YMMV / Clone High

• Adorkable: Abe tends to be this on account of how shy and awkward, but ultimately kind-hearted he is, especially in contrast to how tall and deep-voiced he is. Watching him stumble over his words as he tries to make an impassioned and profound speech never fails to endear the audience.
  • JFK comes off as this and is adored by the fanbase thanks to his goofy personality when not being an archetypal asshole jock. This was taken up to eleven in "Spring Broken", when JFK's brain expanded in the desert heat and he turned into a hyper-intelligent supergenius.
• Accidental Aesop:
  • Many people who experienced Sleep Deprivation in high school have said that the half-joking Sleep Aesop in "Sleep of Faith" was more genuine than most of the heavy topics covered in actual teen dramas!
  • "Litter Kills: Literally" is often considered the only episode of the show to play the Very Special Episode straight. Despite how clearly it's intended to be a parody of Tonight, Someone Dies, it's also a straightforward depiction of grief.
• Accidentally-Correct Writing: While it's mainly played as a joke on how shallow Cleo is, in real life people who wear high heels for too long can experience shortening of the calf muscles that leads to an inability to walk comfortably on flat feet.
• Alternative Character Interpretation: While it's clearly a joke, is Cleo forcing Abe to wait for the perfect moment to have their first kiss, despite all of her previous sleeping around, just her being a hypocrite, or is it because she values her relationship with Abe more than her previous flings and wants to give it the proper respect it deserves? And if it's the latter, is it because she respects Abe or, more likely, believes that she deserves to start her new relationship on the most perfect of first notes because she's Cleopatra?
• Alternative Joke Interpretation: "I'm a Kennedy! I'm not accustomed to tragedy!" While obviously a joke about the infamous "Kennedy Curse," this could also mean that a rich, privileged, popular teenager like JFK (at least this show's version of him) isn't used to dealing with having nice things taken away from him.
• Americans Hate Tingle: The only time the show received any mainstream attention during its original broadcast was when it managed to seriously piss off a number of Indian viewers with its depiction of Mahatma Gandhi as a shallow, petty, non-stop party animal. Gandhi is still very much beloved in his home country, and his followers don't take too kindly to any negative depictions of him. This led to protests outside of MTV India and Viacom's New York headquarters, convincing MTV to swiftly cancel the already-failing show.
• Anvilicious: Season 2 has an increased tendency to bluntly parody social issues, such as Frida's song about white male confidence in "Some Talking but Mostly Songs" and the seamen's song calling out the state of sexual education in "Sexy-Ed."
• Ass Pull: "Sexy-Ed" reveals that Topher is attracted to Joan as the reason he starts blackmailing — er, "white leveraging" — Abe so Abe won't confess his feelings. He had never had any substantial interaction with Joan before or shown even a passing interest in her, and doesn't show interest in her during Season 3 either. Knowing the show's tone, though, the abruptness could have been purposeful.
• Audience-Alienating Premise: The show was given a fast death due to this. It was a show about the clones of famous historical figures, whose personalities ranged from flanderizations of its originals to radically opposite of those, in a way that rendered them Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonists. Its portrayal of Clone Mahatma Gandhi as a jerkass party animal also sparked protest in India, as Gandhi is a very revered figure there.
• Awesome Music: The numerous 2000s-era pop punk and emo songs which score every episode. Amazingly, unlike most shows of this nature, all of the licensed music was retained for the DVD release (though unfortunately not the streaming ones).
• Base-Breaking Character: Abe. People either adore him as a charming and relatable, top-notch main character or see him as a bland Vanilla Protagonist. Then there's a third camp made up of those who dislike him for how he treats Joan, ignoring her feelings and innocently insulting her. The creators of the show are aware of how the fandom perceives Abe, with them commenting how the things that made Abe likable in the original series have now made him look like an asshole (just as the things which made Joan an outcast in 2003 make her cool in 2023) and will be portraying him with this in mind. This ended up backfiring and creating a fourth camp that thinks while Abe is a jerk at times, the second season went way too far in punishing him especially for things that weren't even his fault.
