Thursday 2 July 2015

Look and Read - Geordie Racer

Hi everyone! After a quiet couple of months on the blog, I've found this absolute gem which I would have loved to have posted back when I did a little Look and Read season a while back but I couldn't find it online, but it's here now and not a moment too soon! I give you Geordie Racer!



The story was set in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and the surrounding area, and featured pigeon racers and runners competing in the Great North Run. The main character is Spuggy Hilton (Spuggy being a nickname - the Geordie word for sparrow), who isn't a runner like the rest of his family, but is a keen pigeon fancier and owns 'Blue Flash' - one of the best birds in Newcastle. He and his friend Janie observe some suspicious activity, and link a spate of local art robberies with obscure messages they find on some of the pigeons, but find they have even more problems when they go to spy on the crooks.



Tuesday 7 April 2015

Sport Billy

It's been a while since I posted anything new to the site, unfortunately it's getting harder to find shows to share, but this time I've got a show I've been searching for for over a year now, it's the classic Filmation cartoon Sport Billy!




The story revolves around a young boy named Sport Billy who is from the planet Olympus (a twin of Earth on the opposite side of the Sun) which is populated by athletic god-like beings. Billy himself has a magic size-changing gym bag - the Omni-Sack - which produces various tools as he needs them. He travels to Earth on a mission to promote teamwork and sportsmanship. Described by the show's theme song as a "hero from another planet", Billy battles the evil Queen Vanda and her gnome-like henchman, Snipe. Vanda's mission is to destroy all sports in the galaxy since fairness disgusts her.

Billy is assisted by two faithful companions, a girl named Lilly and a talking dog named Willy. The trio travel around in a time traveling spaceship, which resembles a giant wind-up clock, complete with a ringing bell, and mounted on two rocket engines. Each episode the trio travel through time to save a different Earth sport from Queen Vanda's grasp.

Thursday 12 March 2015

Terry Pratchett's Discworld - Soul Music

Today we honour a great fantasy writer who sadly passed away earlier today with the animated adaptation of one of his novels, with Terry Pratchett's Discworld - Soul Music!



Based on Terry Pratchett's Novel. On Discworld (a world carried by four elephants standing on a huge turtle in space), a small girl, Susan Sto Helit, has got a major problem. Her grandfather is Death, who wants to forget that he has just "processed" his adopted daughter and her husband who was Susan's mother and father as this is causing him great grief and Death is a person that can remember everything, much to his chagrin. Susan find herself pressed into taking over Death's "duty" but finds that she is falling in love with an elf/human, Imp, who is slowly being taken over by a kind of "musical" force that is forcing Imp and his friends to play Rock Music to the Discworld. The Rock Music is proving to be a great success, but it has got plans for Imp and everybody wanting to play it and it is up to Susan, the head of the wizards, the Archchancellor and Death (that is, if he can be found and made to remember who/what he is.) to stop it before it conquers the entire Discworld...

Sunday 1 March 2015

Spider-Man Unlimited

Spinning the tale of Spider-Man in a completely different direction late in 1999 came this short lived series featuring Spidey in situations never before encountered in Spider-Man Unlimited!




While covering the launch of John Jameson's one-man mission to Counter-Earth (another Earth located on the far side of the Sun), Spider-Man attempts to stop his two symbiote adversaries Venom and Carnage from boarding the shuttlecraft. Blamed for Jameson losing contact with our Earth, Spider-Man becomes a target of persecution by the media and the public. Believed to be dead after saving a person's life in a fire, Peter Parker uses the ruse to embark on a mission to retrieve John Jameson on Counter-Earth, using nanotechnology stolen from Reed Richards to design a new suit that incorporates stealth technology and sonic weaponry. Making his way to the planet, Spider-Man learns that Jameson has fallen in with a band of freedom fighters opposed to the High Evolutionary whose Beastials, hybrids of animal and humanoid attributes, are the dominant species whilst humans are the second-class minority.

With Jameson reluctant to return until all of the Beastials are defeated, Spider-Man elects to remain on Counter-Earth, blending in as best as he can as Peter Parker, and fighting the High Evolutionary and his Knights of Wundagore alongside the rebels as Spider-Man. It is soon discovered that Venom and Carnage are also on Counter-Earth, and are following orders from the Synoptic, a hive-minded legion of Counter-Earth symbiotes. This series also shows the animated version of John Jameson's Man-Wolf form, as well as superhero versions of mainstream villains the Green Goblin and the Vulture.

