Snowed In



"''"Oh, the weather outside is frightful,

But the fire is so delightful.

And since we've no place to go,

Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!"''"

- "Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!"

An easy way to isolate a place. A frequent manifestation is the snow day. Sometimes this is any snow at all, sometimes you'll at least require that the roads be blocked with it. Used in a wide variety of situations: Locked Room Mystery, Locked in A Room (especially--duh!--Locked in A Freezer), A House Divided, The Siege, Ten Little Murder Victims...

On a lighter note, if a couple (or potential couple) happen to get Snowed In together somewhere cozy, remember that Snow Means Love... (especially if There Is Only One Bed). A still lighter note may produce a Snowball Fight. More darkly, it might result in going mad...or worse.

Mild Truth in Television: in the more southern parts of both Europe and North America, a small amount of snow can bring a city to a halt, mostly out of confusion and rarity (school districts in Texas have been known to declare a snow day for less than inch of precipitation). It's rarely the snow itself that creates the problem, as even if there are no proper snowploughs available, the local highway maintenance organisation still has bulldozers and other earthmoving equipment. The traffic disruption usually stems from drivers who are unused to the icy and treacherous conditions, especially if the abnormal weather conditions have forced the county to be sparing in its use of road salt; roads that have been cleared of snow will often end up impassable again by a pile-up within minutes.

Further north, where this sort of thing is par for the course, it takes actual serious buildup to have an effect. In these areas, school never closes for snow, and the phenomenon of a "snow day" is only known from TV and the Internet. Rarer variations include Hostile Weather such as heavy rain, wind, or similarly extreme weather conditions. See also Heat Wave. The unfrozen version of this trope is Rain, Rain, Go Away. See also Caught in The Rain.

Anime and Manga

 * Episode 7 of Kanokon used this plot. The snow was caused by a yuki-onna (snow woman) as part of a test on Kouta and Chizuru's relationship. Also, there were semi-sentient ninja snowmen.
 * An episode of Kochikame had the main characters trapped the police box in a Tokyo snowstorm. They're prevented from opening the window and escape as it will cause the small structure to collapse until this becomes their last resort.

Comics

 * There's a Disney comic where Mickey and Goofy spend a weekend in a mountain cabin, and get snowed in. Goofy panics at first, while Mickey points out that he brought along plenty of food, books, and even cards. Eventually, Mickey is driven to the edge of panic by boredom and cabin fever, and Goofy calms him down... by starting a Snowball Fight. Eventually, the two dig a hole right through the snow on the other side of the door, and realize that it was only a few inches thick.
 * In some versions of Superman, the Kents use a convenient blizzard to pass Clark off as their own child and to explain away why nobody noticed Martha pregnant.
 * At the end of Bone Phoney is anxious to depart the Valley as soon as possible, but the first snowfall of winter (falling in one solid lump - a Brick Joke from the first issue) delays the Bones for months.

Fan Fiction

 * The rather appropriate title and plot of this "Criminal Minds" slashfic. Hotch and Reid are snowed in and find a rather interesting way to pass the time.

Film

 * The Thing Scientists are stranded in a arctic research base due to lack of communications and transport and they can't afford to let the alien escape.
 * The Shining The family are trapped inside the hotel due to severe weather and the Snow-Cat being sabotaged.
 * Snow Day, one of those Nickelodeon live-action movies, had this as its central premise, complete with evil snowplow man whose goal is to plow the streets and force kids to go to school.
 * So the schools would just reopen at noon, once all the roads were clear? Ok...
 * His intent was to prevent the Snow Day from lasting multiple days. Because he's EVIL.
 * Home Alone 3 had the villains taking advantage of a snowstorm to isolate the street.
 * The ending of Look Who's Talking Too.
 * Preposterously overdone in The Day After Tomorrow.
 * Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush.
 * Alive is the Donner party version. Bizarrely cheerful and upbeat in tone.
 * Die Hard 2, aka Die Hard AT AN AIRPORT, has a Storm of the Century shutting down Washington Dulles airport as the enabling premise for its strangely implausible terrorist hi-jinks.
 * The movie Unaccompanied Minors has the airport that the main group is at be shut down due to inclement weather. They're stuck in the airport because they ran off while all the other people were moved to a nearby hotel until the weather cleared up.
 * French movie Huit femmes (Eight Women) uses this as a setup for a whodunnit.

Literature

 * A blizzard isolates the Overlook Hotel in The Shining.
 * Murder On the Orient Express
 * In To Kill a Mockingbird, the kids get the day off from school because of a light snowfall, a rarity in Alabama.
 * Happens with some frequency in the Laura Ingalls Wilder books, one time in particular nearly starving/freezing a town to death.
 * The Wintersmith causes this in the latest Tiffany Aching novel.
 * Chicago in 1979 in The Pale King.
 * In the Heralds of Valdemar novel Arrow's Flight, a huge blizzard strands Kris and Talia in a waystation for weeks. This does lead to sex; more importantly, though, it gives them the time and isolation they need to get a handle on Talia's out-of-control empathic powers.

