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Tonight, on a very special article of TV Tropes...
An episode, often in a sitcom, in which the lead confronts some highly emotional or forbidden issue from everyday life. Drug abuse, teenage sex, bulimia... At the end of the episode, the protagonist is Enlightened, and the guest character with the Very Special Problem is never seen or heard from again. Often there is an 800 number to call, should you actually have the Very Special Problem. If the problem involves children in some way (and it almost invariably will), then it may also be promoted as something that "No Parent Should Miss". These often come about when networks or writers are bucking for awards.
The tone will typically be much, much more serious than other installments of the series.
These episodes were far more common in the 1980s. They've largely fallen out of favor since then due in part to the increasing number of shows, particularly dramas, where issues such as drug/alcohol abuse, violence, sex and death are dealt with on an almost weekly basis. There's a certain variety of shows where essentially every episode has a special message, such as Touched By An Angel, Joan Of Arcadia, etc.
Often ends up as an Anvilicious Narm, especially if it turns out to be a Clueless Aesop. Very ripe target for parody; these days, parodies of Very Special Episodes are probably more common than Very Special Episodes themselves. May also be vulnerable to Detournement.
See also Public Service Announcement and Too Smart For Strangers, a specific kind of Very Special Episode concerned with child abduction. See Compressed Vice for when a character is saddled with an issue for just long enough to illustrate the aesop, and Long Lost Uncle Aesop for when a new character is introduced solely for this purpose and never seen again.
Examples
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Comic Books
- The Silver Age Speedy (later know as Arsenal and later still as Red Arrow) became a Very Special Character for much of his career, starting with a 1971 story in which he became a heroin addict. The original story was not especially Narmful, but many of the later ones were. One of the most infamous of these stories was the Teen Titans 'Drug Awareness issue' mentioned in Pieta Plagiarism.
- His drug abuse is still part of his character—when Speedy lectured Nightwing in a very holier-than-thou way in a recent comic, Nightwing sneered that he was getting advice from a heroin addict.
- Treads into awkward territory when his mentor, Green Arrow, punched him and threw him out of the house for being a filthy junkie. Though Green Arrow learned later in the storyline how wrong he was, he never apologized for his behavior. When Speedy tells him off for this, Green Arrow weeps silently... in pride for his ward becoming a man.
- The Modern Age Speedy got her own Very Special Issue where she revealed that not only was she a recovering drug addict... she was also HIV Positive!
- Actually, not that it's any better, but Mia is a former teen prostitute. No mention of her having a drug addiction has ever been made.
- This editor has one Very Special Issue of the Robin comic book, wherein Tim Drake talks a kid down from jumping off the roof; it fits well in the story, as Robin himself had recently lost pretty much everyone he ever knew. It even came complete with a teen suicide hot line at the end of the issue.
- DC's fond of these in general, much more so than Marvel (though they get their fair share in too). DC is, in fact, so fond of the Very Special type that they'll go so far as to introduce Very Special Characters, new characters whose entire presence starts out as an excuse to have everything they're in turn to some extent into a Very Special Issue. Examples include the new Speedy (teen prostitution, HIV), and the list goes on.
- Speedy was originally introduced as an ex-prostitute who had her HIV added later, not someone who was there to have everything turn into a very special issue.
- If anything, Mia's inclusion was intended for the opposite effect. She did all the heavy work herself in overcoming her initial "Very Special" situation, without Ollie's direct involvement. Judd Winick, however, has a thing for Very Special moments involving AIDS, given how a close friend to him died from complications.
- Judd Winick also penned a very special issue with Green Lantern Kyle Rayner's homosexual assistant getting beaten up for his sexual orientation. Judd was the one who introduced the character and built up the homosexuality angle prior to this with a less Anvilicious issue.
- Kyle Rayner's Green Lantern series wasn't entirely free of this before Judd, with Ron Marz penning an issue on alcoholism and another on hate crimes.
- The Amazing Spider-Man had a classic issue where Spider-Man saves a stoner from jumping off a building. Fortunately, it wasn't as narmful as it could be, mainly the result of subplots about Gwen Stacey and Harry Osborn.
- That entire arc is famous for how the Comics Code Authority handled the whole Very Special Episode aspect about drug abuse - and in the process signed their own death warrant. The CCA wouldn't allow even the negative portrayal of drug use (never mind the fact that it was the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare that asked them to make the story), causing Marvel to forgo CCA approval for that story.
- On top of it, Spider-Man/Power Pack is an (out of continuity, we hope) very special issue in which we find out an upperclassman/college student sexually abused Peter before he had powers.
- Another one-shot had Spidey and Skids, a mutant whose powers surfaced when her father was beating her, deal with child abuse.
- Still another, not nearly so well handled and packed with Narm, was the infamous Fast Lane
 inserts dealing with pot. So bad that Marvel themselves took broad swipes at them for some time after.
- This trope was wonderfully averted in an arc of Untold Tales of Spider-Man. Spidey made friends with a girl named Sally, who, feeling bored and unfulfilled, decided to become a costumed hero named Bluebird, despite having no costume or training, and all her adventures ending with her almost getting killed and being saved by Spidey. A few issues later, we see Spider-Man standing before a gravestone on the cover, which leads the reader to believe we're in for an Aesop about the consequences of reckless behavior. In the issue itself, though, Spidey talks Sally out of being a hero, and she actually listens...and then is hit by a car and killed a few days later, by sheer random chance. The tragedy is made all the stronger by the fact that she listened to Spider-Man's perfectly sound advice, and still ended up dead.
- New Mutants issue #45 was all about a new kid named Larry who was secretly a mutant. His classmates started teasing him about it (not knowing he really was a mutant) and stuck a flyer under his door that said "X-Factor [the mutant hunting team] is coming for you!" That freaked him out so badly that he ended up committing suicide. And the whole thing ends with a We Could Have Avoided All This speech from Kitty Pryde about name-calling. Fortunately, it's so well-written that it's not really that Narmy.
