History Main / FadeToBlack

* Any twenty-four-minute episodes of ''[[Disney/OneHundredAndOneDalmatians 101 Dalmatians: The Series]]'' used this before a commercial, and sometimes used in various episodes for a scene transition.

[[IThoughtItMeant Sometimes used to mean]] declining to describe a sex scene in textual media; for that, see SexyDiscretionShot.

* ''Series/HeeHaw'': In a goofy, corny comedy series where silly bumper gags always sent the show into a commercial, there were a few instances where they did a "fade to black" with no applause or audience reaction. The most famous of these was in the early 1978 episode where the cast paid tribute to ElvisPresley, who had died just months earlier; the cast was gathered as Elvis' father, Vernon, talked about how much of a fan his son was of ''Hee Haw'' and how he wanted to be a guest on the show (a show that, had it come to pass, likely would have been the highest-rated in its history). Several of the Hee Haw Honeys were shown crying, and the others saddened or struggling to keep check of their emotions, as Vernon spoke about his son's musical legacy and how much of a fan he was of Roy Clark and Buck Owens. A light piano fare played just as the camera pulled away from the cast and faded to commercial.

* Creator/{{Yuriofwind}} often comes across these in his Bullshit Creepypasta Storytime segment. He lampshades it in "[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TcmFMEKJg0&t=7m40s Haunted Ocarina of Time]]".

* ''VideoGame/AfraidOfMonsters'' used it as a transition when crossing the lake on the boat.

%%This page's examples section is sorted alphabetically. It would be lovely if you'd maintain this, thanks.

A means of denoting the end of a scene by steadily and quickly reducing the image brightness until the entire screen is flat black. Its inverse, Fade In, reverses the process to bring a scene into view from a black screen. A fade from one scene to another is called a {{dissolve}}. Sometimes the screen will FadeToWhite instead.

Extremely common in movie trailers, and often used at an ActBreak.

* ''{{Doug}}'': The three twenty-four-minute Nickelodeon episodes and all of Disney's episodes used this right before a commercial.

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* In ''Film/CodeUnknown'', all scenes cut black before new scenes start.

-->--'''Rise''', ''VideoGame/{{Persona 4}}''

* In some countries whenever a news program reports on the recent death of a very famous person, the report ends with a fade to black before proceeding to the next story. Some Russian weekly news programs also use this in their end-of-the-year broadcasts, where they include a slide show of photos of the celebrities that died during the year.

* Cop workplace comedy ''BrooklynNineNine'' uses a brief fade to/fade from black as a transition into/out of every CutawayGag, combined with a "psshhh" walkie-talkie sound effect.

* ''VideoGame/Badland'' has no death animation. Instead, every time your character hits the spikes or the AdvancingWallOfDoom, the screen simply fades to black and unfades at the previous checkpoint.

-->''So...what do we do now? If this were one of my shows, this would be a wrap.''

-->--'''Rise''', ''{{Persona 4}}''

[[folder:Web Original]]
* One of [[WebVideo/TheAngryVideoGameNerd James Rolfe's]] [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Klltwoa6glE top 10 movie cliches]].

* ''Film/WaynesWorld'' fades to black in the credits then fades back in so Wayne and Garth can talk some more. After a few of these fade back ins one of them comments that when they want them to stop talking they'll just fade out and it will stay that way. Then the credits fade to black again for a prolonged period and Garth declares, "I can't believe they did that!"
* ''Film/TheXFilesFightTheFuture'': At the end of the Antarctica sequence. The screen stays black for so long that some people seeing it for the first time thought this was [[NoEnding the end]] of the movie.

* ''Series/StargateSG1'': In "200", Martin mentions that Act 3 "just ends" due to budget cuts, during act three of the actual episode. Although the show normally fades to black, this time it did a hard cut to black, as a nice bit of metahumor.
* ''Series/{{Firefly}}'': FOX has software that automatically runs commercials over any black screen to eliminate the FadeToBlack in favor of more advertising time. Joss Whedon felt that a moment of black at the end of one act of the pilot episode was important enough for the dramatic tension to salvage, so he had it fade to the darkest brown possible that wouldn't be picked up by FOX's computers.

[[folder:Web Original]]
* One of [[WebVideo/TheAngryVideoGameNerd James Rolfe's]] [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Klltwoa6glE top 10 movie cliches]].
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* ''WesternAnimation/WileECoyoteAndTheRoadrunner'' sometimes treats the black screen as a stage curtain that can be lifted or peered around. An entire cartoon was made up of "blackout gags"; brief, self-sustained skits that fade out after the punchline and fade into the next. The term originated in {{Vaudeville}}, where the lights were turned off after each joke to punctuate the humor and give the audience a pause for laughing.
* ''WesternAnimation/WinxClub'' has these at least every two minutes or so.
* The ''WesternAnimation/PinkPanther'' cartoon "Pink Outs" is made up of blackout gags, except the screen fades to pink instead.

* ''WesternAnimation/MikeLuAndOg'' use these for scene transitions.
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* ''{{The X-Files}}: Fight the Future'': At the end of the Antarctica sequence. The screen stays black for so long that some people seeing it for the first time thought this was [[NoEnding the end]] of the movie.

* Subverted in the "A Scandal in Belgravia" epsiode of ''Series/{{Sherlock}}''. John Watson is told by Mycroft Holmes that Irene Adler has been captured an executed by a terrorist cell in Pakistan. John elects to tell Sherlock that she's in witness protection instead. Sherlock appears to buy that but, after John leaves, has a flashback to the executions scene. The terrorists let Irene send a goodbye text to Sherlock as the executioner (all covered in black) walks up with a sword. She closes her eyes, and the screen fades to black. Then we hear the erotic moan she put on Sherlock's phone as her ringtone. The screen "unfades". The "executioner" tells her "When I say 'run', run!" and swings his sword at a terrorist.

* ''{{Stargate SG-1}}'': In "200", Martin mentions that Act 3 "just ends" due to budget cuts, during act three of the actual episode. Although the show normally fades to black, this time it did a hard cut to black, as a nice bit of metahumor.