As you may have heard by now, I love Disney’s Phineas and Ferb. I think it’s the best cartoon to come on the air in a decade, if not more, and I eagerly await each new episode, which premiere far too infrequently for my taste.
Earlier today, I saw a post at Geek Tyrant that seems to indicate the show’s creators are indeed working on a big-screen Phineas and Ferb movie — not a surprise, it’s been rumored for a while. More interesting to me, though, is the notion that Disney may be in the hunt for a spin-off.
My.
Whenever a TV show creates a spin-off, you have to ask yourself which character(s) will be involved. And if the spin-off happens while the parent show is still on the air, how will it impact the series? For example, the most obvious character to get his own spin-off would be Perry the Platypus, the semi-aquatic egg-laying mammal of action. While it would be fun to see longer adventures with Perry and his best frenemy, Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz, I don’t think I’d want to see that if it means they’d leave the core show. It’s too woven into the DNA of the show. Removing them from the series would be a terrible blow, and I don’t know if the resultant “new” series would be the same.
Would it be the second bananas? The Adventures of Buford and Baljeet? It sounds funny, sure, but could that particular odd couple sustain a show by themselves? The dynamic between them is funny, but if it was the main element of the show I could see it getting old quickly. What if they went with recurring characters instead of regulars? I could see a show about the rock band Love Händel. They’re on tour, travelling the world, having adventures… that could possibly work.
Or maybe it’ll be something totally new. I really don’t know. But I know that if Dan Povenmire and Jeff “Swampy” Marsh are in the steering wheel, I’ll at least give it a try. Let’s just all hope that if and when the P&F spin-off happens, it’s more Frasier than The Tortellis, more Laverne and Shirley than Joanie Loves Chachi, more Pinky and the Brain than The Cleveland Show.
Yes, I know The Cleveland Show doesn’t have the same parent as Pinky and the Brain. It just sucks.
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