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** An Episode? Every episode!
-> "But Sam don't you see? This is so serious I'm going to quote a load of statistics at you so the audience know how serious it is."
-> "But Sam don't you see? This is so serious I'm going to quote a load of statistics at you so the audience know how serious it is."
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* ''EleventhHour'': The episode with the Flesh Eating STD.
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* ''EleventhHour'': ''Series/EleventhHour'': The episode with the Flesh Eating STD.
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* Pick any VerySpecialEpisode of ''ADifferentWorld''. The one-hour LA Riots episode that's a borderline roundtable in a SitCom, the MusicalEpisode that spoofed the 1992 Presidential election, TheRashomon episode involving Ron, Dwayne and other students from a rival school...
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* Pick any VerySpecialEpisode of ''ADifferentWorld''.''Series/ADifferentWorld''. The one-hour LA Riots episode that's a borderline roundtable in a SitCom, the MusicalEpisode that spoofed the 1992 Presidential election, TheRashomon episode involving Ron, Dwayne and other students from a rival school...
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*** Just to clarify, Sati never said or implied she didn't care for truth, or that she's only doing it to get Picard. She went after Picard, only after he stood up to her and tried to stop her.
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* ''Series/MythQuest'' was an edutainment show, but usually avoided these kinds of messages. However, "Be yourself, and don't go to crazy lengths to be beautiful" was spelled out several times in one episode. "Feeling beautiful on the inside" was actually said verbatim by one character.
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\"Stop not putting periods at the end of quotes, it\'s very distracting\"
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** Noting that all the androgynous aliens were portrayed by women [[http://www.cracked.com/article_17317_star-treks-6-most-ridiculous-alien-races_p2.html Cracked.com]] notes: "The episode's message ends up completely garbled. Intended as a condemnation of homophobia, the episode instead comes off as the story of one woman's brave quest for cock in the face of lesbian tyranny"
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** Noting that all the androgynous aliens were portrayed by women [[http://www.cracked.com/article_17317_star-treks-6-most-ridiculous-alien-races_p2.html Cracked.com]] notes: "The episode's message ends up completely garbled. Intended as a condemnation of homophobia, the episode instead comes off as the story of one woman's brave quest for cock in the face of lesbian tyranny"tyranny."
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** Historical references, too: In one episode, after signing a treaty with the Centauri an Earth diplomat says, [[NevilleChamberlain "There will be peace in our time"]]. Three guesses as to what happens next.
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** Historical references, too: In one episode, after signing a treaty with the Centauri an Earth diplomat says, [[NevilleChamberlain "There will be peace in our time"]]. time."]] Three guesses as to what happens next.
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** Historical references, too: In one episode, after signing a treaty with the Centauri an Earth diplomat says, [[NevilleChamberlain "There will be peace in our time]]. Three guesses as to what happens next.
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** Historical references, too: In one episode, after signing a treaty with the Centauri an Earth diplomat says, [[NevilleChamberlain "There will be peace in our time]].time"]]. Three guesses as to what happens next.
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** Historical references, too: In one episode, after signing a treaty with the Centauri an Earth diplomat says, [[NevilleChamberlain "There will be peace in our time]]. Three guesses as to what happens next.
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* ''LawAndOrder'' and it's spin-offs are not noted for subtlety. ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion violence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.
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* ''LawAndOrder'' ''Series/LawAndOrder'' and it's its spin-offs are not noted for subtlety. ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion violence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.
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* The New Zealand TV soap ''Shortland Street'' does this ''all the time''. The 1998 episode in which Jenny Harrison appeared on a television show to rant about the poor state of the New Zealand health service is probably the most anvilicious scene of Shortland Street in its 16-year history.
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* The New Zealand TV soap ''Shortland Street'' ''ShortlandStreet'' does this ''all the time''. The 1998 episode in which Jenny Harrison appeared on a television show to rant about the poor state of the New Zealand health service is probably the most anvilicious scene of Shortland Street in its 16-year history.
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* ''Now and Again'' lasted only one season but it still had its own offender, "There Are No Words", about how good it is to read (and write). It features characters who [[ThatMakesMeFeelAngry comment at length]] about their affection for books, and an obligatory book-burning scene.
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* ''Now and Again'' ''Series/NowAndAgain'' lasted only one season but it still had its own offender, "There Are No Words", about how good it is to read (and write). It features characters who [[ThatMakesMeFeelAngry comment at length]] about their affection for books, and an obligatory book-burning scene.
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* The season one finale of ''Arrow'' dropped it really heavy; speeding through a virtual riot in the middle of the night, with cars and people screaming and running in all directions to escape an artificially-made earthquake that's set to level and entire portion of the city in a matter of minutes, one character is seen using his phone while driving, only to be chastised by his girlfriend that "It can wait!" (the current slogan of an anti texting and driving PSA campaign), and grabbing the phone out of his hand saying "it's not worth the risk!" They might as well have flashed the campaign logo up there and had one of them break the fourth wall to tell us to call a hotline for more information.
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* The season one finale of ''Arrow'' ''Series/{{Arrow}}'' dropped it really heavy; speeding through a virtual riot in the middle of the night, with cars and people screaming and running in all directions to escape an artificially-made earthquake that's set to level and entire portion of the city in a matter of minutes, one character is seen using his phone while driving, only to be chastised by his girlfriend that "It can wait!" (the current slogan of an anti texting and driving PSA campaign), and grabbing the phone out of his hand saying "it's not worth the risk!" They might as well have flashed the campaign logo up there and had one of them break the fourth wall to tell us to call a hotline for more information.
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* ''HarrysLaw'' tends to shoot anvil-firing guns at the viewers, with most of the main characters' arguments tending to be far more aimed at the audience in front of the TV than the audiences in the courtroom. However, StrawmanHasAPoint tends to flipflop, where the characters will often be right, but the defense will also put up some legitimate points, making their arguments stand up a little more.
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* ''HarrysLaw'' ''Series/HarrysLaw'' tends to shoot anvil-firing guns at the viewers, with most of the main characters' arguments tending to be far more aimed at the audience in front of the TV than the audiences in the courtroom. However, StrawmanHasAPoint tends to flipflop, where the characters will often be right, but the defense will also put up some legitimate points, making their arguments stand up a little more.
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** As Ben Shapiro noted in ''Primetime Propaganda'', this was actually due to ExecutiveMeddling, as CAIR had started to raise holy heck when Season 4 established a central part of the season's "threat" as an Islamist sleeper cell.
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** As Ben Shapiro noted in ''Primetime Propaganda'', this was actually due to ExecutiveMeddling, as CAIR had started to raise holy heck when Season 4 established a central part of the season's "threat" "threat", from the beginning, as an Islamist sleeper cell.cell...and the BigBad is NOT a white CorruptCorporateExecutive like in Season 2.
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* Norman Lear practically pioneered the trope for American prime-time TV. ''AllInTheFamily'', ''{{Maude}}'', ''GoodTimes'', ''SanfordAndSon'', ''OneDayAtATime'', and ''TheJeffersons'' were all thick with Anvilicious plots and [[AuthorTract Points To Be Made.]] So were his later series, but by then people had become less tolerant of his anvils. Then again, ''AllInTheFamily,'' ''SanfordAndSon,'' and ''TheJeffersons'' had highly sympathetic bigots, which lightened the intended anvils in those series. Which in many ways led to the extreme right-wing and/or racist {{Misaimed Fandom}}s that followed Archie, Fred, George, etc. to the point where paid-up Democrat Carroll O'Connor {{lampshaded}} and subverted the trope in an anti-racist PublicServiceAnnouncement for [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3HBR4r9r-g B'Nai B'rith]] in 1990.
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* Norman Lear Creator/NormanLear practically pioneered the trope for American prime-time TV. ''AllInTheFamily'', ''{{Maude}}'', ''GoodTimes'', ''Series/AllInTheFamily'', ''Series/{{Maude}}'', ''Series/GoodTimes'', ''SanfordAndSon'', ''OneDayAtATime'', ''Series/OneDayAtATime'', and ''TheJeffersons'' ''Series/TheJeffersons'' were all thick with Anvilicious plots and [[AuthorTract Points To Be Made.]] So were his later series, but by then people had become less tolerant of his anvils. Then again, ''AllInTheFamily,'' ''SanfordAndSon,'' 'Series/'AllInTheFamily,'' ''Series/SanfordAndSon,'' and ''TheJeffersons'' ''Series/TheJeffersons'' had highly sympathetic bigots, which lightened the intended anvils in those series. Which in many ways led to the extreme right-wing and/or racist {{Misaimed Fandom}}s that followed Archie, Fred, George, etc. to the point where paid-up Democrat Carroll O'Connor {{lampshaded}} and subverted the trope in an anti-racist PublicServiceAnnouncement for [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3HBR4r9r-g B'Nai B'rith]] in 1990.
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Added Power Rangers Megaforce example
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* The season one finale of ''Arrow'' dropped it really heavy; speeding through a virtual riot in the middle of the night, with cars and people screaming and running in all directions to escape an artificially-made earthquake that's set to level and entire portion of the city in a matter of minutes, one character is seen using his phone while driving, only to be chastised by his girlfriend that "It can wait!" (the current slogan of an anti texting and driving PSA campaign), and grabbing the phone out of his hand saying "it's not worth the risk!" They might as well have flashed the campaign logo up there and had one of them break the third wall to tell us to call a hotline for more information.
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* The season one finale of ''Arrow'' dropped it really heavy; speeding through a virtual riot in the middle of the night, with cars and people screaming and running in all directions to escape an artificially-made earthquake that's set to level and entire portion of the city in a matter of minutes, one character is seen using his phone while driving, only to be chastised by his girlfriend that "It can wait!" (the current slogan of an anti texting and driving PSA campaign), and grabbing the phone out of his hand saying "it's not worth the risk!" They might as well have flashed the campaign logo up there and had one of them break the third fourth wall to tell us to call a hotline for more information.
