Strawberry Shortcake/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


The franchise in general

  • Ear Worm - The songs!
  • Germans Love David Hasselhoff - It had and has a strong following in Mexico among both first-generation fans and girls who watch the remake, where it is called "Rosita Fresita". It may have even contributed to the slang "fresa" [strawberry] being synonymous with posh and over cute, or "Valley Girl.". It also has a berry, berry strong following in South East Asia, particularly in India, Malaysia, Singapore and The Philippines.
  • Periphery Demographic - It's not just kids who watch the TV series and specials, and collect the toys. However, special mention go out to the early episodes of the 2003 continuity for not only attracting the adult collectors but educational programming connoisseurs as well.
  • Moe
  • Tastes Like Diabetes - One could say the 2003 reincarnation, up until the reintroduction of villains, was this. As is the 2009 franchise.
  • Viewer Gender Confusion
    • Coupled with Does This Remind You of Anything? for Plum Puddin' in the '80s. Plum is a boy in the first episodes. Plum is missing in the middle episodes. Plum returns to Strawberryland as a girl for the final episodes.
    • Also in the '80s, Souffle the Skunk is called by both male and female pronouns. Souffle's voice actress often played male characters, to further the confusion.
    • In the 2003 remake, possibly as a homage to the '80s Plum, Plum Puddin' is assigned to a horse who is referred to by male and female pronouns.

The 1980s series

  • Awesome Music - The World of Strawberry Shortcake, Strawberry Shortcake in Big Apple City and Strawberry Shortcake: Pets on Parade feature music by Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman. You might know them better as Flo (Volman) and Eddie (Kaylan), of The Turtles, The Mothers Of Invention and Down and Dirty Duck fame.
  • Genius Bonus - The Purple Pieman's competing recipe in the Big Apple City bake-off is one for "kohlrabi cookies" -- kohlrabi is a variety of cabbage. No wonder the results are bad!
  • Paranoia Fuel and Adult Fear: The first special will get children to think twice when strangers come up to them and try to sell them anything. Not that it's a bad thing of course.
  • Recycled Premise - Strawberry's toy company Kenner swapped out fruit/food for flowers to create the characters and setting of the similar (and scented) toy line Rose-Petal Place in 1984, which spun off two animated specials.

The 2003 series

  • Awesome Music - To the point that there are soundtrack releases.
  • Ensemble Darkhorse - Peppermint Fizz and Sour Grapes.
  • Goddamned Bats
    • Actually played straight without being a video game, although there is a video game based off the film that the goddamned bats were in. Feel free to mention if the bats were also in the game, as this troper has no clue.
    • Yes, there were bats in the game. And you can turn them into butterflies using the magic wand.
  • Harsher in Hindsight
    • In Legend of the Lost Treasure, the Sea Beast makes a Heel Face Turn and narrowly escapes death. The adventure ends with a song about treasuring friends. A few months after said episode was made, the character's voice actress died. (The Sweet Dreams Movie was dedicated with love to Pam Carter's memory, as mentioned in the closing credits.)
    • The death of James Street ventures into this territory. His character, Huckleberry Pie, often used a skateboard to get around Strawberryland. Riding without a helmet, Street was in a fatal skateboarding crash. (Daniel Canfield voiced Huck for the remaining seasons.)

The 2009 series

  • Mondegreen - Happened to some during the Berrykins' song in "Sky's the Limit!". The fast, pitch shifted voices singing sounded incoherent to some viewers, and resulted in strange lines like "Do we have a very nice butt?". It didn't help that the closed captioning was flashing by at too fast a rate to be comprehensible without pausing, either.
  • The Scrappy: Kadie and Sadie Bug
  • Purity Sue: Strawberry Shortcake has been flanderized into this. She's more of a "I told you so" lecture than an actual character.
  • Uncanny Valley: The Berrykins
    • Mr. Longface