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Rocket Power is a popular Nicktoon that ran for four seasons from 1999 to 2004, produced by Klasky-Csupo. It focuses on the (mis)adventures of a foursome of kids living in Ocean Shores, CA. The title refers to brother and sister duo Otto and Reggie Rocket, ostensibly the leads out of the core cast of four. The other two include Otto's friend Maurice "Twister" Rodriguez and new kid Sam "Squid" Dullard.

The show's hook is that the four main characters are all into extreme sports, and nearly every episode features some such activity at the center of the episode's events. Even if it isn't the core of the plot, each episode generally begins with the kids surfing, or hanging out at the local skate park, Madtown. Over the course of the series, everything from relatively tame sports such as roller hockey to extreme and obscure sports like zorb balling are featured in the show.

Other than the main four, other regular characters include Otto and Reggie's dad, Ray, who owned a restaurant on the Ocean Shores pier; his partner Tito, a native Hawaiian who speaks with the requisite accent and is fond of spouting nonsensical proverbs, and Twister's older brother, Lars, who often picks on the main characters. Also included are the Rockets' next-door neighbors, the Stimpletons; Madtown's owner, cool Jamaican dude Conroy; and various other kids the same age as the main characters.

Rocket Power contains examples of:

• 2D Visuals, 3D Effects: The Fourth of July episode ends with a computer-generated firework rocket flying slowly towards the camera,
• The '90s: The show is a love letter to the rise and popularity of extreme sports among youths in the 1990s into the 2000s.
• The '60s: Most of Rays' and Titos' flashbacks to their youth take place in that decade with either crewcuts or Beatle cuts or even long hair. One flashback featured them working on a surf movie that referenced the Frankie and Annette films of that decade.
• Accidental Athlete: Sam Dullard's goalie skills, which are discovered when he casually swats away a hockey puck coming at him from behind.
• The Ace: Tito's nephew Keoni, Twister's cousin Clio and Breezy all fit this trope. It's Deconstructed to the extent that they mostly just want to fit in with the gang, but cause (unintentionally) jealously among one or more of them.
• Actually Pretty Funny: In "Super Squid", the characters eventually come to laugh at it. Tito thought it was pretty funny from the start (Aside from the bit with the coconut in the dark.)
• Adults Are Useless: Averted. Unlike many shows from the era, the adults in authority tend to be very helpful when the kids go to them and their rules are there for a reason rather than just arbitrary fun killing to drive a plot. Unfortunately, the kids often learn this second part the hard way. Otto especially because of his guru nature for the trio.
• Always Someone Better: Happens often, especially with Otto and a visiting athlete. Otto gets particularly incensed when he sees Twister is naturally better than him in street luge... so much in fact that Otto resorts to cheating to beat Twister.
• Amateur Film-Making Plot: After seeing a movie that the characters disliked, the gang decides to make one themselves. Hilarity Ensues - since the finished product looks, well, like something a bunch of kids would make. It goes over well with the gang's family and friends, though MacKenzie and her friends disliked it, and decide to make their own movie.
• Ambiguously Brown:
  • Otto and Reggie Rocket. They're not white, but their dad seems to be... (although he is very tanned, which makes sense). It isn't made clear if they're half Hawaiian/Polynesian and half white or if they're suntanned from always spending time at the beach/spend most of their time outdoors
  • Meanwhile in the TV movie, The McGilles are both Ambiguously Brown. It's easy to assume they're possibly Australian or of Maori descent.
• Anachronic Order: Early Season 1 episodes showed the gang visiting Madtown Skatepark before "Banned on the Run" which ends with Madtown's grand opening. Conroy also appeared before despite the aforementioned episode implying that was when they were first introduced to him.
  • Sam is still seen boogieboarding in some episodes after "The Fall and Rise of Sam" where Sam quits boogieboarding and learns to surf.
  • In "Womp Race 2000," at the end of the episode, Reggie decides Sam should have a new nickname to replace "Squid," and they all decide on "The Sam Man." But in episodes afterward, Sam is still referred to as "Squid," even by Reggie.
  • The episodes "New Girl on the Block" and "After Shocked" featured Ray's new wife Noelani and the Zero Gravity Zone and aired before the series finale, "The Big Day", where the wedding and the ZGZ opening took place.
• Armor-Piercing Question: When Twister tries to persuade Reggie to cover for Otto so the latter could sneak into a skating contest despite his promise to work alongside Raymundo at the Shore Shack in "Otto Mobile":
  Twister: Cover for him, Reg, he is your brother.
  Reggie: Would you cover for your brother?
  (Cue Twister shutting up)
• The Artifact: Sam wears an "N" on his shirt because he was originally meant to have moved to Ocean Shores from New York, but the letter was kept after his home state was changed to Kansas.
• Artistic License – Child Labor Laws: Discussed. While being forced to work in his father's restaurant, Otto complains that there are child labor laws. Sam "helpfully" points out that those don't apply to family businesses as long as their children do nonhazardous work.
• Artistic License – Law: In "Ottomobile", Ray tells 9-year-old Otto and 10-year-old Reggie they both have to work in the Shack that afternoon because Tito is sick. Reggie objects with, "Hey, there are child labor laws!" and gives Sam the stink eye when Sam points out those laws don't apply to family members. While there are indeed exceptions to California's laws against minors under 14 working, none seem to apply to this situation: it's not agricultural work or entertainment work or a sports event, Otto and Reggie would still need work permits, and while those exceptions could theoretically permit a parent to hire their minor children for their business, they do not give a parent or any employer permission to force said children to work against their will. So Reggie is likely right — Ray forcing Otto and Reggie to work in his restaurant against their will would indeed be illegal. And that doesn't even get into the question of if they're getting paid or not (there's nothing to indicate they are)...
• Artistic License – Physics: Invoked.
  • The one episode where Otto thought he could spin his skateboard in the air and go back to his original spot, as if he could do it in reverse. It only gets worse when a ball gets launched into the air by a lawn mower at the right time, which hits his board and actually causes this to happen — causing him to assume it will happen again. And discussed by Sam who mentions it's physically impossible to have done so.
  • To bring up Tito's "Hopscotch" incident again... Also invoked. The kids clearly look at him skeptically since Tito would be lucky to be alive if he stepped on a piece of lava. (And even luckier still to have two legs.)
• Artistic License – Sports: One episode has Reggie and her team winning a volleyball game 15-14. In volleyball (and for that matter, tennis and badminton), you have to win by two.
• As Himself: Several extreme sports athletes have voiced themselves on the show, including Tony Hawk ("Enter the Hawk-Trix"), Willy Santos and Andy MacDonald ("Reggie's Big Beach Break"), Luc Robitaille, Jeremy Roenick, and Martin Brodeur ("Power Play"), and Missy Giove ("Missile Crisis").
• As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Supposing that this isn't his nickname, "Tito" isn't a Hawaiian name and neither is there even a letter T in the Hawaiian alphabet.
• Asleep in Class: In "Snow Day", the entertainers hired by the Vice Principal to perform during an assembly are so good Twister declares it the best assembly he "ever stayed awake in".
• As Long as It Sounds Foreign: There is an ethnically Hawaiian character named Tito, which doesn't make sense, because there is no letter "T" in the Hawaiian alphabet^note Although sometimes, "K" is pronounced as a "T", and while "Tito" is an actual name, it is an Italian/Spanish one, not a Hawaiian one.
• Attention Whore: Otto, in spades.
• Bad "Bad Acting": In "Double-O Twistervision," the kids made their own extreme sport/spy movie "Gnarlyforce 5." Otto plays the lead hero, but tends to overdo it and act rather over the top, while Reggie acts as if she couldn't care less for her part, and Sam has terrible Performance Anxiety that causes everyone to laugh at him during his scene as a laboratory scientist. Averted with Lars as the villain, as he is clearly the best actor out of all the kids in the film.
• Beach Bury: Ray does this to "The Rhino" headfirst.
• Berserk Button:
  • Reggie does not like being called Regina, nor just Twister like being called Squid (he also doesn't like being called by his given name of Maurice, but that's more of a Mildly Annoyed Button).
