Review: Clarence ‘Pilot’

Spoilers Below

Its Clarence’s first day at school and right away he hands out invites to a sleep-over to all of the kids and even invites the teacher. Unfortunately, no one seems to be coming over to the get-together and his mother leaves for the evening for a Tupperware party. Just when the slumber party looks hopeless we meet Jeff, a block-headed kid that comes on over and introduces Clarence to the thrills of game show television. We then meet a kid named Sumo that doesn’t seem to be a wrestler, and instead it looks as though he wants to help Jeff get crazy with rock and roll. Chad comes downstairs to join Jeffrey in his game show watching, but Sumo and Clarence capture the kid and force him to call 911 for a prank call. Eventually, the trio set up a pinata and everyone seems to enjoy this part of the show. However, the party gets interrupted when both the PD AND FD show up which causes a bee hive to explode and go nuts on the kids. Thankfully the kids don’t hold a grudge, and we now have three best friends.

Cartoon Network initially picked this series up at around the same time they picked up Steven Universe and Uncle Grandpa with more episodes coming in April, but of the three series, Clarence is maybe the most grounded. While everyone’s favorite grandpa is running around space in his magical RV and Steven is learning to harness the power of his crystal gem, Clarence is just trying to make friends at a new school. The concept lends itself to being maybe the more relatable animated series on broadcast television ala shows like The Simpsons, Bob’s Burgers, etc. This coming from Skyler Page whom used to work on Adventure Time.

Skyler’s character design style is actually very Matt Groening-like in that he creates characters that all look unique and disregards specific human detail in favor of adorable and recognizable silhouettes featuring block heads, round bodies, complete with chubby face-cheeks. The cast is a winner, right away I loved Skyler as ”Clarence”, but youngster Sean Giambrone as ”Jeff” is just as good as the resident voice veteran Jason Marsden who plays ”Sumo” and both offer a rather stark contrast which should be fun moving forward as we watch Clarence do his best in being friends with both.

Has Cartoon Network finally found its The Simpsons? It may be too early to know for sure, but the ingredients are here that could turn Clarence into the network’s biggest series yet.