Series / A.N.T. Farm

Pictured left to right: Lexi, Olive, Chyna, Fletcher, and Cameron.

"Everybody's got their thing, something different we all bring
Don't you let it clip your wings! (You got it, you got it!)"

—Theme Song

A.N.T. Farm is a 2011 series airing on the Disney Channel. The series follows three best friends, Chyna Parks (China Anne McClain), Olive Doyle (Sierra McCormick) and Fletcher Quimby (Jake Short), who are part of the Advanced Natural Talents program, or A.N.T., which allows gifted middle schoolers to go to High School immediately.

Like many Disney Channel sitcoms, it serves as a vehicle for their new singing star, China Anne McClain.

Its presence in the Disney Channel Live-Action Universe is due to a Tears of Blood poster appearing in the background and the appearance of Mr. Hashimoto, of the Hashimoto Soda Company in Season 3.

On December 26, 2013, McClain confirmed on Twitter that the series' third season would be its last; the series finale aired March 21, 2014.

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These tropes are exceptional, exceptional!

• Accident Prone: In the Christmas episode, Chyna mentions several holiday activities that ended with dad being taken to the emergency room, including cutting down a tree, hanging the lights, and even singing Christmas carols (apparently his singing sounded like the mating call of raccoons).
• Actor Allusion:
  • At the beginning of "Creative ConsultANT", Chyna comments on how tall Sequoia is. This is likely a reference to the Huge Schoolgirl jokes CeCe makes about Rocky on Shake it Up.
  • Angus dressing up as Zach Galifinakis in FANTasy Girl, as Aedin Mincks played a young version of Alan in The Hangover Part II.
  • Vanessa Morgan plays Cameron's girlfriend Vanessa. In one episode, Lexi tries to figure out why Vanessa would want to date Cameron and says "Maybe she's a vampire with a taste for human blood." Cameron responds, "No way, she babysits. Why would anyone hire a babysitter who's a vampire?"
  • Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? in "America Needs TalANT" which featured Sierra McCormick.
• Achievements in Ignorance: Paisley, sometimes to Reality Warper levels. She made a helicopter out of ballooons that worked. She did a full body giftwrapping of herself!
• All-Cheering All the Time: Chyna does this during a scene in "ParticipANTs", but Lexi encourages her to keep cheering, to the point that she could lose her voice and not be able to audition for the school musical. One of the cheers even goes...

  "Lexi says to do it right
  I must cheer both day and night"

