Logo Joke - Television Tropes & Idioms

Some studios have vanity plates that are recognized everywhere. The moment you see a ring of stars swirling into place above a serene-looking mountain, for example, you know you’re looking at a Paramount production. That little kid who tosses a fishing line into the water while sitting in the crook of the moon is instantly recognizable as Dreamworks. Such logos, once they climb to a certain point of universal recognition (no pun intended for those people who are watching a globe spin on their movie screens…), are a sure fire form of brand name recognition.

Every once in a while, though, a creator will have fun with it. The Vanity Plate will be changed in some way, just enough to put a new spin on it.

A very specific type of inside joke. A subtrope of Special Edition Title. More examples in the IMDb's Crazy Credits

section.

Examples:

20th Century Fox

Futurama: The logo reads 30th Century Fox Television.
Robin Hood Men In Tights has a 12th Century Fox logo.
The Simpsons Movie: Ralph Wiggum stands on the 0 in 20th Century-Fox and sings along to the Fox Fanfare.
The Cannonball Run: A pair of cartoon cars chases each over the 20th Century Fox logo, gradually knocking out all of the spotlights.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show: The 20th Century Fox fanfare played on a piano rather than by a full orchestra.
Another movie that features a change to the fanfare is Alien³, where the standard fanfare freezes on the penultimate note and crescendoes into a horrific wail that establishes the Darker And Edgier/Crapsack World tone of the movie.
Edward Scissorhands: Snow is falling on the 20th Century Fox logo.
Die Hard 2: Die Harder DVD menu: Snow is falling during this film’s title card.
- Live Free or Die Hard: The searchlights on the 20th Century Fox logo go out!
Moulin Rouge: Footage of the Fox logo plays on screen in a concert hall behind draped red curtains, and the symphony playing the fanfare can be seen below the stage.
Daredevil DVD: The 20th Century Fox logo turns into something seen though Matt Murdock's enhanced senses. The movie itself has the regular logo.
The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen: At the end it turns dark and the structure turns into some obscure buildings.
The Day After Tomorrow: The 20th Century Fox logo turns blue and storm starts to appear in the background.
X-Men films: The "X" in the Fox logo remains visible to the end although the rest of the logo has already faded out.
Independence Day: The logo is progressively covered by an alien ship's shadow.
Alvin And The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel trailer: Alvin appears on one of the searchlights singing along to the fanfare. Simon and Theodore stand nearby singing along as well. Alvin dashes over to join them for the last notes, nearly knocking Theodore off the platform in the process. After they finished singing, Theodore worriedly glances down at the ground as he is still hanging off the edge of the platform. This logo can be viewed here.
Under Fox Searchlight, Fox's independent wing, Sunshine: the searchlights go out.
Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs: A stone-age version of the logo appears, with the searchlights replaced by smoking fumaroles.

Columbia Pictures

Cat Ballou: The Torch Lady transforms into an animated version of Jane Fonda as a cowgirl who is holding two guns and firing them.
Men In Black series: The Torch Lady’s torch flashes like a neuralizer.
- Trailers also had her wearing sunglasses.
The Mouse That Roared: The Torch Lady looks down, sees a mouse at her feet on the pedestal, and runs off-screen leaving her torch behind.
- At the end of the film is a title-card sequence where she runs back up the stairs of the pedestal and grabs her torch, via running this opening sequence backward.
Charlies Angels: The begins with the usual Colombia Torch Lady logo. Then the logo pans to the right, as the movie starts off in the sky on a plane.
Strait-Jacket: At the end, the Torch Lady’s head has been chopped off and is sitting at her feet.
The Man Called Flintstone: The Torch Lady is replaced with Wilma Flintstone (who is dressed as the Torch Lady).
The Grudge 2: The logo starts as usual, but the torch flickers, briefly causing the Torch Lady to turn into Kayako and the word "COLUMBIA" to turn into "GRUDGE 2."
What Planet Are You From?: Annette Bening, co-star of the film, takes her long-rumored place as the face of the post-1994 Torch Lady (a composite was actually used for every other Columbia film of this era).
Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs: A giant banana falls on the Torch Lady.
Eight Crazy Nights: The basketball referee's sister is the Torch Lady.

