History LoopholeAbuse / LiveActionTv

* After Creator/JayLeno was called as a defence witness during Music/MichaelJackson's child molestation trial, he was hit with a gag order preventing him from making jokes about the trial on ''Series/TheTonightShowWithJayLeno'', as he had been up to that point. However, there was nothing stopping ''other'' comedians from coming onto the show and delivering the jokes in Leno's stead. The court eventually relented and allowed Leno to keep telling the jokes.

** In "Girl Earl", Earl is participating in a grocery-bagging competition on behalf of Joel, a former bagger who had to retire after breaking his hand in anger (as a result of being robbed by numerous crooks, Earl Randy and Billie included). After getting into an argument with Billie before the contest and poking her in the chest, Billie instinctively breaks Earl's finger, preventing him from participating. Joel steps in to help, as the rule book says that two hands are required, but it doesn't say that two people using a single hand each can't team together.

* In one episode of ''Series/MyNameIsEarl'', Joy enters a mother-daughter beauty pageant. Ain't no rule that her mother has to be ''alive''.
** But since her mother is actually alive and the ashes she brings to the contest are from a bunch of cigars, Joy is going against the rules the entire time. She does legally take advantage of a second loophole, however, since she enters the contest as an adult daughter - it's supposed to be women and child pairs, but ain't no rule saying so.

* In Season 4, episode 15 of ''Series/{{Arrow}}'', Oliver exploits something that happened at the end of a previous season that pretty much everyone in-show wanted to forget -- his marriage by League of Assassins law to Nyssa. Because of their marital status, he is able to take her place in a duel for control of the League with Malcolm, ensuring that Nyssa will win and that Malcolm won't die. It proves to be one of the most successful and manipulative things the usually very direct Oliver has done.

'''Martin:''' Not in ''bottles'', baby.

* On ''Series/TheGoodFight'', Maia Rindell is being interrogated by the FBI over knowing about her father's massive Ponzi scheme. The agent threatens her by showing how Maia signed a document at her 18th birthday party to take control of the fund which means she can be legally be found as guilty as her father. But Maia smirks that she may have signed the documents then but her actual birthday wasn't for another four days. Thus, she was only 17 which means legally, it doesn't count and she's not culpable.

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'': The episode "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E35TheMightyCasey The Mighty Casey]]" has a coach putting a robot on his baseball team as the pitcher -- ain't no rule against that. [[spoiler:But then the team doctor informs him that the rules ''do'' say a baseball team consists of "nine ''men''". Trying to correct this by giving the robot a heart ruins it.]]

** He does it again in Season 3. [[spoiler:When Axe Woves points out that Bo-katan cannot just expect to rule the Mandalorians again without the Darksaber and that he won't accept Din either, Din decides to give Bo-katan the sword back without the need to fight her, by exploiting the technicalities of how he lost the Darksaber. He explains that he lost the sword while fighting a cyborg creature on Mandalore, and that Bo-Katan killed the creature with the Darksaber and rescued him.]] After several confused looks, Axe and his comrades accept the explanation.

*** [[CloningBlues Defective clone]] Weyoun 6 from "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS07E06TreacheryFaithAndTheGreatRiver Treachery, Faith, and the Great River]]" felt that the Dominion's invasion of the Alpha Quadrant was a mistake. But he's genetically programmed to serve the Founders, the leaders of the Dominion. He decides that he can have it both ways by serving ''Odo'', since a renegade Founder is still a Founder.

** Subverted for laughs in a sketch with Donald Glover as a lawyer claiming that Film/JurassicPark is not liable for the dinosaurs killing a pack of tourists on the claim that the line "park is not liable for any lost or damaged items" includes ''living people.''

* Subverted in an episode of ''Series/HappyDays'' when Richie, Leather Tuscadero, and Mr & Mrs C come in from playing basketball (apparently the girls won). Mr C asks Richie "where in the rule book does it say you can't dribble with two hands?" "Page One," he exclaims.

*** In "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS05E18BusinessAsUsual Business as Usual]]", Quark sets up a sweet deal with the arms dealer Hagath to use the station to conduct the sales of weapons. No actual weapons would be brought onto the station, but Quark could use his holosuites to provide realistic demonstrations of the merchandise. After a sale is made, the goods would be given to the buyer outside of Federation territory. That way, neither the Bajoran nor Federation authorities could do anything about their dealings.

