History TraumaButton / LiveActionTV

* At the beginning of the TV movie "[[https://youtu.be/T380WIPUtKg?si=XbW4eHXhiifLqEeY Shattering The Silence]]", a woman is inexplicably disturbed by the sight of her father gifting her newborn daughter a stuffed horse--"Family tradition! All my little girls get horsies!" (and out of the corner of her eye, she notices her niece's own upset reaction to this) As the movie progresses, she slowly regains RepressedMemories of she and her sister having been sexually abused by him and that he would disguise his behavior as a game--"Let's play "Ride The Horsey!" The stuffed animal served as a TraumaButton for her niece as well because she's become his newest victim.

* ''Series/FeelGood'': Mae is an addict that suffers from PTSD [[spoiler:from an innapropriate sexual relationship with the manager of a comedy club in their hometown]], and whenever they experince a moment that reminds them of either drugs or sexual abuse, we hear a shard DroneOfDread

* ''Series/HouseOfTheDragon'': King Viserys is willing to overlook a lot in the name of the love he bears his brother, but anything that pertains to his dead baby son Baelon is a trigger for him, be it the "Heir for a Day" toast or the theft of Baelon's dragon egg.
* While hearing static while her boyfriend Jagger fiddled with the radio, ''Series/GeneralHospital'''s Karen suddenly had a flashback of a window shade being pulled down. She later had the same flashback when Jagger himself pulled down a window shade. When she finally remembered having been sexually abused by one of her mother's boyfriends, the complete picture revealed that he'd pull down her window shade so that no one could see what he was doing and turn up the radio to drown out the sound of her crying.

* One episode of ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' has a retired Marina confess to killing a fellow soldier during World War II; however, since it was so long ago, he can no longer remember exactly what happened. The team eventually use this trope to jog his memory, bringing in a retired Japanese soldier and having him bark orders in Japanese until it triggers a flashback in the Marine. Turns out [[spoiler:his friend was badly wounded and there were Japanese soldiers closing in, so he was forced to perform a MercyKill]].

* ''Series/TrueBlood'':
** After Lafayette gets out of [[spoiler:the dungeon that the vampires held him in]], Detective Andy approaches him in the kitchen at Merlotte's, where Lafayette works. The next scene is basically him threatening to put Lafayette back in ''exactly'' the situation he just escaped from. Terry, a veteran with PTSD who probably recognized the signs since Lafayette had fallen down, ''terrified'', calls the officer in question on this in a sort of one-on-one ShamingTheMob.
** Terry also appears to have gotten one just before we come on-screen. Which makes sense, since he's an Iraq war vet who had just seen [[spoiler:his wife covered in blood. She's not dead, but the white sheets are ''dark red''.]]
* Josh from ''Series/TheWestWing'' has a flashback trigger in Christmas music, because his delayed-reaction PTSD erupted right around Christmastime, and he mentally associated the constant caroling of the band in the White House lobby with the sirens from the assassination attempt during which he was near-fatally shot.
** The episode where Josh's trigger is established includes a B-plot of C.J. looking into a story about a woman "freaking out" at a painting during a tour of the White House. It turns out the painting originally belonged to the woman's father, but it was stolen from them by the Nazis during World War II. Seeing the painting brought back the trauma of what she'd been through.
* ''Series/BlackMirror'': "[[Recap/BlackMirrorWhiteChristmas White Christmas]]" contains an early scene where the protagonist has a disturbed reaction to the song "I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day" by Wizzard and to an innocuous but distinctive clock on the wall. This is eventually revealed to be [[spoiler: because he murdered a man while the song was playing, who had that clock on the wall.]]
* In ''Series/TheWalkingDead2010'', Judith's crying clearly makes Michonne uncomfortable, causing her to snap at Beth when the girl asks her to hold the baby. Michonne eventually breaks down in tears, and we later learn that [[spoiler: she had an infant son who was slaughtered during the outbreak.]] This is further emphasized when she suffers a traumatic nightmare relating to the event.
* ''Series/TerminatorTheSarahConnorChronicles'': for Derek, classical music playing (while Cameron practices a ballet routine) triggers flashbacks to a time when he was captured and, it's implied, tortured by Terminators. For John during "Self Made Man," a combination of feeling uncomfortable at a party where Riley is flirting with another boy (who's also a dick), a violent video game, and a confrontation with the boy when Riley steals his lighter leads John to attack the boy. By this time, it's revealed that [[spoiler: John killed Sarkissian]] and his fight with the boy recalls that one.
* In ''Series/TheSopranos'', family patriarch Tony Soprano suffers from panic attacks for the entirety of the series and starts the series by (reluctantly) going to a therapist for help. Around Season 3, it's finally revealed that his trigger is ''meat'', of all things. It turns out that he has a traumatic childhood memory of witnessing his father "Johnny Boy" Soprano torturing the local butcher Francis Satriale after he failed to pay his debts, then going home and finding his mother casually serving meat from Satriale's shop for dinner. By the time of the series, Satriale's Pork Store has become a front business for Tony's own crime family, serving as a constant reminder of the day that Tony found out how his father made his money. {{Call Back}}s reveal that there were hints about it all along: every single one of Tony's previous panic attacks happened when he was cooking or handling meat while under more stress than usual.