Disney/Pixar

Lilo And Stitch: The Walt Disney Pictures logo gets abducted by a Tractor Beam.
One extended-version trailer for and the ending credits of the home video version of WALL-E has the bulb on Luxo Jr. burning out and then being replaced by WALL-E; on his way out he knocks over the R in Pixar and stands in its place.
Enchanted: The camera zooms in on a tower of the Disney castle to show the book on a stand inside, effectively intergrating the logo into the animated prologue.
Atlantis The Lost Empire: The logo looks as if it's been hammered onto brass, and the "arch" looks like an electric spark going over the castle.
Inspector Gadget: The castle has alarm clocks, waldo arms, and other paraphernalia inside it. The "arch" is a large gear, or half a gear. Done in the first two. Also, at the end of the first film, the Caravan Pictures Guy walks down the road, pauses, and puts his briefcase down. The Gadget Copter emerges from his hat and he flies off.
Holes: The castle is rendered in a desert-sand tan, and the arch is formed by a signal flare.
Teachers Pet: The castle is drawn in the style of the series it is based on, and thus series creator Gary Baseman.
Recess: Schools Out: After the flash of light, we see the gang standing on the castle and they play out the jingle with their kazoos.
Race to Witch Mountain: Darker And Edgier music is used for the Disney castle logo, and at the very end, the castle morphs into a silhouette of the titular mountain.

Dreamworks/Dreamworks Animation

Shark Tale: The boy casts his line and the action switches to the worm at the end, which segues into the movie proper.
Bee Movie: A bee scares away the boy and takes his place on the moon.
Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa: The penguins knock out the boy and take his place.
Monsters Vs Aliens: A UFO abducts the boy. Furthermore, the logo appears in grainy black-and-white and in the 3-D version appears flat.
Kung Fu Panda: A leopard in a coolie hat skips across a body of water, fishing pole in hand, leaping up onto the crescent moon to take the boy's place.
Medal Of Honor: The boy throws away the fishing rod, pulls his rifle and puts on his helmet, jumps on a parachute, and gets stuck in the crescent moon. All of that, while the piano theme tune changes to military fanfare.
The Ring: The moon becomes the Ring for a split second.
Shrek: The S in both "Dream Works" and "SKG" grow ogre ears.
The Playstation Jurassic Park game: The boy's line gets a tug, he exclaims "Caught something!", and the boy is violently yanked off the moon as a raptor squeal is heard.

Lucasarts

Jedi Knight series and The Force Unleashed: multiple variations on drawing a lightsaber / using force powers etc.
Afterlife, where the Gold Man first falls into a flaming-red lava pit ... and then flies out with a halo and wings into a heavenly white light off the screen.
Rogue Squadron: Logo is blown up by duelling starfighters.
Armed And Dangerous: features three versions of the 'Gold Man' based on the game characters drinking tea.
The Secret Of Monkey Island: Special Edition: 80's era Guybrush walks on screen with a treasure map and digs up the logo, which changes to its modern form.
Big Sky Trooper: The Slug leader and a lackey descend on the Gold Man, discuss how it has bones and appears to be an ad, then destroy it - as the Slug leader declares, the two things he hates are bones and advertising.

Metro Goldwyn Mayer

On several different Tom And Jerry cartoons, principally those directed by Chuck Jones, Leo the Lion is replaced by Tom, who gives his best housecat "roar".
- And in at least one occasion, it's Jerry, who gives the standard roar.
Most of the MGM-produced Tex Avery cartoons had Leo roaring to the tune of the Tiger Rag.
In the trailer for the Marx Brothers film A Night At The Opera, the lion was replaced by the brothers themselves, each taking turns miming the lion's roar. (When it was Harpo, his ever-present taxi-horn sounded instead.)
In Tarzan, the Ape Man (the 1981 box-office bomb starring Bo Derek), Tarzan's yell is in place of the MGM lion's roar.
In the 2006 Remake of The Pink Panther, after the lion roars, an animated version of Inspector Clouseau appears within the MGM logo, followed by the Pink Panther, then the lion again, reacting Monty Python style.
The Great Muppet Caper opens with Animal in the logo, instead of the lion. Animal roars, then begins to eat the rest of the logo, revealing the opening scene behind him.
Strange Brew: Standard MGM opening, but the lion, instead of roaring, belches and appears disinterested. The camera then pulls back from the logo and pans towards the Great White North set. A few minutes later, the lion roars in the background, and Bob or Doug comments, "Oh, NOW he roars..."
Silent Movie: The Big Picture Studios logo is essentially that of MGM, but with the studio boss in place of the lion and a kitten's mew replacing the roar.
The trailer for Steve Irwin's The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course had an alligator instead of the lion.
The Fearless Vampire Killers had the lion turning into an animated vampire.
The Movie of Josie And The Pussycats has Boy Band music coming on near the end, with the lion being replaced with a squealing teenage girl.

