×

WHERE TO WATCH

SUBSCRIPTION

Hulu

Stream

PURCHASE

Fandango At Home

Buy

Amazon Video

Buy

Apple TV Store

Buy

Google Play Movies

Buy

Powered by JustWatch

This Hanna-Barbera series demonstrates that even in comedy animation, Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale. The first series broadcast in color by the American Broadcasting Company, The Jetsons was essentially The Flintstones^note Which predates this show by two years, and had always been in color, but which ABC initially broadcast in black and white. transferred to an idealized vision (even for the time) of the 21st century, with flying cars, conveyor-belt sidewalks and fancy (or rather, fancier) appliances. George Jetson and his family live in an ultra-high-rise apartment complex with their dog, Astro, and their robot maid, Rosie.

The show was originally canceled after one season due to low ratings, fueled in part because color televisions were still hard to come across in The '60s. After its prime-time run, the original 1962 series was rebroadcast on Saturday mornings on other networks, as well as in syndication. The plots have been compared to those in the Blondie (1930) comic strip and movies — not surprising, since Penny Singleton (who played Blondie in the films) was the voice of Jane Jetson. New Jetsons episodes were produced for syndication in 1985 and 1987, and in 1987-88, there were two feature-length Made For TV Movies. One of those movies, The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones, served as a natural Crossover between the two animated families.

Universal released Jetsons: The Movie in 1990, complete with CGI, a Green Aesop, and late-'80s pop singer Tiffany infamously given the (full) role of Judy Jetson over then-still-living original voice Janet Waldo. The Jetsons stayed dormant for almost 30 years after the movie, until 2017. After Warner Bros. released Direct-to-Video Crossovers with other Hanna-Barbera characters and WWE Superstars, the Jetsons starred in The Jetsons & WWE: Robo-WrestleMania!. Later that year, ABC greenlit a live-action sitcom about the family. 2017 saw the family return in comic book form as part of the Darker and Edgier Hanna-Barbera Beyond series.

The series was animated by three different studios: Wang Film Productions, Taiwan (41 episodes), Hanna-Barbera, USA (24 episodes) and Toei Animation, Japan (10 episodes).

Here's… the… Trope List:

• ACME Products: one episode features Nebulous Nifty, who make a lot of interesting, useful products, that promptly self-destruct. Spacely, George Jetson's employer, merges his company with them, and the sign goes up on the company building, only for George to warn him that their products self-destruct, much like the building eventually did.
• Actually, That's My Assistant: One episode features a company named Contempo Computers. Spacely and his rival Cosgwell want to do business with that company and all they know about their CEO is that he's a young and innovative man. At the company's headquarters, they meet a young man and a boy. The boy is the CEO of Contempo Computers.
• Advertised Extra: In the original 1962-63 season, Rosie was treated as a main character but only appeared two times. She appeared much more often in the revival.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: The whole family (or least George, Jane and Elroy) is way more toxic in the John K shorts, especially the short “The Best Son”, to the point they are completely opposite (although this was most likely intentional); Good-natured Elroy is now a total brat, sweet Jane gleefully replaces him with a robot, and George who normally tries his best to be a good father/husband now secretly approves of him letting Astro attack a young girl, and yells at Jane making her cry.
• Aerith and Bob: The family’s names are George, Jane, Judy… and Elroy!!! One of those is not like the others!
• Aliens Speaking English: Orbitty, the Jetsons' pet alien, speaks English (not perfectly, but still).
• Alliterative Name:
  • Jane and Judy Jetson. And George J. Jetson.
  • The company where he works (Spacely [Space] Sprockets) and said company's rival (Cogswell ['s Cosmic] Cogs).
• Alternative Foreign Theme Song: The original Japanese intro is entirely spoken, with the Jetsons introducing themselves, and has a different instrumental from the US theme.
• Always Need What You Gave Up: In one episode, George accidentally gets computerized dog teeth stuck in his mouth and they cause him to act like a dog whenever anything canine-related is in his view. After the teeth get him fired (again), they finally come out and, in a rage, George destroys them. Immediately afterwards, however, he learns from Jane that a director witnessed one of his antics (clinging to a mailman's satchel) and had offered to pay him big money to appear in a dental glue commercial using the teeth.
  George: Our ship finally comes in, and I destroyed the dock!
• Animation Bump: Season 3 is this to Season 2 due to the animation switching from Wang to Toei.
• Art Evolution: Look at one of the earlier episodes of the first season, and look at one of the episodes of the last season, animated by Toei Animation, which has an almost digital art-like quality. This is really impressive considering they were still using cels to make the show at the time.
• Ascended Extra:
  • Rosie only appeared in two episodes of the original series, as well as in the original closing credits. She's a regular in the '80s revival and even gets her share of limelight episodes.
  • RUDI. He briefly appears during the '60s episodes looking completely different than his later incarnation. In the '80s revival he's not only George's computer but also his best friend on the job.
• Bad Mood Retreat: In "To Tell the Truth", Jane is sad because Elroy broke her pitcher. Rosie gives her a dome to cry in and after she's done crying, the dome breaks too.
• Bad News, Irrelevant News: One episode combines this with Bad News in a Good Way, since the "good" or "irrelevant" news is that the one delivering the bad news doesn't have to deal with it himself:
  Mr. Spacely: Jetson! Thank goodness you're still here! I've got some good news and some bad news…
  George Jetson: What's the bad news, Mr. Spacely?
  Mr. Spacely: We've discovered a very dangerous computer virus that you have to stop right away!
  George: But that could take months! By the way… what's the good news?
  Mr. Spacely: The good news is, I don't have to do it! Bye now!
• Beauty Contest: An episode puts a slight twist on the trope. George enters as a judge, but wears a very Paper-Thin Disguise to prevent Jane finding out he'd spent an evening judging beautiful women. Meanwhile, Jane enters independently, and also wears a disguise in case George happens to see. Naturally, George declares Jane the winner, but they are both disqualified when they discover they were married. Originally, Mr. Spacely was going to be the judge and wore a domino mask so he could be advertised as "The Mystery Judge"; while signing autographs before the pageant, his wife found out and hauled him off, and George had to take over as judge in his place.
• Big Friendly Dog: Astro has a tendency to affectionately pounce on and aggressively lick the ones he loves. He's also very sensitive, and gets his feelings hurt very easily. He's been known to cry if his acts of affection aren't appreciated, particularly by George.
• Bigger on the Inside: All elevated apartments look compact on the outside, but are made bigger inside thanks to the effect of Wraparound Backgrounds.
• Big Honking Traffic Jam: When George is stuck in a jam, the radio broadcast talks about moving to a different highway, which is clear of traffic. As they're in flying cars, he decides to fly his car straight over—and all of the other cars in the jam follow him to that highway too, causing it to become jammed instead. However, the drivers have stopped honking.
• Boot Camp Episode: The series puts its spin on this trope in the episode where George, Mr. Spacely, and apartment handyman Henry have to report to a National Guard training camp.
• Caught on Tape: After being made the new office supervisor, Uniblab uses this to trick George (who has been made Uniblab's assistant) into loosening up and speaking his mind about Mr. Spacely while playing a few card games, while he has the tape recorder turned on.
  Uniblab: Time for fun, fun, fun. Name your game, name your game. Jupiter gin, Jupiter gin; planet poker, planet poker; 5 card satellite, 5 card satellite.
  George: But Spacely doesn't allow cards here, he hates them!
  Uniblab: Spacely's a stupe, stupe, stupe.
  George: Now you're talking, Uniblab. You know something, that's the first real brainwave you've had. Believe me, pal, not only is Spacely a stupe, but he's the king of the old crabs. You talk about pests, I mean he's impossible. Who do you think runs the business for him? Me, George Jetson, that's who! Besides that, he's a cheap–
  • A minute later, Uniblab plays back George's confession for Mr. Spacely, which gets him fired.
• Caught Up in a Robbery:
  • George Jetson and Astro happen to be at a bank when the alarm rings. Two criminals dash from the building with Stock Money Bags in hand, and hop into their getaway car. Before departing, one crook asks the other if there are any witnesses, to which the reply is “Yeah, but we'll come back later 'n' rub 'em out.” George and Astro panic and leave pronto, not seeing a director yell, “Cut!” The robbery was a staged event for a film.
  • In "Jane's Driving Lesson", Jane wants to get her license and a new car. While practicing, a robber leaps into her car and tries to force her to be his getaway driver. Jane's driving is so bad however that her driving instructor ends up feeling bad for the robber.