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* ''PowerRangersMegaforce'' has the episode "Robo Knight" where the Rangers are appalled that humans are polluting the earth, the [[MonsterOfTheWeek monsters of the week]] are created as a direct result of a toxic factory polluting the earth, and the SixthRanger is introduced whose sole mission in life is to punish those who pollute the earth. About every third line hammers home the message, just in case kids didn't get it.
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** A particularly notorious example had the characters in ''SVU'' suddenly start [[TakeThat verbally trashing]]--by name--RushLimbaugh, Glenn Beck, and [[TheOReillyFactor Bill O'Reilly]] as [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech "a cancer spreading ignorance and hate"]]. Needless to say, O'Reilly in particular was not amused.
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** A particularly notorious example had the characters in ''SVU'' suddenly start [[TakeThat verbally trashing]]--by name--RushLimbaugh, Glenn Beck, GlennBeck, and [[TheOReillyFactor Bill O'Reilly]] as [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech "a cancer spreading ignorance and hate"]]. Needless to say, O'Reilly in particular was not amused.
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** The season three one-shot episode ''Isaac and Ishmael'' drew a lot of criticism for this, managing at the same time to be patronizing towards non-radical Muslims and to gloss over the complexities of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
** ''Series/TheNewsroom'' has this as one of two primary criticisms: many critics argue that Sorkin seems to be just lecturing everyone about the "proper role" of the news media without really knowing what he's talking about, and belittling the actual work of journalists by having his fictional ones make long, elaborate speeches about what to do and always be right. (The other criticism is [[MostWritersAreMale a failure to write strong, convincing, and convincingly strong female characters]].)
** ''Series/TheNewsroom'' has this as one of two primary criticisms: many critics argue that Sorkin seems to be just lecturing everyone about the "proper role" of the news media without really knowing what he's talking about, and belittling the actual work of journalists by having his fictional ones make long, elaborate speeches about what to do and always be right. (The other criticism is [[MostWritersAreMale a failure to write strong, convincing, and convincingly strong female characters]].)
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** ''Series/TheNewsroom'' has this as one of two primary criticisms: many critics argue that Sorkin seems to be just lecturing everyone about the "proper role" of the news media without really knowing what he's talking
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* ''MacGyver'' had several of these episodes. Mostly about the environment.
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* ''Series/PennAndTellerBullshit'' runs on this, given the premise. The most extreme example probably being the animal rights episode where they basically say ''the head of PETA supports arson''. On the other hand, they admit up-front that they aren't even ''trying'' for fairness, and they usually aim at providing proof (for example, with the above claim, they note several financial links between PETA and animal rights extremists like the Animal Liberation Front).
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* ''Series/PennAndTellerBullshit'' runs on this, given the premise. The most extreme example probably being the animal rights episode where they basically say ''the head of PETA supports arson''. On the other hand, they admit up-front that they aren't even ''trying'' for fairness, and they usually aim at providing some proof (for example, with the above claim, they note several links between PETA and animal rights extremists).
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** As Ben Shapiro noted in ''Primetime Propaganda'', this was actually due to ExecutiveMeddling, as CAIR had started to raise holy heck when Season 4 established a central part of the season't "threat" as an Islamist sleeper cell.
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** As Ben Shapiro noted in ''Primetime Propaganda'', this was actually due to ExecutiveMeddling, as CAIR had started to raise holy heck when Season 4 established a central part of the season't season's "threat" as an Islamist sleeper cell.
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* ''LawAndOrder'' and it's spin-offs are not noted for subtelty ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion violence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.
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* ''LawAndOrder'' and it's spin-offs are not noted for subtelty subtlety. ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion violence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.life.
** A particularly notorious example had the characters in ''SVU'' suddenly start [[TakeThat verbally trashing]]--by name--RushLimbaugh, Glenn Beck, and [[TheOReillyFactor Bill O'Reilly]] as [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech "a cancer spreading ignorance and hate"]]. Needless to say, O'Reilly in particular was not amused.
** A particularly notorious example had the characters in ''SVU'' suddenly start [[TakeThat verbally trashing]]--by name--RushLimbaugh, Glenn Beck, and [[TheOReillyFactor Bill O'Reilly]] as [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech "a cancer spreading ignorance and hate"]]. Needless to say, O'Reilly in particular was not amused.
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** As Ben Shapiro noted in ''Primetime Propaganda'', this was actually due to ExecutiveMeddling, as CAIR had started to raise holy heck when Season 4 established a central part of the season't "threat" as an Islamist sleeper cell.
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* ''{{Dragnet}}'' was loaded with anvils,often purposely by Jack Webb.
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* ''{{Dragnet}}'' ''Franchise/{{Dragnet}}'' was loaded with anvils,often anvils, often purposely by Jack Webb.
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* ''LawAndOrder'' and it's spin-offs are not noted for subtelty ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion vilence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.
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* ''LawAndOrder'' and it's spin-offs are not noted for subtelty ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion vilence violence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.
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* A recent episode of ''UglyBetty'' basically had the message "cults are bad, they'll take all your money, and they'll [[ForTheEvulz drug you for no real reason]]." Most episodes have at least one kind of social message that the writers pound into our heads repeatedly, but this one was just really blatant (and annoying).
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* A recent An episode of ''UglyBetty'' basically had the message "cults are bad, they'll take all your money, and they'll [[ForTheEvulz drug you for no real reason]]." Most episodes have at least one kind of social message that the writers pound into our heads repeatedly, but this one was just really blatant (and annoying).
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* The season one finale of ''Arrow'' dropped it really heavy; speeding through a virtual riot in the middle of the night, with cars and people screaming and running in all directions to escape an artificially-made earthquake that's set to level and entire portion of the city in a matter of minutes, one character is seen using his phone while driving, only to be chastised by his girlfriend that "It can wait!" (the current slogan of an anti texting and driving PSA campaign), and grabbing the phone out of his hand saying "it's not worth the risk!" They might as well have flashed the campaign logo up there and had one of them break the third wall to tell us to call a hotline for more information.
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* While the cable anthology horror series ''MastersOfHorror'' tends toward good old-fashioned gore and nudity, Season One's ''Homecoming,'' directed by Joe Dante (of ''Film/{{Gremlins}}'' and ''Film/TheHowling'' fame), is anvilicious to the extreme. For no clear reason, the soldiers killed in Iraq rise from their graves as shambling zombies -- not to eat us, but simply to ''vote against the current president.'' The supporting characters are all [[CaptainErsatz pastiches]] of RealLife political heavyweights (Karl Rove becomes "Kurt Rand," Ann Coulter is [[BlondeRepublicanSexKitten "Jane Cleaver"]]). When the zombies garner enough sympathy to sway public opinions, [[spoiler:and the election outcome favors the opposition, the zombies' votes are thrown out to skew the results (in Ohio and Florida, natch).]] Of course, the zombies won't stand for this, and [[spoiler: suddenly ''all'' of America's war dead (all the way back to the ''Civil War'') rise from the grave to get revenge.]]
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* While the cable anthology horror series ''MastersOfHorror'' ''Series/MastersOfHorror'' tends toward good old-fashioned gore and nudity, Season One's ''Homecoming,'' directed by Joe Dante (of ''Film/{{Gremlins}}'' and ''Film/TheHowling'' fame), is anvilicious to the extreme. For no clear reason, the soldiers killed in Iraq rise from their graves as shambling zombies -- not to eat us, but simply to ''vote against the current president.'' The supporting characters are all [[CaptainErsatz pastiches]] of RealLife political heavyweights (Karl Rove becomes "Kurt Rand," Ann Coulter is [[BlondeRepublicanSexKitten "Jane Cleaver"]]). When the zombies garner enough sympathy to sway public opinions, [[spoiler:and the election outcome favors the opposition, the zombies' votes are thrown out to skew the results (in Ohio and Florida, natch).]] Of course, the zombies won't stand for this, and [[spoiler: suddenly ''all'' of America's war dead (all the way back to the ''Civil War'') rise from the grave to get revenge.]]
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** Also ironic is that a couple decades before this episode established a non-monetary economy for the Federation, an early draft of ''The Trouble with Tribbles'' had the following exchange (according to WordOfGod):
-->'''Baris''': After all, my taxes pay your salary. I'm your boss.\\
'''Kirk''': Then I'd like a raise.
-->'''Baris''': After all, my taxes pay your salary. I'm your boss.\\
'''Kirk''': Then I'd like a raise.
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* Subverted by the premise of ''{{Seinfeld}}'', which relied on the mandate "No hugging, no learning." Demonstrated especially in the last episode, in which the four characters [[spoiler:end up in prison specifically for being assholes completely lacking in empathy, and pretty much continue to behave in the same way they had throughout the series. And of course, this angers the audience into one great big WhatTheHellHero reaction.]]
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* Subverted by the premise of ''{{Seinfeld}}'', ''Series/{{Seinfeld}}'', which relied on the mandate "No hugging, no learning." Demonstrated especially in the last episode, in which the four characters [[spoiler:end up in prison specifically for being assholes completely lacking in empathy, and pretty much continue to behave in the same way they had throughout the series. And of course, this angers the audience into one great big WhatTheHellHero reaction.]]
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* ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' season 5 episode "Tribes" had a rather heavy handed religious tolerance message that was hammered home 3 different times over the course of the episode.
* Literally just about ''every'' sitcom or drama since 1970 has had at least one "DrugsAreBad, mmmkay?" VerySpecialEpisode. Many have had several.
* ''FullHouse'' invariably ended in someone learning [[AnAesop a lesson]]. Usually 'it's okay to pick on Kimmy Gibbler'.
** ''FamilyMatters'' was just as bad, especially during its first six or so seasons. With the episodes "Like A Virgin" and "The Gun" being the most {{Egregious}} examples.
