Berserk Button/Live Action TV

When a nice, normal character suddenly goes into a rage, you've hit his Berserk Button.

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• The Big Bang Theory: "WHEATON!!!!!!!"
• Ryuji in Tokumei Sentai Gobusters does this after over heating going into an uncontrollable state were he attacks friend or foe
• Don't call Kegareshia an old lady. Seriously, unless you have a giant robot, don't.
• Garo:
  • Dare to even hurt or make Kaoru cry and you WILL be facing the wrath of a pissed off Kouga and that is not a happy sight, you WILL be crying in the corner and begging for him to spare your life, and you WILL be pissing your pants.
  • Wanna know how frightening an angry Kouga is? Imagine the wrath of God just multiplied by 10 milion, and death is probably being too merciful unless you're the Monster of the Week - and if not, you will be left knocked out in a pool of your own blood or put on life support!
    • Don't talk shit about his parents either, because just like with his girlfriend you will face severe consequences and you will be scared shitless... in general, just don't make a badass One-Man Army angry, unless you have a death wish.
      • Also don't bring up Rei's dead girlfriend, if you do his calm cool demeanor will be lost and he will kick your ass
        • Go after Tsubasa's little sister and he'll impale you.
• If Jack Bauer is demanding answers NOW!!!, you had best answer them. Failure to do so will result in extremely unpleasant consequences.
  • Also, lying to Jack Bauer is the same as feeding yourself to a hungry Grizzly Bear. Just much worse.
    • And if he thinks that you've killed his wife and daughter (Season 1 finale), he will take you down.
    • A good rule of thumb is: don't go after Kim Bauer. Don't threaten Kim Bauer, don't make disparaging remarks towards Kim Bauer, don't touch Kim Bauer, don't look at Kim Bauer in a less than friendly way. Don't even think slightly negative thoughts about Kim Bauer if you value your various limbs.
  • If you're dumb enough to assassinate David Palmer, please don't be dumb enough to actually admit it to Jack Bauer.
  • Don't mention his dead wife. Ever.
  • And if you are actually stupid enough to lose track of Jack Bauer while his life is in danger... well, Bad Things will happen to you courtesy of Rack Bauer Renee Walker.
    • And while we're at it... Don't. Fucking. Touch. Renee. Walker.
  • Do not fuck with Allison Taylor's country, and do not fuck with Allison Taylor's people. Or she will remind you -- painfully -- precisely why she is the first female ever to sit in the Oval Office.
  • Also, it's probably not such a wise idea to do anything bad to Michelle Dessler. Tony will not be happy.
• Do not call anyone on Double the Fist weak, especially Steve. Don't do anything to piss off Mephisto. In fact, it's best to just not be in any vicinity of Mephisto.
• Friends:
  • JOEY DOESN'T SHARE FOOD.
  • Don't tell Rachel she and Ross were on a break either. On the other hand, don't tell Ross that they were on a break.
  • Perhaps not so much a character trait as a one-off breakdown, but... "YOU ATE? MY? SANDWICH?!?"
• Ray J. Johnson, a character on The Redd Foxx Show, employed a variation on this as his signature trope; whenever addressed as "Mister Johnson," he would angrily rattle off a list of other things he would prefer to be called.
• The Golden Age of Ballooning sketch on one episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus starred Ferdinand von Zeppelin, creator of the zeppelin airship, taking a trip in one of his zeppelins. Several people came up to him to congratulate him on his marvellous "balloon," to which he screams in a terrible German accent, "IT'S AN AIRSHIP!" and throws the offender out the window.
  • And he's NOT going to name it after Bismarck. It's a Zeppelin! It's nothing to do with bloody Bismarck!
  • In the Mattress Sketch, one must never say "mattress" to Mr. Lambert unless you want him to put a paper bag over his head and respond to nothing. The only way to snap him out of it is to stand in a tea chest and sing Elgar's "Jerusalem".
• In the episode of The King of Queens "Bun Dummy," Carrie would get very defensive if someone (usually Doug) made even a passing comment about her wearing her hair in a bun (Indeed, Carrie was taking her bun-wearing pretty seriously). It was only when she saw a picture of Doug's old high school librarian (emphasis on "old") with her hair in a bun that she realized they were right all along. To be fair, it was just in that episode, so it could also be considered a Compressed Vice.
• In an episode of Without a Trace, Jack and Samantha catch a serial killer (who was posing as his twin brother) by using his Berserk Button: he hated his childhood nickname, "Mouse." The resulting violence was then cut short by the above agents immediately pointing their guns at him.
• In The Catherine Tate Show, the comedy in the "Derek" sketches comes almost exclusively from his reaction when Mistaken for Gay.
• Scotty of Star Trek: The Original Series has a very logical Berserk Button for a chief engineer. Insult The Federation? Fine. Insult Captain Kirk? Fine. Insult the Enterprise? Prepare for a Bar Brawl.
  • Insulting Captain Kirk did hit Chekov's Berserk Button, but Scotty managed to hold him back.
  • The specific reason Scotty lost it when the Klingon insulted his ship is because, emotionally, she is his child.
  • Don't call Worf a coward. Just don't.
  • Or call B'Elanna "Miss Turtlehead."
    • Klingons are natural berserkers.
  • Also not a wise move to endanger any of Janeway's crew.
    • Killing yourself immediately afterward would be a very wise move as Janeway will personally ensure you live a life of hideous pain for what you did to her family.
    • Ensign Harry Kim is quite submisive...unless you hurt his best friend, Tom Paris, then he will smash your frickin' skull in!

Kim: This man is my friend! Nobody touches him!

• • Jean-Luc Picard is a very refined gentleman. You can assimilate him, torture him, attack his ship, you name it, and he will still be willing to try to sit down and sort out the misunderstanding over a nice cup of Earl Grey. But... if you're a fellow officer who feels you can disrespect the principles of Starfleet or another officer for your own convenience just because you think you have clout, he will seriously mess you up. And the worst part is he won't lift a finger.
    • I dunno... bringing up Jean-Luc's stint as Locutus seemed to press a pretty volatile Berserk Button.

Picard: "They invade our space, and we fall back. They assimilate entire worlds, and we fall back. Not again. The line must be drawn HEYAH! This far, no farther! And I will make them PAY for what they have done!"

