History Series / Reba

* TemptingFate: A positive version of this occurs at the end of the sixth-season episode "Bullets Over Brock", where Reba, dismayed at the prospect of Brock and Barbra Jean getting a divorce, claims "I'll never be able to relax now." Then she sits down and turns on the TV, sees the video clip of Van at Jake's soccer practice that Cheyenne filmed, and promptly bursts into hearty laughter. By the time the video clip sequence ends, Reba is calmly sipping tea, grinning and giggling happily, before muttering to herself: "[[IronicEcho I'm definitely relaxed now.]]"

** Once, when Reba is considering selling her engagement ring to pay for a costly car repair, she's initially reluctant, asking Kyra "what if one of you kids wants it." Kyra points out that an engagement ring from a failed marriage would be like wearing the clothes of a dead man.

** PlayedForLaughs near the end of the episode "The Great Race", where Brock insists on claiming [[ILetYouWin he let Reba win]] and Reba accuses Brock of being a SoreLoser in return. Just as Reba and Brock are on the verge of a race rematch, [[LethalChef Cheyenne]] makes an announcement about her homemade dinner. This prompts Reba to suggest that they change the content of the rematch to a race to the nearest pizza place instead, with the loser footing the bill. Brock agrees to the terms at once, and the episode ends with them starting the race and running away from the house.

*** PlayedForLaughs at the end of the selfsame episode. After Reba and Kyra talk things over and Kyra agrees to move back with Reba, they enter Reba's house, only to witness Brock teaching Jake the dance moves Brock himself learned when he was in the production of a musical. This time, Kyra ''and'' Reba both decide to leave.

* YourCheatingHeart:
** What Brock's midlife crisis made him do with Barbra Jean, kick-starting the series.
** Barbra Jean has no shame falling for other guys ''even after she married Brock''. ''[[UpToEleven She even refuses to let Reba get closer to them]]''.

** During the episode "Issues", Brock and Barbra Jean videotape themselves in bed, per the suggestion of a doctor, to find out why Brock has been sleep-deprived lately. The footage starts with a ''long'' prayer session from Barbra Jean.[[note]]Brock fast-forward through the prayer session, during which he gets up and practices on his golf swing briefly.[[/note]]

* SillyPrayer: In one episode Van jokingly slips in a request for a convertible when praying for something. He later finds a toy convertible in a box of cereal, which he takes as a good omen.

-->'''Cheyenne''': (quietly) Van, Mom just came back from the doctor's office and her blood pressue is off the charts, so keep your voice down.
-->'''Van''': (loudly) But that kid [Jake] is such an embarrass--
-->'''Cheyenne''': (more loudly) '''''VAN, DID YOU HEAR WHAT I SAID?! STOP YELLING!!'''''

* SerialHomeWrecker: Barbara Jean.

* HeliumSpeech: Brock talks this way when he happens to be in charge of balloons for a party Cheyenne throws for Kyra.

** In one episode when Kyra interrupts her mother's date, Van and Cheyenne come home late to find Jake up late watching TV and having eaten ''an entire bag'' of Van's double stuffed Oreos.
-->'''Jake''': ''(through a mouthful of Oreos)'' My stomach hurts.\\

* ScreamingBirth: How 'bout two of 'em?

-->'''Cheyenne''': (more loudly) '''''VAN, DID YOU HEAR WHAT I SAID?! STOP YELLING!!"

** A snarky couple with three children: A ditzy blonde who married a doofus, a snarky middle child who seems to be the only verbal equal to the snarky matriarch, and a young son who everyone seems to forget about. It's not an exact expy of ''Roseanne,'' but it seemed to be a case of what might have happened should Roseanne and Dan get divorced. Both shows even tread similar ground, such as the parents cracking down especially hard on the younger daughter after the eldest daughter grew up too fast and the mother being upset when the kids decide they're too old for Halloween, only to be comforted by an epic prank against her at the end of the episode.

* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: The first season was noticeably different from the rest of the series. Van was more dumb than crazy. Barbra Jean (frequently referred to by her initials) was also a huge Jesus Freak, alongside her other neuroses. Cheyenne was more AlphaBitch than Ditz. Brock wasn't nearly as vain. Reba was much more the OnlySaneMan instead of a control freak (also hearing her curse in the pilot episode is odd, since she usually doesn't later on). Also, the fact that the show took place in Houston was a much bigger plot point, as the Hart family tried to navigate through Cheyenne's pregnancy around ultra-conservative neighbors, school principals, etc. Much like ''Married... With Children'', the show kind of Flanderized into more of a live-action cartoon, and was funnier for it.

* CoolDownHug: After hearing him vent, Reba gives the depressed Brick a hug. Unfortunately, Barbra Jean walks in, sees this, and it immediately becomes a NotWhatItLooksLike situation.

A simple DomCom set in Houston, Texas, and starring Music/RebaMcEntire, and airing for six seasons on Creator/TheWB (2001–06) and then Creator/TheCW (2006-07).

