Watch out, Ken Jeong: Your “Community” co-star Joel McHale is coming for your “Kensday” crown. Through a series of fill-in gigs, McHale — who also stars on Fox’s sitcom “Animal Control” — will be all over Fox’s Wednesday night lineup in the coming weeks.
That’s because McHale is set to fill in for Jeong as guest host of the network’s musical gamer “I Can See Your Voice” on both Wednesday, Feb. 14 and Wednesday, Feb. 21. Then, on Wednesday, Feb. 28, McHale is back — but as guest host on “We Are Family,” filling in for regular host Anthony Anderson. (McHale will host the special two-hour season finale of “We Are Family” in its entirety.)
All of that leads to the Season 2 premiere of “Animal Control” on Wednesday, March 6, on Fox. The network is definitely invested in McHale: On Tuesday, Fox revealed that it had already picked up a Season 3 of “Animal Control.”
Fox is marketing the full McHale press as… “Joel Control.” Which doesn’t quite rhyme with “Animal Control,” but we get it. (Maybe “McHale’s Wednesday Navy”? “Joel McWednesday”? Maybe not. Branding is hard.)
McHale was ready and able to fill in for both Jeong and Anderson when they were under the weather at different times during their shows’ productions. McHale is already a very familiar face on Fox — someone may need to take a timer to record whether he or Jeong (the panelist on “The Masked Singer” and host of “I Can See Your Voice”) have had more screen time in recent years on the network. (Seriously, someone do it!)
In addition to “Animal Control,” McHale also hosts “Crime Scene Kitchen” on Fox. His other recent credits include E’s “House of Villains,” FX’s “The Bear,” The CW’s “Stargirl” and the podcast “Black Box.” Also on Fox, he’s a frequent guest panelist on “The Masked Singer,” and just recently guest starred on Season 1 of “We Are Family” (besides his guest hosting stint on the show). Together, Jeong and McHale co-hosted Fox’s 2020 New Years Eve special. (Earlier, McHale also appeared as a firebrand, right-wing talk show host on the Fox revival of “The X-Files.”)
PvNew also tried, but didn’t succeed, in trying to land an Emmy hosting gig for McHale, Jeong and their “Community” co-star Yvette Nicole Brown. That gig went to Anderson, coincidentally. Small world.
Oh, and McHale is a big fan of Klondike ice cream bars. Check out this clip of McHale doing his best Ken Jeong impersonation on “I Can See Your Voice”:
