Fantasy Helmet Enforcement

Kiddies (and monkeys), you can never be too safe, even on your tricycles!

In many shows, mostly those made for kids, any scene showing the characters biking, "scootering", skating, or doing anything similar, one thing that won't be left at home is a bicycle helmet. The only time a character will go sans helmet is in a Very Special Episode about wearing your bicycle helmet, and/or show where the characters Can't Get Away with Nuthin', where said character will either A. Get caught by the parents, or B. get into an accident that results in an injury that could have been prevented if they had worn said helmet.

Knee and elbow pads can also appear in this trope, although not as frequently. When the character is traveling by car instead of by bicycle, prominent display of a properly-buckled seat belt (or neglecting to buckle up in a Very Special Episode situation) serves the same function. Although this trope is most common in children's works, it can still be found in ones aimed at adults, especially if motorcycles are involved, as there is a large subset of motorcycle enthusiasts who believe that helmets detract from their image.

This trope can also contribute to a good amount of Fridge Logic in situations in which time is a priority, or during quick transitions of little time, yet the characters find time to strap on safety gear.

While there is nothing wrong with wearing a helmet (and many Real Life cyclists, including essentially all pros, would never dream of going biking without their helmet), generally in Real Life, many people bike around without helmets, and don't usually find themselves getting in accidents caused by the wrath of helmet gods for not wearing any gear. Ditto for skating and other activities. Helmet laws do exist however, not necessarily for bikes, but much more often for motorcycles. (And even if a hero doesn't need a helmet to survive, he likely wouldn't want to get a ticket for not wearing one.)

However, the Moral Guardians don't want kids to think, "My favorite TV character doesn't wear a helmet, so why should I?" Thus, no head goes without a helmet to set a good example.

Parodies of this trope may involve the character going overboard by wearing protection also for their body, legs, arms and so on, either of their own volition or being forced to by a parent, police officer or other authority figure.

It should also be noted, at least according to this site, that nobody really wore helmets as much as they do now until The '90s. Ironically, accidents went up, because people believed if you wore a helmet, you were guaranteed safe from any accident. Face it, while a helmet does have some protective value, it's not going to make you invincible.

Contrary to what one might think, this is not the inverse of Helmets Are Hardly Heroic, about the tendency of heroes in the fantasy and sci-fi genres not to wear helmets in battle. It is the inverse of Safety Gear Is Cowardly, when helmets are not to be found at all. See also the Safe Driving Aesop.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• In Cardcaptor Sakura, when she goes rollerblading to school, Sakura wears all the protective gear, including the helmet. The one exception to this rule was when she was trying to catch the Fly card or in a few other card-catching cases, but that first one was in the middle of the night and she was still wearing her pajamas.
• Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid:
  • Played with during Kanna's trip to New York when she and Chloe spend some time at a skate park. In the manga, nobody is shown with helmets at all. The anime on the other hand shows all the kids (including Kanna herself) wearing helmets, but none of the adults bother with one.
  • In a variation, Kyoto Animation released an alternate version of the season 2 key visual◊ where all the dragons were wearing face masks and socially distancing to promote COVID-19 awareness, despite the the fact that it'd be impossible for them to catch the disease, much less spread it.
• Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds:
  • One instance in Yusei has a spare helmet for a second rider even though there's no place to store it, and the bike wasn't designed to hold two people. While there could've been a compartment under the seat like in a lot of bikes, the double-seater has no excuse.
  • The Dark Signers who used D-Wheels still used helmets, though it's kind of odd why they thought it necessary. (They were already dead.) In fact, the only time anyone in the franchise had what might be considered a fatal motorcycle accident was when Placido lost to Yusei during the Diablo invasion, and he got rid of his helmet to switch his D-Wheel to Super Mode. (Although the crash "killed" him, he was an android, and was eventually repaired.)

Asian Animation

• In Noonbory and the Super 7, throughout the first season, the characters constantly wear hollowed-out pinecones as helmets whenever they are riding a vehicle.

Comic Books

• Even someone as badass as Captain America wears a helmet while using his motorcycle. (Helps that it's a pretty Cool Helmet.)
• When she was first introduced, X-Men character Pixie often wore a bicycle helmet when she flew more than a few feet off the ground out of fear of crashing. Note that Pixie is pretty much a mutant/fairy hybrid and she flies with butterfly wings. She eventually grew out of it.
• Spoofed in a Sturmtruppen story arc, where two soldiers remove their helmets and go deep in a trench to enjoy some fresh air and another soldier, on the edge of the trench, rebukes them from removing their helmets and declares he's safer there in his exposed position with the helmet on. Sure enough, an enemy shell explodes nearby and shrapnel ruins his helmet and splits his head open (non-lethally), while the soldiers smart enough to be deep in the trench are unscathed and calling medical help.

