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"Comedy, or at least the kind of comedy I like, are the ones that make you feel a bit uncomfortable and then hit you with a great joke."
Show creator Thurop Van Orman

From the mind of Thurop Van Orman (previously of The Powerpuff Girls and Camp Lazlo) comes The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, a whale of a tale about an adventure-seeking young boy, a washed-up pirate, and a whale.

Flapjack (voiced by Van Orman) is a cheerful yet gullible orphan raised by a motherly whale named Bubbie (Roz Ryan). One day, they rescue a pirate named Captain K'nucklesnote  (Brian Doyle-Murray) who regales Flapjack with tales of a mystical place called Candied Island, which he's spent much of his life searching for. Enamored by this, and much to the chagrin of Bubbie, Flapjack decides to help him on this quest for Candied Island and dreams of being a great adventurer like K'nuckles. Unfortunately, not only is K'nuckles not the adventurer he once was, but the trio doesn't even know where to begin looking for the fabled island, leading them into a series of marvelous mishaps.

And that just barely touches the surface of this Cartoon Network animated series set in the screwed-up port town of Stormalong Harbor. To make a long story short, this show is very, very, very, very, very weird.

The show debuted on June 5, 2008. Towards the end of its run, the show became Screwed by the Network, unlike Chowder, concluding with a short six-episode third season and a series finale that aired completely unadvertised on August 31, 2010 — only people who were following Van Orman on his DeviantArt page were even aware it was airing.

It is virtually impossible to overstate how much of an impact this particular series left on the modern animation industry. Arguably one of the most influential animated series of the 2000s, Flapjack helped forge the careers of such animators as Pendleton Ward, J.G. Quintel and Alex Hirsch throughout its short run, who would later use the experience and skills they gained working with Van Orman to create what would later be known as Adventure Time, Regular Show and Gravity Falls, which in turn would go on to change the entire animation landscape forever.


Who needs Candied Island? It's safer at TV Tropes!

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    Tropes A-M 
  • Abnormal Ammo:
    • One episode featured a guy using a cannon that fired angst-ridden children.
    • Peppermint Larry's Caramel Cannon.
  • Accidental Truth: In "These Boots Were Made for Walking (On Your Face)," K'nuckles tells a pair of thugs searching for Flapjack to search for him in a pile of old diapers as that is one of Flapjack's favorite hiding places, while he sneaks off to talk to Bubbie. However, it turns out Flapjack really was hiding in a pile of diapers and the thugs capture him.
  • Ambiguously Gay: The Real Adventurer. Even though he has a girlfriend/wife, he still has an interest in Flapjack, and wants to adopt him.
  • Ambiguous Time Period: WHEN exactly Flapjack takes place is never clear. It’s implied this series takes place sometime during the 18th or 19th century. Though there are some anachronistic tidbits here or there like Peppermint Larry having a more 1950s wardrobe among other things. Though given the show MAY be set in an Alternate Universe the matter of WHEN it takes place is highly up for debate.
  • And a Diet Coke: In "Who's That Man In The Mirror?" K'nuckles attempts to lose weight by foregoing exercise and drinking nothing but Diet Maple Syrup.
  • "Anger Is Healthy" Aesop: Played for laughs, in Revenge, K'nuckles notices that Flapjack is being extremely docile with the other sailors and is concerned that Flapjack is being taken advantage of. K'nuckles encourages him to show some anger and get revenge on his enemies but it goes wrong because Flapjack keeps helping them by accident. In the end, K'nuckles gets beaten up after Flapjack reveals that he made him clean the boat so well it shows how ugly the other sailors are, which makes Blubbie the whale say that Flapjack is too nice to have any enemies.
  • Anti-Role Model: Captain K'nuckles doesn't always have Flapjack's best interests in mind and is frequently selfish. Flapjack looks up to him anyway, and K'nuckles does view Flapjack as his best (and only) friend.
  • Are You Pondering What I'm Pondering?: Happens in "Low Tidings," although K'nuckles response to the question ("That Scoops Pennington is a hack?") does at least follow logically from what had gone before. Flapjack was actually suggesting that they take the place of the two sick actors in the Low Tide Day pageant.
  • Art Shift:
    • Poseidon went from normal (for this show) animation to live action in the Christmas Episode.
    • The series finale featured a live-action segment with Thurop playing K'nuckles and his daughter as Flapjack. And she. Was. Cute.
