History Main / TrappedInTVLand

* A two-part story from ''ComicBook/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' had the ponies get trapped in ''book'' land since Equestria - despite the occasional SchizoTech - generally pre-dates things like TV and computers. The idea works fine for the ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' and FilmNoir parodies, but it gets a little weird when the story starts parodying ''Franchise/StarTrek'', of all things.

* In ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'', the ponies end up sucked into the comic book world of ''The Power Ponies'' and have to face the [[EvilIsHammy over-the-top]] villainess The Mane-Iac. Oddly enough, in Equestria, the industry of selling comics that can do this seems to be a completely normal and even thriving industry.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheMagicSchoolBus'' did this in the episode "Spins a Web", where the class entered a [[TheFifties Fifties]] SciFi flick about a town being terrorized by a [[AttackOfThe50FootWhatever 50-Foot]] praying mantis. Oddly enough, the Topic of the Week was spiders.

** A SciFi MartialArtsMovie show, where Control Freak gets some [[IKnowKarate training]]

-->-- '''Carlos''', ''WesternAnimation/TheMagicSchoolBus'', "Spins a Web"

* ''VideoGame/ViewtifulJoe'' is basically ''Film/LastActionHero'', except it's a video game about {{Toku}} movies, and the main character ''becomes'' an action hero. It's also [[{{Deconstruction}} deconstructed]] with [[spoiler:Captain Blue, who went insane because his life kept on going downhill, as even after an upside happened, fate would find some way to twist it into something he wouldn't want. His rise to fame as a movie director? Eventually forgotten. He gets sucked into his own movies? Eventually goes insane because he can't escape to meet his family and eventually tries to destroy everything]]. It shows a lot, and is probably what would happen if people really did get trapped in a "Movie Land".

* ''LightNovel/NyarukoCrawlingWithLove'' episode 8 has the cast sucked into a cursed DatingSim (based mostly on ''VisualNovel/TokimekiMemorial'') with [[OrdinaryHighSchoolStudent Mahiro]] as the PlayerCharacter; if he wants to return to reality, he has to pick a girlfriend ([[MyFriendsAndZoidberg or]] [[GayOption Hasta]]) by the end of the school year. The whole thing plays out as an even longer chain of [[ReferenceOverdosed anime references]] than usual and culminates in Nyarko, Cuuko, and Hasta having a martial arts battle over him while dressed as [[VideoGame/VirtuaFighter Pai Chan]], [[VideoGame/FatalFury Mai Shiranui]], and [[VideoGame/GuiltyGear Bridget]]. [[spoiler:Nyarko wins.]]
* ''LightNovel/{{Overlord|2012}}'' handles this in a unique way. While the protagonist is trapped as his VR MMORPG character, everything in the world he's trapped in (aside from his guild base and now-sentient NPC servants) is completely different from the game world, outside of a few suspicious holdovers (primarily, how magic works.)

** ''[=CineMagique=]'' in Walt Disney Studios (Disneyland Resort Paris) is about a member of the audience (played onscreen by Creator/MartinShort) that, after rudely interrupting a silent film montage, gets poofed into the screen by a magician from a (fictional) film and from there travels through a potted history of cinema along with the leading lady from said film (Julie Delpy), incorporating actual scenes and sequences from films including but not limited to ''Film/SomeLikeItHot'', ''Film/Titanic1997'', ''Film/StarWars'', ''Film/HenryV'' (1989), and ''Film/TheUmbrellasOfCherbourg''. Best described as a Disney theme park version of ''Film/DeadMenDontWearPlaid''.
** The Disney's Hollywood Studios attraction ''Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway'' opens by "sending" guests through a movie screen showing a WesternAnimation/MickeyMouse cartoon.

* ''ComicBook/{{Superman}}'': The ''ComicBook/{{Superman}} Annual'' #9 had a secondary story in which Superman artist Creator/CurtSwan fell asleep while drawing a comic and woke up in Metropolis. It was AllJustADream, except that Curt found two bullets in his hand from when Superman stopped a crook.

* This is the entire premise of Creator/CaryBates' and Creator/KeithGiffen's mini ''ComicBook/VideoJack'' series, for Marvel imprint Epic Comics. Due to a [[{{Magitek}} combination of magic and technology]], teens friends Jack Swift and Damon Xarnett are transported to a TV version of their hometown, which changes (as well as them) as they zap through the channels.

* ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6930195/1/My_Little_Brony_Reality_vs_Fantasy My Little Brony: Reality VS Fantasy]]'' (a ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' fanfic) is about a brony who ends up in Equestria. The Equestrian natives are understandably freaked out, and he's forced to go live with Zecora and Apple Bloom. His arrival, however, is just in time for him to witness one of the great laws of Equestrian apocrypha: that which states that all shall go to shit. In this case, a mad scientist wants to get rid of the ponies, but it turns out that [[Series/DoctorWho the (ponyfied) Doctor]] and his companion [[EnsembleDarkhorse Derpy]] [[FunnyBackgroundEvent Hooves]] are watching.
** The fanfiction site [[http://www.fimfiction.net FIMfiction.net]]" contains literally thousands of similar fics based on the same premise; a human in the real world, whether a brony, a normal guy, a celebrity, or a self-insert, somehow lands themselves in the MLP universe. HilarityEnsues.

* The ''VideoGame/{{Action 52}}'' game ''The Cheetahmen'' begins with the Action Gamemaster, while playing video games, suddenly sucked into the TV, where he is somehow transformed into a Cheetahman.

* The Midnight Channel in ''VideoGame/{{Persona 4}}'' is a mysterious alternate reality connected to the real world through [=TVs=], where multiple characters end up trapped in and need to be rescued by the Investigation Team. When trapped in the Midnight Channel, the world takes the form of sets for a TV show reflecting the victim's mind, ruled over by an EvilCounterpart of themselves representing their {{Fatal Flaw}}s and dark secrets.

* This is also the premise of another Amiga CD-32 platformer from the Nineties, ''VideoGame/{{Oscar}}''.

* Rather savagely deconstructed in ''Webcomic/{{minus}}'', somewhat surprisingly considering the tone of the comic. In [[http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus125.html this]] strip, minus brings [[VictimizedBystander a random boy]] into a [[StoryWithinAStory book]] for some reason, and, like with most Self-Insert characters, the boy makes himself into a {{God Mode S|ue}}tu, [[MagnificentBastard playing both the story's hero and villain like a violin]] [[OmnicidalNeutral without regard for the sake of the world]]. It's all fun and games until he realizes that he can't return to his own world, at which point he goes somersaulting over the DespairEventHorizon and [[OffscreenInertia is implied]] to [[RocksFallEveryoneDies destroy the world and everyone in it]], including [[DrivenToSuicide himself]].

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Ben 10}}'' has the episode "Game Over", where Ben and Gwen get stuck in Ben's Sumo Slammer video game due to an accident with Upgrade and [[LightningCanDoAnything lightning]].

** A "[[HalloweenEpisode Treehouse of Horror]]" segment uses this plot, with Bart and Lisa sucked into ''The Itchy & Scratchy Show''. At one point they change channels, appearing in a ''live action'' snippet of ''Live with Regis and Kathie Lee''.

** And the HypocriticalHumor of having Chief Wiggum mock [[TheAhnold Rainier Wolfcastle]] for an obvious parody of ''Film/LastActionHero.''

** A [[TheWestern Western]] [[CattlePunk Robotic gunslingers]].

* The sixth ''Manga/CaseClosed'' movie, "The Phantom of Baker Street", sees the main characters trapped in a virtual reality game controlled by a rogue AI, and featuring UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper.

* An issue of ''Marvel Team-Up'' plays with this kinda sorta when Spider-Man and the Not Ready For Prime Time Players team up against Silver Samurai during the live airing of an episode of ''Series/SaturdayNightLive''.

* Chapter 17/Episode 26 of ''Anime/GhostSweeperMikami'' features a haunted video game which is an expy of ''VideoGame/DragonQuest''. Yokoshima and Okinu get trapped in it while Mikami uses her spiritual powers to participate in it from outside.

* ''LightNovel/NyarukoCrawlingWithLove'' episode 8 has the cast sucked into a cursed DatingSim (based mostly on ''VisualNovel/TokimekiMemorial'') with [[OrdinaryHighSchoolStudent Mahiro]] as the PlayerCharacter; if he wants to return to reality, he has to pick a girlfriend ([[MyFriendsAndZoidberg or]] [[GayOption Hasta]]) by the end of the school year. The whole thing plays out as an even longer chain of [[ReferenceOverdosed anime references]] than usual and culminates in Nyarko, Cuuko, and Hasta having a martial arts battle over him while dressed as [[Videogame/VirtuaFighter Pai Chan]], [[Videogame/FatalFury Mai Shiranui]], and [[Videogame/GuiltyGear Bridget]]. [[spoiler:Nyarko wins.]]
* ''LightNovel/{{Overlord}}'' handles this in a unique way. While the protagonist is trapped as his VR MMORPG character, everything in the world he's trapped in (aside from his guild base and now-sentient NPC servants) is completely different from the game world, outside of a few suspicious holdovers (primarily, how magic works.)

