BBBBBBBBBBLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAREEEEEEE
Without warning, usually three times an episode, a loud horn will blare. When it does, the actors stop what they're doing as the studio audience gets to vote on three options for what happens. The actors return to the set, unaware of the result until they're told they have to do next.
The show wrapped in May 2021 after two seasons, as the COVID-19 Pandemic made the audience participation element more or less impossible to pull off safely.
Just Roll With It contains examples of:
- Abilene Paradox: In "The Birthday War", Owen hates having his dad do a wildly over the top birthday party complete with him as a goofy character ever year. He finally breaks it to his dad that he's outgrown it..and his dad reveals he's hated doing it for years and only did because he thought Owen loved it.
- Ad Lib: One of the show's constants as the actors often have to make up some jokes and dialogue to go with the surprise choices.
- Air-Vent Passageway: Subverted in "The Blair Crush Project", while thinking Owen's class pig is in the vents, Byron tries to go into the ceiling vent and proptly gets stuck hanging out of the ceiling. In a similar vein, Rachael gets stuck in the crawl space under the house while Owen gets stuck in the wall.
- Alien Among Us: The plot of one episode; it's even right there in the title.
- All Just a Dream: Most of "The Preventers Directive" was a hallucination done by a sick Owen. It was hinted at in the beginning when Byron mentioned the last time Owen ate bad food, he hallucinated.
- Alliterative Name: Blair Bennett. Also Byron Blatt.
- Almighty Mom: A wonderful twist when Gator has a huge fight with his mom and moves in with the family. Tired of his antics, Byron goes to confront Gator's mom with a speech to put her in her place...but thanks to the audience vote, she's being played by Tobie Windham's real mother with him obviously unable to keep from laughing and not wanting to say such insulting lines.
- The best part is Mrs. Windham just standing there with a smug smile as if daring her son to go ahead with the insults.
- Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Owen and Blair feel Rachel and Byron are this. The latters' attempts to prove they're not just make it worse.
- And You Were There: Happens at the end of All Just a Dream above.
- As Himself: In "A League of Their Owen" about a charity sporting event, three women Olympic Gold Medal winners appeared during the voted on scenes. Sanya Richards-Ross (track and field), Heather Mitts (Soccer), and Amanda Beard (swimming).
- Bait-and-Switch:
- Bryon and Rachel put together some "snail smoothies" for the kids to drink with Owen and Blair naturally freaking out about it. Just as the drinks about to be served, it's announced the adults have to drink the smoothies instead.
- The vote options end with what looks like a guy falling through the roof and that's that. Then Owen gets hit by bird poop as it turns out the audience vote was a tie.
- More than once, an actor is horrified to see what they think is their actual possessions (from Ramon Reed's desk and dresser to Tobie Windham's car) being destroyed but it turns out it was just a replica.
- The actors are forced to pick which of them will face a horrible "challenge" with Tobie Windham (having already voted for himself) the pick. He winces, preparing for something terrible and then told his "punishment" is...a free trip to Hawaii. He heads off, gloating as the other three actors are kicking themselves.
- Batman Gambit: In "Family Squabbles", DJ Dirty Dan's family is revealed to have pulled this on Owen and Blair, making them think he lost his job and gone broke so they can use their sincerity to win the game.
- Birthday Episode: "The Birthday War" for Owen and Blair.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Happens a lot as the actors react to the audience choices.
- Rachel yells "I just got cleaned" after a wild scene.
- Owen is put in a wild ninja-setting. When asked why he came to a ninja temple, he replies "the director told me to walk in here..."
- When Byron has a snake wrapped around his neck, Blair reads a card about the snake's history and how it's actually a protected species and "Me reading this out loud is the only way we can do this bit."
- At the end of "The Elevator", after saying that award shows are pointless, they agree that the award for best kids' show is the only one that counts, before looking into the camera as a graphic supporting the show to get nominated appears.
- Cannot Spit It Out: Blair admits that she and Rachel are never good about talking about their feelings with one another. This becomes an issue in "Career Day Catastrophe" when Rachel tries to tell Blair that she's jealous that Blair chose Owen to present at her school's career day over her, but couldn't get the words out.
