Weeds - Television Tropes & Idioms

Give in to Hemptation

Weeds is a dramedy on Showtime, airing since 2005.

The show centers on Nancy Botwin, a widowed mother of two in California who deals marijuana to make ends meet. Her sons Silas and Shane (15 and 10 at the start of the series) and mooching brother-in-law, her Rich Bitch friend/nemesis Celia, Celia's long-suffering husband and daughter, her supplier Heylia and grow expert Conrad form the core of the show's Loads and Loads of Characters. And Doug the councilman.

Needs a character page.

This show contains examples of:

Aborted Arc: The Pilot made it seem like Doug's son, Josh, was going to be a major player in the series, but he never appeared again afterward.
- Also in the Pilot, Josh gave clues to Nancy that Doug is not entirely who he seems to be and would not like the idea of Josh being gay.
  - Apparently the writers remembered this midway through Season 4, where Doug gets into a habit of making jokes about his off-screen gay son for a few episodes.
Abusive Parents: Celia, Celia and again Celia, of both the psychological and neglectful variety.
Anyone Can Die: Oh god, where to begin? The plot of the entire series is kicked off by the traumatic and untimely death of Nancy's husband, Judah.
- ...Except not really, considering that none of the characters that could be considered the main cast have died throughout the show's run. Judah's death is before the series begins and is really only the MacGuffin that causes Nancy to explore selling marijuana as a source of income to support her children.
Anti-Villain: The whole Botwin family of Type I
Affably Evil: Guillermo. There's something charming about him until he shows a serious dark side halfway through Season 4.
- Nancy herself, especially in the later seasons.
Ascended Extra - Guillermo, though clearly a small-time gangster when first introduced, he later becomes a pretty important figure in a major multinational crime syndicate, several orders of magnitude larger that he originally appeared to be.
The Baby Trap: The Botwins are big on this.
Bang Bang BANG
Beard of Sorrow: Andy grows one in Season 5
Betty and Veronica: Nancy and Celia, to some extent.
Beware the Nice Ones: Marvin is a notable example.
- Shane. Oh God, Shane.
- I THINK PINK'S YOUR COLOR, FUCKWAD!
- Nancy is mostly docile and calm, but after being pushed too far in Season Three when Celia attempted to blackmail her, it didn't end well...
Black Widow: Nancy at a 67% fatality rate. She even warns a man she's sleeping with in Season 3 about this.
- As of Season 7, her rate's gone up to 100% just as Andy predicted.
Bi the Way: Nancy and Celia
Bishōnen: Silas, full stop, so much that he's a model in Denmark.
- And no mention of Andy?
Bilingual Bonus: The show tends to do this with some of the Spanish that comes up. For instance, Esteban Reyes is Spanish for Stephen King.
- Yael is a very amusing character to watch for Hebrew speakers. Her actress actually speaks perfect Hebrew, slang included, and definitely knows how to make the most of the fact nobody else can understand what she's saying...
Bolivian Army Cliffhanger: The Cliff Hanger ending of Season 2.
Bottle Fairy: Celia. The hypocrisy of her habit, coupled with trying to make Agrestic "drug free" as part of her city council position, was a running gag.
Break the Cutie: Shane Botwin. Though it's more of a snap than a break.
Brick Joke: Several...
- "Hi, can I speak to Mr. Fuckyouson?"
- "Holy shit! I think they shot Peckers of the Caribbean here!"
- Not to mention Celia's admiration of Shane eating so many bananas...
- An Agrestic resident was mentioned in passing several times, noted for his owning a Segway. Guess who rode by right at the end of an episode after another major bombshell Nancy had to deal with?
- The first time Doug sees Andy in season 1, he calls him Randy. Guess what Andy's new name is as of season 6.
Brilliant, but Lazy: The entire Botwin clan seems to be composed of people who could be doing important stuff if only they did not decide to sell weed instead. With the amount of creativity and ingenuity they put into their drug business they could be successful entrepreneurs in many lines of business.
- Doug is shown to be an accounting prodigy but generally prefers to just spend his day slacking off
Butt Monkey: Dean and Andy. You'd think pot smokers involved in the drug trade would bring it all on themselves, but it gets pretty ridiculous at times how "out to get them" the universe is.
Calling the Old Man Out: There's this, and then there's Shane's elementary-school graduation speech in which he calls out every living adult in Agrestic.
Cerebus Syndrome: In Season 1, it's something like Desperate Housewives with more sex, drugs and cussin'; by the end of Season 4, it's a half-hour version of The Sopranos. With grosser jokes.
