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VeggieTales

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VeggieTales
File:Veggietales.gif
Various characters of VeggieTales
Created byPhil Vischer, Mike Nawrocki
Country of origin United States
Original languagesEnglish, Spanish (dubbed)
Production
ProducerBig Idea, Inc.

VeggieTales is a series of children's computer animated films produced by Big Idea, Inc. conveying the Christian Bible and moral ideas to children via humorous, anthropomorphic vegetable characters. VeggieTales was co-created by Phil Vischer and Mike Nawrocki. VeggieTales have also been released as books, movies, and many other branded items such as toys and clothing. Additionally, the series has been adapted for television broadcast and also is shown in Spanish language format.

Brief history

The first VeggieTales video was released in 1993, and was the U.S.'s first completely computer animated video widely distributed in VHS format.[citation needed] Since then, the VeggieTales videos have sold well over 50 million copies. In addition to the videos, there are also books, games, and the ubiquitous plush toys which accompany nearly anything beloved by children. Big Idea went bankrupt in 2003 after they released Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie. The company was bought out of bankruptcy by Classic Media, L.L.C. in 2003 and was moved to Franklin, Tennessee in 2004. In January 2007 Big Idea, Inc. was purchased by Entertainment Rights PLC when ER acquired Classic Media LLC.

Most VeggieTales videos follow a set pattern. The presenters (Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber) set up a moral situation, often arising from a letter from a viewer at home. There is then a discussion among several of the main characters as to how this is best answered. Inevitably, they get to the point where they "roll the video". There is usually an intermission for a "Silly Song with Larry", and at the end the presenters return to wrap up the moral lesson with an applicable "memory verse" as delivered from QWERTY, the computer. Generally, Bob is the straight man to Larry's goofier character. Larry usually gets the best of the sometimes overly serious Bob.

The internal stories themselves are often based on biblical or famous literary stories, sometimes transferred to a different setting (for example, Madame Blueberry clearly draws inspiration from Madame Bovary, Sumo of the Opera teaches about perseverance by retelling Rocky mixed with The Karate Kid and The Mikado, and Dave and the Giant Pickle retells the story of King David's encounter with the Philistine Goliath in First Samuel.)

Violent, sexual, or otherwise inappropriate content in the source material is often replaced with something innocuous. For example, in King George and the Ducky, a retelling of the story of David and Bathsheba, Bathsheba is replaced by a rubber duck whose original owner falls victim to a food fight. Another example is in The Ballad of Little Joe, a retelling of the story of Joseph, where, instead of Potiphar's wife attempting to get him to have an affair with her, she tries to get him to steal a bag of gold.

Videos

Big Idea has released 30 VeggieTales episodes to date. Of these, three are Silly Song collections, three are holiday specials, and one a drawing tutorial. The remaining episodes generally follow the standard format where a moral issue is posited in the opening countertop sequence followed by one or more "films" that address the issue.

In addition to these episodes, there are five compilations that combine previously released material, and one feature length movie. Upcoming releases are listed at the end.

All videos are available in both DVD and VHS formats (unless noted otherwise).

Feature-length films

  • Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie (2002)
    Archibald Asparagus stars as Jonah in this version of the Biblical story. The Veggies learn that God is a God of second chances, and that we need to give second chances too.


Compilations

Episodes

  • Where's God When I'm S-Scared? (1993)
    Junior learns that he doesn't need to be afraid because God is bigger than any monster, as well as a retelling of the Bible story of Daniel and the lion's den.(Handling Fear)
  • Larry-Boy and the Rumor Weed (1999)
    Junior Asparagus and Laura Carrot learn about the dangers of spreading rumors as Larry-Boy battles a weed besmirching Alfred's reputation. (Power of Words)
  • Esther (2000)
    Esther saves her family from endless tickling and learns a lesson on courage in a retelling of the Biblical story of Esther. (Courage)
  • The Star of Christmas (2002)
    Starring Bob and Larry as Cavis and Millward, two theater proprietors whose extravagant production threatens to overwhelm Edmund's (Junior's) modest pageant on opening night.
  • Duke and the Great Pie War (2005)
    Larry stars as Duke who must rescue the Princess Petunia based loosely on the story of Ruth as well as a retelling of the childhood story of Moses from Miriam's viewpoint. (Loving Your Family)
  • LarryBoy and the Bad Apple (2006)
    In Larry-Boy's third adventure he must overcome temptation and defeat The Bad Apple who attempts to lure the citizens of Bumblyburg into her trap by preying on their specific weaknesses. (Available on DVD only.) (Temptation)