* In one episode of ''Series/TheDrewCareyShow'', Mr. Wick grows tired of Mimi's outlandish outfits and garish makeup and tries to seal her up inside a cubicle so that he won't have to look at her. However, she turns out to be severely claustrophobic and Drew ends up convincing Wick to remove the partitions, because her usual bitchy self is far more preferable to the nervous wreck that she's turning into.
* In one episode of ''Series/LawAndOrderCriminalIntent'', a young man at a party suddenly goes berserk and kills one of the revelers. Goren and Eames learn that the young man had been locked up in a basement for long periods of time and subjected to loud house music as part of some cruel therapy for his psychological issues, so when he heard the same kind of music being played at the party, it caused him to want to kill.
* In ''Series/HaltAndCatchFire'', Cameron meets Joe [=McMillan=]'s father, Joe Sr., and they actually get along for a while... until Joe Sr. says that Cameron must make her own father very proud. Cameron lost her dad when she was only 10 years old, and the mere mention of him upsets her so badly that she retreats into another room to cry.
** In the third season, she goes home to try and claim some of her father's old possessions, but the prospect of having to see her mother again fills her with such panic that she completely disappears for several days.
* In the pilot of ''Series/Tyrant2014'', Barry's carefully-maintained stoic façade is jarred when, during his nephew's wedding, his brother Jamal fires a gun into the air and then hands the gun to Barry, expecting him to do the same. This causes Barry to experience a flashback to the time [[spoiler:his father tried to force Jamal to shoot someone, but Barry ended up having to do it because Jamal was too scared]]. Barry hands the gun back to Jamal and quickly walks away before his panic starts to show.
* In an episode of ''Series/NecessaryRoughness'', TK hires a massage therapist to try and speed up his recovery after getting shot. However, he repeatedly throws her out because she keeps touching the area where he got shot, causing him to remember the shooting. After he finally relents and actually starts to remember the shooting, he shows up at Dr. Santino's house looking utterly wrecked.
* Narrowly averted in the pilot of ''Series/{{Defiance}}''; Tommy goes to arrest Irisa, but Nolan talks him out of using handcuffs, saying that Irisa had some really bad experiences with being chained up, and if Tommy tries to put cuffs on her, she will flip out and probably kill him. Since Irisa happens to be a ferocious-looking catgirl, Tommy wisely decides to follow Nolan's advice.
* In an episode of ''Series/TheSuiteLifeOfZackAndCody'', Arwin screams hysterically whenever the word "bowling" is said in front of him. It is eventually revealed that he was once a star bowler and even won a trophy for it. But a head injury inadvertently inflicted on his mother prompted him to relinquish his love for bowling ever since.
* In the ''Series/AgentsOfSHIELD'' episode, "Making Friends and Influencing People", Fitz discovers that [[spoiler:Ward, the man who tried to kill him and left him with permanent brain damage, is being held in SHIELD's basement]]. He proceeds to experience an anxiety attack.

