History Main / RealDreamsAreWeirder

*** Subverted later in ''Hogfather'', however. Some characters' ridiculous childhood nightmares -- like the big scary wardrobe in the corner of the room that wants to eat you -- come to life, and scare the pants off the hardened criminals they terrorise. And then some of them ''kill them'' (or at least [[UncertainDoom killing them is probably the best they could hope for]]).

* In ''Literature/HarryPotter,'' Harry has a variety of weird dreams throghout the series, bordering on a RunningGag; examples include showing up at a Quidditch match only to find that the other team was riding dragons, or watching Neville and Professor Sprout waltz in the Room of Requirement while Professor [=McGonagall=] [[EverythingsLouderWithBagpipes plays the bagpipes]]. He has magically significant dreams, too, but even then some of them are kind of trippy and only make sense in retrospect.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheMarvelousMisadventuresOfFlapjack'' makes note of this:

You awake with a shudder despairing\\

* In ''Webcomic/BobAndGeorge'', Shadow Man (hidden from Mega Man's view) introduces himself to Mega Man as "the one who haunts your dreams". Mega Man takes several guesses at who this person is, which start reasonable ([[BigBad Dr. Wily]]) before getting more and more bizarre (such as "the milkman").

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* OneHitWonder 2Nu's only hit, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gYIbMwswKM "This Is Ponderous,"]] is about a guy recalling a bizarre dream he had, beginning with taking the day off from work when nobody there remembers him before he suddenly winds up on the beach (with [[BrickJoke a billboard telling him he should be at work, no less]]). From there, he appears near a lake and receives a phone call from the operator, who proceeds to sing [[AsLongAsItSoundsForeign a gibberish war chant]], before the narrator tap dances in golf shoes. Then, just before waking up, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking it]] [[ShoutOut rains in southern California]]. Throughout his recollection, the narrator knows that he's in a dream, even acknowledging things he's seen in other dreams (such as a water polo game and a girl who "talks with her eyes").

* ''Theatre/ThePajamaPartyMurders'' has Myrtle's recounting of the dream which inspired her to become a Canadian missionary.
--> '''Myrtle''': Uncle Cosmo, you did enjoy this story, didn't you? May he rest in peace. Yes, it was a dream. I was at Niagara Falls. And I was naked, except for about six floppy disks. The five and a quarter size. And I had on stereo headphones. And I kept running into little souvenir shops, looking for my cookie sheets. And all of a sudden, there was Elvis and Boutrous Boutrous-Gali and Geraldo, or maybe it was Tony Orlando. And they put me on this giant cupcake and my feet kept sinking into the icing and then through the headphones I heard a voice that sounded an awful lot like Leonard Nimoy, saying, "Go to the Horseshoe Falls, Go to the Horseshoe Falls." And then there was Charlton Heston, riding down the Niagara River on my missing cookie sheet, like it was a surf board, laughin' and goin' over the Falls. And I knew it was true. The best view of the Falls IS from the Canadian side. And that's what decided me - I'd become a Canadian missionary.

* At one point in ''VideoGame/GravityFallsLegendOfTheGnomeGemulets'', if you talk to Candy she'll remark "They always say to follow your dreams, but one time I had a dream that I ate the Earth."

* ''VideoGame/LSDDreamEmulator'' is based entirely around this, and specifically some details of the creator's dreams. As such, nothing therein really makes sense, textures keep changing, and (aside from in Flashbacks) no two days are exactly alike.

* ''Webcomic/CyanideAndHappiness'' references UsefulNotes/MartinLutherKingJr's "I Have A Dream" speech:
-->'''Martin Luther King:''' I had a dream.
-->''BeatPanel''
-->'''MLK:''' I was freaking flying!

