Animaniacs / Tropes S to Z

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S

• Satire: The show loves to take aim at and spoof many of the most popular topics of the day, including poiltics, history, and Warner Bros itself.
• Scary Science Words: Enforced in the song "Be Careful What You Eat". It's meant to make kids beware of what they're eating and Scare 'Em Straight by reading out the ingredients with long words such as "bisulphate". In reality, not all of these ingredients are bad for you— in fact, some, such as "beta carotene" and "lactic acid", are good for you.
• Scary Shadow Fakeout: Subverted in one of the Randy Beaman stories:
  "One time Randy Beaman was alone in his bed, and he was in the dark, and he saw some shadows and thought it was Dracula, but his mom said it was the coat hanging on the rack, and he turned on the light and it really was Dracula."
• The Scottish Trope: In "Sir Yaksalot", Yakko get so annoyed by people saying the word "dragon" that everytime somebody says it, an anvil will be summoned to drop on their heads.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Fairly regular.
  • The Warner Brothers attempted to escape "Balony and Friends" multiple times, but for once their efforts were fruitless.
  • Slappy had a strong distaste for cameos and would regularly threaten to leave.
  • Dot's feeling out of it in "Gimme the Works," so the Warners decide to walk off the set and end the thing early. She's not feeling any better in their second short that episode, "Hercules Unwound," but in that case the cartoon goes on without them.
• Sealed Chaos in a Can: The Warners were created in The '30s, but their cartoons were nonsensical, they caused havoc all over the studio and they drove their creator insane, so the bigwigs locked them in the Water Tower until FOR-E-VER. The series starts in The '90s when they finally make their escape, and as the theme song suggests, numerous attempts to lock them back in there are foiled time after time, to the point where most people seem to just leave them to their business, give the tower a wide berth and hope they don't cross their path.
• Seashell Bra:
  • Averted with Mindy in the episode "Mermaid Mindy" (because she is just a little child) while implied with her mother (that we see just from behind).
• Second Episode Introduction: "The Monkey Song", the second total short in the series, introduces literally every single secondary and minor supporting character in the series, some pantomiming what they'll be doing for the rest of the series. The third short, "Good Night, Toon", slightly fleshes out some more of their personalities.
• Secret Chaser: One in every Chicken Boo short.
• Seemingly Profound Fool: The basic premise of the Chicken Boo shorts, though there were rare moments where Chicken Boo showed actual competence at his supposed job.
• Self-Deprecation:
  • "The Warners' 65th Anniversary Special". The crux of this episode is Warner Bros. acknowledging just how awful cartoons featuring the character Buddy were.
  • "Valuable Lesson" has a scene where Attila the Hun storms into Warner Bros. Studios while shouting "Crush Warners!" A guard based on Don Knotts witnesses Attila and remarks "Must be from one of our affiliates."
• Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: In the episode "Taming of the Screwy," Mr. Plotz is holding a banquet for foreign investors, and said investors want to meet all of the workers at the Warner Bros. studio, including Yakko, Wakko, and Dot. Under his orders, Dr. Scratchansniff manages to convince the Warners to keep their lunacy under control so they can attend the banquet... only for Mr. Plotz to force them out of the banquet after they meet the investors regardless because he doesn't trust them not to screw things up. Snubbed and insulted, the Warners return to the banquet and ruin it in their usual Karmic Trickster fashion. In a nutshell, if Mr. Plotz had just let them stay since they were behaving, the entire thing would have gone off without a hitch.
• Sensational Staircase Sequence: In "A Christmas Plotz", the Warners play the Spirits of Christmas in Yet Another Christmas Carol. When Yakko, as the Spirit of Christmas Future, makes his entrance, it's as a flashy musical number in a stairway flanked by beautiful chorus girls.
• Sexier Alter Ego: Wilford B. Wolf in the Minerva Mink short "Moon Over Minerva". The geeky wolf turns into a hunk under the light of a full moon.
• Sexy Silhouette: Minerva Mink (in a nice Parent Service).
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: The premise of the "Randy Beaman story" shorts.
• Shaking the Rump: The Macarena parody "Macadamia Nut" features some Grade-A booty shaking from Dot, Hello Nurse and Minerva Mink.
• Shockingly Expensive Bill: In "Anchors A-Warners", The Warners run up Dr. Scratchansniff's room service bill to $26,590. He screams and starts swimming to China.
