That's So Weird!
That's So Weird is a Canadian sketch comedy television show produced by Halifax Film Company (later DHX Media Halifax), created by Jeff Copeland, broadcasts on YTV.[1] The show has been described as SCTV or Mad TV for teenagers and includes an array of comedic skits.[2][3] Reruns of the show currently airs on ABC Spark.
| That's So Weird! | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Sketch comedy |
| Created by | Jeff Copeland |
| Written by | Gary Pearson Duncan McKenzie Jerry Schaefer Carolyn Taylor Albert Howell Jan Caruana |
| Starring | James Hartnett Hannah Hogan Alana Johnston Kayla Lorette Joey Lucius Alex Spencer AJ Vaage |
| Country of origin | Canada |
| No. of seasons | 3 |
| No. of episodes | 39 |
| Production | |
| Executive producer | Gary Pearson |
| Production company | DHX Media Halifax (Halifax Film) |
| Distributor | DHX Media |
| Release | |
| Original network | YTV |
| Picture format | 1080i (16:9 HDTV) |
| Original release | September 9, 2009 – March 8, 2012 |
| External links | |
| Website | |
Premise
The show is a documentation of a group of teenagers who work at a fictional television station called So Weird TV. They receive various unusual products from their owner, Jamco, and are given the duty of creating commercial advertisements for the strange items. Alongside the ads they are required to do, So Weird TV also has programming that parodies television programs such as Degrassi: The Next Generation and This is Daniel Cook.[4]
Characters
- Alana Johnston[3] – The boss of the station, who, despite being a good friend, can be harsh.
- Kayla Lorette – A worker in the station. She is often criticized by Alana. In season 2 she develops a crush on James.
- James Hartnett – A worker in the station that develops a crush on Hannah, and is unaware that Kayla has a crush on him.
- Hannah Hogan[2] – Has the highest popularity rating, and is often overconfident mostly for her own good. Her father also owns Jamco.
- Joey Lucius – A worker in the station who always manages to attract the attention of others.
- AJ Vaage – A worker in the station who often assists others.
- Alex Spencer – A worker in the station who has a relatively good relationship with everyone.
Production
Most scenes are filmed in front of live studio audiences. Season 1 was filmed in the former St. Francis of Assisi Catholic School building in Toronto.[5] Later seasons were filmed in Halifax, Nova Scotia in Studio 1 at CBC Halifax.[2]
Episodes
| Season | Episodes | Originally aired | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Season premiere | Season finale | |||
| 1 | 13 | September 9, 2009 | March 17, 2010 | |
| 2 | 13 | October 6, 2010 | March 30, 2011 | |
| 3 | 13 | October 5, 2011 | March 8, 2012 | |
Season 1 (2009–2010)
| No. in season | No. in series | Episode title | Original air date | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | "Chocklick" | September 9, 2009 | |
| The team makes a commercial for Chocklick; a chocolate block that "lasts forever". YTV's Carlos makes a guest appearance. | ||||
| 2 | 2 | "Shantz" | September 16, 2009 | |
| A new product that is a shirt and pants are made. | ||||
| 3 | 3 | "Drool Aid" | September 23, 2009 | |
| Drool Aid, a powder making you drool juice, is brought forward. | ||||
| 4 | 4 | "Pretty as a Picture" | September 30, 2009 | |
| A picture frame that goes on your neck and makes you look prettier. | ||||
| 5 | 5 | "Greeting Card" | October 14, 2009 | |
| Greeting Cards for just when you need them is the ad for the team. | ||||
| 6 | 6 | "Beef Whiz" | October 21, 2009 | |
| A commercial needs to be made for a liquid beef named Beef Whiz. | ||||
| 7 | 7 | "Hamicil" | October 28, 2009 | |
| An acne cream that also can be dinner named Hamicil. | ||||
| 8 | 8 | "Tacorea" | November 4, 2009 | |
| A taco restaurant ad needs to be made for the restaurant Tacorea. | ||||
| 9 | 9 | "Leaky Roof" | November 11, 2009 | |
| A leaky roof won't stop following Kayla. Unfortunately, she is the only one noticing it. | ||||
| 10 | 10 | "Scissors" | November 18, 2009 | |
| The team needs to make a Running With Scissors public service announcement. | ||||
| 11 | 11 | "Feetza" | January 6, 2010 | |
| Feetza is a pizza and a foot lotion. | ||||
| 12 | 12 | "Tried" | January 7, 2010 | |
| The detergent for people who don't care about clean clothes named Tried. | ||||
| 13 | 13 | "Background Music" | March 17, 2010 | |
| Alana spends $500 on a subliminal background music machine. | ||||
