Stealth Pun/Live-Action TV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Examples of Stealth Puns in Live-Action TV include:

  • Since 2006 Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve has had the west coast portion that airs after midnight on the east coast hosted by Fergie from the Black Eyed Peas. In case you do not understand the pun you are traditionally supposed to eat black eyed peas on New Year’s Day to bring you good luck in the upcoming year.
  • Overlapping with an ILP, in the Firefly episode "Safe", River wanders off and starts dancing—and it's stated in her backstory that she was a ballerina (Real Life Writes the Plot, Summer Glau is one). How is this a pun? Her name is River, and she is dancing. River. Dancing. Riverdance.
    • In the DVD's scene selection for the episode, this scene is actually called "River Dance."
  • The Father Ted episode "Chirpy Burpy Cheap Sheep" is about a sheep who is being driven neurotic. There's a concealed pun implicit in this concept (and [formerly] revealed in The Other Wiki's relevant episode entry) but it is something of a subversion since neither the pun nor the punchline are actually spoken.
  • The famous Nantucket limerick shows up in the pilot of Babylon 5. Delenn has heard it, and thinks it's a typical example of Earth poetry...
    • In the B5 prequel, In The Beginning, one of the few Minbari who advocates giving peace a chance is named Lennon. (Word of God confirms that this was intentional.)
    • Multiple human characters are cautioned not to use the phrase "aw, hell" while commanding a White Star, or are shown doing so. In Minbari, it means "fire all weapons".
  • And again in this Daily Show/Colbert Report bit, as a shorter alternative to an epic poem.
  • A variant appears in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Naked Now". As the Enterprise crew succumb to an inebriation-inducing virus, Data reports picking up numerous disturbances on internal sensors, including a crewman singing a limerick:

Data: There once was a woman from Venus, whose body was shaped like a--
Picard: Security!

Chuck: But where are the real dummies?
(Emerson starts sniggering)
Narrator: Before Emerson Cod could reply with a clever, if slightly insulting remark, something moving caught his eye.

  • The Colbert Report has Gorlock, a Signs-esque alien who advises Stephen on various topics. He was first introduced as Stephen's financial advisor and an excuse to make Scientology jokes, but we later find out that he's also Stephen's attorney. Making him... A legal alien.
    • Was there ever a mention of him taking a sick day? Which would make him an ILL-legal alien.
  • In Veronica Mars, the late Lilly Kane called her younger brother Duncan by the nickname "Donut". One (admittedly cute) Fanfic posited that it was because he wanted to be a cop as a kid. Someone clearly missed the pun.
  • The BBC's series Merlin features King Uther. He keeps used to keep a dragon penned up in the dungeon.
  • Sherlock does not once excrete onscreen.
  • In Star Trek: The Original Series, Kirk claims to be from the island of Noman at one point.
  • A famous example from Saturday Night Live‍'‍s "Celebrity Jeopardy!" sketches:

Sean Connery: What's the difference between you and a mallard with a cold? One's a sick duck... I can't remember how it ends, but your mother's a whore.

  • In Reaper, the Devil gives Sam his phone number. We never see it, but Sam's reaction to the area code makes it pretty obvious it's 666.
  • On Mock the Week, Milton Jones comments that farmers have recently started using heroin but finding the evidence has been difficult. It's like finding a needle in a haystack.
  • In this Scrubs episode an imaginary patient has a kitten in his mouth. Probably he misunderstood the concept of eating pussy. Either that or the cat's got his tongue.
  • For several episodes of Season 4 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Oz wore a sheepskin jacket. As he's a werewolf, you know what that makes him...
    • In the episode "Tabula Rasa", Spike is being pursued by a demon he owes money to. The demon has the head of a shark. Which makes him... a loan shark.
    • In another episode, Spike and others are gambling with baby cats instead of poker chips. In card games the betting pool is often referred to as "the kitty".
  • In Angel, Wesley and Angel are trying to translate a passage from memory, leading to the predictable gibberish. One of the "nonsense" phrases they come up with is "strangling poultry".
  • Stargate SG-1 has the following exchange:

Anis: You may call me Anis. It means "Noble Strength".
Daniel: I am Daniel. It means "God is my judge".
Jack: I'm Jack. It means... what's in the box?