• Shoo Out the Clowns: The Rita and Runt shorts, while not without their humor, were noticeably darker in tone. Yakko, Wakko and Dot either made their cameos early on or didn’t appear at all.
• Shout-Out: Has its own page. The show slightly dates itself with a lot of early 90's and other contemporary-at-the-time references, but it also abounds in references dating back to the dawn of television comedy.
• Shown Their Work:
  • "Yes, Always" is based on a recording of Orson Welles trying to do a commercial, and criticising the director trying to give him feedback. It's taken almost verbatim, except for the profanity in the original recording.
  • "Win Big" has Brain losing on Gyp-Parody! when he gets the final question wrong after wagering his entire earnings, and he is not invited to come back on the next game. On the actual show, no champion is crowned if neither contestant finishes Final Jeopardy! with a score above $0.
• Sir Verb-a-Lot: In one episode, Yakko, Wakko and Dot are given the titles "Sir Yaks-A-Lot", "Sir Waks-A-Lot" and "Lady Dots-A-Lot".
• Sit on the Camera: In episode "The Boids" with the director, Alfred Hitchcock, sitting on the Goodfeathers. Then they're shown stuck to his butt.
• Smarter Than You Look:
  • The Warners. They can perform and explain Shakespeare; name every country, as well as every American state and capital, and every President, from memory; and generally make frequent references to science, history, literature, politics, and a host of other subjects. At the same time they act as if they haven't half a brain between them whenever Dr. Scratchansniff tries to talk to or explain something to them. They are completely insane, but they are geniuses.
  • Pinky and the Brain. One is a genius, the other is insane. But which is which? The one who tries to take over the world every single night? Or the one who "accidentally" foils his mad schemes every night with his convenient mask of idiocy?
• Soap Punishment: In "Roll Over, Beethoven", Yakko, Wakko and Dot do this to Beethoven after he describes himself as a 'pianist'.
• So Beautiful, It's a Curse: Minerva Mink's intro song is her singing in the shower about how difficult it is to be so pretty.
  Minerva Mink: It's not as easy as ya' think, to be a gorgeous mink!
• Social Services Does Not Exist: Tear-jerkingly averted in the Slappy cartoon "One Flew Over the Cuckoo Clock".
• Soda-Candy 'Splosion: One Randy Beaman segment has Colin claim that Randy Beaman's younger brother ate Pop Rocks and drank soda simultaneously, causing his head to explode.
• Solid Clouds: When the Warners try to convince the giant from Jack and the Beanstalk to try gold eggs and meat:
  Yakko: Eat them, eat them, on a cloud.
  Giant: Oh, all right, for crying out loud! [eats it] Mmm! Gold eggs and meat I do not hate.
  Yakko: But now that cloud won't hold your weight [Giant falls through cloud]
• Something Else Also Rises:
  • Whenever Yakko and Wakko saw an attractive woman like Hello Nurse, their normally bent ears and tails would stiffen and shoot up.
  • Every male who encounters Minerva Mink falls prey to this, especially in the comic.
• Soundtrack Lullaby: When the Warner siblings fall Asleep in Class, "Rock-a-Bye Baby" plays in the background.
• Space Jews: Yakko, Wakko, and Dot portrayed Native Americans on at least two occasions.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Parodied. In "The Taming of the Screwy", Thelma & Louise show up at the stars' party. They arrive by dropping out of the sky in their car.
• Spin-Off: Pinky and the Brain (and to an extent, Histeria! - two of that show's characters debuted on this show).
• Spit Take: In the Chicken Boo sketch "The Good, The Boo And The Ugly", Eli spits out his spaghetti (Get it? "Spaghetti Western"?) after the bartender tells him that the "Man with No Personality" is a giant chicken. Of course, he doesn't believe her.
• Spoof Aesop:
  • An especially brilliant use, an almost Once per Episode gag using the Wheel of Morality.
    Wheel of Morality, turn turn turn, tell us the lesson that we should learn!
    Yakko: ...If you can't say anything nice, you're probably at the Ice Capades.
    Early to rise, Early to bed, makes a man healthy but socially dead!
    You can teach an old dog new tricks, but you can't teach Madonna to act.
    Don't chew with your mouth full.
    People in glass houses should get dressed with the lights off.
  • The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers parody "Super Strong Warner Siblings" mimicked that show's earnest, And That's Terrible-style post-show morality lessons:
    Yakko: Remember, kids, playing with giant bugs isn't cool. If somebody asks you to play with a giant bug, just say no! That's cool.