Reba Hart has to deal with her divorce from a cheating husband, the new (pregnant) wife he left her for, her oldest daughter's teenage pregnancy and hasty marriage, and being a newly single parent to three kids, all the while cracking numerous jokes at the ex's new wife. Despite its slapstick premise, the show exhibited a surprising amount of genuinely touching emotion.

Ignoring your own partiality (or lack thereof) to country music/culture, the show was popular enough to stay on the air for six seasons, even surviving the [[NetworkDecay destruction]] of the network that originally aired it.

* AbortedArc: Part of the first season involved the Harts going to court-ordered therapy after a knock-down drag-out fight at divorce court. This all but disappeared after the first season, until much later in the show's run (the fifth season).

Now has a [[Characters/{{Reba}} characters page]]

*** PlayedForDrama when Kyra decides to postpone college in order to perform and tour with her band, Reba decides to forbid her from doing so. Kyra promptly decides to move out of Reba's house and into the residence of "Stitches", one of her bandmates.

* SpeedDating: During the second season, Cheyenne sends Reba to a speed dating event to help her get back on the horse after her divorce. Lori Ann comes along because it's "like little bite-sized man samples!" Reba ends up getting a date out of it, while Lori Ann doesn't.

* StopCopyingMe: One of the men Reba and Lori Ann meet in the SpeedDating session claims to "like making people laugh"... by copying what the woman he meets says in a mocking tone. Reba and Lori Ann, whom he meets separately, are NOT amused.

* HollywoodGenetics: Jake's black hair is...[[ImplausibleHairColor unlikely]] at best. Considering that his parents and siblings only consist of blondes and redheads.

-->'''Reba''': My checkbook's in there!

* HollywoodGenetics: Jake's black hair is...[[ImplausibleHairColor unlikely]] at best.

-->'''Reba''': Calm down! ''(Puts a hand on Barbra Jean's shoulder)''
-->'''Barbra Jean''': Oh I love how tough you are. When we do go to prison, I am so gonna be your girlfriend!
-->'''Reba''': ''(beat)'' I'm getting out of here!
-->'''Barbra Jean''': Even if we didn't go to prison, I'd still so be your girlfriend!

* AffairBlameTheBastard: It's become a running occurrence in the show that whenever Barbara Jean runs to Reba for help on raising Henry, Reba has to point out that Henry ''was'' conceived when Reba and Brock were still married and holds it in contempt to Barbara Jean out of anger. Being [[TheDitz Barbara Jean]], [[ComicallyMissingThePoint she doesn't see the point]].

** Back in the first seasons, Brock and BJ go and visit BJ's father, "Big Daddy." He takes a superior attitude with Brock for leaving his first wife, and says that Big Daddy and his wife were married for over 50 years... "mostly because she's too ugly to kiss goodbye." Brocks calls him on this, saying that yes, he's divorced, but he would never talk that way about his wife.

* BerserkButton: PlayedForLaughs, it's not so much "berserk" as "reacting strongly" .

** Brock is hit with this the worst as he's the object of physical and emotional abuse from nearly all the cast members. To add hilarity to his injuries, Reba's parents can only glare his way but are able to warm up to Barbra Jean, his mother dislikes how he ended up marrying a bimbo, Barbra Jean's father has many implications of wanting to shoot him (even more when Brock stood up to him about misogynist jokes about Big Daddy's own wife), and Barbra Jean's brother Buzzer has such a deep and scary MySisterIsOffLimits attitude that he removed one of Brock's eyebrows and still has that piece in his pocket.

* CoolDownHug: After hearing him vent, Reba gives the depressed Brick a hug. Unfortunately, Barbara Jean walks in, sees this, and it immediately becomes a NotWhatItLooksLike situation.

** Cheyenne is also a bad cook too, as evident in the episode where Barbara Jean attempts to teach her to cook and fails miserably. She burns bread, refuses to cut a chicken out of Squicked nausea and attempts to serve dinner just until after the meat stops boiling. Van even comments she's one of these.

* DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale: In season 2, after learning that Brock had a secret vasectomy and she wants more kids, Barbara Jean tells Brock she's going to attempt to have another kid with him whether he likes it or not.

-->'''Barbara Jean''': Oh, it will when you get it reversed!

-->'''Barbara Jean''': Why not?

-->'''Barbara Jean''': Brock, you have a choice: we can do it at the dentist's office with anesthesia or late at night...while you're asleep.

* DrugsAreBad: An asceop the characters Reba, Brock and Barbara Jean have to deliver to Kyra in an episode of Season 3.

** Barbara Jean gets skinnier by the Sixth Season.
** Jordan, Barbara Jean's fitness trainer, who is handsome and unbeknown to Brock and Reba, StraightGay.

** Barbara Jean's photos from her dark past of "indecent misconduct" which shows her in lingerie, all ripped with muscles in a speed bikini, really obese in a suit and shirtless with her head photoshopped onto a hairy obese man's body.

** In season one when Reba's friend Lori Ann meets Brock's pregnant mistress/wife Barbara Jean.
-->'''Lori Ann''': You must be Barbara Jean.
-->'''Barbara Jean''': Please, everybody calls me "BJ".

