The Jeff Jones Show (1984 TV series)/Tropes

* The Other Darrin:
** Kate Jones has had 5 main actors. The first left after Season 2 to focus on her schoolwork, the second left after Season 4 due to her puberty, the third left midway through Season 6 due to a pay dispute, and the fourth retired from the role in 2003.
** Chris Williams originally voiced Ickis in the 1st season. Jürgen Néjadepour then got the role after Chris decided the voice was too much on his vocal cords and the rest is history.
* Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping:
** Ickis' teacher Mr. Gromble was voiced by Hiro Kanagawa, who puts on a Frank Nelson-esque voice. In some scenes with him, Hiro's native Japanese accent will slip out.
** The Canadians in the cast occasionally would slip up, such as pronouncing "about" as "aboot." When Mina van den Goorbergh (who is a Canadian born in the Netherlands, by the way) played Kate Jones, she usually pronounced "Sorry" like "Soh-ry".
*** Also, Jake had a tendency to pronounce "garbage" as "gerbige".
** Umeko's mother has a Japanese accent that slips more than a clown walking on a banana peel-waxed floor.
** Ibraahiim Toogane, a Somali-Canadian born in Iceland, portrayed I.M.EVIL with a over-the-top Bulgarian accent based on his home's landlord's voice. Some episodes from his run as the voice actor for the character have I.M.EVIL say "about" as "aboot" and randomly saying "center" as the French "centre".
** Mutsumi Takahashi, a Canadian citizen born in Japan, voiced the Japanese Oblina. Her Japanese accent was well done; though sometimes her usual "news anchor" voice would slip through.
** Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez's Hispanic accent tended to bleed through the voice of Bryan. According to his grandson Clifton Gonzalez-Gonzalez, Pedro wasn't instructed by the American recording team in Los Angeles to hide his accent.
* Getting Crap Past the Radar:
** "Miss Tan Visits" has Robert Stainton pull out a vacbed from his closet. It's likely they got away with it because Robert Stainton referred to it as a "space-age mummification device", and because the show was made in Canada.
** Umeko wears a Debbie Does Dallas T-shirt in "Oblina Gets Real!"
* Off-the-Shelf FX:
** Much of Robert Stainton's inventions for making his life "easier" are clearly everyday objects slammed together. For example, the Robert Stainton Villains-and-Heroes-Get-Erased-by-the-Neutrals-Gun is clearly just a toy replica of an AK-47 with a sink plunger drilled to the barrel (and lots of it painted orange to make it legal if some Brozo were to build a replica or if the actual prop was to be brought to a comic con in the 'States by a show cast member).
** The Season 1 "Toon Transformer" was obviously an Danish dining room hanging lamp drilled upside-down to the top of a 1950's blender.
** The show used the toy replicas for the Toon Transformers in Season 4, and actors and other people involved in the show will mention crew members having to make quick trips to Vancouver-area toy shops (or driving across the border to Washington to find a Toys "R" Us) to replace broken ones.
* Special Effect Failure:
** The start of the race in "Jeff's Big Race". Because the "prepping for the race and taking off from the finish line" scenes were filmed in a small studio, it was too dangerous to have the vehicles move at more than what is quite obviously less than walking pace.'
* Driving a Desk:
** Used with almost every scene that involved the JeffMobile when we see Jeff and Jack driving it close-up. Or the MooseMover. Or any land-based Robert Stainton invention that involves someone driving it like an automobile. All of the examples are very obvious as the bluescreen footage is videotaped and the rear projection is very obviously filmed (complete with lots of film grain at times).
** "Boating for Bananas" and "Lake Heads" had Boating a Desk with the JeffBoat, and so did every appearance of the People's Luxury Yacht or the Robert Stainton Boating Device and every other appearance of the JeffBoat.
** Every scene with the JeffPlane or any plane for that matter had Flying a Desk.
** "Oh No, Ono!" has a scene where Ono is being taken to the JeffMansion by Umeko in a car we barely see her drive again in the following episodes. The car is clearly not moving.
* The Power of Rock:
** Rather, the Power of Italo-Disco (or The Power of Eurodisco, or The Power of 80's Electronic Music That Didn't Chart in the U.S., or The Power of Synthpop). Jeff and Jack use it to "reprogram" bullies (whilst beating them up without ever touching them) in the anti-bullying special "Plug It!"
** The Power of Rock was actually used in "Bloodmouths Good, Vegans Bad", when Robert Stainton and Twisted Sister played the latter's music to ward off a crowd of vegans crowding up on the local hamburger joint.
* Sexy Cat Person: A tendency of this show. No wonder Jeff stopped hating cats after meeting Amelia!
* Spiritual Successor:
** LazyTown is one example of a show that shares charm with this show. They're both foreign shows (Icelandic for LazyTown and Canadian for Jeff Jones) and have a lot of singing. They're also both very memey.
** Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat. Several of this show's actors and actresses were on that show, and Amy Tan (yes, that Amy Tan) wrote for both (and created Sagwa, for that matter!). The original book's illustrator Gretchen Shields also storyboarded for Jeff Jones. Both shows have Friendly Fandoms, and a lot of memey moments (Dongwa is basically Robert Stainton in cat form).
** Greeny Phatom was created by Robert, and several of the Jeff Jones cast and crew moved onto it after Jeff Jones ended.
* For The Evulz:
** Robert Stainton's motives depend on the writer (or what is at the top of his shit list that episode), but they are generally just this trope. He runs around causing even more shenanigans than Jeff and Jack ever do, using "inventions" made out of ordinary household objects.
** In "The Jack Jones Rap Part III: Where'd Moose Go?", aLEx and CarL kidnap Moose just for the heck of it.
* Actor Allusion:
** This isn't the only time Holly Gauthier-Frankel has played a cheerful female character.
* Commercial Pop-Up:
** When PBS Kids aired the show, some stations and the national feed had a bug where Jeff, Jack, and Kate would run across the screen whilst loud Hanna-Barbera running sound effects played and the three yelled "Hurry up!" and "Come on!" repeatedly.
* Happy Birthday to You!:
** In the episode "Jeff Jones' Birthday", Jeff Jones gets treated to a birthday rap performed by Kool Whisp (voiced by a then-unknown MC Hammer), named "The Birthday Rap (Happy Birthday, Jeff!)", which was based on "Holiday Rap" by MC Miker G & DJ Sven.
** In "Ono, A Birthday Party!", they sing the actual Happy Birthday song at Ono's Birthday party... at least in the Canadian broadcast. The cast re-shot the scene for airings outside of Canada with them singing a new birthday song to the tune of the Chinese classical music piece "Butterfly Lovers' Violin Concerto". According to Robert Stainton, both versions of the scene were filmed back to back in reverse order; the longer Butterfly Lovers-based one being filmed first, and the shorter Happy Birthday one second. And also according to him, the script for the Canadian version of the scene just instructed the actors to sing "Happy Birthday".
** "Robert Stainton Turns Older". First off, Umeko sings the actual Birthday song in Japanese: "お誕生日おめでとうございます (Otanjōbiomedetōgozaimasu)", then the entire cast sings the Three Stooges' Birthday song (The one that goes "We baked you a birthday cake…; If you get a tummy ache…; And you moan and grown and woe…; Don't forget, we told you so!") as the cake gets wheeled out.
** "Miss Tan Returns" has the cast singing yet another original birthday song, this time to the tune of the Amtrak jingle from the 1970's (the one that begins "Seeee the country, travel Amtrak!")
** In the revival series episode "Birthday Time Again?", the cast sing a birthday song to the tune of the infamous "Genesis Does What Nintendon't" jingle.
* Amazing Freaking Grace: Umeko sings the song in "The Jack Jones Rap Part II: Sing-Along or Else!" to test her vocal pipes, but is cut off by Robert Stainton halfway through. We guess the writers just didn't like the song.
* Birthday Episode:
** "Jeff Jones' Birthday" is the most well-known from the series, owing to it's location shooting at the Rochester Fair in Rochester, New Hampshire in the United States (Jeff Jones was popular in the Eastern U.S. states for some reason) and the guest appearance by a then-unknown MC Hammer.
** 6 episodes after Umeko's little sister Ono came into the series, she got a birthday episode, "Ono, A Birthday Party!", wherein she and the cast celebrate her birthday; and Robert needs to find a gift for her.
** "Robert Stainton Turns Older" has Robert celebrating his birthday onboard a VIA LRC train.
** In "Miss Tan Returns", it's Amy Tan's self-insert's birthday and the cast plan a surprise party.
** And for Umeko? "Birthday Time Again?" in the revival series!
* No Export for You:
** It took nearly 30 years and a crazed fanbase to get the full series on DVD in the States. VCL released some episodes on VHS in the 1980's, but then their license expired and went to Buena Vista Home Video in 1990. Then after Disney lost the home video rights to Kid Rhino in the early 2000's, the latter farted out some "Best Of" compilations and released Seasons 1-9 and parts of Season 10 and 11 (i.e. only episodes 1-12 and 30 for 10 and episodes 1-15 for 11) on DVD and MiniDVD; and the rest was left in limbo. All of the VCL, Buena Vista, and Kid Rhino releases had all gone out of print and finding second-hand copies cost a pretty penny. Even worse, the Kid Rhino DVD's were Vanilla Editions and used the edited versions used by PBS Kids and some other broadcasters. Then come 2013, and Echo Bridge Home Entertainment released all 11 seasons (at the time) on DVD. Cue happy fanbase.
