Best Known for the Fanservice

""Roger Ebert felt Elvira's appearance was worth mentioning in his review, but I suspect he had a minimum word count to meet before his review went to press, and if you’re going to break out the shovel to up the word count, you might as well talk about the chick with the great rack.""

- The Agony Booth recap of Stoker Ace

It could have had great humor, brilliant action sequences and diabolical villains. What everyone remembers, however, is the female lead's Striptease in the Sweeps one year. Or, in an even more extreme case, a penis when it pops up on screen. This trope refers to the actions of characters rather than characterization.

This is the common tendency for Fan Service to overshadow everything else about a work, regardless of the amount that actually occurs in it (sometimes the most remembered bit of Fan Service actually comes from promotional materials, which don't accurately depict what actually happens in the show). At the extreme end, it becomes All There Is to Know About "The Crying Game"... with boobs. This can be so powerful and effective in Hollywood that the Hollywood Hype Machine will go into overdrive and make an actress who bared all (or most) of herself an instant, overnight household name. Don't laugh- Shannon Elizabeth and Denise Richards got years of movie roles because of this trope.

For the more romantic equivalent, see Most Fanfic Writers Are Girls. See also Freud Was Right. When a viewer looks at a work specifically to see the stripper, they're Just Here for Godzilla. See also Fanservice Extra and Dancing Bear. One-Scene Wonder is a similar phenomenon, but mostly unrelated.

Live Action TV
""The late Susan Oliver. She's a talented actress, author, director, a pioneer of women's aviation... and if you go to her Wikipedia page, this is the image of her they put up: her dancing as the green woman!""
 * Merlin has shirtless Arthur. Starting with season 2, that happens on average at least once an episode. Oh, and also, Leon, Gwaine, and Percival. Gwen's cleavage and harem-girl outfit. And Morgana's black lace dress. Not to mention shirtless Lancelot in Lancelot du Lac coming dripping wet out of the middle of the Lake.
 * Oz: That's the show where Christopher Meloni and his co-mates get naked and show off their penises before raping other naked guys in the shower, right? Was there also great dialogue, realistic characters, great acting, and amazing storylines, or was that just a rumor?
 * Doctor Who has a lot of cases:
 * The Mind Robber is a surreal story set in a world of fairy tales, mythology, classical literature...and a newspaper comic serial from the year 2000 and what's the first image that comes to mind? Zoe's bum.
 * City of Death has sparkling Douglas Adams wit, a man aging to death and the villain being defeated by a punch. Main popular memory - Lalla Ward in a Sexy Schoolwoman outfit.
 * Terminus has a leprosy-like disease, a man going back in time and creating the universe, and Turlough with the Black Guardian. What does everyone remember? Nyssa taking off her skirt.
 * The Caves of Androzani features the regeneration from Fifth to Sixth and actually has the Fifth Doctor being Badass. The memory? Peri's cleavage while she's holding the regenerating Doctor.
 * The Curse of Fenric completes the epic storyline of the struggle against the dark gods and cosmic forces the Doctor has been playing The Chessmaster against. The memory? Half a second of Sophie Aldred's knickers.
 * Pretty much the entirety of Louise Jameson's (Leela) time as companion to the 4th Doctor. Tight leather minidresses split to the hip, prominent cleavage, and plenty of poses emphasizing both.
 * "Bad Wolf", where everybody is fighting for their lives in gameshows that try to kill you, and what does everyone remember? Jack Harkness, naked in front of millions of viewers. Their viewing figures just went up.
 * Planet of Fire has two examples of this trope, one for the boys and one for the girls. What do the boys remember? Peri in a Bikini. What do the the girls remember? Turlough taking off his tight short shorts.
 * The End of Time, part 1 features the return of the Master and Donna's father Wilf and the Doctor coming to terms with his impending regeneration, as well as . What do people remember? The Master a) emerging naked from a swirl of blue energy b) tied up to a chair with several straps, with his legs spread c) the Master wearing a red leather collar with a leash d) the Master in a straitjacket and finally, e) the Master in a pink dress.
 * In Eleven's very first episode, we have a gambit involving a computer virus that draws the authorities to the Monster of the Week, as well as an undertone of abandonment as Amy Pond waits for 14 years for her Doctor. What do people recall? The Doctor of stripping down in front of his companion Amy and her friend Rory. Naturally, Rory looks away, but Amy doesn't -- and neither do the fangirls. Of course, what any guy who watched the episode will remember is Amy in the police uniform.
 * Remember the episode where Mork and Mindy first kissed? No? Remember the one where Mork befriended a caterpillar and then thought it died when really it was just becoming a butterfly? No? Remember the one where Mork was captured by the sexy Nectrotons, whose leader was played by Raquel Welch?
 * Chuck. Yvonne Strahovski regularly strapping weaponry on whilst wearing underwear. Also, the constant presence of the Cat Fight.
 * The Dukes of Hazzard is primarily remembered for a pair of short shorts. They are even commonly called "Daisy Dukes" after the character that wears them.
 * The promo for the shocking, heartbreaking, Emmy-winning House episode "House's Head" featured its scene of Cuddy doing a strip tease for House. (The episode itself did, too, for a wonder.)
 * In the Firefly episode "Trash" the crew stole something and then there was Mal, in the desert, naked.
 * It is also the series where one of the main characters is a prostitute. Oh, sorry, "Companion".
 * Uh, guys? Topless Christina Hendricks anyone?
 * Oh hey, uh, flesh...
 * I'll be in my bunk...
 * What about Summer Glau's naked introduction?
 * Brookside, the soap opera set in Liverpool where Anna Friel kissed another girl. One of the first acknowledgements on British TV that lesbians existed, and avant-garde for its time.
 * Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction" at the 2004 Super Bowl Halftime Show caused a shitstorm of controversy which is still occasionally joked about, and the NFL has only brought in "safe" classic rock bands ever since. Now do you remember who was actually playing in the championship game that year? Which is sad, because it was one of the most exciting Super Bowls ever.
 * To be fair, a sizable portion of people watching the Super Bowl weren't watching it for the game.
 * Even more so because most people do not actually remember the scene as it happened, since it was over far too quickly to notice unless you were paying complete attention. Most people know the event only from its media coverage.
 * This was also subverted in the same Super Bowl. Everybody remembers Janet Jackson. Decidedly fewer remember the guy dancing in the end zone with a football over his wedding tackle.
 * Successfully done in Xena and Hercules, less so in Sheena and The Beast Master, each for the guys and girls respectively. Then came the to a lesser extent for both Andromeda.
 * Most people only remember the series Xena: Warrior Princess as Xena: Lesbian Princess because no one can remember anything else other than Gabrielle and Xena kissing and bathing together. The writters admitted to keeping the UST all along.
 * The Star Trek episode "The Menagerie" is often remembered for being "The One With... the green chick." SF Debris puts it best:

"Cop: Well, we have a restaurant full of people saying that you threatened Kitty the last time she was seen. Michael: How does anybody even remember this? Cop: She showed her knobs in a Steakhouse, sir."
 * Lois Lane of Smallville is Superman's future wife and star journalist of the Daily Planet. In the opening credits, her background scene is still her stepping out of the water in a bikini.
 * Laura Vandervoot as Supergirl likes to wear very skimpy outfits, and wanders around the house in only her underwear.
 * Consider her ensemble in every other appearance.
 * Top Gear, Series 13—few people remember where the presenters went to do a classic rally (Majorca), but everyone remembers James May's co-driver: buxom glamor model Madison Welch.
 * Dollhouse features lots of beautiful constantly naked people frolicking and Eliza Dushku in dominatrix outfits.
 * The Avengers episode "A Touch of Brimstone" is the one where Mrs. Peel wears the leather bustier.
 * Friends has many, many memorable moments: but arguably none more memorable than Jennifer Aniston in the Slave Leia outfit.
 * True Blood is that show where Anna Paquin gets naked. A lot.
 * And has lots of sex with her vampire boyfriend who has a weird way of pronouncing her name.
 * And a tall, blonde vampire having sex at warp speed with a hot Estonian dancer... who also has sex with Pam.
 * The makers of Californication know that everyone remembers the stripper, and consequently there are a lot of babes getting naked throughout the course of the show.
 * Audiences can't seem to agree what they like more about Dexter: the sex, or the violence.
 * Or the creepy intro.
 * Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles is mostly about Summer Glau in her underwear and various other abbreviated outfits. The marketing people played this up with the famous promotional image of Summer Glau's partially-disassembled robot character, wearing nothing but Godiva Hair. The show is notable in that two groups of people will remember it for different things: the first for Summer Glau, and the second for Lena Headey.
 * The Daily Show had a bit of fun when George Takei got married and out of all the Star Trek stills available, the news put up a picture of Sulu fencing shirtless. "Oh my" indeed.
 * Arrested Development keeps it off camera, but has an amusing in universe example in the season one episode "Missing Kitty".

