History Trivia / SgtFrogAbridged

* ActorExistenceLimbo: Saburo was originally voiced by [=DragonFatman=], who was kicked from the team after the original pilot. He'd planned to voice Saburo as a drunk Irishman, an idea Thorn and Yoshi never liked, so from thereon-out they made him a CuteMute, including in the remade Episode 1. [[spoiler:[=MrFailGame=] voiced him for a very quick line in Episode 18, but he passed away before Saburo returned in Episode 20, so the writers left the character a CuteMute once again.]]

* MeaningfulReleaseDate:
** Episode 16 was released on April 16, 2012. When the Kiruru counter appeared in Episode 13, viewers calculated that, if it counted down in real-time, it would activate on April 23. Because Episode 16 starts with Keroro activating it seven days early, the episode was uploaded a week earlier as well.
** ''The Sgt Frog Abridged Movie'' was released on February 16, 2020, ''SFA'''s 10th anniversary.

** The creators openly disowned the original Episodes 1 and 2. They remade them to make them funnier, more in-line with their current writing style, and in-canon with the current continuity. Subverted with Episode 3, which was only remade due to the plotholes and dead references that resulted from the first two remakes, as otherwise Thorn and Yoshi don't consider it a bad episode.
** Thorn is openly unhappy with Episode 8, and she, Yoshi and Travis consider Episode 13 to be their worst, feeling that the writing was lazy and surface-level. By the time of the team's 10th anniversary in 2020, Thorn found that most of Season 1 doesn't hold up very well, but she still especially dislikes those two episodes and still considers redoing 13.

** [[http://themidnightfrogs.wikia.com/wiki/Sgt_Frog_Abridged_Series_Finale On the same podcast where the team said Dororo was their favorite character]], they also voted Episodes 7, 11, and 17 as their favorite episodes. They confirmed this to still be the case on their 10th anniversary hangout stream.

* McLeaned: Momoka following her death in Episode 13. [[WordOfGod The writers would have happily brought her back]] after [[YourHeadAsplode explosively decapitating her]], but her voice actor moved to Japan shortly after the episode went up, so she stayed dead. Subverted in 2013, when her VA moved back to the US, allowing her to be resurrected in Episode 22. See also WhatCouldHaveBeen below.

*** Thorn voiced HQ in Episode 1R, but when HQ returned in Episode 10, she gave the voice to team friend Jiggly Jacob, who would later [[PromotedFanboy join the team and become co-writer]].

** [=ShazMyBot=] from Gutted Wren Studios voiced Dokuku for Episode 20, but by Episode 21 he had stopped voice acting, so Jiggly Jacob took over as Dokuku.

** Jiggly Jacob, a self-professed fanboy of Creator/TheMidnightFrogs and the creator of his own (now defunct) Manga/SgtFrog AbridgedSeries (read SincerestFormOfFlattery), was made the voice of HQ and later Dokuku and Giruru. He became an honorary team member after ''SFA: Reset'' and a co-writer from Episode 22 on.

* RealitySubtext: Writer Thorn came out during production of Episode 11 as a bisexual transvestite[[note]]later pansexual transwoman[[/note]], though [[WordOfGod she states]] that she has always been an [=LGBT=] activist, so the series' examinations of sexuality were likely to happen anyway.
* ScheduleSlip: Episodes 4 through 15 were released one-to-two months after each other. After Episode 15, there were often several months between new episodes, due on two occasions to the canceling and [[UnCanceled uncanceling]] of the series, with Episodes 20 and 21 being a whole year apart from each other. Thorn intended to do an episode a month again following [=SFA21=] through to the season finale, but that too slipped when [=SFA22=] took longer to figure out than he'd hoped. Taken to an extreme with the movie, which took a whole year to write, then the team went into indefinite hiatus before production resumed in April 2019 and lasted until February 2020.

** Jiggly Jacob voices both Dokuku and his brother Giruru in Episodes 21 and 25. Giruru's voice is filtered through a chorus to further differentiate it.
** [=LillyLivers=] voices Natsumi and Gyororo together in Episode 24.

