Western Animation / Literal Metaphor

Literal Metaphors in Western Animation.

In The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius episode "Crouching Jimmy, Hidden Sheen":
Jimmy: It's Yoo Yee's temple, alright. And it's crawling with ninjas!
[cut to the ninjas literally crawling on the ground]
Adventure Time:
- In "His Hero", when Finn and Jake convince Billy that fighting evil with violence isn't so pointless, Billy tells them "It's as if your words are filling a void in my very being... Wanna watch?" He then parts his beard to show that a literal hole in his chest is being filled in again.
- In "Normal Man", a de-powered Magic Man expresses shame for throwing the people of Mars under the bus. A flashback shows that one of the torments he inflicted on them was literally running people over with a school bus.
Aladdin: The Series: In "Shark Treatment", Genie does this accidentally when Aladdin is turning into a shark.
Genie: Al, you look a little green around the gills. [Aladdin starts gasping and puts his hands around his throat] Since when does he have gills?!
Due to its absolute weirdness, The Amazing World of Gumball is chock-full of these. Here are few examples:
- For Penny, a sentient peanut, the term "coming out of your shell" is quite literal.
- In the episode "The Dress", Gumball says that because he's wearing his mother's wedding dress, people think he's a pretty girl and are bending over backwards to please him. Cue Mr. Small walking by, who greets Gumball while literally bent over backwards.
- In the episode "The Nest", in search of mysteriously missing people, the Elmore police literally "leave no stone unturned."
- In the episode "The Night", the Moon says "When everything is tired and bleary, they spoon together snug but weary" as the cutlery literally spoons together.
- There are several in "The Shippening" because the Reality Warping notebook takes Sarah's metaphors literally. Examples include mention of Alan's "chiseled features" (his face gets chipped away at like a rock) and Larry being "destroyed" by a breakup (his head explodes).
American Dad!:
- This exchange:
  Steve: We don't have an instrument for Jeff.
  Bob: He could play the skin flute!
  Steve: [bursts out laughing]
  Bob: [holds up a flute bound with animal skins]
- On one occasion, Francine is completely fed-up with Roger's jerkishness, and screams at him "Would it kill you to be nice for a change?!" As it turns out, members of Roger's species have to let out their innate "bitchiness", or it will fester in their bodies, poisoning and eventually killing them. So, yes, it would kill him to be nice.
Animaniacs
- In the short "Video Revue", the Warner siblings are in a video store, fleeing from a T. rex that came out of a Jurassic Park video — so they decide to drop some "bombs" on it, including Heaven's Gate, Ishtar, and Howard the Duck.
- In the Animaniacs (2020) short "Mouse-Churian Candidate", Pinky complains about his bad luck with online dates because he's always getting cat-fished... then he shows Brain his phone, where one of Pinky's potential dates is an actual catfish.
Aqua Teen Hunger Force, after the gang gets a dog:
Master Shake: [annoyed] Oh great, our little canine friend left a "present" on my chair. Yyyyep... looks like someone delivered some baked goods.
[Shake suddenly becomes happy and lifts a tray of muffins from the chair]
Master Shake: How did he know I love baked goods?!
Archer:
- Double Subverted and played straight in the same episode. Charles and Rudy are two gay guys trying to help Archer seduce a gay spy named Ramon:
  Rudy: I'd try The Cockfight.
  Archer: A cockfight?
  Charles: It's the name of a gay bar.
  Rudy: But they do have actual cockfights there.
  Charles: Latinos... you take the bad with the good.
  [later]
  Rudy: Look at slut just getting home!
  Charles: Well, I guess our advice worked.
  Archer: No! It didn't! Ramon blew me off.
  Rudy: Then where were you all night?
  Archer: Way the Christ out in the Everglades, burying some Dominican guy's rooster!
  Charles: Fun!
  Archer: [beat] Wha...?
  Charles: Oh, you meant literally.
  Archer: Yes!
- In the episode "Lo Scandalo", Kreiger is called in to dispose of a corpse in Malory's apartment.
  Malory: And is Krieger... hard at work?
  Archer: He literally might be, yes.
- In "The Honeymooners", when Archer steals Malory's limitless credit card, and proceeds to waste money:
  Malory: [calmly] I am literally going to kill him.
  Gilette: Well figurati—
  Malory: LITERALLY. I'll lure him to my condo in Miami, drug his steak au poivre, drive him out to the middle of the Everglades, slather him with rancid chicken fat and then toss him to the gators!
  Gilette: [shocked] That's pretty specific for a hypothetical...
  Malory: Oh he is going to pay for this... literally.
From Avatar: The Last Airbender: "The Waterbending Scroll":
Uncle Iroh: [stops Zuko and a pirate captain from fighting] Are you so busy fighting you cannot see your own ship has set sail?
Prince Zuko: We have no time for your proverbs, Uncle!
Uncle Iroh: It's no proverb!
[cut to pirate ship being hijacked]

: Later, Zuko's ship gets hijacked! "Maybe it should be a proverb..."

The Babaloos: The episode titled “Needle In A Haystack” literally involves searching in a haystack for the Compass’s lost needle.