  • Ray was willing to bury The Rhino's head in the sand for encouraging Otto, as well as other kids to surf during a hurricane, as the storm potentially put Otto and Twister at risk.
  • Reggie goes ballistic when Trent suggests that she should "definitely come watch" him and the guys play rugby.
• Big Brother Bully: Twister's older brother Lars often enjoys picking on Twister for the heck of it, playing simple pranks on him, tricking him into believing his lies, and is even a rival of him during the hockey games.
• Big Shadow, Little Creature: Seen in "The Night Before," when Otto, Sam, Twister and Eddie are about to "whomp" a house on Mischief Night, the owner of the house can be heard sending out his dog "Crusher" to get them, and the boys see a rather threatening shadow of the dog in the light from the open door, and run for it. Once they climb up a tree, the dog catches up, and we see it's actually something like a chihuahua.
• Bill... Bill... Junk... Bill...: At the beginning of "Welcome to the Club," Otto goes through the mail, saying "Boring, lame, electric bill, check, report card... Crud, no new surf mag(azine)s!"
• Binocular Shot: "Double-O Twistervision" has a scene showing two movie villains through a cutout of two circles, so as to simulate the Binocular Shot.
• A Bloody Mess:
  • Parodied in the episode where the gang thinks Tito murdered Raymundo:
    Twister: Oh, man! There's blood all over that broken ketchup bottle!
  • Also in the episode where the gang camps out in the woods and Lars and his friends try to scare them by dressing up like zombies, complete with smeared red jello for fake blood. At one point, while running from the "zombies", the Squid accidentally steps in the bucket of jello they used to make their costumes and screams "IT'S A BUCKET OF BLOOD!"
• "Both Sides Have a Point" Remark: Done on purpose in the episode about banning skateboarding on the Pier. While the kids argue that Stimpleton and the adults who want to ban skateboarding are wrong, the adults are right in that it actually is dangerous for multiple people to skateboard around high-traffic areas. However, there was nowhere else for skateboarders to really go: So, the skate park was built as a compromise. This mirrors real life conflict(s) around the time.
• Brilliant, but Lazy: Twister. An effective Hockey Team Captain, but hates handling the pressure.
• Broken Pedestal: Otto experiences this with his favorite skateboarding movie star, Donny Lightning, who is a HUGE Jerkass, has all his stunts done by a (female) stunt double, doesn't even know how to skateboard, and rudely rejects Otto's request for an autograph.
• Butt-Monkey: Sam, who in addition to his lack of skills in extreme sports is the butt of jokes from Otto and Twister.
• Calling Parents by Their Name: Otto and Reggie would occasionally call their dad by his name, Raymundo. This shows that he's a 'cool' laidback parent.
• Calling the Old Man Out: In "Race Across New Zealand", Ray spends most of the movie blatantly favoring Otto over Reggie due to an incident where the father of another competitor beat him in the same competition a few years earlier. Reggie finally gets fed up with this line of thinking and rips her dad apart, claiming that he doesn't care about her at all and just cares that Otto looks good. Since she and Raymundo normally have a good relationship and Ray treats both kids fairly, this is pretty sobering.
• Calvinball: In "Game Day," Otto invents a new game called "Rocketball" that becomes this over time, with more and more new rules added as the game goes on and more people join in.
• Capture the Flag: An episode has a game of freeze tag style Capture the Flag. Otto's team cheats, but Reggie outsmarts him and her team wins anyway.
• Cassandra Truth: Lars in "Falsely Alarmed", who was blamed for pulling the fire alarm at the Shore Shack. It wasn't until Otto and Twister confessed to Officer Shirley that she finally believed that Lars really didn't do it.
• Chain of Deals: One episode involving trading cards.
• Character Development:
  • Mostly Sam, who begins as fairly clumsy and awkward but grows into a competent athlete, even if he doesn't quite approach Otto.
  • Also shows up in "Race Across New Zealand" where Theodore McGill is encouraged to cheat by his father, Chester, but eventually has his conscience catch up with him and reveals how he cheated... which turns out to be how Chester cheated against Raymundo when the two competed in the first Waikikamukau games. Both the McGills' wins are reversed and awarded to the proper winners (The Rockets).
• Chickification:
  • Usually averted with Reggie for the entirety of the series, except for the episode Reggie-Regina where she not only allowed a new boy in town that she liked to call her by her real first name, she also pretended to be terrible at sports so he could teach them to her in a misguided attempt to get him to like her. Thankfully this gets cleared up by the end of the episode.
  • Inverted with Clio. In her first appearance, Clio is a straight-up Girly Girl who likes ice dancing and thinks it's improper for girls to play hockey (though later she tries hockey after betting with Reggie). Later episodes reveal that she's also good at surfing, skateboarding, rollerskating, and playing roller hockey. Justified in that Clio trying ice hockey would have made her more open to playing more male-dominated sports.
  • An in-universe example occurs in the episode "Sim Sammy". In Sam's computer game, Reggie's counterpart, Reginalda, does not know how to skateboard, surf, or ride the ski lift. Reggie calls Sam out by telling him that she taught him to ride the ski lift.
• Chuunibyou: Eddie, who refers to himself as "Prince of the Netherworld" and seems to believe that he is some sort of demon.
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Twister. Occasionally Tito as well.
• Comic-Book Adaptation: Rocket Power comics were featured in Nickelodeon Magazine.
• Comic-Book Time: Subverted, the show starts with Otto, Twister, and Sam being 9 years old. A season 3 episode shows Otto celebrating his 11th birthday.
• Continuity Nod: In the episode "Mr. B Is In The House," Conroy says in his introduction that he went to grad school for his teaching degree while the "skate rat" students were leaving their handprints at Madtown. This was a reference to the episode "Say Hello To Cement Head" where Twister left his handprints (and headprint) on Madtown's new vert ramp.
• Convection, Schmonvection:
  • In the series finale the kids ride bikes over a lava stream and are unharmed.
  • Tito also loses a Hopscotch competition because he stepped on a piece of lava. However, the kids look at him weirdly, since Tito wouldn't have been able to survive, causing him to say he has some dishes to take care of.
• Cool Old Lady: Violet Stimpleton, in contrast to her husband, Merv.
• Cool Teacher: Conroy becomes Otto and Twister's teacher for the year as of "Mr. B is in the House".
• "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: In "Big Air Dare", Otto breaks his leg on a snowboarding slope meant for experienced adults only. A guard, who had previously escorted him off, tells Ray that if Otto listened to him, he wouldn't have gotten hurt.
• Cranky Neighbor: Merv Stimpleton, in contrast to his wife. This gets swapped around during the episode "Violet's Rocket".
• Crashing Dreams: "Mr. B Is In the House" opens this way; it starts with Otto riding a literal rocket-powered skateboard through the desert, but just as he's making a big jump between two cliffs, a radio deejay suddenly says from out of nowhere "Good morning, Ocean Shores!", causing Otto to fall between the cliffs ala Wile E. Coyote as the deejay continues yakking on. Just as he hits the ground, Otto wakes up in his room in a Catapult Nightmare fashion as the deejay says that it's the first day of school in Ocean Shores.
• Curse Cut Short: At the end of "Follow the Leader," Twister and Lars' father Raoul says "tonight will be a living..." before his wife Sandy cuts him off.
• Cutting the Electronic Leash: Happens when Sam's busy, divorced dad back in Kansas spends some time with him. Though here, he just tosses his phone in the backseat of the car as the two drive off to spend that lost time together, and they laugh as the phone rings.
• Dark Horse Victory: One episode focuses on a sandcastle contest, where Sam, a Teen Genius rival, and various other entrants make elaborate and difficult sand sculptures. In the end, the award goes to recurring character Mackenzie Benders, a bratty kid whose entry is about what you'd expect from anyone her age. Ray, one of the judges, notes that they had to give it to her—she was the only one who made an actual sandcastle.