Upcoming releases

  • God Made You Special (2007)
    When a miscommunication makes Bob start to feel unloved, it's up to all of his friends to remind him that God made him special and loves him very much! They do this by viewing four classic VeggieTales episodes (Dave and the Giant Pickle, A Snoodle's Tale, Dr. Jiggle & Mr. Sly, and The Gourds Must Be Crazy). The DVD all takes place at Bob's house and includes a brand new Silly Song. It releases on DVD August 2007.
  • Pistachio (2008)
    The storyline and release date is unknown at this time; what is known however is that Robert G. Lee has written this episode.

Unproduced script

The Bob & Larry Movie was written in 2002 by Phil Vischer, and was put into pre-production after Jonah, but was canceled due to the bankruptcy.[1] Classic Media, who now owns the rights to VeggieTales and this script, is interested in producing this movie, depending on the financial results of the upcoming The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: A VeggieTales Movie [citation needed]. The story line is about how Bob The Tomato and Larry The Cucumber meet and get their own show.

TV airings

Veggietales episodes and the movie have aired on different stations. Below lists the places it has aired:

PAX TV aired the VeggieTales Christmas Spectacular which was The Toy That Saved Christmas, along with an extra "hosting" portion where Bob and Larry and trying to find the tape of the show. The entire PAX TV special is on the Holiday Double Feature DVD and The Toy That Saved Christmas DVD.

PBS aired The Star of Christmas along with Barney's Christmas Special and Arthur's Perfect Christmas. The show was uncut.

TBN has aired Jonah: A VeggieTales movie on TBN, and it is on the promotional commercial for Smile of a Child. TBN has also aired The Veggietales Christmas Spectacular and The Star of Christmas.

qubo In September 2006, VeggieTales and its companion programs, 3-2-1 Penguins! and Larry-Boy, [4] made their broadcast television debut as part of the new educational block for children, qubo, which is on NBC, ION Media Networks and Telemundo.

TV Format

The "VeggieTales" TV series follows a similar format to the videos. The show opens with Bob greeting the kids and inviting over to his house. Then he, Larry, and other veggies(Archibald Asparagus, Junior Asparagus, Mr. Lunt, Pa Grape, and Jimmy Gourd) sing the show's theme song as they hop to Bob's front door. At the end of the theme song Pa Grape makes a comment about Archibald's new sweater. (There's a different comment in each episode.)

The show opens to Bob's living room where Bob says "Hi Kids! Welcome to VeggieTales!". Followed by Larry saying "On TV!" The two await for the mailman, Jimmy Gourd, to deliver their letter. When Jimmy comes, he happily sings his Mail Song, which Bob and Larry both find tedious. Then instead off handing the letter the Bob and Larry, he insists on cramming it through the mail slot.

Bob and Larry read their letter and try to decide how to solve the viewer's problem. One of their neighbors comes in and attempts to solve it. One of three things happen. Archibald will read a story from his Big Book of Oddities (which he got from Oprah's Book Club), Pa Grape will show an old film, or Mr. Lunt will appear as Paco the Storytelling Mule (a stick puppet) and tell a story. The result always proves disasterous, as the story or film makes no sense. Bob intervenes with a story from a VeggieTales episode to solve the problem. (Some episodes include Silly Songs with Larry). Afterwords Bob and Larry wrap things up by reiterating the story's lesson and thanking the kids for coming to his house.

In some episodes the format is slightly altered. In the Sheerluck Holmes episode Bob had to speed things up since the show would run long, causing him to interrupt Jimmy's Mail Song. There was also no neighbor interferance.

