Line #24 WesternAnimation/Detention


1	[[quoteright:320:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Detention.jpg]]
2	->''"As long as we're in school, we're gonna get in trouble!"''
3	-->-- '''The theme song''', ''Detention''
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5	''Detention'' is a [[{{OneSeasonWonder}} short-lived]] animated series that aired on Creator/KidsWB from 1999 to 2000. Lasting for [[ShortRunners just 13 episodes]], it's one of the shortest-lived cartoons to ever come out of Creator/WarnerBros Animation. Animation is provided by Creator/WangFilmProductions, with a similar animation style close to their work on ''WesternAnimation/{{Tiny Toon Adventures}}'', ''[[WesternAnimation/{{TazMania}} Taz-Mania]]'', ''WesternAnimation/{{Animaniacs}}'' and ''[[WesternAnimation/{{PinkyAndTheBrain}} Pinky and the Brain]]''.
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7	The show centers on a group of preteen students at Benedict Arnold Middle School who engage in all sorts of [[HilarityEnsues wacky hijinks during their everyday lives]]; but try as they may, they simply cannot avoid being put in detention by the end of the school day. There, they are kept under the strict supervision of [[SadistTeacher Eugenia P. Kisskillya]], a former [[{{SemperFi}} Marine Corps]] [[{{DrillSergeantNasty}} sergeant]] who is also the school's gym teacher.
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9	The show is now on iTunes since 2018, after several years of unavailability. A DVD Release by Warner Archive followed on May 21, 2019.
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11	Not to be confused with the 2011 horror/comedy [[Film/{{Detention}} of the same name]]. Also not to be confused with the 2017 horror video game [[VideoGame/{{Detention}} of the same name]]. Has no relationship with ''WesternAnimation/{{Detentionaire}}'', either.
12	----
13	!!The kids the show focuses on include:
14	* [[TheLancer Shareena Wickett]], a [[PerkyGoth freely-thinking]] [[LittleMissSnarker Goth-dressed girl]] who prefers to avoid the in-crowd and finds pleasure in the sublime.
15	* [[TheHero Emmitt Roswell]], a blonde boy with born leadership abilities which are questioned by the fact that [[OnlySaneMan he believes that aliens exist]] and tries fruitlessly to make contact with them. Could also be considered a AgentMulder and or a ConspiracyTheorist.
16	* [[TheBigGuy Jim Kim]], a shy kid who is a big fan of comic books (particularly Creator/DCComics, which Warner Bros. owns), to the point that he brings them up in regular conversation and tends to [[LoonyFan think he has their abilities]].
17	* [[KidAppealCharacter Ramone "Gug" Gugleamo]], a short but feisty Hispanic kid who, constantly being left out of competitive sports [[TheNapoleon because of his size]], likes to pick fights with people bigger than him.
18	* [[TheHeart Duncan Bubble]], a boy who [[TheVoiceless never]] [[TheQuietOne speaks]], instead preferring to [[TalkingWithSigns spell out his messages with his yo-yo]].
19	* Orangejella and Lemonjella [=LaBelle=], identical [[TokenBlackFriend African-American]] sisters with [[TheSmartGuy high intellect]] and a habit of trying to one-up each other.
20	* [[TeachersPet Shelley Kelley]], a [[CheerfulChild perky girl]] who constantly kisses up to Kisskillya and as a result is seen as TheScrappy by the other kids.
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22	!!This show contains examples of:
23	* ADogNamedDog: Shareena's pet pig, Pig.
24	* BitingTheHandHumor: ''Series/DawsonsCreek'', a fellow show on Creator/TheWB, gets parodied along with the network itself in the episode "Breaking Out".
25	* CantGetInTroubleForNuthin: Shelley Kelley, despite the fact that she spends the entirety of "The Contest" trying.
26	* CloudCuckoolander: Jim.
27	* DaddyDidntShow: One of the focuses of "Boys 'N the Parenthood". Emmitt waits excitedly, all day, for his dad to show up and hang out with him. He never shows up. As a result, he's the only guy that doesn't drop his water balloon "baby" owing to being too disappointed to engage in antics.
28	* DarkHorseVictory: The twins get disqualified from the spelling bee in "The Man With the Golden Brain".
29	* DisappointedInYou: In "The Contest": when Shareena deliberately throws the bet to stay out of detention by pranking Kisskillya, the teacher is both mad and disappointed. Kisskillya says that she knows that Shareena has the potential to avoid trouble. Shareena agrees; she just decided to have fun so that her friends wouldn't be alone.
30	* DrillSergeantNasty: Kisskillya. She even calls the students "soldiers" or "privates".
31	* {{Duck}}: In "Too Good to be Truant", Shareena and Shelley, skipping school, go to the mall. Shareena yells "Duck!" when she sees her mother at a clothing store and Shelley takes it to mean the store sells ducks.
