Bonus Material

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    And you thought you were just getting a movie.

    A bonus that is added to, but separate from, a particular work. The practice of adding such a bonus to one's work has been around for a long, long time: Charles Dickens, for example, was a regular practitioner of it, back when he wrote his stories for newspapers and magazines.

    If this extra material is another story in the universe, it generally doesn't interact with the primary plot of the work, and is seen as "stand-alone" material. Some times that extra material isn't even considered canon, though such additions can add depth and insight to the primary characters if the writer makes an effort to connect the "extra" to the main material.

    Other kinds of extras are "making of" featurettes, outtakes, deleted scenes, concept art, Feelies and others.

    Nearly all types of media feature extras: artwork is popular for anime and manga, particularly holiday art (especially if the artists can draw the ladies in Sexy Santa Dresses); musicians regularly add "Hidden Tracks" to their records; television producers create extra scenes to be shown over the credits or as online-only "webisodes"; movie producers sometimes create whole new short films, just to add as an "extra" on the DVD, although nowadays Picture Dramas also often fulfill that role; and comic books often feature "backup stories" that are only a handful of pages long. DVD Collector's Editions often come with a reproduction of a prop or another similar bit of memorabilia.

    "Omake" is the anime fanspeak term. "Lagniappe" is a Louisiana Creole word commonly used by chefs that means "a little something extra".

    Print Bonus and Side-Story Bonus Art are Sub Tropes.

    Examples of Bonus Material include:

    Anime and Manga

    • Penguin Revolution ends each volume with an out-of-continuity short involving the characters - for example, at the end of a volume in which Ryo was injured shielding a producer, Yukari polls some of the other characters to find out if they would have done the same, getting humorous results from each. These shorts are then followed by an author's note in panel format - also usually humorous, but in one volume it is devoted to the recent death of the author's dog.
    • Every volume of Fullmetal Alchemist comes with some truly side-splitting Yonkoma strips and assorted drawings by the author parodying the events of her own comic. For example, there's the ongoing drama of Roy Mustang in a 1970s Shoujo romance comic.
      • She also includes occasional bonus chapters, many of which were adapted into the first anime, including Jean Havoc and Armstrong's little sister, Ed vs Roy in an alchemy battle, and Izumi's backstory.
      • Some of the four panel strips were also adapted into the first anime including the rather well known line about a certain colonel and TINY MINI-SKIRTS.
    • Hellsing has these at the end of most volumes. Generally they involve Super Deformed versions the Valentine brothers or Seras giving commentary on the series thus far.
    • Blue Seed has a regular "Omake Theatre" segment after the end of every other episode. These range from goofball jokes and sketches to brief but poignant character pieces. (Particularly outstanding is the segment that reveals that pink-jumpsuited gun-nut Kome once had a schoolgirl crush on a boy who never noticed her—a boy who is now one of her coworkers, for whom she still feels a strong but hidden affection.)
    • Magic Knight Rayearth has an "omake" option on the extras menus of its North American DVD release, but this writer's player steadfastly refuses to play them.
    • The Japanese DVD release of My-HiME includes a tongue-in-cheek "trailer" for an allegedly upcoming feature length film which pits the heroine of that show against the heroine of its successor, Mai-Otome; the end of the trailer promises its release in the Spring of 20006. Yes, twenty thousand and six.
      • The show itself also provides one after every episode's Post Episode Trailer. Some are silly, some are serious, and at least one is a Tear Jerker, but the vast majority of them provide Fan Service.
    • Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex features an omake after every episode involving conversations between the Tachikoma. These shorts are called Tachikomatic Days, and feature surreal humour.
    • Bleach has "Shinigami Illustrated Picture Book" at the end of almost every episode after the beginning of the Soul Society arc. At first just information on the shinigami leaders, this soon became canon omake—generally humorous moments that had happened off-screen during the span of (or just after) the regular episode. Some of them are even animated adaptations of omake chapters written by Kubo Tite himself.
      • Those segments have been dubbed in English as well, but they're only on the DVD's and are renamed "Illustrated Guide To Soul Reapers."
      • There's also the Arrancar Encyclopedia, in which Gin tells us about the aspects of the Arrancar; and the Quincy Encyclopedia, where Ryuken discusses Quincy equipment, and other segments.
    • Shakugan no Shana had as DVD specials two mini-episodes of "Shakugan no Shanatan" and one of "Itadaki no Hecatetan", featuring a pocket-sized version of the titular character that spoofed events in the main series.
    • Video Girl Ai featured an Omake Theater segment after nearly every episode.
    • Gun X Sword has Gun X Sword-san, what amounts to a computer-generated hand-puppet show involving Wendy, Kameo (her pet turtle), and other characters as needed.
    • Saiyuki Reload's UraSai segments are random bits of silliness at the end of each episode, meant to be more kid-friendly because the show originally aired right before Pokémon. They're worth it, if only for Goku's Magical Girl parody.