* In ''Series/{{Leverage}}'', spending any amount of time in a hospital drastically increases the odds of Nathan Ford relapsing on his drinking habit, due to all the time he spent in the hospital when his son was dying.
* ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'': In early Season 7, it's clear that Spike's AttemptedRape of Buffy has left scars. Simply touching his hand by accident in "Beneath You" causes her to flashback to that moment, and in "Him," Spike unexpectedly touching her arm startles her. Even years later, during the Season 10 comics, she still has some troubles with it despite having long since forgiven and accepted Spike; in "Triggers," Spike unexpectedly entering the bathroom while she's showering causes her to instinctively kick him into a wall.
* On ''Series/{{NCIS}}'', Jacqueline Sloane was captured and tortured while serving in Afghanistan, and still has the scars to show for it. So one night she's on a date, and she suddenly hears the voice of her torturer. [[UnstoppableRage The results]] aren't pretty.
* ''Series/GeneralHospital'''s Michael finally admits to being a victim of PrisonRape after seeing his girlfriend being attacked in a similar fashion.
** Karen Wexler began having strange flashbacks triggered by the sound of radio static and/or the sight of a window shade being pulled down. When she finally recalled being sexually abused by one of her mother's boyfriends, she remembered that it always started with him pulling down the window shade so that no one could see what he was doing and turning up the radio to muffle her screams.
* ''Series/LegendsOfTomorrow'': When Nate mentions high school, Gary freezes with wide-eyed terror like he's having a war flashback.
-->'''Nate:''' ''Wow'', you are broken.
* ''Series/LessonsInChemistry'': Elizabeth prefers working with the door open because closed doors remind her of her past assault.
* ''Series/HoratioHornblower'': Implied with Archie Kennedy's reaction to Wellard's beatings. Wellard is a young midshipman who suffers the most because of Captain Sawyer's growing paranoia. It is Lieutenant Kennedy who tries to intervene, openly calls it an injustice and is visibly upset while other Lieutenants try to hand-wave it at first as Captain's harsher ways and common naval discipline. In the first series, Archie was the young midshipman who suffered at the hands of a powerful bully.
* ''Series/SonsOfGuns'': Will has PTSD from his use of flamethrowers in combat. This is PlayedForDrama in the episodes with a flamethrower restoration and a flamethrower cannon build.
* ''Series/StarTrekDiscovery'':
** Michael Burnham watched her parents get killed in a Klingon attack when she was a little girl. Since then, being near Klingons gets her riled up.
** By the same token, Ash Tyler falls apart whenever he gets near L'Rell, the Klingon who held him captive and repeatedly raped him. [[spoiler:Then it turns out that he's actually a Klingon sleeper agent who's having trouble "awakening", and those traumatic memories include the procedure that transformed him into a human.]]
** In the fourth season, we learn about Oros, a researcher Ruon Tarka worked with in an Emerald Chain work camp. After witnessing his former cellmate die in an escape attempt, Oros curls up into a ball and begins panicking when he hears the camp alarms go off later.
* ''Series/StarTrekPicard'': In "[[Recap/StarTrekPicardS1E06TheImpossibleBox The Impossible Box]]", the bad memories of Picard's past assimilation by the Borg start coming back ''en route'' to the Artifact, making him increasingly agitated and snappish. He then sees a picture of himself as Locutus, leaving him stunned speechless and instinctively touching his face where there used to be lots of Borg components. Things go way downhill for him after he beams onto the Artifact, and his mind is assaulted with flashbacks of his time as Locutus. At one point, he can barely stand and would've fallen into a chasm if he wasn't grabbed by two xBs.

