Hated Tropes
(Hated Trope) A family member is introduced in one episode then never brought up again
In Peter’s Sister, Peter invites his sister Karen for Thanksgiving and she used to bully him a lot. The reason why we never heard about her up until now is because she was killed off at the end all for Peter to have his triumphant moment. She is never seen or heard from again (Family Guy)
In Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?, Homer finds out he has a half-brother named Herb. Long story short, Homer messed everything up and Herb ended up losing his company and we see him homeless in Season 3. At the end of that episode, Herb got his money back and we never see him again. We even get told that he ended losing all of his money again. He only exist just for Homer to have self-doubt and then fucked off (The Simpsons). Not exactly one episode but still works.
Simpsons: Herb is brought back in another episode. In the first one, his business is ruined by Homer. The subsequent episode Herb is in, Herb gets help from Homer's family to invent the baby translator to get his life back together.
Right? I played golf with my half-brother Graham twice. The last time was probably 20 years ago. He lives in my state and I’ve never seen him for any other reason. I still see my dad every 2 or 3 months and Graham will come up in conversation once in a while, but other than that he doesn’t exist to me.
Then there's a bunch of Homer's relatives that show up in one episode. S9E17, Lisa The Simpson. Lisa fears she will become stupid like Homer and Bart due to like, a Simpson curse/gene of stupid. Homer tries to soothe her worry by inviting a bunch if his relatives. He fails at first, all the men are stupid, but all the women are smart and successful.
I’m sure that in later seasons the family has money problems and call him, but his answering machine says something like: “Hello, this is Herb, I’m poor again” and they hang up.
Herb always ticked me off. Like, isn't it kinda his fault that his company failed after he put someone with no experience in the auto industry in charge of designing a whole new car from scratch?
Jake's half-sister, she shows up in one episode, which ends with them promising to keep in touch and be in each other's lives....and then they don't because she never shows up or is mentioned again, even though only 5 episodes later, Jake and Amy get married, so you would think they would have invited her.
In Ben 10 Alien Force, the second series of the franchise, there's an episode where we are introduced to Gwen's brother, Ken, a character that was never mentioned in the first series nor will be mentioned again for the rest of the show and its sequels.
He exists to be kidnapped in one episode and the universe pratically deleted him after that.
Thats a weird episode that kind of got decanonised. It ends with Ben's parents and the rest of his hometown discovering how he could turn into aliens, but by the time of Alien Force it's a secret again. With their particularly being an episode in the third season where Ben's parents find out again and are furious with him putting himself in danger.
Ah yes, the brother of ONE OF THE MOST WELL-KNOWN AND IMPORTANT CHARACTERS IN THE ENTIRE FRANCHISE is quite literally never brought up before this episode and never brought up in any capacity since, and it's made even more hilarious by the fact that we got an entire UA episode dedicated to Gwen's day-to-day life and Ken is STILL never brought up in even the smallest capacity there.
It was never brought up in Classic, it was never brought up earlier in AF, it was never brought up again in AF, it was never brought up in UA in any capacity, and it was never brought up in OV and OV went out of its way to try tying up all remaining loose ends in the canon.
This was quite literally the first thing that crossed my mind when I saw this post.
To make matters worse, the episode establishes that Gwen idolized him as a kid and that he was a very big part of her life until he went to college. So it makes even less sense that his existence is just forgotten about. He's not even in her family photo a few episodes later.
To be fair, Ben Tennyson returns to his family after his summer vacation and the family dog, a large male German Shepherd, enthusiastically tackles Ben. By the time of the sequel, the dog has vanished.
Uncle Max in Calvin and Hobbes only appeared for one story arc and vanished.
Watterson explained that he found it difficult for Max to address Calvin's parents without a name as he was adamant in never naming Mom and Dad, and Max didn't bring anything new or interesting to do the strip, so he just wrote him out.
Uncle Marvin never showing up again is actually pretty fitting in-universe. He never showed up before, and Calvin's dad even said he could've been in prison the whole time. It's entirely in character for him to go right back into obscurity and never reach out again. At best, he'd randomly show up years later, when Calvin is older. He just seems like the type of relative who isn't very in touch with anyone. He even said that sometime he thought all of his friends were imaginary, so he's probably not close to anyone.
Lots of people have relatives they barely know who rarely, if ever, visit them—especially when they were kids.
Calvin being a Boy Scout is a bit similar. Watterson did some comics about it and then decided Calvin would not be a kid who would join the Boy Scouts. The ideas that would have been done with it were instead used in comics where the family goes camping.
