10 Banned Episodes Of Beloved TV Sitcoms

7. If You Can’t Be With The One You Love… - Boy Meets World

Boy Meets World drinking
Disney-ABC Domestic Television

It might seem quaint now, but around its highest points, Boy Meets World was a cutting-edge sitcom that navigated teenage life, relationships, and self-identity. It was created by Disney for ABC but, due to its strong viewership and name value, was picked up for syndication on The Disney Channel.

Here, the House of Mouse rifled through the stories and took issue with a handful. One of these was If You Can’t Be With the One You Love.

It kicks off following the ongoing story, where Cory has been dumped by love interest Topanga and is pretty miserable about the whole affair. In order to try and perk himself back up, he attends a house party and sneaks away some whiskey. He even drags his friend Shawn into things but, after the pair are picked up by the police, they agree to never drink again.

However, Shawn gets a taste for things and drinks the entire next week. Jack, his half-brother, discovers this and scolds him - revealing that abuse of alcohol runs in the family.

With a synopsis like that, it’s not surprising that Disney wanted to stay away from it. It was perfectly viable on ABC, where its target demographic understood and empathised with it properly, but the Disney Channel had a wider spread of viewer ages, and refused to air it.

Surely a case of “better safe than sorry”.

Contributor

Coming from a content creation background that now spans over two decades, Psy cut her teeth on personal video production and community radio. Originally joining the team as a writer and presenter, she added video editing duties to her responsibilities over time and became the longest-standing editor of the irreverent gaming show Tues Your Own Adventure. Psy has worked on many previews and reviews, long-form editorials (either her own, or supporting as an editor), as a frequent quizmaster and more. Praised for the two-pronged attack of her hard work ethic and light-hearted editing style, Psy is otherwise known as a font of retro video game knowledge which has caused her to rack up many quiz wins. Outside of WhatCulture, Psy runs First Aid Spray Podcast - a long-running channel that focuses on Resident Evil in all of it's forms. You can follow her on BlueSky at http://psywhite.bsky.social and Instagram at http://instagram.com/therealpsywhite