The world of medicine isn't really the best place to have a giggle at, mostly because it's a profession full of serious business in which the fate of a patient's well-being is in the hands of surgeons and doctors, but sometimes, it's okay to laugh at something that seems terrifying so that there's not much to worry about. Maybe that really tall, attractive and intimidating nurse that's taking your temperature has a sense of humour!
This is simply a comedy about the medical profession, whether it's about the staff in a hospital or a doctor's office or the antics of the patients. It's not always doom and gloom after having your appendix removed — your bedside neighbor could be misdiagnosed with anaesthetics that makes them act a little loopy, or Doctor Jerk has suddenly gained a softer side for a dare, or you have front-row entertainment to the ongoing drama between your doctor and their failed attempts of flirting with another member of staff.
Examples
open/close all folders
Anime and Manga
- Dokkiri Doctor is a comedy manga-turned-anime about Dr Nishikikoji, who works in a school. He has misadventures with the school nurse and some of the students, and he tries to help everyone out the best way he can, leading to hijinks.
Film
- The Carry On film series had four comedies based around hospitals (Carry On Nurse, Carry On Doctor, Carry On Again Doctor and Carry On Matron), featuring hijinks such as a man in drag as a nurse, a man suffering from prenatal depression, someone getting injected in the bottom, and gangsters being chased by pregnant women.
- Young Doctors in Love was a 1982 comedy movie directed by Garry Marshall. The comedy was similar in tone to Airplane!.
- Invoked by Doctor Hunter Patch Adams as a way to lift the patients' spirits and help them during such a hard time. Including said things as walking into the room of the Littlest Cancer Patient with a fake Pinocchio nose and lie his ass off. A hefty amount of the film's drama is the clash between the other doctors thinking that dealing with patients is a business in which comedy is incredibly tasteless, but Adams pointing out that they instead are acting so stoic that it's inhumane.
- M*A*S*H is a comedy about the antics of a medical unit during the Korean War, and spawned a successful television series.
- All the films in the Doctor... Series revolve around medical students and doctors getting into all sorts of trouble, such as car chases, drunken rampages, dealing with difficult patients, love triangles, stalking, wild parties, and stowing away on cruise ships.
- Twice Round the Daffodils is more of a Dramedy than the usual Peter Rogers and Gerald Thomas affair, but still finds some comedy in the tuberculosis sanatorium setting, such as Henry and George sneaking into the ward kitchen to do some late-night cooking.
Live-Action TV
- Garth Marenghis Darkplace is a downplayed example: all of the characters are doctors who work at a hospital, but the place is constantly invaded by monsters and weird phenomena and they rarely do anything medical on-screen as a result (when they do, they do it pretty awfully, for the sake of the Stylistic Suck).
- Scrubs is a comedy-drama set in a hospital full of cutaway scenes and exaggerated character stereotypes.
- Similarly, Green Wing was often seen as a British version of Scrubs.
- Only When I Laugh was a late-'70s/early '80s Brit Com about a bunch of lazy bums who all tried to get themselves a hospital bed in order to avoid work.
- Doctor in the House was a series of sitcoms about medical students and doctors in a hospital in London and/or other locations, such as the series Doctor at Sea (set on a cruise ship) and Doctor Down Under (guess where?). It was initially adapted as a film series from the 1950s comic novels by Richard Gordon of the same name, but for the television adaptation, then semi-known writers such as Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Graeme Garden, and Bill Oddie took over writing fresh scripts with new scenarios for renamed or composite versions of Gordon's characters.
- M*A*S*H was a comedy about a U.S. Army Mobile Army Surgical Hospital during the Korean War. It featured a cast of oddball likable characters working to save lives in a sometimes grim situation. Adapted from Robert Altman's 1970 motion picture.
- Becker, about an inner-city doctor who treats his patients and friends like crap.
- Childrens Hospital starred a variation of doctors in a children's hospital in Brazil — some arrogant, some flirty.
- Surgical Spirit, a 1980s Brit Com television series about an Italian surgeon who is struggling to be understood by her patients.
- Doc Martin is about a former surgeon who had to give up his specialty after developing a phobia of blood, becomes a GP note in the sleepy coastal village where he's a fish out of water and his curmudgeonly personality, poor bedside manner and lack of social skills cause friction with the locals, but his superior diagnostic abilities gain him grudging respect (essentially a comedy version of House).
- Let the Blood Run Free, a truly surreal Australian comedy series set in a hospital.
- Doctor Doctor, a sitcom about a group of doctors in private practice, starring Matt Frewer as the main (and most wacky) doctor.
- House Calls is a sitcom from the 1970s about a British doctor in an American hospital dealing with her strange colleagues.
- The 1998 French series H with Jamel Debbouze was a hospital comedy prone to surreal humor.
- The "Veterinarian's Hospital" sketches on The Muppet Show.
- Muppets Tonight has "E-I-E-I-O-R" sketches.
Video Games
- Octodad: In the short "Medical Mess" of Dadliest Catch, Tommy and Stacy are telling a story about Octodad working as a nurse, helping patients, and even assisting with a surgery. Part of the humor comes from the fact that the kids have very little medical knowledge, and so they like to make up diseases, such as "unicornitis".
- Team Fortress 2: The Medic is a German Mad Doctor whose antics are frequently played for Black Comedy. E.g in Meet the Medic video, he tells an anecdote to the Heavy in which a doctor somehow made his patient lose his skeleton and that the doctor is never heard from again... And then he admits that's how he lost his medical license.
- Two Point Hospital: A hospital management game loaded with Black Comedy courtesy of the funny illnesses and their treatments, as well as the Announcer Chatter from the receptionist.
Web Comics
- Sparklecare takes place at a Crapsaccharine World hospital where demented doctors treat patients for horrifying diseases. As you can guess, it's filled with Black Comedy.
Western Animation
- Some individual instances:
- Daffy Duck seeks Dr. Jerkyl to treat his hiccups in "The Impatient Patient" (1942). Jerkyl turns into the "Chloe" to whom Daffy is delivering a telegram.
- Heckle and Jeckle turn into surgeons giving Chesty the Bulldog the once-over in "Magpie Madness" (1947) as they try to spring Dimwit from an asylum.
- Beetlejuice takes Lydia to a Neitherworld hospital to treat her injured foot ("Generally Hysterical Hospital") where she's misdiagnosed and assigned to have her body removed from her soul. Guess who her surgeon is.
- Bugs Bunny gives the Tasmanian Devil the once-over at a jungle hospital in 1964's "Dr. Devil And Mr. Hare."
- Porky Pig is a patient in "Patient Porky" after overindulging in birthday cake, then he's a doctor in "Calling Dr. Porky" treating a drunk who is tormented by little pink elephants. He's also an involuntary patient to Daffy in "The Daffy Doc."
