The school has low budget for school supplies, so Ms. Li signs a contract with Ultra Cola to allow advertisement inside the school. The only one who is aware of the real problem is Daria.
Tropes present in this episode:
- Adults Are Useless: Daria is the only one protesting the Ultra Cola product placement, while others are either keeping quiet because of the endorsement, and Ms. Li is getting more frenetic about it.
- Armor-Piercing Response: Daria tries to persuade Jodie to do something about the Ultra Cola signs, and receives a brutal combination:Jodie: Daria, if you don't like it, you complain.
Daria: I don't complain.
Jodie: That's all you ever do.
Daria: I mean, I don't get involved.
Jodie: Then I guess you don't really care that much, do you? - Ax-Crazy: Literally in Ms. Li's case, when her caffeine fueled breakdown escalates to grabbing a fire ax and smashing open the vending machines so the students can get soda.Ms. Li: Must drink soda! Soda from machines! Everybody gather around the pretty machines!
- Bittersweet Ending: Daria and Jane review the aftermath of the whole situations. As pros, the machines in the hallways were removed along with the uniforms and posters, and since Ms. Li freaked out and drew more attention, nobody traced back the report to Daria. On the flipside, the machines in the cafeteria, the logos in the newspaper and the tickets are still there, along with giant logos in the roofs, and Ms. Li still was released from the hospital.
- Cassandra Truth: Nobody took Daria seriously over the Ultra Cola issue until it went out of control.
- Comically Missing the Point: To try to discredit Daria, everyone kept asking if she drinks soda.
- Didn't Think This Through: Ms. Li causes far more problems than she solves by signing the contract with Ultra Cola, finding out too late she had to ensure the school met a sales quota on how much soda the students bought. When she tried to bribe the football team into drinking enough soda in exchange for raising their grade point average, she failed to realize they had to buy the soda from the vending machines and should've waited until after the next game for them to do it as all that soda made them too sick to play.
- Dumb Jock: The entire team (except Mack) has grades below 5, so Ms. Li offers extra credit by drinking more soda. Mack immediately points out that the fact alone that he is the only one who can count by halves is terribly sad for the education quality.
- Everyone Has Standards:
- During her meeting with the superintendent, Daria explains that she doesn't care about what the school does or partake in any social activities herself, but even she can't stand the idea that the student body is being treated as a demographic target.
- Daria and Jane's silent shock at what the inside of the school's been turned into indicates they had some willingness to think Ms. Li wouldn't go that far.
- Ms. Barch and Mr. DeMartino are both disgusted by the "learning aids" foisted on them by the Ultra Cola company. DeMartino ends up destroying his (a giant Ultra Cola can made to resemble a globe) in a fit of outrage.
- Extremely Short Timespan: As we see Jane and Daria go the school review meeting, the school bulletin board lists the meeting itself starting around 6pm... and then lists "Superbowl Kickoff" around 6:04. And when we cut to meeting, Mr. Lamm is ending out his speech before Ms. Li announces about [[brickjoke 3-minutes for open questions]].
- Heroic BSoD: The new supplies from Ultra Cola cause this to some characters.
- Ms. Barch had to give a class using a solar system model made of cans and keep making soda puns during the lectures. She says they could either continue the class this way or she could just end the class and spend the rest of the hour watching the tiles in the teachers' bathroom.
- Daria and Jane could overhear Mr. DeMartino having a rage fit by only looking at a world globe shaped like a can.
- Brittany has a long cry over having to use her new cheerleader uniform: A big can without arm holes.
- Evil Teacher: Ms. Li clearly knows that what she is doing is wrong, as she let's it slip multiple times. She does cross the line when she offered to substitute the entire football team's extra credits for Ultra Cola cans.Mack: Ms. Li. Are you sure you wanna do this?
Ms. Li: Just what are you saying, Mr. Mackenzie? Is unethical? Immoral? In direct conflict with my role as an educator?
Mack: Well yeah. But mostly, I was thinking I'm the only one on the team who can count by halves.
Ms. Li: Note to self. Calculators for football team ASAP. - Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Played for laughs, since considering this is Mr. O'Neill, it's his own version of a Precision F-Strike. The first classroom that showcases the budget cut is in Mr. O'Neill's class, where the photocopies are so blurry, he can't even give the classroom a decent assignment.Mr. O'Neill: I apologize for the quality of this class. The school's photocopier is so very old... Darn budget!
Jane: Mr. O'Neill!
Mr. O'Neill: Sorry! - Hoist by His Own Petard: Trying to raise the consumption of Ultra Cola, Ms. Li offered extra credit to the football team in exchange of chugging 20 cans before the game. As a result, the entire team except Mack got sick and had to forfeit, which violated one of the contract clauses by giving bad image to the brand. And to add insult to injury: the soda that team drank DIDN'T help the sales quota for the school due to being from the cafeteria and NOT the machines.
- Hypocrite: Discussed. When Daria talks about how sleazy the Ultra Cola contract is, Leonard Lamm, Jodie, and Mr. Cartwright all try to deflect her criticisms by asking if she drinks soda, as if to make her seem like a hypocrite for complaining about something she indulges in. Daria gets increasingly frustrated and states whether or not she drinks soda has nothing to do with Ms. Li allowing the students to be taken advantage of by a company.
- Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Ms. Li letting Ultra Cola into the school is a somewhat shady but reasonable way of raising money. However, she quickly turns the school, the lesson plans, and students into marketing commodity in order to meet the Ultra Cola sales quota, going so far as to bribe the football team with extra credit in exchange for them drinking more soda.
