History TakeThat / LiveActionTV

**** Some people think the take that at the US was incredibly out of place, since we were being told to root against a arrogant, buffoonish jackass of a President...which means we were being expected to [[DarthWiki/WallBanger hope he fails in stopping a genocidal psychopath from taking over the planet]].

** "It must be bad to be between a man from {{Dallas}} and a man from [[{{MiamiVice}} Miami]]."

* The second-to-last episode of ''{{Riptide}}'' had the team helping out an obvious-but-stupid version of ''{{Moonlighting}}'' (the show that beat it in the ratings).

** The third season finale also clearly flipped the bird at the American government when the Doctor manages to turn back time a whole year to avoid a vast majority of the deaths that occured...and stops ''just'' short of saving the US president as well; with the Doctor specifying that "everything is back to normal." This aspect is arguably justified in it being clearly established that the TimeyWimeyBall effect that allowed him to do this only kicked in ''after'' the President was killed -- however, said President's depiction as a [[StrawmanPolitical arrogant, buffoonish jackass]] who bore a certain resemblance to a certain then-current President definitely belongs here -- and vitrolic comparisons made in that vein on the US DVDCommentary fuel the fire even more.

**** Some people think the take that at the US was incredibly out of place, since we were being told to root against a arrogant, buffoonish jackass of a President...which means we were being expected to [[WallBanger hope he fails in stopping a genocidal psychopath from taking over the planet]].

** RussellTDavies put in one last US president bashing in "The End Of Time" before leaving the show, and BarackObama is the target here: at the end of the first part, Obama (portrayed by a stand-in) was to deliver a speech on the economic recession... which was at the same time that [[spoiler:the Master pulls an Agent Smith on all but two of humanity. Obama isn't immune to the transformation and surely enough, the Master-that-was-formely-Obama decides to screw curing the economy. The crowd of equally insane Master copies at the speech cheered on.]]

* ''[[BabylonFive Babylon 5]]'' took a big swing at ''StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' this way, when Ivanova complained about a gift shop on the station: "This isn't some deep-space franchise, this station is ''about'' something!" For added humor, the line was written by PeterDavid, best known as one of the most talented ''StarTrek'' tie-in writers, and he was surprised that JMichaelStraczynski was actually going to use it.

** Also at former ''West Wing'' writer Rick Cleveland, with whom Sorkin had a public feud over "In Excelsis Deo", an episode which the two co-wrote. Cleveland is written into ''Studio 60'' as Ricky Tahoe. Ricky is time and again characterised as a hack, a nasty little man who publically ostracised Matt over a controversial statement Matt had made. He ultimately leaves the show with a crappily written pilot script, petulently taking the entire writing staff with him.

* ''{{Scrubs}}'' has a pretty mean TakeThat against ''GreysAnatomy'' disguised as a compliment.

** Gervais and Merchant have noted, however, they were not attempting to label people who do "broad" comedy as being bad, but that you shouldn't settle for less if you want to aspire to greater things. Granted this does not mean they neccesarily like such shows, but it's not quite as venomous as the show would make you think...

* ''{{Commander-in-Chief}}'', the show with Geena Davis as the country's first female president, did this pretty blatantly in one episode. There was an episode where a coastal city was hit by a hurricane. Within hours, the president was there helping oversee the relief effort. Gee, I wonder who that was a swipe at? As if that weren't {{Anvilicious}} enough, the president was later shown ''reading to children'' when an aide came up and told her something important was happening. She immediately handed the book to one of the kids to continue reading, got up, and walked away. Take That, Mister 20%!

* In ''SpecialUnit 2,'' one of the main characters explain to the newbie that every monster legend she has ever heard of is true -- except vampires, they're complete fiction.

** The episode "Hollywood Babylon," which is an AffectionateParody of the show itself, contains some {{Take That}}s aimed at [[ExecutiveMeddling the CW executives]]. In the episode, the horror movie's producers and director all die horribly, and EricKripke claims that every request that the executive producer made was an actual request that the writing staff received from the CW execs, which included making the show LighterAndSofter, among other things. Gary Cole's character was the first to die--''on the film's set in the middle of shooting'', no less.
*** In the same episode there is another TakeThat at ''{{Gilmore Girls}}''. When Sam is on a tour of the studio and the tourguide mentions that they will now reach the set for ''{{Gilmore Girls}}'' Sam makes a shocked face and jumps off the train.