Batman: The Brave and the Bold got a creepy example in "Deep Cover for Batman". While Batman is in a Mirror Universe where heroes are villains, the alternate version of Blue Beetle, Scarlet Scarab, comments that he has the heart of a hero. An eavesdropping Batman wonders if he's a possible ally... only for Scarab to add that he keeps it in a jar in his closet.
Beetlejuice: The cartoon loved using these along with visual puns as a frequent source of jokes. Given the wacky nature of the Neitherworld, they were quite easy to make.
- In one episode, Beetlejuice is hosting a Show Within a Show and excuses himself for "a few words from our sponsors"... the words turn out to be "BUY!", "NEW!" and "FREE!"
- After Lydia got mad at him, a depressed Beetlejuice remarks that watching a little TV might cheer him up. Cue him sitting on a small stool, watching a ridiculously tiny television set. (A "little TV.")
Bob's Burgers:
- In "The Deepening", the rampaging mechanical shark ends up in Bob's basement and comes up through the floor of the restaurant. As Bob desperately reaches for something to throw at the shark and slow it down, he tries to reach for the straw dispenser yelling "I am literally grasping at straws!"
- In "Nice Capades", Mr. Fischoeder agrees to pull some strings and get the Belcher kids use of the skating rink at the mall for their ice show. He agrees to do it "for a song", as in he wants to perform a song in their show.
- In "The Gene and Courtney Show", Mr. Wheeler brings up the events of "The Unbearable Like-Likeness of Gene", when Gene dated Courtney and broke her heart... literally, since Courtney has a congenital heart defect and their messy break-up caused her to have a cardiac episode.
In Central Park, Season 1 "Hot Oven", after reading Bitsy's letter in the newspaper that criticized Central Park's management (i.e. Owen), Owen points out he worked his shorts off for the park, "Literally! I've gone through three pairs in the last six months!"
A huge chunk of the humor in Chowder comes from this trope (in addition to it's repeated tactical nukes against the fourth wall). Case in point: in the episode where Truffles takes over as coach for the Marzipan Macadamias, she tells the team they're going for a "Romeo and Juliet play". The next scene is Truffles and one of the players acting out the legendary tower scene.
The Cleveland Show:
- Mr. Waterman is trying to find the rest of his Santa costume:
  Mr. Waterman: Where's my beard?
  Mrs. Waterman: Right here. [Beat, then holds up a Santa beard]
- In "Hustle 'n' Bros", Cleveland realizes he's metaphorically on a Snipe Hunt:
  Cleveland: Chasing these wild geese is like some kind of wild goose ch— son of a bitch!
The main characters in Courage the Cowardly Dog live in the middle of Nowhere. It's an actual town called Nowhere which is located in Kansas, the actual middle of the country. Nowhere is actually established as being in Kansas by another example, with one of the main characters commenting that they're Not in Kansas Anymore after a particularly strange bout of Time Travel, and it shortly being confirmed that she meant it literally.
In Doug, Doug is unable to sell any chocolate bars door-to-door because everyone he asks says they taste like cement. When he and the manufacturer of the candy go to the factory to find out why, they discover that a mis-parked cement mixer is pouring its contents into the chocolate mix.
DuckTales:
- In DuckTales (1987), when we first meet Fenton Crackshell, he's a literal "bean counter", as in, he actually works in a bean factory counting beans that get put in jars.
- This happens in DuckTales (2017), during an argument between Scrooge and Donald in the first episode.
  Donald: Oh, here we go! Giving orders like he's the richest duck in the world!
  Scrooge: I am the richest duck in the world!
- During the second half of the premiere, Donald has to let go and trust his nephew, Dewey. Except in this case, he literally has to let go of the holes in the wall he's plugging so that the room can fill with water, trusting that Dewey's right about a gem on the "ceiling" being the power source.
- Invoked in "Who is Gizmoduck?!" where Huey has Gizmoduck throw a piece of paper with the words "My faith in you" away when Huey feels Gizmoduck has become a sellout.
- In "Raiders of the Doomsday Vault!", after Glomgold handcuffs himself to Scrooge so he can follow him to the vault with the money tree seed, they end up fighting on a frozen lake when this happens.
  Scrooge: You're on thin ice, Glomgold!
  Glomgold: I don't have to listen to you, McDuck!
  Scrooge: No, you are literally on—
  (the ice under their feet gives away and they both fall into the water)
Ed, Edd n Eddy: In "Three Squares and an Ed" Edd and Eddy are trying to bust Ed out after he's been grounded. When Sarah discovers Ed's not in his room...
Sarah: ED!!!!
[downstairs]
Ed: SARAH KNOWS, GUYS!
Eddy: Duh, Ed, we heard her! Just keep your shorts on! [Ed's pants are around his ankles] No, seriously, keep your shorts on. [pulls them back up]
On The Fairly OddParents!, when Timmy and Vicky are competing in a skating competition. When it's Timmy's turn, Vicky tells him to break a leg. Then explains she meant that literally, and tries to kick Timmy off the ramp.
