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* UnusuallyUninterestingSight: The beetle, fly, and glow worm Lucas meets inside the frog's stomach don't seem especially shocked at the sight of a human child shrunk down to their size and in the same predicament as the three of them.
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-->'''Zoc:''' Hova, I did it for you. For the colony...\\

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-->'''Zoc:''' Hova, [[NeverMyFault I did it for you. For you]], [[FalseReassurance for the colony...colony.]]...\\
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* FantasticLivestock: The ants use caterpillars as livestock, specifically farming them for their honeydew.
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* GrumpyBear: The unnamed fly who appears with the beetle and the glow worm is a grouchy, irascible fellow who is easily annoyed by the beetle's perpetual cheerfulness and the glow worm's constant gloom.
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The film received mixed reviews from critics and was a BoxOfficeBomb.
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** A slacking ant (''on vacation'') in reality would be killed on the spot: yes, ants actually execute foragers that do not bring anything home.

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** A slacking ant (''on vacation'') in reality would be killed on the spot: yes, ants actually [[YouHaveFailedMe execute foragers that do not bring anything home.home]].

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Not So Different has been reworked by TRS into Not So Different Remark


* MirrorCharcter: Lucas and Zoc. The former gets picked on by the latter in much the same way Lucas picked on the ants.



* NotSoDifferent: Lucas and Zoc. The former gets picked on by the latter in much the same way Lucas picked on the ants.
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* HeelFaceTurn: The Wasps do this after teaming up and helping the ants against the Exterminator.

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* HeelFaceTurn: The [[spoiler:The Wasps do this after teaming up and helping the ants against the Exterminator.Exterminator]].
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* IOweYouMyLife: The Wasps do this with Lucas [[spoiler:after he saved the life of a soldier wasp from Stan Beals' poisonous fumes]].
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* AFatherToHisMen: The Leader Wasp is like this to his soldiers [[spoiler:after he becomes enraged after one of his soldiers fell victim to Stan's poisonous fumes]].

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* AFatherToHisMen: The Wasp Leader Wasp is like this to his soldiers [[spoiler:after he becomes enraged after one of his soldiers fell victim to Stan's poisonous fumes]].
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* AFatherToHisMen: The Leader Wasp is like this to his soldiers [[spoiler:after he becomes enraged after one of his soldiers fell victim to Stan's poisonous fumes]].


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* HeelFaceTurn: The Wasps do this after teaming up and helping the ants against the Exterminator.

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* AdaptationExpansion: The film is based on a book that's about thirty pages long.

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* AdaptationExpansion: The film is based on a children's book that's about thirty pages long.



* BadBoss: Steve is quite abusive towards his "friends". [[spoiler: This leads to them turning against him in the end.]]
* BalefulPolymorph: [[spoiler: Lucas and the ants beat Stan Beals by turning him into a deformed version of himself, so misshapen that he can barely walk at the end.]]

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* BadBoss: Steve is quite abusive towards his "friends". [[spoiler: This [[spoiler:This leads to them turning against him in the end.]]
* BalefulPolymorph: [[spoiler: Lucas [[spoiler:Lucas and the ants beat Stan Beals by turning him into a deformed version of himself, so misshapen that he can barely walk at the end.]]



* BodyHorror: [[spoiler: Stan Beals' body violently convulses, contorts and ultimately deforms as a result of being injected with the shrinking potion.]]

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* BodyHorror: [[spoiler: Stan [[spoiler:Stan Beals' body violently convulses, contorts and ultimately deforms as a result of being injected with the shrinking potion.]]



* ByWallThatIsHoley: How Fugax survives an attack with a phone receiver -- he very luckily ends up in one of the receiver's holes.



* ByWallThatIsHoley: How Fugax survives an attack from a phone receiver -- he very luckily ends up in one of the receiver's holes.



* ExitPursuedByABear: [[spoiler: Stan Beals is last seen barely outrunning an angry swarm of wasps while on a tricycle.]]

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* ExitPursuedByABear: [[spoiler: Stan [[spoiler:Stan Beals is last seen barely outrunning an angry swarm of wasps while on a tricycle.]]



-->'''Kreela:''' "Why is he covered in trash? Is he crazy? Because I don't teach crazy ants."\\
'''Hova:''' "No, no, no. He calls the trash "clothes". They like keeping their gender traits hidden. He's male."