• Alliterative Name: Susan Skidmore.
• All Just a Dream: A teenage version of Zoltan Grundy from 1956 invented a time machine and traveled to the present day causing both the present Zoltan and the entire boarding school to fade out of existence. Chyna is forced to be the young Zoltan's prom date to send him back to his own time, but it turns out the entire episode was Chyna's dream.
• Alpha Bitch: Lexi, though she's more of a Lovable Alpha Bitch whenever she's interacting with Cameron or showing genuine care toward Paisley.
  • Unlike most alpha bitches, Lexi's personality is typically played for laughs. She either parodies or exaggerates most traits of an Alpha Bitch.
• Alternate Reality Episode:
  • As a Halloween Special, the first episode was re-created, but with the A.N.Ts being M.U.T.A.N.Ts, complete with monsters and all. Chyna was a Gorgon, Olive was a Mad Scientist, Fletcher was a Vampire, etc...
  • MutANT Farm 3 reveals that those episodes take place in an Alternate Universe that parallels the main series' universe. The MutANTs (save for good-natured M.U.T.A.N.T.! Chyna) are basically anti-villainous evil counterparts to the main dimension counterparts.
• A Minor Kidroduction: The episode "Bad RomANTs" featured a flashback of Gibson 25 years in the past with his last girlfriend. The flashback explains his hair and the breakup which caused him to think of his ex everyday of his life through to the present.
• Appeal to Obscurity: In the episode "TransplANTed", when Chyna wants to get her lunch from her locker and eat in the cafeteria.
  Chyna: I left my lunch in my locker.
  Olive: Emma left her lunch in her locker
  Chyna: Who's Emma?
  Olive: Exactly!
• Artistic License – Geography: In one episode, Fletcher played his long-lost twin brother from Spain, who'd crossed the Spanish-American region. This is not possible, as Spain isn't even close to the Spanish-American region. He finished it by saying, "Taquitos". Justified since it’s Fletcher.
• Artistic License – Linguistics: Played for Laughs in-universe, Gibson spoke with a French accent while attempting to do a British accent. Chyna says that it's better than his Australian accent, which is actually an Italian accent.
• Ascended Extra:
  • Angus was just one a secondary character needed for gags. On Season 3 he is ascended to the titles and is more involved with the plots.
  • Hashimoto started as a one-shot character from Suite Life to becoming a recurring antagonist in A.N.T. Farm.
• Assumed Win:
  • Happens to Cameron in "ClairvoyANT", Principal Skidmore even sets it up by saying this person has waited patiently through ceremony while everyone else won trophies. But instead, it's Skidmore herself who wins the award. By the time he finds out, he is standing next to Wacky ready to accept his award.
  • Happens to Lexi in EndurANTs when she and Paisley pose as music and art ANTs, respectively, in order to win $50,000 during the ANT-Lympics. After a good performance by Lexi followed by a strange awful sounding Native song, the host says "well it's clear who should win this..." and Lexi walks on stage only for him to announce that the Australian team won. This causes Lexi to divulge her true identity and age, which causes Webster High to forfeit the 2nd place prize, of $49,000, ouch.
• Attention Whore:
  • Lexi would do anything to be in the school paper, even if it means appealing to Olive, despite the fact that she generally dislikes the ANTs. She even calls a girl, who is constantly in the school paper for doing genuinely good deeds, a publicity hog while fighting with her over a fire extinguisher. The struggle ends when she gets sprayed with said extinguisher. When Olive takes pictures of Lexi, instead of being embarrassed, Lexi begins posing for the camera.
  • In "PatANT Pending", Paisley's broken arm gets all the attention and Lexi gets ignored and becomes jealous, and decides to pretend to have broken limbs in order to get noticed.
• Bad "Bad Acting": On more than one occasion.
  • Lexi and Paisley in "Bad RomANTs" act as if Paisley is choking so Lexi can save her life in front of Olive and get on the frontpage of the school newspaper. Lexi speaks less monotone that Paisley (who shouldn't be able to talk if she was really choking), and is pretty much hamming it up,but it definitely qualifies. However, when she accidentially causes Paisley to actually choke, she reacts in a more realistic, yet clueless, fashion to someone choking.
  • Chyna does this during her fake-boyfriend auditions in "Some EnchANTed Evening" (even though she wrote her lines and probably said them before Jared's audition,) she still has to read them and does so with a very monotone voice.
• Bad Cop/Incompetent Cop: Darryl Parks. He isn't necessarily a dirty cop, but he doesn't follow all of the rules and he definitely abuses being an officer of the law. Among which is to take evidence from the station and gives the items to his kids as gifts, losing a note that a bank robber gave a teller during a robbery, which was in Chyna's gift, and doing his marksmanship training with a fake gun made from his index finger and thumb.
• Big Eater: Angus: he once ate everything at a restaurant in less than an afternoon but was still starving so he ordered a pizza. He also bought everything from a bacon truck even though he doesn't like the food that much.
• Bilingual Bonus: A minor occurrence in the episode ''ContesANTs''. One of the lyrics in Lexi's song is "Amigos son muy especial," which translates to "friends are very special." It's only worth noting because it's not subtitled, and it's one of the nicer things Lexi has ever said or written on the show. YMMV on it being heart-felt or creative on her part.
• Boarding School: All the ANTs move to a private school created by a former ANT on season 3.
• Boastful Rap: Although it was written by Chyna, Olive spits one of these. None of the lyrics make any sense, except when she says "...my skills to recount are innately phenomenal" speaking of her talent for remembering everything she sees, hears or reads.
• Bowdlerize: "The InformANT" was edited in later reruns over complaints of Officer 3-9's Police Brutality. Some of the beatings were removed entirely, while other scenes were toned down and shortened.
• Brain Bleach: Fletcher needed this in an episode in which he had to paint the principal in an extremely skimpy Catholic school girl uniform.
• Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: At the start of "StudANT Council".
  Chyna: Which dance should I dance for my first school dance? The Dougie? [does the Dougie] The Robot? [does the Robot] Dougie the Robot? [does the Dougie in robotic motions]
  Cameron: You just took two of my favorite things... and made them horrible.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall:
  • Chyna does this twice in "You're the One That I wANT". After Olive explains what theatrical asides are.
  Chyna: Can you believe she is pitching an idea where the character breaks the reality of the play and speaks directly to the viewer, it makes no sense.
  • And later she says:
  Chyna: Y'all see what I have to deal with? Writers, unbelievable.