Films — Animation

• Big Hero 6: Played for Laughs. Baymax, being the ever-helpful health service robot, gently advises that Hiro put on his seat belt while they're in the midst of a car Chase Scene.
• The Boss Baby: Played for laughs. Timothy insists that he and the Boss Baby cannot ride a bike without wearing a helmet. Timothy then proceeds to do some of the craziest stuff ever done by a kid on a bike, having just ditched training wheels with the Boss Baby's encouragement.
• Monsters University: A security from Monsters Inc. is chasing down the Oozma Kappa boys for trespassing. The mother of one of the boys is readying their getaway car, but wouldn't drive away until everyone buckles up. They do make it out in time, thankfully.
• My Little Pony: A New Generation: When she's rollerskating, Sunny wears a helmet adapted to fit an equine head, with holes for her ears.

Films — Live-Action

• Defied in Brassed Off. Not only does the elderly Danny not wear a helmet on his bicycle, but he carries Phil as a passenger without a proper seat, while Phil carries his trombone. When Danny puts out his arm to signal a turn, Phil sticks his trombone out as well.
• In Thunderball, James Bond would don a helmet before going to fly around in the Bell Rocket Belt. The filmmakers objected to the helmet, but the stunt man refused to fly the jet pack without it. Promotional art for the film, on the other hand, depicts Bond without helmet when using the jet pack.
• Parodied and Double Subverted in Spaceballs after Dark Helmet refuses to fasten his seat belt after ordering Colonel Sandurz to shift to Ludicrous Speed, their ship bypasses their target, and Dark Helmet can barely hang on. The villain tells Sandurz to hit the emergency brake (which Sandurz does, despite a warning sign on it that says "Never Use") and Dark Helmet is Blown Across the Room headfirst. Luckily, as Sandurz points out, he was wearing the helmet, so he survives (but the helmet itself does not, and Dark Helmet collapses a few seconds later).

Literature

• Defied in Roald Dahl's childhood of the 1920s, in his autobiography Boy. He describes riding his tricycle to kindergarten, in the middle of the road, with no adult present, taking corners on two wheels; certainly no helmets are mentioned. He adds that this was at a time when motor cars were rare. He also describes a significant memory of seeing and envying an older boy riding a bicycle, with his school cap (note: not a helmet) sitting jauntily on his head, and the boy's arms folded casually across his chest, instead of on the handlebars.
• Zigzagged in The Famous Five, who are frequent cyclists, albeit in an era when there was less traffic on the roads. No helmets are mentioned at all, but Julian is strict and pompous about their brakes being in good working order, especially in Five Get Into Trouble when he berates Richard for bad cycling practice. However, some of their habits are of questionable safety, such as having Timmy running alongside them, and carrying a passenger on one of their bikes.
• In the Mouse Math picture book Make a Wish, Albert!, one of Albert the mouse's presents for his birthday is a helmet. The next present is a scooter that he hadn't actually asked for, but did wish for on his cake candles after seeing his friend Leo's new scooter.
• Played with in the Temps story "Playing Safe" by Marcus Rowland, in which there is a list of legally required safety equipment for paranorms, but it isn't enforced (and is never mentioned in any other story). However, the main character dismisses the actual protest group on the subject as "idiots with fractured skulls", suggesting that maybe they should be taking it more seriously.

