YMMV / Titan Academy

• Alas, Poor Scrappy: Cherylene isn't hated per se, but viewers agree that she's kind of annoying with her shrill Cute, but Cacophonic Say My Name tendencies (though it depends whether you see it as a charm point or pure annoyance). Then she pulls the ultimate Heroic Sacrifice, getting her expelled (in addition of being blacklisted from all Singaporean schools) in exchange of the rest of the expelled students returning. Most people who were annoyed at her shrill voice then start lamenting her expulsion, realizing that in the end, she's one of the most selfless characters in the class.
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Jianhao continuously expressed annoyance at Ren Yi Xiang's obsession with Pei Shi and even calls him out about becoming a jerk due to heartbreak. Most people usually imply that this means Jianhao personally doesn't trust Pei Shi. There is an alternate interpretation on this: He actually has no problems with Pei Shi, he's just trying to dissuade Ren Yi Xiang (one of his closest friends just below Denise and Vincent) from continuing to walk in a self-destructive path with his approach on love, the same way he stopped Denise in becoming rebellious and almost getting expelled to sate her temporary catharsis, sometimes a true friend needs to step in and stop their friend from going through a path that will destroy them in the long run after all. Which leads to...
  • Kevin's friendship with Ren Yi Xiang. A true loyal friend in need who will always provide him support no matter what... or a Toxic Friend Influence enabling Ren Yi Xiang's path of revenge by supporting his antagonism to Pei Shi, all in order to have him for himself and eliminating a love rival? Especially when compared to what Jianhao did to Ren Yi Xiang...
  • Vincent’s feelings for Denise. Does he genuinely believe that he loves her, or is he aware that he’s just using her?
  • Teverly’s relationship with Denise. Does he genuinely admire her but has to hide his admiration with hate to finish his job? Or does he admire her in the sense that he’s just jealous and wants to destroy her life? Or does he just outright hate her and developed a personal grudge against her after the fire episode incident?
    • On that note, is that scene still in continuity? Every Teverly vs Denise moment from Season 7 onwards shows that Denise has not clue of his spy identity. It’s most likely Retcon.
• Base-Breaking Character: There's a lot of divide in the fandom when it comes to Vincent, namely because his tenure as an antagonist got rather obnoxious, whereas there are other fans that enjoy him being a normal solid friend when love isn't involved and he still stayed consistent as one of Jianhao's BFF. And then there’s the episode where he tricks Jianhao into saying that he likes Maddy in front of Denise so she would assume that he didn’t love her anymore and leave him for good.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
  • An earlier exam video featured Jianhao using his flute to summon a cobra right in front of Madam Soot Beng, bit her in the head to knock her out and he escaped to find his hidden cheat sheet. Madam Soot Beng came back just fine after a few skits, and nobody ever mentioned Jianhao's bizarre cobra-summoning flute again. Even the other students' reaction on the cobra flute are like "WTF just happened??"
  • During the Multiverse episode, for pure fun and an after-effect of the multiverse travels, a younger JianHao long before he made this very series pops up from a portal, says "What the loh yeh moh yeh is this?" and immediately exits the stage, bewildering Jianhao and his Alternate Universe counterpart and they proceed with their conversation like nothing happened.
• Broken Base: Take your pick on which main teacher is better: Madam Soot Beng or Miss Sherly? And then there's also a camp that desired the return of Mr. Muthu Raja...
• Draco in Leather Pants: Ren Yi Xiang's bully self is usually considered kind of negative and self-destructive and not exactly a good thing. However, many many of his fans justified him for doing so as a Jerkass Woobie and in turn wholly blames Pei Shi for being the cause of his suffering (some of it was brought upon himself even when Pei Shi wasn't being antagonistic), to Ron the Death Eater levels (see below).
