Cluster Bleep Bomb - Television Tropes & Idioms

''I'm a black Scottish cyclops! They got more f-*beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep* than they got the likes of me!

The Demoman, Team Fortress 2

This is when a character launches into a profane tirade for several seconds, which is bleeped out for comedic effect. It's sort of the intersection between The Aristocrats and a Noodle Incident: the humor comes from how incredibly long-winded and offensive the dialog was, but we're left with only other characters' reactions to inform us about what was actually said.

If the actors are visibly speaking their lines with just the sound bleeped out, this can be a sort of Bilingual Bonus (not to mention Getting *Bleep* Past The Radar) for anyone who can lip-read.

A subtrope of This Trope is [BLEEP] and Cluster F-Bomb.

Compare Lost In Transmission.

Examples

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Advertising

Done for laughs in a Bud Light commercial.

Film

This can happen unintentionally when a particularly profane movie is Edited for Syndication. Some cable broadcasts of, Pulp Fiction, for example, will blank out the individual words. In one scene, the F's are flying so fast that all the sound simply blanks out, as if the censor had just given up in exasperation.
Occurs in-universe in Happy Gilmore as Happy's Cluster F-Bomb is broadcast on TV.
Wayne's World combines this with Sound Effect Bleep.
Garth: You know what you can do with your show? You can take a- [The loud whine of a nearby landing airplane drowns out Garth's voice. Cut to Wayne's horrified reaction shot, then back to Garth, several times. No kidding, it actually takes this long.] -until the handle breaks off and you have to find a doctor to pull it out again!
Wayne: You kiss your mother with that mouth?! You've gone mental!

Literature

The Half Prince novels sometimes have "XXX" bombs, the most spectacular of which appears when the protagonist critiques an antagonist's method of killing, describing what he should do if he really wants to horrify people. (From what can be deciphered, it would begin with ripping out her intestines and stuffing them in her mouth.)

Live Action TV

In the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode Agent For Harm, Crow tapes testimony as a character witness at trial of Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds. Hilarity Ensues:
Crow: Is This Thing On? Hi! I'm Crow T. Robot and I'm here to tell you that Mike Nelson is innocent. Mike Nelson is 200% [bleep]ing not guilty. And if you [bleep]s don't [bleep] find him innocent, then you can just [bleep]ing kiss my fat [bleep]ing [bleep]. And that [bleep]ing goes for your bull[bleep] court system, too! Mike, I'm so [bleep]ing sorry I couldn't [bleep]ing be there for this [bleep]ing [bleep]y really bogus trial, man. But let me [bleep] tell ya something, Nelson. If I was there, I'd [bleep]ing kick everyone's fat stupid [bleep]ing behinds and then cram it up their [bleep]ing [bleep]. Anyway, Mike, buddy, I hope this [bleep] helps. Take care, Mike.
Used twice in rapid succession by Buster on Arrested Development: once when trash-talking Michael before a bike ride ("Well let's hope it doesn't come to that"), and when dissing his own mother ("I don't think anybody's going to top that").
Used in the fake behind-the-scenes clips of "Wormhole X-Treme" on the episode "200" of Stargate SG-1, when the Colonel Mitchell Expy is discussing how he came up with his catchphrase:
"It just hit me: 'Sweet [Bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep].' And we can get away with that too, because... it's cable."
Richard Hammond of Top Gear loves this.
When Tom Green appeared on Late Night With Conan O'Brien, he did this as an impression of Morse Code.
The Middleman is loaded with allusions and tropes from The Silver Age of Comic Books, where cursing is rendered as Symbol Swearing. Thus, the tv series has a lot of fun with the Sound Effect Bleep + Censor Bar over the mouth. Generally mild swears (and stealthy euphemisms) get a pass, and the bleep is used on a Rule of Funny basis.
This happens a lot with particularly profane comedians' TV specials, which usually doesn't affect the joke but sometimes makes the joke sound dirtier than it is (censoring shit for example) or not dirty enough.
This occurs in the legendary Intervention episode involving Linda, the Fentanyl addict.
Happens in an episode of The IT Crowd when Jen, having spent much of the episode in pain due to a poor choice in shoes, finally lashes out at a Japanese investor who just stepped on her foot. It turns out that the censorship was entirely diegetic, allowing for Denholm to tell Jen that she fucked up.
In one episode of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Sabrina, her aunts, Mr. Kraft, and Mr. Kraft's ex-girlfriend all end up on Jerry Springer. During this, Aunt Hilda gives the ex a piece of her mind. Her rant is bleeped out every other word. Sabrina points out that Hilda wasn't swearing, and Jerry just shrugs and says "Yeah, but this way, it sounds like she did."
Mythbusters has fun with this one when testing whether swearing helps in enduring pain. They use the bleeps to spell out messages in morse code.
Since profanity isn't easy to translate, the german dub for That '70s Show bleeps out almost everything of Red's Cluster F-Bomb when he takes Hyde in after his mother left him. While profanity usually is never censored in German TV, this arguably makes the scene even more hilarious (and definitly better than an akward translation).

Music

Five Iron Frenzy's "These Are Not My Pants (Part 8)" starts off bleeping out random words. Then the bleeps get more frequent until there's more bleeps than audible words at the end.
Played With in the song "Mutha'uckas" by Flight Of The Conchords, but with parts of the swear words simply left out by the singers instead of bleeped. Some of the curses are obvious (like "mutha'uckas") but as the song goes on and the frequency of swear words increases, it increasingly becomes harder to understand. Bret's second verse, in particular, devolves into nothing but an awkward string of pauses and consonants.

