C-Bear and Jamal is a short-lived German-American cartoon that aired a total of 13 episodes on the Fox Kids programming block from 1996-1997.
The show centers on an African-American boy named Jamal, whose Companion Cube is a rapping teddy bear named C-Bear (voiced by rapper Tone Lōc).
This cartoon contains examples of:
- Acquired Situational Narcissism: "Big Head Jamal" sees Jamal being cast in a cereal commercial and developing an ego over it. After he gets fired from the commercial, he is forced to apologize to his friends for being a jerk.
- Big Eater: Big Chill is always hungry.
- Broken Pedestal: In "Hanging With Mr. Wingo", when Jamal finds out that his father's job isn't as exciting as he thought, he loses respect for him. C-Bear snaps him out of it later.
- Brutal Honesty: In "The Truth and Nothing But the Truth", Jamal lies in order to get a job on the school newspaper as an advice columnist. When he is no longer able to lie, he begins being too honest—even in his own home. After learning how much the truth can hurt, Jamal apologizes to the people he insulted.
- Character Catchphrase: Big Chill's "The b-i-g c-h-i double l is in the hizzouse".
- Distracted by the Sexy: C-Bear gets distracted by an attractive-looking mail carrier while watching clouds with Jamal.C-Bear: Check her out, she's all that, and a bag of chips, a bowl of bean dip, and a jar of cookies, and a root beer float!
- "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: Tone Loc sings the theme song, being a rapper and all.
- Fighting Back Is Wrong: "Raging Bully" sees Jamal trying to deal with a bully and fighting back, only to fear that he's becoming a bully himself. C-Bear advises him to find a way to find common ground with the bully instead.
- Friendly Tickle Torture: In one episode, C-bear tickles Jamal's bare feet with a feather during his karate training.
- Growing Up Sucks: In "Big", Jamal turns 10 and decides that he's too old to bring C-bear to school with him. In response, C-Bear invokes this trope by showing Jamal a vision of him as an adult — working under a Bad Boss (who turns out to be C-Bear over an intercom), then coming home to find himself married to his school principal (who demands that he do all of the household chores while she takes a nap). Adulthood might not mean complete freedom to do whatever you want, but it generally does mean having the freedom to refrain from marrying a complete Jerkass. Then again, C-bear may have been somewhat biased after Jamal wanted to leave him behind.
- Imagine Spot: Once per Episode.
- In "Sleepless in South Central", C-Bear imagines Jamal's dad and the mail carrier going on a canal ride in Italy.
- Missing Mom: We never find out what happened to Jamal's mother. The end of "Big" has Jamal mention her having "gone to Heaven" (as in dead), but no further details.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: "Dumbing Down" has Jamal convincing Maya to act dumb and lower her test scores before she loses all her friends (who don't get grades as good as hers). C-Bear tells Jamal that it's wrong to make Maya reduce her intelligence in order to please others.
- Once per Episode: Each episode features at least one song and one Imagine Spot.
- Puppy Love: An episode is tilted as such, with Jamal wanting to ask a girl to the Spring dance and fumbling through various ways to do it.
- School Play: "Cats in the Hood", whose budget is so nonexistent that its costumes consist of everything but cats, at least until a last-minute miracle.
- Short-Runners: Only lasted for 13 episodes.
- Shout-Out: One of the songs is titled "If I Were A Rich Boy".
- Sissy Villain: The Duke from "Emperor's New Gear" speaks with a frilly voice, is obsessed with purple clothes, and threatens to behead the titular duo for not finding him a good enough outfit.
- Sleep Aesop: "Rap Van Winkle" sees Jamal taking advantage of his dad being away on a trip to stay up late, wreaking havoc on his schoolwork. C-Bear finally uses his powers to show Jamal what will happen if he continues to stay up late every night.
- That Cloud Looks Like...: The beginning of "Sleepless in South Central" has the titular characters looking at some clouds together, only for C-Bear's attention to be diverted to the attractive mail carrier coming up the block.
- The Smurfette Principle: Maya is the only girl in the group in the first season, until Kim is added to the main cast of the second season.
- Token Trio: Jamal (black), Chipster (white) and Javier (Latino).
- Totally Radical: C-Bear often uses a lot of slang fitting the 90's era.