In the first episode of the obscure series The Fairy Tale Police Department, the female officer Chris gets a call from her male partner informing her that he's been attacked by the Three Little Pigs (very long story) and she responds, "You're pulling my leg!" He remarks "Funny you should use that phrase" as one of the pigs pulls his leg.
Family Guy:
- This one:
  Man: Wow, Lois Griffin. Hey, I love your act! Nice melons.
  Peter: Hey, listen pal!
  Lois: Peter, I'm holding melons.
  [she's holding two watermelons]
  Peter: Oh.
  Man: And her hooters ain't bad either.
  Peter: Now hang on a second there!
  Lois: Peter, I'm holding hooters!
  [she has two owls perched on her arm]
  Peter: Oh, sorry.
  Man: No problem. [beat] Your wife's hot!
  Peter: All right, that's it!
- In another episode, Peter is trying to organize Stewie's first birthday party but one of the only things he could find was a "big-ass piñata"; pan over to show a large papier-mâché butt. Brian responds "I sure hope candy comes out of that."
- Yet another time, when Peter and Lois have an argument in the car about the former's father, Peter exclaims, "I'm putting my foot down!" Then he literally puts his foot down to quickly activate the car's brakes.
- After finding out that Cleveland's wife cheated on him, Peter and Brian agree that the last thing they want to do is tell Cleveland about it. Smash Cut to Peter and Brian, having now accomplished everything else on their agenda, telling Cleveland.
- A Cutaway Gag from "Grumpy Old Man" depicts the way every pizza place ruins a salad. It turns out the restaurant is called Every Pizza Place.
- In one episode, Peter says that in order to talk to Lois about something he'll first need "a little bit of courage from my old friend Mr. Jack Daniels". He then reaches for a glass of what looks like whiskey, but instead grabs the phone next to it to call an actual person named Jack Daniels (only to be informed by his wife that he had died recently).
- In "The First No L", when the narrator says that Lois's heart grew three sizes a la the Grinch, it cuts to her in the hospital hooked up to a ventilator after her heart literally grew that big.
The Flintstones: Done in the episode in which Barney Rubble and Fred Flintstone meet Dr. Sinister.
Barney: Hey look, Fred. The volcano's flipping its lid!
Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: In "Setting a President", Bloo nominates himself as a candidate for the President of Foster's in the election against Frankie and Mr. Herriman. When Bloo shouts "Herriman smells like poo!" during the interview and the imaginary friends cheer, Herriman says "But he's just mudslinging!" Bloo then tosses mud at Herriman's face, to which Herriman says "I should have seen that coming."
Futurama:
- An example from when the crew are floating in space collecting Chronotons:
  Leela: All right, cool your jets, hotshot.
  Fry: C'mon Leela, why won't you go out with me? We both know there's something there!
  Leela: No, I mean cool your jets. You're melting Bender's face.
- And another when Zoidberg is trying to do standup:
  Zoidberg: Good evening ladies and germs.
  [rimshot]
  Zoidberg: That wasn't a joke! I was talking to Dean Streptococcus!
- Bender's middle name is actually "Bending".
- In "The Bots and the Bees", as Bender drinks at popular club The Hip Joint, he overhears the following from a robot bar patron:
  Robot: I need to loosen up, give me a screwdriver.
  [bartender lays a flathead screwdriver on the bar in front of her]
- In "A Big Ball of Garbage":
  Talking Bart Simpson Doll: Eat my shorts!
  Bender: Okay!
  [literally eats doll's pants]
  Bender: Mmm, shorts...
- In "Bender's Game", an ordinary outhouse is occupied by a wizardly version of Farnsworth.
  Farnsworth: Just a minute. [closes the door]
  Bender: [waving around his nose] Methinks he's casting a powerful spell indeed.
  [Farnsworth opens the door to reveal a large cozy room]
- Wanting a subject for his experimental growth ray, Farnsworth announces that they'll need a guinea pig. Cut to an actual guinea pig, which Farnsworth uses as bait to trap Zoidberg so that they can experiment on him.
- In "A Taste of Freedom", Zoidberg's prosecution for eating a flag leads to his Decapodian brethren enslaving the Earth, and Fry's ancient heat-seeking missile fails to demolish the Decapodian Mobile Oppression Palace because "All Decapodian technology is cold-blooded, like us!". Zoidberg saves the day by burning a flag "to preserve the freedom it represents" because he's not just expressing his free speech, but also using it as a beacon for the missile.
- At the end of "The Late Phillip J. Fry", Fry finally makes it to his dinner date with Leela after going through two iterations of the universe in a one-way time machine and accidentally killing an alternate version of himself. When Leela expresses disbelief that Fry would make it on time, he casually remarks "That was the old Fry. He's dead now."
- From "The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings":
  Bender: Though you may have to metaphorically make a (Air Quotes) "Deal with the Devil." And by "devil," I mean Robot Devil, and by "metaphorically," I mean "get your coat."
- In "Love and Rocket," Fry gives Leela his oxygen when she unwittingly starts to run out. She tries to resuscitate him and he coughs up a candy heart. The inscription?
  U LEAVE ME BREATHLESS
- In "A Head in the Polls," Bender's detached head informs everyone that he sold his body.
