History Series / TheWeirdAlShow

** The commentaries recall one film (''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJqeVhlwSS4 Soapy the Germ Fighter]]'') which was so hilariously bizarre that they wanted to just air the real thing...only for the execs to tell them it would be too disturbing.

* LargeHam: The announcer. No one else can say the phrase "[[ItMakesSenseInContext glandular problem]]" with more emphasis!

* ShoutOut: Several supporting cast members of ''UHF'', Al's only starring role in a film, made appearances.
** Kevin [=McCarthy=], who played the villainous R.J. Fletcher, plays the mayor of the town in the ''60% Chance of Rain'' parody.
** David Bowe (not, not [[Music/DavidBowie that one]]), who played George's friend Bob, appears as one of the miners in the episode "Mining Accident".
** Gedde Watanabe (already somewhat famous for playing Long Duck Dong in ''Film/SixteenCandles'') plays a martial arts instructor that was clearly intended to be a version of ''UHF''[='s=] Kuni, complete with his trademark catchphrase.
** ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' alumna Victoria Jackson, who played main squeeze Terri in ''UHF'', has a bit part as a crying woman in one of the fake TV shows on Al's TV in the episode "Time Machine".
** Longtime friend Creator/EmoPhillips, who played shop teacher Joe Earley in ''UHF'', shows up as the voice of the villainous Slaw Meister (modeled to look very much like Philips at the time) in the Fatman cartoon accompanying the episode "Mining Accident". He appears again in the show proper as "Dr. Philips", a loony psychiatrist Al hires to try and calm Harvey down in "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Hamster."
** Al's late mom Mary Yankovic also guest stars as herself in the talent show episode. His band also comes in and performs "Yoda" for Harvey's birthday.

-->''For what it's worth.''

->''"And he really makes a mighty fine jellybean and pickle sandwich / For what it's worth."''

* PetTheDog: {{Jerkass}} that he is, Al obviously does care about Harvey, and heaven help you if you do something bad to him.

** {{Anvilicious}}: Every episode would also spend the next half hour pounding the moral into your head from all directions.

* LostForever: In one commentary, Al explains that the dearth of extras on the set is because CBS trashed almost everything from the show, and we're actually quite lucky they kept the master tapes, so we're not stuck watching some grainy Youtube rip.

* MeanCharacterNiceActor: See {{Jerkass}}.

* OutOfOrder: To the point where the premiere, which introduced the regular characters and sketches, aired ''tenth''. Al and friends make a drinking game out of it in the DVD commentary.

* AndroclesLion: Per the ExpositoryThemeTune, how Weird Al got the show. One day, Al was in the forest trying to get a tan when he heard the tortured screaming of a funny little man. He was caught in a bear trap and Al set him free, and the guy that he rescued was as grateful as can be, and it turns out he's a big shot producer on TV. So he gives Al a contract, and whadda know? Now he's got his very own ''Weird Al Show!''

** ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' alumni Victoria Jackson, who played main squeeze Terri in ''UHF'', has a bit part as a crying woman in one of the fake tv shows on Al's tv in the episode "Time Machine".
** Longtime friend Creator/EmoPhillips shows up as the voice of the villainous Slaw Meister (modeled to look very much like Philips at the time) in the Fatman cartoon accompanying the episode "Mining Accident". He appears again in the show proper as "Dr. Philips", a loony psychiatrist Al hires to try and calm Harvey down in "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Hamster."
** Al's late mom also guest stars as herself in the talent show episode. His band also comes in and performs "Yoda" for Harvey's birthday.

* ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything: Val Brentwood: Gal Spy doesn't actually perform any espionage or anything spy-like in any of the episodes we see her in. Given the number of episodes where actual spy work would be useful to Al or his friends, it's surprising that she pretty much doesn't do anything but hang around at Al's house.

** Kevin [=McCarthy=], who played the villainous R.J. Fletcher in ''Film/{{UHF}}'', played the mayor of the town in the ''60% Chance of Rain'' parody.
** David Bowe (not, not [[Music/DavidBowie that one]]), who played George's friend Bob, appeared as one of the miners in the episode "Mining Accident".
** Gedde Watanabe (already somewhat famous for playing Long Duck Dong in ''Film/SixteenCandles'') played a martial arts instructor that was clearly intended to be a version of ''UHF''[='s=] Kuni, complete with his trademark catchphrase.
** ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' alumni Victoria Jackson, who played main squeeze Terri in ''UHF'', had a bit part as a crying woman in "Time Machine".
** Longtime friend Creator/EmoPhillips showed up as the voice of the villainous Slaw Meister (modeled to look very much like Philips at the time) in the Fatman cartoon accompanying the episode "Mining Accident". He appeared again in the show proper as "Dr. Philips", a loony psychiatrist Al hires to try and calm Harvey down in "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Hamster."
** Al's late mom also guest starred as herself in the talent show episode. His band also came in and performed "Yoda" for Harvey's birthday.
* ShowWithinAShow: Several episodes had the animated ''Adventures of Fatman''. Also, the recurring segment of Al watching TV allowed many different shows-within-a-show to be seen, most notably the Fred Huggins Show.

* ScareEmStraight: Reedited actual classroom films become hilarious sendups of this (even with the ExecutiveMeddling, they knew their audience quite well).

** JerkWithAHeartOfGold: How Al is likely supposed to be seen. This does shine through now and then, such as when Al used his time machine to try and get Harvey a birthday present, but the character's Jerk streak is just a bit too long for it's own good.

