So I figured I'd do a thread here about the Dumb and or outright silly moments of censorship that happened with TV shows or film. Be it the infamous attempts by Disney to get changes made to Gravity falls or other instances that happened that are just plain stupid, backfired or made the shows or films actively worse.
I'll start with a few
Censoring swearing especially the word Fuck in "The Magicians"
Context: The Magicians is basically a grim dark deconstructivist series doing a version of what Game of Thrones did to fantasy tropes. It's Skins meets Harry Potter with some Chronicles of Narnia. The Network it was shown on were fine with the drugs, the sex, the violence, the heavily implied bestiality. But when the show was broadcast the network insisted on toning down the language used especially the word fuck. On later released all the fucks were back but the first broadcast and initial subscription / non buy the show whole streaming version were also censored. Luckily Eventually the network realised how stupid they were being and later series got to have all the swearing they wanted.
Stargate Universe: Matthew Scott and 2nd lieutenant Vanessa James's relationship.
So this is a weird one and another one for a show that was going for a more grim and dark take on stuff in this case a dark show about trying to survive on an ancient spacecraft set in the Stargate universe. Oddly some broadcasts of the show decided to cut out a scene in the shows first episode where main character Matthew Scott was having a rendezvous with 2nd lieutenant Vanessa James. The thing being once they end up aboard space craft Destiny Scott gets close to and starts a relationship with senators daughter Chloe Armstrong.
What should have been quite a good set up for interpersonal conflict ended up having to be thrown out because of some networks deciding the scene (though showing no real nudity) was too steamy for viewers and the plotline was cut from the show, expect in a later episode where 2nd lieutenant Vanessa James talks about said relationship and shows she's still a bit bitter of Scott basically ditching her to be with Chloe instead. Worse still the networks that cut that part of episode one didn't cut this part of the later episode leaving some people confused as at no point for them had the series shown or even told them about this relationship.
Continuum - Emily's first fight in the show.
So a show about time travel where the genius dude who becomes part of the future rulers of earth ends up mixed up in with a future police officer tracking down escaped terrorists who have jumped back in time from the future.
Cue Emily, a girl Alec meets and falls in love with, nothing strange, nothing out of the ordinary, something normal in his life.
After spending the night together Alec has to leave for work and says for Emily to help herself to breakfast and stuff and stay if she wants to or let herself out and do stuff in town or whatever. Emily is in clearly thrown on sleep where, a top without a bra (you can see little nipple level lumps) and sort of pyjama / Yoga pants things, and this is where the SyFy networks problem came in apparently. In the full uncensored version of the sequence two armed men break in and Emily reveals she's very much not a normal girl as she very efficiently beats the crap out of them while still in her sleepwear with it being implied she either killed them or seriously hurt them before phoning an unknown person and saying she need help and some-one to come clean up the mess. It's a well shot well choreographed fight.
The Networked objected to the sleepwear and hints at the shape of the female body so in the censored initially broadcast version thy applied a blur over Emily's nipples on the stairs and when the fight broke out the editor zoomed in and out and jerked the camera round such that the previously clear fight scene looked like a Shaky cam fight scene mess all to avoid showing that Emily has nipples or an ass. Worse still it makes the scene look chaotic rather than Emily being a well trained skilled fighter, it makes it look like she only just won mostly by luck.
The entire Avengers episode - A Touch of Brimstone.
This is an old one for you and not Marvel's Avengers related but an English property that shares the same name. The entire episode sees special Agent John Steed and Mrs (Dr) Emma Peel infiltrating a secret society of the wealthy called "The Hell Fire Club". A club supposedly based on previous incarnations of such club that met for debouched celebrations of feed, sex and violence. Only it's suspected this latest incarnation has a sinister agenda behind it. Steed infiltrates pretending to be wealthy landed gentry and Emma infiltrates by becoming one of the act for the club calling herself the queen of sin turning up in in a spiked choker, a bustier / corset on top and short underwear like pants and a whip (Worth noting that the actress Dianna Rigg who played Emma Peel is said to have designed the outfit herself to wear). The issue being this was seen as too sexy and immoral for US tv networks who refused to show the episode at all initially and it only got show in reruns many years down the line.
The hilarious backfire / blow up. At some point an artist for a little comic company called Marvel saw the episode and was inspired. Around the time he was working on Xmen comics and it was the Dark Phoenix arc the artist needed a look for the mysterious Hellfire Club member "The Black Queen" which it turns out the Queen of Sin outfit was great inspiration for. So from an episode US tv stations banned from airing to being the look of a character in a Marvel comic book arc (one quite well known today) turns out for all the protecting the American public from the immorality of it didn't do much other than inspire an artist to make an actually slightly more revealing version of the outfit for a comic book character for the American public to see lol.
