Absent Minded / Be Stella My Heart (The Loud House Season 3 Episode 15) - 'Toon Reviews 30

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Absent Minded

It goes without saying that Clyde is a very knowledgeable, moral, and loyal character offering great support to whatever scheme he’s involved in.  However, he sometimes comes off as over-reactive and makes a big deal over very minor things.  What’s more, moments of this don’t tend to come off as very funny.  So working against this cartoon, the whole story is dedicated to Clyde’s setbacks.  Fortunately, there’s a huge positive factor working in the favor of what we get. 

His great virtues and organization skills get some well-deserved recognition from the school staff and faculty so much so that he’s named Junior Administrator to Principal Huggins. This means that he helps him out with managing everything around the school, and the great job he does as shown in a montage show this position is well-deserved.  This brings up a particular counterpoint when you consider exactly how Clyde’s virtues were recognized and why he’s named Junior Administrator.  He’s been awarded the Perfect Attendance Award, yet through his diary of personal records, it’s revealed that he actually skipped a day of class.  In other words, in accepting the new position, Clyde is technically stretching the truth about having perfect attendance. 

At the same time, it’s conflicting if Clyde’s panic over what he’s done is truly necessary.  If the award was for best attendance instead of perfect attendance, there’d really be no reason at all for not telling anyone he skipped a day.  The title does suggest that he had no missteps when showing up to class, so if he did miss a day, that should mean he doesn’t qualify.  Then again, not telling anyone the truth doesn’t hurt anyone nor does it cause problems of any magnitude, and Clyde really does do a good job at Junior Administrator.  It would be just as problematic if he told the truth and threw away his position at something that benefits people.  To me, it makes more sense for Clyde not to worry so much about not telling anyone about missing a day than the contrary, so it kind of costs what follows value. 

Clyde goes around the school doing many deeds for members of the faculty from the secretary, to the janitor, to the gym teacher, to the nurse.  It’s all in the name of hiding the truth or keeping people from telling anyone he skipped a day.  In addition to being fueled on overreacting, these moments are also repetitive.  All the acts end with Clyde unwisely saying what he did when someone is around and thinking they were heard.  This is a dumb move because there’s no way he can be absolutely sure he was heard, and there’s no way he couldn’t have waited until after he left school to talk about his secret.  That and it’s very awkward when he keeps telling people “I scratch your back, you scratch my back” and they’re left all confused. 

In the end, Clyde’s moralistic side gets him to tell the truth anyway, though going a bit too far through demonizing himself.  However, it turns out he’s fine because he didn’t go to school that day because it was closed then.  This shows he was overreacting, but it could have been stronger if this wasn’t the case and he still got to keep his job because of how good he is at it.  Plus, if school was closed that day, why wasn’t that in the original records? 

I’m just saying now that I don’t consider this bad.  It plays well to Clyde’s talents and gives him a good outlet.  However, the reliance on overreactions and needlessly dumb decisions hold it back from being very interesting or strong.

C+

Be Stella My Heart

As I get older, I’ve grown to believe that the best way to get closer with other people is to treat them well as a friend and not try too hard to be cool or follow a fixed set of standards.  Things like love can follow naturally as long as you’re true to yourself and anything other than that can cause awkwardness that can ruin all chances with everyone.  It’s for these reasons that any story where characters actually think that putting on a coolness act to win a new person over simply fall flat.  Sadly, this cartoon falls into that trap. 

As the title implies, the story is where we get to know the new girl at Lincoln’s school called Stella first introduced in “White Hare” albeit with a significant redesign.  This being her first formal appearance, you’d think the story would be all about her adjusting to being the new kid and showing what she’s like as a character.  Truth be told, Stella has a lot of likable qualities with an upbeat attitude, being direct when it comes to trying to make friends, and a great sense of fun with a variety of interests. 

All these qualities, however, are only shown in little scenes when being observed by the real stars of the cartoon, Lincoln and his friends.  They’re on the mindset that Stella being a cute-looking new girl means that she’s only meant to be a girlfriend for one of them and not just a friend for all of them.  Given what I feel makes a healthy social mindset, this behavior from the guys does not give the story a lot of merit especially since they all come off as dumb whenever around Stella.  Whenever she introduces herself and asks to join them in lunch, gym, or science, they all act very strange and awkward, bringing an uncomfortable tone.  It would be better if their awkwardness was at least funny, but it hardly ever is. 

Also, when Stella asks different guys to join her for different activities, they actually question why she doesn’t just settle for one guy.  It’s totally obvious that maybe she’s interested in all of them because she wants to be their friend.  It takes a long time for the guys to realize that, and they feel the need put on overly stylish getups and fight against each other just to “blow [Stella] out of the water.”  Thankfully, going against each other doesn’t last long, and when they all end up in the nurse’s office, they realize they never should have broken up their great bonds. 

Still, closed-mindedness persists when they actually blame Stella for turning against each other when it’s really their overly-romantic mindsets to blame.  When confronted, Stella retorts with the obvious truth that everything she did was because she wanted to get to know the guys as friends.  She also points out that maybe they don’t deserve her as a friend if they only see her as a romantic partner.  This is exactly why I just can’t support stories where characters have to act so ridiculous and overly cool to find love.  Is it really too much to ask for a story where love forms through caring and friendship?  Even with the boys realizing they were wrong, apologizing to Stella, and her becoming their new friend, their total misguidedness really weakens the story. 

It should really go without saying that people of the opposite gender should be treated as friends and not lovers to be won over.  With how enjoyable Stella is by herself, I can’t help but think how stronger this cartoon could be if the direction was different and the main focus was just on her finding friends.  At least Stella sticks around, which is good considering the sense and logic she brings to Lincoln and his gang.  All I can say that if it wasn’t for her, this whole thing could have turned out a lot worse.

C-

The Ranking

1.      Head Poet’s Anxiety

2.      Roadie to Nowhere

3.      Shop Girl

4.      Breaking Dad

5.      Gown and Out

6.      Fandom Pains

7.      Insta-Gran

8.      Selfie Improvement

9.      Scales of Justice

10.  Net Gains

11.  Crimes of Fashion

12.  No Place Like Homeschool

13.  The Mad Scientist

14.  City Slickers

15.  Missed Connection

16.  Fool Me Twice

17.  Deal Me Out

18.  Teachers’ Union

19.  Tripped!

20.  White Hare

21.  A Fridge Too Far

22.  Pasture Bedtime

23.  Absent Minded

24.  What Wood Lincoln Do?

25.  Friendzy

26.  Pipe Dreams

27.  Be Stella My Heart

28.  Rita Her Rights

29.  Ruthless People

The next Loud House review features Lynn take up babysitting, and offers a day in the life of Ronnie Anne's extended family when the Louds aren't visiting.

Next time on MC Toon Reviews, Steven Universe offers a "Room for Ruby."

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