Tear inducing TV

[TheMonk]

What classic TV moments have made you tear up.
Ones that spring to mind to get started:
-Holding Back The Years, Only Fools And Horses
-"Good luck everyone!" Blackadder Goes Forth
-Nate dies in Six Feet Under
-For me, it was every time Worzel Gummidge cried after being trodden on by Aunt Sally

[Jerzy Bondov]

• When Goose off of Top Gun dies on ER
• Toadie drives in the sea
• At the end of the Six Feet Under in the montage David is at a picnic and he looks up and sees his deceased husband Keith smiling at him and then he smiles back and dies as well

[Malcy]

I tear up at most emotional things on TV.

Long term soap character deaths.
Doctor Who regeneration and companion exits.
DIY SOS gets me 99% of the time.
Even Andy's speech in the BB house in the last episode of Extras had me selling up a bit recently.
Another vote for the end of 6 Feet Under as well.
Cyril's execution in OZ.
It all depends how I'm feeling at the time of watching something though. TV has a way of bringing out underlying emotions i think.

[maett]

That bit in Dr Who when Van Gogh was looking at people in the present day looking at his paintings.

[Utter Shit]

Scrubs was packed to the bastard with these. Ben dying, Cox's breakdown, fucking hell. That show's use of music to rinse your emotions was a masterclass in expert cynicism.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaiAwrD-cP4

[Malcy]

That bit in Dr Who when Van Gogh was looking at people in the present day looking at his paintings.

I was a mess for at least an hour after that.

[lankyguy95]

Only Fools and Horses - Little Problems. People always talk about a moment like Cassandra's miscarriage years later but they did pathos far better than that in the show's prime. The moment where you realise that Del has taken a beating from the Driscoll brothers instead of paying them off and breaking his £2k promise to Rodney gets me every time. They don't linger on it or overplay it - it's a one or two minute scene with Del nursing his wounds in the bathroom, completely unbeknown to Rodney outside, and in typical OFAH fashion, there are laughs too. But for that one camera 'pullback and reveal', it's one of the most moving moments in the show's history in my opinion. Fantastic stuff.

[Thomas]

That bit in Dr Who when Van Gogh was looking at people in the present day looking at his paintings.

The first time I saw a Van Gogh painting, I turned to look up at my grandpa and flatly asked, 'Grandpa, why did he paint a chair?' I was not ready for art. We left the gallery after that. I'm sure I saw a ginger-bearded man sobbing in the corner.

[lipsink]

Julee Cruise singing 'The World Spins' in Twin Peaks while people randomly start crying in the Roadhouse.

Another vote for the Van Gogh episode of Doctor Who from me.

And Matt Smith's regeneration into Capaldi always gets me. It's the best written final speech by a Doctor and Smith just totally nails it.

Tony's face at the end of 'Long Term Parking' in The Sopranos.

[Utter Shit]

Only Fools and Horses - Little Problems. People always talk about a moment like Cassandra's miscarriage years later but they did pathos far better than that in the show's prime. The moment where you realise that Del has taken a beating from the Driscoll brothers instead of paying them off and breaking his £2k promise to Rodney gets me every time. They don't linger on it or overplay it - it's a one or two minute scene with Del nursing his wounds in the bathroom, completely unbeknown to Rodney outside, and in typical OFAH fashion, there are laughs too. But for that one camera 'pullback and reveal', it's one of the most moving moments in the show's history in my opinion. Fantastic stuff.

Same with Grandad's death. Played entirely seriously, emotional without being over the top, and clearly intended as much as a send-off for Lennard Pierce as for Grandad...and yet still beautifully undercut with the hat business. Sullivan was a genius.

I actually think one of the best bits of pathos - in fact one of the best bits of the show in general - is later in that episode, when Rodney gets angry at Del for his perceived indifference to Grandad's death. You learn so much about the character of Del in that scene, and the acting - particularly from David Jason - is note-perfect.

[Thomas]

Julee Cruise singing 'The World Spins' in Twin Peaks while people randomly start crying in the Roadhouse. Always gets me.

I only watched the first two series (and film) a couple of years because I knew a third had been commissioned. I was among the latest of latecomers. But when Chromatics sang 'Shadows' at the end of the first new episode, with Shelley saying that 'James has always been cool' and the words 'Starring Kyle Maclachlan' appearing in that font, I felt very moved indeed. It must have been quite something for people who had actually waited twenty-five years.

[lipsink]

I only watched the first two series (and film) a couple of years because I knew a third had been commissioned. I was among the latest of latecomers. But when Chromatics sang 'Shadows' at the end of the first new episode, with Shelley saying that 'James has always been cool' and the words 'Starring Kyle Maclachlan' appearing in that font, I felt very moved indeed. It must have been quite something for people who had actually waited twenty-five years.

Absolutely. I was almost gonna say that moment too.

[bgmnts]

Babestation.

[DrGreggles]

Not sure I cry at TV shows.
Or films for that matter.

Maybe there's something wrong with me.
Or with you lot.

Yes, it's you lot.
Bloody babies...

[BlodwynPig]

Forbrydelsen Series 1

[AsparagusTrevor]

Probably an obvious one but the whole of the Buffy episode 'The Body'.

Buffy comes home to find her mum dead on the sofa, after we've been getting to know her for 5 seasons, and just after she's given the all-clear on a recent illness.