- For example, the first three seasons have Nancy running a front bakery, figuring out how to hide her job from a DEA agent, then opening a grow house. Season four finishes as Guillermo is trafficking women. Doug is indulging in auto-erotic asphyxiation. Shane is dealing and having group sex with teenage goth girls after he finds out he's been intentionally masturbating to naked pictures of his mother. Celia is kidnapped by her eldest daughter who's planning on killing and gutting her to sell her body parts on the black market. Silas, who at this point is still a minor, dumps the thirty-something MILF he's been having sex with after her ex-husband finds out about the two of them and tells her he's going to use it to get full custody of their son. Agent Till's boyfriend gets his face sanded off while getting tortured by Esteban's muscle. Andy, Nancy's brother-in-law, realizes he is in love with her as she drives to her death, only to have it averted when she reveals she is pregnant with Esteban, the main drug-lord's, baby. A long way from the first season which had Nancy selling pot-laced lollipops.
  - And it's all friggin' hilarious.
  - Though season 5 has shown a much better balance what with Andy falling in love with a doctor, Nancy getting married, and Shane coming to the rescue during the final sudden turn of fate.
  - As well as Season 6, so far the first two episodes have been a series of pretty much non-stop jokes.
The Chessmaster: Heylia, in her own way. Nancy tries, but often fails at this.
Cliff Hanger: As often as possible, and certainly at the end of each season.
Closer to Earth: Entirely, totally averted. The series make it a point to show that women are definitely NOT more moral than men and can be just as evil and conniving. Men are painted in a similarly unsympathetic colour although sometimes they are seen being slightly, but only slightly, more guarded in their evil than women.
Code Name: "Judah" and "Sunshine."
Coming Out Story: Sanjay. Sort of.
Couch Gag: In seasons 2 and 3, every episode began with a different artist singing the Theme Tune "Little Boxes."
- Called out in the penultimate episode when Nancy suggests that Shane could become a "lawyer, doctor, or business executive", the lyrics to the former theme song.
- In Seasons 4 and 5, each episode has a different way of displaying the show's title, the show's creator, and a pot leaf that's relevant to the episode. For example, an episode centered around euthanasia has the info appear in an EKG, while an episode that involves a bar has the info appear on a bar poster.
- And then in Season 5, an episode displays the title on a Wikipedia page that plays "Little Boxes" when clicked on.
Crapsack World
Creator Cameo: Jenji Kohan (the creator of Weeds) appears in the finale of Season 6.
- In an interview she stated that this was a Homage Shot to Alfred Hitchcock, whose films played in the background as she wrote the finale.
Crime Time TV
Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Doug might seem like lazy and incompetent but he is a scary good accountant. He is hired by the investment fund primarily because he seems such a perfect patsy but he figures out the firm's massive fraud scheme by merely skimming through the financial documents. When he then confronts the SEC he has them eating out of his hand within minutes and leaves them so defeated and demoralized that they drop the investigation and the federal agents even buy weed from Nancy to smoke away their misery
Daddy's Girl: Isabelle.
The Danza: Guillermo Diaz as Guillermo.
Dating Catwoman: Peter and Nancy. It does not end well.
Deadpan Snarker: The entire main cast.
Depraved Bisexual: Celia.
Disabled Love Interest: Silas' girlfriend for the first season, Megan Graves, hottest tsundere brainy deaf schoolgirl girlfriend since Shizune Hakamichi. She's good enough a lip-reader and vocalizer that her disability doesn't prove to be much of an impairment even though Silas knows virtually no sign-language. Their relationship goes really well until he accidentally blurts out that he thinks she got accepted into a fancy college simply because she's deaf, rather than actually being intelligent and studious.
The Dragon: Cesar to Esteban.
Drowning My Sorrows
Dumbass Has a Point: Andy on several occasions. "I have my moments."
- He's not so much a dumbass as he is lazy.
Dysfunction Junction: Mostly played for laughs, but everyone in the show is at least a bit nuts.
Even Evil Has Standards: Using Nancy's maternity shop as a front for smuggling weed, or even cocaine and heroin is one thing, using it for guns and sex trafficking is something else entirely.
Everything's Worse with Bears: When Zoya bullies her way into Silas' weed business she suggests that they get a bear as security. As it turns out it was actually not that bad an idea. Their security really is that bad.
Foreshadowing: In season 4, Guillermo has Nancy run a maternity shop as a front for his trafficking. At the end of the season, we find out that Nancy is about to be a mother!
- PLAN C! The Crowning Moment of Awesome in the Season 6 finale.
