As long as there is TV, there will always be controversial television episodes. But sometimes, the nature of the controversy is serious enough that an episode will be taken off the air. While some episodes of these shows may have been shelved briefly, the episodes here were forever scrapped or changed. In other words, these banned and censored TV episodes were found to be too inappropriate for audiences entirely. For certain shows, the content was so bad, these episodes never aired. For others, it was taken out of rotation briefly as a response to real-life events. Whether it was sexual themes, racist undertones, religious iconography, or just poor timing, all of these episodes were pulled from broadcast for being more trouble than they were worth. Check out these shows that had to pull the plug on an episode; some were totally predictable, but the rest might surprise you.
Tap upor downto vote. Your vote is added to Ranker's counts.
Voting identifies your browser with an anonymous fingerprint, stored only as a salted hash, to count one per visitor. Privacy
Source: Ranker, ranked by its voters.
During the second season of Bluey, the episode "Dad Baby" sparked controversy because it was perceived to be mocking pregnancy. In the episode, Bandit pretended to be pregnant by placing Bingo into a baby carrier. He strapped that to his front and then simulated giving birth. Initially airing outside of the US in 2020, the Bluey episode never made it to the States. It was later added to YouTube, however.
"Dennō Senshi Porygon," commonly translated as "Electric Soldier Porygon," was Episode 38 of Pokémon's first season. Broadcast in Japan in 1997, the episode's bright flashing effects resulted in viewers across the country having photosensitive epileptic seizures. In total, 685 people were taken to hospitals and the episode was never rebroadcast internationally. The series even took a four-month hiatus after the disaster.
First aired in 2018, "Mid-Life Crustacean" was part of SpongeBob SquarePants' third season. It featured Mr. Krabs amid a mid-life crisis, one that led to him taking part in a "panty raid" with SpongeBob and Patrick. The raid, however, targeted Mr. Krabs' mother. The episode was deemed inappropriate for young by Nickelodeon and pulled from rotation.
The fourth episode of Transformers: Robots in Disguise aired in Japan on April 26, 2000. The episode featured the threatened explosion of a generator capable of releasing a dangerous zirconium gas. Before its American premiere on September 13, 2001, it had to be re-dubbed to remove all references to the generator exploding, as it was thought to be too similar to the recent 9/11 attacks.
Season 1 iCarly episode "iRue the Day" featured the return of the character Nevel. In an attempt to blackmail Carly and her friends, Nevel hacks their website. Although the episode was first aired in 2007, Nickelodeon temporarily pulled the episode after the highly publicized 2014 Sony hack, due to the its references to illegal hacking. The episode has since returned to the rerun schedule.
As a children's show known for tackling real-life issues, the writers behind Sesame Street spent years thinking of how to best address divorce. In 1992, they finished producing "Snuffy's Parents Get a Divorce," but in test screenings, children were confused by the episode and did not understand the core message that it was trying to communicate. As a result, the episode was never aired.
Wizard of Oz star Margaret Hamilton reprised her role as The Wicked Witch of the West in a 1976 episode of Sesame Street. In the episode, the witch loses her broom on Sesame Street, and terrorizes Big Bird and his friends while she tries to get it back. After the episode aired, the show received an overwhelmingly negative response from viewers. Parents said that the episode was far too scary for children, and the producers chose to not re-air the episode.
"Exercise," which was part of the third season of Bluey, included an opening clip of Bandit weighing himself. He was unsatisfied with what the scale showed and was perceived to be providing young viewers with a negative body image. Put another way, viewers said it was guilty of "fat shaming." As a result, the short part of the episode was removed from the episode entirely.
As part of season 12, "Kwarantined Krab" coincided with real world quarantines amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The storyline was based in the notion that "Clam Flu" strikes a restaurant and the health inspector, Krusty Krab, quarantines the individuals involved by throwing them into a freezer. The episode was later removed because of ongoing animosity and violence against Asians in the US: The episode’s storyline reflects feelings of increased isolation and hatred that many Asian communities have experienced since the Covid-19 pandemic began.
On two occasions, "Mister Skinny Legs" was taken off the air in Australia. The first was in 2004 because it gave children the impression that spiders could be touched, picked up, and played with without concern. Because there are so many dangerous spiders in Australia, this was considered "inappropriate." This all took place in 2012 but, five years later, the episode became available in Australia once again. At first, Nick Jr. said the episode would remain in circulation because Mr. Skinny Legs "did not look real." It was later taken down.
Four episodes of Bluey were removed from circulation due to the inclusion of the phrase "ooga booga." The two-word utterance is, according to The Macquarie Dictionary: A stereotypical rendering of what the speaker regards to be the language of those deemed by them to be African savages. As a result, it was considered "a term with racial connotations and a problematic history for Indigenous Australians." The phrase was later edited and changed to other sounds and both episodes were returned to streaming.
A Season 2 episode of The Amanda Show featured a sketch about a family called the Lucklesses, who always have the worst things happen to them. At the end of the sketch, the family's house is hit by a meteor. The episode original aired in March 2001, but after September 11th, the sketch comedy show decided to pull the episode from the Nickelodeon rerun lineup, as the Lucklesses sketch was too similarly violent to the nationwide tragedy. It has not aired in the US since.
