History Main / MandatoryLine

* In ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory: WesternAnimation/EgoTrip'' Dee Dee only has a few minutes of screentime, and only one spoken line, her catchphrase "Ooh, what does this button, do?" [[spoiler:Subverted, as she says this right before pressing the button that ''saves the world''.]]

* One Veterinary Hospital sketch on ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' (the Music/KennyRogers episode) has Nurse Janice claim that the patient (Kermit) had been under sedation - a box of aspirin fell on his head. When Kermit pointed out that this wasn't what had happened, Janice says "I know, but it's my only joke."

* In the first season of ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales2017'', most of Donald Duck's appearances can be summed up as this, only showing up for a less than a minute to say something, and then never appear again for the rest of the episode; a few of them even being ''off-screen''. He fared a little better in Season two, although still occasionally falls into this. Likewise, the majority of Mrs. Beakley's appearances in the series are to show up for one scene and then otherwise be forgotten about.

* ''Series/{{GhostsUS}}'': As Sass and Hetty are looking at Hetty's portrait in the basement, Nancy, one of the Cholera Ghosts walks by, looks at the painting, and says "Nice ankles, ya whore!" This is Nancy's entire appearance in the episode.

* The Furious Five from the ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda'' franchise often get this treatment. It doesn't help that, with the narrative function they serve, there could easily be less than five of them, and yet the five of them are almost always together and need to have lines in every movie. Tigress is the most vocal of them, generally being the spokesperson for the Five, while Mantis and Crane cover the comic relief role, but Monkey and Viper... let's just say that viewers often complain that they can't recall either of them having ''any'' lines.

*** Angel fell victim to this in season 3. After he became the season's BigBad, it made sense for him to show up in the arc-relevant episodes, but they had to find excuses for him to appear in standalone eps where he wasn't actually causing any trouble, too. So there were several instances where he would randomly bump into Buffy in an alley someplace, say something mean to her, and then leave, adding nothing to the plot. Perhaps the worse example was in "Phases" -- the episode was Oz-centric, and about werewolves, of all things. Angelus did nothing but pop up with a new coat of badass guyliner, turn some random girl into a vampire, and stir up a bunch of old tensions between Buffy and Xander. Later in the beginning of season three, after supposedly lost forever in a hell realm, Angel still appeared in a series of dream sequences until he returned.

*** This about sums up Cordelia's role in the bulk of Season 1 and parts of 3, where in many episodes she just shows up to antagonize the other main characters and then leaving.

** Would finally be subverted in "Bassward", the first and so far only episode in the series not to feature [=SpongeBob=] or some variant of him in any way, shape or form.

* One Veterinary Hospital sketch on ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' had one of the Nurses claim that the patient (Kermit) had been under sedation - a box of aspirin fell on his head. When Kermit pointed out that this wasn't what had happened, the nurse said "I know, but it's my only joke."

** Lisa tends to be reduced to a mandatory line when the plot isn't focused on her. For example, in [[Recap/TheSimpsonsS8E23HomersEnemy "Homer's Enemy"]] she has three lines, two of which are single words. One episode had Lisa's only line be an utterance of "Santa?" from offscreen -- the commentary mentioned that it was added in upon the realization that Lisa had no speaking lines otherwise in that episode. In [[Recap/TheSimpsonsS8E24TheSimpsonsSpinOffShowcase "The Simpsons Spin-Off Showcase"]], this is [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] multiple times in the commentary, but there is actually a reason InUniverse: the third spin-off (the one featuring the Simpson family) includes a joke where [[TheOtherDarrin Lisa is replaced.]] Lisa's only line, as a result, is during the ''first'' spin-off, which focuses on Chief Wiggum.

** At the beginning of season three of ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', Angel (who was supposedly lost forever in a hell realm) appeared only in a series of dream sequences.
*** Angel fell victim to this in the previous season, too. After he became the season's BigBad, it made sense for him to show up in the arc-relevant episodes, but they had to find excuses for him to appear in standalone eps where he wasn't actually causing any trouble, too. So there were several instances where he would randomly bump into Buffy in an alley someplace, say something mean to her, and then leave, adding nothing to the plot.
*** Perhaps the worse example was in "Phases" -- the episode was Oz-centric, and about werewolves, of all things. Angelus did nothing but pop up with a new coat of badass guyliner, turn some random girl into a vampire, and stir up a bunch of old tensions between Buffy and Xander.