** Meanwhile during this time, the entire unedited series was released on DVD in the UK by the BBC through their defunct home video unit and then 2Entertain. Too bad it was in PAL.
** Also during this time, the entire series had been released on DVD in compilations in Hong Kong. These releases were region-free, and as a result many Brozos took to crazy measures (i.e. travelling to Hong Kong or buying the DVD's off Chinese shopping sites) to get copies of them. It was also released on VCD in Singapore, more on that below.
** The series was this until 2016 in Malaysia when it began being re-aired on 8TV after nearly 5 years of absence, and was released on some legit streaming services. Before then, it sucked to be a Jeff Jones fan in Malaysia. Several Brozos from Malaysia reported having to go to the south of the country to find imported Singaporean VCD's of the show in order to get their fix of watching it everyday of the week.
* Crowd Song:
** Happens every once in a while. It's a fun part of doing a drinking game whilst watching the show.
** "Boys and Girls Are Here to Play" is the Signature Song of the series for a reason. It was updated several times as cast members left and came.
* Vanilla Edition:
** The first DVD of the series ever sold (in 1998) was Buena Vista's re-release of VCL's first ever home video release of the show. The only special features are the Latin Spanish (Venezuelan Lips dub) and French (Quebec dub) audio tracks and a trailer reel.
** All of the Kid Rhino DVD's are this. The only bonus features on the "Best Of" comp. DVDs are the Latin Spanish (Venezuelan Lips and 80's-90's Etcétera dubs for most of the episodes with the Los Angeles and 2000's Venezuelan Etcétera dubs included for some episodes) and French (Quebec dub) audio tracks, some Behind the Scenes reels, and some Kid Rhino and Rhino Video previews. Meanwhile, some of the season boxsets Kid Rhino's only special feature was to select the episodes.
* Suck E. Cheese's:
** Averted in "Umeko vs. the Municipal Government of Vancouver", where the cast visits an actual Showbiz Pizza Place (a predecessor of the modern Chuck E. Cheese's). The cast had to travel to the U.S. state of New York to film the scenes, since Showbiz didn't bother expanding outside of the United States, Latin America, and Kuwait.
** Several episodes outside of that one have them visiting "Ditzy Dragon's", a Chinese restaurant combined with the FEC concept which features an animatronic traditional Chinese-music singing Emperor Puyi. The place's debut episode ("What's With Thus Game?") credits Amy Tan and Steve MacLeod with "Non-Copyright Infringing Family Restaurant Concept Creation".
** Another regular Suck E. Cheese's was "Randy's Prison", an Alcatraz-themed variation; with an animatronic band who usually sung... you guessed it, "Jailhouse Rock".
* "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune:
** Show writer Amy Tan (who, due to her more notable career as a author, sang with the Rock Bottom Remainders prior to their retirement from touring) sings the theme song to the Zack's Zoo segments. She also did some singing voice dubbing and backing vocals on the show's songs.
* Non-Singing Voice:
** Robert Stainton, due to being unable to keep his "constantly angered" tone of voice whilst singing, had his singing dubbed by Québécois singer Kristján Sven.
** Mina van der Goorbergh's Kate spoke with Mina's voice when she talked, but was dubbed over by Robert Stainton's real-life sister Rebecca when she sang.
** Averted with Kate II, who spoke and sang as Angel Johnson; and Ickis, of whom Jürgen Néjadepour did the speaking and singing for.
** Oblina spoke as Mutsumi Takahashi and sang as Stevie Nicks (yes, ).
** Krumm sings with an inexplicable heavy metal singer voice, provided by none other than James Hetfield.
** Bryan the Shark spoke as Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez and sang as show writer Bolat Bulat.
** Twisp's speaking voice was done by Rodger Bumpass. However, his singing voice was done by jazz vocalist Gary "The Big G" Halsson.
** In Mantenna's few singing bits, he also sang with Kristján Sven's voice. His speaking voice was done by Lou Schiemer.
** Draco's singing bits were done by Bolat Bulat singing in baritone and later Rockapella bass vocalist Barry Carl, whilst his speaking was done by Vincent Price.
** I.M.EVIL's singing was performed by Luis Juan Cruz, and he sounds nothing like his first two voice actors.
** Averted with Corbin and Spooky; their voice actresses (Peggy Lee and Tabitha St. Germain) did both their singing and speaking.
** Amy Tan dubs the singing voice of Scarlet, Ickis' girlfriend.
* Synchro-Vox:
** A (rather unconvincing) cel animation version was used to animate the mouth of the animatronic Emperor Puyi at Ditzy Dragon's.
** Used in the first installment of "The Jack Jones Rap" during the titular musical number; with a cardboard cutout of a burlesque performer used as the overlay (Robert Stainton stated in a interview that the mouth was that of show writer Valerie Daglish).
