History Series / FreshMeat

* SarcasmFailure: After Oregon fails to come up with any other suspects other than Al, Kingsley sarcastically remarks that [[DeadpanSnarker it might be quicker to look him in a dark room and torture him until he confesses]]. Howard takes it seriously and writes it down.

** [[spoiler:JP's lazy habits and unrealistic career ambitions ensure what while he does graduate, he does so with a third instead of the 2:1 he wanted.]]

* SlidingScaleOfShinyVersusGritty: Under JP's ownership, the house rapidly begins to become a derelict, slug-infested shithole, leading Josie to take asylum in Noah's clean, tidy, shiny, perfect house next door.
** Also, clean-shaven, professional Series 1 Tony Shales, compared to stubbly, smelly, homeless Series 3 Tony Shales.
* SlummingIt: JP and Oregon, the former being more upfront about it, [[SecretlyWealthy the latter pretending to be from a less privileged background.]]

[[caption-width-right:216:(From left to right)\\ Top: [[SpoiledSweet Oregon]], [[DoggedNiceGuy Kingsley]], [[UpperClassTwit JP]]. Bottom: [[{{Ladette}} Vod]], [[{{Geek}} Howard]] and [[PluckyGirl Josie]]]]

The main characters are: Kingsley, a DoggedNiceGuy with a crush on Josie, who isn't as innocent as she appears; Howard, a [[FriendlessBackground social recluse]] with only a slight grasp on normal human behaviour; Vod, DeadpanSnarker {{Ladette}} and self-proclaimed slut; Oregon, a SpoiledSweet-but-neurotic girl trying to escape her privileged upbringing; and JP - [[UpperClassTwit affluent but a bit of an idiot]], who tries far too hard to impress those around him.

* {{Adorkable}}: Howard, who has NoSocialSkills and spends half his life in a woolly jumper with sheep on it.

* SpoiledBrat: JP whenever he talks to Mummy.
* SpoiledSweet: Oregon, though she tries to hide her upbringing.
** This becomes more apparent in series 3, where she takes new housemate Candice under her wing, [[spoiler:becomes the first of the group to congratulate Kingsley and Josie on getting back together, and tries to stop Vod from breaking Javier's heart.]]
* SpotOfTea: Vod, despite being the [[SubvertedTrope opposite]] of the stereotypical tea drinker.
** Candice starts making daily cups of tea for Howard for seemingly no reason; the faint sparks of their romance to come, in spite of Howard's paranoia and geek logic.

''Fresh Meat'' (2011-2016) is a British comedy series from the creators of ''Series/PeepShow'' currently airing on Channel 4. The show centres around [[SixStudentClique 6 students]] attending university in Manchester who miss out on accommodation in halls and so are forced to share a house together.

** Vod refers to Shales as "[[Film/TheNuttyProfessor the slutty professor]]".

-->'''Tomothy:''' [[OhCrap What?!]

* RunningGag: Howard's frustration at everyone's blanket assumption that he's a ''LordOfTheRings'' fan.

* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: Josie gets one in series 4 in the truth tent when she gets angry at Vod and smacks her in the face. She immediately regrets it and fearfully apologises, only for Vod to lose her temper and try to attack her.

* OneHourWorkWeek: Count how many times you see anyone study. You won't need to use your other hand. No wonder Vod fails first year. This is taken UpToEleven in seasons 3 and 4, where education takes such a backseat that you'd be forgiven for forgetting what the protagonists are even studying, and the character arcs almost never intersect with anything education-related. [[spoiler:RealityEnsues when most of the group's final grades are pretty mediocre.]]

* RealVehicleReveal: Oregon has a brand new car purchased by her posh, well-to-do parents. She spends the first few episodes of season 1 denying its existence and pretending she walks everywhere. She's crudely exposed when Vod accidentally presses the key fob while holding Oregon's handbag.

* ExactWords: This happened as part of an event in Vod's childhoos, where Vod told her mother not to get drunk on one of her sports days. She didn't get drunk. She took acid instead, mistook another child (a boy, no less) for Vod, tried to take him home, and [[RealityEnsues the police got involved]]. According to Vod, [[FridgeHorror this was normal for her]].

** The creators intended for the show to run a full six seasons and cover three full years, however it was likely ScrewedByTheNetwork.

* AgeGapRomance: Kingsley begins dating the much older Rosa in season 4, almost exclusively because she's Italian.
** JP also has a pop at Vod's mum Chris, but it doesn't really take...

* PortmanteauCoupleName: A jealous Josie disparagingly refers to Heather and Kingsley singularly as "Heathsley".

** Series 3: New fresher Candice moves in and, unlike Paul and Sabine, she becomes a true Sixth Ranger, joining the group on various clubbing nights, house parties and pub crawls.

* SixthRanger: The house has seven rooms; one too many for the SixStudentClique who form the main cast. Both residents of the extra room so far have been relative outsiders;
** Paul Lamb "The Invisible Man"; TheGhost, who the viewers never see and the housemates claim not to. [[spoiler:Revealed in the first season finale that he was around the whole time and had a mental breakdown because nobody ever noticed him.]]
** Sabine; older, foreign, and more introverted than the rest of them (not to mention taking the room in the place of any of the people they actually wanted to move in), the group take against her at first.

** Averted in the third season; not only does Candice become one of the gang pretty quickly, but Vod's boyfriend Javier lives with them for a while and gets on well with everyone.

* BoyishShortHair: Vod throughout her entire stint at Manchester Medlock, a summation of her outrageously ladette personality. (Except when she dons some hair extensions in one episode, when she falls in love with Al the Handyman.)

* DidntThinkThisThrough: Kingsley drops out of Geology only weeks in, and transfers to Drama, based purely on a) lots of hot girls being in the Drama class, and b) JP verbally committing to do the same. He's left studying for a course he hates, with no friends and nothing in common with any of his classmates.

* FishOutOfWater: Kingsley is shown to be a loner and an outcast in his Drama course, with only the promiscuous Ruth acknowledging his existence. During an animal dancing session, he is made to stand in place as a quiet sheep, while the rest of the class bounces around pretending to be monkeys.

* {{Hipster}}: Several characters, but Oregon in particular is fond of wearing oversize glasses and copying much of what Vod does.

** Later on, Dylan reacts in much the same way when he finds out Oregon had sex with his father.