The Mole (TV series): Difference between revisions

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* [[Adventure Towns]]: The players are always on the move, traveling from town to town (and occasionally country to country) to complete their various tasks.

* [[Adult Child]]: During The Mole 2's Three Questions Game, Dorothy describes herself as one of these in relation to the question of who would be a worse babysitter (between her and Heather) to Bill's kids.

* [[The Cameo]]: The Mole from the first season makes a brief appearance towards the end of the second season.

* [[Celebrity Edition]]: Has had two, both hosted by Ahmad Rashad.

** The Dutch version ''became'' this with every season after the fourth one casting Dutch celebrities only. Strangely, unlike with the US celebrity seasons which all but killed the show, the Dutch celebrity seasons haven't had nearly as much of a negative impact on the show considering that the show has remained popular enough to go on for at least ''eight'' celebrity-only seasons.

* [[The Chessmaster]]: Stephen and Jim from the first season could both be seen as this.

* [[Confession Cam]]

* [[Elimination Houdini]]: The winners of seasons two and five, Dorothy and Mark, definitely had luck on their sides. In ''The Next Betrayal'', Elavia accepted a $50,000 bribe to leave the game in place of an elimination. This spared Dorothy, who scored the lowest on the quiz that night and would have been executed. Mark failed the quiz ''three times'' and only escaped execution by finishing faster than the eliminated players.

* [[Fair Play Whodunit]]: The series always gave clues as to the identity of The Mole. Some were ridiculously obscure, but some were legitimate hints. For example, Jon Kelley never called Season 5 Mole Craig's name during the execution ceremonies.

* [[Final Exam Finale]]: The last quiz covered The Mole's activity from the entire season.

* [[Four Is Death]]: Four was often used as a secret number in clues because of there being four letters in the word "Mole." For example, season one Mole {{spoiler|Kathryn Price was the fourth player to arrive at the starting location in episode one}}.

* [[How We Got Here]]: Many foreign versions of the show open this way, with the host/announcer saying that the finalists just took their final quiz ''now'', but the results won't be known [[No Fourth Wall|until you, the viewer, have watched the entire season]].

* [[Incessant Music Madness]]: "Tiny Bubbles" in a task near the end of the second season.

* [[Like You Would Really Do It]]: [[Invoked Trope|Invoked]] by the players when, at the outset, their bags of personal effects were thrown into an incinerator. {{spoiler|[[Genre Savvy|The players were right, of course]]-- the bags had been switched for fakes prior to destruction.}}

** Averted in season five, when the players (sans Craig, who was ill from the last challenge) were instructed to find a volunteer to have his journal destroyed. When Alex reluctantly came forward, it was revealed that the whole exercise was a [[Secret Test of Character]] and that his journal would be spared while ''everyone else's'' journals would be burned. Mark was [[Serious Business|not amused.]]

* [[Metagame]]: Due to the elimination quizzes, there are three key elements to being a good Mole contestant.

** Gathering as much information as possible about the players and their activities, whether by copious note-taking or by establishing an alliance with another player to share info (although this information is not always reliable);

** Another excellent example is the Mole from Season 3 of the Dutch version who remains the most beloved Mole of that version because they were so good at painting themselves as too lovably goofy to possibly be the Mole.

* [[Off the Rails]]: In the Season 5 mission "Travelers", Craig was chosen to pick out modes of transportation for the rest of the group to reach a monument within a set amount of time, and was told he would be given an exemption if none of them made it. Going for the exemption, he chose modes of transportation that were... unhelpful, including stilts, scuba gear and a two-person llama costume (Bonus: He assigned the head and rear of the llama costume to arch-rivals [[Alpha Bitch|Nicole]] and [[Jerkass|Paul]], respectively.) Rather than participate in the game, the remaining contestants unanimously decided not to play this game right at the start and simply drove to the monument in the vans, forfeiting the money and netting Craig the exemption. {{spoiler|This was [[The Mole|Craig's]] most blatant sabotage of the game. Doubles as a [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|CMOA]] for Craig, as despite single-handedly ruining that mission, [[Magnificent Bastard|not one person suspected him of being The Mole.]]}}

* [["Previously On..."]]

* [[Punny Name]]: In a late episode of season 2, host Anderson Cooper and the players are all eating McDonald's food as a reward. Anderson states "that all of this is compliments of Mickey D's". Aside from the fact that McDonald's was a sponsor of the show, guess who else involved with the show has that nickname? Hint, they're in the title.

* [[Ragtag Bunch of Misfits]]: Besides the mystery of The Mole's identity, the other big part of this show's watchability is the sheer fun it is to watch the contestants try to complete the various tasks.

* [[Reality Show]]

* [[Reunion Show]]: All five seasons had one. Season one was the only season where The Mole and The Winner were revealed through episode footage shown to the players at the reunion show.

* [[Scenery Porn]]: Almost all the time, as the players are always moving.

** Airing The Mole 2 on a [[Friday Night Death Slot|Friday night]] when almost no one was watching, one week after 9/11 happened and the American viewing public were not the in mood for backstabbery.

* [[Secret Test of Character]]: Every civilian season has had this in one fashion or another. Most famously was the second season, when the team travelling on bus were stopped first by a pair of pretty ladies, then later by an older woman, to fix a flat tire. They fixed both cars, and were rewarded. Had they just fixed the pretty ladies' car, they would've lost money.

* [[Sitcom Arch Nemesis]]: Season 5's Paul and Nicole were this to each other.

** Bobby from Season 5 as well. The only way you could tell he was gay was when he explicitly mentioned it in an early [[Confession Cam|behind-the-scenes interview]], stating that his "Gaydar" senses will help him get a feel of peoples intentions. Otherwise, it isn't telling.

* [[Too Soon]]: The reason why Season 2 had a lengthy hiatus after its first three episodes aired in early September of 2001. The dreadful ratings didn't help. The whole season was run in its entirety the following summer.

* [[Unexpectedly Obscure Answer]]: ''Celebrity Mole: Hawaii'' had a very obscure clue involving food storage labels. The labels (if anyone even paid attention to them) said, "Fruits," "Vegetables," "Dairy," "Water," and "Meat." Somehow, you were supposed to know to turn the first letters of each one into an acronym, F.V.D.W.M., which stood for "Frederique Van Der Wal, Mole." Anyone who caught that clue is a genius.

* [[Unreadably Fast Text]]: A few clues were quickly flashed during the opening sequences.

* [[Wrong Genre Savvy]]: Corbin Bernsen and Stephen Baldwin in ''Yucatan'' were constantly looking for clues that weren't there.

** Indeed, Corbin actually caught on to one of the clues (seven candles on the dining room table indicating that Journal #7 was held by the Mole), but he was such a scatterbrain that he didn't act on it.

* [[Wire Dilemma]]: Done in the season five challenge "Tick, Tock, Boom!"

 

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[[Category:Reality TV]]