YMMV / One Tree Hill

• Actor Shipping:
  • A contingent of fans shipped Chad Michael Murray and Sophia Bush, largely because of their former real life relationship. Considering these fans were usually Brucas fans shipping their characters, Chad gets a lot of flack from some of the shippers, with them blaming his divorcing Sophia for the end of Brucas sometime later.
  • A number of fans shipped Chad Michael Murray and Hilarie Burton. It's helped by the fact that Burton refers to Murray as her BFF.
  • Whilst not necessarily shipping them, a number of fans have commented that it's somewhat sad that James Lafferty and Bethany Joy Lenz aren't closer, considering their characters close relationship.
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Nathan trying to kill himself - Is he a selfish jackass doing it because he can't play basketball, or is he doing it out of fear that he's going to become a Generation Xerox of Dan?
  • Is Dan Scott genuinely trying to atone for his mistakes, or just doing it for a quick buck? Or is it a little bit of both?
  • Sophia Bush stated on the Drama Queens podcast that her interpretation was that Brooke lost her virginity to Lucas, and was merely putting on a front to appear more experienced.
• Angst? What Angst?: Peyton nearly dying after being shot in the leg during the school shooting. Whilst she does show distress whilst it’s going on, she doesn’t show any signs of PTSD afterwards.
• Arc Fatigue:
  • The (painfully) long-running Peyton/Lucas/Brooke love triangle. See Romantic Plot Tumor below.
  • Nathan and Haley’s reunion in Season 3 finally happens in the mid-season finale, and is then followed by four episodes where they effectively repeat the same story beats of Haley having reason to question their decision to get back together before Nathan wins her over again - meaning there are five consecutive episodes which end on a Naley reconciliation.
  • The Lindsey/Lucas/Peyton Love Triangle in Season 5 lasts the entire season, even though the audience regarded Lucas and Peyton's reunion as a Foregone Conclusion from the moment their break-up was revealed.
• Audience-Alienating Era:
  • Season 2 can be considered this, thanks to a number of reasons - the new characters Felix and Anna getting a divisive reaction amongst the fandom, the season ending by hitting a Reset Button on Lucas and Nathan's relationship, the Brooke/Lucas/Peyton love triangle being ignored until the final episodes of the season, Lucas and Peyton barely having any screentime together period, Lucas suddenly becoming truly interested in Brooke out of nowhere in the second half of the season, and Haley being absent for a large part of the season.
  • The final three seasons of the show, as noted elsewhere on this page.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Peyton. A lot of the fanbase loves her, while some despise her... Though almost all her haters are die hard Brucas fans who in fact hate her basically just because Lucas always chose her over Brooke, so…
  • Lucas. Some fans found him The Heart of the show and missed him after he left, while others were sick and tired of his having love troubles every season and of his love life being a complete mess in general.
  • Anna Taggaro and big brother Felix were initially disliked for serving as new love interests for Lucas and Brooke, with the hatred for Felix intensifying as he went from merely being smug to a homophobic bully. Whilst Anna does have some fans for the being sole LGBTQ representation on the show, and a rare positive example of such a character in the early 2000s (and one of the first examples of a non-white LGBTQ character), some of the audience didn’t take to the character with a common criticism being Anna’s behavior when Peyton is subjected to homophobic abuse because of Anna’s crush on her and a perceived lack of depth beyond her sexuality.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Jamie and Gavin DeGraw playing "I Don't Wanna Be" at the start of the Season 5 finale. Cute? Yep. Does it make any sense, and is it referred to afterwards? Nope.
• Bizarro Episode:
  • "Lifetime Piling Up" from Season 2, in which a comatose Nathan dreams of how things could have been if Lucas was raised by Dan instead of him.
  • "We Three (My Echo, My Shadow and Me)" from Season 6, in which Tree Hill is reimagined in a 1940s Film Noir setting.
• Catharsis Factor: The opening scene of 5x13, in which Lucas and Nathan finally attack Dan after a lifetime of neglect and abuse, and Keith’s murder. Especially if one was worried that Dan’s role in bringing Jamie home after his abduction would lead to him being Easily Forgiven.
• Common Knowledge:
  • The reason for the Scott family's mismatched hair colors^note Lucas being the son of the brunette Dan and Karen, rather than Dan's son with Deb, another blonde is because Chad Michael Murray and James Lafferty initially auditioned for each other's roles. Whilst it is true that Chad was initially offered the role of Nathan and instead asked to play Lucas, James never read for Lucas and Barbara Alyn Woods wasn't cast as Deb until after the series was picked up and several episodes into production.
  • The belief amongst their fans that Brooke and Lucas weren’t endgame because of the real life divorce of Chad Michael Murray and Sophia Bush, the actors who play the characters. No-one involved with the production has ever confirmed this as the reason for Brooke and Lucas' relationship ending, and putting the timeline of the production alongside the timeline of the divorce shows that Season 3 was several episodes into production before Bush and Murray officially announced their separation, so, if this was the actual cause of their in-universe break-up, the production could have had time enough to abort the Brucas storylines immediately entering the second half of the season, instead of holding off until the beginning of season 4. Besides, Word of God repeatedly stated that it was always meant to be Lucas and Peyton.
  • Lucas becoming a published author in the 4 year Time Skip between Seasons 4 and 5 is commonly elevated to Lucas becoming a best-selling author by the fandom. This is in spite of there being no indication within the show itself as to how successful "An Unkindness of Ravens" actually was, and the Season 5 DVD featuring interviews stating that the intent is that Lucas is simply a new voice generating buzz in the industry. This is further mitigated by "The Comet" being a commercial failure following its release.
  • The perception that every member of a friend group from a small North Carolina town became ridiculously rich and famous - most of the group have some sort of mitigating factor^note There is no indication as to how successful Lucas and Haley actually are; Peyton's independent record label only has one successful artist on the books; and whilst Nathan eventually makes it to the NBA, he plays for one of the worst franchises in NBA history and ultimately retires after his first full season due to the back injury that derailed his career in the first place. with the perception largely arising from Brooke's success in the fashion world.
