History Series / WhatWouldYouDo

* MamaBear: If the set-up involves a child in danger or distress, ''many'' female bystanders display a fierce maternal instinct. A great example is Renee Wood, one of the women in the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nj9t1bzAWY&NR=1&feature=endscreen polygamist child bride scenario]], who swats the other actors aside and pulls the crying "victim" to safety.

*** This very example is used to prop up deconstructions of AbuseIsOkayWhenItIsFemaleOnMale. The man just had to yell at the woman to elicit response. After the GenderFlip, however, most passersby chuckled and assumed he had it coming. The woman ended up ''beating the man over the head with a newspaper'', and even ''then'' the only people who did anything were a group of female joggers, who gave the woman a warning and secretly hung back to see if she followed. When she started hitting him again, they called the cops. Disturbingly, another woman called the abusive actress a [[DoubleStandard "role model" for women.]] And one of the men who ignored it was an off-duty cop.

** One scenario has a family discussing this at a restaurant. In another, a teenage girl approaches patrons at a drugstore to ask if they'll buy her some Plan B, because she's too shy and/or embarrassed to do it herself.

* [[HasTwoMommies Has Two Mommies / Daddies]]: One segment had a patron at a restaurant react negatively to a gay couple eating there with their children. It was repeated on the [[UsefulNotes/DFWMetroplex Dallas]] roadtrip episode, with the waiter throwing them out, which is legal in Texas.

* InspirationallyDisadvantaged: Subverted, and then some, by a scenario on [[FourthWallMailSlot the episode based on viewer ideas]]. A wheelchair-bound woman, who sent the idea in, played herself in a Nyack, NY, supermarket. An actress approached her and gushingly lampshaded the trope, then went on to patronizingly do things for her that she was clearly capable of doing for herself, even wheeling her around at one point. All were things the woman said had happened to her. Most of the passersby reacted by telling the actress to calm down and back off.

** This got lampshaded in one of the tensest segments on the show. They went to South Padre Island, TX, for spring break and had two of their younger actresses [[PlayingDrunk get fake-drunk]] and then give the marks a chance to [[DateRapeAverted avert a potential date rape]]. In one, after they'd made the girls look a little skankier, some guy sidled right up next to them at the bar and began trying to pick them up ... before the actor who was supposed to do that could start doing it. They told the girls to just play it the way they were supposed to, then quickly shifted and told the actor to become the guy looking out for the girls, i.e. what one of the marks usually do.

* CoolOldLady: Oh, so many of them and in all kinds of situations. [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YmaHSxxAY4 One example:]] "Why don't you just shove the stuff up your [[SoundEffectBleep *bleep*]] and get out?!"

* PantyThief: They set this one up in a laundromat, and had a male actor take panties from a WWYD actress' dryer, and it ''seriously pissed off'' several laundromat patrons.

* WeightWoe: Many episodes and scenarios deal with [[YouAreFat bullying toward the obese.]]

* YouLookFamiliar: They tend to reuse several of their actors.
** An actress named Traci Hovel, who appears in several roles that require a woman in her thirties (her roles have ranged from beleaguered waitress to supermarket con artist to lazy EMT). Sharp-eyed viewers might also notice that Traci occasionally gets DemotedToExtra whenever WWYD runs scenarios in restaurants or stores, and in those cases she usually takes on the minor role of clerk or waitress (or even fellow patron) just in case a customer needs someone to vent to, and from the looks of things, the poor woman actually works the job itself for the day.
** An actor named Jeremy Holm, who like Traci participates in a wide range of scenarios, and frequently takes on a waiter role. Quiñones mentioned in one narration that Jeremy works as a waiter in RealLife whenever he doesn't have an acting job.

* BothSidesHaveAPoint: Very unusual for this show, as most scenarios are set up with a clearly defined morality problem. But sometimes the show will not take a side.

* {{Catchphrase}}: "Why--" (or "Why not") "--get involved?"