• • • Sisko feels the same way about anyone betraying the uniform.
  • James T. Kirk will let a lot of stuff slide. But DO NOT try to hijack or steal his lady, the Enterprise. He WILL blow up the damn ship, just so you can see who you're truly messing with.
  • Kirk also doesn't like it when his crew is killed.
  • If you call Spock a half-breed or insult his parents ("Your father was a computer and your mother an encyclopedia!"), your death will be slow and painful. (You have to really go for the throat and stay on those buttons for a while to erode his Vulcan patience. Once you do, though...)
    • Spock was under alien influence when this happened; otherwise, he simply says calmly "when emotion is not present, insult has no effect." This was only subverted just after his home-planet was blown up; otherwise, Harry Mudd said "You couldn't sell faulty patents to your mother!" And Spock only looked puzzled and said "I fail to understand why I should care to induce my mother to purchase falsified patents."
  • Don't try and come between Dr. McCoy and one of his patients, especially if that patient is Spock or Kirk. Just don't. Also, do not suggest that logic is an acceptable solution to anything when human lives are at stake. Especially if you are Spock.
  • In seven years of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Garak played the part of the ever-smiling, urbane, witty, Deadpan Snarker. If you annoyed him, he'd shoot you in the back, probably still smiling. But, in all those years, he consistently had one true love he remained ever faithful to: Cardassia herself. However, right at the end of the show, when Cardassia has finally been liberated from the Dominion at a massive cost of Federation, Klingon and Romulan life, one of the Dominion's last acts was to start wiping out the civilian population of Cardassia as revenge for them fighting for their own freedom, forever destroying the Cardassia everyone had known. And then Wayoun decided to rub Garak's nose in it...
• Kaylee of Firefly behaves similarly to Scotty above, and is ready to fight a garrison of Feds for insulting Serenity. Also, whatever you do, do not threaten or turn on any member of Mal's crew. If you're lucky, he'll just shoot you. But if you aren't, he's more than willing to throw you out the airlock or worse. This is important enough to be reiterated, just DON'T go after any member of Mal's crew. I don't care if it seems like a good idea at the time, it's not, it never will be and he will kill you dead. In particular, do not under any circumstances harm (or even threaten) Kaylee. Not only will Mal kill the living snot out of you, the rest of the crew will help.
  • Inara does not take kindly to being called a whore -- as she will tell you, the term is "Companion." Her anger about it, however, is mild compared to Mal -- his response to Atherton implying that Inara was a whore in "Shindig" was to haul off and deck him.
    • Mal attacking Atherton also falls under his "don't insult my crew" thing. As he states later, he's allowed to call Inara a whore because he's just disrespecting her profession, whereas Atherton was disrespecting her.
  • Don't refer to the Independents' involvement and eventual defeat in the war as anything but heroic around Zoe or Mal. Actually, just don't mention it, it's safer just to keep your mouth shut.
  • Zoe's is rather obvious, although rarely triggered: Wash.
  • Simon has River. River has Fruity Oat Bars Simon. Screw with either of them, and you don't want to know the other will do to you.
• When in Rome, don't talk ill of the XIII Legion. Just don't.
• In the '70s live-action Saturday morning show The Kids from C.A.P.E.R., Bugs went berserk whenever he heard the word "bananas," for no apparent reason.
• One of comedy host Jon Stewart's major hot buttons is gay rights. When he was "interviewing" the show's senior black correspondent Larry Wilmore on the subject of the black community's opposition to gay marriage, Stewart got very worked up and aggressive, despite the fact that the "interview" was pre-planned and comedic.
  • Very little compares to what Jon will do to you if you diss New York City. He used to have a view of the Twin Towers from his apartment. The fact that he doesn't have that view anymore tends to fill him, just as it fills many, many New Yorkers, with Unstoppable Rage. Imply that New York City is unpatriotic, or not part of "Real America," and that Nice Jewish Boy will fucking destroy you.
    • After Sarah Palin saying that small towns were "Real America", Stewart's response? "You know, I just want to say to her, just very quickly...Fuck you. I've never seen someone with a greater disparity between how cute they sound when they're saying something and how terrible what they're saying is. 'Don't ya know, Obama, by golly, he just is a terrorist? What? Oh, you know, he just, gosh, kills babies, you know.' I'm so over the idea that only small-town America is the heart and soul. Small-town America is fine, but it's the same as cities. Cities are just a lot of towns piled on top of each other in one place. They have this whole thing that somehow we can write off entire swaths of the country, that we are somehow...I get it. You know, New York City wasn't good enough for fucking Osama bin Laden, it better be good enough for you. I can't take it anymore. After eight years of this divisiveness, we're back to this idea that only small-town America is the real America. I get it. I'm from New York. We have a lot of gay people. But homosexuals don't have sodomy on Russian flags."
  • Also, do not, under any circumstances, let him catch you eating pizza with a fork.
• Cameron does not like it when someone lies to her. However, being somewhat lacking in emotions, her anger tends to be very cold.
  • John Connor is both Cameron and Sarah's Berserk Button. Harm him, and your life is forfeit.
  • And don't take Cameron's leather jacket. She likes her leather jacket. She does not like you.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer
  • Mayor Wilkins, season 3's Big Bad, tends to lean toward the Affably Evil end of things: insisting on good hygiene from his minions, reading newspaper funny pages, refraining from profanity, and giving Buffy and Angel seemingly genuinely well-meant relationship advice. Then his enforcer, Faith, is put in a coma. He actually tries to smother Buffy right in the middle of the hospital. In front of a nurse. When Angel tries to stop him, he goes so far as to call Buffy a whore. And he was the only villain who actually wanted to keep all the fighting and death a secret. Before this, when Faith has gone missing and her apartment is a warzone, the mayor tells his minion to find her, and the minion tries to remind him of the upcoming Ascension. Cue the first time he ever loses his cool, and the only time in his entire run that he ever yells.
  • In season 3, the Mayor interrupts the Scoobies' meeting in the library. He threatens Buffy and before you can say "Who's your Watcher?" Giles has shoved a sword through his chest. (It's just a shame Wilkins is invulnerable by that point.) If you want to fuck with Buffy, you're going to have to fuck with her badass, daddy figure of a Watcher. Vice versa as well. If you try to screw with Giles, you're going to have to screw with Buffy too.
  • Faith's coma was the result of her hitting Buffy's Berserk Button -- harming Angel. When Spike did so in season 2, he barely survived. The reverse:

Spike: "We all have obsessions, Angel. I believe yours is called... "Slutty" the Vampire Slayer."

• • In Season 6, Spike's habit of calling Buffy "love" or "my girl" is guaranteed to set her off, sometimes violently.
  • The Scooby Gang is one giant Berserk Button. Hurt one of them, and they will all hunt you down. This sometimes works against them, however. When one of their own harms another one of their own, chaos ensues.
  • Tara was Willow's Berserk Button. Warren pressed it. The world was lucky enough to survive; Warren... not so much. He was later brought back to life (still completely flayed) by Amy, but she didn't tell him he'd been dead because she felt it would upset him. Glory survived doing this in Season Five, but she was a hellgod.
  • In the season finale, Andrew tries to calm Anya down by having her think of good things. Then he mentions bunnies...
  • Do not call Cordelia Chase a bitch. She will prove it.
  • Harmony may be an idiot, but that doesn't give you a license to insult her unicorns.
  • Interestingly, later in the series, Angel is Faith's Berserk Button -- don't insult him or endanger him. She even tells Wesley she won't kill him when he's Angelus, because Angel is the only one who never gave up on her.
  • Cordelia is also Angel's berserk button, at least until she dies.
  • Fred's discovery of who sent her to Pylea causes a complete change in her personality, including using harsh language for the first time.
  • Wes and Gunn both had Fred as a berserk button at different times, and both when she was dying. Wes shot the guy who wasn't working her case, Gunn went postal on Knox, and had to fight the urge to bash him to death. Then Wes went postal on Gunn with the knife. And earlier, when "Roger" threatened Fred, Wes was willing to shoot his own father to protect her.
  • Like Team Buffy, Team Angel was one big berserk button with each other, you did not hurt one without the others coming to get you. With the possible exception of Wes in season 3 -- Angel'd have just said "hurt him more".
  • Connor went berserk when he thought Holtz was killed by Angel.
  • Despite the problems, Connor was another Angel berserk button.
  • Alonna was Gunn's, briefly.
  • Don't make any remarks about Illyria being weak or human... most often happens when she morphs into Fred, but other times as well. Case in point: Vail called her a little girl and she punched his head to smithereens. Although given the context, this one was actually less about her and more because Vail had just killed Wesley, the human she'd bonded with most and the lover of her vessel Fred. It was a defining, almost humanising moment for the Old One who had consistently stated that humans are beneath her.
  • Attacking Dru was a big one of Spike's.
  • Another huge one of Buffy's: do NOT go after Dawn or Joyce. Period.
  • Harming or threatening Willow is the only thing that sets Oz off.
• While playing himself in Father Ted, Richard Wilson is portrayed as reacting violently whenever someone repeats his catchphrase as Victor Meldrew to him. The actor himself admits that this (much like anyone else haunted by a well-known catchphrase) is something that spills over to real life.
• In Doctor Who, you do NOT call Ace small. She will hurt you. With a bat. And Nitro-9.
  • For a time, it wasn't wise to bring up the subject of Rose to the Doctor either. He wouldn't hurt you, but you could be assured the things would be unpleasant.
    • Or bring harm to any of his companions, or any person that he likes. It just isn't a safe place to stand.
    • Don't tell Isobel Watkins to Stay in the Kitchen.
    • If you tell Jacob Kewper that smuggling is bad, your only hope of surviving is if he owes you a favour.
    • Don't tell the Sixth Doctor he's got no fashion sense. Really, it's a very bad idea.
  • While the Daleks are pretty much set to berserk, at least in voice, Rose managed to piss Dalek Sec off so badly that he momentarily forgot that he needed her alive to open the Genesis Ark. That's what happens when you take credit for killing the Dalek Emperor. She did this on purpose, of course.
  • Don't threaten, hurt, kidnap, or in any other way harm Ian Chesterton's friends. He will do anything to keep them safe. Especially Barbara.
  • Don't make fun of the Fifth Doctor's celery. Okay, granted, he doesn't go full-on Ax Crazy on you, but he will get angry. And he doesn't get angry very often, so that's kind of a big deal.
  • Captain Cook from The Greatest Show in the Galaxy is, in fact, a crashing bore. However, saying so to his face is not a good idea.
  • Word to the wise, don't kill the Doctor. The resulting fury emanating from River Song will cause a Dalek to plead for mercy.
  • After wiping out the Time Lords to defeat the Daleks in the Time War, the Ninth Doctor pretty much loses it when he discovers the lone Dalek in the basement of Van Statten's bunker. For someone who hates violence (although he was all-around more violent than Ten), he's quick to attack it with intent to kill. Which makes the thing's later Shut UP, Hannibal all the more jarring:

"You would make a good Dalek."

