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Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide
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alt title(s): Neds Declassified School Survival Guide; Neds Declassified
A Nickelodeon post modern live-action series with No Fourth Wall and no Laugh Track set entirely in a Middle School full of Anime Character Types. Now that we have your attention...
Ned Bigby is the clever but Book Dumb protagonist who is dedicated to completing an all-encompassing guide "to help you survive school," covering every issue from tests and dodgeball to puberty and relationships. Each episode is split into two parts with a " Guide to...[Topic]," that has Ned and his two best friends ( Gadgeteer Genius Simon Nelson "Cookie" Cook and tomboy Jennifer "Moze" Mosely) each having their own storyline that requires his advice on the subject.
At least Once An Episode when the moment for giving tips comes: the theme music starts, Ned turns to the audience, and begins, "If you're [someone] who's confused about [something], check out these tips." Despite customary Genre Blindness and Moze being the voice of reason, Ned seems permanently aware of the Fourth Wall, with other characters occasionally acknowledging it, to some surprise. In solving the current dilemma and Tip Subject, Ned usually applies a scientific rigor, Moze goes for the more practical solution and Cookie tries outlandish theories.
Originally the primary emphasis was delivering the tips and focusing on school matters such as homework, lockers and school clubs. But soon the stories expanded to focus on the complex relationships between the maturing characters and the tips focused on how to deal with social situations. A brief synopsis of these relationships would be:
- The nerd Lisa Zemo had a huge crush on Cookie, who accepted her as a friend but was oblivious to her affection. When she came back from summer break changed and stunningly beautiful, he found himself in competition with a fanclub of her new admirers. Meanwhile, he developed a rivalry and potential romance with loud, scary, and slightly-psycho Evelyn Kwong.
- Ned pined after his lifelong crush Suzie and they soon became a couple. But within literally weeks, she moved out of state, leaving him at the mercy of his Stalker With A Crush, the beautiful, rich and popular but insane Missy.
- Moze has several boys she is interested in as well as others who could be considered Stalker With A Crush. The third season she fell for the handsome foreign exchange student, Fayman, and they become a couple, but she can't understand why she doesn't feel the same spark she feels for Ned.
While Ned and Moze are trying to work out their feelings for each other and their other Love Interests (which they have plenty of), they're surrounded by a cast of quirky students and teachers who will always ensure that Hilarity Ensues.
Ran for three seasons and ended in 2007. Rumors concerning a sequel series in high school are only rumors, although after a year of banishment to The-N, the existing series has been given a Prime Time slot on the main Nickelodeon channel.
This show provides examples of:
- Accidental Kiss: Running Gag between Ned and Moze.
- Adult Child: Gordy the Janitor
- All Grown Up: Lisa and her sudden attention from Cookie (and every other boy in the school).
- Ambiguously Gay: Mr. Monroe
- Asian And Nerdy: Evelyn. But the trope is played with since she is also scarily insane.
- Aside Glance
- Awesome Yet Practical: All of the tips, despite how goofy the show can be, have real value.
- Bathroom Stall Graffiti: The "Hottie List"
- Beautiful All Along: Lisa Zemo
- Better Than It Sounds
Anime Live Action TV: The show seems like another immature or annoying tweeners show but is very well-written and acted, appealing to teens and adults well above the assumed demographic.
- Bishie Sparkle
- Black And Nerdy: Cookie
- Also Backpack Boy, to some degree.
- Bokukko: Moze
- Book Dumb
- Breaking The Fourth Wall: In "Guide to Girls", Ned reminds Moze after she finishes her tips to meeting girls to do one more thing: face the camera and explain to the viewers her tips while a boom box plays the theme.
- Brilliant But Lazy: Ned
- Broke Episode: There's one where Ned, Cookie and Moze need money to go to a concert.
- Brother Chuck: Bitsy from season one, Suzie Crabgrass's best friend.
- Butt Monkey: Coconut Head, Lisa Zemo (before her Beautiful All Along reveal), Martin Quirrely, and Backpack Boy
- Clingy Jealous Girl: Missy
- Compressed Vice: Setting tables to collapse, "a Ned Bigby classic", seen only in the Guide to Records.
- A Day At The Bizarro: The Halloween special
- A Day In The Limelight: Ned was stumped for tips on dealing with girls, the best he could come up with is that they like shoes and they smell nice. When Moze harrassed him with "Is that the best you can do?" he pulled out a boombox, turned on the theme music, pointed Mozes' head to the camera and had her deliver the tips.
