- Archive Panic: There are a total of 220 films of the Little Rascals to watch.
- Bizarro Episode: "Mama's Little Pirate" and "Shrimps for a Day"
- Ensemble Dark Horse: Several:
- Jackie Cooper and Miss Crabtree; in the case of Jackie Cooper, Hal Roach oversaw his contract being sold to another film studio in order to ensure Cooper continued success.
- Alfalfa, Spanky and Darla also count.
- Fair for Its Day:
- Farina and Buckwheat come off as an Ethnic Scrappy to modern viewers, but having a black character accepted as an equal by his white peers back then was a big step forward.
- Stymie is easier to accept; he may be poor and illiterate, but he is easily the smartest Rascal of the gang before Spanky took over that role.
- Harsher in Hindsight:
- In "Fish Hooky", the kids decide to write phony sick notes to their teacher in order to play hooky. Stymie suggests saying he has pneumonia on his. Matthew Beard (the actor who played Stymie) died of pneumonia in 1981.
- Some of the jokes about Chubby being overweight can be seen harsher after his actor Norman Chaney died at a very young age of 21.
- Retroactive Recognition: Robert Blake as the second Mickey.
- Seasonal Rot: Many fans would say that the MGM shorts made from 1938 to 1944 fall under this trope.
- Sequel Displacement: The silent shorts are considered very obscure.
- Unintentional Period Piece: The series today comes off as quaint stories your grandparents might tell about being children at the time. Specifically, it's about children during The Great Depression. In more than a few episodes, the children wonder where their next meal is going to come from.
- Unfortunate Character Design: The ghost costume in the film "Shivering Spooks" resembles the outfits worn by the Ku-Klux-Klan.
- Values Dissonance:
- Some modern viewers are put off by Darla's wriggling and vamping, especially in the musical numbers.
- Petey is a Pit Bull breed (sources differ on whether he is a Staffordshire Terrier or an American Pit Bull Terrier). Modern Dog Stereotypes have them as dangerous and often guard dogs. In the early 20th century, they were seen in a similar way to German Shepherds are today—protective of family, sweet tempered, and great with kids. Petey even helped boost their reputation as "nanny dogs".
- A lot of the humor surrounding black characters tends to be of the old-timey Uncle Tomfoolery variety in which much wouldn't fly today. This tends to be negated a bit by the fact that Stymie was an intelligent clever kid. Also, they were just as much equals to the white kids and the latter never made an issue out of skin color.
- The shorts Teacher's Pet, School's Out, and Teacher's Beau mention the Rascals' teacher getting married and them getting a new teacher. This was Truth in Television in some places even into the 1930s; female teachers were not allowed to marry. Those that did had to leave their profession. This may come off as bizarre to modern viewers.
- Values Resonance: The fact that Roach insisted on having at least 1 black child actor be a part of the gang at any time, going back so far as 1922. Not only that, but as stated above, no issue was raised about skin color and all the kids got to participate in the plots equally. It's a neat bit of progressiveness in a time period that no one would suspect.
- Viewer Gender Confusion:
- Buckwheat is a boy, though an unrelated character with the same nickname was previously played by a girl.
- Earlier; Farina followed a similar arc. He started out as Silent Era Ernie/"Sunshine Sammy's" little baby sister.
Tropes specific to Hanna-Barbera's version:
- Hilarious in Hindsight: In "Pete's Big Break", Buckwheat is shown operating a makeshift movie camera while the kids rehearse for the TV commercial. His voice actor, Shavar Ross, grew up to become a respected filmmaker.
- Retroactive Recognition: An 11-year old Scott Menville got his first major animated role as Spanky.
Tropes specific to the 1994 movie:
- Adaptation Displacement: Bring up The Little Rascals to nearly anybody born after 1985 and they'll likely assume you're referring to this movie. Mention the original series, and you'll be met with surprised looks or head scratches.
- Alternative Character Interpretation: Butch and Woim want to be a part of the boys' club, which is why they're seen standing outside the clubhouse hoping that Froggy invites them in.
- Audience-Alienating Premise: For some fans of the original shorts, the Setting Update and the fact that the children aren't poor and look like yuppies may stop them from seeing this version.
- Awesome Music: "We got a dollar, we got a dollar, we got a dollar, hey hey hey hey..."
- The ballet recital that Spanky and Alfalfa are forced to take part in features "Waltz of the Flowers" from The Nutcracker.
- The William Tell Overture, aka the theme from The Lone Ranger, shows up during the climactic go-kart race.
- The original score by William Ross, which of course includes the iconic Our Gang main theme, is nothing to sneeze at either.
- Critical Dissonance: Critics hated the film, but it did well with audiences and is still well-remembered today. On Rotten Tomatoes, this movie has a rating of 23% from critics, but 70% from general audiences. Metacritic (critics only) only rated it 45 out of 100, but CinemaScore (general audiences) gave it a rating of A−.
- Hilarious in Hindsight: "Nothing beats a buck on a duck!" American college football's first playoff tournament came down to a match-up between the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Oregon Ducks.
- Moment of Awesome:
- Alfalfa demonstrating why you should Beware the Nice Ones when he punches Butch hard enough to knock him into a muddy pig pen. Woim, intimidated by this, then throws himself into the mud to avoid getting punched.
- Darla has an Offscreen Moment of Awesome by kicking Waldo out of his own car and finishing the race herself. She tops it off by coming to Spanky and Alfalfa's aid when the bullies have thrown a smoke bomb onto their car.
- Moral Event Horizon:
- Waldo is an arrogant, spoiled Jerkass, but he crosses into this territory when he uses tire spikes against Alfalfa and Spanky in the race, a potentially dangerous (possibly even lethal) trick. Darla even calls him out on this and breaks things off with him, kicking Waldo out of his own racer.
- Likewise, Butch and Woim were already tip-toeing the line when they steal The Blur and pass it off as their own soapbox racer, but definitely cross it when they throw a firework into Spanky and Alfalfa's new racer while they're in the middle of driving through a dangerous stretch of circuit.
- Values Dissonance: During the ballet scene, the teacher's response to Butch and Woim's intrusion and Alfalfa and Spanky inadvertently messing up her recital is to grab them by their ears to walk them out of the ballet school (even going so far as to yell at the latter two to Get Out!). This is Played for Laughs but a joke like that might not be as acceptable in a kids' movie nowadays when child abuse has a become more widely recognized issue. Not to mention that under those circumstances, the ballet teacher would probably be fired and potentially face legal action for that sort of conduct towards children.
Tropes specific to the 2014 movie:
- Retroactive Recognition:
- Jenna Ortega, who portrays Mary Ann, was later revealed to be a middle child.
- Jet Jurgensmeyer, who plays Spanky, later became the new Stinky.
- Grand Palmer, who plays Waldo, would later become a white haired boy.
