History GenreSavvy / WesternAnimation

* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Popeye}}'' Valentine's special, "Sweethearts at Sea," Bluto proves that he's remembered how a stock Popeye plot goes by flipping the sailor man upside down early on and shaking him until all the spinach falls out of his shirt.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheHollow'': The trio, [[spoiler:once aware that the world is actually a video game, assume that the final realm is going to have a final boss battle]]. They're right.

'''Freakazoid:''' Well, if I know my cartoons, and I do, I'll be back later on to rescue you from something really horrible! Buh-Bye!
* ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans2003'':
** In the episode "[[Recap/TeenTitansS2E5FearItself Fear Itself]]", the Titans are investigating strange goings-on in their base after watching a horror movie. Starfire suggests [[LetsSplitUpGang they split up]], but Beast Boy [[NeverSplitTheParty vehemently protests this plan]]:
--->'''Beast Boy:''' Split up?! ''SPLIT UP?!'' Did you not see the movie?! When you split up, the monster picks you off one by one, starting with the good-looking [[PluckyComicRelief comic relief guy]]... me!
** And then, sure enough, he ''is'' the first one to get captured. As he's pulled back into the darkness, he even shouts out "I told you! Funny guy goes fiiiiirrrrst!"
** Beast Boy's knowledge of tropes would come in handy again in the TrappedInTVLand episode.
** When Cyborg is sent to the past in "[[Recap/TeenTitansS4E2CyborgTheBarbarian Cyborg the Barbarian]]", he makes sure not to touch anything. "Sci-fi rule number one: you start messing with the past, you end up with monkeys ruling the future!"
* ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible'':
** Kim, Ron, Shego, and Senor Senior Jr. are of the most Genre Savvy. This however doesn't prevent them from falling victim to GenreTropes (or that they fall into the tropes as part of a fourth-wall bending realisation that they have to do so to have a story), but does make for some great LampshadeHanging afterwards.
** Señor Senior Sr plays this totally straight, because he learned how to be a {{supervillain}} from books and it's an eccentric hobby for him.

** Flash occasionally shows traits of this, as this quote from "The Brave and the Bold" demonstrates:
--->'''Flash:''' Usually when it's this empty, flesh eating zombies show up.\\
'''Green Lantern:''' [[YouWatchTooMuchX You watch too many horror movies]]... ''(interrupted by the sound of a brainwashed mob)''\\

** After Gorilla Grodd subdues and imprisons the Justice League, Clayface says they should just kill them off now--having acted in enough movies, Clayface knows that saving them for the showy public execution Grodd wants will give them time to ''escape'', no matter how helpless they seem. [[spoiler:Hilariously, this is actually ''J'onn'', apparently making sure not to slip up anywhere in his act.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/LegionOfSuperHeroes2006'': Bouncing Boy is the 21st Century horror movie aficionado, so he warns them of the rules.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBros'' has # 21 and # 24 . In "The Lepidopterists", they are well aware that they posses the perfect combination of "expendable and invulnerable". They're sent off on a mission with # 1, and say his cool professionalism marks him for death, while [[ThoseTwoGuys their bumbling incompetence will see them through to the end]], like it always does. Later, they point out that # 1's lack of a name makes him a RedShirt, he reveals his name (Scott Hall), and they say it's just a device to make his impending [[MauveShirt death more emotional]]. Ultimately, he meets his fate when his impressive escape techniques draw the attention of Brock Sampson. [[spoiler:And then somehow survives to show up in another episode.]] # 21 and # 24 were pretending to be wax sculptures at the time. [[spoiler: Ironically, or at least in a cruel twist of fate, in the season 3 finale, 24 stands near the Monarch's car when it suddenly explodes. He's killed in the blast as 21 unintentionally catches his burning head. Why? Because he wore his seat belt and couldn't get away in time.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' discuses it in this exchange:

