History Main / TinCanTelephone

* ''WebAnimation/HappyTreeFriends'': Cuddles and Lumpy play with one in "Hear Today, Gone Tomorrow". This being ''Happy Tree Friends'', it results in Lumpy's eardrums being blown out, rendering him deaf for the entire episode.
** In a comic strip of the same name, Cuddles and Giggles play with one. Cuddles sneezes into the can, causing Giggles's brain to blow out of her ear.

* One episode of ''WebAnimation/HappyTreeFriends'' had Cuddles and Lumpy playing with one. This being ''Happy Tree Friends'', it results in Lumpy's eardrums being blown out, rendering him deaf for the entire episode.

* On ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'', Angelica turns her lemonade stand into a drive-thru service by using one of these as an intercom system.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSmurfs'' episode "The First Telesmurf" uses the talking tube variant with overgrown smurfmelon vines, where a Smurf uses the same blossom both to speak into and to listen from.

[[caption-width-right:350:"Can you speak up? Your voice is a little tinny."]]

* Also used by Progresso Soup [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFmzugixNrE here,]] among other examples. They also now have their soup cans showing video. In one scene, the chef responding looks into the video screen on his tin can and says to the customer, "Let me put you on webcan." (Which is a [[JustForPun cute pun]] on "webcam".)

[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tincantelephone_7099.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:300:"Can you speak up? Your voice is a little tinny."]]

* ''Manga/TimeStopBrave'': When the dragon Bahamut is in the sky, he or his rider can lower one of these with a very long string to communicate with people on the ground.

* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/2744493/1/Absolutely-Not Absolutely Not]]'', Dumbledore has Snape and Harry use one which was charmed to be perfectly audible no matter where the participants are.

Ah, childhood. Treehouses and sleepovers and talking to your friends on tin can telephones. It's made of junk: just two old tin cans and a length of string, but it's the stuff that memories are made of. Occasionally you can see a variant that has a tube that travels underground. This variant is derived from early nautical vessels.

[[folder: Radio]]

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'', Squidward used one of these to apologize to [=SpongeBob=] without actually doing so to his face; however, the attempt was foiled because Patrick was [[{{Squick}} using the string as dental floss]].

* Manga/BlackButler officially takes this trope UpToEleven in chapter 71: '''''[[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome paintings and gramophones?!]]'''''

* Used in episode 4 of season 2 in {{Manga/Working}}!! by Popura to Jun as a way for him to talk to Mahiru without getting hit by her as the latter DoesNotLikeMen and usually hits any guy who gets too close to her. He immediately tells Souma to call Mahiru on his cellphone, but Souma refuses, stating that not using the cup phone would insult Popura. Jun attempts it, until Souma starts laughing at him, prompting him to angrily yank at the phone while crushing the cup. They end up using the cellphone afterwards.

* In the picture book ''Have Fun, Molly Lou Melon'', Molly Lou's new neighbor Gertie starts to call her on her cell phone, only to be impressed when Molly Lou instead dangles a tin-can phone she mader herself through her window and calls her.

* One episode of ''WebAnimation/HappyTreeFriends'' had Cuddles and Lumpy playing with one. This being ''Happy Tree Friends'', it results in Cuddles' eardrums being blown out.

* ''Film/ScaryMovie 2'' parodied this. After getting high-tech goggles and weapons, the heroes didn't have enough money for cell phones. So they used Dixie cups. Dixie cups that have only about 3 feet of string between them.

* Used in ''Series/PeeWeesPlayhouse'' with the Picturephone, except this one is actually a telephone. In Pee-Wee's world, *everyone* uses a tin can on their Picturephones.

* The Mueller commercials used this.
* Also used by Progresso Soup [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFmzugixNrE here,]] among other examples.
** They also now have their soup cans showing video. In one scene, the chef responding looks into the video screen on his tin can and says to the customer, "Let me put you on webcan." (Which is a [[JustForPun cute pun]] on "webcam".)

[[folder:Anime/Manga]]

[[folder:Fanfiction]]
* In ''Fanfic/RainbowDoubleDashsLunaverse'', Trixie and Lyra use this when confronted by Octavia, a pony with remarkable hearing. Knowing that Octavia will hear Lyra if she's anywhere in the room, they go outside and run a tin-can telephone to her. This lets her eavesdrop on the talk between Trixie and Octavia without Octavia sensing her presence.
* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/2744493/1/Absolutely-Not Absolutely Not]]'' Dumbledore has Snape and Harry use one which was charmed to be perfectly audible no matter where the participants are.

[[folder:Film]]

* Used by the kids in ''Film/MilkMoney''.
* Short appearance in ''Film/WalkTheLine''.

* Used by Adam Sandler and the kids in ''Film/GrownUps''.

--> '''Ross:''' It would be so cool to live across [the street] from you guys!
--> '''Joey:''' Yeah--hey, then we could do that telephone thing! Y'know, where you have a can, and we have a can, and, and it's connected by a string!
--> '''Chandler:''' Or, we could do the [[DeadpanSnarker actual telephone thing]].

[[folder:Newspaper Comics]]
* Used in ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'' once or twice.
* ''ComicStrip/{{Peanuts}}'' had them at least twice. In a 1980s SundayStrip, Lucy gave Charlie Brown part of a tin-can telephone for use during a baseball game. In a 1999 strip, Sally was playing with one when she asked, "How do you get an outside line?"
** One of the very earliest Sunday strips shows Shermy giving one of these to Charlie Brown. After failing to contact him a few times, Shermy finds out that "the line is busy" - Snoopy is chewing on the string.
* A cartoon in ''Future Life'' magazine showed a flying saucer hovering next to an observatory. The alien pilot is talking to the astronomer on a tin can telephone, explaining (paraphrased): "Yes, our technology is ahead of yours in many ways but behind you in others."

-->'''Jen''': They're tracing the call!
-->'''Daisy''': HANG UP! HANG UP!

[[folder:Web Original]]
* WebAnimation/HomestarRunner:
** The Homestar Runner (the [[InkblotCartoonStyle 1930s version]]) was implied to be talking to modern-day Marzipan's answering machine on one of these in "Marzipan's Answering Machine 13.2".
** At the end of "Strong Bad is in Jail" cartoon, Strong Bad is somehow able to use one of the cans in his jail cell (the one [[JarPotty labelled "EWW"]]) to prank-call Marzipan.
* The two hosts of the weekly Website/{{WrestleCrap}} Radio podcast, R. D. Reynolds and Blade Braxton, are implied to be conversing on one of these.
* One episode of ''WebAnimation/HappyTreeFriends'' had Cuddles and Lumpy playing with one. This being ''Happy Tree Friends'', it results in Cuddles' eardrums being blown out.
[[/folder]]

-->'''Joe:''' Sounds like things aren't going well at the Griffins'.
-->'''Cleveland:''' This is why no girls allowed!
-->'''Quagmire:''' I hate to do this, guys, but Peter's been compromised. ''(cuts the string)''
* ''WesternAnimation/XavierRiddleAndTheSecretMuseum'': The crew attempts to use tin can phones in the intro for "I Am Alexander Graham Bell." They can't get the phones to work (clearly, they hadn't been told that the string has to be stretched taut), and they quickly end up getting tangled up as they walk around trying to figure the phones out.