Animal Crackers (television series)
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The Animal Crackers 1997 television series, about a group of animals that live in a fictional jungle called Freeborn, is based on the comic strip Animal Crackers.
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[edit] Characters
[edit] Major Characters
- Lyle Lion
- Passive, insecure, and a momma's boy, Lyle is not what one might call "King of the Jungle". He's more intent on talking philosophy and ordering a pizza (preferrably vegetarian) than be the dominant predator. His number one goal in life is to date Lana, being very persistent about it despite the multiple failed attempts; outside of that, his other goal is to be an astronomer. From the show, it is believed that he is left-handed.
- Dodo
- He is the last remaining dodo alive, and is Lyle's best friend. Rash, impatient, and slightly self-centred, he is extremely hot-headed and refuses to believe that he lacks the ability to fly. This leads to multiple failed attempts to take flight, sometimes using some very innovative yet unusual techniques.
- Eugene
- Despite his size and nature, this pachyderm is really an "over-grown baby" who craves for attention. He is rather arrogant and obnoxious and is not afraid to bully others with his size and strength to get what he wants. Some of his secret pleasures include inhaling loads of peanut butter and stomping petunias, but the sight of a tiny mouse will usually freak him out.
- Gnu
- For a "supposed" leader of a herd, Gnu lacks any leadership qualities; rather, his traits show the exact opposite of a leader: lazy, timid, no sense of direction. Despite his nature, Gnu does mean well and is very dedicated to his herd, even though his presence there will hinder rather than help. He is also a caring parent, as he is a single father who has one son that he loves very much.
- Lana
- She is smart, attractive, strong minded, and the object of Lyle's affection. Lana is quite caring towards her fellow inhabitants of Freeborn, and will put the group ahead of herself. She is also an avid book lover, often found with her nose in a novel. Despite showing little to no interest in Lyle's pursuits, it has been hinted that perhaps she does have a crush on him; but only Lana knows the answer to that question, and her lips are sealed.
[edit] Minor characters
- Tito the Chameleon
- Lamont the Hippopotamus
- Louie, Lyle's nephew
- Lance, another lion who competes with Lyle for Lana's attention
- Elmo the Crocodile
- Roxanne the Ostrich
- Grandpa Tortoise and his grandchildren
- Gnu's son and herd
- Sergeant Rhino
- Bud and Edna, human tourists
[edit] Episode List
Season One
- 1. High Gnu'n/ Eu-genial
- 2. Dino-Sore-As-Heck/Wilderness Training 101
- 3. Treasure Of The Preserva Freeborna/Call Waiting
- 4. For Goodness Snakes/Meat The Folks
- 5. If You Can't Be'em, Join'em/Spring Fever
- 6. Pachyderm Epidemic/Herd Mentality
- 7. Going Quackers/Blockbusted
- 8. Pachy My Bag/Mommy Dearest
- 9. Sherlock Dodo/ Poultrygeist
- 10. Lyle's Psychic Alliance/Snowed Inn
- 11. Svelte Veldt/All The Preserve's A Stage
- 12. It's A Date/Woolly For Bully
- 13. Lights, Camera, Lyle!/Bud And Edna's Excellent Adventure!
Season Two
- 14. Sleepover/Classified Casanova
- 15. Eight Hooves Out/My Brother's Keeper
- 16. Lyle's Ark/How To Be A Millionaire
- 17. Lyle Files/The Butler Did It
- 18. Lyle In The Fast Lane/A Wing and A Prayer
- 19. Schooldays/Call Of The Wild
- 20. The Cold Scholder/The Last Dodo Egg
- 21. Lana Tuner Overdrive/Trust Me
- 22. Rust In Peace/Trio In Love
- 23. Downsizing/Gnus In Canoes
- 24. Beauty and Eugene/Freeborn For Rent
- 25. Horrorscope/Prose and Cons
- 26. The Looney Bin/That's What Friends Are For
Season Three
- 27. Look Who's Not Talking/Paris, Freeborn
- 28. Eugenius/Citizen Eugene
- 29. Dial-A-Phobia/Time Flies But Dodo Doesn't
- 30. Rumor Of Her Own/Prime Time Crime
- 31. Dustbusters/Freeborn Online
- 32. Stop In The Name Of Lana/Starstruck
- 33. Volcano Madness/Love Is Blind
- 34. Wishing Well/Eu've Got Mail
- 35. Message In A Bottle/Fame, Fortune, Madness
- 36. Storyteller/Animal Court
- 37. Boo/Fountain Of Youth
- 38. Brand New Gnu/Boyz Night Out
- 39. Fool's Gold/Near Myths
[edit] Trivia
- Lyle's "momma's boy" attitude is shown multiple times in the show, making several references to his mother on a wide range of issues.