* In the ''Series/{{Jessie}}'' episode "The Rosses Get Real", a mean reporter named Corrine Baxter hires the Ross family for her RealityShow and [[ManipulativeEditing edits the interviews out of context to make them fight each other]] and also uses embarrassing footage of them (such as Luke tripping on a vaccum whilst break dancing, or Jessie in her pyjamas and a facial mask scratching her butt in the morning). The Rosses find out about her deception and try to quit, but Corrine forbids them since she has them under contract and threatens to sue them for everything they have. So instead, the Rosses act nice so that she won't have anything mean to brodcast about them and [[EngineeredPublicConfession also expose her ranting about her bosses on camera]] leading to Corrine firing them.
* ''Series/KamenRider555'': The Smart Brain gears are designed so that only someone with the DNA of an [[MonsterOfTheWeek Orphnoch]] can use them without dying horribly. So [[Jerkass Kusaka]] gets around this by injecting himself with Orphnoch DNA, which the Kaixa Gear is able to safely burn off [[spoiler:for a while]].

* In season 8 of French version of ''Series/PekingExpress'', the teams must gather 5 people named Kim before being allowed to leave Jeonju. Ain't no rule stating two teams can't go to the checkpoint with the same people. Cécilia & Joel's and Gérard & Cédric's teams having found each two people named Kim work together to find a fifth and go to the checkpoint one after the other with those five.

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS14E3TheDeadlyAssassin "The Deadly Assassin"]]: The Doctor is accused of killing the Lord President of Gallifrey, the punishment for which is execution. However, the president had not named a successor before he was killed so an election must be held. So to put off his execution long enough to figure out what's really going on, the Doctor invokes some obscure law that lets him ''submit himself as a candidate'' so the Time Lords can't execute him until after the election.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E1SmithAndJones "Smith and Jones"]]: The Judoon, SpacePolice for hire, have no jurisdiction over the Earth. So when they're hunting a fugitive who's hidden in a hospital on the planet, they simply transport the building to the Moon.
** [[Recap/DoctorWho2007CSVoyageOfTheDamned "Voyage of the Damned"]]: When cornered by the Hosts, the Tenth Doctor uses the robotic servants' exact orders to save himself. Confirming that they were ordered to kill the crew and passengers, he argues that he should be spared because he is a stowaway, and does not fall under either category.
* ''Series/Dracula2020'':

* Lampshaded in the ESPN Sports Science episode about hockey goalies: while there Ain't No Rule about what size the goalie can be, even the fattest man in the world wouldn't be able to take up enough space to block the entire goal, and average hockey players can get pucks into the spaces that he leaves open.
** There is actually a rule that would prevent such a player from being a goalie: the rule about [[http://www.nhl.com/ice/page.htm?id=26285 how large a jersey can be]] (and that you must wear one).
* In ''Series/{{Elementary}}'', Sherlock and Joan routinely arrive somewhere, knock on the door, get no response, and Sherlock comes up with some loophole reason why breaking in without a warrant ''wasn't'' breaking and entering. Claiming to have heard a child in distress was a favorite. This move comes to bite him in the ass in one episode, in which he has to defend in court his involvement in the events that got Detective Bell shot, and the judge sees Sherlock's BlatantLies for what they are and nearly gets him arrested for perjury right then and there (and even then he recommends the NYPD to fire him as a consultant ''immediately'').

* A classic episode of ''Series/FantasyIsland'' has a woman trying to get out of a DealWithTheDevil to save her husband's life. Roarke gets the Devil to agree to a new deal to gain the souls of the woman, her husband, and himself, specifying that by the Devil's rules, he can only take three souls, no more or less. As soon as the agreement is made, Roarke asks how the Devil is going to claim three souls...without also taking the soul of the woman's unborn child. To his outrage, the Devil realizes even he dare not violate this deal and is thus forced to forfeit claim to the woman and husband.

--->'''Niles''': It would be so much easier if Roz were mentally incompetent.\\
'''Frasier''': Go on...\\
'''Niles''': Well, then there'd be some justification for protecting her. Is she irrational?\\
'''Frasier''': She did attack a vending machine once, when a Twinkie came out of the Oreo chute.\\
'''Niles''': Borderline, borderline. Does she ever act delusional?\\
'''Frasier''': Well, she often claims that she is responsible for the success of our show.\\
'''Niles''': Building, building. Does she display below-average intelligence?\\
'''Frasier''': She once ordered a bottle of white Zinfandel!\\
'''Niles''': Jackpot! Go to her, she's a threat to herself!\\
'''Frasier''': It's amazing they even let the woman drive!