• Condemned by History: Upon first airing, Season 9 was considered a Surprisingly Improved Sequel when compared to its immediate predecessor, and a fitting final season to the show. As time has gone on, whilst still considered a Surprisingly Improved Sequel to the two prior season, a consensus has developed that the season relies too heavily on the melodrama of Clay's amnesia storyline, Xavier returning to stalk Brooke and Julian, and Nathan being held hostage by Eastern European assaassins, and that the Nathan and Clay storylines feel too absurd when held next to the rest of the series. With that being said, fans are generally receptive to Chad Michael Murray making a final appearance as Lucas during the season, and the season (and series) is considered to end on a high note with the final three episodes - two of which are commonly found on lists compiling the best episodes of the series.
• Creator's Pet:
  • Alex Dupre, who actually hijacked another character's plot in Season 8 after Jana Kramer decided to launch a music career, and the producers decided that Alex was now also a singer, in addition to being an actress and model.
  • Jamie was considered cute and adorable in the beginning, but some fans started getting tired of him especially since he seemed to get more and more screen time, even more than his parents and because he acted way too smart for a kid his age, with Nathan and Haley treating him more like a young adult then a kid. However to be fair, Jamie getting more screen time was a case of Real Life Writes the Plot, due to Bethany Joy Lenz being pregnant and going on maternity leave during the later episodes of Season 8, and James Lafferty only signing up to appear in half of Season 9.
• Critical Dissonance:
  • While it did receive positive reviews, especially for a teen drama, it's a lot more popular with audiences than critics. The best way to explain it would be that the critics felt it was "good for what it was" while audiences liked it period.
  • Season two is the highest rated of all the seasons as far as viewership goes thanks to the show becoming a hit during its first season: despite this, most of the fandom considers it to be the weakest amongst the first six.
• Designated Hero:
  • Lucas for much of the first two seasons.
    • During season 1, he actively pursues Peyton until Brooke wins him over, before cheating on Brooke with Peyton and essentially wrecking their friendship, before further complicating things when goes on to sleep with another girl around the same time - this is either intentional or lampshaded, as it's pointed out by various characters that Lucas had Took a Level in Jerkass since joining the Tree Hill Ravens.
    • Then the following season, he goes on to abandon his loving mother in her time of need to move in with the asshole father who abandoned him (Albeit because Dan's blackmailing him into doing so), doesn't tell his Uncle (and surrogate father figure) that the aforementioned asshole father had hired a prostitute to seduce him and break his heart, and in the process of trying to find something to ruin Dan, manages to ruin the relationship he'd developed with his half-brother since the start of the series.
• Die for Our Ship:
  • Peyton for Brucas fans. She may be easily the poster girl for this trope.
  • Similarly Brooke for some Leyton fans. Though it was much more evident before season 6; after that Leyton fans have simply resorted to remarking "We won. Sincerely, Team Leyton" rather than getting into an argument on the matter.
  • Lucas for Jake/Peyton fans.
  • Similarly Jake for Leyton fans.
  • Lindsey for both Leyton and Brucas fans.
  • Julian for Brucas fans.
  • Intentionally invoked with Chris Keller - Some fans initially liked him, thinking he was there to be Peyton's new love interest, until they realized he was there to cause problems for Nathan and Haley, at which point this happened. The show would later invert this situation with Julian, by introducing him in a way that made it appear he was there to cause problems for Lucas and Peyton, before revealing he was there as Brooke's new love interest, at which point he became very loved.
• Draco in Leather Pants:
  • Brooke in Season 1 - whilst not an outright villain, Brooke is easily at her most antagonistic over the course of the first season. Despite this, Brooke quickly became a popular character and thus was retooled into a more sympathetic character the following season.
  • Dan Scott. In spite of all the crap he does over the course of the first four seasons, you can still find fans who felt Lucas wasn't justified in not forgiving Dan for killing Keith - and in some cases, he's treated as outright being wrong for not doing so.
  • After it was revealed that Ian Kellerman was the driver who nearly killed Jamie and Brooke in episode 8x11, you could still find fans arguing their innocence and that the in-universe cover-up was the actual truth of the events. Just to be clear, it's not even a case of just the evidence pointing to them, but rather the guilty party outright admitting to their involvement when confronted about it.
• Ending Fatigue: For some, the Grand Finale - Gavin DeGraw performs "I Don't Wanna Be" at Tric's 10th Anniversary show, with the Season 9 cast in the crowd singing along, interspersed with shots of the group (And their children) hanging out at Karen's Cafe after hours. Then the final Time Skip occurs, with the cast attending a Ravens basketball game and repeating the closing monologue from episode 5x13, over shots of them standing and cheering as the Ravens come out on to the court.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Brooke Davis. Initially introduced in the second episode of the series to be a female friend for Peyton and serve as an antagonist, Brooke became such a popular character that the following season saw her undergo a significant amount of character development and receive a more fleshed out backstory.
  • Mouth, Skills and Millicent all started out as minor roles, before becoming more fleshed out and bumped up to series regular status.
• Fan Fic Fuel:
  • The summer between seasons 2 and 3, where Lucas and Peyton are left alone all summer. It was a fairly prominent setting for Leyton fanfics prior to the four year time skip.
  • The four year time skip between seasons 4 and 5. It's probably the most prominent setting for One Tree Hill fan fiction, largely because the viewer only gets a handful of details as to what happened in that time period.
• Fan-Preferred Couple:
  • The Official Couples are Lucas/Peyton and Brooke/Julian but there are fans who prefer Lucas/Brooke and Jake/Peyton.
  • Clay/Sara also count. A lot of people prefer them to Clay/Quinn. But then, Sara is a Post Humous Character...
• Fanon: The location of Tree Hill generally seems to agreed upon by the fandom as around half an hour away from Wilmington, the real location used for the setting.
• Fanon Discontinuity:
  • A number of fans consider the Season 6 finale as the real series’ Grand Finale due to it wrapping up the story arcs of all the characters almost perfectly, with everyone getting their fair Happy Ending - and, for part of the fandom, because of it being the final episode featuring main cast members Chad Michael Murray and Hilarie Burton as Lucas and Peyton, with those fans arguing that the show wasn’t the same (And arguably made no sense) without them.