* ''Series/BabylonFive'' had a really terrible habit of giving things away by dropping literary references and allusions that bludgeoned the viewer with the message.
** The first season even has an episode ("Infection") where the captain defeats an alien super soldier made by an ancient race of Space Nazis by lecturing it while it's shooting at him until it realizes that yes, clearly Space Nazism is a flawed ideology. The episode is widely regarded as the worst episode of the show, period. It was the 4th episode shown, but the first one written and the first one shot. Even the JMS felt that it was too anvilicious, and said that if they'd had enough scripts to be able to do so, he probably wouldn't have shot it at all. [[http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/guide/004.html#JS Clicky]]
** Just how obvious did those literary references get, you ask? Well, the Earth Alliance's shift to fascism featured the creation of a new, frightening political department: [[Literature/NineteenEightyFour the Ministry of Peace]]. No, they didn't change the name or anything.
** Creator/JMichaelStraczynski was very blunt in how he much he hated children or anything cute that would supposedly ruin the show, evident by how they were all [[DroppedABridgeOnHim instantly killed in quite jarring ways]]. Even a teddy bear given to him as a joke.
* ''BoyMeetsWorld'' had many anvilicious [[AnAesop aesops]], particularly of the CantGetAwayWithNuthin variety. Perhaps it was the force of all those anvils that led the main character to be so unhinged in the final seasons.
* Virtually anything written by Ben Elton feels the distinct need to tell rather than show. The good ones are funny enough to still be entertaining, the bad ones...
* An episode of ''{{Quincy}}'' when the guy pauses for effect... then declares the cause of death as Punk Rock.
* Pick an episode of ''Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch''. Generally it will have a hamfisted moral about how using magic to solve your problems is immoral unless you're not Sabrina. Surprisingly, the AnimatedAdaptation is far less so. The format allowed a lot more outrageous situations, which make the [[AnAesop moral of each episode]] make some sort of sense.
* ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'':
** The original series was unique for its era in that it was likely the only show [[EverybodySmokes in which no one smoked]]. GeneRoddenberry had originally cast Majel Barrett as the second in command of the Enterprise, a feminist first for the time, but was put under pressure by his producers to put cigarettes into the show. He refused, so they gave him the ultimatum, cigarettes or Majel. Majel did finally make it in in a more traditional role as Nurse Chapel.
** Another tale mentioned in several sources (including [[WilliamShatner Shatner's]] autobiography Star Trek Memories) has it that the network's ultimatum was the alien Spock or the woman officer. Roddenberry went with Spock.
** "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", concerning a race where people who were black-skinned on the left side of their face and white-skinned on the right, were persecuted by the people who were white on the left and black on the right. Anviltastic!
** Another Original Trek episode: "The Omega Glory", described rather accurately by [[http://www.cracked.com/article_17317_p2.html cracked.com]] as "It's common for aliens in the Trek universe to be metaphors created to address contemporary political or cultural issues, but in the case of the Kohms and Yangs subtlety was set on fire, strapped to a dump truck full of dynamite and rolled off a cliff."
** At the height of the VietnamWar, the episode "A Taste of Armageddon" was set in a planet whose two nations were involved in a decades-long, computer-simulated war: citizens of both nations, when "killed" in a simulated attack, obediently marched into disintegration booths. Body counts are bad, mmmkay?
* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'':
** The ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "The Neutral Zone" went anvilicious against the capitalists of the era on its way to demonstrating through Picard's actions that what Kirk did in the corresponding TOS episode was wrong. Gets {{Funny Aneurysm Moment}}s from [[BrokenAesop later events]]; Data proudly announces that the Federation has no television--but it will eventually come out that holodecks are, in their way, worse.
** ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Symbiosis", where Species A is saving Species B from a deadly virus that hasn't existed in centuries by selling them [[RecycledInSpace space crack]], and we learn that doing drugs is bad. It even includes a bonus speech to Wesley about just why drugs are bad. The speech is hilariously taken out of context on YTMND, where it appears [[http://stardrugs.ytmnd.com/ Tasha appreciates drugs]].
** Another TNG episode: In the fourth season "Drumhead", we get an entire episode focused on an overzealous starfleet admiral going on a witch hunt in the Enterprise to find an accomplice of a spy working for the Romulans, accusing an innocent crewman who has the misfortune of being the grandson of a Romulan, and even accusing Picard. A blatant Aesop against those same witchhunts. Even once the evidence proved that the explosion setting off the investigation was an accident, the admiral all but admitted that she didn't care about the truth, only about bringing down Picard for no apparent reason. (Leading to an anvilicious but awesome speech by Picard [[SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped on the subject of the state placing limitations on a person's liberty]] and how a stand must be taken to prevent the state from going too far. Bonus points was that Picard was quoting the admiral's ''father''.)
*** Just to clarify, Sati never said or implied she didn't care for truth, or that she's only doing it to get Picard. She went after Picard, only after he stood up to her and tried to stop her.
** TNG Episode "Force of Nature" about warp drive being dangerous to the fabric of the Universe. Comparing the ozone hole to the destruction of the universe. Real subtle, guys.
** Yet another TNG episode, "The Outcast", had a member of an androgynous species fall for Riker. Turns out she identifies herself as female, which on her planet is considered a psychological disorder. Naturally she's found out and gives a [[AuthorFilibuster long, cliched speech]] about how she shouldn't be considered a "deviant", and how you can't dictate "how people love each other".
** Noting that all the androgynous aliens were portrayed by women [[http://www.cracked.com/article_17317_star-treks-6-most-ridiculous-alien-races_p2.html Cracked.com]] notes: "The episode's message ends up completely garbled. Intended as a condemnation of homophobia, the episode instead comes off as the story of one woman's brave quest for cock in the face of lesbian tyranny"
* ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'':
** A network enforced example: an episode was such an Anvilicious AIDS parable that they went and plugged an AIDS website after the episode.
** An Enterprise episode featured religious fanatics whose planet was a smoking ruin because of a schism over whether creation was nine days or ten. The Aesop being, of course, "[[TheSimpsons The little stupid differences are nothing compared to the big stupid similarities!]]", but worked in with a loud thudding sound.
* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'':
** "In the Hands of the Prophets" is an anvilicious reference to the nonsense of religious dogma and the detrimental effects of having it influence politics. While lip service is played to tolerance, Winn quickly went JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope to the point of terrorism.
** The two parter "Past Tense" was so Anvilicious about the homeless being ignored that when Sisko was delivering his lines at the end of the episode asking how society could get that far, it seemed that he was going to look right in the camera and start addressing the audience directly.
** The episode "Melora" was blatantly Anvilicious, repeatedly hammering home the point that being in a wheelchair doesn't make you any less of a person. You'd think seeing all those alien races would make such a disability seem positively ordinary.
* Norman Lear practically pioneered the trope for American prime-time TV. ''AllInTheFamily'', ''{{Maude}}'', ''GoodTimes'', ''SanfordAndSon'', ''OneDayAtATime'', and ''TheJeffersons'' were all thick with Anvilicious plots and [[AuthorTract Points To Be Made.]] So were his later series, but by then people had become less tolerant of his anvils. Then again, ''AllInTheFamily,'' ''SanfordAndSon,'' and ''TheJeffersons'' had highly sympathetic bigots, which lightened the intended anvils in those series. Which in many ways led to the extreme right-wing and/or racist {{Misaimed Fandom}}s that followed Archie, Fred, George, etc. to the point where paid-up Democrat Carroll O'Connor {{lampshaded}} and subverted the trope in an anti-racist PublicServiceAnnouncement for [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3HBR4r9r-g B'Nai B'rith]] in 1990.
* The New Zealand TV soap ''Shortland Street'' does this ''all the time''. The 1998 episode in which Jenny Harrison appeared on a television show to rant about the poor state of the New Zealand health service is probably the most anvilicious scene of Shortland Street in its 16-year history.
* You can include the entire ''Franchise/{{Degrassi}}'' franchise in this, the result of creator Linda Schuyler trying to make a series that would showcase the effects of certain issues on children. Famous examples of Anvilicious behaviour in the franchise include Dwayne having to deal with AIDS and Shane (a.k.a. "Canada's national baby daddy") dropping acid and jumping off a bridge in ''Series/DegrassiHigh'', and Manny getting an abortion in ''Series/DegrassiTheNextGeneration''. So someone jumps off a bridge and/or has an abortion every episode? Pretty much. It gets worse in the spinoff, at least when [[TheScrappy Emma]] was always there to deliver a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech.
* [[Creator/{{NBC}} Green Is Universal]], a concept so heavy-handed and self-righteous that it couldn't be contained on just one network. Indeed, this bi-yearly theme appears on every cable and broadcast channel owned by NBC. NBC in turn is owned by General Electric, a polluter so massive and frightening that even CaptainPlanet would fear to confront it. [[{{Hypocrisy}} The irony]] is so thick and juicy that you could cut it with a steak knife.
** Bonus points awarded for extending it to, of all things, their ''sports casting'' when they thought it was a good idea to make the guys sit around in the studio with their lights off.
** Except that they paid whatever minuscule environmental benefit all back, with massive interest, by [[http://www.moonbattery.com/archives/2007/11/nbcs_global_war.html flying to the Arctic to film a promo]]. Unless they faked it (the reporter's breath has no fog), in which case they're scamming the audience.
** ''Series/ThirtyRock'', being set at NBC and with a character (Jack Donaghy) meant in part to mock this kind of corporate thinking, has made a tradition of lampshading/parodying this every year (in the same way as it lampshades/parodies ProductPlacement).
** Season 1's "Greenzo," where David Schwimmer is a mascot who tries to put a positive spin on GE's corporate practices; he ends up going ''actually'' environmental.
