Oh, No... Not Again!

Strictly speaking, this is supposed to be dramatic,
but you know...

Red: We've got a complaint, sir. A guest found a pan-dimensional hellhound in their soup!
Monkey: Again?

— League of Super Evil

A simple comedy dialogue trick is to have something bizarre happen, and then have someone say "not again", implying it's happened before. The actual phrasing can vary. A slightly less funny version (unless done just right) is where it actually has happened before, on-screen, and the character is just pointing that out.

A variation is to have the character say something along the lines of "This is just like X all over again," where X is something typically ordinary, such as prom, or graduation.

See also This Is Gonna Suck, which can be combined with it. Is often used in conjunction with the Noodle Incident (especially if what happened the last time hasn't been mentioned or seen before, particularly if the "This is just like X all over again" variation is used). Contrast with Here We Go Again!, which is used to end a story with a repeating motif. Also contrast I'm Not Doing That Again and We Are Not Going Through That Again, in which the character refuses to repeat something that happened before.

Related to Didn't We Use This Joke Already?

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Examples:

Advertising

• Jared's second Dave/GPS commercial; naturally, Dave invokes this trope as he remembers what happened last time.
• In the second video in Game Fly's "Bad Game" commercial, a man who looks like Owen Wilson says "Not again..."
• The head guard in a Captain Morgan rum commercial manages a nonverbal version of this, shaking his head and glaring with a look that's all too clear when he sees Captain Morgan breaking someone out of prison.
• A kid sister yelling "Mom, he's done it again!" was the punchline to two ads from the 1990s:
  • A famous Super Bowl spot for Pepsi about a boy on a beach who quickly finishes off a bottle of the cola with a straw, then can't stop sucking for one more drop until the ensuing vacuum causes his entire body to crumple up and squeeze through the neck of the bottle so he's left trapped inside, much to the disgust of his onlookers.
  • An Airheads commercial wherein a boy's gobbling down a whole piece of the taffy turns him into its balloon mascot and rockets him through the roof. In this one the girl first warns him of what happened last time, as is evidenced by the other boarded-over holes in the ceiling.
• In the Paramount+ commercial "Mountain of Entertainment - Storm", a group of stars notice storm clouds rolling in, which is caught by Number One. When out of the clouds comes a bucket containing water from Flashdance, Spock groans "Not this again."

Anime & Manga

• During a captain's meeting in episode 24 of Bleach, Ichimaru notices Squad 13 Captain Ukitake was missing and is told he wasn't feeling well.
  Ichimaru: Oh, not again. I hope he gets well soon.
  • In the dub version of the same episode, Hitsugaya, the youngest of the captains, is annoyed when the older captains get into an argument.
  Hitsugaya: Oh, no, not again. Old fools caught up in stupid bickering.
• In the beginning of Chrono Crusade, Rosette wails, "Why does this sort of thing always happen to me?!" after her mission to exorcise a demon ends in her crashing a ship into the Statue of Liberty. The very next chapter confirms that this sort of disaster happens because of her all the time.
• City Hunter:
  • Standard reaction from anyone who has to fight Ryo more than once. The most notable example is the boss of the Unryu gang: the first time he encountered Ryo, he started begging for forgiveness upon realizing his son has pissed off the City Hunter, and sometime later his face cried a mix of this and Oh, Crap! when Ryo barged into his house and he realized the women he had just kidnapped was Ryo's partner and client.
  • Throughout the arc of Hirotaka Kitao, he finds himself the reluctant guest for Ryo's invitations to all-night drinking, as he's not as capable of withstanding alcohol as Ryo is. When he's about to move at the end of the arc, his expression to Ryo proposing a week-long farewell party for him is nothing short of this trope, knowing that it'd be a week of non-stop alcohol consumption that he can't handle.
  • Ryo's reaction upon finding out that Yuka is a younger sister of Saeko is this, as Yuka is just as manipulative as Saeko and Reika, albeit too underage to exploit Ryo's sex-obsessed weakness since Ryo isn't aroused by minors. At the end of Yuka's arc, after Yuka tells Ryo and Kaori that she has a pair of younger twin sisters and her father is still trying to have male children, the thought of Yuka's younger sisters — at least two, if not more — coming to him for favors while being every bit as manipulative as Yuka and her older sisters are causes this reaction for Ryo again.
• One episode of Code Geass had Kallen compare their current situation to "what happened in Aomori"; C.C. responds that "at least this time we have our clothes".
• Early in Cyborg 009 when the cyborgs were painting their ship, 007 accidentally knocks down a bucket of paint on 008's head while arguing with 006. A noisy chase ensues, which 004 comments laconically:
  004: Not again.
• In Digimon Adventure 02, we get a shot of the school, then hear an offscreen crash and Daisuke screaming before getting yelled at by a teacher. He explains to his friends that he broke a window playing soccer. Iori simply comments, "Again?"
• Dragon Ball Z
  • During the Buu Saga, after Piccolo and Gotenks discover the ruins of the Lookout, Piccolo states "the Lookout is destroyed... again." Those who've watched the Anime will most likely think back to the Garlic Jr. Saga, which is the only other time that the Lookout was destroyed (on-screen, anyway). (The line was only in the dub, anyway.)
  • Similarly, when Krillin, when trying to come up with an excuse for Gohan's whereabouts to Chi-Chi, considered saying "Gohan's been kidnapped again!" The only other on-screen times he was kidnapped was during the events of the film Dragon Ball Z: Dead Zone, and when Raditz kidnapped him at the start of DBZ (again, dub line).
  • In Super, this is Beerus' reaction when the Zenos asked Goku about what's next, after the Tournament of Power. Beerus actually rushed to avoid Goku give the Zenos any other brilliant idea like the Tournament.
• Boss from Mazinger Z has his made-of-scraps-and-junk Humongous Mecha (Boss Borot) wrecked nearly each episode, so often he utters one sentence along the lines of "Why it is always me?", or "Not again!". He even lampshades it in one UFO Robo Grendizer manga chapter: He is going to fight Great Mazinger (long story), and he is knocked down with a mere backhand. Then he says "The most painful thing is I knew what this would happen."
• In the Great Mazinger vs Getter Robo features, Boss Borot's arms gets eaten by a Robeast. Later his Humongous Mecha gets rebuilt, he fights that Robeast again... And his robot's limb gets eaten again. Boss yells: "What? AGAIN?"
• In Neon Genesis Evangelion, Episode 2 has Shinji being confused when he wakes up to the sight of NERV's sickbay with no memory of the past several hours. But through the course of the series this begins to happen so often to him, that by Episode 14, he reacts with exasperation when he once again wakes up to the sight of the now far-too-familiar ceiling and no recollection of how he got there.
  Shinji: I hate it. It's this ceiling again.
• One Piece:
  • Franky's speedo is stolen and he goes on a rampage throughout Water 7 trying to get it back. Then this exchange occurs:
    Random Villager 1: There's a pervert! Franky's running wild and pantless!
    Random Villager 2: Again?!?
  • After news of Luffy beating Doflamingo reaches the leaders of the World Government, their reaction is, "It's that boy again!" Small wonder, seeing that this is the third of the Seven Warlords Luffy defeated, humiliating the Government.
    • Luffy's arrival in the Paramount War causes Sengoku to yell at Garp (Luffy's grandfather) about his "damn family messing things up again".
  • When the Big Mom Pirates are trying to get to Wano, their ship gets knocked off a waterfall by King (one of Kaido's men). They try it again, only for Marco the Phoenix to show up and send them flying a second time.
• During the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Explorers of Time/Darkness special, prior to Piplup experiencing the Dimensional Scream for the second time, his simple reaction is "Not again..."
• In Sakura Wars (2000), Kohran Li accidentally destroys her steam bike upon approaching the theater. Upon realizing this, she laments that it has been destroyed once before. In the English dub, she even says the trope name verbatim.
• In Tama & Friends, Tama, who is a young cat, seems to have a habit of wondering off and getting lost, particularly during the Uchitama?! Have you seen my Tama? series, much to the annoyance of his feline and canine friends.
  Tora: [after finding a missing cat poster of Tama] Sheesh! Tama is lost again?

Comedy

• During the Olan Rogers routine "Ghost in the Stalls", he tells about scaring a guy out of the bathroom and finding his pants in the stall. When he approaches the staff to report an abandoned pair of pants, the staff member groans, "Again?" The routine ends with Rogers incredulously echoing the reaction.

Comic Books

• Batman:
  • The image at Joker Immunity is from The Batman Adventures comic Mad Love. It has the last two words of this trope. (The panel before showed Batman hitting the Joker out of a train and him saying: "Oh, no...")
  • The Trope Image comes from Batman issue 246 where a villain kidnaps Robin and then keeps "killing" dummies of him in various ways all over the place.
  • The former trope image from the Bat-manga for Seen It All is another example.
    Batman: Drat. He's a pterodactyl again.
• Cherry: Issue #3 of the adult humor comic book featured a parody of slasher films in which Cherry was menaced by a maniac killer — who is summarily dispatched by her heavily armed friends; the joke being that this takes place in a fictional universe where the trope of maniac killers is so common that dealing with them is simply a recurring annoyance.
• Disney Ducks Comic Universe: In the Don Rosa comic, The Quest for Kalevala, the green sea-monster Iku-Turso wreaks havoc on Helsinki. An citizen calmly comments:
  "Wow, that is the second biggest frog I have ever seen."^note Amusingly, it actually is a subtle Shout-Out to Don Rosa's old comic series, The Adventures of Captain Kentucky, as well as one of Maxwell Smart's catchphrases.
• Negation: The series had the catchphrase BOHICA (Bend Over — Here It Comes Again).
• Samurai Squirrel: Nato-san says this when he sees his brother, Malak-qui, being held down by a Ninja.
• Superman:
  • The Silver Age Superman once flew through Hell, causing Hitler to look up and shout "Oh no, not again!" Golden Age Superman had defeated Hitler in one of Action Comics's first issues.
  • Also, Superman's reaction whenever Mr. Myxzptlk pops up for his regular mischief-making.
• Transmetropolitan: A particularly deranged-looking Spider hails/hijacks a cab.
  Cabbie: Please don't kill me and eat me! I couldn't bear to be killed and eaten again!
• Ultimate Marvel:
  • Ultimate Galactus Trilogy: Nick Fury did not go through the Cold War, and in fact end the Cold War, to accept a massively destabilizing terrorist comunications attack coming from Russia!
  • All-New Ultimates
    • After fighting Vermin, the Ultimates find Terry, but Vermin comes back for another round.
    • Cloak teleports everyone out of a van that's about to crash, saying "don't want to relive Prom night" (specifically the night when he and Tandy Bowen were in a near-fatal car crash, which Roxxon used to experiment them).
  • Spider-Men II: Peter Parker is talking to Miles Morales about their duty to be responsible with themselves and each other, and that reminds him of something his uncle used to say. Miles protests that the line is his answer for everything.