--> '''Dean''': Aw, come on. That... That's just SICK!
[[indent:80:Also, later in the episode Dean and Sam want to know how Chuck knows enough about them to be writting these books. At one point Dean demands to know why Chuck wouldn't tell them that he is a Prophet.]]

* ''BeakmansWorld'' took friendly jabs at the competition on occasion. Beakman, on letting his mom do a challenge: "But none of the other TV [[BillNyeTheScienceGuy science guys]] let their moms do stuff!" His mom replies with the JumpOffABridgeRebuttal.

** Considering the subject matter and political bias of the writer, the West Wing had fewer Take Thats than you would expect. However, Bartlett's reelection oppoenent is an obvious {{expy}} of George W. Bush. However, in the end he's shown to be a gracious decent if dim-witted sort. Arron Sorkin seems incapable of writing genuinely hostile or immoral antagonists unless they're an expy for someone who's wronged him personally.

* ''MurphyBrown'' was famous for mocking politician Dan Quayle with attacks ranging from subtle to outright. It got to the point that when the titular character became pregnant and decided to raise her child as a single mother, Quayle took the opportunity to publicly denounce single motherhood. ''Murphy Brown'' gave it right back by having Murphy tearfully complain to Frank that Quayle was mocking her lifestyle. Frank, incredulous at Murphy's trauma, responded simply, "Murphy, it's ''Dan Quayle''." In the following episode, Murphy responds in an apparently mature way by having a special edition of ''FYI'' focused on several kinds of families... then hires a truck to dump several tons of potatoes on Quayle's front door.

* KeithOlbermann's ''Worst Person In The World'' segment on MSNBC -- an, ah, ''enthusiastic'' expansion of an old BobAndRay routine -- consists of nothing but {{TakeThat}}s. Unsurprisingly, the most frequent "winner" of the title is Olbermann's arch-rival in political commentary shows, Bill O'Reilly of Fox News.

** ...it was basically crystallized {{Up to Eleven}} smoked through a {{Take That}} bong.
* Season four of ''{{The Wire}}'' features a despicable cop who completely guts the one unit in the department that's actually doing real work. His name is Marrimow, after an editor at the Baltimore Sun who producer David Simon grew to despise during his time there.

* ''DiagnosisMurder'' once had a TakeThat against the game show ''Twenty One'', where DickVanDyke's character went on a corrupt game show called Thru The Roof, featuring soundproof booths. He noted that it was difficult to breathe in the booths. And someone probably got murdered in there or something, it's been a while since I've seen it.
* Adam Buxton's SketchShow Mee BOX has a sketch involving [[http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=0DJnR5OT9UQ an interview with a fictional actor "Famous Guy"]] which has several Take Thats within. The first and most obvious is a jab at the popularity of actors, as Famous Guy is referred to as a "pretending man" and "the best at pretending". It also parodies the movie industy's constant rehashing of the same ideas with nondescript movie titles like "Horse Chase", "The Exploding Car" and "They Came From Space There". American actors trying to duplicate a BritishAccent is sent-up with Famous Guy's bad attempt at a Cockney accent. There's a more subtle jab at men's magazines in the first part of the sketch: if you pause at the "Man Magazine" you can read headlines such as "Articles about sex inside here" and "Are all feelings homosexual? Why the answer is yes". This is perhaps aimed at [[BritishNewspapers the Daily Sport]], which has recently relaunched itself as being about nothing but "Sports, girls and funny stuff".

** TheColbertReport took the idea and ran with it. [[CrowningMoment/RealLife White House Correspondents' Association]], anyone?

* ''MontyPythonsFlyingCircus'' aimed a few Take Thats at programme planners, who had irritated the team by moving the programme about in the schedules seemingly at random. Among the brickbats include John Cleese's comment in the second series "I'd like to be in programme planning, unfortunately I've got a degree" and an extended sketch in the third series were penguins were discovered to be more intelligent that programme planners.

* A TV movie about the making of ''GilligansIsland'' was narrated by the original show's cast: except for Tina Louise, who was the only surviving cast member to not participate. It's probably not a coincidence that she's portrayed as a bitchy, slutty moron in stark contrast to the downright saintly portrayals of everyone else.