* ComingOutStory: This is a scenario that WWYD explores quite often, since it's a current hot-button issue in the USA, and WWYD typically uses it whenever they visit other cities. They also mix it up a bit: usually they play it with a child coming out to a parent, but they've also done it with a parent coming out to a child, a wife/fiancée/girlfriend coming out to her husband/fiancé/boyfriend, or vice versa. Usually it's played with the recepient of the WordOfGay freaking out, in order to elicit reactions from people.

* CoolOldLady: Oh, so many of them, in all kinds of situations. [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YmaHSxxAY4 Best example:]] "Why don't you just shove the stuff up your [[SoundEffectBleep *bleep*]] and get out?!"

* DateRapeAverted: Very often, people don't let the drugged/drunk/intoxicated girl walk away with the obviously less-than-unsavory fellow who has made it apparent that he's got one thing on his mind.

* DeliberatelyCuteChild: Two segments had a young boy and girl sell hideously overpriced lemonade (in New Jersey) and sweet tea (in Texas). A large cup with a straw, napkin, and umbrella was ''30 dollars''. Thankfully even ChildrenAreInnocent was averted, with most of the marks calling the kids out on how unfair the pricing was and when the girl actor tried to use a "times are tough" excuse the mark called her out. The pair did manage to make 59 dollars (It was all given back). She even made twenty due to how sweet she was being.

* HypocriticalHumor: The show's most popular segment (based on a viewer poll and ensuing special) had [[GirlPosse a group of girls]] bullying another one in a park near a busy walkway. Almost every woman who passed by chose to intervene ... and often made disparaging remarks about the girls doing the bullying that were as bad or worse than the girls had, sometimes using profanity (which the producers had told the actresses not to do so as not to allow that as an excuse for intervening).

* LampshadeHanging: Hilariously, more and more marks are beginning to mention that the scenarios feel like that TV show called ''What Would You Do?''

* PantyThief: They set this one up in a laundromat, and had a male actor take panties from a WWYD actress' dryer. And it ''seriously pissed off'' several laundromat patrons.

* WeightWoe[=/=]YouAreFat: Many episodes and scenarios deal with bullying toward the obese.

** Notably an actress named Traci Hovel, who appears in several roles that require a woman in her thirties (her roles have ranged from beleaguered waitress to supermarket con artist to lazy EMT). Sharp-eyed viewers might also notice that Traci occasionally gets DemotedToExtra whenever WWYD runs scenarios in restaurants or stores, and in those cases she usually takes on the minor role of clerk or waitress (or even fellow patron) just in case a customer needs someone to vent to. And from the looks of things, the poor woman actually works the job itself for the day.
** Ditto for an actor named Jeremy Holm, who like Traci participates in a wide range of scenarios, and frequently takes on a waiter role. Quiñones mentioned in one narration that Jeremy works as a waiter in RealLife whenever he doesn't have an acting job.

* BothSidesHaveAPoint: Very unusual for this show, as most scenarios are set up with a clearly defined morality problem, but occasionally WWYD wouldn't explicitly side with either party. But it does happen from time to time.

* {{Eagleland}}: For one scenario, they placed a Type 2 couple in France to test the [[FrenchJerk snooty French stereotype]]. Aside from some eyerolls and ugly American comments, no French people spoke up--instead, it was [[StopBeingStereotypical another American tourist that called them out]]. Some of the French people found them funny as opposed to obnoxious.

* EnforcedMethodActing: Sometimes, an actor playing in a scenario will be profoundly moved by people getting involved, and will have a cry while still in character. One notable incident was when a waiter berated a [[HasTwoMommies lesbian couple]] in front of their children and a fellow restaurant patron later approached the couple with a lengthy handwritten letter. One of the actresses was herself a lesbian parent.
* EverythingIsBigInTexas: The show had one episode in which they took a bunch of previous scenarios and watched how they played out in the [[UsefulNotes/DFWMetroplex Dallas area]] to see if they would turn out differently from in the North. The IdiosyncraticWipes of some episodes invoke Texas stereotypes, including cattle brands, star-shaped tin sheriff badges, cowboy boots, and Western-style fonts. A few [[TheMark mark]] reactions had conservative and faith-based bents, and nearly all reactions followed the "be good to others" {{Aesop}} that WWYD enjoys showcasing.
** One scenario was a waitress berating gay parents in a restaurant. There were some people had the conservative and faith-based bents but the show noted that more Texans spoke out against the waitress berating gay parents than people did in the North. One guy even invoked and paraphrased Jesus to the waitress, telling her, "Don't judge."

