History Series / FreshMeat

* PoliticallyIncorrectHero: JP takes this trope UpToEleven. Among other things, he claims that he could have ruled India had he been born a century earlier, dresses as Hitler for Halloween, and asks if anyone would be offended if he "deployed the n-word."

* SchoolOfNoStudying: Count how many times you see anyone study. You won't need to use your other hand. No wonder Vod fails first year. This is taken UpToEleven in seasons 3 and 4, where education takes such a backseat that you'd be forgiven for forgetting what the protagonists are even studying, and the character arcs almost never intersect with anything education-related. [[spoiler: Then again, eventually most of the group's final grades are pretty mediocre.]]

** Kingsley reads [[Literature/TheGame The Game]] at one point. His new trilby, facial hair and (attempted) dismissive attitude towards women are also references to the pick-up artist subculture.

** Kingsley's post-heartbreak [[Literature/TheGame soul patch]].

* SpotOfTea: Britishness is showing. With tea-drinking.
** Vod drinks tea, despite being the opposite of the stereotypical tea drinker.
** Candice starts making daily cups of tea for Howard for seemingly no reason; the faint sparks of their romance to come, in spite of Howard's paranoia and geek logic.

* PoliticalCorrectnessGoneMad: JP loves to blurt this phrase out, usually when he doesn't get his way, other times just for shits and giggles, such as in his drug test trial:
-->'''Doctor''': Testees cannot know what drugs they're taking, or the test is utterly useless!
-->'''JP''': Well, that's political correctness gone mad.
** It can also be taken as a ShoutOut to ''Series/PeepShow'', where Jez similarly abuses the same phrase.

* LimitedSocialCircle: {{Justified}} with the six main characters, as they've all moved to Manchester from other parts of Britain, so they wouldn't have any friends there beyond their uni mates.

* HerCodenameWasMarySue: Oregon writes a play ("We Had to Kill Her") in which a girl called Delphine [[OnlySaneMan puts up with a cavalcade of idiots]] like Gwen, a Welsh simpleton who has sex with AnythingThatMoves and wears a sack, her boyfriend "Ainsley" (also in love with Delphine, as is everyone), ThoseTwoBadGuys who are described as "a posh twat and a Scottish slob", and the main villain, Hilda, who deceives a guy called Alfonso into marrying her for selfish reasons and ends up getting smothered to death by Delphine. The housemates find out about it... and, self-serving as it is, [[BrutalHonesty it actually serves]] as a pretty effective WhatTheHellHero to several of them, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone including Oregon]].

* ExactWords: This happened as part of an event in Vod's childhood, where Vod told her mother not to get drunk on one of her sports days. She didn't get drunk. She took acid instead, mistook another child (a boy, no less) for Vod, tried to take him home, and [[RealityEnsues the police got involved]]. According to Vod, [[FridgeHorror this was normal for her]].

* RealityEnsues:
** Josie accidentally drills through a patient's cheek in her dentistry practical, due to turning up hungover. She gets kicked off her course and summoned to a disciplinary hearing.
** When Dylan finds out that Oregon had an affair with his father, he decides not to stay with her because he decides it's too weird to be dating someone who previously did the same with his father.
** [[spoiler:Vod gives her mother a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech, knowing full well her mother could flip out and fly into a rage. Sure enough, that's exactly what happens.]]
** [[spoiler:JP's lazy habits and unrealistic career ambitions ensure that while he does graduate, he does so with a third instead of the 2:1 he wanted.]]

* SchoolOfNoStudying: Count how many times you see anyone study. You won't need to use your other hand. No wonder Vod fails first year. This is taken UpToEleven in seasons 3 and 4, where education takes such a backseat that you'd be forgiven for forgetting what the protagonists are even studying, and the character arcs almost never intersect with anything education-related. [[spoiler:RealityEnsues when most of the group's final grades are pretty mediocre.]]