  • Subverted in Wakko's Wish, where the Wheel provides the (non-ironic) moral of the movie.
• Squick: In-Universe Example. One of the lessons provided by the Wheel of Morality is "Never ask what hot dogs are made of." and Yakko winces while reading it.
• Standard Snippet: Despite Warners having access to a huge music publishing library that was made of good use in the original Looney Tunes shorts, the only frequently quoted song is "We're in the Money" from Gold Diggers Of 42 used to represent money or millionaires.
• Stealth Pun: The Wheel of Morality has a "Bankrupt" space...^note Not really a reference to Wheel of Fortune. Just morally bankrupt.
  • ...and while the cartoons never showed them hitting it, the comic book did.
  • "Warner Bros." = "Warner Brothers" + a "dot".
• Sticky Situation: In the Warners' 65th anniversary special, Daffy Duck recalls the Warners' first solo cartoon where they had flypaper stuck on their fannies, which he admitted, was funny for an animated short, but this went on for eight hours!
• The Stinger: After the credits, the door to the water tower swings open, and a character delivers one last joke of some sort.
• "Stop Having Fun" Guys: The parody of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids in "Back in Style" has all of the characters telling the Warners that fun is bad, and that it's better to "preach pro-social values until they spew out everyone's ears and all over the ground".
• Straw Fan: Of the Affectionate Parody version, in the "Please Please Pleese^*  If you were upset by this misspelling, you need this foundation's help! Get a Life Foundation"
• Strictly Formula: Most characters have a very strict plotline attached to their shorts. The quality of the writing usually depends on how much can be done with that given formula.
  • The Warner sibling shorts: the Warners encounter a Straight Man (which could be anything from a celebrity to a Historical Domain Character to a mythical or literary figure), whom they drive insane with their zany Literal-Minded antics.
    • Occasionally the formula is inverted by the Warners encountering someone even more annoying than them, and they are the ones driven insane.
  • The Pinky and the Brain shorts: Brain comes up with an elaborate Zany Scheme to take over the world while Pinky absent-mindedly tags along. The scheme backfires either due to Pinky's idiocy or Brain making some fatal mistake, so Brain has to return back to the drawing board to come up with a new scheme.
  • The Buttons and Mindy shorts: Mindy's mother trusts Buttons to take care of Mindy, who wanders around while Buttons suffers Amusing Injuries. The French episode shows that the formula doesn't need to be in English to work, and the caveman episode proves that it doesn't even need an intelligible language.
  • The Chicken Boo shorts: Chicken Boo wears a Paper-Thin Disguise to blend in with a group of humans, which fools everyone except one guy who points out he's a giant chicken. Then, following some zany antics, the disguise falls off and the angry mob chases away Chicken Boo.
  • The Katie Ka-Boom shorts: Katie does something ordinary for a teenager when one of her family members presses her Berserk Button, which makes her turn into a giant monster of some sort. The family flees in terror until Katie calms down and the conflict is resolved.
    • The episode "Katie Ka-Boo" combines the above two formulas: Chicken Boo disguises himself as Katie's boyfriend, and Katie's little brother enrages her by pointing out that her boyfriend is a giant chicken.
• Stupidity Is the Only Option: When going to Dracula's Castle.
  Yakko: We're not that stupid. We just know the plot.
• Stupidly Long Filler Sound: "Macadamia Nut," which is "The Macarena" with parody lyrics, has the cast break out in a giggling fit. Slappy Squirrel, as implacable as ever, has to ask "What's so funny?" Several characters emits lengthy "uhh"s, trying to explain the joke. Yakko gives a drawn out one solo, before giving up and beginning the third stanza. Viewable here at the 02:48 mark.
• Subverted Catchphrase: At the end of "Meet John Brain", there's a twist on Brain's usual catchphrase, "The same thing we do every night, Pinky: Try to take over the world":
  Pinky: Why, Brain? What are we gonna do tomorrow night?
  Brain: ...You know.
• Suckiness Is Painful: In "Video Revue", "bombs" (bad movies) were treated as weapons grade ordinance and would explode after falling off the shelves. Yes, names were named.
• Suddenly Speaking:
  • The Mime, Chicken Boo and Buttons (all ordinarily voiceless) can be seen singing along with everyone else in the opening credits when the characters shout "We're Animaney, totally insaney!"
  • We also see the mime move his lips in Wakko's Wish, and he actually says something in "Les Boutons et le Ballon". " Le Owwwwww".