• • Do not attempt genocide if the Doctor is around. He will not be intimidated. He will be angry. And you will perish.
  • Don't take Rose's face. Ever.
  • There are a few Eleven examples. For instance, he goes into a psychotic violent rage when the Dalek keeps denying that it's a Dalek.
  • For the love of all things sweet and cute, do not try to excuse your actions by saying you were only following orders. The Doctor will NOT be impressed.
  • Do not threaten Martha's family, or even imply that something's more important than they are. Witness how vicious she was towards The Master for the former, and for the first time she was very pissed at the Doctor for the latter (they made ammends, but it probably helped her get over her crush on him...)
    • Similarly, do not tell Rory that Amy's not important. You like having teeth? The Doctor, of course, pressed this one on purpose.
  • The Sontarans' feeding orifice on the back of the neck is quite sensitive. It is NOT a weakness.
  • It's probably not a good idea to tell any villain not to do something, but the Master takes it personally when someone tries to use him to their own ends. He once retaliated by near-complete genocide of humanity: literally everyone on earth but two people were utterly remade as duplicates of him. Sure, it got reversed, but you know what he did for an encore the very next episode? He personally ended the Time Lords as a species, excepting only the Doctor, because one of them manipulated him. Once. That once was a doozy, sure, but he did have opportunity to avoid Disproportionate Retribution. He decided against.
  • Wanna hurt the Doctor's companions? Okay, it's your funeral. No, literally.
  • Basically, to sum it up, NEVER do or threaten to do anything violent around the Doctor, especially not if it includes one of his Companions or someone he likes in general. It will end badly.
  • Don't try to get to the Doctor through the people he love. You will find out exactly why he has so many rules...

"Good men don't need rules. Today is not the day to find out why I have so many."

• • Harm Amy Pond and you'll have her husband to deal with. He will have a Let's Get Dangerous moment, and it won't be pretty.
    • If you really don't value your life, threaten their daughter as well. Rory will break out the Centurion armour...and then you'll find out that River Song gets her ability to make Daleks beg for mercy directly from her Dad.
    • Rory also hates it when the Doctor endangers anyone. He will chew the Doctor out because of this.
  • On the other hand, threaten the Doctor in any way and River Song will kill you. Seriously.
  • If you are hunting the Doctor and he runs away instead of fighting, you should probably run and hide yourself instead of attacking random people.

Son of Mine: He never raised his voice. That was the worst thing... the fury of the Time Lord... and then we discovered why. Why this Doctor, who had fought with gods and demons, why he had run away from us and hidden. He was being kind... He wrapped my father in unbreakable chains forged in the heart of a dwarf star. He tricked my mother into the event horizon of a collapsing galaxy. To be imprisoned there... forever. He still visits my sister, once a year, every year. I wonder if one day he might forgive her... but there she is. Can you see? He trapped her inside a mirror. Every mirror. If ever you look at your reflection and see something move behind you just for a second, that's her. That's always her. As for me, I was suspended in time and the Doctor put me to work standing over the fields of England as their protector. We wanted to live forever. So the Doctor made sure we did.

• There's an engineered instance in Torchwood: the guy Suzie has been messing with will go into a ten-second Unstoppable Rage when the titular organization is mentioned.
  • Do *NOT* touch Jack's Hand-In-A-Jar.
  • Rhys is shlubbish, out of shape, even a little dim sometimes. He's not in Jack's league, and he knows it. Gwen loves him anyway. Don't hurt her, or the secret conspiracy keeping Britain safe from alien invasion? It won't have the resources or ability to save you.
  • Also do not hurt Jack. It doesn't matter that he's immortal and near-indestructible. Meek and quiet Ianto Jones will stop at nothing to keep his lover safe!
• Do you want to harm Luke Smith? The correct answer is - no, you do not. His mother Sarah Jane - a former Companion, and not of the screaming type either - will stop at nothing to save him. No, seriously. There's no power in the universe that can save you from Sarah Jane's wrath. And they've all tried. Needless to say, they failed. Painfully.
• When he was first introduced, Hooch from Scrubs did not take kindly to his name being misused. And then, he went crazy.
  • Man, Hooch is crazy.
  • Did you pull a screw from a door, so it won't stay open right? The next 7 years of your life are hell, courtesy of the Janitor.
• Don't make fun of Trudy within earshot of Adrian Monk. Or talk about how you can vacuum his carpet to make the lines all diagonal. Or relieve yourself on the subway. Monk has several things that set him off, but most of his Berserk Buttons (such as urinating in public or public nudity) are played for comedic effect. With the exception of his wife Trudy's death. Press it and all bets are off.
  • A classic example of his berserk button in action is in "Mr. Monk Is on the Air", where he's questioning the killer of the week on his talk show. Trudy is brought up, and the host immediately starts cracking jokes about her death via car bomb. Monk glares at him, slowly takes off his headphones, and jumps over the desk to tackle him. In fact, security personnel actually are seen forcibly removing Monk from the studio because of this. I'm pretty sure someone's going to accuse that jockey of intentionally inflicting emotional distress.
  • Speaking of wife-related berserk buttons, never, EVER hurt/nearly kill (intentionally or not) or even imply at having an affair with Stottlemeyer's first wife, or else you'd better pray that he doesn't end up beating you up or killing you for for it.
  • Also, in "Mr. Monk and the Man Who Shot Santa Claus", Stottlemeyer can tolerate people crowding a crime scene to jeer at Monk for shooting Santa (of which the actual details are debated, although Stottlemeyer knows Monk's version is the true version), but if someone ever attempts to go so far as to throw one egg at Monk or Natalie, especially during a crime scene investigation that Monk is involved in trying to determine what most likely happened, Stottlemeyer's fury at this will have no bounds, even going so far as to shout when demanding to know who threw an egg at them and rush towards them. Justified, though, because egging someone in an active crime scene could also end up contaminating evidence. Plus, egging is also a crime.
  • Randy Disher does not take it kindly whenever the cops think that he is not a reliable source when he had managed to witness a murder. You also don't want to mess with Randy's captain or the captain's wife, because Randy will suddenly remember that he's a cop, and a pretty good one at that.
  • Natalie has her own Berserk Buttons. Often these have to do with Monk's reluctance to pay her or being fed up with Monk's idyosyncracies.
    • First in "Mr. Monk vs. the Cobra," where she is like this upon learning that Monk is still paying rent on Trudy's old office.
    • In "Mr. Monk and the Genius," there are two instances: the first is when Natalie screams in frustration and makes an Angry Fist Shake upon learning Monk's reluctance to pay her $1,800 in backpay. The second is when Monk dares to suggest that Natalie's lemonade is poisoned.
    • There's one in "Mr. Monk and the Bully" where Natalie gets in Monk's face when he insists on continuing a case despite the fact that she thinks his obsession with the case is bordering onto the lines of stalking.
  • In "Mr. Monk and the Magician," this happens when the titular magician, also a killer, treats Monk and Natalie's investigation like it's part of a show, with Natalie telling him off.
• In the remake of Battlestar Galactica, Commander Adama's is when people threaten his crew -- comes with being a True Companions. It's most obvious in the second season, when Helo and Tyrol are facing execution for accidentally killing another officer, so he almost goes to war with the superior battlestar Pegasus to get them back.
  • Speaking of Helo, don't ever call his wife or daughter a "toaster." Nor should you call him a "toasterfrakker."
  • And as evidenced in season 4.5, do not keep Laura Roslin from talking to her people. Do not cut off Laura Roslin's wireless. And especially do NOT tell Laura Roslin you've just killed her boyfriend, Admiral Adama. She will be COMING. FOR. ALL. OF. YOU.
  • You can kick Felix Gaeta out of the military and leave him stranded on New Caprica to lose his faith in Gaius Baltar day by soul-destroying day, attempt to throw him out of an airlock on charges of betraying the humanity he's largely responsible for saving, expect him to take orders from people who tried to murder him, send him off on a fool's mission under an unstable commander whom he despises (and in company with most of the people who tried to murder him), shoot his leg half off and refuse to take him back to medical care in time to save it, send him straight back on duty after the amputation with barely enough time to recover, kill yourself almost in front of his eyes (if you're his best friend) and force him to face terrible truths about the past by murdering his shipmates one by one, and he'll just get bitterer and snarkier. But don't make the mistake of telling him that the people who survived the Cylon occupation of New Caprica are going to be forced to live under Cylon occupation again and like it. Or at least, make sure you're not holding a loaded military while you do. Because if you are, he will take about three-fifths of it away from you, aim it very precisely in your direction, and let go. With prejudice.
  • Harming Gaius Baltar's friends in anyway will show you why most people on the show are actually shit-scared of him. He stormed into a pagan temple and trashed the place, shot John Cavil and drove the Cylons to the brink of extinction. Threatening children will also send him dangerously close to the edge. Remember when Sharon Agathon tried to take Hera? He forced her at the point of a gun to turn the child over to him and the Cylons. Insulting him or threatening his life will also probably result in mass destruction as well.
• In The X-Files, Mulder and Scully are each other's Berserk Buttons. Hurt Mulder or Scully. Just try it. The other half of that partnership will own you. Witness the normally calm Scully's outburst at Boggs in "Beyond the Sea" and Mulder's rage when Scully is abducted. I would not want to come between those two.