Comic Strips

• In an early FoxTrot arc, Andy becomes quite paranoid that her husband Roger is having an affair, when he calls to tell her he'll be home late again. As Andy continues to think of ways he could be lying to her about what he's really doing, Roger counters her questions with substantive answers. He even puts the phone up to his desk chair and says "Listen — you know how my chair squeaks?" "Sounds like bedsprings", Andy replies, and Roger yells for a coworker named Fred to "get over here and talk to [his] wife", to which the coworker groans "Not again..."
• The Far Side:
  • A hippie stops at a house to ask for directions; upon noticing that the person he's speaking with is an elephant-bird-giraffe-man, the hippie says, "Oh, wow, déjà vu."
  • In another one, a group of soldiers at a frontier fort are being attacked by assailants using suction-tipped arrows. One of them groans, "Cripes, not these Indians again!"
  • A duck and a scientist both wash up on a deserted island. The duck says, "So, Professor Jenkins!... My old nemesis!... We meet again, but this time, the advantage is mine!"
• Garfield:
  • Garfield is complaining about how there's only reruns on TV, and leftovers in the fridge. Then Jon runs by, screaming about how the plumbing has backed up, and pirahnas are spawning in the toilet. Garfield's reaction? "Again?!"
  • In one strip around Christmas, Garfield comments that it still doesn't feel like Christmas — and then Jon comes in tangled up in Christmas lights with the tree strapped to his back:
    Jon: I did it again.
    Garfield: NOW I feel Christmasy.
  • In a 1991 strip, Garfield reflects that life with Jon is not normal. Jon walks past announcing his intention to tap dance on the front lawn in his underwear with a balloon animal tied to his head and carrying a pineapple in each hand, and dressed and equipped for exactly that. Garfield, his expression unchanging, simply thinks, "Again?"
  • In a strip popular with Square Root of Minus Garfield contributors, Jon has glued a blender to his face. Garfield is stunned: it's Saturday already? Evidently, this is a weekly thing for Jon.
• Two Calvin and Hobbes strips several weeks apart show Calvin opening a can of food and Hobbes pouncing on him. The second time it happens, Calvin feels the Bad Vibrations and braces himself.

Fan Works

• In A Very Potter Musical, when Voldemort and Malfoy are making an Unbreakable Vow (i.e. a spit-shake):
  Malfoy: [before Voldemort can get out of the shake] And you have to be my slave for a whole day starting now!
  Voldemort: You little shit! You got me, oh this is so embarrassing! That's the second time that's happened!
• In the Potter Puppet Pals episode "The Vortex", we have this exchange:
  Hermione: Professor Dumbledore! Ron's trapped in an alternate dimension!
  Dumbledore: Oh no, not again!
• Yet more Harry Potter silliness: Oh God, Not Again! is a breezy Peggy Sue-parody in which 23-year-old Harry gets to relive his entire childhood fortuitously having done it all before.
• In Child of the Storm and its sequels, this, or variations such as 'oh god, here we go again', are the usual reactions to Harry getting wrapped up in trouble.
• In Origins, a Mass Effect/Star Wars/Borderlands/Halo Massive Multiplayer Crossover, the trope appears as a chapter title and is promptly lampshaded by Samantha Shepard—mainly that the Big Bad they thought might possibly be defeated in fact, was not. The Flood is pretty hard to kill.
• Used to lampshade the increasingly frequent instances of "darkness enfolding him" in ToyHammer.
  "Darkness enfolded me. Again."
• Said by Fakir in Princess Tutu Abridged: "Did I just get taken out by a ninety pound ballerina? Damn, not again."
• Takamachi Nanoha of 2814 has a spectacular example that is entirely in line with canon.
  "I am going to die a virgin," Tuxedo Kamen said, then added conscientiously, "Again."
• Negi Springfield in Equal & Opposite Attraction quotes this verbatim before passing out when he discovers that, yet again, he is teaching mages in his class.
• Sasaki says this almost word for word (she drops the "no") in chapter 54 of Kyon: Big Damn Hero. It's the third time she's been captured by the Sumiyoshi-rengo.
• Said by Sam in Strength In Numbers when she learns that Danny had a two-hour eating binge again.
• Second Wind: Zoro gets this reaction in Chapter 3 when, after meeting Luffy in Shells Town, he discovers that his captain has no ship with which they can set sail. He reflects that some things never change in regards to his captain's tendencies as an Idiot Hero.
• In Fate Genesis, this is the Sonic characters' response to being warped to the Nasuverse.
• This is Apollo's reaction in Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Case 5: Turnabout Substitution when Phoenix Rickrolls him over the phone.
• From Monster of the Week's take on The X-Files episode "Demons"
  Mulder: [over the phone] Hey, Scully. I just woke up covered in blood in Rhode Island.
  Scully: Again?
• Ultra Fast Pony. In "Hippocratic Oafs", Twilight's only reason for saving Ponyville from the giant bear is, "So, Celestia says she doesn't want to lose another entire town to bear attacks this week, so consider yourselves lucky!" In "One Joke to Rule Them All", Rainbow Dash's pet parasprites turn violent, and her reaction is, "My new family's trying to kill me again!"
• Xander's reaction in Sounds Fishy to Me or Blackened White Fish to being chained up in a dungeon is a simple "Not again." And again when he learns the villain plans to experiment on him.
• In I Against I, Me Against You, this is Church's reaction upon returning to the Red vs. Blue world and realizing that everyone is separated just like at the end of Season 2.
• Fully justified in Xendra when Xander and Wesley are turned into women. Wesley freaks out, but Xander's had it happen so many times (both on purpose and on accident) that his main problem is that they lost their clothes.
• In Ponies and Dragons, this is Twilight's mental reaction when she finds out that Princess Cadance sent Sunburst on vacation to Ponyville for three weeks, for the sake of shipping him and Starlight together. To quote:
  Twilight Sparkle: [thinking] Still, why would Cadance give Sunburst a full three weeks off? ...Wait, isn't Hearts and Hooves Day in three... damn it, Cadance, not again.
• Universe Falls: In "Into the Bunker", Amethyst gets poofed during a fight with Experiment 210. Garnet and Pearl, not wanting Stan to know too much about their mission to find out more about the Author of the Journals, tell him that Amethyst was hit by a train. Stan just laughs it off and says "That’s like, the third time she bit it to a train, isn’t it?"
• "The Last Seiðr" sees Harry Potter being sent into the Marvel Cinematic Universe after the battle in the Chamber of Secrets when he enters a portal created by the Tesseract. Accompanied by Fawkes and the Sorting Hat, Harry joins the Avengers in the Battle of New York, which concludes with him breaking Loki's staff when he uses it to channel a spell to close the wormhole, the same spell channelling energy through Fawkes so that he burns up and resurrects. The now-chick Fawkes proceeds to swallow the Mind Stone, which prompts Fury to mutter "Not again" when he hears that, evidently recalling how Goose ate the Tesseract (Captain Marvel (2019)).
• Fate/Harem Antics: Saber says this when she finds out Shielder is Sir Galahad, since this situation reminds her of how in the previous Holy Grail War, she found out Berserker was Sir Lancelot. Fortunately, unlike her father, Galahad is not a homicidal maniac with a grudge against Saber.
• In The Institute Saga, a gang of bank robbers exclaims this when they try to steal a bank and they find themselves caught by Superman, Supergirl and others. Who had arrested them in a previous bank robbery attempt.
• Infinity Crisis: After Jane is taken hostage by Hela, Ray wonders if they can ever get through this kind of team-up without someone getting kidnapped by the bad guys.
• Loved and Lost:
  • Rarity has this reaction when she's sentenced to work in the Diamond Dogs' mines once again.
  • During the climax, Shining Armor says this when he once again cannot use his shield spell against the Changelings due to shortage of magical power. Luckily Cadance lends him the power this time.
• In this post, this is Marinette's reaction to finding out that Superboy is her son, assuming she somehow used her Ladybug powers to bring yet another being to life (the previous ones being dolls of various superheroes, including Chat Noir and Ladybug); Tikki reassures her that this time, she had nothing to do with it.
• 221B: In "Burned", Watson wakes up after being knocked out during a fight and asks what happened. Holmes answers that he got hit with a chair, causing Watson to quip, "What, again?"
• In Full Circle, Olympia and Oona spend two hours explaining to Otis what shipping is, and he finally understands once he sees a GIF of Vladimir from Tangled making two ceramic unicorns kiss that Oona had saved on Pinterest...before he then asks what Pinterest is, causing Olympia to react by groaning and doing a Face Plant right into the Ball Room.
• In OSMU: Fanfiction Friction, Oswald finishes his shower and puts on clean clothes following the Interrupted Bath incident where he was teleported to the Lab in the midst of his shower, naked and all, and began having a Naked Freak-Out. After Orchid scolds him for not cleaning up the water he left behind, he then says that the day can't get any worse. Cue Gooey Randall racing through and splashing him and Omar with a tidal wave of goo that manages to leave him so stunned and so upset that he decides to drag Omar back to the Mobile Unit van to clean up there, despite Omar protesting that the vehicle only has pineapple juice for its base liquid source and has no water.
• Inferior or Superior: Knockout's response to Soundwave returning to the Pokemon Centre with a bite wound on his arm is to say "Oh not again!" and guess what's attacked him this time. Anna picks up on the "again" part and questions just how many times Soundwave has gotten bitten by Pokemon.

Films — Animation

• The Adventures of Tintin:
  Tintin: Mrs. Finch! A man's been shot on our doorstep!
  Mrs. Finch: Not again.
• At the beginning of Asterix Conquers America, this is the Roman senate's reaction to learning that another platoon of legionaries has gotten thumped by Asterix's village again.
• In the beginning of Batman: Assault on Arkham, after the Squad wake up after being captured, Harley Quinn sits up with an annoyed face and exclaims, "Aw crap! Not this again."
• In The Boss Baby, both Tim and the Boss Baby react this way anytime after the Boss Baby reverts to acting like a regular baby because the effects of his formula are wearing off.
• The Land Before Time:
  • In The Time of the Great Giving, Littlefoot and Cera both say this when they encounter Hyp and his gang of bullies once again.
  • At the beginning of The Great Day of the Flyers, Petrie messes up his flying practice and accidentally knocks himself and his siblings out of the sky. When his mother arrives to check up on them, we find out this isn't the first time it has happened.
    Mama Flyer: Oh, Petrie. Not again.
• In Lilo & Stitch, Nani runs into her love interest David after a fire-dance gone wrong leaves him slightly singed.
  Nani: David! Did you catch fire again?
  David: Nah, just the stage.

• Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland:
  • When Nemo is first brought to meet King Morpheus, the throne is revealed to be empty and the Professor says this exact phrase, indicating the king sneaking off is a regular occurrence.
  • During the "Etiquette" musical number about training Nemo to be a prince, the horse that Nemo tries riding on flips him off his seat and onto the arms(and chest) of the plump dancing instructor he'd previously gotten away from, and he says, "Not again!"
• Happens twice in Monsters, Inc. as Mike and Sulley walk to work. The first is when a monster that is reading a newspaper sneezes fire and causes the newspaper to burn into ashes. He says "Aw, nuts!", but the way he says it implies it has happened before. The second time happens when a Blob Monster walks over a metal grate that causes him to fall through, leaving his eyes and teeth behind, quipping "Aw, great!"
• My Little Pony: Equestria Girls – Rollercoaster of Friendship: This sums up well Rainbow Dash's reaction to finding herself and Fluttershy in a White Void Room... again.
  Rainbow Dash: Aw, man! Are we trapped in a magical phone? Typical.
• Phineas and Ferb The Movie: Across the 2nd Dimension:
  Dr. Doofenshmirtz: If I Had a Nickel... for every time I was doomed by a puppet, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice, right?
• The Running Gag in Rockin' with Judy Jetson where Felonia Funk goes into a bounce-off-the-walls rage if she even hears the word "music," forcing her lieutenant Gruff to douse her with water. The first time it occurs in the movie, he grumbles, "Here we go again."
• In Shrek 4D at Universal Studios, Lord Farquaad says this word-for-word when he's faced against Dragon again.
• In Toy Story 3, this is the gang's reaction when the bad guys push Buzz Lightyear's Reset Button, making him go back to the way he started in the first movie- thinking that he's a real space ranger.
  Woody: Oh, no...
  Hamm: Oh, yes. Return of the astro-nut!
• Said word-for-word by Rabbit in Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree when he hears Pooh outside and fears he'll eat him out of house and home again.