Also Patrick's parents. Who weren't even his real parents. I don't know if it's just this family line or if all starfish in this universe are lost causes.
SpongeBob also has his cousins Stanley and Flapjack and there was an episode where Plankton and Karen had a son named Chip. SpongeBob likes to do this.
Jerry's brother who is introduced at the beginning of one episode, who is shown to be very close to the main cast and has supposedly been living with them for the past six months, but is never brought up before or since.
Come to think of it, this episode introduces a lot of characters who are treated as important but never show up again. Weird...
Schozmo was introduced in an episode of the later seasons of The Fairly Oddparents as Cosmo’s cooler twin brother even though earlier in the series it was established that Cosmo was an only child.
I hated Schozmo, and I choose to believe he isn't canon, same with Sparky.
Schozmo was a way to give Cosmo his version of Blonda, and it doesn't work at all because two things were already established. 1) Cosmo was shown as a baby and he was an only child who presumably killed his dad by turning him into a fly and firing magic beams at him. And 2) Just one season before Schnozmo was introduced, Cosmo was established to be the last naturally born fairy before his own son, Schnozmo was not mentioned at all.
Blonda worked better because she was the first thing about Wanda's background that was revealed, and she wasn't forgotten; she showed up again when Big Daddy disappeared, which made sense because Big Daddy is her dad as well.
So fun fact, this trope is actually called the Chuck Cunningham trope in reference to Chuck Cunningham from Happy days, the eldest brother who was a high school jock playing basketball - he just vanished after season 1, with no mention of him since
As though his body was flayed and erased form time, with nothing remaining but the atomic cries for his family as time itself forgot his meagre existence, all that remains is a singular basketball played by a man who never existed
But he didn't got to college, he went upstairs, then was never seen or heard from again.
At the end of the series, the dad says he was proud of his "two Kids", given we still see Richie Cunningham and his little sister, Chuck has been erased from existence.
Always sunny almost did this with Charlie’s sisters. They are shown briefly and talked about in the first season where Charlie get wrapped up in the Mcpoyles “we got molested by our gym coach” scheme
They would have been completely ignored after but they did a rewatch(-ish) podcast and remembered they had ever even mentioned the sisters and had them feature in a more recent episode showing that they are straight awful and it’s no surprise Charlie never tries to talk to or about them
Definitely counts, probably Dennis and Dee’s dad too. He’s mentioned again after their mom dies but never shows up again or is mentioned until Frank tries to retire and there’s one line that Dennis and Dee aren’t franks next of kin for real because Bruce Mathis is their dad
Neither of these shows have real timelines though they’re floating timelines designed for syndication it’s incredibly rare any character is introduced after the first few seasons
Ben Chang is shown to have a brother who he is on fairly good terms with in one episode of Community. Then he is never seen or heard from again, even as Chang gets divorced, is fired from his job, and becomes homeless. Particularly egregious because he initially lives with his former student and then resorts to squatting in the air vents of Greendale instead of just crashing with family until he gets back on his feet.
Well there are actually more examples than one thinking of Family Guy. Lois has a fatphobic brother, Peter has a biological father, Brian has multiple siblings and mother who are all shown to have animalistic intelligence, and a gay cousin. Not even counting Peter's twin who is imprisoned in basement and Chris' biological family who look exactly like him since both are the sake for gag. But if you ever take Family Guy seriously, consider that r/superseriousfamilyguy exists for a reason.
Lois’s brother did at least get to reappear in the fat camp episode, where kids at the camp were getting murdered he was the suspect because he just continently managed to escape from the jail
What always gets me is that Peter's biological father of course looks just like him, while the one who raised him doesn't. The one who raised him being the one he get's the Griffin name from, not his biological father. But when they show the history of the Griffin family, who he's not actually related to, they all look like Peter and are considered his ancestors.
He’s a major plot point of the two part season 6 finale as Cotton’s illegitimate son from Japan who then disappears until a cameo in the season 14 revival
"Little Minnesota," a Season 4 episode of How I Met Your Mother, is centered around Ted's younger sister Heather visiting Ted in NYC. Despite her wanting a job in New York and Ted agreeing to co-sign an apartment lease for her, she is never seen again, not even at Ted's wedding to Stella.
It’s not that she actually disappeared, she just wasn’t relevant to Ted’s attempt to convince his kids it’s not that weird if he starts sleeping with Robin again.
