Pungeon Master

Teddie has some un-bear-able habits.

"You think you're red-dy for my rhymes?
 You'll soon be green as envious limes!
 I see you're not yellow, fellow,
 But I don't wanna make you BLUE, so get a CLUE.
 And pur-pull the plug before you play,
 OR I'LL O-RANGE A RAINBOW ON YOUR PARADE!"

—Punsie McKale, The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, "Pun Times (with Punsie McKale)"

A close parent of Pun Personified: A dude who absolutely, positively, has to propund a pun at every possible oppuntunity, no matter how Pungent or Unpunny... - in fact, this only aids its Punishing power. May get pun-ctuated with a You Just Had to Say It.

This can range from a general breeziness to a full-blown Punderstorm, which can come as a bit of a blow (if it doesn't leave you in gales of laughter).

If this character is a Punny Animal, then they're Pun Fursonified (please, please don't kill us).

The only known cure for a Pungeon Master is punicillin. May spread to other characters to cause a pundemic. You may need a lawyer to sue the Pungeon Master for punitive damages.

When the Pungeon Master critically fails, it's very pungent.

Examples of Pungeon Master include:

Anime and Manga

  • Rumiko Takahashi's Urusei Yatsura is chock full o' puns. For example, the character "Cherry" (He likes to be called that in English, for obvious reasons, even in the Japanese language version) has the Japanese name "Sakuranbou" which can be written as "Cherry" or "The Deranged monk" (and is presented this way when he first says it) - Did I mention he's a Buddhist monk?
  • The Team Rocket trio is really fond of this in the Pokémon anime, notably in the Vermilion Gym rematch, right after Pikachu dodges Raichu's Thunderbolt by using its tail:

Jessie: What a shocking story!
James: That was quite a tale!
*Meowth punches them both*
Meowth: And now you have both been punished.

    • The entire series (and indeed all of Pokémon) is begging for it, since many Pokémon have punny names.
      • A Primeape example of Team Rocket's puns:

Jessie: Alright, garden wall! You 'axed' for it! (while wielding an axe)
James: We're the toughest team you ever 'saw'! (while wielding a saw)
Meowth: Let's cut to the chase! (while wielding two scythes)
(Roots from the garden wall attack. Jessie and James are knocked back)
Jessie: A timber tantrum, eh!? Let's get to the root of its problem!
(They are beaten back. The roots are chasing them)
James: I think its bite is as bad as its bark!

Ryoko: I got 'im!
Izumi: "Got 'im"? Isn't that where Batman lives? (snicker)

  • Osaka from Azumanga Daioh has a knack for this, although it's apparently unintentional.
  • Nagi of Kannagi has quite the thing for puns and wordplay, using them (and pointing out accidental ones said by others) whenever possible. Most people just ignore them, but Nagi is quite amused at herself.
  • In Mx0, Michiyo Inui does this because Hiragi finds puns uncontrollably hilarious.
  • Manabu Itagaki from Hajime no Ippo.
    • Manabu's father is even more so. Even Mamoru Takamura got owned in a pun war against him.
      • Pwned, as you might say.
  • Negima!? uses this trope extensively with the usually quiet background character Zazie Rainyday. Even going as far as having Mana Tatsumiya rate her on the puns as well as making a few of her own.
  • Brook in One Piece is fond of making jokes about his condition as a living skeleton. One of first, upon first seeing Nami, is to comment that "I've always had an eye for pretty ladies. Though as a skeleton I have no eyes! Yohohoho!"
    • "Skull joke!"
  • Yakitate!! Japan is definitely not stale when it comes to getting a rise from people...
  • In the English dubs of all three Yu-Gi-Oh! series, most enemy duelists make puns based on their deck theme and/or gimmick. For example: Arkana made magician and show business puns, Seeker made hunting puns, Aster Phoenix made time and destiny puns, Johnson made courtroom puns, etc.
  • Kan from Bio-Meat: Nectar always has to make at least one bad pun each arc. His first one was especially bad, as in a reference to making homemade flamethrowers, he remarked that it was "like lighting fire to a bicycle." The other party members went off without him.
  • Hikaru Amane aka Dabide from The Prince of Tennis. Though he's not as good as he likes to think he is, and his partner Kurobane ends up kicking him in the head as punishment (or as his Straight Man).
  • Chocolove. That is all.
  • Izuki from Kuroko no Basuke.
  • The titular Shirokuma (a polar bear) of Shirokuma Cafe cannot resist making terrible puns when Penguin asks him something.