MTM Productions/Enterprise

Mary Tyler Moore's film company, MTM, uses a logo that is a parody of the MGM logo, using a meowing kitten (named Mimsie) instead of a roaring lion. MTM has used variations of its own logo for various shows produced by them over the years.

One Christmas Episode of The Bob Newhart Show showed Mimsie encircled by a Christmas wreath in place of the usual gold ribbon.
At the end of the "Put on a Happy Face" episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Mary Tyler Moore herself appeared in place of Mimsie and mouthed the words "Th-th-th-that's all folks!"
At the end of the 1991 Mary Tyler Moore Reunion Show, Mimsie says "Bye!" in Mary Tyler Moore's voice.
On videos produced by MTM Home Video, the kitten holds a remote control. After meowing, the kitten hits "rewind". The picture winds backwards (and loses color), and the kitten meows again.
The Duck Factory: As the logo fades in, a voiceover says "And now, here's the cat!" The cat then quacks.
The Graham Kerr Show: As befits a Cooking Show, the kitten wore a chef's hat.
Similarly, on Hill Street Blues, the kitten wore a policeman's hat.
Newhart: Bob Newhart's voice says "Meow" — except for the last episode, where Darryl and Darryl screaming "QUIET!" is used instead.
The New WKRP in Cincinnati: Instead of a meow, you hear Les Nessman saying "Ooooh!"
For Remington Steele the cat wears a Sherlock Holmes deerstalker cap and has a meerschaum pipe in its mouth; when it meows, the pipe falls and lands in front of the word "Productions".
St Elsewhere: The kitten is dressed for surgery in mask and smock. In the final episode, the kitten appeared beneath the closing credits, hooked up to life support machinery, and flatlined at the end of the credits.
- Ironically, Mimsie (the MTM cat) died that year, in 1988.
The Steve Allen Show: The kitten wears heavy black eyeglasses and declares "Schmock!" in the voice of Steve Allen.
The White Shadow: A different kitten from the usual Mimsie bounces a basketball off the MTM logo.
Xuxa: The kitten uses the voice of Xuxa saying "Ciao!"
The feature film A Little Sex has an animated cartoon version of Mimsie crying, followed by a second kitten appearing; the two then rub heads affectionately and purr.

Mutant Enemy Productions

Note that the variants are all exclusive to Buffy The Vampire Slayer, and so the entries refer to episodes of that show.

"Becoming, Part 2": The zombie says "Ohhh, I need a hug." (This was the episode where Buffy killed Angel and left Sunnydale.)
"Amends" puts the zombie in a Santa Claus hat.
"Graduation Day, Part 2" puts the zombie in a graduation cap.
At the end of "Storyteller", the zombie sings, "We are as gods!"
"Once More With Feeling": the zombie sings "Grrr... argh."
"Bargaining, Part 1": the signoff is actually included in the episode itself, with Tara putting on a zombie finger puppet and going "grrr... argh."
"Chosen", the final episode of the series: the zombie looks at the camera, growls, then keeps walking.

Paramount

It was planned for the end Paramount logo to turn into the Star Trek insignia at the end credits of Star Trek The Next Generation, but the plan was dropped.
Indiana Jones: The mountain fades into...
- Raiders Of The Lost Ark: A mountain in the film via a dissolve.
- Temple Of Doom: A relief carving of a mountain on a gong.
- Last Crusade: A mountain in Utah.
- Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull: A molehill.
Team America World Police: The Paramount logo animation runs backward.
In Eddie Murphy's film Coming to America, the camera zooms in to the mountain — and then over it, until it reaches the fictional African country.
In South Park: Bigger, Longer And Uncut, the mountain changes into a construction-paper mountain in the skyline of South Park, Colorado.
The Core: as it finishes, it zooms into the mountain's core.

