Narrowed It Down to the Guy I Recognize: Difference between revisions

== Films -- Live-Action[[Film]] ==

* Cleverly done in ''[[Sleepy Hollow (Film)|Sleepy Hollow]]'', where the main character, already investigating a crime, is introduced to the town's most important men and the audience is already looking for the guilty among them. They are all played by "vaguely famous" actors: former Maigret (and later Dumbledore) Michael Gambon as the leader, Jeffrey Jones from ''[[Amadeus]]'' as the reverend, Ian "Palpatine" McDiarmid as the doctor; Michael Gough, formerly Batman's butler and a usual in Burtons's films, as the notary; and Richard Griffiths from ''Naked Gun 2'' as the magistrate. The guilty party is... {{spoiler|A conspiracy among all of them!}} But wait: {{spoiler|The real villain behind the ghost is the leader's wife, played by Miranda Richardson.}}

** CSI is very guilty of casting actors that are go-to TV bad guys as the eventual killer. It's pretty simple to pick out whodunnit if you've watched enough TV (especially 90's dramas like the X-Files). More than once they've cast two "that guy" actors in an episode, and more likely then not they both did it.

** [[Lost|Mark]] [[Supernatural (TV series)|Pellegrino]] guest-stars as a helpful neighbor giving eyewitness evidence of the killer leaving the scene of the crime, in hopes of getting a reward. {{spoiler|He did it, and framed the other guy for a past murder to boot.}}

** Another episode featured "magician" and professional poser, Criss Angel. When the team suspected him early on, it seemed obvious he wouldn't be the killer. However, by the end of the episode, he had performed almost all of his signature tricks. Oh, and killed someone.

* ''[[Numb3rs]]'' often did this.

** A similar ''SVU'' example involved guest star [[Jerry Lewis]]. Producers must've been particularly aware of the trope this time as even the ''promos'' gave away that he did it, and indeed the crime ultimately committed by his character was done right in front of the eyes of the star detectives -- thedetectives—the episode's plot revolved instead around tension leading up to the crime, whether or not he was justified in his actions and {{spoiler|whether or not mental incompetence played a role.}}

** Averted in an original flavour ''[[Law and Order]]'' episode, in which [[Kevin Smith]] appears -- inappears—in a one-scene cameo.

** Subverted in the SVU episode Wet which had David Krumholtz from Numb3rs and [[The Santa Clause (film series)|The Santa Clause]] as an [[Absent-Minded Professor]] who grow poisonous mushrooms and was obsessed with water right seemed like a slam dunk as a perp. Plus it also hade Rosemary Harris who played Aunt May in the [[Spider-Man]] movies as a [[Rich Bitch]] who ran the charity were victim was given the poisoned Mushrooms. Add to that the special guest ADA for the episode was played by Paula Patton from [[Precious]] and the defense attorney was played by Michael Boatman from [[Spin City]]. Yet none of them was the kill, however one of them came off as more of a [[Complete Monster]] then the actual murderess, and was responsible for her behavior.

** The first episode has the father of the kidnapped {{spoiler|and then murdered}} young man played by Don S. Davis -- whoDavis—who spent eight years on ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'' as Gen. Hammond. {{spoiler|He did it.}}

** There were [[Homicide: Life Onon the Street|Reed Diamond]] {{spoiler|he did it}} in the season 7 episode ''Forensics'', [[JAG|Steven]] [[Desperate Housewives|Culp]] {{spoiler|who also did it}} in the episode ''Jurisprudence'', and [[Eli Stone|Loretta Devine]] in ''Soul'', {{spoiler|and yes, she did it too}}, among others.

** As soon as Daniel Baldwin showed up, you just ''knew'' he was the perp. He was so effective in this role, he stayed on for 7 episodes.

* ''[[Medium]]'':

** Ironically, an episode of it ''seems'' like [[Homicide: Life Onon the Street|Reed Diamond]] did it, but in the end Allison finds out that the 'victim' is still alive and a few years younger than in her dreams, so she understands he ''might'' do it, despite being anything but a killer to this point, and warns him so hopefully he won't do it.

** [[DiDiRT RT(video game)|Will McCormack]] raped Devalos' daughter and others.

** [[That '70s Show|Donna]] was a serial killer of sex offenders who ended up killing an undercover cop.

* ''[[The West Wing]]'' had Glenn Close show up during a search for a Supreme Court Justice.

** Subverted in the Season 1 cliff-hanger finale, where Richard Schiff shows up as a guest star, {{spoiler|and is killed off after just a couple of minutes of screen time}}. The DVD commentary says they specifically hired a big name so the audience would see him as the ultimate bad guy--theyguy—they wouldn't pay a big star like that to be just a [[Incredibly Lame Pun|one-shot]] flunky.

* ''[[Lie to Me (TV series)|Lie to Me]]'' had [[Oz|Beecher]] as the perp in the second season finale.

** Also been subverted quite a bit as [[Star Trek: Voyager|Robert Picardo]], Debi Mazar, [[The Simpsons (animation)|Dan Castellaneta]] and [[Pulp Fiction|Phil LaMarr]] have all popped up as being allies rather than killers.

* ''[[Homicide: Life Onon the Street]]'' was usually pretty good at averting this trope... whenever a famous guest star appeared, he/she was either a relative of the victim (like [[Robin Williams]], [[Mystic River|Marcia Gay Harden]] or [[Lost|Terry O'Quinn]]), or his identity as the killer was made intentionally clear from the beginning and the episode actually focused on the detectives' attempt to ''prove'' that he was guilty (like [[The Lord of the Rings (film)|Elijah Wood]], [[Reservoir Dogs|Steve Buscemi]] or [[Lethal Weapon 4|Chris Rock]]).

* ''[[Lost]]'' loves to play around with this. One good example is the actor [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0006535/ Doug Hutchison], most famous for his role as the sadistic guard in ''[[The Green Mile]]''. He briefly appears in a season 3 episode. Then he briefly appears in a season 4 episode. Then he plays a central role in five episodes in season 5.

* The [[Nero Wolfe]] series played with, or possibly completely inverted, this trope: The supporting cast stayed mostly the same from episode to episode, but the actors played different roles in different stories - so while you can nearly always recognise "the guy" (or "the gal"), it's of no use to you in jumping to the solution of the case.

* Lampshaded on ''[[The Simpsons]]'':