Friday 27 February 2015

Time Riders

Time Travel. Who hasn't wanted to go back in time and change a few things around? That's what happens when a young scientist and her motorcycle time machine get going in Time Riders!



Doctor BB Miller, a young scientist, is working on time travel. She succeeds in bringing a young boy, Ben, to the present from the 19th Century, but then her time machine explodes. Once repaired, BB and Ben are transported to the English Civil War, and are captured by Roundheads. Then they are captured by Cavaliers, and the sinister Lady Chalmerston decides to 'play' with them. Eventually they manage to effect an escape and eventually return to the present.

Monday 9 February 2015

Orm and Cheep

I've been looking for this show for ages and I've finally it and can share it with you all! It's the overly vute, yet severely odd looking Orm and Cheep!



Cheep was a baby bird who fell from his nest before he learnt to fly. He is helped to recover from his ordeal by Orm - a clever worm, who lives in a little round underground house. In each episode Orm, Cheep and their many friends including Mole, Snail and Mouse have an adventure, which usually involves one of their enemies - Crow, Rat or Cat!

Friday 6 February 2015

The Forgotten Toys

First new post in such a long time it seems! Here is a tale of two toys, searching for a new home and children to love them, it's the Forgotten Toys!



Based on the book by James Stevenson 'The Night After Christmas', The Forgotten Toys follows the adventures of an abandoned rag doll and teddy bear as they try to find new children to love them after being thrown out in favour of new high tech Christmas presents.

Annie, voiced by Joanna Lumley, is a refined, but somewhat scruffy rag doll. She is kindly and helpful and a contrast to her friend Teddy. Teddy (played by Bob Hoskins) is a rough and ready, gruff little teddy bear. He does, however, have a soft centre which he tries desperately hard to disguise. The two bicker, and care for each other, like brother and sister.

Their first appearance on screen, in a half hour special broadcast in Christmas 1995, sees them overcome adversity and find new children. However, no sooner has the first episode of a 26 part series started, than they find themselves lost again – stranded on an airport carousel en route to a family holiday. Will they ever be reunited with their children again?

Sunday 11 January 2015

The Mighty Ducks

Spinning off from the popular kid's movies about a group of ice hockey kids, Disney decided to make a series based upon ice hockey playing alien ducks! The Mighty Ducks!




In another galaxy exists a planet populated entirely by humanoid ducks. Dubbed "Puckworld" by its inhabitants, it is an icy planet, perfectly suited to the Ducks' favorite pastime, Hockey. For the citizens of Puckworld, hockey was not simply a sport, but a way of life, occupying virtually every aspect of day-to-day existence.
Legend has it that centuries ago, during an invasion by a reptilian race called Saurians, a duck named Drake DuCaine became the planet's savior over the Saurians' Overlords. The legend tells that DuCaine did so with a high-tech goalie mask. With it, DuCaine sent the Saurians to a mysterious "Dimensional Limbo".
The last of the Saurians escape Dimensional Limbo and returns to Puckworld with an armada of robotic attack ships. The group of four is led by the last of the Saurian Overlords, Lord Dragaunus, who is assisted by his minions Siege, Chameleon and Wraith. They invade the planet and enslave the people of Puckworld. However, a resistance was formed by Canard, who has found The Mask of Drake DuCaine. With it, the wearer of the Mask could see through the Saurians' invisibility cloaks. Canard forms a band of Ducks to fight Dragaunus. The members of his team consists of Wildwing, Nosedive, Tanya, Duke, Mallory and Grin. They go on a mission to destroy Dragaunus's fortress the Master Tower and free the planet from the Saurians' control. While the mission is successful, Dragaunus and his forces manage escape in their ship, the Raptor. The Saurians open up a dimensional gateway to escape through but Canard and the others follow him into the portal with the Aerowing, intent on stopping them.
Dragaunus attempts to get rid of the Ducks inside the portal by attacking them with an electromagnetic worm that will grow until it can swallow the Aerowing. In a desperate attempt to get rid of the worm, Canard sacrifices his own life by throwing himself to the worm. Before dying, Canard gave the Mask, and leadership of the team, to Wildwing Flashblade, his best friend. Both the Raptor and the Aerowing leave the portal and enter a different dimension, landing in the Earth city of Anaheim, California. The Ducks meet Phil Palmfeather, a human who becomes their manager and makes them a legitimate NHL team. Their arena, only known as The Pond in the show, has a hockey rink that doubles as a landing pad for the Aerowing above and has a formal HQ below. On Earth, the Ducks and Dragaunus continue their fight, although there are other villains that also challenge the six Ducks.