    Sanzo: * firing his gun* What the hell are you doing?
    Goku: A little... fanservice...
    Sanzo: For whom?

    • Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water has ten omakes that contain crack plots and supplementary information about the plot, the characters, and 20,000 Leagues under the Sea.
      • There also exist fairly kitschy official Nadia Anime Music Videos, which were originally released on Nadia LCDs.
      • The omake set is called Nadia's Omake Theater.
    • Every episode of Cardcaptor Sakura ends with a "Leave it to Kero-chan" segment where Kero introduces Sakura's outfit of the week.
    • Pokémon has "Professor Oak's Lecture", where the Professor talks about one species of Pokémon and usually ends up getting attacked by it.
    • The DVDs of the full Sky Girls series contain comedic extras in which Eika tries her hand at fishing. No, really.
    • Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha started its life as a mini-game that was included in the Triangle Heart 3 ～sweet songs forever～ fandisc which depicted the adventures of the main character's little sister as a Magical Girl.
    • Naruto Shippuden has omake at the end of most episodes; they ranged from characters talking about the history of Konoha to downright silliness like Shikamaru and Asuma talking about changing the show's name to Shikamaru/Asuma Shippuden. The latter is particularly memorable when Naruto shows up indignantly in the end and is handed the script for future episodes, only to find that he's barely in any of them. (A subtle dig at the manga's and its titular character's lack of screentime for a long period.)
      • Also to note is that the Shippuden Omakes have been dubbed into English, which doesn't happen that often.
        • Though they're only on the DVDs; the Disney XD broadcast cuts them out (which is probably true for a lot of anime aired in countries with more commercial time per episode).
    • Played straight in both To Heart and To Heart: Remember My Memories, where six stand-alone omakes were made for each series. The To Heart omakes were more of slice of life themed, while the Remember My Memories omakes had a continuous plotline for the six omakes.
    • D.Gray-man had super deformed versions of the characters acting out little omake at the end of later episodes. The characters were done in the style of the "talk pages" in between the chapters of the manga in the tankoubon.
    • Gundam SEED has some hilarious omakes in its Gundam SEED Character Theater. This first involves Yzak Jule's hilarious attempts to take Athrun down a peg or three by learning and mastering Athrun's secret of success. The other two involve Rey Za Burrel, Meyrin and Lunamaria Hawke, and Shinn Asuka's attempts, on Gilbert "Gil" Durandal's orders to destroy the successful formation of Kira and Athrun's friendship, and destroy Lacus' reputation. Both attempts fail hilariously.
    • Princess Princess is published with actual slipcovers. If you happen to take the slipcovers off, you find that there are omake printed on the covers of the books themselves. The mini comics are called "Prince Prince" and feature the main characters in an Alternate Universe as girls crossdressing as guys. (As opposed to the canon, where they are guys crossdressing as girls.)
    • Third season episodes of Konjiki no Gash Bell would end with a gag section where they switched two characters' hairstyles.
    • Darker than Black has two omake chapters in the manga (one in which the secondary protagonist discovers that Hei is on good terms with the cops, and another consisting of rather hilarious four-panel comics), and the OVA similarly spoofs the main series.
    • Code Geass has quite a few. Some are serious (like Picture Dramas which fill in gaps in the backstory), but mostly they're comedic, like the Flash-animated and highly nonsensical Baba Theater included with the R2 DVDs. Even the Manga Spin Offs have been known to add the occasional omake pages, involving such characters as Lelouch, Clovis, and Bartley.