- There was an Archie comic where a friend of his (never seen or heard of before) gets into a drunk driving accident and experiences a spiritual reawakening.
- Death talks about life. It's practically a sex-ed comic book trying to convey what abstinence-only sexual education didn't. At least it's of the Vertigo line which is aimed at mature readers...
- Spider-Girl issue #89, all about May's friend Sandra, who was being abused by her (now ex) boyfriend. Slight subversion in that it was the culmination of a long subplot and the abused character stuck around, but otherwise a textbook example.
Live Action TV
- The fourth wall destroying quote above comes from the recent lost episode of Gap, which also served as a Take That Critics to all the people who protested against the many many (mostly) implied instances of teenage drug use and alcoholism.
- Popularly attributed to Blossom, which had a lot of Very Special Episodes, promoted as such.
- A trait that was lampshaded when The Powerpuff Girls had their own episode (about stealing) entitled "A Very Special Blossom" (the Blossom in this case being the leader of the Powerpuffs). Thankfully, the cartoon carried off this plot with its usual mixture of cuteness, sharp wit and kick-assery.
- Parodied on Friends when Joey (who has just been chosen to appear on a poster warning against sexually transmitted diseases) walks into the flat and says 'I've got VD." Chandler sardonically replies 'tonight on a very special Blossom!'
- Subverted by an episode of the American What Not To Wear. Billed as "A Very Special Episode", the celebrity makeover target was revealed to be Mayim Bialik, the actress who used to play Blossom. And in fact she did seem to dress like a grown up Blossom gone to seed. As is common with many guests of the show, She Cleans Up Nicely.
- This was also parodied on The Venture Brothers when Dr. Orpheus says his powers can "make you believe you are on a very special episode of Blossom!"
- Perhaps the most notorious show for very special episodes was the WB's 7th Heaven where for a while, virtually every episode was "very special." This often involved new friends that were never seen or mentioned again.
- Diffrent Strokes had a few. The best known is probably the one in which a pedophile bike shop owner attempts to molest Arnold and Dudley. Tragically, the actor playing Dudley was sexually abused in Real Life.
- The traumatic part of it for me when I was a kid was that it was Gordon Jump, the sweet, clueless station manager of WKRP In Cincinnati. Mr. Carlson, how could you?!
- Another Very Special Episode had Nancy Reagan coming on to do her "Just Say No!" schtick. Apparently, the cast didn't exactly get her message - especially Dana Plato.
- Family Ties had many of these.
- The episode in which Alex loses a friend to drunk driving.
- The episode where Stephen has a heart attack.
- The episode in which Alex gets addicted to diet pills.
- The episode in which Long Lost Uncle Aesop is an "off the wagon" alcoholic. (Which is now Hilarious In Hindsight thanks to the fact that the uncle in question was played by Tom Hanks.)
Uncle Ned: (* sob* ) I hit Alex...
Uncle Ned: It may not be Miller time, but it is vanilla time!
Uncle Ned: C'mon, Alex, are you too good to sit down and have a glass of maraschino cherries with your uncle?
- The episode where Jennifer becomes a rabid environmentalist and falls into a deep depression over not being able to save the Earth in a half hour.
- An episode of Family Matters involving marrow donation.
- An episode of Family Matters involving both gun and gang violence among youth, complete with PSA from the actors out of character at the end, and a catchphrase ("Squash it.")
- Yet another that deals with police discrimination, where a cop pulls over and unfairly tickets Carl's son because he was a black teenager driving in a white neighborhood.
- And then there was the episode that dealt with black history month, where upon Laura suggesting that a black history class be put into the curriculum, somebody posts a IF YOU LOVE BLACK HISTORY SO MUCH WHY DON'T YOU GO BACK TO AFRICA note on her locker. (Things get uglier when she actually opens the locker.)
- And another when someone spikes Urkels drink at a party and almost dies as a result.
- Then another episode where Carl had a heart attack.
- Step By Step toyed with this territory on occasion. Most memorable is an episode where J.T. learns he has dyslexia. Throughout the episode, his parents and siblings take note of his poor grades and blame them on his study habits and work ethic. The lesson begins to hit home after Cody has J.T. read a chapter out of a schoolbook and has him report on the contents:
Cody: So what'd it say?
J.T.: I dunno...it didn't make any sense.
Cody: Come on, man, stop fooling around.
J.T.: I'm not fooling around!
- Punky Brewster had a special two-part episode. Part One had to do with Punky learning CPR, then in Part Two, her friend suffocated inside an old fridge, which allowed Punky to put her CPR skills to the test. A choma-keyed text imposed atop a still of Punky's CPR class, along with a stern announcer, told us "CPR should only be performed by certified people" (of which Punky was not, incidentally).
- Another has her stepdad Henry becoming addicted to medication. Typically for a VSE, the problem is resolved in a single episode and never mentioned again.
- An early example is the "Maude Has An Abortion" episode of Maude. It wasn't done as a Very Special Episode, though, since it did not moralize. It simply shocked America. In fact, it might have inspired the very concept Very Special Episode by the massive ratings it received.
- The ending PSA about the Very Special Problem was parodied in an episode of Dinosaurs. Robbie and his friend, Spike, find a plant in the woods and become addicted to it; at the end of the episode, Robbie urged viewers "Don't do drugs — and help stop preachy sitcom episodes like this one."
- And the finale itself was a Very Special Episode about pollution. It wasn't very up-beat.
- An episode of Home Improvement was billed as an episode where Randy might have cancer. Turned out he didn't and the whole thing was a false alarm. He did wind up with hypothyroidism, a thyroid condition that effectively requires a pill a day for the rest of his life.
