History Series / Roseanne

* {{Revival}}: The fact that the original show ended on a definitive (if controversial) note and the lengthy intervening period (two decades) suggests a revival, but the way the show is being promoted is more akin to UnCanceled. ABC is using the tagline "Same cast. New episodes." and the new season is being billed as the tenth season as opposed to the first season of a new series. As yet it's unclear what repercussions this has for syndication. (For example, Wiki/TheOtherWiki regards the new ''Roseanne'' as a continuation, but Website/IMDb treats the two incarnations as separate entities.)

* CoolOldLady: Nana Mary

** One neighbouring family, the Tildens, introduced a few seasons into the series got tons of episodes and development, including one daughter pursuing main character David and her overweight wallflower sister catching Roseanne's attention as somebody who needed support and guidance. The Conners even all traveled to California with them in an RV at one point. Unlike their previous sets of neighbours, who'd had proper send-offs, they eventually just stopped appearing.

-->Roseanne (to Dan): Oh, look honey, our kids are necking.

* SurrealHumor: The show dabbled in quite a bit, mostly in the tags; examples include DJ being stuck in a time loop where Becky and Mark keep walking past him, the customers at the diner doing a sudden coordinated dance around Roseanne, and Roseanne blowing up the house as a Halloween prank. The final season cranked the surrealism UpToEleven, with Roseanne fighting terrorists and an upscale party becoming a spoof of ''Film/RosemarysBaby''. YMMV on the "humor" part.

* DramaticIrony: First, Dan got killed off at the end of the original series run. This was undone because it wasn't something fans liked and it prevented the proper return of the show. Then, Roseanne had to be killed off to continue the franchise. Both Conner parents have now been killed off for reasons that mirror each other.

* BirthDeathJuxtaposition: Dan dies of a heart attack on Darlene's wedding day. While she's pregnant no less.

* NotImportantToThisEpisodeCamp: So far, we haven't seen much of Mary at all or of Mark outside of his spotlight episode.
** Also Jerry to the whole show, mostly likely because, being a baby in the older seasons, he didn't really have an established personality.

* AbsenteeActor: Michael Fishman (D.J.) does not show up in the episode "Darlene v. David", even though D.J.'s daughter Mary appears and the episode revolves around his niece Harris' birthday.

* SomethingCompletelyDifferent: The episode "The Fifties Show", which transports the characters into a parody of 1950s {{Dom Com}}s.

* GenderBlenderName: Darlene names her and David's daughter Harris Conner - Healy.
* TheGloriousWarOfSisterlyRivalry: Becky and Darlene. Roseanne and Jackie have shades of this too.
** Mark and David also serve as a male example of this trope, Mark being the womanizing bad boy and David being the sensitive artist.
* GlurgeAddict: Played surprisingly sympathetic with Crystal.
* GracefulLoser: In "Wait 'Til Your Father Gets Home," Roseanne and Jackie's father Al dies, and his second wife--who was originally his mistress--comes to the funeral parlor. When she runs Bev, the older woman wastes no time in releasing a ''nasty'' TheReasonYouSuckSpeech to her...but also offers to sell her the cemetery plot she's had reserved beside Al's for decades, respecting the other woman's status as Al's new wife. "You love him so much, ''you'' spend eternity next to him!"

** It could be coincidental or HilariousInHindsight but "Good Girls Bad Girls" alludes to Danielle Harris' work in the ''Franchise/{{Halloween}}'' franchise. She's flirting with two guys, and she asks Darlene "Which one do you want?" Darlene replies "Whichever one [[StuffedInTheFridge will kill you and stuff you in the trunk."]]

-->'''Roseanne:''' People like us, the poor people, and the people like us regular people are paying more taxes than the rich people because they got all these lawyers who find loopholes, I want loopholes. I mean, we're paying you guys our money anyway, and then you mishandle it worse than any of us ever could. And the government is like 3 trillion dollars in debt, I think I heard that on "[[Creator/PhilDonahue Donahue]]." Can you imagine 3 trillion dollars in debt? That's like you make what $15,000 a year and then charge up your Master Charge [[spoiler:the former name of MasterCard]] $50,000, and then you pay $5,000 monthly interest. It's insane! The whole thing is insane! You know, people like us, we should get smart and audit THEM!

