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Not to be confused with Creative Closing Credits or simply running credits over The Tag, The Stinger, or the Hilarious Outtakes, a credits gag involves a show making jokes within, about or upon the credits themselves. These may be a form of Couch Gag in a television series.

Common versions include:

  • The credits getting "broken" and arguments over fixing them.
  • Spoof credits, such as fake names, nonsensical or ridiculous roles, or fictional characters supposedly working behind the scenes.
  • Referencing things within the credits, sometimes within a self-deprecating manner.
  • Running fake credits before the end of the show, only to continue later.
  • Homemade productions made by one person list job after job after job; with the same person's name next to it.
  • Joke legal disclaimers. Variants on No Animals Were Harmed or This Is a Work of Fiction are subtropes of this type.

This is not just limited to the actual credits though, a film/series title gets this treatment too.

See also Logo Joke, Character as Himself and Special Edition Title.


Examples

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    Anime and Manga 
  • Blood Blockade Battlefront: The series title in the first opening ("Hello World") is seen through Leonardo's All-Seeing Eyes of God.
    • A more direct gag appears in the same opening too: creator Yasuhiro Nightow's name appears on a street sign when Leonardo uses his Eyes to look at his sister Michella.
  • Durarara!! has the ending credits, and the openings say "Produced by Ikebukuro Dollars." The Ikebukuro Dollars are a color gang that exists in the story.
  • The closing credits for the North American dub of Excel♡Saga contain multiple different gag credits in each episode.
    • A quick example is "Ms. Calvello's wardrobe provided by Straight-Jackets R Us". And after an episode whose theme is that there are to be no gags, the credits are given straight with a comment reminding the viewers that it was the "no-gags" episode.
    • As the closing credits roll, underneath Menchi the dog sits on a stage and mournfully yips a song entitled "Bolero of Sorrow (Please Don't Eat Me)"; in the corner of the screen, a translator dutifully renders the lyrics in Japanese. For the very last episode, they trade places, with the woman singing, and Menchi translating her performance into Dog.
  • The ADV Films release of Full Metal Panic! includes in-character voiceovers from the main cast to accompany the FBI warning. While the warning itself is standard, the voice-overs paraphrase in various ways; Kaname announces that she is setting out some rules as Class Representative, while Sousuke warns against using the disc or its packaging as a weapon and makes sure to note that any Humongous Mecha specifications the viewer may come across are strictly confidential. This is carried over from the similar voice-overs done for the piracy warnings on the Japanese DVDs, which are included as extras on the ADV Films DVDs.
  • JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: A few villains use their Stand powers in the episodes where they appear (also under Special Edition Title).
    • A more direct gag appears during the "Battle Tendency" opening credits (Bloody Stream), when Wamuu performs his Holy Sandstorm (Kamizuna Arashi), the credit for the studio "Kamikaze Douga" briefly changes into "Kamiarashi Douga".
  • In episode 23 of Kill la Kill the second ending song is interrupted by Nui, seen here at this link.
  • In the anime adaptation of The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suzumiya, the credits include characters from the show among the production staff. For instance, in both the North American adaptation and the original Japanese the opening credits cite "The Ultra Director Haruhi Suzumiya" as being in charge of the program.
  • At the end of the first episode of Lucky Star Spin-Off The Miyakawa Family's Hunger, the Miyakawa sisters step out onto a stage to perform the credits theme... only for it to Smash Cut to a test pattern before they can start singing. Turns out they're so poor, they couldn't pay the animators to do a proper credits sequence. Over the following episodes, more and more of the ending plays, with the sisters voicing their exasperation every time they get cut off, until in Episode 5 it finally plays in full.
  • After My Sister, My Writer's anime adaptation became notorious for its consistently Off-Model artwork, episode 6's credits listed one of the animators as "Shoujiki Komatta". That's not a real name - instead, it can be translated to mean, "We're in serious trouble".
  • The second season of Nyaruko: Crawling with Love! opens with a parody of Bewitched's opening creditsnote , with Mahiro and Nyarko in place of Darrin and Samantha; it even credits their respective voice actresses, Eri Kitamura and Kana Asumi. It turns out that Nyarko was making the credits using some video-editing software, as we discover when Mahiro comes in to ask why she isn't getting ready for school.
  • Similarly to Full Metal Panic!, the dub of the Ranma ½ OVAs frequently included piracy warnings performed in character; perhaps the best was Nabiki's, recited over a picture of her taking Marilyn Monroe's place in the famous "Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" sequence (or perhaps Madonna's in the "Material Girl" video).
  • Sazae-san: In the anime adaptation, Sazae's pet cat Tama is credited as "?". No one has any clue who it is in the anime's history.
  • Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei credits all characters as playing themselves, and then goes on to credit some random non-characters (also played by themselves).
  • School Days: Makoto Itou, the protagonist, is credited as producer. There is actually an anime producer named Makoto Itou, who was never involved with the anime, he made a joke about it, as seen here.
  • Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu: In the second season’s opening “Imawa no Shinigami”, Miyokichi’s face appears on a spinning gramophone record, seen here. Her voice actor Megumi Hayashibara is an accomplished singer. The record also represents a memory of someone dead and gone.
  • Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann plays a trick with the credit for Makken, the "Cotton Hill"-look-a-like side character. He's credited as "Reo Kaminaga", which can be scrambled to instead spell "Ore ga Kamina", or "I am Kamina", as an allusion to his real voice actor who shares his voice with Kamina. This was mainly done to not ruin the ending to Episode 26.
  • Tsukiga Kirei: A conversation through the messaging service Line takes place in the closing credits, between Kotaro and Akane. Each episode features a different conversation, referring to events in their future relationship.
  • Zombie Land Saga: Tae Yamada's voice actor is credited as "????".

    Comic Books 
  • In the opening credits for 101 Ways to End the Clone Saga there's a box saying "Edited by Ralph Macchio, tolerated by Bob Harras".
  • Marvel Adventures: The Avengers #2 and #3 credits the staff as parts of a brain - Jeff Parker is the cranium, Manuel Garcia is the hypothalamus, Nathan Cosby is the gray matter, Mark Paniccia is the temporal lobe, Joe Quesada is the overmind, Dan Buckley is the cosmic consciousness...
  • The Batman Adventures:
  • In the first issue of Transmetropolitan, the editor has his job description changed to "whore-hopper".
    • This is a fairly common gag in comics credits; generally the jobs will be changed to something related to the issue, e.g. "warden" if it takes place in a jail. The most common variant is probably the Hollywood issue, with the writer labeled "screenwriter", the artist labeled "director", etc.
  • Each issue of the Sin City: That Yellow Bastard miniseries ends with a double-page spread with the title and credits. In the final issue, the main character is shown left hanging to death and finally giving up the fight to save a young girl. The next two pages are the credits, but it's all a fake-out — the protagonist changes his mind and says that he won't allow his story to end like this. There follows another half-issue of action. Sadly, removed entirely from the graphic novel.
  • Stan Lee era Marvel Comics usually credited the creators in some rather over-the-top way ("Wonderfully Written by: "Spectacular" Stan Lee." "Drawn by: Steve Ditko Master of the Macabre." etc. And then they'd make fun of the letterer. "Lettered by: Art Simek, because his name fits this space." During the second half of the 60s, a fictitious person (always called Irving Forbush) was occasionally credited with stuff like having swept the subway.
  • The credits for Not Brand Echh always let everyone involved have it for inflicting this indignity upon the world. And in an inversion of the above, Irving Forbush is always given some high-powered job, such as being the founder of the comic itself, "so you can't blame it on us!"
    "Wretchedly written and pathetically perpetrated by Smilin' Stan Lee and Merry Marie Severin. Aided and abetted by F. Giacoia (inker) and Al Kurzrok (letterer). <— They shoulda known better!"
  • On Bongo Comics titles, Matt Groening was given various story-related job titles of authority until it was decided that he would be credited as "publisher".
  • Uncanny X-Men #361 was written by Steve Seagle and penciled by Steve Skroce. For the credit box, all the other people involved had their respective first name changed into "Steve" as well, including the lettering studio Comicraft.
  • The Incredible Hulk: The credits for issue #467 lists Peter David (who was leaving the book after that issue) as "Ex-writer" and artist Adam Kubert (who was moving on to X-Men) as "X-artist".
  • The 2014 She-Hulk comics sometimes have the editors credited as various things, such as "Marvelous People" or "(Names) On Something".
  • The credits page for Big Trouble in Little China is written in the form of a Chinese restaurant menu, even promising free delivery and no MSG.
  • The Transformers (Marvel): During Simon Furman's run, editor Rob Tokar and editor in-chief Tom DeFalco are given derogatory titles, so for issue 74, which begins on a picture of Unicron slumbering in the void, Tokar is credited as "nothing" and DeFalco as "nobody".

    Fan Works 

    Films — Animated 
  • During the ending credits to the VeggieTales movie Jonah, three characters interrupt midway through the credits to sing a meta-tastic song about how "this is the song that goes under the credits/these are the credits, so this is where it goes/it has nothing to do with the story" and so on. Eventually they all get bored and wander off to do something else.
    There should be a rule that the song under the credits
    Remotely pertains to the movie’s basic plot
    That rule has not been made so for now we’ll have to say
    Hey! Hey! Hey hey hey hey hey hey
  • Happens regularly with Pixar movies:
    • Monsters, Inc.:
      • It features odd, colorful, and extremely active opening credits, with (among other things) one sequence being eaten by a monster (including the merciless hunting down of a quick-footed "e") and then being regurgitated into the title. This was added because the studio found that starting the movie with the "monster simulator" scared younger viewers; the cheery opening helps set the tone for the beginning of the film.
      • And in the end credits, they actually perform the play they made up as an excuse earlier. The DVD includes the credits for said play, where Mike Wazowski is repeatedly credited for everything.
    • Finding Nemo featured funny things happening around the credits during the end, such as Mike Wazowski (from the film directly above) swimming through a gap.
    • A Bug's Life decorated its credits with a (fake) blooper reel with the titular bugs as Animated Actors. The aforementioned Monsters Inc. and Toy Story 2 did the same thing.
    • The credits for WALL•E start with a series of vignettes depicting the Axiom's passengers readjusting to Earth life, done in progressive art styles. It then depicts the characters re-enacting the events of the film in Cliff's Notes style among the credits in faux 8-bit video game graphics style. Also, the logo of Buy n Large, the MegaCorp in the film, appears alongside Disney and Pixar's logos.
    • The "Production Babies" segment of the credits for Soul is retitled "Recent You Seminar Graduates", tying back to the movie itself as the "You Seminar" is where souls come from before birth.
    • In Cars, one of the unnamed pittys who quit on Lightning in the beginning is misnamed "Chuck" by Lightning, and responds with, "AND MY NAME IS NOT CHUCK!" as his final line; in the credits, the voice actor for said pitty is credited as "Not Chuck".
    • Coco: At the end of the closing credits, there is an ofrenda to the deceased people who inspired the filmmakers of Coco, in the form of a mosaic made from photographs.
    • Turning Red: The songs of the In-Universe boyband 4*Town are credited as "performed by 4*Town" in addition to being credited to their voice actors. Also, the name 4*Town is displayed as a wordmark matching the one used within the film.
  • The opening section of the end credits of The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle features Rocky, Bullwinkle, Boris, Natasha and Fearless Leader pursuing each other to and fro and in and out of the credit captions, as well as using them to bludgeon and bewilder each other.
  • The end credits of Frozen contain a "disclaimer" saying, "The views and opinions expressed by Kristoff in the film that all men eat their own boogers are solely his own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of The Walt Disney Company or the filmmakers. Neither The Walt Disney Company nor the filmmakers make any representation of the accuracy of any such views and opinions."
  • In Penguins of Madagascar, John Malkovich's character is at first credited as Debbie, then corrected as Dave, in keeping with the Running Gag of Skipper misnaming him.
  • South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut
    • Saddam Hussein is credited as playing himself.
    • The songs are listed as being performed by the characters themselves rather than the voice actors.
  • A subtle one but in Zootopia, Finnick's voice actor, Tommy Lister, is created as Tiny Lister instead, a common nickname for him and definitely a joke based on the character's size.
  • The opening credits for Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs simply has "A Film By" which sits for a moment before adding "A Lot Of People."
  • The ending of The Addams Family (2019) has an animated version of the classic TV series intro.
  • The Iron Giant: The Signature Edition includes the CinemaScope logo in the end credits. Brad Bird wanted to include the gag in the original release as a homage to '50s sci-fi films that were shot in the format, but was prevented from doing so by Executive Meddling.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • The credits for Monty Python and the Holy Grail begin with dark, dramatic, epic-style music... then faux-Swedish subtitles start showing up talking about moose, interspersed by notices that first state the people responsible for the fault in the subtitles had been "sacked", then that the people who were supposed to sack those responsible for the fault in subtitles were also sacked. The credits restart with lush, romantic music...with more credits revolving around moose. Eventually, we are told "The directors of the firm hired to continue the credits after the other people had been sacked, wish it to be known that they have just been sacked." Then the credits begin flashing in seizure-inducing colors, while credits related to llamas start appearing and Mexican music plays in the background. All this nonsense, and the movie hasn't started yet.
    • There was a reason for this: the movie was too short and the Pythons had run out of money, so they wrote really long credits.
    • Anyone who puts the DVD in their player gets to sit down and watch the first two minutes (and credits) of Dentist on the Job (a genuine movie, in case anyone was wondering) before the "projectionist" (Terry Jones) realizes his mistake and puts the correct film in.
    • And then there's another credits gag at the end: there are no end credits, since all of the credits people have been sacked. So you get to listen to three minutes of jazz organ while watching a black screen, which also doubles as Fridge Brilliance.
    • During the credits, the disclaimer about all characters are fictional and bear no resemblance to people living or dead tails off with "Signed, Richard M. Nixon."
  • Count Von Count "counts" the credits of the Sesame Street film, Follow That Bird, including a Shout-Out to show creator Joan Ganz Cooney ("Hi, Mom!"). He leaves after a few credits are counted, only returning immediately after they've all rolled by, announcing that he's counted 278 credits in total, as seen here.
    "I love motion pictures!"
  • The Muppets:
    • The Great Muppet Caper opens with Kermit, Fozzie, and Gonzo riding in a hot-air balloon and commenting on the credits as they appear.
    Gonzo: Gee, a lot of people worked on this movie!
    Kermit: Oh, this is nothing. Wait 'til you see the end credits!

