History Main / YourTelevisionHatesYou

** In "Krusty Gets Kanceled", Krusty is trying to get back in shape by sparring with Homer, but he's too depressed to punch. Then Maggie touches the remote, and ''The Gabbo Show'' (which is what caused Krusty's show to be cancelled) comes on; Krusty becomes angry, and starts punching Homer furiously. Then Maggie hits the button again, and a news report comes on saying the price of pork has gone up. Now ''Homer'' is ''just'' as angry, and starts punching ''Krusty'' just as hard.

This is a quick gag that's pretty common when you're trying to make the audience [[TheWoobie feel sorry for your character]], or prove just how much [[ChewToy the universe hates him]]. It's almost always [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment never mentioned again]]. Can be {{justified}} when the character's circumstances are due to some supernatural agency that is also perfectly capable of controlling the programming on the TV.

* This WebAnimation/YouTubePoop "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPH3m-skbz0 The Age-Old Mask Device]]" uses this trope, featuring examples of LatexPerfection on every channel.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAngryBeavers'' Norbert is trying to get his mind off Daggett being taller than he. When he watches TV, everything suggests that being short means being a loser.
* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'' had Jenna, who has a bed-wetting problem, invited to Muffy's sleepover with no way to politely decline. Jenna is too embarrassed to put on her pull-up, so she stays awake most of the night worrying. She turns on the television, only to be presented with images of running water, an ad with a Scot advertising a [[ToiletHumor wee patch for wee leaks]], and a kids' show sponsored by the letter "P".

* In the ''WesternAnimation/AsToldByGinger'' finale "The Wedding Frame" Ginger, who is still reeling from her break-up with Darren and is hesitant about entering into a new relationship, is at home watching a music video where the curly and titian haired chanteuse is singing about being abandoned by the man she loves. Ginger soon imagines herself and Darren in place of the characters in the song and she finally drowns.
* The ''WesternAnimation/{{Bonkers}}'' episode "Stressed to Kill" had one scene where a stressed out Lucky Piquel tries to watch some television to ease himself over his trouble in capturing the Mole, only for every channel to mention moles or feature characters that look like the Mole.
* This happens to Robert Freeman twice in ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks'':

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Doug}}'' when Porkchop disappears, once Doug has given up searching for him, he tries to take his mind off with some TV. A folk singer can be heard singing "Every boy needs a dawg, every dawg needs a boy, a puppy dawg is just--" before Doug turns it off.

* In the PilotMovie of ''WesternAnimation/FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends'', Bloo has just learned that Mac has to give him up, and as he changes the channels late at night, every show is about being lonely, saying goodbye, or having "the blues". One show even talks about the Grand Canyon being a "deep depression".
* In ''WesternAnimation/FriskyDingo'', Killface, brooding over the betrayal of his friendship by 'Barnaby Jones' (in reality Xander Crewes), tries to take his mind of things by watching TV, except that every single channel is either about Xander Crewes, Series/BarnabyJones, friendship, or spells out 'Xander Crews' or 'Barnaby Jones' by judicious use of channel flipping. Eventually he just shoots the TV.

** In the episode "Suspended" Harold tries to spend part of his first day at home by watching cartoons, scary movies, and "those dumb talk shows", but as soon as he turns on the TV a cartoon is interrupted by news coverage of the World Economic Conference from Kyoto, Japan. Much to his horror, he finds it playing on every channel.

** A movie theater example: In "Hooky" Arnold and Gerald skip school and spend the whole episode narrowly avoiding getting caught, they take refuge in the movie theater and before the movie starts; A PSA is played of a politician telling kids to "stay in school".