• Epileptic Trees: It's been theorized that Regna is Tasha's older sister. Other Organisation-student familial relationships have also bee theorised, such as Mr Alan and Jianhao
• Growing the Beard: The second season, starting from the Back to School: Expectations vs Reality video, is where the show is considered to have grown a beard, with a more consistent storyline and characterization from the first one, and introducing the first story arc of the Love Triangle between Jianhao, Denise and Vincent and overall improved production value.
• Harsher in Hindsight: Vincent exposing Denise's 99 mark in the 2nd exam and being insensitive about her feelings have been considered one of his lowest points. But at that time, neither he (who got better over time) nor the audience knew just why it was that distressing on her: Turns out that she's being threatened by her own mother to get 100 at minimum or else she would be heavily punished.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • During 9 Types of Students in a Test, when the scene shifts into the Among Us parody, the locked door only opens when someone swipes a card. This predates the game's Airship map, where it featured 'Open door with card swipe'.
  • In 20 Types of People with Face Masks, Madam Soot Beng played a parody of 'Karen' type ladies (and it was listed in the Top 20 2020 Moments video as 'Karen Soot Beng'). Come 12 Excuses Students Make to Escape Classes, she revealed that her full name is literally "Karen Soot Beng".
• Like You Would Really Do It:
  • If the Squid Game episode wasn't a dream, then that means a majority of the cast would be written out of the show due to being expelled for being eliminated. Of course the series can't afford to lose its cast member that quick at this time! While the mass expulsion would give similar results and looked like this trope, it's not quite because Jianhao himself has stated that there would be a lot of students expelled and there's already the build-up ever since the appearance of the Organization.
  • Originally, Alan planned that the new passing score would be 80. However, there's no realistic way for Jianhao and many characters to accumulate that high score so quickly in such a short time, and if that plan went through, then the main character gets expelled. And so, during the exam, the passing score remains at 50.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Debbie's "I am the bell!" is so out there that it's sometimes used with more focus in several custom classroom animations by other users.
  • Ever since Kevin quoted Steven He's "EMOTIONAL DAMAGE!!", several people have been putting up scenes of rejection or disappointment from the show with Steven's own "EMOTIONAL DAMAGE!!" clip.
  • And more recently, Zachary’s “Where is my CLASS?” (with the Funny Accent emphasis on “CLASS”) has also become a meme.
• Moral Event Horizon: Mr. Alan is revealed to have been coercing Teverly into doing his bidding by threatening to cancel his scholarship, which his mother wouldn't be able to afford. And when Teverly finally tries to break away from his control at the end of the Study Buddies arc, Alan reels him back in by threatening to cancel Diana's scholarship as well.
• Never Live It Down:
  • Pei Shi will basically never live down the fact that she cheated Ren Yi Xiang. No matter what she tried to achieve in further episodes, that's what most people will think of her.
  • Cleverly will most likely be remembered for his relationship with Diana in Season 4. Even then, most fans won’t even remember the specific events of their relationship (such as the often-ignored bit of Diana dragging him outside and forcing him on a date), just his expulsion and the fact that they were a thing.
    • He also has cemented his reputation as the one ‘less smarter’ than Denise due to him answering a single question wrong.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap:
  • This tendency tend to happen to either one of the main teachers (Madam Soot Beng and Miss Sherly), in their debut, something of their trait did not endear the fandom, and being considered something of a Replacement Scrappy for their predecessor. But then, after awhile, they developed their character and turned around their fan reception:
    • In case of Madam Soot Beng, when she debuted, she was a Sadist Teacher played completely straight, regularly torturing the students with loads of homeworks and giving no room for them to retaliate, as opposed to the more laid back but still generally strict Mr. Muthu Raja. She turned it around in a single episode, where she took the blame for the students so they do not get expelled and she got booted out as a result, revealing that in the end, she's a well meaning teacher who puts emphasis on protecting the students. This rescue and the ensuing surge of popularity resulted the short I am a Teacher, which further develops Soot Beng (and her daughter Vicky) and increased her fandom.
