This is like a running joke they do. They reuse the sounds on purpose. The Wilhelm Scream is everywhere when you know how to listen for it.

Generic sound effects are one of the most commonly used public domain items, so it’s really common to hear the exact same sound effect used in a lot of different media.

I regularly hear the "Sonic losing rings"effect used as a “transaction success” sound at POS systems, which, as a gamer, is confusing because hearing that sound in Sonic isn’t that of success.

This is a deep cut, but I had Spider Man cartoon maker on CDROM back in the 90s. The police always played the same radio chatter on repeat, so it was ingrained in my brain. I hear it every now and then in the background of police TV shows.

Examples?

When I was in college for TV and radio, one of my editing classes had a sound bank of effects we could use for various projects. The amount of SFX that I had heard before in that bank were astounding! Easily more than half of StarCraft 1 SFX were stock SFX.

Also that “sheep” scream that went viral back in the day? It’s a stock goat scream: youtu.be/OZvbBDnzQqA.

Some sounds just become the thing they are supposed to represent. They aren’t used because there are no more sounds to be made. Two reasons.

First. Directors won’t use a schnauzer as a guard dog in a movie, because they don’t portrait the intention of a guard dog on screen. For exactly the same reason you can’t use a gong as a laser sound, it doesn’t portrait a laser.

Second. People have collected sounds and made them available. There are stock sounds, just like there are stock pictures.

And so, certain sounds have become used for certain things. And the more they are used the more iconic they become. The Wilhelm scream, red tailed hawk, and many more.

I recently watched Nimona (2023), and in the part where they’re fleeing in the car and it breaks down, I recognized a familiar sound effect right away

This isn’t new. They used to sell vinyl records full of sounds that people could use in their productions, and now it’s audio files.

Chances are those laser blasts from Empire Strikes Back were just Laser Sound #12 from BBC Sci-fi Sound Effects Vol 3.

I always recognise the wizard 101 crafting table bubbling sound whenever it’s used in other media. Stock sounds are very prolific

I heard the “failed dice roll” effect from Baldur’s Gate 3 in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Unfortunately I can’t exactly remember where. I think something with Verso.

I can hear every sound referenced in this thread in my head.

There are huge sound effects libraries that have been continuously built up and added to since sound in movies became a thing. Foley artists dip into them constantly. If you watch enough old movies you can pick out some almost 100-year-old foley effects that still get used in modern tv and movies. A lot of the time foley artists will toss them in as a joke or reference that mostly only other foley artists are going to catch.

But yeah there are a lot of foley effects that get used a ton. I hear the exact door opening/closing sound from the old AOL instant messenger used in a movie or tv show at least a couple times a year. There’s also a specific cat noise that gets used constantly which people who played Postal 2 back in the day will recognize instantly.

Wait till you learn about the Wilhelm scream…