Universal Studios

Serenity: The Universal spinning-planet logo becomes Earth-That-Was, with the colony ships blasting off for space.
Waterworld: The Universal Studios spinning-planet logo shows the ocean levels rising up and flooding the continents.
Xanadu: A recreation of the 1929 Universal globe with biplane flying around opens the film. As the opening credits appear, the globe remains on screen and a succession of increasingly modern flying machines (four-engine airliner, Concorde, flying saucer) emerge from behind the Earth. The music changes in different styles of music as the objects appear.
The 'Burbs: The normal Universal Globe appears. The text fades out, leaving only the globe, into which the camera then zooms until it turns into a flyover shot of the town the film takes place in.
Casper: The globe turns into the moon.
The Mummy Trilogy: The text "UNIVERSAL" disappears and the logo turns into the sun.
The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas (as well as the first Flintstones film): the Universal logo is made of bones, named "Univershell", and hovers over Pangaea (prehistoric Earth).
Changeling: A 1920s version of the logo is used -— appropriate for a 1920s period film.
An ad for Universal Studios Theme Park featured the camera zooming in on the Universal Earth until arriving at the park itself.
Jurassic Park 3: The Universal Earth as well as the Amblin Entertainment logo ripple like water from the accompanying T-Rex footfalls.
Van Helsing: The Universal Earth is in black and white, and transforms into the flaming end of a torch carried by a member of a Torches And Pitchforks mob.
The Remake of The Wolfman features the Universal Earth to reveal a full moon.
Bruno: to fit with "Brüno", "Üniversal".
Doom: Mars is used instead of Earth.
2 Fast 2 Furious: Earth cuts into a hubcap.
Land Of The Lost: Uses the 1970s version of the Universal logo.

Warner Brothers

Since it's just the unveiling of a shield and a snippet of "As Time Goes By", the WB logo often receives a different tint and audio (generally one that starts the movie).
The Matrix trilogy: A special version of the WB and Village Roadshow Pictures logos, made of the running green code of the Matrix itself, appear at the start of the film.
Constantine: The Warner Bros. logo starts out in front of the traditional blue sky with fluffy white clouds. Then the sky and clouds turn red and the logo crumbles and blows away, which is a reference to events later in the movie when Constantine goes to Hell. Again.
You've Got Mail: The background changes into a computer screen and the Warner Brothers logo moves to up-left corner.
Osmosis Jones: The logo appears as a one-celled organism floating in a dark background.
Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird: an animated Big Bird blows up a balloon in the shape of the WB shield and says "Sesame Street is brought to you today by the letters W and B."
300: Not only are the WB and Legendary Pictures logos rendered to look like unearthed ancient gold, but the "As Time Goes By" jingle is also done in a Greek-sounding style.
Batman The Animated Series: The WB Logo fades into a police zepplin.
Batman Forever and Batman And Robin: The Warner Brothers logo morphs into the shapes of the Bat Emblem. The latter has the logo freezing.
Superman Returns: The opening logo isn't changed, but the accompanying music has a few notes added at the end, effectively playing the Superman fanfare.
Superman IV: The Quest For Peace featured the usual Warner Brothers logo but play a few bars of the Superman theme.
Gremlins 2: Bugs Bunny is lounging on top of the WB shield when it zooms into view. Daffy Duck immediately appears and attempts to usurp his place.
The trailer for Batman Begins had the WB shield dissolving into hundreds of bats.
A variation: For many of their cartoons, WB would use an intro with Bugs Bunny leaning on the shield and eating a carrot while the last few notes of the Merrie Melodies theme plays. When Animaniacs came out, its version replaced the music with the last four notes of their theme ("Those are the facts!"). It ceased to be a pure example, however, when subsequent productions later also used the Animaniacs sample.
In Tiny Toon Adventures, Wackyland's first appearances showed a WB shield and 1970s WB "Big W" chasing each other around in the background.

