Bob's been out all night — maybe he's been out partying, has had some sort of adventure, or accidentally got waylaid coming home. Regardless, after spending an entire night awake he goes into his room and falls asleep... only to be woken up instantly by the sound of his alarm clock going off.
A variant of this trope occurs when a character is woken up not by their alarm, but by another character or the rays of the sun coming up.
This trope tends to be Played for Laughs. See also Sleep Deprivation. Can result in Ring-Ring-CRUNCH!.
Examples:
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Asian Animation
- Upin & Ipin: In the episode "So Sleepy", Upin and Ipin spend the entire night playing a video game and beating all the levels in it. When they finish the final level, they start to feel tired and decide to sleep, only for their alarm clock to ring. Kak Ros can be heard yelling at them for not preparing for school early.
Comic Books
- Robin: On at least one occasion, Tim sneaks in from acting as Robin all night and falls into bed just in time for the housekeeper, Mrs. Mac, to open the door and order him to get up. On another occasion his father opens the door just as Tim is pulling back the covers to get in bed and says it's good Tim is already up and forces him downstairs while rambling about how lazy it is for teenagers to sleep in on the weekend, even though Jack is about to leave rather than spend time with Tim.
Film — Animated
- The Iron Giant: A variant occurs in a scene where Hogarth sneaks into his room after spending the night at the junkyard. He pulls back the covers on his bed just as his mom opens the door.
Annie: You're up already?
Hogarth: (putting the covers back) Just making the bed. - A variant occurs in The Land Before Time II: The Great Valley Adventure, where after spending the night chasing egg thieves and winding up in the Mysterious Beyond, Littlefoot goes back to the hole he sleeps in only to be woken up by his grandmother.
- The Peanuts Movie: Charlie Brown spends all night working on a book report on War and Peace, and when he finally finishes, he goes to bed and falls asleep, only to be woken up by his younger sister, Sally, seconds later.
- At the beginning of The Princess and the Frog, Tiana gets home from her night job, collapses on the bed, and snores for about three seconds before her alarm clock goes off and she starts getting ready for her day job.
Film — Live-Action
- In Sleepover, the main protagonists arrive back at Julie's house and crawl into their sleeping bags. Within moments, the lights come on and the still-dressed girls are greeted by Julie's mother.
Literature
- In the Goosebumps book Calling All Creeps!, due to a prank gone wrong, main character Ricky gets calls starting at midnight which he constantly has to hang up on. It doesn't take until two in the morning for him to finally have the sense to unplug the phone. After that, it takes until seven for him to fall back to sleep, which is when his alarm clock rings.
- In the children's book Peace At Last, Mr Bear cannot sleep through Mrs Bear's snoring, and spends the whole story trying to sleep in all the other rooms in the house, and even in the garden and the car, but they all have their own noises. Eventually he returns to the bedroom, where Mrs Bear has stopped snoring... and as soon as he is asleep, the alarm clock goes off.
Live-Action TV
- Better Call Saul: Kim, seriously overworking herself on the Mesa Verde account, takes to setting her alarm for five minutes while trying to take a quick nap. Smash Cut to the alarm going off with no apparent time elapsing for Kim.
- Brooklyn Nine-Nine: A variation appears in "The Box", when Holt and Jake spend all night interrogating a murder suspect (they know he did it, but they can't prove it, and he obviously won't confess). After they finally manage to get a confession out of him, they leave the precinct to go home and sleep, only to find that everyone is arriving for the next day's shift, and turn around and go back inside.
- In the Father Ted episode "Kicking Bishop Brennan Up The Arse", Ted talks to Dougal about whether or not to go through with kicking Bishop Brennan up the arse. He then tells Dougal "Let's get some sleep" and turns off the light, only to see that it's already daybreak, then he tells Dougal "At least we can get a few hours of sleep" when his alarm clock goes off.
- In Star Trek: The Next Generation: Riker complains to Dr. Crusher that he's feeling tired and unrested lately, despite no apparent disruptions to his sleep schedule. After this, he requests a 7am wake-up call from Geordi before going to bed - only for Geordi to immediately arrive and inform him it's 7am. It turned out aliens were kidnapping Riker into a parallel dimension at night, and he had no memory of it the next day.
- That's So Raven:
- In "Blue in the Face", Cory puts Raven's chemistry paper through the shredder, forcing her to find the pieces and tape them back together. By the time she finishes and goes to bed, her alarm goes off. Raven is so sleep deprived that she lets her dad shred the paper again.
- In the "Country Cousins" two parter, Raven is on her extended family's farm when she and Chelsea have to spend the entire night awake for one of her Zany Schemes. By the time they make it back to bed, the alarm goes off.
