- Did you know that a huge reason
English changes so often is just movies and TV?
It has such a huge impact on the daily English
that we use...daily.
If a movie or TV show is that popular,
and then one of the characters just invents a new word?
- Derp. - MILF!
- The Dark Side
- We repeat it in real conversation.
And then it just becomes part of language.
And if the movie's so famous
that people know what the story is,
we just use the movie title as a verb
to quickly explain a situation like...
- You're gonna Can't Buy Me Love me.
You know, transforming me from zero to hero, geek to chic.
- Oh, he wants us to Love Don't Cost a Thing him.
- Please, She's All That me.
- So today you'll learn 10 new English idioms
and expressions that came from movies and TV shows.
(relaxed music)
To catfish.
We all know this one, right?
You meet someone online. You think, wow, you're pretty.
You start talking. You think, wow, we're soulmates.
But then you meet and in real life,
they aren't who they say they are.
This situation came from the original documentary Catfish
which later spawned the amazing MTV show Catfish.
And now everyone understands the term catfish
to mean someone who pretends to be
someone else, usually online.
I don't think I've ever been catfished, but honestly,
when you're talking to people online,
you're never really sure who that person is.
Please be careful out there.
So to use catfish, you could use it like a noun.
"That girl you're talking to. I think she's a catfish.
Or as a verb.
"I think she's catfishing you."
The origin of the term catfish came from that documentary.
One guy said if you put catfish in with cod
it makes the cod last longer,
because it keeps them on their toes,
keeps them guessing, they can't relax.
And he compared that to people,
saying it's good that people act like catfish
because it keeps us on our toes,
keeps us guessing and keeps life interesting.
I don't know if I agree with that, but I dunno.
What do you think?
"As if."
This next one comes from an amazingly
90s movie called Clueless.
If you haven't seen it, Paul Rudd's in it,
and yeah he just doesn't age.
Anyway, when a guy wants to ask
the main character, Cher, out, her response is this.
- Ugh, as if!
- Everyone understands that she's saying definitely not.
That would never happen.
For example, if your boss wants you to work on your day off,
you might want to say "as if."
Be careful though.
Don't actually use it in a business situation.
It's not formal, and it's very direct.
You're saying "Yeah, absolutely no, no."
And like I said, it's also from the 90s.
So maybe it's cool to say in like a retro way,
but it is already old fashioned.
I'm sorry, millennials, it's true.
"To gaslight someone."
When someone tries to convince you
that what you see with your own eyes,
hear with your own ears isn't actually happening,
they might make you question your sanity.
And it's usually just for their own benefit,
Like they're lying and they want you to think you are crazy.
They are gaslighting you.
- [Announcer] Puts up a three for the win, no good!
- For example, if a girl sees with her own eyes
her boyfriend kissing another girl,
but when she asks him about it,
his reply is "No, no, you imagined it.
It's all in your head. You're crazy."
Then that person is gaslighting you.
I thought this expression came about in like 2016
when all the Trump stuff happened.
But actually no, this expression comes
from 1944 in a movie of the same name, Gaslight.
The story is the same, husband tries to convince his wife
that she's going crazy.
- Rick, are you trying to tell me I'm insane?
- That all the things that she's seeing
and hearing aren't actually real
- What?
- You have nothing in your hand.
- So like, yeah, don't Gaslight people.
It's not cool.
"Your bucket list."
Now, apparently according to the internet
this expression didn't exist before the movie
the Bucket List in 2007.
However, I definitely remember using it
and seeing it before that movie,
unless the internet is gaslighting me on this.
Anyway, it comes from the expression to kick the bucket,
which is like a jokey way to say die.
And your "bucket list" is everything that you want to do
before you die, before you kick the bucket.
So what's on your bucket list? Let me know in the comments.
For me, I don't know, what's on my bucket list?
I haven't gone skydiving yet.
That would be on there.
