History BreatherEpisode / LiveActionTV

* ''Series/ThePrisoner1967'': prior to its two-part WhamEpisode finale, the short-lived SF series aired "The Girl Who Was Death", a comedic episode that was unlike any episode of the series to date (and was, in fact, based upon an unproduced script for ''Series/DangerMan'').
* ''Series/{{Sadakatsiz}}'': {{Invoked}} by Gönül and doctor Derya. Bahar is respectively their sister-in-law and friend, and she is having a hard pregnancy due to her age (she's in her forties), being a new mother, and suffering from a lung illness. Furthermore, Bahar and her husband Melih have gotten caught in the middle of a nasty dispute between Bahar's friends and Melih's family, which also causes her a fair amount of stress. So, the day Bahar takes the test to find out the baby's gender, Derya (who is also her gynecologist), holds the information from Bahar and Melih, only telling Gönül. Together, they organize a baby gender reveal party to "celebrate and give Bahar a breather from all of the negativity". In a meta sense, the episode where this happens still has some plot-related stuff going on that keeps the viewer invested but doesn't affect either Bahar or Melih.

** In the midst of the dark and grim Ori storyline, ''Series/StargateSG1'' had "200", the show's 200th episode, which revisited the ShowWithinAShow introduced in the 100th episode as a way for the creators to parody themselves and {{lampshade|Hanging}} the hell out of everything without having to break the FourthWall. It takes the form of a VignetteEpisode in which the eponymous team, SG-1, is meeting with an old acquaintance who is writing a sci-fi action film based (loosely) on them and their experiences. Most of the humor comes from the (often bizarre) ideas that the characters propose, including blatant references to ''Film/TheWizardOfOz'', ''Series/{{Farscape}}'', and ''Franchise/StarTrek'', as well as parodies of related genres. Now sandwich this episode between one involving savage murders and evil aliens who have infiltrated Earth, and one involving genocide and presumed character death. And put the main characters through plenty more situations just as nasty throughout the course of the season.
** ''Series/StargateUniverse'' used "Faith" to give the audience a break after the political tension and space battles of "Space" and "Divided".
*** Earlier, "Earth" was the first episode which did not involve an imminent threat to the survival of the crew. They then got right back on it with "Time".
*** "Cloverdale" provided a mostly-humorous breather in the middle of a darker arc involving Chloe's transformation and Rush's control of the ship.
* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' did this regularly in the later seasons to break up the darkest and most complex storyline in the entire franchise: the Dominion War arc. Comedic episodes featuring the Ferengi were especially prominent. It should be noted, however, that Ferengi episodes were being done before the Dominion War as well.
** The last episode to air prior to [[spoiler: the Dominion conquering ''Deep Space Nine'']] seemed designed to lighten a mood that was about to get pretty bleak.
** Other examples that are placed in the middle of a string of arc episodes include the holosuite-centered "Badda Bing Badda Bang" (a heist caper in 1960s Las Vegas) and "Take Me Out to the Holosuite" (a BaseballEpisode with the main cast playing against a team of Vulcans). The latter episode is kind of an InvokedTrope: Sisko organises the game specifically because there are a lot of war-weary Starfleet personnel taking some shore leave on the station at the time, and they need a way to blow off some steam that doesn't involve drinking Quark's bar dry and causing trouble.
** "In The Cards" provides a big change in pace to break the tension before the season finale, with Jake and Nog getting into all kinds of hijinks.
** "[[WhamEpisode In the Pale Moonlight]]" - widely recognized as possibly the darkest episode in Trek canon - was [[MoodWhiplash immediately followed]] by "His Way", a romantic comedy episode explicitly written to get Odo and Kira together.
* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' does this in the episode "Family", immediately after the climactic events of "The Best of Both Worlds, Part 2". Picard has been rescued and cured of Borg assimilation, and rather than [[AngstWhatAngst dive straight back into adventure of the week]], he takes shore leave on Earth to recover. The episode isn't just light-hearted filler, though: Picard is forced to face his feelings about his violation by the Borg, and the moment when he finally breaks down is a major TearJerker. But even that scene ultimately ends up being an EarnYourHappyEnding moment, because it leads to Jean-Luc getting a lot of stuff he'd been bottling up out in the open ''and'' starting him on the path towards mending fences with his brother. Tragically, thanks to the events of ''Film/StarTrekGenerations'', their reconciliation is short-lived.
* ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'': "Latent Image", which deals with the Doctor suffering a literal HeroicBSOD after a medical incident, was followed by "Bride Of Chaotica!", which was a holodeck story that doubled as a GenreThrowback[=/=]AffectionateParody of 1930s sci-fi films such as the ''Film/FlashGordonSerial''.
* ''Series/StarTrekStrangeNewWorlds''
** Season 1 has the episode "Spock Amok", where Spock and T'Pring suffer a FreakyFridayFlip at the worst possible time, Una and La'an decide to try out "''Enterprise'' Bingo" and Captain Pike and Admiral April trying to woo over a new race to the Federation. This comes after the events of "Memento Mori", which had the Gorn ravage the ''Enterprise'' after murdering nearly everyone in a nearby colony.
** Season 2 has the MusicalEpisode "Subspace Rhapsody", an example of ''Star Trek'' actively ''not'' taking itself seriously. This comes after "Under the Cloak of War" (a serious look at PTSD and war crimes) and before "Hegemony" (the season finale, featuring another battle with the Gorn and ending on a "ToBeContinued" note).