* FridayNightDeathSlot: As of this writing (May 2014) it sits at 8:00 on Friday, although it seems to be doing pretty good for the time being.

* HeyItsThatPlace: Watch the show long enough and you'll notice that they repeatedly use a few of the same neighborhoods and businesses in the Connecticut/New York/New Jersey area. So far, no [[TheMark marks]] have noticed, but one wonders when they're going to ''start''.

* InspirationallyDisadvantaged: Subverted, and then some, by a scenario on [[FourthWallMailSlot the episode based on viewer ideas]]. A wheelchair-bound woman, who had sent the idea in, played herself in a Nyack, NY, supermarket as an actress not only went up to her and gushingly lampshaded the trope, she went on to patronizingly do things for her that she was clearly capable of doing for herself, even wheeling her around at one point. All were things the woman said had happened to her. Most of the passersby reacted by telling the actress to calm down and back off.
* InsultComic: One scenario had a actual comic make repeated jokes at the expense of a man with a younger Asian wife (actors) in a Manhattan comedy club in front of an audience mostly composed of tourists to see whether anyone would react. Some did, mostly in disgust; however one young group, mostly black or Hispanic, found it hysterically funny and were unapologetic about it, beyond not giving their names and letting the show blur their faces.

** For some scenarios, it's the marks with the rude/offensive actions.

* MeanCharacterNiceActor: During the reveal, it's not uncommon to see the Mark be a little unnerved while shaking hands with the friendly actor who was a complete Jerkass just minutes ago.

* RealitySubtext: Some of the actors and actresses talk to Quiñones about how they've dealt with the scenario themselves in RealLife.

* BothSidesHaveAPoint: Very unusual for this show, as most scenarios are set up with a clearly defined morality problem but occasionally WWYD wouldn't explicitly side with either party.
** One scenario focused on a [[TeenPregnancy pregnant teenager's]] decision to keep her child, and the adoptive parents-to-be who became distraught over the girl's decision.

%%* IncrediblyLamePun:

* PantyThief: They set this one up in a laundromat, and had a male actor take panties from a WWYD actress' dryer. It ''seriously pissed off'' several laundromat patrons.

* RaceLift: Zig-zagged.

** Another variant is to make the person/group look poorer or richer than they had in a previous runthrough. It sometimes makes a difference—passersby on a street in affluent Westchester County, NY, were critical and unforgiving of a woman who threw her squabbling children out of the car and left them behind when she smoked, wore drab, older clothes and drove a slightly beat up car; but when she and the kids were dressed stylishly and she drove a pricey SUV, no one seemed to care. On the other hand, people were more critical of someone who took money from a homeless person's plate to pay for a cup of coffee when they were dressed in nice suits and got out of a limo.
* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: The marks who get involved often deliver one.

* RefugeInAudacity: At one point during the BrattyHalfPint scenario listed above, they had the actress playing their mother get up and leave the kids to take a phone call. One of the marks later said it was ''too'' ridiculous to believe.

* RousseauWasRight: The show likes to showcase when this trope is played straight, but it doesn't always happen that way.

* TakeThatCritics: Quiñones started an episode by playing an angry voicemail from a female viewer in Arizona [[note]]regarding a previous segment that featured racial profiling against Latinos[[/note]] , which told the reporter to "go back to Mexico." Quiñones, who is a ''seventh generation American citizen'', took the crew to a restaurant on the Arizona/Mexico border and recorded people coming to the defense of undercover actors (and an undercover Quiñones himself) being racially profiled by a Caucasian actor. At the end of the segment, they played back the voicemail and contrasted it with the footage of the Arizonan Good Samaritans, and the rhetoric seemed to convey a huge "screw you" to the naysayer.