    Fozzie: Does anyone actually read this stuff?
    Kermit: Sure. They all have families.
    • Muppets Most Wanted has a few, starting with a fireworks display in the shape of the character's heads, and continues with Sweetums, Fozzie, Rowlf and the Swedish Chef being forced to scroll the credits manually with a rope. Then Dr. Honeydew shows up with a device to make them scroll automatically, and accidentally fast forwards halfway though them before getting the speed right.
    • Later, Fozzie shows up again to hang his hat on one of them. Then again at the very end to tell his Ma that the movie's over and she can go home.
  • A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum: The film adaptation features a closing credits sequence of animated Roman frescoes. One fresco depicts a Roman orgy, but one character raises the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) seal in protest; in the 1960s the MPAA developed a film rating system to judge whether a film's content was too offensive/adult for audiences.
  • Airplane! and most other Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker films have numerous gags buried in their end credits.
  • The credits for the movie Wrongfully Accused (done by ZAZ collaborator Pat Proft) have many of these, including one where a message scrolls by saying "nobody cares about the following people" and proceeds to fast-forward past that section of the credits. Also included are the Boom Operator (real job, operating the Boom Mic), followed by Pow Operator and Kablam Operator, along with a dinner menu.
  • During the credits for Gremlins 2: The New Batch, Daffy Duck pops in a few times to make sarcastic comments. (He also appears at the beginning of the film, attempting to usurp Bugs Bunny's place on the Warner Brothers logo.)
  • Like Excel Saga, the Fight Club DVD plays a very in-character gag on the FBI warning. At first it appears as normal, and then with some flickering and warping (the film's "Tyler has started fucking with something" visual cues), it is replaced with this:
    WARNING

    If you are reading this then this warning is for you. Every word you read of this useless fine print is another second off your life. Don't you have better things to do? Is your life so empty that you honestly can't think of a better way to spend these moments? Or are you so impressed with authority that you give respect and credence to all who claim it? Do you read everything you're supposed to read? Do you think everything you're supposed to think? Buy what you're told you should want? Get out of your apartment. Meet a member of the opposite sex. Stop the excessive shopping and masturbation. Quit your job. Start a fight. Prove you're alive. If you don't claim your humanity you will become a statistic. You have been warned ...... Tyler
    • The Blu-Ray version of Fight Club takes it one step further— it starts off with the menu screen from Never Been Kissed before transitioning into the correct one.
  • As Fahrenheit 451 is set in a future where reading is forbidden, the opening credits are spoken by an announcer over footage of TV antennas.
  • The Court Jester: Danny Kaye interacts with the opening credits, including making the cast names appear, then pushing them off (Basil Rathbone's credit is particularly aggressive, hinting that he plays the villain of the piece); referencing how awesome Technicolor coloring looks ("You'll see, as you suspect/Maidens fair in silks bedeck'd..."), miming a tune for the music credit, and dancing to the choreographer's credit. Watch it here.
  • At the end of the various Phantasm horror films, along with the standard legal penalties, copyright-violators are threatened with "the wrath of the Tall Man".
  • Bubba Ho Tep, from the same director as the Phantasm series, warns copyright violators that they will be punished with "the wrath of Bubba Ho Tep".
  • Spy Hard has many: Emergency Operator: 911, Enterprise Captains: James T. Kirk, Jean-Luc Picard, Still Waters: Run Deep, Horse Translator: Doctor Dolittle, Dead Sculptors: Michelangelo Buonarroti, Auguste Rodin, This film owned by the Juice Mafia, Sketches: Vincent van Gogh, Plastered: My Weird Uncle Bob, Loaded Cameraman Getting Help, Kung Fu Grip: G.I. Joe, Chicago Gangboss: Al Capone, Missing Accountants Under Investigation, Ms. Sheridan's Stand-Out: Her Legs, Horse Shoe Ringer 3 Points, Legal Advice Kanwee, Cheatum and Howe, Gorgeous Blonde's Phone Number: Still Trying To Get It, Go see Naked Gun 33 1/3
  • The last cast credit in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is "That Woman", played by Alanis Morissette, who hasn't appeared at all in the film — until its final moments after the credits where she, reprising her earlier role as God, appears to close the book on The View Askewniverse.
    • In the documentary on the Clerks II DVD release, Kevin Smith notes that the page of the book with "The End" on it is actually in the middle.
  • The French cult movie La cité de la peur features credits gags such as Tulle à vue played by Kim Onku (could be translated as "Avenue Seenit, played by Wu Mayass", and refers to a popular joke among 10 years olds), includes Bruce Wayne as Batman, Peter Parker as Spiderman and "Ca en fait" played by "Du monde hein?" (put together that means "That's a lot of people, isn't it?"). There's also a line about the number of lumps put by one of the actresses in her teacup and how people should watch the movie again just to count them.
  • Robert Altman's M*A*S*H ends with the camp's P.A. announcer reading off the names of the cast.
    • This was also done on the TV show, in the Season 4 premiere "Welcome to Korea".
    • Speaking of Altman films, Nashville opens with a fake commercial for its own soundtrack album, with the cast members' names ("Twenty-four of your favorite stars!") being rattled off by a motormouthed voiceover announcer in the manner of an old K-Tel spot.
    • Another Altman film, Brewster McCloud, had its main titles begin at the Houston Astrodome. We pan from the ceiling, where the first batch of credits begin, to a band led by Margaret "Wicked Witch of the West" Hamilton, performing "The Star-Spangled Banner." When we get to the title, Hamilton abruptly stops the band and berates the group for performing poorly. Then the band starts up again, the camera pans up to the ceiling, and the credits begin all over again!
  • The Biopic Man on the Moon (1999) opens in black-and-white with Andy Kaufman (Jim Carrey), in character as Foreign Man, thanking the audience for coming to see the movie about him, and that he wishes it was better. He goes on to say that he isn't happy with the result because of all the changes made to his life "for dramatic purposes," so he recut it. "Now the movie is much shorter. In fact, this is the end of the movie. Tank you veddy much. [pause] I'm not fooling. Goodbye. [longer, more awkward pause] Go." Andy proceeds to put on a record of sappy music and the end credits cast list rolls. This turns out to be Andy's way of driving people who "who just wouldn't understand me, and don't even want to try" out of the theater — he's actually happy with the film. This was inspired by the opening of Andy's 1977 TV special, in which a similar gag was employed with Foreign Man.
  • The film School of Rock ends with the characters' band playing AC/DC's "It's a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock and Roll)," as the credits scroll over the scene. Near the end Jack Black sings the new lyric: "Movie's almost over!/Credits got to roll!/Look at that name there!/I do not know that guy!"
    • Particularly interesting, when you notice that Jack is "following" the credits in the wrong direction! (he's scrolling down, they're scrolling up)
      • Or the TV version, with no credits.
  • No-budget horror director Henrique Couto does this a lot, often with a bit of Self-Deprecating Humor:
    Any Similarities to Any Individuals Living, Dead, Undead, or Currently Dying is Purely Coincidental. Unless We Ripped Them Off for Material.
  • The Great Dictator has one, being that both Hynkel and the Jewish Barber are played by Charlie Chaplin, the opening credits end with a footnote saying: "Any similarities between Chancellor Hynkel and the Jewish Barber are purely co-incidental."
  • In the closing credits of Mary Poppins, Mr. Dawes Sr. is initially said to be played by one "Navckid Keyd". Then the letters rearrange themselves—turns out, it's a Sdrawkcab Alias for Dick Van Dyke, who also plays Bert. Mary Poppins Returns does something similar for Dawes Sr.'s son, Mr. Dawes Jr.
  • The Star Wars prequel trilogy has the latter two credit "Michael Smith as Javva The Hutt", thanking the owner of ILM's coffee hut.
  • Pulp Fiction has a subtle example. Right as a name relating to sound production shows, the background music gets changed to static before changing to the next song. There are also characters credited as "Long Hair Yuppy Scum" and "Coffee Shop". The latter is the coffee shop owner who says "I'm only a coffee shop..."
  • The opening credits to Attack of the Killer Tomatoes! named one man for six different positions, each with a variation on his name (C.J. Dillon, Constantine James Dillon, etc). It also claimed the film included a special appearance by the "Royal Shakespeare Tomatoes", and was based on "The Tomatoes of Wrath" among other gags- such as an advertisement.
    • In the sequel, an elderly woman appears just as the ending credits start, stating her son (the director) and a lot of other people worked very hard on the film and the audience should sit through the credits.
    • Return of the Killer Tomatoes! also did this with the opening credits. It opens with a parody of a movie host introducing the film, then plays the opening credits for a movie called "Big Breasted Girls Go to the Beach and Take Their Tops Off".
  • The President's Analyst allegedly bothered the FBI for its portrayal of the agency - so to placate them it starts with a disclaimer caption "This film has not been made with the consent or cooperation of the Federal Board of Regulations (FBR) or the Central Enquiries Agency (CEA). Any resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental, and so forth and so on."
    • They also redubbed all the film's references to the FBI and CIA with FBR and CEA, sometimes making the dubbing very obvious.
  • The 1968 comedy Skidoo (directed by Otto Preminger) closes with Harry Nilsson singing a song containing all of the film's credits, including every single cast and crew member and legal disclaimers.
  • Wayne's World ends with a fade to black and a credit roll. About halfway through Wayne and Garth fade back in -
    Wayne: "Well, that's all the time we had for our movie. We hope you found it entertaining, whimsical and yet relevant, with an underlying revisionist conceit that belied the film's emotional attachments to the subject matter."
    Garth: "I just hope you didn't think it sucked."
    • They then fade out and the credits keep rolling - near the end they fade back in again reading magazines and periodically looking into the camera.
    Garth: "Um...I don't think anybody's gonna tell us when to leave."
    Wayne: "Good call. I think they'll just fade to black when they're done."
    fade to black
    Garth: "I can't believe they did that."
    Wayne: "Told ya."
  • The end credits for Woody Allen's Gag Dub film What's Up, Tiger Lily? featured a split screen sequence. The credits ran down the right hand side while the left hand side featured Woody watching a stripper. At the end of the credits came the text 'If you're reading this instead of looking at the girl on the left, we suggest you see either a psychologist or a good optician," followed by an eye chart scrolling up.
  • The first movie of Brazilian comedy group Casseta & Planeta has fake credits (with things such as "Camera Operator: Stevie Wonder" and "Special Effects: O. Bin Laden") before cutting to a "post-scriptum" with the group, then come the real credits.
  • Ethan Coen's 15-year-old son Buster was credited as Mr. Damon's Ab Double in True Grit. He actually was an assistant to the script supervisor.
  • More of a quirk than a gag, but in the opening of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, the film's title appears during Willie Scott's musical number, carefully form-fitted so that Willie appears to be standing in front of the words.
  • In Ocean's 11 (the original, with Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack), the ending scene has the Rat Pack walking past a marquee on the Vegas Strip with their names on it.
  • In the 2001 film Ocean's Eleven, the initial cast listing concludes with "And Introducing Julia Roberts".
  • Lt. Robin Crusoe, U.S.N.'s credits list the writer of the story as Retlaw Yensid. Read it backwards.
  • In the film adaptation of the Discworld story Hogfather, Terry Pratchett is credited as "mucking about with the script".
    • Also, the Death of Rats is credited to Dockery Hellmice, which is an anagram of Michelle Dockery (voicing the Death of Rats, and also playing Susan Sto-Helit).
  • Not really a gag, per se, but there seems to be no other place for it — in Richard Donner's Re-Cut of Superman II, Donner places at the very end the following disclaimer:
    Since the making of this film in the late 1970s, a greater awareness has developed regarding the cruelty to animals in connection with the fur business, and the health risks associated with smoking and second hand smoke. Therefore, I do not condone the use of tobacco and fur products as depicted in this film. -Richard Donner.
    • Also counts as perhaps an Author Filibuster of sorts, as Donner was known for his staunchly anti-fur views.