    • In case of Miss Sherly, she got the heat due to causing Madam Soot Beng's departure from the school, given her Bitch in Sheep's Clothing personality, the opposite of Madam Soot Beng, and generally, her 'Sheep's Clothing' part is less wacky than Madam Soot Beng, usually being the Only Sane Man in any classes she taught. She started turning this around first after the school re-opened, where she genuinely gave a pep talk to raise the spirit of the downhearted Vincent, usually a problem student, and when she announced her departure, it's not just the students in-show that were saddened. She then cemented the turnaround in "Welcome to Titan Academy", where she chose to stay with her students during the takeover in order to protect them, a decision that the fans praised since it also ties in with her appearance in I am a Teacher, where Madam Soot Beng planted the seeds of Character Development for her.
  • From the students, there's Vincent himself. When he had his early tenure of being Denise's (self-proclaimed) boyfriend, there are many fans that hated him for being such a toxic, domineering figure who's also insensitive to Denise's problems (fans exploded in joy when Denise snapped at Vincent). They let off him a little when he teamed up with Jianhao to expose Terry, and afterwards he focused more on being Jianhao's BFF than constantly hounding Denise. When the school re-opened, he had an extremely relatable Freak Out about the school's new safety procedures that those who used to bash him now sympathize with him that once he recovered (with the return of Miss Sherly) and continued for the competition of Denise's heart, fans doesn't get angry at him anymore.
• Ron the Death Eater: If there's one character who's often getting negative portrayal by certain fans, that would be Pei Shi. She is by no means a wholesome good student as she is a Control Freak Bitch in Sheep's Clothing when the chips are down. However, many defines her as nothing more than being 'the cheater' thanks to breaking Ren Yi Xiang's heart and antagonized him simply by existing and Ren Yi Xiang's 'revenge' against her was completely justified. Never mind that in Season 4, Pei Shi has kind of stopped being antagonistic to Ren Yi Xiang, most of the conflict was because Ren Yi Xiang started it first and it kept escalating despite his Character Development to be better (and she'd prefer to be his friend again and hopefully be his old self). But no, Pei Shi is usually the one made out to be worse than she is and being the first offender (conveniently forgetting that Ren Yi Xiang was the one who struck the first blow by cheating her on Melody two episodes before Hamza even appeared).
• Ship Mates: After Madeline's introduction, fans who ship Jianhao and Denise prefer that Vincent ends up with Maddy so that he doesn't interfere with them again.
  • This gets subverted though, as Vincent still goes after Denise despite Maddy’s introduction, and the love square even got reversed!
• Ship-to-Ship Combat:
  • There are some fandom that wanted Jianhao X Debbie to happen, regardless if their relations were just normal friends at best, and both have their respective love interests (Denise and Ben), on the basis that their actors are married in real life. Eventually, the show makes use of this, where in the Alternate Universe, Jianhao X Debbie did happen, and Debbie got into an argument with Denise when the latter got too close with the main-verse Jianhao and Debbie thought Denise is gonna steal her boyfriend.
  • There has been massive debate over who to ship who with following the reverse love square. Popular consensus is Denise-Jianhao, Maddy-Someone who is kind to her, and Vincent with no one.
  • Ren Yi Xiang X Kevin vs Ren Yi Xiang X Pei Shi. Take your pick. The pro-Kevin camp usually cite on how Kevin always try to support him even in the hardest times and absolutely livid at Pei Shi for being 'the cheater'. The pro-Pei Shi camp either thinks the old couple was cute and generally full of interesting conflict that looks like it's a K-Drama
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: While the fandom has mostly embraced them, there is a faction of people who don't like Class N4T1 and would've preferred if the series had focused solely on Class T1T5 as it had before.
  • This gets worse in Season 8, where the new N4-T1 seems charmless and its cast carbon-copied from its previous characters.
