Best clichés ever?

[superluser]

OK.  We've got a thread for worst clichés, but how about best clichés?  Or at least ones that haven't been run into the ground, and you still find yourself enjoying?

One of my favorites is what TVTropes calls the Sarcastic Confession.  For example:

In Towing Jehovah, God dies, His body falls into the ocean, and the Vatican, wanting to cover the whole thing up, hires a supertanker to drag the two-mile long corpse to the North Pole, where He will be entombed and the whole thing forgotten.  At some point along the way (I think refueling), the captain meets up with another commander, who asks what they're towing.  The captain responds, ``Actually, Commander, it's the dead and rotting carcass of God Almighty.''  The commander lets him go.

Any clichés you like?

[Vidar]

"billions and billions"  -Carl Sagan"  (He never actually said this, except in "Demon Haunted World", where he explained that he never actually said this.)

[Jack McSlay]

"Risking it all on a final blow" often gives me manly tears - such as seen several times on Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann and Yuusha Ou Gaogaigar

Epic speeches during battles are no bad either

[Sunblink]

Anything involving religious irony or the depiction of a religious figure as a villainous character. I'm sorry to anyone who's particularly religious, but I just can't resist that kind of stuff.

[Gareeku]

Good guys who also have a dark side to them. I know it's been done to death (my character being an example of this trend), but i find the idea of a hero figure having a dark side to them interesting and less two-dimensional than if they were just a plain hero without any flaws whatsoever.

And I must agree with the epic speeches in mid battle and risking it all on one final blow clichés. They have brought a manly tear to these eyes before. Manly, I tell you! >>

[superluser]

Epic speeches during battles are no bad either

Enjoy!

Anything involving religious irony or the depiction of a religious figure as a villainous character. I'm sorry to anyone who's particularly religious, but I just can't resist that kind of stuff.

When this is done well, it's not bad, but when it's done poorly, I find this cliché to be supremely annoying.  It's especially bad in video games, where every religious figure turns out to be the supreme evil in the universe, so it never comes as a shock, and is always sort of nonsensical.

MY SHAPELESS FORM HAS PENETRATED THIS FEEBLE WORLD FOR THE PURPOSE OF SUBJUGATING ITS PUNY LIFE AND BENDING IT TO MY WILL FOR THE DESECRATION OF ALL THAT IS GOOD AND HOLY!

i am also helping three couples through marriage counseling and candystripe at the hospital the third saturday of every month

[Jack McSlay]

for some reason, I don't get tired of "bad cooker" jokes... same applies to "awkward situations mistaken for affection/sex" whenever properly applied

ps.: and I've yet to experience a "religion is corrupt" case that displeases me, because most of the time I can relate to how religion is treated in our world (specially if you're atheist), like in Halo where they would kill farking everyone in the farking galaxy due to damn religious misinterpretations.

[Sunblink]

It's especially bad in video games, where every religious figure turns out to be the supreme evil in the universe, so it never comes as a shock, and is always sort of nonsensical.

MY SHAPELESS FORM HAS PENETRATED THIS FEEBLE WORLD FOR THE PURPOSE OF SUBJUGATING ITS PUNY LIFE AND BENDING IT TO MY WILL FOR THE DESECRATION OF ALL THAT IS GOOD AND HOLY!

i am also helping three couples through marriage counseling and candystripe at the hospital the third saturday of every month

I can't really argue there. XD At times the cliche is horribly horribly horribly abused, but when it's good - it's really good. But on the subject of video games, I did find the plot twists relating to Spira's primary religion in Final Fantasy X to be very interesting. I think that's what started my whole love of the cliche, besides the fact I find corruption among highly trusted religious figures to be utterly despicable and therefore worthy of being demonized.

shit I have a cold. I should be in bed. But I'm not. Instead I'm waxing philosophy with a bunch of furries.

[Janus Whitefurr]

When this is done well, it's not bad, but when it's done poorly, I find this cliché to be supremely annoying.  It's especially bad in video games, where every religious figure turns out to be the supreme evil in the universe, so it never comes as a shock, and is always sort of nonsensical.

MY SHAPELESS FORM HAS PENETRATED THIS FEEBLE WORLD FOR THE PURPOSE OF SUBJUGATING ITS PUNY LIFE AND BENDING IT TO MY WILL FOR THE DESECRATION OF ALL THAT IS GOOD AND HOLY!