  • In S1m0ne, all the "I"s and "O"s in the person and company names in the opening and end credits are replaced with "1"s and "0"s respectively. At the end of the end credits, there is a list of people Simone herself would like to thank, with "Hank Aleno Software Inc" being the last on the list - Hank Aleno being the programmer who gave Viktor the software in the first place.
  • Polish cult comedy Hydrozagadka has the opening credits spoken by the actress in affectionate manner (no written credits appear on the screen).
  • As the end music for The Running Man concludes, the show's In-Universe announcer credits the (fictional) companies sponsoring The Running Man, mentions other companies involved ("Damon Killian's Wardrobe by Chez Antoine - 19th Century Craftsmanship for the 21st Century Man!") and finishes with this request:
    If you'd like to be a contestant on The Running Man, send a self-addressed stamped envelope to ICS Talent Hunt c/o your local affiliate, and then go out and do something really despicable! I'm Phil Hilton - good night, and take care!
  • The ending cast credits to Ten include one for Mervin Fly performing the role of "Fly" - "Mervin" was a dead housefly used for a scene in which a character swatted a fly . The credits also list a "Fly Handler", and more mysteriously a "Finding Uterus" - the latter turns out to be an in-joke about one of the crew, who claimed the women in her family were all good at finding lost items.
  • The found-footage horror-on-a-porn-set Lucky Bastard lists "Ashley Saint" as one of the executive producers. She's actually a character in the film as well as the film's sole survivor.
  • Subtly done in the Resident Evil: Afterlife. As the credits roll, Jill Valentine is credited near the bottom of the cast, a character who hasn't appeared in the film at all that point. A few seconds later, the credits cut to a stinger featuring said character.
  • In Annie (2014), after "It's the Hard Knock Life" finishes, the theme song from Moonquake Lake plays. The title of one of the songs listed in the soundtrack takes a jab at people who read the credits.
  • The screenplay of Adaptation. is credited to Charlie and Donald Kaufman, who were both nominated for an Academy Award for their contribution. While Charlie Kaufman is the name of the movie's actual screenwriter as well as the protagonist of the film, Donald Kaufman is his fictional brother.
  • The copyright notice in the end credit for RoboCop (1987) has "This motion picture is protected under the laws of the United States and other countries and its unauthorized duplication, distribution or exhibition may result in civil liability and criminal prosecution by enforcement droids."
  • State and Main:
    • A Running Gag is the amount of people who are promised "associate producer" credits (as one character says, "It's what you give your secretary instead of a raise.") At the end of the film, there's a credit that says, "A complete list of associate producers is available upon request."
    • Another gag in the film is the main characters wondering how you can have a movie called The Old Mill without actually having an old mill. The end credits song is about "the old mill", and then someone calls in wondering the same thing.
  • Musicians, a 1968 Norwegian feature film, has the main actor Leif Juster presenting the credits at the opening of the movie, while the said musicians play away all around him. The credits are presented on posters, which Juster replaces in a swift pace. When he comes to his own name ("also starring Leif Juster"), he unwittingly puts the poster up twice - the second time correcting himself while winking to the audience.
  • Deadpool (2016) has nothing but jokes in the opening credits - it starts with "Some Douchebag's film", then there are descriptions of the cast ("God's perfect idiot", "A British Villain", "A hot chick," "A gratuitous cameo", "A moody teen", "Comic Relief", "an entirely CGI character"), and jokes on the most important crew ("Produced by Asshats; Writers - the real heroes here; directed by An Overpaid Tool”). The closing ones have an animated Deadpool doing silly things - the cast has him warrant comments on the hotness of protagonists Ryan Reynolds and Morena Baccarin and antagonist Ed Skrein, and Gina Carano's credit has Deadpool make the unicorn he's riding repeatedly poke its horn at her name.
  • The Jungle Book (2016): "Filmed in downtown Los Angeles."
  • 20th Century Fox kicked off a campaign in a effort to combat piracy of movies by putting end cards in their films starting with Taken 2 as follows:
    "The making and legal distribution of this film supported over 14,000 American jobs and involved over 600,000 work hours."
  • The closing credits for Up Your Alley, starring Linda Blair (of The Exorcist fame) and the Unknown Comic, ends with a copyright notice ending with the statement "...So don't mess with us, Buddy!"
  • The CD-ROM documentary Making Magic, about the theatrical release of the Special Edition of Star Wars, featured end credits where George Lucas claimed he didn't know if he'd be directing any of the prequels, and if he did he'd only do one. This was intercut with Rick McCallum being asked the same question, and saying that he knew for sure that George was going to be directing the first one, and probably at least one other. The screen showing this then shorted out and dropped out of the frame.
  • The credits for the Direct-to-DVD Psalty's Salvation Celebration includes a recipe for chocolate chip cookies, apropos of nothing.
  • Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy: Karla Films is mentioned at the end of the closing credits, named for spymaster George Smiley's nemesis Karla.
  • The Marvel Cinematic Universe films generally mention in their credits that the hero of their respective film will return (Thor will return, Dr Strange will return, The Guardians of the Galaxy will return, etc).
    • Avengers: Infinity War has an unusual one: "Thanos will return."
    • Ant-Man and the Wasp has another unusual one: "Ant-Man and the Wasp will return?", referencing the fact that Wasp had been disintegrated by Thanos's snap and Ant-Man had been trapped in the Quantum Realm.
    • Doctor Strange (2016) features a message at the end of the credits warning viewers to not be distracted when driving. This is a reference to Dr. Strange's catastrophic car accident, but it is also a running gag in the film about essential warnings appearing after (not before) instructions.
    • Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) included the disclaimer "No raccoons or tree creatures were harmed during the making of this film." It reappeared in Vol. 2 with the addition "However, the same cannot be said of their handlers."
      • Also in Vol. 2, a few of the listed closing credits are "I am Groot" before changing to the actual text.
    • Each film in the Spider-Man: Homecoming Trilogy credits Flash Thompson (under his real name "Eugene Thompson") for performing his own party music, rather than his actor Tony Revolori.
    • Black Panther (2018):
      • The film title and the main cast/crew have their credits briefly appear in Wakandan script before changing to English.
      • The closing credits also changes the color to suit the tribe each main cast member belongs to (eg Lupita Nyongo’s credit turns green, she plays Nakia of the River Tribe whose color is green).
      • Producer Kevin Feige's credit is represented by a throne.
  • Green Lantern (2011): the closing credits takes place in a montage of seven quasars, each quasar a specific color of the rainbow. This is based on the emotional electromagnetic spectrum, a Green Lantern theorem that states each color is based on a specific emotion.
    • Both the credits of Ryan Reynolds (Hal Jordan) and Mark Strong (Sinestro) glow with both green and yellow light; Jordan and Sinestro were Green and Yellow Lanterns in the comics.
    • Blake Lively (Carol Ferris)'s credit glows with a violet aura; in the comics Ferris was a Star Sapphire, who wielded the violet power of love.
    • Peter Sarsgaard (Hector Hammond)'s credit glows with an orange aura; in the comics Hammond was possessed by Ophidian, an entity formed from the orange power of avarice.
    • Temuera Morrison (Abin Sur)'s credit glows with an indigo aura; in the comics Abin Sur was the founder of the Indigo Tribe, a corps which wields the indigo power of compassion.
  • Logan: The words "Alpha Flight" appears under Camera Units. Alpha Flight is the name of a Canadian superhero group that Wolverine was originally a member of in the comics.
  • The credits of Kingsman: The Golden Circle includes 'Dope thanks to: Samuel L. Jackson'.
  • About halfway through the closing credits of Scary Movie 3, there's a message reading "We are about halfway through this thing!"
  • Four Lions has the credits gag "One sheep was harmed in the making of this movie". Earlier in the movie, one of the characters trips over a sheep while carrying a homemade bomb...
  • SHAZAM! (2019): In keeping with the issues over the Marvel title, the closing credits just refer to the members of the Marvel Family as their superpowered forms (Super Hero Freddy, Super Hero Mary, etc) and while Billy Batson and his superpowered form of Shazam are credited separately, his siblings get their superpowered forms credited together.
  • Aquaman (2018): A school of fish are summoned and form the film title.
  • Beauty and the Beast (2017): The main credits have a French subtitle to homage the fairytale's French roots.
  • Dumbo (2019): At the end of the closing credits, a jazzy version of "When I See an Elephant Fly" is heard, which was how the original Dumbo ended.
  • Tomorrowland: "Shot on location in British Columbia, Alberta, Florida, Valencia, Paris, Eleuthera, Los Angeles and Tomorrowland."
  • The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990) has the film title appear from behind the corner of the sewer, just before the Turtles come around it and are fully seen for the first time.
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows has the film title appear with a comic symbol of the four Turtles and the number 2, representing the Turtles' comic origins and the film being the second installment.
  • Spider-Man 3 had the opening credits be blown away by sand during the part where the Sandman's theme was playing.
  • Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019) had Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra, and King Ghidorah listed as themselves in the closing credits' cast list.
  • Dora and the Lost City of Gold: There is a statement from the Fox Council of America at the start of the film: "Everything you are about to see is true. Except that foxes don't swipe. That is a hurtful stereotype." However, it has Swiper's face on it...
    • At the end of the film, the Fiesta Trio, who usually appear at the completion of a quest in the show, do a curtain call.
  • At the end of Aladdin (2019), everyone dances to "Friend Like Me". This came from the Broadway performance of Aladdin, which ends with the cast performing "Friend Like Me".
  • Herb Tanney, an actor who starred in various Blake Edwards films, was generally credited with a nickname (that starts with 'S') relevant to his role in the film, whatever it was (e.g., in Sunset he played a train conductor and was credited as "Steem Tanney", in Victor/Victoria he played a detective and was credited as "Sherloque Tanney", etc.) He has 17 credited appearance according to IMDb... and in all 17 he is billed by a different nickname starting with S.
  • The Recovered has two in the closing credits:
    • The disclaimer about the film being a work of fiction not intended to resemble "any real people living, dead or undead."
    • There is a Special Thanks credit to "Steak (the Food)"
  • Mortal Kombat: The Movie has a cheat code for Mortal Kombat 3 hidden in the closing credits.
    • At the end of the film, a "Flawless victory!" statement is made, which is used when a battle is complete.
  • Take Me Home Tonight has an actor credited as playing a character named "That Loser That Always Shows Up At The Party With A Guitar". A clip of his one scene, in which he briefly performs "Oh Sherry" by Steve Perry on acoustic guitar, is on the soundtrack album and is credited the same way.
  • The credits for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire include a disclaimer stating "No dragons were harmed in the making of this movie."
  • In Lady in the Lake, the character Chrystal is never seen because she's been murdered. In the opening credits, she's listed as being played by Ellay Mort. This is a homophone for "elle est mort'', French for "she is dead".
  • Emma. (2020): The title has a full-stop inserted by the director, as a pun on the film being a period piece.
  • The Witches (2020): Roald Dahl's credit is composed of items/people from his stories.
  • The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent credits the role of Nicolas Cage's Imaginary Friend Nicky to "Nicolas Kim Coppola", Cage's birth name.
  • The Northman: The film's title and its intertitles are in ancient Norse runes.
  • Cracking Up, the last film Jerry Lewis wrote and directed, runs the opening credits over born loser Warren Nefron attempting to navigate his psychiatrist's office with its overwaxed floor and polished leather furniture. Lewis' own acting credit is given as "Jerry — Who Else?", while the score alternates a duet between upright bass and cymbals with bursts of big band jazz as each credit appears... except for composer Morton Stevens, for whose credit the music cuts out entirely for a few seconds. The "theme song" (which is purely instrumental) is also said to be sung by Marcel Marceau.