** After the season three hiatus, there was a FormulaBreakingEpisode called [[Recap/SupernaturalS03E13Ghostfacers "Ghostfacers" (S03, E13)]]. It was a light and silly episode to give the fans a break before the last three episodes of the season. Fans literally scoffed until they actually ''saw'' the gore, unhinged crazy, and massive angst of those episodes.
** As [[Recap/SupernaturalS04E05MonsterMovie "Monster Movie" (S04, E05)]] was supposed to air between [[Recap/SupernaturalS04E02AreYouThereGodItsMeDeanWinchester "Are You There, God? It's Me, Dean Winchester" (S04, E02)]] and [[Recap/SupernaturalS04E03InTheBeginning "In The Beginning" (S04, E03)]]--but aired after [[Recap/SupernaturalS04E04Metamorphosis "Metamorphosis" (S04, E04)]]--it certainly counts as this. Fans generally loved it and it can be agreed that it was a lovely break from the increasingly unrelenting misery that season four had so far inflicted on the boys. And therein lies the problem: season four was ''so'' angsty and the boys were ''so'' fucked up that this episode doesn't really fit in, making it a complete standalone.
** It's also remarkable how most of the season 4 MonsterOfTheWeek episodes were incredibly goofy. First, there was [[Recap/SupernaturalS04E05MonsterMovie "Monster Movie"]]. Then [[Recap/SupernaturalS04E06YellowFever "Yellow Fever"]] (despite the extreme MoodWhiplash). Then [[Recap/SupernaturalS04E08WishfulThinking "Wishful Thinking"]] with the suicidal teddy bear.
** There is usually at least one breather episode per season where the show becomes ridiculously self-aware. See [[Recap/SupernaturalS02E15TallTales "Tall Tales"]], [[Recap/SupernaturalS02E18HollywoodBabylon "Hollywood Babylon"]], [[Recap/SupernaturalS05E08ChangingChannels "Changing Channels"]], and [[Recap/SupernaturalS06E15TheFrenchMistake "The French Mistake"]], as well as those mentioned above. Although, this being ''Supernatural'', it's hard to have a ''completely'' lighthearted episode.
** In season seven, there was [[Recap/SupernaturalS07E14PluckyPennywhistlesMagicMenagerie "Plucky Pennywhistle's Magical Menagerie"]] and [[Recap/SupernaturalS07E18PartyOnGarth "Party On, Garth"]] as breather episodes. Except the former ended up angsty because Sam and Dean were actually happy for once [[note]]If your fanbase cries because the main characters are happy for once, then you have a ''seriously'' angst-heavy show[[/note]] and the latter made everybody tear up because [[spoiler:it addressed the possibility of Bobby's ghost hanging around]].
** Season nine has [[Recap/SupernaturalS09E04SlumberParty "Slumber Party" (S09, E04)]] and [[Recap/SupernaturalS09E05DogDeanAfternoon "Dog Dean Afternoon" (S09, E05)]] between two episodes heavy with a star-crossed bromance.

* Most of the later ''Franchise/SuperSentai'' series have these kinds of episodes for either Christmas or New Year's Day, though there have been some exceptions - Series/TokumeiSentaiGobusters had theirs around episodes 31 & 32, tying it into a CrossOver with [[SpaceSheriffGavanTheMovie Gavan Type-G]].

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'':
** "Once upon a Time" shows that Creator/BusterKeaton was still as funny as ever in his final years, casting him as a grumpy janitor in 1890 who uses a time travel helmet and finds himself in 1962. The episode came [[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E71TheMirror after]] [[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E72TheGrave seven]] [[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E73ItsAGoodLife horror]] [[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E74DeathsHeadRevisited episodes]] [[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E75TheMidnightSun in]] [[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E76StillValley a]] [[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E77TheJungle row]].

** "Wish Bank" is a light-hearted, comedic episode which immediately preceded the violent, horror-themed "Nightcrawlers".
** "The Leprechaun-Artist" is a comedic episode about three teenage boys who find a {{Leprechaun}}. It immediately preceded "Dead Run", a very dark episode about souls who have been wrongfully sent to {{Hell}}.