• Sultry Belly Dancer: Shown briefly amongst the boarding passengers in ''Plane Pals".
• Suspiciously Specific Denial: Dr. Scratchansniff's fear aversion therapy includes repeating a few "comforting" phases.
  A clown will is my friend. A clown will not bite me and throw me in the basement. A clown is not a big spider.

T

• Take That!: If it's in public media, it's a target. Nothing, NOTHING is safe (not even the fans), though Disney and network censors are choice victims.
  Yakko: It's that time again.
  Dot: To make fun of the Disney Channel?
  • In "Sound of Warners":
    Dot: Why don't you go bug the kids in Goof Troop?
  • In "Deduces Wild," some of the items they're searching for in a scavenger hunt are...
    Wakko: A happy postal worker.
    Dot: Edible fruitcake.
    Yakko: A funny episode of Bonkers.
  • In "Slappy Goes Walnuts", after trying Skippy's favorite sugary cereal, Slappy says...
    Slappy: No wonder you like that Bonkers show. That junk's rotting out your brains there!
  • At the end of "Rest in Pieces", when Skippy asks Slappy how she knew that Walter Wolf was faking his death, she tells him that cartoon characters never really die, but she considers Bonkers an exception.
  • One really obscure take that is aimed at a vintage Disney short, "Playful Pluto", specifically the famous flypaper sequence that it's known for. The skit involved the Warners in one of their early works, "Flies in the Ointment" , where they get flypaper stuck to their butts, and the film ran for eight hours.
  • The dog that Slappy abuses during "Bumbie's Mom" appears to be based on Pluto.
  • In "No Face Like Home", the surgeons make Slappy unconscious by making her watch Alan Alda movies. Slappy says she'd rather get whacked in the head with a hammer.
  • "Back in Style" has the Warners loaned out to guest-star on parodies of Yogi Bear, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, and Underdog. During all their guest appearances, the Warners riff the cartoons for their cheap animation and bland plots and also inflict injuries on the characters. In the case of the Yogi Bear and Scooby-Doo parodies, they count as Take That and not Self-Deprecation because Hanna-Barbera was still a separate entity from Warner Bros. at the time.
  • Every one of Chicken Boo's disguises is based on a historical figure (Baryshnikov, Beauregard) or a fictional pastiche (the Jock, the Western Gunslinger, the Frontiersman) that is renowned as a masculine archetype. Their more accurate biographies and portrayals, however, are less than flattering; like Boo's disguises, if you look past the surface, you're likely to lose some respect for the person or pastiche he portrays.
  • The series loves to take swipes at Disney. For instance, in "Jokahontas", the Pocahontas parody is merely jabbing Disney for milking the cash cow of using the same plotline for all its female heroines (like Ariel and Belle).
  • In "Gimme a Break", Slappy ends up on a parody of Speed while trying to take a bus to the airport. When Keanu Reeves asks where to find a bomb, Slappy says "Check out your performance in Dracula."
• Take That, Audience!: The famous "Please, Please, Pleese Get a Life Foundation" sketch made fun of their Periphery Demographic (which features geeks rattling off Animaniacs trivia and nitpicks culled from an actual list found on a newsgroup).
  • The cartoon was previewed for a group of hardcore Internet fans who made a pilgrimage to the studios. Afterwards, one of them pointed out an error in one of the quotations from the list - from memory. The response: "It's very layered, isn't it?"...that is, after the producer picked his jaw up off the floor.
• Team Dad: Dr. Scratchansniff sometimes takes on this role with the Warners, particularly in the short, "I'm Mad", where he tries to take them on a long road trip only to try and keep Yakko and Dot from arguing and Wakko from complaining the whole trip.
• The Teapot Pose: The Brain does this involuntarily in the episode "Pavlov's Mice", thanks to Pavlov conditioning him to sing "I'm a little teapot" and pose like a teapot (one hand at his hip like the handle, and the other raised like the spout) when he hears the sound of a bell.
• Teens Are Monsters: Katie Kaboom literally turns into a monster Once per Episode, and spends most of it as one.
• Terrible Trio: Dr. Scratchansniff and Hello Nurse join Ralph in chasing the Warners in one episode.
• Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Marita of "The Hip Hippos" segments is a perfect example, differing from her husband Flavio because she's colored purple and wears a bow and lipstick.
• That Makes Me Feel Angry:
  • The end of "I'm Cute", where Dot expresses anger over her brothers for ruining her song.
  • Throughout the entire song "I'm Mad."
