"You've really screwed up this time, Charlie Brown."
The protagonist has just done something stupid that he shouldn't have done. Everyone who knows what he did has abandoned him. The protagonist looks to his faithful Fido for validation — dogs love their owners unconditionally, right? No, the dog lowers its head and leaves the room.
In comedic examples, the dog, or another pet, may instead put its paws over its eyes and whine, as the animal equivalent of a Facepalm. In live action, this trick is accomplished by placing the animal's paws over its eyes, filming it removing them, then reversing the film to make it look as though it is covering its own eyes.
Sub-Trope of Animal Reaction Shot. An animal who pulls this trick often is probably a Silent Snarker.
Examples:
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Advertising
- In the "Above The Influence"
anti-marijuana ads, if you smoke weed, your dog will not only be ashamed of you, it will tell you it's ashamed of you.
- A Geico commercial from the 1990s had a version of this trope, with a dog laughing hysterically at his owner's ostensibly high car insurance bill.
- Among the "lie detector" / "buzzer" radio ads for Legal Sea Foods — in which a chief/restaurant owner gets quizzed on the freshness and quality of their seafood, gameshow-style — is one where the (New England) restaurant owner being quizzed, upon being compelled to admit that his seafood is less-than-fresh, states that he brings shame to his wife (ding!), kids (ding!), and dog (ding!).note
Anime and Manga
- In episode 11 of CLANNAD, Kyou's boar and Misae's cat both pass out from listening to Kotomi's violin playing.
- Crayon Shin-chan: Shin-Chan's pet dog Shiro reacts this way to his owner all the time.
- Downplayed in the Grand Cruise Adventure arc of SPY×FAMILY, since the person giving the disapproval is a baby. The arc involves Yor's Escort Mission for former Mafia Princess Olka, her baby son Gram, and Zeb, their still-loyal retainer. At one point, after his mother Olka chews out Zeb for panicking over their situation, Baby Gram also expresses disappointment over his cowardice.
Comic Books
- In The Killers of Krypton, Empress Gandelo has finally pushed Supergirl too far, to the point Kara is going to kill her to avenge all Kryptonians murdered by the Empress. Before she swings her axe down, though, Krypto gets in front of her and gives her a sad, ashamed look. Realizing she was about to commit murder, Kara gets horrified and spares her enemy's life.
- The "Good Ol' Boys" arc of Preacher has Butt-Monkey Cal Hicks, a painfully wannabe police detective whose only role is to be shown up by Jody and T.C. He has a Canine Companion in Doofus, but loses even that (along with the supermodel he was escorting, the McGuffin he was transporting, and his dignity for good measure), taking a dump in front of him when he calls it to play fetch.
- Groo the Wanderer: Rufferto, Groo's Canine Companion, was introduced specifically because a dog would always be faithful and loving, while a human sidekick would need to be even dumber than Groo to ignore his idiocy. As such, Rufferto's image of Groo as a brave and brilliant hero never wavers... except once, during the Magic Talisman arc. Fed up with The Ministrels constant insulting songs, Groo uses the talisman to wish away the Ministrels ability to rhyme, making it impossible for him to sing, and plunging him into despair. Ruffertos disappointed glare is so piercing that Groo reassembles the talisman just so he can reverse his wish.
Comic Strips
- Garfield:
- Garfield does this to Jon all the time.
Jon: One nice thing about confiding in pets is that they are non-judgmental. Garfield, I got a speeding ticket today.
Garfield: [smacks him on the head] That was a stupid thing to do. - One strip has Garfield and Odie burying their heads in the sand due to embarrassment at Jon's beachwear.
- Garfield does this to Jon all the time.
- Peanuts: Snoopy does this to Charlie Brown many times. And in one of Snoopy's novels:
He began to feel uncomfortable with others in the family. He knew it was important for those who share a home to have similar values. So the dog left.
- In one issue of Sad Sack, Sad Sack is being chewed out for being a doofus by everyone at base camp, even people who don't specifically outrank him. He hopefully goes to pet the camp dog, saying: "There's still Betsy...." - but Betsy, too, growls at him. He puts on a comical "crybaby" face and moans: "I haven't got a friend in the world!"
Fan Works
- In Bitter Tears: An Anon-A-Miss Fic, Dog!Spike snaps at the Humane Five and the CMC because he, like Twilight, is angry at them for their actions against Sunset Shimmer. Played with in that Spike is not a pet and is just taking the form of one.