** Again the following year, when Jack mocks the idea of NBC acknowledging the environment, and even calls attention to the fact that one of the only noticeable differences during the week is that the NBC logo turns green.
** General Electric stands to make a huge profit off of manufacturing "Green" products (e.g. high-efficiency home appliances and low-emission aircraft engines and locomotives). Thus, they are promoting their own products by telling consumers that they should be green.
* ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'':
** "Pangs", where Willow rants about how evil Thanksgiving is and how every person is responsible for the wrongs committed against Native Americans. This is taken to the point where she doesn't want the team to stop a murderous Native American ghost. Finally the evil, soulless vampire Spike tells her to quit bitching, since what happened to the "bloody Indians" was no different than what happened to every other conquered nation throughout human history.
** "Beer Bad" was also anvilicious, but at least had the decency to [[LampshadeHanging hang an amusing lampshade]] on that aspect of the episode:
--->'''Xander''': And was there a lesson in all of this? What have we learned about beer?\\
'''Buffy''': Foamy!\\
'''Xander''': Good. Just so that's clear.
** Ironically, the episode was intended to have a clear moral, as the writers participated in an competition to write a storyline that (realistically) brought up the dangers of drinking... and were disqualified, because every complication is caused by supernatural influences rather than the beer itself.
** The drugs/magic episode, "Wrecked", is probably the most blatant metaphor in the whole show.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'' during the years that Andrew Cartmel was script editor (1987-1989) had a tendency to be a bit on-the-nose about how 'right-on' the show was. In 2010 this was admitted by people who worked on the show and who claimed they had filled the [=McCoy=]/Seventh era (1987-89) with attacks on the Thatcher government. This "revelation" was largely treated with derision, firstly for the sheer hubris of those involved (''Doctor Who'''s days as a national favourite were well behind it and the audience by the late '80s consisted of hardcore fans and kids, neither of whom were a large voting block) and secondly because this was barely a secret since the attacks on Thatcherism had all the subtlety of, well, an anvil. Add in the fact that a LOT of shows were attacking Thatcher, so it was also a bit of "yeah, you and a thousand other blokes."
* ''Series/TorchwoodChildrenOfEarth'' delivers one of these about School League Tables, when [[spoiler: they are used to determine the worst ten percent of the nations' children to round up to be taken away and used as drugs by a hostile alien race. Yes, that's right, ranking schools results in mass murder (of a sort at least).]]
* ''TheAndromedaStrain 2008'' remake as a TV miniseries changed the novel's white scientists to a race-mixed cast with one homosexual member who keeps his head cool when others don't. Director Robert Shenkkan, true to form, claimed it was his "obligation" to do so.[[note]] Shenkkan's full quote: "If you're going to update the story, which is our mandate, you have an obligation to reflect the world as it is." There are gay scientists, there are scientists who aren't white. There wasn't a line where someone went 'Hey, isn't it great we work in such a diverse environment 'cos we'd sure as hell stand no chance of defeating this killer virus from the stars if we was all straight honkies', was there, hmmmmmnn?[[/note]]
* ''Series/TwentyFour'' often runs afoul of this, whenever the show is focused on anything other than [[MemeticBadass Jack Bauer kicking ass]]. One long-running anvil throughout the latter half of the series is the message that not all Muslims are terrorists. This began in Season 4 with a filler episode where Jack Bauer and Paul Raines (on the run from paramilitary commandos working for a defense contractor) hole up in a downtown L.A. sporting goods store, which is guarded by a pair of Muslim brothers who repeatedly state that they are not terrorists, and that they will protect America at any cost. This was followed by a PSA in which Kiefer Sutherland opined the same message. In Season 6, [[DamselScrappy preachy side characters]] (including a government informant and a CTU analyst named Nadia) were also added to the cast to hammer home this message.
* The (very short-lived) ''TheWeirdAlShow'', thanks to a rampaging case of ExecutiveMeddling, had one specific lesson for each episode to teach, and that lesson was mercilessly repeated to the point of drawing attention to it in voice-overs before each commercial break. Half of the enjoyment of the DVD release comes from the scathing commentary of Al and others on the anvilicious display of insipid points.
* ''Now and Again'' lasted only one season but it still had its own offender, "There Are No Words", about how good it is to read (and write). It features characters who [[ThatMakesMeFeelAngry comment at length]] about their affection for books, and an obligatory book-burning scene.
* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': "Life sucks, get a helmet."
* ''EleventhHour'': The episode with the Flesh Eating STD.
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone'': Several episodes written by RodSerling come off as terribly heavy-handed today ([[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gift_(The_Twilight_Zone) "The Gift"]] is an {{egregious}} example, made worse by casting with UnfortunateImplications)-- but given that Serling created the show due to ExecutiveMeddling with his more socially conscious scripts ([[http://www.ithaca.edu/hs/depts/theatre/news/3163/ the story]] about his script based on the lynching of Emmett Till is a doozy), it may just be that one generation's subversive social commentary is the next generation's dropped anvil. It's easy to forget that Emmett Till's funeral was recent at the time of the script, and that having a righteous black man surrounded by corrupt racists was, well, so out of the ordinary it is amazing it aired. Sometimes it's difficult for those who grew up in the 80s and 90s to remember that some of those classic programs were on the air before (or at the very start of) the civil rights movement. It's jarring to remember that, at the time, showing non-whites as stupid, worthless, and/or actively evil was generally considered ''just fine''.
* While the cable anthology horror series ''MastersOfHorror'' tends toward good old-fashioned gore and nudity, Season One's ''Homecoming,'' directed by Joe Dante (of ''Film/{{Gremlins}}'' and ''Film/TheHowling'' fame), is anvilicious to the extreme. For no clear reason, the soldiers killed in Iraq rise from their graves as shambling zombies -- not to eat us, but simply to ''vote against the current president.'' The supporting characters are all [[CaptainErsatz pastiches]] of RealLife political heavyweights (Karl Rove becomes "Kurt Rand," Ann Coulter is [[BlondeRepublicanSexKitten "Jane Cleaver"]]). When the zombies garner enough sympathy to sway public opinions, [[spoiler:and the election outcome favors the opposition, the zombies' votes are thrown out to skew the results (in Ohio and Florida, natch).]] Of course, the zombies won't stand for this, and [[spoiler: suddenly ''all'' of America's war dead (all the way back to the ''Civil War'') rise from the grave to get revenge.]]
* ''Series/StargateAtlantis'' drops an anvil by having Rodney [=McKay=] say that the real solution to global warming is "everyone doing their part". Then it goes SpaceWhaleAesop.
* ''TheSecretLifeOfTheAmericanTeenager'' does this on an episode-to-episode basis about sex, and a ''scene-to-scene'' basis for [[VerySpecialEpisode the moral of the episode]].
--->"Just because you're having a baby together doesn't mean you two are right for each other"\\
"You shouldn't be with Ricky just because you're having his baby."\\
"The parents of a baby aren't the people who created the baby, but the people who take care of it."\\
...etc.\\
-Various people during the VerySpecialEpisode about baby daddies.
* The final scene of the final episode of the remake of ''[[Series/BattlestarGalacticaReimagined Battlestar Galactica]]'' is a ridiculously anvilicious message about the dangers of overdeveloping modern robotics. Or maybe "Treat your creations with respect", or "do not enslave artificial lifeforms".
* This is a hallmark of Creator/AaronSorkin's writing whenever it has to do with public affairs.
** The characters in ''TheWestWing'' display at times a tendency to really try and hammer the point they're trying to make home.
** The season three one-shot episode ''Isaac and Ishmael'' drew a lot of criticism for this, managing at the same time to be patronizing towards non-radical Muslims and to gloss over the complexities of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
** ''Series/TheNewsroom'' has this as one of two primary criticisms: many critics argue that Sorkin seems to be just lecturing everyone about the "proper role" of the news media without really knowing what he's talking about, and belittling the actual work of journalists by having his fictional ones make long, elaborate speeches about what to do and always be right. (The other criticism is [[MostWritersAreMale a failure to write strong, convincing, and convincingly strong female characters]].)
* ''SeaQuestDSV'' featured an annoying episode involving Lucas and Condoms.
* Subverted by the premise of ''{{Seinfeld}}'', which relied on the mandate "No hugging, no learning." Demonstrated especially in the last episode, in which the four characters [[spoiler:end up in prison specifically for being assholes completely lacking in empathy, and pretty much continue to behave in the same way they had throughout the series. And of course, this angers the audience into one great big WhatTheHellHero reaction.]]
* A recent episode of ''UglyBetty'' basically had the message "cults are bad, they'll take all your money, and they'll [[ForTheEvulz drug you for no real reason]]." Most episodes have at least one kind of social message that the writers pound into our heads repeatedly, but this one was just really blatant (and annoying).
* The ''Series/{{House}}'' DayInTheLife episode focused on Dr. Cuddy is subtle as a brick in its criticism of the current healthcare situation of America.
* ''Series/GreysAnatomy'' might as well be titled ''Grey's Anvils'' given how the writers love this trope to death and have never heard of the word "subtle".
* ''Series/PennAndTellerBullshit'' runs on this, given the premise. The most extreme example probably being the animal rights episode where they basically say ''the head of PETA supports arson''. On the other hand, they admit up-front that they aren't even ''trying'' for fairness, and they usually aim at providing some proof (for example, with the above claim, they note several links between PETA and animal rights extremists).
* ''{{Glee}}'' personifies this trope. It has a theme practically every episode and does not hesitate to beat you over the head with it. Violently.
* By season 6 of ''Series/{{Lost}}'', what with all of Jacob's speeches (the most anvilicious of which was the whole thing where he doesn't assist the islanders in seeing right from wrong because he wants them to figure it out themselves, blah blah), we'll be damned and roasted on a barbie if Jacob isn't some sort of metaphor for God.