  • A much smaller minority feel that the appropriate Grand Finale should have even been the season 4 finale, which featured the main characters’ graduation from high school and wrapped up all the major story arcs of the first four seasons. In reality, the following Retool made in season 5 with the 4-year Time Skip was precisely planned in order to wrap things up in the much more complete and satisfying way they did in season 6.
• First Installment Wins: Despite accounting for less than half of the show's run, the show is best remembered for the high school centered seasons in the first half of the show.
• Fridge Brilliance:
  • Nathan wears #23 for the Ravens - the same number famously worn by Michael Jordan during his NBA career. With Dan using Nathan's basketball career to vicariously relive his glory days of playing for the Ravens, it may seem odd that Nathan doesn't wear his father's number. However, with Dan's #33 off the table due to the Ravens retiring the number, it makes sense that Nathan would wear Jordan's number instead.
  • Dan's transplant heart being eaten by a dog. Karma's a bitch.
  • The first episode of season 3 uses the the season 2 opening titles. The episode jumps ahead 3 months after the title sequence, but before that? Still at the time of the second season finale, so the use of those opening titles makes sense.
  • Why was Nathan the only member of the Ravens side that won the State Championship who had his number retired? Whilst Lucas was co-captain with Nathan, and both he and Skills were considered instrumental in the Ravens' winning the championship, Lucas left the team before the post-season began and Skills only joined the team at that point, with Skills taking Lucas' original number and Lucas taking a new number upon his return - whilst both Skills and Lucas were important in the Ravens winning the championship, Nathan was the only one of the three to be part of the team all season.
  • The music video for "The Mixed Tape" by Jack's Mannequin features Hilarie Burton reprising her role of Peyton Sawyer, and explains away the removal of her "Where Are They Now?" gallery from above her bed. The only problem is that the video teases a relationship between Peyton and singer Andrew McMahon - unless you don't look at the video as being set in the OTH universe, but rather it's a music video within the One Tree Hill universe itself and and Peyton's playing the love interest.
  • Why was Jimmy Edwards missing from the retelling of the pilot's events seen in "Lifetime Piling Up"? It was Nathan's dream, and Jimmy lost touch with Lucas and the rest of the River Court guys between Lucas joining the basketball team and Nathan befriending the guys himself - Even if Nathan doesn't remember that Mouth and Jimmy "announced" the one-on-one game between Lucas and Nathan, it's not unlikely that Mouth mentioned his commentary to Nathan afterwards.
  • During the second episode of the series, Peyton tells Lucas that she wants to draw a moment of clarity; during the fifth season, it’s made clear that in his novel, Lucas described the aftermath of the State Championship game as the moment of clarity when he realized he was in love with Peyton. As she puts together a time capsule in the following season, Peyton draws that same moment - finally drawing a moment of clarity.
• Fridge Logic: In early season 4, Brooke accuses Rachel of trying to seduce Lucas when he was her boyfriend. Whilst Rachel did try to seduce Lucas, he wasn't technically Brooke's boyfriend at the time due to her insistence on a non-exclusive dating arrangement; this also raises the issue that, if Brooke did consider Lucas to be her boyfriend at the time, it would mean that when she slept with Chris Keller she was actually cheating on him - something that makes her treatment of Peyton at the time much worse and her look way more hypocrite.
• Growing the Beard: Seasons 5 and 6 could be seen as this due to the massive Retool due to the 4 year Time Skip.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • Certain elements of the series (The Psycho Derek storyline and the sexualisation of the female characters, for example) can be much harder for viewers to watch in light of the revelation that series creator and showrunner Mark Schwahn sexually harrassed and assaulted numerous female members of the cast and crew during the show's nine season run.
  • Lucas giving Julian relationship advice about Brooke in "Searching For A Former Clarity" is this when you realise Chad Michael Murray (Lucas) divorced Sophia Bush (Brooke) and she had since begun a relationship with Austin Nichols (Julian) in real life. Before the show ended, this could be seen as Hilarious in Hindsight; however, after the end of the final season it was anounced that Bush had split up with Nichols and moved the scene fuller into this trope.
  • The jokes about Chuck's mom being an alcoholic became this when Season 9 revealed that Chuck's father abuses the two of them. No wonder she turned to alcohol.
  • Haley joking about wanting to keep Jamie small forever when he turns 7 years old in the Season 7 premiere isn’t as funny with the knowledge that Jamie’s actor Jackson Brundage only grew up to be 5 foot 1 inch tall.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • In the pilot, Nathan informs Peyton that if Lucas wins their one-on-one at the River Court, he gets Peyton. Lucas wins the game, and ends up marrying Peyton.
  • In the second episode of the series, Peyton chastises Lucas for looking through her art by saying she doesn't read his diary, which he protests he doesn't have. Come Season 4, it's revealed that Lucas is in the midst of writing a novel about his life growing up in Tree Hill, and Peyton's the one of the first people he lets read it.
  • Lydia, Haley's mom, assuming that Haley is pregnant when Haley comes to talk to her and her dad about getting married to Nathan. She wasn't pregnant then, but in Season 4...
  • "The whole point of Friends with Benefits is there's No Strings Attached"
  • This scene from Dawson's Creek.
  • The opening scene of third season "Locked Hearts and Hand Grenades" features Lucas having a dream, within a dream that Haley was having, which was itself a dream Nathan was having. Come 2010, Inception made the idea of a "dreams within a dreams" into a meme.
  • The Les Yay subtext with Peyton and Brooke, plus Anna kissing Peyton, after Hilarie Burton played a lesbian on both Grey's Anatomy and Little Britain USA.
  • The O.C. debuted the same season as One Tree Hill, and ended after four seasons. In it's series finale, Show Within a Show The Valley was stated to have been renewed for additional 5 seasons - the same number of seasons that One Tree Hill ran after it's rival show was cancelled.
  • The WB/UPN merger into The CW happened during production of the show's third season. At the time, there was much debate over which shows would survive the merger, with Mark Schwahn noting on a DVD commentary track that one analyst made the comment "When was the last time One Tree Hill had an episode about something that mattered?". The episode in production at the time news of the merger broke was 3x16, the school shooting episode.
  • Late in the third season, Lucas reveals that since professional basketball was out of the question, his dream was now to become a published author and wound up doing so in the 4 year time skip after season 4. Lucas' actor Chad Michael Murray wrote the graphic novel Everlast, which was published in 2013, and co-authored the novel American Drifter: An Exhilarating Tale of Love and Murder, which was released in 2017.