• The Woobie: Within Class T1T5 and N4T1, you will find no shortages of characters who evokes the pity of the audience:
  • Denise. She's a Teen Genius, The Ace, kindhearted and patient and often considered the star of her class. However, people only saw her as nothing more than a tool to copy her homework or exams, and her high intelligence made her misunderstood. She has no true friends and always had to eat lunch alone in the the toilet while sometimes hearing her own friends gossipping that she's just using her intelligence to grab the attention of the boys, thus a slut. Adding to this is her own perfectionist streak, she had to isolate herself while dedicating herself wholly for her own studies and grades, preparing for tests and exams way ahead of the time and if after all those she thought she failed to get a full mark, she's driven into tears. And later we learn why: She has an extreme Education Mama that threatens her to send her Off to Boarding School if she ever failed that overly high standards, as much as Denise wanted to be more than that.
  • Debbie. She's an awkward nerd who tends to be a Cloudcuckoo Lander. While being a natural Nice Girl, she gives out such a nerdy aura that people tends to ridicule her and anyone she tried to befriend. She likes the star basketball player Ben, but Ben continued to roughly reject her just so he didn't get laughed by his own friends, leaving Debbie in tears. Although thankfully, she tends to get some bones thrown at her, any scenes involving her getting rejected for 'being annoying' tends to be hard to swallow. Worse, Ben gets expelled, therefore Debbie can no longer pursue her dream boy again.
  • Ren Yi Xiang. He's also an awkward nerd, but thankfully he looked like he might have a more stable relationship. But turns out he is Not Good with Rejection, when he saw his crush Pei Shi having a relation with Hamza, he snapped and tried so hard to win her back, only for more misunderstanding to come around. Combined with also being easy pickings for bullies, this made Ren Yi Xiang finally decide to discard his goody-two-shoes image and became much more rebellious and cynical, being at odds with Pei Shi despite her already breaking up with Hamza and wanted to just come back being friends with Ren Yi Xiang again, and to his frustration, she patched up with Hamza during the holiday. On top of that, he's expelled, to the point that he completely forgot his issue with Pei Shi and even rejected Kevin, the only one who still cared for him, because he's just in too deep in his own depression, this time losing his chance at education and place in the Titan Academy.
  • Class N4T1's Cleverly is an awkward nerd with No Social Skills with almost no friends. Then when he had the chance to be more than that when the popular girl Diana developed a crush for him, he committed a Heroic Sacrifice by showing himself to the Organization, making him look like the only one snooping when Alan and Regna are discussing their evil plans together. As a result, he got a really over the top punishment: Having a complete Traumatic Haircut and then expelled for good measure, and then his parents just decided to send him to boarding school (instead of reporting such blatant abuse on their children). All those possible good future, both intellectually and socially, dashed to ground in instant and he can only have the memories of the fleeting sweet moments with Diana. This may also turn Diana into one for similar reasons (minus the punishment).
  • Trev. While at first introduced as a Jerkass domineering boy and later his crybaby personality is sometimes Played for Laughs, sometimes you can't help but pity him after the pandemic: His mother left him to elope with his former teacher (who annoyed him) and then he got scammed, losing a majority of the riches his mother left behind. And he kept missing out the exams that no quarters were given to him, naturally resulting him being expelled. So the guy lost his family members with nobody to help his immaturity, causing him to lose his own riches, and now his education chances. Damn it. Sometimes, when he actually cries, there's also a room for wanting to give him a hug. On the bright side, Abbey still decided to stick with him and she got expelled too, but there was a time she almost announced they're better off breaking up... Until she really did go through the plan during the time they're stuck in an island, leaving Trev all alone.
  • When first introduced, Maddy is a sweet girl who also knows some ways to defend her friends against bullies. She manages to tame the bad boy in Vincent and the two becomes very close. Unfortunately, after the island episode, everything goes downhill for Maddy as Vincent's 'toxic boyfriend' personality (the similar one that distressed Denise in the past) resurfaces and she's taking the full brunt of it, with Vincent trying to get back to Denise. In all of her appearances ever since, she's constantly ridiculed and humiliated despite her loyalty and affection to Vincent, leaving Maddy to justifiably grow more and more jealous at Denise.

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