[[caption-width-right:216:(From left to right)\\ Top: Oregon, [[DoggedNiceGuy Kingsley]], [[UpperClassTwit JP]]. Bottom: [[{{Ladette}} Vod]], [[{{Geek}} Howard]] and [[PluckyGirl Josie]]]]

* NotSoDifferent: JP suggests that he and Oregon are this when he learns that she owns a horse: "You're one of me!".

* TheFellowshipHasEnded: [[spoiler:The final episode, where most of the housemates finish their degrees and part ways, though downplayed in that some of the group do stay paired up. Howard lands an internship that requires him living in London, Vod and Oregon are off to teach in Laos, and JP and Kingsley are planning on living together, with the former planning on using his connections to get employment and the latter living rent-free with an unpaid internship. Only Josie is left behind and alone to finish her degree, [[BittersweetEnding a prospect she isn't looking forward to.]]]]

* ExpositoryHairstyle:

* {{Fingore}}: Vod tells the others of a break-in where someone got tied to a chair and his fingers were cut off one by one until his gave up his PIN number.

** JP also called Tomothy out for [[YourCheatingHeart being unfaithful to his wife because he adulterated with Oregon]]. [[IgnoredEpiphany Tomothy ignores him and carries on regardless]]. JP later does the same thing when Tomothy gets drunk and makes unwelcome moves towards Josie.

* SlutShaming: Josie's "Pope Kingsley" rant is against this, as she assumes he thinks she's a slut for having sex with JP despite him being a stranger to her at the time. Subverted, as Kingsley's only really upset because he had feelings for her. And her rant does lose a lot of its thunder when it's revealed that [[YourCheatingHeart she has a boyfriend she's been cheating on]] (before and after the audience knows of his existence).

* YourCheatingHeart: Josie... and Kingsley. Eventually they come clean to each other, and conclude that they're "even"... but neither seems to really buy this, and they keep sniping about the other's infidelity and offering excuses for their own. [[spoiler:Already by the very next episode, they're each carrying on brand new (albeit non-sexual) "affairs of the mind".]]
** Vod finds out that JP's father had a lover on the side and had written letters to her. Vod burns the letters so that JP won't find out.
** Tomothy, JP's older brother, connects with Oregon and goes on to have his way with her, despite having a wife and a young son. [[JerkassHasAPoint JP even calls him out on it]], but Tomothy ignores him. In the final episode, Tomothy also drunkenly tries to make unwelcome moves on Josie, causing JP to [[RageBreakingPoint finally snap at his brother]].

** Howard is clearly Scottish, though he has a softer Edinburgh burr than the Glasgow patter that [[ViolentGlaswegian often crops up in British shows]].

* TrueArtIsIncomprehensible: The David Hockney drawing in JP's room. Kingsley thinks it's a baby sitting under a tree; JP, true to form, thinks it's a man wanking.

* BigFancyHouse: JP's.

* [[GirlPosse Boy Posse]]: The Stowe-aways, a group of hugely entitled posh boys and JP's fellow [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stowe_School Stowe School]] graduates who engage in cruel hazing, bizarre sexual games and look down on anyone who isn't them. JP is desperate for their approval.

* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: Oregon introduces herself to Dylan using her real name, Melissa. [[YankTheDogsChain Shame it doesn't last...]]

* VerbalTic: JP's posh-boy slang, which basically consists of him adding adding "-ers" on the end of absolutely anything. At one point he refers to his dad's heart attack as a "hearters."

* MistakenForRacist: Vod for kissing Mark after spending all night trying to pull his friend Riz. When she tries to explain that this was only because they were both wearing identical jackets and ''[[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial definitely wasn't]]'' because [[IdenticalLookingAsians they're both Asian]], she just ends up [[DiggingYourselfDeeper digging herself deeper]].

