History Main / FlashInThePanFad

* An episode in ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'' has the boys set up a platypus-themed restaurant they call "''Chez Platypus''". Word of the "trendiest restaurant" spread into the entire Tri-State Area and people quickly went in line to the Fletchers' backyard, even Dr. Doofenshmirtz and his date. At the end of the day, a badger-themed restaurant opened up in the street, the patrons promptly bailed, and the restaurant was sold to someone who wishes to expand it to a chain.

-->-- '''Robin Lefler''', ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', "The Game"

* Discussed in the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode [[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS5E6TheGame "The Game"]]. As the ''Enterprise'' crew become obsessed with playing a holographic video game, Robin Lefler thinks, "It's a fad. This week it's popular, next week we won't even know it existed." But she's wrong, and The Game turns out to be both highly addictive and capable of mind-controlling anyone who plays it.

* ''Wiki/SCPFoundation'' puts a horror spin on the phenomenon with [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1425 SCP-1425]], a self-help book titled ''Star Signals''. It quickly becomes a best-seller due to its mind-warping, reality-altering effects, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and also celebrity endorsements]]. Then a week later, the book is completely forgotten--because the Foundation realizes the threat it poses, seizes all copies of the book, and uses their considerable resources to erase the book from the collective memory, both [[LaserGuidedAmnesia literally]] and [[UnPerson figuratively]].

* Discussed in the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode [[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS5E6TheGame "The Game"]]. As the ''Enterprise'' crew become obsessed with playing a holographic video game, Robin Lefler thinks, ''"It's a fad. This week it's popular, next week we won't even know it existed."'' But she's wrong, and The Game turns out to be both highly addictive and capable of mind-controlling anyone who plays it.

-->'''Rarity:''' Well, um, you see, nopony wears the vests anymore because, um, that was yesterday's fashion.
-->'''Twilight:''' Yesterday's fashion?
-->'''Rarity:''' Yes.
-->'''Twilight:''' But, but I...
-->'''Rarity:''' You need to, uh, you need to keep up with the times, there, Twilight.

* Exaggerated in ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'' with "Woogle" collectibles, a craze that annoys Arthur to the point that he says that clicking the bubble-top of a metal bottle cap would be just as fun. Cue the next trend: bottle cap clicking.
* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'' takes this UpToEleven in the episode that centers around short-lived fads. The kids spend the day coming up with new fads every few ''minutes'', and the Eds desperately try to figure out how to keep up with them.

** In the episode "Run Away Runway", Phineas and Ferb set up a fashion line based on their LimitedWardrobe. Within seconds everyone is wearing it, until an army of Doofenschmirtz clones inadvertently turn ''his'' LimitedWardrobe into a craze. [[StatusQuoIsGod until the next episode, anyway.]]
-->'''Gaston Le Mode''': Face it, mon ami, your designs are 3 minutes and 37 seconds ago.

Fiction likes to take the [[PopularityPolynomial natural rise and fall]] of trends and parody it by cranking up the speed. Anything at all--a style of clothes, a book, a new diet, a must-have gadget, whatever--can be completely unknown one week, then the hottest topic in the world next week... and then DeaderThanDisco the week after that. Heck, sometimes this rise and fall happens in mere days. And it's practically a StockJoke now that as soon as you buy a computer, a new model will come out and make yours obsolete.

---> ''"See, I follow trends. All of them, no matter what -- piercings, colonics, trendy surgeries, online affairs. I've even done some street fighting."''

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* An episode in ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'' has the boys set up a [[EverythingsBetterWithPlatypi platypus-themed]] restaurant they call "''Chez Platypus''". Word of the "trendiest restaurant" spread into the entire Tri-State Area and people quickly went in line to the Fletchers' backyard, even Dr. Doofenshmirtz and his date. At the end of the day, a badger-themed restaurant opened up in the street, the patrons promptly bailed, and the restaurant was sold to someone who wishes to expand it to a chain.

* Exaggerated in ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'' with "Woogle" collectibles, a craze that annoys Arthur to the point that he says that clicking the bubble-top of a metal bottle cap would be just as fun. Cue the next trend: bottle cap clicking.

* Parodied in ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'' by the super-trendy Katt Savage, who makes it her life's calling to be ahead of the pop-culture curve and has a storage room full of fads that stopped being cutting-edge. It leaves her a StepfordSmiler on the verge of a breakdown.
--> ''"See, I follow trends. All of them, no matter what -- piercings, colonics, trendy surgeries, online affairs. I've even done some street fighting."''

* ''Wiki/SCPFoundation'' puts a horror spin on the phenomenon with [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1425 SCP 1425]], a self-help book titled ''Star Signals''. It quickly becomes a best-seller due to its mind-warping, reality-altering effects, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and also celebrity endorsements]]. Then a week later, the book is completely forgotten--because the Foundation realizes the threat it poses, seizes all copies of the book, and uses their considerable resources to erase the book from the collective memory, both [[LaserGuidedAmnesia literally]] and [[UnPerson figuratively]].

* Discussed in the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode [[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS5E6TheGame "The Game"]]. As the ''Enterprise'' crew become obsessed with playing a holographic video game, Robin Lefler thinks, ''"It's a fad. This week it's popular, next week we won't even know it existed."'' But she's wrong, and The Game turns out to be a highly addictive and capable of mind-controlling anyone who plays it.

* ''ComicStrip/PearlsBeforeSwine'': In the [[http://www.arcamax.com/thefunnies/pearlsbeforeswine/s-1786364 January 22, 2016]] strip, Rat buys the [[BlandNameProduct Smartphone 6]], which just came out that very day. Then the store announces that the Smartphone 7 ("All new features! Faster! Bigger!") is coming out ''tomorrow''.

** Similarly, Music/{{Pantera}} mercilessly and angrily criticizes trends in their song "The Great Southern Trendkill"

* The Creator/DrSeuss story "The Sneetches" mixes this trope with a struggle between the haves and the have-nots. Initially the star-bellied Sneetches are the upper class of Sneetch society. But when the plain-bellied Sneetches find a way to ''get'' stars, the upper crust preserves the class dichotomy by removing their own stars and declaring that the plain-bellied look is now ''in''. The two sides swap their looks so many times that they eventually can't remember which they started out as.

** PlayedForDrama on the episode "Born Again to be Wild", wherein Bobby becomes part of a radical Christian youth group that is essentially TheMoralSubtitute skater punk rocker gang. Bobby associating religion with "radical" heightens his love of God but Hank, ever the FantasyForbiddingFather, comes to detest the group because he's afraid Bobby will eventually grow bored of the skater fad and ditch religion altogether as a result.

Often overlaps with the TrendAesop. See also AnyoneRememberPogs, when the flash-in-the-pan fads are [[AddedAlliterativeAppeal reminisced and ridiculed in retrospect]].

--> from Creator/MTV to on the floor

** Similarly, Music/Pantera mercilessly and angrily criticizes trends in their song "The Great Southern Trendkill"

--> from Main/MTV to on the floor

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