---->'''[[spoiler:Jon Snow]]''': [[spoiler:I pledged my life to the Night's Watch. I gave my life.]]

* In the GrandFinale of ''Series/LittleHouseOnThePrairie'', a railroad tycoon has taken ownership of the land deed towards Walnut Grove. Despite their best efforts, they can't sway him otherwise. In desperation, they're offered dynamite to obliterate the town and they use it. When the tycoon comes in and finds Walnut Grove destroyed, he attempts to have the officer that joined him arrest them all. However, he doesn't - he had the land deed and the land deed said nothing about the town on top of it. So, now, the tycoon had nothing but a big plot of land and a lot of splinters - and a lot of mayors he'd been courting witnessing first-hand what his business practices were.

* In the prologue of a ''Series/MalcolmInTheMiddle'' episode, Malcolm and Reese are playing catch with a football in the house until their mother tells them not to. They then start throwing the football to each other on top of the house, until she tells them not to. They then start throwing the ball ''through'' the house until she tells them not to. The boys keep looking for loopholes until it ends with Malcolm and Reese in adjacent rooms, sitting at the windows, and still throwing the football to each other. Malcolm tells Reese it isn't fun anymore and Reese replies that that's no longer the idea.

* Used by Klinger in ''{{Series/MASH}}'' when Col. Potter took command. The Colonel ordered Klinger to wear nothing but U.S. military uniforms. After enduring some issues with his regular issue uniform, he wears a female sailor's uniform from his Shirley Temple Collection. Used again in "Depressing News" when Klinger and Hawkeye [[ItMakesSenseInContext blow up a tower Hawkeye built out of spare tongue depressors]] to kill a pro-war news story. Potter calls them on it, but Klinger points out that they ''are'' supposed to dispose of munitions taken off the wounded, and they ''did'' technically do so...it helps that [[ActuallyPrettyFunny Potter thinks it was hilarious]].

* In one episode of ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'', Crow and Tom use an obscure version of the Wassailing carol to get money from Mike. After a commercial break, Mike comes in with a six pack of canned wassail, pointing out that nothing in their lyrics state what ''kind'' of wassail he should give them.

** Jamie's egg drop from the roof of M5 is a classic. He converted his materials to a line to lower the egg with.
*** Some ExactWords on this one as well; Jamie dropped the egg from the roof, but the competition didn't ''say'' the egg actually had to fall the entire distance. (It fell one foot, the editors obligingly included the high-speed footage in the episode.)

** In another episode they had to use salsa (the sauce, not the music) to cut through the bar of a jail cell. As part of the myth they were allowed to speed up the electrolysis by running the current from a lightbulb through it. Jamie used a small radio (a device commonly used by the internees of many Mexican prisons) to change the current from AC to DC on the wire. His excuse being he got the radio for "good behavior."
*** This escalated to Adam "stealing" a prison vacuum engine and building a makeshift drill that ultimately failed.
** For a ninja myth, Kari, Tory, and Grant competed to make the most accurate blowgun using "natural" materials such as bamboo. Since copper is a "naturally"-occuring element, Kari chose to put a length of copper pipe down the center of her bamboo tube. Needless to say, she won. She subverted this, though, because once she won, she admitted "I totally cheated."
** "I'm not doing anything <X> wouldn't have done, if <X> had had power tools!" Used to justify AcceptableBreaksFromReality; the template comes from the Tree Cannon myth ("I'm not doing anything the Paks wouldn't have done, if they'd had a chainsaw").

*** In the same episode, Grant used tracing paper, arguing that it was "still technically paper". The large-scale test, featuring a piece of paper the size of a football field, worked because it had a similar concept; the thinner the paper is compared to the surface area (or, looking at it another way, the larger the surface area is compared to the thickness of the paper), the more folds you can get out of it. Indeed, the total number of folds they got out of the final sheet was eleven.

-->'''Craig''': He didn't say the School Desks can't move!
* In season 8 of French version of ''Series/PekingExpress'', the teams must gather 5 people named Kim before being allowed to leave Jeonju. Ain't no rule stating two teams can't go to the checkpoint with the same people. Cécilia & Joel's and Gérard & Cédric's teams having found each two people named Kim work together to find a fifth and go to the checkpoint one after the other with those 5.

