Danny Phantom/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Anvilicious: Many episodes have aesops. Many of these hit you over the head with them.
  • Badass Decay: Skulker at first was the most dangerous enemy Danny encountered, but in his following appearances, he became less and less a serious threat, only showing competence one or two times during his encounters with Danny.
    • Vlad also suffered from this. In the beginning, he was shown to be the most powerful enemy Danny had, being able to easily defeat Danny with one hand behind his back. However, such success diminished overtime when he encountered the likes of Pariah Dark and Vortex. Even a few times, Danny was able to beat him.
      • These decays could be somewhat justified. In Skulker's case, Danny's power grew over each of his encounters with him and as he said himself, Skulker relied mostly on his suit. As for Vlad, well, there's always a bigger fish.
  • Base Breaker: Sam Manson. She is a polarizing figure due to being bossy and hypocritical at the eyes of many fans, usually as a mean to push her agenda; temporarily forcing her Ultra-Recyclo Vegetarian diet on the entirety of Casper High or protesting a beauty contest, and criticizing Danny's power abuse, but supportive when she wanted to scare people away from buying environmentally threatening trucks. However, her fans worship her and romanticize her (eventually canonical) relationship with Danny.
    • Jack Fenton. Some see him as a Bumbling Dad who is genuinely funny and with some awesome moments. Others see him as an incredibly irresponsible, racist, violent would-be Mad Scientist with a skewd sense of morality, whose carelessness had caused the entire plot.
    • In some extent, Danielle "Dani" Phantom. Part of the fans think she is a Canon Copy Cat Sue with no interesting personnality, other thinks she is an interesting character with underexploited potential.
  • Non Sequitur Scene: The random iguana-ghost attack during the beginning of "King Tuck". It's never mentioned again for the rest of the episode.
    • That might have been used to represent how no one listens to Tucker.
  • Canon Fodder: Lots, the most famous being Dark Danny's ultimate fate.
  • Complete Monster: Dan Phantom. Think Vlad is evil? Just take a glimpse of how Dark Danny was created, and then you'll see who the true monster is.
    • It's very telling that Dan is the only character to have explicitly killed anyone in this show.
  • Draco in Leather Pants: Vlad is the second most paired off character in the series. The fact that he has plotted and would commit murder, was responsible for many people getting hurt in attacks and Dark Danny in one timeline doesn't matter much to most of his fangirls. They see (as the entry puts it) a "...suave, handsome, charismatic, obscenely rich, relatively competent, with an alternate form heavily resembling a vampire and superficially sympathetic motives (he wants to make his old love interest his wife and his arch-nemesis his son): a perfect object for fangirl lust..."
    • Vlad is a borderline deconstruction; When Danny goes back in time to reverse the accident that caused him to become a ghost, he's villainous regardless.
    • Dark Danny also has his fans. Most notable thing about him is his voice and body, but most fans tend to forget he's a mass murdering psychopath that would as just as soon do this to them as kiss them... if they're lucky. Remember he is a sadist.
    • According to fans, the Ghost Writer is one Hot Librarian. Somewhat averted in that he wasn't evil, just overzealous in trying to teach Danny a lesson.
  • Ear Worm: You will remember my naaaame.
  • Ensemble Darkhorse: Clockwork. For a character only appearing in two episodes, he has amassed quite a following.
    • Same for Ghost Writer, especially with the fangirls. One episode and there are SWARMS of fanart of him everywhere. Don't even get me started on Dark Danny.
      • The fanboy equivalent would be Ember. Gothy, leatherclad and clearly desperately lonely—not to mention having a very ambiguous backstory.
    • And Desiree as well. Although a bitch, it's sort of justified in that her sultan's lover was an ass (so of course we feel sad for her)--plus, have you seen that body?...even though it's in 2D?
  • Evil Is Sexy: Vlad Masters, adorned in a black suit. Also, Sam during her temporary evil in "Urban Jungle".
    • Also Dark Danny, whose voice acting was so brilliant it stands out in fandom. It even gained him fangirls. Also, that muscular body is a very large improvement for someone who did it in just ten years.
    • Spectra. At least until the end, anyway.
    • Desiree
    • Ember
    • Freakshow's Not Brainwashed minion, Lydia.
    • Ghost Writer.
  • Fan Dumb: Oh, so much: The ongoing True fan/Anti-fan wars, The people who act as though Danny's a real person and get annoyed with the way he's treated in fanfiction -particularly Vlad/Danny slash, which admittedly is pedophilia, the general air of Serious Business....need I go on?
  • Fanon: A lot of people believe that Paulina's last name is "Sanchez". This is never mentioned anywhere in canon. Also many believe that "James" is Danny's middle name. Also, a number are divided on if Vlad can sense ghosts or not.
    • Not to mention many fans under assumption that Ember's song indicates a bad romance that tragically took her life.
    • Though a picture exists, Vlad being a smoker has spread like plague-probably because it suits his character.
    • On a similar vein, a lot of slash-friendly fans have Vlad and Jack Mistaken for Gay in college or hint that the Backwash Incident involved slash.
    • Most Danny/Sam shippers believe Danny's affectionate nickname for Sam is "Sammykins". The only time it was ever used in canon was by her mother when waking Sam up.
  • Growing the Beard: Though Season One had its continuity and Story Arc, Season Two upped the ante with deeper, darker plots and more Character Development.
  • Jerkass Woobie: Valerie and Vlad.
  • Magnificent Bastard: Vlad.
    • Walker also achieved this by orchestrating the public reveal of Danny Phantom.
    • By the end of the show, Valerie shows she has chops as this too.
  • Moment of Awesome: Jack gets a totally awesome one in the finale.