  • Authority in Name Only: In "Over the Moon," K'nuckles declares himself to be 'The Moon King' and starts giving orders to the moon.
  • Awesome Moment of Crowning: The concept is parodied in the Moon episode with: "Captain K'nuckles, King. Moon King."
  • Ax-Crazy: The townsfolk of Stormalong Harbor in general can turn into violence without much prompting.
  • Bathroom Breakout: In "Liar, Liar, You for Hire?" Flapjack escapes from Captain Johnny's ship by flushing himself down the toilet, which is inexplicably connected to Stormalong's sewer system.
  • Be Careful What You Wish For: In "Wishing Not So Well," K'nuckles wishes to be left alone and immediately finds himself in a Stormalong that contains no other people. It doesn't work out so well for him.
  • Bedouin Rescue Service: A Liliputian variety appears in "Lost at Land."
  • Benevolent Architecture: When K'nuckles and Flapjack are in a runaway trolley, we cut to Stormalong's resident Gadgeteer Genius, having just completed a ramp-like structure: "I call it R.A.M.P! Radical Ascension-" Then the trolley smashes right through it.
  • Bigger on the Inside:
    • Stormalong Harbor is a bigger community than it looks from the outside. It even has a slum and an upper-class quarter. In any case, it seems unlikely that it really has a population of no more than one hundred, as one of the episodes suggest.
    • Bubbie the whale. You can practically live in their.
  • Big "WHAT?!": One that extends to the The End screen of "S.S. K'nuckles."
    K'nuckles: Eh, I never learned to sail anyways.
    Flapjack: WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!
  • Blown Upward by a Blowhole: Despite spending most of her time at the surface, Bubbie the whale can blow people through her blowhole, although Flapjack and Knuckles don't do this often.
  • Bucket Helmet: One of the urchins in Stormalong wears a saucepan with eyeholes cut in it as a helmet. He also wears an eyepatch over the helmet.
  • Call-Back: At the end of "Rye Ruv Roo," a newspaper is shown with the Colonel elected as mayor. Guess who wins at the end of "Mayor May Not" several episode later?
  • Cannot Tell a Joke: Lolly Poopdeck. In "Day Without Laughter," he attempts to become a comedian, but the punchlines to all his jokes consist of really strained puns based on his own name.
  • Can't Live Without You: Once all of Stormalong was infected by the Plague, K'nuckles goes off to find Flapjack living on Plague Island and tells him that Stormalong couldn't live without him. Flapjack thinks of this as being a Living Emotional Crutch when K'nuckles told him that they couldn't live without him, but then he tells him that they literally can't live without him. Flapjack's blood contained the antidote.
  • Card-Carrying Villain: The "Low Tidings Special" reveals that a considerable number of the Stormalong townsfolk (including Captain K'nuckles) are perfectly aware of their less than morally acceptable and savory character and try to hide to avoid supernatural retribution until the Spoof Aesop becomes also about being proud about their choices in life and band together to fight for their right to be evil.
  • Catchphrase:
    • "Adventure!"
    • "Hmm, yes."
  • Cheerful Child: Flapjack could give Spongebob a run for his money on sheer cheerfulness.
  • Constructed World: The world of Flapjack shows some elements of this, the most notable example being in the episode, "Lost at Land," in which we get to see Flapjack's world from space (making it a Patchwork Map too).
  • Continuity Nod: It's safe to assume that if either of the Inventors show up, there's a continuity nod or two. An example is the Grand Flying Contraption, it was destroyed at the end of "Several Leagues Above the Sea," but in "The Return of Sally Syrup," the Inventor's Brother has been working on a new and improved version.
  • Convection, Schmonvection: In "Off with His Hat," the anthropologist falls into an active volcano, but is fine because she lands on a floating chunk of rock. She then then gets erupted out of the volcano.
  • Cool Ship: Flapjack calls Bubbie, "The fastest ship in the sea" despite, you know, Bubbie being a whale.
  • Crapsack World: Stormalong Harbor is seriously one screwed up place.
  • Crazy Cat Lady: Flapjack accidentally lets all of the cats escape from the home of one in "Who Let the Cats Out of the Old Bag's House?"
  • Crossdressing Voices:
  • Crying Wolf: In "Liar, Liar, You For Hire?" K'nuckles claims to know where Candied Island is. At the end of the episode, he really does see Candied island but no one will believe him.
