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  • Accidental Aesop: While the moral of "Big Winner" seems to be not to meet your heroes — Lorena discovering that Maria de los Ojos Verdes y Grandes is a horrible diva — the fact that everyone on set can't stand her and let her get away with such rude behavior for so long (despite even her co-star saying he's wanted to tell her off for a long time) suggests that such behavior should be called out or reprimanded before it escalates to those levels.
  • Alternative Character Interpretation: Carlos's status as the Big Brother Bully seems a bit like an Informed Attribute. While he's a bit superficial and lazy, he's never outwardly mean. He teases his younger siblings sure, but he has far more Pet the Dog moments involving them than George. George arguably starts out even worse than Carlos when it comes to bullying, before he Took a Level in Kindness in Season 3.
  • Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Margaret Cho's cameo in the lottery episode. She tries to pass herself off as a long lost relative who needs money for her dog's operation - which is 'coincidentally' located on the French Riviera. Sonia for some reason holds the Idiot Ball, believes the sob story and is about to pay the money when the dog gives the game away. The gag doesn't tie into the episode's theme (the family losing sight of who they are) and it's not mentioned again.
  • Crosses the Line Twice: Neeko's Traumatic Haircut at the hands of Sonia becomes quite funny due to the circumstances. A chunk of her hair gets accidentally chopped off when Lorena distracts Sonia by suffering a magnificent pratfall and spilling some hot tea (that Nico herself had ordered). Nico's hammy Villainous Breakdown afterwards seals the deal.
  • Estrogen Brigade:
    • George appears to have the most fangirls. Half the comments on Youtube uploads are asking what his actor Bobby Gonzalez is up to these days.
    • Carlos was created to appeal to teenage girls back when the show was on, what with his Pretty Boy appearance and reputation as The Charmer.
  • Fans Prefer the New Her:
    • Bad Boy Larry of course - due to the leather jacket, Cool Shades and air of being Badass Adorable.
    • In the Season 3 premiere George spikes his hair to mark the start of the school year. It's a sign of him trying too hard to be cool, but he suits the style.
  • Fridge Horror: Jacqueline is not seen after her Very Special Episode. Of course it's possible she had to move for medical reasons too, but the implication is still there.
  • Growing the Beard: By Season 2, the child actors had slotted into their roles, characters had become more defined and the plots were a little less preachy.
  • Harsher in Hindsight:
    • During a gag where each of the children swipe a newspaper from Ray, Lorena reads a headline saying "possible recession". This was four years before one of the worst economic recessions the world would see.
    • Lorena accidentally revealing that her favourite soap star wears a wig is presented as a satisfying comeuppance for her, and Played for Laughs. Then comes the episode where Carlos discovers a new girl at school wears a wig...because she has cancer.
    • Jacqueline's storyline about cancer becomes harsher since Lupe Ontiveros - who played Abuelita - died of liver cancer.
    • The episode where Larry films people for an assignment, and catches their worst moments, only for The Reveal that he edited things to portray his family very honorably. The series was made in the early days of reality television, and in the years since it's become a hot button issue for how these kinds of shows can use Manipulative Editing to misrepresent their subjects - who often have no control over how they're portrayed. Total Divas and RuPaul's Drag Race are notable examples.
  • He Really Can Act: Jeffrey Licon brings it in an episode where Carlos discovers that a new student at school has cancer. It's a slow build when he's brought to the hospital - from his quiet "is she gonna die?" when he finds out, to his emotional breakdown when he sees Sonia fitting a wig onto the girl's head.
  • Heartwarming Moments:
    • An episode has Larry wanting to get a haircut from someone other than his mother. But when he tries to go to another barber as a rite of passage, he runs out in terror. And he then goes to Sonia anyway to get it fixed. There's also a cute moment afterwards where Carlos spikes the new haircut up for him.
    • While the feminism Aesop was badly handled, the episode does have this sweet moment from Carlos to Lorena.
    "I know I don't always treat you like I should, but I do care about you. I can't imagine our family without you."
