Plot devices and literary techniques

Reset button technique - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
a plot device that interrupts continuity in works of fiction. Simply put, use of a reset button device returns all characters and situations to the status quo they held before a major change of some sort was introduced

Examples of the reset button technique include dream sequences, alternate-history flashbacks, parallel universes, "alternate realities", "alternate timelines", daydreams, time travel and hallucinations. Occasionally, a character will find himself in a situation that seems familiar but during the episode some things seem odd, and then something major happens such as a lead character having a significantly different position or dying.

Deus ex machina - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
a plot device in which a person or thing appears "out of the blue" to help a character to overcome a seemingly insolvable difficulty.

Framing device - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
refers to the usage of the same single action, scene, event, setting, or any element of significance at both the beginning and end of an artistic, musical, or literary work. The repeated element thus creates a ‘frame’ within which the main body of work can develop.

Familiar examples of this include the Arabian Nights where Scheherazade must narrate stories in order to prevent her execution, Boccaccio's Decameron where young people away from Florence to avoid the plague pass the time telling stories, and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in which the host at the inn charges the travellers with each providing a tale.

- In Titanic (1997) Old Rose tells the story to the modern day treasure hunter.
- Slumdog Millionaire
- CSI episodes seem to loosely follow this framing from Sherlock Holmes
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle often structured his detective stories in frames. The crime was reported, Sherlock Holmes solved the crime, and then he explained the solution to Dr. Watson. Thus the reader gets three looks at the same event.

Cold open - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
he technique of jumping directly into a story at the beginning or opening of the show, before the title sequence or opening credits are shown. On television this is often done on the theory that involving the audience in the plot as soon as possible will reduce the likelihood of their switching away from a show.