  • Cute Creature, Creepy Mouth: One episode has a cat that looks fairly normal... until the camera closes in to show that the cat has, among other things, a Lamprey Mouth with needle-like teeth.
  • Department of Redundancy Department: "Have you ever had to make a decision that would decisively decide every decision that you would ever decide?"
  • Depending on the Artist: So often you can tell who storyboarded the episode by style alone. Some examples here.
  • Deranged Animation: The visually deranged imagery of deformed faces, weird creatures and surreal situations is one thing, but the deranged behavior of the characters and the script in particular are deranged on another level alltogether.
  • Disproportionate Retribution:
    Oh, tryin' to be friends, but people are jerks,
    So I'm gonna put some fleas on you
    And the fleas'll have the plague, and they'll make you cough a lot,
    And then you'll be too sick to hurt my feelings anymore.
    • In context
    • "Under the Sea Monster" shows that the community of Stormalong punishes falsely ringing the alarm bell for sea monsters (even if it was by mistake) by removing the perpetrator's hands that rang it, his mouth that uttered it and his tongue for saying it and they are then banished for life in which case it means being catapulted into the ocean with a giant straw in their mouth.
  • Distinguished Gentleman's Pipe: K'nuckles acquires one (along with a top hat) when he becomes Mayor of Stormalong in "Mayor May Not." He doesn't really look the part, even when he dresses the part.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?:
    • Every one of Bubbie and K'nuckles' arguments sound suspiciously Like an Old Married Couple. Then there's the obsession with 'candy', and especially K'nuckles stash of Maple Syrup, which adds a whole new layer to their relationship.
    • Bubbie and K'nuckles' Like an Old Married Couple relationship is really, really played up in "Come Home, Cap'n." Lampshaded by Thomas Hatch during his song, when while pretending to be Flapjack, he calls them a husband and a wife. Cue Capt'n's and Bubbie's hilarious 'wut' faces.
    • The entirety of "K'nuckles and his Hilarious Problem" and his candy addiction. When you get to the point where you have scenes of K'nuckles chugging a bottle of maple syrup, stumbling, slurring, and finally falling down the stairs, they're not even trying to be subtle anymore.
    • Lady Nickelbottom has an enormous "beauty" mark on the top of her head, which, in her conversation with Flapjack (who was standing in for Doctor Barber), is implied to be a tumor that is possibly malignant.
    • K'nuckles' termites in "What's Eatin' Ya Cap'm?"
    • The whole "get foreigners oil" thing.
    • The very literal cathouse, where sailors go to spend time with the cats.
  • Double Entendre: There are a few of these.
    • One of the larger ones was when, after being chased by a barber they thought was trying to kill them, K'nuckles says "Whew! I thought you were going to kill us! Now... do you have anywhere I can swab my poop deck?"
    • Dr. Barber and sweepers: "Oh no he did nooooooooot!"
    • The Character Eight Armed Willy wears an eyepatch, so an alternate nickname for him is One Eyed Willy.
    • After Flapjack states that Bubbie could beat any ship in a race, a sailor says "That whale couldn't beat my legless mermaid!"
  • Dramatic Wind: The Real Adventurer's hair, which flows even inside Bubbie's mouth. It only stops flowing when Flapjack rejects him.
  • Dude Looks Like a Lady: In one episode several people mistake Flapjack for a girl, with one man asking if Flapjack would marry his son because he believed he had a girl's voice.
  • Eat the Evidence: In "Candy Colleague," Flapjack disposes of the eponymous colleague by eating him while Doctor Barber is out of the room.
  • Edible Ammunition: Peppermint Larry's caramel cannon.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Most of the time is K'nuckles who inspires this reaction most often from other not so innocent characters. One example is in his bullying of Candy Wife. Lolly Poopdeck, the military-like Captain and the Bald Pirate laughed while he threw drinks from her hand and slapped her with her face, but when he covered her with pickle juice he was alone in his laughing as the rest were like take it easy, too far dude.
    • And another more oscillating reaction occurred when K'nuckles got beaten up by the three bullying sailors Satch, Patch and Hatch. Most of the witnesses like the angry Captain and the Pirates thought it disgusting given how much of a pushover K'nuckles is. Then again they didn't have a problem with making fun of that pushover when it appeared that he got beaten up by Flapjack. When an angry K'nuckles threw down Flapjack and landed on him to prove that he could at least beat up a kid the enraged patrons kicked him out as they despise people beating up on kids.