- In fact, most of the emotional turmoil the characters experienced were, indeed, that he might have cancer, or several other things, and that they simply didn't know. The stress of waiting to find out was the linchpin of the drama.
- Well, that and the parents thought that not telling Randy was the best option. Which then backfired when he did his own research and understandably freaked out.
- Yeah, withholding important and easily-researched information from the most intelligent and book-smart of their children really isn't the smartest move they could have made.
- In their defense, this was their own child who might have cancer; if it were one of your children, you'd spaz out like a squirrel on sugar too.
- Home Improvement was a rare show that actually handled these kinds of episodes very nicely. For example, in another Very Special Episode, Brad smoked pot. Parents behaved in the typical matter, but the episode lacked the soap box feeling most episodes of that nature had. Nobody died when Brad smoked, nobody even got injured, no out of proportion hallucinations that pot doesn't actually have, and even Jill came out later in the episode, admitting she experimented with it. Basically, they said Drugs Are Bad, but they didn't put an anvil on the drugs.
- And who could forget the episode of All In The Family when that serial rapist tried to attack Edith? Quite a few of you, apparently.
- This was actually a continuation of a storyline which involved the sexual assault (they never use the word "rape" in any of the episodes) of Gloria by a college classmate. The writers decided for Edith to be the potential victim to show that rape was about power, not sex, as the actress playing Gloria, Sally Struthers, who was quite attractive at the time, was often accused of "asking for it" (even by Archie, Mike, and Edith herself!). It all ends with Edith, after Gloria calls her a coward and unworthy of her respect, slapping Gloria before breaking down in sobs and finally agreeing to prosecute the attacker. What should be Narm-inducing ends up being a Crowning Moment of Bittersweet.
- Does the episode where Edith realizes she's a kleptomaniac count?
- How about the one where Archie befriends a Jewish anti-fascist? This in and of itself could be a Very Special Episode what with Archie checking his bigotry and making a human connection with someone outside his political comfort zone, but no, that's not what makes it a Very Special Episode. What makes it a Very Special Episode is at the end they drop a bridge on the anti-fascist and by drop a bridge I mean some neo-Nazis blow him the fuck up! It's good that Archie got to see how hurtful and downright dangerous bigotry can really be, but ''DAMN!''
- The episode of Saved By The Bell in which Jessie becomes addicted to caffeine pills, leading to the infamous "I'm so excited, I'm so excited, I'm so... so scared!" scene (may be seen here).
- Also the very special episode where Zack's duck Becky is killed by an oil spill.
- Also the one where the gang meets their favorite actor and finds out that he smokes pot.
- And the one where they drink and drive during homecoming and they wreck the car and Slater breaks his arm.
- This is mentioned in an episode of Ugly Betty
- While the episode "The Body" in Buffy The Vampire Slayer is a favorite to some fans, it does fit the Very Special Episode concept, where the death that Buffy must cope with is an everyday-life event that is pointedly not connected to the usual supernatural forces of the show.
- One episode of The Sopranos focusing on the soccer coach of Tony's daughter being a child molester played with the trope, in that given their general treatment of women, Tony and his crew come across as somewhat hypocritical in condemning his behavior—particularly in later seasons, the difference between the way Tony and his crew treat women and the way the coach did is that Tony and his crew wait until they're eighteen. Moreover, rather than the black and white morality of the usual Very Special Episode, the show is typically morally ambiguous, as Tony wants to kill the coach, feeling that he would be less of a man were he to rely upon the legal system to seek justice—and that even if he did, what the legal system would do could hardly be called justice. In the end, however, Tony gets very relaxed on both medication and alcohol, and seems quite content with the idea that "I din' hur' nobody".
- Friday Night Lights had a Very Special Two-Parter about racism that was actually very good and realistic. The racist coach even gets some amount of pity from the show as he privately admits to struggling with his own prejudices.
- A fourth-season episode of 24 had Jack Bauer hiding out in a gun shop owned by two foreign immigrants, who demonstrated that they were patriotic and wanted to serve for the good of the American people. This episode also featured a PSA by lead actor Kiefer Sutherland, who highlighted the discrimination faced by Arab and East Indian residents living in America, a situation caused by 9/11 and the War on Terror.
- The West Wing did something similar with, "Isaac and Ishmael", by having a staff member have the same name as a terrorist. While the rest of the team answered questions from schoolkids about the history of terrorism, and why it happens, Leo was with secret service agents and the accused, asking questions in a shockingly hostile manner. After it turns out that the man is innocent, Leo gets a sharp wake-up call from the accused, who reminds of the shooting in Rosslyn, and adds that it was because "one of [the staff] wasn't [white]".
- Literally, EVERY EPISODE of the Degrassi Junior High / Degrassi High / Degrassi The Next Generation franchise is a very special episode. From abortions to suicide to events ripped from Canadian headlines to rape to lesbianism to abuse to unwanted pregnancies to neglected friends to pedophilia to online stalkers to self-worth to HIV/AIDS to environmental awareness... it's all here. In fact, the "Degrassi Classic" franchise emphasized this in a series of short documentary features co-produced by the Canadian government called "Degrassi Talks", in which cast members talked about disturbing events that happened in their lives. 7th Heaven doesn't have s#$@ on this.
- Exception: Seinfeld is known for having never had a Very Special Episode, and just never being that sentimental in general.
- In fact, the rules the writers set for Seinfeld are "No hugging, no learning".
- One could argue that the popularity of Seinfeld led to other shows imitating the conceited superficial narcissism of its characters, spelling the death of the VSE in sitcoms.
- The third season episode "The Pez Dispenser" * did* include a never before seen Special Guest Character who was struggling with drug addiction, and was never seen again after the successful intervention got him into rehab. Of course, the intervention itself took place offscreen, the buildup was played for laughs, and the whole storyline was a secondary plot.
