The Raccoons
Canadian-American animated television series From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Canadian-American animated television series From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Raccoons is a Canadian animated television series that ran on CBC from November 11, 1985, to March 19, 1991, in Canada and on Disney Channel from July 4, 1985, to August 28, 1992, in the U.S., with three preceding television specials from its inception in 1980, and one direct-to-video special in 1984. The franchise was created by Kevin Gillis with the co-operation of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.[2]
 | This article's lead section may be too short to adequately summarize the key points. (November 2020) |
| The Raccoons | |
|---|---|
Title card | |
| Genre | |
| Created by | Kevin Gillis[1] |
| Directed by | Kevin Gillis |
| Voices of |
|
| Narrated by |
|
| Theme music composer |
|
| Ending theme | "Run with Us" by Steve Lunt (Season 1), Lisa Lougheed (Seasons 2–5) |
| Country of origin | Canada |
| Original language | English |
| No. of seasons | 5 |
| No. of episodes | 60 (plus 4 specials) (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer | Sheldon S. Wiseman |
| Producer | Kevin Gillis |
| Running time | 25 mins |
| Production companies |
|
| Original release | |
| Network | CBC |
| Release | July 4, 1985 – August 28, 1992 |
The series revolves around Bert Raccoon and married couple Ralph and Melissa Raccoon, of whom Bert is a friend and roommate.[3] The series mostly involved the trio's efforts against the industrialist forces of greedy aardvark millionaire Cyril Sneer, who regularly tries to destroy the forest for personal wealth.[4] However, the Raccoons always save their forest from Cyril's schemes, with help from their forest friends including Schaeffer, a gentle Old English Sheepdog; Cedric, Cyril's college graduate son; and Sophia Tutu, Cedric's girlfriend. As the series progresses, Cyril becomes more of a sympathetic character, eventually becoming an antihero, becoming more responsible in his priorities and business practices.
Originally, the story was set in a kind of hidden world in the Evergreen Forest where a small human family of a forest ranger and his children reside unaware of the struggles taking place out of sight. The second season had these human characters removed as the premise shifted to an unambiguous fantasy world of a sophisticated humanoid animal version of Canada with complex transportation systems, broadcasting media and heavy industry etc. In addition, Ralph's relatives become regular characters, especially his young nephew and niece, Bentley the insecure child technology prodigy and Lisa the statuesque athletic teenager who became an understated love interest for Bert.
Unlike many other cartoons of its time, it handled action, humour, and romance in a fairly sophisticated manner, while remaining sufficiently uncomplicated for younger viewers. Lessons featured in the series mainly focused on environmentalism. It also covered other topics, including friendship and teamwork.
The Raccoons franchise was originally conceived by Kevin Gillis in the 1970s, while appearing in shows like Celebrity Cooks and Yes You Can. The initial idea for the show was created by Gillis and columnist Gary Dunford. They drew their inspiration for Ralph Raccoon from a dilemma that happened at a cottage in Ottawa. Dunford backed out, but Gillis took his idea to Ottawa lawyer Sheldon S. Wiseman, who saw a potential in Gillis' idea and put together a large group – animators, musicians, and writers, to create the first special to star the characters known as The Christmas Raccoons.[8][9] Production on the special began in 1979 and was completed in 1980, and the special was shown on the December of the same year on CBC Television. It was also shown in countries all over the world, including the U.S. and the United Kingdom. The special was a huge hit and resulted in two sequel specials The Raccoons on Ice and The Raccoons and the Lost Star and a direct-to-video special, The Raccoons: Let's Dance!. In 1981, US television networks CBS, NBC and ABC approached Sheldon Wiseman about producing a 13-episode "Raccoons" television series.[10] In 1984, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and the Disney Channel began funding on the television series, which cost about $4.5 million to make.[11][12] In the U.S., the show was run on The Disney Channel from July 4, 1985 until August 28, 1992.[13] In Canada, it was shown on CBC on Monday evenings for the first season and was shown in a block consisting of The Wonderful World of Disney and Jim Henson's Fraggle Rock on Sundays for the next two seasons before moving to Wednesdays in its fourth, sharing an hour block with The Beachcombers and then eventually Tuesdays in its fifth and final season.
