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đ”And so I found a place
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The Cleveland Show is an American adult animated sitcom created by Seth MacFarlane, Richard Appel, and Mike Henry for Fox. Serving as a spin-off of Family Guy, the series centered on the Browns and Tubbs, two dysfunctional families consisting of parents Cleveland Brown and Donna Tubbs and their children Cleveland Brown Jr., Roberta Tubbs, and Rallo Tubbs. Similar to Family Guy, it exhibited much of its humor in the form of cutaway gags that often lampoon American culture, though it uses significantly fewer than Family Guy.
The series was conceived by MacFarlane in 2007 after developing the two animated series Family Guy and American Dad! for the Fox network. MacFarlane centered the show on Family Guy character Cleveland Brown, his new wife Donna Tubbs, his step-children Rallo and Roberta Tubbs, and his son Cleveland, Jr., who, in the show, is depicted as an obese, soft-spoken teen, as opposed to his depiction as a younger, hyperactive child with average body weight on Family Guy.
The series premiered on September 27, 2009, and ended on May 19, 2013, with a total of 88 episodes over the course of 4 seasons. The Cleveland Show was nominated for one Annie Award, one Primetime Emmy Award, and two Teen Choice Awards. Reruns of the show currently air on Comedy Central, VH1, BET, FXX and ITV2. Reruns once aired on Adult Swim from September 2012 to July 2018. This Page will focus on Seasons 2-4, where the show got really good.
Production
Development
Seth MacFarlane initially conceived The Cleveland Show in 2007 while working on his other two animated series, Family Guy and American Dad!.
The Cleveland Show first appeared on the development slate at Fox in early 2008, under no official name for the pilot, after a report that Fox had purchased the series from creators. On May 5, 2008, MacFarlane and 20th Century Fox Television inked a deal. The pilot was named The Cleveland Show in May 2008, when it appeared on the primetime slate for the 2008â09 television season, although it wasn't officially on the network schedule. Shortly after a report that King of the Hill just ended, leaving air time for The Cleveland Show, the show was picked up for a full season after an additional nine episodes of the show were ordered. In May 2009, The Cleveland Show appeared on the primetime slate for the 2009â10 television season, for airing on Sunday nights at 8:30 pm On June 15, 2009, it was announced that The Cleveland Show would premiere on September 27, 2009.
MacFarlane and Henry pitched a 22-minute to Fox which aired on September 27, 2009 but had been leaked on the internet in June 2009. Even before the pilot episode premiered, the show had already been renewed for a 22-episode second season. After the first season of the show aired, it was given the green light to start production. On June 10, 2010, less than three weeks into the first season's summer hiatus, it was announced that Fox was ordering a third season. A fourth season was announced on May 9, 2011, just a few days before the second season concluded.
Executive producers
Seth MacFarlane, Mike Henry and Richard Appel served as executive producers on the series since the first season.
Voice cast
Mike Henry voices two of the show's main characters: Cleveland Brown and Rallo Tubbs. The voice of Cleveland was developed originally for Family Guy by Henry after being influenced by one of his best friends who had a very distinct regional accent. For the voice of Rallo, Henry stated that he created the voice over twenty years before; he had used it while making prank phone calls.
Sanaa Lathan voices Donna Tubbs, the wife of Cleveland, stepmother of Cleveland Brown Jr., and mother of Roberta and Rallo Tubbs. In developing the character, Lathan said that the producers "wanted her to be educated, but to have some edge." Prior to voicing Donna, Lathan had only one other voice credit in a relatively low-budget film entitled The Golden Blaze. In addition to the show, she also primarily worked as an actress in such films as Alien vs. Predator, Love & Basketball and The Family That Preys.
Reagan Gomez-Preston plays Roberta Tubbs, the stepdaughter of Cleveland. Gomez has stated that she uses her own voice to portray Roberta and that she herself gets mistaken for a fifteen-year-old over the phone "all the time." Before Gomez was cast as Roberta, Nia Long (who co-starred with Lathan in The Best Man franchise) provided the character's voice during the first thirteen episodes. According to Long, she was replaced because producers decided they wanted an actress with a younger-sounding voice, given that the character is a teenager.
Kevin Michael Richardson, a recurring guest voice on Family Guy and American Dad!, portrays Cleveland, Jr., as well as Cleveland's next-door neighbor Lester Krinklesac. In portraying Cleveland, Jr., Richardson drew inspiration from a character named Patrick that he had played on the NBC drama series ER who was mentally impaired and wore a football helmet. For Lester, Richardson stated in an interview that, being African American, he had "run into a few rednecks in [his] time", and decided to simply perform a stereotypical redneck impression for the voice of Lester.
Jason Sudeikis plays Holt Richter, one of Cleveland's drinking buddies with short stature, and Terry Kimple, one of Cleveland's longtime friends who now works with him at Waterman Cable. Sudeikis originally began as a recurring cast member, but starting with the episode "Harder, Better, Faster, Browner", he was promoted to a series regular.
Seth MacFarlane played Tim the Bear up until season 3 episode 10, which MacFarlane admits is a "Steve Martin impression [...] a Wild and Crazy Guy impression". Jess Harnell voices the character for the rest of the series from the next episode onward.
Other voices include that of Arianna Huffington as Tim's wife Arianna the Bear, Nat Faxon as Tim and Arianna's son Raymond the Bear, Jamie Kennedy as Roberta's boyfriend Gabriel Friedman, a.k.a. " Federline Jones", Will Forte as Principal Wally, Frances Callier as Evelyn "Cookie" Brown, Craig Robinson as LeVar "Freight Train" Brown and David Lynch as Gus the bartender.