- From around the third or fourth season onwards, every other episode of MacGyver was a Very Special Episode.
- One unintentionally hilarious episode involved black rhino poaching in Africa. It starts out with a warning for the squeamish that they would show a "realistic" depiction of a rhino involving blood (it wasn't too convincing looking), then after the regular plot (basically just Strictly Formula MacGyver), Richard Dean Anderson gives an out of character speech for nearly a minute about the dwindling population of the black rhino. Most people were just laughing hysterically at it.
- Boy Meets World had a couple of these, including one in which Cory and Shawn become completely drunk sharing a small bottle of whiskey, leading to Shawn having a harrowing week of alchoholism before it being solved by 'talking to some guy.' (I kid, I kid, I love that episode.)
- Another is the episdoe where Shawn has a friend who is physically abused by her dad, so Shawn and Cory decide to hide her at Cory's house overnight. Ends with the Kids Help Phone Hotline number.
- The Drew Carey Show parodied this with "A Very Special Drew." The episode covered potential miscarrige, raising a child in poverty, irresponsible gun (and alcohol) ownership, obsessive-compulsive disorder, kleptomania (supplemented by a Freudian Excuse), anorexia, misdirected self-loathing, loved ones succumbing to unknown illnesses, illiteracy, unexpected death of a loved one, organ donation, last-minute marriage (failed due to said unexpected death), the Littlest Cancer Patient, and coming out of the closet (Spartacus-style).
- Waterloo Road does a few of these, complete with the phone number to call at the end of the show, but the acting is generally good enough to get away with it. The first season's Very Special Episode about homophobic bullying was nominated for an award by a major gay rights organisation.
- Sesame Street's Very Special Episode dealing with the death of Mr. Harold Hooper, which was ENTIRELY justified as the man who played him also died. Not a shred of Narm this time, this Very Special Episode headed straight into Tear Jerker territory.
- There was also an episode about racism. No, seriously.
- They also made an episode dealing with Mr. Snuffleupagus's parents getting divorced, but the test screening showed that the kids didn't get the right messages from it (such as them becoming more worried about their parents getting divorced), so it was scrapped and never aired.
- Anyone else remember the episode of Mr Belvedere where one of Wesley's classmates contracts HIV?
- There was also an episode about Alzheimer's disease, where Wesley has to deal with the failing memory of an old lady he visits in a nursing home.
- Yet another episode had Wesley getting molested by a summer camp counselor.
- During a AIDS/HIV awareness month on American television, Star Trek Enterprise aired an episode in which T'pol, the catsuited Vulcan first officer, entered an unprotected mindmeld with a rogue hippie Vulcan (played as an Anvilicious sexual metaphor), a scene which veered into Mind Rape territory, and as a result, T'pol contracted a rare Vulcan neurological disease that... oh forget it, she got Vulcan Space AIDS. Not that this disease was ever brought up again after that episode.
- It was, twice. First, T'pol mentions to her fiance that she is "ill", in an attempt to get him to forget about marrying her. Later, she explains to T'pau that she won't meld because she has Vulcan Space AIDS, and doesn't want to spread it. T'pau explains that she can cure it.
- Not to mention the extremely anvillicious episode where Phlox tries to get information about the disease from Vulcan medical authorities, who essentially refuse because of the strength of their prejudice against mind melds. Quite the most illogical behaviour I've ever seen from Vulcans, notwithstanding the later multi-part Retcon explaining why something is rotten in the state of Vulcan.
- Walker Texas Ranger takes these to their extreme. There are several episodes about racism, one about AIDS, and an episode about sexism where they even had a normally tolerant character act out of character just to hammer the point home.
- Another episode that takes it to a further extreme, for their message against gangs, they have a young girl killed, magically resurrected by an angel (special effect glow and all), and then 'blessed' with holy wisdom and the ability to talk to her angel, with the actors talking to the screen more often than to each other.
- Kyle XY had one about tolerating gays. See Fiction Is Not Fair.
- Jack & Bobby had an episode where Jack's ex-best friend Matt (who was only in this one episode) committed suicide. Through flashbacks in Jack's memory, the reason for Matt's suicide was revealed to be that Matt was gay, and in love with Jack. After confessing his feelings to Jack, the two eventually parted ways. Later, when Jack talks to Matt's parents, he finds out that Matt had tried to come out to his mother, but she had rejected him. At the end of the episode, there is a hotline number on the screen for LGBT teens who are depressed or suicidal.
- In a notable subversion, the TV show Titus framed every episode as a Very Special Episode, most notably because of the subject matter (drugs, suicide, abuse, cheating, and insensitivity to others were common in the series). However, because they then took to the other extreme of the VSE, the subject matter was always presented as humorous and without redeeming qualities (people very rarely learned a lesson that was really worth learning). And it worked.
- Part of the effectiveness is a knowledge of what to make fun of. At no point do they say "Alcoholics are funny," when they staged an intervention to get Papa Titus to start drinking again. It Makes Sense In Context- They thought he was nicer when he was drunk, their mistake.) Also, they never say "You can make fun of sexual abuse," but they do say "Laughing is a way to deal with your problems."
- And part of it comes from real life experience. The real Christopher Titus doesn't drink, the reasons stemming from a real life incident where he drunkenly fell into a bonfire when he was 17. The series plays this for laughs, as Chris goes on to explain that it wasn't the falling in alone that convinced Titus not to drink, but his drunken friends attempt to stamp out the flames to give up the bottle. As Titus says, "Falling into a bonfire is a one step program."
- Top Gear does regular VSEs to raise money for Children in Need, usually by aping the style of a different show, previous examples have included Top Gear of the Pops, Top Ground Gear Force and a crossover with Ashes to Ashes
- Parodied like so many other things in Mr Show, where they outright admit from the start that they're just doing it to get an award and improve their ratings. Then the "very special" event is David Cross coming out as bald.