    Young Clovis: You're the only one who understands me, Bartley.

      • The picture drama associated with the last episode of Code Geass R2 actually extends the show's ending, showing what some might consider to be the true conclusion of the series.
    • Fushigi Yuugi's Pioneer DVDs contain a lot of omake, including raw commercials, artwork, music clips, a relationship chart, interviews and footnotes. There's also a special omake known as "The Tale of the Forbidden Women's Hot Spring Resort", which parodies the Nyosei arc that the anime omitted.
      • The second OVA had short, humorous segments after each "chapter" called "Fushigi Akugi" ("Bad Play"), which were generally three "bloopers" from scenes in that episode.
    • Harukanaru Toki no Naka de - Hachiyou Shou has versions of the next episode previews narrated by villains on earlier DVDs (normally, these are narrated by the members of the central cast), and the last one contains the Multiple Endings for the series.
    • There's a Yonkoma in between every chapter of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann's Manga adaptation.
    • The DVDs of Mariasama ga Miteru contain shorts with the characters in chibi-format, called Maria-sama ni wa Naisho ("Don't tell Maria-sama"), in which the makers poke mild fun at events in the series with the characters as Animated Actors.
    • Higurashi no Naku Koro ni manga volumes tend to have at least two omakes. The anime also has omakes of their own. The sound novels have bonuses too.
    • At the end of every Mirai Nikki volume, there is an Omake that explains certain things easy to miss in the main work, or reveals a little about other Future Diary holders.
    • Rosario + Vampire has a few extra pages at the ends of volumes, usually a collection of 4-Komas. They go by the title "Meaningless End-of-Volume Theater." One notable strip has Nekonome-sensei reading a fan mail asking how the girls' Magic Pants work.
    • Mayoi Neko Overrun has Mayoi Neko Neko Douga, 3 minute shorts that involve, in order, Nozomi dancing, Rock Paper Scissors matches, fanservice and surreal short sketches. Possibly the only thing weirder than the series itself.
    • The pre-opening shorts in Oretachi ni Tsubasa wa Nai (We Without Wings) are not only out-of-continuity, they are out-of-genre.
    • In the start of the Yu-Gi-Oh! manga volumes, Kazuki Takahashi would have a small paragraph explaining either how he got started on the story itself (he wanted a shounen hero who never hits anyone, hence games), how a certain character was conceived (Kaiba started from him overhearing an arrogant card player and Marik from a fear of having a cellphone meant his publishers would annoy him in his free time), or random observations as the story progressed (noting his Art Evolution from the first manga).
      • Likewise in the GX manga, his student Naoyuki Kageyama would insert small Yonkomas about his life as a Mangaka student. (Like how he was thrust with doing the GX manga by a drunk Takahashi).
    • Fairy Tail has these at the end of most volumes. Included are special missions, a dating misunderstanding, a tour of the local girls' dormitory while searching for treasure, a High School AU, Happy's backstory, and others. The latest one details Lucy's adventure in invading Natsu's house instead of the other way around for once. Several have already been incorporated into the anime, and two of these have been adapted into full-length OVAs.
    • Black Lagoon is somewhat well-known for having hilarious omakes, which are different for the anime and manga. These range from having the Blood Knight partially Axe Crazy Revy turning into a Magical Girl who kills everyone because of Blue and Orange Morality, to a High School AU where the most hard-core criminals become students, teachers, and the faculty.