* IfItsYouItsOkay: Barbara Jean seems to have this for Reba as their unusual friendship has plenty of HoYay tendencies and Barbara Jean hopes that Reba will break her out of prison if she gets arrested. Then, admiring how tough she is, expresses desire that Reba be her "prison girlfriend". Reba is Squicked out by this and leaves. Barbara Jean then says even if they didn't end up in prison, she'd still want to be Reba's girlfriend.
-->'''Reba''': Calm down! ''(Puts a hand on Barbara Jean's shoulder)''
-->'''Barbara Jean''': Oh I love how tough you are. When we do go to prison, I am so gonna be your girlfriend!

-->'''Barbara Jean''': Even if we didn't go to prison, I'd still so be your girlfriend!

* JerkAss: Barbra Jean's sister Katie-Ann, who does nothing but make fun of her by telling everyone cruel jokes and embarrassing stories about her for the entire family reunion. It really says something when even Kyra(who normally makes fun of BJ) is put off by how mean and nasty she is to BJ (to the point where [[PrecisionFStrike Kyra outright calls her a bitch]]).

* LaxativePrank: In the last scene of the episode "The Blonde Leading The Blind", Reba bakes cookies for Van to show him that she forgives him for telling Barbara Jean to check up on her after her her laser eye surgery left her temporarily blind, despite her making it very clear that she wants to be left alone. Jake walks through the front door and a suspicious Van insist that he have a cookie, which he does, convincing Van that they're safe. Jake arrives in the kitchen where he tells Reba that he took the cookie she told him to. Van is then shown holding his stomach and walking quickly out of the living room.

** Kyra also comes off this way as she often seems like the most well-adjusted person in the family (she's the one who convinces Cheyenne to go back to high school and calms her down about the prospect of giving birth). Reba may not be an idiot, but she is however at times prone to being extremely petty (usually because of Barbra Jean and Brock), a control freak(when it comes to Van and Cheyenne and Elizabeth) and downright manipulative (bribing Kyra with fake money to tell her about Barbra Jean and Brock's house rules). Also for all of her lectures about doing the right thing, she isn't above bending the rules to get her own way (I.E. using Van's handicapped parking pass to find a parking spot so she won't be late for her job interview, which ironically ends up costing her the job due to the boss being handicapped himself).

** Van thought getting off from food stamp services was more embarrassing than signing up for it (and being so proud of it for not ''trying'' to work at all). He also thought that his whole family was practically a bunch of circus people when presenting them to her sports agent and is embarrassed of them all, forgetting the fact he's pretty much the biggest source of embarrassment himself (which didn't help when out of panic he told her lesbian agent that Reba was super gay).
* SlapSlapKiss: In Season 6, during their recent separation and impending divorce, Brock and Barbara Jean try to "act" on their status as a soon-to-be divorced couple in public and they end up having a loud argument over it. Barbara Jean almost punches Brock and it ends up with them making out in a diner booth (in front of several shocked people), which continues into intercourse in the parking lot before finally ending up at her bed.

** During the first season, Reba, acting as a respectable substitute teacher, counseled a young couple friends to Cheyenne about how extremely difficult it is to raise a child while still being in high school as they saw it very fun and manageable seeing Van and Cheyenne making it (all because Reba decided to support them). Despite all the warnings (and Van and Cheyenne's utter lack of common sense), the young couple ends up being caught about to have sex that same night.

** In the Sixth Season, Van explains to Reba why he is working so erratically though this line.

* WiseBeyondTheirYears: Kyra, as she's a straight-A student on the honor roll and frequently comes off as more level-headed then the adults a lot of the time(in one episode Reba outright says that Kyra is "the only other adult in the family"). It's especially noticeable in season 1 when she's the one who ends up convincing Cheyenne to go back to high school and the one to help her calm down about the prospect of giving birth.

-->'''Kyra:''' I know it's dark out but if you borrow Barbara Jean's spy goggles, you'll be able to see I'm not Cheyenne!

** When Reba and Brock tried to hide the Cayman incident from the IntimidatingRevenueService, neither of them told on the other. Barbra Jean, completely hysteric about the heavy pressure, casually revealed the issue during a harmless coffee break with an agent outside their private conversations, landing them all in a heavy debt that almost forced Brock to move to Las Vegas.
** When Jake didn't want Barbra Jean to know about [[spoiler:his very complicated and elaborate Halloween prank on her mother, who considered Halloween pranks as a revered tradition in the family and lost faith in the lack of interest from everyone else]]. Everyone on the plan knew that Barbra Jean would have ruined everything from the start if she had known, so her obliviousness to the whole thing only added to it, albeit in her own exaggerated way.

* OffscreenMomentOfAwesome: Kyra punching out a girl for calling Cheyenne a slut.

* AMistakeIsBorn: In an episode in Season Two, during a heated argument with Van and Cheyenne over their recent pregnancy scare, Reba forbids them from having another baby in her house and says she will not let them make the "same mistake" twice (I.e, teen pregnancy). Cheyenne and Van are obviously hurt from her calling their daughter Elizabeth this and they call her out on it, though she denies it at first and this prompts them to move out.