Is Duckman really as awful and depraved as the show portrays him to be, or does he engage in his hedonistic tendencies to cope with the guilt of accidentally killing his not actually deceased wife?
Cornfed is usually portrayed as the nicest, most reliable character in the show. However the final episode reveals that Cornfed knew Beatrice was alive the entire time, casting a ton of doubt on just how good he actually is.
Bernice and Duckman antagonize each other on a regular basis. Is it because they truly don't like each other or because they actually do and are trying to hide it? There are a few episodes that put them close together and they prove to be an ideal match, with Bernice understanding what her sister saw in Duckman and Duckman treating her like an actual person rather than his nemesis.
Ass Pull: The notorious final scene. The show's crew have since admitted that they threw it in as a desperate attempt to basically dare the network to go through with a likely-looking cancellation and let the show end on that note, and had no idea how they were going to resolve it if the plan worked.
Base-Breaking Character: Duckman himself is a major one. Depending on who you ask, he's either funny and charming, or one of the most unlikable characters to ever come from an animated series.
Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Occasionally, such as Gecko briefly gaining the ability to speak and smoke a pipe in "The Amazing Colossal Duckman".
Cult Classic: Still a highly respected show by those who remember it. This show predated South Park by over three years, and Family Guy by five, and it's not farfetched to say that the seeds for those shows can be seen in Duckman. It was never a huge sensation when it originally aired, but Jason Alexander chalks it up to the fact that it was so far ahead of its time and was on a network no one really knew about (the channel's true breakthrough hit, Monk, didn't come out until 2002, 5 years after Duckman ended its run).
Lampshaded in "Bev Takes a Holiday". Charles and Mambo ask Bernice how she plans to have enough energy to be a mom and a Congresswoman. Bernice replies that she'll take power naps in the bathroom like Strom Thurmond. Immediately, a disclaimer appears on the screen, stating to disregard the joke if Strom Thurmond has died around the time of the episode's premiere (or rerun). Doubly funny as this episode was rerun on Comedy Central the day after Strom Thurmond died. Possibly done so deliberately.
Before he died, Jim Varney voiced Walt Evergreen, president of a tobacco company. Varney died of lung cancer in 2000.
The fake-out opening to "America the Beautiful", which is revealed to be a video game that Ajax is playing. In said game, a group of fashion show contestants get into a fight with each other until one of them pulls out an Uzi and kills everyone. May have been darkly funny at one time, but with the rise in mass shootings, this scene is deeply uncomfortable to watch nowadays, even if it is fiction In-Universe.
In "Cellar Beware", Duckman mumbles in his sleep, "Sssh, Hillary, not so loud. What if Bill hears you?" Considering the Lewinsky scandal three years later, it's not Hillary we have to worry about having an affair...
"Sperms of Endearment" features a gag about Cornfed being contractually guaranteed at least 10 seconds of screen-time per episode. When the show finally ended, Gregg Berger did miss a couple episodes, but he still appeared more than any other character besides Duckman.
This was actually lampshaded in "Ebony, Baby". The first scene is a farewell dinner for Cornfed, who's going on "my first vacation in 11 years"; he has absolutely nothing to do with the plot and isn't even seen again until the credits. What makes this especially hilarious is that this episode came after both "In The Nam of the Father" and "A Clear And Presidente Danger".
"Das Sub" features a Shout-Out to Comedy Central's Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist, with Duckman saying, "They look at you and see what they wanna watch. They look at me and know it's the wrong channel." After Duckman ended, though, reruns turned up on Comedy Central.
"Ride the High School" sees Duckman pass out after getting repeatedly beaten up. When he comes to, he sees three Bernices. Pretty funny after Beverly (the third sibling) was introduced in Season 4. On a similar note, Bernice remarks in "From Brad to Worse" that she's fresh out of sisters.
Fluffy and Uranus are cute looking creatures who suffer horrific deaths... sound familiar?
Ho Yay: So much between Duckman and Cornfed. To the point that it's one of the reasons why the show garnered a large LGBT Fanbase.
Jerkass Woobie: Duckman's behavior and antisocial attitude stems from the fact he still misses his wife, and that she was the only person who could keep him in line.
Memetic Mutation: "What the hell are you staring at?!" is often the first thing that comes to mind when this show is brought up.
Misaimed Fandom: In some very strange parts of the internet, Duckman gets hailed as "the greatest philosophical mind of this generation." Really? While his rants are sometimes justified and can have genuine points to them at the best of times, he's generally a spiteful, selfish, arrogant prick.
No Problem with Licensed Games: The few who have played it say that while the computer game was a standard point and click adventure title, the writing was on par with, if not better than the show itself.
In one episode, a very young Mae Whitman, the daughter of series regular Pat Musick, made her voice acting debut years before her famous voice roles as Little Suzy and Katara.
"The Gripes of Wrath" has a musical parody of the song "Holiday for Strings", aka the theme to "The Red Skeleton Show".
During a couple episodes of season 4, Bernice was accompanied by a brief Leitmotif which sounded very similar to the Wicked Witch of the West's theme from The Wizard of Oz.
And the Friends theme was parodied in "With Friends Like These".
The music heard during the "groups who benefit from cancer" video in "They Craved Duckman's Brain!" is a soundalike to "Sirius" by The Alan Parsons Project.
Cornfed plays a soundalike to "Voodoo Child (Slight Return)" by Jimi Hendrix in "America the Beautiful". In the same episode, Mr. Stone works out to a soundalike to "Billie Jean".
The ending to "Inherit the Judgement: The Dope's Trial" is a take-off of "Merrily We Roll Along", aka the Merrie Melodies theme.
During the Easy Rider parody in "Not So Easy Riders", a sound-alike to "Purple Haze" by Jimi Hendrix is heard.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Harry Metfly, an unemployed TV critic and the main antagonist of the episode "Clip Job", and the Only Sane Man who tried to get Duckman cancelled. Metfly vowed to return and become a recurring villain if people got tired of King Chicken, but while King Chicken continued to make appearances, Metfly, however, didn't make any more appearances, not even in the series finale.
Similar to Homer Badman, Papa Oom M.O.W. M.O.W. focuses on media sensationalism, although in this case Duckman really did commit sexual assault, unlike Homer. He also comes to enjoy the attention, which is theorized to be one of the reasons people commit certain atrocities: to make a name for themselves, even for all the wrong reasons.
Vindicated by History: Downplayed. The show was by no means poorly received back then (on top of being critically acclaimed, the show was nominated for three Emmys), it's just that most people didn't even know this show existed.note "Dozens of people watch USA!" Nowadays more people are aware of this show and praise it for being ahead of its time.
What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: The show was made by the nice people who brought us Rugrats, and despite having offensive language, politically-incorrect subject matter, rampant female fanservice, and sex-related jokes that could've easily given the show a TV-14 rating, it somehow got a TV-PG rating. With that said, Duckman is one of the few Klasky Csupo works that isn't kid friendly and the intro makes it obvious that this is an adult cartoon.
and his rant on modern life