• Daydream Surprise: In "Twister's Cuz," Sam is nervous about the new "Sky Torpedo" thrill ride at the Ocean Shores amusement park. A while after the characters arrive at the park, Sam is shown hesitating to get in a mini-rocket vehicle, but Otto and Reggie keep pushing him to do it, and the demented ride operator locks him into the car, laughs at him, and starts the ride. Sam buckles up, and then the ride elevates the carousel far over the ocean and begins spinning the vehicles faster and faster. It then tilts to the side as it goes even faster, and then the screw nut holding Sam's vehicle in place pops out and sends his vehicle flying, to which it leaves a path of destruction as it careens through the park, flinging Sam to his impending doom. Otto then starts crying out Sam's name, only for it to ripple back to reality as Otto snaps Sam out of his fantasy.
• Didn't Think This Through: Often the reason most of the Rocket Gang's schemes or attempts to clean up said schemes go bad. One standout example comes in "Pool's Out Forever", where, thanks to Otto's big mouth, Eddie's new pool is getting wrecked by an all-out "empty pool" skate party. Sam manages to get all the party-goers to leave by announcing that the Shore Shack is giving away free ice cream and french fries. It works, except...
  Sam: It worked ...just call me Sam, the super genius.
  Otto: Just one problem, super genius.
  Sam: What's that?
  Reggie: Who's gonna pay for all the fries and ice cream?
  Sam: Oops.
  All: AHHHHHH!!!
• Disabled Means Helpless: In one episode, Reggie meets a snowboarder who has a prosthetic leg. Feeling sorry for her, Reggie decides to let her win. However, she gets a What the Hell, Hero? from her dad and friends, and the snowboarder herself calls out Reggie on the way she treated her and wanted to be treated normally. Reggie does so by being serious and beating the snowboarder in a rematch which earns the latter's respect.
• Disqualification-Induced Victory:
  • In "New Squid on the Block", Maurice (who's still "The Squid" at the time) gets the puck stuck inside the Stimpletons' new mailbox and Lars, who's playing for the other team, tries to claim victory by forfeiture, claiming that, according to international rules, whoever loses the puck loses the game. Sam (who still didn't become the new Squid at the time) averts this by recovering the puck.
  • In "The Great Sandcastle Race", a little girl wins a sandcastle contest for being the only entrant whose entry looks like a castle.
  • Reggie and Otto are awarded the Prince (and Princess) Waikikamukau award in "Race Across New Zealand" when Theodore McGill confesses to taking an out-of-bounds shortcut in the final race. Ray is also awarded Chester's medal from the very first Waikikamukau Games after the latter confesses to doing the same thing when they competed.
• Distinction Without a Difference: In "Safety Patrol Sam" when Sam writes a citation to Lars and his friends for loitering. Sputz says to Sam: "We were just hanging around." which Sam replies: "Exactly!"
• The Ditz: Twister. However, there appear to be some Hidden Depths. (See The Gift)
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": NO ONE calls Reggie by her real name, Regina, not even her father. In fact, aside from the Chickification incident cited above, no one has ever spoken or heard of it before or since.
• Don't You Dare Pity Me!: In one episode, Reggie meets a handicapped snowboarder and lets her win a race by wiping out on purpose. Afterwards, they call Reggie out for this and declares that she just wants to be treated like everybody else.
• Dramatically Missing the Point:
  • In "Radical New Equipment", Reggie feels sorry for a girl named Lizzie who has a metal prosthetic leg, so Tito and Raymundo try to change her perspective with a story about a guy they knew. In the story, this acquaintance lost his sight and would sit by the beach while other pitied he couldn't surf anymore. But one night, they all witnessed him surf in the dark. The whole point of the story was to help Reggie recognize that the girl's prosthetic didn't make her any different than the next snowboarder, but Reggie just sees it as an inspiring testament of how the girl is trying to compensate for her missing leg.
  • In "The Return of Clio", Otto spends nearly the whole episode disapproving on Reggie's sudden friendship with Clio. At some point, Tito tries to share with Otto an old philosophy about 'the winds of change' to help him be more open-minded towards the new friendship. Unfortunately, it flies over Otto's head, as he takes it as advice to strategically avert the metaphorical winds of change or even push them away. A frustrated Reggie has to spell out that he should accept the change rather than treat it as something that must go away.
• invokedDude, Not Funny!: In "Radical New Equipment", Twister makes a remark about a group of handicapped snowboarders that leaves the rest of the crew in shock.
  Twister: Squid, don't worry. You're not the lamest snowboarder on this mountain anymore.
  Reggie: Twister, harsh!
  Otto: That's not cool, man!
  Sam: I can't believe you said that, dude!
• Eat the Camera: "The Great Sandcastle Race" ends this way, when a seagull that's sitting on a blimp (that keeps appearing throughout the episode as a Running Gag) takes off from the blimp and flies right into the camera, its' open beak engulfing the screen with black.
• Embarrassing First Name: Twister's first name is Maurice. The episode it's revealed in makes it a Running Gag.
  • In one episode, The Rhino blushes in embarrassment when Raymundo calls him by his real first name, Walter.
  • Embarrassing Middle Name: Twister laughs when he finds out Mr. Stimpleton's middle name is Jeremiah, to which Reggie reminds him of his name, Maurice.
• Embarrassing Hospital Gown: In "Big Air", after an asthma attack lands Sam in the hospital, he is naturally put in a hospital gown. The embarrassing part comes when he leaves his bed and bends over to pick something up from the floor, and at that very moment, his friends and Raymundo come in through the door behind Sam. While the viewer is spared the view, it's pretty obvious from their reaction the other characters got a good look at Sam's bare behind.
• Embarrassing Nickname: Other than his first name, an even bigger Berserk Button for Twister is "Squid" which was his nickname before Sam came. Averted with Sam who was happy to have a nickname other than "Dink".
• Even Nerds Have Standards: In "Loss of Squid", Sam meets Oliver for the first time and is happy to have a friend who shares his interest in science and computers. However, Sam later gets bored of him because Oliver doesn't like sports or games, has no sense of humor, is afraid of any physical activity, and doesn't want to do anything else except study. At the end of the episode, Sam introduces him to the gang and tries to get him to play hockey.
• "Everybody Laughs" Ending:
  • "The Wrath of Don" ends this way; the kids vow off the "Skate Wars" movies, and then see a random boy walking around in a Donnie Lightning shirt and shades, and then they shrug it off and run into Mad Town laughing, to which the episode ends.
  • "Womp Race 2000" also ends this way, after Twister apologizes for accidentally hitting Sam's cast while he is in the hospital.
• Exact Words: In "The Great Sandcastle Race", the gang enter a sandcastle contest... And their model amusement park loses to a little girl who built a dinky little castle. It's a sandcastle contest, and she was the only one who actually built a sandcastle, while everyone else built elaborate and intricate models.
• Expy: The main cast is suspiciously similar to that of Rugrats: Compare Phil, Lil, Tommy, and Chuckie. "Rugrats eXtreme Sports Anyone"?
• Extreme Sports Plot: Being a show about a group of preteen California skaters, it's filled to the brim with them, including one episode that features Tony Hawk.
• F--: Otto gets in trouble with his dad for earning a "check minus minus" in Classroom Citizenship.
• Fantasy Helmet Enforcement: The kids are always wearing helmets when skating. Otherwise this show would get some serious flak.
• Fell Off the Back of a Truck: In "Losers Weepers", the kids end up with a motorized skateboard that fell off a truck (from a rather aggressive lady driver) but decide to hide it from others...until each one of them tries it out in secret behind the others because the temptation to use it is unbearable (though they convince Sam to use it since he hadn't tried it yet).
• Fictional Counterpart: Ocean Shores is obviously one of Santa Monica, down to the iconic pier. Oddly, at one point in the series, the main cast travels to Malibu for a surfing trip, and they use the real life place name.
• Flanderization: Twister. Watch him in the first couple of episodes where he's merely a bit slow. However later on, he's almost comedicly stupid.
  • Otto as well, who increasingly became more self absorbed and obnoxious.
  • An in-universe example with the Super Squid game where Sam of course makes fun of his friends. However, he doesn't make as much fun of Reggie.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: Otto is choleric (reckless and egotistical), Twister is sanguine (the simple-minded sidekick), Reggie is melancholic (the irritable sister), and Sam is phlegmatic (the voice of reason).