Friends Rent Control: Justified in that Nancy's inability to maintain her McMansion and the lifestyle it symbolizes through legal employment is the setup for the whole series.
- Of course, her lifestyle rapidly deteriorates anyway.
Friendly Enemy: U-Turn takes Nancy under his wing while simultaneously extorting her. U-Turn's sidekick Marvin, even moreso, until he proves that he's a Not So Harmless Villain.
- Guillermo seems like a nice guy for a sadistic gang leader. After an episode in season four, this changes more than a little, but he's still friendly with Nancy even if it is just to trick her into getting him out of prison.
Genius Ditz; Doug really is an idiot but he can play the political game with surprising skill.
Girl on Girl Is Hot: Inverted when Nancy relaxes herself with gay porn left in an RV.
Gray and Grey Morality: In the early seasons. Turns darker in later seasons.
Heroic Sociopath: Shane just wants to protect his family. Especially his baby half-brother
Hey, It's That Guy!: Wait a second, Harper Pitt and Prior Walter are in-laws?
- Valerie still winces when she sees lotion or hoses.
- Scarface is a hyper guy for a drug dealer.
- Hey, It's That Director: Several episodes are directed by Troma alumnus Ernest Dickerson.
Hey, It's That Voice!: You'll never look at Finding Nemo the same way again, especially after the second and fifth seasons' finales, and some of the fourth season.
Hot Mom: Nancy. Very much so. And also Celia.
Holier Than Thou: The Christians at Shane's summer school are pompous dicks ("Say you love Jesus, or we'll punch you again!"). The only one who isn't is the most kindhearted person you'll ever see.
Hollywood Pudgy: Isabelle.
Housewife
Hurricane of Euphemisms: Andy's talk to Shane about masturbation.
Hypocritical Humour: Season 5 features a protestor outside an abortion clinic holding a two-sided placard. The first side reads "Every life is sacred", and the other reads "Die, abortionists, die!"
I Call It Vera: Ignacio calls his stun gun Mr. Zappy
Ivy League For Everyone
Jerkass: Celia Hodes and Doug Wilson.
- A fair number of the drug dealers/suppliers Nancy deals with as well, usually because she is an upper-middle-class white woman blithely walking into the aggressive, alpha dog business of illicit drugs.
Killed Mid-Sentence: Pilar... by Shane... with a croquet mallet. (He couldn't find a golf club)
Kill It with Fire: Guillermo uses this to deal with a biker gang, but the fire ends up torching ~~Agrestic~~ Majestic instead.
The Last Dance: Celia's likeability and competence both sharply rise when she thinks she has cancer. But as soon as she finds out she'll probably survive, she promptly returns to her Rich Bitch ways.
- This was even pointed out by Isabelle:
  Isabelle: You know, maybe you should double-check just to be sure. I mean there's still some chance you'll die, right?
  Celia: Why would you say that?
  Isabelle: 'Cause when you think you're going to die, you're a much better person.
Laxative Prank: Celia gives Isabelle laxatives, making her publicly soil herself, but she does it to make her lose weight, not as a prank. Isabelle retaliates by given Celia anti-laxatives
Magical Negro: Averted with Heylia.
Mama Bear: Nancy in spades. Heylia to an extent.
Manic Pixie Dream Girl: Andy's girlfriend Kat... playing up the Manic portion.
Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Was Shane really in communication with his dead father or imagining it? Or being a Manipulative Bastard?
Me Love You Long Time: At the start of the series, Dean cheats on Celia with his Asian tennis instructor.
Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: Subverted twice within three episodes.
Missing White Woman Syndrome: Lampshaded when Marvin takes Nancy along to the negotiations with the Mexicans.
Marvin: Don't nobody want a dead white lady on their hands!
Ms. Fanservice: Nancy, especially in the show's promotional material...◊
Must Have Caffeine: A bit of a running gag. Nancy really likes her iced lattes, to the very last drop. It helps that Mary Louise Parker looks cute with a straw sticking out the side of her mouth.
Naïve Newcomer
Only Sane Man: Well, only sane girl. Isabelle. Also Silas from Season 5 on.
Pac Man Fever: In one episode of season 3, Nancy is playing Wii Tennis. Though the racket noises are accurate, the pause sound is completely alien to the game (and the Nintendo Wii).
Product Placement: Some unusual ones - "It's A Grind" coffee shops, Advanced Nutrients plant food, and the book Rejuvenile (written by Jenji Kohan's husband).
- Not to mention Guillermo's Vibram Five Fingers in the season six finale.
Psycho Lesbian: Zoya. She was in prison for burning a man alive. She gets released, and finds Nancy. She then insists upon the two of them moving to Burlington, Vermont to "open a world-class hotel. For dogs."