• Theme Tune Roll Call:
  We're Animaniacs
  Dot is cute and Yakko yaks
  Wakko packs away the snacks while Bill Clinton plays the sax
  We're Animaniacs
  Meet Pinky and the Brain who want to rule the universe^note Meet Ralph and Dr. Scratchansniff, say hi to Hello Nurse(Pinky and the Brain had their own show by that point)
  Goodfeathers flock together, Slappy whacks 'em with her purse
  Buttons chases Mindy while Rita sings a verse
  The writers flipped, we have no script, why bother to rehearse
• Theme Tuneless Episode: "The Warners' 65th Anniversary Special" and "One Flew Over the Cuckoo Clock" do not open with the Animaniacs theme song, as the first was presented as a special event In-Universe and the second was a Poorly Disguised Pilot.
• This Is Gonna Suck: Done with Slappy Squirrel in "Bumbie's Mom," after Slappy has cheered Skippy up from the trauma of Bumbie, on the plane ride home they watch the in-flight movie, which turns out to be Old Yellow. Slappy gives an Oh, Crap! face when we hear the titular dog being shot, and then she flatly comments "Uh-oh," not amused by what's about to happen (Skippy bawling loudly again.)
• This Is Reality: Happens in other shorts, such as "Smell Ya' Later" and "Turkey Jerky," where the villain finds themselves suspended in mid-air somehow, only for the other characters to point out the impossibility and causing them to plummet to the ground.
• Throw the Pin: There's a short where the Warners are being put through military training, and their sergeant is instructing them about grenades with the line "Pull the pin and then throw it". Wakko, naturally, throws the pin.
• Tired After the Song: In "All the Words in the English Language", Yakko is already a bit out of breath by the middle of the song, is straight-up tired towards the end, and nearly falls asleep, but then he wakes up and says, "Zaire!" completing the song.
• Title Drop: Given that the show can go to levels of meta, the show's title is mentioned at least in almost every episode featuring Yakko, Wakko, and Dot.
• Token Minority: the Warners are Maltese, Dr. Scratchansniff is German, Goodfeathers are Italian and Flavio and Marita are Spanish.
• Too Hot for TV: In a rare case of self-censorship, the staff retired the Minerva Mink shorts after only two episodes because the sexual undertones were too blatant.
• Too Long; Didn't Dub: In the Latin American Spanish dub of the short "I'm Mad", Wakko's line "Gotta use the potty, better stop the car!" is translated into "Tengo que ir al baño para la potty"^note  "I gotta get to a bathroom soon to use the potty!". This is justified, as the Spanish word for "potty", "orinal", also happens to be the word for "urinal".
• Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth:
  • The Warners themselves, repeatedly.
  • Also Baloney (a Barney Captain Ersatz), a Captain Ersatz of Maria from The Sound of Music, and the dangerously affectionate Elmyra from Tiny Toons Adventures have proven too much for the Warners. Notably, the Warners escape Elmyra by enticing her to follow Mindy, due to Mindy's cuteness. Cue Amusing Injuries, and Button's relief.
• Toothy Bird: The Goodfeathers. Chicken Boo often averts this, except in some cases when he shows expressions.
• To the Tune of...:
  • "The Warners Lot Song" is a parody of the Gilligan's Island theme song.
  • "Yakko's World" is to the tune of The Mexican Hat Dance.
  • "Wakko's America" is to the tune of Turkey in the Straw.
  • "The Presidents Song" is to the tune of William Tell Overture.
• Trailer Park Tornado Magnet: There was a short called "The Brave Little Trailer", in which the title character battles a tornado that always attacks the trailer park he inhabits
• Tricked into Signing: There's an episode where the Warners are taking the place of Plotz's sick secretary. So one of them gives Plotz a few documents to sign, hiding among them a check for 80 billion. He then shouts to his brother and sister "We're rich!" Plotz takes the check away, to which the brother merely says "We're poor!"
• Truncated Theme Tune:
  • When the show aired on Nickelodeon and Nicktoons, a shortened intro was created that just consisted of these lyrics: "It's time for Animaniacs / And we're zany to the max, / So just sit back and relax, / You'll laugh 'til you collapse! / We're Animaney, / Totally insaney, / Nick-a-laney, / Animaniacs, those are the facts!"
  • Instead of the regular clips they were set to, Nickelodeon set the lyrics to different clips making the lip-syncing off-key To keep the shortened intro on the same key, they pitched up the first half of the intro. But because they didn't re-record the intro, the Warners' voices were pitched up and sound effects like Dr. Scratchansniff's laughter are still heard confusing viewers (who took notice) who didn't see the show on Kids' WB!, Fox Kids or Cartoon Network.
