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Young Sheldon

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  • Alternative Character Interpretation:
    • Paige in "A Second Prodigy and the Hottest Tips for Pouty Lips". Sheldon confesses that he has a crush on Paige and she says she feels the same way and has for a long time, but when they're about to kiss, she instead draws a mustache on him. Was she just messing with him the entire time, or was she being honest about liking Sheldon back and pranked him at the last second because she was too nervous to kiss him? Her confession seemed rather sincere and her actions in "A Solo Peanut, a Social Butterfly and the Truth" imply that she still likes him in some way. If it was a prank, was Missy in on it? (Missy is the one who suggested Sheldon might have a crush on Paige, and it's possible, given their close friendship and mutual love of picking on Sheldon, that she and Paige were both working together to trick Sheldon.)
    • Sheldon's son being named Leonard Cooper. Is it merely a homage to one of his favorite actors, or is it also a way of honoring his best friend at the same time? Knowing Sheldon, it could be either.
    • Mary's casual prejudices don't seem as prominent in this show as in the parent show, where she's constantly dropping innocently prejudiced remarks regarding Howard and Raj. Is it because she became more prejudiced over time (perhaps due in part to all the grief her family suffers after George passes away), or is it simply because in this show, she is almost never seen interacting with anyone who isn't white and Christian?
    • The finale puts Sheldon's belief his family coped fine with George's death after going to Caltech into perspective. Did he really not know because no one told him, or did he actively avoid finding out whether or not his family was okay due to not wanting to relive the trauma of his dad's death and eventually came to genuinely believe they were okay?
  • Aluminum Christmas Trees: The shortwave radio station that broadcasts the "time in Ottawa" in "A Swedish Science Thing and the Equation for Toast" is a real station with the call letters CHU, which has been on the air since 1923 (it actually transmits time announcements in English and French).
  • And You Thought It Would Fail: While its parent show was one of the biggest shows on TV during the 2010's, it was also very polarizing, with Sheldon Cooper himself being a major Base-Breaking Character. This made many viewers hesitant to see a Sheldon-centric prequel series. While Young Sheldon didn't earn the same level of success as The Big Bang Theory, it managed to be one of the top rated series on its network and ran for seven seasons. In addition, those who saw it were pleasantly surprised to see that the show avoided many of TBBTs biggest flaws (such as its mean-spirited and oftentimes immature humour, Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonists, and a persistent Studio Audience), with Sheldon himself being interpreted as naïve, but well-intentioned rather than, in Chuck Lorre's words; "bratty and annoying".
  • Ascended Fanon: Fans, in order to preserve George's character, speculated for years that as opposed to cheating on Mary with Brenda Sparks, he and Mary hook up while she wears a blonde wig, and Sheldon sees that instead. The show uses that theory in the final season.
  • Awesome Music: The short theme song, "Mighty Little Man" by Steve Burns.
  • Base-Breaking Character:
    • Sheldon, much for the same reasons as in The Big Bang Theory (see here for more info.)
    • Mary, again for the same reasons as in The Big Bang Theory (minus her Innocent Bigot tendencies, which almost never show up in Young Sheldon).
    • Missy. Some people think that she's hilarious, adorably mischievous and a brilliant contrast to the calmer and more composed Sheldon, with a more vulnerable side that explains her bratty attitude at times. Others think of her as nothing more than a spoiled brat, who is constantly rude to her family, and who only ever thinks of herself. However, both sides often agree that Missy's actress is one of the best in the show, despite her young age.
    • Connie. Some fans think that she's a better parent than Mary or George to all three children, due to being the ideal balance between overbearing (Mary) and lax (George). Other fans think that she's an immature Dirty Old Woman who only cares about sticking it to Mary and George, especially since her other children never speak to her. Others think she's somewhere in the middle—which is to say, probably a better parent, but still nowhere near perfect. Both sides often compare her to what Penny would be like if she ever became a grandma; Penny, like all of the other main characters in the parent series, is a Base-Breaking Character herself.
    • President Hagemeyer. Some fans admire her ability to put up with Sheldon. Other fans point out that she only uses Sheldon to boost the University's funding, and doesn't actually care about his well-being. She also didn't win popularity for her rude behaviour to Mary on the phone "he didn't come to you complaining about me".
    • Mandy. Does the fact that Georgie (who is doing everything he can to support her and the baby) lied about his age and the stress she's under justify her rude behavior towards him?
  • Captain Obvious Reveal: Mandy's pregnancy in "A Solo Peanut, a Social Butterfly and the Truth". The episode showed Georgie and Mandy having sex, Adult Sheldon was just talking about how hard it is to raise children, and there was really no other possible twist that could keep the Georgie/Mandy storyline going.note  However, some were thrown off since Georgie's appearances on The Big Bang Theory suggested that he didn't have any kids, though it was never outright stated that he didn't have kids either.