Live-Action TV

• In the 1960s Live Action Batman (1966) they Lampshaded several things in a The More You Know kind of way, including taking the time to properly buckle your safety belt.
• Power Rangers normally has it easy, as helmets are part of Rangers' suits. And yet...
  • There's one instance in Dino Thunder of a helmet appearing out of nowhere between shots, when Tommy has to drive a barely-conscious Elsa out of the area on an ATV. Earlier in the premiere episode, Tommy also makes a point of locking the door and fastening his seat belt before driving off even though the freaking Tyrannosaur chasing him seemed to be the greater safety hazard.
    Tommy: Great, yeah, lock the door, Tommy, real good!
  • Ziggy of Power Rangers RPM also has a strange moment where he stops to put on a helmet before driving off in a go-kart in order to get away from the deranged Venjix agent Tenaya 7. (Then again, this is Ziggy we're talking about...)
  • Also, the series follows this in general whenever Rangers are skateboarding, rollerblading, bike riding, etc. They will wear helmets and knee pads. Most notable in Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie.
• This also got a playful nod in Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger. In the episode where the team encounters former Carranger leader Kyosuke Jinnai, the Gokaiger attack the Monster of the Week while riding vehicles like scooters and bicycles. Kyosuke admonishes Red and Green for riding double on a single bicycle, which is perfectly in character since he's been shown to be a traffic safety nut throughout the episode (and Carranger itself was all about traffic safety).
• In Sesame Street, nobody is seen biking, skating, riding a scooter or even riding a pogo stick without wearing a helmet, and this extends even to tricycles. Lampshaded in an "Elmo's World" segment on bikes where the Animate Inanimate Object's that Elmo talked to were a bike and a helmet. Whenever the bike said something that she'd do, the helmet would say "Not without me".
• In the Wonder Woman TV series, Diana can use her Instant Costume Change spin to change to a motor cycle or roller-skate version, helmet included. (Fortunately, it matches the rest of the costume.) Oddly enough, this Trope is averted the rare times her Invisible Jet appeared in the series.
• Both Ice Road Truckers and, on occasion, Dirty Jobs subvert this by pointing out that while driving on iced-over bodies of water, you do not wear your seat belt since falling through the ice is a far likelier hazard than crashing, and undoing a seat belt wastes valuable seconds.
• Angel doesn't need to wear a helmet for protection, but, as Wesley points out, it's the law in California. He just wishes it weren't bright pink.
  Angel: It's just, y'know, the whole visibility issue, not to mention the whole hat-head thing, I mean when you, when you really think about how come I have to wear the lady's helmet?
  Wesley: Stop being such a wanker and put it on... looks good. Hop on board, gorgeous.
  Angel: You'll pay for this.
• An episode of Blood Ties (2007) had a bizarre example, where a child is shown sneaking out of the house to ride his bike. Just because you are the evil spawn of a dark elf, sneaking out of the house to murder one of the neighborhood children, that's no reason to ignore bicycle safety.
• Pee-wee's Playhouse: Pee-Wee Herman started out not wearing a helmet on his scooter, but by Series 2 he got one. Appropriately, it was decked out with a cyclops eye and other impractical doodads.
• It goes without saying that this is a part of Kamen Rider, which features helmeted Henshin Heroes riding motorcycles. However, it also comes into effect when one of the Riders brings someone along on their bike and magically possesses a second helmet for them to use.
  • During the Kamen Rider Wizard in Magic Land movie, Haruto gets into a motorcycle chase while unmorphed, and his helmet simply appears between shots. One suspects A Wizard Did It.
  • Kamen Rider Build can summon a helmet out of nowhere as one of his bike's explicit powers, to be worn by himself when unmorphed or by any passengers when morphed. Even though it makes more sense than the times helmets appear out of nowhere between shots, there are still times where not budging one inch before everyone's helmeted no matter what can get ridiculous. If, for example, your Muggle passenger was being shot at, you'd probably forgo summoning a helmet and waiting for him to put it on before taking off just this once, but nope!
• A lampshaded aversion in the Murdoch Mysteries motorbike episode "Murdoch Rides Easy", as fits the period: When Julia considers getting a motorcycle, Murdoch warns her of how dangeroud motorcycles are and says riders should probably start wearing helmets (no motorcyclist in the episode has any sort of head protection beyond driving goggles). Julia retorts that falling off a motorcycle is no more dangerous than falling off a horse or a bicycle, and nobody thinks their riders need to wear helmets. Murdoch looks thoughtful about this but doesn't press the point.
• In Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation, Michelangelo does some "Sewer surfing" which is basically riding in a motorized street luge through the Absurdly Spacious Sewer. He only puts on his helmet when his brakes break and a crash is imminent. After smashing a hole into the wall of the Turtles' lair, he's only mildly dizzy.
  Raph: Good thing you were wearing a brain bucket, huh?
  Mikey: Oh, yeah, sewer surfing is all about safety!

