History Radio / Nebulous

* BBCQuarry: referenced:

** Over the course of the series, Harry has stated that he has lost his hands (he initially claimed to retain one but more recently stated that he only has a mechanical grabber), fingers, feelings, toes (all ten, which he now keeps in a jar), both legs, upper lip (although he retains the lower one), chin, mouth, nose, nerves, head (although Nebulous notes that Harry retains ''most'' of his head), brain (replaced with a chip that apparently causes him headaches), back (although he does have a hunch), arse (he mentioned that he has rented one from an unidentified source), spleen, heart, [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs eyeteeth, normal teeth, and eyes]] (with his optical scanners apparently processing the information and presenting it as a pie chart for some reason). The only things he definitely still has are his neck, and an inner ear. That is now an outer ear. On his neck.

* MissingEpisode (in universe) - Parodied in the liner notes for the first series, which claims that there were at least 11 series of ''Nebulous'', but almost all the episodes were lost. Many of the examples given are spoofs of famous ''Series/DoctorWho'' episodes - many of which are themselves missing.

-->'''Nebulous''': These people have had their [[{{Brainwashing}} brains washed]], rinsed, conditioned, and then put through some kind of mangle, then ironed, and folded, and then put in some kind of airing cupboard: an airing cupboard of the mind, I'm drifting.
* MonsterClown: sort of, Nebulous has terrifying (to him) flashbacks about ''being'' a clown.
** Because both his parents were clowns, and being clowns was the family business. He bucked the trend by becoming an underpaid scientist.

* OnceAnEpisode: Every single episode contains an instance of someone saying "clown" to send Nebulous spiralling into a flashback to his traumatic clown childhood, no matter how contrived. On one occasion, Nebulous' boss says "clown", the corrects himself to "crowd"; on another occasion, Nebulous misheard someone saying "cloud"; on yet another another occasion, ''Nebulous himself'' says it and immediately passes out.

** Dr Clench in "The Man Who Polished The Sun" has a RobotMe "mandroid" plant in a maximum security prism. He speaks with an obvious electronic effect on his voice but everyone is fooled by it.

** Over the course of the series, Harry has stated that he has lost his chin, mouth, nose, eyes (with his optical scanners apparently processing the information and presenting it as a pie chart for some reason), hands (he initially claimed to retain one but more recently stated that he only has a mechanical grabber), feelings, toes (all ten, which he now keeps in a jar), both legs, upper lip (although he retains the lower one), heart, fingers, nerves, head (Although Nebulous notes that Harry retains most of his head), brain (replaced with a chip that apparently causes him headaches), back (although he does have a hunch), arse (he mentioned that he has rented one from an unidentified source), spleen, heart, eyeteeth and normal teeth. The only thing he definitely still has is an inner ear. That is now an outer ear. On his neck.

* OnceAnEpisode: Every single episode contains an instance of someone saying "clown" to send Nebulous spiralling into a flashback to his traumatic clown childhood, no matter how contrived. On one occasion, Nebulous' boss says "clown", the corrects himself to "cloud"; on another occasion, Nebulous misheard someone saying "crowd"; on yet another another occasion, ''Nebulous himself'' says it and immediately passes out.

** Over the course of the series, Harry has stated that he has lost his chin, mouth, nose, eyes (with his optical scanners apparently processing the information and presenting it as a pie chart for some reason), hands (he initially claimed to retain one but more recently stated that he only has a mechanical grabber), feelings, toes (all ten, which he now keeps in a jar), both legs, upper lip (although he retains the lower one), heart, fingers, nerves, head (Although Nebulous notes that Harry retains most of his head), brain (replaced with a chip that apparently causes him headaches), back (although he does have a hunch), arse (he mentioned that he has rented one from an unidentified source), spleen, heart, eyeteeth and normal teeth; the only thing he definitely still has is an inner ear that is now an outer ear on his neck.

-->'''Harry''': No! *gack* Please *gack* - kill me!
-->'''Nebulous''': (cheerfully) That's not ''you'' talking, Harry - that's the sheer agony talking!

-->'''Guy''': Excuse me, would you like to sign up for the University Dramatics Society?\
'''Harry''': [[PunctuatedForEmphasis NOOOOOOOOOOOO! THAAAAAAAAAAANK! YOOOOOOOOU!]]

* CasanovaWannabe: Rory claims to be the team's ladies' man. There is absolutely no evidence for this.

* TheCameo: Creator/PeterDavison as Professor Diplodocus. Creator/KateOMara (who played the Rani) as the Lindaviduals. Creator/DavidTennant as MadScientist Dr. Beep.

* TheCameo: Creator/PeterDavison as Professor Diplodocus. Kate O'Mara (who played the Rani) as the Lindaviduals. Creator/DavidTennant as MadScientist Dr. Beep.

* TakeThat!: "I suppose now you've become sentient, you'll want to move out of Edgeware."

-->'''Nebulous(cheerfully) ''': That's not ''you'' talking, Harry - that's the sheer agony talking!

-->'''Nebulous(, cheerfully) ''': That's not ''you'' talking, Harry - that's the sheer agony talking!

* AirVentPassageway - parodied

* BigWordShout - Harry loves these and has probably done just about every sub-trope, too.

* BlackHelicopter - L.O.U.G.H.B.O.R.O.U.G.H. maintain a fleet of them.
* BodyHorror - While it is left ambiguous exactly how much of Harry's original body is left after the original accident, it clearly isn't a pleasant physical appearance for any of the concerned parties.

* BrownNote - the colour "Garrow" causes all who look at it to go crazy.