- Captain Ersatz: One episode has Blair pass herself off as a Hannah Montana parody.
- Christmas Episode:
- "Merry Christmas, Mr. Gooch" in Season 1
- "The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year" in Season 2
- Cold Open: Each episode begins with a prologue of the cast welcoming the audience to the show and explaining the voting element.
- "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot:
- Blair is upset about Owen getting close to classmate Ruth, relating she and Ruth were once best friends but when Ruth moved a grade ahead, she stopped talking and Blair figured she dumped her as being too old. When the two finally talk, Ruth reveals she had assumed it was Blair who wanted to stop being friends and they realize that if they just talked to each other earlier, they could've still have been friends.
- The gang get themselves stuck in an elevator with Rachel, Owen and Blair each thinking they somehow contributed to it. In the end, Byron has to admit the elevator company had called him up hours ago to tell him the elevator was broken and not to be used but he was too busy admiring his new robot to pay attention.
- Continuity Nod: There were quite a few in the two part "The Preventers Directive".
- The robot from "The Elevator", Ungar from "The Karate Wars", the clown Lil' Pouty from ""The Big Sneak", and the toilet T.O.T from "Bringing Up Toilet" all made appearances.
- Kaylin was surprised when her mother was a part of the dunk tank surprise and commented that she had been a surprise before, which came in "Merry Christmas Mr. Gooch".
- Crazy-Prepared: As it's the studio audience who decides what happens in a scene, the producers and set people have to be ready for any outcome. Thus, in the behind the scenes videos during voting, the viewers can glimpse some of the unused concepts from a giant hamster wheel to a pack of pro wrestlers standing ready.
- A pack of designers were all set to redress a hallway to look like either a ninja temple, an Old West bar or a pirate tavern in minutes (the ninja temple won).
- Didn't Think This Through: Byron's radio partner, Gator, gets this a few times.
- When the family is trapped inside an elevator, Gator breaks in to help them out...with a cannon that fires a t-shirt. When that miserably fails, Gator admits he had no other plan.
- Gator decides to change the brackets at a karate tournament so Owen and Blair face each other in the finals.
Gator: This way, you have a one hundred percent chance of celebrating a kid winning!Rachel: But we also have a one hundred percent chance of the other kid sad that they lost!Gator: ...Okay, I think your math is off because that's two hundred percent... - Eat That: Some challenges include things like Blair making a sandwich with her feet for someone to eat, snail smoothies and Rachel and Byron blindfolded and having to feed each other at a restaurant.
- Enforced Method Acting: In-universe and how. The point of the show is how the cast is pushed into wild stunts and having to "just roll with it."
- Moments have included being sprayed with paint; drumming in paint as a full marching band walks in; dance-offs in an elevator whose walls keep closing in; fighting a sumo wrestler; and Rachel handcuffed to a security guard.
- The actor playing Owen had spent several days rehearsing a scene in the school hallway with a guy in a dog suit. When the altered scene begins, he finds he's now in a ninja temple.
Owen: This is not what we rehearsed Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday...- The Halloween episode has the actors playing Byron and Rachel confused when a creepy girl in a black dress keeps popping up right after they've sent her outside. They're literally screaming when it turns out it's a pair of twin sisters.
- Every Episode Ending: All episodes end with the cast saying goodbye and meeting up with some audience members for photos and autographs.
- Eskimos Aren't Real: At Halloween, Gator says he and his mom "always go as our favorite mythological creature: the horse."
- First-Name Basis: Owen and Blair call their respective stepparents by name instead of "Mom" or "Dad", respectively.
- Flat Joy: Student Norman always speaks in a flat monotone with characters noting how "wow, he's really fired up!"
- This has a great payoff when Norman is revealed as framing Ruth for vandalism. Standing up, Norman starts talking in his usual flat voice...and then erupts in a tirade attacking Owen and is dragged out screaming "I own this town!"
- Foregone Conclusion: When Rachel walks a tight rope over a pool of goo, everyone knows what's going to happen.Blair: Mom, just get to the good part and fall off!
