Chip 'n' Dale: Park Life is a 2021 French-American animated web television series co-produced by The Walt Disney Company France and Xilam Animation starring the titular chipmunk duo. The series has 13 episodes comprised of 39 seven-minute segments and is non-verbal.
The series premiered on Disney+ on July 28, 2021. A second season was also announced June 15, 2022.
Chip 'n' Dale: Park Life Tropes:
- Adaptational Nice Guy: Donald Duck is notably nice with Chip and Dale compared to their traditional dynamic to the classic cartoons and previous shorts.
- Adaptational Personality Change: Clarice's personality in Chip 'n' Dale: Park Life is stern, serious, and tomboyish. Compared to her standard personality where she's flirtatious, bubbly, and sweet-natured. She also has shades of a Composite Character, given how she's a skilled mechanic and tinkerer, just like Gadget, the chipmunks' mutual love interest in Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers.
- Anthropomorphic Shift: A reverse example with Clarice who's depicted as a regular chipmunk as Chip and Dale in the series. Compared to her standard design where she had a more humanoid design.
- Bigger on the Inside: In The Jungle, Chip and Dale enter a small prickle bush whose inside becomes a vast jungle they get lost in.
- A Bloody Mess: A Running Gag on Bird Brains is Dale mistaking raspberry juice for blood, leading him to think Chip is a murderer.
- The Bus Came Back:
- "Pluto's Quin-puplets" from the 1937 Pluto cartoon of the same name make a return to animation after being absent in Disney related media for 84 years.
- Clarice the Chipmunk from the 1952 Chip 'n Dale short "Two Chips And A Miss" also returned after being absent in animation for 69 years (not counting some of Disney's Japanese exclusive shorts). note
- Butt-Monkey: Donald Duck, of course. The titular duo, too, especially Chip.
- The Cameo: Starting in Season 2, other characters in the wider Classic Disney universe make an appearance beyond Pluto and Donald, like Daisy and his nephews. Most notable in the Christmas episode, where Mickey, Minnie, and Goofy appear at Donald's Christmas party.
- Chained Heat: In “It Takes Two to Tangle”, Chip and Dale get their tails knitted together. They’re at first amused, but soon start getting on each other’s nerves.
- Company Cross References: In "The Flight", while Dale is flying with the ducks, he can be heard singing something similar to "You Can Fly! You Can Fly! You Can Fly!".
- Cone of Shame: In Cone Alone, one of Pluto's pups gets a cone after going to the vet, and is showered with gifts to make him feel better. Dale sees this and puts on a traffic cone to get the same treatment from Chip.
- Disney Death: The Ghost opens on Dale's funeral, with a flashback revealing that he was chased out to the street by Butch and got run over by the guy painting the white line on the street. Turns out it didn't kill him, just painted him white, and when Chip finds out they decide to make Butch believe Dale is a ghost. It gets played with when Butch dies of a heart attack and comes back as a ghost, but then jumps back into his body.
- Dogface: Many a background character has them, though it is particularly egregious when certain characters are just humans with dog noses, to the point they have human ears as well.
- Doom It Yourself: The third segment of episode 9, Craft Craze, is kicked off by Chip accidentally destroying Chip and Dale's home just by trying to put up a picture, so Dale tries to fix everything, but gives up and hires Clarice to do it while Chip's not around.
- Help, I'm Stuck!:
- In Dog in the House, Pluto gets stuck in the chipmunk's tree.
- In Cone Alone, both Chip and Dale end up stuck in a traffic cone, and in trying to get loose the cone then gets caught in a cement mixer, and cement start pouring into the cone. They manage to get out just in time, but then Chip is encased in cement.
- Help Mistaken for Attack: In Bird Brains, a peacock falls on a trashcan and Chip tries to pull it out by her tailfeathers, tearing them off. All the other animals, including Dale, think Chip was attacking her, and they shun him from the park. Later, the peacock falls in again and this time Dale gets the blame when trying to help her and is shunned as well. In the end, it's the chipmunks who fall in the trash and the peacock is the one kicked out.
- Mistaken for Murderer: Chip in Bird Brains, after Dale mistakes raspberry juice on his face for blood.
- Mouse World: Rodents and other small creatures of the park and beyond all live in a world of their own complete with businesses, clubs, etc.
- Mythology Gag: In "Who's Your Granny?", Dale wears a Hawaiian shirt when on "vacation", not unlike the one he wore in Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers.
- New Job as the Plot Demands: Beginning in Episode 12, Donald Duck is placed in a different type of job for each short.
- Not So Remote: In The Jungle, Dale finds an exit to their home when he and Chip get lost inside a bush. He tries to tell Chip, but Chip, assuming they're lost, doesn't pay attention and busies himself trying to survive. So Dale goes home and even has a party there, while Chip nearly kills himself exploring. Dale returns and finally gets Chip to listen to him about the exit, but then is unable to find it again.
- Ominous Owl: Chip and Dale have a run-in with one in The Jungle, who seems intent on eating them, but in the end, he eats a raspberry they were looking for instead.
- Speaking Simlish: Unlike the older Chip n Dale shorts (where Chip and Dale speak in English, albeit sped up), Chip, Dale, Clarice and the other animals speak entirely in gibberish in "Park Life."
- Stab the Salad: In Bird Brains, Dale thinks he sees Chip beating a mole to death behind a bush, when actually he's hitting some raspberries the mole collected for him.
- Stomach of Holding: In Thou Shalt Nut Steal, Dale is able to hold half a cart’s full of chestnuts on his cheeks.
- Tongue on the Flagpole: In Struggling Duckling, Chip saves a duckling who gets his tongue stuck on a metal bar inside a sewer pipe.
- Voice Grunting: Outside of Chip and Dale alongside the other animals who live at the city's park. Major characters such as Pluto, Fifi the Peke, and Butch the Bulldog mainly communicate by barking, whimpering, or gasping. This even extends to the citizens that inhabit the city including The Beagle Boys.