• Brick Joke: At the beginning of "angus' first movemANT", Chyna mentions a "Silly Song" of hers being popular in Taiwan. At the end of the episode, Olive tries to record a "Sillier Song" by having Chyna, Lexi & Angus sneeze on a microphone.
• Broken Aesop: The theme song says that everyone is exceptional. That's easy for Chyna to say: she's an ANT, who's more talented than most people, and are usually seen as more intelligent than everyone else. Cracked has pointed out that the Aesop is further broken by the Ditzy Genius nature of the characters.
  • The Episode "Product MisplacemANT" is also this. The hidden lesson is that trying to impress someone does not mean you have to abandon a lifestyle that means a lot to you. Lexi followed this Aesop, as she developed a Guilty Pleasure for Glarcon, because she and another character had a lot in common in things like fashion. Nonetheless, Lexi still broke this Aesop by having Seth move his stuff from his room, only for him to realize that the Glarkon franchise is silly after reading some of her magazines.
• Butt-Monkey: Fletcher. His talent is usually dismissed as useless and everyone treats him as an idiot. It even gets worse in Season 3, where most people treats him like he's nobody, Olive acts more aggressively toward him, and for some reason, the entire country hates him.
• Call-Back: "MutANT Farm" is a Halloween-themed reflection of the first episode and as such reuses a lot of dialogue from that episode.^note  Slightly altered to fit the Halloween theme. Also, Chyna sings a song at the school dance after the music is no longer available, just like she did at Lexi's party.
• Catchphrase:
  • Lexi's "Shut up, Paisley!"
    • Lexi, being the show's main antagonist, winded up saying "You have got to be kidding me! when she is bested by Chyna, and on occasion Olive, Cameron and even Paisley.
  • Olive saying "What the heck!" might count since no one else says it (you barely hear it on other Disney shows), she says it a lot, and in Fletcher's Web cartoon, the character based on Olive says a version of it, "What the ant hill?"
    • Not to mention "Interesting factoid" and "HOLLAH!" (and, as of season 3, "Zazzow!").
• Characterization Marches On: Lexi went from an extremely straight example of Alpha Bitch to Lovable Alpha Bitch with helping Fletcher and Cameron sneak into a movie theater, help Chyna resolve Fletcher's Stalker with a Crush tendencies through song, and being nice to Angus when he fixed her computer. The turning point seems to have been America Needs TalANT and ContestANTs, in which both times Chyna and Lexi at least partially reconciled their differences...once again, through song.
• Christmas Episode: Entitled "SANTa's Little Helpers", which referenced A Christmas Carol and Olive mentions that our economy would be worse off if not for the huge amount of money spent during the Christmas shopping season, and states that that is what Christmas is really about.
• Chroma Key: When Olive paints Chyna's bedroom wall green during a slumber party, Chyna uses Stock Footage from a movie for her background while video chatting with Lexi, to prove that her slumber party is cooler than Lexi's. Everyone in the background is at least 10 years older than Chyna and are dressed like they're in a nightclub. However, it works, even when Olive puts on a hoodie the same color as the green wall, which blanks out everything except her head until Chyna covers it up. Lexi doesn't catch on until a ninja drops in and attacks the people in the nightclub.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Olive, as seen in "The PhANTom Locker". She blow dries her hair in Chyna's locker. It barely makes sense in context. Gibson is even worse.
• Counting to Potato: Paisley counts only in vegetables in one episode.
• Covers Always Lie: Compare this promotional photo◊, to this red carpet photo of the cast.◊ Stefanie Scott has on heels, yet has roughly the same height difference to the ANTs. Carlon probably wishes he was that tall. It's probably symbolic, but still, kinda shocking.
• Cover Version: Chyna has performed two: "Dynamite" by Taio Cruz in "TransplANTed" and "Beautiful" by Christina Aguilera in "America Needs TalANT".
• Cunning Linguist: Olive is called upon by the principal to translate Japanese to a prospective Japanese Ant.
  • Olive also says a few phrases in other languages in other episodes such as German and Danish, and speaks English in quite a few different foreign accents.
• Cute, but Cacophonic: Olive speaks relatively loudly and with an overdone accent of sorts. But not as loud as their science teacher.
• Department of Redundancy Department: Although a mild case of redundancy, Chyna says the same word a lot in this sentence.
  Chyna: Cameron, what dance should I dance for the first dance of my first high school dance?
  • In "fraudulANT", Lexi describes herself as "pretty, beautiful & gorgeous".
  • From "ignorANTs is bliss":
  Gibson: I can't get this sign up sign up, but this is where you sign up, so sign up!
• Dick Dastardly Stops to Cheat: Lexi on a couple of occasions.
  • In an early episode, when Chyna doesn't know much about her, Lexi talks Chyna into trying out for the cheerleading squad. Chyna surprisingly makes the squad. But at practice, Lexi puts Chyna through a torturous first day, which leaves her bruised up, but more importantly, Chyna loses her voice. And Lexi reveals that she did this to stop Chyna from auditioning for the lead role in the school's musical. When Lexi is introduced in the Pilot, she shows that she was the lead nearly every play or musical at the school, clearly making her a front-runner even with Chyna as competition, since someone in Chyna's position might get a few minor roles, or at least one, before she would be considered a viable threat to Lexi.
  • And again in "America Needs TalANT", she works hard to find out what Chyna is singing for the finals so she can sing it first and make Chyna look foolish. Instead of working on her own song. Chyna was aware of her attempted sabotage and as well as being misleading to Lexi, she 'carelessly' leaves a fake song for Lexi to steal. Lexi ends up looking foolish after singing a song about being a donut and getting no applause. Chyna even points out that Lexi didn't need to cheat. And while Lexi wasn't necessarily the favorite going into the finals, the judges apparently liked her.
• Did Not Do the Bloody Research: In "ReplicANT", Fletcher calls someone a 'plonker'. While it's still not a strong swear in Britain, it still isn't the sort of language Disney would use deliberately.
• Did Not Get the Girl: Gender flipped by Chyna at the near end of the episode MeANT To Be?, which implied that she wished she had a chance of fully loving Fletcher. Even worse considering it's the 2nd to last episode, but luckily averted in the finale where Fletcher and Olive (her friend) broke up due that Fletcher stays in New York, but even then, Chyna still never gets a chance to love Fletcher, thus making the Flyna ship unresolved.
• Didn't Think This Through: Principal Skidmore shuts down the internet in retaliation for a prank pulled on her. It never occurs to her this makes her work more difficult too and the episode ends with her returning it.

