Our Lawyers Advised This Trope

What? It's just Wonder Man as a woman and Power Man as a girl. What's wrong with that?

"If you are the kind of asshole who takes medical advice from a Las Vegas juggler, then you are an idiot who deserves to die!"

— Penn Jillette (whenever he discusses his massive weight-loss)

In the interests of full disclosure, we are describing Our Lawyers Advised This Trope here.

Pursuant to the avoidance of unnecessary civil litigation and criminal prosecution, a variety of disclaimers, notices, and even changes to the actual work, are present in modern fiction, usually in the packaging of said works, before the beginning if applicable, or during the opening and/or ending credits if applicable.

These may be mandated with threats of legal actions by government bodies or could be attempts by the well-advised creators to reduce their vulnerability to civil litigation from civilian citizens. Please note that these threats may or may not be actually true, considering the number of people who do exactly the opposite of this disclaimer and still roam the streets at night, but we are heavily implying that you follow them anyway.

Parodies of the trope may, or may not, have some overlap with Suspiciously Specific Denial.

See separate documents, heretofore referred to as the Sub Tropes of this Super-Trope, called This Is a Work of Fiction and Don't Try This at Home, for instances relating to said notices.

Our lawyers recommend you see also Content Warnings, No Animals Were Harmed, Side Effects Include.... They also explicitly deny the implications of Screwed by the Lawyers regarding the diligence of legal professionals with respect to media properties.

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Within the following folders are, to the degree and/or extent which is so far known to us, et alii our lawyers, Straight Examples:

Straight Examples

Anime & Manga

• The Excel♡Saga DVDs from ADV Films actually add in-series jokes to the FBI warning at the beginning of the disc. Here's the screenshot◊; hopefully TV Tropes won't be prosecuted under the Don't Toucha My Toot-Toot Pact for posting this...
• Full Metal Panic!!:
  • The North American release of the anime has a different character voicing over the FBI warning at the beginning of each disc. The FBI has never been cuter than when advocated by Tessa Testarossa. "You wouldn't want me to have to put a cruise missile down your chimney, would you?" or scarier when advocated by Gauron: "Look, I'm a businessman, and digital piracy is bad for business. So don't do it, or else you and I might have to have some words in the future, got it friend?"
  • Shouji Gatou gives one of these at the end of the first Full Metal Panic! novel, on his use of the country of North Korea:
  The author happens to harbor no ill will against a certain country that is integral to the plot. I was limited to choosing a dictatorship reachable by domestic flight. So, to those from that country, please don't abduct me. On the other hand, if I disappear or die in an accident—or if there's a mysterious fire at Fujimi Books—you readers know where to start the investigation.
• The Uta∽Kata DVDs also feature disclaimers narrated by the main characters, who, in this example, discuss the finer points of the message.
  Ichika: The video, audio, packaging, and all contents of this work are the property of the copyright holders. The only rights granted to you are for personal viewing within your own household.
  Manatsu: It says, "in your household," right? So if you live alone, then that's just one person.
  Ichika: Any other uses, for example secondary works, modification, screenings, broadcast, or cable broadcasting, cause the copyright holders serious damages, and is strictly prohibited by law.
  Manatsu: But if you've got like a huge family, and a ton of them all get together during New Year's or Obon, and you show it to your family of more than like, 100 people... That's basically a screening, right? I wonder how that would work?
  Ichika: Eh... Ehh?
• The Blu-ray release of Macross: Do You Remember Love? has Mika Doi reading the Japanese anti-piracy warning in the character of Misa Hayase as if it were an announcement from the bridge of the Macross.

Comic Books

• The final page of The View Askewniverse comic Chasing Dogma shows Jay uttering the following disclaimer:
  "So's we don't get sued, I just wanna remind all you knee-jerk fucks out there that this is a work of parody. Doogie doesn't really make porn ... not that I know of anyway. And Fred Rogers is probably a saint of a guy. Federal Wildlife Marshals aren't nearly as stupid as they're portrayed here, and John Hughes has never led anyone to believe that Shermer really exists. And I never ... NEVER ... jerked no guys off. Snoogans."
• Any issue of The Beano in days gone by would have included its child characters, caught out in mischief, being up-ended over an adult's lap and roundly spanked for their sin with hand, slipper, cane or belt. Corporal punishment in D.C. Thompson-published comics lasted long after its abolition in schools. The issue was only really confronted when Scotland passed laws to make physical punishment of children an act of illegal child abuse. Therefore the Dundee-based publishers of these comics could not be seen condoning actions likely to breach Scottish law. It was well into the 1990's when the father of Dennis the Menace kept his slippers exclusively for wear on his feet, and the long-suffering teacher of the Bash Street Kids hung up his cane for the last time.
• A Postman Plod strip in Viz ended with the title character being fired from the Royal Mail, getting a reference which described him as a lazy, clumsy idiot, and then going to work for a new employer whose interviewer greeted him with "Welcome to Initial (REMOVED ON LEGAL ADVICE)". In-context to anyone who read the strip at the time, it would probably have been obvious that the new employer was meant to be Initial City Link, then a prominent courier company in the UK.^note (The only other company the punchline would likely have been seen as referencing was Initial Rentokil, and having Plod go work for a pest control company would have made for a rather illogical punchline)

Fan Works

• In a Discworld fic by A.A. Pessimal which deals with a terrorist bombing campaign in Ankh-Morpork, the author explains, in a bout of Footnote Fever, that as a kid in The '70s, he was able to access quite a lot of recipes for manufacturing explosives and incendiary bombs via his local library. He suspected attitudes might not be as liberal or as carefree in the opening decades of the 21st Century, assured his readers that the recipes work, and apologised for having to fudge the exact detail as Take a quantity of commonly available dry powder organic acid A and keep it completely and rigorously separate from the freely available liquid chemical B - until you actually want them to mix. Then stand well back. He pointed out this was sufficiently vague enough to spare him from lawsuits and added that great Discworld-Wizard disclaimer: DO NOTTE TRYE THIS ATT HOME!
• In Equestria: A History Revealed, a referenced book which describes the exact recipe for a love potion has a legal warning before it, saying not to try this at home. Upon immediately trying it at home, the Lemony Narrator writes in her letter of formal complaint to the publishers that "before their lawyers point this out, while she did see the warning beforehand, she chose not to acknowledge it, so she couldn't possibly be held accountable for that."
• Sakuya Izayoi Gives You Advice And Dabs: The Steam store page contains a tiny disclaimer that the game "is not meant to treat or diagnose any medical condition and is not meant as a substitute for professional help".
• The homage/unauthorized parody/fanfic A Shoggoth on the Roof. The album cover states that it's written by "Him Who (For Legal Reasons) Must Not Be Named."

Films — Animation

• Humorously done in Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film For Theaters. The opening includes a little old-time routine about theater etiquette before Mastodon takes over to add on to said etiquette before finishing with warning about how the movie was copyrighted by Time Warner, video taping it would result in punishment from Satan and selling it on eBay will result in your wife being torn in half.
• Despicable Me: Gru is reading from a book he wrote himself:
  Edith: That one looks like me!
  Gru: No! What are you talking about? These are kittens. Any relation to persons living or dead is completely coincidental.
• Mr. Huph of The Incredibles uses this trope while berating Bob for helping customers file insurance claims.
  Bob: Are you saying we shouldn't help our customers?
  Mr. Huph: (sighs) The law requires that I answer "no".

Films — Live-Action

• Numerous films subject to colorization have a disclaimer before their broadcast or video saying, "This is a colorized version of a film originally marketed and distributed in black and white. It has been altered without the participation of the principal director, screenwriters, and other creators of the original film."
• An American Werewolf in London modifies the usual disclaimer to state "any similarity to actual persons living, dead, or undead is purely coincidental."
• Dr. Strangelove and Fail Safe both contain notices stating that, according to the US Air Force, the events of the films could never take place. Given that both movies are about accidental nuclear war, this was probably reassuring to the audience. Or the filmmakers were using a Suspiciously Specific Denial to imply that they could take place. Both movies came out in 1964, and while distrust in the government then was not quite as widespread as it would become by the end of the decade, there were a substantial number of people who, informed by the government that something couldn't possibly happen, would immediately start to regard it as something to be legitimately worried about.
• The Mr. Magoo live-action film featured a disclaimer saying that it was "not intended as an accurate portrayal of blindness or poor eyesight."
• The Hungarian comedy-drama Kontroll, about a group of eccentric ticket inspectors on the Budapest Metro, started with a stiff address by a member of the Metro management complimenting the director's skill but warning people not to take it as an accurate depiction of the system.
• Borat has two:
  • The standard This Is a Work of Fiction disclaimer in the end credits is... noticeably different:
    None of the real persons, companies, or organizations in the film are affiliated or associated with the film or its producers in any way. No real person or entity depicted or appearing in the film has sponsored or otherwise endorsed its contents. The same applies to the government and people of Kazakhstan, none of whom are involved in this film or have approved it in any way. Nothing in this film is intended to convey the actual beliefs, practices or behavior of anyone associated with Kazakhstan.
  • The DVD has an additional message after the standard FBI warning, stating that "selling piratings of this moviedisc will result in punishment by crushing".
• The Fight Club DVD had a warning from Tyler Durden. Though if you make the effort to freeze-frame the warning so you can read it, it tells you to get out and do something instead of wasting your life reading secret messages on DVDs.
• The Ring had noises in the background during the FBI warning.
• There was a video montage of male-male kissing scenes from Hollywood films that made the rounds a few years back, which came with a disclaimer along the lines of "If you find this material offensive, we suggest you watch it over and over until you become desensitized."
• Scarface (1983) started with a disclaimer that the film does not depict Cuban-Americans in a representative way.
• Early television broadcasts of The Godfather included a disclaimer that the film's depiction of Italian-Americans was not representative of the community as a whole.
• James Bond Films:
  • A View to a Kill opened with a disclaimer that the villain's name "Zorin" was not based on any real-life person or organization. The disclaimer was added when it was discovered a company with a similar name did exist, but well after filming and too late to make any changes.
  • The Living Daylights in certain showings and video releases featured a disclaimer regarding the use by the villains of the Red Cross/Red Crescent emblems and pointing out that said actions were illegal under The Laws and Customs of War.
  • Licence to Kill featured a recognizable brand of cigarettes in one scene. Despite the fact said cigarettes were disguising a bomb, the makers of the film were forced to add the Surgeon General's warning against smoking to the closing credits.
• The Hunt for Red October has a disclaimer that "according to official sources, none of the events in this film ever happened."
• The Boy Who Could Fly had a disclaimer on its British VHS release that "The scenes that include flying in this film are performed by professional stunt artists, observing special safety rules under strict supervision. DO NOT IN ANY WAY ATTEMPT TO IMITATE ANY OF THE STUNTS PERFORMED."

