The Cleveland Show (season 1)

The Cleveland Show
(bathtub falls) "...Oh, that's right, Cleveland moved." - Peter Griffin
Genre: Animated sitcom Running Time: 21-22 minutes Country: United States Release Date: September 27, 2009 – May 23, 2010 Network(s): Fox Created by: Seth MacFarlane Richard Appel Mike Henry Distributed by: 20th Television Starring: Mike Henry Sanaa Lathan Kevin Michael Richardson Reagan Gomez-Preston Jason Sudeikis Seth MacFarlane Jess Harnell (season 3-4) Episodes: 21

The Cleveland Show is an American adult animated sitcom that is a spin-off to Family Guy. It ran on FOX from September 27, 2009 to May 19, 2013. Reruns of the show currently air on Comedy Central, VH1, BET, FXX, and ITV2. This page focuses on the first season of the show.

Plot

The show follows Cleveland Brown back in his hometown of Stoolbend, Virginia with his new family.

Bad Qualities

Note: This is only a page on the first season, not the rest of the series.

1. The idea is not a good one, as Cleveland isn't fit to star in his own show.
   • Speaking of Cleveland himself, he is flanderized from being a kind, well-meaning guy to an unfunny and annoying person who abuses his son now and then. He's essentially become the black version of Peter Griffin. For some reason, he's very wimpy and did not know how to fight in the past for some reason. Thankfully, he does improve in Seasons 2-4 where he became much better as a character.
2. It copies the formula of Family Guy and American Dad!, both of which Seth MacFarlane also created, so that's mixing both shows into one but African-American.
3. A lot of stereotypes, particularly for the main characters, such as Donna being the sassy black woman and Lester's wife Kendra being an obese stereotype who speaks in an annoying voice and delivers some of the grossest moments.
4. Aside from stereotypes, many of the other characters are pretty unlikable in this season, such as;
   • Cleveland as mentioned above, was flanderized badly in this season.
   • Tim the Bear, who acts like a Brian Griffin ripoff. Because of this, Seth MacFarlane stopped voicing him after Season 2 and was later replaced by Jess Harnell. However, much like Cleveland, he gets better and becomes much more hilarious.
   • Lester who is nothing more than a stereotypical redneck who is pretty racist and hates Black History Month and even said the n-word in New York in front of a whole group of African-Americans and is nearly killed. Unlike Cleveland and Tim, Lester never improves and still remains unlikable until the show's cancelation.
   • Robert Tubbs who is Donna's ex-husband and has his own page on loathsome characters wiki. He's essentially a black version of Quagmire for hitting up on women and use to be a terrible father and husband before he divorced Donna in one of the dumbest ways possible; Losing a dance contest.
   • Evelyn, who is Cleveland's mother, may be lovable to Cleveland but never leaves LeVar despite the amount of times he has cheated on her and trashes Donna for apparently making bad dinner food.
   • Roberta is nothing more than a stereotypical mean popular girl who is highly disrespectful to both Cleveland and Donna, has a very annoying voice, thanks to Reagan Gomez-Preston doing a very poor job. She never improves and is still a bad character, although she has her moments.
   • LeVar, who is nothing more than a cruel, obnoxious, abusive, lying and cheating man. When Cleveland was younger as a child, LeVar hated him after Cleveland would cause the family to lose a game show and that caused him to fat shame Cleveland, but apart from that, he tends to cheat on Evelyn with other women and never held himself accountable. He also forgot their anniversary, causing Evelyn to nearly make a divorce with him. His worst crime that could've landed him in jail is his abuse towards Cleveland and it so bad to the point that in the season 2 episode, "Murray Christmas", it is well-deserving for LeVar to suffer a heart attack from being beaten up by Cleveland. If only this could happen in the show as well.
5. The jokes fall dry a lot and the Cutaways are rather bland and tasteless. They almost feel like Family Guy cutaways, but even worse.
6. Barely any character development in this season.
7. Auntie Momma (a Madea expy and somewhat a spoof of the character) is an extremely annoying and disgusting character because she keeps saying that she's outrageous, emitting flatulence, and even worse, portraying her as just semi-stereotypical black Transwoman as part of a semi-recurring joke for both Terry Crews' crossdressing and Donna Tubbs' personality foil.
8. Over-reliance on gross-out humor. For example, the episode Gone with the Wind has Cleveland do nothing but fart the entire episode, as well as the thanksgiving special where everybody did nothing but vomit.
9. Not only does Cleveland Jr. look almost nothing like he initially did in Family Guy, but his voice can get annoying at times, though justified because they didn’t want to be into controversy when it comes with Bill Cosby.
10. Loads of Bad/Mediocre Episodes such as:
    • Pilot (which started Season 1 and the show on a sour note)
    • "The One About Friends"
    • "Birth of a Salesman"
    • "Cleveland Jr.'s Cherry Bomb"
    • "Ladies' Night"
    • "A Brown Thanksgiving" (the worst episode of these seasons and the entire show)
    • "Field of Streams"
    • "Once Upon a Tyne in New York"
    • "The Brown Knight"
    • "Gone With the Wind"
    • "Brown History Month"