Real Men Wear Pink: Stone cold killer Cesar used to be a nurse.
Real Song Theme Tune: Malvina Reynolds' "Little Boxes," in seasons 1-3.
Rich Bitch: Celia manages to be this even when broke and homeless.
Right Through His Pants: Played almost every way possible. Averted when Andy Botwin has sex, inverted when Conrad has sex with Nancy, played straight when Nancy has sex with Sullivan Groff, and avoided entirely when Nancy has sex with Esteban.
Sassy Black Woman: Heylia.
Sexy Shirt Switch: In Season One, after Nancy sleeps with Peter for the first time, his shirt that she grabs reveals he's a DEA agent.
Scary Black Man: U-Turn tries to be this, and succeeds most of the time. Thug means never having to say you're sorry. Eventually he turns into more of an Affably Evil Friendly Enemy. Conrad on the other hand is a complete aversion of this.
Schoolgirl Lesbian: Isabelle, although Celia is convinced she's just doing it to torment her and as an excuse for being fat.
Screw the Rules, I Have Money!
Shout Out: The autoerotic asphyxiation scene in the season 4 finale is a parody of a similar, much less funny scene from The Shawshank Redemption.
- "What would Vic Mackey do?"
- A shout out to Dexter:
  Silas: Shane can become... I don't know... one of those good serial killers who only kills other serial killers.
- The final scene of the season 1 finale is a shout out to the ending of The Godfather
- The season one scene where Andy jokingly calls himself "Andrew Drew" and Nancy "Nancy Drew" was probably not a shout-out, but it reminded this troper of the one scene the same actors had in Angels In America.
Sleazy Politician: The entire Agrestic City Council but especially Doug.
Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome: Shane's actor seems to have slammed into puberty between season 5 and 6 resulting in his voice drastically changing in the roughly 3 seconds of show time between those two seasons. The TimeSkip of season 7 makes this easier to deal with.
Soft Glass: Averted when Celia hits Doug over the head with a glass pitcher—Doug gets knocked out, and Celia drinks the rest of her screwdriver straight from the pitcher.
Spank the Cutie: Happens to a couple of different characters, actually.
Spicy Latina: Subverted with Pilar Zuazo who is more of a frigid Ice Queen despite being very attractive.
Spousal Privilege: The reason why Peter and Nancy get married.
Stepford Smiler: Celia starts out this way, and maintains it even as she's thoroughly broken.
Stepford Suburbia: The reason Nancy does such good business.
Stupid Evil: Nancy's insistence and, indeed, almost obsessive need to indulge in serious criminal behaviour at the first opportunity regardless of circumstance has, after so many years, become a little baffling. No-one is so obsessed about selling pot or making a quick criminal buck.
- Nancy seems to be addicted to the chaos and excitement that her criminal activity creates. She can't stop herself from indulging in it at every opportunity and always seeks a bigger 'fix' no matter how stupid her actions are.
Team Chef: Andy does the cooking in the Botwin household, is hired to cater for a porn director, and, in the DVD extras, has his own segment on Good Morning, Agrestic! called Wake and Bake.
Team Mom: Literally.
Took a Level in Badass: Shane towards the end of Season 5.
- Tells you what kind of a show this is that his level in badass comes with quite the loss of innocence
- Shane again in episode 6 of season 6.
The Stoner
Troubled, but Cute: Silas, sort of. Andy just uses it to get laid. Shane would be the closest to a straight example.
- Not so much after the season 5 finale.
Turn Coat: Given that the show has Loads and Loads of Characters, and everyone's pretty much in it for themselves, this shouldn't come as a surprise after a while.
- Celia takes the cake, though, when, at the end of Season 3, she turns on the team pretty much as soon as the police take her in, when realistically, all she had to do was play dumb and the lot of them likely could have gotten off scot-free. Immediately afterwards, however, the rest of Nancy's team turns on CELIA, implicating her as the kingpin of the operation.
Villain Protagonist: Of the Ineffectual Sympathetic variety, at least in the early seasons.
- Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: From Season 4 on. As she becomes increasingly despicable as a person her good qualities become fewer and fewer, being mostly her Mama Bear reactions at times (though her general care for her children is sporadic at best) and that she is really hot.
Wicked Cultured: Esteban.
Yandere: "Be my friend! Be my friend!" (said while yanking hair)
You Have To Have Jews: The sheer number of protagonists who are openly Jewish and not-so-subtle about it is... interesting to say the least.
You Can Keep Her: Quinn's attempts to ransom Celia hit a bit of a snag.