Comic Books

  • Robin used to be portrayed this way in Batman comics, especially in The Golden Age of Comic Books.
    • Holy Punning Puns, Batman!
  • The Joker can be this way in some of his tamer adaptations, such as in the campy Sixties Batman and Robin television show.
    • Oh, Mr. J is like that in some of his scarier incarnations, too.
  • The Crypt Keeper, with some lethally bad lines that never fail to knock 'em dead!
  • Spider-Man. The man peppers every single fight and interaction with a sarcastic comment.
    • That must be one of Spidey's superpowers. To infuriate his foes with so many puns and goofy comments that they just start flailing wildly.
      • Word of God says his Spider Sense and superhuman agility are so finely tuned that he can instinctively dodge most of what's thrown at him, leaving him free to concentrate on quips and snarky comments.
        • Practical analysis of his power set also indicates that he literally thinks faster than people with normal nerve conduction velocity... which would suggest he probably experiences large portions of your average fight in his own personal bullet time. Can you think of a better thing to do than come up with jokes while the world catches up with you?
        • In his first fight with The Kingpin in Ultimate Spider-man, Spidey gets his butt absolutely whooped and even his mask taken off and his identity revealed. In his rematch, however, knowing that he wouldn't be able to win with his previous tactics goes with dodging attacks whilst insulting The Kingpin (guess which type of insults) - at one point even stopping to pull out a notepad containing some zingers he prepared earlier. This obviously makes him so angry that Spidey soon gets the upper hand and defeats him. That scene may also count as a Crowning Moment of Funny and a Crowning Moment of Awesome.
        • That and when taking on murderers and more serious criminals he's scared shitless and is just running at the mouth as a coping mechanism.
          • He's classic adrenaline addict—the same situations that should scare him shitless actually improve his mood, to the point that he can't help making jokes of everything. In fact, he copes with his personal Angst by jumping off buildings and chasing murderers.
            • He actually refers to this at one point. During one of his personal break downs he questions why he would throw jokes to enemies like Sin-Eater.
  • In the same category as Spider-Man, we have Deadpool. His impressive lung capacity has been commented on many times in Marvel comics, as well as on his page on this wiki.
  • Groucho Marx's first trait in Dylan Dog. He keeps telling bad jokes and puns even in direst situation, in combat and while in a coma.
  • King City and Multiple Warheadz creator Brandon Graham likes to fill his stories with puns and funny wierdness going on around the main characters.
  • Cut Man in Mega Man, to the point where even Mega Man cracks an Incredibly Lame Pun after his defeat.


Film

  • Austin Powers (as a parody of the Bond One-Liner). You might say it's a Punishment Worse Than Death!
    • Austin Powers hanging from Dr. Evil's recently pulled down pants: "You know Dr. Evil, I used to think you're crazy, but now I can see your nuts."
      • "A-thank you!"
    • Dr. Evil himself: "Welcome to my submarine lair! It's long and hard and full of sea men!"
      • "Nothing? Not even a titter?"
  • The title character from Beetlejuice.
  • In Batman and Robin, Arnold Schwarzenegger's Mr. Freeze is the Incredibly Lame Pungeon Master. Here's a montage of all the "ice" jokes came up with.
    • Unfortunately his material left the audience cold.
    • He got a rather chilly response.
    • I don't know, I thought he was pretty cool.
  • Groucho and Chico. Harpo, not so much. Not Zeppo either...
  • Mrs. Peel in The Avengers 1998.
    • "Mother tells me he left under..." "A cloud?" "Naturally."
    • "Frankly I'm amazed" as they're walking through a maze.
    • After she falls down a hole and is captured by Sir August: "I thought I'd drop in."
  • The Hoover Dam tour guide from Vegas Vacation is dam fond of puns.


