History Series / TheSoup

** At one point, KeithOlbermann. (Though theirs was much more good-natured.) Creator/TyraBanks is a much more subtle example. As it has been mentioned in passing on the show that she sent them a Cease & Desist letter to get them to stop showing clips of her talk show and ''Series/AmericasNextTopModel''. Joel's reply: "No."

* IReadThatAs: MTV's ''[[ColonCancer Real World/Road Rules Challenge: The Ruins]]'' used a logo where a mountain formed the I in "Ruins". Joel called it "''The Runs''".

** There was also what was considered one of the most OOC moments on The Soup. Back in January 2008, shortly after the death of HeathLedger, at the end of an episode, a picture of Ledger was shown and Joel spoke to the audience, asking both for sympathy towards him and to respect his memory.

* Sports channel Versus had ''Sports Soup'', hosted by Matt Iseman from ''Series/CleanHouse''. Segments included "The Great Outdoors", "Covering the Coverage", and "5 Star Clip". The {{Woobie}} of the franchise because of Versus pre-empting it often due to sports coverage and {{ESPN}} and the regional sports networks clamping down on fair use of their clips in a comedic sense; depended towards the end more on themed 'blooper' shows and cameos from sports celebrities such as Chad Ochocinco. Done after January 2011 as a result of NBC Sports taking control and rebranding Versus as a serious ESPN competitor under the new name of NBC Sports Network. (Sister network Golf Channel never bothered with a ''Soup'' spin-off since they're in Orlando far away from Los Angeles, and golf is just plain SeriousBusiness.)

* ChromaKey: The main "set" for each show. As such the show can also come from other exotic locales when Joel has another project to do such as...St. Louis (when he was shooting ''The Informant!''), Austin, Texas (filming ''SpyKids 4'' at Creator/RobertRodriguez's greenscreen complex) and UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity (doing press and upfronts for ''Series/{{Community}}''). However these shows can be notable for being the least funny due to the regular crew not being in tow, Joel only able to get writer and director input via Skype and winging it alone, and a different sound and tenor to the audience, who is usually just either rounded up at random or in the St. Louis case, was taped at a Creator/{{PBS}} station with a crowd of confused station employees and donating members who wondered why a guy was making Creator/ParisHilton jokes in front of a green screen instead of [[CookingShow cooking]] or teaching adults how to get their GED.

** When his fellow castmembers of ''Series/{{Community}}'' started showing up following the news that ''Community'' was being put on hiatus, they all (jokingly) laid into Joel for not doing anything to promote the show on ''TheSoup''.

* ThroughHisStomach: A woman on ''Maury'' accuses another of luring away her man by cooking him "CHICKEN TETRAZZINI!" ''TheSoup'' turned this into one of their running gags, and the segment was the Clip of the Year for 2009, with the lady herself from the clip showing up to receive the award and spout her catchphrase.

*** "It's Miley!" ("MileyCyrus News")

Then, in 2004, E! aired ''The What The? Awards'' which was quickly changed to ''The Soup'' with host Joel [=McHale=]. They even acknowledge the original ''Talk Soup'' with the segment "Chat Stew".

** "Chicks, man."

->''"It's like the [[Series/TheTonightShow Johnny Carson]] of...whatever."''

** Playing Jeffrey Osborne's "On The Wings Of Love" whenever introing clips from said season of ''TheBachelor''. Joel always tries to get them to stop because "the song is too sincere!" Osborne eventually made an appearance [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments hawking Jeffrey Osborne's Wings Of Love chicken restaurants]].

** "What are you doing here, [[JanesAddiction Dave Navarro]]?"

* MuppetCameo: Unfortunately for Joel, it was StatlerAndWaldorf.

** The spinoff ''Series/WebSoup'' has its own dueling show in ComedyCentral's ''Series/{{Tosh0}}'' Which in turn isn't a fair fight; ''Series/WebSoup'' airs on G4 which is usually on a higher digital-only tier than basic-cable Comedy Central.

* E! sister channel Style had ''The Dish'', hosted by [[Main/BoyMeetsWorld Danielle Fishel]], that gave special attention to the feminine side of pop culture: fashion, weddings, interior design, etc. Segments included "Clip Closet", "Daylight Cravings", "Here Come the Brides", and a closing "Freak of the Week". Canceled in March 2011, though -- likely due to ratings issues and the NBC/Comcast merger making it verboten for Style to [[BitingTheHandHumor make fun of Bravo and Oxygen's programming]] now that they're all sister networks.

** Current TV aired a similar show called infoMania, which covers the week in pop culture with segments that are very similar to The Soup's.[

* ProductPlacement: Parodied when people show up to plug their DVD collections or new seasons of their TV series. Got recursive with Joel's (and all of the show's main cast, with the [[SarcasmMode surprising]] exception of Chevy Chase) plugging of ''Series/{{Community}}'', starring [=Joel McHale=], Thursdays on NBC. Even Dan Harmon showed up on the 2013 Top 40 Clips show.

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** "''Series/TheHills STEPHANIE PRATT'', unlikely voice of reason, STEPHANIE PRATT, your logic is a-pleasin', STEPHANIE PRATT!"

** "GREG KELLY , unlikely voice of reason, GREG KELLY, your logic is a-pleasin', GREG KELLYYYY!"

The SeriesFinale will be airing in the US on December 18, 2015.

* ManipulativeEditing: The Soup loves to do this with Series/GoldRush, making note of the "glory holes" and the name of one of the cast members, Jack Hoffman.
* MuppetCameo: Unfortunate for Joel, it was StatlerAndWaldorf.

** And sometimes subverted- Joel set up a clip for ''Small Town Security'', giving a bizarre description ("...and they reenacted the dinner scene from ''Film/TheTexasChainsawMassacre1974''") and said it was all true, but the clip was way worse than what he promised- someone farted, everyone started laughing at the farts, one lady laughed so hard she peed herself, and a dog started humping her leg.

* MuppetCameo: Unfortunate for Joel, it was StatlerandWaldorf.

[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/The_Soup_Set.png]]

* ChromaKey: The main "set" for each show. As such the show can also come from other exotic locales when Joel has another project to do such as...St. Louis (when he was shooting ''The Informant!''), Austin, Texas (filming ''SpyKids 4'' at Creator/RobertRodriguez's greenscreen complex) and NewYorkCity (doing press and upfronts for ''Series/{{Community}}''). However these shows can be notable for being the least funny due to the regular crew not being in tow, Joel only able to get writer and director input via Skype and winging it alone, and a different sound and tenor to the audience, who is usually just either rounded up at random or in the St. Louis case, was taped at a Creator/{{PBS}} station with a crowd of confused station employees and donating members who wondered why a guy was making Creator/ParisHilton jokes in front of a green screen instead of [[CookingShow cooking]] or teaching adults how to get their GED.

Viewers in the UK who can't view the show (which should be very few of you, considering this show goes out on E! UK as well), should consider it to be a cattier version of ''Series/HarryHillsTVBurp''. Or Americans who can't view the show might think of it as MST3K meets Hollywood gossip.

** Web Soup's done well, however, as Hardwick's brand of foolish yet energetic snarkery provides a great alternative to Tosh's Deadpan.