  Farnsworth: Sold your body?! Oh, Bender, I've been down that road. I know it's glamorous and the parties are great, but you'll end up spending every dollar you make on jewelry and skintight pants!
Garbage Pail Kids Cartoon:
- "Green Dean Goes Out of His Bean" had Elliot Mess express his disbelief at Patty Putty's claims of a plant monster with a voracious appetite being on the loose by telling her to stop pulling his leg. Because Elliot's limbs are scrambled, Patty actually was pulling on his leg while dragging him along.
- The "Garbage Pail Groaner" segment of the episode "Heartless Hal" had a boy attempt to swipe cookies from a cookie jar. When his mother catches him, she states that she caught him red-handed. The boy disagrees on the grounds that his hand isn't red, but finds to his shock that his hand actually has turned red, causing his mother to say "I told you so".
- The final episode had a segment where a boy's mother scolds her son with common figures of speech and the boy then undergoes a transformation following his mother's words literally. For example, when he is warned that making a face will cause his face to freeze that way, his face literally becomes frozen solid.
Goofy shorts made use of literalized idioms as visual gags:
- "How to Play Golf": when the narrator says "Keep your eye on the ball", Goofy is literally having the ball stuck in his eye.
- "Californy er Bust" are full of these, and most of them literally don't age well:
  - Buffalo, New York is literally a desert full of buffalos.
  - A Blackfoot literally has black feet.
  - An "ol' patchy" chief literally has patches all over his clothes, including his head feathers, is also literally wearing an eye patch.
  - Crazy Horse is literally a nutjob with a Mohawk, blinkers and a horse collar.
  - Among all the Indian tribesmen who're about to fight European settlers, there's literally a Cleveland Indian playing with his baseball, literally an Indian, red skin and feather and all.
  - Rain-in-the-Face literally walks around with a cloud that showers at his face.
  - When the narrator says "We're really cawt wid ahr..." without finishing that sentence, three settlers literally pull their pants up constantly because they keep coming down.
  - When the narrator says "Well, ah was knawkin' dem awl like flahs", the "pesky Redskins" literally drop left and right like flies.
  - And when he says "And another Injun bit the dust", that Injun literally drops and bites dust for some time.
  - And yet he says "Dey throo evrythin' at us but de kitchen sink", a kitchen sink is literally thrown.
- "Get Rich Quick": Goofy as George Geef indulges in all sorts of gambling and get-rich-quick schemes, including chain letters attached to literal chains and a pyramid club whose members wear literal pyramid-shaped hats.
- "Hockey Homicide": The narrator says that nothing escapes the referee, almost like he had eyes behind his head. Immediately, a second pair of eyes appears behind his head to spot the two team captains fighting each other.
- In "The Art of Self Defense", to illustrate shadow boxing, Goofy's shadow literally comes to life and starts beating the snot out of him.
Gravity Falls:
- In "Headhunters", Dipper interrogates Manly Dan Corduroy trying to find out who vandalized a wax dummy of Dipper's Grunkle Stan. Dan's alibi is that he was punching the clock.
  Dipper: So you were at work, then?
  Manly Dan: No, I was punching that clock! [points out the window to a broken street clock]
- In "Irrational Treasure" Quentin Trembly, the 8th and 1/2 President of the United States, is said to have won the election in a landslide. Said landslide buried everyone else running, leaving him the only suitable person for the role.
- In "Land Before Swine":
  Mabel: That's kinda sappy.
  Stan: What?! That's how I feel!
  Mabel: No, I mean—(indicates that his hand is stuck in tree sap)
  Stan: Oh, yeah.
- In the episode "Little Gift Shop of Horrors", Dipper advises Stan against taunting the fortune-telling Hand Witch, to which Stan loudly refers to Dipper as a wet blanket to everyone in earshot. Cut to Toby Determined selling actual wet blankets.
- In the Grand Finale "Weirdmageddon 3: Take Back the Falls", Mabel finds Stanford, who's been turned into a gold statue by Bill Cipher, and calls out "I found Ford, and he's golden... but not in a good way."
Used as a Running Gag throughout Green Eggs and Ham. For example, in the first episode:
Receptionist: Lose the frown, kid. They're just a bunch of bean counters and pencil pushers.
(The door opens, revealing rows of people at desks literally counting beans and pushing pencils around.)
The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy:
- "It's Hokey Mon!": Grim has created chaos after being badgered into bringing kids' Hokey-Monster cards to life, and Mandy puts a stop to things by making her own monster for Grim to bring to life, which she describes with the phrase "Makes toast out of all other monsters." In this case, Mandy's monster literally turns its enemies into slices of toast.
- "Brown Evil": Billy accidentally makes a batch of brownies that taste terrible to humans, but are irresistible to monsters. Instead of throwing them out like Mandy ordered him to, Grim decides to stash the batch inside his skull. Unfortunately, the smell of the brownies attracts a horde of zombies to Billy's house, and Hoss Delgado ends up coming in to investigate. After determining that the zombies aren't interested in brains or human flesh, Hoss detects the smell of the brownies and finally figures out what's going on:
  Hoss: [points at Grim] It's all in his head!