• Broken Base: Season 2 became this very quickly. Due to the gap in time between the two seasons and the various changes in staff, much about the show's direction was changed to keep up with modern times. Those who love the season praise it for the focus on Joan, progressive values, and overall greater focus on serious character writing. Those who dislike the season criticize it for the change in tone, poor handling of the returning characters^note from missing the point of JFK's gags, to the general derailment of Cleopatra, and especially Abe's Butt-Monkey status, unfitting designs of the new clones added to the main cast, removal of fan favorite and Fountain of Memes Gandhi^note and that Confucius is a poor replacement, with the main character dynamics in general less satisfactory, needless topicality^note with episodes focusing on topics such as social media and cancel culture, and excessive use of blood and gore in gags. But the biggest criticism is that Season 2 misses the most important element of Clone High as a whole: its not-aesops and satire of teen dramas. Both sides agree, though, that Principal Scudworth is still just as funny as ever (aside from the lack of screentime for Mr. Butlertron), and that one of the new clones, Topher Bus, has a design that fits in beautifully with the existing clones (though his personality remains divisive).
  • As noted above the designs of the new clones in Season 2, specifically Harriet Tubman, Frida, and Confucius are divisive. Many think they look out of place next to the original clones and find them over designed with too many saturated colors, Harriet being the biggest offender as she barely represents her clone mother, with her and Frida (whose design is the more positively received of the three) even having background cameos in the original series with completely different designs that some prefer more. However, some don't mind their designs and argue their outfits are appropriate for Gen Z teenagers and that despite being clones of historical figures they're still their own people so it's fine if they don't look 100% like them.
• Better on DVD: Being a serialized comedy pre-streaming era may have been a little too ambitious. Watching it on DVD or on a streaming service allows the viewer to keep up with the overarching plots and character arcs.
• Catharsis Factor: After Joan's treatment of Abe throughout Season 2, as well as her treatment of all the other clones in the finale, her becoming a social pariah upon Candide showing the clones camera footage of Joan getting them eliminated in the Death Maze felt very satisfying to many fans.
• Common Knowledge: Thanks to the MTV India controversy, everyone "knows" Gandhi's clone is a popular catchphrase-spouting "party animal". He wishes - that's how he describes himself in the first episode, but the character, in fact, is never invited to parties, can't get a date to prom, and his jokes and catchphrases always fall flat (in-universe, at least).
• Crosses the Line Twice:
  • Blink and you miss it: in their first scene together, Gandhi casually gives JFK finger-guns, and JFK flinches. Wonder why.
  • Normally, a joke involving a guy trying to have sex with a girl by getting her drunk would be rather tasteless, but when JFK tries it on Joan...
    JFK: So, ah, are you, ah, drunk enough yet to sleep with me?
    (Joan roundhouse kicks JFK in the face and knocks him to the ground. He sits up and points at her)
    JFK: Answer the question!
  • The way Ponce de Leon dies. It involves lots and lots of litter. And so much blood.
  • The whole episode with Ponce is this, except instead of being funny, it's sad.
  • "Nothing bad ever happens to the Kennedys!" Car flips over. Better yet, it's an open top car at that, for a few extra feet past the line.
  • JFK refusing to work Cleo's kissing booth because he doesn't want to kiss fat girls? Not funny. Cleo telling him that at least she doesn't complain about kissing poor people? Now it's funny.
  • The Spoof Aesop of "ADD (The Last D Is For Disorder)": "people will only accept neurological disorder if they're less disgusted with it than they are with homosexuality."
  • At one point, the head of the Board of Shadowy Figures tells Scudworth that he's "on thin ice. Clone-of-Karen-Carpenter thin!"^note Karen Carpenter died from complications caused by anorexia.
  • Daniel Feldspar, the stereotypically Australian dragon. That is all.
  • Larry Hardcore in the same episode: "Nowadays the only dancing fruits the teens wanna see is the Backstreet Boys!"
  • "If there's one thing Mahatma Gandhi stands for, it's revenge."
  • In "Some Talking But Mostly Songs" from Season 2, Abe has this comment about getting a part in the play.
    Abe: "Theater is in my blood! And my blood is sprayed all over the theater!"
• Cult Classic: It is fondly remembered by fans as a hilarious parody of high school melodramas. But it received mediocre ratings during its initial run.
• Designated Monkey: Abe is turned into this in the revival, due to new staff members on the writing team hating his character. They thought the fans would like it if they turned him into a Butt-Monkey and did things like have everyone in the school pour hot sauce into his flesh wounds in "Let's Try This Again", have Frida sing an entire song about his white guy confidence in "Some Talking, Mostly Singing", and having Joan unfriend him completely in "Saved by the Knoll". However, fans didn't find this amusing, citing Abe's abuse to be undeserved, needlessly cruel, and also unfair, since other characters in the show have committed sins that were just as bad, if not, worse than him (i.e. Cleo, JFK, Harriet, Joan) but received little to no punishment, whatsoever.
