Tv Tropes Let Us Never Speak of This Again

"You forget a thousand things every twenty-four hour period. Make sure this is one of them."

While Bob and Alice are going about their business, something happens that reveals a (possibly embarassing) fact most Bob he would rather have kept for himself.

Two possible scenarios can follow:

1. Bob knows Alice saw everything and says something like, "Er... you didn't meet that," or "You better forget you ever saw that."
2. Bob isn't sure whether Alice did encounter anything incriminating and asks her, "Did yous see annihilation?" This can result in a Suspiciously Specific Denial.

Can lead to Let U.s.a. Never Speak of This Again. In some cases, Bob may endeavor to resort to Laser-Guided Amnesia to make sure Alice forgets what she saw.

Sometimes, authors volition accept this reaction about an Quondam Shame, and then in that location are those things nosotros all have never seen. This trope is not limited to sight, but can besides be invoked for the other senses. Though sight and hearing are the virtually common examples, for obvious reasons. In that location are also many non-romantic or embarrassing examples.

Come across also Implausible Deniability. Compare I Was Never Hither, when Alice specifically seeks out does non seek out Bob and I'll Pretend I Didn't Hear That.

May exist connected to You Can Come across That, Right?.

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Examples:

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    Anime and Manga

• Baccano!!'s Luck Gandor takes this approach in Drugs & the Dominoes after a bookstore owner witnesses him go right back up after a hitman slit his throat. Information technology's a bit easier to pull off when you're function of The Mafia.

  Luck: My, my, that was dangerous. If not for the timely rescue by this book, I'd probably have just died.

  Store Owner: Uh, but, that, no, blood...

  Luck: It was the cover of this book handful everywhere- y'all saw wrongly. Because it was too sudden.

  Store Owner: But-

  Store Owner: N-, no! I can't have your money...

  Luck: What that bastard cutting just at present was this book. Do you understand?... Very good. Only those who sympathize the times tin stand up out. The smart alone volition succeed in business. Keep up the good work!

    Fan Works

• Advice and Trust: Shinji, Asuka and Rei are talking with a classmate. When their classmate asks if Rei is implying Asuka and Shinji have had sex activity, Asuka denies it. Trying to placate her, the girl says that Shinji would evidently never practice anything indecent with Asuka. Infuriated, Asuka replies that Shinji would annihilation he could with her, all night long, and beg for more. Then she pauses and mutters: "That didn't but happen and none of yous call back anything. Or I will scoop out your brains and make a pie, understood?"
• The Child of Love: In chapter 3 of the sequel while the pilots are changing Rei mentions Asuka has gotten fatter and her breasts bigger. Shinji tells the new kid he did non hear that, and Takuma answers "Hear what?"

  Asuka:"Well, someone messed up my measurements then! […] Ack! They got the breast measurement all wrong..."
  Rei:"No, information technology is more than probable that your breasts have enlarged, due to the fact that yous are a mother and currently breast-feeding a baby. Since the plug suits were never designed for the possibility that one of its users might have gone through pregnancy. Furthermore, you might have gained body fat during that period. […] I believe your bra size has increased by at least 3 sizes."
  Asuka:"What? […] Why y'all footling! Just wait until you have kids! And then we'll encounter what happens to you!"
  Shinji:"I think you lot should forget what you merely heard near my Asuka,"
  Takuma:"What...what? I didn't hear anything."

• Doing Information technology Right This Time: When Maya unexpectedly says yes to Ritsuko's semi-jokingly request if she wants to exist her "torrid lesbian rebound fling", Ritsuko mutters: "Uh... We never had that conversation, okay?" And so they take a Relationship Upgrade anyhow.
• Superwomen of Eva two: Lone Heir of Krypton: In affiliate seventh chapter's omake Shinji catches Asuka playing with dolls. She asks what did he see and he screams he did not see her playing with her dolls:

  Asuka: "What did you see?!"
  Shinji: "Cypher! [...] I didn't run across you playing with your dolls!"

• In the Star Expedition: The Original Serial Child Fic Insontis Ii, at one signal, as Kirk is chasing the pajama-clad Spock down the hall, he encounters Sulu and mutters for him not to say a word. Sulu responds, "Didn't see anything, sir."
• Powers of Invisibility has a variant, subsequently Marinette accidentally transforms back from Ladybug in forepart of Juleka (and not for the first fourth dimension, equally she soon finds out):

  Marinette: I don't suppose at that place's any mode y'all didn't just come across that?
  Juleka: See what?
  Marinette: (perking up a little) Wait, really?
  Juleka: No. (snorts as Marinette deflates again) We can talk nigh this subsequently.