Scully: I came here to tell you that if he dies because of what you did, four days from now no one will stop me from being the one to throw the switch to gas you out of this life for good, you sonofabitch!

• • • And then there's:

Mulder: (showing Duane Barry Scully's bloodied hair) Did you hurt her?
Duane: N-no...
Mulder: DID YOU HURT HER?!?

• • • Both the above examples are within season 1-2 of the show. God help you if you tried anything after they'd been partners a few years longer. It never worked out well for the perpetrator.
    • Baby William is also a Berserk Button for both of his parents, plus Doggett, Reyes, Skinner, and the Lone Gunmen. Scully is probably the scariest; Mama Bear does not appreciate the attempts on her son's life. At one point, she shoots a would-be kidnapper three times in the stomach and refuses to give him medical treatment until he gives her answers.
  • John Doggett's Berserk Buttons involve anyone hurting his partners (especially Agent Reyes), and his son, Luke. Likely stemming from issues around his son's kidnapping and murder, Mulder and Scully's son William also becomes a Berserk Button for him during season 9.
• Harm Noah Bennet/HRG's family, and you will understand why he doesn't need superpowers.
  • Jessica has a similar reaction to any perceived threats to Micah. Only she has superpowers.
  • And Hiro hates being called "Pikachu."
  • Threaten Claire and not only will HRG bring down a world of hurt on you, but so will Peter, Nathan, Angela, Sandra, and a whole lot of others.
  • Do not threaten Molly Walker or Daphne Millbrook. Matt Parkman knows how to screw with your mind.
  • Harm an innocent special that Samuel has his eye on. To rephrase, harm someone he considers his family. The man can level buildings with a single thought. You think you can take him?
  • Gabriel Gray's name is "Sylar", and would appreciate you refer to him as such.
    • Also, don't ever tell him that he's not special or lie to him about it. That's just asking for it.
  • It's understandable that, when Sylar and Elle (along with everyone else) lose their powers for several hours, the first thought in their minds is "Fuck! Now, HRG's training is more than enough to end us." HRG punctuates this with a sniper rifle from half-a-block away. Honestly, they only survived this because of luck.
• In CSI, Gil Grissom can converse coolly with rapists, child abusers, murderers, arsonists, and serial killers without breaking a sweat. But hurt Sara, and Unstoppable Rage doesn't even begin to describe it. The Miniature Killer is lucky to be alive. In the first season, Grissom cites three Berserk Buttons he has.

Grissom: "There's three things I got a real problem with: Guys that hit their wives, sexual assault on children and the scum that deal death to kids."

• • This is very true - however, Grissom will merely coolly destroy the lives of anyone stupid enough to attempt the above. It isn't until Sara is taken that viewers see precisely what happens when Grissom goes off the deep end.
  • The hurting kids thing also goes for Catherine. And specifically do not attempt to harm Lindsey Willows, or Mama Bear Catherine will personally tear you apart.
  • Nick gets into the act as well with child attackers, due to his own childhood.
  • A more minor one: Greg will not share his Blue Hawaiian coffee with you and don't try swiping it.
  • And don't tell Greg you kidnapped Morgan, as evidenced in "CSI Down".
  • Ecklie used to seem to love pushing Grissom's Berserk Button early in the series. Ecklie WAS one of his Berserk Buttons, I think.
  • Don't abuse animals and let Sara catch you. Or be a rapist or child abuser.
  • Do not try to steal a body from Doc Robbins' office. He may seem harmless enough, but he's something else with that crutch.
  • Sam Braun's was someone going after Catherine...he might be tempted to get the concrete shoes out in that case.
  • Nate Haskell pushed Ray Langston's when he sent him a kidney bean to remind Ray of the stabbing that lost Ray his real kidney. Langston's other one was, again with Haskell, hurting Gloria. Ex wife she may have been, but Haskell paid anyway.
  • Don't call Julie 'Julie' or 'Jules'. Just call her Finn and you'll be okay. D.B. is that way to a lesser extent about 'Diebenkorn', but he doesn't get as peeved as Julie.
  • Just try mentioning the name Jeffery Mckeen in connection to a case when Nick is in the room and see how he reacts. It won't be pretty.
• In CSI: NY do not make any attempt to harm either Danny or Lindsay. They're not fun to make angry on their own, and Shane Casey would attest if he were still alive that the other half of the couple will hunt you down and personally shoot you unless Mac can hold them back. Doubly so if you get Lucy involved.
  • And do not make any negative remarks about the Marines around Mac. Or harm children. He isn't fond of Dirty Cops either, or people who hurt cops. He told the guy who shot the mounted officer in 'Officer Blue' that if it were up to him, he'd shoot the guy right there without a trial.
  • Or be someone who hurts women when Stella's on the case.
  • It's not a good idea to shoot/hurt/kill any member of the team. The others will hunt you down, with Mac in the lead. Shooting Mac himself is ten times worse, just ask the chick who did it at the end of season 8. You will be lucky to make it to a trial. Happened with Aiden's death too-Danny would have beat up the guy he thought did it badly if not for Mac warning him to do things right if he wanted a conviction.
• Don't ever say the suits of the Power Rangers RPM are made of spandex in Dr. K's presence. "Tights" seems to be okay, though.
  • The same series includes Scott, who doesn't take it well when a Mook Grinder scratches his Cool Car.
  • Also, in the third season of the show, whenever Rito Revolto would call Lord Zedd "Ed"... it just wouldn't end well. At all. Actually, Rito was just a walking Berserk Button for all the other villains.
    • Alpha 5 does this as well when Zedd invades the Command Center in "Changing of the Zords, Part 2":

Lord Zedd: Oh, Alpha, you can come out of hiding.
Alpha 5 [trembling]: I don't like you . . . Ed!

Lord Zedd: IT'S ZEDD, YOU BLINKING BUCKET OF BOLTS! LORD ZEDD!

• In Kamen Rider Kiva, Knight Templar Keisuke Nago goes berserk over a button on a shirt. Nago is a Bounty Hunter who takes a button from every crook he captures as a trophy. In one episode, a Fangire criminal goes out of his way to mess with Nago, even having the buttons of his coat reinforced so they can't be yanked off. This causes Nago to go completely off the deep end, even beating up some cops and abducting the criminal post-arrest just to get the damn thing. And while doing so, he rants "BUTTON! MY BUTTON! MY BUTTON!" Not his proudest moment.
• While calling Hidari Shotarou 'half-boiled' will annoy him, making someone cry will really piss him off.
• In NCIS, don't endanger anybody on Leroy Jethro Gibbs's team. Especially Abby.
  • Also, Tony DiNozzo will travel halfway around the world, get himself captured by terrorists, and willingly undergo torture that would make the CIA blanch in order to get his teammate(s) back (more specifically, to get Ziva). And then Gibbs will snipe you. From half a mile away.
  • Tony goes into heavy depression without Ziva, Ziva starts River Tam style slaughtering you if you hurt Tony. But they're only team-mates. Nothing more AT ALL.
  • Also, do not slight Gibbs in any way around Abby. She can kill you without leaving a single trace of forensic evidence.
• Michael Weston of Burn Notice has two major berserk buttons. One is messing with his family (or Sam or Fiona, who are as good as at this point), the other is abused children. And you do not want to mess with Michael when he's angry.