Literature

• In The Fifth Elephant, the emergency signal flare rockets for the clacks tower have the warning "Do Not Place In Mouth". This turns out to foreshadow how Vimes kills Wolfgang (a werewolf that can only be killed by fire or silver): he tricks him into catching one of the rockets in his mouth before the flare goes off.
  • Did it contain nuts too?
  • This may be a shout-out to a certain Darwin Award winner who was posing for a photograph with a lit firework clenched between his teeth, failed to spit it out in time and blew his head off.
• Dave Barry sent this up in Dave Barry Slept Here, in which the text is interrupted early on by an advisement to include more information about the accomplishments of women and minorities, or else "this book will not be approved for purchase by public school systems in absolutely vast quantities." Afterward, the narrator states:
  "Another important fact we just now remembered is that during the colonial era women and minority groups were making many contributions, which we are certain that they will continue to do at regularly spaced intervals throughout the course of the book."
  • Accordingly, about once a chapter thereafter he inserts a sentence about "all the enormous contributions by women and minority groups, despite having the same legal rights as gravel."
• The Foundation books take care to point out that the quotations from the Encyclopedia Galactica are reproduced with the permission of the Encyclopedia's (fictional) publishing company.
• The Author's Foreword in The Pale King is rife with this. David Foster Wallace even uses his footnotes to apologize for the abundance of apparently necessary legal writing.
• Several works published by Random House Children's Books have a disclaimer — though it's of a different legal sort. "Random House Children's Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read."

Live-Action TV

• Some Galactica 1980 and all Project UFO episodes ended with this disclaimer. "The United States Air Force stopped investigating UFOs in 1969. After 22 years, they found no evidence of extra-terrestrial visits and no threat to national security."
• Penn & Teller: Bullshit!:
  "You'll notice more obscenity than we usually use. That's not just because it's on Showtime, and we want to get some attention. It's also a legal matter. If one calls people liars and quacks, one can be sued and lose a lot of one's money. But "motherfuckers" and "assholes" is pretty safe. If we said it was all scams, we could also be in trouble. But BULLSHIT, oddly, is safe. So forgive all the bullshit language. We're trying to talk about the truth without spending the rest of our lives in court because of litigious motherfuckers!"
  • The Multilevel Marketing episode hung a giant lampshade on it. They were standing in front of a Pyramid (dressed as Pharaohs) talking to their lawyer that they cannot describe the companies in the words they knew they really were.
• MythBusters has the classic "Please, don't try anything you're about to see at home." It was usually followed up by one of these:
  • "Ever!"
  • "We're what you call 'experts'."
  • "It's safer that way."
  • The hosts or narrator will also frequently mention variations of "Don't try this at home" during the course of the episode usually right before (or during) especially dangerous moments. Sometimes even right before seeing exactly how badly it can go.
  • Lampshaded by Adam during an episode when they're making thermite and the ingredients (which had their labels obscured in post-production) warned against mixing "blur" and "blur."
  • In an effort to get kids interested in science, a few episodes featured interesting but unlikely-to-go-wrong experiments, and the disclaimers were changed to "Please do try this at home."
    • In one such case it was zigzagged — when doing an experiment with the well-known reaction of Diet Coke and Mentos, they told audiences that they could (and should) try the experiments at home... under the condition that they do them outside, as they would make a gigantic mess.
• Satirical news quiz Have I Got News for You has a habit of adding "...allegedly" after saying anything that could get them sued. Despite the fact the players know that it has no legal effect whatsoever, and have commented on it.
  • And they were actually charged with contempt of court and fined for the joke, "The BBC are in fact cracking down on references to Ian and Kevin Maxwell just in case programme-makers appear biased in their treatment of these two heartless, scheming bastards." The heartless scheming bastards' trial was about to start, and pointing out on television that they're heartless scheming bastards risks prejudicing the jury. There's footage from the taping of Ian Hislop expressing concern over leaving the joke in, but leave it in they did.
• Never Mind the Buzzcocks had the host Simon Amstell speculate with Noel Fielding about how Courtney Love would beat the stuffing out of Amstell.
  "Or she could kill me and make it look like suicide!
  • Immediately captioned by the producers with the disclaimer "Simon Amstell is definitely wrong."
• DVDs by Blue Rhino, including Beast Wars and Mystery Science Theater 3000, have a pen drawing glasses and a mustache over J. Edgar Hoover's face during the FBI Warning. They also did this on VHS tapes as early as the '90s.
• The Daily Show, Global Edition (which, in some countries, is shown on 24-hour news networks), has this disclaimer posted to comply with certain countries' legal qualifications on what they consider a news program (such as the United Kingdom):
  The show you are about to watch is a news parody. Its stories are not fact checked. Its reporters are not journalists. And its opinions are not fully thought through.
• This Hour Has 22 Minutes is a satirical examination of daily events. Often followed by a satirical "Warning!" based on an examination of daily events.
• Happens all the time on 10 O'Clock Live with Jimmy Carr's segments. Particularly funny because it is live and you almost hear the pain of the show's lawyers and producers as they shout in Carr's earpiece to clear up any "misinterpretation" that might have arisen with his completely innocent monologues.
• The JAG episode Rogue began with a statement the story was not based on any real person or event, however anyone who had read the Rogue Warrior novels would know this is based on the real and fictional exploits of Richard Marcinko, down to phoning a Commanding Officer at the last minute to confirm orders thus giving carte blanche to well, go rogue (Marcinko made a habit of informing his superiors of his actions, before usually being unable to receive orders not to.)
• The X-Files credits included the sentence "This production has not been approved, endorsed or authorized by the Federal Bureau of Investigation."
• One episode of Inspector Morse had to have a particularly embarrassing disclaimer added to the end credits. The story involved the Inspector investigating a murder in a screwed-up upper-class family, with an extreme Asshole Victim named Sir John Balcombe. Unfortunately, it was realised too late that the Asshole Victim had exactly the same first name, surname, and knightly title as a senior judge, forcing a disclaimer to be read out after the episode explaining that the character had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the real person.
• COPS is filmed on location with the men and women of law enforcement. All suspects are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law".
  • "Due to the graphic nature of this program, viewer discretion is advised."
  • Many other police shows such as Live PD include similar disclaimers about viewer discretion and the presumption of innocence.
• The :20 Minute Workout:^note Any exercise program will include a "consult your physician" disclaimer, but this one is specific to this show.
  "WARNING: The following program depicts exercises which, depending upon your physical condition may be hazardous to your health. You are therefore warned not to attempt any of these exercises without consulting your doctor. Even with such approval, all exercises should be done in moderation, and should not be performed if tired, or to the point of fatigue or pain. Do not overexert yourself."
• Most if not all of the allegations made on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert are about Trump and thus Colbert will cover himself by saying something along the lines of: "No, Russia had no involvement in defaming Hillary Clinton, it was all Trump's idea...allegedly.
• On The New Yankee Workshop Norm always advised the viewer about proper use of power tools right before beginning to use them in every episode:
  • "Be sure to read, understand and follow all the safety rules that come with your power tools. Knowing how to use your power tools properly will greatly reduce the risk of personal injury. And remember this, there is no more important safety rule than to wear these—safety glasses."
• The Lifetime docuseries Surviving R. Kelly, about the singer's sexual assault allegations, contains not one, but four disclaimers, presented separately in succession as follows, and repeated after every commercial break:
  • R. Kelly has denied all claims related to sexual assault, domestic violence/abuse, and sexual misconduct with minors.
  • Kelly's lawyer claims that Kelly has witness statements and evidence showing his innocence, but cannot release them due to the active court cases against him.
  • His lawyer also alleged that Kelly "is the subject of a smear campaign" and that "the accusers have not acted like victims at all" because "they have used their accusations to promote contemporaneous books, albums, and speaking tours."
  • Due to explicit discussion of sex involving minors, parental discretion is advised.
• Geraldo Rivera's original claim to fame was as a maverick reporter on New York's WABC-TV in the 1970s with a tendency to unexpectedly veer on-air into political rants on the Vietnam War, various elected officials, and other hot-button topics while making straight news reports. The very strict rules about the divide between news and opinion in television journalism at the time made this unacceptable, but Rivera was a top reporter and a ratings godsend and couldn't be fired. WABC's solution was to have the control room primed to throw up a caption reading EDITORIAL the instant Rivera went off topic, thereby converting Rivera from objective news reporter to subjective pundit at the press of a button.
• A 2022 Channel 4 documentary called Jeremy Kyle: Death in Daytime about salacious things that happened on the now-canceled chat show The Jeremy Kyle Show ends with a long disclaimer that was provided by ITV claiming among other things, that all guests knew what they were getting themselves into, support was given before during and after episodes, and that the claims made in a documentary are false. He also claimed that Kyle himself was asked to be interviewed but he refused due to ongoing litigation.
• Humorously subverted in the Xena finale. "Xena was fatally harmed in the filming of this episode".
• Since it was only 29 years since the (actually very overexaggerated) reports of mass panic from Orson Welles' adaptation of War of the Worlds, CBS decided it was going to take no chances with a documentary titled The Day Called X, which depicted a Real Life evacuation exercise in Portland Oregon that was simulating a nuclear attack. Since real city, state and Federal government officials were playing their roles as if the attack were genuine, any time a nuclear attack was mentioned onscreen, CBS made sure that the disclaimer "AN ATTACK IS NOT TAKING PLACE" appeared on the screen.
• How I Met Your Mother: Robin's days as a Teen Idol in Canada came to an end when she traded her "Robin Sparkles" persona for the Darker and Edgier (by Canadian standards) "Robin Daggers". The only song she released after the switch was "P.S. I Love You", a song about her becoming a Stalker with a Crush on someone that rejected her. The full version of the song includes her declaring "Restraining orders don't scare me!" which is immediately followed by a rapid-fire disclaimer:
  Robin Daggers: The lawyers at the record company / made me promise to say / that the views expressed in this song do not necessarily reflect the views of Dominant Records or any of its subsidiaries.

