| “ | If there's one thing Mahatma Gandhi stands for, it's revenge! | „ |
| - Gandhi |
Mohandas "Mahatma" Karamchand Gandhi is the tritagonist of Clone High Season 1. He is the clone of the Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist. Unlike his original counterpart, Gandhi is a fun-loving, hyperactive teenage slacker, who lives in the moment and provides the show's comic relief. He is friends with Abe and Joan of Arc. Though he has the tendency to lie and betray them, he does change his ways afterwards and still remains a loyal and supportive friend to them.
He was not present in the 2023 reboot, being canonically written off the show as the only clone not to be defrosted from the freezer, due to the controversy surrounding him being the reason the original series was cancelled.
He is voiced by Michael McDonald.
Biography[]
Overview[]
Gandhi is the tritagonist of the first season and often serves as the comic relief. He is the best friend of Abe and Joan. Gandhi is an outcast at school and is often considered annoying and a "spaz" by his classmates. However, Gandhi's desire is to be popular and constantly seeks acceptance by those around him. He is the class clown, life of the party and is a lazy, irresponsible and underachieving slacker. He also has A.D.D and plays the school's mascot, DNA Dan.
In the reboot, Gandhi's role was drastically reduced to only having small cameo appearances during its two season run and occasionally being mentioned by Abe.
Description on site[]
Being the clone of Mahatma Gandhi is a lot to live up to. That's why this clone buckled under the pressure of living up to his legacy, and instead gets himself, and best friend Abraham Lincoln, into wacky schemes week after hilarious week. In his quest to be the life of the party, Gandhi continuously gets himself in awkward and embarrassing situations, but keeps a positive attitude and always finds the will to spout out cliché catch phrases, such as "Shazam!"
Season 1[]
In "Escape to Beer Mountain: A Rope of Sand", Gandhi joins Abe on his walk to Clone High on their first day of school. Gandhi says that he spent the entire summer perfecting his high-fives and finger snaps. He also takes a liking to Joan's newly developed breasts, which got him punched out by her. Gandhi also tries to help Abe and Genghis Khan get beer for the upcoming party and fails. Gandhi later makes a promise to Joan to help her with her teen crisis hotline instead of going to the party, which he, of course, breaks but tries to justify, by running the hotline on a mobile phone, while at the party. Gandhi gets a phone call from Van Gogh and he puts him on speaker to embarrass him in front of everyone at the party. When Joan finds out about how Gandhi betrayed her trust, she tazes him and later steals his pants and underwear. The following day at school, Van Gogh gets his revenge on Gandhi by painting a mural of him pantsless at the party, which also doubled as an ad for the teen crisis hotline.
References in the 2023 Reboot[]
Although he was not brought back in the series revival of the show, Gandhi was still referenced a number of times, throughout the show's two seasons.
Towards the end of the second season intro, Gandhi’s file name appears crossed out, obviously referencing him being written off the season.
In "Let's Try This Again", the file for Operation Spread Eagle featured a photo of four of the five main clones, these being Abe, Joan, Cleopatra, and JFK. A sticky note was attached, reading "Missing anyone special?", obviously referencing to the absence of Gandhi.
Later in the episode, Abe was talking to who he assumed was Gandhi, only to find out later that it was actually a roasted turkey sitting on top of a fire hydrant.
Abe later mentioned that usually in times of distress, he seeks help from his friend Gandhi but because he hasn't seen him around recently, he's come to the conclusion that he's been avoiding him. It's then revealed that Gandhi is still frozen in the cafeteria freezer, apparently having never been defrosted.
In "Anxious Times at Clone High", Frida Kahlo spray paints a mural of Mahatma Gandhi on the wall. The mural later winks at Abe, startling him.
In "For Your Consideration", a flashback to the 1980's sees Gandhi in a test tube as a fetus.
In "Clone Alone", Candide Sampson reveals to Joan of Arc that she erased all the clones' memories of Gandhi, to which Joan responds "Who?" and it shows Gandhi still frozen in the cafeteria freezer. (Despite having their memories of him erased, Abe still managed to remember who he was in "Let's Try This Again".)
In "Blinded With Pseudoscience: Magnetic Distractions", various items belonging to Gandhi are shown in Principal Scudworth's lost & found drawer such as one of the two matching friendship lockets (S1E3), the G-Spot chain and a copy of his song "G Spot Rocks the G Spot" (S1E7) and possibly one of his earrings that Scudworth wears throughout the episode.
In "Bible Humpers: A Much Needed Praycation", Abe mentions to JFK that he already lost Gandhi as a friend.
In "The Principal Principle: Sub Zero to Sub Hero", one of the sounds recorded on Scudworth's soundboard is Gandhi's iconic "Say whaaat?" line (said by Scudworth). Scudworth tells Mr. B while driving back to the school with their burritos that he hopes that they'll have the freezer space for them and Mr. B replies that he'll move Gandhi.
In "Cyranos: A Portmant-Opus", Principal Scudworth makes the Parent-Principal conferences mandatory and threatens the clones with sending them to the freezer if their parents don't show up. It then cuts to Gandhi, still frozen in the cafeteria freezer.