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-->'''Kreela:''' "Why Why is he covered in trash? Is he crazy? Because I don't teach crazy ants."\\
\\
'''Hova:''' "No, No, no, no. He calls the trash "clothes". They like keeping their gender traits hidden. He's male."



* TheHighQueen: The Queen Ant is a wise and benevolent ruler, and while she's displeased by Lucas's actions towards her colony, she elects to give him a chance at redemption rather than just have him killed.

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* TheHighQueen: TheHighQueen:
**
The Queen Ant is a wise and benevolent ruler, and while she's displeased by Lucas's actions towards her colony, she elects to give him a chance at redemption rather than just have him killed.



* IncredibleShrinkingMan
* InkSuitActor: Creator/PaulGiamatti as exterminator Stan Beals. Almost no difference -- the goatee, the nose, the eyebrows.

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* IncredibleShrinkingMan
IncredibleShrinkingMan: Lucas, courtesy of the ants' shrinking potion, is reduced to the size of an ant himself.
* InkSuitActor: Creator/PaulGiamatti as exterminator Stan Beals. Almost no difference -- the goatee, the nose, the eyebrows.



* InsultToRocks: Inverted [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]], after the ants are attacked by tarantula hawk wasps and Lucas finds a firecracker and uses it to scare them away, Fugax praises him by saying he now knows why Lucas is nicknamed "[[AffectionateNickname Peanut]]": "Because his brain is the size of a PEANUT!" which would be an insult to humans, but it serves as a compliment to ants.

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* InsultToRocks: Inverted [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]], after laughs]]. After the ants are attacked by tarantula hawk wasps and Lucas finds and uses a firecracker and uses it to scare them away, Fugax praises him by saying he now knows why Lucas is nicknamed "[[AffectionateNickname Peanut]]": "Because his brain is the size of a PEANUT!" which To a human this would be an insult to insulting, but since ants are much smaller than humans, but making peanuts comparatively much larger, it serves as a compliment to among the ants.



* MeaningfulRename: [[spoiler: The Queen Ant gives Lucas the name "Rocai" as his ant name when he saves the colony from Beals.]]

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* MeaningfulRename: [[spoiler: The [[spoiler:The Queen Ant gives Lucas the name "Rocai" as his ant name when he saves the colony from Beals.]]



-->'''Zoc:''' Hova, I did it for you. For the colony...
-->'''Hova:''' (sharply) You did it for yourself.

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-->'''Zoc:''' Hova, I did it for you. For the colony...
-->'''Hova:'''
colony...\\
'''Hova:'''
(sharply) You did it for yourself.



** Early in the movie, Lucas is the monster "Peanut the Destroyer", whose the ants perceive as a building-sized monster that regularly rains destruction on their colony.

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** Early in the movie, Lucas is the monster "Peanut the Destroyer", whose who the ants perceive as a building-sized monster that regularly rains destruction on their colony.



** When Lucas asks Hova to cross her heart, she crosses her abdomen not her thorax like Lucas does, explaining to Lucas that her heart is in her abdomen. This is true about [[http://missdanaants.blogspot.com/2013/03/ant-anatomy.html ant anatomy]].

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** When Lucas asks Hova to cross her heart, she crosses her abdomen not instead of her thorax like Lucas does, explaining to Lucas that her heart is in her abdomen. This is true about [[http://missdanaants.blogspot.com/2013/03/ant-anatomy.html ant anatomy]].



* ToiletHumour: When reading off Lucas's ListOfTransgressions, among them is one only referred to as "the dreaded ''yellow rain''!" Lucas contests that [[PottyEmergency he really had to go that day]].



* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: No one knows what happened to Stan Beals after he got chased away by wasps.



* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: No one knows what happened to Stan Beals after he got chased away by wasps.
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** [[AluminumChristmasTrees Unbelievably]], ants use not just chemical weapons, but other objects against enemies they cannot defeat with their mandibles alone, such as [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YpDCt_IaNM soaking the noxious coating of slugs with pieces of sand]. Be glad they are not human-sized indeed.

