Clifford the Big Red Dog (TV series)

Clifford the Big Red Dog is an American-British animated children's television series, based upon Norman Bridwell's famous children's book series of the same name. Produced by Scholastic Studios, it originally aired on PBS Kids from September 4, 2000 to February 25, 2003. In the United Kingdom, the show was dubbed with British voice actors, replacing the original American soundtrack.

Two 15-minute stories made up each half-hour cartoon. Usually one story featured Clifford and his canine friends, Cleo and T-Bone among them; the other story would focus on Clifford's owner Emily Elizabeth and her friends. As in other shows of its kind, during scenes focusing on the dog characters' perspective, human speech would replace barking to engage viewers in the storyline from the dogs' point of view.

Veteran actor John Ritter voiced Clifford in all episodes. This was originally done by Brent Titcomb in the series that debuted in 1988 and ran into the early 1990s. Generally speaking, his schedule dictated the production of Clifford the Big Red Dog. By the time the last of the 68 half-hour cartoons and the movie were completed, Ritter was back on ABC's prime-time schedule, starring in 8 Simple Rules. Ritter's death on September 11, 2003 came less than a week before PBS debuted Clifford's Puppy Days, a function of keeping Clifford's legacy going.

While no new Clifford episodes have been released since Ritter's death in 2003, voice actors for the main characters have reprised some of their roles for the Ready to Learn PBS Kids PSAs. The film Clifford's Really Big Movie serves as the series finale due to Ritter's death, as no new episodes were made to continue from where it left off.