History Main / HelpHelpTrappedInTitleFactory

By the way, I'm trapped here, and TropeCo/TropeCo is forcing me to type up trope entries! Send help!

By the way, I'm trapped here, and they are forcing me to type up trope entries! Send help!

In comedic versions, it's usually just a throwaway gag, and the fate of the mysterious victim isn't ever alluded to. And whether it's played for [[PlayedForLaughs laughs]] or [[PlayedForDrama drama]], it's a subtrope of DistressCall.

* ''Film/WithoutAClue'': The man forced to counterfeit pound notes for Professor Moriarty prints a clue on them about his location. Ironically Holmes and Watson completely misunderstand the clue, yet stumble on his location anyway.

* ''VideoGame/FairyGodmotherTycoon'' has a story part where someone finds a wig -- there's a little note attached. "''Please help. Kidnapped. Forced to make wigs. Rapunzel.''" Not to mention the tip "Help, I'm trapped in a tip-writing factory."

** It happened again in [[https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2018/10/10/17953106/walmart-prison-note-china-factory 2017]] when a women bought a purse in Walmart, and the note details how prisoners are forced to work long hours to finish a quota, those that don't get a beating, they are served little food because most of it is eaten by the guards.

* The page image is from ''Webcomic/{{Oglaf}}'', where a writer has been enslaved in his own home by a particularly mean and ugly muse.

* ''LightNovel/OreGaSukiNanoWaImoutoDakedoImoutoJaNai'', an anime which was infamous for its frequent instance of OffModel, has one of the staff credited as 正直困太 ("Shoujiki Komatta"). That's not a real person's name - it instead translates to "We're in serious trouble"

* ''LightNovel/OreGaSukiNanoWaImoutoDakedoImoutoJaNai'', an anime which was infamous for its frequent instance of OffModel, has one of the staff credited as 正直困太 ("Shoujiki Komatta"). That's not a real person's name - it instead translates to "We're in serious trouble"

* ''Manga/DetectiveConan'': A writer has disappeared, though he continues to turn in manuscripts to his editors; however, Conan discovers that said manuscripts contain a coded message for help. [[spoiler: Ultimately subverted, as the author was simply terminally ill and had faked his own kidnapping in hopes that one of his fans could solve the puzzle he'd devised before he passed away.]]

-->'''''Q.''' What made you come back to [=WildStorm=]?''\\
'''''A.''' I was abducted. Please help. I'm sending this message out through an advertisement in the hope that Jim Lee won't see it and therefore won't give me the hose again. I'm in a bunker under a building in Burbank. '''Please help me.''' ''

-->''And bye the border of Afhter, fromme the east side even untoe the west side, a portion for Naphtali.''/
-->''And bye the border of Naphtali, from the east side untoe the west side, a portion for Manaffeh.''/
-->''Buggre all this for a Larke. I amme sick to mye hart of typesettinge. Master Biltonn is no Gentelmann, and Master Scagges noe more than a tighte fisted Southwarke Knobbesticke. I telle you, onne a daye laike this ennywone with half an oz. of sense should bee oute in the sunneshain, ane nott stucke here alle the liuelong daie inn thif mowldey olde By-Our-Lady workeshoppe. @*"AE@;!*''/
-->''And bye the border of Ephraim, from the east fide even untoe the west fide, a portion for Reuben.''

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E7Kerblam "Kerblam!"]], the Doctor receives a rather overdue package from the titular MegaCorp with "HELP ME" typed on the back of the packing slip inside. This prompts her and her companions to head off for the company's headquarters to investigate. [[spoiler: The trope ends up being subverted, as the message didn't originate from a trapped worker, but from Kerblam!'s operating system. It had discovered one employee's plans to execute a terrorist attack by rigging thousands of packages with bombs, while nobody else in the company noticed anything amiss.]] Ryan, who works in a warehouse back in Sheffield, initially dismisses the message as a prank, implying that he and his co-workers used to do similar things as pranks at work.

-->'''Frankie''': Help me, I'm trapped in a sign-making factory.

-->'''Dave''': "Help, I'm being held prisoner in a complaint box", which is actually kinda funny.

--> '''Colin''': Help me they're making me do "Hats" I wanna go home...

