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Clone High Ep 1.10 ‘Litter Kills; Literally’ says goodbye to a beloved clone

Clone High Ep 1.10 ‘Litter Kills; Literally’ says goodbye to a beloved clone

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Clone High Episode 10 ‘Litter Kills; Literally’

Written by Judah Miller & Murray Miller

Aired 1/19/2003 on MTV

 

When Clone High is at its very best, it’s able to pile trope on top of trope, until it has this Escher-like contraption of story and parody that feeds into every facet of the plot. It’s not quite the case with ‘Litter Kills’, but when its focused on JFK, it’s one of the most touching episodes of the series. In a nutshell, ‘Litter Kills’ is a very special episode about death, wrapped in a very special episode about environmental concerns, wrapped in a very special episode about how a community heals together; and when it’s running at full-tilt, it’s quite an impressive contraption.

Ponce de Leon’s death shouldn’t be something that affects the audience: we’re told he’s going to die before we even meet him, and he only spends a few scenes with JFK before he dies a gruesome death, a victim of his own littering (he gets stabbed in the neck by a juice box, sliced up by whipping candy wrappers, and chokes on his own blood after a bag falls on his head, he trips on a banana peel, and cracks his head on an empty soda bottle… oh yeah, and he’s handcuffed by plastic soda rings). But ‘Litter Kills’ does a lot with those scenes, not only establishing him as the coolest kid in school (everyone wants to litter like him), but a angst-ridden teenage kid rebelling against his father (who is the school’s janitor, the man who cleans up the trash) and trying to make sense of the world around him.

In his final scene, he talks to JFK about enjoying life and making the most out of each day, an obvious sign that something awful is about to happen (as it always does on “very special” episodes) – and when it does, JFK’s left with the terrible memory of their last interaction, a fight caused when Ponce’s new sensitivity caused JFK to question their friendship. It leaves him a broken shell, a man who cries like a monkey and has a hysterical outburst when attempting to deliver a eulogy (he eventually climbs into the casket with Ponce, after punching in the face to prove he’s still alive). Ponce died because of his littering, and it sends him into a depressive spiral, clinging onto Cleo for comfort (which pisses Abe off, of course).

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It’s not until Abe sits and talks with JFK that he’s able to start healing: the most important thing ‘Litter Kills’ suggests is that isolating ourselves is the most unhealthy thing to do after death. Sometime we need to cry like a monkey in our friend’s arms when we’re handing a bowl of shit from life; sometimes reaching out to an enemy who is in pain is the best way to mend fences. Ultimately, what killed Ponce is what brings everyone together: they finally realize that littering is bad and clean up the community, ending the episode on a lighter (but still “very special”) moment about the environment.

The rest of the episode is boring filler material, centered around Ghandi getting confused with some death row inmates. He gets imprisioned after picking up trash near them in his orange jumpsuit, and what follows is a bunch of semi-threatening rape jokes. Ghandi is sad over Ponce’s death, but there’s never a real connection made between the two, just a lot of “haha they could rape Ghandi at any time!” kind of humor, eventually revealing themselves to be a supportive, tender bunch who console each other naked in the showers.

But the JFK material is fantastic – and for a brief moment, allows JFK and Abe to share a pleasant moment together, the ever-present Cleo conundrum pushed off, if only for a few short minutes. JFK’s journey through grieving is an easy story for an audience to relate to, and ‘Litter Kills’ (like the best Scrubs episodes, to reference another Bill Lawrence show) handles death in a way that’s reflective without losing its comedic touch.

 

Other thoughts/observations:

– JFK sees a vision of Ponce, and can’t understand what the hell it means. “You’re a g-g-g-g-g-….. dead guy!!”; “You came back as genie! Here’s my first wish: bring back my friend Ponce!…… Ponce-y, you’re back!!!”

– When Joan is complaining about the litter, she says something to the effect of “You guys, you can’t litter so much, you guys, because what you guys are doing is bad for the environment, you guys. You guys! (gets hit with a piece of trash) You guys suck.”

– who is voicing Glenn, the janitor (and Ponce’s foster father)? Why that’s Neil Flynn, who played Janitor on Scrubs (he also provides the voice of Julius Caesar in this episode, and others).

– Luke Perry voices Ponce, because of course.

– Abe, talking to Joan about love: “I never asked to be a fisherman on a sea such as this.”

– Glenn gets fired by Scudworth at the end because there’s no longer any trash, which everyone decides is a sign that a little bit of littering is a good thing. “In moderation!”

– Scudworth: “he puts my papers in these neat little piles… you know what neat little piles are? Chaos!”

– Genghis sings a beautiful ‘Ave Maria’, don’t you think?

– Scudworth interrupts Glenn’s eulogy: “someone puked in the hallway… could you clean that up now? Your son will still be dead when you get back.”

[wpchatai]