    • Another time while a mother was screaming for her baby who was floating in shark-infested waters, a crowd of many of Stormalong's miscreants were watching stupefied while he chose instead to mock her and make some fart jokes. One of the pirates even asked him earnestly
      K'nuckles, what's wrong with you?
  • Even the Guys Want Him: Tee Hee Tummy Tums. He's so beautiful that a crowd of men form around him and throw money at him just to see his face.
    "PLEASE!! Lemme see yo' face!"
  • Eldritch Location: The area of the ocean that lies West of Stormalong, which is said to lead to the edge of the world. Just uttering the word "West" there summons sea monsters, and while the horrifying visions Knuckles and Flapjack have are brought on by drinking sea water, there seems to be something abnormal with the area.
  • Exactly What It Says on the Tin: The Evil Inventor's twin brother's "Grand Flying Contraption" (it even says so in the blueprints) from "20,000 Leagues Above the Sea"
  • Eye Cam: In "Something's A Miss", we see from Flapjack's POV as he is blinking and recovering after his voice-change surgery.
  • Fake Ultimate Hero: Captain K'nuckles
  • Faked Gift Acceptance: Played with in the episode "Bubbie's Tummy Ache". When Flapjack journeys to Bubbie's stomach to find out the cause of her pain, he notices that Bubbie didn't swallow the breakfast he prepared for her some time ago, which she supposedly had eaten. Bubbie admits Flapjack is a terrible cook.
  • Falling-in-Love Montage: Doctor Barber and Candy Colleague get one in "Candy Colleague."
  • Family-Unfriendly Death: In No Syrup For Old Flapjacks a stack of rotting pancakes gains sentience and proceeds to knock out King Hotcakes hard enough to break his neck, and according to Flapjack is now the new ruler of Maple Syrup Island. Yes, this is one screwed up show.
  • Fan Disservice: Multiple occasions. Special mention goes to K'nuckles kissing the Dock Hag's foot.
  • Form-Fitting Wardrobe: Flapjack's pants fit like a skin on a grape.
  • For Science!: Doctor Barber regularly performs surgery for no reason. This surgery could be necessary, dangerous and almost always turns out bad.
  • Friend-or-Idol Decision: A variation. In "Flapjack Goes To Party," he must choose between hiding his true identity and shunning his "family" to win the approval of his peers or admit that he is that "weirdo Flapjack" and forever be an outcast.. .he chooses option B obviously.
  • Gainax Ending:
  • Getting Hot in Here: Flapjack and K'nuckles climb a mountain and assume it's going to be hot at the top because it's closer to the sun, so they do this. Of course, they were wrong about the top of the mountain being hot....
  • Giant Enemy Crab: There is one at the beginning of episode "My Guardian Angel."
  • Giant Medical Syringe: The show features this in the episode "K'nuckles is a Filthy Rat." Said episode has Flapjack adopt a flea-ridden rat and name it after Captain K'nuckles. The fleas eventually infect everyone with the Bubonic Plague. Heartbroken, Flapjack agrees to take the rat to Plague Island at Bubbie's request and after releasing it is told that as he's the only healthy person left, the doctor needs his blood to make an antidote for the plague. Flapjack remarks that it's nice to be needed and maintains a happy disposition even after seeing the doctor holding a needle several times his size.
    Doctor: Don't you mean nice to be needled?
  • Gleeful and Grumpy Pairing: During the episodes where Bubbie isn't involved with the main plot, we’re left with the gleeful adventure seeking Flapjack and grumpy, lazy Jerkass K'nuckles.
  • G-Rated Drug: The show makes more sense when you replace candy with alcohol. Hell, with they way they use it, the candy probably is a symbol for weed/anything that gets you high. That leaves Candy Island to be a very special place.
  • Grossout Show: Probably rivals The Ren & Stimpy Show. Cannabis does accurately represent the effects of candy on K'nuckles and Flapjack.
  • Gross-Up Close-Up: Oh so much. So so so SOOOO MUCH! In fact, this show contains extensive amounts of extremely gratuitous gross-up close-ups, that it makes the likes of The Ren & Stimpy Show and SpongeBob SquarePants looks like Care Bears by comparison at times.
  • Half the Man He Used to Be: Played around very strangely in "Sea Legs" where a giant leaves his bottom half behind temporarily.
  • Hell Is That Noise: Not is the cat with the Nightmare Face terrifying to look at, but it emits an equally chilling sound. "Eeeeerrrrggg..."