Films — Live-Action

• In Airplane II: The Sequel: "Ted, I have the strangest feeling we've been through this exact same thing before."
• In the movie Arsenic and Old Lace, Mr. Witherspoon has this reaction to committing Mortimer's cousin Teddy (who thinks he's Theodore Roosevelt) into his asylum:
  Witherspoon: Oh, dear. Another Roosevelt!
• Back to the Beach: Just as things finally start to go the... ahem... unnamed bartender's way, his buddy turns up to cheerfully announce it's time to go on another three-hour tour. The news is not received well.
• In Back to the Future, after arriving in the past, Marty pushes his dad out of the way of his grandfather's car, resulting in him being hit instead. His Grandpa promptly gets out of the car and looks him over.
  Grandpa: Stella! Another one of these damn kids jumped in front of my car!
• In Beerfest, Jay Chandrasekhar's character wakes up naked in the middle of a field after a night of heavy drinking. Lying next to him is a dead deer with blood around its neck, Jay's character with blood all over his mouth. "Ohhh, not again!"
• Die Hard 2: Both the husband and the wife get in on this.
  John: How can the same shit happen to the same guy twice?
  Holly: Why does this keep happening to us?
• In the German movie Fack Ju Goethe (English title: Suck Me Shakespeer), this happens after the teacher Mrs. Leimbach-Knorr jumps out of a window.
  Mrs Gerster: Oh, Mrs Leimbach-Knorr. Not again!
• Played entirely for drama in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald. When Grindelwald shares his vision of World War II at his Paris rally, Jacob — himself a veteran of the Great War — can only whisper, "Not another war!" in subdued horror.
• In Home Alone 3, after Alex confirms in the bathroom mirror that he has chickenpox marks (specifically, on his butt) he screams. His older sister calls from her room, completely deadpan "Alex slammed the toilet seat on his thing again!" His dad, on the phone downstairs, calmly tells the person he's talking to "I gotta go, my son slammed the toilet seat on his thing again". The person on the other side makes a sympathy noise!
• In Hook when Captain Hook decides to commit suicide, Smee's response indicates that it's not the first time. Hook even tells him, "Don't try to stop me this time, Smee." Smee, try and stop me!
• It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World: Captain Culpepper, in frustration, flings his hat out the window of his office instead of onto the hatrack he was aiming for, forcing a deputy to have to run outside and get it; while running out, he turns to the secretary and says "He did it again."
• Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back:
  • The studio guard interrupts the filming of the Show Within a Show Good Will Hunting 2: Hunting Season with the announcement that they have "a 10-07 on their hands." A 10-07 (two unauthorized persons on the studio lot) is not to be confused with a 10-82 (disappearing a dead hooker from Ben Affleck's trailer). But the guard's announcement does cause the following exchange:
    Matt Damon: [exasperated] Oh Jesus! Again Ben?
    Ben Affleck: [cocky] No, bullshit! Because I wasn't with a hooker today, ha-HA!
  • Later in the same movie, Mark Hamill has this trope as his response when his hand gets chopped off.
• In the soundtrack to John Carter, the music that plays when John is fighting the White Apes is called "The Second Biggest Apes I've Seen This Month". Considering that the White Apes are about 5 metres tall...
• After a hotel-roof shootout in Last Action Hero, culminating in a crane causing a helicopter to crash, Jack Slater (portrayed by Ah-nold) asks his kid sidekick to bring the car around. Upon being informed that the helicopter landed on it, he replies, "I hate it when that happens." Right on cue his daughter arrives with a truck and spare clothes because she heard about the shootout and knew daddy would be needing those.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • The "This is just like X all over again" variation occurs in The Avengers. Black Widow comments that the fight they're currently in is "Budapest all over again." Hawkeye snarks, "You and I remember Budapest very differently."
  • In Doctor Strange, the Ancient One decides to "inspire" Stephen Strange to master the Sling Ring by dropping him through a one-way portal onto the peak of Mt. Everest. Mordo's response upon learning of this is an irritated, "Not again!"
• In Mary Poppins, about fifty chimney sweepers roll out of the Banks family's fireplace and start dancing around singing. And the first thing the cook says when she sees them is, "They're at it again!"
• Used twice in MouseHunt. First, when the Mayor faints after swallowing half a cockroach, his wife yelps, "Oh, no! Not again!" Later, when Lars and Ernie go to the animal shelter and ask for a vicious cat, Mory tells them he has the perfect one: "I had all but given up hope of anyone wanting him. We were about to gas him again."
• Rick O'Connell in The Mummy Returns upon seeing the Soldier Mummies back in action. "Oh no, not these guys again!"
• In Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Scott's sister Stacey finds out Wallace has seduced her new boyfriend behind her back. Her response? "Wallace? AGAIN?!"
• In Sherlock Holmes, Mrs. Hudson spots her tenants' dog keeled over on the floor. Watson's follow-up response implies this is a somewhat regular occurrence.
  Mrs. Hudson: Oh, look, he's killed the dog. Again.
  Watson: [to Holmes] What have you done to Gladstone now?
• John Hurt's character gets out this line during his cameo in Spaceballs when a miniature Alien bursts out of his chest — which is, of course, an Actor Allusion to his role in Alien.
• Star Wars:
  • Along similar lines, in Attack of the Clones when Anakin dives off the side of a speeder in the middle of high-speed, flying traffic, all Obi-Wan can come up with is, "I hate it when he does that."
  • Later in the same film, Anakin's lightsaber is destroyed (leaving him weaponless). When he realizes it, he laments "Not Again... Obi-Wan's gonna kill me." Made funnier because it's a Call-Back to Obi-Wan scolding him for dropping his lightsaber during the speeder chase, which itself sounded like an argument they've already had a thousand times.
• Stroker Ace:
  • At the beginning, Stroker decides to end his employment by dumping wet cement into his boss's rental car. With his boss in it. Lugs' following comment bemoans the fact that he does this, with undertones that this isn't the first time.
  • Later on, Harry Gant says this word-for-word when he gets caught between Stroker and Aubrey once again.

Jokes

• Crossing it with No One Could Survive That!: "Sarge, Private Miller jumped out without his parachute!" "Not again!"
• A weeping woman bursts into her hypnotherapist's office and sobs, "I have been faithful to my husband for fifteen years, but yesterday I had an affair! The guilt is killing me! I just want to forget that it ever happened!" The hypnotherapist sighs, "Not again!"

Literature

• Bruce Coville's Book of... Monsters: This is the protagonist's reaction at the end of Personality Problem when he realizes his psychiatrist, like so many other people, is trying to kill him via burning him alive, just because he's a monster.
• Discworld:
  • A subtle example: It's demonstrated in Carpe Jugulum that in the kingdom of Lancre, a child's legal name is whatever the priest calls them at christening. One of the characters later mentions a former king named "My God He's Heavy the First". That may not be an example, as it's tradition to give monarchs a number based on their name when they are crowned, even if there has never been another monarch of that country with that name before. Of course, this being Discworld it's rather more likely than in our own world that there actually was a King My God He's Heavy II.
  • One of the "flashbacks" in Thud! reads "On this day in 1802, the painter Methodia Rascal woke up in the night because the sounds of warfare were coming from a drawer in his bedside table. Again." The novel does eventually go on to explain why this was a regular occurrence.
  • In Jingo, Vetinari says to Colon, "Oh, no, this is going to be like that business in Djelibeybi all over again, isn't it?" They were never actually in Djelibeybi together; he just says this, and Colon plays along, to get the attention of the crowd and let Vetinari steal a flying carpet.
• In Lev Grossman's The Magician's Land, a Pegasus says this exact line when hearing that the land of Fillory is dying.
• Throughout the Harry Potter books, Hogwarts' school nurse Madam Pomfrey has said this a few times after having to tend to Harry, courtesy of yet another of his shenanigans.
• In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, two missiles in flight are turned into a whale and a bowl of petunias (this makes only slightly more sense in context). The whale has an entire internal monologue, but the bowl of petunias just thinks "Oh no, not again." The sequel Life, the Universe and Everything actually explains why it thinks this, turning it into a Brick Joke.
• One of the Wayside School stories involved a new student in Miss Jewels' class turning out to be a dead rat hidden under a pile of raincoats. Apparently this wasn't the first time this had happened.

Live-Action TV

Series:

• 30 Rock:
  • In an episode, Liz, trying to figure out why a hot man wants to date her, tells him at one point that "If you're a gay guy looking for a beard, I don't do that anymore!"
  • In another episode, she asks Jenna, "What's going on? Why are being so happy and nice? Are you soaking your tampons in vodka again?"
• In Arrested Development, George Sr. plans to blackmail his accountant by making him think he has killed a stripper. The plan involves a huge cake with a narcoleptic stripper inside it and red colored corn syrup. However, Buster stumbles upon the corn syrup and drinks it all, after which he finds the cake, which he then attempts to eat. However, he accidentally gropes the sleeping stripper inside, causing her to wake up and panic, leading her to punching him out cold. Still drowsy and confused, the stripper emerges from the cake to discover Buster lying on the floor, with what appears to be blood around his mouth, making her think she has accidentally killed him. Her reaction?
  Not again!
• On The Big Bang Theory, when Sheldon sees Leonard and Penny kissing after they've broken up, he sighs "Oh, friggity-frack, not this again."
• In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a warning of the impending apocalypse is met with a Collective Groan of "Again?" by the Scoobies. We've seen several near-apocalypses before.
• In an early season of Charmed (1998), the sisters vanquished a demon who had stolen a Cupid's ring, causing him to melt into a puddle. Wearing a Cupid's ring made him unkillable so he soon reformed from the puddle again, good as new. Later, after they had gotten the ring off of him and re-vanquished him, his reaction while melting for the second and final time was an exasperated, "not again!"
• Cheers:
  • In the beginning of season 7, Rebecca takes a look at new boss Mr. Stone, and starts thinking he might give her the acknowledgement she's craving. Everyone else at the bar, who've been through a whole year of her trailing hopelessly after her previous boss, groan in annoyance.
  • One episode has the bar hold a raffle. After the ball is drawn, some drama results when no one can tell if the number is "66" or "99". They eventually sort out the drama and Woody decides to raffle off the rest of the balls. After he draws this one...
    Woody: Number eleven!
    (turns the ball upside down)
    Woody: Uh oh, here we go again.
    Sam: Uh, Woody?
• A Running Gag on The Cosby Show involving Sondra and Elvin's tumultuous relationship before they ultimately got married.
  Huxtable #1: Sondra broke up with Elvin.
  Huxtable #2: Again??
• Doctor Who:
  • At the very end of the TV movie, the Doctor is just settling down to relax in his TARDIS when his gramophone starts to skip, causing it to repeat the word "time" over and over again, just like it did at the start of the movie. The last line is the Doctor's despairing "Oh no... not again!"
  • "The Rebel Flesh":
    The Doctor: I have to get to that cockerel before all hell breaks loose! [Beat] I never thought I'd get to say that again.
  • And this gem, from "Night Terrors":
    Rory: Oh great, we're dead. Again.
    • In the end, Amy died twice and Rory died ten times (and only three times off-screen). Rory deserves particular mention for dying of old age twice without use of any rapid-aging phlebotinum.
  • "The Power of Three": One of Rory's emergency room patients show up because his foot is stuck in a toilet. Rory's reaction? "Again?"
  • Played straight when the fifth Doctor gives exactly this response in "The Visitation" when some peasants are about to decapitate him. However this is actually a Call-Back to him nearly getting his head cut off in "Four to Doomsday", so in this case we've already seen the Noodle Incident.
• In Season One of the FX series Fargo, Duluth police lieutenant Ben Schmidt remarks that the events in Bemidji are "goddamn Sioux Falls all over again." The mysterious Sioux Falls incident was central to the plot of Season Two. In one Season Two episode, a younger Schmidt says, "Oh, Christ! It's Rapid City all over again!" As of 2016, it appears that Season Three's events will not involve Rapid City, so Schmidt's line was most likely a joke for those who had watched Season One.
• In an episode of Father Ted, Ted is showing Bishop Brennan a number of security measures to stop Father Jack from sleepwalking, one of which is a rope snare:
  Ted: I'd like to see him chew through that. [Bishop moves out of earshot] Again.
• Get Smart:
  • A more specific version is one of the best-known running gags from Maxwell Smart.
    Max: The old Professor-Peter-Peckinpah-all-purpose-anti-personnel-Peckinpah-pocket-pistol-under-the-toupee trick. That's the second time I've fallen for it this month.
  • He also notes that some absurdly large items are "the second biggest __ I've ever seen."
• In a late season 6 episode, How I Met Your Mother went meta when Ted responded to something Barney said with him having the feeling that in fact, they collectively learn the opposite lesson at least once every year for a while now.
• In an episode of iCarly (which is also a crossover episode with Pawn Stars), Gibby sells his pants to Chumley. When he comes back from signing the paperwork, Sam's first reaction when he comes out in his boxers is "Did you have another accident?'' A few minutes later, when the pawnshop owners ask for some pictures with the group, Gibby says he's not allowed to get his picture taken without pants anymore.
• In Kenan & Kel, Kenan is trying to trick a tattoo store owner to leave by saying her mother was just bit by a crocodile. And that now she is spewing foam from her mouth. The tattoo artist groans "Not again!" while leaving, causing Kenan to do a Double Take.
• In Last Week Tonight with John Oliver's coverage of Canada's election, they concluded the segment by bringing out Mike Myers dressed as a Mountie to advocate that Stephen Harper not be elected Prime Minister.
  John: Exactly, don't do it, and I'll tell you why. Stephen Harper doesn't care about black people!
  [the music abruptly cuts off]
  Mike: Oh god... not again!^note This was in reference to Myers' charity telethon with Kanye West in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, where West said exactly that regarding then-President George W. Bush, leaving Myers in Stunned Silence.
  John: Oh, sorry, my mistake. What I meant to say was — Stephen Harper doesn't care about Muslim people!
  Mike: ...totally fair! I think he's been pretty clear on that.
• In her third appearance on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, FBI agent Dana Lewis asks why Stabler has a problem with her. Stabler's reply is "every time I meet you, I end up in the hospital! The first time I got shot and the second, I was blown up!" Later, when Lewis confronts the man who raped her, she fires a shot to scare him... and the ricochet ends up hitting poor Elliot in the shoulder.
  • In his hospital bed, Stabler literally groans "aw, no" when Dana shows up to apologize, honestly worried she'll do even worse to him.
• When Leverage's Eliot uncharacteristically starts making Sophie tea, Parker asks her if she's hypnotized Eliot "again".
• The MADtv (1995) sketch "Gump Fiction" had Phil LaMarr reprise his role from Pulp Fiction. As a nod to the meta, he shouted out, "Not again!"
• Two separate occasions with Joy in My Name Is Earl:
  Joy: Darnell, get me a rag! Somebody kicked me in the face in the bathroom again!
  
  Joy: Darnell, call the police! Exterminator sprayed me in the face with rat poison again!
• One episode of NCIS had a suspect, upon walking into his living room to find the team pointing guns at him, say "Not this again! Bloody hell!" Interestingly enough, he also was rather surprised to find they're cops.
• Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide: In the Guide to Money, one of Cookie's several failed attempts involves a failed ventriloquism act. Moze sees the poster, and she invokes this trope.
  Moze: Oh, no. Not Baxter Bear!
• Odd Squad: In the Cold Open of "Training Day", the security guard at the museum begins explaining about the museum's famous giant ball of gum. Otto, having already dealt with an odd mishap involving a ball of gum in "Zero Effect", has this as a reaction and believes that the ball's been shrunken to a single wad. It hasn't — it's been shrunken down to 43 wads instead.
• The Office: "He's put my stapler in the jelly again!"
• Played with on Parks and Recreation:
  Leslie: Some guy handcuffed himself to a pipe in my office because we wouldn't put a copy of Twilight in the time capsule.
  Ben: [sarcastic] Dammit, again?
• Power Rangers:
  • Queen Machina in Power Rangers Zeo when Mondo is struck down by the Super Zeo Megazord.
  • Tenaya on Power Rangers RPM, the second time Dr. K grabs her violin.
• On Press Your Luck, one of the Whammy animations featured one attempting to blow up the contestant's winnings with a Plunger Detonator, only to have it blow up in his face instead; this is followed by "Not again..."
• Hilariously used by George Takei in Psych. Throughout the episode, there are references to a horrible experience he had at a convention in San Antonio. Shawn and Gus (who have tricked Takei into thinking they're assistants he doesn't remember hiring) end up solving their case on stage just as Takei is about to go on, with Shawn pretending to use Gus' "magic head" to channel his psychic abilities. Off to the side, Takei angrily remarks that this is the same thing that happened in San Antonio.
• Quantum Leap. Sam leaps into a character and is disoriented as usual, proceeding to mutter this verbatim. A police detective walks into the room just as he says this, and with a stunned expression, asks:
  "Have you been raped before?"
  (A stunned Sam looks into a mirror at the bruised face of the young woman he's leaped into)
• In the Red Dwarf episode DNA, the dwarfers are playing around with a machine which can transmogrify DNA to change any organic matter into any other organic matter (it briefly turned Lister into a chicken and made Kryten human which they are trying to fix). They end up accidentally creating a giant monster from Lister's mutton vindaloo and while running from it, both Lister and Kryten make a Call-Back to Polymorph when that specific monster had turned into Lister's favorite food in order to ambush and attack him.
  Lister: How can the same smeg happen to the same guy twice?
• A Sabrina the Teenage Witch episode had her aunts warning Sabrina about wish magic, in which if a witch desires something or someone enough that their magic can make them spontaneously appear. The aunts demonstrate this by saying the name of singer Randy Travis three times and he promptly appears in their kitchen. Travis looks around and instead of freaking out, he sighs and says, "Hello Hilda, hello Zelda, and you must be Sabrina. I've heard a lot about you." Reinforced when he leaves the house: "If you need me, you know where to find me... you always do."
  • In another episode, Hilda tries to trick Zelda into losing a coin flip with the phrase "Heads I win, tails you lose". Zelda scuffs and responds: "Yes, like I'm going to fall for that old trick ... again."
• Occurred on Saturday Night Live during Colin Quinn's stint as anchor for Weekend Update.
  Colin: Ol' Dirty Bastard was arrested again... you know, we should really keep that cue card!
• This brief exchange in Scrubs, reinforcing Kelso's lesson to Turk that everybody lies.
  Random Patient: I'm still a virgin.
  Turk: [flatly] You're pregnant.
  Patient [exasperatedly resigned] Again?
• In the Seinfeld episode "The Nap," Jerry has his kitchenette redone and lets the contractor call the shots, which leads to the kitchen intruding on the living area. Kramer does his typical drop-in and no longer recognizes the room, leading to a muttered, "Oh man, I'm on the wrong floor again."
• Smallville:
  Chloe: Clark has amnesia.
  Lois: Again?
• Stargate Atlantis:
  • When Dr. Weir's mind is taken over by an alien, everyone reacts with shock. Except McKay, who just whines, "not again". We'd seen another character taken over by aliens a few episodes before. Before that, McKay himself had had a woman's mind inhabit his brain and take over his body.
  • McKay also says this when he's trapped in a sinking ship for the second time.
• In a seventh season episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Worf says this when Chief O'Brien stops by his quarters with a bottle of blood wine, determined to figure out what Worf's problem is with Ezri Dax even if it means consuming large amounts of alcohol in the process.
  • A variation occurs in an earlier episode, where thanks to a Timey-Wimey Ball, O'Brien ends up encountering his future self multiple times. By the last encounter, the future version of O'Brien has clearly had enough of this.
    Future O'Brien: [on seeing his past self] Oh, no, not you again!
  • This trope likely had a role in Worf's rather strong reaction when Miles and Keiko announced they were expecting another child, an amusing callback to the previous series when he ended up delivering their firstborn.
• In the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The Naked Time", Kevin Riley (under the influence of an alien intoxicant) repeatedly sings "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen" over the ship's comm system.
  Riley: And now, crew, I will render "Kathleen" one more time!
  Kirk: Please, not again.
• In That '70s Show, when the gang finds themselves in a crisis on Thanksgiving.
  Hyde: Okay, here's the situation.... It's Thanksgiving Night. Everything's closed. And we need to find a hundred record bins by midnight. (beat) It's the same damn thing every year....
• Teen Wolf: Werewolf hunter Chris Argent returns home to find his daughter Alison kissing werewolf Isaac, when she has previously dated Scott, the titular Teen Wolf. Chris, having had a long day, just leaves the room while loudly complaining "ANOTHER WEREWOLF!"
• One episode of the docudrama series Untold Stories of the E.R. recounted an incident in which a heart attack patient had his bypass surgery delayed because they found a homemade sex toy in his rectum and decided it was not safe to operate until it was removed. When his wife found out, the emergency physician was surprised that her response was this trope. "I told you those things are dangerous!"
• One 'Weird Newscasters' sketch from Whose Line Is It Anyway? had Kathy Greenwood as a whiny mobster moll. She uses an incredibly high pitched voice to do the role. Then this happens.
  Colin: This just in. All dogs within a five mile area go deaf.
  Kathy: Again?
• The Wire: In the Season 2 premiere episode "Ebb Tide", this is how everyone in the bar reacts when Ziggy takes his pants down.
  Delores: Goddammit, Ziggy, you're not taking your dick out here again!

