Joey Clift’s “Off the Reservation” Brings Native Teens, a Séance, and John Wayne’s Ghost to Dropout’s Toonout

“A group of Native teens decides to make their ancestors proud the only way they know how.” That’s the plot of Joey Clift’s new animated short, and it’s underselling things a bit. What really happens is the teens hold a séance to conjure John Wayne’s ghost for a little fight-club therapy to make their ancestors proud, and it only gets better from there.

This must-see short is “Off the Reservation,” Season 1, Episode 12 of Toonout, Dropout’s first stab at scripted animation. Each episode features a different independent creator; season one includes Matt Braly (who created Amphibia), Raj Brueggemann and Jonathon Wallach (Big City Greens), and Violaine Briat, a storyboard artist on Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Episode 12 belongs to Clift, NDN Country’s favorite Garfield-loving comedy writer, with a gift for telling Native stories in spaces that would normally overlook them.

The episode title is working just as hard as the story. “Off the reservation” comes from a real, ugly policy that took effect in the 1800s that prohibited Native people in the U.S. and Canada from leaving their reservations without permission from government agents, and getting caught without permission could mean jail or worse. Somewhere along the way, the phrase got flattened into slang for acting reckless or unpredictable, the history scrubbed out of it, which is exactly why NDN Country has pushed back on it for years. Clift doesn’t tiptoe around any of that. He builds the whole short around the phrase with kids who are literally off the reservation, living in a city, dragging up history so they can settle a score with it.

Ross Bryant, Joey Clift, Siena East, Dallas Goldtooth, and Benny Wayne Sully voice the short. Goldtooth’s probably the most familiar name here. He cofounded the sketch group 1491s and played William “Spirit” Knifeman on Reservation Dogs, and he’s also appeared in Rutherford Falls, Ghosts, and Fallout. Bryant’s a Dropout regular from way back, a cast member on Make Some Noise and Very Important People who started out doing sketch comedy at Second City in Chicago before moving to LA. East is an LA-based Choctaw writer and comedian who’s been building a name in comedy circles for years, including a stint helping run one of the first all-Native improv shows at Upright Citizens Brigade. You may also recognize East as Diedra from Sterlin Harjo’s The Lowdown. Sully, an enrolled citizen of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, is a stage actor who made his Off-Broadway debut with Primary Stages and was a finalist for Yale’s Misty Upham New Native Actor Award.

Clift is an enrolled member of the Cowlitz Indian Tribe and has a Peabody nomination and two Emmy nominations. His writing credits include Spirit Rangers on Netflix, PBS’s Molly of Denali, LEGO Ninjago: Decoded, Paw Patrol, and Rubble & Crew. He made Gone Native, a Comedy Central Digital series that won a Webby and put Native comedians front and center, wrote a book called We’ve Been Here The Whole Time!, and directed an award-winning animated short, POW!

“Off the Reservation” is streaming now on Dropout. Watch it now for a hilariously Native good time.