• Censorship by Spelling: when Jane is out shopping for a robot maid, the salesman introduces her to one of their older models, Rosie. He notes how Rosie is a dedicated worker even if she’s a bit “H-O-M-E-L-Y”. Unfortunately for him, Rosie is clearly smart enough to know how to spell, and promptly lays into him.
  Rosie: I may be homely, but I am S-M-A-R-T, smart!
• Chekhov's Skill: Early in "A Date with Jet Screamer", Jane points out that George shouldn't complain about the music Judy and her friends like to listen to, as his own drumming sessions might not be music to their ears. His skill on the drums becomes important later when, while tailing Judy on her date with Jet, he arrives at a club at which Jet is performing Judy's contest-winning song. After being denied entry as a paying customer for being too old, he poses as a member of Jet's backing group to sneak in the back, then bribes Jet's usual drummer to take the night off before taking his place. Fortunately for all involved, George is a talented enough drummer that the performance of Judy's song is a resounding success.
• Citizenship Marriage: A variation occurred in one episode where a new robot law required Mac to marry Rosie to gain a legal permit and avoid being melted down.
• Comedic Underwear Exposure: In "Instant Replay", Rosie angrily rips the dress off a snobbish socialite who had insulted the titular family. Both Jane and the woman had entered a party wearing identical dresses, which led to the whole conflict.
• Company Cross-References:
  • In the episode "Miss Solar System," George Jetson compliments the disguise of the character Mr. Spacely by telling him that “as Yogi Bear would say, [he's] smarter than the average bear!”, referencing another character created by Hanna-Barbera.
  • Another Hanna-Barbera reference shows up in the episode "A Jetsons Christmas Carol". When the Ghost of Christmas Past takes Mr. Spacely to a "fly-in" theater, the theater screen shows Fred and Wilma Flintstone.
• Continuous Decompression: This happens in one episode when George winds up traveling with a circus troupe. George accidentally plugs up the hole with his butt all the way until the ship lands, including during re-entry.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: Mr. Spacely was originally an implied one, but mostly showed signs of it in the '80s series and was played straight in the 1990 movie. Spacely's business rival, Mr Cogswell, is just as bad if not worse.
• Cowboy Episode: "Dude Planet" ('60s episode) and "High Moon" ('80s episode). In the former, Jane needs a break from all the button-pushing house chores, so she takes a vacation on Beta Three Dude Planet.
• Crashing Dreams: In "Elroy Meets Orbitty", Elroy has a machine that makes dreams. The machine incorporates things and pets on or near the bed into the dream, as seen when Astro jumps onto the bed and the machine adds a swarm of deadly bees to the dream.
• Cut a Slice, Take the Rest:
  • In the opening, George takes a few bills out of his wallet for Jane, but Jane takes the entire wallet instead.
  • Spoofed on Family Guy where George yells at Jane for taking all his money and ends up throwing her out of the air car, killing her.
  • In the episode "Future Tense", George wins a pile of money at a horse race, at the end the 'interplanetary revenue service' takes the pile, hands him a stack out of the pile, and keeps the rest for themselves.
  • Also used in this Jetson's sponsor's tag for Saran Wrap — George cuts a slice of pie, wraps it in Saran Wrap, and then picks up the rest of the pie and takes a bite.
• Darker and Edgier: Similar to The Flintstones DC comic series, the rebooted version of the Jetsons still has its moments of humor but takes the setting they're in much more seriously. For instance the reason everyone in the future lives in those Sky Pad homes is because the oceans rose over the centuries so much the Earth became 99.7% water. Also Rosie the maid is actually George's mother who downloaded her brain into the android because she was dying.
• Dartboard of Hate: In an episode, Cogswell tells off Spacely, then hangs up, saying he's going to go "throw darts at your picture".
• Day Hurts Dark-Adjusted Eyes: In "Test Pilot", Mr. Spacely takes some cash from his safe to offer George as a bonus if George agrees to become the titular pilot. The bills were inside the safe for so long that the man pictured at the top bill puts on sunglasses.
• Denied Food as Punishment: In the episode "Elroy's Mob," George sends both Elroy and Astro to bed without supper pills after Elroy comes home from school with terrible grades, then seemingly lies that they weren't really his, and only Astro tries to defend him. Of course, another boy really did switch Elroy's straight-A report with his own, and the unfair punishment drives Elroy and Astro to run away from home.
• Depending on the Artist:
  • Toei Animation worked on the 3rd season, but did only two episodes in-house. The rest were outsourced to other (uncredited) studios. What follows is a list of the subcontractors the company used.
    • "Crime Games": Magic Bus
    • "ASTROnomical I.Q.": Madhouse
    • "9 to 5 to 9": In house
    • "Invisibly Yours, George": Toei Animation Philippines
    • "Father/Daughter Dance": Madhouse
    • "Clean as a Hound's Tooth": Ajia-Do
    • "Wedding Bells for Rosie": In house
    • "The Odd Pod": Studio Junio
    • "Two Many Georges": Ajia-Do
    • "Spacely for a Day": Ajia-Do, Flying Dragon
  • Any time John K.'s hands are on a Wang-produced episode from the second season, expect his trademark Deranged Animation to show up at least once per episode.
• Deranged Animation: The John K.-produced Flash shorts from the early 2000s, as expected from him. Particularly evident in the first couple minutes of "The Best Son". John K. did layout work on the second season of The Jetsons in 1985, and also supervised the animation of his scenes at Wang Film Productions in Taiwan, so of course his Signature Style would often pop up in the 1985 episodes animated at Wang. Needless to say, this was the only Hanna-Barbera show John K. enjoyed working on, and his style would be adapted, for better or worse, into the Wang house style for the better part of a decade afterward.
• Deus Exit Machina: In similar fashion to the outro gag for The Flintstones, George's screams to "stop this crazy thing" are never replied in the original ending credits. Family Guy took another swipe at the show with this.
  George: [haggard and livid] DID YOU NOT HEAR ME BACK THERE?!?
• Diegetic Soundtrack Usage: The Jetsons' doorbell chimes four notes of the theme song.
• Dinner with the Boss: George let his boss Mr. Spacely go have dinner with his family in the pilot episode.
• Disastrous Demonstration:
  • In the 1962 episode "Uniblab", Mr. Spacely is trying to persuade the other members of the board of directors at Spacely Sprockets that the robotic employee in the episode's title is the way forward for the company. However, George, who has lost his job to Uniblab and is in the office to clear out his desk, conspires with Henry Orbit to spike the robot's oil. The "drunk" Uniblab spends the entire demonstration suffering from Alcohol Hics, gives the baseball scores when Spacely asks for the latest stock market figures, sprays the board with hot coffee, and plays a recording of George calling Spacely "a stupe" and "king of the crabs" on a continuous loop. The unimpressed board members tell Spacely to fire Uniblab or risk termination himself.