TV Movies:

• In the Rescue from Gilligan's Island movie, the crew, having finally gotten off the island, go about their lives. They come together for a reunion cruise only for another storm to wash them off course and onto a beach. The Skipper says there's no way of telling where they ended up, but Gilligan says he knows where they are. When asked how, Gilligan shows them a piece of driftboard he found marked S.S. Minnow I.
  Skipper: Oh NO!
  Howell: The same island!
  [the Professor just gives a slow "I give up" shake of his head]

Music

• From David Lang's "Are You Experienced? I. On Being Hit on the Head": "What happened? That felt like... a blow to my head! That's twice this week!"
• Linkin Park lampshades this trope in "Bleed it Out" - a song about the frustration of writing lyrics:
  Now here we go for the hundredth time...
• From "ECNALUBMA" by They Might Be Giants:
  Well, it's a good thing that I brought a napkin
  I knew that this would happen
  Why does this always happen?
• From "Your Horoscope for Today" by "Weird Al" Yankovic:
  Gemini! Your birthday party will be ruined, once again, by your explosive flatulence.
• From "Ashes to Ashes" by David Bowie:
  Time and again I tell myself I'll stay clean tonight
  But the little green wheels are following me
  Oh no, not again
• In the parody song Screw the Nether, one of the singers falling "In the lava AGAIN!" marks the turning point where the singers lose their enthusiasm for living in the Nether and want to go home to the overworld.

Podcasts

• Interstitial: Actual Play: While fighting a group of Organization XIII Replicas, they figure out which one is Vexen when he shouts this after Roxanne bisects him with Axel's Chakram.

Pro Wrestling

• At wXw Back To The Roots 3: When Punk Met Hero... In Germany, this was the former's reaction in a nutshell.

Puppet Shows

• In The Great Muppet Caper when Beauregard drives his cab into the Happiness Hotel and then into the kitchen ^note  which invokes Fridge Logic when you remember the "Happiness Hotel" song flat out said the place had no kitchen:
  Pops: Well, it looks like steering wheel soufflé for dinner.
  Janice: Again?
• From Dinosaurs, when Robby is sent home with a letter from his teacher.
  Fran: "Dear Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair, your son Robert was expelled from school today for rejecting all known belief and threatening to obliterate the foundations of social order!"
  Earl: AGAIN!? What is it with you?
• On nearly all of his appearances in Sesame Street, Mr. Johnson's reaction to encountering Grover is, "Oh... not you again!"

Pinballs

• Finishing Martian Attack in Attack from Mars and starting it again gives you this soundbite from the Martians:
  "Not you again? OHHHHH!"

Radio

• In the Sherlock Holmes novel The Sign of Four, Holmes has been forgoing sleep out of frustration with the case, and Mrs. Hudson remarks to Watson, "I hope he's not going to be ill, sir." The radio adaptation with Clive Merrison changed this line to "I hope he's not going to be ill again," highlighting Holmes's habitual self-neglect.

Video Games

• In Halo, if you stick a Grunt with a plasma grenade, you will occasionally hear them utter "Not again!" before they explode (especially if you have the "I would Have Been Your Daddy" Skull turned on).
• Havoc delivers one in Command & Conquer: Renegade after the second mission and is approached by GDI MPs with handcuffs, this is after he had launched a landing craft against orders in his classic Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!.
• Baldur's Gate II has a moment like this: if you pursue a romance with (recently widowed) Jaheira you will at one point be ambushed by bandits, and you have the option of taking an arrow for her... which causes the somewhat narmy reaction of "Blast you filthy bogslimes! Not again!" For extra hilarity, make sure your character is equipped witht the Shield of Arrow Reflection, which causes the arrow to bounce harmlessly off you and hits the bandit for massive damage while Jaheira freaks out about how you're injured.
• In the WarioWare series, Ashley's theme song includes the lyrics "Pantalones giganticus! / Oh no, not again!" to conclude a presumed spellcasting attempt by the young witch. What actually happened is left as an exercise to the audience.
• At the beginning of the Team Fortress 2 video "Meet the Spy", the huge wall-o'-signs that light up in combinations to form messages like "ALERT" — "RED SPY" — "IN THE BASE" has one that just says "AGAIN", meant to be used at the end of any message. (This board was later turned into an actual in-game prop in the map Double Cross.)
• God of War:
  • The Boat Captain says this every time Kratos pwns him. It happens again during his cameo in God of War II.
  • A less funny version is when Kratos says this after Ares forces him to relive his family getting killed.
• Super Mario Bros.:
  • In Paper Mario 64, one of the NPCs in the beginning of the game complains that Bowser captured Peach again, since that pretty much is the plot of every Mario game.
  • In the sequel, Peach is being held captive by the X-Nauts and laments "I can't believe I've been kidnapped! Again!"
  • Yoshi's Safari uses the trope as the Excuse Plot for playing the game again on Hard mode. Mario and Yoshi must rescue King Fret and Prince Pine while collecting the 12 jewels again because Bowser and his underlings stole/kidnapped them yet again.
  • In Mario vs. Donkey Kong, the game travels in a circular direction, and Donkey Kong ends up snatching up all the Mini-Mario toys he can get his hands on twice. Mario has not only the line "Stop! Not again!" but also an exasperated, "Here we go- again. AGAIN." This gets used when he reaches World 2+ and the True Final Boss.
• Magic and Mayhem:
  Lucan: The river Styx... Fear it, Cornelius! It marks the entrance to Hades — the Underworld!
  Cornelius: [with a sarcastic smile] We're not going there, are we?
  Lucan: No, never again!
• Monkey Island:
  • Guybrush Threepwood has a tendency to say "that's the second-[superlative] [noun] I've ever seen!" Played with in Escape from Monkey Island, where Guybrush observes a giant sea shell and says "That's the second-biggest... no, wait, that is the biggest conch shell I've ever seen!"
  • In Tales of Monkey Island Chapter 5: Rise of the Pirate God, Guybrush will say, "Not again," and get dispossessed if he keeps trying to escape from jail using the secret passageway without the Spirit Gum.
  • Also, during the Battle in the Rain in Chapter 1, when Guybrush botches up the recipe for the Cutlass of Kaflu due to LeChuck's meddling by breaking the bottle of root beer, Elaine sighs and says, "And now we're going to die. Again. Heh. Wonderful."
• One of the quotes that a Gruntz may say when it dies.
• In Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, if Frank West wins a match, zombies will show up and chase him down. Sometimes, he'll angrily complain, "Again? Why do you guys always go for me?"
• In King's Quest VI: Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow, Alexander says "Not again!" when he gets caught by the druids on his second trip to the Isle of the Mists. This "Not again!" quote marks the second time that he's been captured (the first time was by the Winged Ones).
• Raiden's incredibly deadpan reaction to losing another arm in Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is a simple "Shit. Not again."
• Malvolio Portius of WildStar has a great distaste for the Chua. The "Dirty Little Secrets" video shows why.
  Chua: (puts bomb on Malvolio's goblet)
  Malvolio: (brings goblet back to his face, sees bomb) Oh, not again...
• Final Fantasy XIII has one funny case. Early in the game, Hope finds a Pulse Dreadnought mech that can be piloted, and uses it in the Vile Peaks to allow Lightning and him to quickly bust through some enemies and barriers. Flash Forward to Chapter 11, while the party is exploring a mine on Gran Pulse, and have to come up with a way to hitch a ride on the Fal'Cie Atomos. Hope, once again manages to find another pilotable Dreadnought mech, and struggles to control it just like before, with the plan to use it to stop Atomos, leading to an exasperated Lightning to note "It's the Vile Peaks all over again".
• In Final Fantasy Dimensions, Styx, one of the Four Generals of Avalon, bursts in on the reunion of Eduardo and his mother to gloat about how the Warriors of Light have fallen right into her trap. This follows Vata of the Wind saying the same thing, as well as the general of Fire, so Sol just groans "Not again!"
• During a section of Saints Row IV that parodies Metal Gear Solid, one of the guards you kill will shout "Not again!" Considering it's a simulation, it's quite possible that the guard had been killed before.
• Crash Bandicoot:
  • In Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back, when N. Gin's mech is destroyed, he gets sucked into the vacuum of space. In his boss fight in Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped, it happens again and he yells "Not again!"
  • In Crash Nitro Kart, Cortex will sometimes flatly say this verbatim when he falls off the track.
  • In Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled, Ami will occasionally say "Not again!" when she spins out.
• From Resident Evil 7:
  Jack Baker: [stabs his son Lucas' arm with a knife and saws it off]
  Lucas Baker: God damn, old man, not again!
• Psychonauts: On the "Gloria's Stage" level, Becky exclaims this after an actress is crushed to death by a falling stage light, as The Phantom has struck.
• In BlazBlue: Chronophantasma, an NOL officer escorts an imprisoned Noel, Tager and Makoto to Kagura's office, whereupon a woman bursts out of Kagura's office, yelling at him all the while. The guard sighs, as do Tager and Makoto, as if implying this trope is in effect.
• In Undertale, there's an Easter Egg that lets you get into Sans' bedroom at his house in Snowdin. You're led to believe there's some sort of Earth-shattering revelation in there... but then you find you've been tricked into walking on a treadmill in the dark. Then Papyrus comes in and complains about his brother pranking people across time and space.
• In the arcade game APB, when picking up the hitchhiker (identified in the game as a "hitcher"), one of the things she might say is, "Not you again.".
• Although not seen in the game itself, Varric's character trailer prior to the launch of Dragon Age: Inquisition gives him this response to witnessing the event which kicks off the plot. It's a catastrophic explosion resulting in countless deaths, demon invasions, and a literal hole in the sky. And all he can say is "Oh... not again."
• Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas: Near the end of the introductory cut-scene, Carl famously mutters "Ah, shit, here we go again!" after Tenpenny drops him off in the territory of the Rollin Heights Ballas.
• In RWBY: Arrowfell, when Armicio Glass attacks Team RWBY with a Humongous Mecha, Ruby groans out "Augh! Not another giant mech thing!"

