cover as the 303rd Logistical Studies Division, which carries out ultra-top secret black ops missions for the US Government. The show attempts to be both a family drama and a male-centric show about war via the split focus upon the men in the "Unit" and their wives, of various different clashing personalities, who are forced to co-exist and pretty much lie to everyone around them about their husbands do for a living, due to the classified nature of the group. A lot of the practices and terminology used in the show come from ''Inside Delta Force'', the memoirs of Command Sergeant Major Eric Haney, one of the unit's founding members. For all intents and purposes, the 303rd '''is''' Delta Force, with the serial numbers filed off.

* TheWarOnTerror

The show was a mixed bag, dealing with a variety of issues involving the TheWarOnTerror and generic soap opera stuff involving the wives, who spend most of their time together trying not to kill each other when they are not getting in and out of trouble or being dragged kicking and screaming into the cloak and dagger world of their husbands.

* Jonas needs Mack's help in covering up his own injury, so he can continue to operate, and not have to retire.
* TheBrigadier Ryan is attempting to get himself demoted back to Colonel, so he can resume command of the Unit.

* Main/ComfortingTheWidow: Played with.