* In ''Webcomic/OurLittleAdventure'', when Jordie was TalkingInYourDreams, Emily is jealous: [[http://danielscreations.com/ola/comics/ep0402.html she dreamed of being naked in an aquarium with people staring.]]
* In ''Webcomic/BobAndGeorge'', Shadow Man (hidden from Mega Man's view) introduces himself to Mega Man as "the one who haunts your dreams". Mega Man takes several guesses at who this person is, which start reasonable ([[BigBad Dr. Wily]]) before getting more and more bizarre (such as "the milkman").
-->'''Shadow Man:''' No! I'm Shadow Man!
-->'''Mega Man:''' What? You're not in my dreams.
-->'''Shadow Man:''' And now I'm very thankful for that.

* From ''Website/TheOnion'':
** ''Our Dumb Century'' has the headline: "MLK: 'I had a really weird dream last night.'" The article has King describing a really weird dream he had the other night, concluding that he has no idea what on Earth it meant.
** Their horoscope section once had the prediction "You will soon meet the woman of your dreams, the one where every tooth in her mouth has its own screaming face."
* [[Blog/DasSporking Mervin]] lampoons the lack of dream-weirdness in ''[[Literature/TheTwilightSaga Twilight]]'' in her own sporking of the series.

* In ''WebAnimation/FinalFantasyVIIMachinabridged'' Cid asks Cloud if he had a dream (in the ambition sense of the term) and Cloud shares his own strange dreams that are suspiciously close to his Crossover appearances.
-->'''Cloud''': Well, there was this one time... ([[Franchise/KingdomHearts shows Cloud in his KH attire]]) I LOOK SO COOL!! (flashback to real world) [[VideoGame/SuperSmashBros ...And then I fought a]] [[Franchise/DonkeyKong gorilla with a tie!]] [[UnexpectedCharacter I don't think]] [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall anyone saw that coming]].\\
'''Cid''': I ain't talkin' bout sleepin' dreams that can never, ever happen, ya idjit!

* ''WesternAnimation/HomeMovies'' - the guys are confronted by the angry goalie Brendon got a goal off of (by the ball bouncing off his face):
-->'''Cho:''' ImYourWorstNightmare!\\
'''Jason:''' (snorts) That is ''so'' old! Huh? Let me wipe the cobwebs off that line! ...but technically my worst nightmare to date is: I'm sitting in a high chair, and I'm breast-feeding my own mother, and she suddenly opens her mouth and I see my father's head...\\
'''Cho:''' Yeah yeah yeah, all right, I get it, shut up! You're giving me the creeps.
* ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'': In "Hank's Unmentionable Problem", Peggy's nightmare about Hank dying (yes, from constipation) is realistically and hilariously weird. Hank's corpse is caked in clown makeup, former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop officiates the burial and asks everyone to pass in their algebra homework, and the grave turns into a giant toilet, with Cotton "flushing" Hank's casket.
* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'':
** In contrast to the dreams of the rest of "[[Recap/JusticeLeagueS2E5And6OnlyADream Only a Dream]]", the Flash's dream (before Dr. Destiny turned it into an inescapable nightmare) was a surreal romp that included giant frogs in the fridge, cannibal children, and watching cartoons of himself while a small boy picked at the plot holes.
** In another episode, Supergirl had a dream where she went out, chased, and murdered a guy. She went to ComicBook/MartianManhunter, who wasn't sure what to make of it, since it was far more linear and logical than normal dreams. [[spoiler: It wasn't a dream, it was a shared memory between Supergirl and her clone.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/UglyAmericans'' had a twist on the phrase "a dream come true", with [[SuccubiAndIncubi Callie]] bringing Mark's dreams into reality... including such sights as Doug (the Koala-man) riding a saddle on Frank's back, and [[ParentalIncest Callie looking like his naked mother]].

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAdventuresOfJimmyNeutronBoyGenius'': When Carl is having recurring nightmares, Jimmy offers to enter his dreams to help sort them out, assuring him it will be easy to find and apply a logical solution, since that's how Jimmy's dreams work. Carl is skeptical, since in his last dream, he married a turkey. When Jimmy enters the dream, he finds oddities like Libby rowing her desk to school with a mannequin's leg (since her paddle was broken), Carl's pen turning into a worm, and Carl still married to the turkey (who eats the worm pen). Jimmy finds the whole experience unsettling, but Carl and their dreamed-up classmates find nothing unusual.
-->'''Carl''': Besides, if this was only a dream, could I do this? *pulls his brain out of his head*\\
'''Jimmy''': That's the only time you can do that.