    • Parodied in that this is an actual conversation change because he didn't know the meaning of his name....
      • So when it comes to names, he doesn't know Jack.
  • In The Sopranos, Phil's men is hiding in Vito's motel room, where they ambush and plan to kill him due to the revelation that he's gay. Phil himself is hiding in a closet, and once Vito has been subdued, Phil reveals himself to Vito by coming out of the closet.
  • On Top Gear, there is a joke award for the biggest presenter error called the Golden Cock award (a small figurine of a rooster). In the 2009 Top Gear Awards, the award was given to their "tame racing driver," The Stig, who refused to give it back and got quite violent when Richard Hammond tried to take it away from him. So you could say The Stig really likes the cock.
  • Cheers episode "Little Carla, Happy at Last": Carla finds out she's pregnant by Eddie LeBec. Worse yet, it's twins. She thinks that's bad news but the father disagrees:

Eddie: Twins means we're twice blessed! I can't believe it! This is the happiest night of my life!
Sam: You know, I had twins once. It was the happiest night of my life too.

  • An episode of Malcolm in the Middle has Dewey being menaced by a girl in his class. Reese offers to help him come up with some barbs to throw at her, and suggests finding something that rhymes with her name. Dewey says she's "Regina Tucker", and Reese says that isn't much to work with, but he's sure they'll think of something.
  • Lost has a ridiculous amount, if you stop to think about it. Locke—a man known for thinking out of the box—used to work at a box company. Naomi in fourth season didn't have a Ruth, making her ruthless. And in sixth season episode "The Substitute", Sawyer dangles for a while between the devil and the deep blue sea.
  • Doctor Who episode "Aliens of London" features a pig being put into a spaceship and fired at Big Ben in order to create a fake alien invasion which will scare the populace. So the entire plan revolves around a flying pig...
    • And in "The Parting of the Ways", the Doctor mentions the planet Barcelona:

Doctor: They've got dogs with no noses. Imagine how many times a day you end up telling that joke, and it's still funny!