In "The Cloniest Place on Earth: Missile While You Work", a history book said that "Benji" once donated his kidney to Cleopatra. This is a reference to the Season 1 episode, "Escape to Beer Mountain: A Rope of Sand", when Gandhi donated his kidney to Cleo and she mistakenly referred to him as "Benji".
Appearance[]
Gandhi is very short, skinny, bald, and has a goatee. He wears round-rimmed glasses and has a gold earring. He wears a gray short-sleeved shirt with a red stripe, blue jeans, white and red sneakers. Gandhi is very skinny and has visible ribcages on his torso, in reference to how the original Gandhi went on a hunger strike. In "Escape to Beer Mountain: A Rope of Sand", he also has a stitched up scar on his torso, from when he made a kidney donation to Cleo. According to artwork made by Van Gogh in the same episode, he also has a tiny penis. However, Van Gogh could have just been exaggerating this to insult him.
Personality[]
Gandhi is an optimistic, hyperactive, talkative and energetic teenage slacker. The creators described him as being a "party animal with a heart of gold". According to himself in the first episode, he buckled under the pressure of living up to the real Gandhi and became a non-stop party animal. He can often be found to be annoying and stupid but kind and outgoing at times. Gandhi is often portrayed as selfish, arrogant and superficial but in the same fashion that all teenagers are. He tends to find himself in trouble even when he tries to do good. He is often hinted to be very intelligent, but hides it with his outrageous behavior and underachiever attitude.
Episode Appearances[]
Original Show[]
- Escape to Beer Mountain: A Rope of Sand
- Episode Two: Election Blu-Galoo
- A.D.D.: The Last D is for Disorder
- Film Fest: Tears of a Clone
- Sleep of Faith: La Ru D'Awakening
- Homecoming: A Shot in D'Arc
- Plane Crazy: Gate Expectations
- A Room of One's Clone: The Pie of the Storm
- Raisin the Stakes: A Rock Opera in Three Acts
- Litter Kills: Litterally
- Snowflake Day: A Very Special Holiday Special
- Makeover Makeover Makeover: the Makeover Episode
- Changes: The Big Prom: The Sex Romp: The Season Finale
Reboot[]
- Let's Try This Again (Non-Speaking Cameo; Frozen)
- For Your Consideration (Non-Speaking Cameo; Flashback)
- Clone Alone (Non-Speaking Cameo; Frozen)
- Bible Humpers: A Much Needed Praycation (Mentioned)
- The Principal Principle: Sub Zero to Sub Hero (Mentioned)
- Cyranos: A Portmant-Opus (Non-Speaking Cameo; Frozen)
- The Cloniest Place on Earth: Missile While You Work (Indirectly Mentioned)
Foreign voice actors[]
| Language version | Actors |
|---|---|
 Secundaria de clones (Latin American Spanish)
|
Luis Carreño |
 Projeto Clonagem (Brazillian Portuguese)
|
Jorge Lucas |
 Projecto Clonagem (European Portuguese)
|
Mário Bomba |
 Clone High (French)
|
Nicolas Dubois |
 Clone High (Italian)
|
Stefano Brusa |
Trivia[]
- Gandhi, Abe, and JFK are all main characters whose clone fathers died by assassination.
- Gandhi and Cleo are the only two main clones to have never sat at the thinking docks.
- Gandhi is the first character in the series to do the Hands of Sincerity, doing them in "Escape to Beer Mountain: A Rope of Sand", when melodramatically lying about how much he cares about the Teen Crisis Hotline.
- Unlike his original predecessor, Gandhi is Jewish rather than Hindu due to his foster parents being Jewish.
- The original Gandhi was cremated, in accordance with Hindu funerary rites. How his DNA was found is unexplained.
- He appears to be much shorter than his clone father, who was was 5'5" (165 centimeters). Gandhi is around 4'0" on the show.
- Gandhi is the reason why the series was canceled, as his unflattering portrayal offended several Hindu people and caused them to go on hunger strikes and stage protests against MTV for insulting their religious idol.
- Had the series not been canceled after its first season, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller thought of several ideas on how to work around this, by either having the character written out of the show or having it be revealed that he's actually the clone of the late American actor, Gary Coleman.
- When the streaming service HBO Max picked up a revival of Clone High, it ordered two new seasons, bringing the show's total up to three. While there were no plans for Gandhi to appear in the revival, Lord and Miller said that he could have come back if an additional season was ordered. The duo admitted to TVLine that they decided to keep Gandhi frozen because they were "indecisive" regarding how to handle him. "You don't want to kill him or something, then have it just be over," Lord explained. "He's still there, able to thaw out if there's a Season 4."
- The reboot was ultimately cancelled after the franchise's third season, but show writer Michael Culbertson created an edit of Gandhi finally being defrosted, as seen here.
- On twitter, series co-creator Christopher Miller actually promised that if the audience watched the third season, it can help them to get renewed for a fourth season, so they will put Gandhi back on it, meaning that oficially Gandhi was planned to be back on season 4, but It wouldn't happen because of the cancellation.