    Literature 
  • Good Omens has one on its copyright information page:
    CAVEAT: Bringing about Armageddon can be dangerous. Do not attempt it in your own home.
  • Some of Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next novels include credits at the end, the first gag being their very presence in the book. These would include things typical to film credits, such as thanking characters from other stories for agreeing to appear in the book, the copyrights owned by companies and people who appeared, thanks to Fforde's family or friends for coming up with a particular idea or joke, the crew and machinery who built the novel in the BookWorld ("Made wholly on location in the Well of Lost Plots") and messages such as:
    The 'Galactic Cleansing' policy undertaken by Emperor Zhark is a personal vision of the emperor's, and its inclusion in this work does not constitute tacit approval by the author or the publisher for any such projects, however undertaken. Warning: The author may have eaten nuts while writing this book.
  • Some of Robert Rankin's novels do the same thing, even including a cast list.
  • Murder, She Wrote novels credit the authors as "Jessica Fletcher & [the real author]".
  • The author's thanks at the end of each book in The Illuminae Files repeatedly takes the form of hoping they don't get killed in various ways from the book.
  • The credits to Me, Myself & Irene shows stills from the movie highlighting the names of the extras portraying random people in a large crowd, police officers, and one mooning butt in the airplane Irene spots.
  • Karate a Muerte en Torremolinos: The credits are interrupted by a radio host who had narrated some scenes in the movie. He openly says: "We are sorry to interrupt the ending credits, but the dead are raising from their tombs and walking to the homes of their closest relatives!". There are a few other scenes during the credits.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Ana (2020): The end credits include a message to the viewers on behalf of Ana de la Reguera, who is basically playing herself (Mexican actress struggling to find work in Hollywood)
    If any of this resembles reality, please don't tell my mom.
  • And Then There Were None (2015): The opening credits removes an actor's credit when their character has been murdered.
  • The final scene from the Babylon 5 episode "Atonement" was a scene of Marcus Cole singing "I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General" from The Pirates of Penzance. The credits featured an extended version of the tune, followed by the sound of Franklin screaming for him to stop.
  • In an unusual documentary example, the credits for part seven of Ken Burns' Baseball gives baseball-like nicknames to many of the crew members, like "The Babe" and "The Kid".
  • The third season of A Bit of Fry and Laurie had the credits rolling in sync to a hand crank that was being turned by Stephen Fry, stopping and even slightly reversing when he got tired. In one episode the credits came crashing back down at the end when he let go of the crank.
  • Blackadder:
    • The Black Adder had the cast credits in a different order every episode, parodying sitcoms which listed "Cast in Order of Appearance". The first episode had "Cast in Order of Precedence" starting with the kings, and then things like "Cast in Order of Reverence" for the episode where Edmund becomes an Archbishop.
    • Blackadder the Third had the closing credits in the style of a Regency playbill, with the cast getting a brief synopsis of their character after the character name, the crew being credited as "designer of graphics" or "director of lighting", and everyone's name beginning either "Mr." or "Miſs".
      • In the episode "Amy and Amiability", a running gag is squirrels being shot and hitting the ground. At the end of the credits, there's a sound of another squirrel getting shot.
    • Blackadder Goes Forth turned the crew credits into a pseudo-military rank listing, for instance makeup designer Caroline Noble becomes "M/U Dgr. 862641 Noble, C".
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer
    • In "Superstar", the episode in which Jonathan turns himself into a Parody Sue, the usual title sequence is interspersed with shots of Jonathan being heroic.
    • "Once More With Feeling" also features altered credits, with a peppy orchestral version of the theme tune playing over characters' faces appearing on the moon while their names appear underneath.
    • Normally, the actress who portrayed Faith would be billed "Eliza Dushku as Faith". However, for the episode "Who Are You", where she and Buffy switch bodies, her credit instead reads "Eliza Dushku as Buffy".
  • An episode of The Chaser's War On Everything ended with Andrew Hanson taking a piece of paper out of a lottery barrel and declaring it the randomly selected language for the credits that week. The credits then dutifully played in Ukrainian.
  • The UK version of Deal or No Deal sometimes does this. In one early episode a fly in the studio led to an impromptu bit of business in which it was named "Neil", and in the end credits there was one for "Special Guest: Neil". In another episode, a player was invited to make offers to the Banker in a hypothetical game parallel to the real one. At the end, there were two Bankers listed: the usual "Himself", and the player.
  • Doctor Who:
    • Series 8 finale "Death in Heaven" featured a teaser where Clara tried to bluff the Cybermen by informing them, "I'm not Clara Oswald, Clara Oswald never existed! I'm the Doctor!" Cut to the opening credits where Clara's actress Jenna Coleman is billed first, followed by Peter Capaldi, and the shot of Capaldi's eyes is replaced by Coleman's.
    • The Cold Open of Series 9 episode "Before the Flood" features the Doctor explaining the bootstrap paradox, using the example of a Beethoven fan going back in time, discovering Beethoven never existed, and becoming Beethoven himself. He then plays the iconic opening bars of Beethoven's 5th on an electric guitar, before the opening credits roll over a hard rock arrangement of the usual theme.
  • For the Eerie, Indiana episode "Who's Who", involving a family with the surname Bob, everyone in the end credits receives the middle name "Bob" - even Consolidated Film Industries ("Color by C-'Bob'-F-'Bob'-I-'Bob'").
  • Eureka has a couple episodes with thematically altered opening credits:
    • "Founder's Day", which features time-travel to the late '40s, has sepia-toned credits with a big band version of the theme music.
    • "O Little Town", a Christmas Episode, has Christmas-themed credits: all the normal random levitating objects are replaced with wintery and holiday-related levitating objects, Carter is in a coat, the normally instrumental music is sung to the words "fa la la", and so on.
  • Family Feud once replaced everyone's surname with Dawson in the credits, an unsubtle Take That! at then-host Richard Dawson over hiring his son to do some grunt work on the show.
  • The Fast Show ran a series of supposedly foreign language game shows, the credits for everything going to "el presidente!" (except for "Rostrum Camera — Ken Morse". This was a TV industry In-JokeMorse is a real life rostrum camera operator whose name appears in the credits to dozens of shows.)
  • Shows produced by Armando Iannucci often feature joke credits. On one episode of The Friday Night Armistice, photos of the crew were used instead of names.
  • Before the beginning of the sixth season of Friends, actress Courteney Cox got married and changed her name to Courteney Cox Arquette. During the opening credits of the sixth season premiere, all of the actors have "Arquette" added at the end of their name. Courteney and Jennifer Aniston (who was usually listed first) also switched positions in the credits to make the joke work.
    • In a sixth-season episode titled "The One That Could Have Been", the opening montage is redone to show all of the characters' alternate-reality counterparts, including reshooting the iconic "fountain frolic" with Fat Monica and Stockbroker Phoebe.
  • In Garth Marenghis Darkplace almost all credits for creation are for Garth Marenghi and Dean Learner. The sole exception (besides the real credits at the end of each episode) is the line "music by Stig Baasvik, based on tunes whistled by Garth Marenghi".
  • The Goodies episode "It Might as Well be String" ends with the camera looking through the backwards credits on the TV screen at the Goodies, who are sitting on a couch making snide remarks about the episode they've just watched.
  • The funding credits sequence at the start and end of the Great Performances episode "A John Williams Celebration" depicts, instead of the usual post-2008 sequence, Williams conducting the theme music he composed for the series.
  • Later seasons of Green Acres worked some of the crew credits into scenes, appearing as part of the props and sets. Sometimes Lisa (Eva Gabor) would reference them.
  • A late 2000 episode of Have I Got News for You began with Angus saying "Goodnight", then the credits starting to roll at the beginning followed by "Sorry, that was just to annoy anyone who set their video to record this".
    • Another included a Throw It In! moment when a member of the audience stood up during the credit roll. The credits stop and Paul shows "How to do it" and proceeds to run manically around the studio as the credits roll again.
    • One episode in the aftermath of the 2015 general election saw the resignations of Ed Miliband, Nick Clegg, and Nigel Farage announced in the studio as they occurred, one after the other. In the following episode, their faces were crudely scribbled out of the opening.
  • Tool Time, the Show Within a Show on Home Improvement, always opened with Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor coming out and introducing himself (complete with his nickname), and then introduce his assistant Al "(Embarrassing Nickname)" Borland.
  • The main cast of How I Met Your Mother form a band to impress Barney's father. They then sing the theme "Hey Beautiful" instead of the usual opening credits.
    • Done in the end credits of the episode "Swarley". After everyone in the bar yells out Barney's new Embarrassing Nickname, he leaves in a huff, and the song "Where Everybody Knows Your Name" plays, followed by closing credits done with the typeface of Cheers.
    • The episode "Bedtime Stories" renders the title song in the style of a baby's lullaby.
    • The title credits for "How Your Mother Met Me" are redone with photos of the Mother and her friends.
  • A signature gag of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia is making the episode title a direct response to the last line in the cold open, usually in a format of "character says something won't happen, title says that it will." A particularly famous one is:
    Frank: I'm just pallin' around with the guys. How's anyone gonna get hurt?
    Title: Frank Sets Sweet Dee On Fire
  • Chris Morris's Jam dispensed with end credits altogether — there was just a caption reading "jamcredits.com". (It turns out that this was a genuine website with the genuine credits.)
  • Blink and you miss it: in Kung Fu: The Legend Continues the pilot opens with an updated version of the Kung Fu (1972) logo over a shot of David Carradine walking. When the second part of the title comes up, he looks back in surprise.
  • The end credits to The Man from U.N.C.L.E. included an "acknowledgment" to the organization: "We wish to thank the United Network Command for Law and Enforcement without whose assistance this program would not be possible." The gag being, of course, that U.N.C.L.E. was a fictitious organization which exists only in the show's own universe.
  • One episode of M*A*S*H features Hawkeye and Trapper convincing everyone else that there exists a doctor at the 4077th named Tuttle, who they eventually kill off. In the end credits, Tuttle is listed as being played by himself.
  • The second season credits for The Monkees mistakenly names everyone Peter, cut to Peter with sad face, cut back to Monkee with his correct name.
  • Monty Python's Flying Circus, the Trope Codifier, sometimes changed the usual end credits to prolong a Running Gag, such as Spam in episode 25, anagrams in episode 31, and pornographic references in episode 36. In episode 35, one of Eric Idle's characters reads the credits out loud. The Michael Ellis episode ran the end credits immediately after the opening titles, and ended with one character explaining various ways of ending an episode, including fades, walking off into the distance, and finally, the hard cut to black.