Multiple Companies

In Zodiac, co-produced by Warner and Paramount, both companies' logos are presented in period-appropriate (i.e., 1970s) versions.
Gladiator: The Dream Works and Universal logos are sepia-toned.
In the film adaptation of Watchmen, all of the logos (Warner Brothers, Paramount, Legendary Pictures, DC Comics) are rendered in static, monotone black on a yellow background with the "Futura Condensed" font when applicable, mimicking the cover of the comic book.
Monty Python's Flying Circus parodied the 20th Century-Fox and MGM logos in the same sequence.
The Cat in the Hat: The Universal and Dreamworks logos, plus that of Imagine Entertainment, are all drawn and colored Dr. Seuss style. Plus, the Dreamworks logo's kid is wearing the titular hat, and you can see a Seussian fish swim away in the ripples of the Imagine logo. By far, the only good thing about this atrocity of a movie.
Get Smart: The WB logo is a CONTROL-like door, and the Village Roadshow logo is a billboard.
Cartoon Network's old "Cartoon Theater" had parodies of the MGM, Paramount and Columbia logos.
Michael Bay Transformers films: While the visuals are unchanged, the logos are accompanied by the transformation sound effect.
- Though in one fan-made trailer, two of the stars are replaced wit the Autobot and Decepticon logos, then the spaceship from the 80's cartoon crashes into the Paramount mountain in a homage to that respective scene from the cartoon.
Minority Report: Fox and Dreamworks are black and white and look like they're underwater, to fit in the Precog tank opening scene.
A Boy And His Blob (Wii): The Boy and the Blob appear on the Majesco Entertainment logo, then the Boy throws a jellybean over to the nearby Wayfoward Technologies logo, which is strangely missing the "O"; the Blob moves over, eats the bean, and turns into the "O".
Where The Wild Things Are: Each of the logos are static, and have apparently been drawn on by Max. The WB logo has a "wild thing" sort of shape drawn around it, with Max scribbling over the Time Warner byline and replacing it with his name. The Legendary Pictures logo has Max drawing a monster eating it. The Village Roadshow logo has Max turning the logo into his own name, with the "V" becoming an upside down "A", and a crude sword along the bottom of the logo.
Rock N Rolla: The WB and Dark Castle Entertainment logos are spray-painted onto the side of a brick wall.

Other

Lords of Dogtown: The words "locals only" is spray-painted over the Tri Star logo.
- Look Who's Talking Too: The pegasus from the Tri Star logo speaks (in a Mister Ed voice, of course of course).
A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum: The United Artists logo is written in a messy roman font and is spelled "VINTED ARTISTS".
The 'Gracie Films' logo at the end of The Simpsons has been altered for comedy a few times specific to the episode. At the end of every Halloween episode the accompanying bit of music is played on a pipe organ.
The little boy picking the flower in the Gaumont Films logo gets roundhouse-kicked in JCVD, the Jean Claude Van Damme self-parody film..
In the second season of Auf Wiedersehen, Pet the opening Central logo (a white globe) shrinks down and dissolves into a live action shot of a white roulette ball at the start of the opening credits.
One episode of Thames Television's The Kenny Everett Video Show had Kenny bursting through the opening logo. The shot was repeated in reverse for the closing logo.
- Another of Cuddly Ken's programmes replaced the London buildings that made up the Thames logo with women's breasts◊...
- One edition of the Morecambe And Wise Christmas shows produced by Thames used a re-recorded version of the Thames logo jingle: "Here they are now, Morecambe and Wi-i-i-i-i-ise!"
- For the Des O'Connor show, the Thames jingle was played with different instruments. It would then swoop off into the stars, starting off the credits for the show.
- For Storyboard, the last note would be reverbed as white streaks would fly in.
In the Lakeshore Entertainment title card for Underworld, the normally sunlit sky turns dark, and a full moon comes out.
Every game released on the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive, Master System, Game Gear, Sega CD and 32X EVER.
- Note that the site says that the logo used for Sonic The Hedgehog was also used in Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles, which is not true:
  - Sonic 3 had the Sega logo just appear (and not in the same manner as in Sonic 1, even), then the "Seeegaaa!" The background behind the logo suddenly turns black, and Sonic himself runs in from the far distance and pushes the Sega logo away.
  - Sonic & Knuckles starts out just like the Sonic 3 version, but the background behind the logo fades into Sonic and the Death Egg falling through the sky, with the Death Egg landing in the volcano and causing the Sega logo to shake itself out of existance.
- Vectorman easily gets the best, where, using an off-screen power-up, you can blow up the Sega logo.
National Treasure, The Jerry Bruckheimer production company had lightning striking a tree as its logo. The thunder sounds accompanying the logo faded into the thunder sounds of the storm in the first scene.
- Even the "single bolt of lightning" is a reference in itself. The original logo was two lightning bolts striking in the same place from different parts of the screen — being the logo for Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer's company. After Don Simpson's death, Bruckheimer altered the logo to the single bolt of lightning it presently is.
Conkers Bad Fur Day opens with Conker cutting the Nintendo 64 logo with a chainsaw.
Another ITV company who went along with the Logo Joke idea was Yorkshire Television - perhaps the best remembered example was their chevron logo zooming off like a firework in the titles to game show 3-2-1.
Early editions of Tiswas featured the ATV logo running backward. It was eventually stopped.
LWT's adaptation of Just William featured the titular character smashing the logo with a catpult after it had formed up. The endboard after the credits rolled showed it being held together with duct tape.

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