Season 2 (2010–2011)
| No. in season | No. in series | Episode title | Original air date | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 14 | "Space Thunder" | October 6, 2010 | |
| Kayla, in an attempt to gain James's love, gets the right to develop a TV show version of the comic book Space Thunder. | ||||
| 2 | 15 | "Divide and Conquer" | October 13, 2010 | |
| Alex and Hannah both want personal assistants, but they have a problem sharing them. | ||||
| 3 | 16 | "Gravity Trouble" | October 20, 2010 | |
| Weird gravity causes trouble for making TV shows. | ||||
| 4 | 17 | "Emu Flu" | November 3, 2010 | |
| AJ catches the Emu flu, which makes him act like an emu. This causes him to be quarantined. | ||||
| 5 | 18 | "April Fools" | November 10, 2010 | |
| Kayla pulls an April Fools joke, convincing everyone that Jamco is going to fire them if they don't make an April Fools prank. Everyone comes up with their own idea. | ||||
| 6 | 19 | "The Game" | November 17, 2010 | |
| James, Joey, AJ, and Kayla play a game instead of working. | ||||
| 7 | 20 | "Carmine" | January 5, 2011 | |
| A puppet named Carmine brings his show Carmine's Crib back. Carmine becomes an annoyance and an unpopular towards everyone. | ||||
| 8 | 21 | "Power Struggle" | January 19, 2011 | |
| Hannah and Alex battle for who has the most ratings. | ||||
| 9 | 22 | "Retro Show" | February 2, 2011 | |
| So Weird TV's 50th anniversary is coming up; Kayla initiates a plan to get James's attention, but it backfires when James ends up being with his love interest, Hannah. | ||||
| 10 | 23 | "Ruthless Boss" | February 16, 2011 | |
| Alana trains for an annual ruthless boss competition trying to beat last year's champion and uses the MAL1000 computer to try to assist her in being ruthless. Unfortunately, MAL1000 becomes too ruthless for Alana. | ||||
| 11 | 24 | "A Visit from Mom" | March 2, 2011 | |
| Alex's mom pays a visit to the station. | ||||
| 12 | 25 | "Make AJ Do It" | March 16, 2011 | |
| When AJ gets a mustache, he feels more in control. Also, a giant blue hand stops Space Thunder. | ||||
| 13 | 26 | "Bollywood" | March 30, 2011 | |
| Low ratings force the team to make a Bollywood music video. Also, James speaks out to Kayla. | ||||
Season 3 (2011–2012)
| No. in season | No. in series | Episode title | Original air date | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 27 | "Iguana" | October 5, 2011 | |
| AJ falls in love with Alana, resulting in a love song. Alana interviews Jerry Trainor from iCarly. | ||||
| 2 | 28 | "Heist" | October 12, 2011 | |
| The cast try to retrieve their property from Alana's locked cupboard. Also, Alana interviews David Henrie from Wizards of Waverly Place. | ||||
| 3 | 29 | "Mortimer" | October 19, 2011 | |
| Alana dresses up as a new boss to make the team realize that having a fun manager has consequences. | ||||
| 4 | 30 | "Heavy Metal AJ" | November 2, 2011 | |
| Joey discovers AJ's old band, which he decides to rejoin on their comeback tour. | ||||
| 5 | 31 | "Ain't No Thing" | November 9, 2011 | |
| Alex's old sitcom is rebooted to bring back ratings, but the remake is cancelled. Also, Logan and Wilf answer questions from viewers. | ||||
| 6 | 32 | "Hannah's Itch" | November 16, 2011 | |
| Hannah has a back itch which she has trouble relieving. | ||||
| 7 | 33 | "Kaylaland" | November 23, 2011 | |
| Kayla visits Kaylaland, which is a parody of The Wizard of Oz, where people actually like her. | ||||
| 8 | 34 | "Jimmy Jamco" | November 30, 2011 | |
| AJ wants to be known more not as the guy who gets hurt, so he plays Jimmy Jamco. However, it backfires quickly. | ||||
| 9 | 35 | "Ho Ho Ha" | December 7, 2011 | |
| The cast are having trouble finding someone to play Santa. However, Kayla finds a man to be Santa, but he causes havoc. | ||||
| 10 | 36 | "Educating Kayla" | December 14, 2011 | |
| Kayla and James put together an ad for Jamco University, and end up learning things themselves. | ||||
| 11 | 37 | "Sleepover" | January 12, 2012 | |
| Hannah tries to make some friends that are girls by having a sleepover. Daniel Book learns about science. | ||||
| 12 | 38 | "Joey Phones Home" | February 9, 2012 | |
| 13 | 39 | "That's So Musical" | March 8, 2012 | |
Specials
- "That's So Scary!" – Put in an online version, and a televised version. Both have different sketches from each other. For example, the online version has the sketch "Ghost Chasers", while the televised version has "The Mom Whisperer" instead.