** Thorn, Yoshi and Jacob held a livestream for Creator/TheMidnightFrogs' 10th anniversary where they watched all of SFA Seasons 1 and 2. Throughout the stream, viewers lamented in the chat that the SFA movie would never happen, and the guys agreed and went into detail on why the movie was canned and why TMF quietly disbanded. They then aired the trailer for the SFA movie at the end to the chat's baffled surprise.

** Momoka's death in Episode 13 was simply a joke, and they would have brought her back the next time she appeared in an episode. However her voice actress Dobuchu moved to Japan around the time of Episode 14. As a result, they simply left her dead. Dobuchu returned to the US in 2013, allowing Momoka to return, but she wasn't revived until Episode 22 in August 2015, and she did not appear in either of the series' remaining three episodes except for the series finale cast roll call. The team also lost all contact with Dobuchu when they wrote the script for ''The Sgt Frog Abridged Movie'', one of the reasons the movie was canned for three years; when production resumed in 2019, Dobuchu was replaced with xbubblemunkyx.

* WordOfSaintPaul: HQ's name is never given in the series or by WordOfGod. His voice actor Jiggly Jacob [[http://themidnightfrogs.wikia.com/wiki/Living_in_the_Jacob_Whale mentioned on the team's podcast]] that, since it would follow the Keronian naming convention, he thinks HQ's name could be "Hakoko", playing off the codename of "HQ". Jacob demands this be made canon because then HQ's name would sound like "Hot Cocoa", [[RuleOfFunny and that amuses him]].

* MeaningfulReleaseDate: Episode 16 was released on April 16, 2012. When the Kiruru counter appeared in Episode 13, viewers calculated that, if it counted down in real-time, it would activate on April 23. Because Episode 16 starts with Keroro activating it seven days early, the episode was uploaded a week earlier as well.

** Thorn is openly unhappy with Episode 8, and he, Yoshi and Travis consider Episode 13 to be their worst, feeling that the writing was lazy and surface-level. By the time of the team's 10th anniversary in 2020, Thorn found that most of Season 1 doesn't hold up very well, but he still especially dislikes those two episodes and still considers redoing 13.

* CrossdressingVoices:
** Averted for most of the characters, though Tamama is a weird example. She starts out being considered male and therefore an aversion in Season 1, unlike both the Japanese and Funimation versions of the original series, until she is revealed to be a girl in Episode 10, becoming a subverted example and a complete inversion of the original's crossdressing voice.
** Young male characters Private Taruru and Gyororo are voiced by female VA Tiana.
* DirectedByCastMember: The series' voice actors are directed by Thorn, who also voices a large chunk of the cast. He stepped into this role after Episode [=2R=] was delayed due to multiple voice acting issues.

** For a time, Thorn kept forgetting that Tamama was male and not female. He randomly came up with a joke that would reveal that Tamama really was a girl, and he and Yoshi decided to make it canon. After deciding this, they would occasionally make unintentional Freudian slips revealing this secret, but they simply pretended that they were still confused about Tamama's gender. Then Episode 10 rolls around...

** ''Not'' the case in regards to ending the series after Episode 18. Thorn had every intention of ending the series for good. He just simply changed his mind and brought ''SFA'' back later.

*** Thorn voiced HQ in Episode 1R, but when HQ returned in Episode 10, he gave the voice to team friend Jiggly Jacob, who would later [[PromotedFanboy join the team and become co-writer]].
*** Giroro was voiced by [=DFatman=] at the end of Episode 1R. Thorn stepped in as backup should Fatman be unable to record, but Yoshi preferred Thorn's voice anyway, so he became the permanent voice shortly before Fatman was kicked from the team.
*** Kululu was voiced in Episodes 2R and 3R by [=GhostTC=], who dropped out of the series before Episode 4. [=InfamousGentleman=] voiced Kululu from Episode 5 on.

*** Momoka is the team's resident "cursed" character as she went through multiple voice actors: she was voiced in Episode 2R by [=LillyLivers=] as backup after four months of failing to find a stable voice actor and delaying of Episode 2R (Thorn also filled in as Momoka for an episode trailer). The team were so frustrated with Momoka that she was left out of Season 1 until Episode 10 out of spite. From then-on she was voiced by Dobuchu... until they lost contact with her after 2016. Momoka was then voiced by xbubblemunkyx for ''The Sgt Frog Abridged Movie''.