* In an episode of ''{{Psych}}'', Shawn mentions he would make up for skipping a camping trip with his dad by saying he will go over to his dad's house and "Maybe watch a couple of episodes of ''{{The Mentalist}}''." ''The Mentalist'' is a blatant rip-off of ''Psych'', albeit more serious and better funded.

*** As a possible retaliatory Take That, a character on TheMentalist has an intense dislike of pineapple on his pizza - pineapple being a signature {{Running Gag}} of Psych.

* When Heather Locklear debuted as Catlin on ''{{Spin City}}'' and declares that Mike isn't going to push her around, Mike replies "Let's not get overly dramatic - this is not some cheesy soap opera" - a clear TakeThat at Locklear's previous show, ''{{Melrose Place}}''.
* An episode of ''{{Bones}}'' ended with the characters and suspects describing in detail how useless and unreliable luminol is; luminol is one of the most popular pieces of ForensicPhlebotinum on ''{{CSI}}''. Pretty funny given the ridiculous stuff the Bones lot occasionally get up to to solve a case - their magical computer thingy is legendarily absurd.
** Yes, but the magical computer thingy is only used to demonstrate scenrios instead of flashbacks or just talking about it, or use as a just a regular - albeit, expensive and absurd - computer; they never rely on the computer or what it produces as evidence or in any court case, it's always physical evidence. CSI just takes luminol as straight "if it's there, it's a solid nail in the coffin".

* As much SelfDeprecation as a TakeThat: On a crossover episode with ''PicketFences'', ''ChicagoHope'' gave a bitter nod to then-ratings powerhouse ''{{ER}}''. When Kathy Baker's guest-star character became frustrated at what Chicago Hope's doctors were telling her, she irately declared, "We could have gone to the ''other'' one!" The hospital director's reply? "We ''never'' mention the other one." Mentioned or not, ''ER'' eventually buried its onetime head-to-head Thursday night competitor.

** They also subverted it, with a deliberately unfunny "lampoon" of {{Love American Style}}

* ''{{iCarly}}'' has an entire episode setup as a shot at the Disney Channel (transparently disguised in-universe as the "Dingo Channel") for ripping off stuff the creator of iCarly had done, to the point where the characters invade the bowels of the studio, and steal WaltDisney's (or his closest FictionalCounterpart) cryogenically frozen head.

*** Disney seems to have fired back. Notice ''So Random'''s resmblance to AllThat in SonnyWithAChance.
**** The resemblance to AllThat is because one of the creators of AllThat is the creator of SonnyWithAchance.

** Pretty funny, considering iCarly is no better than any sitcom Disney's ever come up with.

* On the ComedyCentral game show ''[=~WinBenSteinsMoney Win Ben Stein's Money~=]'', whenever a contestant [[{{Jeopardy}} phrased an answer in the form of a question]], Ben would force that contestant to wear a DunceCap for the remainder of the show.

* ''Attack of the Show!'' got a pretty good one in against ''{{Twilight}}'' when it [[http://g4tv.com/videos/41784/Kevin-Pereira--Olivia-Munns-Twilight-Spoof/ points out the stupidity of dating a vampire]]!
* An episode of ''MadTV'' had SantaClaus erasing a kid's memories of himself. Santa remarked that while he was erasing memories, he wanted the audience to forgot about a show called ''SaturdayNightLive''. In another sketch, Ms. Swan says, "Live from New York!" and is told that that's another show.

* ''GilligansIsland'' creator Sherwood Schwartz named the Castaways boat The Minnow after Newton Minow made his famous "vast wasteland" speech.

* In response to being [[ExecutiveMeddling horrifically dicked around by NBC]], Conan O'Brien responded by making the last episodes of his tenure on ''TheTonightShow'' almost nothing ''but'' Take Thats. Just about everyone feels this is [[JustifiedTrope entirely justified]].

* A lot of CraigFerguson's jokes on ''[[TheLateLateShow The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson]]'' are (admittedly mostly joking) {{Take That}}s towards CBS and TV in general. He has also said a direct TakeThat to ''{{MASH}}'', saying that his upcoming Robot Skeleton Sidekick will be the "the most awesome thing not just in late-nite television, but in all television, ever!"