- There was an episode of Lizzie Mcguire where Miranda became obsessed with losing weight.
- It involved skipping lunch. Once.
- Who can forget One Tree Hill where Lucas' estranged friend Jimmy decides to shoot up the school? They could at least have made some token effort to point towards the whole gun control vs. right to bear arms issue, but no, it ultimately seemed to come down to "Lonely kids are crazy psychopaths who will kill you and themselves." I suppose the gun with which he initiated the shooting just appeared out of thin air, or something...
- Subverted on Roseanne. The show's Crowning Moment Of Funny was the episode dealing with marijuana. Dan and Rosie thought the blunt they found was David's and threatened to throw him out if they caught him with drugs again, but it turns out to be one of theirs that Dan didn't have the heart to throw out when they were pregnant with Becky and wanted to clean up their lives to be responsible parents. The rest of the episode shows them smoking it and acting blown out of their minds. Even the episodes that really did have serious themes like domestic violence, racism, infidelity, and Dan's heart attack weren't as out-of-place as these episodes tend to be, due to the show's honest look at working-class families.
- An episode of Growing Pains involved Mike and his friends being offered drugs at a party. The episode's coda featured Kirk Cameron speaking directly to the viewers about the dangers of drug abuse.
"Boner wanted me to tell you that he didn't go to the bathroom"
- IIRC, it also had one against drunk driving.
- The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air had this a bit regularly, ranging from questions on racial profiling (Will argues that the sole reason they were pulled over after trying to get to a fancy party was that they were two black kids driving a Mercedes, whereas Carlton argues the cops were just doing their job) to gun violence (an arc had Will recovering from a gunshot wound, which made Carlton briefly Darker And Edgier).
- And the one where Will's dad came back.
- There's also one where Will is given speed to help him study, but he tosses it in his locker since he has no interest, only for it to be found by Carlton, who mistakes it for acne medicine. Carlton, tripping high, goes to a party and nearly dies. It ends with lots of hugging and crying.
- House with season 5's Kutner suicide.
- There were multiple Very Special Episodes for Full House (indicated by the longer version of the opening). One episode was the episode where Jesse's grandfather dies, and unlike many Very Special Episodes for TV shows, it wasn't narmy and was actually handled very nicely, if not a Tear Jerker.
- They played it a little more straight with the child abuse episode, "Silence is Not Golden". Stephanie's never-before-introduced friend Charlie keeps coming into school covered in bruises and whatnot; when his teacher asked, Charlie replied that he fell down the stairs. Charlie's portrayed as a bit of a jerk from Stephanie's point of view, but becomes a lot more sympathetic when she finally pries the truth from him ("I ran into a door. A door named Dad."). She spends the greater part of the episode wrestling with her promise to not tell anyone else, until Uncle Jesse pries it out of her in turn. The episode ends with the usual lecture, this one about how Charlie's father won't be able to hurt him anymore, and that reporting such cases is far better than keeping a secret that gets someone hurt. In typical VSE fashion, Charlie was never seen again.
- The Professionals. "Klansmen" sees Bodie attacked by a gang of blacks, then racially abusing the black doctor and nurses who are trying to save his life. He apologizes at the end, saying they'll never hear that language from him again. Of course, (this being The Professionals) he then goes off on a date with the pretty black nurse. Ironically the episode is now banned in Britain because of its racist content.
- The George Lopez Show had a lot of these involving Carmen. Every teen sex related thing happened to her, just short of getting an STD or getting pregnant.
- Little House On The Prairie in almost every episode. Walnut Grove had a never-ending line of suffering citizens needing help from the Ingalls.
- M* A* S* H had the infamous one where Henry Blake goes home, where the show utterly destroyed the convention for comedies never letting any main character die. Also, pretty much torpedoed the idea of meaningful deaths in war.
- A Different World had an episode on date rape co-starring Tiamak.
- And one about AIDS starring Tisha Campbell.
- Then again, many episodes of A Different World ventured into this trope. AIDS, Apartheid, racism, dating violence, pregnancy scares, interracial dating, gang violence, to name a few all visited the Hillman College campus. In Living Color parodied this in the skit "A Different Message".
- Every Smallville episode that guest starred Christopher Reeves ended with him and Tom Welling telling people to donate to the Christopher Reeves Treatment For Spinal Injury Foundation.
- Glee seems to give every one of the show's Five Token Band A Day In The Limelight. So far we've had the Very Special Zaftig African-American Episode, the Very Special Gay Episode and the Very Special Disability Episode, and a seemingly complete lack of awareness of the Unfortunate Implications of giving the Pretty White Kids With Problems the solos by default.
- Good Times had one with the VD episode, complete with a disclaimer at the beginning. It did not give a number for viewers to call for information at the end like most VSE's. During the episode, a then-unknown Jay Leno tells JJ that if people weren't ashamed to come to the clinic to get treatment, then VD wouldn't be so rampant. It would have helped if they told people how VD was spread and how it could be prevented.
- The multi-episode arc about Penny being abused by her mother has Penny remain on the show once the Very Special Issue was resolved Willona adopted Penny after her mom abandoned her.
- Law And Order Special Victims Unit is a show about sex crimes and child abuse, two rather hot-button issues, and it had a Very Special Episode. What about? Teenaged binge drinking. Complete with a title card PSA at the end about the prevelance of underaged drinking. And the Narm did flow like a mighty stream...
- Ghost Writer had a whole story arc where one of the characters befriends a marijuana user.
- The Very Special Episode was viciously subverted, parodied, mocked, mooned, and otherwise brutalized with the kind of glee generally only reserved for children on Christmas Morning in every episode of Strangers With Candy.
