History Main / WeAreExperiencingTechnicalDifficulties

* In ''[[Franchise/{{Tintin}} Tintin and the Picaros]]'', [[BananaRepublic San Theodoran]] television shows a KangarooCourt sentencing Castafiore to life imprisonment, at which point she starts to sing an aria. It quickly cuts to a "PLEASE EXCUSE THIS INTERRUPTION" message, followed by a cartoon interlude.
* Used in ''ComicBook/TheSandman'' when Dr. Destiny makes the world go crazy and a kids show host encourages children to commit suicide.

* In ''Film/Terminator3RiseOfTheMachines'', a Gas station clerk flicks though multiple channels, each with a test card on. Further proof that [[spoiler:[[ContagiousAI Skynet]] is taking over]]

* "Microsoft outages" (no more precision is available) prevented the virtual premiere of ''Film/ZackSnydersJusticeLeague'' from happening on schedule on March 15, 2021. The people who were invited to it received such messages.
* Creator/{{Toonami}} experienced technical difficulties during the March 16, 2019 broadcast of ''[[Anime/SwordArtOnline Sword Art Online: Alicization]]'', where the episode remained frozen on a still frame for several minutes, including after a commercial break. This lead to a second break shortly after, with the full episode being cancelled and shown in full the following week, and the first half of the block's following show, ''Anime/MegaloBox'', being played twice in succession to fill the gap in the schedule.

*** Independent Russian media broadcaster ''Dozhd'' replicated the above moment when they were shut down by the Russian government during the 2022 Russo-Ukrainian War, signing off with the same ''Swan Lake'' recording.

* On October 27, 2015 Game 1 of the 2015 World Series on Fox [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7CA1K2KtfE was knocked off the air nationally when a broadcast truck lost power.]] The game was off the air for about 30 seconds leaving commentators on screen referencing the incident and Fox switched coverage to that of MLB network. The situation lasted about five minutes.

* When CBS broke into their regular programming [[note]](at 1:40 PM Eastern time/12:40 Central time during ''Series/AsTheWorldTurns'' and at 11:40 AM Mountain time/10:40 AM Pacific time during a repeat of ''The Real [=McCoys=]'')[[/note]] to report on the shooting of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963, they only had their "Bulletin" bumper slide up as their cameras were not warmed up yet. This "technical difficulty" was never specified on-air but did occur twice. CBS eventually went live with Walter Cronkite at the top of the hour after they broke for ten seconds to allow their affiliates to identify themselves and join the network. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZuSirR7pPUA See it here.]]

* On July 4, 2021 the annual broadcast of the Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest on ESPN was marred by technical difficulties on the satellite feed with the broadcast crashing three times in the latter half of the contest, the third and final time leaving long running champion Joey Chestnut's 14th career win with 76 hot dogs eaten unseen by TV viewers.

* While not quite technical difficulties per se, anyone in the USA who thought to flip through the channels as [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks 9/11 happened]] ([[HeroicBSOD and no one can blame folks who didn't]]), saw that many non-news stations had some sort of card up saying they would be off the air for the rest of the day due to the events going on. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYvbmCAz658 Examples of this from television stations in New York can be seen here.]] Several stations were in fact off-air, as they had been using a transmitter on one of the towers.

* On September 16, 1987, one Fuji TV station in Japan had this happen during [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuYgh7Wmei8 a broadcast of]] the ''Manga/DragonBall'' anime. After the commercial break concluded (complete with the beeping that signals the start of a show), the ''Series/MissionImpossible'' intro plays, but is then cut off midway by a grey screen followed by a technical difficulties card. Turns out a staffer had mixed up the tapes for ''Dragon Ball'' and ''Mission Impossible'' (the latter of which was scheduled to be aired at midnight). After the [=VTR=] operator managed to fix the error, the ''Dragon Ball'' episode finally began with the [=OP=] already in progress; the amount of time lost meant that the show had to jump around to the actual content of the episode, first prematurely cutting to the sponsor tag before cutting into the middle of the opening recap.

* A humorous example in the film ''[[Film/JagArNyfiken I Am Curious (Yellow)]]'': Lena and her friend Börje are about to make love in her archive room. There's no bed, so they drag in a mattress and some sheets and pillows from another room, and make all sorts of elaborate preparations. At the moment they actually begin intercourse, a test pattern flips up on the screen. Cut to a pleasant looking announcer fixing her hair, not realizing she's already on camera. She says "We regret that we have had some technical difficulties owing to erection fault" (or "faulty coupling", depending on the translation).

* At some point on October 16, 2021, a ransomware attack struck mega-broadcaster Sinclair Broadcast Group, severely affecting its local television stations. This attack led to numerous issues which became apparent the following morning and lingered for days on end (with some effects still being felt well into November), including stations becoming unable to air their regularly-scheduled newscasts, those that did being forced to run them with bare-bones graphics, sports broadcasts going unaired, failure to run local commercials, and syndicated programs being replaced by simulcasts of Sinclair-owned subchannel networks or Sinclair's ''The National Desk'', among others. While the effects also extended to Seattle radio stations KOMO-AM/FM and KPLZ, which Sinclair sold to Lotus Communications, the ransomware attack did not affect Sinclair's Bally regional sports networks, as well as ''TND'', their subchannel networks, or Tennis Channel.

