History Main / DepartmentOfMajorVexation

* ''WesternAnimation/MegasXLR'': In the episode "DMV - Department of Megas Violations", the titular HumongousMecha gets impounded and Coop has to go to the DMV to get a new driver's license since his current one was expired. By the time Coop finds out he needs to retake a driving test and the driving instructor refuses to give him an exception to allow him to save the world, citing that exceptions would cause the place to fall apart, Coop ends up having an [[ImagineSpot imagine spot]] where he destroys the DMV [[NoKillLikeOverkill with the MEGAS' excessive firepower]] [[LaughingMad while laughing maniacally.]]

* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Zootopia}}'', Protagonists Nick and Judy need to run a license plate but the DMV is staffed by sloths. It takes an eternity for Flash, the DMV agent, to type the plate number into the system. But the OverlyLongGag becomes [[ExaggeratedTrope even more excruciating]] when Nick asks if Flash wants to hear a joke just as he is about to type in the final digit. It delays the interaction further.

VideoGame/AnnasQuest: A dungeon runned by Devil himself works on that intentionally. Because of that even if you win his challenge you won't get a form needed to release you.

[[VideoGame/PrzygodyReksia City of Secrets]]: To be able to reach a Mayor's audience you have to get walk around city to different offices and bring random items. Because of that no one was able to reach it, as it would reveal [[ShadowDictator Mayor's]] true identity.

* ''{{Series/Mash}}'': The entire [[UsefulNotes/UnitedStates U.S.]] military often becomes this {{trope}}, with Radar needing to resort to judicious use of friend-of-a-friend contacts to make crucial (even life-saving) deals. The requisitions department in particular often fouls up along the show's run, sending bulk summer clothes and hammocks during a record cold and sending bulk orders of diapers to a front-line surgical unit.

When a character has occasion to visit a government office, it will be staffed by {{Obstructive Bureaucrat}}s who are [[AcceptableProfessionalTargets lazy, unhelpful, or even downright rude]]. And that's after the character is forced to TakeANumber and stay RightOnQueue in a labyrinth of stanchions for an eternity just to reach the counter in the first place.

* ''Series/{{MADtv}}'': [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] when Miss Swan tries to obtain a replacement license after giving hers to a [[MinorWithFakeID boy who wanted to buy beer]]. The agent isn't about to win any awards for their cordiality. But, it's [[{{Jerkass}} Ms. Swan]] who engages in antics and dishes out the majority of the abuse.

* ''WesternAnimation/MegasXLR'': In the episode "DMV - Department of Megas Violations", the titular HumongousMecha gets impounded and Coop has to go to the DMV to get a new driver's license since his current one was expired. By the time Coop finds out he needs to retake a driving test and the driving instructor refuses to give him an exception to allow him to save the world, citing that exceptions would "bring the place down", Coop ends up having an [[ImagineSpot imagine spot]] where he destroys the DMV [[NoKillLikeOverkill with the MEGAS' excessive firepower]] [[LaughingMad while laughing maniacally.]]
-->'''Coop''': (grumbling) I'll give you "bring the place down".

-->''Coop'': (grumbling) I'll give you "bring the place down".

* ''WesternAnimation/MegasXLR'': In the episode "DMV - Department of Megas Violations", the titular HumongousMecha gets impounded and Coop has to go to the DMV to get a new driver's license since his current one was expired.

* ''Series/{{MADtv}}'': [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] when Miss Swan tries to obtain a replacement license after giving her's to a [[MinorWithFakeID boy who wanted to buy beer]]. The agent isn't about to win any awards for their cordiality. But, it's [[{{Jerkass}} Ms. Swan]] who engages in antics and dishes out the majority of the abuse.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' depicts the entirety of Elmore's city hall as this. Trying to get anything officially approved or legally changed means that you have to live by the ''their'' [[RealityWarper standards of time and reality]]. If you're not sure what line you need to wait in, you'll be told you need to go wait in the line to tell you what line you need to stand in. If you move around the line ropes, you create a literal [[InsurmountableWaistHighFence insurmountable]] labyrinth of red tape. Physically shoving someone will result in a DelayedCausality where they won't feel it until they're up next for service.

* Residents of Elmore who apply for any legal approval or service in ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' are required live by the the city's standards of time and reality. Patrons who are not sure which queue to join are directed to wait in line to find out which line they need to wait in.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' depicts the entirety of Elmore's city hall as this. Trying to get anything officially approved or legally changed means that you have to live by the ''their'' standards of time and reality. If you're not sure what line you need to wait in, you'll be told you need to go wait in the line to tell you what line you need to stand in. If you move around the line ropes, you create a literal labyrinth of red tape. Physically shoving someone will result in a DelayedCausality where they won't feel it until they're up next for service.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' depicts the entirety of Elmore's city hall as this. Trying to get anything officially approved or legally changed means that you have to live by the ''their'' standards of time and reality. If you're not sure what line you need to wait in, you'll be told you need to go wait in the line to figure out what line you need to stand in. If you move around the line ropes, you create a literal labyrinth of red tape. And physically shoving someone will result in a DelayedCausality where they won't feel it until they're up next for service.