    • One episode ended with the BBC apologising for a supposedly insulting reference to Buzz Aldrin; this was followed by the credits run over a picture of Buzz Aldrin with Buzz Aldrin being credited for everything in the show, with "The Star-Spangled Banner" used as background music.
    • Episode six ended with the Pythons as Hollywood writers with silly American accents. The sketch ends with 'Larry Saltzberg' (played by Chapman) reading off the credits, in which everything is credited to 'Irving C. Saltzberg' except for 'Additional Material', which lists the Pythons as 'Graham C. Chapmanberg', 'John C. Cleeseberg', et cetera. Also, Irving C. Saltzberg. The credits culminate with "The Endberg - BBC C. TVBerg Jnr."
    • The Show Within a Show "Timmy Williams' Coffee Time" had enormous credits for 'script by Timmy Williams' and then 'Additional Material by' followed by a huge list of names in tiny print (a Take That! at David Frost, who would treat his writers in a similar way — several of the Pythons had written for The Frost Report).
    • The "Mr. & Mrs. Brian Norris' Ford Popular" episode ended with a "BBC is going bankrupt" gag, and the end credits handwritten on pieces of paper.
    • The Spanish Inquisition episode ends with the credits rolling over the Inquisition as they attempt to make it to court before the end of the credits (which the actors notice going by). They just barely make it and get cutoff mid sentence.
      Head Inquisitor: NO ONE EXPECTS THE SPANISH INQUISIT... (Screen cuts to "The End") Oh bugger!
  • Mr. Show's credits gave "Special Thanks" to notable people not involved with the show as an eyecatch.
  • When Peter Ustinov guest-starred on The Muppet Show, he accidentally sat in a chair that was a Muppet, and that was married to a hatrack who was the show's writer. Sure enough, when you get to the closing credits "The Hatrack" is listed as one of the writers.
    • A first season episode of The Muppet Show in which the Electric Mayhem were on strike, ended with Rowlf having to play the closing theme on his own. Another episode redid the titles and credits to fit the storyline that the show was taking place in a railway station while the theatre was being fumigated. The end music is particularly off-key, because the band are trying to "play the timetable".
  • In one Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode, they "broke" the credits several times.
    • In The Movie, Mike and the bots apply the show's treatment to their own movie's credits at the end ("Puppet wranglers? There aren't any puppets in this movie!").
    • In Teenage Crime Wave the credits are restarted several times, just to see Frank get maced by Dr Forrester.
    • At the end of Tormented and just before the credits roll, Dr. Forrester drops a live grenade in front of Frank. It blows up after the cut to the credits, and makes the title theme skip and warble.
  • Rhino DVDs, including their releases of Mystery Science Theater 3000, used to feature the face of former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover being doodled over in yellow marker during the anti-piracy warning.
  • During a late season two arc of Person of Interest the Machine is infected with a computer virus. The opening credits, which normally show a montage of images and video clips as seen by the Machine, are modified to look like they're glitching out, complete with static and a Repetitive Audio Glitch.
  • Police Squad!! had a Running Gag in the closing credits, which was that the freeze frame was not a freeze frame, but just the actors standing very still (often while other things in the shot — e.g., a suspect being booked, or a chimpanzee (long story!) — would still move).
    • The series also incorporated several Running Gags in the opening titles/credits sequence. Most noteworthy, the crediting of "Rex Hamilton as Abraham Lincoln" in the opening title sequence (as the announcer introduced him (seen sitting in Ford's Theater), John Wilkes Booth's shot knocks off Lincoln's stovepipe hat; Lincoln wheels around holding a handgun and returns fire), the appearance of a "special guest star" (whose entire appearance in that episode amounted to being killed (often in a hilariously over-the-top manner) during the credit sequence), and the announcer announcing the episode title as a different episode title is shown onscreen.
  • On an April Fools' Day episode of The Price Is Right, every contestant was wearing a nametag that said "Pat" as part of the many April Fools gags. To keep the gag going all the way to the end, the closing credits changed everyone's first name to Pat as well.
  • Psych has been known to play with their credits. There have been Christmas episodes that have fake snow put in, and Santa hats or candy canes replacing letters in certain actors' names. Also, in an episode where Shawn investigates a murder on the set of a Spanish soap opera, the theme song is sung in Spanish.
    • Done again in an episode featuring a Bollywood style musical. The credits are in Hindi.
    • In the Twin Peaks tribute episode "Dual Spires", the opening song is a slower, extended version, sung by Julee Cruise, the same artist as that of Twin Peaks.
    • Curt Smith of Tears for fears guest-starred in "Shaun 2.0", and recorded a version of the song.
    • The episodes "High Top Fade Out" and "Let's Doo-Wop It Again" has the theme sung by Boyz II Men.
    • "Heeeeere's Lassie" has the theme done in the style of 50's era music, due to the episode being based on The Shining.
    • The episode "Romeo and Juliet and Juliet" keeps the same theme, but the credits are also done in Chinese.
  • Red Dwarf paused the credits in "Waiting For God" to allow Rimmer to wail about the episode's reveal. "IT'S A SMEGGING GARBAGE POD!"
    • In "Dimension Jump" we hear Rimmer say "It's Wednesday night. It's amateur Hammond organ recital night. Take it away, Skutters!", before the theme tune is played on a Hammond organ. Similarly, in the following episode "Meltdown", the theme is sung by Elvis impersonator Clayton Mark (who played a waxdroid of Elvis in the episode).
    • The remastered version of "Backwards" has the credits run as a mirror image.
    • Gunmen of the Apocalypse had a Western movie theme-style adaptation of the closing music.
  • On Roseanne, the first episode after the show's lead divorced Tom Arnold and started being credited by only her first name, every single credit was of just the person's first name.
  • Saturday Night Live: When Charlton Heston hosted in 1993, the opening extensively spoofed Planet of the Apes (1968), as Heston oversleeps and awakens to discover that apes have taken over the NBC studio. The opening titles shows the performers wearing ape masks and Heston is introduced as "captured human slave Charlton Heston", and when he's led into the main stage, the entire audience and the SNL band are all wearing ape masks and costumes, as well.
  • Charlie Brooker's satirical BBC series Screenwipe did this, in response to a law in June 2007 that forbid the studio's shows to have anything happening in the end credits, since the credits may be squashed, stretched or talked over. In Season 4 Episode 2 (October 2007), the episode ran the credits right at the start in full, then cut to a spoof documentary on "corners", hosted by Victoria Coren. Brooker then walked into Coren's scene halfway through, pushed Victoria off-camera and proceeded to rant about the state of British credits. That episode ended with Brooker pointing out that the credits had already been shown, then cut straight to the BBC announcer.
    • Another episode showed footage of someone's rear, so it would look like it was speaking instead of the continuity announcer — a fact not lost on the announcer when he spoke.
  • Early (pre-NBC) episodes of SCTV featured Dave Thomas breathlessly announcing the opening cast credits, ending with "And Dave Thomas as 'The Beaver!" (Everyone else had gone home and Thomas was stuck reading the credits, so he decided to give himself a special extra plug.) When John Candy actually did play The Beaver in an SCTV Leave It to Beaver spoof, the opening credits were changed to say "And John Candy as 'The Beaver!" for that one episode.
    • In the 1984 episode, where the station is suddenly thrust into Orwell's nightmare world and broadcasts Telescreen-style programming, the end credits are all done Telescreen-style, with every cast and crewmember identified by a serial number, last name and first initial.
      • All these jokes were wiped out in the syndicated version of the show, which uses standarized opening and closing credits.
  • In an episode of She Spies ("The Martini Shot"), the Cold Open has the girls captured by a villain gloating about his tiny, but powerful bomb. Cassie then kicks it out of his hand, catches it in her mouth, and swallows it. Since the bomb is heat-activated, the villain is forced to set them free before the bomb warms to Cassie's body temperature and explodes in the middle of his base. The girls run to freedom and the opening credits start to run... only to be shoved off the screen by Cassie complaining that she has just swallowed a live bomb and will not survive through the credits. Once she coughs up the bomb (and kicks it back down into the villain's base where it explodes), she allows the credits to resume where they left off.
  • Episode 6 of Spaced — the one in which the cast goes to a nightclub — has all the names of the cast and crew written as raver nicknames, often with the typical Xtreme Kool Letterz.
  • Done subtly in the opening credits of the Stargate SG-1 episode "Paradise Lost". While the supporting cast is being listed, actors Bill Dow and Gary Jones are listed on screen at the same time, despite one of them playing a minor role in the episode.note 
  • An episode of The State started with a Cold Open monologue by cast member David Wain where he claimed he didn't mind appearing in less sketches because he was doing more behind the scenes and got to "express [himself] through editing" - cut to a version of the opening credits with a lot of gratuitous shots of David added in.
  • Strictly Come Dancing: It Takes Two traditionally gives everyone in the end credits a Punny Name for Halloween and the last show of the series (when the puns are Christmas-themed).
  • That Mitchell and Webb Look presents The Gift Shop Sketch. Parodying many modern video editing tricks and techniques (including every filter ever conceived), they feature credits scrolling way to fast, for way too long (showing a complete recap of the whole sketch) with many silly names and references. Researchers, for example, include Melanie Google, Art Yahoo, Brad Bingley and Bing Bradley.
  • Top Gear:
    • The Top Gear Africa special episode had all the names in the credits as Archbishop Desmond (person's surname).
    • The earlier America special featured names such as "Cletus Clarkson", "Earl Hammond, Jr.", "Ellie May May" and "Roscoe P. Stig", while the rest of the production staff are named "Billy Bob".
    • The polar special had all the names read "Sir Ranulph (surname)".
    • The Winter Olympics special had the presenters listed as "Björn Clarkson", "Benny Hammond", "Agnetha May", and "Anni-Frid Stig". This is obviously a reference to ABBA even though the show took place in Norway. The rest of the cast is given as "Björn (surname)".
    • The Vietnam special had them all listed as Francis Ford (surname).
    • The Middle East Special has their first names followed by the name of their hometown, e.g. "Jeremy of Doncaster", "Andrew of Glossop"note , etc...
    • The special where they "find" the source of the river Nile listed everybody as James May I Presume, Richard Hammond I Presume, etc.
    • Series 21, Episode 3 has the camera assistants who followed Jeremy and James into Pripyat (The rest of the film crew choosing to go back to Kiev, while Richard had ran out of fuel earlier) credited as "Extra Brave Film Cameras," with their names further highlighted... in glowing "radioactive green".
    • The Burma special credits everyone as "Sir Alec (surname)".
  • If the credits run long on Wheel of Fortune, host Pat Sajak sometimes gets a funny title above his name, such as "Pumpkin Picker" on a Halloween week episode.
    • During the early days of Wheel's syndicated run, Sajak could sometimes be seen changing the tiles on the puzzle board to create an (often nonsensical) word.
  • The end of Whose Line Is It Anyway? has the 'winning' performer reading the credits in a style of the host's choosing. This is a carryover from its run on BBC Radio 4.
  • WandaVision: Almost every episode has an opening credits sequence for the Show Within a Show, with the characters credited as playing themselves. Some episodes also include fake end credits with made-up crew names. At one point, Wanda literally rolls the credits over the show to end an argument but Vision refuses to stop, breaking them.