• The Great Alicorn Hunt: Chapter 22 sees Rarity meeting Mudpuppy. Mudpuppy is a Unicorn who about falls over but stabilizes herself at the final 2nd with her wings.

  Mudpuppy: You didn't see nuthin.

• 12 Days of Smashmas: Samus says this to Marth, Roy and their corresponding wives in response to the mistletoe above her and Pit later she shoots it. They agree.

    Picture show

• In Spaceballs:
  • Colonel Sandurz barges in while Dark Helmet is playing with his action figures.
  • Likewise to a lesser extent, when the instant movie is played and they accomplish the point where the emergency brake was pulled.

    Dark Helmet: No, no, no. Go past this. Pass this part. In fact, never play this again.

• A peculiarly scary variant in No Country for Old Men; Anton has just killed someone in front of a witness. The terrified witness asks if Anton is going to kill him too. Anton replies "That depends. Practice you see me?" and then the scene changes. We never discover out how the witness answered that question, nor whether it was the right answer. Considering Anton's incomprehensible code yet credible lack of concern for how much attention he draws to himself, it really is anybody'south guess what Anton wanted to hear, or whether he would actually let the witness go upon hearing it, or whether it was simply rhetorical.
• Towards the end of the flick Detroit (based on the Algier Motel Incident during the Detroit riots of 1967, a police officer demands that a human being tell him that he doesn't come across the two dead men lying on the flooring of a room. When the human refuses to deny their presence, he becomes victim #iii.

    Literature

• The Ballad of the King's Jest past Rudyard Kipling, virtually a rumour-monger throwing himself between the gears of the Great Game:

  And travelled, in promise of honour, far

  To the line where the gray-coat squadrons are.

  There accept I journeyed as well — but I

  Saw naught, said naught, and — did not die!

    Live-Action Tv

• Done in House, when Amber sneaks out of Dr. House'southward role and escapes via Wilson'due south part. "I Was Never Hither."
• One of the catch phrases of The Fast Show: "Y'all ain't seen me. Roight."
• In Ned's Declassified, Vice Chief Crubbs often says this when he'due south defenseless lazing around in his office when he'southward suppposed to be doing something productive.
• In the Crimson Dwarf episode "Me2", Lister catches the True cat up to no skilful:

  True cat: "Did you see him clearly? Could you spot him in a parade? I don't think and so. I could've been anybody."

• Seinfeld: Kramer's intern says that when Jerry went to the restroom, George washed his hands in Jerry'southward drink and then told the intern "This never happened."
• Sgt. Schultz does this to himself often in Hogan'due south Heroes, every bit he knows that pressing the effect will just become worse for him somehow.

  I know nix! I encounter goose egg!

• In the fourth season finale of The Big Bang Theory, when Penny and Raj wake up naked in bed together after a drunken night Penny tells Raj "This never happened."
• In the Stargate SG-ane episode "Avalon", when Colonel Mitchell tries to convince Carter to bring together his team:

  Mitchell: What if the world needs saving?

  Carter: Well, if the globe needs saving, I will be in that location to do what I tin.

  Mitchell: What if the earth needs saving because I screwed up because you weren't here in the first place.

  Mitchell: How about we pretend I didn't say that?

• One of the catastrophe segments on Sesame Street features Oscar the Grouch kissing his worm Slimey good-night and wishing him sweet dreams. Recalling that he's on TV, he tells the audience, "Hey, you didn't see that, all right? Now scram!"
• Sherlock "His Last Vow":

  Mycroft Holmes: "That name you think you may accept simply heard. You are mistaken. If you always mention hearing that name, in this room, in this context, I guarantee yous on behalf of the British Security Services that materials will be plant on your computer hard-drives resulting in your immediate incarceration. Don't reply, only look frightened and scuttle."

• M*A*S*H: At the end of "Some 38th Parallels," Hawkeye has a bag of garbage dropped from a helicopter onto a colonel who took a rather "win some, lose some" approach to the expiry of one of his soldiers. Every bit Col. Potter said:

  Potter: I didn't come across it, but I loved every minute of information technology!