* At some point on October 16, 2021, a ransomware attack struck mega-broadcaster Sinclair Broadcast Group, severely affecting its local television stations. This attack led to numerous issues which became apparent the following morning and lingered for days on end (with some effects still being felt well into November), including stations becoming unable to air their regularly-scheduled newscasts, those that did being forced to run them with bare-bones graphics, sports broadcasts going unaired, failure to run local commercials, and syndicated programs being replaced by simulcasts of Sinclair-owned subchannel networks or Sinclair's ''The National Desk'', among others. While the effects also extended to newly sold[[note]]to Lotus Communications[[/note]] Seattle radio stations KOMO-AM/FM and KPLZ, the ransomware attack did not affect Sinclair's Bally regional sports networks, as well as ''TND'', their subchannel networks, or Tennis Channel.

* At some point on October 16, 2021, a ransomware attack struck mega-broadcaster Sinclair Broadcast Group, severely affecting its local television stations. This attack led to numerous issues which became apparent the following morning and lingered for days on end (with some effects still being felt well into November), including stations becoming unable to air their regularly-scheduled newscasts, those that did being forced to run them with bare-bones graphics, sports broadcasts going unaired, failure to run local commercials, and syndicated programs being replaced by simulcasts of Sinclair-owned subchannel networks or Sinclair's ''The National Desk'', among others. While the effects also extended to recently-sold[[note]]to Lotus Communications[[/note]] Seattle radio stations KOMO-AM/FM and KPLZ; Sinclair's Bally regional sports networks, as well as ''TND'', their subchannel networks, and Tennis Channel, were unaffected by the attack.

* At some point on October 16, 2021, a ransomware attack struck mega-broadcaster Sinclair Broadcast Group, severely affecting its local television stations. This attack led to numerous issues which became apparent the following morning, including stations becoming unable to air their regularly-scheduled newscasts, those that did being forced to run them with bare-bones graphics, sports broadcasts going unaired, failure to run local commercials, and syndicated programs being replaced by simulcasts of Sinclair-owned subchannel networks or Sinclair's ''The National Desk'', among others. While the effects also extended to recently-sold[[note]]to Lotus Communications[[/note]] Seattle radio stations KOMO-AM/FM and KPLZ; Sinclair's Bally regional sports networks, as well as ''TND'', their subchannel networks, and Tennis Channel, were unaffected by the attack.

* At some point on October 16, 2021, a ransomware attack struck mega-broadcaster Sinclair Broadcast Group, severely affecting its local television stations. This attack led to numerous issues which became apparent the following morning, including stations becoming unable to air their regularly-scheduled newscasts, those that did being forced to run them with bare-bones graphics, sports broadcasts going unaired, failure to run local commercials, and syndicated programs being replaced by simulcasts of Sinclair-owned subchannel networks or Sinclair's ''The National Desk'', among others. While the effects also extended to recently-sold[[note]]to Lotus Communications[[/note]] Seattle radio stations KOMO-AM/FM and KPLZ, Sinclair's Bally regional sports networks, as well as TND, their subchannel networks, and Tennis Channel were unaffected by the attack.

** During Chris's episode introduction speech, the island's malfunctioning gets worse and worse. Chris can't even finish his final sentence due to the technical difficulties and so a full-color still is put up of Chef frying a camera on his stove. The still is framed by a beige roster with a knob in each corner. It lasts for three seconds and the accompanying music is an instrumental rendition of "The Girl From Ipanema".

Often, [[StandardSnippet "Spanish Flea"]] from Music/HerbAlpert and the Tijuana Brass will appear as background music in this trope, or an instrumental recording of "The Girl From Ipanema," which also also shows up in [[TheElevatorFromIpanema elevators]]. Sometimes the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0wOD9TWynM Intermission]] song from ''Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail'' is used as well, particularly among video game streamers or in WebOriginal works where copyright isn't as much of an issue.

* This has happened several times during [[KentBrockmanNews Kent Brockman's]] news reports on ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', with technical difficulties graphics that included a puppy that has pulled a plug from the wall, a bird flying into powerlines, and Kent Brockman wrapped in a straitjacket with a cuckoo clock bird coming out of his head.
** Also happens to Krusty the Clown's show during the "[[ZombieApocalypse Dial Z For Zombies]]" segment of the third HalloweenEpisode, with the graphic card showing a drunken cameraman.
** All of these are accompanied by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5ryzyjh-Uo this easy-listening music piece]] by Alf Clausen.
* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' a news anchor does this manually-- holding a card with an image of TV static and making FakeStatic with his mouth-- after the man-on-the-street interview they were doing resulted in a [[PaedoHunt pedophile]] getting airtime. The anchor does it again after the pedo somehow gets interviewed again, muttering "goddammit" and making the static noises again.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheCritic'' has many pun-based technical difficulty signs used on ''Coming Attractions with Jay Sherman'', such as "We'll be right bark!" with [[http://www.pagepulp.com/wp-content/well-be-right-bark.jpg a picture of Jay as a dog.]]