• Does Not Understand Sarcasm: In "TransplANTed":
  Olive: Let's go to a high school party. It'll be fun.
  Fletcher: Another one? Wasn't this one bad enough?
  • Fletcher sometimes doesn't even understand it when he dishes it out.
  Fletcher: Thanks a lot Chyna. (walks away [Beat]) And to be clear, I wasn't thanking you.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: In "StudANT Council", Olive and Angus talking at the A.N.T. Party the previous night. Olive says that the party was crazy and that she overdid it. While Angus says that "everything is hazy" he even say, "I am never eating candy again." Then eats candy anyway.
• The Dog Bites Back: Despite his status as the Butt-Monkey, Fletcher proves in "feature presANTation" that he does have limits to how much he will endure. In the episode, Fletcher hasn't been able to sleep for days because Angus keeps having nightmares waking him up. He spends the episode helping him with this problem, while Angus acts like a total jerkass towards him. After his final plan to help him ends with them simulating being on a boat, causing Fletcher to still be awake and even fall in a bowl of fish, he finally snaps and not only stands up to Angus, but actually chases him around the school, leaving Angus able to do nothing but run and scream in terror.
• "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: The show's opening, "Exceptional", performed by China Anne McClain.
• Dressing as the Enemy: Chyna, Olive, Angus and Tasmanian Neville attempt to get water from an oasis, but it's being guarded by a flock of emus. Chyna uses their feathers to disguise herself as an emu in order to get the water. It only works for ten seconds.
• Driven to Suicide: After Chyna forgets her permission slip for a history field trip, Chyna's history teacher Mr. McMillan snaps about it then cries he has a sad pathetic life given he doesn't have a car and his girlfriend left him for a clown because of that. Then he jumps out the window to end his life, only to find out he's on the first floor.
• Dumb Blonde: Played completely straight with Paisley. Subverted with Olive since she has the greatest mental capacity on the show, she rarely puts it to good use, as a result, she sometimes ends up looking dumb and childish at times. And there's this crowning example from Paisley.
  Paisley: Yay! I want to thank all the other cheerleaders for reminding me that there is no "I" in team, because I use to spell it with an "I".
  • Also:
    Paisley: I don't even know my own strength! "Strength" means "address", right?
• Dumb Is Good: Played straight and averted. Cameron, Fletcher and Paisley are dumb as a post, but kind. Chyna is reasonably intelligent, but also (mostly) kind. Olive and Angus are also regarded as intelligent, but can be pretty mean. Lexi is of normal intelligence, but mean and manipulative, though she's gotten somewhat better lately.
• Elective Mute: Wacky the Wolf is just a student in a mascot suit, but they're so dedicated to staying in character that they never speak. When Lexi impersonates Wacky, talking nearly blows her cover.
• Evil Laugh:
  • Subverted with vampire Fletcher in the Halloween episode, whose Evil Laugh is a girlish "Tee-hee-hee" while his normal laugh is easily mistaken for an evil one.
  • Played Straight by Sequoia on "Creative ConsultANT". She says Chyna is suspended, then laughs. Angus does it too, but only because he doesn't get her so-called joke, but fakes it. While Olive knows something is wrong because of that and Chyna would never miss an opportunity sing live. Later Olive and Angus find Chyna suspended above a shark tank, and Angus realizes what she meant and does the Evil Laugh again.
• Evolving Credits: The title sequence changes in the final season to reflect the Retool to Z-Tech.
• Extremely Short Timespan: You'd be surprised at how many episodes noticeably take place over the course of just one day. Notable aversions are "SciANTs Fair", "TheReplacemANT" and "PerformANTs" and few other earlier episodes. While many other episodes take place in a day or two, with most of the episode taking place one day and the final scene being the next day.
• Extreme Omnivore: In the first episode, Chyna and Olive hide in what they think is Chyna's locker, and Olive eats what she thinks is a cupcake. Eventually...
  Chyna: This is not my locker, and that's not a cupcake.
  Olive: That would explain the tail. (she holds up a rat's tail, then shrugs and eats it anyway)
• Fat Bastard: Angus is starting to become one of these. This status has been cemented in Season 3 as he has gotten his germs all over Fletcher's bed, framed Fletcher for hacking (a serious crime), stole his retainer and used it as his own, and laughed hysterically when Fletcher fell through a chair.
  • He also took prize money from Chyna and Lexi despite not actually helping either of them in the final performance, changed Olive's IQ test scores to crush her self-esteem to get her to date him, and eating all the food at every establishment he goes to.
• 555: In "philANThropy", there's the number 555-0192.
• Flashback Twist: In "EndurANTs", Chyna was recalling when she first met Fletcher. But everything is a bit off. Olive is dressed as Gibson (which she did but in a different episode) and botched his Welcome Catchphrase, Fletcher is carrying a scarecrow instead of a wax figure of Olive, to which Chyna says "that boy is carrying something" instead "that boy is carrying a dead body." Fletcher says gibberish instead of telling Chyna that she is beautiful, to which she replies "Dynamite" the song she sang in said episode.
  • Olive says that's not how it went, and asks if that's how normal people remember stuff.
• Fluffy the Terrible: The German Shepherd that Cameron tries to enter in a dog show is named Snuggles and is police attack dog.
  • While Lexi's dog isn't shown as being vicious, it's a huge Mastiff named Princess.
• "Freaky Friday" Flip:
  • In "IdANTity Crisis", Principal Skidmore creates an evil yogurt machine that drains the ANTs' personalities into yogurt while their bodies become her mind-controlled slaves. In the end, Chyna defeats Skidmore and convinces the slaves to eat the yogurt to get their personalities back and free her friends. However, they all eat the wrong yogurt resulting in this trope.
  • In the first MutANT Farm episode, Olive talks Paisely into undergoing a procedure to make her smarter. She accomplishes this feat by switching Paisley's brain with a duck's.
• Freudian Excuse: "America Needs TalANT" tells us that the reason Lexi makes fun of Chyna is because she's secretly worried that she isn't as good as Chyna.
• Funny Afro: Gibson, whose Jewfro acts as a Bag of Holding.
  • The ANTs wear Jewfro wigs while trying to save Gibson's job.
  • Chyna dons a huge 1970's fro when Olive is producing a Greek play and called herself Afro-dite.
• Fun with Acronyms: Right there in the title.
• Gamer Chick: Olive in "ReplicANT". She surpasses Cameron's high score in Donkey King and would have won a Donkey King competition had a blackout not happened. And while her proficiency in that game is attributed to her super memory, she also easily handled having to play a live-action of the game staged by Cameron and Wacky the Wolf, complete with barrels, ladders, hammers and an apple.
  • However, it is unknown if Olive is good at video games in which her memory would've be a factor, or whether or not she even plays any other games.
  • Its also left rather ambigous as to whether Cameron is only upset about having his Hi-Score beaten or upset about losing to Olive because she is a girl.
• Genius Ditz:
  • Fletcher skipped several grades due to his artistic ability, but he thinks snow angels are dead snowmen.
  • Olive is very book-smart due to having super memory, but she has very childish moments such as believing Cameron's ghost story, having way more fun while the rest of the ANTs are playing musical chairs, and her overall naivete.
• Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: In the pilot, After their fellow ANT is caught in the wave of passing by high schoolers, Fletcher said that they should save him, only for Olive to say he's gone, complete with a Bright Slap.
• Glass-Shattering Sound: Chyna does this in twice an episode. While Chyna might actually be able to do that, it's highly unlikely that she really did it in that episode since she shattered someone's eyeglasses.
• Gilligan Cut: Subverted in one episode. Chyna refuses to do a music video in a string cheese costume. Cut to her brother on set in the costume. His face was blocked initially to invoke this trope.
• Girlish Pigtails; Olive sports long girlish pigtails with bows that match her dress and even has to lollipop for her little girl disguise in "FraudulANT".
  • Lexi in "EndurANTs", when she poses as an ANT.
• Good Cop/Bad Cop: Chyna suggests this to Olive in "FraudlANT" then Olive declines, but still does it after Chyna's attempt at taking the nice route doesn't work. Olive even threatens the criminal with violence.
• Good with Numbers: Turns out how Lexi gets into the ANT Program.
• Got Me Doing It: The "air quotes" from Chyna's favorite show, High Heels High. First Chyna does it, then later her dad gets in on the act:
  Darryl: I did a little "research" (with air quotes). Wait, why am I doing this now? I actually did do some research.
  • And there's this from "FraudlANT":
  Zanko: How dare you accuse Zanko of stealing?!
  Chyna: Because Zanko is guilty of stealing! Chyna was there and Chyna knows the truth! Why is Chyna talking in the third person?
  Olive: Olive thinks it sounds cool.
• Grade Skipper: The A.N.T. program allows gifted students to skip middle school.
• Halloween Episode: "MutANT Farm".
• Hammerspace Hair: Gibson keeps, among other things, licorice, fresh tissues and corn cobs in his hair.
• Happy Birthday to You!: Chyna stopped Olive from singing it and tells her that she knows how it goes. Lexi also does this to Paisley later on in the same episode.
  • In "ClairvoyANT", Chyna received an award from Principal Skidmore for singing it to her, offscreen of course.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Chyna and Olive, Lexi and Paisley.
• Hiccup Hijinks: Paisley gets the hiccups in Managem ANT after eating table cleanser (mistaking it for parmesan cheese), complete with bubbles flying out of her mouth.
• Hidden Depths: Paisley is apparently able to build a functioning helicopter out of balloons. Complete with a rope ladder. In two seconds.
• High School: The show uses Webster High for the setting of most episodes. Justified as the premise of the show is gifted middle school kids attending high school. It has lockers, one main hallway with a large staircase and at least a couple of minor hallways. It also has a few normal classrooms includingscience lab classroom, Home Ec, the Ant Farm, and what looks to be a makeshift auditorium. Only a few episodes take place entirely outside of school and that was during their summer vacation.
  • It is unknown whether or not Webster High is named for Webster the 80's sitcom, or for a different Webster.
• Honor Before Reason: Chyna trying to correct her A-that-should-have-been-an-F in the episode with the "High Heels High" episode.
• Hypocritical Humour: This being a Disney show, there's a ton of it.
  Chyna: Would you guys please stop saying stuff that makes us sound like little kids? [beat] Ooh, cookies!
  