• Free-Range Children: The late elementary school cast wanders about Ocean Shores by themselves frequently. Although Ray is pretty laid back. Sam's mother is more fussy, but generally, Sam always tags along. (One episode actually does show Sam's mother forbidding him to go to a secret spot because she doesn't know where he is.)
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Josh Grody, one-shot character from "All About Sam", temporary becomes this to the Rocket gang. He annoys the gang with his lame attempts at slang, his sucking up to Otto, and his picking on Sam, while justifying it by saying he was just messing with him. When Josh tries to replace Sam at a game and it becomes clear how little he thinks of Sam, Otto, Reggie, and Twister make it clear to Josh that the only reason they hang around him is because of Sam and unfriend him.
• Fun with Acronyms: "Extreme Nerd" features Robotic Organized Battle Of Technical Skills.
• Funny Background Event:
  • The episodes in which the story is told through interviews on camera or the media is shown. Throughout the episode of a documentary on Otto "Selling out", you can spot all sorts of weird events such as Ray emptying trash on the ground, a whale jumping out of the blader bowl, and an empty skateboard flying out. There was also another funny one where the news anchor stalled for time... and a UFO sucks up a whale and flies off. And occasionally, you can see people falling in the background.
  • A very subtle yet funny background event happens in one episode. Ray is giving his kids a lecture and you see a fish trophy hanging on the wall behind Ray. Sometime in the middle of the scene, the fish blinks.
• Gang of Bullies: Twister's older brother, Lars, is usually seen with two (later three) lackies Pi and Sputz.
• The Gift:
  • Sam is shown that while he (at first) had almost no skill in roller blading, he was an obscenely good goalie. He notably he gets a lot better at any of the sports done as the show progresses, and even manages to coach an impromptu street hockey team made up of side characters when the others get sick.
  • Twister is a natural when it comes to the artistic side of things, which is why he handles camera work and skateboarding videos. In one episode he turns out to be really good at making sandcastles, and in later episodes he's part of a local choir.
• Goofy Suit: In "A Shot in the Park," the gang is visiting a SeaWorld -esque amusement park to shoot footage of marine life for a school project. The park has a goofy seal mascot that likes to sing the park's jingle, high-five kids, and bark like a real seal. Underneath the seal costume, he is a teenage guy covered in zits, but he seems to enjoy his job. He also initially suspects Twister may be trouble when he initially refuses to give him five, and gets in a word after the kids get in trouble.
• Goth: Eddie, the self-styled "Prince of the Netherworld", walks around in a hooded black cloak and Halloween monster mask. Keep in mind the cast lives in Santa Monica southern California.
• Grade Skipper: Sam's the same age as Otto and Twister, but he's in the same grade as Reggie, who's two years older than Otto. Oliver takes it even further. He is in high school and even helps his biology teacher. However, in later appearances he is attending the same school as the main characters.
• Greeting Gesture Confusion: Sam offers Oliver a hi-five, but when he holds his hand up, Oliver thinks he was trying to hit him.
• Gretzky Has the Ball: When Oliver is invited to play street hockey with the gang he asks what position he'll play; the quarterback, jockey, or outfielder. He's assigned scorekeeper.
• Grounded Forever:
  • In one episode, Otto and Twister go out into a hurricane to retrieve Twister's video camera. When Raymundo tracks down and rescues them, Ray grounds Otto forever, to which Otto replies sincerely, "That's cool."
  • In a different episode, Ray declares that if his kids were caught sneaking out after dark, they would be grounded until they're his age. Subverted in the end when he only gives Otto three weeks of garbage duty.
• Grumpy Old Man: Merv Stimpleton, in contrast to his more tolerant wife.
• Gum In Hair: In one episode, Twister is forced to pick up garbage around Madtown Skatepark as punishment for ruining a new ramp. A bunch of kids throw their trash at him, including a piece of gum that gets stuck in his hair.
• Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow: In flashbacks, Raymundo is shown with a full head of long blond hair, but in the present time, he is bald on top, and usually wears a hat to hide it.
• Hard Truth Aesop: From "The Big Air Dare," If an adult is telling you a certain area is too dangerous, listen to them! Otto finds out the hard way when he breaks his leg when going to an adult snowboarding course and sneaking past the guard.
• Hate Sink:
  • Josh from "All About Sam," the new kid that Sam attempts to befriends. However it's quickly clear that Josh only becomes "friends" with Sam to get an in with Otto, Reggie and Twister, and tries to take Sam's place, and constantly insults Sam behind his back. The others make it clear they were only Josh's "friend" because of Sam, and that they always saw through his two-faced facade.
  • Donny Lightning from "The Wrath of Don," a child actor and a phony skater whom Otto is a fan of. He treats the crew members terribly (one of whom is his uncle) and when Otto meets him, he dismisses Otto, who is dressed like him, as a wannabe and harshly rejects Otto's request for an autograph, which makes it satisfying to see him fail miserably and get hurt when he accepts a challenge from Otto to a skating match under threat of being exposed by Otto and the gang.
• Helium Speech: In an episode, Sam accidentally spreads the "Fiji Flu" to his friends, where one of the side effects is having a very high-pitched voice.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: One episode had Sam attempting to shed his token geek persona and become as "cool" as his friends, including trying to adopt their bizarre slang. This led to a joke where he called someone's skateboard trick "sick", with "sick" meaning, in-universe, gross or ugly. A few years later, the word would come to be used in exactly the complimenting way Sam was trying to use it.
• Hong Kong Dub: In "Double-O Twistervision," during the gang's "Gnarlyforce 5" movie, due to Sputz mumbling as usual when saying his line as one of the Evil Dr. Lars's henchmen, Otto dubs in his voice during post-production, and his voice does not match up with Sputz's lip movements, creating this appearance.
• Hurricane of Euphemisms: In "The Night Before," when Officer Shirley delivers a warning that anyone caught out past curfew on "mischief night" will be locked up in jail, she uses numerous slang words for it...
  Shirley: So remember, citizens of Ocean Shores: Anyone caught outside on "mischief night" will spend the rest of the night inside a cell in the pokey, the hoosegow, the iron bar hotel, the big house, JAIL!
• Hyperventilation Bag: In one episode, Sam uses one of these when he imagines the thought of his ski lift ticket posted on the Wall of Shame.
• Hypocritical Humor:
  • When Twister loses his hat, Ray comments he's never seen anyone get worked up over losing a hat... and then says "WHOA!" as he almost drops his own hat he's almost never seen without.
  • Twister is known to laugh at a few characters with embarrassing names, like Walter for "The Rhino" and Jeremiah for Merv Stimpleton, to which Reggie reminds him his name is Maurice.
  • "Sim Sammy" Sam making a game with flanderized versions of his friends. Otto complains about his character admiring a photo of himself, all while fluffing up his hair. Reggie is annoyed that Sam made her character unable to do any sports, while having trouble opening a bag of chips. Twister complains about how dumb is character is, while eating a burger that he poured his shake into.
  • In "Rocket Girls" Otto and Ray are lounging on the couch watching TV and eating snacks. Ray asks Otto if Twister's dad is out of shape and Otto says "total couch potato" which Ray calls a "disgrace". This was days before a parent/child team competition and Otto and Ray were so confident that they'd win that they didn't bother training. Ironically Twister's team beat Otto and Ray (they placed 3rd while Otto/Ray didn't place at all) albeit with Lars posing as Twister's dad.
• I Ate WHAT?!: In "Welcome to the Club," Twister and Sam are trying some new delicacies at the Ocean Shores Beach Club. Sam tries some tripe, and says it "Tastes Like Chicken and salty marshmallows." He and Twister initially enjoy it, but are then grossed out to learn from another club member it comes from sheep stomach, to which they immediately feel like puking.
• Ice-Cream Koan: "Never drink the milk from a coconut you found in the dark."
• I Don't Like the Sound of That Place: There's a dangerous mountain board course called "Bruised Man's Curve".
• If It Tastes Bad, It Must Be Good for You: In the episode "Typhoid Sam", the kids come down with a case of the "Fiji Flu". In hopes of helping the kids get better, Otto's and Regina's father Ray prepares some pineapple soup, much to the disgust of them, as well as some hot fruit punch.
• I Have This Friend: On one occasion, Reggie uses this on Tito, who thinks she's talking about somebody he knows, keeps asking about her, and tells Reggie to give his regards.