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** [[AluminumChristmasTrees Unbelievably]], ants use not just chemical weapons, but other objects against enemies they cannot defeat with their mandibles alone, such as [https://www.[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YpDCt_IaNM soaking the noxious coating of slugs with pieces of sand].sand]]. Be glad they are not human-sized indeed.
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** [[AluminumChristmasTrees Unbelievably]], ants use not just chemical weapons, but other objects against enemies they cannot defeat with their mandibles alone, such as [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YpDCt_IaNM soaking the noxious coating of slugs with pieces of sand]. Be glad they are not human-sized indeed.
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** Red forest ants (Formica rufa) indeed do shoot liquid acid, but they do it from their own abdomen, not using larvae. The sticky goo produced by larvae is used by Asian leaf ants to glue their nests together.

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** Red forest ants (Formica rufa) indeed do shoot liquid acid, but they do it from their own abdomen, not using larvae. The sticky goo produced by larvae is also real, but it's used by Asian leaf South-American leafcutter ants to glue their nests together.
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** Only females (with underdeveloped reproductive system) can be worker/soldier ants. Male ants are winged, wasp-like drones, whose only purpose in the colony is to mate with a virgin queen, and die a few days afterwards. It's possible that the inspiration came from termites (close relatives to ants), whose young males do help workers until they are ready to mate.

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** Only females (with underdeveloped reproductive system) can be worker/soldier ants. Male ants are winged, wasp-like drones, whose only purpose in the colony is to mate with a virgin queen, and die a few days afterwards. It's possible that the inspiration came from termites (close (who are not even relatives to ants), whose young males do help workers until they are ready to mate.



** Red forest ants (Formica rufa) indeed do shoot liquid acid, but they do it from their own abdomen, not using larvae.
** These ants, and most of the ants in fact, build their anthills from foraged plant matter, not sand, because the anthill must be well ventilated to be habitable.

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** Red forest ants (Formica rufa) indeed do shoot liquid acid, but they do it from their own abdomen, not using larvae.
larvae. The sticky goo produced by larvae is used by Asian leaf ants to glue their nests together.
** These Red ants, and most of the ants in fact, build their anthills from foraged plant matter, not sand, because the anthill must be well ventilated to be habitable.

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** Only females can be worker ants. Male ants are winged, wasp-like drones, whose only purpose in the colony is to mate with a virgin queen, and die a few days afterwards.
** The Queen Ant is depicted as having wings. In real life, queens only have wings for their nuptial flight, after which they shed their wings, as their wing muscles will be digested to help nourish the first brood (and as she spends the rest of her life underground, she has no need for them anyway).
** The Glow-Worm is a male. In reality, glow worms are in fact wingless female fireflies, while the males have wings and are capable of flight.

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** Only females (with underdeveloped reproductive system) can be worker worker/soldier ants. Male ants are winged, wasp-like drones, whose only purpose in the colony is to mate with a virgin queen, and die a few days afterwards.
afterwards. It's possible that the inspiration came from termites (close relatives to ants), whose young males do help workers until they are ready to mate.
** The Queen Ant is depicted as still having wings. In real life, queens only have use wings for during their nuptial flight, after which they shed their wings, bite them off, as their wing muscles will be digested to help nourish the first brood (and as she spends the rest of her life underground, she has no need for them anyway).
** The Glow-Worm is of unspecified gender, but has a male.male voice. In reality, glow worms are in fact wingless female fireflies, while the males have wings and are capable of flight.
** Ironically, a winged firefly is also present in the film (Zoc's pet), but is somehow about 1/20 the size of other insects.
** Red forest ants (Formica rufa) indeed do shoot liquid acid, but they do it from their own abdomen, not using larvae.
** These ants, and most of the ants in fact, build their anthills from foraged plant matter, not sand, because the anthill must be well ventilated to be habitable.
** Queen ant is not the actual ''queen'' of the colony: while she certainly is its most distinct member, it's the worker ants who do all the "thinking" decisions (and may even drag the queen around against her will). In fact, the council of high-ranking ants is more accurate than it seems.
** A slacking ant (''on vacation'') in reality would be killed on the spot: yes, ants actually execute foragers that do not bring anything home.
** Ants do not sleep per se: instead they take quite a lot of "power naps" every day, each lasting for less than a minute, so at least 80% of workforce is awake at any time.
** Ants do have a complex system of communication that allows sharing information, giving orders etc., but they rely on pheromones (i.e. scent) and touching each other with antennae, not sound.