- How, how, how was Symbiosis from Star Trek The Next Generation not mentioned? It even included an Anviliciously Narmful exchange between Wesley Crusher and Tasha Yar about the evils of doing drugs. Something along the lines of:
Wesley: Golly, gee, tawillekers, I don't know why anyone would do drugs.
Tasha: Drugs make you feel good. They are an escape from heavy-handed dialog written by well-meaning writers who are afraid that viewers will completely miss the point if any amount of subtly is used in the script.
- The Golden Girls did this periodically, and remarkably well. There were episodes touching on common VSE subjects like drug abuse, AIDS, and homelessness, but they also touched on some other issues that were unusual. The episode in which Dorothy was diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is a good example; the aesop was about the behavior of some medical professionals toward their patients (the doctor Dorothy saw first was unfamiliar with CFS, and dismissed her as delusional). The general lack of narm was part of the reason for the show's enduring popularity.
- The Doctor Who episode "Vincent and the Doctor" is set during Vincent Van Gogh's final days and thus touches closely on issues of chronic depression which the man suffered from in real life. In its original UK airing, the episode closed with a plug for a BBC website about depression and a counselling hotline.
- My So Called Life does this with the Anvilicious episode "So-Called Angels" that deals with the issues of teen runaways/homelessness. Complete with a PSA at the end and Juliana Hatfield as a magic homeless angel strumming her guitar.
- That's So Raven had "True Colors" in which Raven finds out she has been passed over for a job at a clothing store because the manager doesn't like hiring black people. During the episode Eddie relates a story from his childhood where he had a white friend who got yelled at by his dad for hanging out with a black kid so they couldn't see each other anymore.
- Although Party of Five was a drama show there were two episodes in particular where the show's opening credit sequence was not shown and had a noticeably more serious plot than the rest of the season. In season 2 an episode revolves around Julia discovering that she is pregnant and debating whether or not to keep it. It presents two opposing views on the subject of abortion with Charlie wanting Julia to abort the baby since she is only 16 and therefore not ready to be a mother while Claudia wants Julia to keep it since she considers abortion to be the same as murder. At the end of the episode Julia ended up having a miscarriage but the episode did have an effect on her development for the rest of the season, particularly in her relationship with Justin (the father).
- From season 3 there was The Intervention which was the culmination of a storyline in which Bailey became an alcoholic. The family members try to have an intervention for Bailey and are forced to lure him to the house under false pretences. The episode is considered one of the most powerful in the show's run as one scene has Bailey criticising the others for their past mistakes such as Julia's pregnancy, Charlie's cheating on Kirsten and Sarah's failed attempt to lose her virginity. It also drops a huge bombshell that their deceased father was also an alcoholic.
- One of the more famous modern ones is the 8 Simple Rules two parter entitled "Goodbye". This was a case of Real Life Writes The Plot as lead actor John Ritter collapsed on set during the second season and later died of an aortic dissection. The show killed off his character Paul Hennessy (implying that he had a heart attack) and the episode was broadcast without a laugh track and the show's opening credits were never seen again. This is considered a Jump The Shark moment for the show as it had previously been about Paul trying to relate to his teenage daughters but its focus then shifted to Cate dealing with his death and keeping the family together. It also featured the introduction of James Garner as Cate's father who would join the show as a regular cast member.
- Green Week makes NBC the Very Special Network
- Though nearly every episode of CSI covers anything to make it "Very Special", there was one episode in particular that was created in the wake of the Micheal Vick case. The episode was focal around dogfights and how terrible they are for both the dogs and the people. The episode (not sure of later airings, but it's initial one on CBS at least) even had a PSA announcement after the credits by William Peterson, who plays Gil Grissom in the series. To add to that, he even had his own dog with him on screen to show his support in opposing dogfighting.
Music
- Soul Asylum's Music Video for Runaway Train was interspersed with photos of missing children and ended with a phone number to call if the viewer had seen any of them. In an unfortunate twist, it was eventually revealed that some of the now-adults shown in the video didn't want to be found.
- The music video for Sarah Mc Lachlan's "World on Fire" claims she was given $150,000 by the record company to film it. Interspersed between footage of Mc Lachlan barefoot singing and playing the guitar, the video mentions it was filmed for only $15 and the rest was donated to a variety of charities all around the world.
- Megadeth's "99 Ways to Die" music video shows small children and infants carrying around guns, statistics for gun violence against youth and pictures of children that were killed, paralysed or shot.
- Moist's video for "Believe Me" depicted Biff Naked and her friend Violet moping around the Los Angeles River and giving each other FTW tattoos and later Violet somehow drowns herself in said nasty river. It's kind of confusing, really. Aaaanyway, the video does end with the number for the Kids Help Phone.
- Michael Jackson's video for the huge Green Aesop that was "Earth Song" ended with the phone number for his Heal the World charity organization. On the Greatest Video Hits — HIStory Volume 2 compilation, there was also a text scroll detailing the locations the video was shot in and how "man and his technology" had ravaged them.
Video Games
- Parodied in Sam & Max Season 2: Night of the Raving Dead. The pair film a "Very Special Episode" of Midtown Cowboys in which they confront their landlord about his addiction... but the episode is really a massive product-placement ad, because who wouldn't be addicted to the great taste of Old Gutsmack brand Malt Liquor?
- And then they replace the liquor with cigarettes containing garlic, causing a German vampire who is a big fan of the show to smoke them.
- You can also replace the liquor with a brand of water that you find in the castle, leading to some hilarious ad-libs.
Newspaper Comics
- A lot of early Fox Trot storylines had these (for example, Peter taking up chewing tobacco; Paige and Jason finding a used syringe at the beach; Paige and Nicole considering shoplifting). But after a while the strip focused almost exclusively on the Ruleof Funny, although there were couple of exceptions.