* In the ''WesternAnimation/HiHiPuffyAmiYumi'' episode "Yumi Saves Kaz", Yumi tries to escape from being bothered by Kaz trying to help her to show his gratitude for saving his life by watching some television. Somehow, every channel she watches has Kaz voice his praise for her heroism.
* The ''WesternAnimation/HouseOfMouse'' cartoon "Hickory Dickory Mickey" has Mickey becoming annoyed by Goofy's loudly-ticking alarm clock and decides to block it out with music. He turns to the "all-tick station" and the "all-tock station", then turning on the TV to "The Tick-Tock Channel".
** Also from ''House of Mouse'', the short "Donald's Goofy World" has Donald dreaming that everyone and everything is turning into Goofy. When he watches TV, he gets nothing but shows starring Goofy, culminating in ''Goofy's Goof Works'' (a reference to the precursor to ''House of Mouse'', ''Mickey Mouse Works'').

* The ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' short "WesternAnimation/BirdsAnonymous", in which Sylvester tries to swear off eating birds. He turns on the TV, and there's a cooking show featuring a chef cutting into some poultry. The radio hates him, too: The playlist features "Bye Bye Blackbird" and "When the Red Red Robin Comes Bob Bob Bobbin' Along". Talk about ColdTurkeysAreEverywhere.
* Briefly used in the ''WesternAnimation/OggyAndTheCockroaches'' episode "Docu-Mentally". Oggy flips through the channels and finds the exact same thing: the cockroaches messing with his body. Even a television on an ''airplane'' hates him, and '''''lots of people are seeing the madness and LAUGHING AT HIM.'''''
* ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'': In "Daylight Savings", the Professor institutes a 7:30 curfew for the girls, giving all the villains and monsters a perfect opportunity to wreak havoc on Townsville. He tries to get his mind off of the temptation to lift the curfew by watching TV, but every channel is news about how Townsville is getting destroyed. The Professor finally finds solace in the time channel... where he realizes that he forgot to set the clocks back an hour, leading him to realize the girls have time to save the day. The trope is finally inverted when he flips through the channels again to hear that things are getting back to normal.

* In the first episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'', Stimpy leaves to become a big TV star, leaving Ren all alone. To take his mind off it, he turns on the TV...and wouldn't you know it, Stimpy's on every channel.
* In the ''WesternAnimation/RockosModernLife'' episode "Tickled Pinky" Rocko is in a hospital bed where he is going to get his appendix cut out. He turns on the TV to take his mind off of it and sees an ad for a kitchen device called the Cut-O-Matic that looks like a mini guillotine, a chain saw competition, and a detective show with a seedy man taking out scissors to "cut someone out".
* This happens to Guy Hamdon of all people in the ''WesternAnimation/SheZow'' episode "Super Sidekick", when Shaverine is stealing the limelight away from [=SheZow=], (and much like the above ''Barney Miller'' example) even on the Spanish channel.

* ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'': In the episode "The Simpsons Already Did It," the boys believe they accidentally killed their teacher by putting [[SeaAping sea monkeys]] in her coffee. To get their mind off of it, they watch ''The Terrance and Philip Show,'' but the episode happens to be about Terrance accidentally killing Celine Dion and Phillip telling him that murder is never an accident. They change the channel, only to come across a news report about finding semen in the teacher's stomach, which the boys believe is "sea-men."
* In the episode of ''WesternAnimation/SpongebobSquarepants'' "Idiot Box", Squidward is trying to forget about [=SpongeBob=] and Patrick playing in their box, but everything on TV is about boxes, even [[VisualPun boxing]].

* ''WesternAnimation/TazMania'': There's one episode where Taz has been told by his mother to not touch the Sea Bird she's planning to cook for dinner that evening. Taz goes to watch TV and finds that ''every'' station - even the {{western}} channel - is showing something that's somehow connected to Sea Birds.
* ''WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles1987''; after the heroes fought a long, grueling battle against Krang for the first time during the FiveEpisodePilot, they turned on their TV to relax, turning on a science fiction movie called ''The Evil Brain From Dimension X''. (Followed by groans, shouting, forehead slapping, and Michelangelo demanding to change the channel to cartoons.)
* In the Season Two episode of ''WesternAnimation/TransformersPrime'', "Operation: Bumblebee (Part One)", [[KidAppealCharacter 'Bee]] has his Transformation Cog-- the biomechanism that allows a Cybertronian to transform-- stolen by the paramilitary group MECH. Stuck in the base, he tries to watch TV with the humans, but the first thing they see is a car commercial. To add insult to injury, said commercial was for the ''exact same model car 'Bee's alt-mode was based on.'' To cap it off, the tagline for the car?