* RealitySubtext: Writer Thorn came out during production of Episode 11 as a bisexual transvestite[[note]]later Pansexual and gender-questioning[[/note]], though [[WordOfGod he states]] that he has always been an [=LGBT=] activist, so the series' examinations of sexuality were likely to happen anyway.

** The climax to Episode 10 with Future Kululu is what happens when Thorn takes numerous disparate elements from the first season and tries to tie them together. He and Yoshi barely planned for the climax prior to scriptwriting, despite Episode 10 having the most planning of any episode up to that point.

* AscendedFanon: Of the premeditative variety. When the counter debuted in Episode 13, viewers calculated that, if it counted down in real-time, it would reach 0 on April 23, 2012. The writers made it so that Episode 16, wherein the counter activates, would correlate with that date, though because Keroro makes the counter activate a week early, the episode was uploaded a week earlier as well.
* TheCastShowoff: [=LillyLivers=] sang as Natsumi for the 2010 Christmas Special, as the gender-ambiguous [[SingingVoiceDissonance Sumomo]] in Episode 8, and at the end of their 2013 April Fool's redub of Episode 1. And ''she can sing''.

** Thorn also counts Episode 23 as a favorite, considering it one of the few episodes without any missed jokes.

** Young male characters Private Taruru and Gyororo are voiced by female VA [=LillyLivers=].
* DirectedByCastMember: The series' voice actors are directed by Thorn, who also voices a large chunk of the cast. He stepped into this role after Episode [=2R=], which was delayed due to multiple voice acting issues.

*** Thorn voiced HQ in Episode 1R, but when HQ returned in Episode 10, he gave the voice to team friend Jiggly Jacob.

** Revy Moonshine, also from Gutted Wren, voiced Koyuki from Episode 4 to Episode 18 before stepping down prior to Episode 22. Thaichestnuts filled the role from then-on.
** Ches also filled in for Teddy as the voice of Nuii from Episode 22-24.

* RealitySubtext: Writer Thorn came out during production of Episode 11 as a bisexual transvestite[[note]]later Pansexual and Non Binary[[/note]], though [[WordOfGod he states]] that he has always been an [=LGBT=] activist, so the series' examinations of sexuality were likely to happen anyway.

** Lil' Keroro's shocked expression in Episode 4 is simply a frame of him turning his head that Yoshi discovered by accident.

** The episodic series ended with Episode 25, and though there were plans to do a movie, the team quietly retired after 2016. The movie came back into production throughout 2019, and it was announced as a surprise in January 2020.

** Thorn wanted a joke for the end of Episode 18 where, after Keroro realizes that they've taken over the world, [[MoodWhiplash the characters all]] [[SuicideAsComedy kill themselves]], a'la ''Series/{{Blackadder}}''. That way, [[TorchTheFranchiseAndRun the series would conclusively be over]]. Yoshi and Travis vetoed the joke.

** Thorn is openly unhappy with Episode 8, and he, Yoshi and Travis consider Episode 13 to be their worst, feeling that the writing was lazy and surface-level. By the time of the team's 10th anniversary in 2020, Thorn found that most of Season 1 doesn't hold up very well, but he still especially dislikes those two episodes.

** Teddy, a young friend and fanboy of the team, was made official team artist in December 2011 and drew the artwork that made up Giroro & Dororo's wedding in Episode 15, the official SFA logo from Season 3 onward, and various other contributions.

* RealitySubtext: Subversion. Writer Thorn came out during production of Episode 11 as a bisexual transvestite[[note]]he has since stated he is Pansexual and Genderfluid[[/note]], but [[WordOfGod he states]] that he has always been an [=LGBT=] activist, so the series' examinations of sexuality were likely to happen anyway.

* TheCastShowoff: [=LillyLivers=] sang as Natsumi for the 2010 Christmas Special and as the gender-ambiguous [[SingingVoiceDissonance Sumomo]] in Episode 8, and ''she can sing''.