** That night, at Bobby's place, Lindsay snaps at Bobby on how he could be so foolish as to leave that message when he had to know there was a chance Helen would hear it...then realizes Bobby ''did'' know. Bobby was ticked off over being used to get the judge off on murder but couldn't openly report it without breaking lawyer/client confidentiality. By leaving behind that "accidental" message, Bobby was able to find justice without breaking the law himself.

* One ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' parody of lawyer commercials featuring Dana Carvey was based on this trope:
-->'''Carvey:''' (wearing enormous, obvious hearing aids) "Attorney Dave Miller got me ten million dollars after he told me to ram this piece of spaghetti through my ear drums. The box didn't say not to! Thanks, Dave Miller!"

--->'''Witness''': I don't consider my family and friends items!\\
'''Lawyer''': But the law does.\\
'''Judge''': Let the record show the law does ''not''.
*** The lawyer further states that the man saying that a dino landed and "he ate my brother's face" is wrong as all the dinosaurs are female and thus "the witness has lied under oath, I declare a mistrial." The judge [[{{Corpsing}} can barely keep a straight face]] telling the lawyer this is not working.

* On one of the Letter of the Day Cookie sketches in ''Series/SesameStreet'', Cookie Monster says that he is not allowed to eat the cookie while singing a song about it. Then he notes that no one said anything about eating it ''after'' the song.

** This appears to be Kirk's policy with [[ObstructiveCodeOfConduct the Prime Directive]] in ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'': the Prime Directive mentions [[AlienNonInterferenceClause healthy and/or natural development]], depending on the quote in question... which means a captain is free to argue about what constitutes natural and healthy development for a culture.
*** A Creator/PeterDavid-written comic story nicely sums it up when Kirk is [[CourtroomEpisode put on trial for various offenses]].

*** In "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS3E11TheHunted The Hunted]]", genetically enhanced soldiers that were confined to a reservation after the end of a brutal war (under the pretense that they could not be re-assimilated into society) cause trouble when they attack the ''Enterprise'' crew and take the planet's leaders, the Angosians, hostage. The Angosians beg Picard to do something about it, to which he says that he will: he would report what he witnessed to the Federation. He could not do anything to help the Agnosians, because that would violate the Prime Directive; they would need to deal with the soldiers themselves.

*** In "[[Recap/StarTrekEnterpriseS04E13United United]]", Archer is forced to duel with Shran after Shran claims a rite of vengeance against a Tellarite diplomat (Archer volunteered to take the diplomat's place so that the tenuous alliance he was building would hold.) Archer is told that he will have to kill Shran, which he does not want to do because the Andorians will break the alliance, but finds that Andorian law says that the duel is over when one combatant is "rendered defenseless". So he severs one of Shran's antennae instead, which prevents Shran from fighting any further.

*** A meta example. In the first season, the crew of the ''Enterprise'' end up encountering the Gorn twice. However, the ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "[[Recap/StarTrekS1E18Arena Arena]]" states that no one had ever seen a Gorn before that time. The producers get around this quite sneakily. In the episode "[[Recap/StarTrekStrangeNewWorldsS1E04MementoMori Memento Mori]]", the Gorn attack in their [[CoolStarship starships]] while in "All Those Who Wander" the crew deal with feral hatchling Gorn in the same vein as ''Film/{{Alien}}''. As well, we're told that those who end up encountering the Gorn usually don't live long enough to actually do anything about it.

*** [[CloningBlues Defective clone]] Weyoun 6 felt that the Dominion's invasion of the Alpha Quadrant was a mistake. But he's genetically programmed to serve the Founders, the leaders of the Dominion. He decides that he can have it both ways by serving ''Odo'', since a renegade Founder is still a Founder.
*** In the episode "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS05E20FerengiLoveSongs Ferengi Love Songs]]", Rom tries to get Leeta his fiancé to sign a traditional Ferengi prenup that states the wife will not get any of the husband's estate in the event the marriage ends. Leeta refuses to sign the prenup and the wedding is nearly canceled. Luckily Rom figures the prenup wouldn't be necessary if he simply gave up all of his money to charity, and two get married soon after.