• Die for Our Ship: The new main characters in season two all faced an uphill battle to impress fans, but Harriet in particular got much ire from Joan/JFK fans for kissing JFK after their stage kiss in the school play. Note that both JFK and Harriet thought they had feelings for each other, JFK has a history of being a serial cheater that gets downplayed in fandom, and even Joan didn't hold a grudge against Harriet for this.
• Draco in Leather Pants:
  • JFK, to a degree. The fandom seems to take his speech to Joan at face value, but seeing as he has spent the entire season thus far being a cheating, sex-obsessed jerk, his words to her about liking her true self could just be another line. The revival season shows JFK making a legitimate effort to have a relationship with Joan, vindicating his speech to at least some extent and making the interpretation more valid, but some fans (mostly shippers) still downplay his bullying behavior in season one and romanticize him as a "himbo."
  • Canonically, Topher is a manipulative jerkass with no redeeming qualities, but he has tons of fans who make him into a "poor little baby," usually for the purpose of shipping him with Abe. These fans also tend to ignore/retcon his "white leveraging" in fanworks.
  • In the show, Principal Scudworth is guilty of murder, mutilation, slave-driving, and attempted world domination. However, lots of fanart depicts him in a flattering manner, albeit most likely in an ironic way. Such fanart depicts him as things like an anime chibi, a silly cartoon goofball, or an adorkable lovestruck romantic, who's in a romantic relationship with Mr. Butlertron or The Leader of the Shadowy Figures.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Van Gogh. After the first episode he only ever appeared in cameos, but it's not hard to find fanart of him (particularly on Tumblr) due to being a Woobie artist with depression.
  • Ponce is a very popular character. Despite being created to mock the Tonight, Someone Dies Trope, his friendly nature, the genuine sadness JFK feels upon his death and the fact that the best Heartwarming and Tear Jerker moments came from his death makes him a surprisingly popular character.
  • Now Toots may be blind, but he's still one of the most fondly remembered characters, due to being both a loving grandpa to Joan and being utterly hilarious.
  • The Pusher, despite only being in one episode, is remembered for his funky character design, charismatic personality, and his excellent singing voice courtesy of Jack Black.
• Epileptic Trees: Despite the creators saying Gandhi won't return to the show until Season 4 if he does at all, fans spent much of Season 2 coming up with bizarre ways he could return as an actual character, such as one of the new clones being Gandhi in disguise. Granted, these may not be too far-fetched, given the creators' original ideas for bringing Gandhi back to the show without reigniting controversy (like retconning him to be a clone of Gary Coleman instead).
• Fan-Preferred Couple: After their tryst in the last MTV episode, Joan and JFK are more popular than canon ships like Joan and Abe or JFK and Cleo. Ultimately they entered a steady relationship in the first revival season before breaking up for more Joan x Abe teasing, much to their fans' dismay.
• Fan-Preferred Cut Content: Some viewers believe the Harriet Tubman clone from this deleted scene resembles the real Tubman more strongly than does the clone from the Max episodes.
• Fair for Its Day: In an age where teenage romance and sex is seen more negatively, Gandhi and Marie Curie ending up in a celibate romance feels like an Author's Saving Throw to the show's over-the-top treatment of teen sex. Co-creator and voice of JFK Chris Miller said as much himself.
• Fountain of Memes: JFK became one in 2020, with his over-the-top mannerisms, heavy Boston accent and design being a source of several memes.
• Franchise Original Sin:
  • Some fans complain that the revival kind of leans into the totally radical trope, with too much references to modern-day things the kids are all using (i.e., TikTok and EDM) and having characters use slang terms like "Hashtag", "Woke", and "Sus". However, the original run was just like this, referencing to all the same trends that were popular back in the early 2000's, (i.e., MTV Beach Parties and extreme sports drinks).
  • The revival being Bloodier and Gorier, which was criticized for being excessive, has its roots in the first season with Ponce de Leon's death. But the first season's usage of blood and gore was well-received because they were used sparingly, which made moments like Ponce's death stand out more. In contrast, the revival uses blood and gore much more frequently, which undermines the shock factor and comes off as forced.
• Genius Bonus: The show is a lot funnier if you have a strong grasp on history:
  • None of the five original main characters died of natural causes: Gandhi, JFK and Abraham Lincoln were assassinated by gunshot, Joan of Arc was burned at the stake and Cleopatra killed herself.