** Some species of ants ''do'' "farm" beetles for honeydew, having something of a symbiotic relationship.

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** Some species of ants ''do'' "farm" beetles other insects for honeydew, having something of a symbiotic relationship.relationship. Most ants that keep around "livestock" use aphids, but one family of butterflies does symbiote with ants while they are still caterpillars, the Lycaenids.
** Ants do care for their wounded comrades: if an ant loses a limb, others will feed their crippled sister as long as she is able to beg for food with her antennae.
** Ants do indeed have hierarchy among the workers: active foragers do the scouting and give orders to passive foragers (who do the heavy lifting but do not really look for the target unless ordered).
** Ant vs. wasp clashes are very real, and red ants do use their acid to blast the enemy from the sky. Even the reason is realistic: wasps do hunt caterpillars, including those that prefer to hide among ants.
** An ant, while small, can indeed drag something relatively large across a vertical surface.
** While ants do not form "relationships" (that's a termite thing), they do recognize their fellow ants (i.e. specific individuals) and engage in complex communication, even trading resources with other ant colonies.
** Ants have complex eyes. In the film, most insects have pupils, but you can see their eyes are made of small facets. When Lucas makes a lens out of a "discarded" eye, it shows the world in multiple facets as it's supposed to. It's also saying much that an ant seeing Stan's truck can recognize the movement very well, but not the details: this is how ant eyes work.
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* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: [[spoiler:Stan Beals' ultimate fate of seems very harsh considering his actions are not really all that different from Lucas'. In fact, Stan was hired by Lucas to take out the anthill, meaning he's doing it for work, unlike Lucas who did it purely for his own sadistic satisfaction. He may be taking a bit too much pleasure out of his job, but he is unaware that the ants are intelligent creatures. At the end, Lucas gets to go home while Stan presumably has to live the rest of his life with a pretty serious disability.]] A deleted scene reveals that Stan's more of an AssholeVictim. [[spoiler:Stan never had permission from Lucas' father. In fact, his whole motivation for wanting a contract is so he could have one with every house in the neighborhood. Stan exploited Lucas' own insecurities all for his own selfish gain.]]

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* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: [[spoiler:Stan Beals' ultimate fate of seems very harsh considering his actions are not really all that different from Lucas'. In fact, Stan was hired by Lucas to take out the anthill, meaning he's doing it for work, unlike Lucas who did it purely for his own sadistic satisfaction. He may be taking a bit too much pleasure out of his job, but he is unaware that the ants are intelligent creatures. At the end, Lucas gets to go home while Stan presumably has to live the rest of his life with a pretty serious disability.]] A deleted scene reveals that Stan's more of an AssholeVictim. [[spoiler:Stan never had permission from Lucas' father. In fact, his whole motivation for wanting a contract is so he could have one with every house in the neighborhood. Stan exploited Lucas' own insecurities all for his own selfish gain.]]
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* GrowlingGut: After eating honeydew and realizing that it's essentially caterpillar poop, Lucas's belly can be heard gurgling and rumbling up a storm as he fights back the urge to puke. Hova comes to the rescue with some alca root to settle his stomach with... albeit at the cost of making him burp after taking it, which is heralded by an ''even louder'' stomach growl.

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* GrowlingGut: After eating honeydew and realizing that it's essentially caterpillar poop, Lucas's Lucas' belly can be heard gurgling and rumbling up a storm as he fights back the urge to puke. Hova comes to the rescue with some alca root to settle his stomach with... albeit at the cost of making him burp after taking it, which is heralded by an ''even louder'' stomach growl.
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* GrowlingGut: After eating honeydew and realizing that it's essentially caterpillar poop, Lucas's belly can be heard gurgling and rumbling up a storm as he fights back the urge to puke. Hova comes to the rescue with some alca root to settle his stomach with... albeit at the cost of making him burp after taking it, which is heralded by an ''even louder'' stomach growl.
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* MeaningfulRename: [[spoiler: The Queen Ant gives Lucas the name "Rocai" as his ant name when he saves the colony from Beals.]]
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* TheHighQueen: The Queen Ant is a wise and benevolent ruler, and while she's displeased by Lucas's actions towards her colony, she elects to give him a chance at redemption rather than just have him killed.
** The Ant Mother, the first queen and ancestral figure of the ants, is portrayed as this in her worship.

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* NotAfraidOfYouAnymore: Lucas is not afraid of the bully anymore after his experiences with the ants.