* ''FanFic/AShadowOfTheTitans'': [[ManipulativeBastard Tarakudo]] uses this trope to keep Jade from realizing she's stumbled onto him messing around with her subconscious — he conjures multicolored mushrooms and ducks in top hats, then turns himself into a basketball with a mustache.

* ''Fanfic/NationalAnthem'' : In Chapter 7, Link describes for the readers a highly lucid "sensitive" dream that he is having and proceeds to describe the difference between his important dreams and his regular, weird ones:
-->"Most of my dreams are the standard weird stuff without any clear meaning, rhyme or reason. I had one about having conversations with telepathic meat, once. Then there was the one I had not long ago in which I had to barbeque a case of tube socks or dinosaurs would eat me."

* In ''Fanfic/MyLifeIsAGoddamnMess'', Minato wishes he had the kind of "normal" dreams that don't make sense, instead of the plot-relevant ones he tends to actually have.

* ''Fanfic/PokemonResetBloodlines'' has a massive example of this trope in Chapter 24. It covers both in story stress and the author mocking {{Betrayal Fic}}s, begining with a mocking parody of betrayal fic cliches which quickly goes crazy to include rocks with top hats, Ash taking the role of [[Anime/CodeGeass Clovis La Britannia]], Gary acting like Gollum, and then the local [=MissingNo=] shows up...just as the dream ends.
** Red has a similarly odd dream later. Less nuts, but when one has a dream where Ash Ketchum is acting like the the Red/Blue Rival as champion one can't say many things are more odd in-series.

* When Arturia is knocked out in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12190704/11/Light-the-Blue-Touch-Paper-and-Run-Like-Hell Light the Blue Touch Paper and Run Like Hell]]'', she dreams about being in the car while [[DrivesLikeCrazy Irisviel]] [[TheImmodestOrgasm is very much enjoying driving]]. They brake because Loki pops in the road to sell them t-shirts, then Medea comes and asks Iri her driving license. Arturia is understandably confused.
* In ''FanFic/TheApprenticeTheStudentAndTheCharlatan'', Nova gets both a strange, random dream, followed immediately by a plot-relevant vision in Chapter 5. The strange dream is full of {{Shout Out}}s, such as a guard's armor being painted with [[WesternAnimation/FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends hot rod flames and bunnies]], and is purportedly serenaded with Luna and Celestia playing a set of bagpipes and a vuvuzela respectively.
* ''Fanfic/TheBoltChronicles'': In "The Murder Mystery", the story is revealed to be Penny’s jalapeno and pepperoni pizza-fueled nightmare. The dream is far more cohesive than real-life examples, though some surreal touches occur, such as Penny’s classic private eye props containing unusual properties (the calabash pipe she "smokes" emits soap bubbles, and her deerstalker-style hat sports antlers).
* [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] in ''FanFic/ForLove'', where a [[PeggySue time-shifted]] Hinata attempts to convince the 3rd Hokage that she's DreamingOfThingsToCome as a way of influencing future events. Aware of this trope (if her supposed dreams were too literal they'd arouse the Hokage's suspicion), she ensures that the dreams she describes are always a weird and surreal and convey their supposed "message" about future events through metaphor (which also gives her some leeway for things she's not entirely sure she remembers correctly). For example, she describes a version of the Uchiha Massacre where a man in a one-eyed fox mask is [[PeoplePuppets puppeteering]] Itachi, who's crying TearsOfBlood, from the rooftops with chains attached to his hands and feet, who then releases Itachi and dissolves into a red mist, leaving Itachi to [[AndShowItToYou tear Sasuke's heart out of his chest]] without killing him and likewise vanish into red mist.[[note]]She's describing the man she believes to be Madara Uchiha, previously responsible for the Kyuubi's attack when Naruto was born, convincing Itachi to kill his family and then join the Akatsuki ("Red Clouds") organisation, and Itachi on his own initiative making Sasuke hate him with the [[ThanatosGambit intention that Sasuke would one day kill him to become a hero]].[[/note]]
* PlayedWith in ''Fanfic/TotalDramaComebackSeries.'' Ezekiel has a dream that's highly symbolic of his ongoing romance arc with [[spoiler:Heather]]... and also there's a bear in a tutu dancing to "It's Peanut Butter Jelly Time".
** One chapter is devoted to the characters' dreams after drinking a special tea that invokes {{Flashback}}s. Most are meaningful and begin with a note about when they take place, but Owen, Izzy and Chef are having weird dreams[[note]]Owen's is an EroticDream about Izzy wearing giant doughnuts, Izzy's is herself as a warrior woman, and Chef's is about getting a pony[[/note]] with the time stamp listed as "???".