Madeline: For a child? Michael would take on the whole Chinese army.

• • And if you value your continued existence, you will never, EVER, harm a child or even TALK about doing it around Fiona. She will sacrifice the entire mission, break cover, simply to crush you with her bare hands.
  • You do not screw over or kill any of Sam's buddies, he will ruin your life and/or kill you regardless of consequences.
  • You should really think twice (or ten times) before destroying Michael Westin's life. Five seasons later, your entire organization has been systematically dismantled and destroyed.
• Supernatural makes an art of pressing the Berserk Button (and fuels countless gigs of fanfic) by using the preternatural protectiveness brothers Sam and Dean feel for each other. Even think about hurting Sam and Dean will turn your brain matter into jelly. And now that Sam has upped his mojo quotient with demon blood, even minions from Hell won't get a pass if they so much as breathe wrong around Dean.
  • Also, it's a bad idea to call Sam a freak.
  • And no matter how tempted you are to lose faith, do NOT piss off the nerd-angels.
    • Especially Castiel. You do not want to threaten the Winchesters with him around unless you have a death wish.
  • Don't mention Gabriel's family. Just don't do it.
  • Don't mess with Dean's car either
  • Really, just do not threaten, hurt or insult any of Dean's family (including but not limited to Sam, John, Castiel and Bobby). Anyone can tell you it's a bad way to keep all your teeth, let alone your life.
• Ricky in Noah's Arc is typically as carefree as they come, but if he feels for a second that Noah is threatened he WILL let you know how he feels.
• The normally-placid Kyle in All the Small Things physically attacks an antagonist who speaks badly of Tom De Longe, Kyle's favourite singer.
• Law and Order and its spinoffs are rife with these:
  • Hurt Alex Eames and there is nothing Bobby Goren won't do to hunt you down and destroy you. Word of advice: DO NOT mess with Goren's mother or he'll take your head off.
  • Go ahead and insult Connie Rubirosa in front of Mike Cutter. Or, if you're really looking for punishment, try it when he's already irritated.
  • For that matter, don't throw Claire Kincaid in Jack McCoy's face. I wouldn't want to be a drunk driver (one of whom killed Claire) around him either.
  • Law and Order Special Victims Unit has a cast that is very much full of "hot button" issues:
    • Olivia Benson's major issues are rape and alcoholism. She was convinced for years that she was a Child by Rape, and her mother was also an alcoholic.
    • Elliot Stabler despises pedophiles and also incest (due to the many male-offender-young-female-victim cases he's worked). He also does not react kindly to any threat toward his own kids. Also, he has recently been revealed to have a button about mental illness as well.
    • Odafin "Fin" Tutuola has race and drug abuse as his particular hot buttons. Like Stabler, he's also a Papa Wolf.
    • John Munch has suicide, assisted suicide, big government and infringement of civil liberties as his particular buttons.
    • Captain Cragen also has a hot button about alcoholism, given that he's a recovering alcoholic himself and a member of AA.
    • Dr. George Huang does not respond well to pseudo-psychology (it insults his intelligence), and has a major hot button about gay-bashing, as he has been revealed to be gay himself. He also does not appreciate people taking advantage of harmless crazy people -- witness his public screaming match with Stabler after Stabler manipulates a schizophrenic's delusions to get information.
    • Beat up Casey Novak. Go on, I dare you. I'll even pick your mangled corpse off the sidewalk when Elliot Stabler has smashed you to a bloody mess. If Cragen doesn't toss you out of a window first.
  • If you harm a child, harm Alesha Philips, or threaten Ronnie Brooks, you'd better pray that Matt Devlin doesn't find you. In fact, in the case of Alesha, you'd better pray that none of the Law and Order UK team find you.
• The Adventures of Pete and Pete, "Yellow Fever": Bus Driver Stu Benedict's Berserk Button is the song "If You're Happy and You Know It." He and his girlfriend, Sally Knorp, loved that song...but then Sally broke up with him. AGAIN. Over NOTHING!
• The characters on The West Wing are all very protective of each other in this way, and most of them get a chance to snap over one of the others being threatened or insulted. Sam probably got most of these scenes: "You're a cheap hack, and if you come after Leo I'm gonna bust you like a pinata," etc. Charlie also had a lot, most of them over Zoey.
  • You also do not want to call CJ "bitch" in front of Charlie. He will put your ass into the nearest wall.
  • Not that Josh is ever the most adept at handling matters relating to terrorism ("Why don't we just give the sixty billion dollars to North Korea in exchange for not bombing us?"), but when Donna is critically injured in a roadside bombing in Gaza and the staff are trying to work out how to respond, Josh's furious and vehement suggestion is to just kill everyone who has even the most tenuous link to the attack.
  • If you waste his time by making a fuss about how you shouldn't have to pay parking tickets because you're a diplomat, the President of the United States will END you.
• TV Presenter Dec would frequently go insane from people being unable to follow the basic rule of SM:TV Live's phone in game thing "Wonkey Donkey" (The rule, quote him is: "IT HAS TO RHYME!!!")
• True Blood example: Jason Stackhouse may be an idiot, but don't ever say anything bad about his sister, as Gabe found out when Jason kicked him in the balls. TWICE.
  • This might be sort of obvious, since rejection sucks, but Lorena doesn't exactly take too kindly to Sookie telling her that Bill doesn't love her.
  • Sookie is Bill's Berserk Button. So much so that, when he finds out that she's moved onto Eric, he attempts to kill the latter.
  • Sookie is also Eric's Berserk Button, since he's in love with her. Especially since he lot his memory, any new addition to the room or situation sparks his fanged fury.
  • Tara hates vampires. And I mean, she HATES vampires.
  • On the other side, Hoyt will scream profanity at anyone who insults vampires - especially his girlfriend, Jessica.
  • Sam Merlotte really doesn't like weres. At one point, he badly beats up a werepanther simply for being in his establishment. He's also not keen on maenads either, but this, at least, is justified.
  • Do not disrespect Lafayette on the grounds that he's gay. He'll show you that those muscles aren't just for show.
• Agent Sarah Walker is one of the most adorable CIA agents in television history. But....if you even think about harming Chuck Bartowski, she WILL kill you. No questions asked.
  • Agent Casey may act like he hates Chuck, but if you threaten Chuck, he too will seriously mess you up. Try to threaten anyone that's a part of Casey's friends or family (especially his daughter) and prepare for hell to be unleashed.
  • Chuck may seem like a wimp. But if you threaten his sister, his best friend, Agent Walker, or even John Casey, prepare to go to school.
    • Anyone in Chuck's family is off-limits to threats, if you know what's good for you, especially since Chuck got upgraded to Intersect 2.0.
  • For the love of God do not mess with Big Mike's buy more or Morgan in fact.
• Hurley on Lost is a pretty easy-going guy who can take a lot of abuse, especially about his weight, but you're taking a chance if you ever call him "crazy."
  • Don't tell Locke what he can't do!
  • Also, touching upon Sawyer's dark past always makes him act even more angry towards people than usual.
  • Ben Linus can summon the smoke monster. Maybe don't lay hands on his daughter?
• If you eat Liz Lemon's food, she'll cut you so bad you'll have a chin. You'll all have chins!
  • Devon Banks: You don't tell me what kind of pizza to like!
• Elliot on Just Shoot Me is a very nice and mild-mannered photographer; but if you find any fault with his work, he goes on a rampage of insults and stalking. Naturally, job-performance reviews are problematic.
• On The Sarah Silverman Program, Sarah befriends a homeless guy that she knew in high school. When she talks about his mother 'queefing' he goes crazy and tries to kill her.
• You don't want to criticize the writings of Howard T.J. Moon.
• FlashForward: Agent Dimitri Noh and Dr. Olivia Benson do not want to hear what your flashforward was, or how you think it's important, because neither of them want their own flashforward to come true. Olivia went berserk to the point that she nearly killed a patient because she didn't want to believe his flashforward held some significance to correctly diagnosing him.
  • Do not under any circumstances tell Demetri that he can't fight fate, that you won't answer questions that might pertain to his impending murder, or that you can't get vital information about it.
• PIZZA'S NOT FOR BREAKFAST.
• Richard Castle will let a lot of things slide. But if you so much as consider harming one ginger hair on his daughter Alexis' head? Screw the rules, he will bring all of his many connections down on your head. And it will hurt.
  • The same now applies to Kate Beckett.
  • For Beckett, it's betraying her and hurting her mentor.

