Parents' Guide to

Adventure Time: Fionna & Cake

By Joyce Slaton, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 12+

Gender-swapped version of beloved series is more mature.

TV Max Kids' Animation 2023
Adventure Time: Fionna & Cake: A group of characters including Fionna, Cake, Simon Petrikov and others floats underneath a white mushroom-shaped umbrella against a pink cloudy sunset background; the words "Adventure Time Fionna & Cake" appear above them

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this TV show.

  • Adventure Time: Fionna & Cake: Fionna wears a clue shirt and skirt with white rabbit ears, she is holding a sword high in the air. Beside her, Cake is raising her paw to bat at a small, brown creature with a crooked mouth
  • Adventure Time: Fionna & Cake: Cake and Fionna are sitting together on a pile of hay. They're high-fiving, and there's an outline of white emphasis outlining their hand/paw as they smack together
  • Adventure Time: Fionna & Cake: Fionna, dressed in her brown tour guide uniform, looks dubiously at a park ranger as she lifts her arms in rapture. The two are in a wooded glen.

Community Reviews

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age 13+

Based on 2 parent reviews

Tyson S.
Tyson S. Adult
September 24, 2023
age 14+

Perfect Continuation

Picks up on storylines that I desperately wanted to see continued and answers burning questions from even the much older adventure time episodes that I thought would never be answered. They carefully wrote in this story to make things make sense and connect with the original series in a way that im super impressed with. Character development and humor are great and its got some darkness to it that the new TV-14 rating allows more, and they didn't overdo the more adult content in a way that would make it corny as some shows have done. As always, very thought provoking and relatable subjects, aswell as very open minded roles portrayed in awesome ways just like the origional series. Nothing but excitement for this and hope it gets atleast a few more seasons!
JVF0
JVF0 Adult
September 12, 2023
age 11+

CSM only watched the first episode

CSM review applies to the first episode only, which is the cleanest of them all for now. (I'd suggest them to update it after watching some more episodes, and update the poster since it's using non canon art.) Overall, the TV-14 rating for this show feels undeserved and a marketing move, as the only difference in content compared to the original PG-rated show is more frequent blood, alcohol use and mild swears ("ass" and "goddamn" are the strongest ones), which are allowed in TV-PG programming (the exception may be ep 2 though). Moderate horror, comic innuendos and fantasy violence, reminiscent from the original AT, is still present, although more condensed.
See all 2 parent reviews

What's the Story?

Set in an alternate reality city that's much more ordinary than the Land of Ooo, ADVENTURE TIME: FIONNA & CAKE is a spin-off of the popular animated show Adventure Time. This time, the action revolves around Fionna Campbell (Madeleine Martin) and her cat, Cake (Roz Ryan), who are gender-swapped versions of Adventure Time's Finn the Human and Jake the Dog. While Fionna toils away at dead-end jobs during the day, at night, she dreams of a magical world. Meanwhile, in his part of the universe, Simon Petrikov (Tom Kenny) works at a theme park playing the part of a 20th century human for tourists. When these characters meet up, circumstance launches a wild trip through the multiverse to evade a Big Bad determined to erase them from existence.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (2 ):
Kids say (13 ):

As whimsical and surreal as the original Adventure Time, this gender-swapped reboot is also a shade more mature, as befits the now-adult age of its earliest fans. Fionna is an average young woman, adrift in a world that's entirely too average for her. Her city is small and boring, she sighs, and she can't seem to find a comfortable resting place from which to navigate ordinary day-to-day travails. She's just been fired from her ninth (or is it her 10th?) dead-end job this year, she doesn't have enough money to take her best friend/pet Cake to the vet, and she keeps having these weird dreams about an Ice King in a land where she has amazing powers. "What if I'm just bored with everything and wish the world were more magical?" she sighs.

Luckily, as Adventure Time fans could have guessed, things are about to change for Fionna. And fans of the original will be heartened to see that this series is deeply connected to the original, with recognizable (yet twisted) versions of familiar characters who suddenly appear, and with the same knack for surreal yet emotional plot twists. In Fionna & Cake's first episode, Fionna stumbles into a new area of her local park that has been planted with luxuriant weeds by a taciturn landscaper. "My beautiful misfits," the landscape exults, leading Fionna through dark brambles into a sunlit glade ringed with flowers. It's a lovely moment, and a potent visual metaphor for Fionna's search for something magical in her humdrum life. Oh yeah, and that same glade has a character who can talk to pets, and a portal to another land hidden in an ice cream cart. Don't worry about it -- all will make sense (sorta) in this worthy follow-up to an iconic animated fave.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Fionna & Cake was made with the stated purpose of pleasing adult fans of the original Adventure Time. How does Fionna & Cake up the ante in terms of mature content? Could it still be appreciated by young viewers? Should it be?

  • Adventure Time has released many miniseries and specials. How are these different from regular seasons of the show? Does anticipating the next spin-off make you enjoy it more when it arrives? Or is it frustrating?

  • Do you have to be a fan of Adventure Time to appreciate Fionna & Cake? Does experience with the original show increase or detract from your enjoyment of this spin-off?

TV Details

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