  • The 1985 episode "Hi-Tech Wreck" sees Spacely aspiring to win over the Megabucks Group, a consortium of wealthy investors, by interesting them in his "Executive Perks" programme of in-office luxuries, including massages, food and drink, and dancing girls. However, RUDI lacks the computing power to handle the routine at anything other than the lowest setting, so when Megabucks Group head Mr. Bigbyte cranks it to the highest setting, the system overloads and he is beaten hollow by the various luxury machines, scuppering the deal.
• Disguised in Drag: George passing himself off as "Georgina Jetstream" in "Solar Snoops."
• Disney Acid Sequence: The song "Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah" from "A Date with Jet Screamer". The words "Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah" appearing on screen several times in the sequence might be the least bizarre.
• Drama Queen: Judy Jetson is constantly reacting over-dramatically to virtually anything that happens in her life. It's seen as early as the second episode of the series ("A Date With Jet Screamer"). In the third season, made some twenty-five years later, Judy is still reacting dramatically to being embarrassed by her father at the "Father/Daughter Dance" in the episode of the same name.
• Dress-O-Matic: Auto-dressing devices are the norm in the shows universe. George Jetson passes through one each morning to be attired in his workday outfit. A catch though is that the clothes must be properly placed in the machine for it to work, as George once recalled a Noodle Incident where his shoes ended up on his ears. In one episode, Jane Jetson stands still while a mobile device changes her outfits in a clothing store.
• Drill Sergeant Nasty: Both Mr. Spacely and Sgt. Uniblab fill this trope in "G.I. Jetson", with this role actually being in-character for the former.
• Driven to Suicide:
  • In "Rosie Come Home", Rosie resigns as the Jetsons' maid after misinterpreting their attempt to buy her a new master cylinder (she's long overdue for a replacement) as an attempt to buy a new robot maid. However, her malfunctioning master cylinder makes her unable to hold down another job, and with no money, no home, and no prospects, she makes her way to a junkyard and throws herself into a crusher. Fortunately, the Jetsons arrive just in time to see her jump, and while Orbitty holds the plates of the crusher apart, Astro and the four human Jetsons pull her out. One cleared misunderstanding and new master cylinder later, she's back to her old job and her old self.
  • Played for laughs in "S.M.A.S.H." when George figures that the only mature way to get out of explaining why Spacely's new car is a total wreck is to kill himself.
• Driving Test Smashers:
  • Jane's car is hijacked by a bank robber while taking her test. The examiner is horrified and professes concern for "that poor creature" — not Jane, but the robber she's driving.
  • In "Rosie, Come Home", Rosie runs away due to a misunderstanding. Judy is in the middle of a driving test when she finds her. Judy ends up scaring the tester so much^*First by letting him drive, which he refuses out of fear, then by (a still-malfunctioning) Rosie offering to drive he passes her just so he won't have to evaluate her again.
• Dub Name Change: In Latin America:
  • The show was renamed "Los Supersónicos" (The Supersonics).
  • George as Super Sónico.
  • Elroy as Cometín Sónico.
  • Judy as Lucero Sónico.
  • Jane as Ultra Sónico.
  • Rosie as Robotina.
  • Mr. Spacely as Sr. Espacial in the '60s version, and Sr. Júpiter in the '80s version (And again Sr. Espacial in Jetsons: The Movie).
  • Mr. Cogswell as Cosme Cósmico in the '60s version, however, it stayed untranslated in the '80s version.
• Electronic Speech Impediment: In "Rosie, Come Home", Rosie malfunctions and so ends up saying the end of every third (approximately) sentence three times, three times, three times.
• Expecting Someone Taller: In "Elroy's Pal", whenever anyone sees Nimbus the Great in person, they always say that he looks bigger on TV.
• Expensive Glass of Crap: In the episode where Rosie first appears, George invites Mr. Spacely over for dinner at the last minute, and Rosie is able to turn leftovers into what looks like a very nice pot roast.
• Exty Years from Publication: The show started in 1962. Naturally, it was set in 2062.
• F--: Elroy gets his report card switched with a student who gets an H.
• Failed Future Forecast: In Rockin' with Judy Jetson, a Russian newscaster addresses his viewers as “Comrades”, implying that Russia is still communistic in the future (though he might just be using it as a stuffy word for “friends”).
• Fantastic Fireworks: The episode "The Good Little Scouts" has George Jetson oversee his boss's son Arthur on a scouting trip to the moon. The two become lost, and Arthur produces a flare gun that spells out "HEPL" in four shots in the lunar sky. When George points out the error, Arthur fires a fifth shot that strikes out the misspelling, then a sixth shot that appends the correction.
• Flintstone Theming: Cosmos and planets; the Little Dipper School shown in the intro is but one example.
• Flooded Future World: In the comic book adaptation, the reason the family lives in the sky is due to flooding. This isn't the case in the cartoon, where the surface is seen and looks fine.
• "Flowers for Algernon" Syndrome: This happened in the episode Astronomical I.Q., when Elroy's latest invention has made Astro into a super-genius, but that brings nothing but trouble for The Jetsons when he made Rosey upset with her upgrades; this also costs George his job (as always) and almost everything (even his apartment).
• Follow That Car: In "A Date with Jet Screamer", while tailing Judy on her date, George follows the pair to a rocket ride at the amusement park. After their rocket goes up, George jumped into a second rocket, shouting “Follow that rocket!”. Unfortunately for him, the rocket he chose is out of order.
• Flying Saucer: Inhabitants in the future fly around in a UFO large enough to fit 4-5 characters comfortably, replacing cars as everyday transport in this era.
• Follow That Car: In the episode "A Date With Jet Screamer", while tailing Judy on her date, George followed the pair to a rocket ride at the amusement park. After their rocket went up, George jumped into another shouting "Follow that rocket!". Unfortunately for him, the rocket he chose was out of order.
• Food Pills: Yet oddly, Jane managed to mess them up somehow.
• Foot Bath Treatment: In "Elroy's Pal", Elroy wins a visit from TV superhero "Nimbus the Great". But on the day he is supposed to visit, Nimbus gets sick. He is seen at home with his feet in a foot bath.
• Forgotten Birthday: Happens to Judy in "Judy's Birthday Surprise".
• Four-Temperament Ensemble: George (sanguine), Jane (melancholic), Elroy (phlegmatic), Judy (leucine), and Mr. Spacely (choleric).
• French Maid and French Maid Outfit: When Jane goes shopping for a robot, in the first episode ("Rosey the Robot"), one of the models is a French maid robot in a metallic French maid outfit.
• Funny Robot: Rosie the Robot. A domestic-bot in a futuristic world, her humor often came from often being more rational and cool-headed than her human owners.