* ''{{CSINY}}'' once did an episode about how Nazis and neo-Nazis are evil, and the Holocaust was bad. Not only do they beat you over the head with how horrible the Nazis were at every opportunity, but the climax, where Gary Sinise argues with the episode's culprit (an elderly-Nazi played by Ed Asner) might make you feel like you were hit in the gut with a sledgehammer.
** Then after that whole episode seeming fully researched and every little detail being accurate to history, instead of referring to the national socialists in the finale of the final interview he shouts "JUST SAY IT, YOU WERE IN THE HITLER PARTY WEREN'T YOU"
** Then there have been eps where Gary Sinise worked in his passion for US troops. case in point: 'Fight Night',where a cage fighter fakes his death with the charred body of a homeless vet he may or may not have killed. Mac and someone else talk,and Mac launches into a talk about the problem of America's homeless veterans.
* Pick any VerySpecialEpisode of ''ADifferentWorld''. The one-hour LA Riots episode that's a borderline roundtable in a SitCom, the MusicalEpisode that spoofed the 1992 Presidential election, TheRashomon episode involving Ron, Dwayne and other students from a rival school...
* ''LawAndOrder'' and it's spin-offs are not noted for subtelty ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion vilence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.
* ''Series/WithoutATrace'' employed this trope in an episode made all the more anvilicious in that it painted tens of millions of Americans as terrorist sympathizers. The disappearing person in this episode was a woman who was hiding out because a decade before she had bombed an abortion clinic with the help of her husband. Their crime was [[RippedFromTheHeadlines pretty plainly modeled on scumbag murderer Eric Rudolph's bombing of a clinic in Birmingham, Alabama,]] complete with a horribly maimed nurse and dead security guard, just like Rudolph's attack. From the moment the FBI agents become aware that she was "anti-choice", the anvils were flying, and all of them were engraved "All people who oppose abortion want to kill abortionists. A lot. I mean, really, really a lot". There was even a scene in which Malone meets with a deep cover informant infiltrating "the pro-life movement" (not some splinter group, but the pro-life movement, a movement made up of tens of millions of Americans) and she tells him the husband and wife bomber team are "heroes" to pro-lifers.
* News and news commentary in general can get pretty bad with this trope, but Television news is worse. Televised news commentary takes the cake for anviliciousness, as sending a message about opinion of current events is practically the entire point of the genre.
* This trope is subverted in the ''Series/{{Scrubs}}'' episode 'My Mentor', where J.D's attempts to get a patient to stop smoking are futile. Dr. Cox tells him that the only thing he can do is keep treating whatever messes people get themselves into, rather than trying to 'save' them.
* The US version of ''QueerAsFolk'' was a tutorial on how to be an 'acceptable' gay person in the US, running along the lines of: get married in Canada, don't be bi, don't be angry at homophobes, remember that God loves you after all, adopt children and be nice to your mother.
* ''HarrysLaw'' tends to shoot anvil-firing guns at the viewers, with most of the main characters' arguments tending to be far more aimed at the audience in front of the TV than the audiences in the courtroom. However, StrawmanHasAPoint tends to flipflop, where the characters will often be right, but the defense will also put up some legitimate points, making their arguments stand up a little more.
* Critics have been universally fulsome in their praise for ''MadMen''. But they have a lot of good-natured fun pointing out that the show is way too insistent that women were treated poorly in the late '50s and early '60s, and that was ''awful'', OK?
* ''SaturdayNightLive'' pointed out the same thing in an episode hosted by Jon Hamm. Hamm played his ''MadMen'' character in one sketch, and fellow ''MadMen'' actors John Slattery and Elisabeth Moss guest starred. Hamm asked Moss for the time, and she said, "Oh, I'm just a woman. I'm not allowed to wear a watch in this day and age."
* ''SeventhHeaven'' is pretty bad with hitting viewers over the head with morals in nearly every episode. The most notable example would probably be from the episode "Tunes". When Simon starts taking a liking to rap music, he (and the audience) has to endure lectures from everyone in his family about how rap music promotes violence towards women. At the end, Simon stops listening to rap for this reason. This episode basically stated that if you listen to rap, you're supporting abuse towards women so you need to stop. Needless to say, it left a bad taste in the mouth of many viewers (especially the ones who WERE women that listen to rap music themselves).
* Early on in ''Series/{{Fringe}}'''s fourth season, the dialogue is filled with unsubtle commentary on how it feels like something is missing and there's a void in the world. As if we're going to forget that one of the main characters got [[RetGone erased from existence]] without the other characters talking about it unconconsciously.
* ''[[{{Series/MASH}} M*A*S*H]]'' could be bad about this, especially with any scene with Hawkeye in it. In the Mad Magazine parody, when Hawkeye starts a speech about how War Is Bad, one of the other characters yells "Someone stop him before they start flashing telethon numbers on the screen!"
** Fortunately, the morals were often carefully implanted into the plot and required some digging to reveal, which had the uncanny way of uncovering a character's HiddenDepths- in a very dark and plausible manner. One episode had a soldier who was starving himself to death and refused to eat anything. This poor guy was actually traumatized by one horrible battlefield tragedy- his platoon celebrated a Thanksgiving feast in a foxhole. He ate fast to get seconds... only to discover all his friends were killed by an artillery shell right after he left the foxhole. In his words, he would be dead too, if he wasn't such a pig.
** Another episode involves a stuttering soldier getting heckled by everyone in his platoon. When Winchester catches ear of this, he suddenly comes unhinged and dumps a cascade of pure anger on all of them. Later in that episode, he hears from his sister on a tape-recorded message sent to the 4077th, and we learn what brought on Winchester's fury: his sister suffers the [[NotSoDifferent exact]] [[CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming same]] speech impediment.
** The episode where every main character had a nightmare was a way of interpreting how war had affected them all. Margaret was wounded when her ex left alone to suffer. Sherman wants to return back to the bliss of a long-passed childhood. B.J. feels war is tearing him away from his wife Peg. Charles knows that while people think he's perfect, he's no magician- people will die no matter what he does. Father Mulcahy believes the voice of war is silencing the voice of God, which won't change even if he's the Pope. Klinger finally realizes escaping to Toledo will leave him racked with guilt for abandoning his friends, torn up like the war casualties. Hawkeye feels outright helpless to do anything to stop the killings.
** The penultimate episode was a flat-out tribute to all the things war entails- those who never got home, girls that were left behind, boys who became men, and miracles of life.
** The finale of M*A*S*H* deconstructed the concept of WarIsHell by having a mix traumatic and heartwarming events befall several of the main characters to show that war will have its mark on them, as it does to all who suffer (or enjoy) it- and it gives us a stark reminder of what it's really like to say goodbye for good.
* [[http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6213366/sitcoms-very-special-episodes This College Humor video parodies the trope.]]
* ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'' is ramping this up with MartinShort as Marshall's new Save-the-Environment Boss, and Marshall having to pull him back to the path of righteousness. The {{Narm}} was very thick.
* ''Series/{{Aftermath}}'' has two episodes like this.
** "World Without Oil" has all of the oil reservoirs in the earth disappear overnight. Given the world's dependence on oil, everything goes to shit as the oil-dependent social infrastructure crumbles. It's a large dose of horror and ParanoiaFuel that is obviously meant to get viewers to want something done about the oil crisis as soon as possible.
** "Population Overload" has the world's population suddenly double overnight to 14 billion, causing earthquakes from the large-scale buildings built to accomodate the extra people, smog from the large amount of cars being used, and ruination of the water supply due to strains on the plumbing and attempts to grow enough food to feed the whole world. The narrator even points out the number of people who have died over the years leading up to the "good future" we see at the end of the episode, as well as the fact that some say that 7 billion people is already too many for the planet to support. Kinda [[{{Narm}} narmful]] though, given that in order for the population to ''actually'' double overnight, most or all of the world's women of reproductive age would all have to be simultaneously be pregnant with multiples and give birth to them around the same time, and obviously, each country would have TooManyBabies.
* ''Series/CriminalMinds'':
** "Snake Eyes" was pretty much an hour long statement of how gambling addiction can cost you more than just money.
** "The Pact" established David Rossi as a pro-military man, giving up his vacation days to military men who the character says could use it more than he could. Rossi's military background is expanded in "The Fallen" where he rescues his old Vietnam sergeant, who had become homeless, and helps him get back on his feet (without mentioning the other homeless victims they helped). Although it fits Rossi's character, the episodes' message was contrived and forced, with the underlying message, "[[StrawCivilian support our troops at all costs]]."
* ''TylerPerry's'' ''MeetTheBrowns'' is chock-full of them: shoplifting, carrying a gun to school, growing marijuana, birth control, drinking, molestation, teen pregnancy, credit card over-reliance, and tons of others. At some point, they made it too obvious to miss. "Meet the Interrogation" touched up on how lotto addictions bleed you dry. "Meet The Christmas Spirit" went as far as to play up the Christmas spirit cliche by having an angel befriend Joaquin. But the real hum-dinger was "Meet the Big Payoff," sugarcoating that texting while driving will get you killed, which was basically a thinly-veiled obligatory public service announcement.
* ''{{Dragnet}}'' was loaded with anvils,often purposely by Jack Webb.
* The act of British TV impressionist ''RoryBremner'' used to involve satirical skits that poked fun at members of the British government. However, after Britain's commitment to the Iraqi war in 2003 the majority of his shows turned into anvilicious anti-war bashing of everyone involved. Whole segments involved Bremner simply standing in front of a microphone and talking mostly in his own voice to criticize then Prime Minister Tony Blair and his cabinet.
----
* Literally just about ''every'' sitcom or drama since 1970 has had at least one "DrugsAreBad, mmmkay?" VerySpecialEpisode. Many have had several.
* ''FullHouse'' invariably ended in someone learning [[AnAesop a lesson]]. Usually 'it's okay to pick on Kimmy Gibbler'.