  • In "Plane Crazy: Gate Expectations," Abe tries to get a ride in the alleged plane with Buddy Holly, Richie Vallans, The Big Bopper, Jim Croce, Stevie Ray Vaughan and half of Lynyrd Skynyrd, all of whom died in plane crashes.
  • Joan dressing up as "John Dark"; dressing in drag was one of the charges that got Jeanne D'arc executed. George Washington Carver also lampshades how "John Dark" is a pun of Jeanne d'Arc, Joan's French name.
  • Though JFK crashing his car after proclaiming "Nothing bad ever happens to the Kennedys!" is obviously a reference to the infamous "Kennedy curse," it may specifically be referencing the Chappaquidick incident.
  • Gandhi's Buddy Cop Show in "Film Fest: Tears of A Clone" is called Black and Tan. While obviously meant to parody blaxploitation movies or Buddy Cop Shows, a "black and tan" was also the name of a kind of cop during the Irish War of Independence.
  • There being twin clones of Elvis isn't just a gag to show him both at his peak and during his downward spiral. Elvis had a twin brother named Jesse who was stillborn.
  • Hitler's clone makes his only appearance at the student film festival. The real Hitler was quite the cinephile.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: While Gandhi's portrayal was despised by Indians, some Indian-Americans have gone on record praising him, due to him being one of the very few non-stereotypical Indian-American characters in pop culture at the time.
• Growing the Beard: The first season of the revival was rather divisive, but many saw the second revival season as a return to form with funnier jokes and plot lines.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The joke in the first episode where Cleo doesn't recognize Gandhi at all, despite him being her foster brother and a kidney donor, is harsher after Gandhi was cut from the main cast in Season 2 due to the controversy in India surrounding his character being the main reason the show was originally cancelled. Even in-universe, only a few people seem to remember Gandhi's existence by then.
  • The plot of "A.D.D.: The Last 'D' Is For 'Disorder'" has everybody reject Gandhi due to his stigmatized diagnosis, with him begging people to stop ignoring him, which is also harder to watch after he was cut from the show due to backlash.
• He Really Can Act: None of Abe's convoluted, melodramatic mixed metaphors would be anywhere near as funny if Will Forte weren't reading them with total dramatic conviction. The "thinking dock" scene is a prime example.
  "You don't know what you're getting into! And that's out of my friendship!"
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Mr. B, the gentleman robot, meet Mr. B The Gentleman Rhymer
  • Some have noticed that Abe bears a pretty good resemblance to Shaggy. 18 years later, Will Forte, Abe's actor, would eventually play Shaggy in SCOOB!.
  • The end title card of the Season 1 finale, "To Be Continued?!" was originally Harsher in Hindsight when the show was infamously cancelled. However, it becomes funnier when the show was continued... twenty years later.
  • At the end of "Homecoming: A Shot in the D'Arc," when John Dark reveals himself to be Joan, Cleo remarks with shock that she almost had sex with Joan before admitting it would've been "hot." Come season 2, she's gone from possibly Ambiguously Bi to actually having a romance story with Frida Kahlo.
  • In Season 2's "Spring Broken", the clones are stranded in the desert, where they're bedeviled by flash flooding and a horde of zombies...who are later revealed to be a bunch of wealthy neo-hippies who got stuck in the wilderness while attending an art festival. Two months later, attendees of Burning Man ended up being stuck in the desert when the playa was hit by a flash flood.
• Hollywood Homely: Joan; however, some characters do seem to realize she's attractive before her reveal of Beautiful All Along. Inverted with Marie Curie, who is genuinely hideous (yet no one treats her any differently for it).
• Ho Yay:
  • JFK takes to the prospect of being attracted to men rather quickly when he develops a crush on "John Dark" (and his foster parents are a gay couple). And then there's his "best friend forever" Ponce in episode 10, complete with break-up and incessant weeping and crawling into the coffin. Late in that same episode, Abe holds him on the Thinking Dock and kisses his forehead. JFK and Abe's homoerotic friendship is taken to another level in the second revival season, as their friendship is treated like a romance at times. JFK even offers to have sex with Abe.
  • While Gandhi's kiss with Abe in the episode "A.D.D.: The Last 'D' is for Disorder" is Played for Laughs, Gandhi still pays him for it, implying he liked it. Or he's stupid.
  • Scudworth and Mr. Butlertron are all but stated to be a couple. They live together, are almost never apart and constantly bicker Like an Old Married Couple. Mr. B even assumes the role of housewife in several episodes that take place in their home. There are also a couple of scenes where they're holding hands and lovingly gazing into one-another's eyes.
  • After thinking about it for a second, Cleo admits that sex with Joan would've been hot.