• Futuristic Superhighway: George had to deal with traffic jams even with a flying car.
• Future Society, Present Values:
  • So, why didn't Jane learn to drive (pilot?) in High School? Perhaps because she was pregnant with Judy at the time (see Writers Cannot Do Math below)? The above is averted in The '80s revival, where Jane and Judy do indeed drive.
  • Also, why would Jane be a housewife in a society with robot maids, automated kitchens and self-cleaning houses? They didn't always have a robot maid. Either way, Rule of Funny still applies. Maybe it just sounds better than “unemployed”.
• Future Slang: Tons, most memorably “Eep, op, ork, ah-ah! And that means I love you!”
• Game Show Appearance: In "Family Fallout", the Jetsons compete against the Spacelys at the eponymous game show.
• George Jetson Job Security: Trope Namer. Has anyone ever actually tried to count all the times George gets fired by his boss throughout the series? Or threatened to?
• Get Out!: In the episode "The Coming of Astro", this is avoided when George spells it correctly when he threatens to have Astro sent out of the house^note George didn't want to have a dog in the first place. Of course, he changes his mind later.
• Glitch Episode: In "Rosie, Come Home", Rosie the Robot Maid becomes very clumsy and keeps repeating herself. It turns out that one of her components needs replacing, but when George and Jane try to buy a new one, the salesman wants to sell them a whole new robot. Rosie overhears him talking to them and runs away.
• Godwin's Law of Facial Hair: Mr. Spacely is George Jetson's verbally abusive boss who regularly loses his temper towards George. Spacely is usually depicted with the Toothbrush Mustache to further mock his role as the boss of the company.
• Goggles Do Something Unusual: There's an episode featuring a whole slew of them. One pair lets the wearer see the future. One has past-vision. One has X-ray vision and one has far future vision, seeing the other people as old people.
• Goofy Malfunctioning Robot: In "Rosie, Come Home", Rosie has a glitch that causes her to repeat her words, make sneezing sounds, and serve a disgusting alien meal called "Venusian delight" instead of what she was meant to serve.
• Grade-School C.E.O.: One episode features a company headed by a boy around Elroy's age.
• Grade Swap Catastrophe: In "Elroy's Mob", Elroy's classmate Kenny Countdown switched their report tapes to make it look like Elroy got bad grades. The Jetsons didn't believe Elroy and George sent him to his room, but they discovered the truth when Kenny was caught by his dad, who called George to tell him what happened.
• Height Angst: Cosmo G. Spacely is barely one-third of George Jetson's height, which adds to the triggers for Spacely to fire Jetson once per episode.
• Hired Help as Family: The family has a Robot Maid named Rosie, who they consider to be practically family as shown when they refuse to replace her despite more advanced technology existing and they are sad when she runs away.
• Hold Your Hippogriffs: Plenty of proverbs get updated to fit the space setting, such as “That's the way the satellite spins.”
• Hollywood Genetics: Why are Elroy and Judy blondes when their parents are both redheads?
• Honesty Aesop: In the episode "To Tell the Truth", Elroy breaks Jane's favourite pitcher and tells the truth but she's mad anyway. The repairman says to George that lying is better than telling the truth, but then when George tells the truth about why he's late for their date, she's pleased he told the truth.
• Hope Spot: In "Private Property", after George has lost his vice-presidency, he meets a surveyor, who tells him that Cogswell's building is 6 inches over 2,200 feet and must be torn down. George rushes over to Mr. Spacely with the news, only for Spacely to furiously erupt when he tells George that he just bought Cogswell's building, which will be torn down, and Spacely will lose his investment, while George finds himself demoted to Spacely's office assistant.
• Humans Are White: There are no black people in The Jetsons. You know, just like every other TV show created in the early '60s. They did add some more diversity in the 80s episodes, though.
• Incredible Shrinking Man: Happens to George in "The Little Man" when one of Mr. Spacely's machines malfunctions.
• Impossibly Compact Folding: George's Flying Car folds up into a briefcase, as seen in the opening credits when he arrives at work.
• In Medias Res: "Hi-Tech Wreck" opens with George in an Outer Moongolian Express shuttle, begging Mr. Spacely for one last chance to dig himself out of the hole he has dug for himself and the company. After Spacely relents, George returns home and, over dinner, tells his family (in a Flashback) that Mr. Spacely is threatening to send him to Outer Moongolia to sell sprockets door to door because R.U.D.I. is unable to handle the strain of the Executive Perks module Spacely wants to show off to some wealthy investors.
• In the Future, Humans Will Be One Race: The first season infamously only has white characters. At the time, people of colour tended to only have serving roles, which this show used robots for. The second season and the movies added characters of colour.
• Intimidating Revenue Service: An episode has George and Jane winning a large amount of money at the race track thanks to a pair of glasses capable of seeing the near future and then being alerted to some intimidating characters in the crowd. They're told that the two ominous men always demand their cut of the winnings. Fearing that the two shady characters are gangsters or something, George and Jane fly home in their car, followed all the way by the ominous men and breaking the glasses during the chase. Finally, George and Jane are cornered by them in their garage, where the men tell them they're from the Interspace Revenue Service. George breathes a sigh of relief, but is dismayed to find out they end up taking most of their winnings, leaving them with just two dollars.
• Involuntary Dance: In the episode "Dance Time", George attains a pair of automatic dance shoes which do all the dancing for them, but they're not without their fair share of bugs, which cause the footwear to frequently malfunction, much to the wearer's chagrin.
• Last Note Nightmare:
  • The original closing sequence for has George crying out to Jane for help as he gets caught in Astro's dog-walking treadmill.
  • Even the later syndicated reruns of the 1980s, which feature just static shots of the characters over an instrumental of the theme, can be abrupt as the last note of the theme is followed by the loud spinning star logo used for Hanna-Barbera at the time.
• Laugh Track: As typical with many Hanna-Barbera comedies of the time, the original series had one, though it was later removed when the series was remastered in the '90s. Averted with the 1980s episodes.
• Left the Background Music On: In one episode, when members of a flea circus run away from their abusive ringmaster and take shelter on Astro, the ringmaster shows up at the Jetsons' home to get them back, giving a sob story about how he raised them since they were eggs while mournful violin music plays. The ringmaster then tells the wiseguy flea that was mocking him to drop the fiddle.
• Living Mood Ring: Orbitty's species changes color to express emotions. Yellow stands for fear, pink for affection, black for anger, green for envy, and blue for sadness (although it can also mean "far away" when he's on tracking mode).