** ''FamilyMatters'' was just as bad, especially during its first six or so seasons. With the episodes "Like A Virgin" and "The Gun" being the most {{Egregious}} examples.
* ''Series/BabylonFive'' had a really terrible habit of giving things away by dropping literary references and allusions that bludgeoned the viewer with the message.
** The first season even has an episode ("Infection") where the captain defeats an alien super soldier made by an ancient race of Space Nazis by lecturing it while it's shooting at him until it realizes that yes, clearly Space Nazism is a flawed ideology. The episode is widely regarded as the worst episode of the show, period. It was the 4th episode shown, but the first one written and the first one shot. Even the JMS felt that it was too anvilicious, and said that if they'd had enough scripts to be able to do so, he probably wouldn't have shot it at all. [[http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/guide/004.html#JS Clicky]]
** Just how obvious did those literary references get, you ask? Well, the Earth Alliance's shift to fascism featured the creation of a new, frightening political department: [[Literature/NineteenEightyFour the Ministry of Peace]]. No, they didn't change the name or anything.
** Creator/JMichaelStraczynski was very blunt in how he much he hated children or anything cute that would supposedly ruin the show, evident by how they were all [[DroppedABridgeOnHim instantly killed in quite jarring ways]]. Even a teddy bear given to him as a joke.
* ''BoyMeetsWorld'' had many anvilicious [[AnAesop aesops]], particularly of the CantGetAwayWithNuthin variety. Perhaps it was the force of all those anvils that led the main character to be so unhinged in the final seasons.
* Virtually anything written by Ben Elton feels the distinct need to tell rather than show. The good ones are funny enough to still be entertaining, the bad ones...
* An episode of ''{{Quincy}}'' when the guy pauses for effect... then declares the cause of death as Punk Rock.
* Pick an episode of ''Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch''. Generally it will have a hamfisted moral about how using magic to solve your problems is immoral unless you're not Sabrina. Surprisingly, the AnimatedAdaptation is far less so. The format allowed a lot more outrageous situations, which make the [[AnAesop moral of each episode]] make some sort of sense.
* ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'':
** The original series was unique for its era in that it was likely the only show [[EverybodySmokes in which no one smoked]]. GeneRoddenberry had originally cast Majel Barrett as the second in command of the Enterprise, a feminist first for the time, but was put under pressure by his producers to put cigarettes into the show. He refused, so they gave him the ultimatum, cigarettes or Majel. Majel did finally make it in in a more traditional role as Nurse Chapel.
** Another tale mentioned in several sources (including [[WilliamShatner Shatner's]] autobiography Star Trek Memories) has it that the network's ultimatum was the alien Spock or the woman officer. Roddenberry went with Spock.
** "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", concerning a race where people who were black-skinned on the left side of their face and white-skinned on the right, were persecuted by the people who were white on the left and black on the right. Anviltastic!
** Another Original Trek episode: "The Omega Glory", described rather accurately by [[http://www.cracked.com/article_17317_p2.html cracked.com]] as "It's common for aliens in the Trek universe to be metaphors created to address contemporary political or cultural issues, but in the case of the Kohms and Yangs subtlety was set on fire, strapped to a dump truck full of dynamite and rolled off a cliff."
** At the height of the VietnamWar, the episode "A Taste of Armageddon" was set in a planet whose two nations were involved in a decades-long, computer-simulated war: citizens of both nations, when "killed" in a simulated attack, obediently marched into disintegration booths. Body counts are bad, mmmkay?
* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'':
** The ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "The Neutral Zone" went anvilicious against the capitalists of the era on its way to demonstrating through Picard's actions that what Kirk did in the corresponding TOS episode was wrong. Gets {{Funny Aneurysm Moment}}s from [[BrokenAesop later events]]; Data proudly announces that the Federation has no television--but it will eventually come out that holodecks are, in their way, worse.
** ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Symbiosis", where Species A is saving Species B from a deadly virus that hasn't existed in centuries by selling them [[RecycledInSpace space crack]], and we learn that doing drugs is bad. It even includes a bonus speech to Wesley about just why drugs are bad. The speech is hilariously taken out of context on YTMND, where it appears [[http://stardrugs.ytmnd.com/ Tasha appreciates drugs]].
** Another TNG episode: In the fourth season "Drumhead", we get an entire episode focused on an overzealous starfleet admiral going on a witch hunt in the Enterprise to find an accomplice of a spy working for the Romulans, accusing an innocent crewman who has the misfortune of being the grandson of a Romulan, and even accusing Picard. A blatant Aesop against those same witchhunts. Even once the evidence proved that the explosion setting off the investigation was an accident, the admiral all but admitted that she didn't care about the truth, only about bringing down Picard for no apparent reason. (Leading to an anvilicious but awesome speech by Picard [[SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped on the subject of the state placing limitations on a person's liberty]] and how a stand must be taken to prevent the state from going too far. Bonus points was that Picard was quoting the admiral's ''father''.)
*** Just to clarify, Sati never said or implied she didn't care for truth, or that she's only doing it to get Picard. She went after Picard, only after he stood up to her and tried to stop her.
** TNG Episode "Force of Nature" about warp drive being dangerous to the fabric of the Universe. Comparing the ozone hole to the destruction of the universe. Real subtle, guys.
** Yet another TNG episode, "The Outcast", had a member of an androgynous species fall for Riker. Turns out she identifies herself as female, which on her planet is considered a psychological disorder. Naturally she's found out and gives a [[AuthorFilibuster long, cliched speech]] about how she shouldn't be considered a "deviant", and how you can't dictate "how people love each other".
** Noting that all the androgynous aliens were portrayed by women [[http://www.cracked.com/article_17317_star-treks-6-most-ridiculous-alien-races_p2.html Cracked.com]] notes: "The episode's message ends up completely garbled. Intended as a condemnation of homophobia, the episode instead comes off as the story of one woman's brave quest for cock in the face of lesbian tyranny"
* ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'':
** A network enforced example: an episode was such an Anvilicious AIDS parable that they went and plugged an AIDS website after the episode.
** An Enterprise episode featured religious fanatics whose planet was a smoking ruin because of a schism over whether creation was nine days or ten. The Aesop being, of course, "[[TheSimpsons The little stupid differences are nothing compared to the big stupid similarities!]]", but worked in with a loud thudding sound.
* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'':
** "In the Hands of the Prophets" is an anvilicious reference to the nonsense of religious dogma and the detrimental effects of having it influence politics. While lip service is played to tolerance, Winn quickly went JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope to the point of terrorism.
** The two parter "Past Tense" was so Anvilicious about the homeless being ignored that when Sisko was delivering his lines at the end of the episode asking how society could get that far, it seemed that he was going to look right in the camera and start addressing the audience directly.
** The episode "Melora" was blatantly Anvilicious, repeatedly hammering home the point that being in a wheelchair doesn't make you any less of a person. You'd think seeing all those alien races would make such a disability seem positively ordinary.
* Norman Lear practically pioneered the trope for American prime-time TV. ''AllInTheFamily'', ''{{Maude}}'', ''GoodTimes'', ''SanfordAndSon'', ''OneDayAtATime'', and ''TheJeffersons'' were all thick with Anvilicious plots and [[AuthorTract Points To Be Made.]] So were his later series, but by then people had become less tolerant of his anvils. Then again, ''AllInTheFamily,'' ''SanfordAndSon,'' and ''TheJeffersons'' had highly sympathetic bigots, which lightened the intended anvils in those series. Which in many ways led to the extreme right-wing and/or racist {{Misaimed Fandom}}s that followed Archie, Fred, George, etc. to the point where paid-up Democrat Carroll O'Connor {{lampshaded}} and subverted the trope in an anti-racist PublicServiceAnnouncement for [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3HBR4r9r-g B'Nai B'rith]] in 1990.
* The New Zealand TV soap ''Shortland Street'' does this ''all the time''. The 1998 episode in which Jenny Harrison appeared on a television show to rant about the poor state of the New Zealand health service is probably the most anvilicious scene of Shortland Street in its 16-year history.
* You can include the entire ''Franchise/{{Degrassi}}'' franchise in this, the result of creator Linda Schuyler trying to make a series that would showcase the effects of certain issues on children. Famous examples of Anvilicious behaviour in the franchise include Dwayne having to deal with AIDS and Shane (a.k.a. "Canada's national baby daddy") dropping acid and jumping off a bridge in ''Series/DegrassiHigh'', and Manny getting an abortion in ''Series/DegrassiTheNextGeneration''. So someone jumps off a bridge and/or has an abortion every episode? Pretty much. It gets worse in the spinoff, at least when [[TheScrappy Emma]] was always there to deliver a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech.
* [[Creator/{{NBC}} Green Is Universal]], a concept so heavy-handed and self-righteous that it couldn't be contained on just one network. Indeed, this bi-yearly theme appears on every cable and broadcast channel owned by NBC. NBC in turn is owned by General Electric, a polluter so massive and frightening that even CaptainPlanet would fear to confront it. [[{{Hypocrisy}} The irony]] is so thick and juicy that you could cut it with a steak knife.
** Bonus points awarded for extending it to, of all things, their ''sports casting'' when they thought it was a good idea to make the guys sit around in the studio with their lights off.
** Except that they paid whatever minuscule environmental benefit all back, with massive interest, by [[http://www.moonbattery.com/archives/2007/11/nbcs_global_war.html flying to the Arctic to film a promo]]. Unless they faked it (the reporter's breath has no fog), in which case they're scamming the audience.
** ''Series/ThirtyRock'', being set at NBC and with a character (Jack Donaghy) meant in part to mock this kind of corporate thinking, has made a tradition of lampshading/parodying this every year (in the same way as it lampshades/parodies ProductPlacement).
** Season 1's "Greenzo," where David Schwimmer is a mascot who tries to put a positive spin on GE's corporate practices; he ends up going ''actually'' environmental.