• I'll Tell You When I've Had Enough!: In "Happy Luau to You-Au" Tito tells a disgruntled Reggie that he's "cutting [her] off" when she orders more fries after finishing her last serving. He later adds "You're not driving home are you?"
• Imagine the Audience Naked: Sam does this on an episode. Nervous about asking some classmates for a favor, he says to himself "picture the audience in their underwear." Unfortunately, he does it backwards, picturing himself standing in front of them in his underwear. It works anyway, as he says to himself, "Close enough."
• Imposed Handicap Training: In one episode, Twister takes over as the captain of the main four's hockey team and imposes some odd—but effective—training methods. In one case, he blindfolds Sam and Reggie and has them go through an obstacle course, explaining that he saw on television that cutting off one sense strengthens the others. Sure enough, Reggie and Sam are able to navigate the course by using smell and hearing alone.
• Informed Flaw: In "Falsely Alarmed" the group says Lars gets away with everything. In reality he's gotten away with one thing (from "Night Prowlers") and getting away with everything applies more to the kids themselves than Lars.
• Inopportune Voice Cracking: An episode revolves around Twister's voice cracking terribly. Twister doesn't understand why though, and his Big Brother Bully convinces him that he literally cracked his voice. The ending also has Otto making fun of Twister's voice, only for his own voice to crack.
• Inspirationally Disadvantaged: The episode "Radical New Equipment" used this as a Deconstructed Trope by pointing out that "feel-good" stories about physically or mentally impaired athletes are often rife with Condescending Compassion and ignore the genuine talent of those athletes. Lizzie, the central character of the episode who has a prosthetic leg, summarizes the trope with her blistering "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Reggie—she wins races and games because she's good, not because able-bodied people let her win, and to give her special treatment (beyond the reasonable accommodations needed to allow her and others like her to compete) is incredibly insulting: "I just want to be treated like everyone else."
• Instant Expert: Sam fits in right away as a practical "stonewall" goalie for The Rocket gang, but it's totally subverted when it comes to surfing, skateboarding and many other extreme sports, as it either takes Sam finding the right equipment or simply Level Grinding over three seasons to the point where he can at least keep up with the others. Justified in that he originally lived in Kansas, where there's no ocean for surfing and it's too flat for any good skateboarding.
• Instantly Proven Wrong: In "Falsely Alarmed", when Twister jokes that if Reggie and Sam were firefighters they'd come right away if the Shore Shack's fire alarm was pulled, Otto insists nothing would happen if you pull the fire alarm when there isn't an actual fire burning and attempts to show Twister. But right when he pulls the lever, the alarm starts ringing loudly through the Shore Shack much to Otto's horror, and he and Twister run for it to avoid getting caught.
• Insult Backfire:
  • Squid was used to identify the new kid on the block and originally belonged to Twister, who hated it. When Sam arrived, they gave him the squid nickname and he was generally pleased to have a nickname at all.
  • Mostly a nickname that wasn't "Dink".
  • Sam further embraced the Squid name in "Race Across New Zealand" when a local upon hearing his nickname told him the story of a mythological squid which became a spirit animal to Sam.
• Intergenerational Friendship: Reggie and Violet; the gang with Tito and Conroy.
• I've Heard of That — What Is It?; Ray in the episode "Typhoid Sam":
  "The Fiji Flu?! Not the Fiji Flu! Why, oh why the Fiji Flu? (beat) What's the Fiji Flu?"
• Jerkass:
  • In descending order of Jerkass-ish: Lars, Otto, Reggie. All three act like Jerkasses on a regular basis.
  • Twister as well on occasion.
  • Merv Stimpleton also comes off as one towards the gang.
  • Dick Shakley from the episode "Otto 3000" also counts.
  • Jerk with a Heart of Gold: However, all of them can display this as well.
• Jerkass Has a Point: A grumpy security guard in "The Big Air Dare" warns the kids off an adults-only snowboarding course. He says it's dangerous and if he catches them again, embarrassing photos of them are going up on Shame Fame wall. Otto blows him off and sneaks in with Reggie to race with her. It turns out the guard was right; Otto breaks his leg and nearly dies in the snow, if not for the other kids getting help. When the security guard explains to Ray that he previously warned the kids about the danger, Ray reprimands Reggie for not listening to the man.
• "Kick Me" Prank: An episode has Otto and Twister pranking Reggie by putting a sign on her back that said "Hello my name is Lame-O".
• Kids Shouldn't Watch Horror Films: In "Reggie: The Movie", Reggie goes to see a horror movie called Sharkenstein's Revenge that scares her so badly that she blows a big surfing competition the next day. In this case, her father actually gave her permission to see the movie if she thought she could handle it and, although she didn't want to see it, she was goaded into it by her friends calling her chicken.
• Large Ham: Mackenzie, particularly when she's separated from her family and Twister and Sam try to reunite them.
• Laser-Guided Karma:
  • In "Snow Day", Otto successfully convinces Sam to attempt to skip school with him (their own "Snow Day" by Otto's words) while Reggie and Twister continue to attend. The former two get trapped on a roller coaster and is televised on the news, eventually getting caught by Ray, while the latter two get to attend a carnival at their assembly.
    Otto (while trapped upside down on a roller coaster): This is the worst day of my life.
    Twister (on the court at the carnival back at school): This is the best day of my life.
  • In another episode, Lars tricks Twister into believing that there's a suitcase full of money buried in the backyard, and Twister digs for it, eventually getting himself in trouble with their parents. After a lot of anxiety that he's going to be sent away as punishment, he explains the whole situation to his parents. Lars gets his just desserts when he is told by the parents to dig for the nonexistent suitcase full of money, since he's the one who made the lie in the first place.
• Last-Second Word Swap:
  • In one episode, Otto sponsored a rival snowboard company, Sam still cheered "Go, Otto!" When Reggie gave him a disapproving look, he added "'s competition! Go Otto's competition!"
  • In another episode, the Rockets are competing in a family surf competition. After the rival father and son duo complete their surf routine, an impressed Twister says, "That was so awe..." before Otto gives him a disapproving look and Twister follows up with "ful. Awful! You'll definitely beat them, bro!"
• Legacy Character: The Squid (which is a nickname given to the newest member of the Rocket team) was originally Twister before Sam joined.
• Let Me Get This Straight...; Otto says this verbatim in the Fiji flu episode:
  Otto: Let me get this straight. Sam's not sick cause he's always sick and we're sick cause we're never sick?! That's sick! (rim shot)
  Ray: He's delirious.
  Doctor: But right.
• Lethal Chef: Mrs. Stimpleton most obviously (ribbon candy "with real ribbons"? "Jellyfish jelly rolls"? Licorice cookies?), though Ray and Tito have their moments when cooking anything other than hamburgers. When Otto and Reggie are sick, Ray makes it worse by cooking them a series of hot foods which thinks will help.
  Ray: (serving a weird looking pizza) When I was sick as a kid, this always hit the spot!
  Reggie: What "spot" are you talking about?
• Let Me Get This Straight...: When Sam gets the fiji flu and gets over it in only a few hours, Otto is less than impressed when the doctor explains why he, Reggie, and Twister will have it for much worse and much longer.
  Doctor: Sam's probably built up an immunity.
  Otto: Let me get this straight. Sam's not sick 'cause he's always sick and we're sick 'cause we're never sick?! That's sick! [Rimshot]
  Ray: He's delirious.
  Doctor: But right.
• Level Grinding: Aside from hockey and (mostly) surfing, it took three seasons for Sam to steadily improve to the point where he's able to keep up with the rest of the gang. Compare "Pool's Out Forever", where he couldn't even skate out of the bowl to "The Big Day", where he placed in the final five alongside Twister and Otto in the ZGZ tournament.
• Like Father, Unlike Son: Ultimately displayed by the McGills in "Race Across New Zealand". Chester McGill has no qualms about using dirty tricks to win but his son, Theodore, has his conscience catch up to him and not only admits to the cheating, getting both his win and Chester's previous one revoked and awarded to the Rocket siblings (in a tie) and Raymundo, respectively, but is even a Graceful Loser who clearly sees the Rocket siblings as Worthy Opponents.
