Gumball's back. Am I gonna talk about it?

There's unrest in the streets. The planet is on fire. War, famine, Grok waifus. Em dashes are apparently a sign of AI writing now. And yet one question is on everyone's mind: will there be new Mattalamode Gumball reviews? 

It's an interesting question, and it's an interesting time for media in general that I'm not sure to how feel about. All of these shows that were so formative to me, and such a part of my life to the degree that they sort of shaped the person I became and what I've chosen to do with my life, are randomly coming back. Gumball is back. Regular Show is back. Adventure Time is on their twentieth spin-off. SpongeBob never left. There's a grimness to the notion that nothing ever changes, and I don't place any of that blame on the creative voices that have accompanied these shows' rebirth and continuations; it speaks to the depressing state of the industry, especially within animation. The value of new IP is at an all-time low. We've seen brilliant shows like JG Quintel's Close Enough and Guillaume Cassuto's Elliott From Earth get unceremoniously shitcanned, sometimes even leaving behind questions that will never be meaningfully answered. I'm not happy that this is seemingly all that these brilliantly gifted people can do, to resuscitate projects beyond their intended shelf lives and keep them going as if nothing ever happened—artistic freedom has been superseded by financial viability. 

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part X: 15-1

This is Part X of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part IX, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part IX: 24-16

This is Part IX of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part VIII, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part VIII: 49-25

This is Part VIII of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part VII, CLICK HERE.

Just a quick thing before we start up again: sorry for the list coming to a screeching halt over the past two months! I've been busy with college and this blog is a one-man operation, let alone one that I haven't made a cent off of. Hopefully the list will be complete before 2020, but I don't want to make any promises I can't 100% keep.

Now let's keep this enterprise rollin'.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part VII: 74-50

This is Part VII of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part VI, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part VI: 99-75

This is Part VI of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part V, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part V: 124-100

This is Part V of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part IV, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part IV: 149-125

This is Part IV of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part III, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part III: 179-150

This is Part III of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part II, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part II: 209-180

This is Part II of my definitive ranking of every episode of The Amazing World of Gumball. For Part I, and an explanation of what any of this is, CLICK HERE.

A Definitive Ranking of Every Episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, Part I: The Introduction + 240-210

Yes. I did it. I ranked all 240 episodes of The Amazing World of Gumball, from May 3rd, 2011 to June 24th, 2019.

(IF YOU WANT TO SKIP TO THE START OF THE LIST, SCROLL DOWN A LITTLE!)

I expect this to be sent to every person you know with the caption, "The fucking madman actually did it," regardless of if they know who I am, or if they've seen the show, or if they respond with "We haven't talked in a year, and I feel like we've been further apart than we used to, yet however much that initially hurt me, however much I had to step away from everything and learn to grow on my own... I'd like to keep it that way. Please delete my number." This is important.

Enough of the dramatics, though. I've been a fan of Gumball for several years now, and it's a very important, personal show to me. Since 2016, I've been writing about the series, episode to episode, meeting like-minded people and discovering things about myself. It's taught me almost everything I know about comedy; it even set forth my career trajectory and my aspirations of becoming a comedy writer, which I can only really liken to an enthusiastic but moderately-flammable ship. Basically, it's no understatement to say that a lot of my life decisions are indebted to the show.

With that all said, I decided that the best way to reaffirm my love for the show was this... I don't know either. But I wrote it! Since January, I've rewatched the entire series and carefully assembled my definitive ranking of every single episode of the show, from worst to best. But before we get started, here's a few things to keep in mind:

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Inquisition

"It's better this way."

You know an episode is a bit of a head-scratcher when you just sit back and don't know how to really comprehend what just happened, so I'll just start with a basic, two-word sentence. Cliffhangers, right?

Cliffhanger endings are scary, especially when you compound that with them being an unequivocal downer. Everything about "The Inquisition" throws the future of Gumball, not just as a series but as a franchise (if movie rumors turn out to be true), into doubt, and whether or not the finale yields anything else determines how much its ballsiness pays off. Before we really get into the nitty-gritty of all of that, though, and of all the abstract questions raised by the episode, by the show, and by the people behind the show itself, let's just talk about the episode for a minute, because finale or not... this is still a review. "The Inquisition" is fantastic.

Warning: major spoilers. You knew this.