• Truth in Television:
  • A lot of skits, especially of the Warner trio, mimic real-life situations that happen to real people (some, even, on situations that happened to the writers themselves). Though they're incredibly exaggerated, there's always that one line where you hear it and think, "Oh, that is so true."
  "Would ya like to take a survey?"
  Nanny: You must be Dit.
  Dot: That's Dot.
  Nanny: Dot. Right. Wikkie!
  Wakko: Wakko.
  Nanny: And you must be...
  Yakko: (deadpan) This oughta be good.
  Nanny: Petey-pie!
  Dr. Scratchansniff: Hello, we are stuck in an elevator, and we are late for an appointment with Mr. Plotz.
  Voice on Intercom: Ooh, that's bad. Okay, you sit tight and we'll get you out in a minute.
  Ten hours later...
  Voice on Intercom: You still in there? It was our indication that you got out.
  Dr. Scratchansniff: Really? What gave you that indication?
  Voice on Intercom: That's...just the indication we had.
  • And of course, the entire premise of "Bumbie's Mom."
  • The absurd event that triggers Slappy's antics in "I Got Yer Can" ("Please don't throw your trash in my trash can.") came from that exact thing happening to one of the writers.
  • And of course there's Buddy in the Warners 65th Anniversary Special, who was a real WB cartoon character in the 1930s and yes, his cartoons were infamous even back then for legit being incredibly boring.
• Tummy Cushion:
  • "Drive Insane" Wakko and Dot lay on Frau Hassenfeffer; Dot even tells her she's comfy.
  • "Hollywoodchuck" Charlton Woodchuck reads a book while lying on a grizzly bear's stomach while shooting a movie.

U-V

• Unexplained Accent: Wakko has a Liverpudlian brogue based on Ringo Starr for absolutely no damn reason — at least not one ever explained on the show. He's the only Warner that does not have an American accent.
• Ungrateful Townsfolk: In "The Good, the Bad and the Boo", a wild west town's residents offer to make Chicken Boo their new Sheriff if he captures the bad guy who's terrorizing them. Boo manages to honor his end of the deal but, once his human disguise falls off, they turn on him, release the bad guy and chase him away.
• Universal-Adaptor Cast: Cartoons take place anywhere and everywhere. The Warners bugging Einstein, Picasso, or Beethoven? Pinky and the Brain as Pavlov's mice? Slappy vs. Daniel Boone? Mindy and Buttons in Prehistoria? The Goodfeathers as WWI carrier pigeons? Chicken Boo as a Civil War general? Rita and Runt in ancient Egypt? Yes, all those and more!
• Un-person: The "Newsreel of the Stars" segment explains that a sort of damnatio memoriae was ordered against the Warners after they were imprisoned in the water tower — their films were locked in the vault never to see the light of day, and the studio employees were sworn against ever after publicly acknowledging their existence. It was successful, if only for 63 years.
• Unraveled Entanglement: In the first Slappy Squirrel cartoon, Slappy "accidentally" gets a dog wrapped up in a videocassette's tape. When she rewinds the tape to get it back in the cassette, the dog ends up Trapped in TV Land.
• Unusual Euphemism: The Goodfeathers often use "coo" as a swear word, such as "coo you" or "coo off".
• Uranus Is Showing: At the end of "The Planets".
  Yakko: Well, there you go! That's our solar system.
  Wakko: You forgot Uranus.
  Yakko: Goodnight, everybody!
• Vertigo Effect: Occasionally done with Buttons the moment Mindy escapes.
• Very Loosely Based on a True Story: The Warners 65th Anniversary Special. While his creation didn't lead to the creation of the Warner Brothers, Buddy is actually a very real cartoon character created in 1933 and his cartoons were particularly infamous even back then for being insanely boring. Also, they indeed brought another animator to try and spice things up after his first cartoons failed.
• Very Special Episode:
  • "The Little Drummer Warners" has Yakko, Wakko, and Dot go back in time to first-century Bethlehem to witness the birth of the baby Jesus (religion always a controversial subject for kids' cartoons, for various reasons). You'll notice they are unusually low-keyed and respectful - at least until they start performing "The Little Drummer Boy" and suddenly turn it into a 1940s-style swing number. (Hey, they had to do something wacky.)