• Literal-Minded: Sam. In "Otto Mobile", he agrees to cover up for Otto at the Shore Shack and Reggie assigns him dishwashing duties, explaining that everyone works their way up from the bottom. Unfortunately, he interprets it as having to start with the dish at the bottom of the pile.
• Loads and Loads of Rules: Otto tries to make a new altered hockey game to remedy his friends' boredom. To their ever-growing chagrin, the new hockey game becomes a daunting task on itself as Otto kept adding lots of nonsensical rules to it just to avoid losing in it to the point it was almost Unwinnable by Design. Even he kept forgetting his own rules.
• Locked in a Freezer: This happens to Sam in an episode, although it isn't the focus of the episode — it is to show that everyone is ignoring him the entire episode because of Otto's mischief.
• Married to the Job: Sam's father, while a Reasonable Authority Figure compared to Sam's mother, shows it in one episode where he visits and treats the kids to various fun activities, but is always on his phone making business calls instead of having fun with Sam and his friends. He eventually realizes how bad he is as a father and offers to take Sam out for some quality time the next day, ignoring his cellphone the next time it rings.
• Meaningful Name: "Twister" and the last name "Rocket" refer to their love of extreme sports; Sam's last name, "Dullard," is initially used to identify him as a more intellectually inclined character.
• Mid-Air Motion Shot: All over the place, which is a given due to the premise.
• Missing Mom: Otto and Reggie's biological mother. She was confirmed to have passed away in "Island of the Menehune", and it's hinted that the cause of her death was a fatal wipeout.
• Moment of Weakness: In the episode "Rainy Days & Sundaes", Reggie, Otto, and Twister make a huge mess of the Rockets' kitchen when they turn it into a slip and slide with sundae ingredients. When Raymundo comes home, Reggie (not wanting to miss the Junior Triathlon) bails out the window, leaving Otto and Twister to suffer the punishment by themselves. Reggie is left feeling guilty for getting out of getting punished, while Otto and Twister are, for the mess they all made. Even though Otto and Twister agree to keep her role in making the mess a secret until after the Junior Triathlon, Reggie spends the episode feeling guilty until during the Junior Triathlon she decide to leave the sport event and go to her father and confess to him. It turns out he knew all along that she made the mess with Otto and Twister, and was waiting for her to tell him. While he was proud of Reggie for telling the truth, he still punishes all three by having them work at his restaurant during a rush hour.
• Muse Abuse: One episode had Sam programming a game that made him awesome and made his friends look like doofuses — although he was actually rather nice to Reggie; merely showing her as a girl who asked him how to do stuff. Otto, Twister, and Ray got it worst. ("You have been trapped in one of Rumando's boring sixties flashbacks! Game over!") Although they do begin to laugh at it by the end of the episode, and even Tito takes it in good measure. (Just not the bit that's making fun of him.)
• Must Have Lots of Free Time: While Breezy, an adult woman working for Sunset Surf, says in "There's Something About Breezy" that she’s in the area for business, she seems to spend most of her time playing different sports with the kids.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Bruised Man's Curve, the dangerous mountain board course from the episode of the same name.
• Never Bareheaded:
  • While Twister has been shown without his kango hat several times, his brother Lars is rarely seen without his trademark gray beanie, and when he's not wearing it, he has his head covered with a helmet. In "Double-O Twistervision," as part of playing the Big Bad in the gang's "Gnarlyforce 5", he wears a bald cap with false eyebrows as part of his Dr. Evil-esque costume. Lars has only been shown in literally one episode with his head exposed, which is "Bruised Man's Curve". Outside of that episode, Lars never removes his beanie.
  • Raymundo is almost never seen without wearing some kind of hat, usually his trademark green fishing hat, or a coonskin cap when the characters are on a skiing trip. It isn't until the third season with "Twister's Hat" where we first see Raymundo's hat accidentally fall off, revealing he's balding, and we occasionally see this in a few other episodes.
• Never Say "Die":
  • Like many shows with deceased mothers targeted towards children, it is never directly said that Ray's wife "died" or "passed away", only implied, especially towards the end of the series.
  • In "It Was a Dark and Stormy Day", the kids think Tito is murdering Ray, but words like "murder", "kill", and "dead" are never said. Instead, Reggie says that their dad is "not a goner" and once the kids realize their mistake (their explanation is not seen), Ray says, "You know Tito wouldn't do something like that." These words are also avoided in the sister episode "Escape From Lars Mountain", where the kids fake Twister's sudden disappearance (and possible death) to scare Lars.
  • In "Twist of Fate", after Sam is saved from nearly going over a waterfall, he thanks his friends for saving him from "biting the big one".
• New Rules as the Plot Demands: Invoked in one episode, in which Otto invents a game and constantly makes up new rules.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Ray delivers one to "The Rhino" for putting Otto in danger.
• Noodle Incident: Twister had a puppy once, but lost it. Everyone knows about this except for Twister himself.
• Not Cheating Unless You Get Caught: "Total Luger" Lars points out a shortcut to Pi in a street luge race where nobody will see him while he's off the course, stating that "it's only cheating if you get caught." Otto overhears and takes said shortcut, doesn't get caught, and wins the race. Unfortunately for Otto, the guilt soon begins to haunt him...
• Object-Tracking Shot: There's an episode that follows Twister's lost hat until Twister finds it again.
• Obvious Rule Patch:
  • One episode has the group play a game that Otto thought up. Otto repeatedly makes up rules on the fly, eventually causing Reggie to snap and call him out in front of everyone else. This also shows the downside to this trope, because eventually everyone else stops playing because of the "rules" and eventually leaves Otto and Reggie basically trying to play "HORSE", which she uses as a distraction while making Otto do a complicated move to piss off and go surfing with Twister and Sam.
  • Another episode involved the school principal catching Otto, Reggie, and Twister playing street hockey on school grounds and planning on punishing them. Sam (who was the hall monitor in the episode) comes to the rescue by showing that the rulebook has a specific list of activities not allowed on school grounds, but that hockey is not on the list. After the principal realizes Sam's in the right, he lets the kids go, but says that the next day the rule would be rewritten to include hockey.
• On a Scale from One to Ten: In the episode "Bruised Man's Curve", Otto returns to the Shore Shack after a painful day of training on the titular mountain board course. When Sam asks Otto to rate his pain on a scale from 1 to 10, Otto replies, "12."
• One of the Boys: Reggie is often hanging with Otto, Twister, and Sam as the lone female.
• One Side of the Story: In "Race Across New Zealand", Ray Rocket won't stop flapping his yap on how his son Otto doesn't like to lose to hear out his daughter Reggie's own grievance: that she managed a tie in the previous race, and the only thing Ray cared for was Otto's loss.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Reggie, whose real name is actually revealed to be Regina in one episode. Nobody in the entire show is allowed to call her this as it's a MAJOR Berserk Button for her and it seems as though most people have forgotten it entirely.
• OOC Is Serious Business:
  • Most times, when someone unintentionally shows up Otto or proves themselves to better at something that he is, his ego will deny it outright before grudgingly accepting it; this makes it all the more unusual in "Powergirl Surfers" when he's paired up against Trish in an impromptu surfing challenge and doesn't even hesitate to say (in a squeaky voice) that she's really good. Otto's also never been one to back down from a challenge, but in "Bruised Man's Curve", when the day to challenge Lars on the titular mountain board course arrives, Otto's confidence is shaken so much that he outright remarks that he can't do it. Reggie couldn't believe her ears at that comment.
  • Violet is normally happy and cheerful, but in "Violet's Violet", she becomes depressed after her violet garden is accidentally destroyed by the kids and she yells at Merv for referring to her as "Violet". Merv later explains to the kids that Violet grew her violets for a gardening competition that she entered (and won) every year.
  • Reggie generally gets along great with her dad and tolerates Otto's posturing fairly gracefully. However, in "Race Across New Zealand", Raymundo's favoring of Otto to the point of ignoring that she is about to beat the boy Raymundo has set up as Otto's rival in favor of cheering only Otto on during a wind-surfing race makes her deliberately cut her brother off in the water so they both lose and then when Raymundo scolds her for absolutely everything that has gone wrong up to that point instead of realizing that this is highly unusual behavior for Reggie on several levels, she chews him out and claims he doesn't care about her before running off.