** Gwen tries to educate the other campers about the rules of horror movies only to be blatantly ignored... except by fellow horror-buff Duncan, who successfully becomes the {{Final G|irl}}uy because of it. Gwen is then subverted into WrongGenreSavvy when she confronts a real psychotic killer, [[AndYouThoughtItWasAGame whom she thinks is an actor pretending to be a psycho killer.]]
** When Sierra drops her ObfuscatingStupidity in the confessional, she's revealed to be having this in spades, up to intending to manipulate [[AlphaBitch Heather]]; all due to her being an FanGirl that watched the show obsessively.
* PlayedForLaughs in ''WesternAnimation/JohnnyTest'', "When did we land in a bad decade genre medium?" is a running gag, e.g. "When did we land in a bad 70s cop show?"
* Ren from ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'' has shades of this, particularly in the episode "A Yard Too Far". The eponymous duo is starving as they suddenly sense a delicious smell from someone's backyard.
-->'''Ren''': Wait a minute! I'm not stupid. I've seen cartoons like this before! If I set foot into this yard, I'll probably get ripped into shreds by [[AngryGuardDog some enormous dog]]!
** This is parodied shortly after when Stimpy tells Ren [[ExactWords there is no dog]] only for Ren to be attacked by a vicious guard ''baboon''.
* Roger from ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad''. In one early episode he joins a car dealership:
-->'''Roger:''' Oh, it's like a sitcom come true! I'm part of a workplace ensemble! He must be the sarcastic guy. And ''he's'' the dumb guy. Oh! ''He'' must be the black guy who doesn't talk! *said guy glares at him* Yessss!!
* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'':
** In "Legend of the Gobblewonker", Dipper brings seventeen disposable cameras along with him to search for the Gobblewonker, since he realizes how often camera problems ruin monster hunts in movies. Also, Soos worries that he might just be a "side character" and get killed off. Ironically for Dipper, ''all'' [[RunningGag of his cameras get destroyed before the monster shows up]].[[spoiler:..except the one he hid under his hat. It all ends up irrelevant, as the creature he thought he would get to take a photo of turned out to be a robot.]]
** In "Scary-Oke" after Dipper accidentally summons a legion of zombies, Soos says he is prepared after seeing basically all zombie movies ever made. [[spoiler:[[TheWorldsExpertOnGettingKilled Only for him to immediately get bitten]], [[BrickJoke like a side-character would.]] Luckily for Soos, they find a cure for zombism.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'':
** Rick, being a highly ExperiencedProtagonist, displays a ton of genre savviness (often overlapping with pop culture savviness, and helped by him having MediumAwareness) throughout the series, usually being the first to correctly guess what will happen or call that something will end badly. For one example, in "Look Who's Purging Now", he predicts what "the festival" will be, comparing it to a movie.
--->'''Townsfolk:''' Sundown is when the festival begins.\\
'''Rick:''' The festival?\\
'''Townsfolk:''' Ooh, well, for millennia, our society has been free of crime and war, living in perfect peace.\\
'''Rick:''' Oh, I know what this is! You've been able to sustain world peace because you have one night a year where you all run around robbing and murdering each other without consequence.\\
'''Townsfolk:''' That's right.\\
'''Morty:''' What?!\\
'''Rick:''' It's like ''Film/ThePurge'', Morty. That movie ''The Purge''?
** Morty gets more moments of this later in the series as he becomes more TaughtByExperience, occasionally engaging in ConversationalTroping.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Animaniacs}}'': Slappy Squirrel [[AnimatedActors used to star in slapstick cartoons]] and has MediumAwareness, so she knows all of the classic cartoon tricks and gags. Because of this, any attempts to use these tricks against her tend to fail horribly, as she sees them coming from a mile away and knows how to thwart them.
** It helps that she knows she's in a cartoon. Even though her nephew, Skippy, doesn't realize it.
* Sarah from ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' is this. One episode involves her pointing out the lazy sitcom cliches to Gumball and Darwin.
* ''WesternAnimation/StarVsTheForcesOfEvil'': In "St. Olga's Reform School for Wayward Princess", Marco uses his knowledge of prison escape movies to help him and Star infiltrate St. Olga's to bust out Pony Head.
%%** In "Curse of the Blood Moon", Marco makes a long-winded speech about how obvious it is that the creature they've encountered is a bridge troll and how they'll have to do some silly task to get across the bridge in question, deducing that the group should skip all the nonsense and just have him and Star do it, since that'll be the solution anyway. Subverted in that while that ''is'' what the bridge troll wanted them to do, it ''isn't'' what the bridge troll's boss wanted. The intended challenge was a DuelToTheDeath, while the silly task (moving a couch) was the employee trying to shirk his chores. The head troll is so exasperated by this turn of events that he just lets Star and the gang pass, so he can properly reprimand his underling.