* Author Avatar:
** Jeff Jones and Jack Jones for The Two Jakes.
** Robert Stainton for... who else.
** Miss Tan for Amy Tan, right down to her tendency to bring along some of Tan's real-life work.
* Dyeing for Your Art:
** Susan Glover's Mina makeup, which was not only full-bodied but involved latex clothing that made her sweat like hell and featured full eyeball contact lenses and dentures; had the producers hire an American Navy SEAL who taught her some torture-resistance techniques.
** Tane Nikau, Jake Sanford's main stunt double, lost a couple pounds to match Jake for the first season's stunts. Later seasons saw him wearing padding to hide his muscle.
** A variation: Jake Wrzesiński lost much of his hair in a 1992 car accident in Toronto (and eventually became fully bald), and as a result he wore a wig for the later seasons and promotional appearances, and even in the revival series.
** Averted: Alina Withers planned to shave her head for the scenes where Kate becomes a Werepoodle in "Bark of the Werepoodle", however the shaving equipment was destroyed in an accident, so she wore a bald cap instead.
** Joanne Vannicola had her hair dyed pink and purple to play the Jones kids' riot grrrl cousin Tamitha in "The Punk". For Tamitha's next appearances, Joanne wore a wig as the dye nearly fried her hair.
** Pauline Little had her actual hair thinned and damaged to play metal singer CharlotXXX in the episode of the same name. Because she nearly went bald, she wore a wig for CharlotXXX's latter appearances in "The Supposed "Revenge" of CharlotXXX" and "Robert's Big Failure". When CharlotXXX reappeared in the revival series in "CharlotXXX is Back Again", Pauline took avoiding this trope Up to Eleven and wore a green bald cap so the hair could be added in digitally with CGI.
* Deleted Scene:
** Jeff, Jack, and Kate were scheduled to appear in The Earth Day Special, however their scenes were cut as Jake Wrzesiński felt very uncomfortable doing them as he was a pitchman for Petro-Canada (of course he was out of character in that job) at the time.
* Bizarro Episode:
** "Dutch Nelvana of the Northern Lights". It is an episode spoofing foreign knockoffs of American superheroes and its name is inspired by existing nicknames for such things as Turkish Star Wars and Italian Batman. It mostly consists of the show's writing staff and additional actors running around in cheap dollar store Halloween costumes acting out a fairly nonsensical story featuring various wonders such as surf-offs derailed by attacking Werepoodles and detachable exploding boomerang First Nations warbonnets; with the footage filmed in English and dubbed into Dutch and then subtitled back into English, and Jeff and the cast of the show watching a film featuring the above mentioned stuff acting as it's framing device. The main plot of the film is that a comet crashes to Earth, and a scientist named Dr. Skaadoodleydoodleydoodleydumb finds it, studies it, and gives it to Dutch Nelvana of the Northern Lights, alias Maria Nelvana Snerkleflorp, for safekeeping. Then on comes the insanity.
* Poorly Disguised Pilot:
** "Robert Stainton Mysteries", an entirely animated episode wherein Robert Stainton, Miss Tan, a ghost named Dan, Mina, and a pop singer named Laura Bouncybutt solve a vague mystery.
** "Kate's Show!" for the spinoff The Kate Jones Show. Notice how Kate introduces Snap and all her animated friends from the spinoff, and how half the cast are barely in the episode (Robert Stainton appears on screen for a total of 58 seconds and Ickis is hardly seen at all). Note the utter absence of half the animated segments. Note the fact that the cast members who actually do appear don't act out of character so much as they act without character, like blank slates that could have been any character from any show, with everything playing out the same way.
** "That Kitty-Kat" pushes Jeff and his friends into the background in order to showcase Mina and her feline friends' animated adventures.
** "Dutch Nelvana of the Northern Lights" is this to a extent.
* Old Shame:
** Jake Sanford made every effort to make sure "I Hate Cats! There!", or any episode focusing on Jeff's dropped hatred of cats, was not released again. Too bad Comcast's Vortex on-demand service had the episode for viewing. Eventually, it was released on DVD as part of the Complete Series boxset.
* Political Correctness Gone Mad:
** Kate's friends Joel and Carlos are members of a Little League-esque team called the "Vancouver First Nations (formerly known as the Vancouver Little Indians)".
** "Tell 'Em to Whine About It at Home!" has Jose's fiercely Italian cousins butting heads with a Native American group protesting their town's Columbus Day parade during the cast's first U.S. visit. Hilarity Ensues.
* Hilarious In Hindsight:
** In the 1992 episode "Rome-ouch and Juliet-field", James Hetfield accidentally refers to Corbin as being Chinese, when in reality his breed is Thai. One rerun of the episode during the PBS run was on September 1, 2001. Only one day later, Sagwa, the Chinese Siamese Cat premiered.
Category:Tropes