* In one episode of WesternAnimation/YinYangYo, Carl (the Evil Cockroach Wizard) returns home in disgrace after Yin's insult ("bugly") causes the whole town to laugh at him. He switches on the TV to relax because [[TemptingFate it never lets him down]], only for the first thing to pop onscreen being a news reporter giving a story about "bugly" taking the world by storm.
* ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice2010''. In "Coldhearted", Kid Flash has to run across the entire country to deliver a donor heart and is desperate to replenish his calories, at one point running down a street filled with signs advertising fast food outlets.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/RockosModernLife'' episode "Tickled Pinky" Rocko is in a hospital bed where he is going to get his appendix cut out. He turns on the TV to take his mind off of it and sees an ad for a kitchen device called the Cut-O-Matic that looks like a mini guillotine, a chain saw competition, and a detective show with a seedy man taking out scissors to "cut someone out".
* In the episode of ''WesternAnimation/SpongebobSquarepants'' "Idiot Box", Squidward is trying to forget about [=SpongeBob=] and Patrick playing in their box, but everything on TV is about boxes, even [[VisualPun boxing]].
-->'''Squidward:''' ...I give up.
* The ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' short "WesternAnimation/BirdsAnonymous", in which Sylvester tries to swear off eating birds. He turns on the TV, and there's a cooking show featuring a chef cutting into some poultry. The radio hates him, too: The playlist features "Bye Bye Blackbird" and "When the Red Red Robin Comes Bob Bob Bobbin' Along". Talk about ColdTurkeysAreEverywhere.
* In the first episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'', Stimpy leaves to become a big TV star, leaving Ren all alone. To take his mind off it, he turns on the TV...and wouldn't you know it, Stimpy's on every channel.
* In the PilotMovie of ''WesternAnimation/FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends'', Bloo has just learned that Mac has to give him up, and as he changes the channels late at night, every show is about being lonely, saying goodbye, or having "the blues". One show even talks about the Grand Canyon being a "deep depression".
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'':
** In "Deep Space Homer", Homer, after losing an award to an "inanimate carbon rod" and being ridiculed by his family, sits down to watch TV, saying "TV respects me. It laughs ''with'' me. Not ''at'' me." He turns it on and the first thing that appears on screen is a man pointing at the camera laughing hysterically and saying "You stupid..."
** In "Homer Badman", after being publicly accused of molesting a college-aged baby sitter, Homer watches TV in the TroubledFetalPosition while David Letterman remarks "...and the number one reference I am running into the ground is...Homer Simpson!" followed by an episode of the Mexican Bumblebee Man's sitcom, in which the Bumblebee Man gets pinched in the butt while smelling a flower and yells, "Ai-yi-yi! Es Homer Simpson!" However, Homer finds solace in ''An Evening at the Improv'', whose comedians are stuck in the 80's.
** In "The Last Temptation of Homer": Homer is attracted to a sexy female co-worker; back at home he tries his best to not think about cheating on his wife. When he tries to distract himself with watching TV, he cycles though several channels about sex and cheating--first a news special about the affairs of various notable Presidents, then a nature documentary about a fly which has thousands of sex partners and suffers "virtually no guilt", and then a program where the only words Homer hears upon changing the channel are "Just do it!" (It's a ringworm PSA.)
** In "YOLO"[[note]]it stands for You Only Live Once[[/note]], Homer feels trapped in his mundane life and that it's already wasted. (He was okay, but Kirk van Houten showed up in a new sports car with a skateboard and having just enrolled to a rapping course. They laughed at him with Marge, but she later upset him with emphasizing how his life will never ever change.) He watches TV and surfs through channels. The work titles were telling: "Same Time Next Year", "Life Stinks", "No Exit", "Point of No Return", "Dead End", and "[[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Little League World Series]]".
** In "Krusty Gets Kanceled", Krusty is trying to get back in shape by sparring with Homer, but he's too depressed to punch. Then Maggie touches the remote, and ''The Gabbo Show'' (which is what caused Krusty's show to be cancelled) comes on; Krusty becomes angry, and starts punching Homer furiously. Then Maggie hits the button again, and a news report comes on saying the price of pork has gone up. Now ''Homer'' is ''just'' as angry, and starts punching ''Krusty'' just as hard.
** In "Homer Loves Flanders", Homer fails to win tickets to a football game and angrily hits his radio, which starts playing ''Two Tickets To Paradise'' by Eddie Money. Homer misses the irony and is actually cheered up by the song.
** In "Homer's Barbershop Quartet" after Chief Wiggum is kicked out of the titular group, he tries to forget about it by watching TV but all the shows he was watching showed comedians mocking him.
** In "I Don't Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", Marge makes a promise to a bank robber, whose mother abandoned him as a child, to visit him in prison of he turns himself in, only to get cold feet and rescind on it by distracting herself. Later that night, she starts feeling guilty about it while watching an old movie about a prisoner who holds out hope that his mom will show up to witness his execution; she doesn't.
** The series also has a variant featuring the family [[ForInconveniencePressOne trying to get help from a phone line]] with the hold music that plays relating to whatever problem they have, causing them to break down in tears. Examples include Marge calling the mental institution to which Homer has been committed in "Stark Raving Dad" and having to listen to an easy-listening version of Patsy Cline's "Crazy", or Homer calling the missing child hotline after Maggie runs away in "Homer Alone" and being subjected to Player's "Baby Come Back".
* ''WesternAnimation/HeyArnold'':
** In the episode "Arnold's Hat", our hero is depressed because he lost his hat. To take his mind off it, he turns on the TV and sees that it's Hat Day at the local ballpark, and everyone in the stadium is wearing one. It doesn't help.
** In the episode "Suspended" Harold tries to spend part of his first day at home by watching cartoons, scary movies, and "those dumb talk shows", but as soon as he turns on the TV a cartoon is interrupted by news coverage of the World Economic Conference from Kyoto, Japan. Much to his horror, he finds it playing on every channel.
** Turns into a case of Your Movie Theatre Hates You in the episode "Heat". Trying to find relief in the cool movie theatre during a heat wave, the only movies playing are ''The Day the Sun Exploded'', ''Invasion of the People Melters'' and ''Hotter Than the Sun''.
** A movie theater example: In "Hooky" Arnold and Gerald skip school and spend the whole episode narrowly avoiding getting caught, they take refuge in the movie theater and before the movie starts; A PSA is played of a politician telling kids to "stay in school".
** One more movie theater example in "The List". Arnold takes the day off to finally accomplish a bucket list of things he's always wanted to do, one of them being to see a new movie. After losing his ticket, he sneaks inside the theater and finally makes it inside only for the film playing the movie to break and the showing to be cancelled.
** "Sid's Revenge" had an inverted example. Sid vows revenge after Principal Wartz gives him a week's detention for something he didn't do. That night, his television seems to commiserate. He encounters a soap opera with a vengeful lead, a commercial for Sweet Revenge chocolate, and finally a ''National Geographic''-esque program featuring the use of voodoo revenge dolls, which inspires Sid to make one in the likeness of Principal Wartz, using soap.

* ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'':
** In "The Son Also Draws", Peter needs to go to the bathroom while on a road trip. He tries holding it in, but he keeps getting reminded with messages such as a sign stating "Dump Next Left", a trailer passing them with the notice "Wide Load", a nearby furniture store advertising "All Stools Must Go!", another car with a bumper sticker about how its driver loves their Shih Tzu, and another sign advertising "Bob's House of Feces" ([[LampshadeHanging "Oh come on, that one's not even real!"]]). He finally pulls over when he sees a billboard for a casino reading "Craps! Craps! Craps!"
** In "Screwed the Pooch", Brian's having trouble curbing his sexual urges, and he opts to stay home and relax while the family visits Lois' parents for the weekend. But when he tries to watch TV, he finds that FOX is showing ''World's Sluttiest Dogs'', and he immediately bolts and chases down the car.
** In "Stewie Loves Lois", Peter feels sexually violated after getting a prostate exam and Brian tries to console him by turning on the TV, but every channel is about fingers and fingering.
** In [[Recap/FamilyGuyS21E4TheMunchurianCandidate "The Munchurian Candidate"]], Lois hypnotizes Peter to give her oral sex whenever he hears the ''Extra'' theme, which backfires when he hears it and eats Lois' mother out instead. Embarrassed by what they've done, they try to ease the tension in the car by turning on the radio, only to turn it off upon hearing the song [[Music/WeirdAlYankovic "Eat It"]].
* This happens to Robert Freeman twice in ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks'':
** In "Granddad's Fight", after Colonel H. Stinkmeaner (who's blind) beats up Robert with a cane, Robert's grandson Riley gives him the [[EmbarrassingNickname mocking nickname]] of "Señor Piñata". Later when Robert switches on the TV, he finds that all the news channels are reporting his humiliating story, including a Mexican anchorman who also calls him "Señor Piñata".
** In "The Story of Lando Freeman", after Robert and his (allegedly) long-lost son Lando appear on ''Series/TheSteveWilkosShow'', where Wilkos seems to confirm Lando's claims and shames Robert about it.
--->'''Robert:''' After all this time, a son.\\
'''Huey:''' Granddad, it's not all your fault. It doesn't make you a horrible person.\\
'''Steve Wilkos:''' ''(on TV)'' IT'S ALL YOUR FUCKING FAULT! YOU'RE A HORRIBLE FUCKING PERSON!

