Dog Walks You



"Missis had a most winning expression. Pongo, though a dog born to command, had a twinkle in his eye. They walked side by side with great dignity, only putting the Dearlys on the leash to lead them over crossings."

- The Hundred and One Dalmatians, Dodie Smith

A person is out walking their dog. Unfortunately, the dog is stubborn and disagrees with the planned route. Maybe it's seen a cat or some food, or maybe it came from Soviet Russia. In any case, the result is that the dog becomes the one taking its unfortunate owner for a walk.

Obviously, children are more susceptible to this than adults. For added humour, replace "dog" with some other animal - probably one that no sane person would fix a leash to in the first place.

If the animal is strong enough, the owner may end up being quite literally dragged along... or even fly helplessly behind it.

A variant is where they collide with another person. This may even be a Meet Cute.

Anime and Manga

 * This happens with Hana all the freaking time walking Yosev in GaoGaiGar. Generally because she has the good sense to try to walk him right when the Monster of the Week is attacking, and also her dog is like three times her size.
 * Happened in an episode of Naruto, pre-time skip. Then again, Naruto did want the biggest dog, so he brought it on himself.

Film

 * In Ghost Town, Tea Leoni's character has a Great Dane, which is subject to many jokes about its size. While walking the dog, Leoni goes flying when the dog suddenly lunges in one direction.

Literature

 * The Blast-Ended Skrewts do this in Harry Potter, when Hagrid gets the class to take them out for exercise.
 * In Dead Beat, Mouse pulls Harry to see Murphy. If Harry "had leaned back and kept [his] legs straight [he] could have gone skiing over the gravel".

Live-Action TV

 * Happened in Full House.
 * In The Goodies episode "Kitten Kong" Tim gets dragged along by a kitten (and over some dog poo that happened to be there when they were filming the scene, what makes it worse is that that shot was filmed with stop motion, so Tim was dragged through the dog poo slowly).
 * Its Me or The Dog often deals with large, rowdy breeds. According to Victoria, the dog does this because the owner's skittishness can be felt through the leash, leading to a vicious cycle of the dog going faster and the owner becoming more anxious. Especially pully dogs are dealt with by a full head harness.
 * The subject of a song on The Muppet Show.
 * Married... with Children: Buck Bundy has taken Al and Bud for a drag more than once.
 * An Amazing Race Detour from Season 5 had the teams walking a group of dogs through three checkpoints, it quickly turned into this.
 * Happens briefly to Robbie Rotten with his Robot Dog in the "Woof! Woof! Woof!" song from the episode "LazyTown's New Superhero" on LazyTown.

Newspaper Comics

 * Happens regularly in the U.S. Marmaduke comic strip. The title character is a Great Dane, who does this even to adults.
 * From The Family Circus, there is a line: "Wednesday's Child is full of woe" The picture is of Jeffy, being dragged along by one of the dogs saying, "Whoa, whoa, whoa"
 * Katzenjammer Kids had Dur Captain get a dog "ta help me oxercise" on the doctor's advice, and it proved a bit too much of the exercise. And when he felt too lazy to beat rugs, a self-propelled vacuum cleaner towed him around the house.

Software

 * Happens in one of the stories in Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, where the large dog drags the dog-sitter for a while in order to chase a squirrel. Then the tranquilizer kicked in, causing the dog to fall asleep in the park. Oh, and the sitter lost the keys to the house because of being dragged through the park.

Video Games

 * In maybe the only non-accidental case of this, Iggy Koopa in New Super Mario Bros. Wii rides around in a basket dragged by a large Chain Chomp (Mario guard dog equivalent) firing magic blasts at Mario. When he's hit, the Chain Chomp literally Turns Red, changes direction and charges, dragging the knocked out Iggy Koopa with it. Repeat scenario twice for one hell of an interesting boss battle.
 * Baby Mario and Baby Luigi's vehicles in Mario Kart are also being pulled by a Chain Chomp, and every so often it goes careening forward without any semblance of control.
 * Koromaru of Persona 3 is implied to do this sometimes when taken for a walk by the main character and another member of SEES. The other character will occasionally make comments such as complaining that he's too fast or that trying to keep him up with him is great exercise, usually while panting for breath.

Web Comics

 * A giant gerbil briefly does it to Helen Narbon upon the woman's first appearance.

Web Original

 * Happens in the Redearth88 episode "Crazy Bitch", and is seen again from another viewpoint in the following episode, "Creepy Stalking 101". Bucket runs up to Linc, pulling Rachel along behind her. This is the first time they meet; they later go on a date.

Western Animation

 * Batman the Animated Series had this happen with Harley Quinn while she's walking the Hyenas... while she's on roller skates. (It was revealed that the animation team wanted it to eventually end up with a Hyena sticking its head in a baby carriage)
 * In the original Disney One Hundred and One Dalmatians, Pongo eventually resorts to this so he can arrange a Meet Cute.
 * Pongo and Perdita do this in the live action remake.
 * In the credits sequences for The Jetsons. One of the few times this sort of thing happens on a treadmill.
 * Cerbee does this to Jimmy in the opening for Jimmy Two-Shoes.
 * Several dogs can be seen walking their owners during the song "Topsy Turvy" from The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
 * This happens to the titular characters in the Animated Adaptation of Gaspard And Lisa when they petsit a puppy named Maurice.

Truth In Television

 * Truth in Television. Don't try walking a kitten, whatever you do.
 * To be fair, a house cat has no hope of ever being able to drag a human along involuntarily. It's more a case of the cat instinctively trying to go the opposite way of the owner. The end result is that the cat is dragged along against its will. Note that this isn't particularly nice to the cat, and this should never be done with actual kittens (baby cats) as they have been known to literally stress themselves to death in situations like these. At least that's what this troper was told when he got cats.
 * The right way to walk a cat is to go anywhere it wants to and keep the leash from tangling with objects, except when it tries to go too far or to somewhere dangerous, in which case you gently stop it from going further. It's best to do somewhere with lot of open space, rather than on a clear path, since cats rarely are satisfied just with following a straight line.
 * Not unheard of with dogs either, for that matter. Walking a dog that's not familiar with you—especially if you're a child—can quickly lead to it taking initiative.
 * Not only is this embarrassing for the owner, the extreme leash-pulling is INCREDIBLY dangerous and shows lack of training. It is especially hazardous in the case of large dogs, which are quite capable of pulling full-sized adult humans off their feet.
 * Riding a horse subjects the rider to an extreme version of this if they don't know how to control it properly.
 * C. S. Lewis said his boyhood dog was like this, with the remark "He never exactly obeyed you. He sometimes agreed with you."
 * An incident involving then-President Barack Obama having trouble controlling his dog Bo in 2010 was caught by photographers and reported as a "fluff" piece by various news outlets... from which we get our page's image.