, Enitre planets are used as rubbish tips. Recycling has disappeared in the future.

, Leader of the Galactic Federation (or Senate, or whatever), among thousands of other alien races, is always human.

, The alien race that is aeons ahead of humanity and possess amazing technology. They won't give it to us as we're not R"Eady" yet, but we keep trying to nick it from them.

, Every race in the universe are biped creatures.

, An entire world of peaceniks and pacifists who have absolutely no military or planetary defenses of any kind.

, The villain's henchmen have horrible aim, while the hero/good guys shoot better than anyone else.

, Everyone in the future is an atheist.

, Humanoid aliens never move their upper body when walking.

, No matter how many worlds the heroes visit and how many races they encounter, none of the heroes ever need to speak a different language or have difficulty understanding the aliens.

, Societies with resources and tendency for colonization, exploration and growth, who halt for no good reason. First they inhabit a new planet and then sit on their hands and farm crops for centuries. Especially if they know there are other expansionist and agressive cultures nearby. Fundamentally more stupid if their parent civilization consists of several worlds to begin with.

, The smartest and most violent person is usually an alien, but he or she or it cannot be both.

, Concrete and steel in the future has some niffy sounding prefix.

, The women in interstellar spaceship crews exist solely for the purpose of sexual gratification. The males, on the other hand, are actually necessary for the well-being of the ship.

, The words used to characterise spacecraft and especially hierarchical structure is based on naval terminology. In some cases vessels are designed resembling aircraft carriers more than, say, rocket-like shape.

, Humans of the future are astonishingly selfless. Risking their lives and their expensive, top-of-the-line spaceships to save a dying planet or a bunch of people they never met before or know little-to-nothing about is routine for them.

, Villains like to boast. They really, really like to boast.

, Women of high status see men either as sex objects or abusive, controlling obstacles to their own self-actualization.

, Characters with really light hair and skin are always evil and/or haughty.

, No matter how different other species are, humans of the future will always judge them by Earth standards (Picard yelling at some aliens). Those standards are treated as the universal ones for the whole galaxy, simply humans are right even as savage and primtive race (or because of that). Moreover those "galactic" ethical standards will be always based upon atheism and western culture. There will be no asian or african or other (alien) influences and philosophies. This set of values is the ultimate truth. Others are tolerated, but it is obvious that our human way is the best and final, there is no other higher philosophy so we don't even boder to search/invent them. Religion is always primitive and wrong, even if it is not human religion and has nothing to do with our society, values, culture, history, technology and biology. Even if it is portraited as good, it is still wrong-but what main characters believe (if it is not a religion)is never questioned, no matter how many times science have already prooved those beliefs to be false or equally flawed as religion itself. , jzs

, There is nothing cooler and more technical looking than essential switches on the ceiling of your vehicle., GC

, Handrails over any dangerous walkways are no longer required by safety codes. , GC

, Aliens speak English but can’t seem to rap their heads around sarcasm. (Currently, I can only think of “Planet 51,” But I know I’ve seen it so many times before.), MM

, Applies to series: Once stated that a character is some age (example: 21 years old) the character never hits his next birthday no mater how many hundreds of episodes there are. (This is fine if the character is an alien and counts his age based on some alien calendar that has something like 1000 days in each year. No, I’m pointing fingers at authors who make their characters conform to a 365-day-per-year calendar What’s worse is when you try to factor each adventure into a timeframe given that the character is still the age he started at when the series began, and you find that he has had 300 some adventures- some of which are supposed to have taken place over the course of several days. Even despite all this, the main character isn’t exhausted and doesn’t act like he expects and prepares for daily adventures (like keeping a packed backpack of survival gear with him at all times, or doing hourly radio check-in’s with his staff.), MM

, In the future, everyone will wear single-piece spandex suits. These suits don’t have pockets or utility belts. The people who wear these suits (including engineers and solders) are expected to carry the items they need in their hands. Gee- I sure hope that the engineer, who is working tirelessly to prevent the power core from overloading, doesn’t need much more than a hand held screwdriver., MM