* ''WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles1987''; after the heroes fought a long, grueling battle against Krang for the first time during the FiveEpisodePilot, they turned on their TV to relax, turning on a science fiction movie called ''The Evil Brain From Dimension X''. (Followed by groans, shouting, forehead slapping, and Michelangelo demanding to change the channel to cartoons.)
* ''WesternAnimation/TheAngryBeavers'' Norbert is trying to get his mind off Daggett being taller than he. When he watches TV, everything suggests that being short means being a loser.
* In the ''WesternAnimation/AsToldByGinger'' finale "The Wedding Frame" Ginger, who is still reeling from her break-up with Darren and is hesitant about entering into a new relationship, is at home watching a music video where the curly and titian haired chanteuse is singing about being abandoned by the man she loves. Ginger soon imagines herself and Darren in place of the characters in the song and she finally drowns.
* In the Disney short WesternAnimation/DuckPimples, WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck tries to relax on a stormy night by listening to the radio. Given his usual bad luck, all the radio programs he listens to are either horror stories or violent crime dramas.
* This happens to Guy Hamdon of all people in the ''WesternAnimation/SheZow'' episode "Super Sidekick", when Shaverine is stealing the limelight away from [=SheZow=], (and much like the above ''Barney Miller'' example) even on the Spanish channel.
* In the Season Two episode of ''WesternAnimation/TransformersPrime'', "Operation: Bumblebee (Part One)", [[KidAppealCharacter 'Bee]] has his Transformation Cog-- the biomechanism that allows a Cybertronian to transform-- stolen by the paramilitary group MECH. Stuck in the base, he tries to watch TV with the humans, but the first thing they see is a car commercial. To add insult to injury, said commercial was for the ''exact same model car 'Bee's alt-mode was based on.'' To cap it off, the tagline for the car?
-->''The new Urbana 500. It won't just rock your world. It will ''transform'' it.''
* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Doug}}'' when Porkchop disappears, once Doug has given up searching for him, he tries to take his mind off with some TV. A folk singer can be heard singing "Every boy needs a dawg, every dawg needs a boy, a puppy dawg is just--" before Doug turns it off.

