Season 5 was first broadcasted on both CBeebies and BBC Two from between August 1, 2003 and March 5, 2004.
Season 5 is the first season to be produced by both Hot Animation and HiT Entertainment as a whole.
Production[]
On October 29th, 2001, The Pygos Group (The team that produced the first four seasons of Pingu) collapsed and all its assets were sold to HiT Entertainment for over £15.9m. When news of this dropped the same day, investors became skeptical about the price HiT had paid. Rob Lawes, chief executive of HiT had this to say:
"By the time we have put Pingu through our infrastructure we believe it will be substantially more valuable than the £15.9m we paid."
Shortly after the acquisition, Pingu was renewed for two more seasons and research and development commenced in January 2002. Hot Animation would be the studio producing these seasons since they had also created stop motion work for other HiT shows like Bob the Builder. Around this time, Steve Cox and a few others went over to Gutmann’s studio in Switzerland and brought back everything they could find, right down to Biros that had run out. The puppets were all in abysmal condition, so they made molds and recast them out of resin. The models also needed to be made out of more enduring material rather than the plasticine used in the original show to reduce production times.
When it came time to decide who would be voicing the characters, Carlo Bonomi (The person who voiced all the characters in the first four seasons of Pingu without a script) was initially set to reprise his role. This was quickly changed however due to HiT deciding that he sounded too old. That meant that HiT had to start looking for somebody who could speak penguinese as well as Bonomi did. So David Sant (who had a background in physical theatre) sent them his CV and he got the job. He shared Pingu with Marcello Magni, who also had a background in physical theatre.
After 15 months of research and development, shooting began in April 2003 and later that year, the first episode of Season 5 was broadcast.
Episodes[]
| Screenshot | Title of episode | Release date | Episode | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Pingu's Bouncy Fun | August 1, 2003 | #1 | ||
| Pingu has fun when he and Father build a trampoline. | |||||
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Pingu Finishes the Job | August 8, 2003 | #2 | ||
| Pingu is left in Father's tool shed and can't resist finishing the table. | |||||
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Pingu Digs a Hole | August 15, 2003 | #3 | ||
| Father uses a shovel to get snow off his car, and Pingu digs tunnels around the neighborhood. | |||||
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Pingi's Valentine Card | August 22, 2003 | #4 | ||
| Pingu is ecstatic upon receiving a Valentine card from Pingi and makes one of his own. | |||||
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Pingu Wants to Fly | August 29, 2003 | #5 | ||
| A seagull inspires Pingu to fly, and his chance comes when he buys helium balloons. | |||||
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Pingu's Windy Day | September 5, 2003 | #6 | ||
| Pingu and Pinga hang the washing on a windy day and wind catches the towels. | |||||
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Pinga's Lost Rabbit | September 12, 2003 | #7 | ||
| Pingu puts Pinga's toy rabbit out of her reach and it tumbles out the window. When he fetches it, it lands on his sled and slides away. | |||||
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Pingu's Moon Adventure | September 19, 2003 | #8 | ||
| Grandfather tells Pingu about the moon, so he wants to visit. He makes a rocket out of a barrel, tin foil, and snow. | |||||
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Pinga Sleepwalks | September 26, 2003 | #9 | ||
| Pingu follows Pinga when she sleepwalks out of the igloo. | |||||
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Pingu the Snowboarder | January 15, 2004 | #10 | ||
| When Pingu goes snowboarding, he wishes he could jump like Robby. Pingi teaches him how. | |||||
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Pinga has Hiccups | January 16, 2004 | #11 | ||
| Pingu tries everything to make Pinga's hiccups go away. | |||||
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Like Father Like Pingu | January 19, 2004 | #12 | ||
| Father takes Pingu on a fishing trip. | |||||
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Pingu's Ice Sculpture | January 20, 2004 | #13 | ||
| In an ice sculpting contest, Pingu throws a snowball at Robby's sculpture, messing it up. He starts a grotesque sculpture competition. | |||||
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Pinga's Balloon | January 21, 2004 | #14 | ||
| Pinga's balloon needs inflating, and Pingu sees it is difficult. | |||||
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Pingu and the Knitting Machine | January 22, 2004 | #15 | ||
| When Mother rests, Pingu plays with her knitting machine. | |||||
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Pingu's Balancing Act | January 23, 2004 | #16 | ||
| Pingu does a balancing act, but it goes wrong later on. | |||||
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Pingu Gets Lost | January 26, 2004 | #17 | ||
| Pingu drops a bottle of milk that rolls into an icy ravine, and he gets stuck in a maze. | |||||
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Pingu and Pinga Go Camping | January 27, 2004 | #18 | ||
| Pingu and Pinga camp overnight and Pingu scares Pinga by pretending her toy bunny is growling, but later gets scared himself. | |||||
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Stinky Pingu | January 28, 2004 | #19 | ||
| Pingu dislikes the smell of Mother's fish porridge and hides it in his backpack. | |||||
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Pingu and the Band | January 29, 2004 | #20 | ||
| Pingu and Pinga drive Mother crazy by banging surfaces as drums. Grandfather teaches them real music. | |||||
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Pingu and the Snowball | January 30, 2004 | #21 | ||
| Pingu discovers that the more he rolls his snowballs, the bigger they become. | |||||
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Pingu Sticks Up | March 1, 2004 | #22 | ||
| Pingu and Pinga find stickers in their cereal box and start labeling things. | |||||
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Pingu and the Doorbell | March 2, 2004 | #23 | ||
| Pingu breaks the doorbell. | |||||
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Pingu Plays Tag | March 3, 2004 | #24 | ||
| Pingu plays tag with Pinga and gets stuck while escaping. | |||||
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Pingu's Pancakes | March 4, 2004 | #25 | ||
| Pingu tries to make pancakes but ignores Mother's advice. | |||||
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Pingu's Bedtime Shadows | March 5, 2004 | #26 | ||
| In bed, Pingu and Pinga make shadows on their bedroom wall. | |||||
Gallery[]
Opening[]
Sneak Preview[]
Endboards[]
Trivia[]
- This is the first of several things in the franchise:
- This is the first season to be made in the 21st century.
- This is the first season to feature the new logo and music for the series.
- This is the first season to have a music score composed by Keith Hopwood, who would also become the music composer for the Bob the Builder series from its tenth season until the Ready, Steady, Build! series.
- This is the first season to have new voice actors by David Sant and Marcello Magni.
- This is the first season to be shot on Super 16mm film.
- This is the first season to be produced and released in 16:9 widescreen, but some DVD releases such as Children's Favourites (later known as HiT Favourites) as well as the UK VHS releases, Amazon Prime Video, The official YouTube channel (previously) and The Pingu Show have the episodes cropped to 4:3 to match the original episodes.
- This is the first season where episodes were not banned in the US.
- This season remarks the return of the series.
- This season has a preview episode which can be seen on the "Pingu: A Very Special Wedding" DVD and the Children's Favourites Daily Mirror promotional DVDs from April 2006. It shows footage from Pingi's Valentine Card cropped to 4:3. But on the Children's Favourites Daily Mirror promotional DVDs it replaces the coming soon message with an endboard promoting the Pingu Boogaloo DVD.
References[]
[1] [2]