** Again the following year, when Jack mocks the idea of NBC acknowledging the environment, and even calls attention to the fact that one of the only noticeable differences during the week is that the NBC logo turns green.
** General Electric stands to make a huge profit off of manufacturing "Green" products (e.g. high-efficiency home appliances and low-emission aircraft engines and locomotives). Thus, they are promoting their own products by telling consumers that they should be green.
* ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'':
** "Pangs", where Willow rants about how evil Thanksgiving is and how every person is responsible for the wrongs committed against Native Americans. This is taken to the point where she doesn't want the team to stop a murderous Native American ghost. Finally the evil, soulless vampire Spike tells her to quit bitching, since what happened to the "bloody Indians" was no different than what happened to every other conquered nation throughout human history.
** "Beer Bad" was also anvilicious, but at least had the decency to [[LampshadeHanging hang an amusing lampshade]] on that aspect of the episode:
--->'''Xander''': And was there a lesson in all of this? What have we learned about beer?\\
'''Buffy''': Foamy!\\
'''Xander''': Good. Just so that's clear.
** Ironically, the episode was intended to have a clear moral, as the writers participated in an competition to write a storyline that (realistically) brought up the dangers of drinking... and were disqualified, because every complication is caused by supernatural influences rather than the beer itself.
** The drugs/magic episode, "Wrecked", is probably the most blatant metaphor in the whole show.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'' during the years that Andrew Cartmel was script editor (1987-1989) had a tendency to be a bit on-the-nose about how 'right-on' the show was. In 2010 this was admitted by people who worked on the show and who claimed they had filled the [=McCoy=]/Seventh era (1987-89) with attacks on the Thatcher government. This "revelation" was largely treated with derision, firstly for the sheer hubris of those involved (''Doctor Who'''s days as a national favourite were well behind it and the audience by the late '80s consisted of hardcore fans and kids, neither of whom were a large voting block) and secondly because this was barely a secret since the attacks on Thatcherism had all the subtlety of, well, an anvil. Add in the fact that a LOT of shows were attacking Thatcher, so it was also a bit of "yeah, you and a thousand other blokes."
* ''Series/TorchwoodChildrenOfEarth'' delivers one of these about School League Tables, when [[spoiler: they are used to determine the worst ten percent of the nations' children to round up to be taken away and used as drugs by a hostile alien race. Yes, that's right, ranking schools results in mass murder (of a sort at least).]]
* ''TheAndromedaStrain 2008'' remake as a TV miniseries changed the novel's white scientists to a race-mixed cast with one homosexual member who keeps his head cool when others don't. Director Robert Shenkkan, true to form, claimed it was his "obligation" to do so.[[note]] Shenkkan's full quote: "If you're going to update the story, which is our mandate, you have an obligation to reflect the world as it is." There are gay scientists, there are scientists who aren't white. There wasn't a line where someone went 'Hey, isn't it great we work in such a diverse environment 'cos we'd sure as hell stand no chance of defeating this killer virus from the stars if we was all straight honkies', was there, hmmmmmnn?[[/note]]
* ''Series/TwentyFour'' often runs afoul of this, whenever the show is focused on anything other than [[MemeticBadass Jack Bauer kicking ass]]. One long-running anvil throughout the latter half of the series is the message that not all Muslims are terrorists. This began in Season 4 with a filler episode where Jack Bauer and Paul Raines (on the run from paramilitary commandos working for a defense contractor) hole up in a downtown L.A. sporting goods store, which is guarded by a pair of Muslim brothers who repeatedly state that they are not terrorists, and that they will protect America at any cost. This was followed by a PSA in which Kiefer Sutherland opined the same message. In Season 6, [[DamselScrappy preachy side characters]] (including a government informant and a CTU analyst named Nadia) were also added to the cast to hammer home this message.
* The (very short-lived) ''TheWeirdAlShow'', thanks to a rampaging case of ExecutiveMeddling, had one specific lesson for each episode to teach, and that lesson was mercilessly repeated to the point of drawing attention to it in voice-overs before each commercial break. Half of the enjoyment of the DVD release comes from the scathing commentary of Al and others on the anvilicious display of insipid points.
* ''Now and Again'' lasted only one season but it still had its own offender, "There Are No Words", about how good it is to read (and write). It features characters who [[ThatMakesMeFeelAngry comment at length]] about their affection for books, and an obligatory book-burning scene.
* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': "Life sucks, get a helmet."
* ''EleventhHour'': The episode with the Flesh Eating STD.
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone'': Several episodes written by RodSerling come off as terribly heavy-handed today ([[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gift_(The_Twilight_Zone) "The Gift"]] is an {{egregious}} example, made worse by casting with UnfortunateImplications)-- but given that Serling created the show due to ExecutiveMeddling with his more socially conscious scripts ([[http://www.ithaca.edu/hs/depts/theatre/news/3163/ the story]] about his script based on the lynching of Emmett Till is a doozy), it may just be that one generation's subversive social commentary is the next generation's dropped anvil. It's easy to forget that Emmett Till's funeral was recent at the time of the script, and that having a righteous black man surrounded by corrupt racists was, well, so out of the ordinary it is amazing it aired. Sometimes it's difficult for those who grew up in the 80s and 90s to remember that some of those classic programs were on the air before (or at the very start of) the civil rights movement. It's jarring to remember that, at the time, showing non-whites as stupid, worthless, and/or actively evil was generally considered ''just fine''.
* While the cable anthology horror series ''MastersOfHorror'' tends toward good old-fashioned gore and nudity, Season One's ''Homecoming,'' directed by Joe Dante (of ''Film/{{Gremlins}}'' and ''Film/TheHowling'' fame), is anvilicious to the extreme. For no clear reason, the soldiers killed in Iraq rise from their graves as shambling zombies -- not to eat us, but simply to ''vote against the current president.'' The supporting characters are all [[CaptainErsatz pastiches]] of RealLife political heavyweights (Karl Rove becomes "Kurt Rand," Ann Coulter is [[BlondeRepublicanSexKitten "Jane Cleaver"]]). When the zombies garner enough sympathy to sway public opinions, [[spoiler:and the election outcome favors the opposition, the zombies' votes are thrown out to skew the results (in Ohio and Florida, natch).]] Of course, the zombies won't stand for this, and [[spoiler: suddenly ''all'' of America's war dead (all the way back to the ''Civil War'') rise from the grave to get revenge.]]
* ''Series/StargateAtlantis'' drops an anvil by having Rodney [=McKay=] say that the real solution to global warming is "everyone doing their part". Then it goes SpaceWhaleAesop.
* ''TheSecretLifeOfTheAmericanTeenager'' does this on an episode-to-episode basis about sex, and a ''scene-to-scene'' basis for [[VerySpecialEpisode the moral of the episode]].
--->"Just because you're having a baby together doesn't mean you two are right for each other"\\
"You shouldn't be with Ricky just because you're having his baby."\\
"The parents of a baby aren't the people who created the baby, but the people who take care of it."\\
...etc.\\
-Various people during the VerySpecialEpisode about baby daddies.
* The final scene of the final episode of the remake of ''[[Series/BattlestarGalacticaReimagined Battlestar Galactica]]'' is a ridiculously anvilicious message about the dangers of overdeveloping modern robotics. Or maybe "Treat your creations with respect", or "do not enslave artificial lifeforms".
* This is a hallmark of Creator/AaronSorkin's writing whenever it has to do with public affairs.
** The characters in ''TheWestWing'' display at times a tendency to really try and hammer the point they're trying to make home.
** The season three one-shot episode ''Isaac and Ishmael'' drew a lot of criticism for this, managing at the same time to be patronizing towards non-radical Muslims and to gloss over the complexities of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
** ''Series/TheNewsroom'' has this as one of two primary criticisms: many critics argue that Sorkin seems to be just lecturing everyone about the "proper role" of the news media without really knowing what he's talking about, and belittling the actual work of journalists by having his fictional ones make long, elaborate speeches about what to do and always be right. (The other criticism is [[MostWritersAreMale a failure to write strong, convincing, and convincingly strong female characters]].)
* ''SeaQuestDSV'' featured an annoying episode involving Lucas and Condoms.
* Subverted by the premise of ''{{Seinfeld}}'', which relied on the mandate "No hugging, no learning." Demonstrated especially in the last episode, in which the four characters [[spoiler:end up in prison specifically for being assholes completely lacking in empathy, and pretty much continue to behave in the same way they had throughout the series. And of course, this angers the audience into one great big WhatTheHellHero reaction.]]
* A recent episode of ''UglyBetty'' basically had the message "cults are bad, they'll take all your money, and they'll [[ForTheEvulz drug you for no real reason]]." Most episodes have at least one kind of social message that the writers pound into our heads repeatedly, but this one was just really blatant (and annoying).
* The ''Series/{{House}}'' DayInTheLife episode focused on Dr. Cuddy is subtle as a brick in its criticism of the current healthcare situation of America.
* ''Series/GreysAnatomy'' might as well be titled ''Grey's Anvils'' given how the writers love this trope to death and have never heard of the word "subtle".
* ''Series/PennAndTellerBullshit'' runs on this, given the premise. The most extreme example probably being the animal rights episode where they basically say ''the head of PETA supports arson''. On the other hand, they admit up-front that they aren't even ''trying'' for fairness, and they usually aim at providing some proof (for example, with the above claim, they note several links between PETA and animal rights extremists).
* ''{{Glee}}'' personifies this trope. It has a theme practically every episode and does not hesitate to beat you over the head with it. Violently.
* By season 6 of ''Series/{{Lost}}'', what with all of Jacob's speeches (the most anvilicious of which was the whole thing where he doesn't assist the islanders in seeing right from wrong because he wants them to figure it out themselves, blah blah), we'll be damned and roasted on a barbie if Jacob isn't some sort of metaphor for God.