    • The kids all working together to take care of the baby Max - whom they mistakenly think is their new brother. Carlos lets him talk on the phone, Lorena sings to him, George feeds him, and Larry plays rock-paper-scissors (calling back to an Imagine Spot where he had hoped to do the same for his new sibling). Overall it is quite sweet that when they thought Sonia might be pregnant, they agreed to help out a lot more.
    • Tia Gabbi, despite her interference causing mayhem, professes her respect for the Garcia parents in front of the kids - and all they do to raise them right.
    "That's what's made you the wonderful people that you are."
    • The end of the same episode has them watching an old video of their dad protesting. Among the things he says is that they have to make it a better world for their children.
    • Carlos shaving his head to really make up for how rude he was to Jacqueline.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight:
    • The episode where the kids think Sonia has adopted a baby boy. Lorena complains that they didn't adopt a girl. Fast forward to when the family takes on an exchange student - and it does turn out to be a girl. And she and Lorena end up clashing.
    • You can easily picture Lorena auditioning for American Idol or America's Got Talent, which would start airing in a few years.
    • Brenda Song has a role as George's superficial love interest. Her sending a gift back saying she'll wait until he gets real diamonds is quite amusing - The Suite Life of Zack & Cody has her as one of the ultimate Rich Bitches.
  • It's Not Supposed to Win Oscars: Years later, the cast described the series as one that wouldn't have viewers hooked with Cliff Hangers, plot twists or Drama Bombs - but would merely give them a nice feeling by the end with the Golden Moment.
  • Moe: Larry is a rare male example - for being an Adorably Precocious Child and his youthful innocence contrasting nicely with his older siblings'.
  • Narm: In the climax of "Larry's Curse", Ray's speech about blessings seems rather forced in what was a straight-up comedy episode. The moral doesn't seem to gel with the episode's theme and comes across as saccharine. What's more is that it's a Broken Aesop - since the bad luck stops after Larry and Abuelita cleanse the house. And not to mention that Ray goes ballistic over a simple water fight - with the seriousness of if they'd been throwing grenades at each other.
  • Narm Charm:
    • The Golden Moment at the end of the episode is always this.
    • Carlos and Eddie's cornrows in the Season 3 premiere. They really do deserve all the mockery they get for them.
    • The Mysteries of the Maya movie is widely considered So Bad, It's Good by fans.
  • Nightmare Fuel: Louis the barber is pretty creepy, especially as the older siblings tell stories about how he injures his clients. It's not surprising when Larry freaks out and runs away halfway through the haircut.
  • One-Scene Wonder:
    • Sonia's friend Sandy isn't in many episodes, but she's so quirky and entertaining that she's quite memorable.
    • Christina Lopez, Lorena's ridiculously hammy rival contestant in "Maybe Baby". Just two scenes, yet she belts out a memorable rendition of the novella's theme song.
    • Margaret Cho has a scene in the lottery episode where she tries to pass herself off as a long-lost relative - claiming her dog was hurt in an accident and needs to go to a hospital on the French Riviera.
    • And when we finally meet the star of Lorena's favorite telenovela, she's a fantastically hammy diva.
    • Neeko has literally just one scene in "Larry's Curse", but is magnificently Camp, and Emy Coligado is obviously enjoying herself and makes it one of the most memorable scenes in the series.
  • Popularity Polynomial: The show was a modest success when it was first on, netting four seasons. Once it ended, it faded into obscurity for the longest time. Then a 2018 reunion picture went viral, with many now-grown children who had watched it speaking about how much they loved it. The popularity was enough to persuade Jeff Valdez to make a sequel series.
  • Recycled Script: One episode's plot is about how Carlos failed his Spanish test despite being from a Latino family, and his parent(s) view it as him losing touch with his heritage, so they repeatedly speak Spanish and throw Mexican-memorabilia his way. Taina featured a subplot like this, Taina was Puerto Rican instead.
  • Retroactive Recognition:
    • Vanessa Hudgens as Lindsey, one of Larry's love interests.
    • Brenda Song as one of Carlos and George's love interests.
    • Sandy went on to guest star as Miranda's mother in Lizzie McGuire.
    • Piama is one of Sonia's clients.
    • Miss Asteca, Larry's teacher, would go on to become Teresa Russo in Wizards of Waverly Place.
