Most cliched event in History

The United States entering World War One and Two. Some would call it the deus ex machina of history.

Empires Falling.Why can't one live? Why do all of them have to fail!

I think it's mainly due to the saturation of the films, but anything WWII related on the US side.

Pearl Harbor and its aftermath. The good guys get suddenly attacked by the bad guys, so now they must sally forth to kick some evil arse? Oldest story in the book.

Gen. MacArthur returning to the Philippines to retake it after he declared "I shall return." upon his retreat 3 years earlier.

I've always thought that the pope drawing the line of demarcation and the Treaty of Tordesillas.

Pope Man was like, "Yo, so here you guys go; you get this half and, you well, you get this half. Totally fair, everyone in Europe will definitely pay attention to this... Because, I'm the pope, screw you."

"Actually, naw Pope Man, we don't like your line; it's time to draw a new one."

These events have always just seemed strange to me.

The entire concept of the Holy Roman Empire

Cliched = too predictable as a common literary theme to be real (although in this case it is real).

I'd almost have to boil it down to a top 5:

1) The badly outnumbered Greek city-states banding together to defeat the whole freaking Persian Empire (It's so formulaic that there's NO F-ING WAY THAT WOULD EVER HAPPEN, but it did).

2) Every time France or Germany or Sweden or whoever has tried to march on Moscow and wound up freezing, starving, or both.

3) Abraham Lincoln making a deal with God in 1862, amid rebel invasions of both Kentucky and Maryland, that if He will just grant the Union forces a good solid win, just one, Lincoln will announce freedom for the slaves. Sure enough, by a miracle the Rebel marching orders fall into Union hands and the rest is history. (Watch this one on our Emperor's channel, although it's Harry Turtledove's alternate scenario that gets explored.)

4) Steppe nomads that defeat major world powers (I mean jeeesh! Really? Again? We couldn't see this coming after the Scythians, the Medo-Persians, the Goths, the Huns, the Bulgars, the Magyars, the Shong-nu, the Turks, the Pechenegs, the Mongols, the Tartars, Timur the Lame... HOW ARE THESE TINY PEOPLE GROUPS ABLE TO DO IT? HOW? They should be stepped on and pop like beetles. All they have is mobility. They lack numbers, they lack tactical, strategic training, they lack technological supremacy, not to mention FUNDING. But it happens OVER AND OVER, the same damn thing... Sometimes they even capture Imperial Capitals. Sometimes they hold territory stretching from the Black Sea to the Pacific! Where do these people keep coming from? It's even a theme from the Book of Revelation... So Cliche, so impossible, such an obvious literary device! BUT NO: It's real. And awesome.)

5) Every war the United States has ever gotten into. At first it was, scrappy young Democracy vs. The World, just about like the Greece vs. Persia story. Then it became "Don't piss off America, they will own your a$$ and nuke the snot out of you." Then it became, but a determined guerrilla resistance movement, if carried on long enough, will bring the mighty empire to it's knees. SO I guess this is kinda #5, #6 and #7, LOL!

OH, and that Divine Wind thing was ridiculous too! Absolutely no way that happened. Twice.
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