• Papa Wolf: Raymundo's a pretty easygoing guy, but put his kids at risk like "The Rhino" did and all bets are off:
  Raymundo: Ohhh Walter...
  "Rhino": Yeah, dude? (cue off-screen ass-kicking)
• Passionate Sports Girl: Reggie. And a few others, like Trish.
• Performance Anxiety: Sam suffers this in "Double-O Twistervision," in the gang's action/spy movie "Gnarlyforce 5" where he plays a laboratory scientist for the secret agent organization Otto works for. When saying his initial line, he's audibly nervous as his eyes dart from side to side, and by the end of the scene he's so frozen in fear that Otto dubs in Sam's remaining line of dialogue.
• Pet the Dog:
  • Lars is a complete asshole, but he does care for his brother and doesn't want him to be seriously hurt. Likewise, the sandcastle episode has him laugh at Twister when he mentions that the tide is going to ruin their sandcastle. However, at the end of the episode, he and his squad arrive and help hold up the surfboard to block the water from washing away the sandcastle.
  • Merv Stimpleton is mostly shown as a crotchety old man. However, on two instances, he helps the kids out ("Violet's Violet") and in "Reggie's Big Beach Break," does warm up to the teens after he politely asks them to leave and they comply, and thank him for being a good host. (Heck, he warms up enough to throw a concluding party.) Many of his scenes with Violet also count.
• Poor Communication Kills: A non-violent example in "The Big Day" where Noelani and Raymundo's wedding is nearly derailed after Noelani mistakenly thinks Otto and Reggie don't want her to be their new step-mom after overhearing the siblings' heated conversation at the rehearsal party. In actuality, Otto was merely parroting Reggie's earlier words about her hesitance in accepting Noelani as their new mom and (after Noelani walks away) Reggie admits she was nervous about it, but really likes Noelani and is more than willing to accept her as a Rocket.
• [Popular Saying], But...: "Blood is thicker than water... But not nearly as refreshing."
• Power Trio: Otto and Twister are often used as the same personality, as both are Ids, while Sam is Superego and Reggie is Ego.
• Precocious Crush: Occasionally Mackenzie for Twister, although it was never elaborated on and Twister is terrified of her (as is most of Ocean Shores).
• Psycho Rangers: Episodes featuring Lars and his gang usually match them up with the kids. It's especially obvious when the two crews play hockey against one another.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Aside from Merv, most of the adults the kids deal with are this.
• Remember the New Guy?: Animal joins Lars's gang late in the show's run, but is treated like he was always there. To add on to this, in one episode, he's also seen as one of the students on Otto and Twister's class.
• Repeat Cut: Often done whenever a character wipes out during skating and/or other activities.
• Rules Lawyer: During his stint as the school's "Safety Patrol", Sam manages to save the gang's permanent records (after they get caught playing illegal street hockey on school grounds) by pointing out that although the safety handbook outlaws certain sport activities, street hockey is conspicuously absent.
• Running Gag: Tito: "Like the ancient Hawaiian say..."
  Reggie: "Oh no. Not the ancient Hawaiians." [Headdesk]
• Sadist Teacher: Vice Principal Healy. Aside from Merv, one of the few adults who the kids actively dislike.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: Sam in later episodes.
• Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: In one episode Otto creates a new sport (that is basically a combination of hockey and cricket), but uses his "authority" as it's creator to change the rules everytime someone shows to be better than him at it. It doesn't take long for everybody to be fed up with Otto for that.
• Self-Serving Memory: In the "Half-Twister" episode, Otto and Twister have a falling out over a skateboard trick that Otto did but Twister failed at during a game, ending with Twister wiping out and landing right in a garbage can. At one point Otto tries to end the feud by telling Twister that he forgives him, but this only makes Twister angrier. When Reggie asks Otto what he thinks happened between them, he explains that he, in a Dull Surprise manner, warned Twister that the trick was hard and that Twister angrily pushed him when he tried to help after he wiped out, making Otto cry. When Reggie annoyingly wakes him up from his delusional fantasy world, Otto arrogantly tries to prove himself right by watching a video of that moment. Only to see himself mocking Twister for being too scared to try the trick. Then after Twister tried the trick and crashed-landed in the garbage can when he failed, Otto obliviously kept mocking Twister and rubbed his victory in his face. Shocked at sight of himself flatly insulting his friend after completely ignoring the fact that he had just gotten hurt, Otto's response to the video was...
  Otto: [stunned confusion] I can't believe I said that.
• Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Sam and Otto with Twister in the middle.
• Sequential Symptom Syndrome: Twister, Reggie and Otto get the "Fiji flu" from Sam. The doctor describes a few of the symptoms being a high-pitched voice and irritability. As expected, they undergo both. Lars gets the flu in the end.
• Ship Tease: Ray and Officer Shirley have some of this going on, although the finale has Ray marrying a relative of Tito's.
• Shout-Out:
  • There's a secret stealth-shout out to Semisonic's popular song, "Closing Time", in the episode "After Shocked".
    "Move along folks, you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here."
  • When Tito and Ray recalled this one famous surfing star as having a phobia of water, the star in the flashback had a mid '60s haircut and the film may have referenced the '50s and '60s Beach films like Gidget and other such films done by American International Pictures (like Beach Blanket Bingo and Bikini Beach) and the male stars James Darren and Frankie Avalon.
  • The episode, “Big Thursday”, was a nod to the obscure 1978 surfing movie, Big Wednesday, starring Jan-Michael Vincent.
• Shown Their Work: On occasion, Otto and/or Reggie are shown to be working at the Shore Shack for various reasons. This actually is fully legal - Raymundo owns the business, so Otto and Reggie actually can work there (Sam points out that Ray can't require Sam or Twister to help out because they are not his children). Similarly, whenever they are working at the Shack, they're either washing dishes, cleaning up, or waiting tables.
• Sickeningly Sweet: "Pinkie Pixie's Big Christmas Flapadoozy", the Christmas special that Otto and Reggie are forced to watch in the Christmas episode. It features an elf with an annoyingly high-pitched voice hugging a snowman and exclaiming that he's "the loneliest little elf in the world".
• Simple Solution Won't Work: In the episode 'Outta My Pit!', the Rocket gang builds a driftwood pit on the beach and Jerkass Lars and his gang try to take it from them. When the two groups argue over who gets to keep it, Reggie suggests they just share it, which the boys all reject with a resounding, "No!"
• Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: Child Prodigy Oliver van Rossum for Sammy, but really only pertaining to contests like sandcastle building or robot battling. Other than that, Oliver gets along well with the gang and even tries out skating once in a while.
• Skipping School: The episode "Snow Day" has Sam revealing that his old school back in Kansas is having a Snow Day, which inspires Otto to have his own Snow Day in order to avoid going to a boring school assembly. Otto and Sam end up getting stuck on a roller coaster and wind up on the news. When Raymundo and Tito see this and bring the boys back to school for punishment, they find out that Reggie and Twister had fun at a carnival in their assembly.
• Small Name, Big Ego:
  • The obnoxious pro surfer "The Rhino," aka Walter, whom Otto idolizes and Ray hates.
    Ray: Easy on the big story, Walter. Got it?
    Rhino: (embarrassed) Come on Ray, Rhino! Not Walter...
  • Otto himself can be this at times, as when he enters a professional surf contest just after his 11th birthday.
  • Not like Ray was immune to this either. In most of his flashbacks, he makes himself out to be cooler than he really was.
• Smart People Build Robots: Sam's friend and occasional rival, Oliver, in the episode "Extreme Nerd" is stated to win the same robot engineering contest every year.
• Soft Glass: Discussed in the episode "Skate Wars", where the kids explain that the glass on the film set's fish tank is made of sugar to minimize injuries. Sam gives the glass a curious lick.
• Sound-Effect Bleep: In "Secret Spot", every time a character mentioned the titular spot's location, a different random noise prevented viewers from hearing it.
