“And Hartley Hare…”

“And Hartley Hare…”

I had never seen an episode of ‘Pipkins’ until we watched a few for our article on Episode Three.

At least I don’t think I have… I remember watching ‘Rainbow’ and ‘Jamie And The Magic Torch’, but not ‘Pipkins’

Perhaps it wasn’t shown in my region when I was small or perhaps there was something on the other side that was more enjoyable. I was only five months old when it started, mind you!

I had resisted watching as I had seen the title sequence and the rather ratty looking puppets and thought it looked a bit rubbish, but Andrew had been humming the theme tune a lot and in the end, I decided to take the plunge and buy all of the DVDs.

In the first series George Woodbridge plays Inigo Pipkin, a puppet maker and he makes the puppet characters as the series goes on.

There’s Topov the Monkey, who is so called as he sits on top of things. Pictured above is the first incarnation of Topov (dressed as a banana in the screenshot!) who looks evil and has cold dead eyes. The second version of Topov is much cuter and has Danish pastry ears.  And then you have Pig, who is always hungry. The Pig puppet goes through various forms, but is usually falling apart and at one point has to sport a scarf to cover a huge hole in his neck. In all honesty, it looks more like a zombie pig, out to eat your braiiiiiiins.

Then there is Tortoise, Octavia the Ostrich, Mrs P the Penguin, Uncle Hare and, of course, the wonder that is Hartley Hare.

Hartley is a slightly camp hare and a complete diva. He isn’t happy unless everything is all about him. 

Each puppet has a different accent and a character of their own. Hartley has a received pronunciation accent, Topov is a cockney, Pig is from Birmingham and Octavia is French. Tortoise has no accent as such, but talks very slowly. And the voice Nigel Plaskitt uses for Uncle Hare is the same one he will later use as the country bumpkin version of Unstoffe in the ‘Doctor Who’ story ‘The Ribos Operation’.

The title sequences are very funny; the first one features George Woodbridge beckoning you into his shop, setting up his puppet booth and then lots of scared looking children. For a later version the 'Pipkins' van drives about to the utter bewilderment of the child onlookers.

‘Pipkins’ is a fun show and deals with subjects that are not normally talked about on children’s television, including the death of Mr Pipkins. Though Pig’s major concern is who will feed them.

It’s a fun series that doesn’t talk down to its audience. And I think small (well, smaller) me would have liked it.

All the DVDs are available from Network.

(By Lisa Parker)