  Cameron: Chyna, you always exaggerate. You exaggerate like a million times a day.
  
  Olive: I'm only scared of the really scary stuff. For example, I'm not scared of spiders. Like that one at the back of your neck? No biggie.
  Cameron: That's not a spider. That's a birthmark.
  Olive: AAAAAAAAAAAAH! BIRTHMARK!
  
  Cameron: Can we move on to something not dumb & childish?… Ooh, dinosaur balloons!
• I Know Mortal Kombat: A meta example: in 2012, there was an incident where a first grader saved a choking classmate after seeing the Heimlich maneuver performed on an episode of the show.
• Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Every episode title has "ANT" in it somewhere in capital letters. They also do this when the word that "ANT" is a part of isn't pronounced as it normally would be such as "You're the One That I wANT".
• Idol Singer: Chyna and Lexi both get chances to showcast their natural talents. There is even an episode where they make to the Hollywood phase of an Idol show spoof, called America Needs Talent.
  • While most Idol Singers are marketed for looks over vocal ability, or that they get acting jobs due to being a good singer. But a teacher lampshades this when he says "I knew you could sing but your acting skills, wow!"
  • And Lexi is known for her acting skills in high school musicals, being cast as the lead in nearly everything, even if she is cast in a role meant for a male actor.
• I Have to Go Iron My Dog:
  Fletcher: I think I see a mouse.
  Olive: Oh look! My cat go out!
• Innocent Beta Bitch: Paisley is Lexi's best friend and main accomplice. Despite this, she is one of the sweetest and most innocent people in the entire show.
• Innocent Prodigy: Despite her intellect, Olive is very much a child. Chyna is able to trick Olive into spending the night in the "haunted locker" (to prove it's not haunted) by leading her to the school blindfolded. Olive believes she's in Chyna's house playing a game of Pin The Tail on the Donkey.
  • Also when she has to go back to kindergarten for losing her memory, which at the time of her grade demotion, came back, she enjoys being in the same class as 5-year olds in order to "get away from the big kids" as she puts it.
• Interrupted Declaration of Love: In "endurANTs," Chyna stars to tell Fletcher she might reciprocate his feelings, but gets knocked out by a boomerang before she can fully say it.
• It's All About Me: Lexi.
• Jerkass: Other then Lexi, we also have Olive. In her case though, her over-analytical mind seems to give her a Lack of Empathy, plus she's a Cloudcuckoolander.
  • Also Principal Skidmore.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Two from "The replacemANT"
  • Chyna rightfully gets mad Lexi tried to prank Olive by putting a bear in the classroom (luckily she was late so Skidmore took her place). Lexi points out she would've just ran out of the classroom if Chyna hadn't put glue in the locks.
  Chyna: We should coordinate our pranks better.
  • Naturally Skidmore (who fought off the bear) was right to be mad at them and give them detention for the prank even if she wasn't the intended target.
• Journey to the Center of the Mind: In "IdANTity Crisis", the A.N.T.s are forced to share in Chyna's mind when Skidmore steals their personalities. Violet rather enjoys herself messing with the controls, but Fletcher is rather disappointed to discover that he's not one of Chyna's crushes.
  Fletcher: Why is the drawer so full?
  [Rifles through cabinet]
  Fletcher: OH, COME ON! I GOTTA BE IN HERE SOMEWHERE!
• Karma Houdini: Lexi on a few occasions.
  • In "You're the One That I wANT", Lexi says to Fletcher that if she sabotages the play, everyone will suspect her, so she talks Fletcher into doing her dirty work. During the play, its Lexi who sabotages the play while operating the spotlight, in plain sight to everyone. Not only does she get away with it, no one seems to care who the culprit is.
    • She even says "this is worst news ever" with a smile on her face. Yet no one catches on.
    • However, she does mention getting rid of Chyna would be blamed on her, but getting rid of Jared would be blamed on Fletcher, even if she does it. But no blame is placed on Fletcher either. So they both are.
  • In one episode, Cameron dislikes being "locker buddies" with the admittedly irritating Olive, so he fools her into believing the locker is haunted by a ghost because she has a phobia of ghosts. He procceeds to milk this for all it's worth, even laughing about how fun it is. At the end, when he's found out, he pays no consequence whatsoever for basically bullying someone with a phobia.
  • One episode has the gang scamming a guy into buying Fletcher's paintings and then end up blackmailing him, getting away from all legal repercussions.
  • Olive generally gets away with her Jerkass behavior.
• Kick the Dog: Lexi harshly telling Fletcher that Chyna doesn't love him. While a laugh track plays through that, Fletcher's reaction is shown to be... somewhat sad.
  • Fletcher's favorite artist stealing his artwork and claiming it as his own.
  • Angus editing Olive's IQ test scores to lower her self-esteem.
• Latex Perfection: Angus once tried to do this to frame Fletcher for "killing" Olive's videogame pet. Chyna, being the Great Detective in this episode, quickly recognizes that he's not Fletcher and unmasks him.
• Laugh Track: Being a Disney Channel Kid Com, par for the course.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: In "CANTonese Style Cuisine", Goo Goo tells Chyna "don't bother with the birthday song, people just like hearing-" and then gets cut off by the theme song.
• Literal-Minded: Gibson, as seen in "Bad RomANTs".
  Chyna: What is Gibson's idea of a perfect date?
  Gibson: November 3rd!
  [Laugh Track]
  • All the main trio have at least one moment of this.
  Olive: It's blueberry yogurt. *beat* You said to look natural and the label said all-natural.
  
  Lexi: Chyna, you may be an ant, but you need to sound like a wolf!
  Chyna: Okay. *makes dog noises*
  