Literature

  • Star Wars Expanded Universe:
    • Jacen Solo, during the "Young Jedi Knights" series. He gets better afterward. Or rather, worse.
      • The Legacy of the Force-series put good use of this. In the final book of the series, where Jacen had completed his Face Heel Turn, called himself Darth Caedus and was the unquestionable Complete Monster Big Bad, every chapter started with a horrible pun, quoted from Jacen, age 14-16.
    • Also Wes Janson, pretty much all the time unless things are really bad. (And Wedge, after that night with Iella. But can you blame him?) Fittingly, while Jacen is turning evil, Janson (via Wedge) calls him on it, citing the loss of his humor as a symptom.
  • Piers Anthony, ESPECIALLY his Magic of Xanth series. It got to the point that, after the first few books, fans were sending in puns by the dozen for him to use. He made a point of using as many of them as possible. And in his "Crewel Lye" the editor made a point of leaving the first chapter out, since it was filled with fan puns.
  • Peter David, especially in his Sir Apropos of Nothing novels.
  • Almost all of the characters in Spider Robinson's Callahans Crosstime Saloon stories.
    • Callahan's Lady in particular tends to feature puns in a more serious way. And not so seriously. It's a grand mix.
  • Terry Pratchett cannot write a paragraph without some kind of pune, or play on words.
    • To an extent; both The Discworld Companion and GURPS Discworld distinguish between the sort of wordplay Pratchett enjoys and what the GURPS book calls "grinding, humourless punning", and say that there are fewer actual puns in the book than you'd expect - when a character does make a pun, the humour usually comes from other characters not finding it funny.
  • Isaac Asimov loved puns. From the author's note of the very short story, A Loint of Paw (a play on the words "A Point of Law"):

A play on words the noblest form of wit.

    • The plot involves a criminal named Stein who stole money, then entered a time machine set for the day after the statute of limitations for his crime expired. The story tells how the case against Stein was prosecuted and defended, and the judge's eventual ruling delivered in the form of a pun.
      • The pun, for those left hanging, is "A niche in time saves Stein."
    • He also wrote Shah Guido G, later described as a Shaggy Dog Story (get it?). In it, a flying island named Atlantis crashes under the collective weight of its own soldiers, who are known as Waves.
  • Captain Jack Aubrey, of the Aubrey-Maturin series. From a "getting to the point" joke involving narwhal tusks to the infamous "lesser of two weevils" that was also in The Film of the Book, this man is always making horrible puns. And he laughs riotously at them all.
  • In The Harvard Lampoon's Lord of the Rings parody, Bored of the Rings, Birdseye subjects Moxie and Pepsi (read Treebeard, Merry, and Pippin, respectively) to a truly atrocious series of produce-related puns.
  • Finnegans Wake. Practically every sentence includes a pun. Most of which you won't get unless you read fluent French, German, Latin, Greek, Spanish and Klingon. And in Ulysses (pointed out by the endnotes), "he [Bloom] ate kidneys with relish"
    • Are you seriously suggesting that Joyce wrote puns in klingon? Or am I missing something?
  • The Mock Turtle in Alice in Wonderland.
  • Feghoot writers as a whole.
  • Harry Turtledove is also a fan of puns, and several can be found in all of his works. The Case Of The Toxic Spell Dump he once described as the fastest book he ever wrote, because all he had to do was keep coming up with increasingly worse puns. Forget Nick Frank Castle--HT is the real Punnisher!
  • Anthony Horowitz. Just look at the titles of the Diamond Brothers books, which are things like The Falcons Malteser, and the Groosham Grange books. Even in the more serious Alex Rider series he can't stop himself slipping in puns wherever possible.
  • Lieutenant T'Ryssa Chen in the Star Trek: The Next Generation Relaunch novels. She's carried it over to the Star Trek: Typhon Pact series; the highlight this time is her referring to Kinshaya engaging in non-violent protests as "hippie-griffs" (Kinshaya being the Star Trek Novel Verse's Our Gryphons Are Different race).
  • Bone, The Mad Hatter Expy from Patrick Senecal's Aliss, puns constantly, usually with frightening instead of funny results. The only person entertained by Bone's wordplay is his equally terrifying lover, Chair (the March Hare), who also puns at the drop of a hat.