- In Lincoln is Done, a fanfic of The Loud House, everyone is mad at Lola for disobeying her parents (including Lana who did the same thing). Lana's pets then glare at Lola.
- In The Wedding is Off!, everyone is disillusioned by the Mane Five, Shining Armor, and Princess Celestia abandoning Twilight at the rehearsal, letting the Changeling invasion happen, insisting that Twilight did wrong but not themselves, and choosing to forget about their mistakes instead of correcting them. Even Fluttershy's animals turn against her.
Films — Animation
- In Aladdin, both Abu and Carpet are disappointed in Aladdin after he refuses to free the Genie.
- In Frozen (2013), when Kristoff denies having feelings for Anna even though it's clear he does, his reindeer Sven gives him a Disapproving Look.
- Jonah's camel, Reginald in Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie ends up joining Khalil the caterpillar when he leaves the titular character (played by Archibald Asparagus) to wallow in his misery at the end of the story.
- The Little Mermaid (1989): Upon Prince Eric's cluelessness over whether or not the now mute Ariel is the one he's been looking for, his dog Max rolls his eyes and blows hair out of his own face in annoyance, which Ariel mimics.
- The Once-ler's mule, Melvin in The Lorax (2012) joins the animals in their exile from the forest and refuses to come back to the Once-ler because of what he did. Even a little Bar-ba-loot named Pipsqueak he befriended sadly refuses to return to him.
- In Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas, after Marina has saved the ship from the Sirens, and Sinbad has responded to her like a complete ingrate, the crew collectively just gives him an incredulous stare. Sinbad turns to Spike the dog for support, and Spike gives him a hilarious sidelong look of annoyance and just goes "hrumph." Sinbad very reluctantly goes to apologize to Marina, muttering, "The dog, and the crew...!"
- The Sponge Bob Movie Sponge Out Of Water:
- Even Gary turns against SpongeBob during the riot, along with some other snails.
- Squidasaurus rex joins in on the other Bikini Bottomites in their shock at SpongeBob kicking down a trash can and mixing garbage with recycling during his Freak Out, and is later appalled that the Bikini Bottomites try to sacrifice SpongeBob.
Squidasaurus: And I thought my friends were primitive.
- In Toy Story, this happens when everyone thinks Woody killed Buzz. All the toys turn away from him while he's at Sid's, even Slinky the dog, who closes the blinds as he leaves. Sort of downplayed, as Slinky is treated like an equal rather than a pet.
Films — Live-Action
- Beethoven: When George takes Beethoven to the vet's office be put to sleep, right before he leaves the place several of the dogs in the waiting room lower their heads and whimper, as if trying to remind him that he's making a huge mistake (and he is).
- In Funny People, Seth Rogen tells Adam Sandler's character that "Even the dog can tell you had sex!" as the dog skulks away.
- In Legally Blonde, the protagonist was showing off her first day of Harvard outfit and her dog ducked his head in shame.
- At the beginning of Disney's Snowball Express, an accountant learns he's inherited a ski resort in Colorado and promptly quits his job and gets ready to move, much to the outrage of his wife, kids and dog.
- In Swing Time, when Fred Astaire misses his wedding, he faces the anger of his fiancee's dog and cat. (And a glare from her ancestor's portrait.)
- Village of the Giants features a moment where the dog buries its face under its paw as two teenagers make out. The Mystery Science Theater 3000 version of the film has Crow Lampshade this:
Crow: Even the dog's grossed out...
Jokes
- Used in one description of a "Three-Bagger" hookup prospect: a girl so ugly you need three paper bags — one for her, one for yourself in case hers breaks, and one for your dog so he'll respect you in the morning.
Literature
- The Dresden Files: Harry Dresden experiences this occasionally after being adopted by his Big Friendly Dog, Mouse.
- The most notable example thus far probably comes from Turn Coat:
"I can't believe I'm about to say this," I said. "So think real careful about where this is coming from. Have you people ever considered talking when you've got a problem?"
That didn't please anybody, and they gave me looks with varying degrees of irritation mixed with chagrin.
Except for Mouse, who sighed and said something like, "Uh-woof."
"Sorry," I told him at once. "Four-footed nonvocalizing company excepted." - Even better, in the short story It's My Birthday Too Mouse flees the room after Harry is cleaning up after a fight with a slime golem.