    • "The Girl in the Fireplace". The Doctor saves the day and simultaneously foils the bad guys' plans by riding a horse through a mirror. This isn't obvious at first, until he explains and finishes with "I'm not winding you up". Sure, it's a Britishism for "I'm not joking", but he's talking to clockwork, ie. windup, robots.
    • In "The Curse Of The Black Spot", the Siren disappears injured people away to a hospital sickbay. When someone requires medical attention and help is being sent, it's generally heralded by a siren.
  • In the Torchwood episode "Dead Man Walking", after learning how much it sucks to be a zombie, Owen (unsuccessfully) attempts to drown his sorrows in beer.
    • And then he literally tries to drown himself.
  • Chuck's ability to access data on threats to the country is called "flashing". When he temporarily is unable to do so, he tries to practice, and is shown using a series of cards with images of spies on them, which are never actually called :"flash cards".
  • In "The Great British Nightmare" special episode of Kitchen Nightmares, Ramsay's attempts to prove a local restaurant is better than a chain restaurant are accompanied by the instrumental opening of Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain".
  • Tensou Sentai Goseiger‍'‍s ending song has a line which mentions Five Star. That's a possible meaning for Gosei, as used in Gosei Sentai Dairanger.
  • In Supernatural, we get a quick scene of the producer of a movie named Jay talking on the phone to a man named Bob. We never hear Bob's side of the conversation.
  • A possibly unintentional one from Coupling: Jeff has brought up the question of what would happen if breasts were given the power of independent thought, suggesting that "similar people in similar jobs, working in the same bra," wouldn't get along. Patrick suddenly comes up with an idea for a new porn film about battling breast-brains and spends the rest of the episode suggesting titles, including Wobble Wars, Two Minds, One Bra, The Girl with Two Brains ("Three brains, Patrick!") and The Girl With Two Breasts which Steve calls the stupidest title yet. At no point does anyone suggest the obvious pun: Bra Wars.
    • Not "Bra Fight"?
  • One episode of Smallville is all about nightmares. Every single song in the episode is by REM Another has a story where Lionel drove his wife insane -- it ends with him listening to Madame Butterfly.
  • Arrested Development at one point had Henry Winkler walking along a dock, and had to take a bit of a leap to get past a cartilaginous fish that was lying there.
    • A Getting Crap Past the Radar example- Lindsay has done a Cheek Copy and shows Michael a picture of that, thinking it's a picture of a car she wants to buy. Michael replies that what she showed him isn't a picture of a Vol-vo (it's a picture of her vulva).
  • How I Met Your Mother had an episode where Ted was lecturing his class about the work of an architect who had died midway through his work, leaving it unfinished, and repeating the word "unfinished" until the word lost all meaning. The background music? Schubert's Unfinished Symphony. Might double as a Genius Bonus.
    • One of the main characters is Marshall Erickson, a law student (and later a full-fledged lawyer). Incredibly, in six seasons, this pun-loving show has yet to make a joke about Marshall law.
      • Actually, Marshall himself made that joke in the episode where he found out he had passed the bar. Literally, ten seconds later.
  • Farscape has Rygel, a deposed king who has a tendency to release farts similar in effect to helium. Should I really point out that helium is a noble gas?
  • Glee‍'‍s episode "Furt" revolves around Finn's mother and Kurt's father marrying, making them into a family. Finn gives a speech in which he says that, as they're together, they should have a portmanteau name (no); they are now "Furt". Left unsaid is that, as of their families joining, they're Kin(n).
  • The very name of Dexter Morgan is most likely a Stealth Pun, given that it's Latin for "right." The corresponding term for "left"? Sinister.
  • Adrian Monk (notice the last name) is an OCD-ridden detective, making him a Creature of Habit.
  • The Cold Case episode "Beautiful Little Fool" opens with the 1929 New Year party in a mansion. In the next scene, one of the attendants is dead. It turns out the killer worked as butler in said mansion, meaning The Butler Did It.
  • In the first season of Burn Notice, Michael adopts the persona of good ol' boy Homer to repo a boat. He's working for a man named Virgil.
  • In the Forest Dragon part of Dragons: A Fantasy Made Real, there's a confrontation between the dragon and a tiger. While the tiger is crouching around, the dragon is hiding in the forest trees. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
  • In the fourth-series Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch "A Doctor," a doctor hands a questionnaire to a patient bleeding profusely (where his nurse stabbed him) and gives him failing marks for wrong answers (correct answers include "The Merchant of Venice" and "the Treaty of Versailles"). He never says he's giving his patient an exam.
  • In the Degrassi franchise, nobody ever called Mr. Raditch "Radish" until JT and Liberty in his actor's last episode on the show.
  • In an episode of Red Dwarf, Lister suggests a game of squash with Rimmer's light-bee, a device which flies around and projects his holographic image. Squash is a game played with a small hollow ball. Hollow, holo...
  • David Letterman did something along these lines when he gave a list of the top ten Bill Clinton jokes. He never actually got to the punchline, he just would trail off and look at the audience, who could figure it out for themselves and were hysterical by that point.
  • Conan O'Brien on Late Night, doing one of the 'cat is to kitten, what dog is to puppy' routines:

"The New Orleans Hooker (long pause) had sex with several miners."
"Michael Jackson (an even longer pause, with audience already chuckling) was famous in the 80's! What did you think I was going to say?"

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