Crossovers with other animated sitcoms
The Cleveland Show characters have appeared on other animated sitcoms and vice versa. The Cleveland Show crossovers have all involved two other animated programs. Both the other two animated programs were also created by Seth MacFarlaneâFamily Guy and American Dad!. There are also many brief cameos of characters from three other Fox animated shows, The Simpsons, Futurama, and King of the Hill.
Syndication and streaming
In July 2010, the Turner Broadcasting System picked up syndication rights, for their networks TBS and later, Adult Swim. The series first aired on Adult Swim in the United States on September 29, 2012. On July 14, 2018, Viacom later picked up the rights to the series and the series left Adult Swim and TBS on September 9, 2018. The series began airing on Comedy Central in the United States on October 8, 2018 with ViacomCBS sister networks BET and VH1 airing the series starting on August 31, 2020 and September 14, 2020, respectively. The series is available for streaming on Hulu.
The series began airing on FXX on September 20, 2021.
Internationally, The Cleveland Show is available to stream on Star on Disney+
Cancellation
On April 17, 2013, Fox dismissed increasing rumors that The Cleveland Show had been canceled, reporting rather that renewal of the series was undetermined as of that time. However, on May 13, 2013, in the New York Daily News, Fox Chairman of Entertainment Kevin Reilly confirmed its cancellation. Following the series cancellation, it was confirmed that Cleveland and the Brown/Tubbs family would be moving back to Quahog to rejoin the Family Guy cast.
Plot
The show follows Cleveland Brown back in his hometown of Stoolbend, Virginia with his new family.
Good Qualities
- In comparison to Season 1, these seasons were better and saw numerous improvements to make it one of the better animated spin-offs in comparison to other shows that failed miserably.
- Catchy theme song, much like Seth MacFarlane's other animated TV shows, it has great effort and great music. In fact, it is arguably the best out of the three. Likewise, the credits theme is great as well with great jazz added to it.
- The Brown-Tubbs family have improved their characters in comparison from season 1 (apart from Roberta).
- Cleveland was an idiotic father who acted immature and stupid, but now, Cleveland has shown more intelligence on the show and is much more funnier than before.
- The animation is even better than it was in the previous season with Toon Boom Animation making it look better.
- Heartwarming moments here and there, such as Donna reuniting with her mother and Cleveland spending time with his abusive father.
- Great guest appearances with Kanye West, Bruno Mars and many others doing a top notch performance.
- Excellent songs that are executed such as "Be-Cleve in Yourself", "Small Ass Town Big Ass Heart", and "Frapp Attack".
- Creative plots that are much better than what season 1 had. It shows that the writers made adjustments and are actually trying harder to make the show more creative.
- The cutaways are even better than before, they are much more clever, some of the best include "Cleveland at the Dentist" or the infamous Bob the Builder cutaway.
- Excellent humor that is rather funny than annoying and doesn't rely that much on gross-out humor.
- Tons of good/decent episodes such asË
- "Die Semi-Hard" (the best episode of the show)
- "Hot Cocoa Bang Bang" (a great way to end season 2)
- "Fist and Furious"
- "The Blue, the Gray and the Brown"
- "Harder, Better, Faster, Browner" (which started these seasons on a high note)
- "Frapp Attack"
- "Nightmare on Grace Street"
- "The Hurricane!"
- "BFFs" (which started season 3 on a high note)
- "Escape from Goochland" (which started season 4 on a high note)
No No No No No NOOOO!" Qualities
- Cleveland is still flanderized and acts like Peter Griffin, thankfully, his character improved, in comparison to Season 1. While there are instances of unlikability, he is more of a decent character in these seasons.
- Likewise, even the good characters on the show still have their unlikability shown in numerous episodes.
- Some bad episodes such as;
- "Sex and the Biddy"
- "Y Tu Junior Tambien"
- "There Goes El Neighborhood"
- "The Wide World of Cleveland Show"
- "Wheel of Family" (a poor way to end the show)
- Speaking of which, "Wheel of Family" was not a good way to end the series as it was completely random and didn't give the series a proper conclusion. This blames goes on Fox, however, as they decided to cancel the show, a week before the finale.
- Some characters are still unlikable from the first season such as Lester, LeVar, Kendra, Robert, and Evelyn.
- While Season 3 is good, it is the weakest of these three seasons (although it is still better than Season 1) as there are weaker and more forgettable episodes, the characters being more unlikable, though not too much and the writing taking a bit of a hit. However, Season 4 improves this seasons flaws and despite problems, Season 3 is still good enough to be on this wiki.
Reception
While the reception from critics were still mixed, the reception from audiences and fans of the Family Guy franchise were much more positive during these seasons, with many agreeing that this was an improvement over the first season.
Episodes With Their Own Pages
- "Hot Cocoa Bang Bang" (season 2, episode 22)
- "Die Semi-Hard" (season 3, episode 7)
Comments
- Good media
- Good shows
- 2010s programs
- Animation
- Cartoons
- Self-aware shows
- Fox shows
- Disney shows
- Adult cartoons
- Adult Swim shows
- Comedy Central shows
- Cancelled shows
- Traditional animation shows
- 20th Television
- Seasons
- Controversial shows
- Animated sitcoms
- Sitcoms
- Blaxploitation shows
- Shows in streaming services
- Vindicated by history
- ITV shows
- Spin-offs
- Internet memes
- Seth MacFarlane shows
- Decent shows
- Decent media