  Fletcher: You told me to paint what's on the inside.
  Chyna: I didn't mean her skeleton!
  • Olive also did this when Chyna didn't study for her science test and Chyna says that since Olive memorized the entire book, and asks her to tell her everything in the book. Olive proceeds to recite the inner cover including the special thanks and copywrite info.
  • Paisley is this most of, if not all of the time, but a striking example was in the Christmas Episode when she and Lexi were hired to be gift-wrappers, and she showed up to work dressed as a Rapper, then says "lemme get a beet!"
• Little Boy Seeks Big Girl: Fletcher occasionally tends to forget about Chyna when he's around Paisley, especially whenever Paisley hugs Fletcher. One such example (from the pilot no less) happens to be the pictured example on the Tropes page.
• Love at First Sight: Fletcher had been this for Chyna when she came to the A.N.T. program in the 1st episode to the point that he even said "You're beautiful."
• Lyrical Dissonance: Chyna wrote a few songs like this. First, when she and Fletcher are trying to get Gibson to stop from hanging out with them so much.The tempo and melody are upbeat and happy, however the lyrics are quite dark. She says things like, "...feed him fatty foods till his heart explodes" and "dehydrating his skin and make Gibson-jerky"
  • And again when she form a phony children's band in which the band is dress in stuffed animal costumes. Although someof the songs are safe but just plain odd such as "You Gotta Wear Pants in Public" and "Don't Go Potty in the Tub". However, there is a song with an up-tempo Punk Rock melody that even has a Gothic teen saying "Wow, they're dark."
    "When you're doing crafts with art supplies,
    Don't run with scissors, its not too wise
    You can stab your chest, your arms, your thighs,
    You could lose one or even both your eyes."
• Manipulative Bitch: Lexi, like all alpha bitches, is this is spades. In "ParticipANTs", she lets Chyna onto the cheerleading squad just to wear her out so she would be too tired to audition for the school musical. This actually ends up working to Chyna's advantage when she shows up to audition and inadvertantly delivers the best monologue the drama teacher has ever heard.
• Memetic Mutation: In-Universe, Cameron's "Space Cadet" song, which is a remix about his speech on how he willingly decides to go to space to stop an asteroid from destroying Earth.
• Moe: In-Universe, Paisley considers Fletcher to be adorable.
• The Mole: Kennedy, although she grew to care for the rest of the ANTs.
• Monster Mash: In "MutANT Farm", all of the ANTs Are Monsters:
  • Chyna: Medusa
  • Olive: Mad scientist
  • Fletcher: Vampire
  • Gibson: Mummy
  • Angus: Zombie
  • Wacky: Werewolf
• Ms. Fanservice: They hired a model (Allie DeBerry) to play Paisley. It shows.
• Muscles Are Meaningless: Violet easily takes down Officer Parks in "InfANT".
• My God, You Are Serious!: Angus reacts this way when he realizes Chyna wasn't joking about Gibson having an ex-girlfriend.
• Narcissist: Lexi always looks at herself in the mirror.
• Never Say That Again: "Instead of the bling-bling, we got the wing-wing."
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: After the A.N.T. are seen complaining about the faulty climate control of the school, Chyna asks Principal Skidmore to cut something unnecessary from the school budget. She, in-turn, fires Gibson and they spend the rest of the episode trying to raise the money to re-hire him.
  • In "ConfinemANT", Olive sees the school's budget sheets, and notices that Principal Skidmore is cutting the art and music programs to use the money for renovations for her office. However, Olive tells the schoolboard this, only for Skidmore to tell her that the money for her office would be used to fund art and music, not the other way around. If it the ANTs didn't try to save the day, they wouldn't have lost the programs.
  • Also, from the same episode, Chyna does this when she sings a song to save the day. When she's done singing, the Chairman of the Board, says "Wow, you are incredibly good as music. Clearly there is nothing we can teach you."
• No Celebrities Were Harmed:
  • Madame GooGoo.
  • Pauly D and Jersey Shore as a whole in the "America Needs TalANT" episode with Nicky G. and "Yo, I'm from Jersey".
  • Can't really call Corey Delaney a celeb, but they did parody him "EndurANTs". For those of you who don't know him, he is famous for hosting a 500 person house party while his parents were away. It was global news mainly because of how he was highly unapologetic for any chaos that ensued and the subsequent damage. It cost his parents over $20,000, and that was just for the police. He was shown with Neville near the beginning of the episode with Corey's exact look, including his hairstyle and color, hat, shades, and jacket with no shirt on underneath.
  • ROFL.
• No Indoor Voice: The science teacher (and, to a degree, Olive).
• No Such Thing as Bad Publicity: In-Universe, Lexi is such an Attention Whore that not even being photographed covered in foam from a fire extinguisher makes her react beyond stopping and posing.
• Nothing Is the Same Anymore: Season 3 changes the setting from a high school to a special boarding school for child prodigies run by billionaire Zoltan Grundy, thus leaving out many characters (namely Cameron, Mr. Parks, principal Skidmore, Violet and Wacky the Wolf).
• Odd Friendship: Strangely, Lexi and Cameron seem to get along okay.
• Official Couple: Fletcher & Olive as of "unwANTed", but later broke up in time for the finale in "The New York ExperiANTs".
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome: At least a couple noteworthy ones.
  • When Lexi tried to trap Olive in a room with a bear, Principal Skidmore shows ups and subdues the bear while only suffering a few minor scratches.
  • When Chyna falls in to a shark tank, Olive saves her, from two sharks offscreen, and even manages to do so without getting Chyna's hair wet.
  • Chyna mentions that Olive and Fletcher once put together a "...scheme to take down Vegas". Probably would've made for an entertaining episode to say the least, but there is no way Disney would write an episode about breaking the law and seemingly getting away with it. Makes you wonder what they did and how they failed.
• Older Than They Look:
  • Fletcher's actor, Jake Short. He's playing an 11-year old character who looks and sounds like he's around 9. He's actually 16.
  • Cameron's actor, Carlon Jeffery is pretty noteworthy. While he isn't an A.N.T., he looks 15 and plays a sophomore, but the actor is 18.
  • Paisley's actress, Allie Deberry, also plays a sophomore and is only a few months younger than Carlon.
• Old Shame: Subverted in-universe with Principal Skidmore's disco album entitled, Saturday Night Skidmore until she embraces it and dons the exact outfit she wore for her album cover from over three decades ago.
  • And like most people who have a shames of old, she bought every copy in an effort to keep it underwraps.
• Once per Episode: Wacky the Wolf appears in every episode, despite being a minor character and not having any lines.
• Our Vampires Are Different: In "MutANT Farm", Cameron attempts to kill Vampire Fletcher with garlic, then with a stake, then with holy water: In order, Fletcher points out that vampires love garlic, effortlessly takes the stake from Cameron's hand and shrugs off the holy water.
• Padding: In-Universe, Olive's autobiography is bigger than her, but apparently contains very minor details.
• Padding the Paper: In one episode, Cameron has to make an 1000-words essay about his father's job, so his father drives him with his police car. Cameron finds the job boring until his father catches a criminal, to which he exclaims "Wow, my dad is a hero!" Cameron thinks this sentence doesn't contain enough words for an essay, but his father says that a picture covers 1,000 words, so Cameron takes a picture of his father with the criminal for the essay.
• Pet the Dog: Frequent designated antagonist figures on the show, Lexi and Cameron, have some from time to time.
  • Subverted once, however. When Cameron and Lexi found Principal Skidmore's cell phone, Lexi's initial reaction was that they should return it, which is probably the one nice thing she's ever even considered doing. However, Cameron talked her out of it.
• Pie in the Face: In "sANTa's Little Helpers," Chyna creams Fletcher after singing a Song Parody of "Pop Goes the Weasel," as a demonstration of a jack-in-the-box that would pie Skidmore after the kids find out that the principal is selling the Christmas gifts they made for an orphanage.
• Pilot: "TransplANTed".
• Police Brutality: In "The InformANT", a little person police officer called 3-9 is seen beating a thuggish looking man. As the man runs away, the officer goes on to say "That'll teach you to double park!" He is later seen beating another person up, probably for another minor "crime". It ended up generating so many complaints from viewers that Disney quietly released an edited version with the violence toned down.
• Power Trio
• Pre-emptive Declaration: Olive uses this when Fletcher calls her ugly.
  Olive: At least my face isn't black and blue.
  Fletcher: My face isn't black and blue.
  Olive: Not yet.
  • And Olive again while talking to Principal Skidmore in "ReplacemANT" after Chyna suggests that Olive teach History.
  Principal Skidmore: You haven't committed any violent crimes, have you?
  Olive: No. (looks at Chyna) Not yet.
• Put on a Bus: Almost all the non-A.N.T.s in Season 3, after the setting moved to the Z-Tech boarding school. The exception is Lexi, who turns out to have been a math prodigy all along and transfers to Z-Tech with the A.N.T.s — and Paisley, who gets a job at Z-Tech, though she's only in a few episodes. Cameron guest stars in one episode when he visits the school, but after that is never seen again.
• Real Joke Name: Someone really named Dorian Bannister.
• Real Life Writes the Plot: Apparently the reason why they wrote an episode with Flechter in a cast is because his actor actually ended up in one.
• Running Gag: Although all of the A.N.T.s have been in costumes at various times, Olive does this way more than the rest of them, Examples included:
  • Queen Elizabeth the First.
  • Her teacher outfit in the same episode also counts.
  • A German Doctor named Ima Fraud ("pronounced Eema Frowd!").
  • A Nightclub singer circa 1930 with Yogurt-filled boobs.
  • Wonder Woman.
