Noir Episode

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    An episode that parodies or homages Film Noir, in a series that otherwise doesn't. Will almost always be Deliberately Monochrome and feature a Private Eye Monologue, and may contrive a way to get characters into period costume; other noir tropes might or might not appear.

    Subtrope of Something Completely Different, and arguably a form of Out-of-Genre Experience.

    Not to be confused with any given episode of Noir.

    Examples of Noir Episode include:

    Single episodes

    Anime and Manga

    Comics

    • The Doctor Who story "The Happiness Patrol" was originally going to be a black-and-white noir pastiche called "The Crooked Smile". The comic strip The Deep Hereafter counts though, with the Doctor taking on the persona of a detective investigating the death of a fish person detective in an alien City Noir.
    • In Sonic the Hedgehog #52, Sonic stumbles into a noir-themed Zone and has an adventure, complete with muted coloring and casting Sonic and Sally as detective and client respectively.
    • The "Tracer Bullet" strips in Calvin and Hobbes, one of Calvin's recurring Imagine Spot alter egos.

    Live-Action TV

    • The season 7 Charmed episode "Charmed Noir".
    • The Monk episode "Mr. Monk And The Leper" seemed to have borrowed from Film Noir and even broadcast the episode in black and white.
    • The show Radio Active had a noir episode with Morgan as the detective, giving her own Private Eye Monologue. It included a direct riff on To Have Or Have Not's famous 'whistle' line.
    • The Lois and Clark episode "Fly Hard". Half noir black and white episode paralleling the Superman characters in present day.
    • The Smallville episode "Noir". They went full-on noir here—black and white, period costumes, references to noir-era "Superman", and a noir-ish storyline.
    • The Moonlighting episode "The Dream Sequence Always Rings Twice".
    • There is a scene in a Sabrina the Teenage Witch episode where she goes to find a detective in the Other Realm. The parody of Film Noir then starts with her entering the detective's office and the detective narrating...who is then revealed to be Roland (a recurring dwarf character whom she dislikes).
    • Father Dowling Mysteries had an episode where the case of the week involved a really bad detective story loosely based on Father Dowling and Sister Stephanie, and every now and then, the narrative changed to a black and white film showing the events in the book, which mirrored the actual investigation.
    • A subversion in the How I Met Your Mother episode "Of Course": The Teaser plays like this, with Barney on the Private Eye Monologue — but the rest of the episode is in the show's usual style.
    • Fringe combined this with a Musical Episode — that's right, a film noir musical. Justified in that it was a story within a story told by a drugged Walter to Olivia's niece.
    • The first season finale of Quantum Leap (1989) called "Play it Again, Seymour" both uses and spoofs noir tropes. Sam is cast as a P.I., in the typical old fashioned office, takes the case of a beautiful bombshell in distress, dances to a 1940s-style band, and leaps into a body that even resembles and dresses like Humphrey Bogart.
    • The seventh season Boy Meets World episode As Time Goes By contains a parallel noir universe in Corey and Topanga's closet.
    • The Small Wonder episode "Big 'J', Private Eye" had this as Jamie's book report.
    • Deep Space Nine episode "Necessary Evil" had Constable Odo using the Private Eye Monologue to parody the Captain's Log, and flashbacks to a murder he investigated while working for the Cardassian occupiers. Interestingly Major Kira turns out to be the Femme Fatale murder.
      • Another, far less impressive attempt at Noir by Star Trek is Voyager's Ex Post Facto.
    • The Castle episode The Blue Butterfly, jumps back and forth between regular Castle, and Castle reading a diary of a 1940s-era P.I., done noir, of course.

    Music

    • Australian rock band The Church managed to have a noir song - "Loveblind" on their album Sometime Anywhere. Starts off with "Have I told you 'bout the case/Of the man who had no face...".

    Theatre

    Sally: Well, I was thinking we do a Film Noir about silver nitrate. You know, AgNO3....(later)... and it's not until the silver and the nitrogen find all three of the oxygens do they finally solve the case!!!

    Video Games

    Webcomics

    Web Original

    Western Animation

    • Phineas and Ferb had an episode in which the two boys were inspired by a Film Noir movie to become private eyes and even applied black and white makeup to themselves.
      • As it progresses, they end up parodying more modern detective shows as well.

    "Aren't you a little young to know about all these old detective shows?"
    "Yes, yes I... (puts on Sunglasses) am."
    "YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH"

    • Duckman had one, in which Cornfed took on the role of the hard-boiled detective. (Which he kind of is, anyway.) There were femmes fatales, atmosphere music, fog, black and white, the whole deal.
    • There is an episode of Gargoyles in which Broadway did this, called "The Silver Falcon".
      • "Revelations," as well.
    • There's one episode of The Fairly OddParents set in a Film Noir style, which Timmy specifically wished for. It even poked fun at the usual black-and-white visuals, with a corner of Timmy's room still being grayscale after he wished away the Film Noir effect.
    • The Pinky and The Brain episode "Brain Noir".
    • An episode of, of all things, Captain Planet and the Planeteers. (It's just a story one of the characters is telling.)
    • An episode of Samurai Jack about the assassin robot who found a dog and became a trumpet player before being forced back into his old role by Aku.
    • The second season Superman: The Animated Series episode "The Late Mr. Kent", which features Superman narrating (in full Private Eye Monologue) the story of how Clark Kent was "murdered" while investigating a death row inmate's wrongful conviction.
    • The Venture Bros. had one in season 4, with Hank fancying himself a noir detective. The picture switches to monochrome whenever he puts on his fedora. (it came with a whip! A detective's whip!)
    • Recess: "The Girl was Trouble"
    • The Cars Toon "Mater: Private Eye."
    • Dan Vs.: "The Catburglar"
    • Hey Arnold!: Grandpa's Packard
    • Mr. Bogus: "Bogus Private Eye"
    • Archer: Season 8 takes place in an extended dream sequence and full blown dream state, which is entirely inspired by Film Noir.

    Recurring "bits"

    • The "Dixon Hill" episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, despite lacking the usually-obligatory black and white.
    • The "Tracer Bullet" comics from Calvin and Hobbes.
    • The children's show Between the Lions had Sam Spud, Par-Boiled Potato Detective. The bits were frequently a Hurricane of Puns as everything Sam narrated was literally true. The absurdity of it was always lampshaded by a child watching the show, only to be assured by their mother that the show was educational and, thus, should be good for them... somehow.
    • Whose Line Is It Anyway? has a game called "Film Noir", in which the players (typically Ryan Stiles and Colin Mochrie) would narrate for one another.
    • A Prairie Home Companion's "Guy Noir, Private Eye".
    • Pibgorn Nat Bustard's signature style, and he often transforms the strip.
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