* {{SCTV}}'s Bob and Doug [=McKenzie=] were created as a Take That to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. In Canada, the show ran two minutes longer than in the U.S. (due to fewer commercials.) The [[ExecutiveMeddling CBC required]] SCTV to fill these two "extra" minutes with "distinctively Canadian content." The writers and performers mocked this idea: "What do you want us to do? Throw up a map of Canada ans sit there wearing tuques and parkas?" They ended up doing exactly that to prove their point of how ridiculous the CBC mandate was... and ended up creating [[SpringtimeForHitler the most popular characters in the show's history]].

* ''HowIMetYourMother'' had an interesting in-universe Take That. Ted finds out that his ex-fiance's ex-boyfriend made a movie called ''The Wedding Bride'', which is a retelling of the whole marital drama between the trio except blantantly skewed in favor of the ex-boyfriend. To Ted's horror, the main antagonist of the film is called "Jed", and is played up to be the biggest, most unsympathetic {{Jerkass}} in the history of the world.

* {{The Young Ones}} aimed a number of Take Thats, notably at {[Terry and June}} (with Oh Crikey!) and at Channel 4. "Alternative lifestyle Neil? You're about as alternative as Channel 4"

** Made even more hilarious when you realize that the actor who plays Henry (Kevin Schmidt) is the older bother of Kendall Schmidt, who is one fourth of NICKELODEON'S premier boy band, and one of the stars on the show {{Big Time Rush}}--which is, of course, Nick's answer to JONAS.
* {{CriminalMinds}}: The episode ''JJ'' [[spoiler: is JJ's last episode and is a TakeThat to CBS for getting rid of AJ Cook (The actress who plays JJ}. They transfer JJ, making it beyond everyone's control. Then the quote at the end spoken by JJ talks about "taking the high road" and "not wanting to be angry" and just about leaving family, like the team (and the cast) so obviously are.]]
* {{iCarly}} did a take that to it's own fans during the episode ''iStart A Fan War'', by showing them as crazy losers who don't care about the show itself, only about the {{Shipping}}.
* {{VeronicaMars}} was forced by studio execs, early in its run, to include Paris Hilton as a guest star. Later in the same season, they're cracking Paris Hilton jokes. A great take that at both Hilton and the network.
* During the 1990s, the late Jeremy Beadle hosted several popular game shows and comedy programmes on British TV. He was the original presenter of ''You've Been Framed'', a TransatlanticEquivalent to ''AmericasFunniestHomeVideos''. Later, he moved onto a short-lived show called ''Beadle's Hotshots'', where the public would film their own parodies of popular television and send them to him to broadcast. One of the best remembered of these was "You've Fallen Over", a TakeThat which implied that ''You've Been Framed'' consisted mostly of stupid clips of people falling over, and that the "home videos" sent in were all staged.

* ''{{Commander-in-Chief}}'', the show with Geena Davis as the country's first female president, did this pretty blatantly in one episode. There was an episode where a coastal city was hit by a hurricane. Within hours, the president was there helping oversee the relief effort. Gee, I wonder who that was a swipe at? As if that weren't {{Anvilicious}} enough, the president was later shown ''reading to children'' when an aide came up and told her something important was happening. She immediately handed the book to one of the kids to continue reading, got up, and walked away. Take That, Mister 20%! Of course, ''Commander-in-Chief'' left the airwaves long before the end of the Bush administration, proving you cannot build a show on political potshots without actual ''quality'' to hang it on...

** It could also be a TakeThat against Mickey Mantle, whose nickname was "Moose"
*** Probably not. Moose Skowron was a teammate of Mantle, but if Mickey himself had that nickname at all it was extremely uncommon.

* ''GilligansIsland'' creator Sherwood Schwartz named the Castaways boat The Minnow after Newton Minow made his famous 'vast wastland' speech.

* ''GilligansIsland'' creator Sherwood Schwartz named the Castaways boat The Minnow after Newton Minnow made his famous 'vast wastland' speech.

----

. An entire episode of Supernatural 'Live free or Twihard' not only has a take that! towards Twilight, but Twilight fangirls in particular.


-->'''Statler''': 'Ah, the beauty of live-action. Makes you feel like you're really there, doesn't it?
-->'''Waldorf''': Yeah, I can be bored to death from the comfort of my own home!
-->'''Both''': Doh-ho-ho-ho-ho!

* The last episode of ''Riptide'' had the team helping out an obvious-but-stupid version of ''{{Moonlighting}}''.

'''Jacek''': Why not?