** In terms of premise and characters, the show has a lot of similarities to ''Series/{{Community}}'', in that it's an ensemble cast comedy set at an institution of higher learning, featuring a DeadpanSnarker who puts in as little effort as possible (Vod & Jeff), a somewhat robotic introvert with an AmbigousDisorder (Howard & Abed), a TeamMom who [[BitchInSheepsClothing doesn't understand the difference between being sweet and being nice]], and a [[UpperClassTwit clueless rich guy]] who just wants to be included (JP & Pierce). Although the similarities end there.

* SpiritualSuccessor: To ''Series/TheInbetweeners''. Joe Thomas plays more or less the same character in both shows, at different stages of higher education. ''Fresh Meat'' can easily be thought of as "Simon's adventures at uni" (whereas Will [[Series/FridayNightDinner has gone into writing advertising jingles]].)

* VerbalTic: JP will make a diminutive out of anything by adding "-ers" on the end of it. Absolutely anything. At one point he refers to his dad's heart attack as a "hearters."

%% * {{Adorkable}}: Howard, who has NoSocialSkills and spends half his life in a woolly jumper with sheep on it.

* VocalTic: JP will make a diminutive out of anything by adding "-ers" on the end of it. Absolutely anything. At one point he refers to his dad's heart attack as a "hearters."

** JP in series one, but they get used to him. It even gets Lampshaded by him.

* GraduationForEveryone: Averted; at the finale, Josie still has a year left for her degree, which, sadly, leaves her the only one left behind as [[TheFellowshipHasEnded everyone else moves on to the next stage of their lives.]] [[spoiler:Not that it's an instant happy ending for all: Howard received the highest marks, with most of the other group receiving realistically mediocre or poor marks due to mediocre academic habits.]]

** Oregon in the last episode. She's forced to explain to her mother that she was [[spoiler: removed from her post as President of the Student Union, under-performed everybody except JP in her exams, had affairs with Tony Shales and his son, and accidentally broke another student's dick (and got him deported in the process.]] To make matters worse, her acceptance into a master's degree course in Creative Writing is [[spoiler: revealed to have been masterminded by Shales, who switched out Oregon's writing sample with one of his own.]]

* BrickJoke: Vod gets the idea to get Al the handyman to come back to the house by attempting to flush a pair of jeans down the toilet. At the end, Howard answers the door to a different handyman (as Oregon reported Al for the burglary offscreen) who was called out to remove said jeans from the toilet.
* BrokenPedestal: Averted. While staying in JP's house, Vod finds a series of letters from JP's father to a lover he had. Knowing that it would result in this trope if JP found out, Vod burns the letters.
* BrotherhoodOfFunnyHats: The Stowe-Aways, embarrasing InitiationCeremony included.
-->'''Tobes:''' There's a bit more to being a Stowe-Away than banter.
-->'''Ralph:''' Yeah, it's not just about going to a Chinese restaurant and doing a shit in a pint glass.
-->'''Tobes:''' It is ''partly'' about that...
* [[GirlPosse Boy Posse]]: The Stowe-aways, a group of hugely entitled posh boys and JP's fellow [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stowe_School Stowe School]] graduates who engage in cruel hazing, bizarre sexual games and look down on anyone who isn't them. JP is desperate for their approval.

* UsefulNotes/BritishAccents: The show has a ''lot'' of regional British accents. In many cases this is due to ActorSharedBackground, but it also serves to underscore the cosmopolitan nature of the larger UK universities.

* HufflepuffHouse: Kingsley refers to the gang in this way.
* HumiliationConga: Series 2 as a whole is a very long Conga for Josie, as her love life, her friendships and her career all rapidly start to fall apart.

* SixthRanger: The house has seven bedrooms; one too many for the SixStudentClique who form the main cast. The last room is occupied by different guest characters in different series:

** In series 4, Candice is PutOnABus, the room is finally left vacant and the group returns to the SixStudentClique of series 1.

''Fresh Meat'' is a British comedy series from the creators of ''Series/PeepShow'' that aired on Channel 4 for four series between 2011 and 2016. The show centres around [[SixStudentClique 6 students]] attending university in Manchester who miss out on accommodation in halls and so are forced to share a house together.