History Headscratchers / SavedByTheBell

** The difference might be that Eric wasn't Screech's lifelong friend, while Zack was.

* This is stupid but it's always bothered me. In one episode, Jessie is running for student council president, and her major impetus in doing so is because her mother had the same position when she was in high school. Okay, fine. But she tells Slater that her mom was student council president, "and she made ''such'' a difference!" First of all, how would Jessie even know that? It's not like she was there; she would only know that from stuff her mom had told her. Second, just how much difference can a high school student council president even make?

*** To bad this was the late 80's-early 90's
*** Los Angeles high schools in the 70's only had one hallway, everyone live in the schools, friends with the Principal, over the top nerds?

* It's been noted by more than one person that, were this not a comedy, Zack would be on trial for multiple counts of fraud, trespassing, breaking and entering, destruction of public property, and quite possibly felony burglary. There'd also be mention made of kidnapping, forgery and extortion. And let's be honest, for as charismatic as he is, Zack has had his fair share of detentions (the ones he shows up for, anyway), and cut more than a few classes. It wouldn't look good for him.

* This no doubt reveals me to be a horrible, racist person, but I find that the idea of a black, female, sixteen(ish) year-old high school student obsessing over acquiring Bruce Springsteen tickets to be funny in an almost Dadist way.

* As a geeky kid that always got picked on, this show always cheesed me off for how abrasive it was towards kids that weren't the cute, perfect popular kids. Especially the way it treated the "nerds" as some kind of sub-human race that was perfectly okay to abuse and manipulate. Seriously, I saw an episode where Zack was basically (while naturally being grossed out) sexing up as many nerdy girls as possible to get his song voted up the charts, and the other kids response wasn't anger at him being manipulative, but anger that he was fraternizing with the nerds. Hell, Screech is like the kids MoralityPet to somehow make it okay.

** Just a big case of {{Flanderization}}. All the characters experienced it to some extent, but Screech got hit by the Flanders ray the worst. He went from a nerdy but still somewhat-normal teenager in the early years of the show (especially the "Good Morning, Miss Bliss" incarnation) but as the show became more popular and tried to appeal more and more to the trendy, pop-culture obsessed teenage crowd, Screech became a bigger nerd cliche.

** I was also puzzled by the episode I just saw where Kelly seems to lead both Zach and Slater on in a dance contest when Casey Kasum appears. They both compete over her and rather than choose one, she decides to go along with their idea to both dance for her and choose the better dancer

** All flaws aside, Saved by the Bell had no dirty jokes, almost no violence of any kind (I can only recall one episode where a main character got in an on-camera fistfight), and its morals were very kid-friendly. Every episode was an aesop about how Cheating is Bad, Stealing is Bad, Bullying is Bad, Pollution is Bad, Drugs are Bad, etc. People forget that as much of an asshole as Zack could be, he usually got his comeuppance and learned a lesson by the end of the episode. Or he just went on a zany yet harmless scheme. The show wasn't perfect, but I could think of a lot of shows from that time that were arguably worse influences on a child.
* Am I the only one who thinks that everyone (including the viewers) judged Jessie very harshly in the "Palm Beach" episodes, where her father remarries a much younger woman (whom Zack was even flirting with earlier)? I'm not saying that it was okay for her to treat her dad's fiancee in such a cruel manner, but honestly how would you feel if one of your parents married someone very close to you in age? Plus, isn't it a bit odd that her father didn't even introduce her to his fiancee until the day before the wedding?

*** Los Angeles high schools in the 70's only had one hallway, everyone live in the schools, friends with the Principal, over the top Type 1 {{Hollywood Nerd}}s?

** Remember, this was a Saturday morning show airing alongside cartoons. It was unusually successful due to a charming cast but it's basically a live action cartoon.