How did she die? Bitten by a vampire? Killed by some evil demon? Slaughtered by the season's big bad? Nope, just had an aneurysm and snuffed it right there on the sofa.

There's no musical score through the entire episode, no sad pianos to manipulate our emotions, we're just presented with the reactions characters as they deal with the loss in their own ways. Mainly by crying.

Fucking gruelling stuff that episode.

[lebowskibukowski]

Only Fools and Horses - Little Problems. People always talk about a moment like Cassandra's miscarriage years later but they did pathos far better than that in the show's prime. The moment where you realise that Del has taken a beating from the Driscoll brothers instead of paying them off and breaking his £2k promise to Rodney gets me every time. They don't linger on it or overplay it - it's a one or two minute scene with Del nursing his wounds in the bathroom, completely unbeknown to Rodney outside, and in typical OFAH fashion, there are laughs too. But for that one camera 'pullback and reveal', it's one of the most moving moments in the show's history in my opinion. Fantastic stuff.

Another two from OFAH - the episode with Grandad's funeral when Del just rubs the armrest of Grandad's chair, and the one where Reg returns and, just after telling him to fuck off, Del goes up to him at puts some money in his shirt pocket. Maybe not a teary moment, but very powerful

[The Lurker]

The first ones that spring to mind are both from the same show: Futurama.

The ending to Jurassic Bark with Fry's dog.
The Luck Of The Fryish about Fry's brother. Again, the ending to the episode.

[jobotic]

In my twenties I cried a couple of times at Cagney and Lacey. Was feeling a bit fragile and I loved their friendship. Oh Harv.

[Utter Shit]

The ending to Jurassic Bark with Fry's dog.

Using animals is cheating, I don't even like Futurama and that episode did me in.

[Norton Canes]

"I've lost my shoe..."

[Bronzy]

Babestation.

That show once gave me a foreskin tear

[sevendaughters]

thought I was going to out myself as a massive cheeseball when I ran here to say the end montage from Six Feet Under, particularly the bit where David sees Keith as a younger man and then dies. it's a calculated piece of TV but I binge-watched the series after finding the big DVD set that looks like packaged ashes so it was all fresh to me. if I pull it up on youtube now it will definitely affect me. the show itself did start becoming a bit of a melodrama toward the end though.

also the Hayley death episode from Coronation St. was superbly handled, I thought. Vaughn-Williams on the radio, ignoring the knock at the door. just so small and tragic, but in a way what you hope for someone who is going to die. really welled up at that and I don't really watch soaps.

[Cuellar]

Don't think I've ever done a cry at some TV show, you big bunch of jessies

[Phil_A]

also the Hayley death episode from Coronation St. was superbly handled, I thought. Vaughn-Williams on the radio, ignoring the knock at the door. just so small and tragic, but in a way what you hope for someone who is going to die. really welled up at that and I don't really watch soaps.

You know what, I'm not a big Corrie watcher but Jack & Vera having one last dance to "Softly As I Leave You" absolutely wrecked me. Fucking hell, sets me off just thinking about it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMy_dUgGKJU

[Mister Six]

That episode of One Foot in the Grave where the blind fella who's having his letters read to him by Annette Crosbie gets beaten to death was so grim and cruel it reduced child me to a blubbering wreck.

For those that haven't seen it, she makes friend with this old blind fella whose front door is a bit broken (I can't remember if she's doing meals on wheels or she notices the door's ajar or what, but in any case she goes into his house and becomes his pal). He asks her to read him letters from his family, who have moved to Australia, only for her to realise that the thick was of mail he's been saving up is just junk mail.

She gamely ad-libs stories from his family rather than break the truth to him. At the end of the episode she discovers that he was killed by robbers who got into his home because he didn't fix the lock she kept warning him about. She wonders why he wouldn't spend the money to get it fixed - only for it to turn out that he spent the money on a giant stuffed toy for his grandkids who never had any intention of visiting him. The subplot was probably Victor fending off a door-to-door toy seller.

Christ, Renwick could be cruel.

[ccbaxter]

The final episode of "Holding On" when David Morrissey's collapsed character finally returns to (the reveal of) his mother he's snubbed for so long.

[Brundle-Fly]

Reggie screaming at the end of every episode of The Fall & Rise Of Reginald Perrin and end theme because I could feel my own father's restrained anguish as he sat on the sofa next to me.

[Sebastian Cobb]

• At the end of the Six Feet Under in the montage David is at a picnic and he looks up and sees his deceased husband Keith smiling at him and then he smiles back and dies as well

That and old Keith getting shot during the same montage were the saddest bits. I've occasionally thought about that ending since I saw it in 2005, to the point I rewatched it a few years ago to reappraise it now i had a better concept of existential ennui.

[Gulftastic]

Probably an obvious one but the whole of the Buffy episode 'The Body'.

Buffy comes home to find her mum dead on the sofa, after we've been getting to know her for 5 seasons, and just after she's given the all-clear on a recent illness.

How did she die? Bitten by a vampire? Killed by some evil demon? Slaughtered by the season's big bad? Nope, just had an aneurysm and snuffed it right there on the sofa.

There's no musical score through the entire episode, no sad pianos to manipulate our emotions, we're just presented with the reactions characters as they deal with the loss in their own ways. Mainly by crying.

Fucking gruelling stuff that episode.

Sarah Michelle Gellar was fucking awesome in that ep, especially the opening sequence with a long steady cam shot. If genre stuff had got more respect back then, she'd have got an Emmy nod, I'm sure.