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* OhMyGods: The ants often say "Praise the Mother" as an exclamation of joy or relief. Lucas thinks they're referring to the Queen Ant, but Hova tells him they mean the Ant Mother, "the Queen of queens" and the mother of the first ant colony.
* NotAfraidOfYouAnymore: Lucas is not afraid of the bully anymore after his experiences with the ants.ants, which gives him the courage to stand up to him.

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* BorrowedCatchphrase: Lucas borrows Zoc's frustrated utterance of "Kraznots!" as his own.



* TheEeyore: The glow worm, who's quite glum in comparison to smiley cloudcuckoolander beetle.

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* TheEeyore: The glow worm, who's quite glum in comparison to the smiley cloudcuckoolander beetle.



* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: The Queen Ant, who simply decides that Lucas should live like an ant. Likewise, the same would occur for Hova, who opts to give Lucas a chance to prove himself, while, her mate, Zoc would rather not.

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* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: The Queen Ant, who simply decides that Lucas should live like an ant.ant to learn the error of his ways. Likewise, the same would occur for Hova, who opts to give Lucas a chance to prove himself, while, her mate, Zoc would rather not.


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-->'''Zoc:''' Hova, I did it for you. For the colony...
-->'''Hova:''' (sharply) You did it for yourself.
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* OfficialCouple: Though they have their differences, Zoc and Hova are shown to have an affectionate and caring relationship.


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* SavvyGuyEnergeticGirl: Zoc, a jaded, irritable wizard, and Hova, a kind and outgoing healer.
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* InsultToRocks: Inverted [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]], after the ants are attacked by tarantula hawk wasps and Lucas finds a firecracker and uses it to scare them away, Fugax comments that he now knows why Lucas is nicknamed "[[AffectionateNickname Peanut]]": "Because his brain is the size of a PEANUT!" which would be an insult to humans, but it serves as a compliment to ants.

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* InsultToRocks: Inverted [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]], after the ants are attacked by tarantula hawk wasps and Lucas finds a firecracker and uses it to scare them away, Fugax comments that praises him by saying he now knows why Lucas is nicknamed "[[AffectionateNickname Peanut]]": "Because his brain is the size of a PEANUT!" which would be an insult to humans, but it serves as a compliment to ants.
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* InsultToRocks: Inverted [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]], after the ants are attacked by tarantula hawk wasps and Lucas finds a firecracker and uses it to scare them away, Fugax comments that he now knows why Lucas is nicknamed "[[AffectionateNickname Peanut]]": "Because you've got a brain the size of a PEANUT!" which would be an insult to humans, but it serves as a compliment to ants.

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* InsultToRocks: Inverted [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]], after the ants are attacked by tarantula hawk wasps and Lucas finds a firecracker and uses it to scare them away, Fugax comments that he now knows why Lucas is nicknamed "[[AffectionateNickname Peanut]]": "Because you've got a his brain is the size of a PEANUT!" which would be an insult to humans, but it serves as a compliment to ants.
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* InsultToRocks: Inverted [[PlayedForLaughs for laughs]], after the ants are attacked by tarantula hawk wasps and Lucas finds a firecracker and uses it to scare them away, Fugax comments that he now knows why Lucas is nicknamed "[[AffectionateNickname Peanut]]": "Because you've got a brain the size of a PEANUT!" which would be an insult to humans, but it serves as a compliment to ants.
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* WhatHappenedToTheMouse?: No one knows what happened to Stan Beals after he got chased away by wasps.

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* WhatHappenedToTheMouse?: WhatHappenedToTheMouse: No one knows what happened to Stan Beals after he got chased away by wasps.
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* HartmanHips: Lucas's mom has them to a ludicrous extreme.

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* HartmanHips: Lucas's Lucas' mom has them to a ludicrous extreme.



* MagicPants: Averted. Lucas's clothes don't shrink with him, so he's forced to make new clothes out of shed exoskeletons. The same occurs at the end when [[spoiler:Lucas is returned to human size and his ant clothes do not grow with him. He quickly finds himself standing completely naked in the front garden.]]

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* MagicPants: Averted. Lucas's Lucas' clothes don't shrink with him, so he's forced to make new clothes out of shed exoskeletons. The same occurs at the end when [[spoiler:Lucas is returned to human size and his ant clothes do not grow with him. He quickly finds himself standing completely naked in the front garden.]]

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