However, that's probably the way that I would die.
So maybe, I don't know.
Do you remember the year 2020 when every day felt the same?
You wake up, brush your teeth, go not go to work,
eat more food, go to sleep, repeat for the whole year.
Everyone described that situation
as being in Groundhog Day.
In the movie the guy Phil gets stuck in a 24 hour loop.
Every day he has to repeat the exact same day,
over and over again, so if you have that sort of situation
where your every day doesn't change,
feels like you are in a loop,
you're in Groundhog Day, my friend.
"A glitch in the Matrix."
When something happens in real life
that shouldn't exist because it looks physically impossible,
like all the other clouds are moving,
but there's one cloud, which is perfectly still
and doesn't move, that shouldn't exist, right?
You might say, "It's like a glitch in the Matrix."
Of course, this comes from the movie the Matrix,
where he sees two identical cats walk past each other.
He just says, "Oh, it's deja vu."
But his besties are like, "Yeah, no mate.
That's a... - Glitch in the matrix."
- And if English isn't your first language,
a glitch is something where your laptop,
your phone, some machine does something it shouldn't do.
For example, if you tap the volume button on your phone
and it takes a photo, that's a glitch.
It's like saying if we lived in the Matrix,
someone messed up the programming,
because that's a glitch, that shouldn't exist.
"A mind-meld."
I've used this so many times
and I never realized it came from Star Trek.
In the show, it's a technique to share thoughts,
experiences, memories and knowledge with someone else.
It's like telepathy.
However, in real life, we use this
before a meeting where we are gonna
share thoughts or make a plan
or brainstorm with another person.
Not telepathy, but we still call
this idea session a "mind-meld."
Ah, we need a plan for this project.
Okay. Let's meet at 2:00 PM, we can mind-meld,
think of some ideas about how to do this.
(bell dings)
"Spam."
When I was researching this video,
this was the expression that hit me most like,
"Whoa, that's where this comes from?"
So those emails that you get,
which are like rubbish asking for money,
or trying to sell you something that doesn't exist.
we call them spam emails or just spam.
And the reason we call it spam is from Monty Python.
In this one, sketch, they go to a cafe
and they try to order something,
but everything on the menu is just spam, spam, spam.
They can't escape the spam everywhere.
See the connection? So now you know.
"To jump the shark."
This one is more uniquely to describe movies or TV shows.
Think of a really popular TV show.
If that TV show lasts a long time,
eventually people get bored and people stop watching.
But then the TV show does something crazy
to try to get people watching again.
They're like, "Whoa, see, we're still interesting."
This comes from a TV show called Happy Days.
Literally the main character
jumped over a shark on water skis.
Apparently this seemed too obvious as a stunt
to just try and win people back and it was unnecessary,
because now this expression lives on
to describe a TV show that does something large
and unnecessary to try to win back viewers.
"Wait, walking dead has pirates and ninjas now?
This show has really jumped the shark."
And finally, "my bad."
There is some confusion over when
the first time this expression appeared.
Some say it was Clueless.
- [Cyclist] Watch out for the bike lane!
- Oops, my bad.
- Some say it was Louis Armstrong in the 50s.
And some say that Shakespeare invented it.
This is a very quick, casual "Sorry, my bad."
So don't use this with serious things.
For example, if you run over someone's cat,
don't say, "Oops, my bad," because it sounds very casual,
and it doesn't sound sincere.
If you need a sincere apology, I made a whole video
about different ways to say sorry.
You can find it here.
So have you ever been gaslit by someone?
Have you ever been catfished?
Ever had a Groundhog day situation,
or seen a glitch in the matrix that shouldn't be there?
Let me know in the comments,
and to my favorite comments, I'll give little tiny hearts.
Don't forget, you can study more English with my ebook.
It's available on patriot.com/papateachme,
or my website, PapaTeachMe.com,
and I'll see you in the next class, bye.
(relaxed music)