Live Action TV

  • In the TV version of Tales from the Crypt, the Cryptkeeper makes morbid puns before and after every tale he tells.
  • Both on-screen on What's My Line and off in his personial life, Bennett Cerf was THE Pungeon Master for the 50s and 60s up to his death in the early 70s.
  • Ditto Wink Martindale, particularly on Tic-Tac-Dough.
  • Sabrina the Teenage Witch spoofed this in a fantasy episode where Harvey was a James Bond-esque secret agent. At one point, the villain [Mr. Kraft] proclaimed "I'll kill you, Kinkle! If only to stop the puns!"
  • Chandler from Friends can be like this from time to time, particularly in puncomfortable situations.
  • The entire cast of MythBusters, especially narrator Robert Lee. Yes, even Jamie gets in on it.
    • Kari might deserve special mention here, as her puns are so bad that even Grant and Tory are driven to groaning by them.
  • Lee Mack's character in British Sitcom Not Going Out, to the point where he is made to go and see a psychiatrist (his friends wonder if he's covering up for something).
  • And how can we forget JD from Scrubs?
    • Dr. Cox says he wishes for the day JD will not refer to cream cheese as "cow fudge".

JD: "I like to play with words."

Greg: The world leaders are about to die in a plane crash!
Colin: Well that's plane to see!

    • Speaking of Colin Mochrie, his "reindeer in Spain was hit mainly by the plane" gag in a Weird Newscasters, not to mention just about every one of his hoedowns, established him as the greatest Pungeon Master on that show.
      • Really, Colin had spectacular puns in most (if not all) of his Weird Newscasters bits. He was the master of the Overly Pre-Prepared Gag.
      • One could say he made a Mochrie of the form - and when he appeared on Air Farce, they did say that.
    • A particularly Punishing hoedown from Colin:

Colin: I am quite unbalanced, my mind is not that steady, I once pummelled a guy with an Eveready. They took me down to jail and they arrested me, and they charged me with assault with a battery.

  • Hawkeye and B.J. on M*A*S*H. Actually, most of the cast trended this way over time.
  • The Doctor has a tendency towards this kind of behavior. It's particularly bad with the Eighth Doctor, although having companions with names like Fitz and Trix may be partly to blame.
  • Louis Rukeyser of Wall Street Week with Louis Rukeyser.
  • What, no Horatio Cane? Was the entry about the Internet meme focusing on his morbid jokes...expunged?
  • Richard Whitely, of Countdown. Endlessly, and relentlessly, parodied, sent up and otherwise mocked by everyone else in television, ever.
  • Smallville's version of Zatanna has a tendency to make magician and show business puns.
  • Araya and Doubting Dave in Mystery Hunters both get groans, usually from Christina.
  • Two Words: Gil Grissom.
  • Mr. Baggy Pants on Remote Control.
  • Carly in iCarly. Example, when discussing how their entire building has suffered the theft of all TV remotes:

Other character : "What kind of person would go around stealing tv remotes?"
Carly: A.. remote control freak.

Sookie Stackhouse: Fang-tasia?
Bill Compton: You have to remember that most vampires are very old. Puns used to be the highest form of humor.

Music

  • The band Alkaline Trio has released albums called "From Here to Infirmary" and "Good Mourning" and have penned lyrics such as "a farewell to arms, and legs and heads..." It's good music, but unarguably groan-compelling.
  • "Weird Al" Yankovic's "Party at the Leper Colony" is made of this. Actually, he throws them out so fast (and the puns are so morbid) that it's very enjoyable.
  • Bo Burnham's music is so full of puns and double entendre that it would be hard to find a line that doesn't fit this trope.
  • Kitananx is one, but doesn't use so many of them in his songs. He used one in "Meatheads, Meatheads, Everywhere," though.

"He seems to be better than that PRESIDENT EVIL George W. Bush, though...

  • Michael Giacchino owns this trope in the field of film and television scoring, and possibly in the world as well. The following is by no means a complete list...


