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* The whole subplot with Brian's parents. What exactly is their son going to get out of their extreme pressure to make perfect grades? They could have found other ways of encouraging him instead of mental cruelty.
** They probably saw him as a slacker who needed that pressure to make anything out of himself.
** TruthInTelevision. Parents like Brian's aren't always reasonable. There are plenty of cases like his in RealLife where parents just don't understand how cruel their levels of pressure ''are''--or who, for any number of reasons, genuinely believe that cruelty is better for their child in the long run.
** It's also entirely possible that they genuinely don't see it as being cruel at all. After all, we live in a society that tells people that if you work hard and achieve, you can get whatever you want. Obviously that isn't true but it's still something people willingly buy in to, and there are probably thousands of cases of parents who pressured children through school because to them, a higher grade equates to a better future. And who's to say they know they're the root cause of Brian's detention? He was probably pissing himself at the thought of having to tell his parents he'd be spending a Saturday in detention without mentioning what the exact cause of it was...
** They may also have an over-inflated notion of what it's reasonable to expect of Brian. They know he's smart, they just don't have a realistic sense of precisely ''how'' smart he is - i.e. top 10% of his class level, ''not'' Nobel-winning genius level - or of how intellect, alone, can't always compensate for everything (like a lack of mechanical aptitude when crafting elephant-lamps). For all they know, his schoolwork really ''ought'' to be easy for him.
* It seems odd that kids in '''detention''' are left entirely unsupervised for large portions of the movie. Even in the mid-1980s.
** There's nobody there except the kids, Carl and Vernon. Carl has his own job to do and Vernon hates his job--he's there on a Saturday, who wouldn't? But he doesn't care enough to actually do a good job, nor does he care what they get up to. He just wants it to be over so he can go home. The only time he interfered was when he overheard a noise, like Bender falling through the ceiling, or when he caught them in the act, like Bender in the gymnasium.
** Vernon did the bare minimum by leaving the library door open, which would have allowed him a clear view of the kids from his office if Bender hadn't messed with the door (Bender intimates that he's pulled the same stunt before, so you'd think Vernon would have seen it coming; Vernon also might have had Carl fix the door). As the detention monitor, he should have been in the library with the kids regardless, but given his attitude it's not surprising he blew it off. He didn't want to be there any more than they did.
* One hates to imagine what further consequences the kids might suffer on Monday. Their detention resulted in considerable damage to the library ceiling and a shattered window in the door to the library's Foreign Languages lab, destroyed books, etc. Allison pitched the contents of a teacher's locker all over the teacher's lounge in a deleted scene (though, being deleted, one might consider it not to have happened, even though she's shown with the Prince album she took from the teacher's locker later in the library). Plus, while Brian's essay is pointed and satisfying, it doesn't fulfill Vernon's instructions (not for Brian, and certainly not for the others), which is likely all Vernon is going to care about. Of course, it's just as likely that Vernon is going to have to answer some uncomfortable questions about just where ''he'' was when the kids were doing all this stuff.
** With regards to the essay at least, it's unlikely they'll see any consequences for that. Given Brian's description of detention to his mother at the start of the film (that they're supposed to just sit there) and Vernon introduces the essay task with calling it "something a little different", writing an essay is not an official aspect of detention in the first place and more just a completely superfluous task Vernon himself decided to set them purely on a whim, probably because he imagined it might keep them quiet, and this is {{Lampshaded}} in Brian's final essay when he points out that Vernon doesn't care about who they think they are because he's already labelled them. Note how, despite clearly none of them ever doing any work on their essays whenever he comes into the room, he never once tells them to get on with writing it or demands to see their progress which makes it even more clear that this isn't an official task and more a "this is how I suggest you spend the time" thing.
* While there's obvious symbolism in the layers of clothes the kids are wearing (note that Claire wears the least number of layers; note that Andy strips down to just his blue tank-top and jeans when he gets high, note that after Allison's makeover, when she and Andy face each other, they're both wearing the least amount of layers that they have in the whole film; note that, at movie's end, Andy has given Allison his hoodie and she pulls a patch off of his letterman's jacket)the kids must have been roasting. The film is set in late March which, while likely cool, would not have required the layer-upon-layer of clothes and heavy coats (Andy and Bender both have at least 4 layers if you include their coats) the kids were wearing. They all look like they're dressed for the dead of winter.
** Even late March can have very cold days in the Chicago area. Weather Underground records indicate that the average temperature on that day was around 37 degrees and a few days earlier the temperature had reached 0 degrees. People who live in cold areas tend to dress in layers and for warmth because it's much easier to take off a layer than to just be cold.
** They probably saw him as a slacker who needed that pressure to make anything out of himself.
** TruthInTelevision. Parents like Brian's aren't always reasonable. There are plenty of cases like his in RealLife where parents just don't understand how cruel their levels of pressure ''are''--or who, for any number of reasons, genuinely believe that cruelty is better for their child in the long run.
