Fred: You didn't tell him about me, did you?
Fred's mother: No, I lied and told him you're sane.
Fred's mother: No, I lied and told him you're sane.
—Fred 2: Night of the Living Fred
Fred Figglehorn
is six years old. (Fifteen in the film series.) He's a cloudcuckoolander keet with a near-lethal case of Helium Speech, his mother an alcoholic drug addict who's practically abandoned her son, his father locked in the slammer, slated for capital punishment.note You know, just like when you were a kid!
Fred was created and portrayed by young comedian Lucas Cruikshank, acting hyperactive and pitching up his voice. That alone created one of the biggest YouTube phenomena of its time, spawning merchandise, music, a TV series, and a trilogy of films. Fred is also one of the oldest phenomena on YouTube, starting around Halloween 2006 (a year after the site's inception), when Cruikshank was only 13 years old. His videos have gained lots of attention, regularly getting tens of millions of views, with his most viral video clocking out at over 70 million views, which is all the more impressive when you consider that this was all back when YouTube's userbase was so small that you could count the number of channels with more than a million subscribers with your fingers. Oh, and speaking of subscribers, Fred was also the first channel on YouTube to hit 1 million subscribers, so there's that.note
The channel went through some strange phases after Cruikshank sorta retired Fred as his animated equivalent in It's Fred! took over, culminating in the irreversible changes made after the series of universally hated New Fred videos made when the channel was supposedly owned by Yuksung Corporation, a fictional South Korean company. After the channel was "reclaimed" by Cruikshank in a stunt that revealed Fred to be held hostage by Yuksung, the channel started putting out new series of skits that weren't even slightly pertinent to Fred and only gained a fraction of the original Fred videos' views. The channel has since stopped uploading. The closest thing to real Fred content we have nowadays is Cruikshank's personal channel, which can be found here.
Fred provides examples of:
- Aborted Arc: Some of the early Fred videos had a subplot that involved the original owner of Fred's youtube channel sending threatening messages to him with Fred worried about what would happen if he ever showed up...but this went nowhere and was dropped in the 2nd Season. However in the final installment of the New Fred series it's revealed that Claudio was the original owner closing off the arc right at the very end.
- Abusive Mom: Fred's mother locks him up in a dog kennel whenever she thinks he misbehaved.
- Actually Not a Vampire: Mr. Devlin from the second movie, though the final scene suggests otherwise.
- Alliterative Name:
- Ferdinand "Fred" Figglehorn.
- Fred's dad, Fergus Figglehorn.
- Ted Tigglecorn from Ted Tigglecorn Interviews Fred Figglehorn.
- Hunter H. Hunterson
- Anti-Christmas Song: Fred's 12 Days of Christmas and Christmas is Creepy.
- Alpha Bitch: Judy.
- Animated Adaptation: The "It's FRED!" series.
- Art Shift:
- Christmas is Creepy features animation and Stop Motion.
- Tater Haters, Fred Figglehorn, FRED Gets Animated part 1, FRED Gets Adopted, FRED Makes a Campfire, FRED Makes a Diorama, FRED Goes on a Field Trip, FRED Gets a Monkey, FRED Uses a Spork, FRED Goes to a Funeral, FRED Brings Cherie To School, and Fred Gets a Foreign Exchange Student feature animation as well.
- Christmas is Creepy
- Berserk Button: One particularly hilarious example in the film; when Fred is told his "girlfriend" has moved, he goes on a rampage and destroys his living room. Because of his sunny disposition, he cleans up afterward.
- Big Damn Movie: Fred The Movie, Fred 2: Night of the Living Fred and Fred 3: Camp Fred.
- Big Ol' Unibrow: Fadila from FRED Gets a Foreign Exchange Student turns out to have one.
- Broken Aesop: The first film has Fred try and impress Judy, but after being humiliated by her, he finds that Bertha, who was practically right in front of him the whole time, was the companionship he was looking for...until Judy seems to act remorseful, and Fred takes her back.
- Camp Straight: Fred the character. Cruikshank himself is Camp Gay.
- Christmas Episode: There've been a few.
- 2007: FRED on Christmas
- 2009: Christmas Cash and Christmas is Creepy.
- 2007: FRED on Christmas
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Season 1 = Blue hand-lettered shirt. Season 2 = Red shirt. Seasons 3 and 4 = Blue printed (see below) shirt.
- Creepy Child: The basic premise of FRED Babysits a Psycho.
- Crossover:
- With iCarly in Fred on iCarly and the iCarly episode iMeet Fred—Fred is fictional in the iCarly universe, but iMeet Fred features two exclusive Fred videos, both featuring iCarly characters (the second of these videos can be seen here).