  Mandy: You mean Grim's imagining all this?
  Hoss: No, I mean whatever's attracting those zombies, it's inside his head.
In the Harvey Beaks episode "A Tail of Les Squirrels", Fee is literally blind with rage.
In House of Mouse, these and the Visual Pun are quite common.
- After repeatedly being called a "ham" throughout the episode, Donald Duck literally gets transformed into a hunk of pork.
- After Pete takes all its money away, an anthropomorphic thermostat exclaims "I'm broke!" and literally stops working.
Jackie Chan Adventures:
- Jade once used the Snake Talisman to sneak in during one of Jackie's missions. After he's complimented for defeating some bad guys "alone", she complained by asking if she was invisible. Duh, as she said once she realized she was indeed invisible because of the talisman's power.
- In "The Jade Monkey", Jade uses the Monkey Talisman to turn the Dark Hand enforcer Ratso into a rat and herself into a monkey to avoid the other enforcers. When Jackie realizes this, we get this line:
  Jackie: Jade turned Ratso into a rat and herself into a monkey? I'm a monkey's uncle.
Justice League Unlimited:
- Brainiac 5 and Green Arrow find the Fatal Five waiting for them.
  Brainiac 5: Shoot.
  Green Arrow: I know. I was hoping they'd be out looking for us.
  Brainiac 5: No, shoot!
- Also, when the Leaguers went to New Genesis to seek the help of the New Gods, they meet someone who says that the Gods were above them. A few seconds later, they look over and see the floating city that the New Gods live on.
- And when Green Lantern captures Firefly and Volcana in a giant green bell jar, and they try to burn their way out, he says "Sure, knock yourselves out!" A few seconds later, they've used up all the oxygen and fall unconscious.
On KaBlam!, Henry says the ending to one "Sniz and Fondue" cartoon was so sickeningly sweet that he lost his lunch. He then grabs the bag with his meal that he dropped.
Kim Possible: Drakken and Shego go "shopping":
[salesman describes the features of a weather machine they're looking at]
Drakken: We'll take it!
Salesman: Great! Hey, why don't we step into the office.
Drakken: No, I mean we'll take it. Shego!
[they steal the weather machine]
In an episode to King of the Hill, Cotton puts Peggy through a miserable, abusive Training from Hell so she can learn to walk again after her skydiving accident. He also spends the episode fighting to secure a final resting place in a veterans' cemetery. When he finally succeeds, he goads and hectors Peggy to climb up the hill so that she can literally dance on his grave. She makes it, and she and Cotton dance in celebration.
In the Lite Sprites special, the sprites are lost in a cave, and Meadow begins to glow. The other girls try to tell her this, but she takes it as a compliment instead.
Looney Tunes:
- In the 1938 short "Porky & Daffy", Daffy is a prize fighter getting chased around the ring by the hulking champion, and his trainer Porky tells him to "Get on your bicycle!" (which is an old-time boxing term for avoiding your opponent as best you can). Daffy proceeds to literally ride around the squared circle on an invisible bicycle.
  Daffy: I'm so crazy, I don't know this is impossible!
- Marvin the Martian's "Earth-shattering kaboom" in "Hare-Way to the Stars" was a literal metaphor. Then it became metaphorical again — the Trope name for the explosion of a whole planet or moon (or humongous spacecraft), not just the Earth.
- In "The Fair-Haired Hare", Yosemite Sam builds a cabin over Bugs' burrow, and Bugs vows to take the ensuing property dispute to "the highest court in the country!" Cut to Bugs marching up a steep hillside, to a courthouse sitting 6,723 feet above sea level, and wishing he'd picked a lower court.
- Played straight in "Knighty Knight Bugs" where Yosemite Sam is the Black Knight, who owns a fire-breathing dragon who tends to sneeze a lot, breathing fire uncontrollably when it does. At the climax, Bugs manages to lock Sam and the dragon in a tower full of explosives. Sam desperately tries to keep the dragon from sneezing, shouting, "No! No! Don't sneeze, you stupid dragon! Or you'll blow us to the moon!" Unfortunately for him, the dragon does sneeze, and the tower takes off like a rocket, towards the moon. (With Sam growling, "Dragons is so stupid!")
- There was also the time Bugs dressed up as Rocky's boss and threatened that it was "coitins" for the mobster, just before gifting him with a set of actual curtains.
  Rocky: ...Aw, they're adorable!
- In "Compressed Hare," Wile E. Coyote has Bugs trussed up. Bugs quips:
  Bugs: I'd like to stay for lunch but...(chuckles) I'm a little tied up this morning.
The Loud House: Lincoln's dad isn't happy with his wife when she tells him that she has a bun in the oven, since he's gluten-free.
Mickey Mouse (2013): In "Split Decisions", Mickey says that Donald's "been blowing his stack at the drop of a hat", and demonstrates that he means this literally by causing Donald to throw a tantrum by dropping a fedora on the ground.
Ski-Nose, the Bob Hope caricature in the Bakshi Mighty Mouse episode "Bat With a Golden Tongue," greets the audience at an awards ceremony as "Ladies and Germs," and sure enough, the tables are populated by ladies and germs.