    Magazines 
  • Satire magazine Cracked often gave gag names to the artist and writer behind its movie and TV parodies in The '90s.
  • MAD #2 replaced the first names of all its artists with "Melvin."

    Music 
  • Michael Jackson's Thriller video read at the end: 'Any similarity to actual events or persons living, dead, (or undead) is purely coincidental.'
  • Guns N' Roses' Appetite For Destruction credits someone named "Victor 'the fucking engineer' Deyglio", acknowledging the fact that he recorded a on-studio sex session (heard in the song "Rocket Queen"). And there's the "Thanks" section, with several gems such as "Sammy (I be there in 10 min.)" and "Richard Caballero (for keeping Axl and Slash outta jail)".
  • In the only studio album of Brazilian comedy band Mamonas Assassinas, the liner notes are filled with jokes. Besides the credits, which include "Mixed in studio The Enterprise / Los Angeles, in the USA, Stardate 49872.6 by Jerry Napier (the one from Ozzy, ya know?)", there are "Thanks" to the flight crew "who served us food going to the US" and Ultraman "who killed that horrible monster".
  • Michael Nesmith's 1972 album Tantamount to Treason: Volume One splits up the musician credits and sprinkles them throughout the liner notes. The liner notes are a recipe for homemade beer.
  • The liner notes for It's Fun To Steal by John Flansburgh's side project band Mono Puff credit several minor pop culture figures of the past (Trini Lopez, George Sanders, Jo Anne Worley, The Blow Monkeys) with "handclaps" on the song "Imaginary Friend".
  • During the ending of the final track of his 1969 album California Bloodlines folk-rock singer-songwriter John Stewart thanks all the Nashville session musicians who played on the album by saying their names and adding little nicknames ("we'd like to thank Fred 'The Flash' Carter, 'Goodtime' Charlie McCoy...", etc.)
  • Metallica's ...And Justice For All gives extra credits to the "crew fuckers" (Andy 'I've toned down' Battye...James' guitar and insults) and gives a bunch of reasons to why a "Thanks" list isn't there (in the previous three albums, said section was rife with jokes too).
    • Garage Inc. lists songs as "not very produced", "not produced" or "somewhat produced".
  • Weezer's album Pinkerton contains the credit "Karl Koch: Karl Koch" (Koch is their archivist and webmaster, basically).
    • The live EP The Lion And The Witch credits Rupert Peasley and E.O. Smith as Record Producers - Rupert Peasley was the Fan Nickname for the man depicted on the cover art of the album Maladroit, while E.O. Smith is a pseudonym for singer/guitarist Rivers Cuomo, who attended E.O. Smith High School in Connecticut.
    • A predecessor to Karl Koch was Geffen Records crediting their A&R man "John Kalodner: John Kalodner".
  • Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells has a caption reading "This stereo record cannot be played on old tin boxes no matter what they are fitted with. If you are in possession of such equipment please hand it into the nearest police station." This is a parody of labels advising listeners that stereo LPs may be played on mono equipment provided suitable cartridges are used.
  • The CD booklet accompanying heavy prog band Arena's 2006 album Pepper's Ghost includes a comic strip (owing something to The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) which is credited to Tim Bisley. This is obviously a joke because Bisley is Simon Pegg's character from Spaced.
  • Usually when a musician makes a guest appearance on an album, but they are signed to a different label than the one the album was released on, the credits will say something along the lines of "X appears courtesy of Y Records". On Ministry's Psalm 69, Gibby Haynes from the Butthole Surfers appeared "courtesy of his own bad-ass self" instead.
    • Similarly, on Beastie Boys' Ill Communication, Biz Markie appears "courtesy of his own damn self".
  • In the liner notes to The Flaming Lips' Transmissions From The Satellite Heart, the members all have an irrelevant detail about themselves listed in addition to the instrument they play (shoe size, astrological sign, etc).
  • The liner notes of Iron Maiden's album No Prayer For The Dying has the usual "Up the Irons!" in the thank yous. However, right next to it is "No prayer for the cup?".
  • The album credits for the soundtrack album of Hot Shots! Part Deux, released by Varèse Sarabande Records, have several gag credits ("What Is The Varèse Logo Anyway?").
  • Most Pavement albums have "All Rights Reserved" followed by "All Wrongs Reversed", a joke that apparently originated on bootleg album covers - Stephen Malkmus kept up the tradition on his self-titled solo album.
    • This is standard practice for albums released on Malkmus' label, Matador Records. The same disclaimer appears on other Matador albums such as Exile in Guyville by Liz Phair and Summer Sun by Yo La Tengo.
  • Punk rock band Nomeansno often uses intentionally wrong or misleading information in their liner notes. Former guitarist Andy Kerr was also fond of using obvious pseudonyms, such as on the album 0 + 2 = 1 where he credited the guitar playing to "None Of Your Fucking Business."
    • A more subtle than usual example was the Jello Biafra collaboration The Sky Is Falling And I Want My Mommy, where they simply credited everyone (other than Jello) with the wrong instrument on purpose - this fooled some listeners into thinking the band actually switched instruments for an album.
  • The back cover of Camper Van Beethoven's Key Lime Pie. Instead of having a straightforward tracklist and credits, all of the relevant information is delivered in a long paragraph that's formatted to wrap around the sleeve, with a few Lemony Narrator-type asides: Among other things, it notes that having to add legal notices on the back "makes it a little more difficult to have a stark artsy sleeve like all those cool British imports", and even apologizes to vocalist David Lowery for the last-minute cutting of an instrumental outro ("Oh yes, David, Dennis (Dennis Herring, the producer) says that the closing theme bit the dust. Sorry, this record's just too damn long").
    • A few albums had Fun with Homophones of drummer Chris Pedersen's name, crediting him as Crispy Dersen.
  • Type O Negative made a running gag of crediting The Bensenhoist Lesbian Choir with backing vocals. In reality, all backing vocals were done by the band themselves (along with some friends they'd invite into the studio), and "Bensenhoist" is just "Bensonhurst" (a neighborhood in Brooklyn) written in a phonetic Brooklyn accent.
  • The liner notes of Saint Etienne's albums generally credit the band members with nonsensical contributions alongside their real ones ("Pete Wiggs: Prophet 5, Roland Jupiter, Handclaps, Spriguns of tolgus")
  • The cover art of Totally Crushed Out by that dog. is styled after 80's novels aimed at pre-teen girls, with a drawing style similar to the covers of Sweet Valley High books, and the content can be considered a loose Concept Album about love and crushes. To go with this theme, the track-list is written in the style of a blurb for a fictitious story about a teen girl and her crush, which works in all of the song titles in order, and the band members are credited in an "about the authors" section with short biographies.
  • Bob Dylan's Street-Legal has some oddball credits, such as producer Don DeVito being "Captain in charge", and an unknown "Mary Alice Artes" as "Queen Bee".
  • Session fiddler Rob Hajacos, heard on many a Country Music album in the 1990s, was often credited for playing "fiddle and assortednote  hoedown tools".
  • Havalina Rail Co..'s liner notes feature Insistent Terminology: other musicians who help out on albums are always referred to as "Latino All Stars" rather than "guest musicians".
  • Grammatrain's album Flying lists track lengths that aren't wrong, but they're odd. The title track, which is 5:11 long, has a listed length of 4:71; "Rocketship" is 2:24 long, and is listed as 1:84; and so on.
  • Five Iron Frenzy:
    • While on tour (and recording their shows) in 1999, they passed out sheets to the audience, encouraging everyone who sang along to list their names. When they released Live: Proof that the Youth Are Revolting (a compilation of those shows), the credits for "backing vocals" included every single person who signed their name at one of those shows.
    • They (mostly Reese Roper) frequently include nonsense or snipes in their "Thank you" sections. In Quantity Is Job 1, Roper lists the Denver Police Department: "thanks for the tear gas grenade!" (referencing the 1998 Denver Superbowl riot). In All the Hype that Money Can Buy, Roper ends his thanks with a list of people and organizations he has "NO thanks" for, ending with "the person that is reading this and saying, 'Hmm, they didn't thank Jesus yet. They must worship THE DEVIL!' because they should READ THE WORDS." And in Cheeses... of Nazareth, Roper's thanks include nonsense like "That one guy who lives over there. That old guy from that other place. [...] Corn! It can't be beat! And last but not least, special people, you know who you are!"
  • Sufjan Stevens' Songs for Christmas box set. Various musicians, in addition to their actual contributions, are listed as providing mistletoe, eggnog, or "that creepy Christmas feeling". Sufjan himself is exclusively referred to as "Santa Sufjan", and all references to his piano-playing are prefaced with "insipid" or some equally-derogatory term. The lyrics sheets include parenthetical asides like "How many parum-pa-pum-pums does it take to screw in a lightbulb?"
  • Country Music singer Lari White had several on her debut album Lead Me Not: some of the backing vocalists are credited with "ridiculously high harmony vocal", "featured soul vocal", "super evolved harmony vocal", and "tag team harmony vocal", and one track has a large crowd of backing vocalists credited as the "R. C.note  and the Moonpie Choir". Other gags include "more rockin' bongos", "gumbo piano", and "Wurlitzer-ish."
  • Similarly, Matraca Berg's Lying to the Moon credited session player Willie Weeks as playing a "cheap fretless bass".
  • On Da Yoopers' "We're Still Rockin'", frontman Jim DeCaire is credited with vocals, percussion, production, mixing, broom, and coffee.
  • Luscious Jackson's Electric Honey included band member endorsements for their instrument brands of choice. Guitarist Gabby Glaser wasn't endorsing anything specific, so alongside Kate Schellenbach's list of drum equipment and Jill Cunniff's preferred brand of bass, we get "Gabby plays whatever".
  • The Queen Is Dead by The Smiths credits the backing vocals on the song "Bigmouth Strikes Again" to Ann Coates, which is a Punny Name referencing Ancoats, a district of Manchester. Morrissey was actually a Self-Backing Vocalist on that song, they just used studio effects to make his backing vocals higher pitched.
  • Rage Against the Machine bassist Tim Commerford is credited in a number of odd ways, including "Y.tim.K" on Evil Empire. As a whole, the band tends to credit their individual members under the heading "Guilty Parties".
  • When Nine Inch Nails recorded their own version of "Suck", originally a Pigface song Trent Reznor had appeared on, there was minor controversy over how the NIN version credited the songwriting — The Pigface version credited each musician who appeared on the song individually as songwriters, with Reznor's name appearing last, whereas the NIN version was credited to "t. reznor/pigface". In response, Pigface included a version of "Suck" on their live album Truth Will Out and credited the songwriting to "whatever trent says –- really -– no shit".
  • The Cramps' album Songs the Lord Taught Us has, on its spine, some unhelpful advice for record store owners: "File Under Sacred Music".
  • On the P.D.Q. Bach album The Short-Tempered Clavier and other dysfunctional works for keyboard, two names under Peter Schickele's are billed as "famous" performers, followed by "David Robinson, whoever he is."
  • Steve Albini would occasionally be credited on albums for his engineering under the name Fluss — Fluss was in fact Albini's cat, who was considered the unofficial mascot of the Electrical Audio studio. The practice was retired after 2003, when Fluss died.
    • There's also Slint's Tweez, where Albini is credited under the name "Some Fuckin Derd Niffer".
  • Instead of crediting the individual members, the liner notes of Heavy Petting Zoo by NOFX merely state that "NOFX are: Same as last album but older and fatter (Erik's up to 178 lbs)". As a further reference to that aside, when crediting Fat Mike for songwriting, they note that he's "only 165 lbs". In a spoof of other artists including instrument company endorsements in their liner notes, there's the statement "NOFX used guitars, drums, and amps on this album, and other stuff too". And finally, alongside the typical "thanks" section is the following:
    No thanx to:
    MTV - quit bugging us
    Major labels - quit bugging us
    Commercial radio stations - quit playing us
    We've been doin just fine all these years without you so leave us the fuck alone! Assholes
    • The booklet to So Long And Thanks For All The Fish includes a band photo with all of the members listed - no one from NOFX is actually in the photo, and the band is portrayed by members/associates of other punk bands NOFX are friendly with. The CD itself bears the text "Unlawful Duplication May be Hazardous to your Health!" as a Shout-Out to Bad Religion, who had the same warning on some of their albums.
  • The Damned's "The History of the World (Part 1)" was labeled as "Overproduced by Hans Zimmer" on the original album cover for The Black Album.
  • On their Blues for the Red Sun album, Kyuss credits John Garcia for the lyrics to "Molten Universe," "Apothecaries' Weight," "800," and "Capsized." All four tracks are instrumentals.
  • The liner notes to The World's Best Ex-Boyfriend by Ad Frank & The Fast Easy Women mention that the album was recorded in "late summer of 2004 (the one with all the dead squirrels)". Your Secrets Are Mine Now includes a legitimate credit for "ladies' makeup" (presumably referring to the photographs of band members in the booklet), then follows it up with: "The men of Fast Easy Women do not wear makeup. No matter what anyone says". Instead of having a complete lyric sheet, In Girl Trouble just lists every word relating to the first person singular (e.g. "I", "me", "my") used over the course of the album - most likely a bit of Self-Deprecation about self-involved songwriting.
  • Brad Paisley's debut album Who Needs Pictures includes a joke listing for "Steve Williams - Absolutely Nothing" in the musician credits.
  • The Kentucky Headhunters' debut album Pickin' on Nashville credits Rich Ripani for playing a "cheesy organ" on "Rock 'n' Roll Angel". The cassette version also labeled the sides as "Over Here" and "Over Yonder" instead of A/B or 1/2, while their second album had "Walkin' Through It" and "Steppin' In It" instead.
  • Brutal Death Metal band Skinless's fifth album, Only The Ruthless Remain. Joe Keyser and Bob Beaulac's work on the album is repeatedly referred to as "Rhythmic [insert reference to song lyrics here]", Sherwood Webber's lyrical contributions (and those of Noah Carpenter on the lyrics he co-wrote) likewise reference the song lyrics or themes (e.g. "Last Words" for "Funeral Curse"),note  production work is credited to "Forces Of Evil Far Beyond Your Control", and in lieu of a thank you message to family, friends, other metal bands and the fans (a common staple of album credits even in death metal) is a Lampshade Hanging of the absence of such:
    We Offer No Gratitude. Nor Forgiveness. Only The Ruthless Remain.
  • In Daniel Amos’s Doppelgänger, the liner notes credit Ed McTaggert with playing "skins, tubs, and traps (say that five times fast!)". They also credit the background clapping on one song to "The Eric 'Clap-Tons'".
  • The Television Personalities' ...And Don't The Kids Just Love It credits Vic Hammersmith-Broadway with production. In fact, the band produced the album themselves, and Vic Hammersmith-Broadway is a Punny Name, combining a real Record Producer, Vic Coppersmith-Heaven (best known for frequent work with The Jam), with an area of London, Hammersmith Broadway.
  • The liner notes of Chicago's eleventh album credit trombonist James Pankow with "lead vocals and Steinway (Sorry Bobby)."note 
  • Neil's Heavy Concept Album is an album by Nigel Planer done in-character as his The Young Ones character Neil. Because Neil is sometimes depicted as disliking most modern technology in the show, the backing musicians are credited under two headings: "Horrible Electric Musicians" and "Beautiful Acoustic Musicians".
  • The back cover to Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!) by The Beach Boys include a credit for which member sang lead on each individual song: Brian Wilson's lead vocal on "I'm Bugged At My Old Man" is credited to "too embarrassed".
  • The Mavericks' Music for All Occasions liner notes, on a spread of a lawn with four lawnmowers on it, features the credit "The Mavericks are not pictured here, left to right..." along with "Jerry Dale McFadden appears courtesy of his parents."
  • Marilyn Manson, in the liner notes of his album Smells Like Children, is credited as "Reverend Marilyn Manson". It's debatable if this is a gag, since Manson was made an honorary priest of the Church of Satan by Anton Lavey, and Satanist priests can take the title of Reverend.
    • Not only that but the credits themselves add either nonsensical things (with contributions such as: Kiddie pops, Chickens etc.) or synonyms for their actual contributions (Spitting, twang doodles). Their debut album did something similar.
  • Cledus T. Judd':
    • "In Another Size", his parody of Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood's "In Another's Eyes", is credited as being performed by "Waite Gaines and Patricia Earwood", the former a dig at Garth's alter-ego Chris Gaines. Judd's then-wife, Kim Winters, provides the female vocals to the song.
    • The Original Dixie Hick EP features the following credit: "The names of the studios, session players, producers, writers, engineers, singers, lawyers, managers, janitors, caterers, bartenders, and strippers involved in the making of this record have been withheld to protect the innocent, and not so innocent. Even Cledus T. Judd wishes to remain anonymous. Except Wes Hightower, who is proud to be from Texas."
  • Martin Newell's The Greatest Living Englishman credits producer/arranger Andy Partridge as "New and Improved Andy Partridge". This is actually an artifact of an early Working Title and artwork concept for the album — at one point it was going to be called New Product and be designed to look like a box of laundry detergent, and somehow the idea of crediting Andy as though he were a product stuck around even though it no longer made sense.
  • The back cover and liner notes of Hot Hot Heat's Elevator both have the track list in reverse order (i.e. starting with track 15 and ending with track 1), like the floor buttons on an elevator would be. Similarly, the thirteenth track isn't listed, playing off the fact that many buildings with more than 12 floors skip that floor number enitirelynote 
  • On their album Stuffed & Ready, the members of Cherry Glazerr are credited with various things besides their musical contributions: "screaming, humming and lying on the floor" for Clem, "chuckles, standing on chairs" for Tabor, "running around on his hands" for Devin, and Carlos has "magic sauce" and "oat milk" mixed in with his instrumental and production credits.
  • The liner notes of Wire's Pink Flag list a physical feature of each member; for singer Colin (Newman), it's "black hair"; for drummer Robert Gotobed, it's "6 foot 3"; for guitarist B.C. Gilbert, it's "blue eyes"; for bass player (Graham) Lewis, it's "9st.6lbs" note 
  • The original album jacket of That Was the Year That Was by Tom Lehrer listed Lehrer's previous two albums under the heading, "If you don't like this record, you will certainly not enjoy..."
  • XTC have done this for several of their side projects.
    • As The Dukes of Stratosphear, they released two Psychedelic Rock pastiche albums (25 O'Clock and Psionic Sunspot). The members were credited as Sir John Johns (Andy Partridge), The Red Curtain (Colin Moulding), Lord Cornelius Plum (Dave Gregory), E.I.E.I. Owen (Ian "Eewee" Gregory). Producer John Leckie was credited as "Swami Anand Nagara".
    • For the Christmas single "Thanks For Christmas/Countdown to Christmas Partytime", the band were credited as The Three Wise Men, and writing credit was give to "Balthazar/Kaspar/Melchior" (the traditional name of the original Wise Men. Producer Leckie is credited as "The Good Lord".
  • In the soundtrack for The Matrix Reloaded, rather than just a name or two, the track for "Burly Brawl" is listed as "Don Davis vs. Juno Reactor" — emphasis added.
  • Melvins' Elecroretard includes a special thanks to "A. Hilter" — Word of God is it's a Shout-Out to Monty Python's Flying Circus, referring to a sketch in which Adolf Hitler is living in Somerset, England under the name of "Mr. Hilter".
    • Some editions of Prick properly credit the band and their recording engineer for production, then add "Assisted by some dumb ass who just sat and did nothing".
    • In 1992, the band released three solo albums, two of which had some fun with the credits:
      • King Buzzo credits Dave Grohl's drumming to Dale Nixon - this is a Shout-Out to Black Flag's My War, where Greg Ginn played both guitar and bass, but used the Dale Nixon pseudonym for the latter.
      • Joe Preston credits Marina Sirtis with "counseling", as a reference to the actress who played Counselor Deanna Troi - the album lists two additional musicians that seem to be pseudonyms for Joe Preston himself, as "Salty Green" was also credited on bass on Melvins' "Night Goat" single, and Denial Fiend was the drummer of Black Metal band Hellhammer and it's unlikely he actually appeared on the recording. Joe Preston himself is only credited with vocals and mixing, and even the former might be a subtle gag - the album is entirely instrumental save for some Spoken Word in Music clips taken from Apocalypse Now.
  • The credits on the video for Sabaton's single "Livgardet" credit the band members as follows (bolded for emphasis):
    Joakim Brodén - Leading Actor 1
    Pär Sundström - Leading Actor 2
    Chris Rörland - Leading Actor 3
    Hannes Van Dahl - Extranote 
    Tommy Johansson - Leading Actor 4
  • The Police: The liner notes for Outlandos d'Amour credit Sting with playing "butt piano" on "Roxanne", referencing a mishap during the song's recording where he accidentally sat on a piano while trying to lean against it, which the mic picked up.
  • The credits to Rush's second live album, Exit...Stage Left, include, "This album is dedicated to the world-renowned they (Slider's uncles, Eddie and Glen)".
  • Music for Pets by Z credits Bing Jang on rhythm guitar and backing vocals and Arkansas on bass - Bing Jang and Arkansas were the pet dogs of band members Dweezil and Ahmet Zappa. According to one of the musicians who actually played those parts, this had roots in the album's Troubled Production and was meant as a Take That! - guitarist Mike Keneally was fired for starting a side project and bassist Bryan Beller quit in solidarity, so in retaliation Dweezil and Ahmet replaced their credits and photos with the dogs.

