Total DramaRama

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Total DramaRama
Making a daycare spin-off isn't exactly a good idea for an animated reality TV series.
Genre: Animated
Surreal comedy
Running Time: 11 Minutes
Country: Canada
United States
Release Date: September 1, 2018 – April 15, 2023
Network(s): Teletoon (Canada)
Cartoon Network (United States)
Created by: Jennifer Pertsch
Tom McGillis
Distributed by: Cake Entertainment
Starring: Deven Mack
Emilie-Claire Barlow
Katie Crown
Cory Doran
Scott McCord
Drew Nelson
Sarah Gadon
Christian Potenza
Kristin Fairlie
Lilly Bartlam
Bahia Watson
Darren Frost
Wyatt White
Evany Rosen
Seasons: 3
Episodes: 110
Previous show: Total Drama Presents: The Ridonculous Race


Total DramaRama, originally titled Total Daycare Drama or Total Drama Daycare, is a 2018 Canadian-American animated comedy series. It is a crossover spin-off set in an alternate shared universe of Total Drama and 6teen, and the second Total Drama spin-off series after The Ridonculous Race.

Plot

The show is a crossover prequel spin-off depicting an alternate universe where the teenage 'Total Drama' characters and one ‘6teen’ character are aged down to toddlers.

Why It Lacks the Drama

  1. The main problem with this spin-off is that it completely contradicts the original concept of the Total Drama franchise. While the previous shows focused on being a parody of Reality TV, this instead focuses on the everyday shenanigans of the characters in their toddler forms. Of course, it is non-canon at best since it is more of an alternate universe.
  2. The overall concept of the franchise's main characters being in a daycare center, while not entirely bad, feels highly generic and out of place, considering the original Total Drama gimmicks.
  3. The show includes a confession cam, despite no longer being a parody of a reality show (though the characters later imply it may be a mock reality show). This indicates that the writers brought back random elements of the original show without realizing why they were used there, or even considering if the said element was necessary.
  4. Laughable title choice for the show itself: Total DramaRama. It doesn't make any sense as it has nothing to do with the characters as toddlers. The former titles Total Drama Daycare and Total Daycare Drama would have been much more fitting choices for the show's premise and format.
  5. Most episodes range from mediocre to downright terrible. Below is a list of a few examples:
    • "Hic Hic Horray"
    • "Bananas & Cheese"
    • "Snow Way Out" (an infamous example)
    • "Student Becomes the Teacher"
    • "Tiger Fail"
    • "Cluckwork Orange"
    • "Not for the Paint of Heart"
    • "Virtual Reality Bites"
    • "Germ Factory"
    • "Total Eclipse of the Fart" (arguably the worst episode)
    • "Stink. Stank. Stunk." (which ended season 1 on a disgusting note)
    • "Way Back Wendel"
    • "Senior Sinisters"
    • "OWW"
    • "A Bridgette Too Far" (a Bridgette torture episode, which ended the series on an awful note)
  6. Instead of bringing back more of the classic characters like Trent, Lindsay, Heather, DJ, or Tyler and even some of the 2nd generation characters, they included Jude Lizowski from 6teen, which is quite odd considering that those are 2 completely separated and different shows.
    • The fact that Chris McLean's voice actor also voices Jude doesn't help as it causes you to think about Chris' character and not Jude's.
    • Regarding what has been said previously on this pointer, most of the first-generation characters including fan favorites only make very small cameos or don't appear at all. This includes but is not limited to:
      • Ezekiel
      • Lindsay
      • Tyler
      • Trent
      • Geoff
      • Heather
      • Alejandro
      • Mike
      • Zoey
      • Jo
      • Brick
  7. This show is a massive kick-in-the-balls to the Total Drama fandom because Fresh TV was originally planning to make a sixth season of the original Total Drama, but later declined and made this instead.
    • Not only that, but back in 2017, Fresh announced a new season of Total Drama after a long hiatus, but reconsidered and made this show instead.
      • In February 2021, however, Fresh TV would eventually announce two more seasons of Total Drama, which as of right now, are currently premiering on Cartoon Network and HBO Max.
    • Also, the children were going to be portrayed as 11-year-olds before Tom McGillis decided to age them down to preschool-aged children to have more ideas for stories.
  8. This is a pathetic attempt to keep the franchise going, as well as semi-revive the long dead "spin-off babies" trope, maybe even to the point of becoming a cliché. Plus, it feels like an insult to the franchise.
  9. Harold, Noah, and Leshawna were all recast for no good reason and sounded mediocrely childlike, while Cody and Gwen were replaced with actual child actors.
    • On the topic of recasting, many characters sound out of place with their new voice actors/actresses in some foreign dubs.
  10. Most of the episodes plot are nonsensical and out of place for a Total Drama show and feels more like it belongs to a preschool show or an animated sitcom as it uses unrealistic fantasy elements such as: a villain being a talking pants, paint creations being turned to life.
  11. Most of the characters have been flanderized and act almost nothing like their original selves.