    • The fact that Bryan Greenberg (Jake Jagielski) starred in October Road, which was about a man returning home & dealing with the ramifications of writing a bestselling novel about his friends & family.
    • Hilarie Burton published The Rural Diaries, her memoir covering her life after leaving One Tree Hill.
  • This dialogue, from Lucas and Peyton's wedding in episode 6x23, considering that Brucas shippers are still arguing their case over the Brucas vs. Leyton shipping war years after the show conclusively ended it.
    Brooke: I am SO pissed right now, that whore stole my man!
    Haley: Okay, but it's their wedding day so don't you think it's time you let it go?
  • Ashley Rickards and Evan Peters played troubled teenagers Samantha and Jack during the show's sixth season. Peters would go on to greater fame when he took the role of Quicksilver, the mutant speedster in the X-Men Film Series, whilst Rickards go on to serve as enemy of a different speedster in The Flash (2014).
  • In season 5, Jamie is shown beating Skills at an NBA video game because he just keeps shooting threes, which in turn prompts Lucas & Skills to employ a similar strategy with the Ravens. In the years following the conclusion of the series, the NBA would see several teams utilising play styles that heavily relied upon shooting threes - most notably, the Golden State Warriors, who won multiple championships in that manner.
  • In the fifth season, a subplot in one episode features Skills and Jamie buying Rock Band to play at Lucas’ bachelor party. In February 2018, the show’s Real Song Theme Tune was added to the franchise as DLC.
• Ho Yay: Enough to have it's own page.
• Hollywood Homely: At her introduction in Season 5, Millicent Huxtable is made out to be a complete Plain Jane who guys never really looked at, until she met Mouth. Millie is actually very beautiful, but apparently no guy could see it because wearing glasses somehow makes you invisible to every guy except Mouth - an idea taken to absurd lengths when Millie becomes a model in Season 7, after ditching her glasses.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Dan has his moments, especially in the later half of the series.
  • Marcus, the (non-recurring) male student who's held in the Tutor Centre during the school shooting. He continues to antagonise Jimmy throughout the situation, to the point that Skills knocks him out at one point. The penultimate episode of the season reveals that Marcus dropped out of school, because he wasn't able to handle being back there.
• Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Brooke. In addition to Lucas and Julian, her two major love interests from the show, she's also shipped with Nathan, Haley, Chase, Skills, Mouth, Tim, Owen, Jake, Chris, Clay, Rachel, Peyton and Dr. Copeland.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Brooke(ing) Yourself ^ExplanationWhilst on a trip to a cabin in the woods, Rachel walks in on Brooke pleasuring herself, and proceeds to describe the act as "Brooke-ing". Whilst the intent seems to be substituting the name of the person performing the action - as Brooke later says "I 'Haley' myself from time to time" whilst impersonating Haley - Brooke’s name is the commonly used substitution by the fandom due to the fact it sounds most like a Precision F-Strike.
• Moral Event Horizon: One of the clearest cases in any media. Dan Scott - all around Jerkass, bad father, and Corrupt Corporate Executive, but nothing too bad. Until he kills Keith - his own brother - in cold blood, pins the murder on Jimmy Edwards, and uses Keith's death to worm his way back into Lucas and Karen's lives.
• Narm:
  • During Season 2, Lucas briefly dates Anna and breaks things off with her by telling her that whilst he likes her, there's someone that he's been lying to himself about in regards to how he feels about her and that she's currently slipping away. At the same time this is happening, Peyton is in the midst of a downward spiral and had earlier snapped at Lucas over being a bad friend, so one would assume he was referring to her. Nope, he was talking about Brooke, whose big drama causing Lucas to feel like she was slipping away was... dating Felix.
  • When Lucas confronts Nathan about potentially throwing the State Championship final and starts naming the people this is going to affect, he mentions Mouth, alongside Whitey (Who's about to retire) and Skills (Who's relying on the State Championship win for a college scholarship), despite Mouth not even being part of the Ravens team in any way and thus not affected by the loss.
  • Haley naming her first born with her maiden name? Well, it works as James is a very common name and it's also her father's first name. Peyton and Brooke doing the same thing just comes off as awkward.
  • The infamous "dog-eating-the-transplant-heart" scene. The music tells us it's supposed to be sad, but it really looks like a scene out of a comedy like Scrubs.
  • Clay and Quinn happily frolicking on a beach whilst in purgatory at the start of Season 8 after being shot and left for dead for dead by Katie, Clay's psycho stalker who looks like his late wife. Not helped by Clay and Quinn being found hours later by Haley and surviving despite the blood loss; whilst Keith and Quentin both die instantly from a single gunshot wound, and Peyton nearly dies from blood loss after being shot in the leg and having to wait close to an hour before receiving medical attention.
• One-Scene Wonder: One major complaint on Lucas's return in season 9 was his scenes being limited to the airport and that his only interactions were with Haley, Jamie, baby Lydia and Quinn.
• Paranoia Fuel:
  • In 3x16 when Jimmy Edwards has everyone in the tutoring center held hostage, he warns them not to try to escape lest the "others" get them, the kids dismiss and Jimmy asks how they can all be sure there won't be others like him who were ignored or picked on. Considering none of the kids try to dissuade him, it's clear they are worried about someone else like Jimmy doing the same thing again one day. Hell the entirety of 3x16 is Paranoia Fuel incarnate, with a seemingly normal high-school day suddenly turning into an intense hostage situation with no warning, the fact that school shootings got even worse after the episode aired only makes it even harder to watch nowadays.
  • In the second season finale, Peyton receives some creepy emails from someone with the screen name WATCHMEWATCHYOU, leading to Peyton uninstalling her webcam. The implication at the time was that it was Ellie, the woman who had lied about needing to interview Peyton for a piece in Rolling Stone about Tric. Then that same screen name messages Peyton at the start of the fourth season, months after Ellie’s death, and is ultimately revealed to belong to Psycho Derek.
  • The Reveal that Psycho Derek faked the phone call to Peyton saying that her stalker had been arrested, and that he’d spent the intervening time stalking her from the shadows.