    Pinball 

    Podcasts 
  • The fourth season of Mission to Zyxx describes the Allwheat with a different metaphor each episode, including "like if the sun hated you" and "a black hole really hitting bottom".

    Radio 
  • Cabin Pressure: One episode has Benedict Cumberbatch starting out reading the credits as he always does, only to suddenly switch into a Spanish accent (because the episode takes place in Spain).
  • On Car Talk, Click and Clack read an ever-increasing list of prank call names describing the extensive support staff of the radio show. For instance, the accounting firm of Dewey, Cheatum and Howe, the make up artist Bud Tugly, guest accommodations by the Horseshoe Road Inn, chauffeur Pikop Andropov, etc. They also give odd nicknames to their actual production staff, like producer Doug "The Subway Fugitive" "Not a Slave to Fashion" "Bongo Boy" Berman and Catherine "Frau Blucher" Penalosa (complete with sound of horses whinnying and galloping).
    • Apparently they keep a list of these Here. Some of them only work if you try to read them out.
  • Garrison Keillor credits his writing on A Prairie Home Companion to "Sarah Bellum" (Not that one).
    • With music by Sam and Janet Evening.
  • The closing credits to This American Life credits "our [[boss/co-founder]], Torey Malatia" (former general manager of Chicago's WBEZ, where TAL is produced) with a random quote from the episode. The result is inevitably funny.
  • The end credits for Ask Me Another features that week's puzzle guru turning various production names into anagrams.
  • At the end of every episode of Jeremy Hardy Speaks to the Nation, the credits are reflective of the theme. For example, in "How to be a Good Citizen":
    Carla: Jeremy Hardy Speaks to the Nation was drafted by Jeremy Hardy and put into effect by Gordon Kennedy and Carla Mendonça. Ultimate control rested with David Tyler and the show was a Pozzitive production for the state broadcasting company of the United Kingdom.
  • John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme: Often, usually directed in the form of insults toward John Finnemore. One episode has the Storyteller reading out the credits in limerick form, so the actual credits are silent.
    Finnemore: If you missed John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme... that's sweet, we missed you too.
    Simon Kane: You can hear John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme again, and again, and again, and again. For pity's sake, why won't it leave me alone?!
  • In the last episode of the Secondary Phase of The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy 1978, Hig Hurtenflurst is introduced with a lengthy rant in response to being asked who he is, in which every sentence begins "I only happen to be..." The closing credits naturally state that "Mark Smith only happened to be Hig Hurtenflurst".

    Recorded and Stand-Up Comedy 
  • The Firesign Theatre's How Can You Be In Two Places at Once When You're Not Anywhere at All? footnotes the name of Lilly Lamont, a fictional Glamorous Wartime Singer, with "Miss Lamont Courtesy of Paranoid Pictures."
  • Sherman and Larsen's Smash Flops was a collection of songs of dubious reason and quality ("Watch World War III on Pay TV," "Columbus, You Big Bag of Steam") which bears a lemon on its label.

    Tabletop Games 
  • The good folks at White Wolf have a {bad) habit of leaving little odd things in their credits. For example, in Exalted, the Manual of Exalted Power: Lunars gave us references to the underwear of Gaia and the Celestial Incarnae, including the "Pantaloons of the Unconquered Sun."
    • Even better, the Alchemicals book gave us all of the names and titles of one Bender "Bending" Rodriguez.
    • Among those listed in the credits of the second edition core rulebook is 'Your Mother'.
  • The credits page of 1E Paranoia adventures sometimes gave contributors odd job titles that matched the work's theme.
  • The second edition of Dungeons & Dragons has the Monster Manual, which does not list individual artists for monster art, except two people are explicitly credited for the invisible stalker... which has a blank picture as its artwork.
    • Every Fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons product includes a comedic disclaimer at the beginning, which include gags such as implying that Wizards Of The Coast is owned by Mind Flayers or encouraging Dungeon Masters to roll a bunch of dice and tell players that the dragon queen Tiamat attacks.
  • Some Savage Worlds books by Pinnacle Entertainment Group list the credits in the beginning of the book as the names of the contributors, with a nickname for each one in the middle, similar to the Simpsons Halloween Specials. Often begins with John "Night Train" Goff (or "Night Rain", as of Deadlands Deadlands Noir).

    Theatre 
  • The playbill for Spamalot has a batch of ridiculous fake cast bios before the real ones, as well as a fake playbill for a show about the economic rise of Finland (which ties in with the show's Fake-Out Opening).
  • The DVD for The Umbilical Brothers show Speedmouse is filled with these.
  • Irving Berlin's first full-length musical, Watch Your Step (1914), credited prolific librettist Harry B. Smith with "Plot (if any)."
  • After John Travolta accidentally referred to Idina Menzel as "Adele Dazeem", the playbill for If/Then (which starred Menzel) had an insert with "Dazeem"'s cast bio.

    Video Games 
  • Castlevania featured credits telling us who supposedly played the bosses. Spoof names abound, such as Christopher Bee, Belo Lugosi, Boris Karloffice, and Mix Shrecks.
  • A credits gag is actually worked into the final boss fight in Donkey Kong Country. After two bouts with King K. Rool, DK assumes a victory pose, the camera pans to the sunset and some very suspicious "kredits" (listing the names of various enemies as production staff) roll, followed by a faintly ominous "The End?". Sure enough, K. Rool isn't quite finished, and he gets up for one final round before he is well and truly trounced.
  • Bayonetta does this - once you beat Jubileus, Bayonetta stands on a piece of debris falling from orbit towards the earth, and the credits start to roll. Then Jeanne comes in, warning Bayonetta about how the remains of Jubileus will destroy the earth, and the credits immediately stop as the game continues.
    • It then does it again during the actual credits by making some of the flashback photographs that are scrolling by playable. Thankfully failure doesn't do anything but damage your ranking, but if you're playing for ranking you already know this is going to happen.
  • In the second and third iterations of Arika's Tetris: The Grand Master, after you have cleared about 300 lines, ending up at blistering speed, the screen clears, and the credits start to roll. But it's not over. Behind the credits, you have to play Tetris blind. As soon as you place a piece, it becomes invisible. If you let the blocks pile to the top before the credits finish rolling, the game is over. But it is possible to complete.
  • LucasArts adventure games often did this, such as Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge crediting a "proofraeder", or Full Throttle crediting the game designers' cats.
    • Not to mention Full Throttle's credits' "special biker haiku section."
    • At the end of the credits for The Secret of Monkey Island the game tells the player to get off the computer and go to bed. Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge tells you to go do something constructive and even offers suggestions (e.g. run for president or teach basket weaving to clams). Monkey Island also includes "chocolate supply supervision" as a credited role.
    • In The Curse of Monkey Island Guybrush drinks grog mixed with Head-B-Clear medicine, supposedly dying the first time. You then cut to a fake scoring system appearing, implying the player failed. The credits begin and you hear Guybrush in his coffin shouting that he is still alive. The credits suddenly stop and the player can continue the game.
    • Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis has a Long-Suffering Significant Others section, and one for Policy Changes ("you know who you are").
    • In a sim game instead of adventure case, the Afterlife credits follows the heaven and hell theme of the game starting with names listed under Circles IX-I before moving to celestial bodies - and then, the "Special Thanks" includes the Von Trapp family, three musicians and Janeane Garofalo, probably just because the crew like them.
  • Resident Evil 4 ends with a copyright notice from the Raccoon City Police Department, stating that violators will be prosecuted by a member of S.T.A.R.S., "and them some".
  • The end credits of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots start normally, with the voice actor credits. These end with a credit for a character who has not yet had a speaking role. Then a musical sting plays, and the credits are interrupted as this character's scene plays out. Even more shocking: the character is Big Boss.
    • This is referenced in Merry Gear Solid 2, in which the same thing happens. The character here is Santa Claus, who was killed in the first game.
  • Every game in the Ratchet & Clank series features the credit: "A special thanks to our patient spouses, parents, children, girlfriends, boyfriends, and pets."
    • Ratchet: Deadlocked misses out on the inclusion of the recurring character The Plumber, but makes sure to give him a mention at the end of the credits, reassuring players that he was unable to make this game due to a "sump pump emergency."
  • Pajama Sam in No Need to Hide When It's Dark Outside: The end of the credits is topped off by a clearly bogus No Animals Were Harmed disclaimer followed by "Mmmmm, cheese" and "bye bye now bye bye" messages.
  • Portal concludes with the theme song playing over the credits, as the lyrics to the song scroll by in a window beside the credits. These lyrics are interspersed with notes like Personnel Report and Addendum, concluding with the last few repeated lines annotated with PS and PPS and PPPS. Oh, and it's all done in the style of an ASCII terminal screen.
    • Portal 2 does the exact same thing with a different terminal layout, except the forms are a Notice of Dismissal and Severance Package Details. Even funnier, one line of the lyrics is [REDACTED] in print, despite the singer singing it.
      • Continued in the co-op mode's credits, where after opening a vault full of cryogenically frozen humans, GLaDOS reads through a list of negative qualities, such as “Not a team player”, “never listens”, and the like. Then once the names stop rolling:
    GLaDOS: Well, enough about that first person's file. Let's look at some others.
  • Putty credits "Phil-Harmonic Sound Recording System" and "Filmed in SUPERDANNORAMMA" on the title screen of the original Amiga game, as a colorful nod to head programmer Dan Phillips and sound man Phil Thornton.
  • Startopia ends with a set of pretty incomprehensible credits. "Guy with the biggest stick" might be the executive producer and "dudes responsible for breaking the game" could be the design team, but "Cowboys in charge of shooting holes into things"?
    • Most likely they were the Beta-Testers or Debugging Team. Mucky Foot was a small studio and could get away with this kind of thing. Why did they have to die?!
  • The Simpsons games:
    • The Simpsons: Road Rage's credits were accompanied by comments from the Comic Book Guy who would exclaim "WORST... (whichever team or position was being shown at the moment)... EVER!" Later in the credit he begins complaining about how long the games credits were taking.
    • The Simpsons Hit & Run: Kang and Kodos provide a running commentary over the credits, snarking about absolutely everything.
    • Much like the segments from the show the game is based on, the credits sequence for The Simpsons: Night of the Living Treehouse of Horror has the game's programmers being given spooky names like Trevor "Brain Dead" Bent and "Murderous" Matt Green.
  • The N64 title Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire borrows one from Freakazoid!, listing "Weena Mercatur as the Hopping Woman".
  • Starting with Crash Tag Team Racing, the ending credits of the Crash Bandicoot games feature commentaries from assorted characters, often saying something amusing about the games' staff members.
  • During the credits of MadWorld, the Deathwatch commentators repeatedly mock the game's developers. They go quiet while the closing theme ("Soul") plays, only to return for one last round of insults over its final bars.
  • Telltale Games usually spices the end credits with a gag or two: listing the staffs' pets ("Telltale Pets") is most common. A most delightful one is seen at the end of Tales of Monkey Island: Lair of the Leviathan: the credit rolls while Murray the disembodied talking skull makes irrelevant wisecracks at the names, sinking to the sea floor as he does so.
  • Kid Icarus: Uprising had the mother of all Credit Gags, more like a full-on Gag Credits. After defeating Medusa, 8-bit credits roll, complete with matching music. Suddenly, Hades reaches in from behind the credits and tears them away, revealing he was behind the Underworld attack and beginning the 16-level-long real storyline.
  • The first DLC of Borderlands - the Zombie Island of Dr. Ned - ends with a laughably easy fight against the titular Dr. Ned, whose death triggers the credits sequence. Then Undead Ned, his One-Winged Angel form, rips them away with the words "It's not over yet!" Then you fight his undead form and finish him off properly. Made even funnier in the Xbox 360 version, since you gain 1 G for killing Dr. Ned, and 49 G for killing his undead version.
  • In the credits to the first Street Fighter, many of the developers' names were partially replaced with combat terms.
  • In the closing credits to Escape From Ravenhearst, some of the closing credits' names and headings shift back and forth between the real names and jokes. Also a Mythology Gag, as part of the game itself involves picking out which objects in a number of scenes are shifting between two forms.
  • In Discworld and Discworld II, Terry Pratchett is credited as "Shouting At People" and "Throwing Rocks From Afar", respectively. In Discworld Noir he is credited as "Far Too Much Interference".
  • In Freddy Pharkas: Frontier Pharmacist, you can interact with the opening credits using the cursor. For example, using the hand on the job title gives, "You can't take the credit for something you haven't done!"
  • Patapon 3 has in its credits "Astigmatic One Eyed Typography Institute". While they are real and make custom fonts, the decision to make their oddly relevant name their title (as opposed to something like "Font Designer") makes this an invoked trope.
  • In Suzumiya Haruhi no Heiretsu at the end of the second chapter when the boat is sinking, the credits suddenly glitch out and start to rewind as Kyon and the others complain about the fact that they still haven't escaped the "Groundhog Day" Loop they're stuck in as the third chapter starts.
  • After finishing Contender Mode in the Wii version of Punch-Out!!, you will play a little mini-game with the following credits sequence. Some of the names will have upside-down letters or names of some of the characters you have fought on your way to the top. If you move the boxing glove cursor over those names and press A, you will gain points. Chain together combos for higher scores.
  • Once you finish Claw, the end credits start to roll, with a few gag messages thrown in, e.g. "Get a life! Stop reading ending credits!".
  • In Ai Cho Aniki, all of the development credits have "Aniki" in their titles. The voice actors are credited by role, though under the heading "Cast Aniki."
  • Super Mario World ROM hack Super Bobido World (as played by Azure Blade 49) has a long list of credits, all of which say something akin to 'me' as the individual responsible (with me presumably referring to the game creator). You can watch it here
  • A Super Mario Thing has "Out-House Porting" directly after "In-House Porting". There are also voice acting credits, despite there being no voice acting - ranging from known voice actors to raocow's cat and a rubber duck. There's also a caterer, procrastinators, and USER WAS BANNED FOR THIS HACK.
  • Cannon Fodder 2 credits Chris Yates, who helped design the first game, as "not terribly involved in this project actually."
  • In the original version of The Second Reality Project 2: Zycloboo's Challenge, following the normal credits are "Beta-Testing by: The Almighty Powercats", "Secret Exit Advisors: Happy Goomba and his friends", "Dreamland Demon Beast Import: Holy Nightmare Corporation", "Power Supply Station build [sic] by: Meka Chicken", "Hotel Horror TV Program recorded by: Sadako Yamamura", and "Your upcoming nightmares are sponsored by: Zycloboo". The remake has a completely normal credit sequence, but there's a bad ending with nothing but gag credits — "Project Leader: Zycloboo", "Programmer: Thirlox", "Beta Testing: Little Boo", "Secret Exit Advisor: Marty Mole", "Bonus Room Design: Happy Goomba & his friends", "Power Supply Station built by: The Roboxx", "Special Thanks: Lemmy Koopa", and of course, "Your upcoming nightmares are sponsored by: Zycloboo".
  • The Commodore 64 version of Shadow Warriors has a "ninjas mugged by" credit.
  • In The Legend of Kyrandia, Book Two: The Hand of Fate, the Narrator is credited as "His Royal Highness BRANDON, King of Kyrandia, Defender of the Kyragem, Vanquisher of Malcolm, Patron of the Arts, Wearer of the Sandal, and Majority Stock Owner and CEO of Timbermist Casual Footwear, Inc." Additionally, The Hand is listed in every section of the voice credits with a different actor each time, despite having no lines.
  • In Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon, the end credits begin by thanking a long list of fictional companies for their cooperation in the making of the game.
  • The bad ending of Jurassic Park (Sega Master System) changes the staff credits to the names of dinosaurs, to drive the point that they have taken over the park.
  • In the Korean Arcade Game X2222, the final two names in the credits are "Trok Cuf" and "Tamorp Tihs." Rather than being names of programmers, these are vulgar Take Thats, spelled backwards, at the Video Game Companies that produced the game, ORT (Oriental Soft) and Promat.
  • In Tin Star, the Nintendo of America producers' credits include Don James as "Large Man with Bushy Arms."
  • In Jaleco's The Game Paradise: Master of Shooting, the credits that pop onto the screen after the Final Boss are made of destructible letters, for the purpose of Scoring Points.
  • The credits of the Arcade Game Steel Talons use military aviation terms and call signs for almost everyone involved.
  • In the credits of Digimon World, one of the special thanks is to 'chicken nuggets'.
  • The Killing Game Show credits the cover art to "Roger Dean (Yes, THAT Roger Dean)."
  • In Leander (and the Sega Genesis port retitled Galahad), for whatever reason, Andy Ingram receives credit for "MOVEQ.L #0,D0" (a M68000 assembly language instruction) as well as for graphics and art direction. Another credit reads: "Key Grip: What?"
  • In NieR: Automata, getting a Fake/Joke Ending (pretty much any ending except A, B, C, D, and E) will cause the credits to scroll impossibly fast, finishing with the name of the ending appearing on screen.
  • In Constructor: Street Wars, the entire development team is assigned Mafia-style roles: "The Don," "The Godfather," "Consigliere," etc.
  • Pony Island has a fake "credits" list available from the start menu consisting almost entirely of stock historical villains.
  • In Skylanders SuperChargers, after Kaos is defeated, some end credits start to play, accompanied by a cheesy song, but this is quickly interrupted by The Darkness attacking. The real end credits play after the real Final Boss is defeated.
  • The credits roll at the end of The Darkside Detective begins with credits for Francis McQueen as Detective Francis McQueen, Patrick Dooley as Officer Patrick Dooley, and "Vivian Moonman, very real actor" as "The Rest of the Cast". There's a credit for Gozer the Gozerian as "On-Set Extraplanar Entity". The credit for Best Boy is followed by one for "Boy Who Was Just Okay" and another for "Best Cats". There are also parodies of the standard legal disclaimers.
  • Kirby Star Allies rolls the (real) game credits at lightning speed after defeating King Dedede...then they rewind when it becomes clear things aren't over yet. It happens again right before Galacta Knight's appearance near the end of Guest Star ???? Star Allies Go!
  • Touch Detective has fake credits halfway through the final case, after Mackenzie thinks she's solved the case. They're cut off when Penelope bursts into the office and says the case isn't solved yet because there's been another victim.
  • Planet 404 has several:
    • The credits thank random people, such as "the neighbor who once lent me his drill".
    • Scar is given credit for killing Mufasa.
    • The player is thanked for actually reading the credits.
    • At the end of the credits the player is told there's nothing more to see, since this isn't a Marvel movie.
  • Fran Bow's last credit has the person credited for "egnlish prof raeding".
  • Spyro the Dragon (1998) capped off its credits with the note that no sheep were hurt during development.
  • From the closing credits of Power Pete:
    • Things That Are Cool:
    Dat Backup Drive
    Free Upgrades
    Beef
    Anything Made of Granite
    Winning the Lottery
    Big Movie Theaters
    Moorea
    • Things That are Not Cool:
    Plastic Mouse Pads
    Boring Credits
    PC Compatibles
    • Things That Explode:
    Eggs in a Microwave
    Bottle Rockets
    Pens
    Game Budgets
    • Still Going!
    • Things You Should Do:
    Call Your Mother
    Do Laundry
    Feed the Dog
    Find the Cheat Keys
    Give to the Poor
    • Now I Am Done
  • Baba is You has a rather darkly humorous variation after the secret ending, which sees you erasing the entire island the game takes place upon. The credits start out misaligned and it all goes downhill from there.
  • In South Park: The Stick of Truth, if you decide not to go inside Mr. Slave's ass to disarm the snuke and walk out the room, it goes off and you're treated to a credits reel done in the same style from the show, followed by the usual game over screen. The sequel, South Park: The Fractured but Whole, has a similar gag where if you die and don't press anything for a few seconds, the credits reel from the show begins to play. If you decide to reload from your last checkpoint during the credits, it'll start rewinding in fast speed.
  • The credits of Sunset Overdrive begin rolling after a seemingly Bittersweet Ending, where the Player Character defeats the final boss but is killed in the process...then, a moment after the credits start, the PC themselves cut in to complain about the sad ending, then orders the game to rewind back to the Final Boss' defeat so they can respawn and join their friends in the victory celebration, after which the credits roll for real.
  • Early into Immortals Fenyx Rising (whose story is being recounted by Prometheus to Zeus), Fenyx jumps down a pit into Tartaros, the greek equivalent of hell. Zeus then immediately declares the story over as he thinks there's no way Fenyx can survive in it, and fake credits start to roll crediting him in many different prestigous roles roles, while Prometheus is credited with various deprecating ones. Prometheus quickly says the story is nowhere near finished and continues on with it. Prometheus' roles reference his past, mainly that he gave fire to humans, his power of foresight (and that Zeus didn't believe him), and that Zeus had an Eagle feed on his bowels.
  • Westward: In the first game of the series, statistics provided after completing each quest give stats including the amount of food, wood or gold collected, number of bandits defeated... as well as total nonsense such as number of campfire songs sung, cans of beans eaten, times bitten by snakes and other stats which have nothing to do with the gameplay.

