Review of Complete Roobarb And Custard, The

Introduction

In the annals of tv history, there are two animated dogs whose adventures have passed into legend. One is a Great Dane who helped solve crimes, the other is a green mongrel who sounds just like Richard Briers.

In 1974, Roobarb was the last thing on BBC Childrens` Television just before the Six O`Clock News. Four-and-a-half minutes of pulsating madness drawn with magic markers. Every episode would see the innocent green mongrel drawn (pardon the pun) into some crazed, misconceived adventure that would usually leave him the target of the derisive amusement of the manic birds in the garden and the big pink moggy that lived next door (and was inevitably called Custard).

At a time when cartoons tended to be rather straight-laced and gentle, Roobarb was the perfect antidote - a dose of frequently surreal anarchy drawn in a fashion that must have had more traditional animators reaching for the paracetamols.

American tv cartoons were neatly drawn and coloured flatly. They tended to be done using "limited animation" techniques, where only mouths moved for long periods of time and if anybody walked anywhere, the background moved while the figure moved in place (known as a walking cycle). Roobarb - or rather his animator Bob Godfrey - threw away the rule book. Roobarb was animated as cheaply as possible, by being drawn on ordinary paper with felt-tip markers. Colouring in was done with felt tip, so that when the drawings were animated, outlines and colours shimmered. This made for a really striking and lively visual style.

The series tied in nicely with a beginners` course in animation that the BBC was running, and Roobarb with his simple animation technique was the perfect illustration.

Roobarb was created by Grange Calveley, and the stories were told in book-at-bedtime style by the inimitable Richard Briers. Largely an innocent abroad, Roobarb thought of himself as an inventor, explorer and all-round genius. All the other creatures in the garden saw him for what he was - an idiot. Throughout his thirty adventures (all of which are included on the disc, complete with title sequences), Roobarb was generally an amiable if misguided character, often thrown by commonplace events outside his experience (like ice, or windy days). The series remains fondly remembered by the generations growing up during the 1970s for its frequent leaps into the realms of surrealism, for its visual puns and of course the birds with their springs for legs.

Video

Presented in the original 1.33:1 tv format, the adventures look as good today as they did in 1974 when they were drawn. Colours are bright and wear and tear is acceptable, so kudos to Contender for this release.

Audio

It`s a basic Dolby2.0 representation of the original mono soundtrack.

Features

There is a Roobarb and Custard Game on the disc, but nothing else. No subtitles, no commentary, but what do you want? There are all thirty Roobarb cartoons on here, and that tune!

Conclusion

A joy to behold. Over two hours of madness that will send you back to your childhood if you`re of a certain age, or enable you to show your rugrats what proper cartoons were like before Rugrats.