What is your favorite bottle episode?
I'll go first.
Winner:
Breaking Bad, season 3 episode 10, "Fly"
Honorable mention:
Community, season 3 episode 10, "Cooperative Calligraphy"
PS: I'm having a hard time categorizing these as real bottle episodes since they don't feel cheap or "fillery" at all, but they are at least spatially and plot wise confined.
50 replies
So, not a TV show, but Small Gods is a Discworld book that minimally interacts with other books in the series. If you've never read Discworld and are intimidated by those reading order diagrams, it's a bottle book.
and it's fucking awesome 🙌
Ever seen Man From Earth? Technically it's a movie but the whole thing happens in one location.
Sweet. This reminds me of that movie that "follows" a man sitting in a zoom call while the world is under attack or something.
None. Bottles sucks. I prefer bare wine.
Red? White? Dry? Sweet? So help me God if you say Rosé.
Linux. ^^
And yeah, Rosé. Which is not a blend of red and white wine.
It's just white wine with the tiniest little drop of ketchup added.
Really, Grenache, Cinsault, Syrah, Pinot Noir or Sangiovese are typical Rosé berries. It's just fermented without skins. Mixing is not allowed, at least in europe.
What did I JUST say? 💀
As for me, I prefer sweet red wines. I know the correct term is probably not "sweet", but I'm referring to those Hungarian red wines that are literally sweet. The Romanian La Revedere comes close too.
The Box - Brooklyn 99 - s5e14
It made me a Sterling K. Brown fan for life.
Either SG1s Grace or SGAs 38 Minutes.
I cry every time at Grace. 🩷 And forgive me, but 38 Minutes is h0t (and performance wise awesome) af. 🥰
Not a episode, but the movie Greyhound is one of my favorite WWII movies and it takes place almost entirely inside the warships cabin
Best friends forever from South Park.
At the end, there is a battle happening off screen that is supposedly more epic than the battles of lord of the rings.
When they pan to it, it’s like 3 soldiers with a few pools of blood.
Never heard about this term before, so: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bottle_episode
Thanks! I was wondering too.
Alternative tvtropes link, since that's where I thought to look: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BottleEpisode
Nooooo! You just caused me another hour lost at that site!
That site is an SCP cognitohazard
It's never too late 😊
Doctor Who reboot, season 3 episode 10: Blink. Minimal Doctor action, great villain and introduced Carey Mulligan to mainstream audiences.
Midnight, from a few seasons later, is my personal pick. The Doctor is there the whole time, but he's just stranded on a bus with a few strangers. Great example of that "nothing is scarier" type of horror.
Blink is great, but it is not a bottle episode.
Edit: I stand corrected. Abed led me to believe a bottle episode happens in one place, but it's any episode designed around minimizing cost.
https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Bottle_Episode
Which was still not Blink. Blink was designed to allow two episodes to be shot simultaneously but it is not a bottle episode. It uses new locations and new characters (almost exclusively, even)
Reading the Wikipedia page for Blink, I can't see any justification whatsoever for calling it a bottle episode. I assumed from the upvotes, people knew something I didn't, but, no, they just liked the episode so they upvoted the comment.
It's listed in the link you posted as a bottle episode, so I'll stand by it. 🍾
Well, I guess it's time to get involved with a wiki project, because I'm calling bullshit.
Effects
Moffat joked that "since I was a kid, I've been thinking of Doctor Who monsters, just now when I do, it costs the art department […] a lot of money".[8] To create the rigid structure of the angels' dresses, prosthetics supervisors Rob Mayor soaked fabric in fibreglass resin, which was then painted over.[8] Although they are never shown moving on screen, all of the Weeping Angels were played by actresses Aga Blonska and Elen Thomas wearing makeup and prosthetics.[2][8] The actresses wore two distinct masks: one that was more docile looking, and one with fangs bared.[8] Blonska later noted that "I'm partly painted, partly glued into the costume, but it's quite comfortable."[23] Although the actresses were slightly "wobbly" when they stood still, the producers used digital effects to, in essence, freeze the angels on film.[9] Moffat was very pleased with the results, and called them "fantastic".[8] Mulligan later called the effects "so good" and "really creepy".[8]
The argument seems to be based entirely on Tenant t being absent, and fewer special effects than otherwise. Since INTENT seems to matter--for instance the Seinfeld bottle episode of the chinese restaruant was intended as a bottle episode but the budget ballooned due to set construction--I think we need either a statement of intent from the creators in cases where the bottley nature of the episode is not immediately obvious, and I don't think Blink is at all obvious.
Well that's just 90% of doctor who up until about the end of Tennant.
what is a "bottle episode"?
When a show ran out of money or wanted to spend extra on other episodes they’d either do a clip show or a bottle episode. A bottle episode traditionally uses only standing sets and existing cast under contract, with no special props or costumes.
And because they're relying almost solely on pure plot / storytelling to carry the episode, they're often some of the best episodes in an entire series.
They sacrifice plot, and theoretically compensate with character.
Usually called a "bottleneck episodes" because the characters are trapped in a room together. So much of the episode is dialogue based.
Who calls them "bottleneck episodes"? That doesn't make sense. The episode is a bottle episode because it is bottled up in one location. A bottleneck episode would mean that one episode somehow dictated the maximum speed of the series?
Why would the name suddenly be about the whole series if it's an episode description.
It's because episodes tend to be about getting out of the room/place/event. They're stuck trying to get out.
lol….. no.
Archer - Vision Quest
Star Trek:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Drumhead
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meld_(Star_Trek:_Voyager
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Night_In_Sickbay
Seinfeld “The Chinese Restaurant” S02E11
OZ: every episode was a bottle episode.
I love how this became an actual artistic niche, instead of simply being a means to cut costs.
So many good ones. They're often done to save budget, but if written well they can be some of the best in their series.
First thing that popped into my head though was Twilight Zone, "Five Characters in Search of an Exit".
Red Dwarf - Marooned
Only because OP took my 2 favourites already.
TWELVE? Twelve years old? You lost your virginity when you were twelve?
Yeah.
Twelve? You can't have been a full member of the golf club then!
Ren and Stimpy: “Rubber Nipple Salesmen”
Inside No. 9
Every episode is a bottle episode.
Stargate - Window of Opportunity
Fantastic episode 🩷