  • Nanny Carrie - You let someone into your home, trust them with caring for your 4 year old whilst you’re at work and your husband recovers from the injury that ended his career, only for her to try and seduce your husband. And when that doesn’t work, outright abduct your son.
    • And when that doesn’t work, Carrie resorts to stalking the Scott family and abducting and torturing Dan, using his heart condition to lure Haley and Jamie to a remote hospice before attempting to kill Haley and abduct Jamie, and is only stopped because Deb happened to find a picture of Carrie in the Scott house and realized what was going on in time. It gets even worse from Nathan’s perspective as he’s out of state when Haley takes Jamie to visit Dan, and only learns about what happened after the fact.
• Periphery Demographic: The show has a surprisingly high number of fans outside of its target audience, many of whom aren't usually into works of its type. Name a group, and chances are at least a couple people in it like the show. Sophia Bush even stated in an interview that she's had people as old as their 70s recognize her as Brooke Davis on the street.
• Portmanteau Couple Name:
  • Dear God, so many. The first was arguably Naley, for Nathan/Haley, which has actually been referenced in the show. Others include: Leyton (Lucas/Peyton), Brucas (Brooke/Lucas), Jeyton (Jake/Peyton), Brulian (Brooke/Julian), etc.
  • Naley and Brulian have also been name-dropped on the show.
  • Peyton/Lucas sometimes go by Pucas by people who ship Brooke/Lucas.
• Replacement Scrappy: Clay and Quinn for Lucas and Peyton. Not helped by both characters being a pastiche of various characteristics that Lucas and Peyton had.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap:
  • Whilst she doesn't really count as The Scrappy, Brooke Davis post-Time Skip is treated a lot better by Leyton fans than she was before that, largely due to her becoming a Shipper on Deck for Peyton and Lucas.
  • Clay Evans grew beyond his Replacement Scrappy status thanks to Robert Buckley’s endearing performance and the revelation of his heartbreaking backstory.
  • Anna Tagarro, largely due to values shifting as time moved on and fans becoming more receptive to LGBTQ+ representation in media and Anna being the sole confirmed LGBTQ+ character in the series. It helps that Anna's story ultimately closes on a happy note and she’s a positive example of representation, rather than negative tropes like Bury Your Gays or Psycho Lesbian being invoked.
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • B.J. Britt as a referee in Season 1, and Devon Fox in Season 6.
  • Laura Bailey as one of the teenagers who approach the Tree Hill gang as they arrive at Honey Grove’s prom.
  • Evan Peters as Jack Daniels.
  • Candice Patton as the roommate of Katie.
• Romantic Plot Tumor: The (painfully) long-running Peyton/Lucas/Brooke love triangle (which can also be seen as an Arc Fatigue). It was dragged out until just before the mid-season finale of Season 4, even though the issue was completely resolved at the end of Season 1, with Lucas clearly choosing Peyton over Brooke - only for his own bad decisions earlier in the season to cause Peyton to end things with him. This led to the show to repeat the exact same triangle a second time with of course the exact same outcome, wasting two other seasons on the already resolved matter until Lucas and Peyton finally got together for real mid-season 4.
• Ron the Death Eater:
  • Peyton and Brooke both generally receive this treatment from the opposite side of the Leyton/Brucas shipping war. Leyton fans don't let Brooke live down her bitchier days of Season 1 or the hypocritical way she behaves towards Peyton and Lucas considering she made a sex tape with Nathan; whilst Brucas fans accuse Peyton of only wanting Lucas when she can't have him. However, Peyton arguably gets the worse treatment, due to Lucas marrying Peyton whilst Brooke becomes a Shipper on Deck for the couple after the 4 year time skip.
  • Lindsey, despite not actually doing anything wrong aside from starting to date Lucas during the 4 year time skip, is generally portrayed as a rude territorial bitch who antagonizes Peyton and/or Brooke in any post-Time Skip fanfics - so in other words, she's treated the exact same way that Peyton percieves her to be acting in the first half of season 5.
  • Jake will occasionally be portrayed as a crappy boyfriend in Leyton focused fanfics, so that Lucas can once again save Peyton. More often than not, he's just the guy who loses Peyton due to timing or her realising she loves Lucas.
  • Julian had the opposite reaction. When he was first introduced, it was in such a manner that viewers believed he was just there to cause problems for Lucas and Peyton, and he subsequently received the portrayal of a crappy boyfriend. Once the character was fleshed out and even turned out to be Brooke’s most important Love Interest, he started being treated in a much more positive manner and then became a very loved character.
• The Scrappy:
  • Felix Taggaro - though that was probably the intention. Felix and little sister Anna were among the new characters introduced in Season 2, and both were initially disliked for serving as new love interests for Lucas and Brooke, with the hatred for Felix intensifying as he went from merely being smug to a homophobic bully. Whilst Anna would ultimately prove to be less divisive and Rescued from the Scrappy Heap as time went on and audiences became more receptive to LGBTQ representation in media, Felix never developed beyond being a one-note villain without the Love to Hate qualities of Dan Scott or the more memorable villains that would follow in later seasons. The Tagarro family was ultimately written out of the show by the end of the season, and Felix was ultimately largely forgotten by the show, bar a brief mention in the series finale.
  • Quinn James. On top of being a Replacement Scrappy for Peyton and Lucas, Quinn is perceived by some of the fandom as coming off as whiny due to the reasoning the show provides for her leaving her husband in her introduction, and receiving a lot of Character Shilling.
  • Jamie is widely disliked by fans for being badly written due to acting way too mature for a little kid to the point where its hard to suspend disbelief and coming off as unlikable instead of charming as the writers intended him to be. Some fans also hated the fact that Jamie got an excessive amount of screentime and filler subplots (like his crush on Madison), with many seeing his character as a cynical attempt to boost ratings.