In an episode on My Gym Partner's a Monkey, Adam wants to try a game at a carnival where you have to knock over pins; the carnie tells him, "Sure kid, knock yourself out." When Adam tries, the ball ricochets back, and beans him in the forehead, knocking him to the ground. The carnie says, "You know, kid, usually that's a figure of speech..."
My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
- In the episode "Dragonshy", Fluttershy is so nervous about facing a full-grown dragon she's literally scared of her own shadow.
- In "Call of the Cutie", when Apple Bloom is upset about being the last pony in class to get her cutie mark, Rainbow Dash sees her and comments "Looks like somepony has a dark cloud hanging over her head." Fortunately, Rainbow Dash is a weatherpony, and can move the actual dark cloud elsewhere.
- In "Twilight's Kingdom – Part 1", Discord's ears are burning. Yes, literally.
- In "Make New Friends but Keep Discord", Discord gets green fire in his eyes when his rage over Fluttershy's new friendship with Tree Hugger reaches its peak, turning him into a literal Green-Eyed Monster.
- In "Rarity Investigates!", one of Rarity's Private Eye Monologues involves this: "Rainbow Dash was obviously upset, but I had all my ducks in a row!" (An orderly trio of ducklings crosses the screen.) "...except one." (A fourth duckling rushes to catch up with the others, trips, and falls into a rain puddle.)
- In the Distant Finale episode, "The Last Problem", the final shot of the Mane 6 is of the sun setting on them.
OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes:
- In the premiere episode "Let's Be Heroes!", Carol has to take K.O. to work with her because his regular babysitter, Punchin' Judy, is fighting the flu. Cue Judy going by, fighting a giant germ.
- In "Plaza Prom", K.O. decides to liven up Rad's failing dance by telling Enid, who's acting as DJ, to stop playing mediocre popular music and play what's in her heart. Enid proceeds to literally reach into her chest and pull out a vinyl labelled "Good Music".
The Owl House:
- In "The Intruder", when Eda asks Luz where magic comes from, Luz guesses "The heart?" Eda tells her that's technically true... because witches have a "bile sac" attached to their heart that helps provide power for their spells.
- In "Wing It Like Witches", Luz, Willow and Gus are being relentlessly harassed by Boscha, and Willow gripes that, because she's captain of the Grudgeby team, nobody will do a thing about it and that Boscha could get away with murder if she wanted to. Principal Bump then informs them that, yes, she could get away with murder.
  "I can't say I approve, but at least she's trying new things."
- In "Agony of a Witch", Eda comments that Luz is someone who bites off more than she can chew while looking at a photo of her in an Eating Contest.
The Patrick Star Show: The show loves these kind of jokes. For example, in "Bummer Jobs", SpongeBob and Patrick quickly get fired from their first job. As in, the manager loads them into a cannon and fires them away from the store.
Phineas and Ferb:
- Used a couple of times in the episode "Comet Kermillian". While at the park, Candace's screams of "I have Squirrels in My Pants!" are misinterpreted by a couple of performers, who think she's referring to her crazy dance moves. After a musical sequence, the squirrels get out, and one of the guys comments, "We just got served." Later on, when steaks are falling from the sky, the same guy catches one and comments, "We keep getting served."
- Parodied in "Let's Take a Quiz".
  Phineas: You're on fire, Candace!
  Candace: Woo hoo. [Beat] I'm not actually on fire, am I?
  Buford: Nah, you're good.
- In "Brain Drain", Dr. Doofenshmirtz ends up busting a rap about being controlled by Perry the Platypus turning his mind-control device against him. Vanessa's friends all think "There's a Platypus Controlling Me" is a metaphor for "whatever's keeping you down".
  Doofensmirtz: I'm not speaking metaphorically, the platypus controlling me is underneath the table!
- In "Mind Share", Dr. Doofenshmirtz has Perry be his wingman for a date at a square dancing hoedown. When Perry is told to sit with a group of wingmen, they are not just there to help their friends get dates, but they are also dressed like fighter pilots, even with a fighter jet parked behind them. In military jargon, a wingman refers to a pilot who is responsible for supporting their flight leader.
- In retaliation to people telling him not to make a mountain out of a molehill, Doofenshmirtz tried to do it literally in "At the Car Wash".
- In "Picture This!", the boys literally turn the garage upside-down looking for Ferb's favorite skateboard.
- When Doofenshmirtz is told he doesn't have a green thumb in "Moon Farm", he takes it literally and buys a can of green paint to make himself green. Ironically, because of how he held the can, his thumbs aren't painted. Only later, as he explains his plan to Perry, Doof finally understands the metaphor.
In The Pink Panther series where Pink isn't silent, there was one episode where a bad guy was illegally drilling for oil in an Alaskian village. A villager told Pink he was threading on thin ice. After Pink told the villager he agreed with the metaphor, the villager explained he meant it literally.