** For example, they once had a domestic spat in a park.

*** After the GenderFlip, most passersby chuckled and assumed he had it coming. The woman ended up ''beating the man over the head with a newspaper'', and even ''then'' the only people who did anything were a group of female joggers, who gave the woman a warning and secretly hung back to see if she followed. When she started hitting him again, they called the cops. Another woman called the abusive actress a [[DoubleStandard "role model" for women.]] One of the men who ignored it was an off-duty cop.

* WeightWoe[=/=]YouAreFat: Many episodes deal with bullying toward the obese
* WhatYouAreInTheDark: The show will often interview various people off the street on what they would do in a certain situation, then contrast it to with what other people actually do when witnessing the situation on hidden camera.

** An actress named Traci Hovel, who appears in several roles that require a woman in her thirties (her roles have ranged from beleaguered waitress to supermarket con artist to lazy EMT). Sharp-eyed viewers might notice that she occasionally gets DemotedToExtra whenever WWYD runs scenarios in restaurants or stores, and in those cases she usually takes on the minor role of clerk or waitress (or even fellow patron) just in case a customer needs someone to vent to. From the looks of things, the poor woman works the job itself for the day.
** An actor named Jeremy Holm, who like Traci participates in a wide range of scenarios, and frequently takes on a waiter role. Quiñones mentioned in one narration that Jeremy works as a waiter in RealLife whenever he doesn't have an acting job.

** The Utah episode, where an info pop-up on the bottom of the screen points out that this is the'' '''17th time''' ''the actor playing the abusive husband/boyfriend has played a villain in such a scenario.

** One segment took a page out of ''TheDevilWearsPrada'' and featured a fashionista berating her poor assistant at a New York bistro. The fashionista got called out quite a bit for her bad behavior.

** drunk drivers

* BerserkButton: The marks tend to really hate seeing service workers getting mistreated by the actors.

* AdultFear: Quite a few of the scenarios.

* BothSidesHaveAPoint: Very unusual for this show, as most scenarios are set up with a clearly defined morality problem. However, one scenario focused on a [[TeenPregnancy pregnant teenager's]] decision to keep her child, and the adoptive parents-to-be who became distraught over the girl's decision. WWYD didn't explicitly side with either party.

* DeconstructedTrope: Sometimes WWYD will cite a popular movie or TV show's use of a certain situation, then will go on to show [[RealityEnsues how serious said situation would be in the real world]].
* DeliberatelyCuteChild: Two segments had a young boy and girl sell hideously overpriced lemonade (in New Jersey) and sweet tea (in Texas). A large cup with a straw, napkin, and umbrella was ''30 dollars''. Thankfully even ChildrenAreInnocent was subverted, with most of the marks calling the kids out on how unfair the pricing was and when the girl actor tried to use a "times are tough" excuse the mark actually called her out. The pair did manage to make 59 dollars (that was all given back). She even made twenty due to how sweet she was being.
* DistractedByTheSexy: One episode dealt with bike thefts. A Caucasian male in his twenties was stopped. An African-American male in his twenties was stopped. A buxom blonde in her twenties ''got [[AllMenArePerverts guys]] [[IHaveBoobsYouMustObey to help her]]''.
** A recent episode had a similar example. A businessman left his car, which contained an estimated $10,000 worth of goods, unlocked and unattended. A young Caucasian male got stopped a lot of the time, a young African-American male got stopped ''all'' of the time, but a pretty blonde was even able to call over guys to help her carry the expensive stuff out of the car.
* {{Eagleland}}: For one scenario, they placed a Type 2 couple in France to test the [[FrenchJerk snooty French stereotype]]. Aside from some eyerolls and ugly American comments, no French people spoke up--instead, it was [[StopBeingStereotypical another American tourist that called them out]].
** Some of the French people actually found them funny as opposed to obnoxious.

