Saturday, January 26, 2008

"3-2-1 Penguins" Does "Monsters, Inc" One Better

If you're not familiar with Big Idea's non-veggie programming "3-2-1 Penguins," then you're unfamiliar with it (that seems safe enough.) Pretty cute stuff. Lots of geeky sci-fi humor.

Anyway, they're broadcasting new episodes on Saturday mornings. Today, the professor (Fidgel) was testing out his new invention, "The Harryhausen Ray," which causes things it's aimed at to "stop motion." Ha!

You may remember that Ray Harryhausen was the stop animator behind plenty of great old movies like the original "Mighty Joe Young" and "Jason And The Argonauts" (fighting skeletons, anyone?) "Monsters, Inc" made a nice reference to Ray by naming the fancy restaurant "HarryHausen's," but for sheer geeky wondrousness, the Harryhausen Ray gets my vote. Additionally, 50s B-movie fans would certainly have delighted to see a picnic upset by gigantic ants, ala "Them!" True, Harryhausen didn't work on "Them!", but he certainly crafted plenty of other giant stop-motion creatures for similar movies.

3 comments:

Sherry said...

But does it make sushi?

Will now have to stop watching Teen Titans so I can see 3-2-1 Penguins.

hmsnow.novelist said...

Kevin is my favorite. Kevin is everyone's favorite. And no wonder. I just wish they would make a feature with the Penguins like they did with the Pirates Who Don't Do Anything.

Allen's Brain said...

Yup. Over at the Big Idea site, they sell Kevin t-shirts, but none for the other crew members.

Here's my biggest insight into the 3-2-1 Penguiniverse: Each penguin represents one of the human characters in the "real" world.
Kevin is Grandmum: eccentric, plump around the hips, and commonly found serving tea and snacks.
Zidgel, the captain, corresponds the girl twin (whose name has popped out of my memory for a latte, and will return later, I hope): There's an episode where they both refuse to wear their glasses, and Zidgel's pompadour reflects her pigtails.
Fidgel, the ship scientist is Grandpa: In the first episode, the kids come across a picture of Grandpa (now deceased), and he looks a lot like Fidgel. He was also a scientist.
Midgel is Jason: More by default than anything else. Likes flying and speed and other traditional boy things.

Of course, this is probably on the dvd commentaries of those shows, but I've only ever seen the VHS versions.