* ''WesternAnimation/TazMania'': There's one episode where Taz has been told by his mother to not touch the Sea Bird she's planning to cook for dinner that evening. Taz goes to watch TV and finds that ''every'' station - even the {{western}} channel - is showing something that's somehow connected to Sea Birds.

* The ''WesternAnimation/{{Bonkers}}'' episode "Stressed to Kill" had one scene where a stressed out Lucky Piquel tries to watch some television to ease himself over his trouble in capturing the Mole, only for every channel to mention moles or feature characters that look like the Mole.
* In the ''WesternAnimation/HiHiPuffyAmiYumi'' episode "Yumi Saves Kaz", Yumi tries to escape from being bothered by Kaz trying to help her to show his gratitude for saving his life by watching some television. Somehow, every channel she watches has Kaz voice his praise for her heroism.
* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverseFuture'': In "Growing Pains", after an intensely embarrassing and distressing situation where [[spoiler:Steven clumsily and impulsively tries to propose to Connie, only to get turned down]], Steven flips on his TV and sees a [[ShowWithinAShow Dogcopter]] movie where the main character proposes to their partner and gets HappilyMarried. [[YouHaveGotToBeKiddingMe He doesn't take that well]].

--->'''Bruce:''' Sure the power's out, but we got food, we got blankets, we got each other, and it's not like we have any place to be! What's got you riled up?\\

-->'''Haddock:''' Impossible! They're doing it on purpose -- it's a plot!

-->'''Squidward'''... I give up.

%% * This happens once to Fez on ''Series/That70sShow''.

* ''Series/That70sShow'': Having reluctantly broken up with Donna, Eric Forman is depressed in the first few episodes of Season 4. In the second episode, he is listening to the radio whilst moping in bed. Unfortunately, each frequency, for some reason, contains Eric Carmen's "All By Myself". Frustrated, he changes to AM, only to get two frequencies with the song "Donna" by Richie Valens. He eventually throws it against the wall in anger, trying to break it.... only for it to start playing "Donna" less than 3 seconds later. He promptly buries himself in his bedsheets.

** Also from ''House of Mouse'', the short "Donald's Goofy World" has Donald dreaming that everyone and everything is turning into Goofy. When he watches TV, he gets nothing but shows starring Goofy, culminating in ''Goofy's Goof Works'' (a reference to the precursor to ''House of Mouse'', ''Mickey's Mouse Works'').

** In "The Munchurian Candidate", Lois hypnotizes Peter to give her oral sex whenever he hears the ''Extra'' theme, which backfires when he hears it and blows Lois' mother instead. Embarrassed by what they've done, they try to ease the tension in the car by turning on the radio, only to turn it off upon hearing the song [[Music/WeirdAlYankovic "Eat It"]].

** In the episode "Stewie Loves Lois", Peter feels sexually violated after getting a prostate exam and Brian tries to console him by turning on the TV, but every channel is about fingers and fingering.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/RockosModernLife'' episode "Tickled Pinky" Rocko is in a hospital bed where he is going to get his appendix cut out. He turns on the TV to take his mind off of it and sees an ad for a kitchen device called the Cut-O-Matic that looks like a mini guillotine, a [[CanadaEh chain saw competition]], and a detective show with a seedy man taking out scissors to "cut someone out".

* In the ''WesternAnimation/AsToldByGinger'' finale "The Wedding Frame" Ginger, who is still reeling from her break-up with Darren and is hesitant about entering into a new relationship, is at home watching a music video where the curly and titian haired chanteuse is singing about being abandoned by the man she loves. This trope is soon turned UpToEleven where Ginger soon imagines herself and Darren in place of the characters in the song and she finally drowns.