Live Action TV

 * There was an episode of Good Eats that started with "...Three inches of snow paralyzed Atlanta." It was supposed to be a "documentary" episode taking place just after Thanksgiving, and the three inches of snow ended up forcing the cast inside and sending most of the production crew into a "Good Eats starved" frenzy, from which they were appeased by Thanksgiving leftovers until Emeril came by in a V-22 Osprey. I'm not making that up.
 * Given that Atlanta's residents are infamous for driving off the road at the sight of a single snowflake, three inches of the white stuff really would paralyze the city. and since the nearest snowplow is hundreds of miles away, it's probably goint to stay that way for a while.
 * Truth in Television. During the week of 1/11/11, Atlanta was paralyzed by 3 inches of snow. Though the problem was less the actual snowfall, but the week of subfreezing temperatures that turned most of the city into an ice-skating rink. Most schools had a snow week. Cue the puns: snowmageddon, snowacolypse, icemageddon, Hothlanta...
 * The X-Files Season 1 episode "Ice", in which they're snowed out up in the Arctic. And while they find time for a Ship Tease, seeing as how it's The X-Files, the writers find some way to make it creepy.
 * Happens in Little House On the Prairie at least once.
 * The West Wing episode "Holy Night" uses this; though they aren't literally snowed in, the airports are closed due to the blizzard, preventing people from leaving. Among the people stuck at the White House are the president's therapist, Zoe Bartlett and her French boyfriend who Charlie despises, the Yale Whiffenpoofs, and Toby's estranged Jewish Mafia hitman father. Awkwardness ensues.
 * Happens in a couple of different Night Court episodes.
 * This occurs in an episode of Stargate SG 1 to Jack and Sam. They're stranded on an ice planet.
 * One of the outtakes from this episode consists of a hilarious rant by Tapping about how she's "stuck on a glacier with MacGyver"
 * In one Murder She Wrote episode Jessica was snowed in at a ski resort where a murderer was on the loose.
 * This trope has been used a lot in soap operas for both dramatic and romantic purposes.
 * In one episode of Bosom Buddies, Kip and Henry find themselves trapped in a mountain cabin during a blizzard, with no food save half a container of non-dairy creamer.
 * A Benson episode has the main characters snowed in at the governor's winter cabin.
 * The 3rd Rock From the Sun episode "Frozen Dick" has the characters trapped in various locales by a blizzard.
 * An Everybody Loves Raymond episode has Ray and Debra stuck at Frank and Marie's house.
 * A Christmas episode of One Day At a Time has Ann and the girls getting snowed in at a mountain cabin with no heat.
 * The Mary Tyler Moore Show has an episode where the WJM staff, who are all angry with each other for various reasons, get trapped at the station by a blizzard and hash things out at an impromptu early Christmas party thrown by Sue Ann.
 * On an episode of The Nanny, the entire Sheffield household plus C.C. gets stuck in Fran's parents' apartment this way.

Music

 * The song "Let It Snow!", shown at the top of the page, has a surprising amount of sexual implication for a Christmas song. "The lights are turned way down low", for example.
 * "I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm" has this, too.
 * "Baby, It's Cold Outside", even more so.
 * "Please I just wanna go home!"
 * because of the IMPLICATION.
 * Kate Bush's "Snowed In at Wheeler Street" shows a considerably less pleasant situation.

Newspaper Comics

 * Calvin and Hobbes and similar strips/series frequently have the character wish for a snow day:
 * As Calvin once said, "Getting an inch of snow is like winning 10 cents in the lottery."
 * Especially since Calvin appears to live in a part of the country where it snows 2 feet all winter long.

Theatre

 * The entirety of The Mousetrap is snowed in, leading to a Closed Circle.

Video Games

 * Remember 11 focuses on two groups of people, one of which is stuck in a mountain cabin due to heavy snowstorms. The other group also gets snowed in frequently, but doesn't suffer from this as severely.
 * Happens in White Wolf of Icicle Creek to ensure Nancy can only snoop around outside during daylight hours. Also in Treasure in the Royal Tower, when bad weather restricts when she can explore the outdoor areas.
 * In Tokimeki Memorial 2, this occurs in two events: the first happens with, and the second with.

Web Comics
"Dad: Snowed in, you know what that means. All social constructs have dissolved.
 * The Perry Bible Fellowship had something like this, but with a twist.
 * Pictures for Sad Children tackles this one:

Son: No, dad.

Dad: I'm not your dad anymore, I'm just a person."


 * In Question Duck, opening the door is unwise -- and the setting for a question.

Western Animation

 * The Looney Tunes short Snow Business has Sylvester and Tweety trapped in a cabin by a blizzard.
 * An episode of Hey Arnold.
 * Dexters Laboratory.
 * The Simpsons did this on several occasions.
 * Done in an episode of South Park. Cannibalism ensued.
 * The Daria episode "Antisocial Climbers".
 * In one episode of Jimmy Neutron, the titular character enhanced his friend's sunscreen to create a massive snowstorm in the middle of summer. The next morning, he wakes up, expecting it to have worn off... only to find that the snow level is so high, he can barely see out of his bedroom window on the second floor.
 * An episode of Doug.
 * The Ren and Stimpy Show episode "Big Flakes" has Ren and Stimpy getting trapped in a cabin by snow and eventually go insane.
 * Happens in one episode of Little Bear, while Little Bear and his family at at Emily's. Luckily, Emily's grandmother knows a lot of good things to do with snow--including making Snow Cream.
 * Rocko's Modern Life episode "Cabin Fever" when Rocko, Heffer, and the Bigheads are trapped in a cabin by snow.
 * This is the driving ploy for Snowed in at the House of Mouse, the Christmas Episode, in which...well, yeah. The entire Disney "family" is blizzarded into the nightclub for Christmas. Better Than It Sounds.