** Its fourth season is generally considered the darkest, what with Scully's cancer and all. Towards the end of the season, the mood is thankfully lightened by "Small Potatoes". The more light-hearted monster of the week episodes are ''definitely'' welcome breaks in the show given how dark things start getting during the "mythology episodes" (episodes that further the over-arching storyline instead of telling a one-off story).
** A much lousier one comes in the middle of three excellent season 2 episodes: "Duane Barry"/"Ascension" (Holy shit! [[spoiler: Scully's been abducted!]]) "3" (Hang on...Mulder wants to bang a vampire...) and "One Breath" (Holy shit! [[spoiler: Scully's been returned and might ''die!'']] What was "3" about again?)
** There were several times in almost every season in which ''The X-Files'' would suddenly shift from aliens, demons, ghosts, and civilization-threatening conspiracies to straight-up comedy and back again. "Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space'" is considered one of the best episodes of the entire series, despite being self-parody on every level possible (or maybe even ''because'' of it).

* ''Series/StarTrekStrangeNewWorlds'' had the episode "Spock Amok", where Spock and T'Pring suffer a FreakyFridayFlip at the worst possible time, Una and La'an decide to try out "''Enterprise'' Bingo" and Captain Pike and Admiral April trying to woo over a new race to the Federation. This came after the events of "Memento Mori", which had the Gorn ravage the ''Enterprise'' after murdering nearly everyone in a nearby colony.

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' does this in the episode "Family", immediately after the climactic events of "The Best of Both Worlds, Part 2". Picard has been rescued and cured of Borg assimilation, and rather than dive straight back into adventure of the week, he takes shore leave on Earth to recover. The episode is not without dark tones; Picard is forced to face his feelings about his violation by the Borg, and the moment when he finally breaks down is a major TearJerker. But even that scene ultimately ends up being an EarnYourHappyEnding moment, because it leads to Jean-Luc getting a lot of stuff he'd been bottling up out in the open ''and'' starting him on the path towards mending fences with his brother. Tragically, thanks to the events of ''Film/StarTrekGenerations'', their reconciliation is short-lived.

* In ''Series/{{Angel}}'', the first half of Season 3 is a moderately dark arc involving [[{{Dhampyr}} the birth of Angel's son]]. Then we have [[Recap/AngelS03E12Provider "Provider"]], which includes moments between [[StalkerWithACrush Wes and Fred]], [[TheyDo Gunn and Fred]], [[UnresolvedSexualTension Angel and Cordy]], [[AllMenArePerverts Cordy and Gunn]], and ''especially'' [[HoYay Wes and Gunn]].

* The format of ''Series/{{Skins}}'' - where each episode focuses on a different character in its ensemble - gives it a lot of room to do this, as it can easily bounce from a character who is dealing with more serious issues to one dealing with more lighthearted ones, without losing its place in either. Examples:

* ''Series/BabylonFive'' had a mix of {{Wham Episode}}s and Breather Episodes earlier on, but even the latter usually advanced some aspect of the overall series {{Arc}}, if only in B-plot. By the climax of the arc, they were rarer. They returned some in the fifth season, though they were not necessarily light or fluffy. For example, the fifth-season episode "Day Of The Dead," written by Creator/NeilGaiman, was a completely stand-alone story, and a definite breather after the missteps of the Telepath plotline and before the Centauri War; it was not, however, simple fare.

* Most of the later ''Franchise/SuperSentai'' series have these kinds of episodes for either Christmas or New Year's Day, though there have been some exceptions - Series/TokumeiSentaiGobusters had theirs around episodes 31-32, tying it into a CrossOver with [[SpaceSheriffGavanTheMovie Gavan Type-G]].

** After the season three hiatus, there was a SomethingCompletelyDifferent episode called [[Recap/SupernaturalS03E13Ghostfacers "Ghostfacers" (S03, E13)]]. It was a light and silly episode to give the fans a break before the last three episodes of the season. Fans literally scoffed until they actually ''saw'' the gore, unhinged crazy, and massive angst of those episodes.

* ''Series/TheOrville'' went a little more serious in Season Two. "All the World Is Birthday Cake" is the story of a First contact gone ''horribly'' wrong, landing Kelly and Bortus in a concentration camp. "Deflectors" is a [[SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped anvil-nuke about a heterosexual Molocan]], [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything which is grounds for life imprisonment in their culture]], ending in a SadisticChoice for the new security chief and a DownerEnding all around. Sandwiched between them is "A Happy Refrain," a lighthearted and fluffy episode about Dr. Finn and Isaac starting a romance.

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' does this in the episode "Family", immediately after the climactic events of "The Best of Both Worlds, Part 2". Picard has been rescued and cured of Borg assimilation, and rather than dive straight back into adventure of the week, he takes shore leave on Earth to recover. The episode is not without dark tones; Picard is forced to face his feelings about his violation by the Borg, and it ain't pretty. Many aspects of the episode (e.g. the comfortable setting) are there to sweeten the pill, especially [[HappyEnding the optimistic ending]].

* Subverted in ''Series/{{Blackadder}} Goes Forth'': The episode "Major Star" is the only episode of the series not directly centered on Edmund's attempts to escape, but instead focuses on him staging a war relief show (with an obvious purpose).