Michael Kelso

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Michael Kelso (right) and Jackie Burkhart

Michael Kelso (born circa 1959) is a fictional character from Fox Network's That '70s Show, played by Ashton Kutcher. Tall, lanky and long-haired, he is the dim-witted pretty-boy of the group, coasting through life on his good looks. His behavior is very much in line with a stereotypical oversexed lunkhead or mimbo (male-bimbo). Kelso has surprised many by scoring higher on his SATs than his other friends and providing a surprising amount of knowledge regarding the workings of Pong to Red. On one occasion, the episode The Keg, he displayed an ability to do quick math when properly motivated (beer and money). It is possible he is named after Kutcher's real life brother.

Apart from being unintelligent, Kelso has also been known to be quite sensitive. In one episode, Jackie talked him into wearing a leather jacket, believing him to look like Marlon Brando while wearing said jacket. His new piece of apparel led his friends to make fun of him for looking like the Fonz from "Happy Days", however, and he kept sulking every time someone brought up this supposed similarity. This trait was also shown after an off-screen accident with mashed potatoes in the school cafeteria led to the nickname "Tater Nuts", which he greatly despised.

Kelso failed the first grade for his refusal to write in cursive and lied about his age ever since. On a trip to potential colleges he said he had been dropped on his head as a child. In the year 3 season premiere Reefer Madness Kelso was shown smoking in a flashback as a 13 year old and he states that he's now lost all interest in school and academic aspirations, suggesting that he wasn't always as dumb as he often appears to be.Though in one flashback it shows him as a young boy who shows up at the Foremans with no pants since he forgot to put them on contradicting the earlier flashbacks that showed him as a smart geek when he was younger. Because he has kept his real age a secret from the rest of the gang (at least until a Halloween episode), everyone else now holds a grudge against Kelso because he did not use his age to their advantage and buy them beer.

Kelso's interests include smoking marijuana, watching Christmas cartoons, playing with Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots, playing Atari, buying toy dinosaurs, and dreaming of being a spaceman. Kelso also engages in incredibly stupid activities of his own design, such as skiing off the tops of moving cars, and sliding down a rocky hill in a canoe. He seems to have an affinity for falling off the town water tower, and even does so on purpose in the series finale. He has suffered all sorts of consequences for his idiocy (everything from gluing his hand to the Formans' fridge to burning himself while underwater) but apparently by dumb luck manages to avoid being seriously hurt or killed.

Kelso accidentally shot Eric Forman's pet hamster, Snowball, with a BB gun. Later he shot Hyde. There is also one time in which Hyde shoots Kelso in the leg. Hyde and Kelso's fights usually end with Hyde damaging Kelso's eyes, prompting him to shout "Ah, my eye!", or a variation of such. Kelso once wore a pair of goggles to avoid this, but Hyde still beat him up.

When the show started he was dating Jackie Burkhart a popular and self-centered cheerleader. The two lost their virginity to each other after Kelso and his friends got out of jail for riding in a car that was mistaken for being stolen. Jackie gets on Kelso's friends' nerves on a daily basis and Kelso repeatedly said that he was going to break up with her. But Jackie beat him to it and broke up with him after a pregnancy scare. They got back together later. Then in Season 2, Kelso began an affair with Eric's promiscuous sister, Laurie, about which Jackie eventually found out and subsequently broke up with him again. Later in Season 3 however, Jackie decided to test Kelso to see if they should get back together, which they did. Then, in Season 4, after Kelso had neglected Jackie, Eric caught her kissing her boss, and held it over her head. Kelso eventually found out, and went to ambush Jackie's boss, not knowing he was a blackbelt. Kelso is beaten up by Jackie's boss, and he is angry at her for a while, until she tells him to find out why he cheated. She says she cheated because she was neglected. Kelso finds out he cheated because Jackie always insulted him and made him feel bad about himself, and broke up with her because he felt he couldn't be with someone who made him feel like that. It didn't last, as they got back together shortly after. Then in the Season 4 finale, Jackie asked Kelso to marry him, but Kelso freaked out and left for California with Donna. When he returned in the beginning of Season 5 he found out that Jackie had moved onto Hyde, which made him extremely jealous, and he spent the majority of the season trying to get her back. By the beginning of Season 6 however, Kelso had finally gotten over Jackie and was fine with just being friends with her.

Kelso loves a good burn as much as the next guy, even when the burn is at his expense, but generally he doesn't mean to severely hurt someone, which he often does but most of the time he hurts people by an accident through virtue of his innate stupidity rather than by design. It is clear from Jackie and Kelso's relationship that Kelso definitely is not the one wearing the pants in his relationships; he is easily manipulated (Laurie pointed this out once and called him a "tool") and never fulfills his promise of breaking up with his girlfriend, although the latter may simply be because he is afraid to break a woman's heart. When he dates Annette (played by Jessica Simpson), he even remarked "It's good to be under someone's thumb again!" with a grin, suggesting his prefers his women to be controlling.

In the sixth season opener, it's revealed that Kelso is allergic to eggs- right after he downs a glass of raw eggs. Also in the sixth season a plotline was added that made Kelso the illegitimate father of a baby girl, Betsy, (conceived in a bathroom at a Molly Hatchet concert). Shannon Elizabeth guest-starred as Brooke, the mother of the child, in several episodes during that year.

His character became a policeman, albeit a bumbling one. He attempted to take his job seriously by growing a mustache and calling himself "Mike", but was quickly reverted when Hyde and Fez cut his mustache and made him resemble Adolf Hitler. He eventually set the police academy on fire via a flare gun, and even before then, broke into the academy and lost his supervisor's squad car. Consequently, Kelso is kicked off the force, prompting him to accept a job as a security guard for a Chicago-based playboy bunny like club from the sleazy owner who is played by guest star Bruce Willis (ex-husband to Ashton's real life wife Demi Moore). He was promoted as the "supervisor" where he would be the one warning customers "Don't touch that".

Michael Kelso showed up for the series finale of That '70s Show, which aired Thursday, May 18, 2006. He joined Fez and Hyde in the water tower and was tricked into jumping off the tower as was done in previous episodes. He explained to them that he felt he had to come back: "It's like the turn of the century, Man!" He is the last person seen on the show before the end credits.

[edit] Family

Kelso's maternal grandmother's name is Betsy whom his daughter is probably named after. He has an older brother, Casey Kelso (Luke Wilson) and it's known he has at least two more brothers and at least one sister. One of the brothers is older, possibly the eldest and the other is subsequently younger. In all he has six siblings. Both his mother and grandmother have, in Kelso's words, "big honkin' whiskers." Kelso's dad appeared in one episode, entitled "Career Day."

That '70s Show

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