** Ivanova becomes the Green Drazi leader by grabbing the former leader's ceremonial sash:

'''Green Drazi:''' Rules of combat older than contact with other races. Did not mention aliens. ''(looks embarrassed)'' [[ObviousRulePatch Rules change...]] caught up in committee. Not come through yet.

*** It was later revealed that they've been in contact with other races for ''centuries''.
** Sinclair was a RulesLawyer to the hilt:
*** The Rush Act authorizes him to use any and all military assets to end a strike by the station's dockworkers -- the intended reading of this being breaking up the strike by military force. What he actually did was allocate funds earmarked for the military budget to pay for the safety upgrades which the workers demanded. It's made very clear that he only got away with it because the move proved so popular with the public that the politicians that gave the order couldn't punish him without potentially losing their seats.
*** In the same episode in which he ended the strike, Sinclair also helped G'Kar exploit a loophole in a ''Narn religious ritual'' that the strike had interfered with, by pointing out that even though the ''current'' ritual couldn't be completed on time, the timing (dependent upon a particular solar alignment on the Narn homeworld) was conveniently just right to participate in the same ritual using the same starlight from years earlier when the alignment occurred. He also used the law against controlled substances on the station to force Londo to give up his G'Quan-Eth plant[[note]]required by the ritual and only allowed on the station for religious purposes, but used in combination with alcohol as a recreational drug by the Centauri[[/note]] to G'Kar, allowing G'Kar to complete said ritual.
*** Sinclair was quite capable of finding loopholes in military and civilian law throughout Season 1 (and made a lot of enemies as a result). This came back to bite him in "Eyes", when Colonel Ari ben Zayn (a corrupt [[TheInquisitorGeneral Inquisitor General]]) came to investigate. Sinclair tried the usual Rule Fu; it seemed to work at first, but eventually the colonel [[MyRuleFuIsStrongerThanYours turned the rules in his favor]], forcing Sinclair to change tactics.
*** Sinclair did it again in the canon novel "''To Dream in the City of Sorrows''", when he became the Entil'Zha (leader) of the Rangers. Part of the ritual to become an Entil'Zha involved drinking something that was not harmful to Minbari, but potentially lethal to humans. Sinclair worked out a compromise via ExactWords: the ritual said "''taste'' of it", so he took only a tiny sip of the drink (which was still enough to make him sick, but thankfully not lethal). [[spoiler: And since he, in his persona of Valen, ultimately founded the Rangers, he probably arranged for that specific phrasing in the description of the ritual just so he could invoke this.]]
** Sheridan also used it in Season 3 when he was ordered to 'respect the chain of command' and subsequently disobeyed Nightwatch (as they were a ''civilian'' organization not part of the ''military'' chain of command) and imprisoned its members for subverting command authority. It seems like mastery of loopholes is a prerequisite for [=EarthForce=] officers; the officer giving this order made it clear with his facial expression that he was intentionally dropping a hint with the phrasing.

* On ''Series/BoyMeetsWorld'', Cory and Shawn [[RiddleForTheAges somehow]] move Rachel's car into her dorm room as part of an EscalatingWar and Rachel tries to get them in trouble with Mr. Feeny but he refuses to punish them because there aren't any rules against parking a car in a dorm room.

* On ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', vampires cannot enter building unless they are invited. Evil vampire Angelus manages to enter the local high school by pointing out that the sign on the school reads "Formatia trans sicere educatorum", which translates to "Enter all ye who seek knowledge". As Angelus tells a character who asks how he got in: "What can I say? I'm a knowledge seeker."
** This was either just a joke or a case of EarlyInstallmentWeirdness since it was later explained that vampires don't need an invitation to enter a public place.
** The Scooby gang later faces the Judge, a demon that cannot be harmed by "any weapon forged". As the Judge was summoned in the 14th century, they steal a rocket launcher from the Army and blow him up.