Video Games

The Meet the Demoman supplemental material for Team Fortress 2. At one point the title character goes on a 3 second long swearing jag, all of which is bleeped out. Watch it here.

Web Comics

In Bob and George the author will frequently pixelate curses, or hide them behind a black bar. Then you have Ran on this page.
In Gene Catlow, swear-words are replaced by black bars. At one point, a human lets loose with a rant that's almost entirely blacked out, causing the main characters to comment on "That odd human fascination with excrements..."

Web Original

On Youtube, a popular means of editing works to sound vulgar is to bleep out random words to make it sound like the characters are swearing, which often gives off a Cluster F-Bomb feel without having to go to the extra effort of trying to find things that sound directly like swearing. (And often times it ends up being funnier anyway.)
The Wiiviewer's review of Arc Rise Fantasia includes one discussing Easy Levels, Hard Bosses:
Because while the regular enemies are a breeze to kill, the bosses will bend you over and *beep* with mayonnaise and just shove their hand up *beep* fingers out and *beep* *beep* *beep*! And trust me when I say, you'll never look at a pencil the same way again.
Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series does this when The Pharaoh finds out Yugi tricked him into going on a date with Tea.
"Yugi you little *beep*! You son of a *beep*ing *beep* *beep* *beep*! I'm going to tear off your *beep* and shove them right up your *beep* *beep* *beep* *beep* and then *beep* *beep*ing *beep* on your *beep* with *beep* *beep* in the *beep* and *beep* *beep* *beep* your *beep* *beep* *beep* so then you'll have to *beep* sideways! *Beep*!"
The Elder Swear, the worst wizard swear word ever, is said this way in Potter Puppet Pals. The only words not bleeped out are extremely non-sequitur.
Dragon Ball Abridged parodied this when you heard Vegeta saying a bunch of bleep words, and then you heard what he actually said, which was a cluster Gosh Dangit To Heck bomb.
Occurs on I'm a Marvel... And I'm a DC, when Green Goblin sees the Joker hit Harley. At some point, they even give up on the individual bleeps; there's just one long, siren-like whine for a few minutes.
Otaking does one of these in his otherwise quite professional Anime Fansub Documentary on Youtube.
Translation Note: Terran is the word Vampires use to refer to humans.
Otaking: Yeah, I think we can work that out ourselves, you ***ing mother*** *** ***king ***cks!

Western Animation

Family Guy, "PTV." the FCC has taken to censoring real life, and stations an agent next to Peter with an airhorn to censor anything rude he might say.
Peter: Oh, Lois, you are so full of (BEEP)! WHAT?! Now I can't say (BEEP) in my own (BEEP)ing house?! (BEEEP)in' great, Lois. Just (BEEEP)in' great. You know, you're lucky you're good at (BEEP) my (BEEP) or I'd never put up with ya. You know what I'm talking about, when you (BEEEEEP) lubed-up (BEEEEEEEP) toothpaste in my (BEEEEEEEEEEEP) while you (BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP) on a cherry (BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP) Episcopalian (BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP) extension cord (BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP) wetness (BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP) with a parking ticket. That is the best!
The Robot Chicken video "The Emperor's Phone Call", when Vader tells Palpatine about the Death Star's destruction.
From Stan and Kyle's encounter with extraterrestrials from the 1st South Park episode, "Cartman Gets An Anal Probe":
Kyle: Hey, you scrawny-ass ***! What the *** is wrong with you?! You must be some kind of *** *** to be able to ignore a crying child!
Stan: Whoa, dude!
Kyle: You know what you *** like?! You like to *** and *** and *** and *** and *** and ***!
Stan: Hey, Wendy. What's a ***?
- Kenny often swears in frustration (the 'F' word is particuarly common), and is the one most likely to describe lewd behaviour graphically, but everything he says is muffled by his hoodie. Ironically, when he's cursing he is actually clearer than when he's just having a normal conversation, and the close listener will be able to get the gist of what he's describing or the words he's using.
Sam And Max Freelance Police Season Two featured Tiny Timmy, a rat afflicted with Hollywood Tourette's who spoke with every other word bleeped out. In the final episode of the season, Sam and Max switch a Bluenose Bowdlerizer's list of naughty words with a shopping list so that they can get a vital clue out of Tiny Timmy...and discover that his "swearing" is all of the Gosh Dang It to Heck! variety.
The Critic has a few examples.
- Jay Sherman's interview with Cher ended up with this tirade:
"You no good ***. *** you, you piece *** **. Kiss my white, feminie, toned and tatooed ***, *** ***!"
- And then we had a interview with Madonna on a children's show:
Host: Hey, kids! Lets welcome our special guest: Madonna! Hey Madonna!
Madonna: Don't *** with me, hippo.
Host: Hey, do you eat with that mouth?
Madonna: Yeah, and I also *** and *** with it!
Tiny Toon Adventures had the appropriately named Fowlmouth who casually swore constantly, usually to the deleterious effect of those around him (such as making a trio of toddlers in the background burst out crying.) Once, Buster was trying to help him get over it so he could entice a girl on a date, ending up using a contraption so torturous that the background music was barely audible through the beeping. Fowlmouth cursed it to death. Though at the end of the episode, Buster swore (apparently; debate rages on "Well what do you *BLEEP*" could be) and he was subjected to the same treatment... With the same amount of swearing in response.
Total Drama had Lindsay and Owen cussing out Heather in "That's Off the Chain" and "Trial by Tri-Armed Triathlon", respectively, while Izzy goes ballistic on her film crew in the Action special. In the American airings of said episodes, the bleeps are supplanted with alternative dialogue.