Line #4 Headscratchers/Fillmore


1	* Why do they give chase in every episode? The student will come back to school the next day and could easily be arrested then. It's not the like the student can just move across the country.
2	** There was actually one episode where a villain was indeed about to move across the country and was trying to steal a boatload of Smoiks (the fake money that candy and chip companies include in their product that you can trade for prizes) before he went to the middle of nowhere.
3	** If they don't take care of it now, that means the student has all that time to attempt to make themselves not look guilty.
4	** And sometimes the crime is on a time limit and the culprit can win or at least make everyone lose by playing for time.
5	** Also, RuleOfCool. If every episode opted not to give chase and instead went "eh, we'll get him when he comes to school tomorrow," it would make for quite the boring series. Also keep in mind this entire show is basically one big parody of 70s buddy cop shows, which all pretty much had a chase in every episode as well.
6	** Because, in a case of RealityIsUnrealistic, most criminals, even when cornered, will run. Even when there's many members of law enforcement after them, no safe hide away, no back up plan or no reason, humans have a fight or flight instinct, and thus every kid bolts for it because every instinct they have says it's what they should do. The Patrollers give chase because, like police in the real world, they have a duty to make sure the fleeing criminal doesn't harm someone or do more damage in the process of fleeing than they had by committing the original crime. Would you really expect the school's security to sit back and shrug as someone runs when said person has broken a dozen school rules already with no remorse? What kind of heroes would those people be?
7	** Also, there were a few other episodes where there were genuine stakes involved, and the culprit getting away would have had consequences. In "The Shreds Fell Like Snowflakes", they needed to catch the culprit before they succeeded in keeping Vallejo from his re-election hearing, and in Masterstroke of Malevolence, the entire chase scene takes place in the precious few minutes remaining before the vandalism of the painting becomes permanent. There was also Nappers Never Sleep, where they had to get Duappy back from the culprit they were chasing before he starved to death.
8	* Does it not bug anyone else that this series takes place in [[ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything The School That Doesn't Do Anything?]] In every single chase scene the students are shown partaking in a seemingly infinite number of activities... '''except''' actually going to class. You see the kids do sports, arts and any club activity you can imagine, but you never see them behind a desk. Even the main characters seem to be at the Safety Patrol office the entire day. When do they actually, you know, get educated? It seems that all the effort Principal Folsom puts in maintaining the school's image makes her completely forget to make the school do what it's supposed to do: educate children. How is she not fired yet?
9	** You seem to be watching this under the influence of the TethercatPrinciple. Just because you don't see something doesn't mean it doesn't happen. The plots for the episodes are based around extracurricular activities and sports because they have the greatest potential for interesting plots and satire of school and cop show conventions. Not to mention there ''was'' an entire episode based around standardized testing.
10	** Also the episode "A Cold Day at X" is essentially about Academic Integrity. Just because a lot of the action doesn't take place during school hours, doesn't mean kids aren't learning. It's also likely that they work during free periods.
11	** This troper would like to believe that Safety Patrol is an actual class in the school, like an elective. Perhaps all the kids taking it are interested in being police officers when they’re adults.
12	** The school could be some kind of experimental school or alternative education program kind of place , or the more simple case , most of the activity shown are during recess or after school activity hours.
13	* Why the fuck is there an issue about diplomatic immunity when it comes to the trade of forged baseball cards and plates? The culprit is a ''student'', not a ''diplomat!'' Now, if he committed a crime worthy of the police, then yes, he'd be in a lot of trouble.
14	** That was actually Folsom's fault. Due to [[NoodleIncident a previous incident]] [[DestructiveSavior where Fillmore caused massive amounts of trouble busting a foreign exchange student]], she basically gave foreign students the immunity. If you want to give someone the IdiotBall, give it to her.
15	** Just to clarify, it's not all foreign students, just relatives of diplomats, which this kid was, as was presumably the previous one Fillmore busted.
16	* The standardized testing episode raised protesting as a way for people to get their voices across, without breaking the rules or hurting others. All well and good, but doesn't that fall a bit flat in this case? Protest all they want, is anyone really going to listen to a bunch of kids on the matter? Not to mention the episode had one protester, and they were shown to be very ineffective and more of a joke.
17	* In "The Currency of Doubt", Toby is set up by [[TamperingWithFoodAndDrink having his hard-boiled eggs replaced with cheese eggs to set off his lactose intolerance.]] However, he mentions that he eats hard-boiled eggs regularly, meaning he's familiar with their taste and texture, and when his lactose intolerance was brought up during the initial investigation, he pretty much says it's bad enough that he can't have lactose products at all. So how exactly did he miss the fact that the 4 eggs he managed to eat before he got sick were not only the wrong color (when Fillmore finds the remaining egg, it's uniformly yellow) but also were the wrong texture and didn't taste right, namely by tasting like ''something he had never eaten at all''?
18	** It is possible he ate the first cheese egg without realizing it. Sometimes you can go on "autopilot" when doing something you've done repeatedly before. Toby eats hard-boiled eggs so often it's become muscle memory. His brain may not have reacted to the wrong taste[=/=]texture because it was already anticipating the taste of a hard-boiled egg. By the time he realized something was wrong, he would have already eaten the first cheese egg.