* ''Film/TheGoldenChild''. The BigBad communicates with Eddie Murphy's character [[TalkingInYourDreams in a dream]], lampshaded by him because of all the weird stuff happening such as the live StudioAudience, a unicorn trotting around inside the house, and the [[EroticDream scantily-clad heroine]] being tied up with toilet paper.
* In ''Film/CanadianBacon'', when John Candy's character is threatening a mountie played by Stephen Wright ([[ItMakesSenseInContext long story]]), one of Candy's friends says "We're your worst nightmare." The mountie then proceeds to ramble his actual worst nightmare, a dream where he was lost in the Yukon being chased by wolves, and there were these tall skinny rabbits...
* ''Film/DoctorStrangeInTheMultiverseOfMadness'': After finding out that dreams are a look into what happens in alternate universes, Wong asks about a recurring dream he has in which he's running naked from a clown. According to America Chavez, there really ''is'' an alternate dimension out there where this occurs.
* Downplayed in ''Film/{{Inception}}''. The {{Villain Protagonist}}s are industrial spies who can enter the target's dreams and convince them to reveal their secrets. In order for this to work the target can't know he is dreaming, so a convincing 'dream architecture' designed and controlled by the CaperCrew is created that appears just like the real world. When things do get weird, it's a sign that something has gone badly wrong. The trick is then to adapt this weirdness to your own advantage before the target wakes up.

** In ''Literature/{{Hogfather}}'', Teatime announces, "ImYourWorstNightmare!" When he's taken too literally, he then has to clarify that he doesn't mean "the one with the giant cabbage and the [[ChainsawGood sort of whirring knife]] [[BuffySpeak thing]]" or a bunch of equally improbable things, but rather "the one where this man comes out of nowhere and kills you stone dead." "Hey, that one isn't all that scary compared to the [[KilledMidSentence oth]]--"
** Subverted later in ''Hogfather'', however. Some characters' ridiculous childhood nightmares -- like the big scary wardrobe in the corner of the room that wants to eat you -- come to life, and scare the pants off the hardened criminals they terrorise. And then some of them ''kill them'' (or at least [[UncertainDoom killing them is probably the best they could hope for]]).
** In ''Literature/SmallGods'', Urn says that harnessing the lightning is the dream of mankind, and Didactylos replies "Is it? I always dream of a giant carrot chasing me through a field of lobsters."

** ''Literature/TheWeeFreeMen'' has a bit where Rob Anybody describes "normal things gone wrong" as one of the nightmarish threats in Elfland, and Tiffany recalls having surreal nightmares about being threatened by a sugar bowl, or a pair of her late grandmother's boots.