Web Video
- Killer Bean is essentially a sapient coffee bean with two eyes and a mouth, plus hands and feet. The bean is trying to get a night's sleep, but a rave nearby precludes that. The bean then goes on a murder spree, ending with the rave's organizer getting shot dead. The bean returns to the comfort and quiet of his bed ... until his digital clock blips to 6:00 and starts buzzing a moment later.
Western Animation
- Amphibia: Near the end of "The Plantars Check In", Sprig returns to the hotel room to sleep, after being tired from his entire adventure, no sooner when he lies down and closes his eyes, an alarm on Anne's phone goes off, causing Anne, Polly, and Hop Pop to wake up, and demand Sprig to join them on another wacky adventure, much to his annoyance.
- Big City Greens: In "Dream Weavers", after Cricket fixes all of his family's dreams and put them back to sleeping normally, he goes to sleep near them, but no sooner when he closes his eyes, the sun comes up, leaving him too exhausted to spend the day with the rest of the family.
- Bugs Bunny Builders: A variant in "Cat Nap"; Sylvester is tired and cranky when he is asked by the Looney Builders to paint a mural for a cheese-themed cafe for Ruthie and Gerdie. It is revealed that he spent all of the night before working on a puzzle. When he finished it in the morning, he went to bed to get some sleep, only to be awakened by a phone call from the Looney Builders asking for his assistance.
- Happens in some Classic Disney Short starring Donald Duck:
- "Fall Out Fall In": Donald tries to to set up his tent long into the night. He is then keep awake by the snoring of the other soldiers. When he finally falls asleep from exhaustion, the bugler plays reveille, so Donald has to start marching again.
- "Wide Open Spaces": After coming across a fully booked motel where there's only an expensive cot at his disposal, Donald spends a nearly sleepless night struggling to sleep in the outdoors, only to end up back at the motel where the vindictive owner assumes that he slept on the cot and asks for the money, which Donald absently hands over before the owner brings a ringing alarm clock to Donald's head, telling him that the time to use the cot is over and dumps him off of it.
- An episode of The Flintstones begins at night, where Fred is snoring so loudly and strongly that the palm trees outside the window are swaying. Wilma tries various means of muffling the snores, since the din is preventing her from getting any sleep; Betty and Barney from next door come over to help, since the noise is keeping them awake too. When they finally manage to silence things, the alarm clock sounds. Of course, Fred wakes up very relaxed.
- Kenny the Shark: Happens to Kat in "I Love the Night Life" after sneaking out of the house to go on a nighttime adventure with Kenny.
- Looney Tunes: In "Good Night, Elmer", Elmer Fudd is trying to get to sleep, but is kept awake by a stubborn candle that refuses to go out. After he finally gets it put out (which involved chopping his entire bedroom apart with an axe), Elmer is finally able to get some sleep...only for the morning rays of the sun to peak over the horizon. The cartoon ends with the poor guy breaking down crying.
- The Patrick Star Show: In "The Patrick Show After Dark", Patrick and Squidina spend all night outside making a show about the nightlife around town. They arrive home at 5:53 AM. Patrick goes to bed, but at 6:00, Squidina wakes him up to start filming the next episode of the show. Patrick says, "That's show business!", then collapses from exhaustion.
- In the Pingu episode "Pinga Sleepwalks", Pingu gets his sleepwalking sister home just before it's time to wake up. He then proceeds to fall asleep at the breakfast table.
- The Ren & Stimpy Show: In the episode "In the Army", Ren has just gotten back to the barracks after a hard day of training and is settling in for a good night's sleep... when he's suddenly jolted awake by the sound of Reveille. Typical of the show, he has a psychotic breakdown and hacks his bed to pieces with an axe.
- The Simpsons: In the episode "Lisa's Pony", Homer gets a secret night job at the Kwik-E-Mart and returns home moments before he has to get up for his day job at the power plant.
- SpongeBob SquarePants: SpongeBob forgets how to do everything after losing his confidence in the episode "Pickles." He spends an entire night trying to remember the position he falls asleep in, before his alarm clock starts ringing and he shifts his focus to trying to remember how to turn it off.
- SuperThings: Rivals of Kaboom - Kazoom Power: The episode "Speedy Kazoom" sees the Kazoom Kids on a late night mission throughout the city. Their mission ends right at the start of a new day, with Enigma, who is carrying an alarm clock, alerting them to get up. The three of them merely throw their pillows at him in protest.
- Total Drama: In "Lies, Cries and One Big Prize", Sky gets about one second of sleep before Chris wakes her up with an airhorn.