Web Animation

• Bravest Warriors "Dan Before Time", when Future Danny travels back to the moment Danny is about to use his time machine and destroys it to prevent him from creating a Temporal Paradox or a Time Crash.
  Wallow: This happens every time you invent a time machine.
• In the Chimney Chickens episode "Date Envy," the second time Blaze calls 911, he gets the same dispatcher, who recognizes his voice from last time.
  Dispatcher: Oh no, not you again! [she hangs up]
• DEATH BATTLE!:
  • In their fight, Wolverine slices off Raiden's arm, causing Raiden to say, "Shit, not again!"
  • The fight between Twilight Sparkle and Raven starts inside the Golden Oak Library, which is soon on fire thanks to the battle. Twilight reacts by saying, "Oh no, not again!", referencing the time Tirek destroyed it in her show.
• Homestar Runner:
  • In the Strong Bad Email "big white face", Strong Bad impulsively throws the cake he'd made for the Poopmith at Strong Sad's face. After Strong Bad leaves, Strong Sad comments "Wish I could say that this is the first time this has happened to me. ...Today."
  • Then in the email funny", Strong Bad tries to answer an e-mail in "the funniest way ever", and at one point starts doing a crazy dance in front of Strong Sad. Strong Sad asks his brother, "Did you take some of my pills again?"
  • In the email "impression", Strong Bad loses Free Country USA's 4th Annual Strong Sad Look-Alike contest to The Cheat wearing a paper bag made up to look like one of Strong Sad's legs. He complains "I can't believe The Cheat won sectionals for the 4th year in a row dressed up as Strong Sad's left leg!"
  • In "Homestar Presents: Presents", Homestar wakes up late at night on the day he meant to go shopping for presents, and laments "Oh crap! I set the alarm for 10 PM instead of AM again!"
  • In the SBEmail "senior prom", when Marzipan loses the title of Prom Queen to "Strong Bad with no pants on", she mutters in frustration "Every freakin' year..."
  • In one of the "Biz Cas Fri" shorts, Strong Bad's office computer explodes, reducing it to ashes. Strong Bad declares it the worst computer explosion he's ever seen. One of his computers had, in fact, exploded before then. Twice.
  • In "Career Day", during the "edumacational film" on SBASAF, Ted Averill realizes Space Captainface and "Strap" Coopmore have ignored his pre-launch red tape and taken off, and says to himself "Oh, mostly dang. Looks like I'm fired again."
  • In "A Decemberween Mackerel", Marzipan tells Homestar that she doesn't have time to trick him into making out with a mop again. At the end, an Easter egg briefly flashes back to the incident in question.
  • In "I Killed Pom Pom!", Homestar tries to pin the "murder" of Pom Pom on Marzipan, to which Marzi reacts with a deadpan "This again?"
• In the pilot of Long Gone Gulch, Squatch says "Not again" when BW and Rawhide are both possessed by ghosts.
• Overly Sarcastic Productions: During the video on the Roman Empire, Blue recounts a dream he had in which he was in modern-day Naples and Mount Vesuvius erupted in the distance. Apparently, instead of fear or panic, his initial reaction was "Ugh, goddammit, not this bullsh*t again."
• The bonus battle for Pimpnite's Full Lusamine Team involved his Bewear going up against a Decidueye, captioned with "Oh God not you again!", hearkening back to his Epic Bewear Sweep where the last battle shown started with his Bewear repeatedly using Swords Dance(ups user's attack two stages) only for the opposing Decidueye to immediately counter with Feather Dance(lowers opponent's attack two stages), which repeated until Feather Dance ran out of PP—15 turns later.
• Played for Drama in RWBY. Ren is seen running through the remains of Kuroyuri while muttering "Not again, not again". Given that the previous episode ended with Ren realizing that the Grimm that destroyed Kuroyuri and killed his parents was now headed back to Kuroyuri where Ruby and Jaune were, Ren's fear is justified. He's relieved when he sees they're unharmed but drops to his knees in fear and shock when he sees that the Grimm has also arrived.
• In Sitcom #391 by ryoshenron:
  Bobby: I just stole the neighbor lady's laundry off of her clothesline, so we can frolic around in my house in her panties... again.
  Tommy: That sounds like a smashing idea, Bobby.
• In Toon Sandwich's "Super-Villain-Bowl!", that's what Bobba Fett says when his jetpack is hit by one of Hela's swords, sending him flying into the Sarlaac... again.
• In the Supermarioglitchy4's Super Mario 64 Bloopers episode "Mario the Supreme Leader", after Bob is caught in the royal treasury, Mario orders for his spine to be broken. The guard goes one step further and rips out Bob's spine, causing his head and torso to shrink. He quips an angry "Goddamnit! Not again!"

Webcomics

• Cat Goes Meow: Friday sprains her tail by wagging too hard. Aaron's only reaction when he learns this is an understated "Oh... again?" Rin irritatedly demands to know if this is a regular occurrence.
• In a Heart of It All comic, a spinoff of Concession, the Author Avatar exclaims "Not again!" upon being bodily carried away by an FBI agent as he's slowly turning into a Martian.
• Girl Genius: "A bucket? Again?" Made funnier by one of the best Deadpan Snarker lines by Agatha. "Yeeeeeess. I suspected as much."
• xkcd: The Alt Text for this comic is "Why do all my attempts at science end with me being punched by Batman?"
• The Order of the Stick:
  • In the prequel book On the Origin of PCs, when Sir François the paladin can't stand his herald's stupidity any longer and ditches him... guess what the reaction is.
    Elan: Awww, not again.
  • Yes, it's the second time this day they've misplaced a party member.
    Roy: Damnit! Not again!
  • Celia gets her turn later by falling in the Damsel in Distress role:
    Celia: Darn it! Not again!
  • Darth Vaarsuvius being frustrated for the second time from using their incredible powers.
    Vaarsuvius: NOT AGAIN!
  • Durkon joins in when separated from the party — again:
    Durkon: Och, not AGAIN!
  • About to be sacrificed to an orc god, who it turns out doesn't prefer virgins:
    Lien: Dammit! How does my mom keep being right about these things!
• Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic:
  • Strip #200:
    Nike: It's your goblin friend, Gren! She's been captured by pirates!
    Bob: Oh no... not again!
  • Strip #2357:
    Bob: Your majesty, I wish to complain about your husband. He's chained himself up to my girlfriend.
    Drow Queen: Again?
• Questionable Content:
  • Not in these exact words, but the implication is there.
  • And much later, the gang is playing a drinking game where they sit in a circle and say something nice about the person to their left (Faye describes it as "Group therapy with booze")
    Steve: [hugging Martin] I love you man! I love you!
    Martin: Dude, we have talked about this.
  • Also not in the exact words, but Martin clearly implies that he has done this before.
  • Variant #4 "I hate it when..."
  • Roko experiments with her new body, changing her color to resemble Melon's:
    Melon: Oh not I got sucked into the negaverse again
    Roko: "Again"?
• Drowtales:
  • Even though the line isn't spoke aloud, fans agree that this is what was going through Quain'tana's head when Syphile jumped out to shout a challenge. It's all in the expression.
  • Also, this unfortunate Vloz'ress scourge says it nearly word-for-word upon realizing he's about to experience Death from Above for the second time that day, and this time it actually works.
• Bobwhite: Ivy leaves some fish in the care of her roommate Marlene. Seconds later, several of the fish are dead. Marlene says, "I wish I could say this is the fastest a friend's pet has died in my care. I really do."
• Sinfest:
  • Slick, upon... falling into Fire and Brimstone Hell.
  • When Seymour walks into the Trans Zone while under the influence of Cupid's arrow, his reaction is a lot more mellow than the first time.
    Seymour: Oh ... This again.
• The Pigs Ear: "That is the third strangest thing I've ever seen in a pub toilet." The mind boggles at what the first two might be.
• Bug Martini: Bug really is a bona fide bungler of barn raisings:
  Bug: I accidentally nailed a board to my face.
  Amish: Again?
• Slice of Life: When Mr. Cake freaks out about the prospect of Pound having to get flying lessons, Pumpkin responds "Mom! Dad's broken again!"
• Tallyho has the fox rather subtly referencing it.◊
• In the first chapter of Undying Happiness, Naomi learns about her boyfriend Keisuke's Healing Factor the hard way, when his skeleton emerges from the ruins of his burned-down house and a neighbor informs him he must have left the gas on again.
• Stand Still, Stay Silent: In one of his early scenes, Mikkel convinces Emil that his bruise risks developing into face-cancer. Later, admiral Olsen asks Emil why his face is heavily bandanged. The answer prompts admiral Olsen to survey the room, land his eyes on Mikkel, and ask him what he's doing in his base because he's quite sure he fired him a long time ago.
• A variant in Awkward Zombie. Samus refuses to let Ridley into the Super Smash Bros. 4 roster because he killed her parents. Ridley protests that he only did it once.
• Flintlocke's Guide to Azeroth has the gnome rogue Lowping, who is normally run by nothing but automated scripts. The actual player is a rich, well-spoken, and busy lawyer only logs in once in a very great while to see what loot he's gotten and how many levels he's gained. The final time we see Lowping's player check in to see what his rogue has been up to, he discovers Lowping riding a gigantic makeshift Goblin bomb being dropped out of a highjacked Horde dirigible onto the Alliance capital of Stormind. All he has to say about it is a resigned "...again."

Web Original

• In Olan Rogers's Ghost in the Stalls story, this is the Target employee's reaction to Olan finding his poor victim's pants in the bathroom.

Websites

• From Out of Context D&D Quotes:
  Player: Am I inside another dead frog?
  GM: You are now inside another dead frog.

Web Videos

• Critical Role: Campaign One: Most of Vox Machina (not Grog; he bursts out laughing) has this reaction in Episode 16 when, in the Temple of Bahamut, guards escort Keyleth in shackles to the rest of the party. It's strongest with Tiberius, though:
  Tiberius: Seriously? Again? Your Highness, what is your problem?
• Channel Awesome:
  • In the review of Count Chocula cereal, Maven summons The Nostalgia Critic by saying "Nostalgia" three times. When she says it backwards, he turns into a puppet, to which he sighs and says "Not again."
  • After spending most of Spooning with Spoony traumatized and mute, in The Stinger Critic wails that "It's prom night all over again!"
  • Played for Fridge Horror in To Boldly Flee, when Lame R. Prick makes the mistake of calling 8-Bit Mickey short one too many times. Mickey quivers with rage and tells Prick You Wouldn't Like Me When I'm Angry! and Prick ignores him. Cut to Mickey walking away covered in blood and holding a severed hand, and The Cinema Snob saying "Someone must've called Mickey short again."
• Freeman's Mind episode 35 has Freeman noting that he "woke up in a trash compactor again", the last time implied to be the result of a night of hard partying and, knowing him, more drugs than just alcohol.
• Honest Trailers: The Narrator is not too happy when he's asked to review Five Nights at Freddy's 4.
  [the comments requesting "Do Five Nights at Freddy's 4!" pop up]
  Narrator: No!
  [even more comments pop up]
  Narrator: I don't wanna!
  [even MORE comments pop up]
  Narrator: Ugh, fine!
• Joueur du Grenier: In the third RPGs video, the not-Hobbit loudly complains that he got his shoes stolen — again! (The making-of points out the "again" part is a Throw It In.)
• Real-Time Fandub did two fandubs for Sonic Adventure 2, one of which is the Dark Story and Last Story, where, in Iron Gate, Eggman struggles to get out, with the G.U.N. robots knowing Eggman's name. Then, at Lost Colony, Eggman sings a parody of the first part of "Mad World." When the elevator gets to a door, Eggman cuts himself off his singing as he realizes:
  Eggman: I'M BACK IN THE FUCKING BUILDING AGAIN! OHHH MY GOD I'M SO SICK.
  Robot: Please stop. [gets shot] Ouch.
  Eggman: [as he fires at more robots] Ohhh no, they KNOW, NOT AGAIN!
  [screen turns black]
• In the Super Therapy! session "Aquaman Therapy!", Aquaman says it after his latest date, which he brought under the sea to discover the beauty of it, unfortunately drown while he's busy talking to fishes. Again.
• In Sword Art Online Abridged, Kirito lampshades this idea when Alfheim Online turns out to be a broken dysfunctional game that glitches out of control just moments after logging in.
• Smuggling meat down the pants, fights in Chuck E. Cheese, stealing ambulances, women hiding guns in their private parts — Nash pretty much has a list of categories on What the Fuck Is Wrong with You? that he usually refers to as "Why Does This Sh*t Keep Happening?"