Meta

• Don't Try This at Home and Do Not Attempt (rarely required, but used to stave off lawsuits).
• Rattling Off Legal
• Unreadable Disclaimer
• This Is a Work of Fiction
• Offer Void in Nebraska
• Side Effects Include...
• Product Displacement

Music

• "Our Lawyer Made Us Change the Name of This Song So We Wouldn't Get Sued" by Fall Out Boy. Technically a subversive parody, since their lawyers really did make them change the name of the song. (From "My Name is David Ruffin... and These Are The Temptations".)
• The Offspring has a very sarcastic track on Ixnay On the Hombre titled "Disclaimer", as seen on the Quotes page.
• The BBC demanded that The Monkees song "Randy Scouse Git" (a title deemed a tad offensive) be given an alternative title or it could not be played on-air. So its official title in the UK became "Alternate Title".
  • Ironically, songwriter Micky Dolenz had learned the expression "randy Scouse git" from watching Til Death Do Us Part, a sitcom that aired on BBC television.
• Irish folk-rockers the Horslips subverted this trope with a very large disclaimer on one LP sleeve. At the time of the official music industry disclaimer Home Taping is Killing Music! followed by a list of imperatives^note This was printed in very big letters on the inner sleeve and reminded buyers of the terrible apocalyptic outcome of borrowing a friend's paid-for copy and running off a tape, a large banner advert on the gatefold sleeve read You cannot, will not, shall not, are not allowed to, etc. If in doubt, consult your dealer.
• When Australian band TISM were sued by artist Ken Done for using cover art that parodied his work for their EP Australia The Lucky Cunt, it was re-issued with a new cover and the title Censored Due To Legal Advice.
• The Monty Python Contractual Obligation Album lists "Farewell to John Denver (Tune: Annie's Song)" on the sleeve. This is actually Terry Jones explaining that for legal reasons the song is not on the album, and then apologising for the long pause and announcing the next song. The original version had been Eric Idle singing "You came on my pillow..." and then being strangled, and Denver had in fact sued. Magazine adverts for the album proudly announced "Now a major lawsuit!"
  • The LP itself is an example of this trope; the Pythons had a recording contract that ''obliged'' them to cut one more LP. The group members frankly admit they didn't want to do it and were running out of ideas, but they had to turn out something to fulfill the contract with Chrysalis Records. Or, as their lawyers advised them... The LP is an hodgepodge of bits, including reworkings of lots of old sketches that in fact predated Python's formation and had already been performed on stage, TV and radio by other people. Add in scrapped bits meant for films and TV which were rescued from the editing room floor, and some pieces which sound like last-minute slapdash desperation but remain funny nonetheless and you get a comedy album...
• The video for Filipino comedy duo Moymoy Palaboy's "Rugby Boy", a parody of Aqua's "Barbie Girl", has a disclaimer at the beginning stating that "due to their personal convictions", they and by extension the record company do not in any way encourage or condone substance abuse, particularly inhalants such as the titular Rugby brand of rubber contact cement typically used by destitute street youths.

Radio

• Stephen Fry used to have a radio show called Saturday Night Fry. From the intro to the first episode:
  "It may be that some listeners will find some parts of this program rather badly written and incompetently performed."
• Before beginning the quiz portion of Whad Ya Know, host Michael Feldman always calls for a volunteer from the audience to read The Four Disclaimers:
  1. All questions used on Whad'Ya Know have been painstakingly researched, although the answers have not. Ambiguous, misleading, or poorly worded questions are par for the course. Listeners who are sticklers for the truth should get their own shows.
  (The second disclaimer is a Couch Gag.)
  3. Persons employed by the International House of Radio or its member stations are lucky to be working at all, let along tying up the office phones trying to play the quiz. Listeners who have won recently should sit on their hands and let someone else have a chance for a change.
  4. All opinions expressed on Whad'Ya Know are well-reasoned and insightful. Needless to say, they are not those of the International House of Radio, its member stations, or lackeys. Anyone who says otherwise is itching for a fight.

Tabletop Games

• Take one guess whose name needed changing in the game retitled James Ernest's Totally Renamed Spy Game (later re-retitled Before I Kill You, Mister Spy...).
• Magic: The Gathering joke sets like Unhinged occasionally uses this for humorous flavor texts. For example:
  Our lawyers say no matter how funny it would be, we can't encourage players to eat the cards. Hear that? Whatever you do, don't eat the delicious cards.
  • Another example of the parody on Farewell to Arms:
  "When the chosen hand isn't behind its owner's back, sacrifice Farewell To Arms. If you do, that player discards their hand... Of cards (The lawyers wouldn't let us do it the other way.)"
• The Steam-Tech GURPS supplement includes a robot detective called the Holmes-1, which sucks evidence into an internal storage facility through a Meerchaum pipe, is protected from the elements with an Inverness cape and deerstalker hat, and has a vocabulary that rather overuses the word "elementary". The advertising copy that introduces it concludes:
  (Legal Notice: The Holmes-1 Detection Automaton is neither designed nor meant to resemble nor suggest to the public in any way the likeness or mannerisms of Mr Holmes of Baker Street.)

Theater

• The prologue of the musical Louisiana Purchase had a lawyer warning the show's producer that he and the show's authors could be sued by all the recognizable people in it, even though their names were changed. His advice is to add a disclaimer saying that This Is a Work of Fiction, and the Opening Chorus comes on to assert that the characters, the state of Louisiana, and everything else in the show is "mythical."

Video Games

• Nintendo's safety warnings on bootup of the Wii and Nintendo DS systems and their successors. Several Game Boy Advance and Nintendo Gamecube titles released later in those consoles' lifespans carried a similar warning at the beginning.
  • Sony copied this move with their PlayStation consoles, starting with the PlayStation Portable.
• Adverts for 6th-gen and earlier video game titles would often feature flashy rendered or FMV visuals which were much more impressive than the consoles could produce, resulting in the standard disclaimer, "Not representative of in-game graphics" (or alternately "Not actual gameplay"). Since this became the accepted norm, it is amusing that publishers often have an 'anti-disclaimer' on 7th-gen titles to let us know that now the games actually do look that good.^note The push to realistic realtime rendering was helped with the ongoing duel between Sony's Gran Turismo series and Microsoft's counterpart Forza Motorsport; being able to pull off realistic realtime footage was a selling point for both of them and a focal point of their rivalry. Still shown straight occasionally to clear up any confusions over adverts only showing cut-scenes and not the actual gameplay.
• Cannon Fodder: "This game is not endorsed in any way by the Royal British Leagion" [sic]. See The Poppy for why this was present, but for those too lazy to click, suffice it to say that there is one symbolic flower you just do not screw about with in Britain.
• COVID '99: Paddle Royale: The title screen, starting from version 1.1, has a note that reads "This game does not qualify as medical advice!"
• Assassin's Creed and its successors, due to their interaction with often controversial historical periods and events, have a message on startup that asserts the games are made by people "of all faiths and beliefs," and reminds the audience that the product is in fact fictional. This disclaimer was primarily made in the first game due to taking place during The Crusades and being released several years into The War on Terror. It's continued use in several of the later games is of questionable relevance and seems to be more out of habit than anything else.
• In Beavis and Butt-Head in Virtual Stupidity, a screen of copyright notices is captioned "Legal Crap." This is followed by the same Don't Try This at Home disclaimer as in the cartoon.
• On some German game packages, there is the written notice that analphabets can't play the game in question. (So, they address people who are unable to read in written form.)
  • The equivalent in the English-speaking world is "Basic reading ability is required to enjoy this game".
• The Hitman World of Assassination Trilogy games open with a disclaimer similar to the ones from the Assassin's Creed series, indicating that the game was made by a multicultural team of various nationalities, religions, genders, and ethnic backgrounds. At no point do any of the games touch on any sensitive real-life religious, political, or racial controversies, so one does wonder what the purpose of the disclaimer is meant to achieve. It's possibly a response to the internet backlash the previous game Absolution received for including latex-clad dominatrix nun assassins as enemy characters, or the much older controversy from Hitman 2: Silent Assassin where one of the levels (a luxury hospital) was architecturally based on a real-life Sikh holy site.
• Mafia: Definitive Edition, the Video Game Remake of Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven, is conspiciously prefaced by an Assassin's Creed style disclaimer stating: 1) it is an entertainment product and not 100% historically accurate, 2) the game was made by a diverse team of many different religious faiths, and 3) Don't Try This at Home. Unlike Mafia 2 and Mafia 3, the game doesn't really contain any "culturally sensitive topics or themes", and the only really noticeable references to religion are a shootout in a church and a single line making an oblique reference to Catholic fecundity. On the whole the disclaimer just seems like it's there because it's expected by the current cultural zeitgeist.
• Primal Rage had a No Animals Were Harmed disclaimer on the demo screen, just in case anyone got the idea that the developers used actual primates and reptiles as actors in their Fighting Game.
• Mario Party Superstars: The instruction screens for the original Mario Party minigames that require rotating the control stick advise players not to use their palm to spin it. Doing this was a common practice among players in the original Nintendo 64 version, and doing so could lead to getting blisters or lacerations, which caused many players to take legal action against Nintendo. This notice was likely put to prevent facing a lawsuit.
• Police Quest: SWAT 2 allowed for the player to play as both SWAT and terrorists. One option as SWAT is to actually ask then police chief and game designer Darryl F. Gates for advice. No such option exists for the terrorists. Why not? The extensive manual explains that no, they were not going to have a real terrorist give tips on how to better...um, terrorize.
• The Secret Service series of video games all contain a disclaimer stating that the real-life Secret Service were not involved in the making of each game and do not endorse any of the depictions contained within.
• Most modern-day video game adaptations of game shows, especially those developed by Ludia and Ubisoft, carry a rather long-winded disclaimer at the beginning that basically says that players will not actually receive any of the money or prizes that they win in the game.
• Yes, Your Grace: The spellbook for a certain ritual has the following disclaimer:
  The author and publishing company of "Performance of Rituals: Curses and Healing" are not responsible for any side effects nor for damages caused for incorrect performance of the rituals.
• Games rated by the ESRB and which have an online multiplayer component may come with the disclaimer "Online interactions not rated by the ESRB"^note And in 2000s-era games, "Game experience may change during online play printed on the back of the box (if it's a physical copy) and on screens presented at startup. This is a warning that while the developer-made content may have been examined and certified by the ESRB as being suitable for players a specific age or older, the same cannot be said of player-created content like chats and player-made images (such as vehicle livery in Driving Games), and thus neither the developer, publisher, the ESRB, nor related parties will be held responsible if you or your child encounter offensive content from another player while playing online. In other words, the latest Animal Crossing game might be safe for a 7-year-old to play as long as they play offline, but if they visit another player's town/island through online multiplayer, they might encounter players using swear words, wall tiles with ten-second phalluses drawn on them, or worse, use of slurs and other hate-speech expressions.
• The Game Modding website GameBanana advises or warns any modding community of certain video games not to publish mods based on upcoming Downloadable Content until further notice in order to prevent possible DMCA from the associated video game company. This also applies to any public-facing platforms like public Discord servers, though usually modders are still allowed to make them for personal use.