- Karma Houdini: Though it's implied he won't be trying this with other schools, Leonard Lamm ultimately gets away with scamming Lawndale High since the advertising remains in the school, just dialed back to a more reasonable degree. Daria herself acknowledges this wasn't much a victory to celebrate since Ultra Cola's still making money off Lawndale.
- Leonine Contract: The "contract" that Mr Lamm brought to Ms. Li made it SEEM simple: Give Ultra Cola exclusive rights to promote WITHIN the school and having MORE soda machines for students to buy from, all in exchange for more funding for the school ... until it turns out that the school NEEDS to meet a sales quota or face penalties, and to do so: they would have to meet VERY specific sales (as listed in the trope below); but even then, it seems like the only way to meet the quota is to have students would need to drink MORE soda than an actually regular WANT for it.
- The Load: Ms. Li is essentially the other reason why Lawndale High doesn't have enough money for school supplies, as she's hoarding the funds they do have to fund her ridiculous security features.Ms. Li: Do you have any idea what satellite jamming equipment costs these days?
- Loophole Abuse: Used twice during the episode.
- Ms. Li scheduled a school review meeting she wanted nobody to attend so the contract with Ultra Cola could be approved. She did it by almost whispering it through the speakers at dismissal and during the Superbowl Sunday. Daria saw through this and decided to attend it to make sure her suspicions were correct.
- The Ultra Cola representative did this by telling Ms. Li that the sales weren't reaching the mark and that all the cans from the cafeteria didn't count as advertisement revenue.
- Manipulative Bastard: Mr. Leonard Lamm in a nutshell. He proposed the contract with Ms. Li that started the whole thing, promising HUGE funding to the school. But then he brings up the shortcomings sales, leading her to push harder in promotion. He even gave her the idea to use soda to curve the students' grades.
- Money Dumb: In this episode, it's finally shown how Ms. Li's bad use of the school budget has caught up with them, and it's affecting negatively the education quality because throughout the whole series, she has been wasting the school budget on bulletproof roofs for the pool, cheap crowdfunding events that ended up costing the school more in collateral damage for the school instead of gaining more money, and so many other useless additions fueled by her own paranoia. The ones having to deal with the bad end of these dumb decisions are the underpaid teachers and the students.
- Noodle Implements: When Ms. Barch asks if Upchuck would prefer to spend science class in "independent study," he shudders at the thought of "the closet."
- Oh, Crap!: Daria and Jane both expected things had escalated at school when they saw the Ultra Cola bus, but not even they were prepared to see the entire inside of the school completely and literally covered in Ultra Cola advertising.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
- Mr. DeMartino is genuinely enraged beyond his usual demeanor because of the Ultra Cola contract, due to a Freeze-Frame Bonus revealing both of his eyes were bulging and bloodshot when he destroyed that can-shaped globe instead of just the one.
- Daria herself, as she cares enough about the issue to actively get involved rather than just snark from the sidelines like usual.
- Overly Narrow Superlative: Ms. Li was named fourth runner-up for Principal of the Year by the tri-county chapter of the Asian-American Women in Education's Caucus.
- Product Placement: The whole episode theme, which ends up spiraling out of control. Lawndale High was a step away from changing its name to "Ultra Cola High".
- First started with some posters and more soda machines.
- The situation went out of control when Ms. Li forced everyone to drink soda, forced teachers to use Ultra Cola branded supplies, give the cheerleaders impractical uniforms, and forced the football team (sans Mack) to drink 20 cans in exchange for extra credit, which made the team forfeit the game.
- After the Superintendent arrives and Daria's point turns out to be correct, the school has to remove most of the advertising inside the school, but all the roofs and printed material still have the Ultra Cola branding.
- Read the Fine Print: Leonard Lamm doesn't tell Ms. Li about the contract stating the school has to meet a sales quota until after she signs it, giving her a vague threat about being taken to court if Lawndale High doesn't sell enough Ultra Cola.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: The superintendent is somewhat dismissive of Daria's claims, but when he sees the damage wrought by the Ultra Cola deal, he does force the school to scale down the advertising.
- Rule of Three: Daria is asked if she drinks soda.
- Sanity Slippage: Ms. Li becomes paranoid about all the cola she drank and the Ultra Cola contract that she ended up breaking the machines to force everyone to drink. Ultimately, she has to be taken to the hospital while still yelling at everyone to keep drinking.
- The Snark Knight: Subverted. This time around Daria has a solid point when trying to warn people about what the Ultra Cola contract really means, but Helen, Jodie, and Tom pointed out in different moments that unless Daria does something about the situation, she will only be seen as a complainer. For the first time, she is forced to take action and seek a solution herself by reporting the situation to the Superintendent.
- Straw Feminist: As always, Ms. Barch gives another of this kind of homework: Locate the constellation of Orion in the sky and write a report on why he needs to carry a weapon to "feel like a Man".
- This Is Gonna Suck: Daria's reaction when she sees the Lawndale bus drive by, completely covered in Ultra Cola slogans.
- Villainous Breakdown: Ms. Li finally snaps from the pressure of appeasing the Ultra Cola company and from a caffeine and sugar-fueled overload. She eventually grabs a fire ax and starts smashing up the vending machines before being taken to the hospital.Ms. Li: Open up you lousy, damn machine! Give up the soda in your bowels! SODA SODA MUST HAVE SODA!!!
