Do you remember...? (Top Ten Children's Programmes)

Member Name: The Duke

Product:	Top Ten Children's Programmes
Date:	20/09/01 (2232 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great television, Entertaining

Disadvantages: Not on TV anymore, Dated

Pub conversations are fantastic – generally, they revolve around some sort of nostalgia trip, and a perennial favourite is the old “telly when you were younger” conversation. I’ve had this conversation more times than I’ve had hot dinners (and believe me, I’ve had my fair share of hot dinners) and the question always pops up “Which was the best TV programme you can remember as a kid?”.

My answer is always the same, and is a cop out “There wasn’t one single one”. Bad, I know, but what can I say? I remember far too many programmes from when I was younger (much younger, actually!) to be able to pick out just one.

Hurrah then for this top ten category, where I can reminisce about my wasted youth in front of the box.

·Rainbow (Thames Television, 1972 – 1992)
You know the score “Up above the streets and houses, rainbow climbing high…” etc. although if anyone can tell me off the top of their heads what the other seven verses were, I’d be mightily impressed. We’re all aware of Geoffrey Hayes, George, Bungle and Zippy of course. Some of us may even remember Rod, Jane and Matthew who later turned into Freddy (Matthew was actually Matthew Corbett of “Sooty” fame, but more on him later). I can even recall some really strange animations that were meant to link each piece of the show together, and I think they were done by Cosgrove Hall (who went on to do Dangermouse, Duckula and other quality cartoons). What else can I say? What about the guest story tellers who popped in from time to time (typically the only point in the show when Zippy behaved)? Few people remember Zippy ever being zipped, and I do wonder if it ever happened, even though I think I can remember it.

Now, I was obviously too young to think about the strange events in the Rainbow household, but as I’ve gotten older, I have wondered about a few things…


a)Why was George (supposedly a male) coloured pink, and given long eyelashes to flutter when asked to do something he didn’t want to do? See also: effeminate voice and frilly apron for chores and pouting ability.
b)Why did Bungle the bear wear pyjamas to bed when he quite obviously ran around all day with nothing on, apart from his fur?
c)Was Jane cheating on Rod? How come the third member of the trio was always a younger man who never survived very long, until Freddy came along? Were there shenanigans afoot?

·Bod (BBC 1975 – 1984)
Some bald kid with a snazzy green v-necked dress type thing encounters various people (Farmer Barlimow, PC Copper, Auntie Flo, Frank The Postman – but no-one his own age) and strange things happen. Later episodes also contained “Alberto Frog and his amazing Animal Band” in which the Alberto and his chums would help out a person who had some sort of problem (typically couldn’t sleep, was unhappy etc. etc.) which was then cured by the power of music. The greedy frog, having solved the problem, would then forget all his musical chums and hog the reward for himself (always a milkshake) and the band guessed what flavour the milkshake was going to be before Alberto asked (“Chocolate” “Lime” “Raspberry”) and drank the whole thing for himself. I’m surprised the band didn’t beat him up and leave him at the nearest French restaurant, to be honest…

I recently bought the DVD of this, and quite honestly, it’s still great. The stories are a bit more off the wall than I remember though – “Bod’s Dream” is all about a giant bowl of strawberries and cream. Splendid stuff, though, and as an extra treat, it seems that the music was done by none other than kiddies telly favourite, Derek Griffiths!

·The Sooty Show (BBC and ITV – 70’s and 80’s)
There’s not much I can
say about The Sooty Show, because I didn’t like it that much. It was OK up until Harry Corbett left, but quality went out the window somewhat with the arrival of Matthew. Possibly had the two best kids TV characters ever in it, though. Sweep, the squeaky grey dog puppet, and Butch, the black rough looking dog puppet. How Sweep never got a spin off show of his own was always beyond me. Well actually it wasn’t – he was thick, and probably had a crap agent and no business sense, but there you are. He was very much the straight man to Sooty, and inevitably was on the end of much water pistol action (but not as much as Matthew, admittedly). Sweep is a TV hero, and must be given screen time! Matthew, it seems was just in it for the money, firstly taking Sooty and co. to ITV, and then later, selling the whole franchise.