* EverythingIsBigInTexas: The show had one episode in which they took a bunch of previous scenarios (such as a waitress berating gay parents in a restaurant) and watched how they played out in the [[UsefulNotes/DFWMetroplex Dallas area]] to see if they would turn out differently from in the North. Yes, a few [[TheMark mark]] reactions had conservative and faith-based bents, and nearly all reactions followed the "be good to others" {{Aesop}} that WWYD enjoys showcasing.
** Interestingly, the show noted that more Texans spoke out against the waitress berating gay parents than people did in the North. One guy even invoked and paraphrased Jesus to the waitress, telling her, "Don't judge."
** However, the episode's IdiosyncraticWipes fully invoked Texas stereotypes, including cattle brands, star-shaped tin sheriff badges, cowboy boots, and Western-style fonts.

* FridayNightDeathSlot: That's where it sits right now, although [[SubvertedTrope it seems to be doing pretty good for the time being.]]

* GoldDigger: One episode had a twentysomething blonde girl canoodling with an elderly man in a bar. It was made quite obvious to the bar patrons that the girl was only in it for the money, and aside from a few odd stares, very few people spoke up.

* GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion: One scenario has a family discussing this at a restaurant. In another, a teenage girl approaches patrons at a drugstore to ask if they'll buy her some Plan B, because she's too shy and/or embarrassed to do it herself.

* IncrediblyLamePun: So many!
* InspirationallyDisadvantaged: Subverted, and then some, by a scenario on [[FourthWallMailSlot the episode based on viewer ideas]]. A wheelchair-bound woman, who had sent the idea in, played herself in a Nyack, NY, supermarket as an actress not only went up to her and gushingly lampshaded the trope, she went on to patronizingly do things for her that she was clearly capable of doing for herself, even wheeling her around at one point. All were things the woman said had actually happened to her. Most of the passersby reacted by telling the actress to calm down and back off.
* InsultComic: One scenario had a actual comic (can't remember who) make repeated jokes at the expense of a man with a younger Asian wife (actors, of course) in a Manhattan comedy club in front of an audience mostly composed of tourists to see whether anyone would react. Some did, mostly in disgust; however one young group, mostly black or Hispanic, found it hysterically funny and were unapologetic about it, beyond not giving their names and letting the show blur their faces.
* {{Jerkass}}: For some scenarios, the actors have to play them.

* OffTheWagon: Largely averted in a scenario where an actor went to a busy bar on Long Island, claiming to be celebrating his first year of sobriety and wanting to have just one drink. Almost everybody there pointedly refused to buy him one.

* PantyThief: They set this one up in a laundromat, and had a male actor take panties from a WWYD actress' dryer. And it ''seriously pissed off'' several laundromat patrons.

* PlayingDrunk: The actors do this with scenarios that deal with public drunkenness. And they do it ''very'' well.

* RaceLift: Zig-zagged. They'll run a scenario with a person/group of one race, then they'll run it again with a person/group of another, in order to see if reactions differ.

* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: The marks who do get involved often deliver one.
* RealityEnsues: As noted at DeconstructedTrope, above, many scenarios are taken from popular movies or TV shows, including some common tropes, and play out much differently in real life.

* RefugeInAudacity: At one point during the BrattyHalfPint scenario listed above, they had the actress playing their mother get up and leave the kids to take a phone call. One of the marks later lampshaded it, saying it was ''too'' ridiculous.

* RousseauWasRight: The show likes to showcase when this trope is played straight, but it has its share of subversions, too.
* SecretTestOfCharacter
* SpecialGuest: Dr. Mehmet Oz appeared in one episode.
** Barbara Corcoran has also appeared as herself, and a scenario in which the actors play prospective ''WhoWantsToBeAMillionaire'' contestants who openly attempt to cheat on the entrance exam, host Meredith Vieira appeared as herself.

