YMMV / Little Giants

• Alternative Character Interpretation: A lot with Kevin.
  • While he's obviously a chauvinistic Jerk Jock who takes pee-wee football far too seriously and loves boasting about his past accomplishments, all the things he boasts about are college-level trophies and championships. While he was obviously a legendary college athlete, maybe Kevin didn't do so well in his pros, since he's pretty much retired and focused on his car dealership and the pee-wee team. Could Kevin's ego and hyper-competitiveness be overcompensation for failing at professional football?
  • Coach Kevin didn't cut Becky because she was a girl. He cut her because he didn't want his niece to get hurt in what is a dangerous full-contact sport. Alternatively, he cut her because he believed she couldn't make it big in football and didn't want her to be attached to a sport she had no future in.
  • Did Kevin nudge Becky toward becoming a cheerleader to get one of Danny's best players out of the game before Danny could possibly replace her or adapt to playing without her? Or was he genuinely giving her some well-meant (if sexist) relationship advice on the first boy Becky's had a crush on?
• Cult Classic: Largely dismissed as a Cliché Storm upon its release, it's found an endearing audience over the years, as it's triumphant, character-driven underdog-gang-of-misfits and Sibling Rivalry story, and especially Becky's arc, have proven pretty timeless. Actual NFL players and coaches have openly admitted that the "Annexation of Puerto Rico" trick play inspired their own trick plays.
• Fridge Logic: Kevin's final offensive play-call would drive anyone who knows the game of football nuts. It's tied up 21-21 with 10 seconds remaining, and it's 4th down with 1 yard to the goal-line. The obvious choice here is to just kick a chip-shot field goal and go up 24-21, because at worst, Kevin would leave just a couple seconds for Danny's team to try to perform some miracle final play on the following kick return. However, for whatever reason, Kevin chooses to go with a run play that fails. Overall, no one in their right mind would make this choice as there's no excuse to not just take the easy 3 points.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Danny O'Shea is a younger brother suffering from Successful Sibling Syndrome, stuck in Kevin's shadow all the time. Over a decade later, the actual New York Giants would draft Eli Manning, who was considered to be a knockoff of his brother until he started winning super bowls in his own right, and even then was considered the "lesser" of the Manning brothers.
  • "Spike don't play with girls" considering Shawna Waldron (Becky) later starred in seriously steamy movie roles. Said line remains as funny when considering Sam Horrigan (Spike) teams up with a girl years later on Reality TV Beauty and the Geek (with Gender Swapped roles: him the male beauty, his partner a female geek).
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • Devon Sawa's first film.
  • Susanna Thompson as Devon Sawa's mother, and Rick Moranis' current day love-interest. Current day viewers would see her as Moira Queen from Arrow.
  • Todd Bosley for those who recognize the child actor as the kid Kramer had to babysit and also beat at karate in Seinfeld.
• Memetic Mutation: "Spike don't play with girls."
• Moral Event Horizon: Spike's father, Mike Hammersmith, crossed it the moment he ordered his son to injure another player out of the game. Coach Kevin was so disgusted by this act that he threatened to have Spike kicked off the team if he ever does that again.
• Signature Scene:
  • The scene where the John Madden shows up on a bus with several NFL football players and provides a bit of training for the Little Giants team.
  • "The Annexation of Puerto Rico" is basically the movie's version of the fumblerooski. Kevin even calls out "Fumblerooski! Fumblerooski!" from the sidelines as he's watching the play unfold.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Amongst the 4 NFL players, Tim Brown is basically just a cameo cause unlike Emmitt Smith, Bruce Smith, and Steve Emtman, Tim doesn't get a moment helping the Little Giants.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Danny lying to Mike and Spike about his identity in order to get Spike onto his team. It's a surprisingly underhanded and dirty thing to do, and his comments to Mike afterward (he falls on Exact Words in saying he was Coach O'Shea and not Kevin O'Shea) come across as rather condescending. It almost sets Danny and Kevin up as similar except the film opts to focus on the fact that Mike and Spike were just assholes rather than that they were wronged.