"qubo" controversy

The VeggieTales episodes have been edited for broadcast to remove all references to God at the request of NBC's standards and practices department. (Although, for some reason, the religious references have remained intact in the closed-captions accompanying each episode.) The removal of specific religious references has drawn criticism from the Parents Television Council, which has blasted NBC for the edited VeggieTales episodes. VeggieTales creator Phil Vischer has also expressed discontent with the edits, stating that he was not informed that religious content would be removed from the series until after the qubo deal was finalized, and he would have refused to sign the contract if he had known of this beforehand. "I would have declined partly because I knew a lot of fans would feel like it was a sellout or it was done for money," he explains. Still, Vischer adds that he understands NBC's wish to remain religiously neutral, commenting, "VeggieTales is religious, NBC is not. I want to focus people more on 'Isn't it cool that Bob and Larry are on television.'" [5] Due to numerous parent complaints, however, NBC finally relented and decided to stop cutting all references of God out. So when the second batch of episodes were sent to the network (starting with King George and the Ducky), all biblical references were left intact.

Continuing Characters

VeggieTales has a continuous back story that all of the cartoons are actually teleplays, performed by various vegetables and fruit that live together on the same kitchen countertop. Some of these characters have "real names", and take on various roles in the teleplays, although they will also frequently appear as themselves. Most of these "regulars" were established in the very earliest videos.

File:Bob.gif
Bob the Tomato
  • Junior Asparagus: Six-year-old Junior Asparagus is one of the most active co-stars of the VeggieTales series. Junior is a typical playful child, but also is wise beyond his years, taking the lead role in several videos, including "Where's God When I'm S-Scared?", "Dave and the Giant Pickle", and "Lyle the Kindly Viking". Junior has a loving relationship with his parents, who also appear in several of the videos. Junior is voiced by Lisa Vischer, wife of Phil Vischer.
  • Laura Jay Carrot: Junior Asparagus' best friend. She has two younger siblings, Lenny Carrot and Baby Lou. She can be whiny at times, but when her friends are in trouble, she tries to do all that she can. She used to be voiced by Kristin Blegen but is now portrayed by Jackie Ritz.
  • Percy Pea: One of Junior's friends, and is a bit odd. He also appears coming out of Movie Premiers with his little brother in Larry Boy
  • Madame Blueberry: A French-accented berry, and a spoof of Madame Bovary, who plays roles that generally reflect an aberration who doesn't have any kids of Christian morals (such as greed or jealousy). Often she possesses a hidden agenda of some sort. Her first appearance was in the title role of Madame Blueberry herself, though in subsequent appearances played other roles (Miss Kitty in The Ballad of Little Joe, Miss Pickering in The Star of Christmas, and Nona in Duke And The Great Pie War. She is often portrayed by Jackie Ritz, although there have been a variety of actors who have voiced her character.
  • Mr. Lunt: A decorative gourd who grew up in New Jersey and speaks with a Mexican-Spanish accent. He often appears as Mr. Nezzer's assistant. Mr. Lunt also frequently appears as part of "The Pirates who Don't Do Anything", and even once got his own Silly Song ("His Cheeseburger") and starred in another ("Belly Button"). That song and Lord of the Beans (where he appears as "Ahem," a Gollum-like character) as well as Minnesota Cuke and the Search for Samson's Hairbrush are the only times we ever see Mr. Lunt without a hat. However, we never see his eyes because he has none. Mr. Lunt is voiced by Vischer.
  • The French Peas: Spoofs of the taunting French soldiers from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Their first appearance is in Dave and the Giant Pickle, taunting the Israelite army in order to get them to send a champion to fight "Golliath" the pickle. The main two peas are Jean Claude and Phillippe (voiced by Nawrocki and Vischer, respectively), who narrate The tale of Madame Blueberry. The other French peas fill in as Joe's brothers in The Ballad of Little Joe, and as extras in many other episodes. Most of their roles require them to play negative or mischievous characters. All the peas are voiced by Vischer and Nawrocki (with the exception of Christofee Pea, who is voiced by Chris Olsen). In "Gideon: Tuba Warrior" (2006) the peas author the silly song featured as "Ukulele Karaoke with Bob."
  • Pa Grape: Appearing initially as a country yokel, Pa has evolved into a wise patriarchal character. A messianic Jewish character, he has espoused Christmas and faith in Jesus, though he sometimes sports a Yiddish accent, even once exclaiming "oy, vey"! His wife, Ma, and two teenage children Tom and Rosie appeared along with him in their debut, God Wants Me To Forgive Them!?! Tom has appeared only twice since then and Rosie hasn't appeared at all, though Pa himself appears quite often, frequently as one of The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything. To date, Ma has only resurfaced in thirteen years after her debut in Moe and the Big Exit. He is voiced by Phil Vischer.
  • QWERTY: A living computer that delivers memory verses from the Bible. Named after the first six letters of standard keyboards.
  • The Scallions: A trio of scallions who appear in supporting roles and who have never been given names (as pointed out in the Silly Song "Larry's High Silk Hat" from Lyle the Kindly Viking). They are voiced by Phil Vischer, Mike Nawrocki, and at one time Mike Sage.