- For Better Or For Worse is pretty much a string of Very Special Episodes, dealing with every issue you can think of. This strip has the very annoying habit of introducing story elements with long-term consequences (a teenager comes out gay to his mother, a character is paraplegic, a woman gives birth to a deformed child) but conveniently only inflicts these calamities on secondary characters ... so that the strip's main characters only ever have to deal with these Very Special Problems when the strip feels like it, instead of all the time.
Web Comic
Web Original
- Parodied in Yu Gi Oh The Abridged Series, episode 17, which features a commercial for a Very Special Episode of Zorc and Pals:
Announcer: Next week, in a very special episode of Zorc and Pals: Bakura: Zorc, what's wrong? Why haven't you destroyed the world? Zorc: Because I have a terminal disease! Bakura: But you can't die! What about our adopted daughter? Who is going to take care of her when you're gone? Zorc: She also has a terminal disease! Announcer: Don't miss this very special award-winning episode of Zorc and Pals. Because we really need the ratings.
- Parodied in Avatar: The Last Puppet Bender. Toph hosts a special episode speaking out against...people pronouncing your name wrong. Naruto even showed up.
Western Animation
- Static Shock had many Very Special Episodes, including "Sons of the Fathers" (focusing on racism), "Frozen Out" (focusing on homelessness), "Jimmy" (focusing on school violence), and "Where the Rubber Meets The Road" (focusing on dyslexia).
- Mercilessly spoofed in Drawn Together, in an episode appropriately named "A Very Special Drawn Together Afterschool Special". Started as a roleplay by the housemates to help Xandir decide how to inform his parents of his homosexuality, the effort quickly derailed, which resulted in nearly all of them getting killed by the end of the episode.
- Also lampshaded in an earlier episode: ("Hi, I'm Toot Brownstein... In this episode, we awkwardly dealt with eating disorders.")
- Gargoyles has two major Very Special Episodes, but tended to buck the trend by showing aftereffects in later episodes:
- In the "Deadly Force", the dangers of playing with a loaded gun are looked at, including a description of the path the bullet took inside the victim's body. The message may have been too graphic, however. It's usually omitted from reruns on the Disney Channel for being too violent. But still, it forced Broadway (the shooter) to mature as a character; he was initially a fan of violent cop shows and movies, but after this experience grew to prefer investigative work. His hatred of guns in this particular episode is tied directly to his personal guilt, rather than guns being wrong inherently. And, as a nice touch, Elisa spent a few episodes on crutches as she recovered; and - having noted that she shouldn't have left the gun out in the first place - was later shown making sure to keep it locked up.
- Made even better, as the Aesop isn't the tired old (even then) Guns are dangerous/bad/evil spiel that was increasingly common in those days, but that improper and irresponsible handling of them which is dangerous. This at a time when youth violence involving firearms was a major thing in the public's mind.
- Then there's "Lighthouse in the Sea of Time", the episode concerning illiteracy - though the gargoyles came from the Middle Ages, where the ability to read was very uncommon, it's still a little hard to credit a plot where the villain wants to throw away the personal diary of Merlin, and is stopped by heroes, who then deliver a speech about how stories are treasures. (Admittedly, the villain was just frustrated that Merlin's writings didn't include any magic spells, and quickly calmed down.) Again, Broadway's the one who got the major Character Development, becoming quite the fan of Shakespeare - just look at that moment when he describes Castle Wyvern's kitchen, and then his eyes really light up when he describes the library. The blind author introduced in "Lighthouse" also becomes an occasionally recurring character.
- An ABC special called Cartoon Allstars To The Rescue where cartoon characters from Looney Tunes to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles try to teach a child called Mikey about the dangers of marijuana. Ludicrously. the point that breaks Mikey, other than his addiction forcing him to steal from his little sister and his family worrying about him, is that marijuana will turn him into a green-skinned zombie; it's quite obvious where Mikey's priorities are, and it's made even worse when you consider most marijuana users aren't, y'know, zombies. Stupidest of all is that cartoon characters who really have no business knowing about drugs are the ones preaching to Mikey, such as Huey, Dewey and Louie of Duck Tales, Alvin And The Chipmunks and, of all people, the Muppet Babies. And seeing Bugs Bunny talking about a joint is really quite a childhood-killer. And ironic, considering his normal behaviour. Its first US airing began with a live statement from then-President George H.W. Bush, and airings in other countries similarly began with live statements from their respective heads of government.
- Captain Planet is pretty much one big Very Special Show, telling children to not cause pollution (despite rarely going into why people polluted in the first place). However, it had many particular episodes that focused on more down to earth problems that children, teenagers and young adults may face. One of these was a drug episode "Mind Pollution" where Linka's cousin gets addicted to a designer drug called "Bliss" created by Verminous Skumm (who appeared to specialize in "pollution of the body" in the show, so to speak). Another episode was about AIDS, involving Skumm spreading lies about a young AIDS sufferer such as the virus could be contracted just through casual contact. The former episode is at least somewhat notable for breaking the Never Say Die rule by having Linka's cousin die from overdosing on the drug... Then again, the fact he leapt through a glass window and sliced his arms, causing him to bleed profusely on the floor might've had something to do with it too.
- Then there was the episode where Wheeler in a dream discovered an island inhabited by greedy, foolish humanoid mice who refuse to stop having large families. Initially clueless American boy Wheeler is against government mandated population control, but he learns his lesson when the humanoid mice overpopulate to the point that their island destroys itself. He wakes up praising the Planeteers from countries where the government controls family size, enlightened at last. Really.
- And the one about gangs, where we learn Wheeler grew up on the streets of a gritty inner-city slum— wait, what? The kid's about as hard as a pound of wet meat loaf! He's pure whitebread Suburbanite through and through! Who are they trying to bullshit?