  • A lost little girl.
  • Albert Einstein and Marilyn Monroe in a split-costume.
  • A Mad scientist.
  • An expy of Fletcher.
  • Cat Burglar, Chyna also and Fletcher wore an actual Catsuit.
  • Dressed as a Chinese Chef, Chyna did also.
  • Dressed as an Elf although with Fletcher. Chyna was Santa.
  • Her investigative reporter hat might also count, especially since she only wore it in that episode.
  • A Goth chick along with Agnus as an Ozzy Osbourne expy.
  • As a 60's backup singer (along with Violet), dressed in attire similar to that of The Supremes.
  • Dressed as Marie-Antoinette, the tragically famous former Queen of France.
  • Angus wanting to marry Olive.
  • Fletcher's human-faced hoodie.
• Same Race Means Related: Kennedy van Buren, the only Asian cast member, is in fact the daughter and assistant of recurring antagonist and Japanese tycoon Hashimoto.
• Sand In My Eyes: Subverted by Daryl. He tears up about Chyna being old enough to go out with a boy, unsupervised. He claims that there's tear-gas in the riot uniform Chyna is wearing, but then he wipes his eyes with her sleeve only to realize it actually does have tear-gas on it. Happens later while watching a Chick Flick on the couch.
• Sarcastic Confession: Not completely a confession, but in this exchange with Lexi's pageant judge, in which he is trying to convince her that he is an elderly man whom Lexi takes care of, he gives a bit of evidence that reveals he's not really an old man.
  Cameron: I lived here before they finished building the Golden Gate Bridge in 1937. I can still hear the sound of all 1.2 million rivets being put in.
  Mrs. Busby: Wow, You can remember that?
  Cameron: Like I read it in a book this afternoon.
  • When you realize that an elderly man reading about something that was alive for is pretty unlikely, but a sophomore in high school is very likely to have read that as part of his classwork, more than likely, that very same afternoon, and that Cameron isn't smart enough to remember something like that longer than a few hours, it just adds to the hilarity and confirms it's a confession.
  • In Modeling AssignmANT, Angus helps Cameron look muscular by pumping up a bouncing house under his clothes. When Vanessa finally sees Cameron and comments on how well-built he is, Cameron says, you don't get muscles like these but inflating some balloon suit under your clothes.
• Sassy Black Girl: Chyna, sometimes.
• Screw Yourself: Lexi, at the end of "idANTity crisis". G-rated version.
• Separate Scene Storytelling: Chyna and Angus do this in "Body of EvidANTs" while retelling what happened to Olive's toy.
• Serious Business: Donkey King is serious business to Cameron and Olive, Cameron says "for years you've been going to Chyna's concerts, recitals, award presentations; finally I do something that eclipses all of that, and you not even gonna come."
  • He also setup a real-life Donkey King simulation to keep her from competing in the tournament.
  • Olive memorized over 10,000 game patterns and subsequently gets the high score. Although that was easy for her to do. She still took the live game and arcade game seriously and was furious about being setup and her score getting wiped out because of a blackout.
• Sharing a Body: In "idANTity crisis", Olive, Fletcher, Violet and a number of other A.N.T.s temporarily share Chyna's body when she eats the frozen yogurt containing their personalities. Chyna is less than thrilled with the results.
  Chyna: GUYS! LET'S NOT TEAR APART THE ONE BODY WE HAVE!
• Shark Pool: Chyna gets dangled over one in "creative consultANT". The sharks turn out to be guys in shark costumes. Do you know how many questions could be asked about this?
• Ship Tease: Fletcher/Chyna, Paisley/Fletcher, and even Cameron/Lexi.
  • Fletcher/Chyna even moreso now, starting in "EndurANTs".
• Shouldn't We Be in School Right Now?: Almost completely Averted as Webster High is the main setting. It's more fair to ask "shouldn't we be home right now?"
• Shout-Out: When Paisley pretends that she's choking, she exclaims that there's food lodged in her Snuffleuffagus.
  • The name of that episode is "bad romANTS".
  • "SciANTS Fair" features a recreation of the Hindenburg disaster, complete with Olive saying "Oh, the humanity!"
  • When Chyna is working on the fortune cookie machine, she recreates the famous chocolate conveyor belt scene.
  • The number 24601.
  • The tune Fletcher hums while making a puppet of Chyna play the trumpet sounds alot like the original Super Mario Bros. theme.
  • On "America Needs TalANT", Lexi, upon hearing Paisley tell her she is going to be on a Game Show, tells Paisley that she is not smarter than a 5th Grader. A show that the actress playing Paisley's teammate for the episode, Sierra McCormick, was previously on.
  • The Game Show on which Paisley and Olive competed is a Shout-Out is named The Brainy Bunch and the host is Barry Williams.
  • Skidmore mentions being visited by the three Christmas ghosts.
  • "The InformANT" has a little person police officer disguise as a new student. When they ask of his name, he says it's Charlie. When they asked for his last name, he says it's Brown.
  • Cameron names the cat he disguises as a dog to enter and win a dog show, Snoop Dogg.
  • Olive goes Mr. Crocker (complete with looking like a female Mr. Crocker) on her classmates by the 2nd half of the episode "The ReplacemANT" as the substitute teacher, complete with this quote:
  Olive: You know what funny starts with? F!
  • As of "Some EnchANTed Evening", Chyna and Fletcher's friendship/relationship is now similar to Lizzie and Gordo's from Lizzie McGuire.
  • "Why would anyone hire a babysitter who's a vampire?" This doubles as an Actor Allusion, since the character being referred to is played by Vanessa Morgan.
  • While the entire A plot of "EndurANTs" is a Shout-Out to "Crocodile" Dundee and the Crocodile Hunter, when Australian Gibson disapears mere seconds after he is off-camera and Chyna says's "I hate when he does that" is a direct Shout-Out to Mick, who does that often enough for a fellow bushman to say that line in the third movie.
  • "ANTswers" features many parodies of viral internet videos, such as Charlie Bit My Finger, Keyboard Cat, Trolololo, and Dramatic Chipmunk. YMMV on whether they are affectionate parodies or take thats.
  • "ContestANTs" has a twofer when Olive suggest they decide who gets her as a teammate by playing France France Revolution, Lexi thinks she's referring to the actual game, DanceDanceRevolution, but Olive means The French Revolution and even dresses as Marie-Antoinette and throws cake at Lexi's and Chyna's face, (but, of course, doesn't hit Chyna) while they are in stocks.
    • She starts it by saying Let them eat cake
  • The asteroid from ClairvoyANTS is supposed to be the same one from Wizards vs. Asteroid; both episodes had the same original air date.
  • The episode InfluANTces is full of shout outs. For one the obvious rare yet nicely done shout out to Black History Month and Chyna imagining herself as Ella Fitzgerald, Aretha Franklin, and Janet Jackson then later paying homage to each of them while singing Exceptional.
    • Other shout outs include Finesse Mitchell playing Michael Jackson, Angus as John Landis, and Chyna says 5,4,3,2,1 which is a direct shout to Rhythm Nation, And YMMV on Carlon Jeffrey being Tito Jackson.
    • Angus' presentation is on Mark Dean.
  • Fletcher dating Kennedy currently mirrors that of Austin's relationship with Kira, but Fletcher's reason for doing so is because he wants Chyna to be jealous. It's unknown if this will be temporary like Austin's, however.
  • When Dixon made Chyna look like a hamburger with milkshake and fries hands:
  Olive: Look at her. She's an unhappy meal.
• Hippo changing his restaurant theme to apples and Paisley mentions that the other apple stores only sold computers.
• Shouldn't We Be in School Right Now?: Averted mostly. Nearly every episode takes place at school, with a few episodes taking place over summer vacation in Season 2. However, there are times when they're at school when the question might be "Shouldn't we be learning right now?" Especially when they sometimes leave the school during what sometimes appears to be school time and come back to the school.
  • Principal Skidmore doesn't help it by forcing some of them to do non-school related activities, such as Fletcher paint her in PhANTom Locker and stomping grapes to make grape juice in "Ignor AN Ts is Bliss".
• Show Within a Show: The Season 1 episode "SciANTS Fair" has Chyna and Lexi as huge fans of a fictional show called "High Heels High", about a group of high school teenage Valley Girls who are led by a very petty and rude "rich bitch", gorgeous blonde, manipulative bully named Justine, who will stop at nothing to sabotage other girls who she sees as a threat to her "celebrity" status at their school, somewhat similar to the way Lexi's character acts and treats Chyna sometimes, but not nearly as bad and exaggerated as on the "High Heels High" show. Ironically enough, Chyna actually loves and is a huge fan of Justine's character, in spite of the fact that you'd think she'd hate, or at least dislike her character because of the way she's so similar to Lexi.
• Sleep Walking: Olive does this during a slumber party. While sleepwalking she makes rooster noises, plays golf and sleep-knits, and isn't aware that she sleepwalks.
• Special Edition Title: MutANT Farm which re-did the opening with organ music and Halloween style graphics.
• Spiritual Successor: To That's So Raven, but replace "Teen Psychic" with "Tween Prodigy".
  • A.N.T. Farm also has some similarities to Smart Guy (also produced by Disney, but aired on Disney Channel only in reruns after its WB run ended): both series focus on a tween who skips from elementary/middle school to high school, with the lead attending the same school as their Book Dumb older brother, employ the Power Trio format (compare T.J., Marcus and Mo, with Chyna, Olive and Fletcher) and include a Cloudcuckoolander best friend character (compare Mo, with Paisley and to some extent, Olive).
• Stalker with a Crush: Fletcher and Angus both exhibit this with Chyna and Olive respectively. Although Angus doesn't seem that bad, yet. However he is a tech-savvy hacker, so who knows.
• Suspiciously Specific Denial: Fletcher is prone to this, especially regarding his Stalker with a Crush behavior towards Chyna.
  Fletcher: It's not like I stayed up all night making wax sculptures of you.
  