• Seasonal Rot:
  • Season 7 is considered a huge step-down from the previous seasons, mostly because of Chad Michael Murray and Hilarie Burton‘s departure as Lucas and Peyton were two of the five original core characters of the show. Besides, fans generally weren't receptive to several storylines as it felt like the show was just recycling plots as Clay being stalked by Katie was the third such storyline, whilst other storylines just felt as if they were being dragged out - the storyline of Nathan being accused of cheating on Haley whilst on the road took the entire first half of the season to resolve, whilst Brooke and Julian's relationship drama lasted for most of the season. Whilst the storyline dealing with the death of Lydia James and Haley's subsequent depression was well received and generally considered the high point of an otherwise mixed season, when taken alongside other storylines like Brooke's infertility and Alex's attempted suicide, the season just comes off as rather bleak.
  • Season 8 is widely considered the worst season of the show, with the general consensus being that only a few episodes of the 22 episode run are worth watching. More specific complaints are Nathan and Brooke being forced to give up their dream jobs (Nathan because of his back injury from Season 5; Brooke because Victoria and Millicent had falsified the company's accounts), a lack of investment in the Mia/Chase/Alex Love Triangle, Brooke and Julian's attempt at adopting ending up as a "Shaggy Dog" Story before the infertile Brooke miraculously becomes pregnant, and an overabundance of filler episodes - notably, this includes the only Clip Show in the series - that also just happen to be the series' low point in terms of creativity. On top of that, the show brought back the beloved Real Song Theme Tune for the first time since Season 4, only to quickly replace it with a variety of cover versions for the bulk of the season; a situation not helped by the vast majority of the cover versions being widely disliked by the audience.
• Shipping Goggles: Brucas fans have a habit of vilifying Peyton and arguing that it's all her (and, to a lesser extent, Lucas') fault that Brooke & Lucas split up at the start of season 4, with Brooke being completely blameless. Never mind that Peyton was willing to hide her feelings for Lucas if Brooke were to admit that she was in love with Lucas - something she repeatedly refused to do - and that it was Brooke who wasn't willing to fight for the relationship and broke up with Lucas because she thought their relationship had run its course.
• Ship Mates:
  • The Lucas/Brooke and Jake/Peyton fanbases. To the point that it seems that the only people who ship Jake/Peyton are Brucas shippers.
    • On the other side of the coin, the Lucas/Peyton and Brooke/Julian fanbases usually (but not always) coincide.
  • Meanwhile the Naley fans can get along perfectly with any of the above shipper groups. Or they can Pass the Popcorn while the other shipper groups fight.
• Ship-to-Ship Combat:
  • The Leyton vs Brucas war (which started in Season One) is the most infamous and fierce one, to the point that it’s still going on, even after the series came to an end in 2012. Keep in mind that Lucas and Peyton got married and had a kid before leaving at the end of season 6, with Brooke as the maid of honor and godmother and in the meantime meeting herself the love of her life, Julian, whom she got married to and had twin sons with in season 8...
  • Leyton vs. Brucas, Leyton vs. Jeyton, Brulian vs. Brucas, Naley vs. anyone who dares to come between them, etc, etc, etc...
• Squick:
  • The relationships between high school girls and adult men - namely Pete Wentz and Peyton, Rachel and Nathan’s Uncle Cooper, and Brooke and Nick Chavez. The situations are somewhat mitigated by the age of consent in North Carolina being 17 at the time, and the fact that it’s implied Pete and Peyton (The one relationship where the guy knew the girl was in high school from the start) never move beyond making out.
    • Pete and Peyton arguably get the worst end of the stick from the fandom as Rachel and Brooke both lie about their age before the relationship whilst Pete, on the other hand, is shown to be aware that Peyton is only 17 before they enter the relationship - although Nick and Cooper don’t exactly end things when they find out. There’s also a sentiment amongst some fans that it feels like Pete is abusing his position as a successful and famous musician by pursuing a relationship with Peyton. Plus with several famous musicians getting outed for taking advantage of underage girls in the wake of MeToo (e.g., Blood on the Dance Floor, Brand New) many feel that storyline has not aged well at all.
  • Dan and Rachel in Season 7. Yes, they’re both consenting adults, but there’s an age gap of 18 years between them and Rachel went to high school with Dan’s sons - even if the eventual couple never interacted in that time frame, and Rachel had transferred to Tree Hill High during her senior year.
• Strangled by the Red String:
  • Brooke and Lucas fall into this even twice during the first three seasons. The show makes a point that the characters have never really interacted prior to Lucas joining the Ravens, with their relationship being one-sided as Brooke falls for him over the course of a six week long relationship that largely takes place off-screen and with half of the on-screen relationship spent with Lucas either cheating on Brooke with Peyton or in a coma, while the story makes it clear that Lucas doesn’t love Brooke, but he’s in love with Peyton. After the truth comes out about Lucas cheating on Brooke, she's openly hostile towards him for the remainder of the first season (to the point she pretends to be pregnant to take revenge on him for his betrayal) while he basically ignores her and then they barely interact over the course of the first half of the second season (which is even set right after season 1 with no time jump between the season 1 finale and the season 2 premiere). Despite all this and even though she openly admits in several occasions that she knows how unhealthy their relationship and her feelings for him were, Brooke seems to still be into him, while Lucas suddenly decides that he's truly interested in her out of nowhere in the second half of the season.
  • Jake and Peyton. The characters didn't interact for the first half of season one, before they started to become closer after Jake publicly revealed he was a father. Throughout the second half of the season, Jake and Peyton's relationship comes off as platonic, before they suddenly share a brief kiss before he leaves Tree Hill to protect his daughter - and the entire time Peyton and Jake's relationship was developing, she was still in a Will They or Won't They? situation with Lucas, the one she was canonically in love with. The following season, they got together with basically no build up and by making Peyton suddenly being in love with Jake out of nowhere and the show even acted as if they were an epic romance in the waiting, but their history really didn't lend itself to all that.
  • Lucas and Lindsey. They become a couple at some point in the 4 year time skip between seasons 4 and 5 after Lucas' break-up with Peyton, but at no point in the season are viewers told how or when their relationship moved from professional to romantic. Consequently, the fandom never really bought into the relationship.
  • Averted with Lucas and Peyton. The two are speciously seen as this only by Brucas and Jeyton shippers, who claim that Peyton's late season 3 revelation that she was still in love with Lucas was purely because the writers wanted to split Brooke and Lucas after their actors broke up in real life and because Jake's actor wasn't going to be available anymore (even though no one involved in the production ever confirmed all this and Word of God itself repeatedly stated that it was always meant to be Lucas and Peyton). In reality, when one rewatches the third season with the knowledge of Peyton's feelings in mind, it becomes beyond obvious how subtle a lot of the build-up to The Reveal actually was.