Video Games

• In Bully, you don't have to wear a helmet when you ride a regular bicycle, however, your trouble meter goes up if you ride a motorbike without helmets. Shown Their Work indeed.
• Grand Theft Auto:
  • Grand Theft Auto IV:
    • Niko and Luis will both pull a helmet out of thin air to put on when they get on a motorcycle. However, the player can easily just gun the gas as soon as they get on and drive off helmetless. The helmet actually has an advantage in reducing damage when you hit your head in a crash.
    • One exception is Johnny Klebitz, a long-standing biker gang member in which its members wear no helmets at all. Due to revamping bike handling to make gameplay easier for TLAD (the episode he stars in, that focused heavily on motorcycle riding) it's absolutely impossible to fall off the bike, leading to situations where you can end up stuck upside-down, still on your bike — with getting off the bike the only way to correct it.
  • Same thing in Grand Theft Auto V, it applies to ALL protagonist including Trevor, and every character has its own helmet models, pulled out in random styles and colors, except Trevor who mainly wears visorless biker helmet.
• Averted in Mario Kart series starting from Mario Kart Wii and continuing to Mario Kart 8 (where bikes are introduced in the former and prominently featured as a vehicle choice in the latter) but played straight for the Mii Racer characters, who wear racing gear, including helmets.
• In Nancy Drew: Danger at Deception Point, if you don't put your helmet on, Nancy has an accident and ends up in the hospital as a Game Over.
• Averted for years in Pokémon whether the trainer was using a bicycle, rollerblades, a live mount (including a legendary Pokémon like Latios/Latias in Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire), or a souped-up motorcycle like Wes has in Pokémon Colosseum. It's finally played straight in Pokémon Sun and Moon, where the trainer's riding outfit for the various Poké-Ride mounts, even the slow-moving ones, includes a helmet and safety pads, plus a life jacket for surfing mounts. Most later main-series games (excepting Pokémon Let's Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee!) have also continued to follow suit with at least helmets, but no life jackets. Pokémon Sword and Shield even has customization options for the trainer's cycling outfit and helmet, and the Expansion Pass DLC includes a speed upgrade for the bike that also changes the standard helmet to a full-face one. Additionally, you now wear a helmet and protective gear whenever you ride your bike in the Pokémon Diamond and Pearl remakes. Pokémon Scarlet and Violet went back to averting it, as your character doesn't have to wear a helmet when riding Koraidon or Miraidon.
• Sleeping Dogs (2012) doesn't even allow you to accelerate before the protagonist is quickly putting on the helmet. Bizarrely enough, helmet use is exempt on scooters, possibly due to the low speed, although real life traffic law, especially in real-life Hong Kong, still enforces helmets on scooters.
• In the first Space Quest you can't start the emergency escape craft unless you first buckle your seat belt. (And seeing as there's only a limited amount of time before the ship you're on explodes, every second counts.) Even worse, if you manage to escape, then once you crash land, you can't exit the escape craft until you unbuckle it. And time matters here too, because after a while, a spider droid shows up to hunt for you.
• Played for Laughs in Wolfenstein: The New Order. When BJ is about to turn a chainsaw on a captured Nazi officer, the game insists on finding "splatter protection" first (goggles and an apron).

Web Animation

• RWBY: Yang, who shrugs off being smashed through concrete bridge support or being knocked several miles high in the air and the subsequent crash-landing, always wears a helmet when riding her motorcycle. Presumably Remnant's traffic laws don't take into account people who have awakened their Aura. Maybe it's so she doesn't mess up her hair?

Western Animation

• In the Strawberry Shortcake episode "Back in the Saddle", all the girls are shown wearing helmets under their cowboy hats while riding horses.
• Arthur brings the Fridge Logic on this, since the major characters have ears that stick through the air vents, making one wonder if they would be torn in a nasty crash. Also there was one episode where Arthur and Buster are given crap by two skater kids for wearing safety straps.
  • When DW and Kate are shown in the car they are in the proper car seats, including a booster seat for DW.
• Rocket Power, due to Executive Meddling. Nickelodeon would not pick up the show unless the kids were wearing appropriate safety gear during all of their extreme sports activities. In an episode in which Trent the New Zealander kid introduces the gang to rugby, he suggests that they tape over their ears to avoid getting them torn off. Twister heeds this advice, though he can hardly hear because he taped them up too much.
• Rugrats, despite the older kids with big wheels and tricycles never wearing helmets, the only time anything like this is used in the series was because Didi went into My Beloved Smother mode after Tommy whapped his head on a table.
• Johnny Test: A typical preteen boy and his dog, and nary a helmet in sight. Unless his sisters are involved.
• Stanley had an episode that dealt with armadillos and wearing your bicycle helmet when he questioned its necessity.
• In Phineas and Ferb, Candace and the pool turned skate-park in "De Plane! De Plane!"...