The Powerpuff Girls:
- In the episode "Beat Your Greens", the Broccoloids intend to hypnotize people through spores placed in broccoli. The girls inspect the field where the broccoli came from but hide in a scarecrow when they see an approaching spacecraft. They jump out to fight, with Blossom wearing the scarecrow's hat, Buttercup the shirt, and Bubbles the pants and shoes. The girls scream after seeing the aliens regenerate and Bubbles jumps out of her extra attire, saying that scared the pants off her.
- In Whoopass Stew, the series' pilot, the girls' superpowers were the result of Professor Utonium accidentally busting open a can of Whoopass^note over the concoction that made them instead of breaking a beaker of Chemical X.
The Real Ghostbusters: In "The Grundel", the titular monster wrestles with Peter as the Ghostbuster is face-down on the floor, trying to reach the Grundel's intended victims in time to save them from a nasty fall. After a few minutes' struggle, Peter yells at the Grundel to get off his back and throws him off.
The Ren & Stimpy Show:
- The episode "Sven Hoek" ends with Ren taking a whiz on Sven and Stimpy's copy of "Don't Whiz on the Electric Fence", generating a short circuit that blows the three of them straight to Hell... as in, they end up in a fiery pit, where a Big Red Devil admonishes them with "So, you whizzed on the electric fence, didn't ya?"
- An inversion of the metaphor; in "Lumber Jerks" Ren and Stimpy's attempts to become lumberjacks is briefly foiled when they can't find any trees because of the giant forest in the way.
The Golden Girls is spoofed on Robot Chicken when Sophia describes her encounter with a high school basketball team: They run a (model) train on her and she gets their (basket)balls in her face.
Rocky and Bullwinkle: One "Peabody's Improbable History" segment involves Sherman, Peabody, and the historical figure of the day having to literally look for a needle in a haystack (It Makes Sense in Context). Peabody naturally Lampshades it.
She-Ra and the Princesses of Power has an episode wherein Perfuma rants to Bow about how she can't stand cacti. Bow assumes that "cacti" is referring to Huntara, who she has been at odds with since the episode started. He tries giving her some personal advice, before she clarifies that she's talking about actual cacti; it's the only type of plant she has no idea how to control.
The Simpsons:
- In "A Star Is Burns", When Lisa is talking about guest-star Jay Sherman:
  Lisa: I like him! He's smart, he's sensitive, he's clearly not obsessed with his physical appearance —
  Homer: My ears are burning.
  Lisa: Uh, I wasn't talking about you, Dad.
  Homer: No, my ears are really burning. I wanted to see inside so I lit a Q-Tip.
- In "A Fish Called Selma", when members of the "social club" catch sight of Troy McClure.
  Louie: Hey, I thought you said Troy McClure was dead.
  Tony: No, what I said was: "He sleeps with the fishes". You see...
  Louie: Uh, Tony, please, no. I just ate a whole plate of dingamagoo...
- In "The Great Money Caper":
  Homer: How'd you get wise to us?
  Abe: Are you kidding? They used to call me Grifty McGrift. I Wrote the Book on flimflamming.
  [Bart looks at the back of the book he and Homer have been using and sees a picture of a young Abe]
  Bart: Wow, he did!
- In "Make Room for Lisa", at a traveling Smithsonian exhibition, Homer sits down in Archie Bunker's chair to read the Bill of Rights. When the armed guards tell him to get out of Archie Bunker's chair, Homer used the Bill of Rights to shield himself against the guards, complete with the line, "I am so sick of people hiding behind the Bill of Rights!"
- In "Insane Clown Poppy" Homer gives advice to Krusty about being a father. Krusty asks for more help after he alienates his daughter by losing her violin in a poker game. Homer asks Marge if he can play Devil's Advocate. After playing the pinball game with that name, Homer decides to talk to Krusty.
- A major plot point in the two-part special "Who Shot Mr. Burns" is Burns literally trying to take candy from a baby.
- In "And Maggie Makes Three", a Flashback shows Homer quitting his job at the power plant and burning his bridges both metaphorically (with a Take This Job and Shove It moment for the ages) and literally.
- In "D'oh-in' in the Wind," Homer tries to convince two aging hippies to partake in a freak-out and asks where their bus is. They reply that, in a way, the 60s ended the day they sold their hippie bus: December 31st, 1969.
- "Lisa's Sax" is a Whole Episode Flashback about how Homer purchased Lisa's saxophone. During his story, when Homer sees Lisa looking at the music shop, he says "A musical instrument? Could that be a way to encourage a gifted child? (looking upward) Just Give Me a Sign!". That's when the shop owner puts a sign in the window saying "Musical instruments: the way to encourage a gifted child.", to which Homer says "Eh, works for me." and they go inside and purchase Lisa's saxophone.
- In "Pray Anything", Homer complains that the grass is literally greener in Ned Flanders' backyard.
- In "Hungry, Hungry Homer", Howard K. Duff is attempting to denounce Homer as a liar, he gets hold of film depicting Homer literally with his pants on fire.
Used to the point of a Hurricane of Puns in the Tex Avery short "Symphony in Slang", where Noah Webster and St. Peter try to interpret the slang-filled life story of a new arrival at the Pearly Gates.