[[AC: {{Film}} -- Animated]]
* ''WesternAnimation/TheTwelveTasksOfAsterix:'' The eighth task is to retrieve Permit A-38 from a bureaucratic institution known only as "The Place That Sends You Mad", where every employee is entirely unhelpful, busy with something else or slacking, and knows very little about the procedures, leading both heroes in an endless chain of visiting other offices and being ping-ponged between bureaucrats that keep sending them to other bureaucrats that ''also'' won't help and barely know. Asterix manages to turn the tables by asking for a permit that doesn't exist; since the employees themselves ''cannot'' be sure the permit doesn't actually exist, they throw themselves into their own loop of paperwork until they're all entirely insane, with one handing Asterix the real Permit A-38 just to get him out of there.
* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Zootopia}}'', Protagonists Nick and Judy need to run a license plate but the DMV is staffed by sloths. It takes an eternity for Flash, the DMV agent, to type the plate number into the system, but the OverlyLongGag becomes [[UpToEleven even more excruciating]] when Nick asks if Flash wants to hear a joke just as he is about to type in the final digit, delaying the interaction further.

[[AC:{{Literature}}]]

--> I sat down on the screwed-down chairs. Toddlers ran amok. Teenage mothers shouted and smacked. Everyone ignored the "no smoking" signs and stubbed their cigarettes out on the lino. About every ten minutes, a number flashed up on the screen, and someone got up and went through a door marked "private interviews". I didn't see anyone who went through the door come out again. This looked a bit sinister. My mother remarked "they've probably got gas chambers out there".
* ''Literature/JohannesCabalTheNecromancer'': The ''de facto'' first [[CirclesOfHell circle of hell]] is the entrance queue, where a damned bank clerk forces the "pre-damned" to fill out thousands of excruciatingly detailed forms and sends them to the back of the line for any error. The clerk isn't even malicious, just so cosmically anal-retentive that he created the system of his own initiative.

[[AC:LiveActionTV]]
* ''Series/BrooklynNineNine'': Amy tries to file some forms in order to organize a block party, having faith that the system is perfect and scoffing at Rosa's cynicism regarding the procedures. Unfortunately, she runs into a legal error in which [[Catch22Dilemma a form she must get approved can only be approved after getting another form approved that requires the original form to be approved]]. The women manage to get around the issue by exploiting another legal error allowing them to get Hitchcock to reserve space for the party under the pretense of holding a women shaming event, due to the horribly misogynistic and archaic forms having never been removed from the system.
* ''Series/{{MADtv}}'': [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] when Miss Swan tries to obtain a replacement license after giving her's to a [[MinorWithFakeID boy who wanted to buy beer]]. The agent isn't about to win any awards for their cordiality, but it's Ms. Swan who engages in antics and dishes out the majority of the abuse.

* ''{{Series/Mash}}'': The entire U.S. military often becomes this trope, with Radar needing to resort to judicious use of friend-of-a-friend contacts to make crucial (even life-saving) deals. The requisitions department in particular often fouls up along the show's run, sending bulk summer clothes and hammocks during a record cold and sending bulk orders of diapers to a front-line surgical unit.

[[AC:TabletopGames]]
* In ''TabletopGame/{{Paranoia}}'', both PLC (Production, Logistics, and Commissary) and HPD&MC (Housing Preservation and Development and Mind Control) are enormous bureaucracies that Alpha Complex citizens dread dealing with:

** In the adventure "Down and Out in Alpha Complex," the Troubleshooters are sent deep undercover. Unfortunately, their new identities were assigned jobs but nothing else (no quarters, no mess hall, no background, etc.) Once you "slip through the cracks" in Alpha Complex, getting back in requires bouncing around like a pinball between bureaucratic offices for asinine reasons [[spoiler: and turns out to be [[Catch22Dilemma impossible]] unless you find a way to cheat.]]

[[AC:WesternAnimation]]
* ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' depicts the entirety of Elmore's city hall as this. Trying to get anything officially approved or legally changed means that you have to live by the ''their'' standards of time and reality. If you're not sure what line you need to wait in, you'll be told you need to go wait in the line to figure out what line you need to stand in. If you move around the line ropes, you create a literal labyrinth of red tape, and physically shoving someone will result in a DelayedCausality where they won't feel it until they're up next for service.

[[AC:RealLife Regional Equivalents]]
* From 1968 to 1988, the British government department that dealt with welfare payments was called the Department of Health and Social Security. To people who had to negotiate the bureaucracy, which was tailored to the prejudices of politicians and the convenience of civil servants, it was known as ''the Department of Stealth and Total Obscurity''.