    Web Animation 
  • Haloid has "Fake Credits (Sorta)" at the end that say "Directed By Monty Oum", "Produced By Monty Oum", etc.
  • In Sonic Shorts Volume 3, you get to what seems to be the credits.... and then some static appears and SURPRISE! It's the Tails Doll, coming to ruin the moment. After his little scene however, the credits play normally with him trying to come for you again, only to be headbutted and tossed into the air by Tails. He pops up again, this time crying. But don't worry, Marine finds him, and they become best friends! This is one of the more beloved scenes in the series.
    • The sequence led to a continuation released in August 2009 at a very odd time and place. Half the audience laughed, the rest jumped like hell... and then laughed after.
  • A Cyanide and Happiness web animation played with this by making their sequel to "Waiting For the Bus" (probably the most popular of their videos). As it gears up to be emotional, it ends prematurely; the rest of the two minutes are devoted to gag credits, crediting a Jazz Quartet manned by Morgan Freeman, Morgan Freeman, Morgan Freeman and Morgan Freeman among other things.
  • The Demented Cartoon Movie has suitably deranged opening and closing credits on top of a yellow/green strobing background.
  • Homestar Runner has used humorous gag credits in a number of cartoons on the site:
    • The April Fools' Day cartoon "Under Construction" features brief fake credits going by way too fast, including listing Paul Pan and Storm Storm as sound composers and entries such as "Scare Tactics - Poncho" and "Cover Ups - Kevin".
    • The Strong Bad Email "theme song" features several bogus credit sequences, at least two of which have nonsensical credits such as "Theme Song by a Neville of some sort" and "Playa Hata - Stu Scott".
  • The Misadventures of R2 and Miku ends most of its episodes with a single gag credit for a crude joke name (for example, "Mike Crotch"). One episode, which ends on a completely serious PSA for suicide prevention, instead credits "don't insert gag name in here because suicide is not a joke".
  • Flipnote Warrior: The animation doesn't have many people working on it, so for the ending it is Mirror Panel coming up with as many roles as possible, being credited for In-Between Animation 21 times.

    Webcomics 

    Web Originals 
  • Several in the credits of Episodes 1 and 2 of "The Dr. Steel Show".
  • Arkada of the DesuDesBrigade normally does a text version of this for his episodes. Also, while, he managed to keep composure through his Fruits Basket review, once the camera was off...
  • Life Sketch features two characters who are never shown with the main cast in a panel at the end of a comic specially reserved for them and the credits, doing a witty banter that somehow relates to what happened in the comic itself.
  • The opening sequence of the Red vs. Blue DVDs tend to feature these as well, including one where they have a fake version of the FBI warning, followed by an even more fake Spanish version. That isn't even in Spanish.
    • In the credits themselves, the children of the crew are listed under "Grips" in the early seasons (later ones also include parents, partners and pets under "Security"). Revelation also has some friends of the crew as a "Wardrobe Department" (the series is animated...).
  • Echo Chamber:
    • In episode 4 (Dumbass Has a Point), changed Zack's credit as "Director of Photography" to "Doctor of Photography". The credit card also notes that he is responsible for the "Crap Titles".
    • In Episode 7, the music is by Justin Hill; the sound is credited to Dave Unrelated Hill.
  • The end credits of Ben McYellow Returns - Part 3 has a few:
  • In the credits of Episode 27 of Dragon Ball Z Abridged (which are listed in the info box on Youtube) the voice of Yamcha (whose voice actor had left a while back, so he hadn't had any lines for several episodes) is played by Bill Murray.
  • Both Roméo and Julieta videos feature this.
  • For Touhou Project parodies of other anime openings, crediting ZUN with almost task listed is considered in good form. For SUNRISE animes, the production company is changed to ZUNRISE, occasionally accompanied by a short cut from the Mazda ZoomZoom song for emphasis.
  • Some of John Dredge's earlier shows feature completely made-up credits at the end. Later shows do credit the people who have actually taken part, but often continue including some made-up credits as well. One episode goes as far as crediting everybody who has taken part, plus a number of invented people as well - everybody that is, except for Greg Haiste.
  • Dropout: At the end of the "Head of Skate" video, which parodies Sarah Palin as a hockey mom in a bad Disney movie, all the credited members of the movie's production team are in fact members of the Nazi Party.
  • Pausing the credits for Twelve Hundred Ghosts reveals long paragraphs explaining the work that went into the video, as well as a tangent about feeling bad for Jacob Marley.
  • Project Binky by Bad Obsession Motorsport has humor inspired by the works of Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker (mostly Police Squad!), so the episodes feature this a bit:
    • In the opening credits, the starring credits for Nik Blackhurst and Richard Brunning are followed by "and Rex Hamilton as Abraham Lincoln." This is followed by the episode's title displayed onscreen while the voiceover gives a completely different title.
    • In the closing credits:
  • Smosh: A few skits has a few examples such as in ONE LETTER OFF BOOKS, the credits for Fifty Shades of Greg list the credits as follows:
    • Cast:
    Ian Hecox as Greg
    Courtney Miller as Anastasia
    Keith Leak Jr. as himself
    Shayne Topp as The bed
    Noah Grossman as Guy locked in closet
    Unpaid interns as Live studio audience
    Robert Downey Jr. as Kurt (scene cut for time)
    • Crew:
    Guy Tugoodferdis as the Director
    Hornyerica14 as the Writer
    Mark Moneybags as Executive Producer

    Edit bot X27S as Editor
    An Instagram filter as Cinematographer
    What's a gaffer as Gaffer
    Sparky the doggo as Best boy
    Art Direction by the director's daughter
    Craft Services by a bowl of pudding
    Shayne Topp as Guy who locked Noah in the closet

    • Music:
    The Greg Rap: Written and performed by Vanilla ice
    Seriously guys, let me out of this closet. This isn't funny anymore: Written and Performed by Noah Grossman.

    • Others: Based on the novel "Fifty Shades of Greg" which was based of a different Young Adult novel.
  • In Atop the Fourth Wall: The Movie, the closing credits include a couple of side comments about the film beforehand:
    "Wasn't that a spectacular review of BloodGunn?"
    "Still not as popular as The Bee Gees...

 
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The Angry Beavers Credits Gags

The credits of The Angry Beavers would have different silly nicknames for many of the cast and crew members in every episode since season 2 (the first season doesn't have any). Here is one of them from the season 3 episode "Omega Beaver/Bite This!".

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