“Adventure Time”: a popular children’s show chronicling the adventures of 12 year old Finn and his brother, a dog named Jake, as they travel the post-apocalyptic, yet magical, Land of Ooo. Running a span of eight years (2010-2018) and ten seasons, “Adventure Time” was one of the most popular children’s shows in the 2010’s, making it a childhood favorite for many current young adults and teenagers.
Not only did it gain over three million views on certain episodes, but the show was also critically acclaimed and won several awards. The awards it won included eight Primetime Emmy Awards, a Peabody Award, three Annie Awards, two British Academy Children’s Awards, a Motion Picture Sound Editors Award and a Kerrang! Award, and it was nominated for many more. Now it is back – but in a different way than one would expect.
Within the “Adventure Time” universe, there is a character named Ice King or Simon, depending on how sane he is.
This character, within “Adventure Time,” wrote these books called “Fionna and Cake,” which are clearly based on the main characters, Finn and Jake, except with reversed genders. In the original show, they were characters featured in a small number of episodes; within the episodes, they were characters in books written by Ice King who was both clearly out of his mind, and, in later episodes, having the ideas transplanted into his mind via laser while he slept. The idea of a genderbent universe was popular among the fans, though, and a six-issue comic book series featuring Fionna and Cake was released in 2013.
Although “Adventure Time” has been over for five years, it is still majorly popular, which is likely why Max (previously HBOMax), decided to create “Adventure Time: Fionna and Cake” despite the last episode of “Adventure Time” airing five years ago.
“Fionna and Cake” not only looks at the characters of “Fionna and Cake,” but also previous characters after the ending events of “Adventure Time” and before the last four episodes of the show, which took place in a distant future. It features a sane Simon coping with his actions as Ice King and the difference of the world as he remembers (pre-apocalypse) and the current one, a grown up Finn and dead Jake, and other main characters after the series ended and as they got older.
One major difference is the audience; “Adventure Time” was PG, and “Fionna and Cake” is rated TV-14. According to Suzanna Makkos, an executive for both Max and Adult Swim, the show was developed specifically for young adults.
“The Adventure Time fans have grown up and people are still coming in the bottom, and they’re aging up,” Makkos stated in an interview with Comic Book Resources. “[Fionna and Cake] felt like a perfect show for us. Tonally, it is very much Adventure Time, but Fiona’s older. She’s in the workforce. It’s more adult, so I think it’s going to bring in new fans, and it’s also going to serve the fans that we already have.”
The first episode of “Fionna and Cake” released on August 31st, and two 22-minute episodes will continue to be released each Thursday at three o’clock AM EST until the show hits the ten episode limit it was given. The first eight episodes are currently available to stream on Max or Amazon Prime Video.