- The most notable example thus far probably comes from Turn Coat:
- Zigzagged and inverted in Loyal Enemies: the dog belongs to the chief of the troll tribe, not to the heroine, but when the latter tries to calm down a rampaging wizard, who's high on mushrooms and accidentally terrorizing said tribe, and he offhandedly outs her werewolf nature, the dog, who played the Only Sane Man before that moment, accusingly looks at her (dogs can smell werewolves, so it knew), lies down and covers the head with its paws.
Shelena: Surprisingly, I actually felt ashamed in front of it.
Live-Action TV
- Done a few times in the Disney Channel series Dog with a Blog. The titular dog, Stan, has human-level intelligence, making him capable of speech and human behavior. Thus, when someone on the show does something wrong, embarrassing, cringey, or to make him feel ashamed of his actions, he'll play this trope straight.
- Used several times on Frasier with Eddie the Jack Russell Terrier, who was so good at this he could reduce Frasier to delivering eloquent attempts at backpedaling... to a room with no human beings in it.
- Played for Laughs on Full House during the episode "Day of the Rhino", in which DJ gets a bad haircut that is so awful even the family dog, Comet, runs away from her!
- Horrible Histories' "Twit Light" sketch:
Narrator: Warning! Some scenes may contain romantic poetry. Crummy.
Lord Byron: And let thy gentle fingers fling its melting murmurs... [Byron's pet wolf howls] Everyone's a critic, aren't they? - Married... with Children:
- Buck once walked in wearing a paper bag with eyeholes after Al was caught planting an overdue library book to make it look like he returned it years ago.
- While Al was on a 'Dr. Shoe' commercial, he was begging for someone to call and Buck had his paw over his eyes while looking away from the camera.
- Midsomer Murders: At the end of "The Devil's Work", Barnaby makes a dad joke so awful that his wife and daughter both roll their eyes, and Paddy the dog covers his face with his paw.
- Saturday Night Live had the "Spooky Song" skit, where ghosts in a graveyard sing about their deaths. Chance the Rapper's character tries to skip his due to a very Undignified Death, but is eventually pressured into it. Once he gets to why, though, he calls the others out for being judgmental, as even the obviously-animatronic owl is shaking its head in disapproval.
- An episode of Suddenly Susan has Todd and Luis see a portrait of Susan from when she was a (nerdy-looking) teenager with the family dog. Todd whispers to Luis, "Is it just me, or does that dog look embarrassed?"
- On The Waltons when Olivia got her hair permed and everyone in the family said they didn't like it—her husband, her in-laws, even her kids—she was walking in the woods and met the family dog—who didn't want anything to do with her! (Possibly the smell from the chemicals?)
Music
- Older Than Feudalism: In the collection of 5th-2nd century BC Chinese poems and lyrics, The Book of Songs, one song is about a young couple meeting in the wild, laying down deerskin on the ground, and then...
Try not to tear my underwear apart,
And tell your dog to be quiet - Alice Cooper's "No More Mr. Nice Guy" implies that even his pets can tell how "sick" and "obscene" he is:
My dog bit me on the leg today,
My cat clawed my eyes. - Invoked by Warren Zevon in "Disorder in the House."
Disorder in the house
It's a fate worse than fame
Even the Lhasa Apso seems to be ashamed - From "Weird Al" Yankovic: Whoever is being targeted in "You're Pitiful" (parody of "You're Beautiful" by James Blunt) must be a bad case of this, if the following lyrics are anything to go by:
Your dog would much rather
Play fetch by itself.
Professional Wrestling
- Downplayed in a promo package for SHINE 12, as Kimberly's maniac obsessive was shown to be disturbing to one of her dogs but the other two paid her no mind.
Religion and Mythology
- In The Bible's Book of Numbers, Balaam's donkey attempts to get him out of the way of the Angel of the Lord who is blocking their path. When Balaam goes to strike the donkey, thinking it's just being stubborn, the donkey suddenly acquires the power of speech and delivers a What the Hell, Hero? Made even more terrifying that said Angel of the Lord was armed with a very deadly sword!
Theater
- In Peter Pan, when Mr. Darling tricks Michael into taking his medicine by saying he will take his own medicine alongside Michael — and then reneges — the children and Nana (the nanny dog) are all ashamed by this.
Video Games
- In Duck Hunt the dog laughs at you when you fail to shoot a duck or a pair of ducks depending on the mode. He will also giggle at you on the Game Over screen.
- If you fart or belch in Fable II your dog can cover its face.
- There's a few times in Shadow Hearts: Covenant that Blanca (a wolf rather than dog, but a very intelligent one) turns his head away or just walk off if Yuri did something stupid.