- The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You: In the two-part Grand Finale, the audience votes to have the actors pelted with garbage, diapers, and other items. Then the audience gets hit by it too with the actors gloating they finally know how it feels.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: A few times.
- Blair puts together a disgusting meal for Byron on his radio show including live bugs and other gross items. At which point a "caller" suggests Byron prepare a meal for Blair with even grosser items.
Byron: I told you to be nice, now you gonna pay.- The adults prep a "snail smoothie" talking of how "it's good protein"...then learn they have to drink it.
Byron: I am now regretting every one of my taunts. - I Let You Win: In "Family Squabbles", Owen starts feeling bad for DJ Dirty Dan and his family when the children reveal he recently lost his job and they don't know how to live for themselves, so Owen insists to Blair that they throw the competition and let them win for the sake of it. Until it's revealed that Dirty Dan tricked them and he didn't lose his job at all, and he isn't a nice person as they thought.
- Insane Troll Logic: Owen has a tendency to take one tiny incident and blow it totally out of proportion. Such as how he thinks a lack of an invitation to a party will lead him to become a river-side hermit attacked by the FBI.Rachel: Owen! You're doing that thing that got us kicked off the airplane that one time again!
- Live Episode: The series does a one-hour Halloween special live which means instead of just the studio audience, the home viewers get to vote on things as well.
- Lovable Jock: Big Jim may be rather dumb but he's also very good-hearted. He goes out of his way to tell the school not to blame Owen for Jim failing a test as Owen prevented him from cheating and that's more important.
- Maintain the Lie: Gator asks Rachel and the kids to join him at his high school reunion as he's been bragging for years to classmates on being a rich guy with a family.
- Mood Whiplash: When Rachel is to be honored at a military ceremony, it looks like Blair's attempts to get out of it (like faking going to a friend's party) are just her embarrassed. But Blair confesses she hates hearing the story of her mom saving other soldiers because it's terrified her how close Rachel came to dying.
- My God, You Are Serious!: Tutoring basketball star Big Jim, Owen bursts out laughing at a high schooler asking "what are fractions?" He stops when he realizes how Big Jim has been given a pass on schoolwork for years due to his basketball skills.
- Also a common reaction of the actors to wild stuff such as the actress playing Blair informed she's being sent to Arizona or has to take care of a llama for a weekend.
- Noodle Incident: Rachel and Byron will both make mentions of stuff they've done from the former's military missions to the latter's wild stunts.
- No Fourth Wall: Considering the audience has a say in what goes on in parts of each episode, this is in effect, especially when the actors have to read their lines in the moment to lead to an unusual stunt.
- It was forced on Blair, or rather her actress Kaylin Hayman to take home the llama that Blair got as a pet in the episode. In fact, at the end, Blair's mother read that Kaylin would have to take the llama to her real life home for the weekend.
- Oh, No... Not Again!: For one audience vote, Owen has to open a set of lockers to reveal...the crazy lunch lady who dumped food all over him several episodes earlier. Owen openly moans "oh, no, not you again!"
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Mocked when Blair gets a new gig as would-be pop star Shayna Pennsylvania. All she does is wear a wig yet everyone treats her like a completely different person...except Owen, who's stunned no one else sees this is Blair.
- Owen lays out via a huge chart how Shayna and Blair are identical down to mole and light scar...and Byron and Rachel just shrug "not seeing it."
- Blair point-blank tells schoolmates she's Shayna, even putting on the wig...and they dismiss her as just a "wannabe" and try to find the "real" Shayna.
- What does convince Byron and Rachel? When "Shayna" does a "retirement video" and they recognize it's in Blair's room. Owen can only roll his eyes.
- Real After All: Blair is convinced the new next door neighbors are aliens and goes through various ridiculous "tests" on them. Later, Owen comes to apologize only for the daughter to speak in a weird voice on how they had come to offer Earth a chance to join a galactic government but now decide "you're all jerks" and teleport away in a flash of light. Owen just blinks and remarks that the heat wave must be getting to him.
- Rule of Three:
- The "audience vote" usually occurs three times an episode, sometimes more.