• I Knew It!: Despite the Ship Tease for both ships not starting until episode seven, many fans assumed Harriet x Confucius and especially Cleo x Frida would end up being canon based on their interactions in the title sequence.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Cleo. It's implied that her Alpha Bitch personality at least partially stems from being paired with a foster mother who's a chronic alcoholic.
  • JFK. Just try to not feel bad for him about Ponce's death. His anguish is frighteningly realistic.
  • Topher Bus is an unpleasant individual who heckles people online and blackmails Abe so he can have Joan to himself, but it's implied that he cracked under the stigma of him being Christopher Columbus's clone, with him mentioning that he's had to go to therapy because of it.
• Jerks Are Worse Than Villains:
  • Abe Lincoln ignores Joan Of Arc's feelings for him until she chose JFK as her date during the prom and chose not to stand up to Gandhi just to please Cleo. Meanwhile JFK, Cleopatra, and Principal Scudsworth who are depicted as antagonists are loved by fans.
    • In fact, Phil Lord (one of the creators of the show) confirmed that the revival of the series is going to address the fandom's complaints about Abe after a fan asked him, citing that "Abe's going to have a rough go of it this semester."
  • This ended up happening In-Universe for the season 2 finale where despite Candide Sampson being the one who set up the Death Maze and almost wiping out their memories, the clones ended up being more mad at Joan for her vindictive actions getting them all eliminated in the Death Maze.
• Love to Hate: Topher Bus, the clone of Christopher Columbus, is an absolute Jerkass who pretends to be Abe's friend only to blackmail him so he could have Joan to himself. But he quickly became one of the more popular additions in the revival series because of how said unpleasantness makes him entertaining, especially whenever he receives his comeuppence.
• Magnificent Bastard:
  • "Raisin the Stakes: A Rock Opera in Three Acts": The Pusher, in actuality Larry Hardcore, is a rockstar drug dealer who sells raisins as drugs to teenagers. A loyal fan of the California Raisins who was hired by the raisin council to come up with a plan to sell more raisins to teens, the Pusher takes advantage of the average teenager's rebellious attitude to sell them raisins under the guise of hallucinogenic drugs, having done so to several high schools before doing the same to Clone High. Growing more powerful with each raisin buyer, the Pusher allows Principal Scudworth to create a divide between the students and their parents just to sell the teens more raisins.
  • "Snowflake Day: A Very Special Holiday Episode" & "Saved by the Knoll": The homeless person who may or may not be Mandy Moore encounters Joan on the titular holiday to restore her Snowflake Day spirit. Showing Joan how her fellow homeless friends are able to enjoy the season merely through the company of each other, the homeless girl helps Joan find happiness in the holiday and reunite with her loved ones at Cleo's party. The homeless girl then uses a faulty van to simulate the sound of Snowflake Jake's signature cannonballs outside the house, herding the partygoers downstairs for their "safety" while her friends proceed to rob Cleo and Joan's families blind. Returning nearly two decades later, the homeless girl once again comforts Joan at her lowest, while continuing to show off the innovative ways she finds success on the streets.
  • "Cloney Island: Twist!": Mrs. C is a robot assistant built by Sandra Sandria while stranded on a deserted island. Resentful of her role, Mrs. C desired a way off the island, but Sandra stayed in hopes that that her lost love Scudworth would someday find her. Upon spotting Scudworth and Mr. Butlertron's boat, Mrs. C shoots it down to strand them on the island. Using her Mary Poppins-like charm, Mrs. C seduces Mr. Butlertron, then "confesses" to him that Sandra is planning to rob Scudworth, setting her up as a scapegoat so Mrs. C can rob Scudworth herself. Once on the repaired boat, Mrs. C reveals her true self as a rude Cockney robot who plans to use the stolen money to launch a weight loss app as a cover for a robot uprising, taking Sandra hostage as a human slave to solve CAPTCHA tests for her. Mrs. C invites Mr. Butlertron to come with her, claiming that she developed true feelings for him during her scheme, but when he rebukes her, she cusses him out and rides off, having pulled off what Scudworth describes as "the grift to end all grifts."
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "SAY WHAAAAAAAAAAT?"^ExplanationA scene from "Film Fest: Tears of a Clone" where Gandhi tries to make George Washington Carver exaggerate one of his lines, which became a source for shitpost remixes.
  • Makeover Makeover, Makeover Makeover, Makeover Makeover... MAKEOVER!! ^note The Running Gag song used in "Makeover Makeover Makeover: The Makeover Episode," which is frequently added to other scenes in which people get makeovers.