• Supercouple:
  • Lucas and Peyton. The description of the trope practically describes their relationship to a tee.
  • Nathan and Haley. They get together during the first half of the first season of the show and are still together at the end of the season finale, with only a brief period covering part of the second and third seasons having them separated. A significant portion of their storylines deals with their struggles to pursue their dreams whilst staying together as a couple, or the difficulties they face as a married couple in high school.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: A common criticism of Season 8 is the series bringing back the beloved Real Song Theme Tune ("I Don't Want to Be" by Gavin De Graw) for the first time since the conclusion of Season 4 only to replace it with a series of cover versions for the majority of the season, many of which were considered lacklustre in comparison to DeGraw's original. Many fans would have preferred that the show simply hadn't bothered bringing it back if they weren't going to stick with the original version.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Royal and May Scott, Dan & Keith’s parents, only appear once in the series - during the first season. Subsequently, viewers never see their reactions to any of the events that involve their family, but most egregiously, their reactions to Keith dying in the school shooting and Dan being outed as the true killer.
  • Some were dissapointed that Jules never returned after Karen accidentally outed her as an actor paid by Dan to seduce Keith and break his heart.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • Brooke’s role as the Student Council President is barely mentioned following the second season, despite coming with a lieu of responsibilities.
  • Dan's money-laundering scheme gets abruptly forgotten about after season 3.
  • Considering that Clothes Over Bro's clothing, the "Friends With Benefit" CD, and Peyton's podcasts and website were actually made in the real world; it seems like a wasted opportunity on the part of the marketting team to not have "An Unkindness of Ravens" or "The Comet" released as actual novels.
  • Nathan being forced to retire from basketball after it becomes clear that his previously damaged back isn't going to hold up under the NBA's schedule for much longer. One might consider the logical evolution of Nathan's character to become the next coach of the Ravens, rather than becoming an agent.
• Unintentional Period Piece: Despite the use of Comic-Book Time, One Tree Hill is clearly set over the course of the early 21st century.
  • After Keith is involved in a car accident in season 1, he's described as being lucky to have only had a .09 blood alcohol level and would have been trouble if it was .01 higher. As of 2007, the law was changed so that .08 was classified as legally drunk.
  • Everyone uses flip phones until the fifth season, at which point more and more smart phones start popping up.
  • Pete Wentz in season 3. Peyton lists off his musical accomplishments circa 2005, and he's still in the "guy liner" phase of his life.
  • The wardrobes of the characters, especially in the first 4 seasons, are clearly of their era.
  • Slamball is heavily featured in season 6, clearly placing the season in 2008 due to the sport fading away obscurity after a brief revival that year.
  • Contemporary musical artists start turning up to play at Karen's Cafe and Tric.
  • LeBron James is specifically referred to as being in his rookie year in the NBA during season 1.
  • Repeated references are made to the Charlotte Bobcats, as Nathan alludes to the NBA franchise expansion that led to the creation of the Bobcats in the second season, and goes on to play for the team at the end of the sixth season. The team only played as the Bobcats between 2004 and 2014, at which point they reclaimed the Hornets name.
  • At the start of the fifth season, it’s revealed that Nathan was due to be drafted by the Seattle SuperSonics prior to his Game-Breaking Injury. In 2008, the Sonics relocated to Oklahoma City and rebranded themselves as the Thunder.
  • A sub-plot in a late season 5 episode features Skills buying Jamie a Wii for his birthday, and struggling to find one. On top of that, Jake brings Lucas a PlayStation 2 in season 1 as a gift from the team, whilst season 5 onwards shows various characters playing on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
  • Nathan dresses as Batman for a costume party in season 3, specifically in the Batman Begins costume. Similarily, Logan has a Green Lantern ring that was a piece of merchandise for the 2011 film.
  • At the start of the fourth season, Peyton makes reference to her MySpace page.
  • Max’s record store, seen in the fourth season, is shown to have closed down by time of the fifth season and the 4 year Time Skip; with Max specifically citing iTunes and music being bought digitally as the reason.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic:
  • Deb Scott. Whilst the viewer will likely feel sympathy for her being married to Dan due to how cruel he is to both her and Nathan, that doesn't excuse her from throwing herself into her work in order to avoid Dan's cruelty towards Nathan in addition to just sitting to the side ignoring the situation when she was at home. Once Nathan finally grows sick of his home life gets emancipated, Deb acts like he abandoned her and starts showing anger/jealousy towards the only real bright spot in Nathan's life (Haley). Even her descent into alcoholism and prescription pill addiction didn't really win her any compassion from the fans (or her family) since she was a Jerkass before and during it. Then to top it all off, Deb is indirectly responsible for the death of Keith, thanks to Dan believing it was Keith who set the fire at the car dealership that nearly killed him instead of the true culprit—herself. Whilst Deb does get her life in order towards the end of season 4, her only purpose after the Time Skip is to be Jamie's nanny and hook-up with Skills.
  • Jake Jagielski: While it's understandable for him to be upset at Nicki for running off on him and Jenny, she genuinely makes a real effort to try and mend things with him and get back into Jenny's life, but Jake acts like a total Jerkass towards her no matter what she says (and he seems willing to outright disregard the rules of the auction as he tries to ignore Nicki's request even though it's for charity) and refuses to budge an inch, berating her for not buying the exact right items for Jenny (even though the way he talks to her at the end implies he still would've rejected her even if she did get the right stuff). Jake claims he's trying to protect Jenny from getting hurt, but it feels more like he's using her to get back at Nikki out of sheer spite (and seemingly getting Aesop Amnesia over Lucas telling him that keeping secrets only leads to bad things) so at least for some viewers it was hard not to side with Nicki when she says she's determined to be a part of Jenny's life with or without Jake.
• Values Dissonance: As early as the fifth episode of the series, it’s established that Peyton lives by herself for the majority of the year - and as the series goes on, the number of teenagers living without parental supervision only increases. While it is still a debate on how responsible one is in their teen years, the idea of Free-Range Children can be jarring, particularly since the behavior they engage in (random hookups, underage drinking, very seldom having employment, neglecting their studies, etc.) is something that cries out for adult supervision - yet no-one in Tree Hill ever raises the subject, treating the idea of parents being completely absent from the lives of their children as totally normal.
