7.3/10. It's Clone High, so it's not as though this wasn't fun and funny in equal measure, but it was a bit of a letdown as the show's final episode. Sure, it works surprisingly well as a finale in terms of both providing something of a conclusion to the show's premise, and paying off, if not exactly resolving the series's romantic plot threads. But the problem is that the show starts playing those teen show tropes straight rather than just making fun of them, and it hasn't really earned that.
That's not to say that I don't like Abe and Joan and even JFK (especially here) a bit, but I was never really invested in their relationship as anything more than fodder for comedy and parodying the *Dawson's Creek*s of the world. So the tragedy of Abe realizing that he loves Joan and only realizing and trying to tell her when it's too late could be used for hilarious purposes, and instead is mostly done for pathos and twists.
I like that twist, at least a little. There's something about the fact that Abe only realizes that he likes Joan after she changes the way she looks and acts that didn't sit right with me, or at least didn't make me necessarily root for the two of them to get together. I chalked it up to the usual teen movie shenanigans and didn't really worry about it, but the fact that JFK basically calls this out was a pleasant surprise. The problem is that I'm not necessarily convinced Joan would sleep with a pig like JFK if it weren't plot convenient, even if you can sort of handwave it with her being in a difficult emotional state and the rush and expectations of prom.
That's really the problem with this episode, though -- it wants to play in an emotional space that the show hasn't really set up. Between Bill Lawrence with Scrubs and Lord & Miller with Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and The Lego Movie, the folks behind Clone High have shown that they can definitely balance comedy and sentiment with aplomb. But that's just never been this series' M.O., and that means that little details like Gandhi having a similar realization to Abe vis-a-vis Marie Curie come off flat and less-than-compelling.
I'm not going to sit here and say that I come to Clone High to laugh and not to feel. Some of the funniest animated shows of recent vintage: Futurama, Archer, and Bob's Burgers can make you laugh your ass off, but also be patently heartbreaking or sweetly sentimental. Clone High has just never pitched itself as that -- with characters who are more comedy and teen show archetypes that help the stories move and the jokes land than ones who I imagine have rich inner lives and complicated romantic feelings.
Most of the laughs are still there. Scudworth clashing with Stamos yet again and the shadowy government figures being thwarted with a well-timed conga line had the show's delightfully absurd spirit. Gandhi getting a prom group together and pulling the same "sun roof" move as a bevvy of his compatriots (including a return appearance from Teen Wolf!) was very funny. Marie Curie talking about how her date, Rock Hudson, was off showing Oscar Wilde something was worth a chuckle and Toots has stealthily become the show's most consistent source of dumb but potent humor.
The issue is that for a finale, Clone High seemed to want emotional investment in its characters' romantic lives rather than comedic investment in them, and it hadn't really developed them enough for that. It's fine to make your characters two-dimensional at best with some stock character beats, especially when you're making fun of those same stock beats that pop up in countless teen shows. But you can't then turn around, try to play those beats straight, and expect the audience to be on board. It's a solid, but underwhelming end to this endlessly hilarious, cut down before its time show.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP9BlockedParent2016-11-03T19:40:13Z
7.3/10. It's Clone High, so it's not as though this wasn't fun and funny in equal measure, but it was a bit of a letdown as the show's final episode. Sure, it works surprisingly well as a finale in terms of both providing something of a conclusion to the show's premise, and paying off, if not exactly resolving the series's romantic plot threads. But the problem is that the show starts playing those teen show tropes straight rather than just making fun of them, and it hasn't really earned that.
That's not to say that I don't like Abe and Joan and even JFK (especially here) a bit, but I was never really invested in their relationship as anything more than fodder for comedy and parodying the *Dawson's Creek*s of the world. So the tragedy of Abe realizing that he loves Joan and only realizing and trying to tell her when it's too late could be used for hilarious purposes, and instead is mostly done for pathos and twists.
I like that twist, at least a little. There's something about the fact that Abe only realizes that he likes Joan after she changes the way she looks and acts that didn't sit right with me, or at least didn't make me necessarily root for the two of them to get together. I chalked it up to the usual teen movie shenanigans and didn't really worry about it, but the fact that JFK basically calls this out was a pleasant surprise. The problem is that I'm not necessarily convinced Joan would sleep with a pig like JFK if it weren't plot convenient, even if you can sort of handwave it with her being in a difficult emotional state and the rush and expectations of prom.
That's really the problem with this episode, though -- it wants to play in an emotional space that the show hasn't really set up. Between Bill Lawrence with Scrubs and Lord & Miller with Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and The Lego Movie, the folks behind Clone High have shown that they can definitely balance comedy and sentiment with aplomb. But that's just never been this series' M.O., and that means that little details like Gandhi having a similar realization to Abe vis-a-vis Marie Curie come off flat and less-than-compelling.
I'm not going to sit here and say that I come to Clone High to laugh and not to feel. Some of the funniest animated shows of recent vintage: Futurama, Archer, and Bob's Burgers can make you laugh your ass off, but also be patently heartbreaking or sweetly sentimental. Clone High has just never pitched itself as that -- with characters who are more comedy and teen show archetypes that help the stories move and the jokes land than ones who I imagine have rich inner lives and complicated romantic feelings.
Most of the laughs are still there. Scudworth clashing with Stamos yet again and the shadowy government figures being thwarted with a well-timed conga line had the show's delightfully absurd spirit. Gandhi getting a prom group together and pulling the same "sun roof" move as a bevvy of his compatriots (including a return appearance from Teen Wolf!) was very funny. Marie Curie talking about how her date, Rock Hudson, was off showing Oscar Wilde something was worth a chuckle and Toots has stealthily become the show's most consistent source of dumb but potent humor.
The issue is that for a finale, Clone High seemed to want emotional investment in its characters' romantic lives rather than comedic investment in them, and it hadn't really developed them enough for that. It's fine to make your characters two-dimensional at best with some stock character beats, especially when you're making fun of those same stock beats that pop up in countless teen shows. But you can't then turn around, try to play those beats straight, and expect the audience to be on board. It's a solid, but underwhelming end to this endlessly hilarious, cut down before its time show.