* The initial premise of ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnline'' has online gamers trapped in a [[TheMostDangerousVideoGame dangerous virtual reality]] facing real-life death.

* What [[Comicbook/TheUnbelievableGwenpool Gwenpool]] claims happened to her: She lived an ordinary life in the real world but through some unexplained way was transported in the universe of her favorite fiction, Marvel comics. Other characters think she is crazy, which is certainly also an option. Doesn't help that she thinks since the world wasn't real where she came from, its people aren't real ''now'', and are [[ExpendableAlternateUniverse therefore expendable]], so she has no qualms against [[TheSociopath murdering them en masse]].

* In ''Comicbook/TitansRebirth'' #25, Source energy send Nightwing and Miss Martian into a woman's TV and they skip between a ''Film/{{Casablanca}}''-esque FilmNoir, a {{Western}} and a vaguely ''Franchise/StarWars''-like sci-fi movie as she channel-hops.

* In ''FanFic/TheBlueDragon'' series, the two primary protagonists (Demex in the first, Josh in the second) get sent to the ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfSpyro'' universe.

** This trope does happen if the girl falls through a TelevisionPortal into the movies. This happens in ''FanFic/MagnoliaCinderellaCupcake''.
** ''FanFic/IAmNotAMarySue'' is a straight example of Trapped in Fan Fiction Land. A curse dumps main character Caroline into a bad fan fiction she reviewed and transforms her into the main character, an elf named Sornif. The fan author [=Leggieluver123=] has corrupted Middle-earth. Caroline, in the role of Sornif, intends to escape by restoring {{Canon}}, as Sornif is not a canon character.

* TD of ''FanFic/TheNonBronyverse'', with the emphasis very firmly on "trapped". In a sharp contrast to most stories within the genre, he utterly despises being stuck in Equestria, and makes getting home his number one priority.

* One [[ThreeShorts mini-episode]] of ''WesternAnimation/GarfieldAndFriends'' featured this plot, involving him mostly travelling through various commercials; at the end, it was AllJustADream ([[OrWasItADream although he kept the scarf of the shopping channel]]...). Another episode featured a variant on this, where Garfield woke up to find he was in the [[NoFourthWall wrong cartoon]], an odd cross between ''Anime/MazingerZ'' and ''{{Transformers}}''; eventually, he was shot into a forest of ''Bambi''-esque forest animals, and ran off into the distance, shouting that [[SickeninglySweet he wanted the giant robots back.]]

* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheProudFamily'', Oscar's attempt to fix the TV leads to him getting sucked into it. Oscar finds himself into shows/broadcasts that involve painful scenarios, like getting tackled by football players, getting pounded by a boxer, getting chased by a bull while only speaking Spanish, and getting tortured by mobsters.

* ''VideoGame/SeymourGoesToHollywood]]'', set in a film studio. Entering the various sets, Seymour would encounter actual characters from the films. Either that or the actors all followed The Method.

* ''Machinima/Supermarioglitchy4sSuperMario64Bloopers'':

* The third part of ''Literature/MondayBeginsOnSaturday'' opens with a test of the theory that fictional universes exist in parallel to the real one. Sasha Privalov, the narrator, travels to a world made by the collective imagination of ScienceFiction authors. The world is split in two by a wall; one half is a spacefaring MarySuetopia populated by inventors {{infodump}}ing the technical details of their inventions, and the other is a dystopia split into segments where humanity is enslaved by something or other (aliens, TheVirus, etc). And in a subversion of LikeRealityUnlessNoted, almost everyone is near-naked, because writers tend to explicitly describe only small parts of their characters' wardrobes.

* The ''VideoGame/SonicStorybookSeries'' -- all two of them -- in which Sonic is pulled into classical storybooks. The first one is based on the ''Literature/ArabianNights'' story of Aladdin, and the second on Myth/KingArthur. Both featured Sonic the Hedgehog replacing the titled hero, along with the title itself.