* ''Series/{{Impulse|2018}}'': Henry being touched by men or her being close to the truck will lead to this, due to her rape by Clay in his truck.
* ''Series/TheLastOfUs2023'': Near the end of the pilot, a FEDRA soldier holds Joel's group, including the young Ellie, at gunpoint. This causes Joel to have a flashback to his daughter Sarah's death at the hands of a soldier at the start of the pandemic, and he proceeds to [[NoHoldsBarredBeatdown beat the FEDRA soldier to death]].
* ''Series/SleeperCell'': Ilija [[GenocideSurvivor survived the Bosnian genocide]], where Serbs murdered his entire family. Given this, he's triggered by running into anybody with Serbian heritage. The first season has him go on a date with a woman who's revealed to be a Serbian-American from wearing a crucifix which Ilija recognizes as the one used by Serbian Orthodox Christians. Ilija's response is to then ask if she thinks he's a dog, which bewilders and upsets the woman (as the genocidal Serbs had called Bosnian Muslims this) before he leaves in a rage. After he's on the run in Season 2, he hitches a ride with a man it turns out is a Serb. Ilija immediately starts to jump out, but is stopped by the man, who's compassionate to him and wishes for reconciliation after the Yugoslav Wars, revealing he's also married to a Bosnian Muslim woman. On hearing this, Ilija is mollified and sits down.
* At the beginning of the TV movie "[[https://youtu.be/T380WIPUtKg?si=XbW4eHXhiifLqEeY Shattering The Silence]]", a woman is inexplicably disturbed by the sight of her father gifting her newborn daughter a stuffed horse--"Family tradition! All my little girls get horsies!" (and out of the corner of her eye, she notices her niece's own upset reaction to this) As the movie progresses, she slowly regains RepressedMemories of she and her sister having been sexually abused by him and that he would disguise his behavior as a game--"Let's play "Ride The Horsey!" The stuffed animal served as a TraumaButton for her niece as well because she's become his newest victim.

* ''Series/{{Deputy}}'': In "10-8 Paperwork" Paula's triggered by hearing an alarm go off while she's about to perform surgery, as this makes her remember being held hostage during "10-8 Do No Harm". She does manage to calm herself though and continue the operation.

* One episode of ''Series/NCIS'' has a retired Marina confess to killing a fellow soldier during World War II; however, since it was so long ago, he can no longer remember exactly what happened. The team eventually use this trope to jog his memory, bringing in a retired Japanese soldier and having him bark orders in Japanese until it triggers a flashback in the Marine. Turns out [[spoiler:his friend was badly wounded and there were Japanese soldiers closing in, so he was forced to perform a MercyKill]].

* Comes up in the fifth season of ''Series/HellsKitchen''. During the first five episodes, throughout Gordon's berating sprees, he calls a contestant named Robert Hesse by "Bobby." It becomes obvious that it screws with his behavior, as he becomes glassy-eyed and disassociative with his surroundings almost instantly. In Episode 5, Robert goes to Gordon’s office after dinner service when Gordon asks why this happens. He explains that the name Bobby is associated with his [[AbusiveParents abusive father]]. Gordon, having grown up with abusive parents himself, immediately recognizes the issue and makes it a point not to use that name again. Though, [[CouldHaveAvoidedThisPlot he wished Robert had brought it up sooner so it didn't become an issue]].

** When Woody's old girlfriend shows up, he constantly goes out eating with her. He reveals that he used to be obese back in Indiana but since he moved to Boston, he's thin. The other guys realize his old girlfriend is his eating trigger, but don't know how to break it to him.

* In one episode of ''Series/LawAndOrderCriminalIntent'', a young man at a party suddenly goes berserk and kills one of the revelers. Goren and Eames learn that the young man had been locked up in a basement for long periods of time and subjected to loud house music as part of some cruel therapy for his AmbiguousDisorder, so when he heard the same kind of music being played at the party, it caused him to want to kill.