Minis
A series of four mini episodes were made, featuring sketches from the first and second seasons without any sitcom content. The theme song from the second season plays without any opening sketch.
Recurring sketches
- Every episode shows something going on with the team. In Season two, Kayla develops a crush on James who develops a crush on Hannah.
- "This is Daniel Book" – A parody of the TV show This is Daniel Cook, except this is Daniel Book who is nineteen years old instead of six years old, but acts as if he is six years old. Daniel has gone of various adventures, such as dating and snowboarding.
- "Talking with Logan and Wilf" – Two boys that are played by girls talk about various things.
- "Poptrendz" – A parody of entertainment news shows like etalk or Entertainment Tonight, Poptrendz is a show with various guest stars talking and doing adventures. Some of these are James meeting Eva, and interviews with Mario and Peach, Hogwarts Students, etc.
- "Raptoritis" – A boy is afflicted with a rare condition where loud noises cause him to act like a velociraptor.
- "Like a Doctor" – A man who thinks he's a doctor because he has seen every episode of Grey's Anatomy ever made.
- "Abby and Trevor" (unofficial name) – A series where Abby reads incredibly weird things out loud to Trevor, who has a crush on Abby. Unfortunately Trevor has a very hard time trying to clearly explaining his crush.
- Jamco commercials and their production – Appearing in most episodes where the gang receives a product from the fictional company Jamco and have to make a commercial for it. Products include "Extra-cise", "Combo-cise", "Chock-lick" and "Invisiball".
Awards and nominations
| Year | Award | Category | Recipient(s) | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Gemini Awards | Best Children's or Youth Fiction Program or Series[6] | Jeff Copeland, Charles Bishop, Michael Donovan, Floyd Kane, Gary Pearson | Nominated[7] |
| Best Performance in a Children's or Youth Program or Series[6] | Kayla Lorette | Nominated[7] |
2011 Gemini Award Nomination
Best Children's or Youth Fiction Program or Series That's So Weird, Gary Pearson Michael Donovan, Charles Bishop
2011 Canadian Comedy Awards-
Best Television Performance, Ensemble: James Hartnett, Hannah Hogan, Alana Johnston, Kayla Lorette, Joey Lucius, Alex Spencer, AJ Vaage (That's So Weird) (winner)
2013 – Canadian Screen Award Nominations.
Best Children's or Youth Fiction Program or Series – That's So Weird! Gary Pearson, Michael Donovan, Charles Bishop
Best Writing in a Variety or Sketch Comedy Program or Series – That's So Weird! Mike Allison, Jan Caruana, James Hartnett, Alana Johnston, Jerry Schaefer, Gary Pearson, Duncan McKenzie
References
- "DHX Media signs new broadcast license deals for That's So Weird!" (Press release). DHX Media Ltd. 2010-04-01. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
- Brioux, Bill (2010-10-05). "That's So Weird parody draws the tweens". Toronto Star. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
- Halliday, Chris (2010-09-07). "Orangeville native in running for Canadian Comedy award". Orangeville Banner. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
- Ryan, Andrew (2011-03-07). "TV: Five shows worth watching tonight: March 8". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
- Brioux, Bill (2009-09-21). "St. Francis blessed with more weird kids". Toronto Star. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
- Oliveira, Michael (2010-08-31). "Flashpoint leads with 15 Gemini nominations". Toronto Star. Retrieved 2011-12-31.
- "25th Annual Gemini Awards – All Category Winner List – November 2, November 3 and November 13, 2010" (PDF) (Press release). Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television. 2010-11-13. Retrieved 2011-12-31.
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