** Thorn is fairly unhappy with Episode 8, and he, Yoshi and Travis consider Episode 13 to be their worst.

** [[http://themidnightfrogs.wikia.com/wiki/Sgt_Frog_Abridged_Series_Finale On the same podcast where the team said Dororo was their favorite character]], they also voted Episodes 7, 11, and 17 as their favorite episodes.
** Yoshi also included Episodes 4 and 6 as favorites on the podcast: 4 primarily for when Dororo shows up, and 6 because he had wanted to parody the radio episode(s) since the early planning of the series, and it ultimately came out even better than he had hoped. Thorn largely agrees with him.

*** Momoka was voiced in Episode 2R by [=LillyLivers=] as backup after four months of failing to find a stable voice actor and delaying of Episode 2R (Thorn also filled in as Momoka for an episode trailer). The team were so frustrated with Momoka that she was left out of Season 1 until Episode 10 out of spite. From then-on she was voiced by Dobuchu.

** Revy Moonshine, also from Gutted Wren, voiced Koyuki from Episode 4 to Episode 18 before stepping down prior to Episode 22. Thaichestnuts filled the role from then on.

* ScheduleSlip: Episodes 4 through 15 were released one-to-two months after each other. After Episode 15, there were often several months between new episodes, due on two occasions to the canceling and [[UnCanceled uncanceling]] of the series, with Episodes 20 and 21 being a whole year apart from each other. Thorn intended to do an episode a month again following [=SFA21=] through to the season finale, but that too slipped when [=SFA22=] took longer to figure out than he'd hoped.

* TrollingCreator: While the series does away with nearly all of the tropes and iconic elements of the original anime within the first several episodes, Thorn and Yoshi still slipped in a tongue-in-cheek conversation in Episode 5 about Gundam models and ''SFA''-Keroro's apathy towards them. This was an intentional laugh at the expense of their audience, since a large portion of their fans were also fans of the original series, and a key part of the original Keroro's character is his love of Gundam models.
* UnCanceled: Originally ended after Season 2 in November 2012, with the creators seeming prepared to never look back. Three months and a failed attempt to start another AbridgedSeries later, Thorn was more than happy to bring it back and do it again for one more season.

** Momoka's death in Episode 13 was simply a joke, and they would have brought her back the next time she appeared in an episode. However her voice actress Dobuchu moved to Japan around the time of Episode 14. As a result, they simply left her dead. Dobuchu returned to the US in 2013, allowing Momoka to return, but she wasn't revived until Episode 22 in August 2015, and she did not appear in either of the series' remaining three episodes except for the series finale cast roll call.

** There were plans after the episodic series ended to do shorts and the movies, but these never happened after [=TheMidnightFrogs=] quietly dissolved. The script for the movie was completed in 2017, but it was canned due to multiple important voice actors being unavailable (including, once again, Momoka's).

** The team told everyone that the [=SFA1=] remake would be in July 2011. [[TropesAreNotBad They made it in June]].

!!Other Trivia
* Yoshi never intended to be a voice actor, let alone the voice of the main character; he just wanted to script-write and oversee the project. While he didn't quite like voice acting during the first three episodes, he began enjoying it starting with Episode 4, and it became one of his main hobbies after stepping down as SFA's writer.
* Thorn believes that the series is one of the behind-the-scenes pioneers of live voice acting direction in abridging. Starting in mid-2010, Thorn began directing the voice actors over Skype to speed up the process, thereby allowing him to get the takes he wants outright and avoiding the need to re-record lines should they not work with the source video. Many of the long-established and prolific cast members (E.G.: [=LillyLivers=], codeblackhayate) note that ''SFA'' was one of their first online voice acting roles with live direction - most online amateur voice acting is done alone and impersonally, relying on directions from the script or project heads, and is often a long-running process of sending in lines, waiting, and re-recording lines later. From 2011 on, many abridgers adopted live directing themselves, and it is now a common practice, though solo recording is also still common.
* Thorn admits that he wanted to run the project and voice practically everyone in the formative, circa-[=SFA1R=] days. Fast-forward to 2013, and he does run the project and voice a majority of the cast.

