The Amazing World of Gumball is a British-American animatedcomedy television series created by Ben Bocquelet for Cartoon Network; its sixth season premiered on January 5, 2018. The Amazing World of Gumball revolves around the life of a 12-year-old cat named Gumball Watterson and his frequent shenanigans in the fictional American world of Elmore. Throughout the series, he interacts with characters such as his former pet, brother and best friend Darwin, sister Anais, and parents Nicole and Richard. Bocquelet conceived The Amazing World of Gumball in 2007 while working as a development artist for Cartoon Network Studios Europe. Having been asked by the network to pitch an idea for a new series for Adult Swim, he took sketches of several unused characters he had created for commercials and started developing a concept for a new series based on them. As Cartoon Network was heavily interested in "family and school shows" at the time, Bocquelet decided to make the series a kid series called The Amazing World of Gumball which was a combination of both. He pitched the series to Daniel Lennard, vice president of Original Series and Development at Turner Broadcasting, who was impressed by the series' premise and ultimately greenlit its production. The first series to be greenlit by Cartoon Network Studios Europe, it first aired on May 3, 2011 with the episode "The DVD", which was watched by 2.120 million viewers in the United States. On June 2, 2014, Cartoon Network announced that the series had been renewed a fourth and fifth season. Both seasons combined consisted of 40 eleven-minute episodes. On June 22, 2016, Cartoon Network renewed the series for a sixth season which would consist of 44 episodes. On September 6, 2016, Ben Bocquelet announced he would be departing production of Gumball upon completing the sixth season; but production will continue without him. Though Bocquelet would retweet an article stating that the sixth season would be the last, the author of that article would make a follow up post clarifying that the series may continue. The series is rated TV-Y7-FV in the United States for comedic fantasy violence, mild to moderate suggestive content, rude humor, and scenes of danger. Later in November 2019, a six-episode miniseries titled “Darwin's Yearbook” was announced.
A six-episode special called Darwin's Yearbook aired on Cartoon Network in December 2019. The miniseries features Darwin attempting to complete Elmore Junior High's yearbook by examining who he thinks should fill up the best spot. The miniseries is essentially a collection of clip show episodes.