    Comic Books

    • Arguably, the Freaky Friday Flip story arc from Ultimate Spider-Man. In this story, Spider-Man and Wolverine switch bodies and try to live one day each other's lives. They barely last 3 hours. They are on the verge of beating the crap out of each other before Jean Grey steps in and sets things right. The issue starts with the author speaking directly to the audience, almost apologizing for the story. Having been accused of excessive padding in past story arcs, the author jokes that even he could not pad the story for more than two issues. The issue also pokes fun at some of the more mundane aspects of Spidey's powers which most people take for granted, especially Peter.
    • Detective Comics #347 had a rare after-story "what if" segment that showed what would have happened to Robin if the villain of the story had actually killed Batman. (This was in 1966. Who says Bats only got Darker and Edgier after the Adam West years?)
    • During the 80's, several DC Comics titles would feature "backup stories" in the last five or six pages of each issue. Most notably, the Green Lantern series was backed up with Tales of the Green Lantern Corps, short one-shot stories that would feature the members of the Green Lantern corps who didn't interact with Earth all that often. All of these were canon, though, and now that the Green Lantern Corps have their own title, that character development is coming in handy. Oh, and that one story about how the Corps was going to die, written by Alan Moore? Turns out it was important...
    • Star Wars Tales featured one-page strips in most issues starring editors Dave Land and Jeremy Barlow, numerous artists, writers and other personnel interacting with the characters. Featured responses to fan mail, Running Gags, Baby Darth Maul and the revelation that all of the strips are drawn by Jawas.


    Fan Works

    • Aeon Natum Engel has several Code: OMAKE chapters which are mostly crossovers with Nobody Dies. As of this writing, it ended with Creepy!Rei and Terrifying!Rei arguing with each other.
    • Stars Above has some. Each of the Nine are fleshed out in Demon profiles, written in the style of the Madoka website's Witch Cards.
    • The later installments of Neon Exodus Evangelion by Eyrie Productions, Unlimited are prone to "Bonus Theater" segments, which showcase short humorous pieces, bizarre Spin-Off ideas and lighter (often Fourth Wall-breaking) views "behind the scenes" of the production.


    Film - Animated

    • Pixar always throws extras in. In addition to their cartoon shorts, they usually add some supplementary material related to the main movie.
      • A Bug's Life featured a blooper reel during the credits. On popular request, they added ones to Toy Story 2 and Monsters, Inc. as well; on the latter, this is also available as a separate, selectable short on the DVD because it's only included in the widescreen version of the film.
      • The Ratatouille DVD has a short film featuring some fun facts about rats.
      • The Incredibles featured a 1950s style cartoon featuring Mr. Incredible and his "sidekick".
      • WALL-E had an entire second film for those who bought the 2-disc special edition, The Pixar Story


    Film

    • The DVD of the first Ringu movie features Sadako's cursed video as an omake. After the end of the video, the screen blurs and a close-up of Sadako's creepy eye displays, which might also be a Nightmare Fuel to some.
      • The American remake also included the cursed movie on the DVD, but with two extra Nightmare Fuel-inducing factors: first, you couldn't pause, stop, or fast-forward through it, forcing you to watch the whole thing (unless you turned the TV off.) Second, after it's finished and it returns to the menu -- it plays the sound of a phone ringing. Creepy as hell.
    • The I Am Legend DVD has four cartoon shorts done in still-frame comic book style. The one by Orson Scott Card was scarier than the actual movie itself.
    • FearNet.com broadcast a series of half-hour long films that were set in the same continuity as 30 Days of Night.
    • Some films have connected online content that's so extensive it might as well be second films.
    • Inglourious Basterds included the entire movie within a movie, Nation's Pride, directed by Eli Roth (aka Donny 'Bear Jew' Donowitz in the movie).
    • Lord of the Rings. It is the mother of this trope. The Extended Editions included more hours of bonus material than the running time of the actual (pretty darn long) movies. Depending on which EE you bought, you also got a figurine and an additional bonus DVD.
    • The DVD of Monty Python and the Holy Grail tacks on additional footage during the scene where Sir Galahad arrives to the castle Anthrax.
    • The Chronicles of Riddick had special features that looked into the backstory of the character's life, his weapons and training; background information on the Necromonger cult; the video diaries of the bounty hunter Toombs, which serves as a sort of prequel to the film and a virtual guide to the universe with info on characters and settings.
    • The DVD for the 2001 remake of 13 Ghosts includes a full set of biographical dossiers for the 12 ghosts used in the movie (narrated in Affably Evil fashion by good old Uncle Cyrus).
    • Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets includes a post-credits scene which echoes the bookshop-window scene early in the movie; however, Professor Lockhart's book is replaced with another, bearing a different title and cover artwork, reflecting the events of the movie.