* ''WesternAnimation/HeyArnold:'' "The Pig War" has Arnold and his friends participate in a war reenactment where the teams try to capture Arnold's pet pig, Abner. When Abner's captured by the other team, they declare they will roast him at sundown. To get Abner back, the kids construct a giant wooden pig that they hide inside, a la the TrojanHorse, and deliver it to the opposing fort as a gift. The soldier in charge of the gate is well aware of the story and trick and tries to point it out to their leader, Rex Smythe Higgens. Higgens [[IDontPayYouToThink ignores him]] and orders him to open the gate. Once Arnold and his friends all pop out to fight, the soldier glares at the leader and throws out his hands as if to say "[[IWarnedYou See? I told you so]]."
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Kaeloo}}'': In Episode 134, the gang get fired from the show and need to take a job interview with Olaf to get re-hired [[spoiler: the whole of which turns out to be a "joke" on Olaf's part]]. Everyone is stressed except [[ButtMonkey Stumpy]], who points out that [[MediumAwareness they are in a comedy show]] and he's the comic relief, so he'll definitely be re-hired.
* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales2017:'' In the episode "Last Christmas", Dewey travels back in time to meet his tween-age mother Della and uncle Donald. Towards the end of the episode, when the twins deduce that Dewey is a relative from the future, he immediately attempts to warn them that a reckless adventure will leave Della lost in space and presumed dead. Before he can get a word out, the twins physically shut his mouth and ask him if he's seen ''any'' movie about time travel.
* Connie Maheswaran from ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' is a {{deconstruct|edTrope}}ion of this trope. Being a huge fantasy geek and avid reader of young adult novels, she's very aware that Steven, not her, is the main character of the story. However, knowing that she's a side character in somebody else's story led her to develop a rather unhealthy inferiority complex and disregard for her own life. Which isn't helped by having Pearl, who has her ''own'' inferiority complex, as a teacher whose first lessons explicitly tell her to give her life up for Steven. Fortunately, she does get better in later episodes, after Steven convinces her that she's his equal, not his inferior/subordinate.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'': In an episode where he's competing against rival Remy Buxaplenty in a scavenger hunt, Timmy races him to a Central American temple to retrieve a priceless treasure. Unfortunately, Remy beats him there and snatches the gems on the pedestal before Timmy can stop him. However, upon Remy's departure, Timmy notices something strange. In all the adventure and treasure hunt movies he's seen, every time the loot is taken, a bunch of {{Booby Trap}}s are triggered. As that didn't happen, he deduces the gems Remy took were {{Red Herring}}s to keep the real treasure safe. When he removes a cylinder from the pedestal, it descends, which Timmy figures means that he got the actual treasure, to his delight...[[ExplainExplainOhCrap until he realizes the traps are going off]].
* PlayedForLaughs in the ''WesternAnimation/MiloMurphysLaw'' episode "[[Recap/MiloMurphysLawS1E19BattleOfTheBands Battle of the Bands]]," with [[GranolaGuy Mort]] giving long speeches about the various tropes from MusicStories that they're following.
-->'''Mort:''' ''Wow,'' this is like one of those movies where there's one dance team from the streets, and one dance team is classically trained. And they're both gonna do this competition, but then the street team runs out of funding, so they have to raise the money, and then the classically trained dancer leaves the ''other'' team and joins them and teaches them the value of hard work!\\
''[Long {{beat}}]''\\
'''[[OnlySaneMan Zack]]:'''[[note]]The "classically trained dancer who defects to the street team" in this simile.[[/note]] ''Exactly!''
** Bradley in "[[Recap/MiloMurphysLawS2E33TheMidAfternoonSnackClub The Mid-Afternoon Snack Club]]":
--->'''Bradley:''' Look at all of you, with your preppy clothes and perfectly coiffed hair. You all think you're better than me, don't you?\\
'''Zack:''' Bradley, what are you talking about? ''You're'' the preppy one.\\
'''Bradley:''' Zack, would you get with the program? [[WholePlotReference This is like]] [[Film/TheBreakfastClub one of those '80s movies]], where a bunch of kids are forced to have detention, and then they all learn something about themselves at the end. Well, one of us has to be [[JerkassWoobie the angry malcontent who masks his pain by lashing out at the others!]]
* ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks'': In the episode "The Fundraiser", Riley is obsessed with emulating gangster movies like ''Film/Scarface1983'', believing he'll rise to the top and be unstoppable like Tony Montana. Huey quickly points out that Tony died at the end of the movie, which Riley doesn't believe because he only paid attention to the parts where Tony was a badass. Sure enough, when Riley tries to be a gangster, he does almost get himself killed, only saved because he took Huey's advice to wear a BulletproofVest.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheCupheadShow'': When Baroness von Bon Bon offers him to eat as much of [[LevelAte Sugarland]] as he wants, Cuphead refuses because he assumes that she just wants him to [[FatteningTheVictim get fat so she can eat him]] a la ''Literature/HanselAndGretel''. [[spoiler:And he's right.]]
-->'''Cuphead:''' I've read the fairy tales. I eat your candy, I end up in an oven. You just wanna eat me!

* ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'' has # 21 and # 24 . In "The Lepidopterists", they are well aware that they posses the perfect combination of "expendable and invulnerable". They're sent off on a mission with # 1, and say his cool professionalism marks him for death, while [[ThoseTwoGuys their bumbling incompetence will see them through to the end]], like it always does. Later, they point out that # 1's lack of a name makes him a RedShirt, he reveals his name (Scott Hall), and they say it's just a device to make his impending [[MauveShirt death more emotional]]. Ultimately, he meets his fate when his impressive escape techniques draw the attention of Brock Sampson. [[spoiler:And then somehow survives to show up in another episode.]] # 21 and # 24 were pretending to be wax sculptures at the time. [[spoiler: Ironically, or at least in a cruel twist of fate, in the season 3 finale, 24 stands near the Monarch's car when it suddenly explodes. He's killed in the blast as 21 unintentionally catches his burning head. Why? Because he wore his seat belt and couldn't get away in time.]]

* Rick displays some genre savviness (overlapping with TaughtByExperience) in ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'' in the episode "Look Who's Purging Now" when he predicts what "the festival" will be, comparing it to a movie.
-->'''Townsfolk:''' Sundown is when the festival begins.\\

'''Rick:''' It's like ''The Purge'', Morty. That movie ''The Purge''?

-->'''Cuphead:''' I eat your candy, I end up in an oven. You just wanna eat me!

** [[GrumpyBear Bradley]] in "[[Recap/MiloMurphysLawS2E33TheMidAfternoonSnackClub The Mid-Afternoon Snack Club]]":

* ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans''

--->'''Beast Boy:''' Split up?! ''SPLIT UP?!!'' Did you not see the movie?! When you split up, the monster picks you off one by one, starting with the good-looking [[PluckyComicRelief comic relief guy]]... me!

* ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible''

* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague''

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Legion of Super Heroes}}'': Bouncing Boy is the 21st Century horror movie aficionado, so he warns them of the rules.

-->'''Cuphead:''' I eat your candy, I end up in an oven. You juts wanna eat me!

* ''WesternAnimation/TheCupheadShow'': When Baroness von Bon Bon offers him to eat as much of [[LevelAte Sugarland]] as he wants, Cuphead refuses because he assumes that she just wants him to [[FatteningTheVictim get fat so she can eat him]] a la ''Literature/HanselAndGretel''.

* Connie Maheswaran from ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' is a deconstruction of this trope. Being a huge fantasy geek and avid reader of young adult novels, she's very aware that Steven, not her, is the main character of the story. However, knowing that she's a side character in somebody else's story led her to develop a rather unhealthy inferiority complex and disregard for her own life. Which isn't helped by having Pearl, who has her ''own'' inferiority complex, as a teacher whose first lessons explicitly tell her to give her life up for Steven. Fortunately, she does get better in later episodes, after Steven convinces her that she's his equal, not his inferior/subordinate.

-->'''Steph:''' When will I see you again?
-->'''Freakazoid:''' Well, if I know my cartoons, and I do, I'll be back later on to rescue you from something really horrible! Buh-Bye!