32	* EggSitting: The "babies" are water balloons that cry at random -- permanently if the parent doesn't switch it off in time. Shelley's the only one keen on the project, while most of the guys goof off or play recklessly with their babies. The girls fight back by adding enough water to double their size before handing the babies back. Shareena in particular had to watch the baby all weekend so Emmitt could go camping with his dad, but Mr. Roswell never showed. As a result, Emmitt isn't up for getting into mayhem with the other guys, who all wind up dropping their balloons, forcing three of the four families to do the project over.
33	* ForWantOfANail: In "Too Good to Be Truant", Miss Kisskillya would've never learned Shareena skipped school if Shareena hadn't dropped her wallet.
34	* GoKartingWithBowser: Shareena dreads having to go on a solo tour of Washington D.C. with Miss Kisskillya[[note]] It's solo because she didn't feel like following the rest of the gang towards Emmitt's latest theory[[/note]]. She's pleasantly surprised when Kisskillya turns out to be a fun and engaging guide.
35	--->'''Miss Kisskillya''': Well, you can't judge an officer by her stripes.
36	* GrandFinale: The final episode, "Rule the School", ends with Shareena throwing two simultaneous parties at her house: an anniversary party for her parents, and "the cool party" in her bedroom. Not too bad for a ShortRunner.
37	* GuiltByAssociationGag: When giving Shareena detention for skipping school, Miss Kisskillya does the same to the other kids for not saying anything about it.
38	* IWasQuiteALooker: Kisskillya, believe it or not. When the kids find a cave used by previous detention classes, we see an Evolution Line of her going from svelte and attractive, to... Kisskillya.
39	* HousepetPig: Shareena has one named Pig.
40	* JoinsToFitIn: In "The Contest", Shelley plans to get landed in detention in a bid to get the rest of the class to accept her.
41	* KarmaHoudini: In "Too Good to Be Truant", when Shareena and Shelley are caught playing truant, Kisskillya assumes that Shelley didn't do this voluntarily and lets her off the hook. Meanwhile, Shareena gets punished, and so do all the other kids besides Shelley because they were "holding back information". Contrary to what you would expect in a kids' show, Shelley never admits her guilt, because she doesn't want to ruin her perfect attendance record.
42	* MeaningfulName: Emmitt's surname is Series/{{Roswell}}.
43	* PetTheDog: When Kisskillya sees that Shareena was looking for her pig, who just had babies, she says the kids are off the hook, ''if'' they all agree to come back the next day and clean the storage room. Everyone is quick to take that deal.
44	* PokeThePoodle: In a decision to assert their free will, the gang sets a bet on who can stay out of detention the longest. Shelley gets in on the bet via the goal of doing something bad enough that she gets ''sent'' to detention. Unfortunately, her ideas of rule-breaking are skipping extra quickly in the halls and chewing gum. Kisskillya doesn't even notice.
45	* ShamSupernatural: In "The Blame Game", Emmitt gets ordered to to clean out the school's boiler room, which is rumored to be haunted by the ghost of Christopher Crandall, a kid who got assigned the same job long ago and disappeared. Gug decides to take advantage of Emmitt's paranoia by pretending to be that ghost and scare him as a prank.
46	* ShoutOut:
47	** Shelley quotes Sally Brown's outburst from ''[[ComicStrip/{{Peanuts}} It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown]]'' after waiting for an alien on the school roof with Emmitt during the school dance. (Ironically, Warner Bros. now owns the video rights to the ''Peanuts'' cartoons.)
48	** ActorAllusion: While her VA wasn't Sally, she was Lucy.
49	** Duncan Bubble is named after the Duncan yo-yo company.
50	** Orangejella and Lemonjella are named after [[https://babynames.com/blogs/names/baby-names-urban-legends/ an old urban legend]] of the KnowsAGuyWhoKnowsAGuy variety.
51	** While making fun of Jim's obsession with Franchise/{{Batman}}, Kisskillya sarcastically says she'll "See [him] in Gotham City." This was Kids WB's {{Tagline}} for ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries.''
52	** When Shelley decides to tag along with Shareena playing hooky in "Too Good to Be Truant", she says the experience will be like ''Film/ThelmaAndLouise''. Also, Kisskillya's attempts in catching Shareena and Shelley mirror that of [[Film/FerrisBuellersDayOff Ed Rooney]].
53	** In "What Did You Seance?" Jim has a ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'' poster in his room.
54	* SpellingBee: In "The Man With the Golden Brain", six of the kids aim to win a Get Out of Detention Free card. Shareena practices with morbid words, Shelley learns cheerful words, and the twins one-up each other with long words. During the bee, Shareena and Shelley fail to spell words from each other's practice books, Duncan's yo-yo string snaps trying to pronounce one letter too many, [[spoiler:the twins get double-disqualified when one of them interrupts the other's spelling of "rivalry" and Gug wins by spelling a word that he heard the twins spell during practice]].
55	* TheVoiceless: Duncan doesn't speak, instead spelling out messages with his yo-yo.
56	* WorkOffTheDebt: Happens to Shareena and Shelley when they can't pay a coffee shop bill in "Too Good to Be Truant".
57	* YourTomcatIsPregnant: Shareena's pet pig was thought to be male until "he" gave birth to a litter of piglets.

Context WesternAnimation / Detention