** It's also entirely possible that they genuinely don't see it as being cruel at all. After all, we live in a society that tells people that if you work hard and achieve, you can get whatever you want. Obviously that isn't true but it's still something people willingly buy in to, and there are probably thousands of cases of parents who pressured children through school because to them, a higher grade equates to a better future. And who's to say they know they're the root cause of Brian's detention? He was probably pissing himself at the thought of having to tell his parents he'd be spending a Saturday in detention without mentioning what the exact cause of it was...
** They may also have an over-inflated notion of what it's reasonable to expect of Brian. They know he's smart, they just don't have a realistic sense of precisely ''how'' smart he is - i.e. top 10% of his class level, ''not'' Nobel-winning genius level - or of how intellect, alone, can't always compensate for everything (like a lack of mechanical aptitude when crafting elephant-lamps). For all they know, his schoolwork really ''ought'' to be easy for him.
* It seems odd that kids in '''detention''' are left entirely unsupervised for large portions of the movie. Even in the mid-1980s.
** There's nobody there except the kids, Carl and Vernon. Carl has his own job to do and Vernon hates his job--he's there on a Saturday, who wouldn't? But he doesn't care enough to actually do a good job, nor does he care what they get up to. He just wants it to be over so he can go home. The only time he interfered was when he overheard a noise, like Bender falling through the ceiling, or when he caught them in the act, like Bender in the gymnasium.
** Vernon did the bare minimum by leaving the library door open, which would have allowed him a clear view of the kids from his office if Bender hadn't messed with the door (Bender intimates that he's pulled the same stunt before, so you'd think Vernon would have seen it coming; Vernon also might have had Carl fix the door). As the detention monitor, he should have been in the library with the kids regardless, but given his attitude it's not surprising he blew it off. He didn't want to be there any more than they did.
* One hates to imagine what further consequences the kids might suffer on Monday. Their detention resulted in considerable damage to the library ceiling and a shattered window in the door to the library's Foreign Languages lab, destroyed books, etc. Allison pitched the contents of a teacher's locker all over the teacher's lounge in a deleted scene (though, being deleted, one might consider it not to have happened, even though she's shown with the Prince album she took from the teacher's locker later in the library). Plus, while Brian's essay is pointed and satisfying, it doesn't fulfill Vernon's instructions (not for Brian, and certainly not for the others), which is likely all Vernon is going to care about. Of course, it's just as likely that Vernon is going to have to answer some uncomfortable questions about just where ''he'' was when the kids were doing all this stuff.
** With regards to the essay at least, it's unlikely they'll see any consequences for that. Given Brian's description of detention to his mother at the start of the film (that they're supposed to just sit there) and Vernon introduces the essay task with calling it "something a little different", writing an essay is not an official aspect of detention in the first place and more just a completely superfluous task Vernon himself decided to set them purely on a whim, probably because he imagined it might keep them quiet, and this is {{Lampshaded}} in Brian's final essay when he points out that Vernon doesn't care about who they think they are because he's already labelled them. Note how, despite clearly none of them ever doing any work on their essays whenever he comes into the room, he never once tells them to get on with writing it or demands to see their progress which makes it even more clear that this isn't an official task and more a "this is how I suggest you spend the time" thing.
* While there's obvious symbolism in the layers of clothes the kids are wearing (note that Claire wears the least number of layers; note that Andy strips down to just his blue tank-top and jeans when he gets high, note that after Allison's makeover, when she and Andy face each other, they're both wearing the least amount of layers that they have in the whole film; note that, at movie's end, Andy has given Allison his hoodie and she pulls a patch off of his letterman's jacket)the kids must have been roasting. The film is set in late March which, while likely cool, would not have required the layer-upon-layer of clothes and heavy coats (Andy and Bender both have at least 4 layers if you include their coats) the kids were wearing. They all look like they're dressed for the dead of winter.
** Even late March can have very cold days in the Chicago area. Weather Underground records indicate that the average temperature on that day was around 37 degrees and a few days earlier the temperature had reached 0 degrees. People who live in cold areas tend to dress in layers and for warmth because it's much easier to take off a layer than to just be cold.
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** Probably he knew his dad would beat the shit out of him if he didn't go.
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** I was under the impression that the unsecured door bang was so loud that it did obscure his exclamation.
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Ban evader entry/argument going off the rails to focus on things that clearly weren't in the original counter-argument.
