A comedic show specifically concentrating on
being humorous before any concern of plot, drama, or even comprehensibility. Noted for a complete lack of tact or pomposity on the part of the writers, and frequent
postmodern commentary. Can have occasional
Fanservice which the series will openly acknowledge. The
Rule of Funny will be observed.
Because they don't take themselves seriously, gag series tend to experiment across the board with parody, lewd humor,
random cutaways, and short-lived drama. In a win-win situation, these can be very successful experiments when they succeed, or mocked by the series itself when they fail as a protective tactic. Ironically, they can be praised for presenting such topics without being
Anvilicious. However, doing this at the
end of a series can cause accusations of being pretentious.
Anime gag series often use a
Puni Plush design. Many are also
Widget Series. Shows that depend a lot on puns and parody are typically considered too difficult for commercial releases, and are
fansubbed only erratically. A few even get a
Gag Dub.
Anime and Manga are particularly notorious in this genre. Series will regularly go over the top in their nonsense and hilarity even within the context of the show itself. Characters will time-travel, change species or gender, die, destroy buildings, cities, or planets, anything that will push the ridiculousness even higher; also note that these effects are rarely, if ever, permanent. There are times when "normality" is broken and restored in the space of a few minutes.
Occasionally the
Gag Series is an adaptation of some 'canonical' source, except now the writers pretty much do whatever they like.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
- Excel Saga: A mockery of everyday Japanese life seen through the lives of two supervillain henchgirl temp workers and four municipal Sentai employees. Then Shinichi Watanabe turned it into an anime and made fun of every anime genre in existence.
- Seitokai no Ichizon: A parody Anime with bits of Romance added in ..
- Sket Dance: From the former apprentice of the guy who unleashed Gintama onto the world, we have three high school students who will assist anyone with anything, usually with disastrously hilarious results.
- Jungle Wa Itsumo Hale Nochi Guu: With a mix of serious and nonserious subplots.
- He Is My Master: More so in the manga, where the author inserts romantic comedy cliches, then chides the reader for expecting serious resolutions.
- Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo: Plots constructed entirely out of bad puns, sight gags, and pop-culture flotsam.
- FLCL: Although there is a plot, you would be hard-pressed to find someone that could identify which parts are gags and which are not in the first viewing. Additionally, this show has been described as Excel Saga on Excel Saga. The creators themselves admitted that about half of what they put into this show were completely a result of nonsense, and what they found funny at the time.
- Galaxy Angel: The animated equivalent of Dada Comics — nothing is sacred, and the writers are by-and-large allowed to run with whatever they like. Including scissors.
- The Negima!? reboot is sliding towards this, with most of the humorous banter between characters more characteristic of the Pani Poni Dash! writers than Akamatsu's usual fare. The original manga was like this for about 2 volumes before going in a different direction.
- School Rumble
- Digi Charat
- Super Milk Chan
- Ninin Ga Shinobuden
- Azumanga Daioh: To a lesser degree, since the series does have continuity and plot, but each episode is definitely a Gag Episode.
- Magical Pokaan
- Pani Poni Dash!
- Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei
- Hayate the Combat Butler: The first season of the anime, anyway - the second season and manga have continuity, and the latter has a few bouts of seriousness.
- Gintama: Though with a healthy pinch of action and good ol' shonen standbys, like the power of friendship.
- Cromartie High School
- Axis Powers Hetalia
- Tokyo Pig
- Lucky Star: The series follows the norm and is quite realistic for the most part but has it's slight share of wackiness, especially in the anime.
- Beelzebub: Can't seem to take itself seriously even when trying to be shounen.
- Haruhi-chan
- Full Metal Panic Fumoffu
- Puni Puni Poemi: Excel Saga.
- Muteki Kanban Musume
- Seitokai Yakuindomo
- Dai Mahou Touge
- Seto no Hanayome
- Banana no Nana
- Majokko Tsukune Chan is a Cute Witch Gag Series.
- Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt
- Dr. Slump
- Nichijou
- Carnival Phantasm being an Affectionate Parody of the Nasuverse, has gotten quite hilarious EVERYTIME AND EVERYWHERE!
- Colorful. A couple of braindead losers and surprisingly innocent ecchi. The show makes fun of itself and perverts.
- Goldfish Warning. The show has a paper-thin plot, little to no continuity, 7 is just the random insane adventures of a a particular class in a farm school.
- Tantei Opera Milky Holmes, where anything, even reality, is subject to change at a moment's notice.
- Kill Me Baby, 99.9% of which is played for a purely comedic scenario where all seriousness and compassion are thrown out the window.
- Pokemon Pocket Monsters
- DD Hokuto No Ken is a Super-Deformed parody series of the mucn more serious Fist of the North Star. There are two series sharing this name, both presuming that the end in the original's After the End setting never happened. Both shows are heavily referential towards iconic moments and memes of the original.
- The first is a web based Flash show, and is mostly slice-of-life with its humor.
- The second is considerably more comedy based, with Raoh, Toki, and Kenshiro described repeatedly as 'the three idiot brothers' attempting to find work with a convenience store, where everyone has been given an Idiot Ball of their own and Bat of all people is now a Deadpan Snarker Straight Man and possibly the Only Sane Man of the show.
Comic Books
Fanfic
Live Action TV
Radio
- Hello Cheeky was a series based almost entirely on quick jokes, with quite a bit of subtle strangeness and cartoon logic holding it together.
Video Games
- God Hand : Near the end of the game you're treated to a mountain of plot....then you fight midget power rangers and a man in a monkey suit who happens to be a luchador so take that as you will.
- Katamari Damacy: Any attempt at a sane description of the plot is an exercise in futility.
- Saints Row has slowly drifted into this.
- Warioware
Visual Novels
- Dra Koi shifts between being a gag series and some weird sort of romantic meta fiction without a moment's notice. It's hard to know what to take seriously.
Web Animation
Web Comics
Western Animation
Other Media