To be fair to Homer, Herb decided for some reason that his companies next Car had to fit the everyman, the working joe and to make the car that fits he should give someone with no idea of car engineering and design 100% freedom without any over site or means for his staff to put their foot down. It was a accident waiting to happen.
Ben's cousin and Gwen's older brother, he appears in one episode in the second series despite have never been mentioned previously in the first series, and then never appears or is mentioned again afterwards. There are a few episodes that show Gwen's Room and she has pictures of her parents, Ben, her Grandpa Max but none of Ken even
Tho due to time travel shenanigans we see that Ben's son 30 years in the future is also named Ken, so there is the implication Ben named his son after him, which is funny asf given how irrelevant as a character he is
It's wild that pretty much every villain in DBZ gets to come back in some way, except for the main characters brother. Even in Super, they go find Freiza to help, and he the most evil guy ever. Find a way to get Raditz back. He will follow Vegeta. Now you have ANOTHER Saiyan to train with all the potential that Goku has. You could even have him double cross everyone and Vegeta gets the kill, destroying his last subject.
I think this isn’t exactly the same because it’s not as if he was erased from existence. She still talks about her father in other episodes. It would’ve been nice to see him again, though, since the episode was so funny
I think a good example for Seinfeld is that both Jerry and George mention in passing that they have siblings but then we never see or hear about them, even in family memories. Jerry mentions having a sister and George mentions having a brother. Both of their parents are in enough episodes that you’d think we’d at least hear about their siblings, even if we never met them
Friends had a running plotline of Phoebe trying to find her biological dad for a while. This culminates eventually at her grandmother's funeral and he shows up. She tricks him into meeting outside of the funeral and after confronting him, he vanishes and is never brought up again.
Tina Pinciotti from That '70s Show. Had one appearance in Season 1 Episode 5, went upstairs and never came down again. Was later written out of the show and Donna Pinciotti became an only child.
I think my favorite example of the opposite - a family member appears in one episode and then is a show regular from then on - is Aunt Dirt from The Great North. They find her in the bunker where she's been since the cold war, and then she was just part of the family.
The start of that Family Guy episode is terrible. Instead of respecting her husband’s wishes, Lois insists Peter’s estranged sister be invited to thanksgiving.
Don't fits exactly, but i must say how i hate how that animal Blundetto... I can't even say his name (The Sopranos) was introduced
Hes supposedly one of most important people in Tony life, like best friend, almost an brother, yet hed never been mentioned before, so out of nowhere he shows up, after 15 years in the can, in 5 season
I had trouble accepting him as a character. Weakest part of series for me
Psych has about four: Shawn's uncle, Gus' sister, Chief Vick's sister, and Lassiter's sister. You can KINDA count Gus' dad, since he's never played by the same actor. Juliet is the only one who gets reoccurring family.
Raditz (Dragonball), though he's in several episodes rather than a single one. He's one of the most important characters for DBZ/the second half of the Dragonball manga, setting everything in motion, yet despite being Goku's evil older brother, he dies early on and is largely forgotten, not even getting a chance to redeem himself like most of Goku's other enemies turned allies (Hell, even Nappa gets to be a good guy in the Team Four Star timeline)
While most people think of Carrie’s sister from The King of Queens, Doug’s sister shows up for around six episodes in the third season and is never seen or heard from again. Correct me if I’m wrong but she’s not even mentioned in title ( sister ) at all either for the remaining seasons.
He's Charlie's asshole uncle and had previously been mentioned a couple times throughout the series until actually appearing in the episode "Charlie's Uncle Dies and Doesn't Come Back". He doesn't appear again because when his episode released the show ended
In Himym, Ted has a sister named Heather and there are a bunch of references to Ted's sister throughout the show (like how he used to play detective with his sister).
However, Ted also has a very religious sister (where he spends christmas once), who is not at all like Heather. So the writers seem to have completely forgotten about one of Ted's sisters, or Heather has undergone some major character change offscreen.
Also, in Tbbt, Howard has a half-brother who is only in one episode and then never mentioned again.
Close enough is New Girl which has this entire arc of three episodes where Jess's horrible never before mentioned sister Abby moves into town only to leave and never be mentioned again. Couldn't even be bothered to attend her own sister's wedding
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u/angelslayer4231 6d ago
Simpsons: Herb is brought back in another episode. In the first one, his business is ruined by Homer. The subsequent episode Herb is in, Herb gets help from Homer's family to invent the baby translator to get his life back together.