** ''Literature/{{Pyramids}}'' parodies Pharaoh's dream from the biblical story of Joseph (mentioned below) when the protagonist, Pteppic, has reluctantly been made pharaoh of [[FantasyCounterpartCulture Djelibeybi]]. "He saw seven fat cows and seven thin cows. They were playing trombones." Pteppic also dreams that [[HighPriest Dios]] has found an obscure law requiring him to marry a cat.
* In ''Literature/TheVoyageOfTheDawnTreader'', the "island where dreams come true" is a horrifying place where nothing makes any sense.
-->"This is the land where dreams -- dreams, do you understand -- come to life, come real. Not daydreams: ''dreams''." There was about half a minute’s silence and then, with a great clatter of armor, the whole crew were tumbling down the main hatch as quick as they could and flinging themselves on the oars to row as they had never rowed before... [[MassOhCrap For it had taken everyone just that half-minute to remember certain dreams they had had -- dreams that make you afraid of going to sleep again -- and to realize what it would mean to land on a country where dreams come true.]]

* In ''[[Literature/AuntDimity Aunt Dimity Goes West]]'', Lori goes from the recurring nightmare of being shot and menaced by Abaddon (back home in Finch) to dreaming of blue-eyed cocker spaniels, who remind her of the Colorado cabin's young caretaker Toby.

* Creator/GKChesterton remarked in one of his essays that this is the reason many literary dream sequences just don't ring true. Real dreams aren't allegorical or artistic; they're ''weird.'' [[http://inamidst.com/stuff/gkc/dreams]]
-->When the hero tells us that “last night he dreamed a dream,” we are quite certain from the perfect and decorative character of the dream that he made it up at breakfast. The dream is so reasonable that it is quite impossible. [...] When the aged priest in a story narrates his dream, in which the imagery is dignified and the message plain, we are free to yield finally to a conviction that must have long been growing on us, and conclude that he is a somewhat distinguished liar.

* In ''Literature/EndersShadow'', Bean has a dream where thousands of people are fighting, only for a giant shoe to stomp them all. Wearing the shoe is [[ScaryDogmaticAliens a laughing Bugger/Formic]]. The dream clearly seems to deliver AnAesop about "despite all the squabbles on Earth, we must remember that we face a greater enemy [[WeAREStrugglingTogether or we'll all die]]." However, Bean dismisses this, thinking ''dreams don't have morals, they're just random firings of our brain that we assume is a narrative. The only thing it can tell me is what I feel''. He then decides the REAL moral of the dream is "Don't be one of the scurrying ants. [[MightMakesRight Be the shoe]]."
* In ''Literature/TheJenniferMorgue'', Bob can tell his dream is ''really'' weird as it follows a linear structure (seeing through the eyes of Ramona Random via "destiny entanglement") instead of featuring camel-headed spider gods trying to get him to sign a Microsoft User Agreement.
* In ''Literature/TheNameOfTheRose'', Adso has a very bizarre dream mixing recollections from one of his past readings (the ''Coena Cypriani'') along with the people and dramatic events currently taking place in the abbey. This leads afterwards to [[spoiler: an [[EurekaMoment Eureka Moment]] ]].
* Normally, demigods from ''Literature/PercyJacksonAndTheOlympians'' have meaningful dreams (which is [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] to Hades and back), but Percy mentions a recurring dream he has where he's taking a standardized test while wearing a straitjacket (though the time he dreams it in the series, it's meaningful because [[SealedGoodInACan Thalia]] was taking the test with him).
* In the Creator/OgdenNash poem "I Can Hardly Wait for the Sandman" he complains that people won't listen to him describing his ''really interesting'' dreams ... which are all just rambling weirdness that doesn't go anywhere.
-->Another time I dreamt that I was climbing this mountain, although actually it was more like a beach.\\
And all of a sudden this sort of a merry-go-round that I forgot to tell you about turned into a shack with a sign saying [[AC: leda's place, swanburgers 10¢ each]].

* ''Literature/OurDumbCentury'' features an article on UsefulNotes/MartinLutherKingJr about his speech "I Had a Really Weird Dream Last Night", in which he describes seeing Yankee Stadium full of wild animals, meets Creator/JackieGleason, and gets threatened by [[AttackOfTheFiftyFootWhatever a giant roll of paper towels]].
* The current page image comes from the ''Literature/DiaryOfAWimpyKid'' book ''Double Down'' wherein Greg has a dream where [[MakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext he kicks a field goal with his own head on a distant planet while asking for extra mustard on his turnips]]. Greg himself calls the dream "[[LampshadeHanging completely bonkers]]".
* George Santayana, who was a philopher, poet, and novelist, gives the example of white-capped waves turning into white horses galloping down the beach. This actually makes sense--whitecaps are called white horses in British English.