• Law & Order: Britain. Master Crown Prosecutor George Castle returns from an outing to notice suspended Senior CP James Steele working on his defense with Inferior CP Alesha Philips. The two fumble for an explanation, just George matter-of-factly declares, "I'm even so at the Opera."
• The Barrier: The Rich Child Turned Social Activist fellow member of La Résistance finds out the hard mode that she has mutual everyday life acquaintances with Álex, the person among the protagonists who tends to end upward with the odd jobs (including contacting La Résistance). Her response to the encounter is to ask Álex to pretend he never saw her in the resistance headquarters.

    Music

• If Tommy is any indication, it'southward probably best not to use this ane in front of an impressionable kid who just witnessed a murder, or he might accept "Y'all didn't hear information technology / You didn't see it" literally and become blind and deaf.

    Newspaper Comics

• In an early on Garfield strip, Garfield walks up to Odie, pats him and walks on. In the concluding console, Garfield looks at the reader and says, "Y'all didn't run across that."
  • In a later Garfield strip, Odie licks Garfield, and the latter responds by taking a swing at the former. Odie ducks, Garfield misses, and Odie licks him again. The dog hops abroad victorious, for Garfield to point at the Fourth Wall saying "You didn't meet that!"
• One The Boondocks strip has Huey heedless and humming a song, so snap out of information technology and tell the viewer, "No offense to (proper noun of ring), but... you lot didn't hear that."

    Video Games

• Concluding Fantasy VII: Cloud spends a tender moment with Tifa near the end of the game. Depending on how your Relationship Values with her are, the scene can get more blatantly... physical. When you lot later come up back aboard the airship and it becomes evident that the other party members know that they met upwardly, Tifa volition either say "Were you lot listening?" and stand up a niggling awkward, or say "Were you watching?!" and fall on her knees in embarrassment.
• Combines with Allow Us Never Speak of This Again in Tak: The Great Juju Challenge. Lok's bad luck with animals (Being hated by fish and lusted for by apes) culminates in him being sabbatum on by a mammoth. When Tak finally gets Lok costless, the older warrior rather testily declares, "This didn't happen... DO YOU HEAR ME?!"
• Stavros invokes this trope in the Centrolineal catastrophe to Command & Conquer: Cerise Alert, though it takes a repetition or two before the soldier to whom he's speaking gets his migrate.

  Stavros: I don't believe you heard me, private. I don't come across anyone here... do you?

• Michael from Grand Theft Machine V, being the Noble Demon he is, prefers to avoid collateral harm during his heists as much as possible; this brings him to say his Catchphrase (the folio quote) whenever someone is on him. In-universe, information technology is said he took the quote from one of his favorite movies; this ends upwardly being how Trevor finds him all those years after the North Yankton chore.

    Web Original

    Webcomics

• In Questionable Content, where Marten walks in on Hanners... wearing underwear on her head and doing a ninja-stance, presumably inspired by Pintsize's 'Underwear Ninja' human action in the previous strip.

  Hanners: If I karate-chopped you actually fast, do yous think you'd get amnesia about this?

  Marten: Nope, sorry. Probably not.

• In Looking for Group, the undead warlock Richard loses his hood. For some reason, this causes him to human action uncharacteristically politely while Cale stares in horror. After Cale gives him dorsum his hood, Richard tells him "You didn't meet annihilation." Cale can only stutter "He's not dead."
• In NSFW Comix, Becky comments on a sexy photograph of a daughter who's way out of Cuthbert'due south league:

  "It's a trap. He's a male. I tin tell because he's using that clever camera bending that doesn't show off the manly features. And I've used it myself plenty of - Erm - Nobody heard that, right?"

• In the Sluggy Freelance "Nombie Apocalypse" storyline, subsequently BunBun breaks free from the nombie brainwashing with a Cute lil' Bunny Barf he pointedly tells Riff: "This! Never! Happened!"
• Yoda's advice to the reader in Blue Milk Special after Luke pulls up something surprising from the swamp.

  Yoda: Ignore that, you volition.

• Used in Ears for Elves after Luero catches Tanna tresspassing in the temple. She saw an injured nighttime elf there, who was meant to be a secret. Luero'south words are likely for her own protection.