In Sonic Prime, Sonic tries to convince Rusty Rose not to serve the Chaos Council because the Amy Rose he knows isn't that heartless. Rusty Rose responds by opening her chest cavity to show that the only thing inside is a little bird being used as a Living Battery, proving how heartless she truly is.
South Park:
- During one of the show's many repeated running gags (in this case, the famous "Jared Has Aides" episode), the title character repeats the joke while literally beating a dead horse.
- Stan's mom has an actual Aunt Flo who visits about once a month and stresses her out. In Stan's words, whenever her monthly visitor Aunt Flo arrives his mom turns into a real bitch.
- Tom Cruise is so upset that the reincarnated L. Ron Hubbard (Stan) doesn't like his acting that he locks himself in Stan's closet, refuses to come out, and denies that he's in the closet at all. Also, in "200", Cruise gets called a "fudge packer", because he's literally packing fudge into boxes in a candy factory.
- In "Bass to Mouth", some of South Park Elementary's faculty enlists Eric Cartman to help them, but then things quickly go wrong.
  Mr. Mackey: Maybe there is a way out of this, but we're gonna have to throw Eric Cartman under the bus.
  Mr. Adler: How do we do that?
  Mr. Mackey: We get a bus, and then we throw Eric Cartman under it.
- In "Sons of Witches", we learn that all the dads in town like to dress up as witches for Halloween week. When one of the dads falls under a curse and starts kidnapping children, the other witches urge the town not to let it degenerate into a "witch pursuit-thing".
  When things are going bad and there's people you need to confront,
  Just be sure it doesn't turn into a witch-pursuit thing.
- “Raising The Bar” has Kyle lament on how the bar has gotten so low that people find stuff like Here Comes Honey Boo Boo acceptable entertainment. Stan replies that “it’s not like the bar is this actual, physical thing”. Cut to James Cameron, who announces that he will find the bar in the Marianas Trench and raise it with his submersible. He does find the bar, and when he raises it, people stop watching Honey Boo Boo.
- "The China Probrem" viciously mocks Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull showing George Lucas and Steven Spielberg literally "raping their (the fans') childhoods" by sexually assaulting Indiana Jones himself, in scenes based on infamous movie rape scenes such as Deliverance and so on.
SpongeBob SquarePants:
- In "Missing Identity", Mr. Krabs threatens that whoever doesn't pass his inspection will get the boot, as in they'll have to wear a smelly boot all day.
- In "Something Smells", when SpongeBob thinks people are avoiding him because he's ugly, Patrick tells him "you're never gonna feel better 'til you get this thing off your chest"... and then the camera zooms out to show a strange, pulsating octopus-like creature stuck to SpongeBob's chest.
- In "Clams", Mr. Krabs becomes a sobbing mess when his 1 Millionth dollar gets eaten by a giant clam. SpongeBob then says to Squidward "I've never seen Mr. Krabs so broken up", and in the very next scene, the weeping Mr. Krabs is in pieces.
- In "FarmerBob", after SpongeBob and Patrick accidentally destroy Old Man Jenkins' barn, SpongeBob declares that he and Patrick will do some good old-fashioned barn-raising. They proceed to do just that, as in raising a sapient, baby barn all the way to adulthood.
- In "Upturn Girls", Narlene shows Pearl a skyscraper. As in, the top of it literally tears a rip in the sky.
The backstory of Star vs. the Forces of Evil, as revealed in The Magic Book of Spells, includes one of the title character's ancestors creating a spell to break her abusive husband's heart. Instead of doing what she intended, the spell gave her husband a fatal heart attack.
Steven Universe: In "What's Your Problem?", Amethyst turns into a helicopter to get out of talking about her feelings with Steven. She snaps at Steven to "Get off my back!" while he's dangling from the tail-end of her helicopter form, and when he climbs into the cockpit she yells "Get outta my head!"
Steven: Am I getting too personal?
Amethyst: Dude, you're LITERALLY inside my head!
Used in Stroker and Hoop to turn protecting the sword of the fire lotus into a "Shaggy Dog" Story, when all it did was light up.
Villain: The ancient scrolls said its power shone like a lantern... We always assumed it was a metaphor.
Stroker: Yeah... I guess it must have seemed a lot cooler before they invented flashlights.
In the Teacher's Pet episode "Costume Pity Party", Leonard comments that his bully Dutch Calenza is in a class of his own, which he then clarifies means that there are no other students in the class Dutch attends.
In Trollhunters, Claire reads the letter Jim gave to her in secret when he thought he was gonna die from his battle with Draal and thinks that the "monsters" and "world-ending" he mentions was all just elaborate metaphors. He goes along with it not to sound crazy. She eventually realizes that he meant it literally.
In the Uncle Grandpa episode "Bad Morning", it's eventually revealed that Uncle Grandpa's bad mood was caused by him literally getting up on the wrong side of the bed.
In the Whatever Happened to... Robot Jones? episode "Politics", Robot states that he is confident he'll win the election because he has nerves of steel, then states that he really does have nerves of steel.
Happens in WordWorld in the episode "Snug as a Bug":
Bug: Hiya frog! What's up?
Frog: I am! I can't fall asleep.

Literal Metaphor / Western Animation

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