Visual Novels

• Melody contains a disclaimer that basically states that the story doesn't violate any laws or Patreon guidelines. Since the creators had gotten burned for violating Patreon's guidelines once before, you can imagine how fastidiously they kept to this.
• Doki Doki Literature Club!'s content warning is the only hint in its advertising that it's a psychological horror game and not the bubbly dating sim it initially presents itself as, likely to stave off false advertising and mental trauma lawsuits.

Web Animation

• Red vs. Blue made fun of those too. For the season one disc, the sign read something to the lines of "do not steal this disc, but you already know this. So don't eat it or throw it at your sister either." Then it switched to Spanish, which was the same as English, but with accent marks placed at random. One of the other seasons' DVDs' Spanish FBI warning had one sentence of Spanish followed by something like "This is basically the message above only in Spanish. To be honest, we only took one year of Spanish so the only phrases we know are 'Happy birthday!' and 'My cousin likes to walk on the beach.'"
• The Homestar Runner DVDs have characters showing up during the FBI warning and commenting (for example, Homestar pops up during one warning and declares it "Bowwwwinnnngggg!" (this was also used on a legal page for the actual site), while in another Coach Z interprets it as a rap song).
• Napster Bad: The original Flash movie opens with disclaimers that the opinions (not) expressed by Metallica in the movie are not necessarily the animators' opinion and that viewer discretion is advised due to strong language, then notes "We say this only because we're afraid Metallica might come after us, too, when and if they see this."
• Each episode of Helluva Boss starts with its own disclaimer, particularly warning about graphic violence, strong language, flashing lights, horny demons, and sometimes horny humans.

Web Original

• A straight example written as a parody from "Dave does the Blog" notes 'The views expressed by me on this weblog are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer, my church, my party, my candidate, my community, my wife, my friends, or, on occasion, myself.'
• Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog has an 'ELE' warning on the DVD.
• The warning on Neil Cicierega's New Kids on the Rock DVD admits that they really have no way of knowing whether you do any of the things they're warning you against.
• On the infamous shock site "Goatse.cx", the following text was displayed above said shock image:
  The goatse.cx lawyer has informed us that we need a warning! So.. if you are under the age of 18 or find this photograph offensive, please don't look at it. Thank you!
• Skippy's List has examples:
  I don't mind if you want to quote a few items from my list of your site. But please do not copy the list in its entirety.
• In PewDiePie's song/diss track towards T-Series "Congratulations":

I'm sure right now there's nothing that you're doing that's illegal, yeah
I'm certain that you haven't had collusions with the mafia
For legal reasons, that's a joke
For legal reasons, that's a joke
For serious, Indian mafia, please don't kill me, that's a joke

• The disclaimers that start every episode of Dragon Ball Z Abridged utilize this.
  The following is a fan-based parody. Dragon Ball, Dragon Ball Z, Dragon Ball GT, and Dragon Ball Super are owned by Funimation, Toei Animation, Fuji TV, Shueisha, and Akira Toriyama. Please support the official release.

Western Animation

• MTV's Celebrity Deathmatch opened with a standard disclaimer about celebrity voices being impersonated, blah blah blah... then added at the bottom in large letters, "BESIDES, IT'S ONLY CLAY!"
• This was included from season 3 onwards of Beavis and Butt-Head; this was the result of kids who watch the show try to emulate the duo's antics, namely Beavis' "Fire! Fire!":
  "Beavis & Butt-Head are not role models. They're not even human; they're cartoons. Some of the things they do would cause a person to get hurt, expelled, arrested, possibly deported. So to put it another way: Don't Try This at Home."
• South Park's opening disclaimer:
  "All characters and events in this show — even those based on real people — are entirely fictional. All celebrity voices are impersonated ... poorly. The following program contains coarse language and due to its content it should not be viewed by anyone."
  • Ironically, some networks have broadcast it with a genuine disclaimer either before or instead of the joke one.
  • The ending credits of Trapped in the Closet ended with all of the names in the credits replaced with "John Smith" or "Jane Smith" because of the propensity of the Church of Happyology to sue their way out of trouble under various copyright and trademark laws.
• On one of the Futurama DVDs, an alien-language FBI warning screen displays after the usual one.
• In the Invader Zim episode "FBI Warning of Doom", the FBI Warning Of Doom! on a rented DVD makes Zim believe he's being watched by the FBI.
• An episode of The Simpsons that was based on the musical Evita had the following disclaimer at the end:
  On the advice of our lawyers we swear we have never heard of a musical based on the life of Eva Peron.
  • In another episode, an Itchy and Scratchy cartoon is followed by the warning "The preceding cartoon contained scenes of graphic violence and should not have been watched by young children".
  • In another episode, a talent show had a disclaimer stating it wasn't based on American Idol and that they had never heard about American Idol.
  • Also, the episode where Homer complains about not receiving any awards when everyone else in Springfield has.
  Homer: Oh, why won't anyone give me an award?
  Lisa: You won a Grammy.
  Homer: I mean an award that's worth winning! (Words run across bottom of screen: "LEGAL DISCLAIMER: Mr. Simpson's views do not match those of the producers, who don't consider the Grammy an award at all.")
• Total Drama notably plays this trope straight at the start of every episode:
  Chris Mclean: This episode of TD_ contains scenes of extreme stunts performed by animated teens. Do not try any of what you see here at home. Seriously, you could get really messed up.
• The Twisted Tales of Felix the Cat:
  • The episode "Night Drop": "Do not copy this tape, or we will find you and flick your ear."
  • One episode featured Earth being repossessed by Da King of an alien planet. When Felix demanded to know what Da King did to Earth, he showed a film to explain it. The film had an FBI warning stating unauthorized duplication would result in "violent-type actions".