• Special Effects Failure: A few in-universe examples in "Double-O Twistervision," during the kids' movie Gnarlyforce 5 (such as showing pictures of an island at night and day on a stick to simulate the passage of time, or Sam simulating the Shore Shack blowing up with a breakaway model on a makeshift seesaw.)
• Special Guest: Tony Hawk and Andy Mac Donald.
• Start My Own: The kids, in response to a movie that they agreed was terrible, try to make their own movie and find it to be much harder than they were expecting. The episode ends with a younger group of kids deciding that the movie that was filmed by the original group was also terrible, and set off to create their own film.
• Stay in the Kitchen: In the episode "Major Scrummage," when Trent suggests that Reggie come watch him and the guys play rugby, Reggie takes his comment as this. She starts being disrespectful to her male friends because of it.
• Stereo Fibbing: The kids find a motorized skateboard and decide to keep it, in secret. When Ray finds out, they say they are just fixing it up for a friend, called...
  Otto: Larry.
  Reggie: Phillip.
  [beat]
  Otto: Phillip.
  Reggie: Larry.
  [beat]
  Sam: Larry Phillip.
• Surfer Dude: Most of the guys, especially the "soul surfers" from the episode "To Be, Otto Not to Be."
• Swapped Roles: Trying to prove which of their chosen sports requires more talent, Reggie Rocket and Cleo swap events at Winter Fest, with Reggie ice dancing and Cleo playing on her ice hockey team. Subverted in the fact that they're both good and not only win their respective events but impressed the other.
• Tan Lines: The "shoobies" and Sam, even though his body should have evened out as the show went on.
• That Poor Cat: Played straight in "Happy Luau to You-Au," when confronting the accordion band, Tito takes one of the member's accordions and tosses it out a window, to which we hear it crash off-screen followed by a cat yowling.
• That Syncing Feeling: In "Beach Boyz & A Girl", the gang forms a band called "No Worries" but later find out they sound awful. Sam remixes their recorded audio to make them sound better, and they become a hit. They're later asked to perform live at the Ocean Shores Music Festival, to which Otto foolishly agrees to do so, but since their music isn't genuine, they resort to lip-syncing ("Rock stars do it all the time," Otto says). Inevitably, their cover is blown, they get laughed and booed off stage, and they decide to end the band.
• Themed Party: In "Typhoid Sam", Tito is planning a luau party, but his friend Raymundo tries to remind him of the last time he did a theme party, we get a flashback of a failed toga party and Raymundo reminds him of the time he did a disco party, we get a flashback of a failed disco party and Tito ask Raymundo to stop before he reminds him of another party.
• Time to Move: In "Shack Attack", Ray Rocket attempts to sell his diner in order to move to "Shoobietown" (that's what his kids are calling it, and they don't like the idea).
• Toilet Paper Prank: The boys are trying to do this in the episode on Mischief night, only they never get to do it. Instead, Officer Shirley catches Reggie and thinks she did it. They're forced to wear matching pumpkin Halloween costumes in public the next day as Cool and Unusual Punishment for it.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: Reggie and Clio.
• Tomboyish Name: Reggie, which is normally short for the masculine name Reginald but in this case is a nickname for Regina.
• Too Dumb to Live: In the movie “Island of the Menehune,” both Otto and Reggie decide to surf on the Banzai Pipeline after Raymundo forbid them from doing so (due to their late mother dying by surfing there). The two (& Raymundo) would have been killed had Twister and Noelani didn’t rescue them.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Reggie upon meeting Missy Giove and adopting her new persona as "Reggie the Rocket."
• Totally Radical: Done very frequently, to match their sport-loving personality. After a few seasons they stopped cutting away to a tie-dye screen with squiggly words repeating the '90s slang they shout. That is they stopped doing it as much.
• True Companions: The four main characters, despite the hard times and arguing, they still remain good friends.
• Two Words: I Can't Count: Used and lampshaded in "Mr. B is in the House"...
  Twister: Two words: Our new teacher is Conroy, baby!
  Sam: That's six words, Twist.
  Twister: So?
• Typhoid Mary: Sam is one in the episode "Typhoid Sam". He gets sick, but after throwing up, he almost instantly recovers as he built up an immunity to it. The rest of the episode shows the playoffs being subsequently ruined by everyone else getting sick.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Josh Grody is not met with open arms by the Rocket gang, but Sam is sympathetic to him and tries to make him feel welcome. Josh repays Sam by picking on him and trying to replace him in the group.
• Unreliable Narrator: Ray in some of his flashbacks is actually exaggerating for the sake of getting his point across. Tito might have done the same, too, since he apparently stepped on a piece of lava and survived.
• Unresolved Sexual Tension: Ray and Officer Shirley.
• Unsettling Gender-Reveal: In "A Shot in the Park," the kids go on a log flume ride, and Sam's penguin poncho flies off and into the face of a person with long blonde hair behind them. When Otto mentions the poncho flying into the "lady" behind them, the person removes the poncho to reveal he's a Barbarian Longhair man with a blond goatee.
• Unusual Euphemism: The main cast has an entire vocabulary of slang terms, including "shoobie" (referring to tourists who wear socks with their flip-flops, or shoes on the beach), "squid" (slang for new guy; Sam is called this almost universally in the first few episodes), and lots of generic skater slang.
• Very Special Episode: "Radical New Equipment" shows Reggie and the guys seeing a snowboarding and skiing class for people with special needs. Reggie is most intrigued with Lizzie, who has a metal leg, and she makes a big deal out of it to the point where she deliberately wipes out in a snowboarding race to let her win, to Lizzie's chagrin. This episode teaches not to judge people who are physically impaired and to treat them in respect.
• Verbal Tic: Tito always begins his "proverbs" by saying, "As the ancient Hawaiians used to say," or some slight variation thereof.
• Victory by Technicality: This is how Mackenzie pulls off a Dark Horse Victory in "The Great Sandcastle Race": while everyone else's sand structures are clearly better than hers, she's the only person who actually builds a sandcastle in a sandcastle-building competition and thus wins by default.
• Visit by Divorced Dad: Sam's father Doug comes to visit him in one episode. Unfortunately, Doug happens to be a workaholic and is often on his cellphone or laptop.
• Vomit Discretion Shot: Done with Sam, Otto, and Lars in "Typhoid Sam" as they come down with the Fiji Flu.
• We Are Not Going Through That Again: In "Snow Day", Sam tells his friends about Snow Day, prompting Otto to decide to have one so he can avoid an assembly. In the end, Sam asks if he told Otto about rainy days and Otto reacts by closing his eyes and saying he's not listening.
• Wet Cement Gag: Twister falls over head first into the wet cement of a ramp Conroy was working on after attempting to put his initials on it. This stirs up trouble as upon discovering the mess, Conroy closes Madtown until he finds the person responsible for ruining his newly made ramp.
• We Win, Because You Didn't: An episode has Team Rocket place in a sandcastle competition with an impressive replica of the local amusement park, but they ultimately lose to a little girl with a dinky little castle—since she's the only competitor who actually built a sandcastle. However, since their reason for entering in the first place is to deny Insufferable Genius Oliver van Rossum a victory in the competition, their attitude on the outcome is, "At least somebody beat those nerds.", and they still got second place, one rank higher than Oliver did.
• What Could Possibly Go Wrong?: In "Down the Drain", Sam asks what could go wrong when he's about to drain the Stimpletons' pool so he and his friends could skateboard there. Instead of sending the water down the drain, he flooded the Rockets' basement.
• Who Needs Overtime?: Inverted in "Power Play". It's a roller hockey match. Score, 3-4, Rockets down, with NHL pros game on the line. 12 seconds left. Otto takes the puck from Sam with 3 seconds to go and shoots from afar, planning to tie to start overtime, but the goal is waived. Big Downer Ending, folks.
• You Need a Breath Mint:
  • In the episode "Outta My Pit!", Lars orders the gang to leave their new hangout so he and his friends can takeover it. As he's challenging them, Otto tells Lars, "First, I suggest you brush your teeth". This is followed by Lars checking his breath and his friends recoling from the smell.
  • "The Good Housekeeping Seal", when Twister gave a seal he and his gang name Bruce his breakfast burrito before taking off, Bruce burps it hard disgusting him.