  • Catharsis Factor: "The Memoir" shows that the resolve made to stop enabling Sheldon made in "The Change Constant" stuck.
  • Continuity Lock-Out: If you manage to stumble onto Young Sheldon without having watched The Big Bang Theory then you'll most likely be wondering why they decided to show a bunch of random little kids at the end of "A Swedish Science Thing and the Equation for Toast". The episode ends by showing young versions of all the characters from Big Bang with little explanation as to who they are or why we're seeing them.
  • Ensemble Dark Horse:
    • Sheldon's Foil Paige is only in nine episodes but attracted massive fan interest, with many people being disappointed by her absence from the final season.
    • Among the recurring high school staff, Benevolent Boss Principal Peterson, Ms. Hutchins The Eeyore, and George's Like an Old Married Couple fellow coach Wayne have particularly large fanbases.
    • Hippie Teacher Professor Ericson and Nerd Nanny Dr. Lee have far fewer appearances than some of the other University of Texas teachers but are quite popular.
    • Dirty Old Woman Peg tends to provide some of the biggest laughs in the scenes focusing on the church management.
    • Billy Sparks tends to be one of the most loved child characters in the show, and despite being Put on a Bus fairly early on, his laidback father, Herschel, also has a decent fanbase.
    • Georgie's first girlfriend, Veronica, is written out of the series early on, but a lot of fans enjoyed her depth and interactions with him.
  • Fandom Rivalry: While it does have a better reception than its parent show, it still has a bit of a rivalry with The Goldbergs with fans of the latter accusing the show of being a rip-off to cash in on the show and The Big Bang Theory ending.
  • Fanon Discontinuity: Due to the numerous contradictions between the events depicted in this show and what Sheldon's childhood was said to be like on The Big Bang Theory, a number of fans like to think of Young Sheldon as being set in an Alternate Continuity. A lot of it is wishful thinking, since many are hoping that George's impending death and/or infidelity (both of which are alluded to multiple times in The Big Bang Theory) will be retconned away. The affair was retconned, but George's death sadly was not.
  • Harsher in Hindsight:
    • This exchange in "An Eagle Feather, a String Bean, and an Eskimo", after Georgie drops out of school in Season 5.
      Georgie: As soon as I graduate high school, I'm gonna be a professional male model.
      Connie: That is hilarious.
      Georgie: What? I'm good looking.
      Connie: No, that you think you'll graduate high school.
    • In "Quirky Eggheads and Texas Snow Globes", Georgie reminds everyone about the time that there was snow in Texas, in order to sell snow globes. Less than two years after this episode aired, there was indeed snow in Texas, only it led to the worst power outage in state history, causing hundreds of deaths and billions of dollars in damage.
    • In "A Clogged Pore, a Little Spanish and the Future", Sheldon brings up monkeypox to the doctor who is checking out his pimple, and assures the doctor that it may not sound real, but it is. Following this episode's production was a real-life outbreak of monkeypox in the UK, which quickly spread around the world.
    • We know from the parent show, George's impending death takes place as Sheldon and Missy are hitting their teenage years. This is a time ripe for rebellion as a result many of the things they say to George such as Missy telling George to stay out of her life after he tried to help Billy about dating her is going to become very harsh in retrospect. Granted Missy meant to stay out of her love life, but that no doubt will add to a feeling of guilt when when George is out of her life permanently. Older Sheldon in fact has admitted as much.
    • In the episode A Sneeze, Detention, and Sissy Spacek, Sheldon becomes paranoid about air-carried diseases and spends a whole episode wearing a surgical face mask to ward off contamination from the contagious stew all around him. This is taken as further proof of his weirdness and Howard Hughes-level hypochondria. Metford, Texas, is suitably bemused. Two years after this episode screened in mid-2018...
  • Heartwarming in Hindsight: In S4 "A Musty Crypt and a Stick to Pee On", Georgie has a Pregnancy Scare with Jana. He imagines his new life as a teen dad, and freaks out... but he never imagines leaving Jana or the children. Next season, when he gets Mandy pregnant, he doesn't ever consider leaving her, instead supporting her in every way he can; by the end of the series, the two are Happily Married.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: "Dolomite, Apple Slices, and a Mystery Woman" revealing that Sheldon's hatred of Geology comes from being hurt by his Geology loving first crush makes the episode in which Sheldon wakes up with a Geology textbook and treats the whole thing as though he'd had a drunken one night stand even funnier.
  • Improved Second Attempt:
    • You can tell the creators have gone out of their way to not repeat the things that many have criticized The Big Bang Theory for. For instance, the show is presented as a single-camera dramedy shot on-location, as opposed to the three-camera sitcom shot on a sound stage in front of a Studio Audience. The characters on Young Sheldon are mostly likable and sympathetic despite their flaws, as opposed to the Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonists on Big Bang. (i.e. Sheldon being less irritating and having more redeeming qualities, Mary being less aggressive with her religious beliefs, George Sr. being a normal husband and father instead of the drunken, idiotic, misogynist described posthumously in Big Bang).