- Tales of Vesperia: When Yuri mercilessly executes a man for putting him and his hometown through a lot of grief, his dog Repede flashes a look at him that isn't quite shame, but also isn't one of approval.
- Hans the porcavian in Valkyria Chronicles does this pretty frequently, usually over Welkin doing or saying something clueless.
- A short online platformer game called The Visit portrays a humorous deconstruction of the Goomba Stomp in platformer games, with multiple endings. Pick enough "bad" options throughout the game and your girlfriend will throw you out in the rain as you return to your house, after which your cat will come and slap you in the face.
Visual Novels
- Taken to its logical conclusion in Ace Attorney Investigations 2 when the Big Bad is finally brought down. The circus animals of the Berry Big Circus beat the crap out of him, including a gorilla and an elephant.
Webcomics
- In Kevin & Kell, Coney performs a Dope Slap on Rudy after he confesses to not sending Kevin and Kell's marriage documents out of anger over a rabbit being his alpha male. Of course, Coney's not a pet, she's his baby half-sister, but the same principle applies.
- Lessons Of Dog World: since the characters are anthropomorphic dogs, they too take jabs at the embarrassment of others.
- Twisted Tropes: Three panels of three dogs ashamed by their human's pursuits. The first dog is annoyed that a Death Star officer disregards the danger of leaving the exhaust port open, the second dog just stares in disbelief at a scientist who drew a chain of humans burring faces in other people's butts on the blackboard (a la The Human Centipede) for "efficient feeding", and the last dog just facepalms when Peter Jackson lookalike draws a diagram trying to split The Hobbit into three movies for money.
- Questionable Content: After Angus (once again) displays his talent at putting his foot in his mouth, Momo-chan (an anthropomorphic personal computer) lets him know she does not approve.
Web Original
- The Onion has an article in which even the dog is appalled by the light blue tuxedo worn by a TV character.
- The French-Italian YouTuber Tess Masazza owns a pug named Zöe that sometimes looks genuinely perplexed by its owner's behaviour.
Western Animation
- All Grown Up!, "Bad Aptitude": Spike (and everyone else) is disappointed at Tommy Pickles' latest film Gesundheit.
- American Dad!: At the climax of "Hurricane!", when the Smith house is flooded and turned upside-down, Stan keeps trying to assist his family despite him clearly only making things worse. He brings in a bear from earlier to kill a shark, only for them to join forces to kill the Smiths. A minute later, he tries to impale the shark with his college javelin, but misses and pins Francine to the wall with it, causing the bear to look disapprovingly at him.
- Towards the beginning of "Is There a Doctor in the House?" on Arthur, when Arthur and D.W. and even Mr. Read are being particularly rambunctious at dinner and Mrs. Read is getting a cold, she imagines them as clowns and then shouts out "Can't we just have a little peace and quiet for once?!" Everyone looks shocked, even Arthur's dog Pal, who whimpers and scampers out of the room.
- Clifford the Big Red Dog:
- In the episode, "Clifford on Parade", Emily and Charley get into a fight over what theme should their parade float should be and decide they'll each work on it alone, which prompts Clifford to whimper and cover his eyes with his paws.
- In another episode "Promises, Promises", Jetta calls off her beach playdate with Emily at the last minute for another play date with an older girl, for which Mac gives her the cold shoulder even as she gives him his favorite treat.
- In the Craig of the Creek episode "Breaking the Ice", Wildernessa's dog, Cheesesticks, sides with Craig after he calls her out on how she treats him and her hypocritical attitude towards people in general.
- DuckTales (2017):
- An anthropomorphic variant at the end of the episode "The Last Crash of the Sunchaser!". Duckworth, Scrooge's ghost butler who is literally an anthropomorphic dog, leaves the mansion with Webby and Beakley after becoming disillusioned with Scrooge's actions.
- Another (semi-)anthropomorphic variant in the episode "The 87 Cent Solution!": Manny the Headless Man-Horse sides with Huey and everyone else who sees that Scrooge has gone insane from illness, also putting on a surgical mask over the face of his statue head.
Scrooge: Et tu, Headless Man-Horse?
- In "The Rumble For Ragnarok!", everyone in Valhalla starts looking down on Jormungandr for beating up the weaker Dewey and gloating about it. This includes Team Ragnarok's wolf, Fenrir.
- Likewise in Family Guy, Brian is often berating Peter for his behaviour.
- Fillmore! "Even my dog is looking at me funny!"
