History Series / CrankYankers

* AdaptedOut: Special Ed has been axed out of the reboot by the network.

''Crank Yankers'' is a live-action and puppet show that used to air on Creator/ComedyCentral and also for a brief time on [=MTV2=] co-created by Daniel Kellison, Creator/AdamCarolla and the far better-known Creator/JimmyKimmel.

Jimmy Kimmel on February 2019 announced that Comedy Central has revived the show for a 20-episode 5th season. Instead of simply prank phone calls, [[TechnologyMarchesOn they'll be including pranks on social media platforms]]. Comedy Central announced it will premiere on September 25th, 2019.

Jimmy Kimmel on February 2019 announced that Comedy Central has revived the show for a 20-episode 5th season. Instead of simply prank phone calls, [[TechnologyMarchesOn they'll be including pranks on social media platforms]].

The premise: transcripts of real crank calls are re-enacted, cutting between the rooms of each end of the call (usually with lots and lots of BackgroundGags going on). The victims and pranksters are played by Muppet-esque puppets. When not airing prank calls, the show makes the puppets do raunchy explicit things such as gay bars, strip clubs, public sexual intercourse, racist stereotypes, etc. as a form of {{Foil}} to the Muppets. In the U.S., it is illegal to record and broadcast prank calls without both parties' consent... except for Nevada, which only requires one (i.e., the callers). So, nearly all the calls are made in Nevada. However, this made taping and broadcasting episodes fairly uneven due to many of the celebrities being based in California. The show also helped bring fame to Pete Dzoghi, a man who basically made a career out of doing prank calls before selling them as albums for money.

* AssholeVictim: Some of the selected prank call victims were telemarketers. Jim Florentine (who does Bobby Fletcher and Special Ed) released multiple calls of him retaliating back at them called "Terrorizing Telemarketers".

* LethalEatery: Jim Gaffigan keeps calling a pizza parlor telling them they're infested with cockroaches because his daughter had a pizza from them with a roach in it, and that he's affiliated with the "Church of Cockroaches" so he's coming over for a pest control check-up, making the pizza parlor man lash out at him on the phone to stay away. When it's closing time, man-sized cockroaches take over the parlor and start making the pizzas themselves.

!!Crank Yankers has these following examples of tropes, Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy!!!

!!Won't you join the Crank Tropers tonight?

* ProudBeauty: One sketch has Cammie calling a random woman to gloat about how beautiful she is and asking her how does it feel to be ugly.

[[quoteright:281:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/images_2_98.jpg]]

Jimmy Kimmel on February 2019 announced that Comedy Central is reviving the show for a 20-episode 5th season. Instead of simply prank phone calls, they'll be switching to pranks on social media platforms.

[[quoteright:281:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/images_2_98.jpg]]

Jimmy Kimmel on February 2019 announced that Comedy Central is reviving the show for a 20-episode 5th season. Instead of simply prank phone calls, they'll be switching to pranks on social media platforms.

* ComicallySmallBribe:
** In a sketch by Dom Jon asking for settlement money over a car collision (that probably never happened), Dom Jon at first asks for $2500 but lowers it to $2000, then $800, then finally a back-rub or food stamps.
** Hadassah when she lost her diary in a landfill called them to start digging for it, and offered $15 in return.

* DrivenToSuicide: In a Special Ed sketch where he called a Dunkin' Donuts store to play a prank call on the responding baker, his co-worker Fred the Baker got so fed up with having to make donuts that he committed suicide by [[AteHisGun shooting himself in the mouth through the brain with a frosting dispenser]].

* TooKinkyToTorture: Special Ed called a Dunkin' Donuts to screw with them asking them if they make donuts with their butt or if their customers put donuts in their butt. The operator enthusiastically responded Yes to all these ridiculous questions and so Ed hung up because the prank call didn't go too well.

* ComicallySmallBribe: In a sketch by Dom Jon asking for settlement money over a car collision (that probably never happened), Dom Jon at first asks for $2500 but lowers it to $2000, then $800, then finally a back-rub or food stamps.

* CryingWolf: Invoked by the crank callers often, but a more literal case of crying comes up in a Season 2 episode where Katie Kimmel called a pet store to tell the receptionist that she sold her brother (Kevin) a snake and that it ate her hamster, crying on the phone and calling the receptionist a son-of-a-bitch and threatening to "[[GroinAttack kick her in the balls]]". Turns out, Katie never owned a hamster.

* AdoptionDiss: Katie acts like she received one when she prank called a librarian.

Jimmy Kimmel on February 2019 announced that Comedy Central is reviving the show for a 20-episode 5th season. Rather than prank phone calls, they'll be switching to pranks on social media platforms.

Jimmy Kimmel on February 2019 announced that Comedy Central is reviving the show for a 20-episode 5th season.

The premise: transcripts of real crank calls are re-enacted, cutting between the rooms of each end of the call (usually with lots and lots of BackgroundGags going on). The victims and pranksters are played by Muppet-esque puppets. When not airing prank calls, the show makes the puppets do raunchy explicit things such as gay bars, strip clubs, public sexual intercourse, racist stereotypes, etc. as a form of {{Foil}} to the Muppets. In the U.S., it is illegal to record and broadcast prank calls without both parties' consent... except for Nevada, which only requires one (i.e., the callers). So, nearly all the calls are made in Nevada. However, this made taping and broadcasting episodes fairly uneven due to many of the celebrities being based in California.

* BadLiar: Bobby Fletcher, when he kept harassing a rehab receptionist by calling her "retarded" and "not that well-educated" but then immediately denying he ever did so.

* {{Manchild}}: Elmer Higgins.

The premise: transcripts of real crank calls are re-enacted, cutting between the rooms of each end of the call (usually with lots and lots of BackgroundGags going on). The victims and pranksters are played by Muppet-esque puppets. When not airing prank calls, the show makes the puppets do raunchy explicit things such as gay bars, strip clubs, public sexual intercourse, racist stereotypes, etc. as a form of {{Foil}} to the Muppets.

In the U.S., it is illegal to record and broadcast prank calls without both parties' consent... except for Nevada, which only requires one (i.e., the callers). So, nearly all the calls are made in Nevada. However, this made taping and broadcasting episodes fairly uneven due to many of the celebrities being based in California.