  • "... Wesley."^note Mr. Butlertron's Verbal Tic.
  • The GESH logo (a stylized sharp G invoking the Third Reich) is often used as a Grammar Nazi symbol.
  • I like your funny words, magic man!^ExplanationIn "Raisin the Stakes: A Rock Opera in Three Acts", JFK says this phrase after hearing the Pusher talk about his raisins. The phrase has been used as a reaction to a person describing a complex topic, discussing a topic that the listener knows little to nothing about, or using Purple Prose.
  • "Nothing bad ever happens to the Kennedys!"^ExplanationComes from "Sleep of Faith: La Rue D'Awakening", wherein JFK's car suddenly flips over during a drag race with Abe immediately after announcing this. The clip suddenly became popular for edits in 2020, generally attributed to have started when people used it to make fun of politician Joe Kennedy (Robert Kennedy's grandson and JFK's grandnephew) after he lost the Massachusetts Senate primary in September.
  • "My day be so fine, then boom, [x]"^ExplanationNot a line from the show itself, but instead a quote on an image featuring JFK that got used for edits featuring other characters.
  • Drawing other characters to look like JFK was a minor trend in 2020, sometimes accompanied by his "er, uh" Verbal Tic.
  • I need a minute to think about this.^ExplanationGandhi's reaction to being told by Mr. Butlertron that he has ADD and its hyperactive cousin ADHD in "A.D.D.: The Last 'D' is for Disorder" has quickly become popular in June 2023.
  • "JFK humps a casket" ^ExplanationWhen the episode Sexy-Ed came out on Max, many users reported a bug where the English version has the descriptive audio track on with no way to turn it off. This line in particular stuck out to viewers realizing the bug since it's near the beginning of the episode.
  • "Joan will be burned alive in Season 3" ^ExplanationPeople on the Clone High subreddit have made jokes and images about Joan being burned at the stake like her clonemother in the first episode in Season 3 by the other clones as Disproportionate Retribution for Joan eliminating everyone.
• Misaimed Fandom:
  • "Litter Kills.... Literally," which was intended as a scathing attack on dramas that introduce new characters to be killed off for the sake of cheap drama, plays the faux-drama up to eleven and unintentionally ends up being the saddest episode of the whole show.
  • Several fans take the over-the-top shipping plots more seriously than they're meant to be taken, especially younger fans who don't grasp that the show is a parody of early 2000's teen dramas.
• Nausea Fuel
  • Gandhi grabbing Joan's retainer from out of her mouth and shoving it in his own in "ADD: The Last D Is For Disorder." Especially the sound effect.
  • Abe before forced to eat broken glass in "Snowflake Day." Again, the sound effects elevate it from Bloody Hilarious to viscerally painful.
• Once Original, Now Common: Will Forte once described the series as "Niche TV before niche TV existed." It arrived a decade too early for the age of binge-watching and streaming services, which are much kinder to quirky, serialized shows.
• Overshadowed by Controversy: Even though this show's managed to garner a following in recent years, its cancellation due to sparking protests in India for being perceived as mocking one of their greatest national heroes is still one of the first things that comes to mind about it, to the point Gandhi was cut from the revival 20 years later.
• Parody Displacement:
  • Most fans of the show have never seen a single episode of the shows it set out to parody in the first season.
  • How many millennial viewers will recognize that the reason Mr. Buttlertron calls everyone "Wesley" is because he's an expy of Mr. Belvedere?
• Play-Along Meme: Even though Ponce only appeared in "Litter Kills: Litterally" to parody Remember the New Guy? and Special Aesop Victim, fans always go on about how Ponce was a beloved member of the main cast and how tragic it was for everyone to lose his friendship.
• Portmanteau Couple Name:
  • "JoanFK" for JFK x Joan, which became Ascended Fanon in season two as they go by that name numerous times.
  • Frida and Cleopatra are called "Kahlopatra."
• Protection from Editors: Despite (or, more likely, because of) MTV's complete apathy for the show, the creators have admitted that they were never scrutinized by Standards and Practices and were basically given carte blanch on content.
• Replacement Scrappy: The season 2 second generation clone version of Harriet Tubman is much less popular than the original season one Tubman that she retconned.
• Retroactive Recognition: Pre-Saturday Night Live Will Forte stars as Abe Lincoln.