- With The Annoying Orange in FRED Goes Grocery Shopping Feat. Annoying Orange and Annoying Orange: vs. FRED!!!
- With Adventures of Power in FRED Learns to Air Drum with Power and FRED Interviews Sneezle The Cat.
- With iCarly in Fred on iCarly
- Dark Horse Victory: Fred and Kevin compete for class president. The winner is a girl called Cleopatra who Fred claims "didn't have any ideas" and was just sort of there.
- Darker and Edgier: Averted, the TV show is brighter than the web series.
- In the web video, it is implied that Fred's mother is a prostitute.
- Fred's father is never there in the web series. He's not there in the films or TV series either, but we get John Cena to make up for it.
- Daydream Surprise: A large portion of the movies are this. In some places, it's hard to tell what's a Daydream Surprise and what isn't. There are even a few Daydream Surprise characters ...or are they?
- Deadpan Snarker: Fred's mother in the film series.
- Disappeared Dad: Fred's father lives in the State Pen.
- In the films, however, his "dad" takes on the flesh of John Cena.
- Don't Try This at Home: In FRED Gets Animated Pt.2.
- Depending on the Writer: On just how dark it gets. The original YouTube videos depend on a lot of Black Comedy, the animated series is dark as well, and manages to be even crueler to the characters then the videos. The films are relatively clean, with some things from the original hinted at and some dark humor by Nickelodeon standards. The TV series is squeaky clean, with maybe a couple adult jokes scattered throughout.
- Even Evil Has Standards: At one point, Kevin pretended to be Judy, saying that he and Judy had broken up, and wanted to date Fred. When Judy found out, she stated that was too far, though Fred thought Judy was only acting.
- Fourth-Wall Mail Slot: In FRED gets Animated part 1.
- Gross-Up Close-Up: In Tater Haters.
- Guide Dang It!: Likely just a glitch, but six videos will only play if the quality is turned down to 240p: FRED ThrowDown #1 - Peace Around the World for Generations, FRED ThrowDown #2 - Homie G pic, FRED: "Figglehorn '08" Campaign Video, FRED: Kevin's Attack Ad, FRED ThrowDown #3 - Creepiest Picture with your Pet, and FRED Sings at YouTube Live!!!
- Halloween Episode: There've been a few.
- 2006: FRED on Halloween (the first Fred video)
- 2007: FRED on Halloween 2
- 2010: The Babysitter's a Vampire
- 2006: FRED on Halloween
- Helium Speech: Seen as the Trope Codifier for the use of this trope for humor on YouTube. Basically all of the people that embraced the "chipmunk voices are funny" rule on that site after Fred became popular were
directly inspired by him. - Hiccup Hijinks: In the love potion episode of the tv series, Fred tries it out on Bertha at one point, and she gets hiccups.
- I Am Not Weasel: Non-talking animal example. Fred always mistakes small dogs for squirrels.
- Identical Stranger: Fadila from FRED Gets a Foreign Exchange Student turns out to look like Fred with a Big Ol' Unibrow.
- Insistent Terminology: It's a Master Blaster!
- Interquel:
- Watch Every Episode of Figgle Chat!! is set between FRED Gets a Talk Show and Fred Interviews Obama.
- Up Next on Figgle Chat: Perez Hilton!! is set between Fred Interviews Obama and FRED Goes Through Puberty.
- Next on Figgle Chat: Eduardo Fresco is set between FRED Goes Through Puberty and Fred Interviews Eduardo Fresco.
- Up Next on Figgle Chat...We got Brad Pitt! is set between FRED Interviews Eduardo Fresco and FRED Interviews Hunter Hunterson.
- Up Next on Figgle Chat: iJustine! is set between FRED Interviews Hunter Hunterson and FRED Interviews iJustine.
- Up Next: The Biggest Guest EVER!! is set between FRED Interviews iJustine and FRED Interviews Sneezle The Cat.
- Watch Every Episode of Figgle Chat!!
- It's All About Me: According to Cruikshank, Fred is a Stealth Parody of narcissistic video bloggers. Fred's age is him literally comparing them to bratty children.
- Keet: ... YES.
- Love Potion: In the Fred: The Show episode "Love Potion".
- Loyal Animal Companion: Even if Fred has no human friends, Sparky, the Neighborhood Squirrels and the Cat With Rabies will never leave him.
- The Movie: Three of 'em, which were intended for theatrical releases but ended up premiering on Nickelodeon. (The first film did make it to theaters in the United Kingdom due to the distributor capitalizing on the popularity of Pixie Lott there, but it bombed spectacularly.) Nickelodeon has also picked up a TV series (Fred: The Show) and then a third film (Fred 3: Camp Fred).
