Pingu

File:Pingu.png

Pingu logo

Pingu is a Swiss animated children's television series about a family of penguins who live at the South Pole. The main character is the son, Pingu, though some episodes feature Pingu's parents and (after her hatching) his baby sister Pinga, his friend Robby the Seal, and other minor characters.

History

104 five-minute episodes were originally made, from 1986 onwards. The episodes were written by Silvio Mazzola, and directed and animated by Otmar Gutmann using claymation techniques, at Trickfilmstudio in Switzerland.

A special twenty-minute episode ("Pingu at the Wedding Party") was also produced, in 1997, which introduced a family of green penguins and a killer vacuum cleaner.

In 2001, HIT Entertainment bought the UK rights to the series (including the original 105 episodes) for £15.9 million and produced a further 52 episodes, created at Hot Animation and first broadcast in 2004. These feature new voice actors Marcello Magni and David Sant, as Bonomi, now in his sixties, was considered too old.

One reason for Pingu's international success was its lack of dialogue per se. All dialogue was in a honking "penguin language" ("Pinguish" or "Penguinese"), performed (without script) by Carlo Bonomi similarly to La Linea (also dubbed by Bonomi).

Episode Lists

• Alphabetic list of Pingu episode titles (includes alternative titles)
• Lists of Pingu episodes with synopses - series 1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • special
  

Notes

• Derivation of episode titles
  

No official episode title appears on screen, so the lists were initially created from the titles used on various official DVD releases. The main episode titles for Series 1 to 4 were taken from the official Japanese DVD releases, and the alternative titles from the official European DVD releases. Episode titles for Series 5 and 6 were taken from the European DVD releases.

Changes have subsequently been made to these titles to bring them more into line with English usage and practice (e.g. to correct spelling and grammar) and to relate them to the titles used on UK DVDs produced by HIT Entertainment. Alternative titles have also been appropriately added, amended, etc. Title data has also been supplemented with information from other sources, such as the titles used by the BBC for television broadcasts and on video tapes.

• BBC broadcasts
  

In the UK, the BBC appear never to have broadcast any of the normal 5 minute episodes from the latter half of series 3 (3.13 – 3.26) or from series 4 (4.1 – 4.26). Of the episodes that have been broadcast, all have been broadcast since 4 September 2006 inclusive except for episodes

• 1.12 (“Hello Pingu”, last broadcast 2 May 2003),

• 1.14 (“Pingu Runs Away”, last broadcast 18 February 2005)

• 1.26 (“Pingu’s Dream”, last broadcast 15 May 2003)

Commercial VHS and DVD releases

Main article: List of Pingu DVD and VHS releases

Characters

These are some of the main characters appearing in "Pingu".

• Pingu is the main character of the series. His age is possibly somewhere in the 5 to 7 year-old range. He is considered mischievous and a runaway in the episode "Pingu Runs Away". He commonly uses the "megaphone-like beak" gesture and "NOOG, NOOG!" sound to indicate anger, frustration or to get attention.

• Pinga is Pingu's little sister. She first appeared in the episode "Pinga is Born" and surprised Pingu when she had a poo! In most of the episodes she appears to be about 18 months old, though she is seen attending kindergarten in one episode. Pingu gets jealous when she gets to stay home while he has to go to school.

• Mother and Father
  Pingu's father is a postman, who smokes a pipe. He has a motorised sledge to deliver the post. Pingu's mother spends most of her time at home in the igloo. Mother and Father share a lot of the work in the home e.g. knitting, cooking and ironing.

• Grandpa is Pingu's grandfather. He's a whizz at playing the accordion.

• Robby the seal is Pingu's best friend. His name is a pun; 'Robbe' is German for 'seal'.

• Pingi is Pingu's girlfriend.

• Pingo is a friend of Pingu. He has a long beak, basically flat at the bottom but slightly rounded on the top, which is slightly shorter than that of Pingg. He usually tries to get Pingu to do wild and silly things.

• Pingg is a friend of Pingu. He's rather shorter than Pingo, and his beak is slightly longer and more pointed than that of Pingo.

• Pongi is a friend of Pingu. He wears glasses.

• Punki is another of Pingu's friends. He has tufts on the top of his head and wears stripy trousers.

Trivia

• Although the programme is set in Antarctica, Pingu and his family live in an igloo, which are found only in the Arctic as the traditional dwellings of the native Inuit people.

• In 1989, David Hasselhoff released (in Switzerland only) the single "Pingu Dance"[1], a rap song based on the Pingu shorts and featuring samples of Pinguish. A portion of this song is used as the theme to Pingu on the PBS Kids Sprout channel in the United States.

• In 2006, Pingu was featured in a music video for Eskimo Disco's first single, 7-11[2].

• The episode "Pingu WC episode"/"Pingu's Lavatory Story" was banned in some countries because of its graphic depictions of urination. The episode "Pingu's Dream" was also similarly subject to bans because it contains a giant walrus trying to capture Pingu.

• In a Swedish talk show, interviewee Madonna criticised Pingu as a bad influence on talk show host Kristian Luuk's daughter, because she considers TV dangerous to children's health.

• In the episode Pingu is jealous (Episode 6, Series 1), a flag atop Pingu's house nearly resembles the flag of Dominican Republic except for the penguin in the center of the flag.

• In the episode Pingu's admirer, a signpost gives directions to Perestroika and Glasnost.

• Some episodes of Pingu were released as bonus features on Fraggle Rock DVDs.

• Some episodes feature primitive electronic devices, such as a 1980s-era record player in "Pingu helps with Incubating", or a simplistic radio as seen in "Pingu's parents go to a concert".

• In "Pingu and Pinga don't want to go to bed" (Episode 12, Series 1), Pinga's chamberpot is clearly visible.

• On the episode Pingu helps with Incubating (Episode 2, Series 1) Pingu is listening to Woodpeckers From Space by the band VideoKids in the early version of this episode and in the current version, the song is replaced with an extended version of the current Pingu intro theme.

• One Japanese DVD, fun! fun! story, its "fun! fun!" aspect led to flash animated "fun! fun! comics"

See also

• Claymation

External links

• Official Site
• Official Japanese Site
• Pingu at IMDb
• Official YouTube channel