  • Testosterone Brigade: Many now grown up 90s and 2000s kids have confessed to crushing on Lorena during the show's run.
  • Unintentional Period Piece: Downplayed but there are a few traits that date this to the early 2000s. VHS and cassette tapes are still used, the TV is analog, the teens use the house's landline rather than cell phones and Larry's video camera is quite blocky. An episode features George getting to interview Solange Knowles around the time of her debut album (2002). Larry is a fan of pro wrestling, which was still just about mainstream in the early 2000s. More superficially Carlos's Spiky Hair is very much the early 2000s fashion. Lorenna freely references the pop stars of the day - Britney Spears, Janet Jackson, Macie Gray and Mandy Moore. Likewise the video game technology contains Bland Name Products of the Playstation 2 and the Game Boy - and an episode has George fantasizing about a Lara Croft Expy at the height of her presence in pop culture. Overall, despite being made in the 2000s, the Wonder Years-esque narration makes it come across as That Nostalgia Show of the time period.
  • Unintentionally Sympathetic: Lorena, despite people crushing on her, has this. One episode has Larry filming his family members breaking the rules (such as George listening to music on the computer instead of doing homework), and he films Lorena acting out a Telenovela fantasy with her dolls with her as a Self-Insert. When she, Carlos, and George tell their dad about Larry's snooping, her dad asks her exactly what she was doing, and when she mentions she put herself as a Self-Insert, decided she was watching too much TV. Except this is actually something a lot of kids her age do - she wasn't really breaking any rules by playing with dolls.
  • Unintentionally Unsympathetic:
    • Lorena in the "Go Getter Girl" episode. It's presented as a low moment when her brothers trash her cupcake baking with her friends, and she gives a speech about how she feels lonely being the only girl in the family. But she had spent the entire episode interrupting the boys' fun as well, just out of an attempt to cause mischief. While the boys have to apologize, Lorena doesn't for her own actions.
    • Tammy the deaf girl when she breaks her friendship off with Larry after he makes fun of her hearing aid. Except he didn't know it was her hearing aid malfunctioning, and was merely joking about the sound. When he found out it was her hearing aid, he's genuinely ashamed. And had never shown any signs of being intolerant towards her deafness before. So while Tammy being offended was understandable, her joining in with Lorena to mock Larry afterwards was pretty uncalled for.
    • Larry in the episode where he films people. He films Lorena playing with her dolls - and she's mad that he was snooping and filming her in secret. Given that what she was doing is actually normal behaviour for kids her age, this is actually kind of hard to excuse. Of course this is setting up Larry learning An Aesop about invading people's privacy, and he edits the film to remove any of the less flattering stuff. While he has the clip of Lorena playing with her dolls in there, his narration states that he thinks it's "pretty neat".
  • Unpopular Popular Character: In-universe, Lorena is a Bratty Teenage Daughter and despised by her brothers. In the fandom, she's the most popular of the siblings.
  • Watched It for the Representation: As one of the first sitcoms to feature around a Hispanic family, it had a significant following of Hispanic viewers, with the cast confessing years later to getting thanked by many fans for representing them on television.
  • Values Dissonance: The episode where Carlos decides he doesn't want to go to Church any more could be setting up things for a resolution where the parents let him make a decision like that on his own. It ends with him changing his mind and going to Church anyway - making it come across as emotional blackmail forcing him to change his mind especially in The New '10s and The New '20s where church attendance (especially in the Catholic Church, the Garcia Familys' religion) has dropped with people seeking alternative means of obtaining spiritual devotion. It's justified given that the Garcia's are Mexican-Americans who are devout Catholics (and living in a socially conservative state like Texas) and Carlos is a minor living at home, hence he is beholden to his parents' rules.
  • Values Resonance: Carlos learns An Aesop about not conforming to gender standards when he gets a job as a perfume boy at a cosmetic store and, after worrying what his love interest will think, it turns out she has no problem with it. Likewise, despite being the 'cool' character, he's still shown to be excited to be a caregiver to a potential new baby in the family.
  • Vanilla Protagonist: Larry is the sweet youngest child; a responsible Foil to his more flawed older siblings, and the Good Twin to Lorena. He's more the Audience Surrogate to react to the others.

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