A - D | E - L | M - R | S - Z
open/close all folders
S
- Sadist Show: By Season 2.
- Sanity Slippage: When Madame Foster makes cookies to sell to the townspeople for money for a new roof, Frankie later eats some cookies and becomes addicted to them to the point where she goes insane without them especially when finding out that Madame Foster only bakes them once a year. She sleeps in a sleeping bag outside next to the cookie stand and screams at Mac for being just two minutes late with the cookies and demands him to give her forty dozen boxes of cookies. It gets to the point where she stock piles the forty dozen boxes of cookies and several jugs of milk and is lying on her back in her bed gobbling the cookies and milk down at a fast pace with her eyes bulging with craziness and loses the will power to stop eating them and Mac tries to intervene with no success. Eventually this results in her getting fat.
- Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: Mac is intelligent, while his friend Goo is perky and eccentric.
- Schemer: Bloo is often coming up with schemes to get what he wants.
- Sealed Evil in a Can: This is how the parents of the boy who created World viewed him when they locked him in his toy box, and apparently told Foster's such as they kept him in there. However, this is a subversion as World wasn't evil, just misunderstood and just wanted friends.
- Second-Person Attack:
- In one episode, when Bloo gets punched in the face by a young girl for taking some toy glow-in-the-dark vampire teeth.
- In another episode, Bloo is spying on who was supposed to be "the best imaginary friend ever", and he knocks out Bloo with a shovel this way.
- Selective Enforcement: Inverted as a Springtime for Hitler in the episode "Crime After Crime". The episode's B-plot has Frankie cooking something disgusting for dinner, so Bloo causes trouble in an effort to get sent to his room without dinner. Unfortunately the episode's A-plot was Mr. Harriman acting hyper-paranoid over someone discovering his addiction to carrots, leading him to punish everyone else in the house for relatively minor infractions due to thinking they're "on to him" while completely ignoring or even congratulating Bloo.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story:
- When a bust of Madame Foster is broken in "Busted", the main characters spend most of the episode hiding it from Herriman out of fear he'd punish them. When Herriman finds out, he simply picks another bust from a closet full of them. Apparently, the bust has been broken so many times, it doesn't surprise Herriman whenever he has to replace it again.
- "Foster's Goes to Europe" manages to end both its A-plot and its B-plot with one; throughout the entire episode, the cast is trying to get prepared for a trip to Europe, and once everyone's ready, Madame Foster hugs Mac in a ploy to pickpocket his plane tickets for her and her friends. Meanwhile, Eurotrish keeps getting and losing opportunities to tag along with them and see her creator's family again; once she manages to ride with Madame Foster to Europe, she finds that her creator sent her to Foster's because her constant singing was annoying.
- In the short, "Driving Miss Crazy", Frankie and Madame Foster have twenty minutes to pick up the Foster's bus from the mechanic before the garage closes. Mac and the imaginary friends tag along, much to Frankie's ire, and Bloo makes Frankie and Madame Foster get them a meal from a fast-food restaurant. When Frankie and Madame Foster arrive at the garage, it's closed, but Frankie finds out from the mechanic that the Foster's bus isn't ready to be picked up yet; the carburetor is filled with cheese fries.
- Shaped Like Itself: In the episode "Bloo's the Boss", a newscaster states about Madame Foster, "If only everyone in the world had a heart as big as hers, then the world would be filled with really big hearts."
- She Is Not My Girlfriend: Mac, concerning Goo (in the first episode she was in, anyway).
- Ship Tease: Mac insists Goo isn't his girlfriend, but the two have their moments nevertheless.
- Shout-Out: Has its own page.
- Sibling Rivalry: One-shot friends Imaginary Man and Nemesister were created by a boy and his sister as an extended outlet for their rampaging animosity. Their creators come back at the end of the episode to adopt them for their own kids.
- Small Name, Big Ego: Bloo is an arrogant prick who thinks he's better than everyone else.
- Smooth-Talking Talent Agent: In "Sweet Stench of Success", Bloo is convinced by Hollywood talent agent Kip Snip to advertise his terrible deodorant (which actually made people smell worse). Kip also tricked Bloo into signing adoption papers rather than a contract, allowing him to exploit Bloo even further.