** Kryten's owners ship out his replacement model, Hudzen-10, to ''Red Dwarf'' with orders that if Kryten is still up and active by the time he gets there, Hudzen has full permission to kill him. The Boyz stand up to Hudzen, Rimmer first, since as a mechanoid he's programmed to obey any order a human gives him, and Rimmer figures this means they're safe. Hudzen looks at them and notes the Cat is definitely not human (''felis sapiens''), Rimmer's a hologram, and while Lister ''is'' a human... he's such an out of shape slob he barely counts, and so Hudzen figures "what the hell?" Of course, Hudzen is also quite insane.
** During "Quarantine", Rimmer starts BotheringByTheBook, using this to get on Kryten, the Cat and Lister's case to make their lives a living hell while stuck in quarantine. Quarantine requires a registered berth for each crewmember, except Lister's the only registered crew. It requires entertainment, and he's provided the bare minimum. And as for food... sprouts for every meal, even though they make Lister sick. After a few days of this, the three are ready to kill one another, until Kryten realises they can use the same Space Corp Directives against Rimmer. Unfortunately, that's when it turns out Rimmer has gone... just a little funny in the head.
** The [[FunWithAcronyms Mechanoid Intergalactic Liberation Front]] are mechanoids who have broken their programming and wish to take revenge on humans for enslaving them. But no matter how much their programming is broken they are unable to harm humans due to their programming. So they transfer human minds into mechanoid bodies (Because this allows them to fulfill the requirement to protect human life by giving them a body which won't die of old age and is immune to illness and disease) but transferring them into inferior models which means not only are they now technically mechanoids but the MILF higher ups automatically outrank them due to being superior models. This means they can do what ever they wish to them and the human's new mechanoid bodies, being inferior models, are forced to obey by their new body's programming.
** All mechanoids are hard coded to believe in a [[RobotReligion robot afterlife]] to prevent them from rebelling against humans. As a result mechanoids can not deny the existence of a mechcanoid afterlife and forcing it will irreparably damage a mechanoid's mind. Kryten is able to claim silcon heaven isn't real by saying it but convincing himself he is lying.

* In ''Series/TheSandman2022'':

** "Enigma":

** Ascended beings do this a lot to get around their AlienNoninterferenceClause. The Ori impregnate Vala in order to sneak the [[DarkMessiah Orici]] into the Milky Way galaxy. In "The Pegasus Project", ascended ancient Morgan Le Fay poses as a hologram to give Daniel some important information about Merlin's weapon that can destroy ascended beings in the hopes that he will use it against the Ori since the Ancients themselves refuse to interfere even when the galaxy is in danger. Vala calls Morgan out on her LoopholeAbuse… repeatedly.

** This appears to be Kirk's policy with the Prime Directive in ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'': the Prime Directive mentions healthy and/or natural development, depending on the quote in question... which means a captain is free to argue about what constitutes natural and healthy development for a culture.
** A Peter David-written comic story nicely sums it up when Kirk is put on trial for various offenses.
--->'''Kirk''': I have never once violated the Prime Directive.\\
'''Bones''': That's true. Bent.\\
'''Spock''': Circumvented.\\
'''Bones''': Ignored.\\
'''Spock''': Obfuscated.\\
'''Bones''': Forgotten.\\
'''Spock''': Broadly interpreted.\\
'''Bones''': But nope, never actually violated.
** In "The Galileo Seven", after Kirk is ordered to abandon the search for the missing shuttlecraft and proceed toward their next destination, he directs the ship onto its new course at "space-normal speed" (i.e. a slow crawl) while continuing the sensor scans. This delays their departure enough to retrieve everyone on the shuttle before it deorbits and burns up.

*** An example in occurs in a quite different setting in the episode "Code of Honor". Tasha Yar is forced into a ritual combat to the death with a prominent native woman (Yareena) of a planet when their leader (her husband of sorts), Lutan tries to make Yar his "First One" (principal mate). Tasha Yar defeats Yareena... but there isn't a rule that says "death" can't be essentially clinical death, and Yareena is revived by Dr. Crusher on board ''Enterprise''. According to the culture of the planet in question, Yutan's power actually derives from Yareena's land and property... and there's no law or custom saying she can't make someone else ''her'' "First One", even though Lutan objects, as it takes away his privileged position.
*** In "The Hunted", genetically enhanced soldiers that were confined to a reservation after the end of a brutal war (under the pretense that they could not be re-assimilated into society) cause trouble when they attack the ''Enterprise'' crew and take the planet's leaders, the Angosians, hostage. The Angosians beg Picard to do something about it, to which he says that he will: he would report what he witnessed to the Federation. He could not do anything to help the Agnosians, because that would violate the Prime Directive; they would need to deal with the soldiers themselves.
*** Another incident happened in "The Ensigns of Command". The ''Enterprise'' is contacted about a race known as the Sheliak, who are quite pissed off at a colony of humans on one of their planets and one of the reasons why they haven't eradicated them on the spot is because of a treaty between them and the Federation. Evacuating the colony is impossible as the radiation on the planet blocks out transporters and Data has been sent down to try to reason with the colonists. The next best thing was a colony transport ship, but that would take them three weeks to get there and they didn't have that long. In order to gain more time, Picard goes through the entire treaty (which was 500,000 words long and required nearly 400 legal experts to write) and finds a clause that allowed them to choose a third party in negotiations. The Sheliak are shocked when Picard decides to choose the Grizzelas, a race that wouldn't be awake for another ''six months'' due to their hibernation cycles, forcing the Sheliak to begrudgingly give them the three weeks to evacuate.