Real Life

• Copyright and trademark notices in all commercially available fiction.
  • It was a virtually automatic acknowledgment of how bad a movie was, around the 1980s, that the intensity of the wording of the copyright notice was inversely proportional to how likely it was someone would pirate it. Until the use of the Interpol notices became almost universal on movies, the rare movie that had one was probably so awful that you didn't even need to watch the movie to know how bad it was.
  • A Japanese government website circa 2006 had a copyright notice in English with the words "All Rights Reserved." This is a notice for obtaining protection under the Buenos Aires' Convention, to which Japan is not a party. The whole use of the phrase was absolutely meaningless because both Japan and every member of the Buenos Aires' Convention is a member of the Berne Convention, which doesn't require copyright notices in the first place.
• The "FBI Warning" found in countless home video formats over the years. They often now also appear on CD cases because of the whole Napster/MP3 fiasco.
• The Interpol warning. Just like the FBI warning, but international and frequently multilingual.
• "If you find yourself traumatized by what you've seen here, call 555-xxxx"
• "Professional driver on closed course"
  • "Overseas model shown" — Just in case there's any confusion from this ad, the vehicle sold in this country will have the steering wheel on the correct side.
• "Warning: The beverage you're about to enjoy is extremely hot." This one came about after a woman got third-degree burns from a cup of McDonald's coffee. The suit she filed is often laughed at and cited as an example of the problems with the American legal system, but it's more of an example of a "Lack of Institutional Control" on the McDonalds Corporate itself^ElaborationThe Corporate end required franchisees to keep their coffee at 180-190 degrees Fahrenheit (82-88 degrees Celsius), which can cause third-degree burns in two to seven seconds. To be more specific, the problem was that this McDonald's was serving its coffee significantly hotter than usual (like over 180 degrees rather than a more typical 140 or so), and they (not just McDonald's generally, but that specific store) had been previously sued by other people for the same thing. The plaintiff was only suing for her actual medical expenses ($620,000, of which McDonalds was willing to pay $800), so the jury essentially said "Clearly it's going to take a truly outrageous amount of pain and suffering damages to make you actually take notice and stop this, so okay, here you go."
• Anything required by The Comics Code, MPAA rating system, ESRB, Woman's Christian Temperance Union rules, or any Censorship Bureau.
• Anything required by the FCC, an American agency with broad scope.
• "The opinions expressed in the following (episode, speech) do not necessarily represent those of this station."
• "This copyrighted telecast is presented by the authority of the office of the commissioner of [insert major sport here or sporting organization here], for private enjoyment by our audience and may not be retransmitted in any form, or have its facts disseminated without express written consent".
• "The following is a paid commercial program. The thoughts and opinions expressed are solely those of the program's producers and do not reflect the views of this station."
• On documentaries and News Broadcasts, especially ones dealing with controversial issues, a modified version of the previous disclaimer may be used: "This program is a production of <producer's name>, which is solely responsible for its content". This was common on NBC News programs in the 1980s, as well as PBS shows like Frontline in the present.
• The licenses for a lot of software, even including web browsers and iTunes, include warnings like
  You also agree that you will not use these products for any purposes prohibited by United States law, including, without limitation, the development, design, manufacture or production of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.
  You further acknowledge that the software is not intended or suitable for use in situations or environments where the failure of, or errors or inaccuracies in the content, data or information provided by, the software could lead to death, personal injury, or severe physical or environmental damage, including without limitation the operation of nuclear facilities, aircraft navigation or communication systems, air traffic control, life support or weapons systems.
• Health warnings on cigarette packages. The United States were the first to introduce these in 1966, though theirs are now the weakest of the various warnings around the world, just a small "SURGEON GENERAL'S WARNING" stuck on the side of the pack in small print. In comparison, many other countries have adopted huge labels, with some including gruesome pictures and/or mandating generic packaging with no distinctive brandings.
• The so-called "quack Miranda warning" is a relatively new one in the US for any Spice Rack Panacea: "These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, prevent, treat, or cure any disease."
• Some cookbooks and other collections of food writing have a warning not to alter the recipes in any way. Conversely, several prepackaged dinners and mixes have "Ovens vary; cooking time may need to be adjusted". So, in essence, if something went wrong with the dish, it's either your fault for deviating from the recipe, or your oven's fault for not being a lab-controlled oven.
• "Requesting rare or medium-rare meats (or undercooked eggs) may increase your risk of foodborne illness." Similarly for Frozen dinners: "Do not cook in microwaves under 1100 watts as product may not cook thoroughly." On the other side, microwave dinner instructions generally include a line about "let cool for 2-5 minutes before eating", in case people scald themselves trying to eat the food straight out of the microwave.
• The disclaimers that show up on kids' superhero costumes: Use of this costume does not enable wearer to fly. Apparently, a number of kids died thinking otherwise—granted, younger children may not always be able to separate fact and fiction, so possibly justified.
• ThinkGeek sells a letter opener shaped like a batarang as a tie in to Batman: Arkham Knight. Its three-line description reads:
  Look, we know you're going to throw it
  But our lawyers wanted us to remind you not to aim it at other humans
  And that what we're selling you is a LETTER OPENER
• Two New British Universities risked legal difficulties with the names they selected after being allowed to rebrand themselves from their prior status as polytechnics and tech colleges. ^note American readers, think "community colleges". In the first instance, the University of Central Lancashire (UCLAn).^note  Formerly Lancashire Polytechnic, situated in Preston. Has a sizeable population of mature and part-time students and an apparently vast advertising budget. The former Preston Polytechnic sailed close to the wind of legal action by seeking to style itself UCLA — University of Central LAncashire. While the chances of Preston being confused with Los Angeles are vanishingly small — save by those who seriously failed Geography — legal advice insisted that the "n" should be added. The "n", in the form "UCLAn", is very small and inobtrusive.
  • In the second case, when the North-East Wales Institute of Techology (Wrexham) was allowed to leap all the way to University status, at first it named itself "Yale University" after one of its founder colleges — in fact, named for the same Mr Yale who emigrated to the USA and founded Yale University in Connecticut. Even though NEWI had the name first, the superior legal firepower of Yale University, USA, acted as a deterrent, although the Welsh-language Coleg Ial was permitted. Wrexham University now trades under the name Prifysgol Owain Glyndwr/Owen Glendower University.
• In recent times, poker websites and daily fantasy sports (commonly known as DFS) websites in America (where online gambling is illegal in most states) have put up a disclaimer claiming that they are "not a gambling website", despite advertising how you can win money for spending money on their games. The FCC and FTC have shut down poker websites (maintaining that despite their disclaimer, they are in fact gambling websites), but have yet to do so with DFS sites... yet.
  • The federal laws against sports betting were struck down by the SCOTUS in 2018. Not only are those DFS websites totally in the clear, they've opened brick-and-mortar sportsbooks alongside full online betting services. Poker and other non-sports related online gambling is still illegal though.
• Commercial fiction, such as novels and comic books, sometimes carry disclaimers that neither the creator of the work nor the publisher assume responsibility for any website content, either their own or third-party; social media; public commentary and so on. This has been done for various reasons such as avoiding controversy from Moral Guardians over Rule 34 involving characters from said work.
• "Do not take this medication if you are allergic to it or any of its ingredients."
• A television ad for an insurance company shows a woman chopping up a $100 bill in a blender. At the bottom is a disclaimer reading "Dramatization: Do Not Attempt." This is because destroying US currency is illegal, and so is both to keep them safe from prosecution (by establishing that the bill is a prop bill and not genuine) and to keep viewers from trying the same with real currency.
• In Australia, ads for online betting are required to include disclaimers about gambling responsibly. Since 2022, these have included more specific slogans such as "Chances are you're about to lose" and "Imagine what you could be buying instead."
• The Vanity Plate for syndicator Worldvision Enterprises, from 1974 onwards, usually bore the disclaimer "Not Affiliated with World Vision International, a Religious and Charitable Organization", due to the aforementioned Christian aid charity suing the company, claiming they owned the "Worldvision" trademark.

In the name of the 'TV Tropes Ltd.' Legal Department, we like to recall that the items contained in the following folder are Not Straight Examples of the page's topic, or anything resembling it:

Not Straight Examples

Anime & Manga

• A weird one in The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya. While making their student film, Haruhi's subconscious Reality Warper powers start acting up, causing Mikuru to start shooting Eye Beams around, and a random cat they picked up to start talking. Haruhi is the only one who doesn't see any of this, so the rest of the brigade realize they need to convince her none of it is real without alerting her that it's, you know, real. Koizumi's suggestion is to end the movie with All Just a Dream, but that idea is shot down. Kyon uses this trope instead.
  Haruhi: (voiceover the end credits) This story is a work of fiction. All character names, organizations, incidents and any other names, phenomena and such, are fictional as well. It's all made up. Even if it resembles someone, it's probably just a coincidence. Oh, except for the commercials! Shop at Omori Electronics and Yamatsuchi Model Shop for great deals. Stop by and buy! Huh? I gotta say it again? This story is a work of fiction. All character names, organizations, incidents and any other names... Hey Kyon! Why do I have to say all this stuff anyway? I mean, it's totally obvious.
  Kyon: Because! Now do it again!
  Haruhi: Ugh, fine... (bored tone) This film is a work of fiction...

Films — Animated

• The credits of Frozen (2013) make the following disclaimer:
  The views and opinions expressed by Kristoff in the film that all men eat their own boogers are solely his own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of The Walt Disney Company or the filmmakers. Neither The Walt Disney Company nor the filmmakers make any representation of the accuracy of any such views and opinions.

Films — Live-Action

• Trinity And Beyond The Atomic Bomb Movie, being made up of footage of American nuclear tests, has an interesting version of this: "No animals were harmed in the making of this movie. Some goats, pigs, and sheep were nuked in the making of the original films."
• Fido: "No zombies were harmed during the making of this film."
  • Same warning at the end of the first Jurassic Park :"No dinosaurs were harmed in the making of this movie."
• The Killer Elite. A tongue-in-cheek notice announces that there is no company called Communications Integrity nor ComTeg, "and the thought that the CIA might employ such an organization for any purpose is, of course, preposterous."

Literature

• No Bed For Bacon by Caryl Brahms and S. J. Simon — which is deliberately set in The Theme Park Version of Elizabethan England — has the disclaimer "Warning to Scholars: This book is fundamentally unsound."
• Good Omens has near the beginning the disclaimer: "Kids! Bringing about Armageddon can be dangerous. Do not try it in your own home."
• The Muppets Character Encyclopedia entry for Spa'am (the Wild Boar Chief from Muppet Treasure Island) includes the following:
  Not-So-Fine-Print
  The character Spa'am is not related in any way to any other person, animal, character, hologram, vehicle, place or canned luncheon meat. (Our lawyers made us put this in — we have no idea why.)

This is a reference to an actual lawsuit Hormel Foods issued against the Muppets when the character was introduced. They lost, with the judgement snarkily observing that "by now Hormel should be inured to any such ridicule" and "one might think Hormel would welcome the association with a genuine source of pork".