* HurricaneOfPuns: One of Fatman's enemies, "The Egg Man", has such a gratuitous overuse of egg puns that that Harvey is annoyed to no end.

* CoolAndUnusualPunishment: In one episode, a sadistic kid's show host threatens his sidekick with a "Pauly Shore marathon."

* BlindWithoutEm: A real life case, as the show was filmed shortly before Al had surgery to correct his vision. He notes on the commentary that his blind, wide eyed stare while playing the glasses less Fred Huggins actually adds a good deal to the performance.

* {{Bowdlerize}}: Thanks to ExecutiveMeddling, Al was not allowed to call Music/BarenakedLadies by their actual name, instead forced to introduce the band as "BNL." Note that plenty of other kids networks at the time had no problems with using their actual name -- just Al's. In the end, he called them by their full name anyway.

* {{Bowdlerization}}: Thanks to ExecutiveMeddling, Al was not allowed to call Music/BarenakedLadies by their actual name, instead forced to introduce the band as "BNL." Note that plenty of other kids networks at the time had no problems with using their actual name -- just Al's. In the end, he called them by their full name anyway.

* TheCelebrityLie: Weird Al claims to know John Tesh and brags to his friends about inviting him over, and then spends the rest of the episode having to come up with a scheme to raise money to book him for the afternoon to continue the lie.

->''"And he really makes a mighty fine jellybean and pickle sandwich/For what it's worth."''

''The Weird Al Show'' is a half-hour, Saturday morning live action show hosted by Music/WeirdAlYankovic. It showed a little adventure of Weird Al living in a cave 20 miles below the surface of the earth with his hamster, Harvey, then taught AnAesop. It was only on for 13 episodes in 1997 before Creator/{{CBS}} took it off.

Yankovic had wanted to make a straight entertainment program for kids (like ''PeeWeesPlayhouse''), but the show ran into severe ExecutiveMeddling. The previous year, the Children's Television Act had been amended to require U.S. broadcast stations to air a minimum three hours of educational programming for children each week (which affected Saturday morning cartoons on free-to-air TV). As such, CBS wanted its Saturday morning lineup to focus on shows that met the guidelines. ''The Weird Al Show'' had to incorporate pro-social Aesops into each show, which the creators found frustrating to say the least — and that was only part of the meddling they faced. Still, the makers did their best under the circumstances, even if the end result wasn't at all what people wanted out of a wacky kids' show starring "Weird Al" Yankovic.

!!This show provides examples of:

* AndroclesLion: Per the ExpositoryThemeTune, how Weird Al got the show. One day, Al was in the forest trying to get a tan when he heard the tortured screaming of a funny little man. He was caught in a bear trap and Al set him free, and the guy that he rescued was as grateful as can be, and it turns out he's a big shot producer on TV. So he gives Al a contract, and whadda know? Now he's got his very own ''Weird Al Show''!

* BlindWithoutEm: A real life case, as the show was filmed shortly before Al had surgery to correct his vision. He notes on the commentary that his blind, wide-eyed stare while playing the glasses-less Fred Huggins actually adds a good deal to the performance.
* {{Bowdlerization}}: Thanks to ExecutiveMeddling, Al was not allowed to call Barenaked Ladies by their actual name, instead forced to introduce the band as "BNL". Note that plenty of other kids networks at the time had no problems with using their actual name - just Al's. In the end, he called them by their full name anyway.
* BrokenAesop / FamilyUnfriendlyAesop: Several episodes seem to be giving either the opposite message they were trying to convey, or a message that isn't exactly worthy of emulating (i.e. "Don't try to be the best at anything — it's too hard.").

* ChristmasEpisode: "The Obligatory Holiday Episode", which covers most of the other holidays as well.
* ClassyCatBurglar: Valory Brentwood: Gal Spy - in appearance anyway.

* CoolAndUnusualPunishment: In one episode, a sadistic kid's show host threatens his sidekick with a "Pauly Shore marathon".

* CryingWolf: In "The Obligatory Holiday Episode", Madam Judy gives Al a warning about the future, before saying "April Fools". Immediately after, she gets another prediction, trying to warn Al to [[AnAesop listen to his friends]], but Al thinks it's another April fools joke.

** Longtime friend Creator/EmoPhilips showed up as the voice of the villainous Slaw Meister (modeled to look very much like Philips at the time) in the Fatman cartoon accompanying the episode "Mining Accident". He appeared again in the show proper as "Dr. Philips", a loony psychiatrist Al hires to try and calm Harvey down in "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Hamster."

** David Bowe (not, not [[DavidBowie that one]]), who played George's friend Bob, appeared as one of the miners in the episode "Mining Accident".
** Gedde Watanabe (already somewhat famous for playing Long Duck Dong in ''SixteenCandles'') played a martial arts instructor that was clearly intended to be a version of ''UHF''[='s=] Kuni, complete with his trademark catchphrase.
** ''SaturdayNightLive'' alumni Victoria Jackson, who played main squeeze Terri in ''UHF'', had a bit part as a crying woman in "Time Machine".
** Longtime friend Emo Philips showed up as the voice of the villainous Slaw Meister (modeled to look very much like Philips at the time) in the Fatman cartoon accompanying the episode "Mining Accident". He appeared again in the show proper as "Dr. Philips", a loony psychiatrist Al hires to try and calm Harvey down in "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Hamster."