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*** Of course you were shocked when Vernon threatened to beat Bender senseless. It was ''supposed'' to shock you. The whole point of that scene is that Vernon has skedaddled over the thin line between "disciplinarian" and "sadistic bastard". And I don't see how anything you listed is a "hole" in my assessment. Yes, it's completely true that Bender would have a hard time getting anyone to believe that Vernon threatened to hurt him. ''That's the point.'' Bender's built himself a reputation as a trouble maker, a criminal, and a drug user. You think the cops would believe a teenage druggy who complained that his principal, an upstanding pillar of the community no doubt, threatened him with physical harm? The only way they'd believe him is if Vernon himself had a bad reputation, but we have no reason to believe he isn't very well respected by the rest of the teachers at the school. Believe me when I say that ''every'' school has at least one Designated Disciplinarian that students get sent to if they decide to clown around, and they've usually been working there longer than anyone else. Hell, I guarantee your own school had one as well. As for the "what if your dope was on fire?" line, that doesn't indicate that Vernon knows about Bender's home life. It only indicates that Vernon thinks Bender is such a worthless criminal that the only thing he cares about is his weed. It's also Vernon's way of letting Bender know that he knows about Bender's past drug use. He's saying "I know you're a filthy druggy so if you know what's good for you you'd better quit now before I catch you in the act." As for your last point, never in a million years would Vernon respect Bender more if he knew Bender was acting as a distraction so the other kids wouldn't get in trouble. That's like a cop respecting the "selflessness" of a lookout who creates a distraction so the police won't know a bank is being robbed. Vernon wouldn't respect Bender for that. If anything it would make him ''more'' angry. Not only did Bender break the rules, he aided and abetted other student's rule breaking. In retrospect Bender's probably lucky Vernon never found out the real reason he was running through the halls. That might have pushed Vernon over the edge and caused him to actually hit Bender.
*** These days, though, you're likely to get a mouthful of "HOW DARE YOU TELL ME HOW TO RAISE MY CHILD".
*** In no way defending Vernon or his actions, but from his demeanor throughout the film one gets the impression that he's seriously burned out. If he was ever invested as an educator, he isn't anymore. I expect his bit with threatening to beat Bender is at least partially fueled by his frustration, and being sick to death of him and kids like him. He doesn't have it in him anymore to care about what Bender's issues might be, if he ever did.
*** These days, though, you're likely to get a mouthful of "HOW DARE YOU TELL ME HOW TO RAISE MY CHILD".
*** In no way defending Vernon or his actions, but from his demeanor throughout the film one gets the impression that he's seriously burned out. If he was ever invested as an educator, he isn't anymore. I expect his bit with threatening to beat Bender is at least partially fueled by his frustration, and being sick to death of him and kids like him. He doesn't have it in him anymore to care about what Bender's issues might be, if he ever did.
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** A trained singer can break glass by hitting the right frequency. Alternatively, he has [[MakeMeWannaShout sonic superpowers]].
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** A trained singer [[GlassShatteringSound can break glass glass]] by hitting the right frequency. Alternatively, he has [[MakeMeWannaShout [[MusicalAssassin sonic superpowers]].
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** But it's pretty obvious during the movie that the discussion of "different cliques" is more about Claire and Andy vs Brian vs Bender vs Allison. Claire and Andy aren't ever put separately; they're both popular and from the same social circle (they actually talk at one point, one asking if the other is going to the party of an acquaintance they have in common, and it seems to confirm that they do interact socially sometimes or have friends in common). If anything, they're probably just not from the same classroom or have the same strict group of friends, but they're definitely from the same social sphere. I have to disagree about Allison and Bender, though, they're not that similar (not before the events of the movie anyway) out of first glance. Claire even tries to shame Bender into admitting that he wouldn't take Allison to one of his "vomit parties" (or whatever it's called) with his friends. Allison isn't "one of the bad kids", everyone just sees her as kinda crazy, which is not the same as Bender, who is implied to be a part of a group of delinquents, not of eccentrics like Allison. Bender also has a sort of reputation to maintain in his own clique, but it is that of a "bad" kind of reputation, unlike Claire's which is a "good" sort of reputation. Point is: when Claire says they'll all ignore each other on Monday, she's definitely not talking about her and Andy, but about how they'll both ignore Allison and Brian, and how Bender will most likely ignore those two as well; Bender and Allison are not closer to becoming friends and starting to talk to each other than any of the others.
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** But it's pretty obvious during the movie that the discussion of "different cliques" is more about Claire and Andy vs Brian vs Bender vs Allison. Claire and Andy aren't ever put separately; they're both popular and from the same social circle (they actually talk at one point, one asking if the other is going to the party of an acquaintance they have in common, and it seems to confirm that they do interact socially sometimes or have friends in common). If anything, they're probably just not from the same classroom or have the same strict group of friends, but they're definitely from the same social sphere. I have to disagree about Allison and Bender, though, they're not that similar (not before the events of the movie anyway) out of first glance. Claire even tries to shame Bender into admitting that he wouldn't take Allison to one of his "vomit "heavy metal vomit parties" (or whatever it's called) with his friends. Allison isn't "one of the bad kids", everyone just sees her as kinda crazy, which is not the same as Bender, who is implied to be a part of a group of delinquents, delinquent metal heads, not of eccentrics like Allison. Bender also has a sort of reputation to maintain in his own clique, but it is that of a "bad" kind of reputation, unlike Claire's which is a "good" sort of reputation. Point is: when Claire says they'll all ignore each other on Monday, she's definitely not talking about her and Andy, but about how they'll both ignore Allison and Brian, and how Bender will most likely ignore those two as well; Bender and Allison are not closer to becoming friends and starting to talk to each other than any of the others.
