Because Disney cartoons tend to be rerun over and over on the company’s linear channels and they live forever at Disney+, sometimes it’s easy to forget how long ago some of them ended. Take Phineas And Ferb; its original run ended close to ten years ago. But now it’s back with 20 new episodes (40 total stories).
Opening Shot: Stepbrothers Phineas Flynn (Vincent Martella) and Ferb Fletcher (David Errigo Jr.) present the last of “what we did last summer” to their class, which just happens to be all the adventures they went on during the first four seasons of Phineas And Ferb.
The Gist: The boys have spread their presentation out over the entire school year; they finish their talk just in time for another summer vacation. Now Phineas leads the class with a song about another summer, while his sister Candace (Ashley Tisdale) continues to scheme to catch the boys in another one of their schemes and tell their mother Linda (Caroline Rhea).
The boys and their buddies Isabella (Alyson Stoner), Baljeet (Maulik Pancholy) and Buford (Bobby Gaylor) start building like crazy for that night’s block party, while Linda gives Candace pies for the booth that will be manned by Candace’s stepdad Lawrence (Richard O’Brien). Linda feels like she missed all of last summer’s adventures — Candace’s response to that is “duh” — and just wants to be more engaged this summer. That includes the traditional beginning-of-summer family portrait.
Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz (Dan Provenmire) has returned to his evil ways, and that news is immediately met by a visit from Agent Perry the Platypus (Dee Bradley Baker). Doof shows Perry his new “Vaporizorinator,” which he’ll fly in a chicken-shaped balloon over the town and vaporizing whatever annoys him. He starts slow, though, vaporizing cell towers that look like trees and mannequins with no hands.
The block party begins, with Candace hoping that her mom sees at least one of the boys’ wacky contraptions. But when Perry inevitably escapes, things escalate quickly.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The creators of Phineas And Ferb, Dan Povenmire and Jeff “Swampy” Marsh, created the series Milo Murphy’s Law after PAF ended in 2015, and that show shared a similar vibe.
Our Take: Phineas And Ferb has always been fun to watch with your kids because of the catchy music, the idea that these best friends are part of a blended family, and the asides that make the adults chuckle while the kids are paying attention to the action. The creativity that Marsh, Provenmire and their writers and animators is on full display during the “epic” first episode, whose story spans both 11-minute segments.
We won’t spoil what happens in the episode, but the second half has all of the devices the boys and their friends have created trying to corral Doofenshmirtz and his Vaporizorinator, with the epic battle laying waste to the town of Danville. And what’s great about the story is that all of the heroes chip in to the battle, including Candace and Perry.
The second episode made available for review is more traditional, with the gang making a submarine made of food and looking like a sub sandwich in the first story, and the group bouncing around on springs and wearing sticky gloves while Candace takes her driving test in the second. All the while, Doofenshmirtz is deploying his “red-green shiftenator,” ostensibly to help him in traffic, but it ends up making a lot of green things red and vice-versa.
What strikes us is how creative the show’s creators and writers continue to be when it comes to the things that Phineas and Ferb invent and how Candace continues to get frustrated that she can’t show any evidence to her mom. Given the ten-year break, we’re hoping the creativity will be flowing freely as the boys go through another summer.
What Age Group Is This For?: The show is rated TV-G, and is more or less for all ages, though given the action and rapid-fire dialogue in most episodes, we think kids 6 and up will like it most.
Parting Shot: The gang sings about a “brand new summer.”
Sleeper Star: We always root for the goofy villain in these shows, so we’re partial to Dan Povenmire’s character Dr. Doofenshmirtz. In the second episode, he talks about how getting stuff in traffic makes the perishables he buys at the supermarket go bad as he returns his cart. “I may be evil but I’m not a monster,” he tells Perry, whom he has trapped in a hand basket.
Most Pilot-y Line: None that we could find.
Our Call: STREAM IT. We’re happy to see Phineas And Ferb back with new adventures, and after ten years away, it’s as fun and creative as ever.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.