Western Animation

• This is Duke Igthorn's reaction in the Adventures of the Gummi Bears episode "You Snooze, You Lose" when he finds that the titular Bears and their human friends are opposing his siege on Dunwyn; "No...No! Not again! I won't be stopped by two children and a handful of mythological bears!" But unfortunately for him, Failure Is the Only Option.
• In the Adventure Time episode "Graybles 1000+", this is Ice King's response to waking up with a broken leg.
• At the end of The Angry Beavers episode "Box Top Beavers", Daggett and Norbert end up in a cereal box that finds its way into the hands of a little girl who complains that she got beavers again, then puts them with a bunch of other beavers that she got in previous boxes.
• From Animaniacs when the Warners meet Sherlock Holmes and need to borrow Watson for a scavenger hunt:
  Yakko: This always happens. Every time we get our hands on a fat chubby sidekick, whammo, he's kidnapped by a Scottish guy with a huge sombrero in a flying contraption!
• Aqua Teen Hunger Force: In "The Meat Zone", Frylock mentions that a dog exploded on the Aqua Teens' porch "again".
• A variation, from Archer:
  Cyril: I'm so sorry I slammed you in the gut. Geez, that's how Houdini died!
  Pam: Houdini died of AIDS!
  Cyril: No! Why do you always say that?
• John says this in The Beatles cartoon "Run For Your Life" after Ringo gets knocked out a second time and dreams he's King Louis XIV of France.
• In The Biskitts episode "Snatched from Scratch", Shiner plays Distressed Dude and is first caught by the hungry wildcat, Scratch, but is soon captured by the Biskitts' other nemesis, King Max. Then just when his friends have ensnared the evil king and his minions in a net and are about to rescue him, Shiner is, once again, caught by Scratch!
  King Max: Not again!
  Shecky: Not again!
  Biskitts: NOT AGAIN!
• Done in The Boondocks when a famed rapper named Gangstalicious was reported to have been shot on stage.
  Huey & Riley: Again?!
  Sway: [exasperated] Again.
• Said word-by-word by Caillou's father when Caillou climbs out of the bathtub again.
• Castlevania: Nocturne: When a vampire barges into a tavern, demanding to see an old man Juste Belmont, the bartender simply ducks behind his bar muttering, "Aw, fuck, not another one." Minutes later, the vampire is dead, a table is broken, and the whole bar cheers and goes back to partying.
• In Central Park, Season 1 "Squirrel, Interrupted", when Bitsy tells Brendan that Anton, Ambrose's assistant, was accidentally locked inside the broom closet downstairs and he needs to be freed, Brendan opens the door and sees Anton Bound and Gagged and he's not even surprised.
  Brendan: I feel like this happens every year. I wished I've gone to Jacob's bowling party.
• In the Chowder episode "Shnitzel Quits", a chained-up Shnitzel jumps off Endive's balcony to get out of being forced to marry her:
  Panini: He jumped, Ms. Endive.
  Endive: They always do, my dear. They always do.
• Code Monkeys: "Goddamn it, that's the second time I've eaten shit this week!"
• In Codename: Kids Next Door episode "Operation: C.A.B.L.E.-T.V.", this is Mr. B's reaction to learning that his satellite was shot out of the sky after it was launched;
  Mr. B: Again?! That's the third one!
• The Critic:
  • "Oh good heavens!! Can't one single dinner go by without our having to discuss your rotting corpse?!"
  • And another time, when Franklin disrupts a party he's been invited to by turning himself into The Mask: "Oh dear, this is exactly what he did at Nixon's funeral!"
• Dexter's Laboratory:
  • In "Dexter vs. Santa's Claws", Dexter trashes the house trying to "prove" a very-real Santa Claus is a fake, and ends up apologizing to his family "Well, I'm sorry I ruined Christmas... again."
  • At the end of "The Parrot Trap", Dexter accidentally blabs to his parents that he has a secret lab, and Dee Dee cheerfully quips "Smooth move, Dexter. Now you'll have to erase Mom and Dad's memories again!"
• DuckTales: In the first episode, Scrooge, Donald and Dewey end up in a Drowning Pit, and Donald gets into a fierce argument with Scrooge over how dangerous his adventures are, probably because such an adventure led to the fate of Donald's sister Della.
  Donald: It's the Spear of Selene all over again!
  Scrooge: I was NOT responsible for the Spear of Selene!
• Ed, Edd n Eddy:
  • In "Eeny, Meany, Miney, Ed", Eddy takes his clothes off in order to disguise himself as a human-cockroach hybrid as part of an elaborate prank on Ed. When Edd finds them, he demands to know "Why are Eddy's clothes on the floor? Is he running around naked again?"
  • In "Run for Your Ed", when the Kanker Sisters search for their missing ship-in-a-bottle with destructive results.
    Jimmy: IT'S A KANKER HISSY FIT!
• In one episode of The Fairly OddParents! Timmy tries to reassure Chester that no one really cares that he's bad at baseball, when someone blows up his mailbox which lands at his feet. When Timmy questions it, Chester runs off screaming "Not again!"
• Futurama:
  • In "T: The Terrestrial," Bender selectively uses Fry's outgoing voicemail message to cover for his absence at work after leaving him on a hostile planet. At one point he claims that Fry is in the other room exterminating mice and then repeatedly rewinds the first half of the word "myself" to create "mice...mice...mice...", only for the tape to skip, resulting in "...elf...elf...elf..."
    Scruffy: [grabbing a mallet] Elves're back.
  • "Leela and the Genestalk":
    Fry: Whoa! Remember that mural on my cousin's van? It's like it came to life!
    Bender: [exasperated] I keep telling you, we didn't grow up together!
• Gravity Falls: From the in-universe game, Fight Fighters:
  Rumble McSkirimish: Doctor Karate! You killed my father again!
• The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy:
  • In "Billy & Mandy's Jacked-Up Halloween":
    Mandy: What a surprise; Billy's caused the end of the world. Again.
  • In "Billy & Mandy Save Christmas", the mall they visit for Christmas is ultimately burned to the ground (Billy's fault), causing Grim to wonder why that happens every time he takes them to the mall. Billy blames the economy.
• One episode of DIC's Heathcliff series has the fish store owner do this when Heathcliff steals one of his fish (as he often does):
  "Heathcliff? Not again!"
• Huckleberry Hound is a highway patrolman in an early cartoon, and he can't seem to keep from crashing out his car.
  Huckleberry: Officer Huckleberry to headquarters. Send a new patrol car.
  HQ: [long suffering] Oh, no... that's the third car this week and it's only Tuesday!
• In the I Am Weasel short "Who Rubbed Out Cow and Chicken?", Weasel and Baboon are a couple of hard-boiled private eyes investigating the "murder" of Cow and Chicken after they were literally "rubbed out" with a giant eraser. As Baboon is driving them along in their car to ask questions at Cow and Chicken's school, he gets beaned with a brick out of nowhere. Weasel's response is "The old 'knock-out-the-monkey' trick, eh? We must be getting close!"
• Happens to Shendu in the Jackie Chan Adventures episode: "Re-Enter the Dragon" when Uncle, Tohru, Captain Black and all of Section 13 used the same spell that Lo Pei originally used to turn Shendu back to stone and to sever him from his talisman power. Even attempting to disrupt the spell was met with failure.
• Kaeloo:
  • In the Halloween Episode, this is everyone's reaction to Stumpy's stupid zombie impression (which involves dancing like in Thriller).
  • In one of the earlier episodes, Mr. Cat invents a machine which hurts Quack Quack, prompting Kaeloo to say:
    Kaeloo: Mr. Cat, if this is another one of your mean-spirited, two-bit inventions^note Later episodes have him make several more...
  • In Episode 110, Kaeloo and Quack Quack drag Stumpy to a psychotherapist, and he starts screaming that he doesn't want to go the the psychotherapist's office "again".
• Kim Possible and Shego's very understandable reaction in "Stop Team Go" when, while in the process of trying to turn the titular superhero team good again, Ron Stoppable is accidentally turned evil like he was in "Bad Boy", and proves himself to be an equal if not greater threat than Electronique and the evil Team Go, mowing down Wego clones like no tomorrow and plotting to use the attitudinator to turn Kim evil.
  Kim: Not again!
  Hego: What's wrong with him?
  Shego: I think he's evil now.
  Hego: Oh. How bad could that be?
  Shego: You'd be surprised.
• King of the Hill:
  Dale: [playing golf] Hey, if my balls lands on the back of a passing bird, which is then attacked by a larger bird who deposits it into the hole, is that still a hole in one? 'Cause that's how I'm gonna score it.
  Hank: Dale, it already happened once. What're the odds of it happening a second time?
• Let's Go Luna!: Fin has this reaction in "Boomin' Boomerang" when Auggie gets a stomach-ache from eating too much boomy-mite.
• A couple of Looney Tunes examples where the previous incident was earlier in the same story:
  • In "Rabbit Seasoning":
    Daffy: [to Elmer] You're a hunter, right?
    Elmer: Wight.
    Daffy: And this is rabbit season, right?
    Elmer: Wight.
    Bugs: [points to Daffy] And if he was a rabbit, what would you do?
    Daffy: Yeah, you're so smart! If I was a rabbit, what would you do??
    Elmer: Well, I'd... [aims at Daffy]
    Daffy: [weakly] Not again... [gets blasted]
  • In "Bugs and Thugs", Bugs tricks Rocky and Mugsy into hiding in the stove by disguising his voice to make them think the cops are coming. He then turns on the gas and throws in a lighted match to "prove" to the "cop" that nobody is hiding in the stove. Then, the police show up for real, Bugs starts the same routine again, and Rocky and Mugsy jump out of the stove and give themselves up.
  • In "Tortoise Wins By A Hare", the voice of a newspaper vendor roundly announces the rematch race between Bugs and Cecil Turtle. After the announcement, he says "What...again?!"
  • In "The Wise Quacking Duck", Daffy and the mousy little husband of Sweetie-Puss repeat the same "gun in the beak" gag from earlier in the cartoon.
    Daffy: [to us] No, no! Not twice in the same picture!
  • Spaced-Out Bunny, aired as part of the 1980 special Bugs Bunny's Bustin' Out All Over, features a call-back to the 1961 short "The Abominal Snow Rabbit" and a previous encounter Bugs had with Hugo the Abominable Snowman. As Hugo had done in the earlier cartoon, he grabs Bugs and nearly crushes him, intending merely to "hug him and squeeze him and name him George." Years later, Marvin Martian captures Hugo "while in the Himilayas," hoping to use him as muscle, and introduces Bugs to him. As Hugo grabs Bugs, the bunny remembers the earlier encounter and cries out "Oh no, not again" ... but can't make a getaway.
• An episode of Moominvalley had Moomintroll running into Moominpappa as he's running off to prepare for one of his crazy, on-a-whim adventures.
  Moominmamma: Ah, Moomintroll. I'm afraid your father's decided to live a life of wild abandon.
  Moomintroll: ...Again?
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
  • In the episode "The Cutie Mark Chronicles", the Cutie Mark Crusaders' attempt to earn their Cutie Marks via zipline fails and ends with them covered in tree sap and pine needles. Frustrated, Scootaloo gives the following statement:
    Scootaloo: It's no use. No matter what we try, we always end up without our Cutie Marks... and surprisingly often, covered in tree sap.
  • In the episode "A Friend in Deed", Pinkie says she accidentally put the confetti in the oven and the cake in the confetti cannon... again!
  • By "Slice of Life", the citizens of Ponyville are so used to monster attacks that when a Bugbear appears, this trope is their reaction.
• PAW Patrol: Mighty Pups, Mayor Goodway said it after the Pups managed to disable Harold Humdinger, who slides on the ice and lands on her tulips.
  Mayor Goodway: [facepalms] Oh no, not again!
• The Powerpuff Girls
  • The 1998 original series episode "Slave the Day" has the girls saving Big Billy of the Gangreen Gang from being hit by a subway train and him wanting to repay them by joining up with them, but does more harm than good, receiving a big "Reason You Suck" Speech from Blossom, and going back to the gang, at which point the gang sets up a trap for the girls with Billy sitting on the railroad tracks tied up, then to subject the girls to this. But then, Billy saves them from the train. Blossom says it word-for-word when they hear Billy calling for help.
    Big Billy: Help! Help!
    Blossom: Hey! Do you guys hear that?
    Buttercup: Yeah. It's coming from the subway.
    Bubbles: [uses her X-Ray vision to see Big Billy sitting on the subway tracks] It's Big Billy!
    Blossom: Oh, no, not again!
    Buttercup: Wait. We're not gonna save him again?!
    Blossom: [resignedly] We have to!
    Bubbles: We're superheroes!
  • In the 2016 reboot episode "Tooth of Consequences," Blossom becomes a deformed monster running for the mountains when her tooth swells on her and she won't see a dentist. The Professor talks Blossom down and convinces her to see the dentist. When it is then shown that Blossom may need braces, she becomes deformed again and secludes herself to the mountains.
    Buttercup: [groan] Are you kidding me?!
• A variant in Recess: School's Out, when T.J. frantically tries to tell his parents about the terrorists building a giant laser beam in the cafeteria of Third Street School, shortly after accidentally running into the sliding glass door to his house. His mother doesn't believe him, thinking that the bump on the head rattled his brain. When he runs off to the garage to tell his father instead, he just rolls his eyes and asks, "Did you run into the sliding glass door again?"
• The classic bumpers from Rocky and Bullwinkle:
  Rocky: And now...
  Bullwinkle: Hey, Rocky! Watch me Pull a Rabbit out of My Hat!
  Rocky: Again?!
• Rugrats: In "Mommy's Little Assets", when Charlotte arrives at the office late thanks to Angelica messing with the elevator buttons, her relieved assistant Jonathan says, "I thought you'd been abducted by eco-terrorists again."
• Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat: In "Sheegwa and the Blizzard", Sagwa's little sister, Sheegwa, runs away, fed up with her big sister's bossiness. Apparently, this happens often.
  Sagwa: Sheegwa ran away... again.
  Mama Miao: Oh, Sagwa. You weren't bossing her around, were you? Again?
• Sam & Max: Freelance Police:
  • In "The Thing That Wouldn't Stop It", The Geek sees something in the fridge sneaking up on her, and her reaction goes from shock to annoyance: "Not again! This is the third time this morning."
  • In another episode, when a villain escapes Max's grip because of his choice in neckwear, Max shouts "Curses, foiled by a clip-on tie! It's Prom Night all over again."
• Samurai Jack; in the Season 5 Episode "XCV", Jack and Ashi are swallowed whole by a gigantic monster. Jack's reaction is one of mild annoyance, as he's been eaten by giant monsters before (three times onscreen), and he's far more troubled by Cute But Psycho Ashi trying to kill him or otherwise foil his escape.
• The Simpsons:
  • Barney Gumble often says this. Once after mistaking a life-sized, woman-shaped bottle of maple syrup for a woman, knocking "her" over and flooding the store.
    • A similar thing happened when Groundskeeper Willie ran over a ball with a lawnmower and thought it was a child.
  • Another time, this was Barney's reaction after drinking an "all-syrup Squishee" and waking up on a Greek cargo ship wearing a sailor's outfit.
  • In "Thirty Minutes Over Tokyo" a guy at a money-saving seminar says that you have to "Squeeze every penny" and Homer takes it literally and tries to squeeze a penny in his hands really hard resulting in it disappearing into his skin to which Marge remarks "Not again"
  • In "Sweets and Sour Marge", Homer organizes half the population of Springfield into forming the world's largest human pyramid. However, thanks to human stupidity, the pyramid collapses and instead turns into a giant ball of people that rolls down the streets of Springfield. As he runs for his life from the ball, Hans Moleman cries out, "Not again!"
  • In "The Joy of Sect", after virtually all of Springfield has joined the Movementarians, Rev. Lovejoy is seen pouring gasoline on the church floor.
    Rev. Lovejoy: I never thought I'd have to do this again.
  • In "Lisa the Iconoclast", when the Springfield Historical Society ends up digging up Jebediah Springfield's grave to test Lisa's claims: "Can't we have one meeting that doesn't end with us digging up a corpse?"
  • "Can't we just call in David Bowie?" — He's already done so much for this church.
  • From "Make Room For Lisa": "Now, now dear. It's only until we have to pay off your father's desecration of a priceless artifact. (despondent sigh) I never thought I'd have to say that again."
  • From "Rosebud", this exchange between Homer and Lisa.
    Homer: I'll never wiggle my bare butt in public again.
    Lisa: I'd like to believe that this time. I really would.
  • In "Saturdays of Thunder" at a Fatherhood Research Institute, a shark starts attacking a test subject in the "underwater parenting" habitat to which a worker yells, "Dear God, not again!"
  • In "Simple Simpson", everyone at the nuclear plant is showering when Mr. Burns turns off the water and announces that while they were all showering, he sold all their clothes. Everyone complains and Carl says "again?"
  • In "The Telltale Head," the church's Sunday School class drive their teacher up the wall with tough questions about the afterlife, and Bart is apparently a repeat offender:
    Bart: Uh, ma'am, what if you're a really good person but you're in a really, really bad fight and your leg gets gangrene and it has to be amputated. Will it be waiting for you in heaven?
    Teacher: For the last time, Bart, yes!
• In a reference to one of the original shorts that inspired South Park:
  Stan: Put the hat on the snowman, Tweek.
  Tweek: But what if it comes to life and tries to kill us?!
  Stan: C'mon, when has that EVER happened, except for that one time?
• SpongeBob SquarePants:
  • In "Squid's Day Off", Mr. Krabs' arms pop off while attempting to pull a dime out from a drain. SpongeBob says the stock phrase exactly, implying that Mr. Krabs loses his arms on a regular basis. Even within the same episode Mr. Krabs lost his arms again, and it became a running gag that in a state of shock, disapproval or other emotional duress, he sometimes literally falls apart.
  • There's the repeated occurrence of Squidward accidentally swallowing his clarinet, but SpongeBob only references it in "Squidtastic Voyage" when it grows from a simple gag to a plot-guiding calamity- he pulls the clarinet out of Squidward's throat, but its reed breaks off and remains stuck, requiring medical attention from Sandy to remove it.
  • In "No Free Rides", Mrs. Puff says "No, not again" after briefly considering changing her name and moving to another town after giving SpongeBob a boating license before he's qualified to drive.
  • Plankton says this stock phrase when he is about to get run over by Old Man Jenkins' car for the second time in "Drive Thru".
  • When he and Squidward think SpongeBob ate a bomb disguised as a pie, Mr. Krabs said he's seen this before. When questioned on it, he simply replies he'd seen it 11 times. Then Squidward, in guilt, calls the doctor for help, the doctor apparently tells him the exact same thing as Mr. Krabs.
• Star Wars
  • Star Wars: The Clone Wars:
    • "Landing at Point Rain": Ahsoka's reaction when she, Anakin and their group find themselves at the base of a giant Separatist fortress wall that he had previously assured her they wouldn't be going anywhere near is "This is another fine mess you've gotten us into!"
    • "On the Wings of Keeradaks": Captain Rex has this reaction when Wrecker grabs him to throw him onto an attacking Octuptarra droid, since he already got thrown into an air vent by him earlier in the episode.
  • Star Wars: The Bad Batch : In “Aftermath”, Echo says this almost word for word when a fight breaks out between the Batch and the regular clones in the commissary on Kamino.
• Steven Universe:
  • In "Gem Glow", Lars lets out a baffled and frustrated "Again?!" after Amethyst uses her gem weapon to cut the dumpster behind the Big Donut in half.
  • Lars has a similar reaction to finding Lion climbing into the dumpster of the Big Donut in the short "Just Lion Things".
• Transformers: Animated has Blitzwing experience Involuntary Shapeshifting due to his Personality Powers... at one point, his Icy persona (which controls the jet mode) loses control to the Hothead persona (which controls his tank mode) because he's upset at being insulted by Bumblebee. Unfortunately for him, this results in him turning into a tank at 2000 feet up. Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress, as he quickly finds out when he crashes through the frozen lake for the second time that day.
  Blitzwing: Oh slag, not aga—
• The Venture Bros.:
  • In the first episode, "Dia Los Dangerous", Doctor Venture wakes up in a bathtub full of ice, with a missing kidney, and says, "Not again," then realizes this means he's missing both kidneys, causing him to calmly say, "This is serious."
  • Another when Brock realizes the boys have been kidnapped right before a bomb goes off in his face.
    Brock: Oh, Crap!, Myra's back.
  • "A Very Venture Halloween" opens with several flashbacks of the boys' attempts to scare their father on Halloween. In one, he finds that they have apparently been crushed to death by a fallen bookcase. They faked it, but they are baffled that he treated their deaths as a minor annoyance. He doesn't actually say the words, but it comes off as a "not again" moment for the audience. It hearkens back to an earlier montage of about a dozen of their deaths, shown when Dr. Venture first revealed that they had been cloned multiple times.
    Dean: He is impossible to scare.
• Wakfu, season 2 episode "The Return of Percedal", in a Call-Back to season 1:
  Evangelyne: Amalia and Ruel have gotten themselves turned into ghouls!
  Sadlygrove: Again? Ruel will end up getting a taste for it...
• In The Weekenders, Tino suggests that an unresponsive Carver's brain will leak out of his ears unless someone plugs them. Lor says "I did it last time!"
• In an episode of Wildfire, the title horse agrees to be a wage in an effort to rescue a friend of his. To win, the heroes have to find out where a certain troll lives and what his name is. After they find the troll, he says they'd need six clues. Based on their experience trying to find the troll, Sara deduces his name and won. She then returns to the mortal realm, where her Native-American friend, Helen, learns her dream name but isn't allowed to tell anyone. Sara then asks for a clue and Helen says she'd need six. Sara then invokes the trope.

