Most of the items listed below are ones that had high expectations, large amounts of money or widespread publicity, but fell far short of success. Obviously, due to the subjective nature of "success" and "meeting expectations," there can be disagreement about what constitutes a "major flop."

Musical comebacks gone awry

• MC Hammer's failed restyling as a gangsta rapper
• New Kids on the Block's attempt to return with a more mature sound as "NKOTB"
• Diana Ross's "Diana Ross and the Supremes" tour, which was cancelled for lack of strong ticket sales and because she had refused to include other original members of the Supremes in the tour; 23 scheduled appearances were cut off
• Vanilla Ice's multiple returns, such as his gangsta rap and hardcore punk phases
• Victoria Beckham's attempts to launch a solo pop career after the break up of the Spice Girls. All the other former members had managed a UK Number One record. Her first solo album was released under the name 'V.B.' as a reference to 'Jennifer Lopez' and after poor sales she was dropped. A second album was recorded with another label but when the first single release failed to make number 1 this was shelved.
• Peter Andre's eventual flop on stage after he tried to revitalise his career on I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here!. Andre was pelted with fruit and cans/bottles until forced to stop singing.

Flops in sports

• The American Football Women's League
• The European Hockey League
• The World Hockey Association in both the 1970's and 2000's
• The United States Boxing Championship tournaments of the 1970s
• The United States Football League
• The Women's Football Association
• The XFL
• The Baseball Network - A joint venture between Major League Baseball, ABC, and NBC that ran from 1994-1995.
• The Triplecast - A pay-per-view service by NBC for the 1992 Summer Olympic Games in Barcelona.
• The List: Biggest Heisman flops
• ESPN25: The 25 Biggest Sports Flops
• The Ontario Motor Speedway, built in 1970 in Ontario, California, for $25.5 million dollars, closed after the 1980 racing season

Flops in television

Flops in soap operas

• 90-minute installments of the soap opera Another World, which were reduced back to one hour after sixteen months and a 50% ratings decline, from which the show never recovered
• The NBC soap opera Texas, originally made as a springboard for popular actress Beverlee McKinsey, who left the show after one year, causing the show's cancellation the following season
• The NBC soap opera Generations
• The BBC soap operas Triangle and Eldorado
• The ABC soap operas The City & Port Charles
• The relaunched ITV1 soap Crossroads

Other flops in television

• Bette
• Cop Rock
• The U.S. version of Coupling
• The Chevy Chase Show
• The Pat Sajak Show
• The Sharon Osbourne Show
• Living It Up! With Ali & Jack
• The Magic Hour hosted by Magic Johnson
• Pink Lady & Jeff
• Televicentro's Puerto Rican version of Remote Control (Control Remoto ), had to be cancelled after three months on the air because MTV threatened a lawsuit
• The disastrous 1980 season of Saturday Night Live—after cast member Charles Rocket said fuck on the air, every performer was fired—except Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo
• Supertrain
• Thicke of the Night , a talk show hosted by Alan Thicke
• Turn-On, ABC's derivative answer to Laugh-In, became the first show to ever be cancelled by its network before the first episode had finished airing. In some markets, the show went to a commercial break and never came back.
• You Bet Your Life remade with Bill Cosby
• G4techTV was the highly controversial merger of successful tech channel TechTV and failing gaming network G4.

See also: jumping the shark

Turkeys (Flops in theatre)

• 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (1976): Lyrics by Alan J. Lerner, of "My Fair Lady" and "Brigadoon" fame; music by Leonard Bernstein (who had important Broadway successes such as "On the Town," "Candide," and, most notably "West Side Story," to his credit). Closed after only seven performances. There was no cast recording made. An attempt was made to revive it in London in 1997. A reviewer commented: "As exhumations go, this one had its bright moments."
• Carrie (1988): A Broadway musical adaptation of Stephen King's novel of the same title, starring Betty Buckley, closed after only five performances and 16 previews. One of the many problems plaguing the show was the bucket of pig blood used in a climactic scene in the film. In the play, it was replaced by people dabbing red paint on the actress's face, as actually pouring stage blood on the actress would have interfered with her body microphone. The show was such a notorious turkey it provided the title to Ken Mandelbaum 's survey of theatrical disasters, Not Since Carrie : Forty Years of Broadway Musical Flops.
• Oscar: In October 2004, a musical by Mike Read about Oscar Wilde closed after just one night at the Shaw Theatre in Euston after a severe critical mauling.

Flops in film

A movie is most likely a flop if it doesn't perform as expected. A major movie flop might barely (or not even) make back the money it took to finance it. In extreme cases it might put the studio out of business.

A separate discussion of famously awful movies and box office bombs provides examples and rationales. See also Golden Raspberry Awards.