“In crook stories it is almost always the necklace,” explains Alfred Hitchcock, godfather of the thriller. “And in spy stories it is most always the papers.”

What he’s explaining here is a TV trope known as the MacGuffin. It’s a story element commonly used to drive the plot, but serves no other purpose. It’s not going to come up again later and it won’t help bring clarity to the story’s ending.

Chances are a lot of your childhood stories involve a MacGuffin. If we’re being completely honest here, it was probably the television remote controls. The time you got into a wrestling match with your siblings over the remote? Or maybe the time you accidentally broke Mom’s favorite Vase because you were playing monkey in the middle with the remote? Those stories.

Although MacGuffins are plot devices in movies and TV, chances are you and your family cherished the remote. So much so that even today you’d probably race out to the local electronics store for a TV remote controls replacement should anything ever happen. But what could ever happen that you’d need to hastily get replacement remote controls?

Here are a few of the most common reasons why people buy replacements of their childhood MacGuffins.

They Broke Them.

Whether it’s because your favorite The Walking Dead character was eaten by a zombie, or the wrong person got voted off of Survivor island, or because your team lost, many people have wound up breaking their remotes in fits of rage. Sometimes it just doesn’t pay to invest yourself so heavily in a TV show.

They Lost Them.

Remotes are notoriously good at hide-and-go-seek. It’s almost mind boggling just how good they truly are at the game. Many people have to get replacement remote controls much to their chagrin because their original remote vanished.

They Want a Spare One.

Sometimes people get replacement remote controls just so that they can have spares. Although, to be completely fair, they probably got such an idea as the result of having broken and lost too many remotes.

Thankfully if you break or lose your original remote, there are plenty of places where you can get Sony replacement remote controls, Sharp replacement remote controls, Samsung replacement remote controls, or replacements of any other major manufacturer. If you have any stories about fighting over the remote, feel free to share in the comments. Get more info here.