Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy

That's one stylish newscaster.

"He had a voice that could make a wolverine purr, and suits so fine they made Sinatra look like a hobo. In other words, Ron Burgundy was the balls."

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy is a comedy starring Will Ferrell.

It is The Seventies, the age of strange haircuts, polyester, wide lapels, and swinging bachelors. Ron Burgundy is the top anchor of the #1 news program in San Diego. He is somewhat demanding.

One day, the nebbish who runs the station hires a new co-anchor, Veronica, who happens to be female. Burgundy (like most males in the film) is sexist, and so it's near-hatred at first sight. It doesn't help that the lady wants to be a serious newscaster but is assigned stories about kittens in trees.

The film is about how this becomes a Slap Slap Kiss situation - how Burgundy falls for her, and she for him, and they try to make things up with each other even while the news is still happening.

Oh, and there is lots of 1970s-style decadence.

A straight-to-DVD movie was made with various outtakes, unused plot concepts, and clips from the final movie called Wake Up, Ron Burgundy. The plot concerns a radical team of bank robbers being investigated by the Action 4 team. They refer to themselves as "The Alarm Clock", seeking to "wake up" San Diego. The companion movie was released with Anchorman as a special gift.

8 years after its release, Will Ferrel showed up in character on Conan to play some jazz flute....oh, and also to announce they were finally making a sequel — which was released in December 2013.

Tropes used in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy include:

• Agree to Disagree
• Ambiguously Gay: Champ.
• Avengers Assemble: "News team... ASSEMBLE!" They've actually been standing behind him the whole time.
• Badass Boast:

Ron: I don't know how to put this, but... I'm kind of a big deal. People know me. I'm very important. I own many leather-bound books, and my apartment smells of rich mahogany.

• Beard of Sorrow: Ron grows one after he gets fired.
• Berserk Button: Insulting Ron's hair.
  • Don't talk about Wes's mother, she's a saint!
• Big Damn Heroes: Played with. Ron attempts this, utterly failing ("I immediately regret this decision!"), the rest of the news team does pretty well, but it's Baxter who saves the day.
• Big No: After the biker punts Baxter off the bridge
• Bilingual Bonus: The restaurant the women go to is "Escupimos en su Alimento" (Spanish for "we spit in your food")
• Bloody Hilarious: Channel 2's news anchor losing both arms.
• Bottled Cool: Sex Panther by Odeon. It's illegal in nine countries. It's made with bits of real panther, so you know it's good. It smells like bigfoot's dick
• Cain and Abel: A deleted scene reveals that Ron and Wes Mantooth are half-brothers.

Wes Mantooth: I hate you Ron Burgundy! I hate you.

• Chew Bubblegum: This great quote by Veronica Corningstone (Christina Applegate).

Corningstone: Because I am good at three things: Fighting, screwing, and reading the news. I've already done one of those today, so what's the other one gonna be? Huh?

• Cloudcuckoolander: Brick
• Cluster F-Bomb: In the uncut version, following Ron's exile from Action 4.
• Comically Missing the Point: Brick: "I would like to extend to you an invitation to the pants party."
  • This little gem:

Veronica: I'm good at three things: fighting, screwing, and reading the news. I've already done one of those today, so what's the other one gonna be? Huh? Ed (hopefully): Uh...screwing?

• Critical Research Failure: In-universe, Ron's brief summary of the history of San Diego.

Ron: Discovered by the Germans in...1904. They named it "Sandiaago". Which, of course, in German means "a whale's vagina".

• The Cuckoolander Was Right: Brick's statement that women's periods attract bears sounds like another one of his bizarre comments, but it turns out to be important in the climax.
• Cue Card: This is a plot point, Ron Burgundy relies on teleprompters to do the news.
• Did I Just Say That Out Loud?: "VERONICA CORNINGSTONE AND I HAD SEX, AND WE ARE IN LOVE!"
• Disney Acid Sequence: Pleasure Town!

Ron: Look! It's the most glorious rainbow ever! Veronica: Do me on it!

• Disproportionate Retribution: The biker who's accidentally pelted by Ron's burrito punts Ron's dog off a bridge. He does get better.
• The Ditz: Brick.
• Elephant in the Living Room: Champ declares his love for Ron whilst the news team is in the car. Extreme awkwardness ensues as Ron and Brian concentrate very hard on ignoring him.
• Epic Hail: Subverted, in that they were in the same building the whole time.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: This little exchange:

Champ Kind: I will smash your face into a car windshield, and then take your mother, Dorothy Mantooth, out for a nice seafood dinner and never call her again! Wes Mantooth: Dorothy Mantooth is a saint! You understand me? Dorothy Mantooth is a saint! Ron Burgundy: Hey, let's leave the mothers out of this.

