People outside of Australia probably thinking this is exaggerated. I’m telling you now I’ve experienced sooooo many people who acted like this in class
I went to an all girls school in Perth, I was in Year 11 when this came out and every week, the day after it aired, we'd all be talking about it inc. teachers, its how I started watching it from hearing about the epic first ep from the girls. Mr G is still my favorite character.
I absolutely love his series. The comedic approach to a very mundane event is always so good because it's so relatable to the viewer. Like pretty much everyone else said this isn't an exaggeration of what it's like in an Australian school. There's always that one trouble making kid who is desperate for the teacher's attention.
Only way you get sent to adult prison at 17 is if you commit a terrible crime lile a gruesome double homicide that goes for usa and australia. Minor drug charges, petty theft etc all stuff trouboed teens get in trouble for isnt enough to go to jail
I love watching all the reactions of the kids in the class to his antics. No wonder they crack up, it must be impossible to keep a straight face. Brilliant.
You put him next to people who aren't his friends, and he bothers them and ruins their work. Put him next to his friends, he clowns them and bothers everyone. Same in Special ED. Worst kind of kid and this show is so dead on accurate about this phenomenon. Chris, idk if you read comments, but this is genuinely the best representation of High School life I have ever seen. Drama, comedy, or whatever in media. So spot on that I was confused, I thought this was a documentary until I read in on it lol. No joke. Wish this show was more popular where I lived and in US.
Jonah is such the splitting image of a kid in my class from year 7 right into year 10. I remember when year 11 started and saw he wasn’t there, all the students celebrated including me.
The funniest (and saddest) thing is that it really ISN'T too removed from reality (p.s I'm Aussie and kids like Jonah were the bane of my high school existence)
Tommy Fresh yes so many people can’t take a joke, cause apparently the charcter Jonah from Tonga is offensive to Polynesians but I know so many Polynesians who love this. The only people offended by it are non Polynesians
I don't even find this funny because it isn't even an exaggeration. Towards the end, I actually forgot that I was watching an adult act as a teenager and I started to feel sorry for the other students.
one of my teachers at school was chris lilleys cousin. They were so alike. It was a blast, he was also hilarious. Chris even dropped in one day to say hi when he was visiting family in town. This was around 2009ish.
my favourite line is where he says he can keep his hat on because timeout isn't even real school lol - love Jonah. Had plenty of kids like him in my school and it felt really nostalgic to watch
I know is humor and a parody or reality but many of us knew people like that. Forcing some unruly people to study not only gets unsuccessful but damaging for others who are at least trying to study. Thus, there should be some way to look for their interests (if they have any) without compromising the rest. Not everybody is willing or even able to conform to certain learning parameters (may be they are good at other things) and that’s simply how things are, denial or believing that everyone could adapt with enough patience is, for some cases, useless. I am not writing about those who have a bad phase or some psychological fixable problems but those whose personality is already cut in a way that won’t adapt to such systemic expectations.
Some people just have learning difficulties and don't discover it until they're out of school, this then making a student feel "dumb" or distracted because maybe there are problems at home or problems they're struggling with but don't even realise. There's a few reasons as to why there are students like this and i know this because I was one. I have dyslexia and through out my life teachers thought i didnt want to learn but in fact i didnt know how so instead of helping me they ignored me and what do people do when they get annoyed? Annoy others to seek attention. Sorry for not making much sense but i hope it gives you somewhat my perspective.
I remember when I use to watch this during year 8 class, my friend and I would go outside and sit on our phone cause you can download an app where you can watch this for free. Good old days and now I’m 20😭 time goin to fast
*when i had a kid like this in class, I would put the desk facing the board next to mine and then put a cardboard stand around him so that the only people who could see him were me and the front row of kids. And I'd always say the same thing, a clown can't perform without an audience. 100% would always work*
I went to Australian schools, I am white, weirdly enough the Austronesian kids I found usually didn't mess with people and were pretty decent people, despite being bigger and probably could beat you up easily if they wanted to. But in my schools it was mostly a minority of white kids that acted just like Jonah, god it's so similar, he hits the nail on the head. In my grade/year we had 2 guys just like Jonah, they were both white guys. I personally think they probably came from rough families and suffered from some kind of mental thing to be honest. In Australia after year 10 is over, you are allowed to leave school, and only kids who want to stay go onto year 11 and 12, the year 11 and 12 are so quiet and calm because all of the kids like Jonah are basically gone.
I remember going from primary school, where the teachers ran a pretty tight ship, to high school (public school in Sydney) and there was a version of Jonah in most classes. It was funny, but it was also very disruptive. And it wasn't a race thing... there were Jonahs from all backgrounds, including Anglo. To echo what others are saying here, this was an accurate portrayal of an Australian classroom - at least the school I went to.
I've witnessed far worse in High Schools in 1970s. Picture the boys changing rooms covered in spit balls of green snot and chewed paper, walls smashed and graphitied. It was probably worse than prison, more violent, lived in fear of being bashed every day. Most of the teachers were lazy, incompetent, didn't even try...High School in Melbourne.
This class is well behaved compared to a lot of Aussie classrooms. Because it wouldn’t just be Jonah, there’d be at least 2 or 3 other clowns interacting with him. Meanwhile, the good kids would give up on trying to do any work and just start talking and not really doing their work. You’d end up with a couple of kids doing the work, a handful just staring into space and the rest just watching the clowns and enjoying the show. Meanwhile the teacher will be seriously contemplating not coming back the next day and generally hating their life.