- Deadpan Snarker: The Genre Savvy Moze
- The Ditz: Seth Powers
- Elaborate University High: Somewhat justified by the short episode lengths.
- Emo Teen: "Mark Downer", who was so emo that flowers wilted in his presence.
- Everyone Calls Him Barkeep: Coconut Head and Backpack Boy
- The European Carry All: Ned's experimental "School Survival Cushion Protector" (an ordinary bedroom pillow). Also the "Guide to Volunteering", which is about community service as a school requirement, not actual volunteering.
- Exactly What It Says On The Tin: Backpack Boy, Crony, Lunchlady and several other minor characters.
- Failure Is The Only Option: Gordy's eternal pursuit of The Weasel.
- Fartillery: "Timmy Toot-Toot;" his incredible flatulence is always accompanied by a betrayingly tiny "Toot toot!" sound effect.
- First Name Basis
- Free The Frogs
- Getting Crap Past The Radar: In a fake parenthood class experiment, Ned and Cookie are partnered together. Mr. Monroe even pushes two male dolls together to represent the relationship.
Mr. Monroe: You can be the alternative family!
- There is also a rather interesting moment during the first episode of season 3:
Cookie: Do you think that Lisa Zemo is hot?
Gordy: Ummm, I can't answer that, due to the fact that I'm 40.
- Is This Troper the only one to hear Martin say PMS (in reference in the school's name, Polk Middle School) in the Season 1 episode, Guide to Talent Shows? The school's full name is James K. Polk Middle School, but he definitely said PMS.'
- There is Suzie's habit of wanting to share lockers with whoever her current boyfriend is, which is treated akin to moving in together as adults.
- Goggles Do Something Unusual: Cookie's glasses have something very much like a full-function Windows PC built into them. He seems to see perfectly well without them, and Ned doesn't seem to suffer any ill effects while wearing them for a full episode.
- Grand Finale, including:
- Hey Its That Guy: It's Cliff the dodgy lawyer from Veronica Mars! And apparently Fairly Odd Parents as well.
- Scoop voices Phineas.
- Melissa Peterman, known for playing Dumb Blonde Barbara Jean on Reba, played Mrs. Splitz, the guidence counsellor.
- Happily Ever After: A running gag, usually used at the conclusion of the explanation of whatever scheme's been cooked up this time. Also, the final words of the series, as everything's tied up once and for all with more-or-less everybody being satisified with what they end up with.
- Hollywood Dress Code: Gordy's jumpsuit, Loomer's leather jacket, Seth's ever-present warmups and so on...
- Hopeless Suitor: Loomer might had have a chance with Moze but she knew better then to trust him in a relationship. It didn't stop his scheming.
- Huge Schoolgirl: Moze
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Every episode is "Guide To: something"
- In A World: Parodied in "Guide To: Video Projects."
- Insistent Terminology: Clarence Sawyer, Future Lawyer.
- Jumping The Shark: Literally. On the episode about making and taking dares, Loomer dares Cookie to jump over a tank containing a shark on his bicycle. Although the actual shark-jumping was done by professional BMX biker Mat Hoffman once Cookie comes to his senses.
- Last Minute Hookup
- The Libby: Missy
- Limited Wardrobe: Crubbs, Seth and a few others always have the exact same outfit. Missy, despite being The Libby, usually wears a yellow blouse if not her cheerleading outfit.
- Les Yay: Between Moze and Missy.
- Love Triangle: In the first two seasons, Lisa has a crush on Cookie, who always overlooks her because she's Hollywood Homely. After her (unnecessary) makeover, their roles reverse- Cookie likes her back now that she's pretty, but after 2 years of unrequited love and a newfound Unwanted Harem, she doesn't really see him as anything more than a friend now.
- To be entirely fair to the show, they lampshade the fact that Cookie's sudden interest in Lisa is purely superficial at several points after her makeover, especially with his insistence on calling her "new hot Lisa Zemo" or "the hot Lisa Zemo". I'm fairly certain Ned and Moze also point out he had no interest in her before her makeover and thus deserves being spurned by her now. This was even covered by an episode where Lisa had her allergies return for a while and Cookie realizes that no matter what she looks like, he still loves her.
- Magic Countdown: On the "Dismissal" episode, there's a timer in the bottom left corner. While it never leaves the screen, the seconds slow down and go faster 10 "seconds" before the bus leaves.