• Mean Boss: Mr. Spacely's no doubt one of animation's biggest examples of this, with him constantly firing George for the most trivial of reasons. And again, Mr. Cogswell.
• Metaphorically True: In the first episode, Judy asks Jane if she can go swimming after school, and she says she can if George says yes. Judy goes to George, who is sleeping, and asks if he's sleeping. He says "yes" to that, and then Judy tells Jane that he said "yes", not making it clear what he said yes to (and Jane did not say what he had to say yes to).
• Miserable Massage: One episode has George Jetson at work, enjoying a massage in his reclining chair from a motorized roller. Mister Spacely walks in, clearly displeased, and presses a button that makes the roller pound on George's midsection, then sits him bolt upright.
• Moving Roadways: Moving walkways are ubiquitous to the point of absurdity (even within people's houses); local and express slidewalks are also shown taking the place of transportation within the city.
  “These local slidewalks are so slow. I'd get there faster walking.”
• Mystery Box: In "Family Fallout", the Jetsons and the Spacelys entered a game show and the Jetsons won. George then had a choice: collect the Grand Prize or whatever was behind the force field. If he picked the force field, Mr. Spacely would get the Grand Prize. Fearing for his job, George chose the prize hidden behind the force field. The force field then revealed a new stove (it was earlier shown to the viewers that the Jetsons needed one) and Mr. Spacely got a set of Cogswell products.
• The Napoleon: Mr. Spacely is barely half as tall as George (or Mrs. Spacely) and has one of the shortest tempers and greatest desires for wealth and power of the primary cast.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain!: George is the antagonist in "A Date with Jet Screamer" when he sabotages Judy's entry to a lyric-writing contest to keep her from getting a date with the title Teen Idol. Judy's original lyrics probably wouldn't have won, given that they were generic and frankly terrible. George's fake entry, on the other hand, is a lot quirkier and unusual, and wins the contest easily.
• No OSHA Compliance: Noting that these buildings are thousands of feet in the air, the parking lots don't have any barriers, and there are even suspended conveyor belts without railings^note Such as the conveyor belts seen in some airports. in public places. Far worse when you think hovercraft accidents may leave the occupants hurtling through the glass domes, and down thousands of feet.
• "Not Really Married" Plot: One episode has George and Jane revealed to be not legally married due to the original priest who presided over them being a conman. They decide to actually get married and along the way go through a series of events that strangely enough mimics their pre-marriage romance. With their love rekindled ever more, they finally get married presided by an actual priest, who unfortunately was not let in the whole thing beforehand as he gets shocked when he finds out that the bride and groom's fully grown children are the best man and woman.
• Off to See the Wizard: There's an episode called Elroy in Wonderland.^note Despite the name of episode, this has more in common with The Wizard of Oz (1939) than Alice in Wonderland. It involves Elroy and Astro winding up in an Oz-like world inhabited by antique robots. During their journey, Elroy and Astro meet three robots who sound a lot like George, Jane and Judy.
• "Pan from the Sky" Beginning: Every episode begins with a shot of Earth, then it pans down to the family in their Flying Car.
• Pet the Dog: Spacely will have a moment or two that shows he's not such a bad guy.
• Plane Awful Flight: In one episode, Mr. Spacely ends up on one of these, stuck between two fat guys, because he tried to save money by flying a cheap air/space-line.
• Professional Slacker: In the TV opening when George arives at his job, he tosses his briefcase-transformed car on his desk, sits back and slacks off.
• Property Line: In "Private Property", Spacely is upset when Cogswell constructs a new skyscraper, so he hires George to look over the blueprints. At first, George thinks that Spacely has the larger property and Cogswell's building is infringing on it by 6 inches… until Harlan points out that Cogswell has been reading the blueprints upside-down, which means Cogswell has the larger lot, and Spacely's building is 6 inches on Cogswell's property. Out of desperation, Spacely reluctantly buys Cogswell's building, which George learns from the surveyor is 6 inches too high and must be dismantled, only to learn that Cogswell's building now belongs to Spacely and will have to be torn down, which results in a humiliating loss for Spacely.
• Rapid-Fire Nail Biting: In one of the 1980s episodes, Judy Jetson does this hoping her father George doesn't embarrass her with his dancing at her party.
• Reaching Between the Lines: There are videotelephones where either party in the call can pass his body through the screen.
• Rearrange the Song: The '80s seasons had the same theme song but some of the instruments were changed to synthesized ones, in an effort to keep up with the then-current trends in music.
• Reassigned to Antarctica: In "Hi-Tech Wreck", Spacely tells George that if R.U.D.I. goofs up, his family will be reassigned to Outer Moongolia. After a presentation goes haywire when the board of directors demands that R.U.D.I. (who is in danger of overloading his circuits) operates the executive perks program at full power, and R.U.D.I. short-circuits, with Spacely exiling the Jetsons to Outer Moongolia. Subverted when R.U.D.I. threatens to meltdown and destroy Spacely Sprockets, which leads Spacely to re-hire George, who fixes R.U.D.I. at the last minute, and bring his family back to Earth.
• Recycled with a Gimmick: The Jetsons are The Flintstones IN THE FUTURE!
• Repetitive Audio Glitch:
  • In "Uniblab", the titular robot gets stuck repeating "Spacely's a stupe" (one of the things it recorded George Jetson saying) after George and Henry Orbit get Uniblab drunk (or, rather, the robot equivalent of drunk) just before Spacely shows off the robot to the board members of Spacely Sprockets.
  • In "Elroy's Mob", Elroy's (robot) teacher, Miss Brainmocker, has a short circuit in one of her transistors that manifests as if her voice were a stuck record, requiring her to perform Percussive Maintenance on herself. She is unamused when Class Clown Kenny Countdown mimics her malfunction and smacks his own head to "resolve" it.
  • When it emerges that Rosie's master cylinder is thousands of miles overdue for a replacement in "Rosie Come Home", one of the ways the problem manifests itself is by Rosie's speech getting stuck repeating the same words.
• Resignations Not Accepted: Mr. Spacely hires George to be the judge of a dog show, but tells him his wife's dog has to win or he'll be fired. Then he's coerced by a gangster that his dog better win or George will sleep with the fishes. Even moreso, his family enters Astro in the dog show and expect him to play favoritism. George tries to get out of the mess by resigning as judge, but Spacely orders him to be judge under threat of losing his job otherwise.
