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Sit Down, Shut Up was a short-lived animated series that first aired on Fox as part of their Sunday night animation block, premiering April 19, 2009. It is based on a sitcom of the same name from Australia, which was cancelled after 1 season.

The show is about a group of oddball, misfit teachers. It follows the many misadventures they have during their work day. It uses animation superimposed on live-action background shots (similar to what The Amazing World of Gumball would do a scant two years later).

The show is created by the same people behind Arrested Development. Josh Weinstein, a creative talent for a number of years behind The Simpsons as well as his own short-lived show, Mission Hill is also involved. Many talents from Arrested Development are involved in the show as well, including many of the voice actors. When it first premiered, the pilot received mainly negative reviews from national critics. Subsequent episodes were received similarly, with its rating dropping as well. Eventually, because of its poor reception and ratings, it was canceled from airing on Fox prime-time after four episodes. The rest of the episodes (along with the four episodes from primetime) aired at midnight (eastern standard time) on FOX in the months after the network cancelled MADtv and needed filler to air while waiting for the premiere of The Wanda Sykes Show. Eventually, Fox stopped airing the reruns at midnight in favor of reruns from the canceled live-action sitcom Brothers. Sit Down Shut Up aired on Comedy Central from May 2010 to July 2010, with the episodes "Pilot" and "High School Confidential" banned for reasons unknown (most likely content, even though Comedy Central has aired worse adult animated shows than this).

From November 2014 to January 2015, the show reran on Cartoon Network's [adult swim] line-up on Sunday nights at 8:00pm EST, bumping the back-to-back episodes of King of the Hill to 8:30pm and 9:00pm.


Tropes:

  • Acquired Situational Narcissism: Willard briefly becomes a dictator when most of the town is trapped in the school during a hurricane, and almost leads everyone to their deaths because he loves the power so much he'd rather die than give it up. He redeems himself in the end by going out into the flooded streets to save Miracle's baby.
  • Activist-Fundamentalist Antics: Miracle: "Look Larry, I'm idealistic, ok? I believe in doing things that're unrealistic, or have no effect. That's who I am."
  • Actor Allusion:
    • On the episode "Hurricane Willard," one of the pictures on Willard's enemy chart is Fonzie, the Happy Days character made famous by Willard's voice actor, Henry Winkler.
    • An anti-drug poster in the hallway also depicted Fonzie, and Willard insisted "it's still relevant".
    • After hearing Miracle sing, Andrew says that Miracle sounds like Kristen Chenoweth from Wicked, as Miracle's voice actress played Galinda. Of course she's never heard of the play.
  • Animated Adaptation: It's an animated adaptation of an equally short-lived and obscure Australian series, though there are a few...complications.
  • As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Whatever it is that Happy speaks, although he speaks perfect English in the last couple episodes.
  • Barefoot Loon: Miracle is a lighthearted version of this trope: ditzy, New-Agey, and perpetually barefoot.
  • Black Bead Eyes: All extras (including every single student) are drawn this way in contrast to the main characters.
  • Breakfast Club: Parodied on "Back in Time", along with other 80's movie cliches.
  • Body Horror: Willard's health issues; among other things, he needs medication just to keep his kidneys inside his body.
  • Boob-Based Gag: From Stuart of all people (after he took Helen's estrogen medication, believing they were steroids and when he was pretending to be his own sister), which are quite bouncy.
  • Butt-Monkey: Willard Deutschebog, to almost uncomfortable levels. At one point, he was reduced to living inside the school bell, and considered this an upgrade.
  • Catholic School Girls Rule: Miracle is dressed like one when she goes back to high school.
  • Catchphrase: Strangely parodied. ("I need a catch phrase!")
  • Clip Show: Used in the fourth episode.
  • Cloud Cuckoolander: Every faculty and staff member except Sue Sezno and Larry Littlejunk.
  • Cold Opening: In every episode.
  • Comically Missing the Point: "I was the 'Whoop-de-do Kid'." -gasp- "You were a kid?"
  • Companion Cube: Ennis and the raffle ball cage in "Miracles Are Real." He later gets it on with some windshield wipers in "High School Confidential."
    • Helen and any of her various partners. She actually prefers the company of objects or robots, probably because they can't judge her.
  • Department of Redundancy Department: When the staff do a (bad) interpretation of High School Musical the sign outside on opening night refers to it as a musical three times, so it reads "High School Musical: The Musical (A Musical)".
  • Drugs Are Bad: The school tried to send this message in one episode by making an anti-drug special, but not only did this fail, Larry ended up in a turf war with a high-voiced drug lord named Sweetie Pie.
  • Dysfunction Junction: Just about the entire school faculty and student body are completely incompetent.
  • Embarrassing Last Name: Larry's last name is "Littlejunk". He tries to insist on being called "Larry L".
  • Fight Clubbing: The Pillow Fight Club. Except, the first rule is actually about proper pillow stuffings. When Sue says she thought the first rule was not to talk about Pillow Fight Club, Miracle chastises her with, "Then how are we having this conversation? Think, Sue."
  • Fun with Subtitles: The translator whenever Happy talks.
  • Girlish Pigtails: Miracle has these in a flashback to her high school days. She wears them again when she has to actually go through high school, and again in Pillow Fight Club.
  • GIS Syndrome: All locations in the show are live-action.
  • G-Rated Drug: Heart attacks, if you can believe it. Willard has a massive heart attack after a huge binge on candy, and has an amazing near-death experience, which sounds so incredible all the kids at the school want to have one too and begin overeating. While this is bad enough, the heart attack craze coincides with the Florida public school fitness tests which Larry desperatly wants them to pass.
  • Have I Mentioned I Am Sexually Active Today?: Ennis is pretty obsessed with reminding people of his sexual prowess and even boasting to his class in one episode about a weekend in which he nailed three women. In truth, he does get around but they're not exactly prizes. One of his weekend sexual partners was Miracle's elderly mother.
  • Hippie Teacher: Miracle Grohe. Subverted in that she's a Conservative Christian, or at least a parody of one.
  • Hot for Teacher: When Miracle goes back to high school to finally graduate, she and Larry are caught kissing.
    • The Whoop-De-Do Kid Willard Deutschebog in his youth also counts.
  • Leaning on the Fourth Wall: A lot in "High School Musical Musical", but they actually do this more often than not.
  • Limited Animation: There's hardly any background animation at all.
  • Limited Wardrobe: Every single character appears mainly wearing the same outfit.
  • The Long List: Larry's list of dying career fields in "H.S. Confidential". As this was written during the financial crisis of 2008, Larry concludes that the only careers with any future were "Sharecropper" or "butt wiper".
  • Meaningful Name: Andrew LeGustambos is a reference to his pansexuality. It translates in Spanish to "He likes both."
  • Monster Clown: Or in this case, Prison Clown. Stuart Proszackian was a clown who entertained at prisons before he was hired as an assistant principal. He demonstrated this in episode two, where in order to cheer up Larry he appears in a prison-striped clown outfit and sings "Someone Sent You A Prison Clown."
  • Noodle Incident: Naked Miracle and the Papier Mache Monkey in the Flashback that was never shown due to content issues.
  • Porn Stache: Ennis wears one in his dating class advertisement.
  • Really Gets Around: Ennis isn't exactly picky when it comes to women. During the hurricane episode, he says he's going to "go trolling for grandmas".
  • Snap Back: Certain things happening in one episode, like Willard losing his job or being evicted from his apartment, are never mentioned in later episodes.
  • Strawman Political: Miracle manages to be this of both the hippie and Christian evangelicals.
  • Suspiciously Specific Denial: Sue is not up to no good at the school's auto shop.
  • Ultimate Job Security: Miracle is supposed to be a science teacher, yet she knows very little about science.
  • Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: The whole cast. Given that it's a typical adult cartoon on Fox, it's to be expected.
  • Unusual Euphemism: Miracle's breast are refer to as the possessive "Miracle's Are Real".
    • In the same episode, however, Ennis did refer to them as "chesticles" and "sweater puppies".
  • Vomit Discretion Shot: In "Math Lab" the meth addicts were getting nauseous and just when they were about to blow chunks, the scene suddenly cuts to the main cast changing into a different clothes. Larry, hoping to show the world a negative effects of drugs, yells "wait, they cut that!?", Stuart proclaimed that it was "really gross".
    • They didn't vomit because of meth. It was because they ate the spoiled food Miracle and Willard prepared.
  • Victoria's Secret Compartment: Miracle's storage space for the student starvation drive.
    • As well as Sue's for the Willard Death Pool and her raffle ticket.

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