- Grandpa Tortoise, the local mail carrier is also the oldest inhabitant of Freeborn. As Dodo puts it: "200 years old and still going strong!"
- Eugene's favourite football team is the Chicago Bears. This may be a reference to the fact that there are no natural bears living in Africa, where Freeborn is located.
- It is only revealed that Gnu is a single dad, as nobody really knows what happened to Gnu's wife. It is possible that Gnu is widowed or they may have been divorced.
- Lana's parents are most concerned with Lana finding a boyfriend/husband that can provide for her. Her mother reveals that her father won "Provider of the Year" Award 6 years in a row.
- Lyle's dream of becoming an astronomer is also referred to many times, as he is often seen with his telescope star gazing at night.
- Eugene has 2 hobbies: stomping petunias and eating peanut butter.
- Gnu and Dodo have the same zodiac sign: Capricorn.
- Lance, another lion, often competes with Lyle for Lana. However, this rivalry is not always hostile, as the two have been known to put aside their differences and cooperate in some competitions before.
- Elmo the crocodile is somewhat of an expert in stock market investments.
- Roxanne the ostrich runs a dating service, although she dresses up as a peacock at work.
- Certain individuals drive their own vehicles: Lyle drives a Hummer, Dodo drives a moped, Gnu drives a motorcycle, and Tito drives a jeep.
- Eugene seems to be a huge sports fanatic. He has been seen playing hockey, baseball, and golf, and is an avid football fan.
- It has never been revealed who are Louie's real parents.
[edit] Allusions
Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.
Animal Crackers, particularly the TV series, is known to spoof many famous things, people, or events, sometimes having the characters actually act out certain sequences.
- Once, Gnu's leadership of his herd was challenged, and the challenger demanded for a head-butting contest at High Noon.
- Lyle, Dodo, and Tito once went treasure hunting, and Lyle was nearly ran over by a boulder similar to Indiana Jones.
- After hitting his head, Dodo believes he can woo Lana. The costume he wears and the way he behaves at this time is similar to The Phantom of the Opera.
- Gnu's leadership skills were questioned again from within, as two teenage gnus sought to replace him as leader. One candidate they interviewed was an ice carver making the Pietà statue, except the two characters in the statue were two gnus.
- Throughout the entire series, Sergeant Rhino dresses and behaves like Douglas MacArthur.
- Lamont the hippopotamus was experiencing an attack from gnats, causing him to itch unbearably. In his attempts to find comfort, he jumps and rolls all over the place, in which Gnu observed: "This must be one of your new Hippo-Hop things". This is a reference to Hip Hop music and dances in general.
- Lyle was missing from Freeborn and Dodo went to great lengths to find out what happened to him. The costume he wears and the way he behaves at this time is similar to Sherlock Holmes. It turns out that Lyle only went out for pizza without telling anyone!
- A mysterious being appeared into Freeborn and began stealing things, causing everyone to declare a Poltergeist is at hand. When they were on the "witch hunt" to find out who the poltergeist was, their actions and behaviour were similar to the characters from The Crucible.
- For Freeborn's anniversary, Lana proposes to do Romeo and Juliet in celebration with Lyle to play Romeo. Lana was Juliet until she encountered larynghitis, and Eugene was asked to take her place instead!
- Both Lyle and Gnu have auditioned in Hollywood movies before. Some scenes they auditioned for include the "flying scene" from Titanic, the "White House destruction" scene from Independence Day, and the "stomped by a T Rex" scene from The Lost World: Jurassic Park.
- Bud and Edna, the human toursists, were stranded in Freeborn and everyone secretly tried to help them leave. Fittingly, that episode is name Bud and Edna's Excellent Adventure, after Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure.
- Lyle tried to save everyone from a monsoon by building an ark, similar to Noah's Ark.
- A firefly crossing the lens of Lyle's telescope caused a widespread panic that Freebron was invaded by aliens. Lyle and Lana dressed up as Mulder and Scully from The X Files to investigate. Meanwhile, Tito found an actual alien baby and sought to bring it back to its parents. He borrowed Dodo's new invention, a flying bicycle and pedalled across the sky with his silhouette across the moon to chase down the flying saucer, a homage to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Independence Day is spoofed again as after the baby was returned, the flying saucer shot out a beam of laser and cooked Tito to a crisp.