  (in a later episode)
  Olive: Where's Chyna? She's supposed to be helping me with this.
  Fletcher: How would I know? It's not like I sewed a GPS transmitter to the lining of her backpack so I could track her every move.
• Sustained Misunderstanding: Lexi is unaware of a fellow cheerleader's birthday since she never received her invitation. When she stopped trying to find out why, her Dumb Blonde friend Paisley says she has to deliver an invitation to someone named "IX37" and assume its a robot. When Lexi sees the name, she realizes that Paisley had the envelope, which says LEXI, turned upside-down. When she tells Paisley, Paisley replies, "I didn't know my best friend was a robot!"
  • Angus as good as admitted to sabotaging the IQ test so Olive would fall for her bad results and go out with him.
• Swapped Roles: The point of the "MutANT Farm" Halloween Special, except instead of two people swapping roles, the entire social order of the school is changed, with the ANTs (cast as traditional Halloween monsters) being the most popular kids in the school and the regular kids like Lexi, Paisley and Cameron, being the outcasts. The main plot of the episode even mirrors the situation presented in "StudANT Council", with all of the monster kids throwing a school dance and excluding the regular kids.
• Tagline: "Small is the new big."
• The Cameo: R2-D2 and C3PO show up in in one episode. Likely to get a test run for Disney's new acquisition of the license.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Pretty much all the characters who were not Put on a Bus for Season 3 became a lot meaner and more inclined to heap abuse upon each other. The exceptions are Lexi and Paisley, who stayed pretty much the same — though Lexi was already a Jerkass and simply didn't get any worse, and Paisley was Demoted to Extra and only appeared in a few episodes.
• Two Girls and a Guy: Chyna, Olive and Fletcher.
• Unlimited Wardrobe: Madam Goo Goo. Lampshaded, of course. She pairs it with the ability to change her outfit in the two seconds it takes her to walk through a door.
• Unsound Effect: Olive attempts to disguise herself as a coffee table in "unforeseen cirmumstANTs"; when she blows her cover by talking, she follows it up with "table sound".
• Unwanted Assistance: Chyna pretty much tells this to Angus in "Modeling AssignmANT during Cameron and Vanessa's date in a fake hot-air balloon.
• Villain Team-Up: Hashimoto and Winter Maddox do this in FinANTial Crisis.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Olive and Fletcher's plot in "Angus' First MovemANT" ends with Olive chasing Fletcher with a basket of venomous snakes. Fletcher isn't seen for the rest of the episode (Olive appeared in The Stinger).
• Wholesome Crossdresser: Paisley in "EndurANTs" and Chyna in "ANTswers".
• Wild Teen Party: A major plot point in "TransplANTed".
• Will They or Won't They?: Chyna and Fletcher, in "EndurANTs" and "SignificANT Other".
• You, Get Me Coffee: Whenever a situation arises in Season 3, the other characters generally tells Fletcher to go away.
• Zany Scheme: Not relied upon, but they do make use of them.
  • Lexi's attempts to find out why she was not invited to a popular friend's birthday party.
  • When they try to retrieve Fletcher's painting from Zanko.
  • Lexi and Cameron's scheme to help Lexi keep her most recent pageant crown. While not that zany, it is definitely noteworthy for being an unusual plan. It gets Zany when the real Cameron is required to make an appearance for the pageant rep so she can talk to him and his disguised persona at the same time.
  • Pretty much the entire plot of "PerformANTs" complete with crazy costumes, convenient disguises, a song that is thought up at a moment's notice to keep their story straight that also contains a freestyle rap, and a singing perfomance meant to fool her mother that has some choreography.
    • Cameron's B-Plot even could be considered zany. He needs to get Lexi a backstage pass. But backstage passes are for employees only. What does Cam do? He grabs a help wanted sign and poses as a tattoo artist.
  • Subverted in "Creative Consultant" when Olive and Angus show up to save Chyna, who is suspended above a shark tank, Olive mentions how dolphins have been known to save humans from shark attacks, and while Chyna's rope is snapping away little by little, says "...so all we need is a dolphin, and Angus proceeds to order one, online. Time quickly runs out before he can make the purchase, and Olive saves Chyna with an Offscreen Moment of Awesome.
  • Lampshaded in "Early RetiremANT" when she gets Skidmore back as the Principal so her Grandmother won't be principal anymore.
  Grammy: If that's how you felt, why didn't you just tell me?
  Chyna: I didn't want to hurt your feelings?
  Grammy: So instead you make up an elaborate scheme to get rid of me?
  Chyna: I make up elaborate schemes when I'm stressed.

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