The series had a new wave soundtrack including the theme song "Run with Us" by cast member Lisa Lougheed. Season 1 ended with a different version of the song, not sung by Lougheed. "Run with Us" was performed in season 1 by Stephen Lunt. In the first season, Canadian singer Luba performed several songs, several of which were later re-recorded by Lougheed for use in other seasons. There were also several other songs performed by other musicians such as Rita Coolidge and Rupert Holmes who performed songs for the first special, Leo Sayer and Coolidge again for the second, and John Schneider and Dottie West for the final TV special. Due to contractual reasons, Schneider's vocals on three of the songs were replaced with Frank Floyd and Hank Martin when they were released on the accompanying soundtrack album for the fourth special. Rory Dodd, The Dior Bros. (actually Kevin Gillis and Jon Stroll under a pseudonym), and many other musicians also had songs performed, although somewhat rarely compared to the aforementioned people. According to Jon Stroll, Frank Floyd, the frontman of the 1970s R&B funk group The Writers, was originally selected to be the main male singer for the series but backed out at the last minute. Needing a replacement, they brought in Curtis King Jr. at the suggestion of backup singer Valerie Wilson.
The earlier version of "Run with Us", like quite a few of the other songs from The Raccoons, were never officially released. The songs from the first two specials were released on the album Lake Freeze – The Raccoons Songtrack in 1983. A soundtrack for the fourth special was released in 1984, but featured vocals from Frank Floyd and Hank Martin to replace John Schneider. Nine of the songs from the series featured on Lougheed's album Evergreen Nights (1987), though Lougheed only sang some of the songs (sometimes in duets), while some were sung by other artists (Curtis King Jr. and Stephen Lunt). The French version of "Run with Us", as well as most of Luba and Lisa Lougheed's songs, was performed by the Quebecois Canadian singer Jano Bergeron with "Run with Us" being renamed in French to "Viens Vers Nous".
The instrumental music was composed by Kevin Gillis and Jon Stroll and performed largely by the National Arts Centre Orchestra from Ottawa, Canada, though due to contractual reasons, they were credited as the National Raccoon Orchestra and later the Royal Raccoon Orchestra on the accompanying soundtrack albums. Most of the instrumental cues heard in the series were actually recorded for The Raccoons and the Lost Star and re-used. Only six of the instrumental tunes (two from The Raccoons on Ice and four from The Raccoons and the Lost Star) have ever been released officially (they can be found on the Lake Freeze and Let's Dance! albums).
From 1979 until 1985, Canadian animation studio Atkinson Film-Arts provided the animation for the four specials and first season of the series.[14][note 1] In 1986, after producing the first 11 episodes, Hinton Animation Studios took over to animate the remaining seasons of the show (seasons 2–5).[15][note 2]
The Raccoons ran on CBC from November 11, 1985 until March 19, 1991 in Canada. It was also shown in countries all over the world, including the U.S. and the United Kingdom (BBC). In the U.S., the show ran on The Disney Channel from July 4, 1985 until August 28, 1992.[13] In Canada, it was shown on CBC on Monday evenings for the first season and was shown in a block consisting of The Wonderful World of Disney and Fraggle Rock on Sundays for the next two seasons unitl moving to Wednesdays in its fourth, sharing an hour block with The Beachcombers and then eventually Tuesdays in its fifth and final season. In the late 1990s, Trio, a US cable network then partially owned by the CBC, aired repeats of the show.
Embassy Home Entertainment released the specials and Season 1 on home video from 1982 to 1987.[16] Embassy also released the specials on Laserdisc, CED and Betamax formats. Other distributors, such as Catalyst and GoodTimes Home Entertainment released some specials and episodes on VHS.