Newspaper Comics

  • The entire Patterson clan in For Better or For Worse. Grandpa Jim can't even speak much and is close to death, and he STILL makes puns in his head.
  • Funky Winkerbean has more than its far share, but instead of being humorous, most are incredibly somber or death/fate related. This fact is a driving point of the Curmudgeon's hatred of the strip.
  • Frank and Ernest is this trope and nothing but.
  • Grandpa from One Big Happy gets in a good one now and then.
  • Stephan Pastis of Pearls Before Swine forces his characters into this role. They call him (or at least his Author Avatar) out on it.
  • The entire world of Australian comic Snake. The eponymous reptile is particularly bad about it, but everyone else gets the opportunity to say something groanworthy; it's just that Snake, being The Chew Toy, is the one most likely to end up smashed under his own rock or thrown into the river tied to a brick as a result.


Professional Wrestling

  • Former pro wrestler Mick Foley seems to just adore bad puns and awful jokes, as evidenced by his books and his work as color commentator on WWE Smackdown. With him, though, it's an endearing trait, not an infuriating one.


Radio

  • Once Per Episode on The Life of Riley, Riley would run into his pal Digby "Digger" O'Dell, "The Friendly Undertaker", who could always be counted upon to unleash several dreadful puns related to his (flat)line of work. A typical exchange would begin with Digger noting that Riley was "looking very...natural", and end with him saying, "I'd better be...shoveling off."
  • A Prairie Home Companion has several regular features which are comprised primarily of extremely painful puns. Probably the most egregious being Guy Noir, Private Eye.
  • In the CNN Student News Podcast, Carl Azuz makes a pun at the end of every episode, extremely lame ones at that.
  • The teams on I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue - especially Graeme and Barry as Hamish and Dougal.
  • Lou Costello of Abbott and Costello, given most of their humor was puns and deliberate misunderstandings of a punny nature.


Religion


Sport

  • Jeff Stelling from Soccer Saturday.
  • The webmasters of the National Hockey League's website has a habit of naming the highlight videos from recent games in the most punny way possible.


Tabletop RPG

  • GURPS has the surprisingly effective advantage Rapier Wit. Not only is the victim stunned but a good enough (or bad enough) joke can physically harm an opponent. Talk about "cutting remarks"...


Theater

  • Shakespearean examples:
    • Mercutio from Romeo and Juliet pretty much lives and breathes in horrible puns. At one point he even has a mock "contest of wits" with Romeo which consisted of both of them trying to out-pun each other. Even when he's dying, he can't resist the allure of a pun, saying "ask for me tomorrow and you will find me a grave man".
    • The main character of Hamlet does the same thing; it's just harder to notice because he's so melancholy. Arguably Mercutio is what Hamlet would be if he weren't the main character of a revenge tragedy.
    • In Two Gentlemen of Verona, token servant Launce is the main punner. For example, after Valentine learns that he's been banished from Milan, he angstily claims to be "nothing". Launce's response:

Sir, there is a proclamation that you are vanished.

    • Launcelot, a similar servant in The Merchant of Venice. Notably, he's told by Lorenzo that "every fool can play upon the word!" (translation: "Any idiot can make puns!") and gets his revenge by finding a double meaning in everything Lorenzo says. Told he's gotten a "moor" pregnant, he avoids an awkward exchange (or perhaps even makes it worse):

It is much that the moor should be more than reason, but if she be less than an honest woman, she is indeed more than I took her for!


Theme Parks

"Right this way, and as they say...look alive!"
"Why, you're dead right!"
"Why it's the Sea Witch! So nice of you to plop in!"


Video Games

  • Dr. Morris in Advance Wars: Days of Ruin. He's unequivocally the absolute worst ever.

"I used to be a resident, but now I'm president! Ohohoho... Perhaps you didn't hear me, I said --"
"I heard you."

  • Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Justice For All has one of these in the shape of a clown, Moe.
    • Don't forget Phoenix (unwillingly) getting into the action himself early on in the case. "Why am I, Phoenix Wright, such a great attorney? Because I'm Wright all the time!".
    • In Trials and Tribulations, it seems to have rubbed off on Phoenix and Maya, as they start making puns at inappropriate times.
    • The writers of the Ace Attorney series in general fit this trope, too. The vast majority of names in the games are puns in one way or another. For instance, the aforementioned Moe the Clown's real name is Lawrence Curls. The owner of Blue Corp is Redd White, while Wendy Oldbag is definitely a windy old bag of a woman. Lotta Hart is a southerner with a passion for photography, and then there's Sal Manella, Penny Nichols, April May, Mack Rell, Shelly de Killer (who is, indeed, de killer), a victim called Deid Mann, Frank Sahwit (who claims that he did, indeed, see it), the sisters Ini and Mimi Miney, and the flight attendant Cammy Meele, to name a few. And it doesn't end there. There's Russell Berry's circus, the Berry (Very) Big Circus, and the nations of Allebahst (Alabaster) and Babahl (Babel), for instance.
  • The developers of Artix Entertainment seem to be so, due to the Hurricane of Puns that are their games.
  • Persona 3's Chairman Shuji Ikutsuki tells the worst puns imaginable pretty much constantly.
    • One event in the game involves putting on an impromptu comedy show with one of your friends, which pretty much requires (for a good show, anyway) that you come up with horrible puns. Your friend even compares you to Ikutsuki.
  • Teddie from Persona 4 isn't quite as bad as Ikutsuki, but still quite un-bear-able.
    • The protagonist also gets the chance to deliver a few groaners. Whether or not he does depends on the player.
    • This is the result of their Translation Style Choice, naturally; in the Japanese, he ends his sentences with "kuma" or some variation thereof (it means "bear", and also happens to be his name). They decided to treat English-language players to a real (wait for it...!) bear (ha!) instead of subjecting them to his Verbal Tic. Well, some would rather have it the other way, perhaps.
  • Wigglytuff from Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky/Time/Darkness apparently was one when he was younger. For example, upon falling into a pit, he says "Oh, for pity's sake..."
  • In Nethack, if a pit viper or pit fiend falls into a pit, it says "How pitiful! Isn't that the pits?"
  • ALL Gnomes in the Quest for Glory world do this. They're all jesters and whatnot.
    • Even THE NARRATOR of the games is this.
  • Ernie Steele from Backyard Sports.
  • Higashizawa and Minamimoto in The World Ends With You, specializing in food and math puns, respectively.
  • Galuf from Final Fantasy V.

Galuf: Don't push it, kid. Here in Bal, bad jokes like that will get you PUNished.

  • Kingdom of Loathing shouldn't be overlooked, although its puns are too numerous to list here. Really, the game sometimes seems little more than a vehicle for punnery. The puns are sometimes delivered semi-apologetically, as in this snippet from a fight with a Bread Golem:

This is a golem made out of a loaf of bread. You find him crusty and his wit stale. Having thought the previous sentence, you almost hope he manages to kick your ass.


Web Comics

  • The entire Deegan family, and many others, too. At one point, Dominic actually ended up in jail for using inappropriate puns around the mayor. (Granted, she was pissed at him to begin with, but still...) He comments that "This time, the pun-ishment fit the crime."
    • For Dominic, it's gotten so bad lately that he's made terrible puns without even realizing it!
  • When Elan from Order of the Stick decides to take the Dashing Swordsman prestige class, he learns the pun is mightier than the sword. It turns a formerly weak character into a pun-man army... at least as long as his supply of good puns lasts. Occasionally, his quips get so bad that they lampshade it.
    • Elan later duels his father who it turns out knows how to defend himself against many obscure combat techniques, leading to a pun duel between them.
  • You can hardly read a week of Irregular Webcomic strips without running into at least one pun. As such, many of the characters are Pungeon Masters.
  • What's New with Phil and Dixie describes a proposed 'Jester' archetype for Dungeons & Dragons, who is shown to kill monsters with pun-attacks. (And, not incidentally, his party, demonstrating that Puns aren't picky about targets.)
  • Ennesby in Schlock Mercenary. Traditionally, his puns are followed by threatened physical harm.
    • Willis is not allowed to enjoy his job by making murder puns (but does this anyway).
  • Father Gregori is this at first in Concerned.
  • Torg in Sluggy Freelance becomes one with the slightest encouragement. Riff gives him nothing but encouragement, and they circle each other in a Hurricane of Puns.
  • Rich in Loaded Dice is known to drop puns at essentially any opportunity, which naturally earns him the ire of the other players.
  • One of the characters in Cyanide & Happiness will drop atrocious puns in Equally bad situations.
  • Bad puns form the typing quirks of some of the trolls in Homestuck. Nepeta (Leo) is a plefurra of cat-related puns, Equius (Saggitarius) says 'neigh' for 'nay', and Eridan and Feferi have this exchange:

CC: DON'T YOU GLUB IN T)(AT TON-E OF GLUB WIT)( M-E MIST-ER!
CA: ill glub in wwhatevver dumbass bubbly soundin fishnoise i wwant to glub
CC: O)( S)(IT, you are angling for SO MUC)( TROUBL-E NOW.
CA: ok please lets just not get into the wwhole fuckin fish pun thing again ok
CA: like wwe get it wwe are nautically themed

    • Even the first token silly character calls Feferi out on her fish puns... especially when they are so contrived that it's... fishy.
  • Not to mention Professor Bee, the protips program from MS Paint Adventures' previous story, Problem Sleuth. He rounded off a hurricane of bee puns with:

'...That will bee one honey of a rave!

I'm a bee!"

Western Animation

  • Shane Weston in Joe 90 can never resist a lousy pun. And why should he, since his name is a lousy pun in the first place?
  • Numbuh Two in Codename: Kids Next Door.
  • Flash's status as one of these is Lampshaded in the Justice League Unlimited episode Dead Reckoning, after the team reverses a transformation that had turned them into monkeys.

"Everything okay?"
"Well, I do miss Flash's obligatory joke about how Grodd made a monkey out of us."
"You just had to say it, didn't you?"
"Obligatory."

    • Speaking of which: in the first-season episode introducing Grodd, he taunted the villain by calling him the "gorilla my dreams".
      • But when it comes to capers, Flash doesn't monkey around.
      • The rest of the League would go ape if he did.
      • You guys are driving me bananas!
      • Cut it out or we'll have to orangutan your hide.[1]
  • Captain Planet announces every move he makes with this kind of pun.
    • Parodied by at least one episode of "TV Funhouse" on SNL, in which the hero came up with a long, drawn-out series of increasingly awful torments for his defeated opponent, accompanied by increasingly awful puns. It ended, as I recall, with the character's mind snapping—he ends the episode further bludgeoning the villain's unrecognizably mutilated remains and sobbing incoherently about his parents.
  • M.A.S.K. has T-Bob has this.
  • Carlos from The Magic School Bus. His classmates found most of his jokes to be eye-rollingly awful.
  • One word: Flabber. Flabtastic!
  • Two Words: Magilla Gorilla. Even worse in his appearance on Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, though he's roundly mocked for it, of course.
    • "Thanks for the lift, Eagle! If you were an ape, you'd be the GORILLA my dreams!"
      • -cue the Eagle pecking the hell out of Magilla's face "cawcawcawcawcawcaw!"
  • Remember the Ruby-Spears Mega Man cartoon? Every single character (who wasn't a one-off, that is) was appointed Pungeon Master. Better yet, some Masters were themed (Cutman made scissor- and cut-related puns, for one). And of course, they didn't always check Urban Dictionary.
  • Punsie McKale from The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, in the episode "Pun Times (with Punsie McKale)".
  • One-time Kim Possible villain The Mathter had a constant stream of terrible maths-related puns.
    • Just when you think the puns have run out, they keep multiplying.
    • Please, don't add any more to this example. The supply of funny associated with it has been decimated, and we don't need any more division among the ranks. Anybody who puts more examples here is a square.
  • Avatar: The Last Airbender: Sokka. Enough said...or it would be until we learn he's just like his father.
    • So I guess that makes this a classic case of "like father, like pun".
  • There's an entire Animaniacs episode spent on playing with puns (more so than usual). This Pun For Hire
  • Xandir from Drawn Together is definitely this.
  • Beetlejuice from the cartoon, especially.
  • Riddler in Batman: The Animated Series was a one of these with his various death traps having Incredibly Lame Pun names. The result was so bad that Batman had this to say:

Batman: I don't know whats worse, the traps or the puns!