*** This about sums up Cordelia's role in the bulk of Season One.
*** It is also why Seth Green left the series -- he was tired of Oz just having his mandatory line appearances in most episodes.

* Tina's role on ''Series/{{Glee}}'', where she is an AdvertisedExtra.

* ''[[WebVideo/YuGiOhTheAbridgedSeries Yu-Gi-Oh! The Other Abridged Movie]]''
** Lampshaded:
-->'''Tea:''' I'm just here to look pretty!

* Lampshaded on ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'' in one episode [[DayInTheLimelight which focuses solely on Steve and his friends]]. The rest of the family is not seen at all for half the episode, and when they do show up, they're all sitting together in the living room as Steve walks by and says one brief line to them. Stan says, "[[LampshadeHanging It sure was nice of Steve to acknowledge us this week, even if it was just this once]]." Other than that (and a quick, silent scene with Francine at the end) they don't appear for the rest of the episode.

* In Season 3 of ''WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers'', Teddy's voice actor, Larry Murphy, was promoted to main cast. As a result of this promotion, Teddy is now written into almost every episode, although usually for just one or two scenes. Most often, he will be seen near the beginning of the episode in the restaurant as Bob and Linda explain to him the family's plans for the day and he does not appear again for the rest of the episode. If this isn't the case, he usually ends up appearing as a result of the Belchers needing his help with something. In the few episodes where Teddy doesn't appear at all, Murphy usually voices someone else instead.
** This trope is best exemplified in the episode "Li'l Hard Dad", where the subplot involves Tina needing to give a presentation at school. Louise borrows Teddy's wheelbarrow for Tina to use in the project and tells her that he wants to be in it. During the last five seconds of the episode, after Tina has given her presentation, Teddy appears outside the classroom window looking for Tina and asking if he missed it.

---> "Mom uses this stuff to take off her makeup. Rath added a little something extra."

* ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' episode "Red Man's Greed" featured one new character who was hanging out with the regulars, and who kept inserting random lines of dialogue that could easily have been cut without changing the main plot line at all. At the end, Stan and Kyle lampshade this by saying "Who the hell are you?" and telling him to get out, only for [[BreakingTheFourthWall him to explain]] that he got to be in the episode due to a RealLife auction the network held. The boys tell him to go away. RuleOfFunny, obviously.

* Many times on ''Series/{{Castle}}'', both Martha and Alexis have been on camera for only their one line, though both have sometimes been left out of the script completely at times as well.

* The ''WesternAnimation/{{Daria}}'' episode "Jane's Addition" focuses entirely on the relationship between [[TheSnarkKnight Daria]], [[CoolLoser Jane]], [[TheSlacker Trent]] and the newly-introduced [[TallDarkAndSnarky Tom]]; as such it's the only episode where Daria's family do not appear onscreen at all. About three minutes before the end of the episode, however, we see Daria watching TV as the three each yell a [[{{Flanderization}} simplistic explanation]] for why they're too busy to show up.

*** Perhaps the worse example was in "Phases" -- the episode was Oz-centric, and about werewolves, of all things. Angel did nothing but pop up with a new coat of badass guyliner, turn some random girl into a vampire, and stir up a bunch of old tensions between Buffy and Xander.

** Episodes 4 and 8 both have a sketch where Michael Palin is an art critic and Katya Wyeth comes on and makes an IncrediblyLamePun. When he complains about it, she wails, "But it's my only line!"

* In ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory: WesternAnimation/EgoTrip'' Dee Dee only has a few minutes of screentime, and only one spoken line, her {{Catchphrase}} "Ooh, what does this button, do?" [[spoiler:Subverted, as she says this right before pressing the button that ''saves the world''.]]

* ''Franchise/D4DJ'': The voice actress for Rei Togetsu was replaced between seasons one and two, and it seems to have affected production. While all the characters had their screentime slashed in season two (to make way for the extra characters from the mobile game), Rei was affected particularly hard. In group discussions with her idol (or, sorry, "''DJ''") unit Happy Around!, she has at most a handful of lines of dry exposition, and very rarely are they intended to be funny or bring her character out. The other three members of Happy Around! get multiple opportunities to work with other units to coordinate Operation Beckoning Cat or forge emotional connections, but Rei doesn't. Even when Happy Around! use her mansion as a vacation spot with Peaky P-Key, the other seven girls banter freely amongst themselves while Rei has maybe three lines at most. It's like the production team did the bare minimum to remind you Rei exists, while also minimizing the amount of dialogue they'd have to replace.