[[folder:Religion and Mythology]]
* Dreams in Literature/TheBible - even the [[PsychicDreamsForEveryone prophetic ones]] - are occasionally straightforward, but are just as often realistically bizarre and symbolic. A recurring plot point is where a dreamer has a premonition that their dream meant ''something'', but requires a person with divine inspiration to figure out ''what'' it meant. For example, the Pharaoh has a dream [[SurrealHorror (nightmare?)]] of seven fat cows and seven skinny cows emerging from the Nile River, then the skinny cows eating the fat cows while remaining just as skinny as before, followed by a similar dream except the cows are replaced with wheat - including the part where the ''skinny wheat eats the fat wheat''. Joseph interprets the dream to be a premonition of seven years of plenty, followed by seven years of famine.
** Literature/TheTalmud specifically says (Nedarim 8a-b) that just as you can't grow wheat without getting straw, any prophetic dream is going to have parts that shouldn't be taken seriously.
[[/folder]]

* ''Series/{{Angel}}''. In "[[Recap/AngelS05E10SoulPurpose Soul Purpose]]", Angel has a number of AnxietyDreams reflecting his current fears, but is rather puzzled by the presence in one dream of a man in a bear suit.

* In the ''Series/{{Blackadder}}'' episode "[[Recap/BlackadderS2E3Potato Potato]]", [[MilesGloriosus Walter Raleigh]] says he's brought [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} Queen Elizabeth]] lands beyond her wildest dreams...her response is to ask if he's sure because she's had some pretty wild dreams, like the one where she was a sausage roll, or the one where there was this enormous tree and she was sitting right on top of it.
** In "[[Recap/BlackadderS3E2InkAndIncapability Ink and Incapability]]", Blackadder is relieved that Dr Johnson isn't angry at him for destroying the world's first Dictionary. Then he sees Baldrick with a dog's head. "Oh God, this is a dream, isn't it..."
* ''Series/{{Cheers}}:'' One episode begins with the bar gang talking about typical anxiety dreams, until Woody mentions a dream he had about going to a classy restaurant where you had to check your legs in at the door, and then spending the entire meal worrying if someone would accidentally take his legs.

* On ''Series/JoanOfArcadia'', while God does occasionally talk to Joan through dreams, her normal dreams also include Adam as a dog and evil koala bears in hats.
* Charlie mentions having one in an early episode of ''Series/{{LOST}}'':
-->I have this dream. I'm driving a bus, and my teeth start falling out. My mum is in the back, eating biscuits. Everything smells of bacon. It's weird.
* In an episode of ''Series/ThirdRockFromTheSun'', Harry was concerned about FantasticRacism against aliens:
-->'''Tommy:''' You're gonna be like some sort of alien [[UsefulNotes/MartinLutherKingJr Martin Luther King]]?\\
'''Harry:''' Exactly. Because I, too, have a dream. And in that dream, [[NotWearingPantsDream I'm naked on a ferris wheel]].

* [[Blog/DasSporking Mervin]] lampoons the lack of dream-weirdness in ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'' in her own sporking of the series.

* A deleted scene from ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'' has Helen having AnxietyDreams about her husband leaving her because she has settled into the role of housewife, which translates into picking up laundry near a pool while Bob is being held aloft on a couch and fed grapes by beautiful women, ending with her getting sucked into a washing machine. The scene was eventually cut in favor of making Helen's worries about Bob's fidelity into subtext.

* [[http://www.collegehumor.com/post/7024863/dreams-in-movies-vs-real-life This]] ''Website/CollegeHumor'' comic compares Dreams in Movies (which are always fairly coherent and obvious) vs. Dreams in Real Life (which range from mundane to completely nonsensical).