Spin-offs

Trivia

  • The Larry-Boy Cartoon series was the only Big Idea video that exclusively used traditional 2D animation. According to Vischer, in addition to 3-2-1 Penguins!, this project was started as a means to provide additional funding to the company during production budget overruns of Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie.
  • The name of the computer, QWERTY, comes from the first six letters in the second row of a computer's keyboard (which are, from left to right, QWERTYUIOP).
  • At the end of most VeggieTales videos, we hear a humorous little ditty entitled "What Have We Learned?". Bob the Tomato originally hated the tune, since it always interrupted him. Later, he grew to like the song as much as Larry did. In more recent episodes, however, it seems that Bob has gone back to hating the song.
  • The "What Have We Learned" song contains the exclusive percussion of Phil Vischer thwacking his fingers against the sides of his cheeks to make the hollow sound through the mouth.
  • For much of the series' history, characters had no arms or legs due to the prohibitive cost of the necessary software to provide and animate them. However, the characters do interact with and hold other objects, even without hands. During one crowd scene that included loud applause, a character asked how the others were clapping. Pa Grape, in VeggieTales' often Self-referential humor replied, "I have no idea!" And in the VeggieTales theme song, Larry objects to playing the guitar because he has no hands, even though he plays a guitar during the Silly Song in Lord of the Beans.
  • The video The Toy that Saved Christmas was the first VeggieTales episode to feature a character with arms or legs: Buzz-Saw Louie. He called attention to this distinction when, in an attempt to make a lasso to halt an out-of-control sled, he cried, "Everybody with hands, start tying!" After a moment, he added, "That'd be me."
  • Prior to the 2003 bankruptcy, all production was done with an in-house computer animation staff. After Classic bought the company, they outsourced all production to IDT Entertainment (now Starz Media) in Toronto.

Parodies

  • Saturday Night Live parodied VeggieTales in a "TV Funhouse" computer animated cartoon called, "The Religetables", which is similar to "VeggieTales", only the stories center on scandals and violence in the world of religion (Episode 532). Original Airdate: November 16, 2002 (QuickTime)
  • There have been three references to VeggieTales on The Simpsons.
1. Season 12 Episode 9, entitled "HOMR," the Simpson family visits an animation convention and Bob and Larry are shown on one of the booths. Original air date: January 7, 2001
2. Season 15 Episode 5, entitled, "The Fat and the Furriest," Homer, Bart and Lisa are walking outside of the "Sprawl-Mart," and in the front window are a cluster of television sets. On the TV sets a cucumber Moses says, "Mighty Yamses, we are weary of building your food pyramid. Let my pickles go!" To which Homer comments, "Mmmm...Moses." Original air date: November 30, 2003
3. Season 16 Episode 9, entitled, "Pranksta Rap," the Simpsons' dog has swallowed the TV remote and every time he barks the channel changes. After one of his barks the channel changes to a program called, "The Salad of the Christ," in which a peach is in the Christ position, carrying the cross upon his back and carrot guards are whipping him. Original Airdate: February 13, 2005
  • Drawn Together parodied Veggie Tales in Season 2, Episode 5: Clum Babies, in which Bob and Larry appear as the VeggieFables, Bob the Cucumber and Larry the Tomato, and encourage Wooldoor against giving in to urges, which concludes with Bob the Cucumber going on a homicidal rampage. Original Airdate: November 16th, 2005

Video games

See also Christian video games.

Notes

  1. ^ Vischer, P: "Me, Myself & Bob", page 187. Nelson Books, 2006 ISBN 0-7852-2207-1
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