- No Ending: The Babysitter's a Vampire.
- No Indoor Voice: Fred always talks loudly. He also screams his lungs out once every video.
- Overly-Long Gag: In the first film, when Fred's faced with a car repairman who doesn't speak English, he thinks he is being messed with and proceeds to run away screaming, while we are shown brief shots of different areas (like near a fence, on a railroad track and even on a roller-coaster track). This continues until he runs into a live dam.
- Parental Abandonment: His mom loves bars and staying out late and is almost never there, and his "rock star" dad is on Death Row. The first film implies that Fred's father actually lived nearby (until the film's events actually occur), and was never in jail (or a rock star), but FRED Makes a Diorama has Fred's dad appear in jail.
- Pottery Barn Poor: Fred and his mother. Also Judy, to a degree. Fred lampshades this, saying that her trailer is Bigger on the Inside.
- Previously on…: FRED Gets Animated Pt.2 opens with a clip from the end of FRED gets Animated part 1.
- Product Placement:
- Newer episodes have the title character wearing the official licensed Fred(TM) t-shirt rather than the original hand-lettered one.
- Fred Finds a Creepy Doll is all about Fred(TM) discovering one of the officially licensed talking Fred(TM) dolls. This kid doesn't miss a trick...
- Even before that he was plugging Zip-its.
- The films have YouTube visible on computers.
- Newer episodes have the title character wearing
- Random Events Plot: The film series.
- Santa Claus: Appears in FRED on Christmas, Christmas Cash, and Christmas is Creepy.
- Sdrawkcab Name: Derf from the film series.
- Series Continuity Error: In I Wanna Be A Celebrity, Fred mentions his "first CD" while holding up a few copies of his second CD, Who's Ready to Party? With FRED. His first CD, mentioned in FRED Finds a Creepy Doll and Fred Talks About His Christmas Music, was It's Hackin' Christmas! With FRED. This error is especially egregious since both CDs actually exist and are available for purchase.
- Shout-Out: In a shot in the first movie where Fred is sitting in the bathtub, there is bacon taped to the bathroom wall, a reference to a similar shot in the surrealist, avant-garde film Gummo. Yes, seriously.
- Stalker with a Crush: Talia, Kevin's little sister from the second film.
- Fred himself to Judy in the original series and first film.
- Stealth Insult: The entire "Fred" character is one to video bloggers. Cruikshank is literally comparing them to obnoxious, self-absorbed children.
- Talk Show: The Figgle Chat series.
- Talky Bookends:
- Watch How I Do This, Christmas Cash and The Babysitter's a Vampire have them at their beginnings.
- Tater Haters has one at its end.
- Watch How I Do This
- Trailers Always Lie: Nickelodeon's commercials for the second film, AND HOW. Practically THE ENTIRE COMMERCIAL was just Cena's appearances, the Twilight Homage/Take That!, the wrestling scene and the first water g-IT'S A MASTER BLASTER! scene, ALL OF WHICH WAS IMAGINARY.
- Training Montage: In the Fred: The Show episode "The Expired Cow".
- Tuckerization: The films reveal that Kevin's family's last name is Libo, the same as writer David Goodman's cousins (as mentioned in the first film's DVD Commentary).
- Uninvited to the Party: Fred spends half the movie on a quest to find Judy's new house, thinking she's either miserable or in danger. By the time he gets there, he finds her having a party he wasn't invited to, meaning he accidentally crashes. After being humiliated by his bully Kevin at said party with the footage posted online to boot, Fred seeks revenge by throwing his own party and making it clear to everyone that they are not invited to his party. However, when it comes to his friend Bertha, he decided to invite her as she was the only person who didn't think the video was funny, and the two of them throw such a great fake party that it makes the rest of the school feel jealous and desperate to get back on Fred's good side.
- Unreliable Narrator: Even more so in the films, where (at least) half of the events don't even happen.
- Unnamed Parent: Both of Fred's parents were this, but their names were eventually revealed:
- His mother's name is Hildegard (Hilda for short) in the second film and Cherie in FRED Makes a Campfire, FRED makes a Diorama, and FRED Brings Cherie To School.
- His father's name is Fergus in FRED Makes a Diorama.
- His mother's name is Hildegard (Hilda for short) in the second film and Cherie in FRED Makes a Campfire
- The Voice: Everyone that isn't Fred, except in a few specials, most of the fourth season, the films, the talk show Figgle Chat, the Animated Adaptation "It's Fred!", and the TV series Fred: The Show.
- Vomit Indiscretion Shot:
- In "FRED Has a Snow Day" after Fred is hit by a snowball by Kevin. It's even shown in slow motion.
- To an absolutely ridiculous extent near the end of the film at the party.