  Kid 1: Safety first! [throws a helmet on Candace]
  Kid 2: Safety first! [throws knee and elbow pads on her]
  Kid 3: Safety first! [hands her a steering wheel]
  Candace: Steering wheel? How is this safe? [crashes and airbag deploys from the steering wheel]

  Then Candace and Jeremy end up getting hurt anyway when Phineas and Ferb's passing airplane blots out the sun, causing Candace to accidentally crash into Jeremy.

  • Definitely lampshaded in "Tour de Ferb", when Candace drags Linda out of the shower - and onto her bike - to see Phineas and Ferb's latest project, and Linda quips "Lucky thing I picked today to wear my bike helmet in the shower."
  • In "My Sweet Ride", Linda is riding skates and Jeremy somehow instantly notices that her hair is actually a hair-shaped helmet.
• Kim Possible:
  • Any of her gadgets will strap on the necessary safety gear. When she pulls the cord to fire up a backpack-jetpack, a robot arm pops a helmet on her head.
  • Also played straight in the odd episode where it's not one of her gadgets but a borrowed jetski or something, she always puts on life-preservers and similar gear.
• Plot point in Darkwing Duck: in "Darkly Dawns the Duck," Darkwing always wears his hat on his motorcycle. Gosalyn finds a discarded helmet, and lectures him on bike safety; he then normally wears the helmet when riding. "Dead Duck" features Darkwing skipping the helmet, as it had been destroyed (by a falling anvil). Guess what happens based on the episode title. (In fact, when Darkwing quotes his catchphrase, "Let's get dangerous!" Lauchpad stops him, pointing out the missing helmet, and saying, "That's a little too dangerous!")
• Fillmore!: They always hijack the helmet as well whenever they pull a Flashed-Badge Hijack on a bike, scooter, whatever.
• American Dragon: Jake Long: Supposedly, this was considered for the title character, but ultimately rejected, presumably because an impressionable youth is much more likely to bike without a helmet than turn into a dragon and fly, helmet or no. He and the other members of his Power Trio do wear safety equipment when skate-boarding, so the Moral Guardians can't complain about that and it's honestly a good point to make.
• In both X-Men: The Animated Series and X-Men: Evolution', even Wolverine wears a helmet when riding a motorcycle. Presumably the in-universe issue is less about safety than blending in and not getting a citation. But it's weird to see Sabretooth, of all people, also wearing a helmet in Evolution, as he makes no attempt to blend in and can presumably... deal with any cop unlucky enough to pull him over.
• Code Lyoko:
  • Averted much of the time. Part of the complex route the kids use to get to the factory and save the day involves riding skateboards (or in Jérémie and Aelita's case, a scooter) through an Absurdly Spacious Sewer, yet none of them keep any safety gear down there. You'd think at least safety-conscious Jérémie would stash a helmet with his scooter.
  • However, during a skateboard competition organized by the school, all the kids are wearing helmets and protective gears. Which is a good thing, because they tend to fall a lot... or even crash into each other.
• Batman: The Animated Series always put particular prominence on Batman putting a helmet on during his inevitable Bike chase scenes, as does Batman: Mask of the Phantasm.
• In the premiere of Batman Beyond, Terry starts fighting with a motorcycle gang of Jokerz and (after knocking a few off their rides) grabs one of their bikes to lead them away. As he takes off, there's a quick scene showing him reach back for a helmet conveniently sitting on the seat — you'd think that putting it on would interfere with his driving.
• In the variant on seat belts, the censored version of the show's film Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker featured removal of blood, replacing some possible prostitutes with a well-to-do married couple, a much less gruesome and graphic death for a major character and.... digitally putting seat-belts on Terry and Bruce when they're driving.
• In a variant of the rule, British childrens cartoon Peppa Pig is to be seen in the future wearing safety belts while riding in a car, as well as helmets when riding bikes. And the creators of the show are also taking retroactive remedy in that all older episodes are to be edited to feature them wearing safety belts and helmets as well. This is explicitly because of complaints from at least one parent with children refusing to wear seatbelts.
• Dora the Explorer: Dora is always buckling up.
  • Additionally, Dora once served as a spokesgirl for St. Jude's safety trike-a-thon program.
  • One episode even shows Dora and Boots buckling their seatbelts on a merry-go-round Most kids don't realize that they can fall off the merry-go-round if they stand up while it's going.
• Kick Buttowski: Suburban Daredevil: Kick Buttowski always wears his helmet when performing stunts... because he never takes it off to begin with. (Never know when a stunt opportunity will present itself.)
• Franklin: Like on Arthur, there's at least one character whose ears stick straight up through their helmet.
  • There's no story about someone getting in trouble because they don't think helmets are cool. There is, however, one entirely focused around Franklin getting a fancy new helmet with a flashing light on top because he's outgrown his old one and some of the other kids find the new helmet goofy. When he hears the kids making fun of that type of helmet, he hides it and tries to borrow his friend Bear's to use for a bike safety rally, only to be told that you should never wear a helmet that hasn't been specifically fitted for you. In the end, another friend helps him to see that it doesn't matter if the other kids think the helmet is dorky and the bike safety officer suggests that the flashing light could be a useful safety feature. He is seen wearing this helmet throughout the rest of the series.
  • In the episode "Franklin's Granny", as the two explore her attic, Franklin looks at an old photograph of her as a youngster on a bike without a helmet. Granny Turtle remarks on how bad she was at stopping, and shows the scar on her forehead from falling off. Granny said that helmets didn't exist at the time after Franklin said how important it is to wear one.
• In My Friends Tigger & Pooh, the Super Sleuths (Pooh, Tigger and Darby) always wear their helmets when riding their Sleuther Scooters. ("Somebody's needing our help today, so helmets on and scooters away!")
• In "The Magic Skateboard" on The Backyardigans, the Backyardigans (minus Tasha, who is not in the story) all wear helmets and padding. Uniqua's antennae stick up through her helmet, Austin's ears stick up through his and Tyrone's antlers through his. Additionally, his ears stick out to the sides.
• Seen on Gofrette, and yes, once again, there are anthropomorphic characters with ears that stick through their helmets.