-->'''Roseanne:''' People like us, the poor people, and the people like us regular people are paying more taxes than the rich people because they got all these lawyers who find loopholes, I want loopholes. I mean, we're paying you guys our money anyway, and then you mishandle it worse than any of us ever could. And the government is like 3 trillion dollars in debt, I think I heard that on "Donahue." Can you imagine 3 trillion dollars in debt? That's like you make what $15,000 a year and then charge up your Master Charge [[spoiler:the former name of MasterCard]] $50,000, and then you pay $5,000 monthly interest. It's insane! The whole thing is insane! You know, people like us, we should get smart and audit THEM!

** Becky and Darlene seem to have this too. Becky's is more lighthearted--her [[AllGirlsWantBadBoys love of bad boys]] seems to be her taking after her mother. Darlene's was initially PlayedForLaughs--she had verbally abusive streak towards men which lasted quite awhile--but [[RealityEnsues reality kicked in]] when David broke up with her, and her follow-up boyfriend did the same left her specifically because she treated him like crap. Fortunately, Darlene gets better after she realizes what she's doing and that she really did love David and wanted to make it work between them (she's still snarky thereafter, but also tries to be more compassionate).

* RealityEnsues: Becky tries to pass herself off as 33 instead of 43 in order to have Andrea's baby. After visiting the doctor, she finds out that [[spoiler: her eggs are too old to be from a 33-year-old, and she is not a suitable surrogate]].

* NotSoDifferent: Roseanne and her new Muslim neighbors in "Go Cubs". After thinking that they were dangerous due to the excessive amount of fertilizer in their yard,[[note]]Roseanne thought it was being used to make a bomb, but it turns out the husband added too much to his online shopping cart[[/note]] Roseanne carries a baseball bat with her when she needs to ask them a favor. The neighbors answer the door carrying a bat themselves, and also mention that they themselves were afraid due to harassment (to the point that their son needs to wear a bulletproof vest in order to feel safe).

** In the eighth season finale, they have the same argument following Dan's heart attack after Roseanne refuses to cook the unhealthy foods Dan likes. The only difference is now Roseanne says "''eleven'' years ago."
*** Except it isn't true. At least once we've seen Dan cooking a meal, making chili, imitating Julia Child.

* CharacterDevelopment: Quite a bit, but Mark is a particularly notable example, going from your standard bad boy rebel to a goofy dork with rough edges.

** In "It's No Place Like Home for the Holidays" (season 5, episode 12), we meet Mark and David's little sisters: Lisa Healy (played by Clara Bryant) and Nicki Healy (played by Sarah Freeman). We never see or hear of them ever again, not even when David's subsequently "adopted" by the Conners in "It's a Boy" (season 5, episode 19). Considering the reason David's taken in is because of their mother's [[FridgeHorror physical and psychological abuse]]... Poor Lisa and Nicki's disappearance probably qualifies as WhatHappenedToTheMouse, but not even ''fans'' seem to remember them!
*** They do get mentioned when David tells Darlene his parents are getting divorced; his father takes them with him. Since their scene in the holiday episode is removed in syndication, for many fans this one sentence is the only acknowledgement they even existed.

** A one-time gag at the end of a later episode had her only faking that personality; her "real self" in the gag was a [[TheLadette Ladette]] with a deeper voice who drank beer with Fred. When asked why she didn't act this way all the time, she said, "Well that wouldn't be much fun now, would it?"

* RetCon: Of the {{Rewrite}} variety. The ninth season (in which the Conners win the lottery) was unsurprisingly retconned, but so was Roseanne's "explanation" in the series finale: Dan is still alive, Jackie is not a lesbian, Becky still married Mark and Darlene still married David. It's implied in the first episode that she wrote a story about Dan dying, though. One thing that was apparently not retconned from the original finale, however, was Roseanne's mother Bev actually being straight rather then a lesbian: in one episode, she introduces Roseanne and Jackie to her boyfriend Lou (played by {{Creator/ChristopherLloyd}}).