Good Qualities

1. One of the characters, Rallo Tubbs, is a great and hilarious character, though he might have similarities to Stewie Griffin since he's a talking baby who sounds like a grown up (the only difference is that everybody can understand Rallo, while only Brian, Chris and minor or guest star characters can understand Stewie, unless it's convenient for the joke).
   • Likewise, Rallo's friends Theodore, Walt and Bernard are also quite likable, as they share an excellent chemistry.
   • Cleveland Jr. and Donna Tubbs-Brown are likable in their own ways since they are not mean spirited at all in most of the episodes.
   • There are some moments where Cleveland Brown himself has his original and likable personality like "A Brown Thanksgiving".
   • Holt was the only member out of the four who hung out in the bar that was always likable, funny and enjoyable in this season as well as the next three seasons.
2. The theme song is amazingly well-done and is very fantastic.
3. Decent voice acting, with Mike Henry reprising his role as Cleveland Brown and still has so much energy and enjoyment voicing the character, making that one of the most enjoyable parts of the season, alongside his excellent performance on Rallo's voice.
4. The animation is pretty good, and an improvement over the modern seasons of Family Guy.
5. Seasons 2-4 are a huge improvement over these seasons as the writing, jokes, and characters began to improve.
6. There can be some heartwarming moments in the show.
7. While Cleveland Jr.'s redesign and new personality were clearly meant to make him more like Chris Griffin (and to a lesser extent, Steve Smith), it ended up being a strangely fortunate decision, since Cleveland Jr. originally looked and acted like a very young Bill Cosby. Had they not redesigned Cleveland Jr. when they did, the producers would probably have been forced to drop him altogether when Cosby's crimes came to light.
8. Good/Decent Episodes such as:
   • "Da Doggone Daddy-Daughter Dinner Dance"
   • "The One About Friends"
   • "A Cleveland Brown Christmas"
   • "Love Rollercoaster"
   • "Our Gang"
   • "Buried Pleasure"
   • "Brotherly Love"
   • "Cleveland's Angels"
   • "You're the Best Man, Cleveland Brown" (which ended Season 1 on a high note)

Trivia

• Originally based on a Concept Art for the show in 2007-08 and Season 1 DVD commentary, there was no Richter family; there was supposed to be a British family (unnamed, but revealed as the Pennyapples in the DVD commentary) as Cleveland's right-hand neighbors. But they were cut out during the making of the pilot; according to Seth and some of the staff, they didn't know about where they put the British-stereotype jokes. So they replaced them with the Holt Richter family in the finished pilot--Holt first, then his family was added in later episodes to expand his personality.

Reception

The first season of The Cleveland Show received mixed reviews by critics, audiences and fans of Family Guy alike.

Tom Shales of The Washington Post spoke very negatively about both the show and MacFarlane himself, describing him as "no better than the dirty old man hanging around playgrounds with naughty pictures or risque jokes as lures". However, Rob Owen of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette was more positive about the program, writing that although The Cleveland Show was "just as rude-crude" as Family Guy, it also had "more warmth" due to Cleveland being a more likable character than Peter Griffin. Owen also praised the character of Tim the Bear, stating that "Tim is by far the most amusing creation."

Episodes With Their Own Pages

A Brown Thanksgiving - Season 1, Episode 7

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