• Vindicated by History: Season 2. Whilst the season as a whole is considered the weakest among the first six of the show, it is viewed little more favorably following Seasons 7 and 8 or the melodrama heavy Season 9. However, in the years since the series ended, Season 2 has gained a wider appreciation for Anna Tagarro's Coming-Out Story, and the rare positive portrayal of an LGBTQ+ character in an early 2000s produced series who doesn't suffer from a tragic end to their story.
• Wangst:
  • Brooke, especially in high school. Whilst there's no denying that Brooke's life isn't as easy as viewers were initially left to believe, she still has a much easier time of things than the rest of the main cast in the first four seasons.
  • Haley for some people, especially during season 2 in her arguments with Nathan over her music and in season 5 after Nathan's injury.
  • Mouth regarding his whininess over a lacking lovelife, although he maybe just was looking at the wrong kind of girls. Even more infuriating, is that Mouth has more love interests in the show than any other character period. None of this is helped by his whining in early Season 4 that Lucas basically jumps from relationship to relationship and has half of Tree Hill High chasing after him - which was only close to being accurate during the days of mid-season 1, when he cheated on Brooke with Peyton; after losing both girls, he doesn't have a serious relationship until he gets back together with Brooke, nearly two full seasons later.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not Symbolic?: Dan's donor heart gets eaten by a dog. Dog, backwards, is God.
• Why Would Anyone Take Him Back?:
  • Brooke pursues Lucas, and after they get together, she quickly falls for him before he cheats with her best friend Peyton in Season 1. Come Season 3, Brooke gets back together with Lucas, and spends the majority of the relationship paranoid of history repeating with her boyfriend falling for her best friend again.
  • Nathan and Haley get together in season 1 and at the end of the season she accepts his impulsive marriage proposal. Come season 2, they start arguing all the time since they struggle to adjust their new life as a married couple while Haley begins to distance herself from Nathan once she discovers her passion in music and then the musician Chris Keller, who is clearly interested in her, invites her on tour with him; Haley accepts and leaves Nathan without saying anything after cheating on him twice with Keller. Then, she stays on tour for months even if she knows Nathan was devastated by this whole situation (and as a consequence even attempted suicide), until she suddenly decides to come back home only after Lucas paid her a visit while still on tour and made her come to her senses at the end of the season. Once she’s back, she tries to make amends and Nathan, after keeping her away for some time, forgives her and they get back together.
  • After Lucas and Peyton's Long-Distance Relationship becomes strained after a year spent apart, Lucas attempts to save the relationship by proposing - only for Peyton to ask him to wait another year, feeling it's too soon. Lucas takes this as an outright refusal and breaks up with Peyton by leaving her in their hotel room without so much as a note saying goodbye. Come Peyton's return to Tree Hill after three years, she still wants to repair the relationship, even after she watches him almost marrying another woman and he drunkenly accuses her of ruining his life after being left at the altar in said wedding due to him still being blatantly in love with her. In the end, Lucas finally apologizes to her for what he’s done and, despite everything, Peyton forgives him, prompting him to propose again and this time she accepts. Fortunately, they are able to successfully rekindle their relationship and now both mature enough to settle down together, ending up Happily Married one season later.
• WTH, Costuming Department?:
  • As beautiful as the women of One Tree Hill are, it's rather obvious if not jarring (especially in comparison to the later seasons) to see the copious amount of makeup they were all wearing during the first season. Granted, in some cases it was a necessity (like in James Lafferty's case to cover up his then-acne), but with the others, it was too much.
    • There's also the matter of Lucas' hair from that same season. Yes it was, in a sense, done to display how "poor" (or poor in comparison to the rest of the teenagers/students in Tree Hill/Tree Hill High School) he was, but it noticeable how unnecessarily dirty/unkempt it looked.
  • Lucas and Nathan's haircuts (Or rather, lack of them) in the fourth season is a point of ridicule amongst most of the fandom, with even Chad noting his displeasure over Lucas' longer hair. Considering the following season features Nathan with even longer unkempt hair as part of his Heroic Blue Screen of Death following the 4 time skip, it's likely that the actors were told to grow their hair out in preparation for the story and they hadn't decided which Scott brother was going to be the focus.
    • Leyton shippers have another issue with Lucas' haircut in the fourth season - it's very similar to Psycho Derek's, which raises the Fridge Logic of Lucas not doing something with his hair to remove the resemblence, especially after the Bait-and-Switch at the end of 4x15, where Peyton opens her front door expecting to find Lucas waiting to take her to prom, only to find Psycho Derek when he turns around.
  • Haley's "Mom" hairdo from season 5. It was a short, dark brown bob and mostly unflattering on her. Double goes for Mouth's "newscaster" hairdo that same season.
• The Woobie:
  • Peyton, for everything that happened to her in the first four seasons and her backstory.
  • Jimmy Edwards. Just watch 3x15 and 3x16.
  • Abby Brown - Was one of the students held in the Tutor Centre during the school shooting, before being released by Jimmy due to her diabetes. Subsequently, Abby is the sole witness to Dan killing Keith, and spends the remainder of the school year hiding at home, pretending to be catatonic out of the fear that no-one will believe her.
  • Clay Evans - Met the love of his life, married her and had a little boy together... And then she suddenly dropped dead in the kitchen, and Clay was so traumatised by this, that he blocked out all memories of his son and took several years to even accept his wife's death.
• Win Back the Crowd:
  • The Season 7 story arc revolving around the death of Lydia James, and Haley's subsequent grief fuelled depression, is generally considered the high point of an otherwise lacklustre season.
  • Season 9, following the Seasonal Rot of the two preceding seasons, with the Darker and Edgier storyline of Nathan being kidnapped by Eastern European assassins. For fans that don't care for the melodrama that makes up the bulk of the season, the final three episodes are considered a return to form and a fitting conclusion to the series as a whole - with "Danny Boy" and "One Tree Hill" commonly being listed amongst the best episodes of the entire series.

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