* CatchPhrase -

* ChasteHero - Nebulous remains oblivious to his assistant Paula's obvious and blatant attraction to him

* CasanovaWannabe - Rory claims to be the team's ladies' man. There is absolutely no evidence for this.
* ChalkOutline - Paula attempts to draw one, makes one of the legs too long, and 'just makes the other one longer to match'.

* CreatorProvincialism - Parodied, when one of the villains claims that there are so many alien invasions of the UK "for tax reasons".

* FlashbackBackBack - Nebulous has frequent flashbacks to his childhood, triggered by variants of the word "Clown".
* ForScience - Nebulous has shown a lack of foresight regarding some of his inventions.

* FunWithAcronyms - K.E.N.T.'s biggest rival is L.O.U.G.H.B.O.R.O.U.G.H. - the Legitimate Organisation Undertaking General Humanitarian Business Operations Requiring Optimum Unconditional Global Harmony. Apparently, people from [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Kent K.E.N.T.]] have always hated people from [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loughborough_University L.O.U.G.H.B.O.R.O.U.G.H.]].

* FutureFoodIsArtificial - parodied, as no-one has any issues with cannibalism, but the idea of eating soya-based Soylent Beige makes people retch in horror.

* IstanbulNotConstantinople - The Withering means that the Empire of Luxembourg is now a superpower, while The Midlands is now an exotic sounding old name for The Withered Zone.
* JustBetweenYouAndMe - Wonderfully parodied in the final episode of Season 1, where Nebulous is held at gunpoint by his arch-nemesis.

* KidsAreCruel - "Nobulous".
* LostTechnology - parodied, since the lost technologies include the vacuum cleaner and fire (although luckily, that one came back pretty quickly).
* MeatVersusVeggies - taken to extremes, parodying the fact that there were more than a couple of ''Series/DoctorWho'' stories [[AuthorTract promoting vegetarianism obsessively]].
* MercyKill - Harry at one point begs Nebulous for this. Nebulous does not provide.

* {{Metaphorgotten}} - a RunningGag is that Professor Nebulous frequently takes metaphors too far until they break:

* MonsterClown - sort of, Nebulous has terrifying (to him) flashbacks about ''being'' a clown.

* MyGreatestFailure - Nebulous blew up the Isle of Wight while trying to move it to the left a bit. It ruined his career, [[spoiler:his subsequent attempt to avert the disaster failed,]] and nobody lets him forget it.
* NoEndorHolocaust - spoofed in "The Deptford Wives" when Nebulous decides to blow up the whole island with a nuclear device, killing Professor Diplodocus to save the world. Paula and Rory dedicate the final scene to casually speculating that the infrastructure of the island meant it must have had at least five hundred innocent employees who were just doing their jobs who surely also must have been killed, to which Nebulous insists that it was only the professor and there ''was minimal loss of life''.
* NoIndoorVoice - Harry is fitted with a voice synthesiser which is constantly too loud, even on its quietest setting.
* ParodyEpisode - many episodes are fairly close parodies of classic sci-fi series.
* PerkyFemaleMinion - The aptly-named Paula Breeze, who takes perkiness to the point of mental illness.
* RoboSpeak - Parodied a couple of times:

* ShoutOut - aplenty:

* SickEpisode - Third series episode "Us and Phlegm". Rory, Paula, Harry and ninety-nine percent of the nation's workforce come down with every serious illness in the world, one after another. Eventually Nebulous discovers that [[spoiler:aliens were behind it.]]

* TheCameo - Creator/PeterDavison as Professor Diplodocus. Kate O'Mara (who played the Rani) as the Lindaviduals. Creator/DavidTennant as MadScientist Dr. Beep.

* FutureImperfect: '' Good Bod, yes''. A lot of knowledge was lost in the Withering: how to make vacuum cleaners & fire ("though thankfully, that last one came back pretty quickly"); people remember great scholars of the past - Da Vinci, Galileo, Barney the Dinosaur; "What exactly ''was'' the Guinness Book of Freckles?"; Paula wishes to meet famous historical figures Napoleon Brandy and Broccoli Spears; and modern theologians believe there to have been four true deities - the evil twins Yin & Yang, Feng Shui the Destroyer, and of course, [[WesternAnimation/{{Bod}} Merciful Bod]].

* FutureImperfect: '' Good Bod, yes''. A lot of knowledge was lost in the Withering: how to make vacuum cleaners & fire ("though thankfully, that last one came back pretty quickly"); people remember great scholars of the past - Da Vinci, Galileo, Barney the Dinosaur; "What exactly ''was'' the Guinness Book of Freckles?"; Paula wishes to meet famous historical figures Napoleon Brandy and Broccoli Spears; and modern theologians believe there to have been four true deities - the evil twins Yin & Yang, Feng Shui the Destroyer, and of course, Merciful Bod.

-->'' 'Nebulous' '' : How ''dare'' you talk to Harry like that?! He may look like an overcooked Christmas pudding in a Bath chair, but he is easily your equal.

-->'''Nebulous: How ''dare'' you talk to Harry like that?! He may look like an overcooked Christmas pudding in a Bath chair, but he is easily your equal.

** The Withering apparently occurred within the characters lifetimes (Rory and Paula mention having both lost their fathers to the Withering), but appears to have caused mass amnesia - Nebulous wonders at what life was like before the Withering, and the knowledge of how to make '' fire'' was temporarily lost.

* ItIsPronouncedTroPAY - Professor Diplodocus. Everyone calls him "Di-PLOD-o-cus." He insists that it's "DI-plo-DOK-us". After this correction, K.E.N.T. struggle to pronounce his name right, Nebulous usually flubbing it slightly whenever he says it and Paula calling him things like "Professor Triceratops".