The fifth season of the British-American animated television sitcom The Amazing World of Gumball, created by Ben Bocquelet, aired on Cartoon Network in the United States on September 1, 2016, and was produced by Cartoon Network Development Studio Europe. The series focuses on the misadventures of Gumball Watterson, a blue 12-year-old cat, along with his adopted brother, Darwin, a goldfish. Together, they cause mischief among their family, as well as with the wide array of students at Elmore Junior High, where they attend middle school.
Contents
Development
Plot
The season focuses on the misadventures of Gumball Watterson, a blue 12-year-old cat, along with his adopted brother, Darwin, a goldfish. Together, they cause mischief among their family, as well as with the wide array of students at Elmore Junior High, where they attend middle school. In a behind-the-scenes video documenting the production of the second season, creator Ben Bocquelet expanded on the development of some of the characters, and how they are based on interactions from his childhood.
Production
On June 2, 2014, Cartoon Network announced that the series had been renewed for a fourth and fifth season. The two seasons combined were commissioned as 40 half-hour blocks. Production for the fifth season began on March 3, 2016, and concluded on May 12, 2017.
Mic Graves remained the series director, while Antoine Perez, a former assistant director, began serving as a partial director for certain episodes throughout the season.
The season is notable for a transition in the show's lead voice cast. In the episode "The Copycats", the characters Gumball and Darwin Watterson were officially recast due to their previous voice actors reaching puberty. Jacob Hopkins was replaced by Nicolas Cantu as Gumball, and Terrell Ransom Jr. was replaced by Donielle Hansley Jr. as Darwin. While "The Copycats" served as the narrative explanation for the change, the episode "The Ollie" had previously leaked on cable OnDemand platforms in December 2016, featuring the new cast in the end credits despite being released out of production order.
The fifth season maintained a steady audience, averaging approximately 998,000 viewers per episode.
Crossovers
Characters from Clarence, Regular Show and Uncle Grandpa make cameo appearances in the episode, "The Boredom".
Miracle Star
Miracle Star (Chinese: 奇奇妙乐星; pinyin: Qí qímiào lè xīng; lit. 'The Weird', 'Wonderful', 'and Delightful Star') is a Chinese children's animated comedy series created by Chinese food company Sanyuan Foods to promote a brand of goat milk of the same name. The show is best known for plagiarizing The Amazing World of Gumball by imitating its scenes, character designs and animation style. Miracle Star is about an anthropomorphic goat named Miao Le Xing (referred to as Kiki) and his talking pet frog named Gua-Gua (referred to as Quack or Ribbit) who lives in an apartment with their parents.
The series aired from 2014 to 2017, with a total of 12 episodes broadcast before being cancelled due to negative reviews.
The 167th episode of The Amazing World of Gumball, "The Copycats", addresses the plagiarism.