It's hard to know just how much of the past six seasons of Gumball were really building to this exact point, but everything about the premise, and how it becomes increasingly dark and twisted, is perfect. Not only is the show tackling untapped territory which, at this point in the show, is sort of an intrinsically exciting rarity, but it's a master-class in deconstruction, with its humor more meta than ever before. This time, Gumball subverts its own visual identity, with its vibrant cartoon characters existing in a photorealistically-rendered world, by acknowledging that its characters are an anomaly. While their irregularity and individuality makes them charming and who they are, it also means that, as their world comes to a screeching halt, none of them will survive.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The BFFS

"What are you doing?" "Oh, just looking for a darn to give."

It's so weird to think that we're one episode away from the end of the series, and that, come the 24th, I'll never write a standalone review of the show ever again. Certainly not helping with that general weirdness is the fact that "The BFFS" doesn't feel like the penultimate episode the show. In fact, it barely feels like anything. At best, it feels like a disappointment. Maybe I just didn't have enough darns in my darn pocket, but this was a strange one, and not necessarily in a great way.

Certainly not helping is the premise of Gumball's first best friend, Fuzzy, knocking on his door one day, with the two reconnecting, much to Darwin's immediate discomfort. There's a lot wrong about the premise itself in that it forces us to pretend that there's a logical reason Gumball would even have a best friend as a toddler that went completely unmentioned over the past 238 episodes, let alone that friends you have as a toddler don't really add up to anything, because we all know that toddlers are stupid. (I said it. We were all thinking it.) Even so, though, beyond having to suspend your disbelief, "The BFFS" just feels rocky on a lot of other fronts.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Decisions

"There! I made a decision to do... exactly what that guy told me... ugh."

Self-awareness in late seasons of a TV show is something of a double-edged sword. In some cases, it comes across as smarmy, making fun of your show's own failings without making any proper amendments to fix them, but in other cases, it's a step towards fixing some deeper-set issues. Whether or not "The Decisions" was able to symbolically fix up Darwin's spotty history as a character over the past few seasons of sidelining, it's far more in the latter lane than the former.

Darwin's always been something of a difficult character for the show to grapple with. While there are some pretty solid spotlights here and there, most recently with "The Sucker," he's relegated to a supporting role without even the faintest bit of influence over what's going on too many times to count, and while he once had a fun level of tact in that role (like in "The Hug," by calling out Gumball's idiocy), the past two seasons have eroded most of that away, making him a pleasant but biteless partner-in-crime. That's what makes "The Decisions" so exciting in its self-awareness: Darwin finally realizes that all he does is whatever Gumball tells him, and he needs to learn how to forge his own path in life.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Revolt

"STOP OBJECTIFYING OBJECTS!"

Remember how, in my last review, I said that when all is right, Gumball's writers sure know how to make an episode fly? Yeah... this is what happens when that fails.

Gumball is, indisputably, a show that puts comedy first, and there's nothing inherently wrong with that. Whereas cartoons are generally headed in a more serious, narratively-driven direction, Gumball is one of the last strong shows working episodically with the central focus of being fun, and that prevents it from being as weighed down as its contemporaries in the sense that anything can happen. While that usually plays out to the show's benefit, though, there's a lot of ways it can go wrong, with writers instead using the opportunity to go sloppily apeshit in pursuit of some self-destructive idea that works against the show, because as I said, anything can happen, right?

"The Revolt" isn't just one of those episodes: it's the epitome of everything going as roughly as you could imagine. It suffers every single issue that a Gumball episode possibly could, and whereas there's quite a few episodes that unfortunately fall victim to a few issues, "The Revolt's" licked a few too many doorknobs, and it's just sweltering with grotesque infection.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Heart

"What seemed sweet has turned out to be lethally toxic, like feeding a chocolate cake to a puppy, next to the tailpipe of a 4x4, in the middle of an oil spill, while reading it Elmore Stream comments."

It's surprising how many recent episodes have made efforts to be legitimately sweet or optimistic in one way or another. "The Heart" is the latest installment to take that direction, serving to bury the hatchet between Mr. Robinson and his toxic relationship with Gumball and Darwin by reaching into the emotional core, or rather the lack thereof, of his character.

It's an exciting development considering how repetitive and nonsensical the Watterson brothers' infatuation with him is. It feels like one of the few major elements from the show's first season that's really survived this far into the program, with episodes centered around him often going in the same direction: Gumball and Darwin give him nothing but love, but he isn't having any of it. "The Heart" reaches an interesting fork in the road, though, by forcing them to realize that Mr. Robinson has never loved them, and it crushes their souls. Not only does that freeze up the normal route these sorts of episodes like to take, but it pushes Mr. Robinson into the spotlight as an unlikely protagonist, and the new angle does wonders.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Mess

"Ask me for anything you like and I'll buy it for you!" "I would like the golden twinkle in an old man's eye as he holds his infant granddaughter." "What?" 