  • Here Be Dragons: West is portrayed as this.
  • Heroic Comedic Sociopath: Doctor Barber is usually on the side of Flapjack and K'nuckles, and often helps them. This doesn't mean that he is above performing grotesque experiments or generally being creepy, however.
    "Goods news sir, you got the plague..."
  • Historical In-Joke: In one episode Flapjack and K'nuckles fall prey to a bar with trapdoors in the floor, through which over-candied sailors would be spirited away and enslaved. Anyone familiar with the local lore of Portland, Oregon will recognize the Shanghai Tunnels in this episode; in fact, the only real difference is that in real life they used alcohol (also, more people insist that with the Shanghai Tunnels, it really happened).
  • Holding the Floor: In "Shave and a Haircut and Two Friends" after the barber steals Flapjack's and K'nuckles' map to Candied Island, Bubbie distracts him and his sailors by pretending to be in need of a haircut. It works, and Flapjack and K'nuckles board their ship and take the map, only to be caught by the barber.
  • Hourglass Plot: In "Foot Burn", K'nuckles remembers the first time he rode on the trolley, and met a girl whom he later pushed into the sea to get eaten by a squid. This girl turns out to be the current trolley conductor, whom K'nuckles has insulted several times. At the end of the episode, the woman pushes K'nuckles into the sea to get eaten by a squid.
  • Human Popsicle: This happens when Flapjack and K'nuckles go hiking in the mountains.
  • Hurricane of Puns:
    • An episode with the "Stormalong Harbor Pun-off" consisted of a huge string of these.
    • When K'nuckles and Flapjack had to can fish as part of community service, Flapjack said: "Yes we CAN! It'll be just like shooting fish in CAN! Nice work if you CAN get it. So CAN it, you loose CAN-non!"
    • If you were a treasure chest, you would LIE at the bottom of the ocean! You would LIE in a LIEGHTHOUSE full of LIEONS and LIEMA BEANS!
    • "You think you're RED-y for my rhymes? You'll soon be GREEN as envious limes! I see you're not YELLOW, fellow, but I don't want to make you BLUE, SO GET A CLUE, AND PUR-PULL THE PLUG BEFORE YOU PLAY, OR I'LL OR-RANGE A RAINBOW ON YOUR PARADE!
  • The Hyena: Flapjack.
  • Hypocritical Humor: Bubbie, frequently. She'll give K'nuckles no end of grief for not being a good role model and later she does EXACTLY what she berated K'Nuckles for. Flapjack calls her on it frequently, too.
  • I Lied: K'nuckles says on mutltiple occasions (although he's not always a villain).
  • Idiot Hero: Flapjack himself.
  • Impossible Task: In the episode "Willy," Flapjack bets a man that he can capture Eight Armed Willy or he will never say "adventure" again. Willy has the reputation of killing everybody he meets, so it seems that Flapjack is doomed. Being the main character, Flapjack of course succeeds, with the help of K'nuckles and the Stormalong Writer's Guild.
  • Innocent Inaccurate: A particularly odd case; a plague rat drastically oversimplifies the effects of the plague... possibly because its brain is too small to fully comprehend them.
  • Insane Troll Logic: K'nuckles mind seems to function on a mixture of this and Know-Nothing Know-It-All.
  • In the Style of: Arguably, Tom Waits.
  • I Take Offence to That Last One: Peppermint Larry refuses to extend credit to Flapjack and Cap'n K'nuckles because "Everybody knows you don't have any money!" K'nuckles indignantly replies "Stop lyin'! Not everyone knows that."
  • It Tastes Like Feet: "This candy tastes like horse poop, Cap'n!"
  • It Will Never Catch On: In "Fastest Man Alive," Flapjack and K'nuckles go to the under-sea inventor seeking help in escaping the constable on the bicycle. Flapjack proposes a bicycle with three wheels called a "tricycle," and the inventor proposes methods of transportation he invented that never became popular, such as the "automobile," the "heliocopter" (helicopter), and the "rocket." K'nuckles rejects all of these ideas.
  • Large Ham: Lord Nickelbottoms, both when he behaves authoritatively and expects everyone to follow the etiquette and even more when he shows his slovenly adventurous side.
  • Leitmotif: Whenever the Real Adventurer spoke.
  • Let's Meet the Meat: "No Syrup For Old Flapjacks."