-->'''Beast Boy:''' Split up?! ''SPLIT UP?!!'' Did you not see the movie?! When you split up, the monster picks you off one by one, starting with the good-looking [[PluckyComicRelief comic relief guy]]... me!

-->'''Flash:''' Usually when it's this empty, flesh eating zombies show up.\\

** In "Scary-Oke" after Dipper accidentally summons a legion of zombies, Soos says he is prepared after seeing basically all zombie movies ever made. [[spoiler:[[TheWorldsExpertOnGettingKilled Only for him to immediately get bitten]], [[BrickJoke like a side-character would.]] Luckily for Soos they find a cure for zombism.]]

-->'''Townsfolk:''' Sundown is when the festival begins.
-->'''Rick:''' The festival?
-->'''Townsfolk:''' Ooh, well, for millennia, our society has been free of crime and war, living in perfect peace.
-->'''Rick:''' Oh, I know what this is! You've been able to sustain world peace because you have one night a year where you all run around robbing and murdering each other without consequence.
-->'''Townsfolk:''' That's right.
-->'''Morty:''' What?!
-->'''Rick:''' It's like ''The Purge'', Morty. That movie ''The Purge''?

-->'''Bradley:''' Look at all of you, with your preppy clothes and perfectly coiffed hair. You all think you're better than me, don't you?\\

** In "The Last Adventure", part of the {{Big Bad}}'s plan involves creating a void which will erase anything that falls in from existence. However, he figures that even ''if'' he did somehow manage to push Scrooge through, he'd find some way of coming back since "he's Scrooge McDuck" and that's just what he does. So instead, he threatens to push Scrooge's family in unless Scrooge signs a MagicallyBindingContract that would force him to never adventure again.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'': Mr. Incredible has been around the block enough times that when Mirage is explaining the situation with the Omnidroid, he can already guess most of what she's going to say because the situation is just ''that'' by the numbers for him. [[spoiler: Which makes perfect sense when it's revealed that it's actually a trap meant to draw in and kill superheroes; Syndrome deliberately created a scenario so typical for supers that they'd never question it]].
--> '''Mr. Incredible:''' Let me guess: [[GrewBeyondTheirProgramming it got smart enough to wonder why it had to take orders]]?
--> '''Mirage:''' (''surprised'') Uh, yes. One other thing - obviously the Omnidroid represents a ''substanstial'' investment--
--> '''Mr. Incredible''': You want me to disable it ''without'' completely destroying it, right?

* ''WesternAnimation/BeastWars: In "Dark Designs", Rhinox is [[BrainwashedAndCrazy captured and reprogrammed as a Predacon by Megatron]]. Rather than come to his rescue immediately, Optimus suggests waiting a while before saving their friend. It turns out that making Rhinox a Predacon made him a far bigger problem for Megatron than the Maximals as [[TheStarscream Rhinox attempts to usurp leadership of the Predacons.]]

* Every fan of WesternAnimation/{{Popeye}} knows that once per episode, Popeye will pull a can of spinach out of his shirt, get super strong from eating it, and beat Bluto to a pulp. So in the Valentine's Day episode, "Sweethearts at Sea," Bluto simply shakes Popeye upside down until all his cans of spinach fall out, and ''then'' ties him to an anchor and throws him overboard.

* Every fan of WesternAnimation/[[Popeye]] knows that once per episode, Popeye will pull a can of spinach out of his shirt, get super strong from eating it, and beat Bluto to a pulp. So in the Valentine's Day episode, "Sweethearts at Sea," Bluto simply shakes Popeye upside down until all his cans of spinach fall out, and ''then'' ties him to an anchor and throws him overboard.

-->'''Mort:''' ''Wow,'' this is like one of those movies where there's one dance team from the streets, and one dance team that's classically trained. And they're both gonna do this competition, but then the street team runs out of funding, so they have to raise the money, and then the classically trained dancer leaves the ''other'' team and teaches them the value of hard work!\\

** [[GrouchyBear Bradley]] in "[[Recap/MiloMurphysLawS2E33TheMidAfternoonSnackClub The Mid-Afternoon Snack Club]]":

'''Zack:''' ''Exactly!''
** Bradley in "[[Recap/MiloMurphysLawS2E33TheMidAfternoonSnackClub The Mid-Afternoon Snack Club]]":