So over to everyone else.
I'll start with a few
Censoring swearing especially the word Fuck in "The Magicians"
Context: The Magicians is basically a grim dark deconstructivist series doing a version of what Game of Thrones did to fantasy tropes. It's Skins meets Harry Potter with some Chronicles of Narnia. The Network it was shown on were fine with the drugs, the sex, the violence, the heavily implied bestiality. But when the show was broadcast the network insisted on toning down the language used especially the word fuck. On later released all the fucks were back but the first broadcast and initial subscription / non buy the show whole streaming version were also censored. Luckily Eventually the network realised how stupid they were being and later series got to have all the swearing they wanted.
Stargate Universe: Matthew Scott and 2nd lieutenant Vanessa James's relationship.
So this is a weird one and another one for a show that was going for a more grim and dark take on stuff in this case a dark show about trying to survive on an ancient spacecraft set in the Stargate universe. Oddly some broadcasts of the show decided to cut out a scene in the shows first episode where main character Matthew Scott was having a rendezvous with 2nd lieutenant Vanessa James. The thing being once they end up aboard space craft Destiny Scott gets close to and starts a relationship with senators daughter Chloe Armstrong.
What should have been quite a good set up for interpersonal conflict ended up having to be thrown out because of some networks deciding the scene (though showing no real nudity) was too steamy for viewers and the plotline was cut from the show, expect in a later episode where 2nd lieutenant Vanessa James talks about said relationship and shows she's still a bit bitter of Scott basically ditching her to be with Chloe instead. Worse still the networks that cut that part of episode one didn't cut this part of the later episode leaving some people confused as at no point for them had the series shown or even told them about this relationship.
Continuum - Emily's first fight in the show.
So a show about time travel where the genius dude who becomes part of the future rulers of earth ends up mixed up in with a future police officer tracking down escaped terrorists who have jumped back in time from the future.
Cue Emily, a girl Alec meets and falls in love with, nothing strange, nothing out of the ordinary, something normal in his life.
After spending the night together Alec has to leave for work and says for Emily to help herself to breakfast and stuff and stay if she wants to or let herself out and do stuff in town or whatever. Emily is in clearly thrown on sleep where, a top without a bra (you can see little nipple level lumps) and sort of pyjama / Yoga pants things, and this is where the SyFy networks problem came in apparently. In the full uncensored version of the sequence two armed men break in and Emily reveals she's very much not a normal girl as she very efficiently beats the crap out of them while still in her sleepwear with it being implied she either killed them or seriously hurt them before phoning an unknown person and saying she need help and some-one to come clean up the mess. It's a well shot well choreographed fight.
The Networked objected to the sleepwear and hints at the shape of the female body so in the censored initially broadcast version thy applied a blur over Emily's nipples on the stairs and when the fight broke out the editor zoomed in and out and jerked the camera round such that the previously clear fight scene looked like a Shaky cam fight scene mess all to avoid showing that Emily has nipples or an ass. Worse still it makes the scene look chaotic rather than Emily being a well trained skilled fighter, it makes it look like she only just won mostly by luck.
The entire Avengers episode - A Touch of Brimstone.
This is an old one for you and not Marvel's Avengers related but an English property that shares the same name. The entire episode sees special Agent John Steed and Mrs (Dr) Emma Peel infiltrating a secret society of the wealthy called "The Hell Fire Club". A club supposedly based on previous incarnations of such club that met for debouched celebrations of feed, sex and violence. Only it's suspected this latest incarnation has a sinister agenda behind it. Steed infiltrates pretending to be wealthy landed gentry and Emma infiltrates by becoming one of the act for the club calling herself the queen of sin turning up in in a spiked choker, a bustier / corset on top and short underwear like pants and a whip (Worth noting that the actress Dianna Rigg who played Emma Peel is said to have designed the outfit herself to wear). The issue being this was seen as too sexy and immoral for US tv networks who refused to show the episode at all initially and it only got show in reruns many years down the line.
The hilarious backfire / blow up. At some point an artist for a little comic company called Marvel saw the episode and was inspired. Around the time he was working on Xmen comics and it was the Dark Phoenix arc the artist needed a look for the mysterious Hellfire Club member "The Black Queen" which it turns out the Queen of Sin outfit was great inspiration for. So from an episode US tv stations banned from airing to being the look of a character in a Marvel comic book arc (one quite well known today) turns out for all the protecting the American public from the immorality of it didn't do much other than inspire an artist to make an actually slightly more revealing version of the outfit for a comic book character for the American public to see lol.
So over to everyone else.