* CastFullOfWriters: Thorn and Yoshi were the primary scriptwriters and core voice cast for Seasons 1 and 2, the latter stepping down as writer after Season 2. Voice actors [=LillyLivers=], [=BigTUnit1=], [=JigglyJacob=] and [=InfamousGentleman=] also contributed to the writing in several episodes, and the only non-cast member to write for ''SFA'' was an-artist-complex in Season 3.

* DirectedByCastMember: The series' voice actors are directed by Thorn, who also voices a large chunk of the cast.

* WrittenByCastMember:
** Thorn and Yoshi are the writers and lead voice actors, the latter retiring from writing after Season 2.
** Episodes 6 and 24 were co-written with Natsumi's VA [=LillyLivers=].
** Travis voiced various minor characters before becoming recurring co-writer with Episode 9.
** Episode 22 was co-written with Kululu's VA [=InfamousGentleman=]. 22 and 23, both centered on HQ, were also co-written by HQ's VA Jiggly Jacob, who continued on as a co-writer through the rest of the series.

** Averted for most of the characters, though Tamama is a weird example. He starts out being an aversion in Season 1, unlike both the Japanese and Funimation versions of the original series, until he is revealed to be a girl in Episode 10, becoming a subverted example and a complete inversion of the original's crossdressing voice.

** Episodes 6 and 24 were co-written with Natsumi's VA [=LillyLivers=]

* ContestWinnerCameo: In place of album covers, Episode 18 hides pictures of the winners of Creator/TheMidnightFrogs' 2011 Manga/SgtFrog abridging contest.

* HeyItsThatVoice:
** [=LillyLivers=], codeblackhayate and [=BigTUnit1=] all voiced in multiple projects (internet and professional) before voicing in ''SFA''.
** Sumomo and an animator in Episode 8 were voiced by [=1KidsEntertainment=], best known for ''WebVideo/PokemonTheBridgedSeries''. [=1Kids'=] cohort xJerry64x also makes a cameo as an animator in Episode 8 [[RelationshipVoiceActor in the same scene as 1Kids]].
** Dokuku was voiced in Episode 20 by [=ShazMyBot=] from Gutted Wren Studios, best known as Amuro and Bright in their ''WebVideo/MobileSuitGundamAbridged'' series, before Shaz stopped voice acting and [[TheOtherDarrin was replaced by Jiggly Jacob for Episode 21]].
** Yukiki is voiced by Creator/EdwynTiong.
* InspirationForTheWork: Mugiwara Yoshi was inspired to begin ''SFA'' after becoming a fan of both [[Manga/SgtFrog the original]] and of [[TheAbridgedSeries abridged series in general]], and thus he wanted to see an abridged series of ''Sgt Frog''. However there was no good abridging of it, so he took the opportunity to start one himself.

** There were several voice actor change-ups during the original first five episodes which were retconned out of the series with the Episodes 1-3 remakes, and they were part of why the episodes were remade. There were also numerous voice actors brought in to voice Dororo, Momoka, Omiyo, Natsumi, and Paul but were replaced before they ever appeared in an episode.

*** Giroro was voiced by [=DFatman=] at the end of Episode 1R. Thorn stepped in as backup in case Fatman couldn't record, but Yoshi preferred Thorn's voice anyway, so he became the permanent voice shortly before Fatman was kicked from the team.

*** Momoka was voiced in Episode 2R by [=LillyLivers=] as backup after four months of failing to find a stable voice actor and delaying of Episode 2R. The team were so frustrated with Momoka that she was left out of Season 1 until Episode 10 out of spite. From then-on she was voiced by Dobuchu.
*** There was supposed to be a running joke involving Thorn and Yoshi trading off each episode as the voice of Tamama, but Yoshi only voiced the character in Episode 3R before retiring as the second voice. It was one of the reasons that Episode 3 was remade despite being a mostly competent episode.

** Revy Moonshine, also from Gutted Wren, voiced Koyuki from Episode 4 to Episode 18 before stepping down prior to Episode 22. Thaichestnuts filled the role from then on. Ches also filled in for Teddy as the voice of Nuii from Episode 22 on.

** [=ThePS2God=], the original voice of Momoka, Omiyo and Dororo, had recorded lines for Episode 2R before being kicked from the project. However the then-script ended up not fitting with the source video, so his recordings were scrapped.