- Thanks to a hole in the roof, Owen has some bird poop fall oh him. He moves a few feet over and a larger pile of poop then falls. He then moves a few feet from there and a massive dump of poop falls on him.Rachel: That's a big hole.Byron: That's a big bird.
- Screams Like a Little Girl: It was revealed in "Lightning and Lockdown" that Owen screams this way when he hears thunder.
- Seeing Through Another's Eyes: In "Karate Wars IV: Dawn of the Karate Wars", the "Eyeball Swap Obstacle Course" that Blair and Owen participate in have them wear helmets with special cameras that see out the opposite wearer, so it would appear they're seeing through each other's eyes.
- Self-Serving Memory: Played with in "Before the Beginning" which relates how the family first met. While the events are what happened, Owen is thrown by how Byron has himself and Owen in outfits and hair from the early 1990s while Rachel and Blair are dressed like the '80s, despite how "this was only three years ago!"
- Signing Off Catchphrase: "And that's our show! You guys have been a great audience!"
- Shout-Out: "Gater's Reunion" has one to House where Owen pretends to be a child psychic to helps the FBI solve crimes.
- In "And Gator Makes Five" the obstacle course "School Time Zombie Apocalypse" from the first vote that Blair and Owen had to compete in was basically a live action version of Donkey Kong.
- Smelly Skunk: In "The Blair Crush Project", in the crawl space under the house, Rachael comes across a skunk (actually a realistic puppet that the actress at first thought was real) that ultimately sprayed her.
- Subverted Suspicion Aesop: In "Aliens Among Us", the family hears of aliens landing on Earth and meet the neighbors next door who act abnormal, suspecting they're the aliens. They try to gain proof, but it all ends up upsetting and insulting them to the point they have to leave, and Owen is forced to apologize. But then it turns out the neighbors are aliens all along, and retreat for their ship.
- Swapped Roles: This was the premise of "The Great Switchy Witchy" where the kids and parents swapped places.
- Third-Person Person: Big Jim is this but everyone just accepts it.
- This Is Gonna Suck: A constant reaction of the cast when they realize what wild stunt they have to perform.
- Even a guest star playing Rachel's old army buddy gets it as he mutters "oh, brother" when he reads the stage direction on how he has to put on goggles after a vote.
Byron: Nothing good ever happens with goggles.- Kaylin Hayman is horrified to realize a challenge will involve dunking her real-life mother in a tank.
Blair: Mom, I apologize in advance, please don't ground me. - Title Drop: In "Just Reminisce With It!", after entering a scene she wasn't ready for, Rachel says (or rather, her actress ad-libs) "I just roll with it."
- Unwinnable by Design:
- On a game show, the family have to spin a wheel containing donuts, several of which are packed with disgusting flavors. Each one hopes they get the "good" donut in a spin. It's after each has consumed a horrible treat that they're informed there was no "good" donut at all.
- Blair has to take part in a "high stakes water gun race" against a sinister gang boss. The real-life mothers of the two actors are placed above water tanks and Kaylin Hayman's mother ends up dunked when she loses. When the actor playing the gang boss remarks "we've been having trouble with the tanks," his mother also gets dunked with both actors apologizing profusely.
- The Walls Are Closing In: When they were trapped in an elevator, the audience voted for them to do a dance floor game. After Blair finished, it was revealed that failure to succeed was for the elevator walls to close in, much to the surprise of all involved.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: In the end of the second act of "Merry Christmas, Mr. Gooch" a vote decided results in Blair being punished by Mr. Gooch for disrupting him by being sent all the way to Tuscon. After she is hustled out the door, she does not appear for the rest of the show, aside for a brief epilogue of her arriving there.
- What the Hell, Hero?: After Owen and Blair manage to not only stop their respective grandparents from fighting with each other, the two grandparents start to fall in love. This disturbs Rachel and Byron and they try to break up their parents. Owen then calls them out on this, especially his father Owen mentioned his grandmother had never been happier since her husband's death. this causes Rachel and Byron to realize they were horrible to their parents.
- And that's our show! See you next time on "Just Roll With It"! Bye-bye!