Jack: An old friend? No. You? Yes. *Turns his back and leaves*

    • Danny getting his powers back in "Phantom Planet".

Danny: *To other ghosts* The good news is, my powers are back. The bad news is, my powers are back! (KO's everybody with the Ghostly Wail)

    • Jack gets another one in "The Million Dollar Ghost" where he single-handedly thrashes Vlad.

Vlad: This can't be! You're an idiot! An idiot!
Jack: That may be, but I'm the idiot who beat you.

  • Motive Decay: Vlad's initial, intriguing motive to turn Danny into his son and apprentice, putting him on par with Slade from Teen Titans, disintegrated without explanation by Season 3, leaving him nothing your average, run-of-the-mill Villain with Good Publicity.
  • Nightmare Fuel: Dark Danny just before he kills his human half in "The Ultimate Enemy". Actually, the whole episode will suffice. Spectra and Bertrand also qualify.
    • This is Nocturn's whole schtick.
    • Dannielle's entire body melting and Danny collapsing next to the pool of her remains saying he was too late.
    • The very fact that a ghost dog appears in an episode where a character says they "got rid of the guard dogs." Wonder how they got rid of 'em. Poor dogs. This isn't helped by a shot of apparently abandoned dog houses.
  • Periphery Demographic: "Boy's Action Show"—ya right, Hartman. The fangirls of mostly the teenage and college age variety eat this show up.
  • The Scrappy: Some fans attribute this to Danielle.
  • Seasonal Rot: Despite the introductions of new friends and foes, the development of new powers, and the return of some fan favorite characters, many felt the third season went through a bit of this due to changing of executives and the very bad writing plots of many episodes ("Urban Jungle" is one of the most prominent examples).
  • Sending Stuff to Save the Show: Five rallies from DP Fans have been held for three years in various official Nickelodeon/Viacom areas to get the show back for another season. No dice.
    • Don't forget all the "Save Danny Phantom" fanart people drew and sent in to the studios!
  • Shipping: And how!
    • Fan-Preferred Couple: Danny/Valerie, Danny/Vlad, Danny/Dan, Sam/Tucker, Tucker/Valerie, Sam/Dan, Sam/Kwan, Sam/Dash, Danny/Tucker/Sam, Maddie/Vlad, Danny/Paulina - the list goes on and on and on and on...
      • That's not to say Danny/Sam isn't popular. In fact, at least a quarter of the fandom ships them.
    • Foe Yay Shipping: Plenty of Vlad/Danny for all!
    • Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Seriously, the fans pair Danny up with everyone...and everything. Many of these pairings have nicknames, such as Pitch Pearl.
    • Mind Game Ship: Ala Teen Titans. Some Shippers just took it and ran with it.
    • Ship-to-Ship Combat: The infamous "True-Fan VS Anti-Fan" wars which basically boiled down to "Canon" (Danny/Sam) VS "Fanon" (Danny/Anyone Else) and/or "Heterosexual Pairings" (IE: Danny/Sam, Danny/Valerie) VS "Slash" (Danny/Vlad, Danny/Dash, and even Danny/Himself *Don't ask*).
      • What is even more disturbing, one has multiple options for the last one.
    • Ships That Pass in the Night: The Dani/Youngblood ship, despite the two never having interactions, or even appearing in the same episode.
  • Squick: In-universe. Danny was quite disgusted that two of his enemies had a child.
  • Too Good to Last: Debatable. Some were happy to see the third season end before it got worse.
  • Tear Jerker: Seeing Danny in the alternate future. It's no wonder he wanted to get rid of his emotions.
    • For some, the perfect clone of Danny dissolving and Vlad's subsequent Big No could be interpreted as a tear jerker. Even Danny and Dani look a little upset.
  • Villain Decay: Vlad during the first two seasons was a Magnificent Bastard and a very competent arch-foe with an often sympathetic side. But in the third season, he became a shallow crook with little redeeming qualities; his final plan was to force the world to let him save it from a giant meteor in exchange for world domination (an agenda that was poorly conceived) and 500 billion dollars...as if he wasn't already filthy stinking RICH!
    • Though to some degree it was justified. He underwent a Villainous Breakdown after his perfect clone was destroyed and he didn't want Danny as his son any more. So thus he was more interested in making Danny's life a living heck than his original motive.
    • It was also lampshaded, on one of his first season 3 appearances he actually said "Sorry, the fun wise-cracking Vlad isn't here right now." It should also be noted that his absolute competence and power didn't really change, so much as that Danny became more competent and powerful.
    • The Fright Knight suffered from a mild case of this. In his first episode, he's the most powerful and terrifying villain Danny had ever faced; in later episodes, he's always relegated to the role of The Dragon. He's still just as powerful as he always was, but seems weaker in comparison to Pariah Dark (and later Dark Danny).
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