In the United Kingdom, Embassy Home Entertainment released the four Raccoons specials on VHS in the mid-1980s, before the distribution rights went to Channel 5 Video (a division of Polygram Video) in 1986. They re-released the four specials on video, as well as released another video called The Raccoons Big Surprise with two Season 1 episodes "Surprise Attack" and "Going It Alone" (Cat. No. CFV 05042). Then three videos with Season 2 episodes were released, the first two were by Picture Music International (PMI) that included "Double Play" and "The Sweet Smell of Success" on volume 1, released in 1988 and then "Blast from the Past" and "Power Trip" on volume 2, released in 1989. Then Video Collection International Ltd released a third tape which contained the episodes "Stop The Clock" and "The Artful Dodger" on 13 August 1990 (Cat No. VC1191). That same tape was re-released again by Video Collection International Ltd on 22 July 1991, as part of their Children's Club range (Cat No. KK0019).
In 2003, Morningstar Entertainment released the show on DVD for the first time. Two 9-episode boxsets were released, each containing 3 discs that were also available separately. The discs were released without any region coding in NTSC format. The first set contained nine of the ten episodes from season 2 (omitting "Stop the Clock") and the second set contained the first nine episodes of season 3. The extras include character bios, a chance to create your own scene from The Raccoons and Raccoon-A-Roma DVD-ROM content, like QuickTime animated sequences. For this release, Len Carlson also reprised his role as Bert during menus and gave in-character commentary before and after episodes. Both sets are now out of print, and no North American DVD release has come out since then.
A 2-disc Region 2 PAL DVD release of the complete series 1 was released on September 17, 2007 through Fabulous Films Ltd. The bonus features on set 1 were duplicated from the Canadian release, mainly the create a scene and Raccoon-A-Roma DVD ROM content. They later released a DVD entitled Three Adventures With The Raccoons on April 7, 2008. This DVD contained the first 3 episodes of Series 1 with no extras. Series 2 was released on April 20, 2009 by Fabulous Films Ltd. in another 2-disc set. DVD extras on the set include character model sheets and a documentary.
In September 2009, MORE Entertainment released an 8-disc DVD set in Germany, containing all 60 episodes (7–8 per disc) and no extras. The language track is German only. Later in November 2013, MORE released a DVD featuring all four Raccoons specials. As with previous complete series set, the only language track is German.
In December 2009, the first season of The Raccoons was released on iTunes in Canada. It was also released on iTunes in the U.S. in April 2010.[17][18][19] The first two seasons were released on DVD to Netflix in the U.S. in early-2010 and in Canada in August 2011.
As of June 2020, the full-episode series is now available on YouTube.[20]
Since March 27, 2023, the series in its 4K remastered form currently airs on Boomerang Canada.[21]
The Raccoons was well received by critics. The New York Times, in its review for their second TV special, said "the Raccoons are an adorable lot, supported nicely by an attractive production."[1] Variety praised the third special, The Raccoons and the Lost Star, calling it "a rollicking good adventure filled with space-age animation, high-tech gadgetry, lilting tunes, a lovable sheepdog, and the delightful Raccoons team."[22]
In 2022, series creator Kevin Gillis said that the show was seeing a resurgence of interest, speculating that it was due to the "original audience now having young families of their own and want[ing] to reach back to what helped form their early lives."[23]
The show was nominated for many awards, including a Gemini Award for Best Sound and Best Writing, and won the Gemini for Best Animated Series.
In 1990, Bert and Lisa were named the mascots of the Canadian Olympic team.[24] That year, the Canadian Junior Olympics were held.
Its theme song "Run with Us" was also featured in the 2011 film Hobo with a Shotgun.
In January 2022, the show was featured in the premiere episode of Son of a Critch.[25]
Children's novels based on the series were published by Cardiff-based publisher Candy Jar Books in 2024.[26]
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