I never understood why anybody liked The Job, The Finale, The Rival or The Brain and pretended as if The Amazing World of Gumball could do no wrong in regards to good comedy and storytelling, but I am happy to come across something else many of us can agree is very bad. It is just too sad, depressing and painful to see Darwin's naivety get him in danger when he thinks that saying nothing to Jamie until she works it out for herself will solve the problem, and just lets Jamie shout at everybody else who tries to talk to her or Darwin. It ends in one of the cruelest punch lines I have ever seen from this show, with an actual punch included. Darwin's plan of long-term silence almost works when Jamie chases after Gumball, wanting him to be another boyfriend for her, then suddenly comes to the conclusion that love is something you earn. Darwin finally gains the courage to tell Jamie the same thing, but somehow THIS is the one time Darwin should have kept his mouth shut. Jamie learned nothing and does not practice what she preached because she did exactly what Darwin expected she would do to him. She punched him out for trying to teach her a lesson about being a healthier, less abusive girlfriend. All she does is be a rude, despicable person who shouts at or hurts everybody who gets in her way. She is a despicable, narcissistic bully, which is not unusual for her character, but The Girlfriend is a very heinous episode because it misses the point of how it could have resolved its own conflict much better by having Jamie learn why she should stop doing what she did to hurt everyone who disagrees with her, even if she thought it was fun.
The only funny parts of The Girlfriend that make it slightly more bearable to watch are the running gag of when Jamie gets frozen in thought and makes a hilariously ugly, confused face. I can pretend to tolerate the aforementioned episodes if I turn off my brain or pretend to take nothing The Amazing World of Gumball seriously, and The Girlfriend would still be indefensible because it is just that unfunny, even when it is intended to be funny, and it gives kids the worst advice ever on how to handle an abusive girlfriend or boyfriend who is just a bully. Following a potentially serious message with a cruel joke where Jamie punches Darwin for doing what he should have done along is not funny. It is just sad! A storyline pitting a naive boy like Darwin against an abusive bully like Jamie is a horrendous, unhappy idea on principle doomed to fail. It is like the Spongebob Squarepants episode Pet Sitter Pat having Patrick be the worst pet sitter ever who almost kills Gary several times. Storylines that pair up characters who should never be together can be funny, and as a general concept it can make for lots of good comedy, but not when that comedy is as shallow or predictable as...the baseline of abusive or idiotic danger that we would already expect to come from it. All Pet Sitter Pat and The Girlfriend do is go through the motions of abusing and torturing Gary and Darwin with Patrick's idiocy and Jamie's cruelty. Were those episodes intended to be hated by all of us? Because they are, and I hope the mean writers who wrote them and the mean directors who directed them are happy with how angry or sad they have made us from them.
The only funny parts of The Girlfriend that make it slightly more bearable to watch are the running gag of when Jamie gets frozen in thought and makes a hilariously ugly, confused face. I can pretend to tolerate the aforementioned episodes if I turn off my brain or pretend to take nothing The Amazing World of Gumball seriously, and The Girlfriend would still be indefensible because it is just that unfunny, even when it is intended to be funny, and it gives kids the worst advice ever on how to handle an abusive girlfriend or boyfriend who is just a bully. Following a potentially serious message with a cruel joke where Jamie punches Darwin for doing what he should have done along is not funny. It is just sad! A storyline pitting a naive boy like Darwin against an abusive bully like Jamie is a horrendous, unhappy idea on principle doomed to fail. It is like the Spongebob Squarepants episode Pet Sitter Pat having Patrick be the worst pet sitter ever who almost kills Gary several times. Storylines that pair up characters who should never be together can be funny, and as a general concept it can make for lots of good comedy, but not when that comedy is as shallow or predictable as...the baseline of abusive or idiotic danger that we would already expect to come from it. All Pet Sitter Pat and The Girlfriend do is go through the motions of abusing and torturing Gary and Darwin with Patrick's idiocy and Jamie's cruelty. Were those episodes intended to be hated by all of us? Because they are, and I hope the mean writers who wrote them and the mean directors who directed them are happy with how angry or sad they have made us from them.