- Soap Punishment: Discussed in "Crime After Crime"; Mr. Herriman makes up new rules so no one will suspect his carrot addiction, one of which involves not standing on rugs. Wilt stands on a rug upon hearing this new rule, and throughout the episode, he tries to decide on how to punish himself. At one point, he suggests washing his mouth out with soap, but decides against it because if he did that, he'd be touching the soap (as Herriman had earlier punished some other imaginary friends for touching toys).
- Soap Within a Show: The Loved and the Loveless is an in-universe soap opera.
- Soda-Candy 'Splosion: In the episode "Partying Is Such Sweet Soiree", where Bloo hosts a wild party at Foster's, Mac accidentally tastes a tiny droplet of punch and experiences a massive sugar rush, causing mayhem around the room. He then consumes soda and Pop Rocks, and while he doesn't outright explode, he goes into hyperdrive, stripping naked and causing more chaos through the halls and all over town.
- Soul Eating: The guys watch a horror movie about a "cannibal ghost", who "scares you to death and eats your ghost".
- Spotting the Thread: Mac is forced to decide between Bloo and a near perfect impostor, and picks the real one because the impostor's friendship speech is too nice. Mac knows Bloo is a Jerkass.
- Squashed Flat: Bloo in "Adoptcalypse Now", when a giant, gorilla-like imaginary friend is launched through the window and lands on him.
- Squishy Wizard: Mac is highly intelligent for an 8-year old, but one drop of sugar and he goes from being the Only Sane Man to making Goo look perfectly sane.
- Stalker with a Crush: Berry won't leave Bloo alone.
- Stealth Pun:
- Cheese has a few of these: Mac created Cheese. You know, "Mac and Cheese?"note Making Mac's two creations Bloo Cheese.
- When Bloo tries to get Cheese adopted, he offers a package deal with a Ridiculously Cute Critter named... Crackers.
- Bloo and Berry. As Berry has a crush on Bloo, this is not accidental.
- Strange Minds Think Alike:
- In "Bloo's the Boss" Bloo finds a cat and names him Chuck. Later when the cat's owner comes to collect him it turns out Chuck just happened to be his real name. The same thing happens when Bloo decides to name an imaginary friend Wally just because "he looks like a Wally." In the next scene, it's revealed that that was his real name, again because he looks like a Wally.
- In "Duchess of Wails" when Mac's mom tells him they're moving Terrence tells him they're going to Singapore, which Terrence says is all the way in Wisconsin. Cut to Bloo asking Mac, "So you're saying Singapore is not in Wisconsin?"
- Straw Feminist: Subverted with Nemesister, who doesn't really have a political agenda. She just likes to destroy or sabotage anything that guys like.
- Stuck in a Chimney: In the Christmas Episode "A Lost Claus", Bloo sends out all of his friends to try and prove to Mac that Santa exists. He makes Eduardo climb through the chimney, but he gets stuck there for most of the episode, until something pushes him out.
- Suicide as Comedy: In "The Bride to Beat", Bloo has a pair of conversations with a suicidal imaginary friend who seems like he's going to jump off the roof. Both times, Bloo pushes him off (though he survives both falls).
- Summon Bigger Fish: In the Halloween episode, Bloo believes that everyone in the house has turned into zombies (it was actually an extremely elaborate practical joke that they all orchestrated due their annoyance at him always playing the Spring Snakes in a Peanut Can gag every Halloween). In order to combat them, he steals the candy from a trio of trick-or-treaters and force feeds it to Mac, knowing that Mac in his sugar-induced rampage state is stronger than any group of zombies. Of course, this works out against him when it's all revealed to be joke, considering he ended up creating a sugar-hungry monster on Halloween of all nights.
- Survival Mantra: Mr. Herriman chants "A dog is not in the house presently" several times in "Who Let the Dogs In" to try and get over his fear of dogs.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Happens surprisingly often, even as entire episode premises:
- For example, when Little Lincoln turned out to be a scam artist in a The Farmer and the Viper type of plot, sold the imaginary friends to be used as mascots, planning on turning the home into a casino. The only reason he was stopped is Madame Foster tricked the bodyguard (who always got Little Lincoln back off of whoever captured him) and instead of signing it over, chewed on the pen-based imaginary friend to get him to cooperate in confessing his crimes and getting the friends back one by one.
