The Nerd Quadrilateral Variety Show

Three former Gophers and one former Bass had put their heads together to create a variety show, performed by nerds, for nerds. Some of the negotiations were more pleasant than others. Harold was the original show runner, and he told Cody to come join the show. He was more than happy to join, but he wanted to make sure that Noah signed on too. Harold had no problem with this, but Noah did.

"I don't want to be on another show with Harold; he'll hog all the screen time and will never shut up," Noah said.

"I will," Harold said, "Probably."

"Come on," Cody said, "It'll be fun!"

Somehow Noah could not say no to Cody. "Okay," Noah said, and then he signed on.

Beth was the easiest of all to negotiate with—she would get to be on a show with three cute geeks, and no other girls! She had to say yes to the offer. Though early in development, Harold and Cody had pondered letting Courtney join the show, she had adamantly refused the offer to "humiliate herself" some more by being on a show with them—before they even brought it up to her.

"It's okay," Harold said, "We don't need that Duncan-lover anyway."

"Yeah," the Gopher geeks responded in unison.

Harold's vision was that the shows would come with a basic formula; there would be several short sketches, as well as the following recurring segments: Harold performing a nerdcore song, Noah reading a poem, Cody dancing, and Beth doing a trick.

The pilot revealed the opening, which included among other things, calculus problems, quotations from Romantic and Victorian poets, Greek, Arabic, and Japanese letters, and algorithms for chemistry, floating in a background of changing colors—first purple, then red, then green, then yellow, then blue—along with the title, "THE NERD QUADRILATERAL VARIETY SHOW starring BETH, CODY, HAROLD, and NOAH".

The scene went to a curtain, in front of which Harold was standing. He said, to the general direction of the audience, "Hello, and welcome to the Nerd Quadrilateral Variety Show. I'm Harold. You might remember me from such reality shows as Total Drama Island. Well, today, my fellow nerds and I are bringing you an entirely different kind of show that actually does not insult your intelligence!"

The audience applauded. Harold smirked, although that was not scripted. He almost got so distracted he forgot what he was doing, but luckily managed to say, "Enjoy the show." He walked off-screen while the curtain was pulled up.

It was dark, almost too dark to see. If one looked hard enough, he could just barely see Cody's chin and mouth, where he could possibly pick out tiny fangs. He was covered in a dark hoodie, with his hood down over his forehead, casting shadows on his eyes. He was sitting on the sidewalk.

"I will never live it down," Cody said, "What if Gwen finds out what happened to me."

A flashback was shown. Cody was walking down the street when he suddenly got ambushed by Noah in a vampire costume—ridiculous showy cape, fangs that looked almost too big for him to carry, a ludicrous black wig, and so much white makeup he looked like a mime—and screamed.

Noah, in an over-the-top faux-Romanian accent said, "I will suck your blood."

"Oh, my god!" Cody shouted, "Not my blood!" He then started to run away, but it was too late. Noah had Cody pinned to the ground—or, he would have if Cody wasn't actually struggling before Noah touched him—and then "bit" him on the neck—although two audience members (Izzy and Trent) believed it was an actual hickey.

The flashback ended, and Cody was sitting down, when Beth, dressed in a pseudo-believable Gwen costume that might have worked if she wasn't wearing glasses or of a ridiculously dissimilar build. She said to Cody, "Hey Cody, nice costume!"

Cody then said, under his breath, "I wish it were a costume," prompting Beth to give him a weird look.

"What?" she asked.

"Oh, nothing…" he responded, and walked away. He sighed. "Gwen would never love me if she knew I was a vampire… at least not one like this."

The curtain came down. Harold took the center stage once again. "Wasn't that swell, people? Now, here's a song that I like to call Simpson's Paradox."

"This should prove interesting," Noah said sarcastically.

"Don't get impressed by the numbers," Harold rapped, "Because sometimes numbers lie. When the basic count is lower, sometimes percentages are high. I can give you an example, with a not-so-random sample, but the people I fought ample; in Total Drama Action, my team got but a fraction, but when I got to World Tour, my last team had gotten much more; the difference in percentages is around forty-five but the numbers were the same; six is the number on each team that continued in the game. And one who is in the know always chalks it up to Simpson's Paradox."

"Woo-hoo!" Noah shouted, "Sing us another! We're dying to be condescended upon. Also, those of us who didn't already know about Simpson's Paradox totally got your song."

"GOSH!" Harold shouted, "I had an entire other verse planned, but you know what, you're ruining everything! Fine! If you don't let me sing Simpson's Paradox, then I'm going to start the next sketch. You know the Studies Show sketch."

"Please don't make me do that one," Noah pleaded, "Cody wrote it as a joke."

"Noah, you were being immature during my nerdcore song, so now we have to do the Studies Show sketch," Harold said.

Noah grumbled, but grudgingly accepted.

The two of them stormed off stage only to reappear behind the curtain once it was lifted. Noah was reading a book, and Harold was on a computer. The background was minimalistic, containing nothing but a white box for the computer to sit on, a brown box for Noah to sit on, and a blue wall.

Harold turned to Noah and asked, "Did you know that studies show that being born last in a long line of siblings makes you shorter?"

Noah rolled his eyes, and said, "Tell me something I don't know." He continued reading his book, while Harold continued to be on the computer.

Then he turned to Noah again, and asked, "Did you know that studies show that being born last in a long line of siblings makes you dumber?"

Noah looked up at Harold and said in a very snide manner, "Yeah! Right!" He then turned back to his book, when Harold went back to the computer.

After about ten seconds he gasped, and then he turned to Noah again. He asked, "Did you know that studies show that being born last in a long line of brothers makes you gay?"

Noah, looking very helpless and awkward at this point, stutters out, "Y-you shut up."

The audience laughed. This caused Noah to hide his face and walk off stage indignantly. "That's the last time I'll ever interrupt Harold's song," he muttered under his breath.

"Well, I guess it's time for a word from our sponsors!" Harold said, and then walked offstage. He talked to Cody. "I don't know what's wrong with Noah. It was all scripted. No one thinks it's real."

"Um, yeah," Cody said, "If you look at the script I wrote for it, it says that he's supposed to tell you to shut up, but it says nothing about embellishing it with embarrassment. Considering how much he hated doing that skit, I'd say he'd be willing to phone it in, so we can't chalk it up to being an excellent actor—that embarrassment was genuine. And believe me, I can sympathize." He glanced away from Harold slightly, "That's why I didn't want you to actually put it in the show."

"He started it!" Harold insisted, "This was supposed to be a scripted show. You know, something entirely different from the shows we were on earlier! But no, Statler over there can't go through anything without heckling it."

"No offense intended, Fozzie Bear," Noah said, reappearing, "But you do realize that our viewers are supposed to be nerds that don't need to be taught everything. Also, Statler needs a Waldorf to function, and I can heckle on my own accord!"

"Guys, please quit fighting," Cody said, "You do realize that by alluding to the Muppet Show, you guys are alluding to a variety show with heckling that worked?"

Noah said, "Hey, I never questioned that it worked."

Harold sighed. Then Cody asked, "Hey, where's Beth?"

Where was Beth, indeed? She had locked herself in the greenroom and she was fantasizing about having a romantic relationship with all of her cast mates at the same time. It made her so distracted she forgot about the show.

Noah went to search the west side, while Cody searched the east, and Harold searched the north. Whoever finished first was to search the south if Beth was not found. Unfortunately, it was at this moment that the first commercial break ended.