    • In "Careful What You Fish For," K'nuckles and Flapjack catch a fish which they attmpt to eat. the fish begs for its life claiming, amongst other things, that it has a girlfriend
  • Literal-Minded: When Captain K'nuckles is standing in line to register a boat and, after drinking an excessive amount of water, needs to go to the bathroom. He asks the Banker in front of him to hold his spot while he goes to the bathroom. The man cuts a hole in the ground and holds it.
  • Lost Him in a Card Game: Subverted. K'nuckles bets Flapjack in a card game, but actually wins. But still, Flapjack is insulted enough that he leaves to become a banker.
    K'nuckles: "What d'ya got?"
    Player: "Pair of TWOS!!!"
    K'nuckles: (shows hand) "Pair of threes."
    (Player runs off crying)
    • Subverted again (but in another sense played straight), in that K'nuckles win's somebody else's kid sidekick in that card game
  • Love Triangle: It's implied at the end of Lovebugs that K'nuckles may have a thing for Candy Wife. It gets payoff in Candy Cassanova, when K'nuckles runs away with Candy Wife so he can marry her.
  • Lyrical Dissonance: The upbeat, albeit gravelly-voiced "Plague Song"
  • Mad Doctor: Take a guess. Here's a hint: he provides the page quote.
  • Madness Mantra: In "Fastest Man Alive," K'nuckles goes crazy after being constantly arrested by a constable on a bicycle. He curls up in a ball, impersonating the bike's bell: going "Ching. Ching. Ching."
  • Mama Bear: Well, more like a Mama Whale, but still ...
  • Medium Blending: From the start! This is in the opening credits.
  • Mistaken for Pregnant: Happens to K'nuckles a few times in "Who's That Man in the Mirror?", oddly.
  • Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: Doctor Barber is far too obsessed with performing strange surgeries on people.
  • Mushroom Samba: Drinking sea water sends Flapjack and K'nuckles down a trippy hallucination in the episode "How the West Was Fun."
  • My Beloved Smother: Dr. Barber and his mom who lives in his drawer.

    Tropes N-Z 
  • Playing a Tree: In the Low Tides day pageant, a boy plays the tide. He sits down when asked to lower.
  • The Power of Love: It gives Flapjack the power to play billiards perfectly. When playing against Peppermint Larry, Flapjack actually causes every single pool ball to fly straight up through the ceiling and orbit around the moon in a figure eight before falling back down into the pool table holes. IN ONE SHOT. To make the whole scene complete; there's even a Carmina Burana-like chorus playing as the BGM.
  • Prehensile Hair: The fish head and hair monsters made by Dr Barber in "Fish Heads."
  • Pun-Based Title: Almost every single episode.
  • Pungeon Master:
    • They devoted an entire episode for this, and it's pretty much the only reason for stand-up comedian Punsy McHale's existence. He doesn't take it well when he is on the receiving end of some punny put-downs or when people stop finding him funny, but to his credit he genuinely values them so much that he bonds with his ex-rival Peppermint Larry because he is the only one who appreciates them as much.
    • Ropes Pierre, but the only kind of puns he makes are bad ones about ropes. He's "knot" funny.
    • Flapjack himself will do this on occasion, usually to end an episode.
  • Quirky Doctor: Dr. Barber is, as his name implies, a part-time doctor and a part-time barber. Once he stole a map from K'nuckles and Flapjack to get to Candied Island. He lives with his mother and stands around on the docks all day, soliciting potential customers for either of his occupations, and as such he is very unnerving to the citizens of Stormalong Harbor. He has a mysterious creature in his basement to whom he feeds hair to.
  • Raised by Wolves: Flapjack was raised by Bubbie, an intelligent, talking whale, who loves him dearly. Bubbie is kinder, smarter, and more moral than basically every human on the show. And yet she thinks that Stormalong Harbor is a safer place for Flapjack to live than Candied Island — the rationalization being that it's better to live in a stable populated place than risk life and limb to find Candied Island, even if the stable place is Stormalong.
  • Rapid Hair Growth: Brings an episode with a snake oil salesman (it is eel in universe) that sells one of these.
  • Real Dreams are Weirder:
    Skymaid: "Keep wishing, and all your dreams will come true!"
    Flapjack: "Even the scary ones?"
    Skymaid: "Ahahahahahahahahahahaha... YES."
  • Right Behind Me: Happens when K'nuckles is mocking Worthington in "Who's Moochin' Who?"
  • Running Gag: Every time a man is about to tell he flashback, he announces it by saying "Back when I was handsome..." Even if they looked exactly the same back then.