  Luero: Listen to me. Forget what you saw back there. Non a word. Not to anyone. This did not happen. Sympathise?
  Tanna: But-
  Luero: Understand?!!
  Tanna: I... understand...

• In The Wretched Ones, Jack threatens to throw Nicky off a roof if he did not pretend he did non merely come across Jack employ his teleportation power to salvage him... From falling off that aforementioned roof.
• Gunnerkrigg Court: Donald Donlan catches himself making a midly misogynistic remark to Antimony.

  Don: She wouldn't ask him out. She was waiting for him to do it.
  I mean, you lot know how girls are~
  uhh...
  Movement to strike previous annotate.
  Antimony: Granted.

    Western Blitheness

• In The Simpsons, when Lisa is visiting Smithers, his PC starts up with an intriguing graphic of Mr. Burns.

  Computer: How-do-you-do Smithers,- you lot're- quite- good- at- turning- me- on.

  Smithers (to Lisa): Um... you probably should ignore that.

  • In "Home Abroad from Homer", when Bart and Milhouse watch a live webcast featuring two college girls doing sexy things, and they discover out they're doing the show from neighbour Ned Flanders' house without his cognition.

  Bart / Milhouse: Flanders?!
  Ned: That's odd. I could have sworn I merely heard someone shriek my name.

  Bart: Uh...you heard nothing!

  Ned: Oh, that's better.

• The penguins in Madagascar. As they disappear down a hole, the rear one says to the sole witness, "You lot didn't see annihilation." Turns into a Running Gag in the spin-off series The Penguins of Madagascar.
• In an episode of Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, after Phil Ken Sebben gets a rather bad haircut, he encounters Harvey in the bathroom and starts sobbing into the sink. "Tell me I'k pretty...I'm a pretty petty girl - you didn't hear that."
• In the Duck Dodgers episode Enemy Yours, Dodgers tries to impress the Martian Commander and his "Arch Nemesis" with an army of.... 5 adorable kittens. Later on Dodgers' embarrassing retreat, The Eager Space Cadet remarks "Fifty-l-let'southward pretend this never happened."
• XR in Fizz Lightyear of Star Control lost his arm while bragging about the qualities of the alloy of which he'due south made. "Information technology's OK. Nobody saw that."
  • In another episode Buzz and Zurg squad up to take down a forcefulness of extra-galactic invaders. After escaping the explosion of the mothership we run across Buzz holding Zurg in his arms, conjugal style. After they split Fizz says "Nobody saw that."
• In the Kim Possible episode "Mind Games", a guard of a height underground facility finds out that the facility was robbed. He shouts out "The Neutronalizer!"... then looks at Kim's family (with whom he is having dinner). "Y'all weren't supposed to hear that."
• Ed, Edd n Eddy, after Edd's lid goes off for the very kickoff fourth dimension in "Cease, Expect, and Ed":

  Edd: If yous say i word to anyone, I'll... I'll... never speak to yous again!
  Ed (with a skull on his head): I am dead from the neck up.
  Eddy: I'll merely save it for ammo when I need it, Double-Dee.
  Ed: Eddy is e'er a step ahead.

• Whenever Mr. Weatherbee witnesses something as a result of Sabrina's magic on The Archie Comedy Hour, he would turn to the camera and say, "I didn't see that! I did not see that!!"
• In the second flavour premiere of Gravity Falls, when Grunkle Stan was photocopying the pages in Dipper'due south journal on operating the Universal Portal earlier giving information technology back to Dipper, Mabel's squealer, Waddles, is watching.

  Stan: (To Waddles) You didn't run across nothing!

• In the Hey Arnold! episode, "Stinky's Pumpkin", Ernie drives downwards the street showing off his new wrecking ball to Arnold and Stinky, only for him to accidentally swing it and knock over a fruit stand and so drives away while telling the boys, "You didn't encounter nothing".
• The Hair Bear Bunch episode "Love Bug Boggle" had the zookeepers Peevly and Botch committed to a infirmary padded room after Mix-up tells 2 police officers that they were chasing iii bears on an invisible motorcycle. The keepers interruption out and pursue the bears. The ii officers see them.

  1st Cop: Aforementioned two kooks still chasing bears.
  2nd Cop: Well, I didn't see it if you didn't.
  1st Cop: I didn't see nothin'.

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Source: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YouDidntSeeThat

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