"Royce said hell would rain down, didn't know hell looked like you."

• A mild example, played for laughs, is a therapist, David, who appears in one episode of Reba. Call him "Dave," and he'll have a cow. As for regular characters... Reba gets upset should she be compared to her ex-husband's wife and told to be Not So Different from her, while said ex-husband's wife won't take being called "blondzilla" kindly, which Reba learns the hard way.
• During Spike's VGA awards, once Jack Black realised he didn't win the best game award, he destroyed his best voice in a video game award and most of the stage.
• The team in Criminal Minds has a lot of berserk buttons, both individual and shared:
  • As a team, each other, but especially Reid, who as the youngest they all feel protective of.

Prentiss: Screw protocol, Reid's in trouble!

• • Hotch, JJ and Morgan share a common berserk button towards anybody who hurts children. Morgan is especially terrifying when faced with child molesters.

And don't forget the biggest one of all: "I'm going to kill you. And then I'm going to find that bastard son of yours. And then I'm going to show him his two dead parents, and then I'm going to tell him that it was all your fault. And then I'm going to--AAAH!" And mayhem ensues. Oh does it ever.

• • Reid over-identifies with bullied young killers and tends to go berserk on those who he feels should have been able to help them.
  • Morgan is also really terrifying towards anyone who ever tries to harm Garcia.
  • The killer in the episode "Haunted" went nuts whenever anyone tried to touch him.
  • If you mess with Hotch's family, he will LOSE HIS SHIT, as seen in the Reaper arc. That also goes for JJ, as demostrated in the season seven finale.
  • Elle in Season 1 went pretty psycho in "Broken Mirror". Early on in the episode the UnSub says "You're no threat to anyone." Later on, she pushes him to the ground and, uh.... persuades him (read: threatens to crush his dick) to tell her where the kidnapped girl is.
  • Speaking of Elle.... "Aftermath", anyone? She murders someone. A rapist, but still, it was clear murder.
  • Reid got spicy with the UnSub's father in "The Uncanny Valley".

Reid: These girls are what, like nine... nine or twelve years old, I'm assuming?
Doctor: My PhD is on the effect of trauma on prepubescent girls. I do not appreciate what you're implying.
Reid: Oh, I'm not -- I'm not implying anything. I'm making an inference. An inference is an educated guess, and based on that, I form a hypothesis. For instance, my hypothesis here is that after you raped your daughter, you submitted her to electroshock treatments to make sure she stayed quiet.
Doctor: ...This is outrageous.
Reid: And then, out of guilt you bought her toys... more specifically, you bought her a line of dolls. Because that's what serial molesters do, they give gifts. So you continued the pattern with your other patients, and then once they left your care you added their toys to your collection.
Doctor: I'm sorry. You can't back up your story... *Doctor*.
Reid: This is why I love my job, *Doctor*, uh... because my lab, it's a jury of your peers. My tests will be Jenny Larson, Abigail Moore and Linda Kraus. The DA will put them on the stand and I'm gonna personally bring these dolls in and we're gonna watch how they react.

• A more humourous example is Stephen Fry in the wonderful gameshow QI. One of the few things that ruffles Stephen's usually relaxed mood is willful ignorance or asking why people should know obscure facts, or read certain books etc etc. Asking this tends to get you a forceful, yet beautiful, summary on why you are wrong.

Stephen: It's always the children who say, "Sir, sir, what's the point of geometry" or "what's the point of Latin" who end up having no job, being alcoholic and they don't notice that the ones who actually find knowledge for its own sake and pleasure in information and in history and in the world and nature around us are actually getting on and doing things with their fucking lives!

• Clark Kent will absolutely lose it when Lana, his parents, or his friends are harmed.
  • His mother, now Senator Martha Kent, has demonstrated that if she considers someone a threat to Clark, she is very willing to fuck them up.
• Do not play Sharon Raydor for a fool. She will team up with her rival Brenda Johnson and the consequences will be... unpleasant.
• Do not, I repeat, do not call Hannah Montana's Lilly Truscott "stupid" within earshot of her boyfriend, Oliver!
• The Thick of It: Don't insult Al Jolson in front of Jamie. Seriously. It's a very bad idea to piss off the only man in Whitehall to keep gaffer tape and a balaclava in his car:

"You take the piss out of Jolson again, and I will remove your iPod from its tiny nano-sheath and push it up your cock. Then I'll plug some speakers up your arse and put it on to shuffle with my fucking fist. Then, every time I hear something that I don't like -- which will be every time that something comes on -- I will skip to the next track by crushing your balls."

• In The Big Bang Theory, Howard Wolowitz doesn't like being reminded that he doesn't have a PhD. Every time he tries to start something, Leonard tells him to sit down and he complies. He might not have a PhD but he recognises he's too puny to do anything about it.
• Don't threaten or hurt Bones. Because if you do, it might be a little too late to realize a certain FBI agent, who's quite fond of Bones, is right behind you, shoving a gun into your mouth or doing much worse things to you. Same with Bones herself. Do anything to hurt Booth and she'll come over to kick you to kingdom come.
  • Also Bones is quite protective over babies.
  • Brennan doesn't like negativity against science.
  • Betraying the uniform is also kind of a big one for Booth.
  • And so is hurting Parker.
  • Do not call Gordon Gordon a 'fry cook'."FRY COOK? FRY COOK???"
  • Best not to call Hodgins "Thurston"
  • In the same ep, the intern he was arguing with got mad when his record was brought up. They were at each other's throat the whole ep.
  • Papa Wolf Max will get you if you go after Bones and Booth doesn't get you first.
  • Do not try hurting Angela, either. If Hodgins doesn't get you, her dad most certainly will. Even trying to marry her wasn't entirely easy-Hodgins got tattooed for it twice.
• A word of advice to anyone planning to hurt a child in Miami-Dade County -- don't. Just... don't. Or Horatio Caine will personally ensure you regret it for the rest of your existence... provided you still have one, that is.
  • And if you hurt someone on his team? Well you could say that... *pulls sunglasses on* It gets worse.

YEEEAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!