- In Garfield and Friends episode "Cutie and the Beast", Garfield played a trick on Nermal to make him think he wasn't cute anymore, for which Odie continuously gave Garfield an angry growl, even when he tried to sleep, until he made it right.
- Garfield Specials:
- In Garfield's Halloween Adventure, Odie glances toward the camera and shakes his head at Garfield when the latter expresses his greed for the loads of candy he'll receive from the houses at the opposite side of a river.
- Garfield's Thanksgiving has a quick shot of Garfield covering his eyes in embarrassment after Jon (who waited until the last moment to even begin preparing for his Thanksgiving dinner date with Liz), instead of rubbing butter on the turkey skin, rubbed it on his own skin.
- Gargoyles, "Upgrade": Bronx reacts like this to Brooklyn, Broadway, and Lexington bickering.
- Green Eggs and Ham: To show that Guy had gone too far in saying that Sam isn't a fit for even his own mother, Mr. Jenkins also becomes saddened and leaves him.
- In the opening of "Madeline and the Treasure Hunt" from Madeline, Genevieve the dog whimpers and whines each time the girls give obviously wrong answers to questions being asked of them regarding geography.
- The Talking Dog in The Powerpuff Girls Rule! doesn't join in the gasping the people make when the girls fight over the Key to the World. Instead, he scoffs "I have nothing to say to you" and walks off.
- In the Ready Jet Go! episode "A Visit From Uncle Zucchini", Moonbeam, Zucchini's pet, is visibly annoyed at her owner's stupidity. He seriously thought Titan was Earth.
- In Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, Scooby laughed at Shaggy when he revealed that he used to play role-playing games.
- Scooby also did this fairly regularly in other series, most notably in Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! when the Monster of the Week (or rather, the mask-wearing criminal of the week) was revealed to be involved in a fairly heinous crime.
- The Simpsons:
- In episode "You Kent Always Say What You Want," a dog shows its shame by covering its eyes with its ears when Kent Brockman looks at it.
- Another episode justifies this, and actually the cat and the dog are the most ashamed: Bart sold his soul, and animals have a sharper perception about this, apparently.
- In "Old Yeller-Belly", a group of dogs show their contempt at Santa's Little Helper for not rescuing Homer from a fire.
- In "The Yellow Badge of Cowardage", Santa's Little Helper shows his disapproval when Bart chickens out of stopping Milhouse from getting beat up during a school race. He finally forgives him when Bart makes it up to Milhouse.
- A non-animal example in "Bart Gets Hit By a Car": When Mr. Burns gives his testimony which he twisted to make himself look good, everybody in the court glares at him. Especially Smithers, whom he vilified during his retelling.
- SpongeBob SquarePants:
- In the ending of "Sleepy Time", Gary was among those annoyed at SpongeBob for entering their dreams, though merely for the reason that it was an invasion of privacy (rather than ruining it in some way, like the others sans Patrick).
- In "Squeaky Boots", Gary also becomes annoyed by the squeaking from SpongeBob's boots, retreating into his shell and coming out with earplugs.
- In "Squirrel Jokes", when SpongeBob tries stand-up, his first joke is met with silence from the audience, save for Chirping Crickets represented by a live-action shot of an actual cricket in grass. The second joke bombs so bad even the cricket won't dignify it with a response.
- In the beginning of "What Ever Happened To SpongeBob?", Gary was technically the first of SpongeBob's friendship circle to call him "Idiot Boy" for breaking his shell from an extremely tight hug, albeit it comes out as a furious hiss. He is also the first to feel ashamed for it when SpongeBob runs away as a result, which the others sans Squidward follow suit.
- In Steven Universe, in "Dewey Wins", Lion gives a Disapproving Look to Steven before leaving with Connie showing he's just as angry as she is at Steven for surrendering himself to Homeworld, especially when Steven innocently brushes off his actions, not realizing the anguish it caused everybody, and insensitively ignores her feelings about it in order to avoid facing his own for the time being. He stays with Connie for a few weeks after that, presumably to give her comfort and companionship during her and Steven's estrangement, as well as to teach Steven a hard lesson about taking his loved ones for granted, and returns to him only after he and Connie reconcile.
- In the Tiny Toon Adventures episode, "Toons Take Over", a boy, a girl, and their dog are watching TV when Babs pirates the signal to show the world an adventurous, romantic, and dramatic cartoon that she, Buster, and Plucky made. The dog, along with the boy and girl, are disgusted by the cartoon.
- Wallace & Gromit: Gromit does it all the time with Wallace.