* TakeThatCritics: Quiñones started an episode by playing an angry voicemail from a female viewer in Arizona [[note]]regarding a previous segment that featured racial profiling against Latinos[[/note]] , which told the reporter to "go back to Mexico." Quiñones, who is actually a seventh generation American citizen, took the crew to a restaurant on the Arizona/Mexico border and recorded people coming to the defense of undercover actors (and an undercover Quiñones himself) being racially profiled by a Caucasian actor. At the end of the segment, they played back the voicemail and contrasted it with the footage of the Arizonan Good Samaritans, and the rhetoric seemed to convey a huge "screw you" to the naysayer.
* TeensAreMonsters / KidsAreCruel: WWYD has had quite a few scenarios revolving around these.
* TeenPregnancy: A recurring backdrop for scenarios.

* TheUnfairSex: Happens quite a bit, especially when WWYD {{Gender Flip}}s a scenario. For example, they once had a man yelling at his girlfriend in a park, and subsequently several people called the police. When WWYD reversed it and had the girl yell at her boyfriend, most passersby chuckled and assumed he had it coming.
** This very example is used to prop up deconstructions of AbuseIsOkayWhenItIsFemaleOnMale. The man just had to yell at the woman to elicit response. After the GenderFlip, the woman ended up ''beating the man over the head with a newspaper'', and even ''then'' the only people who did anything were a group of female joggers, who gave the woman a warning and secretly hung back to see if she followed. When she started hitting him again, they called the cops.
*** Disturbingly, another woman called the abusive actress a [[DoubleStandard "role model" for women.]] One of the men who ignored it was an off-duty cop.

** Notably an actress named Traci Hovel, who appears in several roles that require an average woman in her thirties (her roles have ranged from beleaguered waitress to supermarket con artist to lazy EMT).
*** Sharp-eyed viewers might notice that Traci occasionally gets DemotedToExtra whenever WWYD runs scenarios in restaurants or stores, and in those cases she usually takes on the minor role of clerk or waitress (or even fellow patron) just in case a customer needs someone to vent to. And from the looks of things, the poor woman actually works the job itself for the day.
** Ditto for a recurring actor named Jeremy Holm, who like Traci participates in a wide range of scenarios, and frequently takes on a waiter role. Quiñones mentioned in one narration that Jeremy works as a waiter in RealLife whenever he doesn't have an acting job.

** Taken to ridiculous levels in the Utah episode, where an info pop-up on the bottom of the screen points out that this is the'' '''17th time''' ''the actor playing the abusive husband/boyfriend has played a villain in such a scenario.

*** Disturbingly, another woman called the abusive actress a [[DoubleStandard "role model" for women.]]

* EvilAlbino: Mentioned by Quiñones in the introduction to a segment dealing with two guys bullying an albino man. Albinos in ''TheDaVinciCode'' and ''TheMatrixReloaded'' were cited as examples.

* SuspiciouslySimilarSong: The intros to segments often include original music in the background meant to mimic that of a song related to the scenario. For example, the background music in a segment on a waiter serving food that fell on the floor is similar to (of all songs) Music/CeeLoGreen's "F*** You".

* {{Utah}}: One episode was set in Utah, where some scenrios were played once more.

* BadBoss: One segment took a page out of ''TheDevilWearsPrada'' and featured a fashionista berating her poor assistant at a New York bistro. The fashionista got called out quite a bit for her bad behavior.

* SpinOff: ''[[http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/abc-news-slates-new-primetime-hidden-camera-show-would-you-fall-for-that_b189166 Would You Fall For That?]]'', which will place more emphasis on the hidden camera antics than the moral of the story.

* DeliberatelyCuteChild: One segment had a young boy and girl sell hideously overpriced sweet tea (a large cup with a straw, napkin, and umbrella was ''30 dollars''). Thankfully even ChildrenAreInnocent was subverted, with most of the marks calling the kids out on how unfair the pricing was and when the girl actor tried to use a "times are tough" excuse the mark actually called her out. The pair did manage to make 59 dollars (that was all given back). She even made twenty due to how sweet she was being.