• Adventures from the Book of Virtues uses this. Both kids wear helmets while riding up to the cave of the story tellers.
• Both Will and Dewitt always wear their helmets when riding or biking on Will and Dewitt.
• Though no bikes were involved, an episode of the Sam & Max: Freelance Police animated series features Sam using Max to batter down a door, and he does indeed put a helmet on Max (and the duo give a warning about how they're cartoon characters who have "being fictional" as their stunt qualifications). The Effigy Mound, a now-out-of-print Sam & Max sketchbook, actually has materials from the production of this, revealing that the original drafts were more like Steve Purcell's comics. For that scene in particular is a note insisting on the helmet, and complaining that "it still seems like something a child could imitate at home with a pet rabbit".
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
  • The young pegasus Scootaloo always sports a helmet while riding her scooter. Even Pinkie puts on a helmet while riding along. The CMC also wear protective gear while roller skating.
  • In "Somepony to Watch Over Me," when Applejack becomes overprotective of her little sister Applebloom, she tries to make her wear a helmet all the time. At one point, she puts a second helmet over the first one.
  • In "Pinkie Apple Pie", all of the characters wear life vests when rafting except Big Mac, who wears a floaty and water wings.
  • In the Season 4 premier", "Princess Twilight Sparkle", Spike puts on a seatbelt while riding on Twilight's back mid-flight. The question becomes where did it come from?
• Lilo & Stitch: The Series: Stitch and Gantu put on helmets before getting on bikes. Which they had stolen. In the middle of a chase scene. Makes even less sense for Stitch than it does for Gantu, considering the experiment is stated several times to be indestructible (though Gantu's sheer size would likely make him tougher than humans). In the movie he gets run over by an 18-wheeler.
• Spider-Man: The Animated Series: Spider-Man and Black Cat are fleeing from S.H.I.E.L.D. agents on flying motorbikes. When Spidey runs out of web-fluid, Black Cat steals a motorcycle, and is suddenly helmeted in the shot where they're about to take off. Spidey puts a second one on, noting that he's probably gonna need it.
• Parodied in the The Simpsons episode "The Springfield Connection". Marge has become a police officer, and notices Bart is about to go skateboarding without wearing a helmet or pads. She tells him that he has to wear them, saying it's for his safety. Cut to Bart getting wailed on by a group of bullies, stating that the equipment's soft padding makes it easier for them to beat him.
• Snake Eyes is nearly always wearing a helmet when he's riding his motorcycle in G.I. Joe: Renegades. In one instance, he's first seen driving a stolen Cobra ATV, wearing a helmet, before he hops off, tossing the helmet off as he does...and then putting on a different helmet three seconds later when he hops on his motorcycle.
• Inspector Gadget has his famous Copter Hat, which at first simply comes out of his hat. When he becomes Lieutenant Gadget in Gadget and the Gadgetinis, however, the Copter Hat transformation also includes a helmet and visor.
• Sofia the First:
  • In one episode, Cedric magics up a seat belt for himself before taking off in a flying machine.
  • While keeping an eye on Sofia to make sure she doesn't get hurt on her Buttercup camping trip, Baileywick brought some helmets just in case, which get used as they slide down a steep hill using the sled the girls built.
• In Muzzy in Gondoland, Bob and Princess Sylvia take off on his motorbike to elope, and both are shown putting on helmets. This gets a little weird in Sylvia's case, as the trope ends up colliding with the Ermine Cape Effect - she's somehow wearing her trademark crown on top of her helmet.
• In The Snowman, the boy and the snowman put on helmets before riding and flying off on a motorcycle.
• Used ridiculously in one Jackie Chan Adventures episode where Jade finds not only a perfectly usable skateboard in a dumpster, but just happens to find a helmet that fits perfectly as well.