, They say that you can tell what a person is like by rummaging through their stuff. Well… All crewmen, who are nonessential to the plot, have no hints of distinguishing characteristics or personal histories, unless they specifically speak about it. A peek into their closet won’t reveal anything like non-regulation clothing, or a small box of Christmas decorations, or a bookshelf with fiction novels, or posters of pretty girls tacked to the inside of the closet door. You won’t see artwork or stacks of magazines in their rooms. You most certainly won’t find an adult novel under their beds. Nonessential personnel don’t seem to have anything to do when they are off duty., MM

, Bad guys are intolerable leaders. If a battle does not go his way, the “Big Baddy” takes it out on his crew, blaming them for incompetence. Even so far as to commit a random execution of one of his staff. If luck begins to favor the bad guy, he prances around and congratulates himself on being so brilliant. Even so far as to commit a random celebratory execution of one of his staff (I’ve seen it, I’m not lying.) Why his constantly abused underlings don’t commit mutiny is beyond me., Mush

, Professionals using non-professional terms: like a psychologist using the word “crazy” to describe a patient, or a botanist using the phrase “gangly shrub.” It’s almost as if the world in which these characters live in was created by someone who never bothered to do any research on behalf of his characters. Hmmmm..., Mush

, Androids and aliens constantly commenting on the futility of human behavior. , Mush

, A glass of wine might be seen at the dinner table, but nobody seems to be an alcoholic., Mush

, Nobody seems to fear surgery, lawsuits, or bankruptcy., Mush

, People sing incoherently to themselves during the opening credits- sometimes while doing air guitar with a tennis racket. , Mush

, Any story, when boiled down to it’s elements, is: Romeo and Juliet, Dances with wolves, The Highlander, Cowboys and Indians, Pride and predigest, Cinderella, Lord of the Rings, Ernest Goes to Camp, or House on the Parry -IN SPACE!!!!!!!!!, Mush

, Aliens speak and spell in proper English. An alien will never spell the word “Please” as “plz.” An alien will never say “BRB” when they mean “I will be right back.” The only grammatical error aliens tend to make is speaking in “split-infinitives.” They will say the phrase “to boldly go,” instead of the grammatically correct “to go boldly.”, Mush

, No culture speaks in sign language. (Exceptions: “Architects of Sleep” a novel where anthropomorphic raccoons populate an alternate Earth, and “Loud as a whisper” from season two of Star trek The Next Generation.), Mush

, When aliens first send probes to earth and see humans or animals walking around, none of the aliens watching the transitions wonder which one of their staff hacked into the video feed and was showing video of “puppets or CGI Monsters.” Personally, if I sent probes blindly to a hundred some-odd planets and one came back with images of bountiful extraterrestrial life, then I would turn to my brother and smack him across the face for screwing with my serious work., Mush

, Alien children are either insanely well behaved (sitting silently in a corner with their hands folded neatly in their laps for hours and hours without food, water, light, or company) or they are bratty and irritable (walking into your work station and kicking a foot through the control panned, demanding your utmost attention while they complain that they received alphabet soup for lunch instead of a French dessert crepe.), Mush

, Aliens are either technologically superior to humans (by a lot) or technologically inferior to humans (again, by a lot.) It’s rare to see an alien race that is in the same general era as the Industrial revolution., Mush

, Alien cultures who believe in heaven and hell (or their equivalents) always think that heaven is above their heads, while hell is below their feet. Never, is there an alien race that views the stars with suspicion and the ground with adoration. Imagine the advantage of a burrowing sentient race from a sci-fi writer’s point of view. Space faring humans would automatically think that the planet was uninhabited because there aren’t any buildings on the surface. The planets’ natives would instantly fear and hate the humans as anyone would fear and hate demons from hell. Hey- Story conflict! , Mush

, Bad guys either use swear words or demeaning phrases (such as: “Insolent fools,” or “lowlifes”) when addressing their enemies, subordinates, and allies (just, not their superiors.) It’s rare to see a bad guy use “kinder language” when addressing anyone. (Exception: Dr. Henry Killinger [from “Venture Brothers”] saying “your powers don’t work on me, you silly-billy”), Mush