• The Science of Discworld: The second book explores the phrase "may contain nuts", and how it came about in the notoriously Literal-Minded Ankh-Morpork: The Patrician feels very strongly about food labelling (an understandable view in a city like Ankh-Morpork), and asked the wizards of the Unseen University if they could prove whether an item did or did not in fact contain nuts. He wasn't satisfied with their answer that they couldn't be certain, because it was unhelpful. Hence, "may contain nuts". The book then proceeds to use it as a Running Gag.

Live-Action TV

• Also parodied in Garth Marenghis Darkplace with the line "I do not believe that any form of life, be it human, animal, or plant, should be hurt in the making of a television programme. So I personally feel really bad about that cat we killed."
• The MTV show Fur TV started each episode with an overly long viewer warning. It changed every episode too, so it doubled as a sneak preview.
  Warning: This show contains adult humor, strong language, random acts of violence, shocking images, and scenes of a sexually explicit nature between humans and puppets, which some viewers may find offensive.
• In one episode of Insomniac with Dave Attell, Dave spends some time with some government employees tasked with hunting an invasive rodent species with airsoft rifles to control their population. At the conclusion of the segment, he informs the camera that "a lot of animals were harmed in the making of this program".
• Parodied in an episode of Las Vegas in which Jean-Claude Van Damme is killed in a rooftop motorcycle movie stunt gone wrong. According to the credits, "No Jean-Claude Van Dammes were killed in the making of this episode".
• The MythBusters has had a few gags of this nature throughout the series, mixed in with their much more serious warnings not to try what they do on the show. One memorable one from Lead Balloon involves Adam discussing the sex appeal of Jamie's walrus mustache, while they're dissipating static electricity from adhesive tape on their facial hair.
  Adam: There's women out there going, "Oh, I wish I was that piece of tape right now!"
  Jamie: Ya think?
  Adam: I'm sure of it. (looking at the camera) Raise your hand. Yeah, you!
  Jamie: Gimme a break.
  Rob Lee: The producers of MythBusters are not responsible for any marital issues resulting from raised arms.
• There was an Australian sketch show a few years back that started one episode with a recording of a sheep grazing and a voiceover announcing "no animals were harmed in the making of this show... except for this sheep". Cue the sheep being "blown up".
• Played with by Andy Levy on Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld, who states "As always, by the way, legal asks me to point out that I am not a lawyer. But I am Jewish, so we can assume I could be if I wanted to."
  Greg: Or a doctor.
  Andy: Yeah, absolutely.
  Isiah: Producer.
  Andy: What was that?
  Bill: He said 'Go back to Israel.' It was terrible.
• On How I Met Your Mother, Robin's song "P.S. I Love You" sees her telling her love interest that "restraining orders don't scare me". This is immediately followed by: "The lawyers at the record company / made me promise to say / that the views expressed in this song do not necessarily reflect the views of Dominant Records or any of its subsidiaries."
• Saturday Night Live:
  Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.
• Frequently parodied in the credits of All Aussie Adventures:
  This program is in no way endorsed by the Alice Springs Tourism Authority.
  Russell Coight's School Wildlife Visiting Program is no way endorsed by the Education Department and is currently the subject of police investigations.
  The makers of this program in no way endorse the shooting of sheep or crushing of native bandicoots. They also have some reservations about handling loaded guns to minors.
• On one Last Week Tonight with John Oliver episode, John Oliver gave away (well, sold for 25 cents) tickets to premium Yankees seats to whoever could come up with the most ridiculous outfits. (One set of winners dressed up like dragons, for example, and another went as Ninja Turtles.) This was a protest about Yankees owner blocking access to elite seating and accommodations to "someone who has never sat in a premium location".
  John: We are legally bound to give you these contest rules and tell you that the Yankees were not invited in this contest in any way, but I think that should be pretty fucking obvious by now.
  • In regards to the end of a libel suit brought by Bob Murrey, John initially plays it straight by discussing how they've run things by their legal team "who are getting very tired of us by now"... but then does this when having a fake lawyer drag Murrey in a musical number that was apparently also run by said lawyers to avoid libel/slander... by being so outrageous that no reasonable person could assume the jokes were true.
• Discussed — and mocked — on Taskmaster. During one of the "prize rounds", Rose Matafeo brings in an unspooled cassette tape as a prize (long story) and jokingly claims that once it's been respooled, the tape plays the true identity of the assassin of John F. Kennedy. During the resulting discussion, Greg Davies quips that he'd love it if the identity of the assassin on the tape was musician and celebrity Peter Andre, which prompts David Baddiel to remark that Greg might want to offer one of these disclaimers in order to avoid any kind of legal action. Greg ruthlessly mocks the idea that anyone would seriously take legal action over the joking suggestion that Peter Andre of all people was part of a cabal to assassinate a US president, to the point that he boldly states "I think that Peter Andre killed JFK. Sue me." For what it's worth, Peter Andre was born about ten years after the assassination. There is of course no evidence whatsoever that Peter Andre is a Time Lord, a Victorian inventor with a strange machine in his basement, or some smeghead with an experimental time drive who really wants a curry.

Tabletop Games

• Pandemonio has a parody of the cautionary "this is fictional" disclaimers found in White Wolf and other supernatural horror RPGs. It's extremely stealth, up until the last line, where instead of warning against any of the "evil" actions depicted in the game, it warns that Neoplastic Press does not condone the practice of monotheism.
• It seems to be a running gag for the Dungeons & Dragons 5E Rulebooks to contain humorous disclaimers. For example:
  • The Player's Handbook disclaimer:
  Wizards of the Coast is not responsible for the consequences of splitting up the party, sticking appendages in the mouth of a leering green devil face, accepting a dinner invitation from bugbears, storming the feast hall of a hill giant steading, angering a dragon of any variety, or saying yes when the DM asks, "Are you really sure?"
  • The Monster Manual disclaimer:
  Any similarity between monsters depicted in this book and monsters that actually exist is purely coincidental. That goes double for mindflayers, which absolutely, utterly, and completely do not exist. Nor do they secretly run the D&D team. Do we really need a disclaimer to tell you that? Don't use your brain to consider such irrational thoughts. They only make the mind cluttered, confused, and unpleasantly chewy. A good brain is nice, tender, and barely used. Go ahead, put down this book and watch some reality TV or Internet cat videos. They're really funny these days. You won't regret it. We say this only because we love you and your juicy, succulent gamer brain.
  • The Dungeon Master's Guide disclaimer:
  Wizards of the Coast does not officially endorse the following tactics, which are guaranteed to maximize your enjoyment as a Dungeon Master. First, always keep a straight face and say OK no matter how ludicrous or doomed the players' plan of action is. Second, no matter what happens, pretend that you intended all along for everything to unfold the way it did. Third, if you're not sure what to do next, feign illnes, end the session early, and plot your next move. When all else fails, roll a bunch of dice behind your screen, study them for a moment with a look of deep concern mixed with regret, let loose a heavy sigh and announce that Tiamat swoops from the sky and attacks.
  • The Elemental Evil Player's Companion disclaimer:
  For safe utilization of elemental magic, remember the following guidelines. You can drink water but not fire. You can breathe air but not earth. You can walk on earth but not on water (unless you have the right pair of boots or spell). You can do a lot of things with fire, but almost all of them are bad ideas.
  • The Volo's Guide to Monsters disclaimer:
  Wizards of the Coast does not vouch for, guarantee, or provide any promise regarding the validity of the information provided in this volume by Volothamp Geddarm. Do not trust Volo. Do not go on quests offered by Volo. Do not listen to Volo. Avoid being seen with him for risk of guilt by association. If Volo appears in your campaign, your DM is undoubtedly trying to kill your character in a manner that can be blamed on your own actions. The DM is probably trying to do that anyway, but with Volo's appearance, you know for sure. We're not convinced that Elminster's commentary is all that trustworthy either, but he turned us into flumphs the last time we mentioned him in one of these disclaimers.
• Evil Hat uses joking disclaimers beneath credits and copyright information in its Fate products:
  • Fate Core and Fate System Toolkit disclaimers state:
  This is a game where people make up stories about wonderful, terrible, impossible, glorious things. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional. Any resemblance to real people, fantasy adventures, wizards of the arcane, supernatural cops in China-colonized Hong Kong/America that never was, cybernetic super-intelligent apes, or squirrel mechanics is purely fictional, but kinda hilarious.
  • Fate Accelerate edition disclaimer:
  This is a game where people make up stories about wonderful, terrible, impossible, glorious things. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional. All resemblance to real people, magical martial artists, schoolgirl witches, pulp scientists, or piratical cats is purely fictional, but kinda hilarious.

Theme Parks

• In The LEGO Movie: 4D — A New Adventure at LEGOLAND, Risky Business forces Emmet's friends to dance to a knockoff of "Everything Is Awesome", which contains the line "This is legal under Fair Use."

Video Games

• Sonic Colors: "Please keep your hands and feet in the car at all times, because there are tiny asteroids traveling at incredible speed hurtling through space. Keeping your hands and feet in the car won't prevent you from being hit, but our lawyers tell us we have to say it anyway."
• Parodied in the credits of the original Spyro the Dragon games. "No sheep were harmed in the production of this game."
  • Later repeated in Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando, which was made by the same developers. It also adds, "Except for one. He had it coming to him."
    • Qwark featured one or two of these at the end of his own advertisements in the first game, too.
  Qwark Enterprises is not responsible for sprains, broken bones, snapped tendons, bruised egos or accidental death incurred while taking the challenge.
  • And also parodied at the end of a campaign in Left 4 Dead, in which case it is used to show the body count.
• Every second-generation Sierra game starts with an appeal to please not make illegal copies because they worked hard on creating this game. They went for the moral angle instead of the legal one. Several of those games follow up with something like "...by the way, the game is unplayable without the information contained in the manual. It's not just the law, it's a good idea!" Confusingly, this follow up was actually false in some games, that were perfectly playable without the manual.
• In Fallout: New Vegas, the Courier can take a tour of the headquarters of REPCONN, a pre-War rocket manufacturer that used a wide variety of nuclear waste as fuel and had frequent problems with their prototypes exploding or crashing into people's homes. Every single exhibit on the tour features at least one (and usually two or three) legal disclaimers regarding the terminology used.
• Hane Hane Paradise parodies the typical Arcade Game territorial license warning screen:

  WARNING
  

  THIS GAME IS DOWNLOAD AND USE IN JAPAN AND OTHER COUNTRIES.
  
