Unfortunately that happens to a lot of the "goofy" characters on tv shows. They start off ditzy yet still have their moments of logic and intelligence, but then as the show goes on, the writers feel that braindead=funny, so they just become a flanderized moron. Disney shows are notorious for this.
Apparently in carny terms, 'geek' or specifically the sideshow attraction 'the geek' meant someone who's only skill or contribution to the whole carnival, was to chase after an animal in a tent in front of an audience, catch it, and bite its head off. Most often these were chickens or snakes. Basically a 'geek' meant someone so low on the social scale or in the eyes of the public that they have to be the ones to perform something perverse to get notice or to play a role, and was basically someone everyone else looked down on or was seen as an 'untouchable'. They brought up 'the geek' in an earlier script version of the 2022 'Elvis' movie, I guess in that case it was something that appealed to people even though they didn't know why and that they kept watching even though they found it perverse and repulsive, re Elvis's hip gyration and leg wiggling.
I don't get why we must get this cheerleader stereotype in seemingly every show with a HS setting...most of the cheerleaders in my school in real life weren't like that at all.
When I was in high school I didn't even know who the cheerleaders were lol. It wasn't a popular sport (kickline was more popular) and the girls on the team definitely didn't walk around with their uniforms on and announce themselves as cheerleaders. The "popular" girls in my grade weren't on the team.
My vibe of that crowd was that many were decent and hardworking, and tried to be kind to people. They seemed really into getting involved with school culture and local events etc.
True, I personally hate this stereotypes because most, if not all of the jocks/cheerleaders back when I was in middle school and high school were really nice, I was actually good friend with a few of them and I was far from being popular. The worst people in my school was actually the student council, they really thought they were on top of everyone else and acted like jerks, though none of them were actually “geek”, they’re just regular teens with huge egos.