  • "One Flew Over the Cuckoo Clock" as well, in which Slappy Squirrel suffers a nervous breakdown after watching too much daytime TV and has to be sent to a nursing home. This eventually results in Skippy being taken away by a CPS agent. The whole thing reminds one of an older relative going senile, seeing how it was based on Tom Ruegger's memories of visiting his aunt in a nursing home.
  • Also parodied in one episode opener. The opener begins with a subdued Yakko and Dot, talking about how the upcoming episode was a very special episode, and how it had special meaning to all of the cast, with both sounding very earnest... until they get to The Reveal about what made the episode so very special...
  Wakko: I'm not wearing any pants!
  • Parodied in "A Very Very Very Very Special Show". The Warner siblings try to win a humanitarian award, so they preach throughout the whole cartoon about smoking, violence, sexism etc. Once the award goes to a different cartoon, the Warners instantly revert back to their normal selves and go against everything they were preaching.
• Victoria's Secret Compartment:
  • Ms. Flameil keeps a red marker in her bra, apparently. Also a rare example of a not particularly attractive woman making use of this trope.
    Yakko: Ooh, what else do you have in there?
  • This is where Minerva Mink keeps the key to her diary.
• Visual Pun: "It's not a joke, it's a visual gag."
• Vocal Evolution: All three Warners went through this. Yakko originally had more of a "tough guy" sound; Wakko originally sounded more like Ringo Starr; and Dot was higher-pitched. Also, Skippy's voice got deeper as Nathan Ruegger aged, to the point that some of the last Skippy/Slappy segments have him pitch-shifted.

W-Z

• The War Room: Parodied in a episode where the Warners get pulled to Camelot to deal with a dragon that's causing havoc across the kingdom. Yakko calls his siblings to the War Room, then asks King Arthur where the War Room is. When Arthur says they don't have one, Wakko pulls one out of his bag. Inside is a setup that would make any general or Mad Scientist envious, with monitors on every wall showing the rampaging dragon and at the bottom a group of military leaders and scientists around a table debating whether to destroy the dragon or capture it for study. The Warners decide to forget the War Room after that.
• Wasn't That Fun?: Wakko in the episode "Ups and Downs", after the maintenance men raise the elevator he and Dr Scratchansniff are trapped in and drop it really quick:
  "Wasn't that neat?"
• Weaponized Landmark: The Warners weaponized the Warner Bros. water tower in "Super Strong Warner Siblings."
• We Have Forgotten the Phlebotinum:
  • When Dr. Scratchansniff and Wakko were stuck in an elevator (in probably the only instance where Wakko was the Straight Man).
    Scratchansniff: You've got to get us out of here! Do something big and silly from your gaggy bag!
    Wakko: I didn't bring it.
    Scratchansniff: [searching Wakko frantically] But you ALWAYS has your gaggy bag!! Where iz it?!? GIVE ME YOUR GAGGY BAG!!
• What Are You in For?: Rita asks Runt this when they first meet in the city pound. Runt's answer is "peeing on the floor".
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?:
  • The number of times Chicken Boo has been ostracized just for being a chicken, regardless of whether he was any good at his job before being unmasked...
  • Reminiscent of the Chicken Boo shorts, Brain running a successful campaign to become president only to be ridiculed when the people find that he is a mouse.
• Wheel o' Feet: Subverted in "Draculee, Dracula" — at one point the Warners rev up with this to start running, but then just walk off instead of darting.
• Wheel of Decisions: The Wheel of Morality.
• Whole-Plot Reference: Far too many to count.
  • Among those that haven't already been listed, A Christmas Carol and Disney's Beauty and the Beast are some of the most notable examples. They also did an entire parody on Disney movies in general, and Pocahontas in particular.
  • And a Rita-and-Runt full-on musical parody of Les Misérables, and the Goodfeather parodies of West Side Story and Fiddler on the Roof.
• Who's on First?:
  • Just with 1960s band names instead of baseball players. i.e. "Who's on stage?" "Yes." "So Yes is on stage?" "No, Yes isn't at this concert."
  • They also get a bit more mileage out of the same gag in "Piano Rag":
    Yakko: Very Pete Townshend-esque.
    Dot: Who?
    Wakko: Exactly.
  • There was another one involving Wakko participating in Dr. Scratchansniff's bingo game:
    Dr. Scratchansniff: Now our first combination is...B4!
    Wakko: Before what?
    Dr. Scratchansniff: I29.
