History TakeThat / LiveActionTV

** I'm not sure if that counts as a Take That. More than a few cops feel that way.

** As opposed to all the times they like flinging it at each other, or the host. Or at the director. A fabled YouTube item shows Wayne and Brad about to sing the theme tune for a sitcom. An audience member suggested 'Cosby and Hitler'. This was rejected. During the actually-used song, Ryan (as Cosby!) throws a Nazi salute and goosestep; Colin shakes his head no.

* An episode of ''MadTV'' had SantaClaus (played by Michael McDonald) erasing a kid's memories of himself. Santa remarked that while he was erasing memories, he wanted the audience to forget about a show called ''SaturdayNightLive''. In another sketch, Martin Short (who guest starred on ''{{MADtv}}'' and was a cast member on ''SNL'' in the mid-1980s), "Live from New York!" and is told that that's another show.

* ''[[{{Ptitlehwgm85et78jj}} Monty Python's Flying Circus]]'' 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.

* The first episode of ''{{NCIS}}'' has Gibbs talking to a security guard when arriving at a crime scene. The guard asks if

* One Episode of ''{{NCIS}}'' has one of the main characters, Tony Dinozzo talking to a security guard. The guard asks if ''{{NCIS}}'' was like ''{{CSI}}'', to which Tony replied, "Only if you're dyslexic."

** At the beginning of season five's "Free to Be You and Me," as Dean kills a vampire: "Eat it, {{Twilight}}!"

* ''GhostWhisperer'' itself had an entire episode dedicated to knocking ''{{Twilight}}'' in general and the StalkingIsLove aspect of it in particular. In it, Melinda has to help out a teenage girl who believes one of her classmates is a vampire, because of the weird stuff that's been happening around her. This being ''GhostWhisperer'', it of course turns out that she's actually being haunted by the ghost of a friend who'd died after they'd lost contact and was [[UnluckyChildhoodFriend upset that they'd never be able to have a relationship]].

* The vampire romance ''TheVampireDiaries'' has evil vampire Damon read ''{{Twilight}}'' and makes several insults about its mythos. Given that the show could not possibly be explained as anything other than a shameless attempt to capitalize on ''Twilight'''s popularity, this might seem in poor taste.
* ''[[{{Ptitlelzof8tzd}} 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]]!

* ''{{Glee}}'' took a shot at ''{{Twilight}}'' in the episode "Theatricality", where Principal Figgins informs Tina that she must abandon her Goth look due to the pseudo-vampirism caused by the popularity of the book series.

** 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.

--> '''Dean''': Aw, come on. That... That's just SICK!\\

\\

** The episode "Monster at the End of the Book" contained a thorough TakeThat 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]]:

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.

** In the episode "Laryngitis", Rachel attempts to sing "The Climb" by Miley Cyrus...only for her to completely butcher it due to having laryngitis.
** The first five minutes of the first episode of season two consists of the show aiming Take Thats at ''itself''. It's like the writers read the JustBugsMe page.

*** The Queen watches DoctorWho? [[OneOfUs Awesome!]]
** The presidential mockery trend continues in the same-universe spinoff ''TheSarahJaneAdventures'', too. In one episode, a villain has the power to control the minds of people depending on their zodiac sign. Shortly after he takes control of all the world's Cancers, a news report informs us that "the president has left the White House and is outside holding hands with the First Lady of Kazakhstan." We're not told who this president is, but it's worth noting that then-current Prez {{George W Bush}} is a Cancer himself.

* ''DoctorWho'': In the episode "The Empty Child", Rose introduces the Doctor to a new acquaintance as "[[StarTrekTheOriginalSeries Mr. Spock]]", and when he complains she says, "What was I supposed to say? You don't have a name! Don't you ever get tired of 'Doctor' -- [[TitleDrop Doctor who?]]". In the original script, but not in the broadcast episode, the Doctor responds with "I'd rather have 'DoctorWho' than ''StarTrek''!" Luckily StevenMoffat saw sense.
** ''Doctor Who'' delivered a Take That to their entire fanbase once; the character of Whizzkid in "The Greatest Show In The Galaxy", a whining, stereotypical nerd who didn't show any hesitation in telling the producers of the aforementioned show that their work was unwatchable rubbish directly to their faces. And then killed him. Horribly. Whether or not this little shot was justified, it seemed that contemporary outspoken criticism about the recent poor quality of the show had hit a nerve...