* ''Series/WandaVision'': This is the ''entire premise of the show!'' Wanda Maximoff and Vision find themselves in an idealized retro sitcom world, with Vision somehow alive and well even after [[Film/AvengersInfinityWar being killed earlier]]. Cracks soon appear in this seemingly perfect facade, and Wanda and Vision eventually realize that everything is not as it seems, despite Wanda's best efforts to avoid realizing the true nature of this world.

* In the sex comedy ''Deep in the Valley'', two friends get trapped in a world based on porn movie cliches, and find it's not all fun and games when a [[{{yandere}} lovesick stalker]] and a FairCop go after them.

* A voluntary example is the German comedy ''Die Einsteiger''. The duo Gottschalk/Krüger use a technobabble remote to jump into genres, mostly for trolling Nazis, vampires, gangsters, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Romans]] et al. (since they are GenreSavvy and their "victims" not) and merrily snark along.

* In the Creator/DisneyChannel original movie ''Film/TeenBeachMovie'', the main characters are a couple from 2013 who get sucked into a "beach party" movie from 1962.

* ''Day By Day'': The best-known episode of this short-lived NBC sitcom of the late 1980s was "A Very Brady Episode," where teenager Ross Harper -- after being yelled at by his parents about goofing off and getting poor grades as a result -- falls asleep and imagines himself in an episode of ''Series/TheBradyBunch'' as "long-lost Brady son" Chuck Brady. A satire of the original series, Chuck interacts with several of the show's main characters and gets advice about his poor grades from Mike, and all is going well ... until the family begins to repeat their dialogue. "Chuck" wonders what's amiss, and Mike explains what he's seeing is a rerun. Everything becomes chaotic and Ross screams to be let free into the real world ... after which he wakes up and realizes it was AllJustADream.

* New Zealand kids show ''Series/{{Freaky}}'' had an episode where a girl with troubles at home gets sucked into the TV and finds herself as part of perfect DomCom family.

* A variant is the old Amiga platform game ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premiere_%28video_game%29 Premiere]]'', where a guy finds himself trapped in the rival film studios. Every level is a stage that represents a different film genre, such as horror, sci-fi, western, historical epic and, [[FridgeLogic oddly enough]], cartoons.
* This is also the premise of another Amiga CD-32 platformer from the Nineties, ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ez1BKlQpG94 Oscar]]''.

* The VideoGame/SonicStorybookSeries -- all two of them -- in which Sonic is pulled into classical storybooks. The first one is based on the ''Literature/ArabianNights'' story of Aladdin, and the second on Myth/KingArthur. Both featured Sonic the Hedgehog replacing the titled hero, along with the title itself.
* ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seymour_series Seymour Goes To Hollywood]]'', set in a film studio. Entering the various sets, Seymour would encounter actual characters from the films. Either that or the actors all followed The Method.

* ''WebAnimation/KaizoTrap'' has a video game trapping the heroine's partner inside it, and she goes in to rescue him. Unfortunately, the game is a PlatformHell title, but after countless deaths and game overs, she eventually gets the skills of a speedrunner.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* ''WebVideo/SevenSecondRiddles'': A girl gets pulled into a nightmarish horror-movie world by a MonsterClown, but is able to escape by [[RiddleMeThis solving his riddle.]]

* Control Freak (again) in ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitansGo'' This time he shoves the team inside "Pretty Pretty Pegasus", a show Raven is obsessed with. She loves it but everyone else is weirded out by it. Control Freak also loves this show, apparently.

* ''Animation/PleasantGoatAndBigBigWolf'': Invoked by Wolffy in ''Happy, Happy, Bang! Bang!'' episode 38, where he invents a portal that lets one travel into television and movie screens and enter the program or film they're playing. Wolffy uses the portal to trap Paddi in the film ''Dao Yang Kong Jian'' and chase after him.

* ''ComicBook/{{Superman}}'': The ''ComicBook/Superman1939'' Annual #9 had a secondary story in which Superman artist Creator/CurtSwan fell asleep while drawing a comic and woke up in Metropolis. It was AllJustADream, except that Curt found two bullets in his hand from when Superman stopped a crook.