• In Gravity Falls, everyone always buckles up. One of the funnier cases is in "Sock Opera", with Bill in Dipper's body buckling up, despite the whole joke of the episode revolving around how happy he is to feel pain in his new body. If this is intended as a message, it's rather ineffective, considering how many other car safety rules they break.
  Stan: [singing] Headlights are out, can't really see where I'm going, doo dee doo dee doo.
• On Miles from Tomorrowland, Miles' spacesuit deploys a sort of holographic helmet every time he does a somewhat reckless activity.
• Star vs. the Forces of Evil:
  • In "The Other Exchange Student", Star hitches a ride on the roof of the Diaz's car to chase after them on their way to a camping trip, and magically produces a rainbow to buckle herself up.
  • In "Brittney's Party", when Ludo and his minions hijack a bus, the minion who takes the wheel spends time to buckle up and check the mirrors before driving. Ludo complained that it took so long.
• The Mixels episode "Snow Half-Pipe" plays with it. The sport combines snowboarding and skateboarding together into one sport. As such the ground-based Mixels are wearing helmets...none of them being actual bike helmets (such as Flain wearing a Viking helmet, Kraw a football helmet, and Slumbo a construction helmet). Flurr, being a flyer and not actually riding the snowboard, foregoes a helmet all together.
• Okay, most kids aren't going to get into a fight with a child-hating restaurant owner who's willing to feed kids to sharks to make money, like Chester is in Codename: Kids Next Door. Still, Numbuh Three certainly kicks his ass good — by herself — and probably the biggest reason is, she has the foresight to wear a helmet.
• Class of the Titans enters an interesting situation. Archie, who can't swim, gets knocked off a boat at one point. Despite wearing his life preserver, he is under the water for a while to see the giant sea creature down there.
• On Toot & Puddle, any character seen riding anything such as a bicycle or go-kart is never seen without a helmet. As is typical for a series such as this, all such helmets have holes for the ears to stick out, in order to keep that feature distinctly visible.
• On Doc McStuffins, it's discovered that Super Stuntman Steve is missing his in "Don't Knock the Noggin." Super Stuntman Steve thinks this is totally not rad because Super Stuntman Steve never rides without his helmet. Doc McStuffins would never think of doing so either.
• An episode of Ozzy & Drix has Hector skateboard without a helmet, giving him a concussion and causing a major blackout in his body, causing the titular duo to prevent him from falling asleep and risking his life. Since then, Hector has worn a helmet every time he skateboards.
• Dragon Booster. Justified as they are racing on dragons at ludicrous speeds while swinging around weapons and thus the helmets are needed not only for head protection, but for their visors to see. Most helmets cover the entire head with only a small gap for the mouth, justified as they need to shout orders to their dragons. Some, like Moordryd's even have chin protection beneath the mouth gap. Hilariously the most ineffective helmet is worn by Phistus, the head of the very physical Grip of the Dragon crew, and is essentially a skullcap with spikes and a chinstrap. Artha's magically-generated armor comes with an attached helmet, while Moordryd's is possibly a subversion as his Shadow Booster headgear looks more like a tight face mask with a crest.
• The SWAT Kats justified their need for it — their primary vehicle is a custom jet fighter — of course they'd need em! Though they were cool enough (and given the villains they faced, needed enough) to be worn when they were on foot, or using their countless other vehicles (motorcycles, drill tanks, sandmobiles).
• On Creative Galaxy, Arty and his friends don't go anywhere on Arty's Creative Spark rocket ship without making sure to first "buckle up." Arty's shapeshifting blob friend, Epiphany, gets a pass because she doesn't ride on the ship, she just floats like she always does, traveling alongside the ship.
• The Venture Bros.: Brock reprimanded the Venture family for not buckling up, even while they were being chased, by threatening that they might end up like Gary Busey.