    Literature

    • Stephen King's short-story collection Night Shift includes two stories in the same continuity as 'Salem's Lot, one set a century before the events of the novel, and one a couple of years after.
    • Every second chapter of Herman Melville's Moby Dick, or The White Whale is old-style Bonus Material; they have nothing to do with the story of Ahab and the Pequod—they are informative essays about whales, whaling, and whaling ships.
    • The appendices in The Lord of the Rings. Which is somewhere around 10% the size of the rest of the trilogy put together.
      • The Silmarillion also includes a "note on pronunciation", an "index of names" and "elements in Quenya and Sindarin" names. All are interesting, but the second one can be particularly useful when reading the book for the first time.
    • As noted in the Trope Description, Charles Dickens regularly published his stories as serialized articles in newspapers and magazines. In addition to the primary story, he'd often include extra scenes, out-takes, where-are-they-now-style vignettes, and so on.


    Live Action TV

    • Similar to The Ring example above, the Doctor Who season three boxed set contains a video that plays half a conversation (It's complicated) that took place in the episode Blink.
      • We also have this out of Character moment (But no really) where we get to see what The Doctor really said to Martha during his video tape in "Human Nature".
      • Black Orchid is like a whole episode of this.
    • Friends was good at adding extra scenes that only had a peripheral connection to the primary plot of an episode over the end credits.
    • The number of television shows that offer "exclusive online content" on their network's websites is truly staggering. Common offerings include behind-the-scenes blogs; extended interviews with the actors, writers, or competitors; games; photo galleries; and unaired footage.
    • Mockumentary-type shows like The Office and Parks and Recreation will have a short tag that relates to a B-plot, or a one-off gag in earlier in the show. For instance, if a small gag was someone complaining about their Dr Pepper being stolen out of the office fridge, expect to see whoever it was taking the Dr Pepper out of the fridge during the bonus material.


    Music

    • The 2012 re-issue of the discography of the science-fiction Death Metal band Timeghoul had the CD contained a digipak that had exclusive artwork as a completely wrap-around cover and a booklet containing lyrics and background notes on the band.


    Newspaper Comics

    • Several of the Calvin and Hobbes collections.
    • Newspaper comics, published in the Sunday edition, often are designed with an embedded, "thrown-away" panel or two, usually at the beginning. That is, the comics are designed to make sense even if the first panel or two are not printed. This is because some newspapers provide less space for the comics than do others. (Ironically they are now more likely to be included if the paper has less space, because the smallest full-width layout involves shrinking and rearranging the panels, leaving enough room for all of them.) In some cases the first couple of panels are a separate, but perhaps related, introductory gag and in other cases, the comic is so cleverly written that the elimination of the first two panels has no effect.
      • This was eventually averted by Calvin and Hobbes. Later Sunday strips cannot be rearranged, at Bill Watterson's insistence.


