"The Time... Guys" is a web series documenting the adventures of the eponymous team, comprised of
Dr. Carlos Chronos, D.D.S.;
Timothy Ward; and
Caveman as they travel through time, encountering historical figures that
all look suspiciously similar. The complete series can be found
here
.
This series contains examples of:
- Affectionate Parody: Started out as one of Back to the Future.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Parodied with T.A.C.O.S., who antagonizes Timmy, but is only apathetic to humanity in general.
- Also, the only reason he hates him is that Doc couldn't resist giving the administrator password.
T.A.C.O.S.: Downloading hatred4timmy.exe. Administrator password required.
Doc: TIME!
T.A.C.O.S.: Password accepted.
- As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Mostly averted, except for the odd British accent, but played straight with Julius Caesar and King Confucius.
- As You Know: Lampshaded in Episode III.
Timmy: Great! Now we can find out where Caveman is.
Doc: Every time you say something, I say "duh" in the back of my head.
- Beleaguered Bureaucrat: The gang encounters Death multiple times. He's always very busy.
Death: Can we rush this a bit? My schedule is... killing me.
- Borrowed Catch Phrase: Timmy tries twice in Episode III, to varying effect.
Timmy: Caveman, we came back to save you from messing up TIME!
Doc: That's only funny when I do it.
[later]
Timmy: Look, the cave festivities are cave-mencing!
- Bilingual Bonus: Doc is very bad at Spanish, as seen in "Dinner... TIME".
Doc: Ah, mi hijo! How was your español testículo? [Translation: Ah, my son! How was your testicle Spanish?]
- Butt-Monkey: Everyone, even his teachers, seems to hate and/or ignore Timmy.
- Calvinball: Averted with Knocken, the rules of which are clearly explained.
- Catchphrase: Doc uses his many... TIMES!, but Caveman is uncavesputed master of this cave trope. Cave.
- Christmas Episode: "The Most Wonderful TIME of the Year" is a No Fourth Wall musical short.
- Chromosome Casting: All the cast members featured so far are male.
- Cool Car: The Time... Car from the pilot. Unfortunately, it was lost between Episodes I and II in a Noodle Incident.
- Crippling Overspecialization: Doc is a brilliant inventor, but can apparently only make time... items.
- Don't Fear the Reaper: Death is actually pretty cool, even partying with Doc when Timmy and Caveman were unavailable for the weekend.
- Dramatic Ellipsis: Besides being in the title, this quirk occurs every... TIME Doc uses his favorite word.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: The pilot features no T.A.C.O.S., barely any Caveman, and not quite the same style as subsequent episodes.
- Eldritch Abomination: Death.
- "Freaky Friday" Flip: Doc invents a brain-switching device. Turns out he can only invent time machines.
- Fun with Acronyms: What's the name of the Time... Lab's technologically advanced computer operating system? T.A.C.O.S., of course.
- Later brought up when Timmy's Spanish teacher comes over for dinner.
Timmy: [whispering] Doc, I thought you were supposed to pick up tacos.
Doc: Oh, right! He's still at soccer practice!
[Cut to a laptop being hit with a soccer ball in an open field]
T.A.C.O.S.: If I had emotions, I would hate.
- Genius Ditz: A bizarre example: Doc has no idea what he's doing most of the time, but is great at inventing TIME... machines. Just TIME... machines.
- Gilligan Cut: From Episode III:
Timmy: How hard can it be to find one dumb rock?
[Cut to Doc and Timmy in a boulder field]
Timmy: Aw, come on!
- Grand Finale: Just in time for October 21, 2015, The series was brought to an end with a retrospective Q&A panel.
- Gratuitous Spanish: Used frecuentemente in the episode with Timmy's Spanish teacher.
- Historical Rap Sheet: Doc assassinated Julius Caesar, and it's heavily implied that he convinced John Wilkes Booth to kill Abraham Lincoln.
- Hulk Speak: Caveman talk like this, but Caveman's prodigious cave-telligence imply this more for style.
- Human Popsicle: Averted with Caveman, who is in the modern era because he befriended Doc on the latter's first time... adventure. When Doc needed an intern, Caveman was his first choice for the job.
- Hurricane of Puns: And that's a punderstatement.
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: The title of every episode is based on a saying with the word "time" in it.
- In My Language, That Sounds Like...: Taken to comedic extremes with Timmy and King Confucius.
Timmy: Um, I don't really speak your language. [Subtitle: We are elusive terrorists.]
Confucius: Why.. you.. here? [Why you here?]
Timmy: Uh, we don't really have a reason for coming here. [To pillage and kill.]
Confucius: [gasp] No reason? [Kill who?]
Timmy: Exactly! [Everyone!]
...
Doc: Don't worry, Tim, I'll handle this. Kill the boy and let me live. [Let me reason with your translator.]
Timmy: DOC!
- Large Ham: Most notably Christopher Columbus, Caveman in Episode III, and Alexander the Great at Knocken.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Timmy occasionally notes that all the historical figures are played by the same actor.
- Like a Duck Takes to Water: Caveman the intern, a native of the 40th millennium B.C., is leagues more competent than Doc.
- No Indoor Voice: Doc.
- Noodle Incident: Apparently, Doc was arrested while dressed as Batman at a Renaissance Fair (
which, when you think about it, is already a weird destination for a time... traveler). - Origins Episode: Episode III reveals that Caveman is the same Caveman from Episode I, who was seen inventing fire, and explains how he came to be Doc's intern.
- Only Sane Man: Due to the constant gags that render his historical knowledge (which is accurate in terms of our reality) meaningless, Timmy could be considered the only sane being in the entire universe.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: When Doc takes his multiple neckties off, Señor Tigre instantly realises that Doc is not Timmy's father.
- The Points Mean Nothing: Zigzagged with Knocken. The points do have numerical value, but the last two of 102 rounds are each worth 100 points.
- Prison Episode: Doc, Timmy, and Caveman have been arrested by Roman senators (almost), King Confucius, and Alexander the Great.
- Pungeon Master: This is the single most important aspect of Doc's character.
- Death also makes about a dozen death puns in every episode he's in.
- And when the two of them have a scene together...
Timmy: So, what do you do exactly?
Death: Well, I just show up there when people die, and I escort them into the afterlife.
Timmy: That sounds kind of boring.
Death: Well, it's a living!
Doc: Boy, Death sure has a grim sense of humor.
Timmy: [turns to camera] Kill me.
Death: Watch yourself, now!
- Rapid-Fire Comedy: Used often. In Episode II, for example, almost every other line is a joke.
- Riddle for the Ages: There's some random kid playing a video game in the Time... Lab during the Christmas episode. Knowing the showrunners, this will not go unexplained.
- Set Right What Once Went Wrong: Caveman's mission in Episode III.
- Shout-Out: Out the wazoo! To name a few subtle ones:
- Señor Tigre's name, outfit (minus the sombrero and sunglasses), and lack of teaching credentials call to mind Señor Chang from Community.
Sr. Tigre: ¡Soy un genioso de español! [I am a Spanish genius!]
- Steven Ulysses Perhero: Timmy (phonetically "tim-E") Ward is the ward who travels through time.
- Swirly Energy Thingy: Timmy falls into one in the pilot when he leaves the Time... Car in mid-transit.
- Third-Person Person: Caveman, again.
- Time Travel: Oh, so very obviously.
- Touch of Death: Look carefully; you'll notice that Death always wraps his hand in his sleeve whenever he physically interacts with someone.
