History Main / CrazyMemory

* [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] in ''Series/{{Community}}'' when Troy is being initiated into the Air Conditioner Repair School so no one would believe him and think he was just remembering a dream. Highlights include a black Hitler and an astronaut cooking paninis.

* Future!Ted from ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'' occasionally had some of these, which were usually implied to be him simply misremembering things or being unable to recall what happened outside of his biased perspective, leading to the events of the episode suddenly veering into totally surreal territory for a few minutes. Usually prefaced by "Kids, I ''swear'' this is what happened next..."

* [[http://s.cdn.gaiaonline.com/images/publishing/weekly/2009/08/05/4-koma-juviecamp.jpg "I got stabbed in the part of my brain that produces flashbacks."]]

* Subverted and parodied in ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'', twice. In the episodes "Fry and the Slurm Factory" and "A Clockwork Origin," Professor Farnsworth is declared crazy and everything he has just said has been lunacy. In retaliation, he begins ranting and shouts "and he's my uncle" pointing to the much younger character, Fry. This is actually true, as Fry [[HumanPopsicle comes from the distant past]] and is Farnsworth's great great great great great etc uncle (and his [[spoiler: great great great great great great great etc [[MyOwnGrampa grandfather]]]]. However, nobody believes him, writing him off as nuts.

** [[AnythingThatMoves Depends on how you define "relationships", really]].

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[[quoteright:350:[[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/homer_crazy_memory.jpg]]]]
[-[[caption-width-right:350:How Homer Simpson remembers the last town hall meeting.]]-]

[[folder:Anime And Manga]]

* In ''Manga/LoveLab'', Maki does this a lot, like having a flashback of her and Riko having a LoverTugOfWar with a ''human'' Huggy (Huggy is a pillow with a man drawn on it).

[[folder:Film]]

* The whole premise of ''Film/BigFish'' is that Edward Bloom's stories about his life couldn't possibly be true. In the end it seems that some of the details might have been exaggerated, but the general events actually happened.

* Captain Jack Harkness in ''Series/{{Torchwood}}'' does this often in the form of references to relationships with historical characters (which could very well have actually happened since he's a time traveler and he's taken TheSlowPath) and impossible situations like being pregnant.
* In ''Series/DoctorWho'', the Doctor will often slip in references to stories which may or may not involve Michelangelo, arrows, alien super-computers and pepper-pots with plungers. Random bystanders will think he's a madman. Well, he ''is'' a madman, but his stories are probably all true. Also, he's second only to Captain Jack at this point in terms of relationships with historical figures.
** [[AnythingThatMoves Depends on how you define "relationships", really]].
** Lampshaded in "The Doctor's Wife"--Rory asks Amy if she believes any of the Doctor's crazy memories, to which she responds she was there for some of them.
* In one episode of ''Series/ItsAlwaysSunnyInPhiladelphia'', Frank tries to pass off more than one story from John Franchise/{{Rambo}}'s life as something that happened to him. No indication is given that he doesn't genuinely believe these things happened to him.
* Beans from ''Series/EvenStevens'' was a lot like this.
* Future!Ted from ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'' occasionally had some of these, which were usually implied to be him simply misremembering things or being unable to recall what happened outside of his biased perspective, leading to the events of the episode suddenly veering into totally surreal territory for a few minutes. Usually prefaced by "Kids, I ''swear'' this is what happened next..."
** Barney often claims to have done some pretty crazy things. On the one hand, he does lie/exaggerate a lot, on the other hand...he ''is'' Barney, so really anything's possimpible...

[[folder:Newspaper Comic]]
* ''Comicstrip/BloomCounty''. Milo sometimes did this, but about Binkley's life, not his own. Note that Milo and Binkley are both children.
-->'''Milo:''' Tell me, Binkley, if you had your life to live over again, would you do everything the same? Would you have left home to join those Bohemian resistance fighters? Would you have married that Turkish leopard smuggler? Would you have spent those twenty years chasing white tigers in the mountains of Ceylon?
[[/folder]]

* Pretty much every CutawayGag on ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' is one of these, where a character will say something like "This is just like when I..." before cutting away to a crazy situation that almost certainly couldn't have happened.
** Played with several times and as early as the first season, where Peter set up the memory sequence, only for the clip to play the previous scene that led to the current situation. Lois rightly pointed that out. In another, Stewie sets up the gag only to be baffled that it was just dialog and there was no clip. Another gag revealed that one of Peter's memories was so out of left field, they didn't even have a clip to cut to and frantically looked for one that fit the situation the best.
* Arnold's grandfather on ''WesternAnimation/HeyArnold'' spouts these frequently. At one point, Arnold calls him out on a particularly outrageous war story:
-->'''Arnold:''' Grandpa, you did ''not'' [[AdolfHitlarious fight Adolf Hitler]]. You're making this all up.\\
'''Grandpa:''' Heh heh heh. Okay, you got me. I made that part up. Pretty funny, huh? ...It was Goebbels.
* Roger in ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'' has these on a regular basis. Of course, he's a 1600-year-old alien MasterOfDisguise who [[BecomingTheMask becomes the mask]] on a regular basis, so no one really knows how many of them are true. Roger included.

* Gir from ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'' tends to fall prey to these. Especially when he is asked to remember something important.
* During the ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' episode "The Cutie Mark Chronicles", the Cutie Mark Crusaders ask the Mane 6 about how they acquired their marks. Pinkie Pie explains how she grew up on a "rock farm", where there were "no laughing, no fun, only rocks" and she had to push rocks around all day, until the sonic rainboom made her feel joy and she threw a spontaneous party for her family. The scene cuts to the present and she finishes with "...and that's how Equestria was made!" much to the complete bafflement of the CMC. The fanbase is somewhat divided on the issue of whether her story is true or a complete fabrication.
** Later seasons have ran with it, and it's apparently actually true, if photos of said party on her wall are indication. Though one element left out of the flashback was her 3rd sister, Maude Pie. She was first mentioned briefly in a novel before appearing in one of the photos of the party, later in the same season she appeared in a proper episode named after her.
* Monterrey Jack from ''WesternAnimation/ChipAndDaleRescueRangers'', likes to tell crazy stories of his past adventures. Many of them are true. Probably.
* At the end of one episode of ''WesternAnimation/HarveyBirdmanAttorneyAtLaw'', Harvey has a flashback of a scene at the beginning of the episode, except there's a plate spinner and sword-swallower in the background, then a scuba diver floating in the middle of the room.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Archer}}'' has numerous characters either remembering odd events, not remembering a particular event (or oddly not remembering one memory out of a chain of similar situations even though remembering any of them at all meant that they should have really known better than to get into their current situation), or remembering stuff that never happened at all.
* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheGrimAdventuresOfBillyAndMandy'' opens with Billy trying to take Grim's scythe to attack a gorilla at the zoo. When Grim stops him he's told that they had been in agreement on the idea the previous week. The scene then cuts to Billy's memory of that, where Grim, now a camel-based MixAndMatchCritter in a surreal landscape, tells Billy to get "those nasty gorillas", and offers to ride him over.
-->'''Billy''': Now bend over and let me ride your humps!

* ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}'': Burgundy recounts her first encounter with Cilan: he thrashed her in a Gym, then he and his Pansage loom over her, much to the horror of poor little Burgundy and her Oshawott. Arguably subverted, since Cilan acted rather unsettling during their rematch.

-->'''Edd:''' "''My'', Ed, what a charmed world ''you'' live in..."