Remember “Clone High?” Well they’re rebooting it. For those unfamiliar, the premise of this early 2000’s, one-season wonder is a secret organization has made clones of historical figures that must endure high school together under their mad scientist principal, Scudworth (Phil Lord, writer for “The Lego Movie”). The episodes mostly satirize teen dramas and after school specials, while chronicling the lives of the the main characters, who are, of course, clones: Abe Lincoln (Will Forte, “The Last Man on Earth”), Joan of Arc (Nicole Sullivan, “Black-ish”), and, uh, Gandhi (Michael McDonald, “The Loud House”). There’s a lot to unpack here.
As far as execution, the show is like “Dawson’s Creek” by way of “Total Drama Island” with a dash of Dexter’s Laboratory or maybe Spongebob thrown in. If that all sounds incongruous and awkward, it’s because it is. While on paper the idea sounds compelling, “Clone High” suffers from a multitude of problems that end up making it just okay.
The humor, while at times endearing and quite inventive, is often too scattered and random to build on itself or have a consistent tone, leaving about half of the jokes stuck in this confusing purgatory where they aren’t really bad, nor funny. The writing often feels like it is on the cusp of being cohesive. As the show goes on, there’s also an increase in on-screen violence and gore, which is jarring when compared to the tone of the rest of the show. As a show from the early 2000’s there are a few uncomfortable jokes that have definitely not aged well. Such as, making Eleanor Roosevelt a predatory lesbian gym teacher.
The show is treading on uncertain ground by casting religious and socio-political figures as rambunctious teenagers. As a result, you need exceptionally clever writing to make it palatable, and “Clone High” just doesn’t have that. That isn’t to say it’s bad, but its focus on repetitive gags, juvenal satire, and randomness leaves viewers left to wonder why these characters needed to be clones at all. For instance, Gandhi is the obligatory overconfident loser, a creative choice which did not exactly sit well with Indian viewers. While the show at one point has him explain that he is this way because he feels he can’t live up to the real Gandhi, that’s all we get. As he brings it up once and then it is never expanded upon. This is a consistent problem with all of the characters. The show doesn’t feel as committed to the premise as it should, and as a result the premise ends up feeling more like a gimmick than anything else.
Criticisms in mind, it would be jumping the gun to say a reboot is necessarily a bad idea. After all, the original writers and creators are being brought on for the project, and with years more of experience now under their belt, a new and improved version of the show’s initially half-baked concept might be just what it needs to realize its full potential. After all, these were the guys who made it possible for “The Lego Movie” to be a solid piece of entertainment, and Phil Lord co-wrote “Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse,” which as we all know was wonderful. Because of how unique the show was, there’s a lot of potential for something really great to come out of this. Maybe “Clone High” wasn’t quite ready for the world when it first came out, but that’s not to say it never will be. A fresh start could be just what it needs to become the next big adult animated series.
Photo from Vulture