  NEVER INQUIRE OF THE MANUFACTURER BECAUSE I AM A FAN OF AND NOT PARTIES CONCERNED THOUGH THIS GAME LOOKS LIKE THE CERTAIN ARCADE GAME THAT A CERTAIN MANUFACTURER DEVELOPED EITHER.
• The manual of Boogerman makes a few cheeky additions to the otherwise standard warnings about handling the game cartridge, cautioning readers not to "bend it, crush it, or submerge it in liquids or boogers," and noting that "boogers will melt in extreme heat."
• CAVE became somewhat emblematic of poorly-translated legal warnings on their arcade games. In the 2010's, when they began porting those games to Steam, they updated the warning to proper English, but left the word "jam" in place of "law" in tribute to the original Gratuitous English. They also altered the text to say that the game was for use on Planet Earth only (as opposed to "Japan only") and any use by extraterrestrials would be considered a copyright breach.
• In 2006, Detroit Tigers pitcher Joel Zumaya missed part of the team's playoff schedule with a sore wrist which the team's GM admitted in a radio interview was caused from Zumaya playing Guitar Hero (specifically the PS2 version of Guitar Hero II). Though Zumaya would later admit that the Guitar Hero story was untrue and a cover for the real (and never disclosed) reason for the injury, the later Xbox 360 release of Guitar Hero II carried the following disclaimer:

  "No pitchers were harmed in the making of this video game.

  Except for one. Joel Zumaya. He had it coming."
  

Web Comics

• Parodied in Darths & Droids. Pete, player of R2-D2, has a d20 that is carefully never described but is always apparently not completely safe when used. From The Rant, strip #909:
  "Many of the things we depict in the comics, we encourage you to try in your own games.
  
  "Not today.
  
  "We disclaim all responsibility where Pete's dice are concerned."

Web Videos

• A video made by "The Mechanic Shark Channel" features a disclaimer, which features the "Tianamen Square Copypasta", a long string of Chinese and English texts of China's forbidden topic.
• Dragon Ball Z Abridged has this to say right before a young Gohan gets kicked by Raditz: "We here at Team Four Star do not condone child violence... we do, however, find it hilarious."
  • Also, before their blooper reels (which typically contain large amounts of swearing), there is the disclaimer: "Warning. The following contains language unsuitable for minors. If you are under the age of 18 and have not heard the word "fuck" before... well, ya have now."
• Parodied at the beginning of Doctor Steel's Propaganda DVDs. An FBI warning screen pops up... but the words are not what you were expecting.
• The Spoony Experiment: Spoony occasionally includes one right before an awesome scene in the Reb Brown movie he's reviewing. For example:
  Warning! What follows is the manliest thing ever recorded on film. Your balls may drop off in shame at the mere knowledge that you will never in your entire life do something half as manly.
• Parodied on a Zero Punctuation video when Yahtzee says the Paper Mario game he's reviewing isn't [a Paper Mario game] despite "looking like one and wearing the skin of one." He then says that he's not a fat woman, even if he- and then cuts himself off saying his lawyer has advised him not to finish the statement (accompanied with an image of his avatar wearing the bloody skin of a fat woman a la Michael Myers).
• In the Half in the Bag review of Jack and Jill, Mike and Jay make a very half-hearted attempt before making their case that the movie is basically a scheme to pump the cash from an inflated movie budget into the pockets of Sandler and his friends. Though the first two notes they start to read from their lawyers are themselves libelous (and even in the third, Mike has to change the word "cohorts" to "associates" as he is reading the statement.)
• CJ DaChamp: During "Revy's Hood Safari" in the Black Lagoon video, Lagoon Company comes across Nazis who want to steal a painting that Lagoon Company is after. However, CJ doesn't want to get in trouble with YouTube for mentioning Nazis on his channel, so he refers to the Nazis as "Hydra agents" instead.

Western Animation

• The Simpsons:
  • Parodied in "Dog of Death" with "No dogs were harmed during the production of this episode. A cat threw up and somebody shot a duck, but that's it."
  • In "Politically Inept, with Homer Simpson", Homer is putting up with unfair treatment on an airplane, and a disclaimer appears saying that if we're watching this episode on a plane, the airline depicted is not the one you're on.
  • The ending of "The President Wore Pearls" has a claim that "Our lawyers had us insist we have absolutely no knowledge of a musical based on the life of Eva Perón.
• The bonus short on the Ratatouille DVD ended with a parody disclaimer, with warnings about rat interaction varying from the reasonable (rat interaction can cause disease) to the outlandishly slanderous. (claims that rat interaction can lead to mutilation, and that all right-minded people know rats caused the Black Plague). Remy is offended, and protests loudly while trying to stop the disclaimer.
• The Curse of the Were-Rabbit has bunnies floating around during the credits. They end with "No rabbits were harmed during the making of this film" — and the last rabbit bumps its head on those words.
• Parodied in the Superman: The Animated Series episode "Fun and Games". When Superman crashes in on Toyman (who is about to execute Bruno Mannheim) the villain throws something called "Dopey Dough" on him, which quickly starts to grow and spread.
  Toyman: Uh, maybe you should read the label: "Dopey Dough is a lethal biochemical formula. Contact with the skin can prove fatal, as it won't stop growing until it asphyxiates its host. Not recommended for children under three.
• This moment from the Duckman episode "Ajax and Ajaxer":
  Duckman: Why, I bet a kid, thinking I was a role model and wanting to imitate my behavior, could easily steal sodas from a vending machine... too. DO IT! Do it now, kids! Stick it to the man! HAHAHAHA!!
  [Cornfed is handed some Censor Notes]
  Cornfed: "But of course that would be wrong."
• Total Drama Action: After DJ goes flying into the power lines and gets electrocuted, Leshawna asks Chris if he's going to send for help. Chris begins laughing hysterically, at which point, the show pauses and pans away to show Chris some time in the future, reading from a script about how Total Drama totally cares about the welfare of its competitors and how no animals got hurt. He doesn't even try to make it convincing.

Real Life

• No Animals Were Harmed is for publicity reasons, not legal reasons. It's a certification from the American Humane Society.
  • This actually has historical reasons for existing, though. According to The Other Wiki, the AHA disclaimer was brought on by controversy about a 1939 movie named Jessie James, in which a blindfolded horse was ridden off a cliff to its death. (Needless to say, said movie was not following the AHA guidelines.)

Our lawyers, who consequently took action, persisted, that both A Little From Column A, and A Little From Column B shall be displayed in this article, naturally in a fair and comprehensive ratio:

A Little From Column A, A Little From Column B

Advertising

• A magazine ad for Pokémon Red and Blue featured drawings of Pokémon imposed on a Game Boy screen, with the small text below the image saying, "This is a color illustration, not an actual game screen. We know you know that, but this line makes our lawyers feel better."
• A TV advertisement for Sheba cat food features a woman snuggling her cat when her son offscreen shouts that he fell. She says there are bandages in the cabinet but when he says he's bleeding, she casually replies "grab two." A disclaimer on screen flashes up saying "We don't encourage this behavior, though your cat might."
• A 2022 E-Trade commercial, which marked the return of the E-Trade Baby, has a disclaimer reading "Dramatization. Wood chopping, helicopter flying and financial advising are not suitable activities for babies."

Comedy

• From the beginning of ''Monty Python" album "Live at City Center"...
  Announcer: "Good evening ladies and Gentlemen, may I have your attention please. The taking of photgraphs, the use of recording devices and smoking are strictly prohibited in this theater..."
  John Cleese "But are encouraged nevertheless."

Comic Books

• An issue of Marvel's What If? asked the question "What if WonderMan were a woman and Power Man were a girl? The lawyers from the distinguished competition leave a note in the panel advising them not to print it.

Films — Live-Action

• From Kevin Smith's film Dogma, the following disclaimer ... over four separate screens ...
  Disclaimer: 1) a renunciation of any claim to or connection with; 2) disavowal; 3) a statement made to save one's own ass; 4) a foresaid word for not being blamed later.
  Though it'll go without saying ten minutes or so into these proceedings, View Askew would like to state that this film is from start to finish a work of comedic fantasy, not to be taken seriously. To insist that any of what follows is incendiary or inflammatory is to miss our intention and pass undue judgment; and passing judgment is reserved for God and God alone (this goes for you film critics too... just kidding).
  So please before you think about hurting someone over this trifle of a film, remember: even God has a sense of humor. Just look at the Platypus. Thank you and enjoy the show.
  P.S. We sincerely apologize to all Platypus enthusiasts out there who are offended by that thoughtless comment about Platypi. We at View Askew respect the noble Platypus, and it is not our intention to slight these stupid creatures in any way. Thank you again and enjoy the show.
• Monty Python and the Holy Grail has a standard legal disclaimer which purports to be signed by Richard M. Nixon. It was made in 1974 during Watergate.
• At the end of the Phantasm films (at least, from the second one onward), there is "Any unauthorised duplication will result in civil liability, criminal prosecution, and the wrath of the Tall Man."
• Airplane! used a standard disclaimer/copyright notice... except that it added "So There" at the very end.
• The Informant! has this: "While this motion picture is based on real events, certain incidents and characters are composites, and dialog has been dramatized. So there."
• This from Slumber Party Massacre II:
  Any unauthorized exhibition, distribution or copying of this film or any part thereof [including soundtrack] is an infringement of the relevant copyright and will subject the infringer to severe civil and criminal prosecution as well as a midnight call from the Driller-Killer.
• From Not Of This Earth 1988 (the Traci Lords version): "Any unauthorized exhibition, distribution or copying of this film or any part thereof (including soundtrack) is an infringement of the relevant copyright and will subject the infringer to severe civil and criminal prosecution... not to mention a one-way ticket to Davanna."
• (500) Days of Summer: "AUTHOR'S NOTE: The following is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. Especially you Jenny Beckman. Bitch."
• The credits to Doctor Strange (2016) include a warning against reckless and distracted driving, based on how Strange had ruined his life doing so at the beginning of the film. This counts as "part parodic" because its placement calls back to a gag earlier in the film where Strange tests out a magic spell and then sees all the warnings against the dangers of using it, wondering why in the world the warning didn't come first.
• The Three Stooges short "You Nazty Spy" begins with the following disclaimer: "Any resemblance between the characters in this picture and any persons, living or dead, is a miracle." This is a borderline example because at the time, The Hays Code prevented any movies from depicting any foreign power "in an unfavorable light", even the Nazis, and they could have gotten into trouble for it.

