Headscratchers / Saved by the Bell

Headscratchers for Saved by the Bell.

• My god, did anybody in this school ever set foot in a high school!? Were they raised by wolves?! Were they smoking marijuana mixed with crack cocaine and crystal meth when writing and filming this show!? ....right....so it just bugs me that this show is so freaking not like high school.
  • Apparently you never went to a high school in Los Angeles in the 1970s... Truth in Television more than a non-Los Angeleno would suspect, I guess.
    • Too bad this was the late 80's-early 90's
    • Los Angeles high schools in the 70's only had one hallway, everyone lived in the schools, friends with the Principal, over the top nerds?
  • 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.
• 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.
  • Zack could do all that and get put away for jaywalking.
  • Hell, Zack is a textbook example of a sociopath.
  • How do you plan on incarcerating a man who can CONTROL TIME?
  • Zack is very much a Ferris Bueller Expy, though he doesn't get away with as much.
• 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 Dadaist way.
  • I think it is more of an environmental thing rather than a racial one. Keep in mind that the majority of her friends are white and that her closest friends since elementary school were Zack and Jessie. Regardless of racial stereotypes, it makes sense that they would have many interests in common. (On a more technical note, it may also have been an artifact from when Lisa's character was envisioned as being white and Jewish, but I doubt that this is the case).
  • Also keep in mind that the original part for Lisa wrote her as Jewish. A number of the same mannerisms and storylines were kept
• 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' Morality Pet to somehow make it okay.
  • I was always a geeky kid who got picked on as well, but I somehow knew not to think too hard about anything on this show when I watched it as a kid. However, now that I'm a geeky adult, I just want to hit the people responsible for this, because really, just because a person is socially-awkward and smart doesn't mean they're not a person.
  • I don't think the geeky kids got pushed around or bullied that much, they were just pigeonholed by the popular kids into being a subservient class. I thought what was funny was that nerds were so identifiable by their dress and use of glasses.
  • Well there was one episode where Zack was "bought" by an overweight girl in one of those dating auction things. He spent a lot of time making excuses for why their date had to be pushed back, until she caught him in one of his lies and he gets chewed out for being such a dick. IIRC the episode ends with them dancing together.
• I've only seen scenes from the show, but what is with Screech's and Zack's report on Zack's "American Indian" heritage? It is so racist I can't believe that it was allowed to air.
  • The teacher in that class basically said the same thing right after the report was over, and assigned Zack to redo the project. The episode ends with Zack doing a much more somber report and becoming genuinely proud of his Native American (specifically Nez Perce tribe) heritage.
• Why is it that Screech was considered to be a kid genius during the first few seasons (enough to have the other kids actually respect him for his intelligence), yet in later seasons he becomes a moronic punching bag for the rest of the gang? In fact, why did Screech even hang out with people who looked/acted nothing like him, verbally abused him, and could barely tolerate his existence? And what happened to Kevin the Robot?
  • He was a nerd who's friends were among the most popular kids in school. I'd say that's a pretty good deal for him and he got the protection of Slater and Zach against bigger bullies
  • He became sapient and attempted to murder Screech. The rest of the gang don't like to talk about it very much.
    • When it comes to Kevin the Robot, the first season of the show seemed to involve occasional sci-fi episodes (like the one where Screech gets hit by lightning and can see the future, the one where his dental filling can pick up radio waves, etc.). After the first season, the showrunners apparently decided to discard these elements. By the time the show evolved into The College Years, it was hard to imagine that this franchise had started out with elements like talking robots.
  • 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 cliché.
  • Kevin the Robot did make an appearance in an episode of the new show when the OG characters were discussing Screech's death.
• When I had to get glasses as a kid, I refused to wear them in school for so long because this show treated wearing glasses as something that will immediately stop all schoolkids from interacting with you except to beat you up. When I finally did wear them in school, I got about one 'hey, you've got glasses' comment and then it was mostly fine. I'd have started wearing much earlier if it weren't for this show traumatizing me.
  • Except Jessie had Purely Aesthetic Glasses. And she probably wore them for about a third of her overall screentime.
    • Except no she didn't. There was one episode were she was actually worried about the possibility of having to wear glasses. But was able to avoid it.
• Why the hell does anyone in the cast like Kelly, I mean it's obvious she just likes Zack because of his looks and that as soon as something better comes along she'll dump him quicker than rancid bread, in fact she has already done this at least twice. First she is in a good relationship with Zack and leaves him over her boss, then in college years Zack already was starting a relationship with a nice girl and she came in wanting him back, after she gets back with her and start yet another good relationship she dumps she cheats on him (not sexually though) with her teacher, both times the reasons were pretty much they're older and prettier and every time Zack has to "try" to make her get back with him after the incident. If the show would had kept going after they got married in Vegas I would bet money that she would divorce him over the mailman or something.
  • 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 Kasem 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
  • Because they're teenagers and teenagers are stupid. Also viewers.
  • Yeah because Zack was such a great and decent guy and these kids were all great upstanding people
  • Kelly did seem superficial (though that wouldn't be unusual for a teenage girl in a rich area of California), she was also very sweet and caring about others. Certainly more than the materialistic fashionista Lisa or intellectually arrogant Straw Feminist Jessie.
• "Model Students", how exactly did Screech get those pictures? Are we supposed to buy that all eleven girls on the swim team posed sexily conveniently enough for him to snap them from a distance? And the wide Colgate smiles they all have, yeah that's likely. And for the twelfth picture, they didn't think of asking another girl to pose for them as opposed to sticking Belding's head on Jessie's body?
  • It wouldn't be necessarily out of the ordinary for girls to pose for each other to show off their bodies.
  • A better question would be how did Screech spend an entire practice in the pool in SCUBA gear without the girls noticing him?
• Why was this show so popular with parents? I can't imagine ANY self-respecting parent wanting her kid to emulate its six main characters (especially Zack). And yet, during the 90's, parent groups and conservative Christian groups all raved about it. This made no sense to me even as a kid.
  • 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 fiancée 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 fiancée until the day before the wedding?
  • Big difference between understandable and justified. Jessie acting out over Leslie's age is understandable but incredibly superficial. She's a teenager so who is she to decide who's appropriate for her father to marry? The scene where Jessie says "I don't like Leslie" and can't come up with any reason why is very telling; Leslie was nothing but nice to her, and Jessie pretty much accuses her of only marrying her father for his money. Honestly Leslie was very forgiving of her when she apologized, so it seems they did see it as just acting out. It is very weird that Jessie wouldn't have met Leslie before the wedding but maybe her dad is often away for work and they just hadn't had the time to meet beforehand.
• In "The Bayside Triangle" during the fashion show, commentator Screech says while Kelly and Jessie are modeling their fashions that "[they] would never treat their men like dirt" in lieu of "his" woman Lisa, who developed mutual feelings for Zack. Um, where the hell have you been Screech? Aside from the fact that Lisa isn't your girlfriend and doesn't even have a boyfriend, did he forget that both women have treated their men like dirt on several occasions? Whereas the former cheated on then dumped Zack for Jeff, only for Zack to be portrayed as being in the wrong for not getting over his broken heart, the latter spent most of her time arguing with Slater and has even been physically abusive towards him like the time she put him in a headlock for wanting to get reacquainted with his ex-girlfriend. Granted, Zack and Slater are huge jerks, but it's ignorant to portray the girls as innocent just because they're women.
  • Screech just saw the girl he's loved for almost 15 years kissing his best friend of almost 15 years. He's not exactly thinking straight and really just wants to hurt the both of them.
• In "Bedside Manner" (the episode where Kelly was working as a head orderly when Professor Lasky was admitted as a patient due to a stress-induced ulcer and Zack hung around to keep an eye on them), was Kelly working at a student medical center or an actual hospital? It alluded to being the former, but was a bit too detailed for that and showed signs of being the latter (it was mentioned to have an X-ray lab, a morgue, Dean McMann made a quip about if Zack's angle for working there was a girl being in a body cast he was trying to take advantage of, etc.)
  • It's likely a teaching hospital attached to the university.
• Why does Slater call Zack "Preppy" considering Slater typically dresses quite preppy as well?
  • I think it's supposed to be an Insult of Endearment with a dash of Irony.
• 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?

