Basic Trope: An archaeologist goes on globe-trotting adventures, essentially using their profession as an Excuse Plot.
- Straight: Dr. Bob often goes on adventures in exotic locations and ancient catacombs in search of rare treasures while avoiding bad guys who are after the same items. Sometimes, he is shown giving lectures and doing museum work.
- Exaggerated: Dr. Bob defends the galaxy from invading aliens, often spending days, if not, weeks on other worlds. His profession rarely comes up.
- Downplayed: Dr. Bob spends a great deal of time at the university. If he gets involved in any adventures, they happen at the excavation sites where he is working.
- Justified:
- Bob is part of the Masquerade which secretly protects rare, mystical artifacts from evil oculists. Archeology is just a front.
- Bob's story takes place in 1920s, when this was common in real life.
- Bob is at an excavation site that's genuinely difficult or dangerous. He'd be dead if he couldn't handle himself in a fight or disaster.
- Bob uncovered an Artifact of Power (especially an Artifact of Hope) at an excavation site, and now the bad guys want to get it, essentially forcing Bob to become an Adventurer as well as an Archaeologist.
- Inverted:
- Officer Bob ignores crime-fighting in order to study archeology.
- The archeology shown on-screen is even more boring than normal archeology.
- Subverted:
- Dr. Bob tries his best to do his job and tries not to go on treasure-hunting adventures.
- Dr. Bob is an archaeologist who gets dragged into an adventure, but it turns out said adventure has absolutely nothing to do with archaeology.
- Double Subverted: But when one of his students goes on an adventure to recover a lost treasure from Somali pirates, Bob has no choice but to follow along to protect him.
- Parodied:
- Dr. Bob is Archeology Man, a costumed superhero who fights crime using historical facts.
- Raiding a Temple of Doom is a requirement for obtaining a master's degree in Archaeology.
- Dr. Bob does everything a normal archaeologist would do, except while riding a bicycle through flaming hoops.
- Zig Zagged: Dr. Bob is an adventurer who loves history but finds office working to be boring. When his superiors put pressure on him, he comes back to work but soon quits it altogether to become a fulltime adventurer. He makes a living by stealing the treasures he finds.
- Averted: Dr. Bob is just an archaeologists who does everything any other archaeologist does and hardly leaves his hometown.
- Enforced: The writers want a reason to send Bob to exciting locations and uncover ancient, mystical relics. Archeology seemed like an appropriate excuse.
- Lampshaded: "Who knew that a career in archeology would be so dangerous."
- Invoked: Dr. Bob is an adventure seeker and got into archeology as an excuse to go to dangerous locations around the world for the sheer thrill of it.
- Exploited: Dr. Bob is manipulated by an Ancient Conspiracy into uncovering lost relics they need to unleash an Eldritch Abomination.
- Defied: Dr. Bob has the opportunity to go on adventures but refuses, preferring to stay at the university and teach.
- Discussed: "Where's Dr. Bob? I bet he's on another one of his adventures, isn't he?"
- Conversed: "This show is great but you have to wonder how Bob manages to stay employed when he is getting into trouble halfway across the globe every week."
- Implied:
- All of Bob's archeological discoveries were scheduled in some of unstable regions.
- "My grandfather was an archaeologist. Never saw the inside of a museum, though. Too busy traveling the world and trying not to get killed."
- Deconstructed:
- Dr. Bob goes on adventures and never attends his own lectures. This gets him in trouble with the Board of Education who fire him.
- Dr. Bob tries his damnedest to balance his dangerous and mundane duties at the cost of his mental health. He was already busy before he started venturing into dangerous locales, but now the stress of his work has multiplied.
- Dr. Bob manages to successfully get the Ancient Artifact into a museum but is shunned by the scientific community who are horrified at the damage his adventure has caused to the now collapsed Temple of Doom, which would have had far more archeological and historical value than any single artifact.
- Dr. Bob is a realistic archaeologist thrust into a globe-trotting adventure. He is very much an intellectual, not an Action Hero, and it's clear he's in way over his head.
- Reconstructed:
- He is rehired, however, when his adventures begin to uncover huge findings in archaeology. Because of this, he is seen as a sort of Bunny-Ears Lawyer.
- Dr. Bob has a specialist role; most sites are off-limits for him. But when a legitimately dangerous archaeological site is found, he's the first guy they ask for.
- The story does not gloss over the "boring" parts of Dr. Bob's work.
- Dr. Bob settles into the role of The Smart Guy on the globe-trotting adventure. He may not be able to outfight bad guys, but he has teammates for that, and his knowledge of ancient civilizations still helps find the lost treasure in the end.
- Played For Laughs:
- While Bob is off fighting bad guys in another country, a Running Gag involves his students patiently waiting for his lecture to start, spending an entire month in an empty lecture hall.
- Bob is an adventurer archaeologist... with the attitude of a modern archeologist. He collapses into a weeping ball when the local temple of doom implodes itself, mourning the information lost.
- Played For Drama:
- Dr. Bob cares enough about preserving history that he is willing to go to dangerous locations and brave the elements/wild/locals in order to do it.
- Dr. Bob has some angst about all the history he's inadvertently disturbed while searching for the MacGuffin.
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