- Mr. Herriman having trouble working as a grocery store cashier after losing his job as house president. Many administrators often find themselves struggling with ground level or menial jobs. Of course,
Fridge Logic comes in given that he looked for every job BUT an administrator, which he was quite skilled at. - When Kip Skip admitted on live television that his deodorant brand is designed to make people smell worse instead of better, he's arrested for false advertising.
- When Mac decides to take bowling lessons from Bowling Paul, a self-proclaimed "bowling-guru", Paul gives him advice that is far too abstract and metaphorical, and doesn’t focus on basics such as stance, dexterity, and concentration. As a result, Mac throws his ball way off course on his first attempt after taking these lessons, and only manages to get a strike through dumb luck.
- Sweet Tooth: Inverted with Mac. Sugar is his G-Rated Drug, making him tear off his clothes and run around outside.
T
- Take a Third Option: In "Bloo Tube", Mac and the imaginary friends try to cheer Bloo up when their trip to the Monsoon Lagoon water park gets cancelled due to a rainstorm. One of their attempts is with a board game mishmash called "For-Rat-Trap-O-Life", which features elements from board games called Forgive Me!, Rat Trap, Duopoly, and Family Life. During their game, Eduardo lands on Moorpark Gardens, and has to give Mac either $500 or his first-born son. Eduardo instead gives Mac his last "Forgive Me!" card.
- Take Off Your Clothes: Invoked by name by Eduardo during the Funny Bunny crisis in "World Wide Wabbit". Mac tries to hide all evidence of the Funny Bunny video from Mr. Herriman, including the various clothing many people are wearing. Cue Eduardo running through the house, shouting, "Take off your clothes! Take off your clothes!" The only person who unquestioningly complies is Madame Foster.
- Talkative Loon: Goo and Cheese. Emphasis on "talkative" in Goo's case, and "loon" in Cheese's case.
- Tempting Fate: In "The Sweet Stench of Success", Bloo pretends to be an imaginary friend desperately in need of adoption in order to get even a few seconds of fame on television. Whilst pulling off this scheme, he pledges to "love and hug" his future adopted family "forever". Towards the end, Kip (who underhandedly tricked Bloo into signing adoption papers) is on the receiving end of this broken promise when Bloo not only kicks him, but declares that he'll always be Mac's imaginary friend, making the adoption rather short-lived. So much for "love 'em and hug 'em forever", though it's not to say Kip doesn't deserve it.
- This Means Warpaint: Mac dons warpaint on his face in "I Only Have Surprise For You" when he tries to sabotage his own surprise birthday party.
- Tickle Torture:
- In the episode "Make Believe it or Not", Bloo and Mac are subjected to this via a Robotic Torture Device called the "Insanolizer".
- In the episode "Race for Your Life, Mac & Bloo", Mac tries doing this to Bloo to make him lose the race.
- In "The Bloo Superdude and the Great Creator of Everything's Awesome Ceremony of Fun That He's Not Invited To", one of Bloo's hallucinations involves him receiving this from Frankie to make him eat his soup.
- Time Zones Do Not Exist: Averted in "Foster's Goes to Europe". when Mr. Herriman presents a schedule for gang's European trip, only to take it back for revisions once Mac reminds him of the different timezone.
- Toilet Humor: Done a lot with Cheese (and to a lesser extent, Bloo)
- Tomboyish Name: Frances "Frankie" Foster.
- Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth: Extremosaurouses are perfectly willing to eat good people, but they will vomit up evil people after taking a few bites. Apparently, bad tastes bad.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Cookies for Frankie.
- Tricked into Signing: A producer named Kip Snip entices Bloo into signing an acting contract. However, Bloo didn't Read the Fine Print, and it turned out that he had been tricked into signing an adoption paper. The papers ended up being null and void because it wasn't run through Mr. Herriman first.