, Alien creatures never seem to look like monsters from human mythology. (Centaurs seem like perfectly viable creatures that could exist in real life. Just because they have a human head and torso, does not mean they’d be clumsy, top heavy, or in any other way disadvantaged to the point where they would not have evolved naturally on their own planet), Mush

, If the alien race is bipedal (walks on two legs), then you can tell a male from a female the same way you do with humans (male aliens still have broader shoulders, bigger muscles, facial hair, an “atoms’ apple” broader jaw, smaller pelvis, etcetera; Female aliens still have smaller shoulders, smaller muscles, no facial hair, a feminine neckline, a smaller chin, larger pelvis, a waist, an “hourglass figure”, larger eyes, boobs, etcetera…) It’s funny how these aliens look just like humans except for antennae and a green tint to their skin. , Mush

, Food products and utilities having the words/prefixes “space” “astro” or “UFO” in them. : “Mom! I wanna eat space-aroni and cheese! I’m tired of asparagus and astro-casserole! Al Ien’s mom lets him eat UF-O’s for dinner, why can’t I? Whaaaaaaa----” (PS. If you didn’t get the joke about Al’s name, it spells “alien”), Mush

, Bad guys saying “I’m so lonely” after they laugh manically., Mush

, Trained military solders know better than running out into the jungle, screaming, and firing wildly in all directions until they run out of ammo. If nothing else, they would want to conserve their ammo without broadcasting their position to any unseen enemy. *Rambo, Robo war, Commando* , Mush

, Someone falls over and faints after something mildly shocking happens (Usually, this only happens in a comedy, but I’ve seen it elsewhere. Nevertheless, it’s an unfunny joke.), Mush

, Citizens of primitive cultures are never seen doing the hard labor that comes with having wood-and-stone technology. Despite this, their woven grass barrels are mysteriously full of grain, their mud-brick houses have no visible cracks, and their children are plum and well fed. , Mush

, Peaceful alien cultures live in a land without natural predators- not because the aliens do a decent job of fending off such predators, but because they were never there to begin with., Mush

, Any kind of hidden civilization occurring at the biggest tree of the forest (Avatar, an episode of the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon, Disney’s Tarzan cartoon, Swiss family Robinson, Pretty much anything that involves forest elves) - It’s a bit corny, but acceptable, if the people want to be found (like in Swiss Family Robinson). But placing the whole of your civilization in, on, and around the biggest tree in the forest does not make sense for a secret society of night elves who shun outsiders and want nothing to do with the outside world. Why place your headquarters where anyone with a good view of the tree tops can see it?, Mush

, The distant future is indistinguishable from present day times except for the floating/ flying versions of everyday objects. (Floating mountains from Avatar, flying cars from Jetsons, hover-boards from Back to the Future, floating raw hamburger patties from Planet 51, dogs with jetpacks chasing cats with jetpacks from Futurama), Mush

, Shakespeare is still renowned as a great writer in the year 32,098, even though present day high school kids find his works nearly indecipherable do to Shakespeare’s archaic use of the English language. (I’m complaining that English would practically be a different language thousands of years from now, and therefore, Old English is illegible), Mush

, Never having touched or seen a piano in his life, an alien will sit down and write a grand masterpiece. (and then look up at the crowd with mild surprise and say “What?”) , Mush

, People in the distant future watch black and white episodes of “I love Lucy” , Mush

, Human soldiers are rude to each other, alien soldiers are polite., Mush

, Any desired material that is named “unobtainium.” Un-obtain-ium. meaning “Can Not Get.”, Msuh

, (Note: I have only seen this once, but MAN was it stupid.) Any scene where a mathematically inclined character is asked to capture or locate something, and the character’s response is to build a cage, step inside, and declare his location (namely the inside of the cage) as being “outside.”, Mush

, If you get to see a younger version of some character, he/she will wear the exact same color scheme as what he/she wears in adulthood. , Mush

, Note: there are some variations to the previously listed cliché: Variation #1. the younger version of the character wears lighter colors of the same basic outfit [example: someone who wears a red jacket in adulthood may wear a pink shirt as a child] , Mush

, Note: there are some variations to the previously listed cliché: Variation #2 the younger character may have a different article of clothing that is the same color as what he/she will wear as an adult. [example: someone who always wears a red jacket as an adult, may be seen wearing a uniform with bright red buttons.] , Mush

