8 TV Episodes That Were Banned For Insane Reasons
From incest to nuclear war...
When it comes to television show episodes, it's much more common for something to get cut or censored rather than outright banned. This is because networks would much rather reach a compromise than throw away a huge amount of time and money on an episode audiences will ever see.
When bans happen, then, they tend to be unique, fascinating and often downright weird. Various cultures and communities around the world react to the same things in different ways, so predicting what might or might not be inappropriate is tough.
Though most people aren't aware, some of the world's most popular and successful television shows have banned episodes. Bans don't always happen just because something is inappropriate, however. There are much more bizarre reasons for banning television, some of which stem from tragedy, and others that are completely nonsensical (and more than a little bit frustrating).
Forget nudity and violence, these bans are something else entirely.
8. Pokemon – Beauty And The Beach
The Episode: When it comes to having episodes banned, Pokemon is no stranger. One example in particular pertains to the episode Denno Senshi Porygon (translated as Cyber Soldier Porygon) which infamously caused a string of epileptic seizures in Japan. The banning of that episode makes sense, however, as it posed a genuine health risk to vulnerable watchers. Beauty And The Beach, however, well...its content is a lot more questionable.
Beauty And The Beach is the eighteenth episode of the first season of the original Pokemon. It sees Ash, Misty and Brock arrive at the beaches of Porta Vista and wind up working in a restaurant. Subsequently the restaurant's rival premise hires Team Rocket, and Meowth sabotages the gang's business. This prompts Misty to enter a beauty contest in order to win some money for Moe, the restaurant owner.
Why It Was Banned: The beauty contest is where the controversy comes in. James from Team Rocket enters the beauty contest alongside Jessie, donning a bikini and large fake breasts. The breasts in question have nothing to distinguish them as fake, leading to a visually bizarre yet amusing sequence. What this resulted in, however, was the banning of the episode in all countries outside of Asia for almost three years, after which it was significantly cut for general broadcast.