* ''Fanfic/LockedInDigital'' is about [[Manga/MyHeroAcademia Izuku Midoriya]] being kidnapped by a MadScientist with a BodyUploading Quirk and digitized into a computer server. The teen must go through nine different simulations based on early 21st century Horror games, including ''VideoGame/BioShock'' and ''VideoGame/FiveNightsAtFreddys1'', and beat them all within a year before the server overheats and kills him. The story is told as a FlashbackBPlot with the "B" plot itself showing his runs. The "A" plot reveals the aftermath: The simulations have not only taught Izuku a lot of skills like swordmanship and gunmanship but has altered his body into that of borderline superhuman, despite being Quirkless. The downside is he suffers from severe PTSD with BloodKnight tendencies thanks to his struggles to survive which involve [[TheManyDeathsOfYou constantly dying]] and encountering multiple dangers within the games. Unfortunately, Izuku must also deal with going to UA, encountering similar events as his canon self [[ForWantOfANail with his kidnapping being the catalyst of the notable changes]].

%%* ''Film/ThePurpleRoseOfCairo''

* ''Ms. Wiz Goes Live'' has Ms. Wiz take Caroline and her little sister inside the TV. In a variation they go to an actual TV studio where the sister causes an uproar on a talk show, Ms. Wiz reads her own version of the news and Caroline does a guest spot on a drama. The book ends with a producer calling the house to see if Caroline wants a bigger role.

* In The Librarians episode And the Silver Screen, two of the characters get trapped in a movie.

* The ''Series/DoctorWho'' story "The Mind Robber" features the Second Doctor and companions getting stuck in the Land of Fiction, where characters from every story ever written are real (the ''Franchise/DoctorWhoExpandedUniverse'' returns to the Land on a couple of occasions).

* An issue of ''Marvel Team-Up'' plays with this kinda sorta when Spider-Man and the Not Ready For Prime Time Players team up against Silver Samurai during the live airing of an episode of ''Series/SaturdayNightLive''.

%%* Happens to the Twist kids in the ''Series/RoundTheTwist'' episode "TV or Not TV".

* The Creator/DisneyChannel original movie ''Teen Beach Movie'' is about two modern-day teenagers who get sucked into a '60s beach party movie.

* Series/WandaVision: This is the ''entire premise of the show!'' Wanda Maximoff and Vision find themselves in an idealized retro sitcom world, with Vision somehow alive and well even after [[Film/AvengersInfinityWar being killed earlier]]. Cracks soon appear in this seemingly perfect facade, and Wanda and Vision eventually realize that everything is not as it seems, despite Wanda's best efforts to avoid realizing the true nature of this world.

* ''Spot Goes To Hollywood'' has the titular 7 Up mascot exploring levels based on movies.

* Yet another Amiga game: the protagonist of the shooter ''[[http://www.mobygames.com/game/videokid Videokid]]'' gets sucked into his VCR and must fight his way inside five tapes based on different film genres (fantasy, western, sci-fi, gangster drama, and horror).

* On the website ''WebAnimation/HomestarRunner'', in ''WebAnimation/StrongBadEmail'' #150, "[[http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail150.html alternate universe]]", Strong Bad celebrates his big "sesquicentenn-email" by constructing an alternate universe portal and visiting the various alternate realities of the Homestar body of work, where he meets all of the various duplicates of himself.

* ''WebVideo/TheNostalgiaCritic'': At the start of their review of ''Literature/TheRing'', Doug, Malcolm, and Tamara exploit the fact that [[StringyHairedGhostGirl Samara]] has to emerge from a TV set by switching the channel to ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', ''Film/TheWickerMan2006'' where she gets hit by a truck, and a ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' cartoon where she gets blown up by Wily E. Coyote.

* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheProudFamily'', Oscar's attempt to fix the TV leads to him getting sucked into it. Oscar finds himself into shows/broadcasts that involve painful scenarios, like getting tackled by football players, getting pounded by a boxer, getting chased by a bull while only speaking Spanish, and getting tortured by mobsters.

* ''WesternAnimation/ThePatrickStarShow'': At the end of "[[Recap/ThePatrickStarShowS1E3LostInCouchPatAThon Lost in Couch]]", [=GrandPat=] gets stuck inside the wall, and then finds his way into the TV. He winds up on a bowling show, but he has fun with it.

* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheProudFamily'', Oscar's attempt to fix the TV leads to him getting sucked into it. Oscar finds himself into shows/broadcasts that involve painful scenarios, like getting tackled by football players, getting beat up by a boxer, getting chased by a bull while only speaking Spanish, and getting tortured by mobsters.

* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheProudFamily'', Oscar's attempt to fix the TV leads to him getting sucked into it.

** In "The Librarians" episode And the Silver Screen, two of the characters get trapped in a movie.

* At the end of an episode of ''Series/ClarissaExplainsItAll'', Clarissa fakes this happening to her as part of a ZanyScheme to get revenge on her brother.