19	** That explains the first one and maybe even the second one but he specifically states "last week I got sick after 4", meaning that he only noticed something was wrong 4 eggs in and apparently never registered precisely what was wrong.
20	* I know that the culprit who said Fillmore busted him for pen pal fraud in the casino in "The Currency of Doubt" is meant to be a parody of mail fraud but how the heck does "pen pal fraud" even ''work''?
21	** Original poster here. I posed the above question to my mother and she speculated that it's basically identity fraud via a pen pal system/program, which makes sense but that doesn't cover other possible kinds of mail fraud...
22	* Why did Mr. Guirerro in "Next Stop: Armageddon" think moving to another town would be a more sensible alternative to, say, expanding the store stock? Surely adding something like a more expanded modeling market would have worked just fine and it's no guarantee that a new town would have a thriving fan base for model trains or even one as small but devoted as the one in the town the show takes place in.
23	** Three possible reasons. A.As what shown in the episode , the model train fanbase in universe(or at least in the town the show takes place in) are......"kind focus on trains only" so maybe Mr. Guirerro want to keep his store "specialized" in trains only(to keep the regulars). B. There is a chance that he was think about "take over the lease" of some model shop at the new town.(That's he probably familiar with the owner , and know the market.) or C. As the businness was going down ,he was thinking about the concpet of "close the business and move back to his hometown".
24	* Obviously Ingrid being the one to go undercover in "Red Robins Don't Fly" falls under TheMainCharactersDoEverything but Tehama's reason for not being an option, which boils down to "They'll recognize me", doesn't really make sense given that Fillmore and Ingrid AKA the two best officers in the patrol can go undercover with ease no matter how much or how little they actually disguise themselves (heck; Fillmore wears his signature shades ''every time he goes undercover''). How precisely does someone who isn't nearly as high profile be more recognizable than the officers who have been involved in the majority of recent busts?
25	** my guess: Tehama may not be as high profile as Ingrid, but she's a) been at the school longer, meaning the suspects must have seen her at least as often as Ingrid (emphasis on "at least"). B) She is of Japanese descent, which should make her stand out even more.
26	** Tehama mentions something about her 'beat' in 'Jay something' for her reason why she wouldn't be able to go undercover and Ingrid mentions getting cookie dough as a gift from the 'Jays'. Are the Jays a separate girl scout troop at X that Tehama joined at some point? In that case, it would make perfect sense as to why Tehama couldn't go undercover. As a Jay, she would have likely interacted with the Red Robins, which would explain why they would know who she is. It might not even be for the reason of 'they'd know I'm a belt', they would know that she's from a rival troop, which would be considered equally suspicious as to why she suddenly wants to join, considering the possibility that it'd be for a revenge-driven purpose given what the Robins have done to their competition.
27	* Another question about the Red Robins episode: when Ingrid met the girls, she said "I'm a transfer from another Red Robins troop." Why didn't anyone ask said troop if she's really a transfer?
28	* In the episode 'Cry The Beloved Mascot', how did Harrison know about where missing retainers would be found or when corned beef and cabbage would be served? While it is likely that he stole said student's retainer in order to complete the 'foot-in-the-door' phenomenon with Alistair, how did he know about the corned beef and cabbage? While it is also likely that he knew from his journalism job, he isn't a well-known reporter, considering he always got stuck reporting on Alistair. If it wasn't that hard to obtain the information of when corned beef and cabbage would be served then wouldn't it defeat the purpose of Alistair being supposedly 'psychic', since it wouldn't be that hard to figure out without the use of otherworldly forces?
29	** Similarly, if Harrison hated reporting on Alistair, then why did he put in motion all of those events in the first place? Why did he put himself through that? While having Alistair show up and 'predict' where the can of lobster treats was hiding would be easy enough, it probably wouldn't have been that hard to pin the blame on Vern some other way. It would have spared him the trouble of being stuck reporting on Alistair, considering the 'psychic' was only going off of the emails Harrison sent him and would have likely been found a fraud. Hell, Harrison would have won if he didn't go the extra mile and tried to have Alistair plant a fake Lobstee in Vern's bedroom since Harrison had already been named editor-in-chief. Fillmore and Ingrid wouldn't have been able to get through to Alistair since they'd be suspicious but not have any hard evidence to prosecute him, so neither of them would have made the connection to Harrison, which means Lobstee would not be found and the game would have been lost.
30	* Why wasn't Alistair's last name Starview? It's a street in San Francisco and would serve as a MeaningfulName as well.
31	* It's stated and shown in 'A Wurm In Our Midst' that Tony takes the bus home from school, but why? The first few minutes of the episode shows his house being ''right'' outside of X and in ''running distance'' of the school. While I understand the bus scene was used for the sake of drama and to include another chase scene, what's the point of taking the bus when he can just walk home?
32	** It's possible that "takes the bus home" was in a metaphorical sense where he rides the bus somewhere after school on days when he doesn't go directly home. Granted, that doesn't explain why he wouldn't just walk home but it's an explanation if nothing else. Or same theory but he had somewhere specific to go after school that required the bus ride the particular time it came up in the episode and clarity wasn't given for streamlined story-telling.

Context Headscratchers / Fillmore