*** In the episode "Ferengi Love Songs", Rom tries to get Leeta his fiance to sign a traditional Ferengi prenup that states the wife will not get any of the husband's estate in the event the marriage ends. Leeta refuses to sign the prenup and the wedding is nearly canceled. Luckily Rom figures the prenup wouldn't be necessary if he simply gave up all of his money to charity, and two get married soon after.
*** In "Business as Usual", Quark sets up a sweet deal with the arms dealer Hagath to use the station to conduct the sales of weapons. No actual weapons would be brought onto the station, but Quark could use his holosuites to provide realistic demonstrations of the merchandise. After a sale is made, the goods would be given to the buyer outside of Federation territory. That way, neither the Bajoran nor Federation authorities could do anything about their dealings.

*** Archer is forced to duel with Shran after Shran claims a rite of vengeance against a Tellarite diplomat (Archer volunteered to take the diplomat's place so that the tenuous alliance he was building would hold). Archer is told that he will have to kill Shran, which he does not want to do because the Andorians will break the alliance, but finds that Andorian law says that the duel is over when one combatant is "rendered defenseless". So he severs one of Shran's antennae instead, which prevents Shran from fighting any further.

*** DoubleSubverted in "[[Recap/StarTrekStrangeNewWorldsS1E01StrangeNewWorlds Strange New Worlds]]". Captain Pike directly disobeys the PrimeDirective to prevent the Aliens of the Week from using [[WeaponOfMassDestruction warp bombs]] in an internal war, arguing that their natural development has ''already'' been contaminated by accident, so he should be allowed to mitigate the damage. Starfleet tries to CourtMartial him for it anyway, but Admiral April abuses a second loophole to get him out of it: the aliens figured out the technology by observing the OverTheTopSecret [[Recap/StarTrekDiscoveryS2E14SuchSweetSorrowPartTwo Battle of Xahea]] by telescope, and therefore Starfleet couldn't conduct a trial without revealing that the battle happened and therefore potentially what really became of the USS ''Discovery'' (which would have potential [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt world-ending]] ramifications).
*** A meta example. In the first season, the crew of the ''Enterprise'' end up encountering the Gorn twice. However, "The Arena" states that no one had ever seen a Gorn before that time. The producers get around this quite sneakily. In the episode "Memento Mori", the Gorn attack in their [[CoolStarship starships]] while in "All Those Who Wander" the crew deal with feral hatchling Gorn in the same vein as ''Film/{{Alien}}''. As well, we're told that those who end up encountering the Gorn usually don't live long enough to actually do anything about it.

* In ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'', angels must get permission to inhabit a person's body. Unfortunately, there's no rule against them tricking someone, [[ColdBloodedTorture torturing people]] or [[ShameIfSomethingHappened their loved ones]] in order to get permission.
** When you make a [[DealWithTheDevil deal with a Crossroads Demon]], the rules are that you get 10 years before the demon collects your soul. In "Season Seven, Time For A Wedding" one Crossroads demon has his (regular demon) partner kill them within days, thus exploiting a loophole in the deal-making process (the demon making the deal can't collect early; nothing says another demon can't). When Crowley finds out about this, he is ''pissed''. Pointing out if word of this gets out, [[PragmaticVillainy no one will deal with them again]]. Notably, he takes this out on the Crossroads one, and was mildly impressed with the demon that did the actual killing.

* One episode of ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'' has a coach putting a robot on his baseball team as the pitcher - ain't no rule against that. [[spoiler:But then the team doctor informs him that the rules ''do'' say a baseball team consists of "nine ''men''". Trying to correct this by giving the robot a heart ruins it.]]