** There's also the tradition of each new actor to play the Doctor taking time out after he's regenerate to mock the previous actor, and to bicker non-stop whenever [[TimeyWimeyBall they happen to meet each other]]. Jon Pertwee and Patrick Troughton turned this bickering into an art during convention appearances, and Colin Baker and Peter Davison have traded insults on DVD commentaries.

*** Note that the show referred to the character as the President''-elect'', which of course is the person who has just been elected President but has not yet taken office, and has no actual political power. This is a TakeThat to the Dr. Who writers who apparently couldn't be bothered to look at Wikipedia.

**** 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 hope he fails in stopping a genocidal psychopath from taking over the planet.

*** Arguably justified in that the UK was in ruins after the Titanic nuked southern England. Losing weight probably wasn't people's first priority.
**** Also justified in that America is comparatively much more overweight than the UK, hence the "wonderfully fat country" comment.
*** Also, the Series 1 two-parter "Aliens of London"/"World War Three" had aliens take over the British government and contrive a situation so they would be given access to nuclear launch codes under the pretense of stopping nonexistent "massive weapons of destruction." Also, part of the setup involved crashing a spaceship into Big Ben in a shot that bears some resemblance to the 9/11 attacks.

** 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-formerly-Obama decides to screw curing the economy. The crowd of equally insane Master copies at the speech cheered on.]]
*** That sounds more pro-Obama. Think, crazy white guy takes over and it's screw the economy? Sounds more like 2000-2008 to me.

**** They're both British institutions
***** Although, to her credit, the Queen's (and the rest of the Royal Family's) weird, obsessive fans still outnumber Whovians two-to-one.

*** [[IncrediblyLamePun Yes he is.]]

** This line was probably a TakeThat to ''{{Friends}}'', a show that ''Coupling'' has repeatedly been referred to, even been called "a British rip-off of Friends", which is patently absurd.
*** Nah...considering that Series Four came out just after the NBC version bombed, I can TOTALLY see Steven Moffat distancing himself from that version and its many flaws.

** Of course, given that said ''shameless attempt'' is better than ''{{Twilight}}'' by a wide margin ''and'' is actually one good show - oh and the fact that ''{{Twilight}}'' ''fully deserves'' any TakeThat - it's pretty funny.
** While not arguing the capitalization, ''Diaries'' predates ''Twilight'' by more than a full decade; any jabs they take are well deserved.

-->'''Statler''': 'Ah, the beauty of live-action. Makes you feel like you're really there, doesn't it?

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* ''{{Misfits}}'' has had a couple of pretty overt jabs at ''{{Heroes}}''. Very early on there's a scene where all of the characters break down laughing at the idea that they should all start fighting crime and saving the world (although that could just be superhero stories in general). But the villain of the S2 Christmas episode is a handsome dark-haired guy who wants to be the most powerful person in the world, collects other people's powers but mostly uses telekenesis... and is an utterly pathetic douchenozzle who dies ludicrously well before the end of the ep through stupidly misusing one of his own powers. Anyone get the idea that the writer of that episode doesn't like a certain guy named after a watch brand?

* ''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.]]

* An episode of ''MadTV'' had SantaClaus (played by Michael McDonald) erasing a kid's memories of himself. Santa remarked that while he was erasing memories, he wanted the audience to forget about a show called ''SaturdayNightLive''. In another sketch, Ms. Swan says, "Live from New York!" and is told that that's another show.

* 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 forget about a show called ''SaturdayNightLive''. In another sketch, Ms. Swan says, "Live from New York!" and is told that that's another show.