• • Especially if that person was named Marisol. He would follow you all the way to Brazil to get his vengeance.
  • And if by some miracle you manage to evade Horatio and his Sunglasses Of Justice, a certain Mr. Dexter Morgan will take great delight in setting up a nocturnal playdate for you and his Dark Passenger...
• Unsurprisingly, after this incident on The $20,000 Pyramid, William Shatner (yes, that William Shatner) never appeared on the show again.
• Wot, no ALPHABETTI SPAGHETTI?!?!!!
  • I believe you meant Gazpacho Soup...
• Jonas Blaine will fly halfway around the world to wreck you if you mess with Betsy.
• Boston Legal
  • If you harm Shirley Schmidt, the staff of CP&S will bring its formidable legal skills down on your poor unfortunate self, led by Alan Shore and Denny Crane. The end results are... unpleasant.
  • Make fun of Denny Crane -- or try to fire him -- and Shirley herself will do whatever is necessary to ensure neither ever happens again, with only this explanation necessary -- "I'm Schmidt."
  • Don't mess with Alan. Denny will shoot you. He's done it before. Twice. Likewise, don't insult, belittle, undermine, or otherwise screw with Denny. Like Shirley, Alan will utterly destroy you. Alan's other berserk buttons include wild salmon, civil rights, and any time the little guy is being brought down by the big guy.
• In BBC's Jekyll, Hyde likes to hurt and screw with people as a general principle (in both senses of the word "screw"). But if you threaten his/Jackman's family, he will kill you. No questions, no hesitations, you're dead...or in Christopher's case, in a not-quite-dead sack-full of broken body parts on the hospital floor. He's scary enough by himself, but when Jackman (Jekyll) and Hyde come together after the wife and kids are abducted, the two of them switch off London. And that's little more than a Battle Aura.
• Miss Piggy in The Muppet Show. She seems like a nice but diva-ish actress until you insult her. And then ... HII-YAAA!
  • Also...if you know what's good for you...stay away from the frog!
• Nice Guy Will from Glee can patiently take a lot of the trouble and crap other people give him. But when he found out that his wife Terri was faking a pregnancy, he utterly loses it and snaps.
  • Same with Finn, a surprisingly friendly and kind jock. When he found out that his girlfriend had gotten pregnant by his best friend Puck, he goes into an Unstoppable Rage at Puck. In other words, don't mess with the nice people.
  • You think Sue's bad on normal day? Try insulting her hair. Then run for your life.
• Law and Order Trial By Jury: Tracey Kibre can keep her cool through any name you call her. Calling her partner Kelly Gaffney a bitch, however, is a surefire way to find yourself cowering against the wall sweating bullets.
• Call Mad TV's version of Oprah Winfrey a stupid bitch, see what happens.
• Do Not Shoot At Omar's Little Grandmother.
• Do not mess with the SGC if General Hammond can find out.
  • Do not threaten Teal'c's son, Rya'c. Seriously, don't.
  • Claiming you're a god in front of Master Bra'tac is... not wise.
    • The reverse is also true. Anyone within earshot who claims they're not gods will soon feel the Goa'ulds' wrath, preceded by the Glowing Eyes of Doom.
  • The most efficient way to ensure Samantha Carter will end your life painfully is to harm Jack O'Neill in any way, shape, or form. She will find you. And she will end you.
    • And don't hurt Samantha Carter, or Jack O'Neill will end you. Actually, don't hurt anyone on the SG-1 crew. Because the remaining members will line up to take your ass to school, and then General Hammond will finish it off.
      • Except for Dr. Daniel Jackson. If you kill him you're fine, he'll just come back eventually. If you capture and torture him, that's when you need to worry.
  • Do not threaten, harm, or in any other way make uncomfortable Janet Fraiser's adopted daughter Cassandra. That adorable little doctor has forgotten more about how to kill people with extreme prejudice than you will ever know.
• Do not insult anyone working for Dr. Elizabeth Weir.
  • Do not speak ill of Sateda within earshot of Ronon Dex.
    • Harming Jennifer Keller is also a bad move.
    • Or just being a Wraith in front of Ronon is bad.
    • A commanding officer betraying his men will soon find a gaping hole in his gut from Ronon's Hand Cannon.
  • Do not accuse Teyla - or, for that matter, any inhabitant of the Pegasus Galaxy - of serving the Wraith.
  • You also probably don't want to execute two of John Sheppard's men without cause and then pretend to shoot Dr. Weir, unless you want him to kill over 50 of yours without breaking a sweat.
  • Rodney Mckay has a cranky disposition anyway, but if you value your health and sanity, don't threaten Atlantis or his friends. And, in the name of all that's holy, don't let him neat Wraith enzyme.
• Unless you enjoy the sensation of Master Sergeant Greer repeatedly pummelling your face, do not lay a finger on Colonel Young. And attempting to depose him is fairly likely to get you shot.
• Leverage has a few notable ones:
  • Do not use Nate Ford's dead son to get him to do something. Especially not since he leads a group of some the best criminals, ever.
    • You also don't want to steal a dying kid's transplant heart, especially if you yourself are already on his "naughty list". Nate is quite clear on this.
  • Elliot seems to have an issue with people who abuse their children.
  • Parker is generally rather crazy, but isn't really violent. However, she has her limits. Do not use orphans to get money for your illegal weapons operations, or she will stab you with a fork. Do not be implied to have betrayed the Team, or she will dangle you off the roof of a building with full intent to drop you. Do not use her facial expressions to fake-psychic that she witnessed and blames herself for her little brother's death when they were children, or she will request that the Team take you down by chopping off your arms. And your head.
• iCarly has one: Offend or harm Carly with Sam being a witness, provided Carly doesn't hold her back, and Sam will demonstrate why she ever had to see a therapist for anger management in the first place.
  • Likewise, do NOT tell Carly to calm down. It will whip her up and send her ranting about.
  • If you're Spencer and her nerdy cousins are visiting for dinner, you better damn well be there!
• Blair Sandburg of The Sentinel is a mild-mannered anthropologist, raised by a peacenik flower child, who hates guns, who prefers to talk than fight. But harm or even threaten to harm Jim Ellison and you'll know why you have to look out for the peaceful ones.
• Lie to Me: Lightman's is someone harming or threatening to harm his daughter.
• While almost all of Moya's crew in Farscape will go bonkers if you try to hurt any other member (or Moya herself,) each of them tend to have their own personal Berserk Button.
  • John - Don't threaten Earth, don't lie to him and Do NOT touch Winona.
  • Aeryn - Don't touch her Prowler. This is NOT what it sounds like. And don't threaten her unborn child.
  • Rygel - Do NOT touch his food. Oh, and if you torture him he will wear your head as an accessory.
  • Chiana - Don't call her a trailk.
  • D'Argo - Don't. Just don't. His species has what's called Hyper-rage. ‘nuff said.
  • Stark - He's insane already. It doesn't take much to tip him over the edge, although he will most likely fall into a BSOD most of the time. Just don’t mention Scorpy.
  • Zhaan - She is a VERY spiritual being and has utmost control of her emotions. When that control slips...find another galaxy to live in.
  • Crais - Don't kill his brother. His button will get stuck in the on position for a very long time if you do.
  • Scorpius - Don't threaten his life's ambition to destroy the Scarrens which means don't threaten his quest for wormhole technology which means don't try to take or kill John.
  • Moya – Very Gentle until it comes to something threatening her son. Then she becomes a Starship sized Mama Bear.
• Joy in My Name Is Earl is already a borderline psycho-bitch. See what happens when you mess with her kids.
  • Earl's dad really hates drug dealers.
• Red Dwarf: Do not call Kryten tetchy!
  • In "Polymorph", the Polymorph is attempting to get Rimmer angry so it can suck the emotion out of him, it begins by taking the form of his Mother and has sex with Lister but Rimmer holds back, at least until the Polymorph says "The things this boy can do with alphabeti spaghetti" in which Rimmer responds "ALPHABETI SPAGHETTI!".
  • In "Beyond a Joke" it is revealed that Kryten has a device that saves all negative emotion, eventually this device fills after Lister asks for some Ketchup to go with the Lobster Kryten had just served, once the drive is full Kryten's head proceeds to explode.
• Do not mention The Good Life within Vyvyan Basterd’s earshot. It’s an equally bad idea to remind him that he has a girl’s name.
• Dollhouse: Do not threaten one of Adelle DeWitt's Actives. Or speak ill of Topher in her presence. The woman is ruthless.
  • Do not harm Echo while Boyd Langton or Paul Ballard is around. Or vice-versa.
  • And if you ever lay a hand on Sierra, the entire Los Angeles Dollhouse will come down on you like a ton of bricks.
• Never claim to Shorty that all pit bulls are vicious, or say that you've got something better to do than help a pit bull in need.
• Deadwood: Do NOT accuse Dan Dority of being scared of you. He'll tear your damn eyeball out of your head, and let you flop around in the muck screaming for a little while before he bludgeons you to death.
• If you like your eardrums intact, your confidence undestroyed and all your extremities attached, don't suggest to Lynda Day that she might be attracted to Spike Thomson...especially if your name happens to be Spike Thomson.
• You might think that you can get away with harming Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers, seeing as how she's almost universally disliked at Scotland Yard. The key word there, however, is "almost". One person does like her, very much, in fact - her partner Inspector Thomas Lynley. How much? It took an armed assault team to keep him from going to her when she was being held hostage. Repeat: Armed. Assault. Team.
  • And as it happens, harming a child in Great Britain is not a good idea. Lynley and Havers together are all but unstoppable, and they both have issues with children getting hurt. Really, it's probably best just to throw yourself off the Dover cliffs - it will save you a world of pain.
• Human Target: If you wish to see another sunrise, DO NOT call Guerrero a "freak" or threaten his son. Ever.
  • Trying to hurt a client of Chance's is generally a bad idea.
• In the TV series Soap, Danny Dallas' brother, Jodie (Billy Crystal), is gay. Do not say this around Danny. He's just a little bit in denial.
• In Babylon 5 Delenn will go into a royal rage at times. When she does you are wise to, well, be somewhere else.
  • This is true of all Minbari. If a leader of their is killed, their button will be pressed and stuck in this position until your entire species is gone.
  • Additionally, in Crusade, every suggesting that there is a God in the presence of Galen is bound to get you hit with a fireball.
  • Don't try to telepathically scan Susan Ivanova, and don't talk about her mother. Just... don't, okay?
  • Don't bring up Jeffrey Sinclair's fight in the Battle of the Line. Ever.
  • Don't hurt, capture, or otherwise threaten Delenn. John Sheridan will not be happy, and you will perish.
  • Don't fire on a civilian transport carrying thousands of wounded away from their government's own bombs. John Sheridan and Susan Ivanova will go to war with you.
  • Don't kidnap and torture John Sheridan. Susan Ivanova will finish what he started. With extreme prejudice. "God sent me," anyone?
• Community: Don't steal Annie's pen.
  • Also don't mention Jeff's dad. He will beat you, even if you are a generally harmless old man.
  • And whatever you do, DO NOT refer to Starburns as Starburns to his face. A war (well, okay, a multi-day pillow fight) was started over this.