, If a daemon comes out of the TV, it is a shape shifter that goes from themes like “cowboy” to “astronaut” in a flash of static (or snow screen). A good example of this is the “Rockoons 2” music video. , Mush

, The bad guys' names mean "daemon" in another language., Mush

, If one alien tells you that another alien is sick, that other alien will undoubtedly bed ridden- yet still quire able to whoop anybody’s ass with his superior mind bending powers., Mush

, If you see a commercial on an alien TV channel, that commercial will always have a heavy element of porn in it. (Advertising prostitution, usually.) , Mush

, Aliens who have a strong dislike of innocent humans are either outright evil or have some kind of justifiable misunderstanding. There is never an alien who dislikes humans because the alien is absolutely bat-shit insane. (the same way that a crazy earthling might irrationally hate aliens because he things that they are going to steal all of earth’s gravity.), Mush

, Alien songs always sing about things like spirituality/ great wars of the distant past that reduced them to a pre-industrial state/ wanting a hero to save their world. They never sing about lost love, how unfair their parents are, or any other random slice-of-life type things. Look at us humans; some of our most popular songs are about Mary’s little lamb, the Atom’s family, and how white your teeth will be if you use Crest’s toothpaste. Just because something is in song does not mean it has much in the way of depth. , Mush

, A cop whose general philosophy is “shoot first ask questions later,” is an avid churchgoer and mostly hangs around the altar under the only floor-to-ceiling mosaic window in an otherwise empty church. Which is funny because most churches I know of have a no-murder policy. , Mush

, (In a game or movie, this is usually a black screen (no graphics) with either voice-overs talking in hushed tones or text boxes.) bad guys you know nothing about (their location, their physical appearance, their intentions) are discussing the hero and their intentions for him. But before they can get to that part, they first go into extensive detail recapping information that they already know. What bothers me is that they don’t think about the possibility of there being any recording devices, listening spies, or an undercover agent in their midst. The bad guys just talk openly. , Mush

, Aliens who believe in reincarnation don’t bother looking for the new form of their most effective or most popular leaders. I mean, that’s the equivalent of being able to reelect Gorge Washington for the presidency as many times as we want. (Well, except the part where he can only serve 2 terms per lifetime.) , Mush

, Robots are always grossed out by human biological functions. (Examples: Bender from Futurama) They are likely to say something like “You humans- always ejecting and assimilating fluids! You make me sick!”– My question is why do robots even need the emotion of revulsion? , Mush

, The superpowered heroes can move so quickly that they become invisible. However, they are not fast enough to dodge a fireball moving way slower than themselves (I am particularly thinking of DBZ fights that take episodes and episodes to be finished). Normally, such fights should end in a blink of an eye, but this way DBZ would have lasted for one or two episodes ! , SG

, Cliché- Aliens seem to have evolved beyond normal (and healthy) biological tendencies such as aggression, lust for power or sex, and phobias to what should be their natural predators. These traits aren’t arbitrary personality flukes that all sentient spices should work to illuminate from their species as a whole; they have deep-routed biological functions. So for example, human aggression towards other humans promotes genetic fitness (ex: having those who were able-bodied with good immune systems gain access to more food and resources while those with crippling genetic debilities [ex: hemophilia, blindness] die off before reproducing.) I very much doubt that a race of aliens could survive for more than 100 generations once they completely eliminate their “animalistic hardwiring.” (sometimes I wonder if the perfect utopias they display in sci-fi’s are actually a brief window of what a society would look like as it’s about to die.), Mush

, Most aliens look like a cross between humans and lizards, with scaly and sometimes slimy-looking hairless skin. They also tend to have ridges or spikes on the face, scalp, forearms, spine, and/or legs. Animals on distant planets also tend to have a reptilian appearance to them., JL

, When someone time travels to the future, the future inhabitants will ultimately learn the error of their futuristic ways, eventually learning to embrace 1980s slang, mannerisms, and social norms., AA

, The captain of any ship will readily volunteer for missions where in reality a namesless redshirt would be sent in, SN

, Evil, oppressive empire has same structure and clothes as the nazis, manaraki