    • Gwen went from a cynical and slightly sarcastic person who isn't goth but rather a loner who's usually nice and was one of the most normal and level-headed out of the cast to a generic creepy child, but blander and more unlikable. She even screamed in "An Eggs-tremely Bad Idea" all because her chair was ruined by Izzy and Owen, and it will likely get on your nerves.
    • Beth went from an awkward yet nice and friendly girl to a selfish, bratty jerk who sometimes picks her nose as well as providing some other toilet/gross-out humor.
    • Izzy, while she is still insane and crazy, now feels much more obnoxious, even if she has the same personality as in the original.
    • Harold, while still a nerd, no longer boasts about his "mad skills" or goes on about useless trivia; instead, he is now a straight-up nerd, and even wimpier than the original.
    • Owen, similar to Izzy, mostly has his original personality, except he is much more annoying, dumber, and obnoxious.
    • Noah went from an intelligent, sarcastic, and pessimistic person who would be able to have fun on the inside to an extremely sensitive person who can't take a joke.
    • Cody went from a slightly perverted, yet also friendly guy who had good intentions to be the butt-monkey out of the gang as he gets abused in every episode he's in through no fault of his own. To make matters worse, he has died at least seven times.
      • Speaking of Cody, when he cries in the episode "Tiger Fail," some of his crying was reused from Sierra's in All-Stars. This shows us just how lazy the sound designers can be.
    • Duncan went from a bad boy who also had a good side to a complete wimp as he is more prone to crying and tearing up than in the original series, which he only did twice.
    • Leshawna went from a sassy yet loyal friend to basically being the mean popular girl out of the gang as tons of episodes show her acting like a spoiled brat toward everyone.
    • Lightning went from a cocky, arrogant, competitive, aggressive, and dumb jock to a kind and friendly person who is more intelligent than in the original.
    • Ella, while still very likable, went from a nice and gentle person who rarely, if ever, got angry to a more short-tempered person who is more prone to getting angry and has a tendency to turn into a dragon whenever she does get angry.
    • Max went from an incompetent villain who was treated as a joke to a more competent villain who is much better at evil deeds.
    • Chef Hatchet, despite being likable, went from a sadistic person who liked torturing the contestants to a strict yet kind caretaker who tried to take care of the kids. It doesn't help that he, like Cody, became a butt-monkey as many episodes show the kids torturing Chef.
  12. The kids are very unlikeable in this series and are annoying, spoiled, whiny brats who often like to torture, annoy and ignore Chef.
  13. It overuses a lot of unfunny jokes relying on gross-out/toilet humor similar to Total Drama All-Stars, especially from Beth and in "Germ Factory", where the main characters literally lick the bathroom floor and walls, making them sick. That's disgusting, and yes, it can make you very sick.
    • The most infamous example is the episode "Total Eclipse of the Fart", in which a fart fairy who is specifically named Smelliot smells toddler farts. This takes the gross-out humor too far and is pretty much somewhat considered as pedophilia, which is highly illegal.
    • Another infamous example is the Season 1 finale "Stink. Stank. Stunk." Do we really need to explain this?
  14. It also tends to use obnoxious sound effects, which can get annoying very quickly. For example, the episode "The Tooth About Zombies" has Chef literally scraping his nails on a chalkboard, and it's annoying to listen to. Gladly, it lasts for only a second.
  15. Characters like Jude, Gwen, Noah, and Bridgette are always very underused while the rest of the cast are overused.
    • Out of the 52 episodes of Season 3, Bridgette only appears in four; and only one is dedicated to her, which is "A Bridgette Too Far". Besides, it's a torture episode for her!
      • The fact that this is the series finale does NOT help at all.
  16. The intro song is very annoying as it only consists of a chorus of children babbling nonsense.
    • Speaking of the intro song itself, most parts of the background music consist of babbling children.
  17. Dated references. For example, in the infamous "Snow Way Out", Owen does a floss dance move from Fortnite in one scene, Duncan does the same floss dance in "The Big Bangs Theory" and Courtney is rendered into a gender politic by correcting everyone to say "snowperson". A lot of the titles are just dumb parodies of movies such as the episode titled “Gum and Gummer” being a satirical reference to “Dumb and Dumber”. While having parodies of movie titles is common, this is just a poor way to use them and comes off as uncreative, lazy, and stupid. They also look like they came from a random title generator. Izzy even says "Izzy Jenkins" which is a reference to the Leroy Jenkins meme in the episode "Not for the Paint of Heart".
  18. In some episodes, there are bad morals.
    • "OWW" teaches that sometimes, you'll have to play dirty.
    • "The Gold and the Stickerful" teaches that you'll need to be superior to the others.
  19. Most of the endings in each episodes tends to be rushed and mean-spirited.