    Video Games

    • Halo 2 and 3 both had Collectors Editions with some extra stuff, but Halo 3's Legendary edition came with even more and also had a model of Master Chief's helmet.
    • The War Room tutorial segments in Advance Wars: Days of Ruin feature exaggerated, less-serious versions of the characters—including villains—who come to give you advice, and contain much of the game's humor. At one point the game lampshades it with the page quote.
    • Another Day in The World Ends With You probably counts as an extended Omake with the characters cast in completely different roles with humorously tweaked personalities and even lets players meet some developer avatars, including character designer Tetsuya Nomura.
      • It also has the rare distinction of being a canon version of an Omake-everything that happens in the Another Day chapter takes place in a parallel universe from the main game, and reading the Secret Reports will clue you in that one of the Joshuas and the Mr. Hanekoma on top of the rooftop are actually the versions from the regular universe, and that this is where Joshua spent his time in between getting blown away by Minamimoto and coming back for the ending!
    • The Metal Gear Solid games generally do this in their expanded re-releases. Metal Gear Solid 3 was the most notable contributor, featuring a 'Secret Theatre' with movies such as the humorous Metal Gear Raiden shorts, dedicated to humiliating him, and the Snake vs. Monkey minigame, which featured Snake and...a monkey.
      • MGS4's ginormous encyclopedia may have come close to toppling that though, at least in terms of effort put in by the contributors.
    • This was released prior to Soul Calibur 4's Japanese release. In it, recurring character Cassandra explains the gameplay to new character Hilde.
    • Inverted for Katawa Shoujo—it's a Visual Novel based on a one-page Omake from the Doujin Schuppen Harnische by RAITA
    • Warhammer Online had a collectors edition filled with this. It had a map, comic, miniature, and artwork book.
    • Infocom text adventures nearly always came with "feelies" such as matchbook covers, calendars, etc. that contained important hints, copyright protection info or both.
    • Freddy Pharkas, Frontier Pharmacist came with a "medical manual" that doubled as copyright protection and the solution to several pharmaceutical-related puzzles.
    • EarthBound comes with the official Player's Guide - which causes the box to be a lot larger than an average SNES game.
    • The Suffering provides an entertaining little documentary on haunted prisons as a little extra you don't even have to unlock!
    • Deadly Premonition gives you the entire damn soundtrack upon completion.
    • The collector's edition of Alan Wake gives you a bonus making of DVD, the soundtrack and an proper hardback book all detailing bits of Bright Falls' history.
    • The collector's editions of Gears of War 1, 2 and 3 all contained making-of DVD's and art books.
    • The limited edition of Halo: Reach gave you a bulky black case in which was a note from the 'owner' and a diary filled to the brim with bits of paper, notes, drawings, maps and some kind of ID cards or somesuch, all contained within a black bubblewrap seal.
    • The collector's edition of Oblivion came with a fold out map of Cyrodiil; a bonus DVD filled with concept art, early renders and a substantial making-of; a 112 page 'Pocket Guide to the Empire' and a reproduction of a Septim, the in-game currency.
    • Skyrim comes with a very nice linen fold out map of the region, but the collector's edition comes with the Art of Skyrim, a map, a making of DVD and a statue of Alduin, the Big Bad.


    Webcomics


    Web Original

    • Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series includes several videos not directly related to the actual abridgement, such as Christmas specials, bonus material of the villains' behind-the-scenes plotting, song parodies by the cast, an episode of Zorc and Pals, and more.


    Western Animation

    • Avatar: The Last Airbender has the chibi shorts that came with the second season DVD.
    • One of the Futurama DVD sets gave us an episode of the Show Within a Show "Everybody Loves Hypnotoad". Hilarity ensues.
      • An in-universe example is the Everybody Loves Hypnotoad DVD box set. As well as all 365 episodes, it has deleted scenes (identical to the rest of the show), a blooper reel (where the toad is shown upside down) and an audio commentary ("ALL GLORY TO THE HYPNOTOAD").
    • The Venture Brothers Christmas Special falls in this category: it is rather shorter than a regular episode and appears divorced from continuity (even the parts which weren't All Just a Dream), as it features Hank and Dean even though they died in the previous episode.
    • The Walt Disney animation collection DVDs come with a lithograph.
    • The second TMNT series was supplemented by various types of bonus material during its run, including several one-minute shorts and character profiles, as well as "Mayhem From Mutant Island", a series of thirteen shorts which combined to make a full-length episode.
    • Teen Titans had a half-length "Lost Episode."
    • The ending credits of Evil Con Carne and The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy during their final seasons had additional scenes from the show's episode.
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