Real Life

• Texts From Last Night has this as its second most common trope. (We're sure you can guess the first.)
  • This one is particularly nice:
    #1: Banned from zoo.
    #2: Again?
• QDB
  • This one. Comes with a side dish of Squick.
  • There's another one with less Squick and more Too Dumb to Live.
• In one edition of Countdown, Keith Olbermann called out the TSA for detaining a high-ranking member of the British government who was working with the Department of Homeland Security because his name was the same as one on their watch list — and it wasn't the first time it had happened to him.
  "He's in the Cabinet! And we patted him down for weapons at Dulles Airport! AGAIN!!"
• In Improv Everywhere's spontaneous musical I Love Lunch!, the character "Jeff" begins by standing on a balcony expounding upon how much he loves lunch, and his friend below tells him, "Jeff...don't sing a song, man..." Later, in the middle of the song, he can be heard saying, "He does this every day..."
• Charles de Gaulle, leader of the French resistance during World War II and President of France after the war, was targeted by at least thirty assassination attempts during his presidency. He reportedly said "What? Again!?" during one such attempt.
• In February 2015, after receiving a record amount of snowfall, this was the collective reaction from Boston when they found out they were getting another foot of snow on top of the three already there. The response was predictable.
• Spider bites Australian man on penis again.
• Drunk parrots acting up and falling out of the sky (again)
• Florida man rescued from giant floating hamster ball -- again.
• A dramatic and rather terrifying example: Tsutomu Yamaguchi was famous for being the only person confirmed to have survived both Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He one time confessed that after the second bombing, he momentarily thought the very same mushroom cloud from Hiroshima had followed him.

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