• Ridiculous Future Sequelisation: In one episode George watches a clip from Rocky 912.
• Ridiculously Fast Construction: In one episode, George is at work and watches a machine build a multi-story office building next door in under a minute. His boss, Mr. Spacely, briefly goes on a "back in my day" tangent about how it used to take a whole week to construct and furnish a whole office building.
• Rings of Activation: Propulsion from jet packs or flying vehicles is depicted as white rings expanding from the exhaust.
• The Rival:
  • Mr. Cogswell/Cogswell Cogs to Mr. Spacely/Spacely Sprockets.
  • One episode revealed that there's no real practical difference between sprockets or cogs, in such a way as to suggest that this is some sort of dirty secret which could prove ruinous to one or both companies should it ever be made public.
  • One episode reveals the rivalry came from when they were kids. They attended the same school; graduated the same day; Spacely Sprockets and Cogswell Cogs were founded practically at the same time. Making his millionth cog before Spacely made his millionth sprocket meant so much for Cogswell he didn't mind going to prison for what he did to sabotage Spacely.
• Robot Maid: Rosie, who's iconic enough to also be the trope image. She's a robot and her job is to keep the house clean.
• Same Character, But Different: RUDI in the 1980s episodes looks absolutely nothing like his 1962 appearance, although it was apparently the same character (in both versions he was voice by Don Messick).
• Scout-Out: Subverted when Elroy's Space Cub Scout pack goes to the Moon.
• Second Place Is for Winners: In "Family Fallout", after the Jetsons win the game, Cosmo is pressured by his wife and mother-in-law to ask George to take the second-place prize while the Spacelys get the first-place prize. Just as Jane is rebuking George for caving in under pressure, the second-place prize is revealed to be a new "Food-A-Rack-A-Cycle" food processor to Jane's elation since that was what the family was hoping to win, while the Spacelys end up with a lifetime supply of Cogswell Cogs.
• Shameful Shrinking: The visual shorthand version happens to Judy in Rockin' with Judy Jetson when she's humiliated by Sky Rocker singing the wrong song.
• Shown Their Work: Though the series regularly fell over Writers Cannot Do Math, Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale, and Techno Babble, the writers did occasionally include genuine science facts. For example, in "Family Fallout", the Jetsons' and the Spacelys' appearance on the eponymous quiz show opens with a question asking for Kepler's Third Law of Planetary Motion. Rosie buzzes in and correctly states that according to Kepler's Third Law, the squares of the periods of any two planets in the Solar System are proportional to the cubes of their mean distances to the Sun.^note  If T₁ and T₂ are the periods (that is, the time taken to complete a full revolution around the Sun) of two planets, and d₁ and d₂ are their mean distances to the Sun, then as an equation, Kepler's Third Law states that T₁²/T₂²=d₁³/d₂³.
• Small Role, Big Impact: The cat burglar who appeared in Astro's debut episode. He only appears in that episode but it's because of his attempt to rob the Jetsons back then they decided to keep Astro instead of an "apartment approved electronic dog" as their pet.
• Space Is Sleepy: "Elroy Meets Orbitty" has Elroy dreaming about being on a rocketship.
• Speech-Impaired Animal: Astro can talk but growls out his words in a doggish way, actually pre-dating Hanna-Barbera's more famous canine example of this by seven years.
• Spiritual Antithesis: The Jetsons is this to The Flintstones. Both are animated sitcoms created by Hanna-Barbera about an average family living in a distant time based on the values of America in The '60s. The most obvious contrast is the time period (Hollywood Prehistory vs. The Future), but there's more to it than that. The Flintstones lead a very blue-collar lifestyle due to Fred's manual labor job and their friendships with the Rubbles are a key part of the plot. The Jetsons, on the other hand, are more white-collar and, while not anti-social, George is less connected with the world and doesn't seem to have any close relationships beyond his family and his job. Also, Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm are pre-verbal infants, and Judy and Elroy are high school and elementary school-aged, respectively. Finally, Fred and Wilma start as pet owners and become parents later, while George and Jane are the opposite.
• Springtime for Hitler: In "A Date With Jet Screamer", Judy enters the contest to win a date with the eponymous teen pop star. George, sick of hearing Judy obsessing over Jet Screamer, decides to swap the song Judy wrote for the contest with a nonsensical "secret code" message Elroy had been using as part of a game Elroy had been playing, figuring something with nonsensical phrases like "Eep Opp Ork Aah-Aah" couldn't possibly win. George ends up with egg on his face when Elroy's secret code message not only ends up winning the contest, but, as Jane explains later, it turns out that Judy was the one who made the code for Elroy's game in the first place, meaning she would have won the contest either way.
• Stay in the Kitchen: In one episode, Jane decides she needs her own car. So she goes to driving school. (The writers could imagine flying cars, and they could imagine robots — the Jetsons have one of those too — but they could not put them together and imagine self-driving cars. This ain't hard science fiction.) When the instructor sees her, he says, "Oh, no!" He pushes a button and the "Student Driver" sign on his car changes to "Woman Student Driver." And Jane, who is a perfectly level-headed character in other episodes of the series, turns into a total featherbrain when she gets behind the wheel — a billboard advertising a clothing sale is enough to distract her. This was the 1960s. You could get away with woman-driver jokes.
• Stupid Future People: The show tried to show this by having the worst problems in society being getting tired of pushing buttons all the time, portraying it as being joint-breaking labor that the characters did nothing but complain about. Ha ha, ignorant future people don't know what work is.
• Superpowers for a Day: George Jetson becomes "Super George" when an experiment goes wrong.
• Taxman Takes the Winnings: An episode has Jane and George making it big on betting in races (using a pair of glasses that can see a few minutes into the future) and running away from a pair of men that they think belongs to The Mafia… only to find out that the men belongs to the Intergalactic Revenue Service and that the government's cut of their winnings leaves them with only two (space) dollars.
• The Teaser: Much like its sister cartoon, the original series opened episodes this way. When the show went into syndication, all of the teasers were cut, and so far only one episode on DVD retains its teaser.
• Teen Pregnancy: Judy is sixteen and her mother is thirty-three. That would mean Jane had Judy at roughly seventeen.
• Theme Tune Roll Call: Meet George Jetson, his boy Elroy, daughter Judy, Jane, his wife.
• There Was a Door: Mac, Henry's robot assistant, has trouble getting places, and he usually crashes through the walls, and right after he says, "Open door."
• Through a Face Full of Fur:
  • Common with Orbitty, as he has the special ability to change into various colors, depending on his mood.
  • In "Astronomical I.Q.", an angry Spacely's face turns red as he yells George's surname as usual and gets aggravated by a mishap caused by the now highly intelligent Astro.
• Title Sequence Replacement:
  • The '80s series used the same intro animation from the original, but the theme tune was re-recorded with (electronic) Simmons Drums, electric bass and some other changes (some de-jazzification?) in an attempt to make it sound more modern. But this new recording was also applied to subsequent re-issues of the original series in some weird attempt at revisionism.
  • The '60s series also gained the 1985 title cards, end credits sequence, and the laugh track was removed to put it in line with the then-new season. Compare this to this. This was an attempt to "seamlessly" fit the 1962-3 and 1985/1987 seasons into the one syndication package, as if no one would notice the difference between them (e.g. the voice actors ageing by a couple of decades, and real-life technological advances during the gap leading to the '80s seasons focusing more on computer than mechanical technology). The 2004 DVDs (and newer re-issues to broadcasters) have restored all of the above to the originals except for the title cards, with the original teasers still missing.
  • The 1990 movie has a completely remade version of the intro animation, which features some CG. Notably, Jane kisses George instead of taking his wallet.
• Token Robot: The titular family live with one another, two pets (a dog and an alien) and a Robot Maid named Rosie.
• Treadmill Trauma: The end title sequence shows George walking Astro in a treadmill when Astro sees a cat and goes after it, leaving poor George caught in the conveyor belt, going round and round screaming, "Jane, stop this crazy thing!"
• Tube Travel: The show features tube travel that sucks a user and plops them where they want to go, as part of its Retraux aesthetic.
• Two-Timer Date: George's boss forces him to go on a date with a star to get a contract signed. Of course, this happens just as George is on a romantic outing with his wife. This example actually works out for the best, however: In the process of his date with the star, George Jetson ends up involved in some shenanigans with a circus troop, and he does them a favor. In return for this favor, the circus troop later confirms George's alibi that his date with the star had no meaning other than professionalism, and George and his wife's relationship is saved.
• Un-Cancelled: So long as you accept that the prime time episodes and the 1980s syndication episodes are in the same series. Very easy given all episodes were shown as part of the same series; and the fact the original voice cast was reunited for the second and third season.
• Undesirable Prize: In "Family Fallout", Mr. Spacely has this opinion of the titular game show's grand prize once he learns it consists of several Cogswell products.
• Unplanned Crossdressing:
  • The automatic grooming device(s) would occasionally dress George in Jane's clothes and/or give him her hairstyle.
  • It also happened to Judy when the device accidentally dressed her in George's tuxedo. Bizarrely, it actually fit her better than you'd expect.
• Used Future:
  • Rosie's often stated to be a long-obsolete (by the Jetsons' era's standards) robot model, with more advanced robots available.
  • There's also the Jetsons' futuristic tech sometimes breaking down or malfunctioning.
  • In "Private Property", when George Jetson and Mr. Spacely saw a building being erected next to the headquarters of Spacely Sprockets, the two of them agreed that it's not like in the "old" days when it took a "whole week" to erect a building.
• Variant Chess: An episode has a character promoting a game called "Chess-O-Matic." It is a variant that spans three different levels of game board platforms.
• Video Phone: Fitting with the cartoon's Raygun Gothic aesthetic.
  • Taken to ridiculous ends all the times Mr Spacely is able to reach through the screen and physically throttle George.
  • In some episodes, Jane can be seen shopping and the kids doing schoolwork on it, which pushes it slightly more towards the desktop PCs of the actual future than the dedicated-hardware videophone of pure zeerust.invoked
• Visual Pun: "Let me put on my face" is usually a euphemism for putting on makeup. In the cartoon, Jane and a friend of hers actually put on faces over their bed heads.
• Viva Las Vegas!: Befitting its futuristic premise, the series has a futuristic Vegas counterpart, "Las Venus."
• Vocal Evolution: Naturally, due to the two decade gap, some of the characters' voices have aged somewhat in the revival seasons and movie. Mel Blanc's voice for Mr. Spacely in particular evolved a fair deal throughout the series. He sounds almost unrecognizably soft spoken in the first few episodes, only resorting to his typical bellow when yelling at George. By the revival seasons, he is perpetually hoarse and has gained something of a Brooklyn accent.
• Wacky Wake Up Gadget: If the parents or Rosie need to wake the kids up for school, they may press a button on the wall, causing the beds to go into the wall, leaving the kids on the floor.
• Web Games: Two Flash-based games were released in 1998 on the Cartoon Network website: Mealtime Malfunction and Jetsons Space Race.
• We Will All Fly in the Future: When we're not using moving sidewalks, everyone gets around with flying cars or jetpacks.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Orbitty, the Jetsons' alien pet that was added in the second season, doesn't appear in the third season (aside from one cameo) or any of the movies.
• Who Names Their Dog "Dude"?: Astro, originally known as Tralfaz in "Millionaire Astro", when he belonged to J.P. Gottrockets, as his attorney reminds them.
  Astro: Tralfaz? Yecch!
• Writers Cannot Do Math: Jane is thirty-three and Judy is sixteen. One expects Hanna-Barbera didn't intend for Jane to have become a mother at the age of seventeen, especially since George is seven years older than her…
• Yet Another Christmas Carol: There's one with Mr. Spacely as Scrooge, George Jetson as Bob Cratchit, a dying Astro as Tiny Tim and robots as the ghosts (with the Ghost of Christmas Present being a package to make the pun). Mr. Spacely is even given a deceased business partner named Jacob Marsley. Mr. Spacely only decides to make nice out of self-interest, however. You see, since Astro had become ill from choking on a Spacely Sprocket, the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come shows Mr. Spacely a future where the Jetsons had successfully sued him and gotten all his money. Of course, that's the only thing the Jetsons could sue him for. The origin of the plot is lampshaded when George, complaining about Spacely, comments that Scrooge was nice in comparison and that Spacely would end up scaring the ghosts away.
• Zeerust Canon: When the show was revived in the 1980s, it continued to be set in the Raygun Gothic-style future established by the original 1960s episodes despite advances in technology since then.^note On the other hand, references were made to personal computers, which were rising in popularity at the time, instead of the UNIVAC-style mainframe computers that were referenced by the 1960s episodes. It even carried over into the 1990 movie.