  • Samus Is a Girl:
    • Cammie the ogre, who is voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson. Though she does have a bow...
    • In the episode where Flapjack is confused as a girl, he meets a huge, ugly buff man with a girly voice. But the "guy" turns out to be a woman whose wig keeps falling off.
  • Sassy Black Woman: Bubbie's voice invokes this.
  • Schmuck Bait: Pretty much the entire plot of "Mind the Store, Don't Look in the Drawer."
  • The Scottish Trope:
    • Saying the word "west" tends to summon very weird and eldritch creepies.
    • "French fry? You want french fry?"
  • Screw the Money, I Have Rules!: Tee Hee Tummy Tumms.
  • Series Goal: Flapjack and K'nuckles' goal throughout the series is to find Candied Island. While they finally find the island, they never physically step on it, but Flapjack tastes it by spitting and sucking his spit back up.
  • Serious Business: Shopping for fancy pants.
  • Shark Pool: Captain Johnny has one on board his ship in "Liar, Liar, You For Hire?" However, the shark is really cardboard.
  • She Is Not My Girlfriend: "I don't love women, not men, not anything!" Which isn't entirely true...
  • Shout-Out:
    • The episode "Whale Times" makes reference to the Cartoon Network programming block the series aired on in the United States at the time.
    Flapjack: Bubbie sure knocked him down to size!
    K'nuckles: Har! Har! Tharsday!
    • The intro song contains a couple modified lines from the song "The Big Rock Candy Mountain." The ongoing search for Candied Island could even be a Whole-Plot Reference to the song.
    • A Virtual Boy vibe from that sequence in "How The West Was Fun"?
    • Candied Island was based on a Dairy Queen ad Thourp van Orman used to see a lot as a child. He claims he was always more interested in exploring a world made of candy than he was eating it.
  • Show Some Leg: The entirety of the episode "Sea Legs," albeit giant, green, horrid legs in short shorts.
  • Simpleton Voice: Peppermint Larry, courtesy of Jeff Bennett.
  • Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism: Very cynical for a kids show. The series takes place in a Crapsack World with ugly, deformed Jerkass characters. The only amounts of idealism from this series comes from the naive optimism of the main character.
  • So Beautiful, It's a Curse: A male example. Well it is a curse if the mere sight of this beauty reduces people into drooling idiots who just can't get enough of it and will give anything just for one more chance to look at it. And well when the source of it wishes to be appreciated for the quality of his merchandise instead.
  • Spell My Name With An S: The K in K'nuckles is pronounced.
  • Spiritual Successor: Chad Rucco makes a strangely persuasive case in an April Fools' Day video that the series could be considered an Animated Adaptation of the 1994 Chris Elliot vehicle Cabin Boy.
  • Status Quo Is God: Despite their efforts at adventuring, the duo never quite set foot on Candied Island. They've certainly seen it, but lack any evidence to support their claims. The episode "Over the Moon" had Flapjack and Captain K'Nuckles see and nearly touch Candied Island...but since it wasn't the Grand Finale, the moon's gravitational pull grabbed them back and they were forced to watch the sugar-coated island float off into the distance. At least Flapjack was able to taste it...
  • Stealth Pun: Miss Leading. Say it out loud.
  • Stock Scream / Screaming at Squick: A deep scream is heard whenever a Gross-Up Close-Up occurs.
  • Stylistic Suck: Most of the original songs are sung off-tempo and off-key, with awkward lyrics. The general consensus is that they are awesome.
  • Super Cop: Parodied/deconstructed with the constable who invented the bicycle, which allowed him to easily pursue and capture criminals, in "Fastest Man Alive." He ended up only chasing and arresting Flapjack and K'nuckles, which he did at every opportunity, even when they weren't doing anything wrong, making their lives miserable and becoming the not-so heroic Hero Antagonist for that episode.
  • Take That!: The episode "Panfake" was a poke at a Disney Television Animation series that was being made at the exact same time. The show, which Cartoon Network successfully got Disney to scrap, shared the same premise and character dynamics as Flapjack. The name of said cartoon? Poopdeck.
  • Taking Over the Town: The pirates do this to Stormalong in "100 Percensus." And rely one-hundred and percent on their numbers.
  • Telegraph Gag STOP: Done by Lolly Poopdeck in "Who's Moochin' Who?"