Starburns: MY...NAME...IS...ALEX!!!

• Full House: If you are drinking around D.J. Tanner, do not attempt to drive. She will prevent you by any means possible (in part because her mother died in a drunk driving accident years earlier).
• Don't refuse Ms. Piddlin's peas.
• Cliff Clavin on Cheers is very, very close to his mother. And any suggestion that she won't always be there for him is met with furious denial.

Cliff: YOU TAKE THAT BACK!

• Alton Brown will be happy to ruin you if you create soulless over-processed food.
• Do not threaten Daenerys Targaeryn or her unborn child. Her warlord husband will end you. And if he's unavailable, Ser Jorah Mormont will happily substitute.
  • Do not threaten Samwell Tarly unless you want to fight Jon Snow. And his direwolf. Insulting his late father is also a bad move.
  • The Stark children have direwolf companions. BE WARNED.
• DON'T MENTION SUZANNE!
• Veronica Mars. Do not mess with Logans V, or he will smash up a police car with a baseball bat JUST TO GET ARRESTED, so he's close enough to beat the shit out of you.
• Ted from How I Met Your Mother is a proud New Yorker and a proud non-New Jerseyan. The one thing that finally set him off when his fiancee Stella left him at the alter was that she refused to move to New York and expected Ted to move in with her in New Jersey, but she moved to New York with her ex-boyfriend without a fuss.
  • Also not too long after being left at the alter, Doug, the short-tempered McLaren's bartender, insulted Ted saying "no wonder your fiancée left you." Despite never fighting anyone before in his life, Ted punched him.
• If you bring your son into Cook County General Hospital, please do not leave evidence that you've hurt him where Doug Ross can see it unless you want to become a patient there yourself.
• The Kids in The Hall takes to an extreme in the sketch "Citizen Kane", in which a man's inability to remember the name of said movie (and refusal to accept his friend's suggestion of the title he was looking for) drives his friend into a homicidal rage.
• Lost Girl: Don't threaten to kill and eat Lauren in front of Bo. She will instantly level up in order to kill you, even if you're a powerful and nigh-immortal lich.
  • Don't touch Lauren with the intent to harm her in any way when Bo's around full stop or you will have one chance to to remove whatever hand you don't want to lose from the good doctor.
• Merlin: Do not infer that something is the result of magic on Merlin when Uther is around. Don't confess to using magic when Uther is around. In fact, don't even say the word 'magic' when Uther can hear you. The result will not be pretty.
  • Also, disagreeing with Uther doesn't turn out pretty either.
  • Or messing with Merlin's mom, Hunith.
  • Morgause and Morgana. We fans saw what happened when Morgause got wounded at the end of last season. The castle is probably still picking up the pieces.
  • Ditto most of the time for Arthur where Gwen is concerned.
  • Don't call Arthur a prat. Or a dollophead. Or say he's fat.
    • Unless you're Merlin, that is... who will simply get put in the stocks, or similar, because Arthur's fond of him. But yeah...
  • Merlin's friends. Don't hurt them, or you will find out why that nice, clumsy guy who bears more than a slight resemblance personality wise to Peter Parker/Spiderman, has the highest bodycount on television this side of the Doctor and the Daleks. He will kill you and be utterly expressionless while he does it.
  • Don't hurt Merlin. You will have Arthur and the Knights attempting painful dismemberment in about ten seconds flat.
  • Hurt Arthur or Morgana in front of Uther? Destination Defenestration.
• Dragnet's Sgt.Friday was similar to Gil Grissom...child abusers, killers of women and people who deal drugs to kids would really get him going.
  • And if he was asking you a question,it wasn't a good idea to play funny or try to annoy him. He was too straight laced a cop to break regulations, but he would lean on you verbally and get in your face about it.

Gannon: When my partner leans, he goes in hard and deep enough to strike oil.

• Primeval:
  • Threatening Rex will likely result in Abby beating the crap out of you.
  • Threatening Abby, or even just making her unhappy, will result in Connor coming after you with whatever he can find - oars, rocks, Becker, anything handy.
  • Lester is normally a very composed guy, who will nevertheless use every means at his disposal to take you down if you either a) usurp his authority or b) threaten his Jag. The former involves political connections and clever subordinates. The latter involves an EMD.
• If you're not Sherlock and you tell Mrs. Hudson to shut up, he won't take it lightly. And if you make the monumental mistake of actually physically hurting Mrs. Hudson, Sherlock will headbutt you into unconsciousness and you will "fall" out of a window. Several times.
  • John is also something of a Berserk Button for Sherlock, although Sherlock doesn't seem to understand how to approach it; he doesn't physically do anything, but his face loses all composure in both The Great Game and The Reichenbach Fall at the thought of losing John.
  • Try to harm Sherlock Holmes, and Dr John Watson of the cuddly jumpers will end you. With a bullet. Through two windows. Even insulting Sherlock in front of John will earn you a bloody nose.
• One episode of Have Gun — Will Travel had Paladin taking a job to help his star crossed lover, and over the course of the case a ranch hand slaps her. Paladin nearly beats him to death, and only stops from a combination of her pleading and the ranch owner threatening to kill him if he continued his assault.
• If someone tries to bury someone alive under NCIS's watch in NCIS: Los Angeles, Sam will carve the digger's butt a new one if the person dies before they are returned to the surface. It's justified, as he himself was a victim of being buried alive alongside a fellow soldier in Croatia during a mission, a situation of which he was the only survivor.
• Do NOT forget to water Jess Day's plants. If you do forget and she finds out, RUN.
• Andy Sipowicz of NYPD Blue is a veteran of The Vietnam War (as is his actor Dennis Franz). He doesn't talk about his experience much, but when a fellow officer lied about serving in the war, Sipowicz went off on him.
• Do not threten Myka or Claudia in front of Pete. If you do, you are screwed.
• In the first season of Highlander, it was not a good idea to go after Tessa. Caleb Cole could attest to that if Duncan hadn't killed him. The same really goes for any of Duncan's lovers-he was just as ready to behead Kern for killing Little Deer back in the 1800s.
  • Tessa would be the same way at times. She fended off Felicia Martins with a blowtorch.
  • Richie's was being told what to do, at least some of the time. Mac would be trying to help him keep his head, and Richie would just get angry and not listen.
• Charles, the music producer's son on I'm With The Band, goes nuts if anyone calls him 'Chucky'.
• Adam-12 didn't have these too often, but Malloy let a suspect have it once in 'X Force' when the guy kept saying the girl he kidnapped and molested was asking for it. It got him four days suspension.
  • Reed doesn't like anyone trying to hurt his wife. The situation with the biker gang in the ghost town in 'A Sound Like Thunder' had to be handled carefully due to what they were up against, but Reed did get mad when they caught the gang's leader and he said something to Jean.
• Hell's Kitchen:
  • The best way to press Gordon Ramsay's Berserk Button is to put up food that is improperly cooked or prepared, especially if it's undercooked

Chef Ramsay: It's RAW!

• • The other way to push Chef Ramsay's Berserk Button is to disrespect him, usually by forgetting to say "Yes chef" when he gives an order or by second-guessing/completely disregarding his orders