- Wheeler's inner-city origins were laid plain as early as the pilot, when he was shown receiving his ring after breaking up a street fight. With his bare hands. Someone Did Not Do The Research, perhaps?
- Parodied in "A Very Very Very Very Special Cartoon Animaniacs'' in which the Warners attempt to win the Humanitarian Award by shoehorning every social issue they can think of into their next cartoon.
- The complete list is saving the whales, car engine pollution, reading educational books (about Gandhi), planting trees, walking instead of driving, anti-smoking, nursing orphaned owls, not littering, helping for no reason, non-fattening foods, no gratuitous violence, the goodness of being a vegetarian, respecting women for their minds rather than their...well, you know. In other words, it's absolutely nothing like a normal episode.
- Then, when the award goes to "A Panda Called Pookie", they spend the last minute of the show going back to normal, involving committing acts of gratuitous violence, eating fattening cheesecake, wasting gas, chopping down trees, wasting time, and admiring Hello Nurse for ...well, you know.
- Let's not even mention practically every cartoon made by Filmation studios.
- Oddly enough, Pinky And The Brain had one about cigarette smoking. It was not very Narm-y, but it was kind of weird to have a Very Special Episode in a show about two lab mice trying to conquer the world. Even weirder was the fact that Pinky was the voice of reason (well, as reasonable as he could get, anyway).
- Nonetheless, the episode's humor and style did not suffer.
- I'm glad I'm not the only person here who remembers that Pinky And The Brain episode. I especially like near the end, where The Brain listens to a speech made by the new Vice President of the tobacco company who looks like an ailing Kentucky Colonel, with long grey hair, a wheelchair and an oxegyn tank, and suddenly says something to the effect of "Oh my god! That man is only 42 years old! I only saw it once, so I had a suspicion that the tobacco companies all joined up to ban future airings of the episode.
- Clone High made fun of the concept by having its episode-end eyecatches for the next ep promote every episode as "a very special Clone High".
- And every single episode is transformed into a humongous squiggly ball of Narm. Deliberately.
- Shall we remember that episode 9, Raisin the Stakes, was about the danger of getting high... on raisins?
- Buzz Lightyear Of Star Command did an anti-drug episode, though due to the show's sci-fi setting the popular genre convention that Radiation gives you superpowers is used as a metaphor for it.
- Tiny Toons had the requisite Very Special Episode, but, being Tiny Toons, they hung lampshades on everything in sight.
- Why Dizzy Can't Read is about... well, Exactly What It Says On The Tin. It turns out that he was addicted to television. He overcomes this by finding analogies to food within the stories. The ending of this short played Broken Aesop for laughs by having a shot of children at home reading books and ignoring their TV, prompting Dizzy to poke his head out of their set and turn it off.
- One Beer sees Buster coercing Hamton and Plucky into a cold one and admitting it's radically out of character for him in the same breath. They proceed to get entirely sloshed on 1/3 a beer each, become smelly, slurring hobos, steal a cop car, joyride it off a cliff into a graveyard, and die. At the end of the episode, it pulls back to the studio as they pull off their "angel" costumes, mention that a very important lesson has been taught, and hope they can be funny again in the next episode. However, it's preceded by an Anvilicious short about smoking that seems to be less about the actual health hazards posed and more about how to harass people you think are doing something objectionable into giving in to your nagging. [There was a link to the episode here, but it has been removed because the video is no longer available on You Tube.]
- Sadly, as the series went on and they ran out of ideas, they played it straighter. Witness the whaling episode or the episode against Moral Guardians.
- Given a nod in the Big Wolf On Campus episode The Sandman Cometh: "They did four Very Special Episodes in a row... it was an emotional workout."
- "Disney's Doug" played it straight on the episode when Patti Mayonnaise and friends dealt with anorexia. Generally a little more highly-regarded than many other examples on this list, since Patti & crew are the perfect characters to tackle the issue, anorexia was a big problem among the target demographic at the time of airing, and the episode does a fairly good job addressing the issue at hand.
- Teen Titans had an episode centered around racism, which has Action Girl Starfire repeatedly being put down by an Aloof Ally that called her "Troq"... the equivalent of "the N Word" for Tamaranians.
- An Arthur episode titled The Great Mac Grady has the kids finding out lunchlady Mrs. Mac Grady has been diagnosed with cancer.
- Parodied in South Park where
one of Kenny's many deaths the death of Kenny was played as a Very Special Episode. Also a subversion of their own Running Gag.
- Beavis and Butt-head had one called "A Very Special Episode" where they nurse a sick bird back to health so it will die.
- Batman Beyond had so many teen drug episodes it's hard to call them 'very special,' but they all have that tone to them that makes them seem to count. Then again, one of them was a 'excessive fashion statements = drugs' episode, and one of them was a 'video games = drugs' episode. And then there was the 'adoption / stalking' episode. And a couple of bullying episodes, although those are more just an excuse to have someone ELSE Terry knows from school go insane in a way that involves Batman.
- Batman Beyond always seemed to operate on addiction is easy, not something equals drugs. It always felt more like the special episodes were saying don't get too involved in something, not this equals drugs.
- Batman: The Animated Series had a very special episode in the form of "It's Never Too Late", which features two brothers: one grew up to become a priest, the other a criminal. Flashbacks reveal that, as a child, the Priest sacrificed his leg to save his brother, as such the criminal never lived it down. A very special episode about second chances and brotherly luv.
- Harvey Bird Man Attorney At Law spoofed an episode where they used Peanut "discovering" his super-powers as an euphenism for...growing UP.
- The Powerpuff Girls had an episode in which Chemical X was giving kids super powers temporarily, and causing an addiction.(Mojo Jonesin')
- Another episode went under the title "A Very Special Blossom" and detailed the consequences of Blossom stealing golf clubs for a Father's Day present.
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