• Doubling as Fridge Horror, just who was videotaping the gang's life events in "Time Capsule"? Keep in mind that it wasn't them just telling the future class in vivid detail everything they experienced; they actually included clips from various episodes shown on the tape.
  • Fridge Brilliance: Ron Toddman. Of course no one remembered him; he was always behind the camera, chronicling events, not actually being a part of them. To the rest of gang he was probably a forgettable, ubiquitous AV Club nerd.
  • What is even stranger is that someone videotaped their dreams..during this episode they show the clip where Lisa is having a nightmare about Screech. How the Hell did anybody manage this?
• Why was Lisa matched up with Screech in "The Mamas and The Papas"? Even though Belding claimed that all the students were matched alphabetically, if it's going by just the six of them (and isn't it always going by just them?), then Jessie should have been paired with him (Spano/Powers) and she should have been paired with Slater (Turtle/Slater).
  • How hilarious would it have been for Screech to be working with Jessie?
• After seeing how upset or jealous Screech gets upon Lisa going out with or having feelings for another guy (as "The Bayside Triangle" being the prime example), why wasn't he bothered over Eric's obsession with her in "The Wicked Stepbrother" two-parter? Or when she began to return those feelings? If he was so in love with her as it's already been established, why wasn't he behaving normally there? He even wept with joy when she begged Eric not to leave at the end of the second part, calling her speech "beautiful".
  • The difference might be that Eric wasn't Screech's lifelong friend, while Zack was.
• If Kelly's family was so poor/cash-strapped (or at least in comparison to her friends), then why did she have that huge bedroom (of her own) with a walk-in closet or bathroom and a collection of nice clothes?
  • Her family wasn't always poor. Their income dropped when the defense plant her father worked at for years was shut down due to the end of the Cold War.

• In the episode where Screech takes pictures of the girls during the swim meet how come the girls are posing so perfectly if the pictures were taken without their knowledge?

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