Milkman: PREPARE FOR YOUR...I can't believe I'm gonna say this...UDDER DEFEAT!! (holds up a cow) HA!! I SAID IT!! HAHAHAHA!!

  • Danger Mouse got in a number of these. An example from "One Of Our Stately Homes Is Missing," where DM, Penfold and DM's friend Major Melvin seek to retrieve the Duke of Bedbug mansion:

DM: But how are we going to get it off the ground?
Melvin: That's easy. BLEEPs (Building Location and Emergency Extradition Platoon) brought two engines. Dig tunnel under building, strap 'em on.
Penfold: But how will you know where to fit them?
Melvin: That's easy. Thing's going to fly, so east and west wings.
Penfold: (to us) I knew I shouldn't have asked.

    • The narrator was prone to this at the end of a number of episodes.

Isombard: If Danger Mouse had found a yellow-and-black-striped insect in (Merlin's ink well), would it have been the "Well of the Wasp?" And if Penfold had dropped a sweetie in it and made it disappear, would it have been the "Lost Well and Tasty Mint?"


Web Original

  • Linkara's co-personality, conspirator, and live-in girlfriend Iron Liz has a reputation for being an incorrigible punster. Don't incorrige her... Oh god it's contagious!
  • Egg farmer Masayuki of the animated web series Broken Saints cannot resist making egg-related puns every chance he gets.
  • Rob from Dimension Heroes fits this trope to a T. Thankfully, his bad puns usually result in him getting smacked upside the head by one of the other characters.
  • Go listen to the Football Weekly podcast at The Guardian. Depending on your Mileage, the host, James Richardson is either punniest man alive or the most pungent.
    • Just some samples of some of his puns. When told that some Spanish football clubs rewarded their players with food, he asked, "Did they have a lobster clause in their contract?"
    • When told that some Ipswich fans reacted badly at the appointment of Roy Keane as manager, he remarked, "There's no pleasing Suffolk."
  • SCP-504 is the polar opposite of this trope: if someone makes a lame pun, a horrifyingly bad joke, or even simply repeats a poorly-phrased sentence, it reacts. Violently.
  • Daniel Kiser, from Epicbattle Axe.com's weekly podcast Epic Battle Cry, is addicted to punning.
  • Us. Seriously. Look how many pages that link to Incredibly Lame Pun where the Pothole in question is one.
    • Also, the index page Sorting Algorithm of Tropes was clearly written by a Pungeon Master.
  • Ferr from the Freelance Astronauts is a notorious punner.
    • Maxwell Adams notes that the best thing about puns is making other people listen to them.
    • pipes! also takes up the punning duties on occasion.
  • Andy Zaltzman of The Bugle podcast. In one episode he once did a runner of 22 North Korea-based puns, and later told an story about Lou Reed's concert for dogs which included 34 dog puns. Fellow co-host John Oliver is not the biggest fan of them.
  • Rutskarn of choclate hammer and the Spoiler Warning Let's Play series.
  • NTom64 is a HUGE Pungeon Master. He has claimed it himself, and he most certainly can back it up.
  • The main character from The Annoying Orange, much to the annoyance to almost everyone else in the show.
  • Chuggaaconroy is well known for this in his Lets Plays. His puns are generally met with a Collective Groan from Proton Jon and Nintendo Capri Sun when they play together as The Runaway Guys.
  • Cyrus from Spill, earning him the nickname The PUNisher
  • Everyone in Holy Musical Batman! loves a good pun but Sweet Tooth takes it Up to Eleven at every opportunity. He, literally, has a prop for every pun too.


Real Life

  • Michael Giacchino the composer. Just look at the track list on any of his soundtracks.
  • Skippers on the World Famous Jungle Cruise revel in this trope.
  • Flight attendants, most notably those working for Southwest Airlines.
  • Tour Guides.
  • Neil Cavuto of Fox News LOVES puns.
  1. ↑ I cannot believe I just typed that.
This article is issued from Allthetropes. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.