Literature

• The actual disclaimer of the hardcover edition of Kildar by John Ringo:
  This Is a Work of Fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental. This book and series has no connection to reality. Any attempt by the reader to replicate any scene in this series is to be taken at the reader's own risk. For that matter, most of the actions of the main character are illegal under U.S. and international law as well as most of the stricter religions in the world. There is no Valley of the Keldara. There is no Kildar. And the idea of some Scotts and Vikings getting together to raid the Byzantine Empire is beyond ludicrous. The islands described in a previous book do not exist. Entire regions described in these books do not exist. Any attempt to learn anything from these books is disrecommended by the author, the publisher and the author's mother who wishes to state that he was a very nice boy and she doesn't know what went wrong.
• Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: Raoul Duke's lawyer, Dr. Gonzo, frequently began sentences with the phrase, "As your attorney, I advise you to...". Said "advice" was almost never legal, and in fact was often blatantly illegal, e.g., recommending that he take a hit of adrenochrome. Reportedly, Oscar Zeta Acosta, whom Dr. Gonzo was based off of, had this particular verbal habit in Real Life, hence Thompson's inclusion of it in the novel.

Live-Action TV

• Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe spoofed the "If you're traumatized call 555-xxxx" variation few times on the course of the show. The following example comes from the episode about news coverage.
  If you have been affected by the issues in that picture phone the National Buzzsaw Incident Hotline on 0808-1dehblehdeh
  • With OFCOM's strict rules about keeping opinions separate from news, editorial pieces are prefixed with Charlie Brooker saying "Remember, these are his views, not facts". One particularly controversial one, about media influence in Parliament, had Charlie Brooker repeating this over a stern red card reading "Viewer information hastily added following legal advice" for the best part of 30 seconds.
• The Arrested Development episode "Motherboy XXX" gave us this gem when Michael went to the hotel for the Motherboy pageant:
  Michael: I'm here for Motherboy.
  Desk Clerk: You realize that's not the band.
  Narrator: Motherboy was also the name of a heavy metal band that rocked pretty hard throughout the seventies. We are legally obligated to make this distinction.
• When Laverne & Shirley was shown in certain countries, this disclaimer, or something similar to it, was shown before every episode.
  Warning: The two women you are about to see have escaped from an insane asylum. Do not try to imitate their actions.
• MythBusters added their traditional (and deadly serious) warning to the million match heads experiment, and then Adam added this:
  "If I find out that any of you tried this at home, I will personally come to your house and kick your butt!"

Music

• Ani DiFranco's albums contain the notice "Unauthorized duplication, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing."
• 2 Live Crew albums featured the warning "Unlawful duplication will get you fuck up by the Ghetto Style DJs." [sic]

Tabletop Games

• White Wolf tabletop RPG books mostly contain some serious though tongue-in-cheek examples. Examples from Vampire: The Masquerade books usually start with the five words "You are not a vampire." and end with a suggestion that if you want to carry out various inhuman acts you should seek counselling and leave roleplayers to get on with their games. One Exalted disclaimer helpfully advises players that "You should not hit your friends or loved ones with swords."
• The Bretonnia sourcebook for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay starts with the disclaimer that Games Workshop, Black Industries and the author do not endorse the sexism which is part of the Bretonnia setting, and which was included because the author believed that women pretending to be men made interesting characters. The author also does not endorse fighting wars over insults, worshipping the Ruinous Powers or arbitrarily executing peasants.

Theme Parks

• In the JAWS ride at Universal Studios, numerous disclaimers are included in the commercials for Captain Jake's, including: "Seats not available on all boats", "Some boats may be guest-operated", "Shade available at additional cost", "Insurance waiver required", and so on.

Video Games

• The Trauma Center series, being a series of games based around surgery, has the bog-standard disclaimers that the player is not a qualified practitioner of medicine and thus should not attempt to practice medicine without proper licenses, degrees, or certifications. Trauma Center: Second Opinion has a bit of fun with this: Should the player complete all seven X operations, the player gets one final monologue that again states that the player is not an actual medical doctor and therefore shouldn't go straight into real-life surgery...and that if the player is an actual doctor, they probably shouldn't tell their patients how much they struggled with a (rather Nintendo Hard) video game about surgery.
• Earthworm Jim has a disclaimer in most versions of the Easy Mode credits stating that Shiny has no opinion either way about the concept of evolution after Doug Ten Napel (a noted Creationist) snarks at the 'What Are Worms?' text (that he's being forced to read out) for mentioning it. Ironically that disclaimer is also read out by Doug Ten Napel (and is left out of the Windows 95 version for unknown reasons.)

Web Animation

• The Dragon Ball Z Kai versions of Dragon Ball Z Abridged mixes the disclaimer with a shortened version of it.
  Vegeta: [first episode] This is a parody support Akira Toriyama!
  Freeza: [second episode] This is a parody. Buy the fucking show!
  Garlic Jr.: [third episode] Don't be a dummy! Give them your money!
  Android 16: [fourth episode] Physical media is forever! Buy Laserdisc!
  Perfect Cell: [final episode] Give money, receive Dragon Ball!
• One of GradeAUnderA's videos exposing Prank Channels specifies that there's only a possibility that the pranksters he brings up are fakes, and then proceeds to come up with an alternate explanation for everything suspicious - for example, when he sees a victim/paid actor turning violent during a prank, Grade points out that the prankster gets punched, but his head doesn't move in the same direction as the punch, which violates the law of conservation of momentum. As such, Grade concludes...that the laws of physics are incorrect.
  Grade: Because, right, the only other possibility is that this video is fake, which, I'm sure you'd agree, would be an absurd thing to suggest.

Web Comics

• A disclaimer appears at the end of chapter 77 of the Roman à Clef comic Joe vs. Elan School, and what pushes it into almost parody — albeit quite grimly, given the comic's subject matter — is the fact that the author claims that Elan School didn't even exist, even though he'd spent the previous several years linking to evidence of its abuse and speaking quite openly about his own terrible time there.
  Due to the subject matter of upcoming chapters, a lawyer has advised me to state that This Is a Work of Fiction. That's right, I made it all up. There was no Elan School (so don't bother looking it up!). All similarities are purely coincidental and nothing I wrote or am about to write actually happened... ahem... especially the stuff I'm about to write.

Web Videos

• The disclaimer for the video seen here with the Swedish Chef is both. (The message is sarcastic when it claims the Chef is "sort of" a professional, but you should not try this.)
• An episode of Outside Xbox plays with this trope. Hosts Andy and Jane attempting to recreate a cocktail recipe that they had seen in Dishonored. However, because of the way the recipe was written and poor comma placement, the two of them believed it called for a handful of nutmeg. A warning appears underneath saying "Spoiler: This is too much nutmeg." Later, it says "Like, seriously, a dangerous amount of nutmeg. Do not eat this much nutmeg ever."

Western Animation

• The DVD release for My Little Pony 'n Friends: "The End of Flutter Valley" and apparently many Rhino DVDs includes the standard copyright disclaimer from the FBI at the end, but it is prefaced with "A friendly reminder from the FBI" and during the spot, the image of the FBI agent is given spiky hair, glasses, and a beard in crayon.
• All six episodes of Clerks: The Animated Series began with your typical disclaimer (read by Kevin Michael Richardson), followed by a joke statement (like for the pilot "Is anybody still watching after all that?"); he also did a VO in the middle of episode 3 stating "Due to the recent lawsuit by Dustin Hoffman over the alleged unauthorized use of his likeness, the role of Dustin Hoffman in Randal's cartoon brain calculation will be played by- Al Pacino!"

Real Life

• The disclaimer from this article — in financial articles, there is an obligation for the writer to disclose if they own or handle for others any security, stocks or companies directly mentioned, for conflict-of-interest purposes — has a nice gem at the end:
  At the time of publication, Michael Brush did not own or control shares of any fund mentioned in this column. Nor does he carry a Herm's handbag.
• Cancer Treatment Centers of America would like to remind you that "No case is typical. You should not expect to experience these results".
• The flowcharting software Interactive EasyFlow is mostly remembered today for its humorous and cynical disclaimer and user license agreement, which express the usual sentiments in blunt English rather than legalese:
  We don't claim Interactive EasyFlow is good for anything — if you think it is, great, but it's up to you to decide. If Interactive EasyFlow doesn't work: tough. If you lose a million because Interactive EasyFlow messes up, it's you that's out the million, not us. If you don't like this disclaimer: tough. We reserve the right to do the absolute minimum provided by law, up to and including nothing. [...]

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