Recap / Clone High S1E06 "Homecoming: A Shot in the D'Arc"

Teletoon air date: 11/24/2002

MTV air date: 2/24/2003

Written by: Eric Kentoff

Clone High's basketball team is facing steep competition from rival school GESH (Genetically Engineered Super Humans), especially now that Principal Scudworth has made a high-steaks bet with GESH's principal on whether or not the clones can score a single point this season. Scudworth decides to crack the whip on the basketball team, but despite her natural skills, Joan isn't allowed to join because the rules don't allow girls or animals. Instead, she dons a clever disguise and, under the assumed name John Dark, joins the team, leading them to great success. Meanwhile, Gandhi, severely pissed about GESH defacing the school's banner, goes after the rival school's mascot ("Because if Mahatma Gandhi stands for anything, it's revenge!"), only to discovered that it's actually a genetically engineered monster and become attached to it.

The tropes don't allow girls or animals:

• Absurdly High-Stakes Game: Parodied. Principal Scudworth and Colonel Principal decide to raise the stakes of their previous bet, which was Scudworth's first-born son, to "loser does the winner's laundry for a week."
• Ambiguously Bi: After JFK's initial worries, he adapts to the prospect of being gay pretty quickly. Cleo, too, doesn't seem too put out about almost having sex with Joan.
• Animal Athlete Loophole: Inverted for the purpose of a You Go, Girl!! moment by Clone High's actual sports team, which explicitly prohibits "girls and animals" from playing on the team (considering it's supposed to be boys' basketball). A lot of those players have fine mustaches...
• As Themselves: Sportscasters Chris Berman and Dan Patrick as the school basketball announcers.
• Attractive Bent-Gender: Parodied. Joan doesn't look any different as John Dark than she normally does, but both JFK and Cleo are insatiably attracted to "him."
• Bilingual Bonus: Lampshaded by George Washington Carver, John Dark is meant to sound like Jeanne d'Arc, Joan of Arc's French name. Also makes the title a Stealth Pun.
• Bloody Hilarious: Geshi's... violent eating habits, which include skewering baby birds with a blade from his snout and inhaling the flesh off of a moose. There's also Principal Scudworth presumably killing the previous basketball coach with his bare hands off-screen.
• Body Horror: Geshi, the GESH High mascot, was genetically engineered with a zipper to resemble a mascot costume more. If someone pulls on the zipper, all his organs fall out.
• …But He Sounds Handsome: "John Dark" attempt to talk Abe into dating his more attractive friend Joan of Arc.
  "Forget Cleo! She's a skanky ho. You should date... Joan of Arc!"
• Comically Missing the Point: "[I]f Mahatma Gandhi stands for anything, it's revenge!"
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: JFK telling his fathers that he wants to watch Will & Grace with them is framed to sound as if he's coming out.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: After Joan overcomes a sexist (and speciesist) school rule and scores the winning shot, the rest of the students all cheer for their hero: Abe! Because he gave Joan an inspiring speech.
• Erotic Eating: Cleo attempts to seduce "John Dark" by seductively eating a banana and whipped cream. And pouring a carton of milk all over herself.
• Even the Guys Want Him: JFK is attracted to "John Dark" and has an existential crisis over the possibility that he's attracted to men, but it's only because "John" is just Joan with a mustache.
• Girl on Girl Is Hot: After Joan reveals herself, Cleo is grossed out be the thought of almost having sex with her, but after a second though admits that it would've been hot.
• Gag Penis: While in the men's locker room, Joan at first snickers at Napoleon, implied to have a teeny weenie, then looks on incredulously at Genghis Khan, whose walk is accompanied by what sounds like a boulder being dragged.
• Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today?: JFK becomes increasingly self-conscious about his attraction to "John Dark," first attempting to distract from the homo-eroticism of the men's locker room by swapping sexcapades stories with the other students. When that doesn't work, he tells "John" that he's "open for anything." Of course, the second Joan reveals that she was John the whole time, JFK drops any notion that he might be attracted to men.
• I Am a Humanitarian: The (off-screen) fate of Scudworth's son.
  Scudworth: "By the way, how is Brian?"
  Colonel Principal: (eating what looks like ground beef) "De-liscious!"
• Insignia Rip-Off Ritual: Scudworth does this with the insignia on Abe's basketball jacket.
• Internal Reveal: Inverted for the sake of comedy. Joan is never seen putting on or removing the disguise until the end, and when she does, it's given a long, dramatic reveal to imply that even you, the audience, fell for it!
• Killer Rabbit: Geshi, the genetically engineered mascot for GESH, looks like an odd but cuddly creature, but is actually a vicious predator when left on its own.
• Major Injury Underreaction: Geshi bites the arm off a referee and the only reaction he has is to signal a foul, using his recently detached limb no less.
• Mathematician's Answer: Mr. Butlertron gives one to Joan while comforting her.
  Mr. B: What would the real Joan of Arc have done?
  Joan: She'd have listened to her heart... and then gotten burned at the stake. But, y'know, what are the odds of that happening?
  Mr. B: Thirty-eight percent.
  (Joan looks at him in shock)
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Joan's "John Dark" disguise is nothing more than a fake mustache, a backwards baseball cap and a fake deep voice. It fools everyone, to the point that nobody believes her confession until she takes off the mustache. Afterwards, Scudworth tells every team member in a fake mustache to get off the court... and all of them are animals in fake mustaches (and Groucho Marx)!
• Putting on the Reich: GESH has a very Nazi-esque aesthetic, complete with red-and-white flags embroidered with angular "G"s meant to resemble swastikas.
• Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: After "John Dark" reveals herself, Scudworth just shrugs it off and decides to change the "no girls" rule that he himself made up.
• Shout-Out: "John Dark"'s story about "his" clone counterpart ends with him finding the Statue Of Liberty and realizing "he'd been on Earth the whole time."
• Sweet on Polly Oliver: JFK and Cleo, towards "John Dark".
• Sweet Polly Oliver: Joan as "John Dark." Played for laughs since everyone is too dense to get that they're the same person until Joan removes her fake mustache.
• Take That!: Chris Berman comments that he's never seen anything as disgraceful as GESH defacing Clone High's banner, reminding the crowd that he was in Eddie, the movie where Whoopi Goldberg coached the Knicks.
• Totem Pole Trench: Napoleon and Taft attempt this. And unlike "John Dark," nobody is fooled.
• Unsettling Gender-Reveal: JFK is rather put off by the "piece of fresh tail" turning around and revealing "his" big bushy mustache. Subverted in that it's Joan in a Paper-Thin Disguise.
• Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Parodied. Abe attempts to shove "John Dark" but because he's really a girl, Abe ends up pushing himself to the ground in his vain efforts, meaning he's incapable of hitting a girl.
• You Go, Girl!: Joan of Arc disguises herself as a boy by putting on a cap, t-shirt, and mustache, and calling herself "John D'Arc" so she can play for the boy's basketball team, since they don't allow girls or animals. When her disguise is blown, Abe gives a speech on letting Joan take the last shot. She then hits a free-throw to score the school's first point against their competition, and win a bet principal Scudworth had made against their rival's principal... and then the team treats Abe like a hero for his speech, leaving Joan feeling completely betrayed.