** FOX was also the company that produced ''{{Angel}}''.

* {{CriminalMinds}}: The episode ''JJ'' [[is JJ's last episode and is a TakeThat to CBS for getting rid of AJ Cook (The actress who plays JJ}. They transfer JJ, making it beyond everyone's control. Then the quote at the end spoken by JJ talks about "taking the high road" and "not wanting to be angry" and just about leaving family, like the team (and the cast) so obviously are.]]

* On the ComedyCentral game show ''[[WinBenSteinsMoney Win Ben Stein's Money]]'', whenever a contestant [[{{Jeopardy}} phrased an answer in the form of a question]], Ben would force that contestant to wear a "dunce" cap for the remainder of the show.

* ''MockTheWeek'' is about 28 minutes of this per half-hour episode, but one recent (as of August 29, 2009) example takes the orize for being the most...direct. Dara O'Briain, the host, had fluffed his "That's right, the answer is [X]" several times, and announced "Just in case this gets on one of those outtake clip shows, Anne Robinson's a cunt."

* During a late season episode of ''TheCosbyShow'', a young member of the Huxtable family approaches Heathcliff wearing a Bart Simpson mask, and Heathcliff snaps at her to take it off. At the time, ''TheCosbyShow'' was losing its ratings battle with ''TheSimpsons'', and Bart Simpson was considered a bad role model for young children.
** The Simpsons have fired back numerous times, most notably when Bleeding Gums Murphy does a cemeo on the Cosby show. The children complain that wedging him in as a grandfather makes no sense, and Cosby degenerates into nonsensical ramblings instantly while Bleeding Gums just looks around nervously.

** Hell, that entire ''week'' was a rapidly accelerating LensmanArmsRace of Take Thats from every side of the late night war. [[http://tv.gawker.com/5448615/the-late-night-war-reaches-its-boiling-point-all-the-clips-you-missed Just check out the clips in this Gawker article.]]

* A lot of CraigFerguson's jokes on ''[[TheLateLateShow The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson]]'' are (admittedly mostly joking) {{Take That}}s towards CBS and TV in general. He has also said a direct TakeThat to {{MASH}}, saying that his upcoming Robot Skeleton Sidekick will be the "the most awesome thing not just in late-nite television, but in all television, ever!"

* ''{{Community}}'', besides its frequent parodies of just about everything, has featured a couple {{TakeThat}}s against ''{{Glee}}'':

<<|TakeThat|>>

** The ''{{Supernatural}}'' episode "Hollywood Babylon," which is an AffectionateParody of the show itself, contains some {{Take That}}s aimed at [[ExecutiveMeddling the CW executives]]. In the episode, the horror movie's producers and director all die horribly, and EricKripke claims that every request that the executive producer made was an actual request that the writing staff received from the CW execs, which included making the show LighterAndSofter, among other things. Gary Cole's character was the first to die--''on the film's set in the middle of shooting'', no less.

** The episode "Monster at the End of the Book" contained a thorough Take That to Sam/Dean shippers. Sam and Dean find a series of books that document their lives exactly. Sam then mentions that there's fanfic of the series. And we get [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RoiX1pbBcPY&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Flj-toys.com%2F%3Fjournalid%3D1454833%26moduleid%3D20%26preview%3D%26auth_token%3Dsessionless%3A1238889600%3Aembedcontentiurl%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fi3.ytimg.com%2Fvi%2FRoiX1pbBcPY%2Fhqdefault.jpg&feature=player_embedded the following exchange]]:
--->'''Dean''': What's a slash fan?
--->'''Sam''': As in...Sam-slash-Dean. '''Together.'''
---> Long pause as it slowly dawns on Dean what Sam means.
--->'''Dean''': Like...''together'' together?
---> '''Sam''': Yeah.
---> '''Dean''': They ''do'' know we're brothers, right?
---> '''Sam''': Doesn't seem to matter.
---> '''Dean''': Aw, come on. That... That's just SICK!
[[indent:80:The episode was really one huge take that against everyone. Especially M. Night Shyamalan.]]
*** M. Night Shyamalan, Deangirls v. Samgirls, rabid fans... the list goes on. Except it was also an example of the show showing just how much it understood and appreciated its fans, while not being afraid to make fun of their...idiosyncrasies. The writers also took potshots at examples of their own bad writing for heaven's sake.