"Television Without Pity Recap: I really can't emphasize enough how distracting it is that he's delivering this monologue while two naked ladies are theatrically pleasuring each other."
 * The BBC miniseries of Pride and Prejudice is remembered by many female viewers for the part in which Colin Firth dives into a pond.
 * It appears the Discovery Channel website attempted to invoke this one on those who browsed the MythBusters photo galleries, inviting us to see the "Bathtub Test" album by saying "See production stills -- including pictures of a half-naked Adam -- from episode 19".
 * For some reason, Game of Thrones has the rather bad habit of laying down important exposition while sex is happening in the scene. Episode 7 had Petyr Baelish delivering a rather important, character-defining monologue in the midst of making two whores "play" with each other.


 * Sherlock's A Scandal in Belgravia... That's the one where both Irene Adler and the great detective himself are naked at some point, right?
 * Stargate SG-1 has the episode where everyone is infected with an anti-Goa'uld device, but that's sort of secondary to Dr. Fraiser opening up her shirt (and revealing her bra) because she's infected and hot.
 * The pilot episode "Children of the Gods", had full-frontal nudity in its original airing on Showtime. It was edited out in later airings on regular cable (replaced by a couple long closeups of Teal'c's face), but is retained in the DVD release.
 * The 2005 series of UK Big Brother. Kinga, on her first night found a novel place to put an empty wine bottle. Anyone remember who won the competition?
 * A later season of Survivor had two female competitors strip naked and forfeit an immunity challenge in exchange for a plate of Oreos.
 * It's actually surprisingly hard to find Legend of the Seeker clips that don't contain Cara or Kahlan, though mostly Cara. Why does this count as this trope? Tight red leather. Low neckline. Tabrett Bethell. On second thought, this might not be such a bad thing.
 * Bath house scene.
 * Everyone remembers that Richard's first scene was shirtless.
 * Pretty much the only main character who hasn't had this treatment is Zedd.
 * Say Torchwood, and the the reaction is most likely to be "gay sex". While it's true that the show mentioned gay sex at least once an episode, and the straight main character was briefly turned gay in only the second episode, and there was at least one episode mostly focused on a character having gay sex with an alien, it barely ever actually showed the sex.
 * That Kamen Rider series where the main character is constantly seen in nothing but his boxers.
 * Francois Arnaud of The Borgias mentioned in an interview that everyone wants to talk about his character's leather pants and extremely close relationship with his sister. Admittedly, the incest thing is kind of a big part of the Borgia legend.

Tabletop Games

 * All most Warhammer 40,000 fans seem to remember about the Sisters of Battle is that they're an Amazon Brigade in a very male-dominated setting, and that one of their troop options literally wear nothing but three scraps of paper (and a Chainsaw Sword). Also, apparently the Dark Eldar do nothing but rape everything to death. As do Slaaneesh worshippers.
 * Mention the card Elvish Ranger to any Magic: The Gathering fan and prepare to hear about its art featuring an elf woman in a Fur Bikini. Nobody seems to know that the card came with an alternate art version featuring a conservatively-dressed male elf.

Web Original
"Troper: I saw an Israeli war movie (forget the name, sorry) that began and ended with a scene showing the protagonist and his girlfriend rubbing paint all over each other while making love. Not sure what this had to do with the rest of the movie. Other troper: Who cares?"
 * A YouTube video on a channel known as Vlogvetica featured a naked guy walking in the background, for maybe one second, and was never pointed out in the actual video. Guess what every single comment was about.
 * The trope "But You Screw One Goat!", is the punchline of a joke that owes its humor as much if not more to the trope under discussion here than the one that actually bears its name.
 * From This Wiki on the Body Paint page:


 * Any sex scene in Survival of the Fittest quite often eclipses the character. Case in point, there's a reason that She Bop (girl on girl rape) is the most infamous thread of V3. So far as characters go, Rosa Fiametta of V4 often gets this treatment, to the point where her characterisation is simplified to just being a sex maniac due to the frequency with which she gets it on.
 * The Game Heroes ad where The Nostalgia Critic gets kidnapped. Fangirls completely failed to notice what they were selling, being distracted by the pretty boy getting manhandled and a gun being put to his head.
 * The Surf Ninjas review is a Dying Dream episode, with lots of clever Sarcasm Mode, a nice scene where The Other Guy and friends are looking after Critic, and Optimus Prime bringing him back to life by dying for his sins. And what do people remember? "GEEEEEEENIUS!"