White Collar/YMMV

• Ensemble Darkhorse: Diana, who was only in the pilot, but was brought back as a full time regular in season two because of her popularity.
• Foe Yay: Between Caffrey and pretty much all of the female criminals.
  • Some of the male ones too.
• Follow the Leader: With the success of Burn Notice, USA seems to like the motif of an exiled protagonist returning to his usual lifestyle. Also includes using terminology frequently used on NCIS (such as "Probie" and BOLO), which is frequently replayed on USA. However, to be fair, those are real phrases used by law enforcment.
  • Other similarities are evident between Neal Caffrey's and Michal Westons' M.O.s - conning a bad guy to reveal his plans/hiding place/incriminating evidence and figuring out a "that's what I'd do" plan when trying to get inside the mind of an antagonist.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: In the seventh episode of the first season, they catch a lackey because, upon exiting a secret tunnel, he turns to look at a girl and gets caught on camera. We find out the meaning of the following exchange a few seasons later when we learn exactly how Peter caught Neal the first time. The affected casualness of the last two lines really sells it. And it even works at the time because Neal always, always hits on every woman in sight. Successfully.

Peter: Guy steals three point two million in diamonds and we get him because he can't resist a pretty face. Neal: Happens to the best of us. Peter: [pointed glance] Neal: What? Peter: ... You know what. Neal: No I don't. Peter: Yes you do.

• Ho Yay: Oh yes. There's a reason the fandom's main ship is Neal/Peter/Elizabeth.
• New Knowledge as The Plot Demands: Not as egregrious as some examples, but definitely Neal.
• Magnificent Bastard: Neal, Peter & Elizabeth. Curtis Hagen even calls Neal a 'particular kind of bastard' in the pilot.
• Mary Sue: A lot of people find Peter more interesting than Neal simply because Neal seems to have no significant faults. As an example, being a crack shot with a gun he's never handled before, despite being, quote, "not much of a gun guy."
  • Neal never specifically said that he hadn't handled the gun before, just that he didn't like it.
  • If you think Neal doesn't have faults after pretty much everything he does in the second half of "Point Blank"...
    • Forget "Point Blank", the entire second season shows how messed up Neal is. Then again, who wouldn't be after watching your girlfriend die in a fire.
  • Alongside plenty of the rest of season 2 after "Point Blank" has shown just how flawed and complex Neal really is, such as his wish to get away from crime and desires life more like Peter's. So, at this point, the trope has been subverted.
  • Alex seems like a Mary Sue as well: she's a gorgeous criminal with ties to Neal--the type of original character one would find in a fanfic.
    • OTOH, given that this is a cops-and-criminals show with the entirety of the female cast being highly attractive, it seems to be par for the course.
  • Lampshaded slightly in "On Guard" when Peter keeps Neal's severed tie as a memento of, as Peter puts it, a rare moment of imperfection.
• Never Live It Down: In "Forging Bonds", Burke becomes the butt of a number of jokes after inadvertently meeting Neal and letting him get away, and he keeps the lollipop Neal gave him as an eternal reminder of that fact. A more humorous one would be when Neal distributes pictures of Burke's mustache to his entire department.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Neal's stolen treasure ends up and the lies/cons he's wrapped up around it to hide and protect it manage to get Elizabeth kidnapped by Keller.
• One-Scene Wonder: In "Judgement Day", Bosch of Sterling-Bosch, who helps save Neal's bacon.
• OT 3: The fandom is fairly satisfied. Also averts Die for Our Ship, mostly due to Elizabeth's sheer awesomeness. The show itself also heaps piping-hot servings of OT 3 subtext onto our plates.
• Special Effects Failure: The end of the first season finale, when Kate's plane explodes. The season two premiere creates one in the form of a horrible green screen when Peter and Elizabeth are eating. The green screen is also evident whenever they are talking over the phone. This was an attempt to hide Tiffani Thiessen's pregnancy.
• Some Anvils Need to Be Dropped: Most of the later Season 3 episodes have not been subtle in stating that despite the whole ankle bracelet thing, Neal's currently living the good life. He's no longer running from the FBI, has a job, a permanent home, and lots of new friends. And yet he's still willing to throw it all away for what he thinks he wants.
  • In his own words, Neal describes the con as an addiction or a rush. Only hitting rock bottom has a chance of changing someone from that life... and he (again in his own words) hasn't even hit rock bottom.
• Tear Jerker: Everything involving Peter and Elizabeth's marriage in "Veiled Threat". Sure, they make up, but watching a normally Happily Married pair have their relationship disintegrate through no fault of their own is heartbreaking.
• Unfortunate Implications: "For the next four years, you belong to me."
  • Planning to profit from Nazi loot is okay if it's a Loveable Rogue doing it, apparently. Rather than, you know, trying to find the legitimate owners or their descendants. Eastin tried to ameliorate it by mentioning in his Twitter that the art came from museums. Because it's not like a good chunk of the art in the Reich's museums was appropriated/outright stolen from undesirables after the Nazi party came to power in 1933. Oh wait...
    • Mozzie mentioned that the art was from Russian museums.
  • Well, the show has been portraying the sale of the Nazi treasure as an ultimately morally bad thing, though not for the exact reasons stated above.
  • Many pieces of art have a history of bloodshed to them, and it's rare for anyone to try to find the legitimate owners or their descendants. The Nazis were evil, but they didn't even manage to reach their goal, whereas, there have been groups of people who have successfully committed acts of mass genocide, taking treasures and works of art of the dead. And then, there's works of art that don't have a history of bloodshed to them that have been put in museums while the descendants of their creators have tried unsuccessfully to get them released. This argument irritates me because I doubt if the treasure was that of some tribe that was wiped out by the newcomers to America, or that of an Islamic tribe wiped out by the Catholic church, or really any other group of people that were targeted by anyone but the Nazis viewers would be so quick to call Neal and Mozzie out.