• Dan Vs.: Played for Laughs. Though the show can be lax about safety equipment, when Chris wants to drive away from an imminent explosion, Dan stops him, insisting he put on a seatbelt first.
• On Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, everyone buckles up in the trolley. Also, in "Daniel's Bicycle," Dad Tiger gives Daniel his old red bike from when he was a kid, spruced up, and the next thing he gives him is a shiny red helmet with blue straps. Later, Daniel places his blue plush tiger, Tigey, in the bike's yellow basket He gets a yellow helmet with blue straps. He also has a fantasy sequence in which Tigey has come to life and is racing him on a bike. In this, both of them wear sporty blue helmets.
• On PAW Patrol, Ryder normally has a helmet whenever he rides his ATV. The strange part is even ignoring the fact that pups are driving their own custom vehicles, they all wear seatbelts designed for humans. When actually visible, the seatbelts are buckled uselessly around their hind legs. If they actually were in a crash, they would be launched away as if they weren't wearing them in the first place.
• The animated Llama Llama show depicts Llama and his friends Nelly Gnu and Gilroy Goat all wearing helmets while out scootering or riding bikes and wearing lifejackets while in a boat. All of them include the typical holes for the characters' Expressive Ears to stick out of, as well as, in the case of Nelly and Gilroy, holes for their little horns. Curiously, though, Llama is helmet-free while riding his scooter in the Llama Llama and Friends book based an installment of the series.
• "Buckle, Bucket, Seatbelts and Chuckle" from Mack & Moxy is about making sure that everyone is properly buckled up on a car trip, including children restrained appropriate child booster seats.
• OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes: Parodied in "Special Delivery" when Rad pulls a seatbelt out of Hammerspace so he can ride on the hood of his car without upsetting Moral Guardians. In general, the characters always wear seatbelts, but rarely bother following any other car safety rules, doing things like driving at ludicrously unsafe speeds or trying to give Rad’s van dangerous illegal modifications.
• In "Red Thunder" from Timothy Goes to School, Timothy wrecks his new bike doing a trick that's too advanced for him, but neither he nor any of the other characters would think of riding without their helmets.
• On Butterbean's Cafe, Cricket and her friend Sasha make sure to wear their helmets when riding their bikes. As Sasha is a chipmunk person, she has the requisite holes at the top of her helmet that her ears stick through. Cricket's has holes on the sides to keep her Girlish Pigtails visible.
• In Miraculous Ladybug, Alix always wears a helmet and kneepads when on her rollerblades. Other characters also wear helmets when riding a bike. Even heroes aren't exempt: "Feast" features a scene where Marinette and Adrien need to chase down a villain on bikes while in their civilian forms, so Marinette puts on a face-concealing motorcycle helmet, while Adrien wears a full-body costume but reassures her that he's got a helmet on underneath it.
• On Esme & Roy, Esme & Roy wear their helmets when riding their scooter to the home of the monster or monsters that they're monster-sitting. Roy's has a little holes for his horns to stick through, while Esme's has horns to make her look a monster.
• In the Steven Universe: Future episode "A Very Special Episode", one of the things Sunstone teaches the other Gems is to wear a helmet when skateboarding, which they then do — even though you'd think protecting their gems would be more important.
• Ready Jet Go!: Whenever the kids ride their hover scooters or go-karts, they always make sure to wear helmets. The kids also always buckle up whenever they're about to go into space.
• Work It Out Wombats!: The characters always wear helmets while doing activities such as rollerskating or jumping on a pogo stick
• All over the place in Danger Rangers since the show is about teaching proper safety to kids, including wearing your helmet when it's important to.
• Molly of Denali: Molly always wears a helmet when she rides with her dad on his snowmobile, and in "River Skate," Molly, Tooey, and Trini all wear helmets when skating,

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