- Trouble Making New Pet: Imaginary friends aren't pets, but nonetheless the episode Everyone Knows It's Bendy plays this straight. Bendy is apparently wrongly blamed for all the misdeeds that he committed at his old creator's home, but once he's been welcomed to Foster's, he actually turns out to be a complete Jerkass who promptly gets Wilt, Eduardo, Coco, and Bloo into various kinds of troubles that he did himself, while still mooching to Mr. Herriman and Frankie under his innocent facade.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Bloo after the pilot episode became an obnoxious and self-centered jerk with very few redeeming qualities.
- Totem Pole Trench: Standing on each other's shoulders as a disguise was done by Mac and Bloo to the point of being a Running Gag. Wilt once substituted as a majority of Orlando Bloo.
- Troll:
- Bloo in spades. About 95% of his screentime is devoted to him finding creative ways to troll people.
- Bendy from "Everyone Knows It's Bendy" is even worse than Bloo.
- The Troublemaker: Blooregard "Bloo" Q. Kazoo is Mac's imaginary friend and the one who causes the most trouble among the main quartet of himself, Wilt, Coco, and Eduardo. Best exemplified in "Setting a President", as when Bloo nominates himself as a candidate for the President of Foster's in the election against Frankie and Mr. Herriman, Mac brings up many of the bad things that Bloo has done in the past, all of which were the plots of previous episodes. These include destroying Madame Foster's bust, opening the secret door that housed the Scribbles, uploading an embarrassing video of Mr. Herriman to the internet, flooding the house, throwing a wild party against Madame Foster's wishes, sabotaging Frankie's date, destroying a beloved elephant squeak toy, ruining Mac's reputation at school, and blowing the roof off the house.
- True Companions: They may get into their squabbles, but Mac and Bloo are always there for each other.
- Tsundere: Frankie Foster, who is a type B. She's a Cool Big Sis to the Imaginary Friends, though she loses it around Bloo and Mr. Herriman.
- Tulpa: The imaginary friends seen in the show are thoughtforms taking on lives independent of their creators.
U
- Unflattering ID Photo: In "Bus the Two of Us", Bloo uses Frankie's drivers' license, complete with a silly-looking photo, to fool a traffic cop into thinking he's her (Fun Fact: It's the same photo used in Mr. Herriman's attack ad against her in "Setting a President").
- Unimpressive Progress Reveal: In "Camp Keep a Good Mac Down", Mr. Herriman ventures into the forest in search of food for his friends, and he becomes more afraid the darker and more mysterious it becomes. And he starts to panic.Mr. Herriman: Oh. Oh dear. My bearings, they seem to have become misplaced. What's that noise? Hello?! HELP! HELP! MADAME FOSTER!!!
Madame Foster: Yes?
(cut to reveal he's only a few feet away from the camp)
Mr. Herriman: (nervous laugh) I mean, t-that's what you would have said if any of you went into the woods. (laughs) ...Tally-ho. (hops into the woods) A-hunting we will... Hello? Hello? HEEEEELP!
(Madame Foster facepalms) - The Unintelligible: Coco. Her only dialogue is sequences of "Coco!". Certain characters seem to be able to understand her, notably Wilt and Eduardo, but to most of the rest of the cast she's as unintelligible as she is to viewers.
- Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: Bloo's a selfish jerk to everyone.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Mr. Herriman in "Imagination Destination", when he admonishes World for everything he has done right after Frankie has calmed him down. See Interrupted Cooldown Hug for more.
V
- Varying Competency Alibi: In the pilot movie, House of Bloo's, Terrence locks Mac up in the closet long enough for him to adopt out Bloo, with Mac arriving too late to stop it. He notes however that Terrence is too stupid to come up with a plan this complex, therefore, Terrence must be receiving instructions from someone who wants to get rid of Bloo. Cue everyone figuring out it's Duchess.
- Villain Has a Point: In "The Big Lablooski", Jerkins essentially steals Bloo away from Madame Foster's team (with a paddleball). Foster expresses disgust that not only would she steal away her teammate when Jerkins already has enough, but she would sabotage one of her own just to make room for Bloo. But Jerkins is not impressed, as she argues that Madame Foster is not paragon of Undying Loyalty either: she did trade-off Mac for Bloo when it was convenient. At realizing she has no high ground, Madame Foster is stunned speechless.