    • The Friendship Algorithm from the original series had Sheldon be sent to the kids' section to understand how to make friends, which while it was regarded as funny, it ignored the existence of the popular book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. Rockets, Communists, and the Dewey Decimal System has Sheldon have the same struggle and he actually finds this book and is able to milk it for plenty of humor by Sheldon taking the advice and failing to understand people will still reject his friendship even following the rules. Even when Missy comes up with the clever idea of talking to people who also read the book, and therefore are looking for friends, Sheldon has trouble once again because the people who checked it out were all his teachers dealing with breakups that left them with self-esteem issues or were just trying to use the book to secure a better job.
  • Just Here for Godzilla: A lot of fans don't care about the Sheldon-centric plotlines, and instead only watch the show for the rest of the Cooper family. The writers seems to have caught on to this, as Sheldon's importance in the series diminished as it went on.
  • Like You Would Really Do It: While the scene of the Earth being devoured by a black hole is genuinely unsettling and nerve-wracking, very few people thought that the show would actually go that route, for obvious reasons.
  • Memetic Mutation: "Young Sheldon ends tonight." note 
  • Older Than They Think: This isn't the first time that Zoe Perry (Laurie Metcalf's daughter) is playing the younger version of Metcalf's character, as Perry played a younger Jackie, whom Metcalf portrayed in Roseanne.
  • Ron the Death Eater: Mary gets this the most. She can be preachy with her religious beliefs, usually focuses more on Sheldon, and can be unintentionally neglectful to her other kids, but she's generally a well-meaning person who loves everyone in the family. Her detractors, however, claim that she's a horrible mother who spoils Sheldon, doesn't care about Georgie and Missy, and treats them badly. They completely overlook all the times Mary tries to be supportive to all the kids, like when she builds a baseball trophy for Missy to make her feel special (in return, Missy tells her mother that she dislikes the trophy and then blows it up) or when Mary is against her husband's idea of kicking Georgie out of the house for dropping out of school (ironically, George Sr. is usually considered a flawless parent/father by Mary's detractors).
  • The Scrappy:
    • Jana is the least liked out of all of Georgie's love interests. She has far less character depth than Veronica, Mandy and even Amber, who only appeared in a couple episodes. Her Clingy Jealous Girl tendencies don't exactly make her endearing either, nor does her dumping Georgie after he drops out of high school, even though it wasn't entirely unjustified.
    • Pastor Jeff, while initially tolerable, began to embody the negative stereotypes of Christianity more and more as the show progressed. The last straw for many viewers was him firing Mary from her bookkeeping job at the church due to Georgie getting Mandy pregnant, and more or less shunning the entire family afterward. Even though he makes peace with them later, fans are not so forgiving.
    • Dale falls here as well due to being a misogynistic asshole who's too set in his ways to change. His relationship with Connie isn't very well-received, with many fans unable to see why Connie stays with him. He's also a horrible role model for Georgie (it was he who encouraged Georgie to drop out of school and keep seeing Mandy). Additionally, in Seasons 6–7, most of his appearances are for no reason other than the episode needing a B- or C-plot, and so that Connie can appear in the episode.
  • Signature Scene:
    • The Season 2 finale, which shows The rest of the Big Bang Gang as kids, is considered to be the highlight of the series, as a glimmer of optimism in an otherwise depressing episode. It helps that this episode aired immediately after its parent show's Grand Finale.
    • The final scene of "A New Home and a Traditional Texas Torture" for being the massive Tear Jerker that fans had been dreading since the beginning, where Tom and Wayne inform the Cooper family that George has died of a heart attack.
  • Spiritual Successor: The premise of a child genius dealing with his dysfunctional family brings to mind Malcolm in the Middle.
  • Surprisingly Improved Prequel: Reception for Young Sheldon is miles more positive than its parent show. Due to the differences in formatting and jokes (dramedy angle, plots based on family, single-camera), it's seen as more accessible to viewers that either have never heard of Big Bang (thus making it easier to get into) or don't care for it and its comedy style.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: It can be disappointing that some of the Noodle Incidents from the original show like George showing Sheldon how to scare a raccoon by shooting near it or having him watch football games on TV are never featured or even discussed to contrast them to George's current attitude as he matured more as a husband and father.
  • Unintentional Period Piece: Yes, the show fits this trope despite being an intentional period piece. "A Computer, a Plastic Pony, and a Case of Beer" has Sheldon testing ELIZA (a 1960s chatbot) and declaring that "the future may be overrated". This episode aired in January 2018, when chatbots were still mere gimmicks with little practical purpose. But five years later, the rise of large language models like ChatGPT overturned this notion, with hundreds of millions of people now using them on a daily basis.
  • The Woobie: Has its own page.

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