For whatever reason, Gumball's writers really like making Gumball sleep-deprived for quick jokes. The good news, though, is that they do it incredibly well, and evolving his sleep-deprivation into a full-fledged, conceptual episode alongside Darwin was a smart way to elevate the gag with some new wrinkles added to the formula. Fueled—or, I guess, the opposite of that, really—by a night of video-watching, Gumball and Darwin are tasked with watching Penny's sister, Polly (making her first major appearance in an episode) though they fade in and out of consciousness repeatedly, losing Polly along the way and awakening every minute somewhere else, in the middle of a new scenario with an inexplicable lack of context.

That's the game of "The Mess," and it's a ton of stupid fun. Watching Gumball and Darwin run around at only half of their mental power is already fun enough, allowing for more interesting dialogue and an all-around weirder narrative, but centering it around them attempting (and failing) to babysit Polly adds a nice sense of urgency to everything. It's just a terrible day, but amplified up a thousand times, and that kind of idea is right up the show's alley.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Web

"Feel the doom impending / 'Cuz stupidity is #trending."

There's a lot of problems with "The Web" in a lot of different directions. This is the series' long-overdue (though not at all necessary) satirical take on the boomer-millennial/gen-Z gap in understanding technology, and while that does allow the episode to find some interesting beats along the way, there's too many compromises being made for certain jokes to land or have any merit.

Not that, realistically, that's anything new for the past season. As much as I will defend a lot of the show's stranger episodes, there's been a concurrent trend of changing core qualities in its characters, most often their intelligence, to make odder premises work. (Think back to "The Wish" just a few weeks ago.) This time, though, Nicole is the unfortunate victim, getting spun into an archetypal boomer parent with a complete misunderstanding of tech terms, and it's a bad look on her and the show.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Agent

"Your name?" "Watterson. Gumball Watterson." "Is that all one word or with a hyphen?" "What?" "Like 'Watterson Gumball Watterson' or 'Watterson Gumball hyphen Watterson.'"

Nothing goes together like Gumball and Gumball pretending to be something else entirely. That's not even a joke: some of the series' greatest entries are its genre-swapping episodes, turning a run-of-the-mill day in Elmore into anything from a horror movie to detective noir, fully committing to stylistic mimicry while retaining the heart of the show's comedy. "The Agent" is the latest entry to follow suit (spy pun unintended but welcome), and while it's not one for the books, it's undoubtedly a strong outing.

This time, Gumball and Darwin get to play dress-up in a send-up of James Bond movies from the moment the episode starts, with Gumball's entry framed through the barrel of a toilet paper roll. Admittedly, I'm not the biggest expert on the franchise, with my knowledge pretty much limited to a handful of Mitchell and Webb sketches and old GoldenEye 007 cartridge-tilting videos that I thought were hilarious when I was 14, but it's clear to see that "The Agent" was as much a labor of love as its colleagues: the winning writer threesome of Richard Overall, Mic Graves, and Tony Hull (credit where credit's due) finds a great middle ground between what they're spoofing and the sensibilities of a more traditional episode. The best genre parody episodes, after all, are the ones that can be unequivocally appreciated regardless of your familiarity with the subject matter, and if I'm any indication, "The Agent" really gets the job done, featuring an awesome Thunderball-inspired title sequence and handfuls of excessively circumstantial, Bond-esque witticisms.

The Amazing World of Gumball Review: The Factory

"If you're not back in two minutes, we'll move your desk to a bathroom stall." "I know you mean that as a threat, but as we're not allowed to take bathroom breaks, it would technically be an improvement."

An episode centered around the Rainbow Factory has been teased for quite a while, so expectations of "The Factory" were fairly high. This was our chance to find out about one of Elmore's few locations that has never been properly explored, after all, and it's a factory that makes rainbows! Obviously, knowing Gumball, there's something a lot more shady afoot, but it was all a matter of trying to figure out what. The answer: it's pretty much like anywhere else, if not painfully sugar-coated.

Thankfully, though, "The Factory," even if a fairly traditional episode, was able to key into the funner aspects of a change in location. Everything, plot-wise, is fairly straightforward: Nicole has to negotiate with the CEOs of the Rainbow Factory to make sure it doesn't get shut down, and Gumball and Darwin do their silly little Gumball and Darwin thing of tagging along without being asked. They're definitely made more naive here than usual, acting more like kids without the faintest bit of cynicism, but focusing on the more juvenile aspects of their personality works well enough here, especially in the episode's musical number.