Redeeming Qualities

  1. Some of the original voice actors reprise their roles.
    • Deven Mack does a passable imitation of Chef.
  2. The animation is passable as it's good, smooth, has a nice color palette, and manages to capture the animation style from the original Total Drama series.
  3. Some characters capture the feel of their older counterparts.
    • Bridgette
    • Chef
    • Cody
    • Noah
    • Harold
    • Izzy
    • Jude
    • Lightning
  4. The character designs of the kids are pretty cute, such as Izzy, Cody, Bridgette, and Courtney.
  5. Nikki Wong from 6teen has a small semi-speaking cameo role in the form of a flashback in toddler drawing style, making this crossover not entirely pointless.
    • Speaking of 6teen, Jude Lizowski makes a reappearance 8 years after his show ended. 6teen aired its final episode in 2010 and Total DramaRama debuted in 2018.
  6. Because it takes place in an alternate universe and therefore it is non-canon to the original series and the previous spin-off, thus all of the pre-existing canon from the original and first spin-off series can be considered safe.
  7. Some characters that never interacted in the original series, like Harold and Izzy or Gwen and Noah, do here and it's interesting to see them resulting in amusing dynamics.
  8. Some of the jokes can be executed decently.
  9. Chris McLean himself finally appears in the episode "Broken Back, Kotter", and while retaining his sadistic personality, it is notably toned down. It is restored closer to how it was in the first three seasons of the primary show.
  10. Some characters from the original have returned, mostly as a cameo, examples includeː
    • Trent, DJ, and Katie appeared in "Gum and Gummer".
    • Katie and Geoff appeared in "Duncan Disorderly".
    • Ella (TDPI) and Max (TDPI) make an appearance in "Dissing Cousins", and remain as supporting characters.
    • Sugar (TDPI, although she was unlikable back in the previous season, notably how she voted off Ella due to her singing) and Lightning (TDROTI) appear and become part of the main cast in "Sugar & Spice & Lightning & Frights".
    • Heather (TDI), Alejandro (TDWT), and Jasmine (TDPI), albeit as teenagers, make a silent cameo in "A Hole Lot of Trouble".
  11. Speaking of WILTD #18, they even made fun of one of the instances where a character flosses. When Cody flosses during a carpet protest, Chef Hatchet tells him "Cody, no more flossing! Do you have any idea how dated that'll be when it airs on TV?" Not only that, but some of the other jokes hit well.
  12. There are some decent/good episodes here and there like:
    • "Dissing Cousins" (especially since two Pahkitew Island contestants, Ella and Max made a guest-star appearance in that one)
    • "Stay Goth, Poodle Girl, Stay Goth"
    • "Broken Back Kotter"
    • "A Hole Lot of Trouble"
    • "Gwen Scary, Gwen Lost"
  13. With the show's conclusion in 2023, the Fresh TV crew will focus more on the franchise's original premise of spoofing reality television.

Reception

Total DramaRama received mostly negative reviews from Total Drama fans because they considered this series pointless and wanted a sixth season of the main show instead. On the other hand, though, this show does have several people who like it. Currently, it has a 4/10 on IMDb and a 2.6/5 on Common Sense Media.

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