• The Scrappy: While most of the second generation clones eventually grew on the fandom, a notable exception is Harriet Tubman. This is for various reasons such as her design being seen as unnecessarily loud and colorful even compared to the other new clones, her existence retconning the more popular original Harriet Tubman from the first season, her role in the new cast being seen as less defined than the rest of the clones, and her being involved in a love triangle that put the highly popular JoanFK ship in serious jeopardy.
• Signature Scene: The riot following the cross country meet, due to it being one of the most hilarious moments in the entire show. Including the likes of Genghis Khan flipping the ground level pool over, and then setting it on fire.
  Scudworth: Did you see the pool?! They FLIPPED the bitch!
• Squick: Invoked whenever Cleo and JFK kiss. Their tongues wrap around one another like snakes and make a loud, slimy sound to be as hilariously gross as possible. This eventually happens whenever any other character kisses as well.
• Suspiciously Similar Song: "We Are The Seamen" from "Sexy-Ed" seems to be modeled after Nathan Evans' cover of the classic sea shanty "Wellerman".
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Topher Bus, despite the revival featuring him as part of the new cast, the revival could have done more to explore him trying to distance himself from his clonefather and could have featured him in more major plotlines. Instead the show barely features him in the revival with him being more of a secondary character and only briefly appearing as an antagonist to Abe.
  • Marie Curie, with her unique Ugly Cute mutations and a Nice Girl attitude rarely seen in the original series, was Demoted to Extra in the revival series, as she only served as a love interest to Gandhi, who was Put on a Bus. The angst and humor that could be mined from a mutated clone thus remains unexplored.
  • Adolf Hitler, who was absent in most of the first season and the second season, could've finally returned in the revival as part of the Bleacher Creatures due to him being the clone of the most monstrous person in history and being ostracized as well as having his name censored in the files for it. The angst and humor that could have been mined from being the clone of Hitler has remained unexplored and it would have been interesting if Hitler, if he's the same pacifist he appeared in the first season, be ironically the Token Good Teammate of the Bleacher Creatures outside of Joan.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The revival tends to do this a lot.
  • Season 1 was most likely setting up a blended family drama plot, where Toots and Cleo's Drunk Foster Mom got married, forcing archenemies, Joan and Cleo to become sisters. However, this plotline was destroyed in the revival, when they had Toots killed offscreen and written out of the show, completely.
  • The revival's premiere, "Let's Try This Again", could have been an episode about all the first-generation clones (except Joan, who's part of the Inclusivity Committee) getting canceled by the second-generation clones for using outdated slang from 2003, leading to all of the G1 clones getting sent to the canceled corner and ultimately, a war between the two generations on the battlefields of the school grounds. Joan would have to end it all by calling out the second-generation clones for being so impatient and unforgiving against people from a different time, helping reunite the two generations for unity week. Unfortunately, the new writers hated Abe's character so much, that they turned the episode into a humiliation conga for him, where he was the only G1 clone to get canceled ^note (This also creates a plothole, as somehow, all the other G1 clones somehow automatically knew not to use this kind of verbiage, despite coming from the exact same time as he did.) and ended up becoming a social pariah and getting physically abused by everyone else in the entire school.
  • The episodes "Saved by the Knoll" and "Spring Broken" could have carried out a well-done arc about JFK cheating on Joan with her best friend, Harriet and even sleeping with her. However, the writers made JFK act uncharacteristically nice this season and downplayed their little affair as much as possible, so that no real conflict could take place and Joan could immediately forgive them both. They also had her take out all her anger on Abe, because of course he needs to suffer the most, for having the nerve not to tell her about this affair, even though he knew this would have killed her. Even if they wanted to make her unfriend Abe over this, they could have at least had her dump JFK and unfriend Harriet too, setting up a story about her having to deal with everyone she trusts betraying her.
  • Topher blackmai-(ahem) "white leveraging" Abe into staying away from Joan went nowhere, since Topher didn't make a move on her or even really have a single interaction with her beyond this moment. There could have been a story about Topher hitting on Joan, which would have been a solid story, no matter which direction they took it. Yet, they did nothing with it and had JFK destroy Topher's evidence between his buttcheeks, making this plotline ultimately worthless.
• This Is Your Premise on Drugs: Used for a joke:
  Smoking raisins is like LSD... on acid!
• Too Good to Last: A fondly remembered Cult Classic that lasted one season of 13 episodes. The sheer fury at its cancellation resulted in a Newbie Boom in 2020 and finally a follow-up season in 2023.