• Everybody Was Kung-Fu Fighting: Every anchorman apparently keeps weapons on their person, at all times.
• Everything's Worse with Bears: They can smell menstruation.
• Five-Man Band:
  • The Hero: Ron
  • The Lancer: Brian
  • The Big Guy: Champ
  • The Smart Guy/The Sixth Ranger: Veronica
  • The Chick: Brick
  • Team Pet: Baxter.
• Hilarious Outtakes: Even includes an outtake from Smokey and the Bandit II, which was the first film to include outtakes in its closing credits.
• Human Interest Story
• Hyperspace Arsenal: "Brick, where'd you get that hand grenade?" "I don't know..."
• I HATE YOU, BUT YOU HATE ME MORE!
• I Take Offense to That Last One: Ron is only enraged by Veronica insulting his hair.
• It Tastes Like Feet: "It smells like Bigfoot's dick!"
• It Will Never Catch On: Ron's opinion on Sports Center.

Ron: "Sports Center? That's just dumb..."

• • The Alarm Clock's "manifesto" in Wake Up Ron Burgundy.

Maya Rudolph: Electric cars? Man, are you high right now?

• Kent Brockman News
• Kick the Dog: Right off a bridge (though in the TV-edited version, it was Throw the Dog). He gets better, though.
• Lame Comeback: "Oh yeah? Well you're about to be in ... dead place."
• Large Ham: Most of the news team, but everything that comes out of Ron's mouth would qualify.
• Leave the Camera Running: In-universe example with Ron Burgundy himself: "I love scotch. Scotchy-scotch-scotch."
• Major Injury Underreaction: When Luke Wilson's anchorman gets his arm chopped off by Tim Robbins — "Oh, man! I did NOT see that coming!"
  • Later when the other arm is bitten off by a bear — "Oh, this is ri-goddamn-diculous!"
• Male Gaze: The entire Newsteam has some intense Perverse Sexual Lust for Veronica. Just to drive the point home, about half of her early scenes involve the guys gushing about her shapely butt.
• Naked Apron: Veronica wears one in Ron's fantasy.
• Narrator: Real-life anchorman Bill Curtis doing the opening and closing narration. Most people know him from A&E crime-show narration ("the Menendez brothers..."), but for anybody who grew up watching him on CBS 2-WBBM in Chicago, this was a special treat
• Noodle Incident:

"Put down the gun, and let the marching band go. We'll play it off as a prank."

• • Also, why Brick's charity golf game won't be repeated.

"Too many people died last year."

• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Many of the characters are based on real San Diego newscasters that were well known to locals back in the 70's.
  • Though Ron Burgundy himself is allegedly based on a Santa Barbara anchor.
• Oh, Hi There.: Veronica "catches" Ron doing his weightlifting

"I don't know if you heard me counting, I did over a thousand."

• Porn Stache: Several (there's two in the poster alone). Ben Stiller, for one. Also, Danny Trejo.
• Raging Stiffie: "Don't act like you're not impressed."
• Redemption Equals Death: Mildly played with at the end with Wes Mantooth.
• Serious Business: Competition between local news teams is cranked Up to Eleven.
• The Seventies in full effect
• Sex Equals Love: The aftermath of the trippy "Pleasure Town" sequence
• Shirtless Scene: It's time to get your tickets to the gun show.
• Small Name, Big Ego: Ron
• Smoking Hot Sex
• Take That: During the "where are they now" narration near the end of the movie, the narrator states that Brick Tamland become "one of the top political advisors to the Bush White House".
• This Is for Emphasis, Bitch: "Como están, bitches?"
• Transparent Closet: Champ Kind

"I miss your scent, Ron, your musk..."

• • He's later fired from ESPN for sexually harassing Terry Bradshaw.
• Truth in Television: Local TV news in San Diego does love a good baby panda story. It helps the realism that the San Diego Zoo is one of the few zoos outside of China that houses giant pandas.
• Unusual Euphemism: Pretty much every single one in the film.

Ron: Knights of Columbus, that hurt!

• Volleying Insults: Ron and Veronica in the news room before it gets physical.

Ron: "You are a smelly pirate hooker. Why don't you go back to your home on Whore Island?!"

• Workout Fanservice: While attempting to invoke this, Ron Burgundy invites Veronica into his office while "sculpting [his] guns." However, this didn't work, since Ron is out of shape and he refers to his arms as "guns" usually.
• World of Ham: It would be easier to list the lines that aren't hammy.
• Yeah! Shot
• Yet Another Baby Panda