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E7Kerblam "Kerblam!"]], the Doctor receives a rather overdue package from the titular MegaCorp with "HELP ME" typed on the back of the packing slip inside. This prompts her and her companions to head off for the company's headquarters to investigate. Ryan, who works in a warehouse back in Sheffield, initially dismisses the message as a prank, implying that he and his co-workers used to do similar things as pranks at work.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E7Kerblam "Kerblam!"]], the Doctor receives a rather overdue package from the titular MegaCorp with "HELP ME" typed on the back of the packing slip inside. This prompts her and her companions to head off for the company's headquarters to investigate.

In comedic versions, it's usually just a throwaway gag, and the fate of the mysterious victim isn't ever alluded to.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E7Kerblam "Kerblam!"]], the Doctor receives a rather overdue package from the titular MegaCorp with "HELP ME" typed on the back of the packing slip inside.

-->'''''Q.''' What made you come back to [=WildStorm=]?''
-->'''''A.''' I was abducted. Please help. I'm sending this message out through an advertisement in the hope that Jim Lee won't see it and therefore won't give me the hose again. I'm in a bunker under a building in Burbank. '''Please help me.''' ''

[[folder:{{Literature}}]]

[[folder:LiveActionTV]]

* One ''Series/MockTheWeek'' ''Scenes We'd Like to See'' round gave us ''Weird Things to See on a Road Sign'' to which Frankie Boyle provided us with...
-->'''Frankie''': Help me, I'm trapped in a sign-making factory.

* Creator/StephenColbert used [[http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/82145/february-13-2007/the-word---apocalypse-mao--murdered-by-the-orient-s-success---frenemy this trope]] in a [[Series/TheColbertReport Colbert Report]] -- [[ChinaTakesOverTheWorld Apocalypse Mao: Murdered by the Orient's Success]].

[[folder:NewspaperComics]]

[[folder:TabletopGames]]

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[[folder:WebComics]]

[[folder:WesternAnimation]]

[[folder:Urban Legends]]
* There's an urban legend of an immigrant or other forced labor using the fortune cookie as a "I'm being held prisoner at [a Chinese food preparation place]." The earliest documented one is from 1955 [[http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/fortune_cookie_or_fortune_cake_help_im_prisoner_in_a_chinese_bakery/ (listed here)]] but like most urban legends, it's probably been around for longer than that.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:RealLife]]

-->"The work is written, master, give me a drink. Let the right hand of the scribe be free from the oppressiveness of pain."
-->"Let me not be blamed for the script, for the ink is bad, and the vellum defective, and the day is dark."
-->"St Patrick of Armagh, deliver me from writing."

-->"Let me now be blamed for the script, for the ink is bad, and the vellum defective, and the day is dark."

-->'''Frankie''': Help I'm trapped in a sign making factory.

* [[https://youtube.com/watch?v=nDNfV1HZU04 A woman whose boyfriend was holding her and her three children against their will called for help in a Pizza Hut order.]]

* [[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/true-crime/wp/2017/07/13/an-atm-dispensed-cash-and-notes-for-help-from-a-man-trapped-inside/ ATM dispenses cash and notes for help from man trapped inside]]

* A ''VideoGame/YouDontKnowJack The Lost Gold'' CouchGag reads: "Help! I'm trapped in a tagline writing factory!"

[[folder:Urban Legends]]

* {{Downplayed}} during the Middle Ages, when [[https://blog.bookstellyouwhy.com/the-humorous-and-absurd-world-of-medieval-marginalia disgruntled scribes would insert complaints]] about the drudgery of their jobs in the margins of books.

-->"Writing is excessive drudgery. It crooks your back, it dims your sight, it twists your stomach and your sides."

* A message in ''Discworld/{{Hogfather}}'' is in a Christmas Cracker and says "Help help help Ive fallen in the crakker machine I cant keep runin on this roller please get me ou-". Someone says it's the same old mottos as when they were kids.

* The episode titles the first part of ''WesternAnimation/RobotChicken'''s fourth season form the message "Help me. I'm trapped in a DVD factory. They took my thumbs. Two weeks without food. Tell my mom I love her, but not in that way. Love, Maurice PS: Yes, in [[ParentalIncest that way]]." In a twist to this trope, the second half's episodes titles make up the factory's response: "Dear Consumer, we are a humble factory. Maurice was caught unionizing our labor. [[RedChina President Hu]] forbids it! Due to constraints of time and budget, the ramblings of Maurice cannot be erased, so sorry. Please do not notify our contractors. Especially [[BitingTheHandHumor the animal]] [[Creator/AdultSwim Keith Crofford]]!"