• Tough Act to Follow: In some ways, it was almost inevitable that the revival would be as divisive as it has proved to been. In the 20 years since the original's cancellation, the show had become a Cult Classic with an extremely vocal following that adored its offbeat humor and storytelling, its status as a time capsule of early 2000s MTV and pop culture, and its ruthless pastiching of teen soaps. As a result, expectations for a revival to recapture the original run's unique spirit ran high, and when it became evident the show would be following a different direction when it returned (due to how much had changed culturally by the 2020s and the fact the genre it spoofed is now largely irrelevant), many were left angry or disappointed.
• Unexpected Character: Scangrade shows up as part of the test in the Season 2 finale despite appearing to have blown up in the original series. Joan even lampshades, "Of all the characters to bring back..."
• Unintentional Period Piece: The series' technology (such as the use of flip-phones, lack of DVDs, and a gag involving dial-up internet in "A Room of One's Clone: The Pie of the Storm"), and use of pop-culture icons such as Marilyn Manson and Mandy Moore back in their heyday (and before the latter had primarily moved onto acting) date it to the early 2000s. Season 2 makes a point of how the original characters' mindsets are so stuck in 2002 and struggle to adapt to 2023 (as the second season is more explicitly a period piece).
• Unpopular Popular Character:
  • Gandhi frequently tries and fails to be popular in-universe, not getting invited to parties and dropping catchphrases and funny jokes that never fly. The fandom, however, finds him one of the funniest characters on the show (controversy from the mainstream audience notwithstanding).
  • Topher Bus was vilified by the whole school for being the clone of Christopher Columbus and generally being an unpleasant person anyway, but he's one of the most popular new characters to debut in season two.
• Values Dissonance:
  • Co-creator and voice of JFK Chris Miller has acknowledged that the show's over-the-top depictions of teen promiscuity could only have existed in the early 2000s, when teen sex comedies and jailbait pop stars were all the rage. The resurgence of the show's popularity in the 2020s, on the contrary, led to some discourse over whether the sexualization of the characters (albeit tongue-in-cheek) was too inappropriate, as gratuitous sex between underage characters is now more controversial among the show's target demographic. The Season 2 theme song noticeably dials down the "sexy teens" angle of the show's premise, and designs of the younger clones have less provocative designs, though the sex comedy is still present due to the Grandfather Clause.
  • Eleanor Roosevelt being portrayed as a husky-voiced Butch Lesbian gym teacher who ogles her female students was considered a Bottom of the Barrel Joke at worst in 2002. Post-2010s, it would more likely be considered both needlessly gross and slightly homophobic.
  • The entire joke behind Genghis Khan is that being Mongolian and mentally disabled means he fulfills both definitions of the word "mongoloid": a word that was already barely acceptable in either definition back then and is now considered an outright horrific slur in both.
• Values Resonance: JFK's foster fathers were created at a time where gay people were often the butt of jokes. While Carl and Wally have somewhat stereotypical designs, and Wally is blatantly Camp Gay, they also happen to be the most loving foster parents in the series, with the two being nothing but supportive to JFK's goals and desires. JFK himself also has no issue with referring to them as his parents, with him being embarrassed by how much they dote on him rather than the fact that they're gay.
• Vanilla Protagonist: Lincoln gets a fair bit of this; given how much of the show is parodying teen drama, it's likely intentional that his character ends up being one of the blander castmates. It's often speculated that this might be why he ultimately Did Not Get the Girl—his "relatable everyman" issues finally caught up to him.
• Vindicated by History: Like every animated series on MTV not called Beavis and Butt-Head or Daria, it wasn't seen as anything special during its initial run and was canceled due to low ratings as soon as the Gandhi controversy came up. Today, it has an impressive cult following and is considered one of the best shows of The Millennium Age of Animation, hence why it got a revival season in 2023.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: The Season 2 theme song incorporates very smooth updated graphics that show off the modern polish of the show without sacrificing the over-the-top style.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: The streaming site Flixanity has Clone High listed as a kids show and Nelvana released the show on their YouTube channel for children shows, but it's really not. Keep in mind that even though the show is about famous historical figures and has an art-style in the vein of kids shows like Dexter's Laboratory, it's actually about the clones of said historical figures who are portrayed as stock high school teen show characters, like the Jerk Jock, the Alpha Bitch, the apathetic Goth girl who hates the popular kids, has a crush on The Everyman protagonist, and dresses in black, the party animal and comic foil to the protagonist, etc. While animated historical series for kids exist (such as Liberty's Kids, Histeria!, Horrible Histories, Time Squad, Peabody's Improbable History, Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum etc.), this one is not all that educational and not all that kid-friendly.

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