·Monkey (BBC 1979)
Friday nights at 6pm on BBC2 will always have a great memory. There were two series of Monkey. Everyone remembers the first one with Monkey, Sandy, Pigsy and Tripitaka the priest, but not too many people remember the second (inferior) series with the talking horse. Much hilarity ensued as once again, Monkey, having been thrown out of heaven, has to protect Tripitaka as they deliver scrolls somewhere (can’t remember where though). Lots of fighting and monster-baiting (“Come back and fight, demon!” “Oh, so you want to fight, eh?”) before the valuable lesson was learned at the end, at least until the next episode when Monkey made the same mistakes all over again. Absolutely splendid, although doesn’t really bear a repeat viewing, with the possible exception of the first two episodes which set the tone for the series. Contains all the old favourites such as “comedy” voice over, beating the tripe out of demons, blowing on your fingers to summon a pink cloud and not forgetting the quite fantastic theme tune.

·Star Fleet (ITV – around 1983)
Some sor
t of Japanese/European puppet hybrid programme that involved some really, really great characters (especially the bad guys) in a long story arc that revolved around some girl who was destined to rule the universe, or something. Contained stereotypical fat bloke and black guy Apologies if my recollections are patchy or even plain wrong for this programme, but I believe the series got one run on British telly, and hasn’t been seen since. Contained elements that can now be seen in modern TV programmes, like smaller vehicles joining to form a big kick ass robot for pummelling bad guys with. It’s basically a combination of Gerry Anderson, Japanese anime and the Power Rangers, only in space. Mainly only remembered for woolly haired Queen guitarist covering the theme tune.

·The Adventure Game (BBC – early 80s)
Really cheap BBC “game” show which involved teams of three “celebrities” from BBC’s children’s department being kidnapped by aliens and having to earn their freedom by participating in a set of logic puzzles which were set by the aliens. Often cut with what seemed to be doctored footage of games on a BBC Microcomputer to provide a “science fiction” feel to it, even if it was really, really crap. I could never get my head around some of the games – the Drogna (or was it Drogma?) game was all about the alien “currency” and had something to do with the geometric shapes on the “coins” and their colours, although I never did figure it out.

Other notable pieces – a bloke who claimed to speak backwards “Doogy Rev”, he would say. And the patriarch alien turning into a plant of some sort, who would wibble a bit and vibrate when annoyed. Oh, and the bit at the end when one of the celebrities would play “tag” with an invisible vortex in order to get to the shuttle home, and “win”. Usually accomplished by a cunning use of
stale bread rolls gained somewhere along the way to pin point the position of the vortex, who sucked you out into space, or something, if you occupied the same space as it.

·Starsky & Hutch (BBC – 1975 to 1980)
OK, not a kids programme, per se, but I was allowed to stay up late on a Saturday night to watch this (9pm, BBC1 if I remember correctly) and if I was lucky enough to stay awake, I could also watch Match of the Day (Woohoo!). Featuring one of the greatest themes of all time (“Gotcha” by Tom Scott) and the finest car in TV history, S&H will always be a favourite. Even today, watching it on Bravo or UK Gold, it seems the programme hasn’t lost any of it’s charm, and remains great viewing. I never understood how Huggy Bear, who was quite obviously a criminal, was great mates with the boys. Did HB ever say “The word on the street is…” though? Despite being a cad and a bounder, HB was always there, bringing Starsky chicken soup when he was ill and stuff. Rock on, HB.

The cast were all outstanding, but I do believe that as much as I like the two main characters themselves, both Captain Dobie (Bernie Hamilton) and Huggy Bear (Antonio Fargas) were the better characters. There has never been a finer cop show on the telly.

·Airwolf (ITV – 1984 to 1987)
Not really, Airwolf itself, but the entire genre that sprung up around that time for inventing a new type of superhero who was an ordinary person with some sort of technological wonder and could fight crime. See also: Knight Rider, Street Hawk, Blue Thunder and Automan. Obviously, this was really, really cheesy stuff, but captivating at the time. Good to watch these days, if only to spot the glaring continuity errors and the actors that Glen A. Larson repeatedly used across all his programmes.