    Wakko: Oh, no you're not! You must be at least 50! Really, 29.
    Dr. Scratchansniff: Oh nein. Oh nein.
    Wakko: O9? Bingo!
• Who Writes This Crap?!: The Warners go on an extended tirade about how awful the show's writing is during one end-credits gag where they accidentally leave the microphone on after delivering the closing sign-off.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Wakko and Plotz are both so terrified of clowns that the mere presence of one in "Clown and Out" makes them uncharacteristically nervous.
  • The Topps trading card game reveals that Wakko's biggest fear is having a Potty Emergency. It also mentions that Chicken Boo is scared of being revealed to other people as actually being a chicken, while Rita is afraid of heights.
• Wily Walrus: In the episode "Bumbie's Mom", a walrus lady complains when Skippy starts crying in the theater, and she's very rude about it. However, Slappy quickly shuts her up.
• The Witch Hunter: On one "Rita and Runt" segment set in Colonial Salem, Massachusetts, a witch hunter is after Rita, claiming she's a witch's familiar.
• Worm in an Apple: In the episode "Guardin' the Garden", after much trouble with Slappy, the serpent in the Garden of Eden finally gets its tail on an apple to feed to Eve. However, she declines when she spots a worm sticking out of it. The serpent only barely realizes in time that the worm is actually a lit fuse and that the apple is a bomb.
• Wormsign: In "Draculee, Draculaa", the Warner siblings leave a trail as they reach Transylvania during a failed attempt to go to Pennsylvania and Yakko explains and he and his siblings know they aren't bunnies but it's a Warner Bros tradition. In the end, they try to go to Pennsylvania that way again but end up in Tasmania.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: In "The Big Candy Store", Flaxseed manages to grab Wakko and Dot by their scruffs and hoists them up to his eye level. Unfortunately for him, the nun from earlier shows up with her convent as backup in a second attempt to get donations from the candy store, and thinks he was abusing them. Wakko and Dot happily roll with the assumption by fake-crying to get Flaxseed to let them go.
• Wraparound Background: Seen in the Yogi Bear parody of "Back in Style".
• Wrong Parachute Gag: In a Boot Camp Episode, while plummeting towards the ground with their Drill Sergeant, the Warners tell him that they took the liberty of washing the sheets he stores in his backpack. He pulls the cord and a duck headed flotation device comes out.
• Wunza Plot: "Boo Wonder": One's a human, the other's a chicken. Together, they fight crime!
• Xylophone Gag: Subverted and lampshaded by Slappy here.
  • "Old gag. New twist."
• Yank the Dog's Chain: "Whoopi-ti-yi-yo, oh, ghost of Magellan, the East Indies islands were right over there!"
  • Chicken Boo. Just when you think he's about to succeed, his disguise comes undone at the worst possible moment.
• Yet Another Christmas Carol: Starring Mr. Plotz in the Scrooge role, Ralph the Guard as Bob Cratchit with his son Ralph Jr. in the Tiny Tim role, Slappy as Jacob Marley and the Warner siblings as the three ghosts. The main difference from the original A Christmas Carol is that rather than having the Tiny Tim character die, Ralph Jr. vows revenge on Plotz for firing his dad and in the hypothetical future grows up to take over the Warner Bros. studio, with Plotz working as the security guard. Ralph Jr. fires Plotz in a similarly callous manner to the way Plotz fired his dad.
• Yodel Land: "Schnitzelbank".
• You All Meet in a Cell: Rita and Runt first meet in the pound.
• You Are Worth Hell: "Meatballs or Consequences."
• You Have to Believe Me!: Every Chicken Boo short has one character who points out the Paper-Thin Disguise and is scorned.
• You Remind Me of X: Pretty much Slappy's catchphrase.
• You Say Tomato: Mr. Director discusses this trope.
  Take the word 'animal'. Transpose the letters 'n' and 'm' and you get 'aminal'. That, in a nutshell, is comedy.
  • An aminal is a kind of chemical compound.
• You're Cute When You're Angry: Yakko says this to Dot after he and Wakko piss her off during "I'm Cute". Considering how seriously she takes her cuteness, it works.
• You Sexy Beast: In the Minerva Mink short "Moon Over Minerva". A geeky wolf, named Wilford B. Wolf, would turn into a hunky Fabio-like wolf when exposed to the full moon. Minerva won't give his geeky self the time of day, but she goes crazy for his moonlit self. Needless to say the short is pretty heavy on the Fanservice for both the male and female audiences.