* ''{{CSINY}}'' once did an episode about how Nazis and neo-Nazis are evil, and the Holocaust was bad. Not only do they beat you over the head with how horrible the Nazis were at every opportunity, but the climax, where Gary Sinise argues with the episode's culprit (an elderly-Nazi played by Ed Asner) might make you feel like you were hit in the gut with a sledgehammer.
** Then after that whole episode seeming fully researched and every little detail being accurate to history, instead of referring to the national socialists in the finale of the final interview he shouts "JUST SAY IT, YOU WERE IN THE HITLER PARTY WEREN'T YOU"
** Then there have been eps where Gary Sinise worked in his passion for US troops. case in point: 'Fight Night',where a cage fighter fakes his death with the charred body of a homeless vet he may or may not have killed. Mac and someone else talk,and Mac launches into a talk about the problem of America's homeless veterans.
* Pick any VerySpecialEpisode of ''ADifferentWorld''. The one-hour LA Riots episode that's a borderline roundtable in a SitCom, the MusicalEpisode that spoofed the 1992 Presidential election, TheRashomon episode involving Ron, Dwayne and other students from a rival school...
* ''LawAndOrder'' and it's spin-offs are not noted for subtelty ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is probably the crowner. This is particularly sad because it deals with such a sensitive subject and while the writers do mean well, a little subtelty now and then wouldn't hurt them any, one example is how there is more anti-abortion vilence shown in the series then there has actually been in real life.
* ''Series/WithoutATrace'' employed this trope in an episode made all the more anvilicious in that it painted tens of millions of Americans as terrorist sympathizers. The disappearing person in this episode was a woman who was hiding out because a decade before she had bombed an abortion clinic with the help of her husband. Their crime was [[RippedFromTheHeadlines pretty plainly modeled on scumbag murderer Eric Rudolph's bombing of a clinic in Birmingham, Alabama,]] complete with a horribly maimed nurse and dead security guard, just like Rudolph's attack. From the moment the FBI agents become aware that she was "anti-choice", the anvils were flying, and all of them were engraved "All people who oppose abortion want to kill abortionists. A lot. I mean, really, really a lot". There was even a scene in which Malone meets with a deep cover informant infiltrating "the pro-life movement" (not some splinter group, but the pro-life movement, a movement made up of tens of millions of Americans) and she tells him the husband and wife bomber team are "heroes" to pro-lifers.
* News and news commentary in general can get pretty bad with this trope, but Television news is worse. Televised news commentary takes the cake for anviliciousness, as sending a message about opinion of current events is practically the entire point of the genre.
* This trope is subverted in the ''Series/{{Scrubs}}'' episode 'My Mentor', where J.D's attempts to get a patient to stop smoking are futile. Dr. Cox tells him that the only thing he can do is keep treating whatever messes people get themselves into, rather than trying to 'save' them.
* The US version of ''QueerAsFolk'' was a tutorial on how to be an 'acceptable' gay person in the US, running along the lines of: get married in Canada, don't be bi, don't be angry at homophobes, remember that God loves you after all, adopt children and be nice to your mother.
* ''HarrysLaw'' tends to shoot anvil-firing guns at the viewers, with most of the main characters' arguments tending to be far more aimed at the audience in front of the TV than the audiences in the courtroom. However, StrawmanHasAPoint tends to flipflop, where the characters will often be right, but the defense will also put up some legitimate points, making their arguments stand up a little more.
* Critics have been universally fulsome in their praise for ''MadMen''. But they have a lot of good-natured fun pointing out that the show is way too insistent that women were treated poorly in the late '50s and early '60s, and that was ''awful'', OK?
* ''SaturdayNightLive'' pointed out the same thing in an episode hosted by Jon Hamm. Hamm played his ''MadMen'' character in one sketch, and fellow ''MadMen'' actors John Slattery and Elisabeth Moss guest starred. Hamm asked Moss for the time, and she said, "Oh, I'm just a woman. I'm not allowed to wear a watch in this day and age."
* ''SeventhHeaven'' is pretty bad with hitting viewers over the head with morals in nearly every episode. The most notable example would probably be from the episode "Tunes". When Simon starts taking a liking to rap music, he (and the audience) has to endure lectures from everyone in his family about how rap music promotes violence towards women. At the end, Simon stops listening to rap for this reason. This episode basically stated that if you listen to rap, you're supporting abuse towards women so you need to stop. Needless to say, it left a bad taste in the mouth of many viewers (especially the ones who WERE women that listen to rap music themselves).
* Early on in ''Series/{{Fringe}}'''s fourth season, the dialogue is filled with unsubtle commentary on how it feels like something is missing and there's a void in the world. As if we're going to forget that one of the main characters got [[RetGone erased from existence]] without the other characters talking about it unconconsciously.
* ''[[{{Series/MASH}} M*A*S*H]]'' could be bad about this, especially with any scene with Hawkeye in it. In the Mad Magazine parody, when Hawkeye starts a speech about how War Is Bad, one of the other characters yells "Someone stop him before they start flashing telethon numbers on the screen!"
** Fortunately, the morals were often carefully implanted into the plot and required some digging to reveal, which had the uncanny way of uncovering a character's HiddenDepths- in a very dark and plausible manner. One episode had a soldier who was starving himself to death and refused to eat anything. This poor guy was actually traumatized by one horrible battlefield tragedy- his platoon celebrated a Thanksgiving feast in a foxhole. He ate fast to get seconds... only to discover all his friends were killed by an artillery shell right after he left the foxhole. In his words, he would be dead too, if he wasn't such a pig.
** Another episode involves a stuttering soldier getting heckled by everyone in his platoon. When Winchester catches ear of this, he suddenly comes unhinged and dumps a cascade of pure anger on all of them. Later in that episode, he hears from his sister on a tape-recorded message sent to the 4077th, and we learn what brought on Winchester's fury: his sister suffers the [[NotSoDifferent exact]] [[CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming same]] speech impediment.
** The episode where every main character had a nightmare was a way of interpreting how war had affected them all. Margaret was wounded when her ex left alone to suffer. Sherman wants to return back to the bliss of a long-passed childhood. B.J. feels war is tearing him away from his wife Peg. Charles knows that while people think he's perfect, he's no magician- people will die no matter what he does. Father Mulcahy believes the voice of war is silencing the voice of God, which won't change even if he's the Pope. Klinger finally realizes escaping to Toledo will leave him racked with guilt for abandoning his friends, torn up like the war casualties. Hawkeye feels outright helpless to do anything to stop the killings.
** The penultimate episode was a flat-out tribute to all the things war entails- those who never got home, girls that were left behind, boys who became men, and miracles of life.
** The finale of M*A*S*H* deconstructed the concept of WarIsHell by having a mix traumatic and heartwarming events befall several of the main characters to show that war will have its mark on them, as it does to all who suffer (or enjoy) it- and it gives us a stark reminder of what it's really like to say goodbye for good.
* [[http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6213366/sitcoms-very-special-episodes This College Humor video parodies the trope.]]
* ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'' is ramping this up with MartinShort as Marshall's new Save-the-Environment Boss, and Marshall having to pull him back to the path of righteousness. The {{Narm}} was very thick.
* ''Series/{{Aftermath}}'' has two episodes like this.
** "World Without Oil" has all of the oil reservoirs in the earth disappear overnight. Given the world's dependence on oil, everything goes to shit as the oil-dependent social infrastructure crumbles. It's a large dose of horror and ParanoiaFuel that is obviously meant to get viewers to want something done about the oil crisis as soon as possible.
** "Population Overload" has the world's population suddenly double overnight to 14 billion, causing earthquakes from the large-scale buildings built to accomodate the extra people, smog from the large amount of cars being used, and ruination of the water supply due to strains on the plumbing and attempts to grow enough food to feed the whole world. The narrator even points out the number of people who have died over the years leading up to the "good future" we see at the end of the episode, as well as the fact that some say that 7 billion people is already too many for the planet to support. Kinda [[{{Narm}} narmful]] though, given that in order for the population to ''actually'' double overnight, most or all of the world's women of reproductive age would all have to be simultaneously be pregnant with multiples and give birth to them around the same time, and obviously, each country would have TooManyBabies.
* ''Series/CriminalMinds'':
** "Snake Eyes" was pretty much an hour long statement of how gambling addiction can cost you more than just money.
** "The Pact" established David Rossi as a pro-military man, giving up his vacation days to military men who the character says could use it more than he could. Rossi's military background is expanded in "The Fallen" where he rescues his old Vietnam sergeant, who had become homeless, and helps him get back on his feet (without mentioning the other homeless victims they helped). Although it fits Rossi's character, the episodes' message was contrived and forced, with the underlying message, "[[StrawCivilian support our troops at all costs]]."
* ''TylerPerry's'' ''MeetTheBrowns'' is chock-full of them: shoplifting, carrying a gun to school, growing marijuana, birth control, drinking, molestation, teen pregnancy, credit card over-reliance, and tons of others. At some point, they made it too obvious to miss. "Meet the Interrogation" touched up on how lotto addictions bleed you dry. "Meet The Christmas Spirit" went as far as to play up the Christmas spirit cliche by having an angel befriend Joaquin. But the real hum-dinger was "Meet the Big Payoff," sugarcoating that texting while driving will get you killed, which was basically a thinly-veiled obligatory public service announcement.
* ''{{Dragnet}}'' was loaded with anvils,often purposely by Jack Webb.
* The act of British TV impressionist ''RoryBremner'' used to involve satirical skits that poked fun at members of the British government. However, after Britain's commitment to the Iraqi war in 2003 the majority of his shows turned into anvilicious anti-war bashing of everyone involved. Whole segments involved Bremner simply standing in front of a microphone and talking mostly in his own voice to criticize then Prime Minister Tony Blair and his cabinet.
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