- Motor Mouth: Martin Quirley
- His one-time character sister; it's also implied that his entire family are fast-talkers
- Must Have Lots Of Free Time: Gordy. He follows the kids around and doesn't do his job at all, saying that "the night guy will get it."
- No Name Given: Many people are only known by their nicknames: Coconut Head, Backpack Boy...
- Noodle Incident:
Moze: This is your worst idea ever. ...Wait, cheese pants was your worst idea ever. But this is close.
- Not to mention the varying number of times Ned has been trapped in the Girl's Bathroom
- Not So Different: The "Guide to Stress" ends with the three protagonists' frightening realization how they're Not So Different from their Mentors: Ned and Gordy, Moze and iTeacher, and Cook and Mr. Wright. Their role models were also a little freaked out.
- The Paolo: 2 — Faymen and Suzie
- Parental Bonus: Vice-Principal Crubbs. His name is a combination of Crockett and Tubbs from Miami Vice, he even dresses with a white jacket over a red shirt. Originally he wanted to be a Vice Cop, but found the education system more rewarding and he still had "vice" in his title.
- Pick On Someone Your Own Species: Gordy vs. the Weasel; the madness has spread by the Grand Finale to the point where most of the school staff joins the hunt, which culminates in practically tearing the school down.
- Real Men Wear Pink: Crony's sewing.
- Refuge In Audacity: Everything that happens in the show is over-the-top and not just fueled by the Rule Of Funny... It's fueled by the Rule Of Hilarious.
- Sadist Teacher: Mr. Sweeney, parodied to some degree.
- Although you do see him soften up towards the end, to the point where he doesn't rat Ned out for sneaking onto the field trip. He still leaves him in that tree, though...
- School Newspaper News Hound: Ned, in one episode (again!)
- Also, the often forgotten character of Scoop.
- Script Wank
- Shout Out: Several to The Fairly Odd Parents (Which is appropriate considering Daren Norris, the voice of quite a few characters on FOP, plays Gordy), many to (what else?) Star Wars in the "Guide to Dodgeball"
- Two were made in "Guide to The New Kid". In the end, a new kid from Britain shows up with a Hogwarts Uniform and earlier than that:
Teacher: Please welcome... (is handed a piece of paper from Cook) ...Lord Simon Neslon Cook, The Duke of Hazzard.
- Another episode has Ned's gross school lunch slowly moving off of the plate. It helps that both the film and the episode were directed by Savage Steve Holland.
- Stock Sound Effects: and how.
- Stuffed Into A Locker: Coconut Head, of course, in Guide to Vice Principals
- Suspiciously Similar Substitute: The first season had The Libby character as Bitsy
for a few episodes. Later seasons she is nowhere to be seen and the character type was replaced by the similarly named Missy , complete with similar looking actresses.
- That Poor Cat
- Theme Naming: Mr. Chopsaw the woodshop teacher, Billy Loomer the (looming) bully, Missy Meany the mean girl, Mr. Sweeney the Sadist Teacher, and iTeacher who teaches from a Mac computer.
- Three Amigos
- Three Shorts: Two shorts, actually.
- Toyota Tripwire: Locker-door version.
- Transfer Student Uniforms: Averted (a neat trick since the school doesn't have a uniform.) A girl from a rival school joins the volleyball team to sabotage it; she wears Polk team warm-ups throughout the episode.
- Unlucky Childhood Friend: Ned is very slow to realize Moze fits the profile of his perfect girl despite the fact he's "known her forever."
- Unnecessary Makeover: Despite the intention of revealing Lisa to be Beautiful All Along, the growth of her characterization, personality, and damn, even appearances seemed to have considerably decreased by eighth grade. Rather disappointing, for This Troper.
- Unwanted Harem: "The Huge Crew"
- The Urkel: Cookie.
- Unresolved Sexual Tension: Ned and Mose. About as blatant you can get on a Nickelodeon show.
- Victorious Childhood Friend: Ned and Moze
- The Voiceless: One of Loomer's sidekicks (Well, okay, he talks in one episode.)Lampshaded when Loomer said something along the lines of "You talk!?" when the sidekick spoke.
- Voice With An Internet Connection: literally I-Teacher
- Weasel Mascot: Gordy's arch enemy — think Tom And Jerry.
- Webcomic Time: Sort of; the show was retooled after the first nine episodes; after that (and a year-long hiatus), the "new" first and second seasons each covered one semester, while the third season covered all of eighth grade and first aired roughly concurrently with the 2006-07 school year.
- Yandere: Evelyn Kwong
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