* ''WesternAnimation/MegasXLR'': In the episode ''DMV - Department of Megas Violations'', the titular HumongousMecha gets impounded and Coop has to go to the DMV to get a new driver's license since his current one was expired.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' depicts the entirety of Elmore's city hall as this. Trying to get anything officially approved or legally changed means that you have to live by the ''their'' standards of time and reality. If you're not sure what line you need to wait in, you'll be told you need to go wait in the line to figure out what line you need to stand in. If you move around the line ropes, you create a literal labyrinth of red tape, and physically shoving someone will result in a DelayedCausality where they won't feel it until they're up next for service.
-->'''Paper Woman:''' This is the Kingdom of Bureaucracy. Everything happens in its own time. Usually too late.

-->'''Professor Farnsworth''', ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}''

When a character has occasion to visit a government office, it will be staffed by [[ObstructiveBureaucrat Obstructive Bureaucrats]] who are [[AcceptableProfessionalTargets lazy, unhelpful, or even downright rude]]. And that's after the character is forced to TakeANumber and stay RightOnQueue in a labyrinth of stanchions for an eternity just to reach the counter in the first place.

Sometimes, the Bureaucrat is of the [[BeleagueredBureaucrat Beleaguered]] variety. They want to be helpful, but are impeded due to being overworked, inadequately trained, disgruntled from constantly taking abuse from [[UnsatisfiableCustomer Unsatisfiable Customers]], or provided with broken equipment. Expect them to be using TheAllegedComputer.

!!Examples

-->'''Agent:''' You know that's illegal, right?
-->'''Ms. Swan:''' So is prostitution, but that didn't stop [[YourMom yo mama]].
-->'''Agent:''' That's just stupid. You didn't even know my mama!
-->'''Ms. Swan:''' Neither did yo daddy.
* ''{{Series/Mash}}'': The entire U.S. military often becomes this trope, with Radar needing to resort to judicious use of friend-of-a-friend contacts to make crucial (even life-saving) deals.
** The requisitions department in particular often fouls up along the show's run, sending bulk summer clothes and hammocks during a record cold and sending bulk orders of diapers to a front-line surgical unit.

* From 1968 to 1988, the British government department that dealt with welfare payments was called the Department of Health and Social Security. To people who had to negotiate the bureaucracy, which was tailored to the prejudices of politicians and the convenience of civil servants, it was known as ''the Department of Stealth and Total Obscurity''.

* ''{{Series/Mash}}: The entire U.S. military often becomes this trope, with Radar needing to resort to judicious use of friend-of-a-friend contacts to make crucial (even life-saving) deals.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheTwelveTasksOfAsterix:'' The eighth task is to retrieve Permit A-38 from a bureaucratic institution known only as "The Place That Sends You Mad", where every employee is entirely unhelpful, busy with something else or slacking, and knows very little about the procedures, leading both heroes in an endless chain of visiting other offices and being ping-ponged between bureaucrats that keep sending them to other bureaucrats that ''also'' won't help and barely know. Asterix manages to turn the tables by asking for a permit that doesn't exist; since the employees themselves ''cannot'' be sure the permit doesn't actually exist, they throw themselves into their own loop of paperwork until they're all entirely insane, with one handing Asterix the real Permit A-38 just to get him out of there.

* The British government department that dealt with welfare payments was called the Department of Health and Social Security. To people who had to negotiate the bureaucracy, which was tailored to the prejudices of politicians and the convenience of civil servants, it was known as ''the Department of Stealth and Total Obscurity''.

* ''Series/BrooklynNineNine'': Amy tries to file some forms in order to organize a block party, having faith that the system is perfect and scoffing at Rosa's cynicism regarding the procedures. Unfortunately, she runs into a legal error in which [[LogicBomb a form she must get approved can only be approved after getting another form approved that requires the original form to be approved]]. The women manage to get around the issue by exploiting another legal error allowing them to get Hitchcock to reserve space for the party under the pretense of holding a women shaming event, due to the horribly misogynistic and archaic forms having never been removed from the system.

* Protagonists Nick and Judy need to run a license plate as part of a missing persons investigation in ''WesternAnimation/{{Zootopia}}'', but the DMV is staffed by notoriously slow sloths. It takes an eternity just for the agent to punch the plate number into the system, but the OverlyLongGag becomes [[UpToEleven even more excruciating]] when Nick tries to tell a joke and make small talk with the agent as they are on the verge of receiving the information.

* ''[[Series/{{Mash}}]]: The entire U.S. military often becomes this trope, with Radar needing to resort to judicious use of friend-of-a-friend contacts to make crucial (even life-saving) deals.

* ''{{Series/Mash}}]]: The entire U.S. military often becomes this trope, with Radar needing to resort to judicious use of friend-of-a-friend contacts to make crucial (even life-saving) deals.