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLEGOMovie2TheSecondPart'', Wyldstyle tells one of Queen Whatevra's guards "ImYourWorstNightmare!" He replies in confusion "You're me, and I'm late to school, I forgot my homework, and my pants are made of pudding?"

* ''Manga/AzumangaDaioh'': Each character's {{hatsuyume}} -- the first dream of the New Year, which is normally supposed to be meaningful -- is instead a series of non-sequiturs that veer into SurrealHumor. Osaka dreams that Chiyo uses her pigtails to fly, Tomo dreams [[DreamSue she's comically superior to everyone else]], and Sakaki dreams that a weird orange cat is Chiyo's dad. [[spoiler:Oddly enough, the last of these ''is'' meaningful in a roundabout way, as Chiyo's dad ends up giving Sakaki cryptic hints about her goal to find a "real cat".]] Other dreams the characters have are just as strange, such as when Osaka dreams that Chiyo's pigtails are detachable and sentient.

[[folder:Comic strips]]

* OneHitWonder 2Nu's only hit, "This Is Ponderous," is about a guy recalling a bizarre dream he had, beginning with taking the day off from work when nobody there remembers him before he suddenly winds up on the beach (with [[BrickJoke a billboard telling him he should be at work, no less]]). From there, he appears near a lake and receives a phone call from the operator, who proceeds to sing [[AsLongAsItSoundsForeign a gibberish war chant]], before the narrator tap dances in golf shoes. Then, just before waking up, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking it]] [[ShoutOut rains in southern California]]. Throughout his recollection, the narrator knows that he's in a dream, even acknowledging things he's seen in other dreams (such as a water polo game and a girl who "talks with her eyes").

* ''WesternAnimation/UglyAmericans'' had a twist on the phrase "a dream come true", with [[HornyDevils Callie]] bringing Mark's dreams into reality... including such sights as Doug (the Koala-man) riding a saddle on Frank's back, and [[ParentalIncest Callie looking like his naked mother]].

** There is a commentary on this in which Pharaoh's court interpreter described the dreams as relating to issues personal to Pharaoh, which was too low-class an interpretation for Pharaoh's dreams; they had to be significant for all of Egypt.

** Additionally and in reference to this, in "[[Recap/BuffyTheVampireSlayerS4E22Restless Restless]]", [[spoiler:the First Slayer]] comes into each of the main character's dreams to kill them. All the dreams are filled with metaphors and symbols which reflect the characters' histories (and even some {{foreshadowing}}), ''but'' each of them is at some point interrupted by the sudden appearance by a guy offering slices of cheese and MeaninglessMeaningfulWords-ridden advice. Afterwards, while they are debriefing over the experience, none of them have any idea what to make of this guy.[[note]]This was intentional by Creator/JossWhedon, and he is not relevant at all, despite fan theories. [[/note]]

* In ''Machinima/FinalFantasyVIIMachinabridged'' Cid asks Cloud if he had a dream (in the ambition sense of the term) and Cloud shares his own strange dreams that are suspiciously close to his Crossover appearances.

* ''Series/LovecraftCountry'' opens with Atticus--a Korean War veteran and science fiction fan--having a dream that looks like a 1950's war movie that someone turns into a FlyingSaucer invasion involving a GreenSkinnedSpaceBabe and tentacled horrors that can be destroyed with a baseball bat.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAdventuresOfJimmyNeutronBoyGenius'': When Carl is having recurring nightmares, Jimmy offers to enter his dreams to help sort them out, assuring him it will be easy to find and apply a logical solution, since that's how Jimmy's dreams work. Carl is skeptical, since in his last dream, he married a turkey. When Jimmy enters the dream, he finds oddities like Libby rowing her desk to school with a mannequin's leg (since her paddle was broken), Carl's pen turning into a worm, and Carl still married to the turkey (who eats the worm pen). Jimmy finds the whole experience unsettling, but Carl and their dreamed-up classmates, find nothing unusual.
->'''Carl''': "Besides, if this was only a dream, could I do this?" *pulls his brain out of his head*
->'''Jimmy''': "That's the only time you can do that."