* PropRecycling: Still frames and footage from older episodes were reused for the season finales and for ''Reset'', either for the character models or the settings.
* RealitySubtext: Subversion. Writer Thorn came out during production of Episode 11 as a bisexual transvestite[[note]]he has since stated he is Pansexual and Genderfluid[[/note]], but [[WordOfGod he states]] that he has always been an [=LGBT=] activist, so the series' examinations of sexuality were likely to happen anyway. He does however acknowledge that making [[EveryoneIsBi all of the characters bisexual]] and making Giroro a CrossDresser is HilariousInHindsight.

** Jiggly Jacob voices both Dokuku and his brother Giruru in Episode 21. Giruru's voice is filtered through a chorus to further differentiate it.

* UnCanceled: Originally ended November 2012, with the creators seeming prepared to never look back. Three months and a failed attempt to start another AbridgedSeries later, Thorn was more than happy to bring it back and do it again for a third season.

** The writers intended to bring back Momoka after killing her off in Episode 13, but her voice actress Dobuchu moved to Japan shortly after the episode went up. As a result, they simply left her dead. Dobuchu returned to the US in 2013, allowing Momoka to return, but she wasn't revived until Episode 22 in August 2015, and she did not appear in either of the series' remaining three episodes.

** ''Not'' the case in regards to ending the series after Episode 18. Thorn had every intention of ending the series for good. He just simply changed his mind.

** Al Vee, one of the voice actors for Momoka during the character's [=SFA2R=] fiasco, was the only VA before [=LillyLivers=] to record lines with the finalized script. Her health and living situation prevented her from finishing recording. After a failed attempt to find an understudy for Al, Lilly was asked to voice Momoka as backup.

* TrollingCreator: While the series does away with nearly all of the tropes and iconic elements of the original anime within the first several episodes, Thorn and Yoshi still slipped in a tongue-in-cheek conversation in Episode 5 about Gundam models and SFA-Keroro's apathy towards them. This was an intentional laugh at the expense of their audience, since a large portion of their fans were also fans of the original series, and a key part of the original Keroro's character is his love of Gundam models.

** Episode 6 was co-written with Natsumi's VA [=LillyLivers=]

** Episode 22 was co-written with Kululu's VA [=InfamousGentleman=]. 22 and 23, both centered on HQ, were also co-written by HQ's VA Jiggly Jacob.

** Jiggly Jacob, a self-professed fanboy of Creator/TheMidnightFrogs and the creator of his own (now defunct) Manga/SgtFrog AbridgedSeries (read SincerestFormOfFlattery), was made the voice of HQ and later Dokuku and Giruru. He became an honorary team member after ''SFA: Reset'' and co-wrote Episodes 22 and 23.

** Jiggly Jacob, a self-professed fanboy of Creator/TheMidnightFrogs and the creator of his own (now defunct) Manga/SgtFrog AbridgedSeries (read FollowTheLeader), was made the voice of HQ and later Dokuku and Giruru. He became an honorary team member after ''SFA: Reset'' and co-wrote Episodes 22 and 23.

** [[spoiler:The climax to Episode 10 with Future Kululu]] is what happens when Thorn takes numerous disparate elements from the first season and tries to tie them together. He and Yoshi barely planned for the climax prior to scriptwriting, despite Episode 10 having the most planning of any episode up to that point.

** Giroro, Kululu, Mois, and HQ all had voice actor change-ups after their characters had already appeared. There were also numerous voice actors hired to voice Dororo, Momoka, Omiyo, and Natsumi but were removed before they ever appeared in an episode.
** There was supposed to be a running joke involving Thorn and Yoshi trading off each episode as the voice of Tamama, but Yoshi only voiced the character in Episode 3R before retiring as the second voice. It was one of the reasons that Episode 3 was remade despite being a mostly competent episode.
** Momoka was voiced by [=LillyLivers=] for her debut in 2R, but was voiced by Narusasu in Episode 10 onward. Narusasu also did Momoka for the Episode 2 remake.

* TheOtherMarty: [=ThePS2God=], the original voice of Momoka, Omiyo and Dororo, had recorded lines for Episode 2R before being kicked from the project. However the then-script ended up not fitting with the source video, so his recordings were scrapped.