If there was a piece of machinery that could be “souped up” then in the mid-eighties, it was painted black, given a flash
computer and the ability to do 0 – 300 in 1.24 seconds. Whilst the macguffin in question had to have some sort of “hard” name (Airwolf, Street Hawk, Blue Thunder etc.), the hero obviously had to assume some sort of daft name (Michael Knight, Jesse Mach, Stringfellow Hawke) and some sort of ridiculous sidekick who was also the voice of reason (KITT, Norman Tuttle, Dominic Santini).

These programmes are now very dated, and it’s impossible not to cringe at some of the stuff that takes place in a typical episode.


·Jackanory (BBC – dawn of time to around 1985)
Stupid name, top programme. Resented by some sort of celebrity ( I remember Martin Jarvis and Willie Rushton being two of the more memorable ones) who would spend four evenings a week (Monday to Thursday) telling us a story with some nice illustrations to go along with it. I do remember my weeks activities being planned around that Monday night showing – if the story was good, then I’d watch, and if it wasn’t, well, I wouldn’t! Very simple, and yet very effective television. The one I particularly remember was The Hobbit being read by (I think) Willie Rushton on some sort of decorated set that was meant to relate to Middle Earth.

·It’s a Knockout / Jeux sans Frontiers (late 70’s)
Both the same programme really, even though I only remember JSF. Teams of people (IAK used towns, JSF used countries) played stupid games usually involving an assault course and some coloured water whilst dressed in huge foam outfits that were related to the theme of the game they were playing. Actually, the games were pretty crap, to be honest, but the whole show was worth watching for Stuart Hall, who could barely commentate on the action through belly-aching laughter (“The English are… Har! Har! Har! He’s fallen over… Har! Har! Har! Oh dear! Har! Har! Har!.. etc. – you get the picture) whilst poor Eddi
e Waring had to be the referee. If I remember correctly, there were also “winter” episodes that had skating games etc. which were just as daft, and Hall was still unable to talk through laughing. Sadly, brought back by Channel 5 without the good bits i.e. Stuart Hall and with extra bad bits i.e. Cheggers.

So there you go – my top ten kids programmes. Actually, it’s more like “Top Ten Programmes from when I was a kid”, but it’s nearly the same thing. As usual in my Top ten lists, they’re not listed in any particular order except for the order I remembered them in. I hope you enjoyed it, and please feel free to comment or point out any glaring errors (the dates and channels are only guesses).

Before I finish, I’d like to present the “close but no cigar” awards to:

Chigley / Trumpton / Camberwick Green
Puppet/strop motion thing, narrated by Brian Cant. Contained lots of music and was quite jolly. Aired on telly around the late 60s and early 70s.

Anything with Johnny Ball in it.
Science and maths made fun with the use of household items to demonstrate his points of view.

Ivor The Engine.
Cartoon featuring Jones the Steam, some dragon thing (well, it is based in Wales) and other stuff I can’t remember.

Willo The Wisp.
Cartoon narrated by Kenneth Williams, and featuring Arthur the Caterpillar, Evil Edna (weird TV-like witch), Moog (a dog thing) and Mavis the fairy. Usually the last thing the BBC would show as their children’s slot ended at around 5:35 pm and was sheer class.

A very special award goes to:

The Interceptor. (ITV/Channel4 – 1991)
Like the bastard son of “Treasure Hunt” and the film version of “The Running Man”, The Interceptor consists of two teams of two, each with a suitcase strapped to their back with their prize money in it. These teams had to run from the mi
ddle of nowhere to Annabel Croft while avoiding The Interceptor only with the aid of a map. The Interceptor was some mad blonde guy who spoke absolute rubbish at all times and made weird sounds. His job was to aim some sort of super telly remote control at the contestants that would lock their suitcase and prevent them from claiming the monster prize (which was probably around £100). Of course, while the contests are stealing bicycles etc. Mr Interceptor gets a big helicopter to fly around in, with long suffering pilot “Mikey” being forced to listen to the inane ramblings of a man who clearly liked the sound of his own voice a bit too much. Quite clearly a work of genius, and only fails to make it into my top ten because I wasn’t a kid at the time this was aired.

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