- A female chameleon moved to Freeborn and Tito wanted to impress her. One of the dates they went on was to a dance, and Tito danced to Saturday Night Fever.
- Eugene's girlfriend from Hollywood, Ella, once came to visit him. When she was to leave for Hollywood again, Eugene cried at the train station shouting "Ella! Ella!" like Stanley from A Streetcar Named Desire.
- Louie, Lyle's nephew, wisecracks and comments on the actions of the adults in a way similar to Mikey from Look Who's Talking. Lyle's relationship to Louie is also similar to Uncle Buck's relationship to his nephew and nieces, an uncle who is generally not ready to tackle more "parental-like" duties.
- Eugene was struck by lightning and turned into a genius. However, it also made Eugene magnetic, causing everyone's metal goods to stick onto him. When the gang used a kite with a metal key to attract another lightning bolt to strike Eugene to turn him back to normal, he was attempting to figure out the meaning of life. Also, the key tied to a kite technique is an experiment that Benjamin Franklin once tried to study electricity and lightning.
- Dodo was the one who started the internet shopping craze in Freeborn, mirroring the popularity of E-Bay in real life. Likewise, Eugene was the first in Freeborn to receive a chain email.
- One episode features the threat of a nearby volcano erupting, causing widespread panic and strange plans by Freeborn's inhabitants to prevent the eruption. This is similar to the situation in the movie Dante's Peak.
- Once, Lyle was reading Louie a bedtime story, in which he ended up falling asleep and turning into that story's protagonist, Robin Hood!
- When Lyle dropped Louie off at Dodo's place once, Dodo was doing some welding, with a flamed torch and a mask on, resembling Darth Vader. Dodo even said to Louie the now famous line in a low, machine-like voice: "Louie, I am your father!"
- Two incidents involving Gnu being knocked out became spoofs of famous pop culture icons. The first time had Gnu waking up thinking he is Super Gnu, his son's favourte comic hero. This is a reference to most comic book superheroes, such as those from Marvel Comics or DC Comics. Another time had Gnu being hypnotized by Lyle to try and figure out what Gnu saw before fainting. Lyle told Gnu to think way back, in which Gnu replied: "Frankly my dear, I don't give a hoot!" When Gnu snapped out of hypnosis and asked Lyle what he found out, Lyle said: "You were Clark Gable in another lifetime."
Spoilers end here.
[edit] Cast and crew
[edit] Cast
- Mark Camacho as Lyle/Additional Voices
- Teddy Lee Dillon as Dodo
- Terrence Scammell as Eugene
- Mark Montgomery as Gnu
- Kate Hutchinson as Lana
- Richard Dumont - Additional Voices
- Dawn Ford - Additional Voices
- Craig Francis - Additional Voices
- A.J Henderson - Additional Voices
- Rick Jones - Additional Voices
- Bronwen Mantel - Additional Voices
- George Morris - Additional Voices
- Simon Peacock - Additional Voices
- Michael Rudder - Additional Voices
- Terry Simpson - Additional Voices
- Rob Wreford - Additional Voices
[edit] Crew
- Micheline Charest - Executive Producer (Cinar)
- Ronald A. Weinberg - Executive Producer (Cinar)
- Christian Davin - Executive Producer (Alphanim)
- Cassandra Schafhaussen - Producer
- Nadja Cozic - Director
- Katell Lardeux - Line Producer
- Justine Hyun Van Phong - Line Producer
- Lesley Taylor - Line Producer
- Heidi Blomkvist - Timing Director
- Sebastian Grunsta - Timing Director
- Alan Jeffery - Timing Director
- Jean Pilotte - Timing Director
- Pascal Pinon - Co-director
- Andrew Gryn - Talent Coordinator
[edit] Writing Credits
- Roger Bollen - Comic strip
- Joseph Mallozzi - Writer
- Wayne Millett - Writer
- Louis Piche - Writer
- Anthony Guandango - Writer
- Jason Bogdangeris - Writer
- Thomas LaPierre - Writer
- Jacques Bouchard - Writer
- Mark Camacho - Writer
- Scott Peters - Writer
- Amy Jo Cooper - Writer
- Greg Van Riel - Writer
- Steve Kramer - Writer
- J.D. Smith - Writer
- Ken Scarborough - Writer
- Anne-Marie Perrotta - Writer
- Daniel Baldassi - Writer
- Toby Roberts - Writer
- Mark Montgomery - Writer
- Ken Ross - Writer
- Lydia Eugene - Writer
- Bill Mathney - Writer
- Todd Swift - Writer