The first three Breath of Fire games would like to talk to you. And then wipe you out because you have the potential to DESTROY THE WORLD. 8D

[Myxini]

Instead I'm waxing philosophy with a bunch of furries.

The combination of 'waxing' and 'furries' sounds painful.  and humorous. 

[techmaster-glitch]

shit I have a cold. I should be in bed. But I'm not. Instead I'm waxing philosophy with a bunch of furries.

The combination of 'waxing' and 'furries' sounds painful.  and humorous. 

If I hadn't finished my root beer before reading these, it would now be all over my computer screen

[Tapewolf]

I can't really argue there. XD At times the cliche is horribly horribly horribly abused, but when it's good - it's really good. But on the subject of video games, I did find the plot twists relating to Spira's primary religion in Final Fantasy X to be very interesting. I think that's what started my whole love of the cliche, besides the fact I find corruption among highly trusted religious figures to be utterly despicable and therefore worthy of being demonized.

Morrowind.  This one has three gods, plus a self-serving religious order (heck, they made me pay to use a shrine dedicated to me!).  I won't say any more, but I think you might enjoy it.
Oh, and Thief 2.  Karras is absolutely awesome.

Anyway, I think my favourite cliché has to be that of an evil guy who tries to redeem themselves.

[Vidar]

It's especially bad in video games, where every religious figure turns out to be the supreme evil in the universe, so it never comes as a shock, and is always sort of nonsensical.

MY SHAPELESS FORM HAS PENETRATED THIS FEEBLE WORLD FOR THE PURPOSE OF SUBJUGATING ITS PUNY LIFE AND BENDING IT TO MY WILL FOR THE DESECRATION OF ALL THAT IS GOOD AND HOLY!

i am also helping three couples through marriage counseling and candystripe at the hospital the third saturday of every month

I can't really argue there. XD At times the cliche is horribly horribly horribly abused, but when it's good - it's really good. But on the subject of video games, I did find the plot twists relating to Spira's primary religion in Final Fantasy X to be very interesting. I think that's what started my whole love of the cliche, besides the fact I find corruption among highly trusted religious figures to be utterly despicable and therefore worthy of being demonized.

My $0.02 on this subject. There are 2 ways of doing this "evil religious bastard" thing.
1) EVB is a corrupt baby-eating bastard, and uses a religion for his own personal gain. This has been done to death already.

2) EVB is not corrupt, and follows his religion to it's natural conclusion, and it's incredibly destructive. All attempts to sway EVB from his religious doctrine fails, because EVB happens to have absolute and unwavering faith in his religion. In this scenario EVB isn't the real villain, but religion is, and EVB is a mere pawn of his own doctrine. This isn't done all that often, because of the taboo on casting religion itself as the bad guy.
Does anyone know of any movie in which this is done in a compelling way?

[Tapewolf]

2) EVB is not corrupt, and follows his religion to it's natural conclusion, and it's incredibly destructive. All attempts to sway EVB from his religious doctrine fails, because EVB happens to have absolute and unwavering faith in his religion. In this scenario EVB isn't the real villain, but religion is, and EVB is a mere pawn of his own doctrine. This isn't done all that often, because of the taboo on casting religion itself as the bad guy.
Does anyone know of any movie in which this is done in a compelling way?

Movies, not offhand.  Something a bit like that does happen in the game Arx Fatalis though... a side-quest involves a cult kidnapping some child to use as a sacrifice.  Out of curiosity I made myself invisible, hid in a corner and sat back to watch what happened.  The kid exploded, a demon appeared and killed all the cultists one by one.  Kind of sad considering all the effort they put into it, really.

[Lysander]

Duel Savior Destiny is one I'd recommend with the idea that the religious figure is evil, but the game is entirely Japanese.

It's not so much based on religion, but something similar when the bad guy fights for his own beliefs that by doing something most of the planet would consider terrible like destroying the world for the sake of saving it. Example of Dhaos in Tales of Phantasia and his being bent on killing all life on the planet that the world might live. Though it would be interesting to play as someone who isn't human and the goal is to kill humans because of how corrupt and evil these types of villains claim they are. 

[Alondro]

Actually, I prefer the sorts of things where the religion isn't bad, but the so-called leaders twist it into a form that they can use to give themselves absolute power, even though they don't believe a word of it themselves.

That's rather closer to the reality of the world after all.