* Happens on the ''WesternAnimation/TotalDrama'' ShowWithinAShow ''Celebrity Manhunt''. As Eva angrily throws objects at the covering hosts we get a black and white, "Technical Difficulties" screen... of Blainley getting choked by the Drama machine while Josh looks on in melodramatic shock [[SoundtrackDissonance as Muzak plays in the background.]]

* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Freakazoid}}'' starts like this, while you hear Freakzoid hastily try to put the finishing touches on the show in the background.
* This was a RunningGag in the ''WesternAnimation/UltimateSpiderMan'' episode "Freaky". One instance had a screen with a chibi Franchise/SpiderMan holding a messed up video tape when {{Wolverine}} [[FreakyFridayFlip in Spider-Man's body]] slammed into the side of a building after a botched web-swing.
* In ''WesternAnimation/TransformersAnimated,'' Soundwave started a RobotWar by turning machines against humanity. When the news guy's camera bot begins chasing him, turning the broadcast into a JawsFirstPersonPerspective shot, and just as it catches up with him we get a "PLEASE STAND BY" screen instead of [[GoryDiscretionShot the probably un-TV-Y7 fate]] of the newscaster.

* In ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants''' "The Fry Cook Games", when the torch's flame is blown out by the wind, we get "PLEASE STAND BY" right before the runner brings back another, larger flame.
** The very same "PLEASE STAND BY" screen appeared during the Patchy segments from "[=SpongeBob=] B.C.", when Patchy has an accident as stagehands appear on the set.
* A card depicting a panicking cameraman dousing another guy with a fire extinguisher (in trying to aim for a camera that's on fire) appeared a few times in the AnimatedAdaptation of ''WesternAnimation/{{Dilbert}}'', including once where a [[Series/TheJoyOfPainting Bob Ross]]-{{Expy}} named Rusty Shanks was assaulted by a hitman from the "five families of art" (leading to a BrickJoke where Dilbert is delivered Rusty's head on a platter at a restaurant).

* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Archer}}'' short “[[https://youtu.be/wy1vLBf4CqI Cooking with Archer]]”, a brawl ensues between Archer and celebrity chef [[Series/GoodEats Alton Brown]] after they start throwing food at each other. The scene cuts away to a Technical Difficulties card, and about thirty seconds later, the scene resumes with Alton finishing the dish, Archer’s newly remodeled kitchen destroyed, and Archer stuck head-first through the oven door.

* This happened to French-language TV channel Unis TV just as they were about to show an episode of ''[[Manga/RockLeesSpringtimeOfYouth Rock Lee and his Ninja Pals]]'' (TheOneWith the Mister Konoha beauty pageant), where just as the episode was about to start, the [=SMPTE=] color bars showed up, then a black screen with the program and episode titles. The episode was just delayed a little bit and nothing happened to the schedule (as the show was broadcast commercial-free.)

** Episode 71, campaign 2: After Creator/LiamOBrien goes on an unhinged rant à la ''Film/{{Network}}'', the stream cuts to [[https://youtu.be/8tCcRA2aogk?t=416 a card]] with Trinket [[note]]Vex'ahlia's pet bear from campaign 1, of which Liam's character Vax'ildan is a CoolUncle to[[/note]] having unplugged the cable.

* Many Website/YouTube videos have comic versions of technical difficulties cards that show up when the presenter has an unexpected problem with a demonstration, or when multiple presenters get into a conflict or argument about something. These cards are very creative and are usually PlayedForLaughs.

* A humorous example in the film ''I Am Curious (Yellow)'': Lena and her friend Börje are about to make love in her archive room. There's no bed, so they drag in a mattress and some sheets and pillows from another room, and make all sorts of elaborate preparations. At the moment they actually begin intercourse, a test pattern flips up on the screen. Cut to a pleasant looking announcer fixing her hair, not realizing she's already on camera. She says "We regret that we have had some technical difficulties owing to erection fault" (or "faulty coupling", depending on the translation).

Sometimes played for BlackComedy if the presentation of the message sharply contrasts with the horror of the scene. An even darker version is when [[BlatantLies the message is displayed]], but the horrible noise in the background indicates what is actually going on. It may also happen if the GenreBlind RedShirtReporter tries to get an exclusive interview with the EldritchAbomination.

* On July 4, 2021 the annual broadcast of the Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest on ESPN was marred by technical difficulties on the East Coast with the broadcast crashing three times in the latter half of the contest, the third and final time leaving long running champion Joey Chestnut's 14th career win with 76 hot dogs eaten unseen by TV viewers.

* On July 4, 2021 the annual broadcast of the Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest on ESPN was marred by technical difficulties on the East Coast with the broadcast crashing three times in the latter half of the contest, the third and final time leaving long running champion Joey Chestnut's 14th career win with 76 hot dogs eaten unseen on the East Coast.