- Villainous Breakdown: While he's not intentionally a bad guy, World has one at the climax of The Movie when Mr. Herriman threatens to leave him sealed in his toy box alone again, causing him to snap and reduce his world to a white void and go One-Winged Angel. It takes Frankie's kindness to snap him out of it and calm him down.
- Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: The main series has Berry, a sociopathic Stalker with a Crush who's willing to commit murder to get what she wants. Good Wilt Hunting has Foul Larry, a rude, violent friend who caused Wilt to lose both his arm and his eye. Destination Imagination has World, a Reality Warper who's severe emotional problems makes him violently dangerous and selfish.
- Visual Pun: Duchess. At the start of the series, she's full of herself an generally an Alpha Bitch. At the end of the series, she's still full of herself and an Alpha Bitch. The literary term for a character who does not go through any changes is called a "flat character." Duchess is two-dimensional (she is literally a flat character model).
- Vitriolic Best Buds: Mac and Bloo sometimes, particularly in episodes where Bloo is especially obnoxious and Mac is especially mature. Other episodes show very well that they have more in common than they seem.
W
- Walking Away Shot:
- "Phone Home", twice with Bloo; going out to find a friend to take home, and with him chasing the man in the phone suit
- "The Big Lablooski" with Eduardo about to bowl and Jerkins scares him.
- Walking Spoiler: In Affair Weather Friends, has a rich boy Barry Bling wanting to have Bloo for himself. Turns out that Barry Bling was just Berry from Berry Scary in disguise.
- Walk Through the Camera:
- House of Bloo's; Where Bloo opens the gate and walks into Foster's.
- Adoptcalypse Now; Where Bloo is running away from a group of kids.
- Phone Home; An imaginary bone being chased by dogs
- Bloo's Brothers; With Bloo pushing Mac to the front of the classroom
- Better Off Ed; Where Eduardo is looking for Scrappy and gets interrupted by Jackie Khones.
- This Little Peas; Peas is running about to jump into an elevator
- Welcome Titles: During the title sequence, the camera jumps through all of Foster's Home's windows because it's following Mac going upstairs and meeting the main cast. The number of windows increases as someone new tags along until there are too many of them and we get only two windows —the staff peeking from one window and everyone else running in another. It ends when they get to a sad Bloo, Mac's presence cheering him up.
- Wedgie:Terrence gives one to Mac.
- What Were You Thinking?: Mac often admonishes Bloo for his inane conclusions and plans.
- Wham Line:
- A rather quiet one in the pilot. When Mr. Herriman tells Frankie that every child eventually outgrows their imaginary friend, she just gives him a knowing smile and says "Yours didn't," then walks past a portrait of the woman who later turns out to be Madame Foster.
- From "Challenge of the Super Friends", we have this one from Imaginary Man, which changes everything we know about his interactions with the episode's villain, Nemesis...
Imaginary Man: (rescuing Nemesis from Bloo) Nobody pulls my Nemesister's hair but me! - White Gloves: Mr. Herriman wears a pair of white gloves.
- Who Even Needs a Brain?: Type II is used in an in-universe movie in the episode "Cheese a Go-Go", where a woman who has had her brains sucked out by aliens shushes her love interest and informs him that she's hiding from the aardvarks.
- Wise Beyond Their Years: Mac tends to be more insightful and intelligent than your typical eight-year-old, though he can be as childish as the rest of them at times.
- With Friends Like These...: Mac and Bloo. More prominent in some episodes than in others.
- Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: World from Destination Imagination. Justified since it's his world anyway.
Y
- Yandere: Berry for Bloo. She's absolutely nuts for him.
- Yet Another Christmas Carol: Bloo tries to pull one of these on Mr. Herriman. It doesn't work. In fact, it makes things worse.
- You Won't Feel a Thing!: "Seeing Red": Terrance says to Mac before beating him up "This will only hurt for a second." The line becomes a Running Gag throughout the episode, and at the end is given an Ironic Echo by Bloo: "Don't worry, it'll only hurt for a week."
Z
- Zombie Apocalypse: Subverted in that it was a Halloween prank meant to get back at Bloo. Pretty convincing, though.