  • That Came Out Wrong: In "Oh, You Animal," Bubbie attempts to explain about her and Flapjack:
    "He doesn't live with me. He lives inside me. (pause) My mouth. He lives inside my mouth. (pause) That sounds weirder than it is."
  • That Liar Lies: You LIED! If you were a treasure chest, you would LIE at the bottom of the ocean! You would LIE in a LIEGHTHOUSE full of LIEONS and LIEMA BEANS!
    • "Boy, that guy sure sounds like a really big liar."
  • Third-Person Person: Cammie hate sardines! And Cammie hate saying Cammie all the time! But, if Cammie didn't say Cammie, then no one will say Cammie.
  • Tickle Torture: In "These Boots were Made for Walking (On Your Face)" the gang searching for K'nuckles kidnap Flapjack and attempt to force him to tell them were Kn'uckles is by tickling him.
  • Toilet Teleportation: In "Liar, Liar, You For Hire?", Flapjack escapes from Captain Johnny's ship by flushing himself down the toilet (which, for some reason, is connected to Stormalong's sewer system).
  • Too Dumb to Live: Very nearly literally true with K'Nuckles when he eats the last remaining fruit in Stormalong Harbor, and an angry, scurvy-induced mob threatens to carve him up to retrieve the fruit. And more than half of the series plots wouldn't have been kicked off if it wasn't for K'nuckles almost uncanny ability to lack higher mental functions.
  • Took a Level in Jerkass: Sally Syrup seems to be acting harsher and more abrasively than in her initial appearance though it may just had been her limited screen-time and role in the first season. Along with the fact that she was frustrated and bored in Stormalong.
  • Tuckerization: Punsy McHale is named after show animator Patrick McHale. Unlike most Tuckerizations this is more of a disservice.
  • Traveling Landmass: Candied Island.
  • True Meaning of Christmas: Subverted in "Low Tidings" — K'Nuckles learns the "better to give than to receive" Aesop...but it's made moot when Poseidon states that everyone can get gifts now, no matter whether they've been good or bad. You know, just like in Real Life.
  • Verbal Tic: Doctor Barber... Hmmm?... Yes?
  • Villainy-Free Villain: The early episode "That's a Wrap" had Peppermint Larry rewarding Flapjack and Knuckles handsomely for bringing him candy wraps. It turns out that somehow those wraps were part of a map that would give away the location of Candied Island. Which of course he didn't tell them. But apart from being rude about it and calling them idiots behind their backs, he didn't really do anything wrong or go back on his deal with them. Unlike Knuckles who cheated Flapjack out of his share and stole from him the last piece.
  • Walk the Plank: In "Liar, Liar, You For Hire?", Captain Johnny makes K'nuckles walk the plank into a cardboard cutout Shark Pool despite having the sea nearby. And all around them.
  • Weird Moon: There was an entire EPISODE that centered around this trope. A weird human-faced, talking, extremely gullible moon.
  • Where the Hell Is Springfield?: The location of Stormalong harbor is never established though in the episode "No Syrup for Old Flapjack" an obnoxious German man is mentioned suggesting that the series takes place in the real world in relation to where that guy was from.
  • Whole-Plot Reference: The Highlandlubber is an extended parody/deconstruction of Highlander, presenting it's Ramirez expy as an escapee from Stormalong's Insane Asylum thinking he's immortal and jumping into a volcano to prove it
  • Wide-Eyed Idealist: Flapjack, of course. Bubbie interestingly enough, plays Women Are Wiser completely straight compared to Knuckles, while being less than accurate in her optimistic opinion of Stormalong Harbor.
  • Wouldn't Hit a Girl: In "Sally Syrup Returns" Sally tries to beat a pirate in a fight by acting helpless and saying "You wouldn't hit a girl, would ya?" but after he backs down and she starts kicking his butt, he grabs her and holds her at arm's length. Flapjack tries the same trick on a different pirate, but it turns out to be a woman and she kicks his butt.
  • Write Who You Know: In-Universe; when Peppermint Larry starts putting on puppet shows, they revolve around "Pancake" and "Captain K'neecaps" and how lame they are.
  • You Mean "Xmas": Low Tides Day. The episode was titled "Low Tidings." Remember "God Rest You Merry Gentlemen"? The end of the episode has the holiday changed significantly to more resemble Christmas... sort of.


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Peeping Bubbie

Flapjack catches Bubbie spying on Peppermint Larry, who is having marital difficulties with Candy Wife.

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