* Briefly used in the ''WesternAnimation/OggyAndTheCockroaches'' episode "Docu-Mentally". Oggy flips through the channels and finds the exact same thing: the cockroaches messing with his body. Taken UpToEleven when a television on an ''airplane'' hates him, and '''''lots of people are seeing the madness and LAUGHING AT HIM.'''''

* In "I Don't Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", Marge makes a promise to a bank robber, whose mother abandoned him as a child, to visit him in prison of he turns himself in, only to get cold feet and rescind on it by distracting herself. Later that night, she starts feeling guilty about it while watching an old movie about a prisoner who holds out hope that his mom will show up to witness his execution; she doesn't.

** In the episode "Suspended" Harold tries to spend part of his first day at home by watching cartoons, scary movies, and "those dumb talk shows", but as soon as he turns on the TV a cartoon is interrupted by news coverage of the World Economic Conference from Kyoto Japan. Much to his horror, he finds it playing on every channel.

** In "April 9th", Binky gets traumatized when he witnesses fire break out at the school, and he later gets scared watching an episode of ''Bionic Bunny'' featuring a fire-themed supervillain named Hothead.

* ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'': In the episode "The Simpsons Already Did It," the boys believe they accidentally killed their teacher by putting [[SeaAping sea monkeys]] in her coffee. To get their mind off of it, they watch ''The Terrance and Philip Show,'' but the episode happens to be about Terrance accidentally killing Celine Dion and Phillip telling him that murder is never an accident. They change the channel, only to come across a news report about finding semen in the teacher's stomach, which the boys mistake as "seamen."

** Another instance takes this UpToEleven as the shows that Lisa watches to get her mind off not being able to get a date for the school dance seem to be about... her not being able to get a date for the school dance.

** In "The Last Temptation of Homer": Homer is attracted to a sexy female co-worker; back at home he tries his best to not think about cheating on his wife. When he tries to distract himself with watching TV, he cycles though several channels about sex and cheating--first a news special about the affairs of various notable Presidents, then a nature documentary about a fly which has thousands of sex partners and suffers no guilt, and then a program where the only words Homer hears upon changing the channel are "Just do it!" (It's a ringworm PSA.)

* In the Season Two episode of ''WesternAnimation/TransformersPrime'', "Operation: Bumblebee (Part One)", [[KidAppealCharacter 'Bee]] has his Transformation Cog--- the biomechanism that allows a Cybertronian to transform--- stolen by the paramilitary group MECH. Stuck in the base, he tries to watch TV with the humans, but the first thing they see is a car commercial. To add insult to injury, said commercial was for the ''exact same model car 'Bee's alt-mode was based on.''

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverseFuture'': After an intensely embarrassing and distressing situation where [[spoiler:Steven clumsily and impulsively tries to propose to Connie, only to get turned down]], Steven flips on his TV and sees a [[ShowWithinAShow Dogcopter]] movie where the main character proposes to their partner and gets HappilyMarried. [[YouHaveGotToBeKiddingMe He doesn't take that well]].

* In ''Film/ANewLife'', newly-divorced Steve flips channels only to keep seeing the same mattress store ad with the jingle "have more fun in bed!"

* In ''Series/MarriedWithChildren'', this happens repeatedly to Al. He sits down to watch TV but only shows he hates are on: Oprah, Facts of Life, etc. This trope is averted in the episode where he has built himself a man's bathroom (with a mighty Fergusen - Bar-WHOOOOSH!). He just finished it, and went in to 'christen' it, but was constipated. He turned on the television and the array of programs loosened him right up.

** In "April 9th", Binky gets traumatized when he witnesses fire break out at the school, and he later gets scared watching episode of ''Bionic Bunny'' featuring a fire-themed supervillain named Hothead.