Meg and Mog - even people from Wigan can be evil

Today I'm going to review an episode of Meg and Mog, who started life in a series of 1970s children's book written by Helen Nicholl, and illustrated by Jan Pienkowski (the person responsible for Meg having half a head). The pair were brought to life in a show that first aired in 2003, and I believe you can still catch reruns of it on various sky channels.

I have two overwhelming memories of the Meg and Mog series. Firstly, being herded up to the library once a week with my class, and being forced to choose a book and read it. Everyone obviously fought over the books with the biggest pictures and the least words, and since I was quite bulky as a kid I must have won those fights quite often. Hence I ended up reading a hell of a lot of Meg and Mog books. Secondly, in one story Meg throws a dinner party, and Mog is served "Welsh Rabbit". It was only in recent years that I discovered that this wasn't an actual dish, but a parody of Welsh Rarebit. I'm still not entirely sure what Welsh Rarebit is, but I think it has something to do with being square shaped.

As far as I can tell, the animated show remained pretty true to the original books, with the same stories and illustration style. By 'illustration style', I mean possibly drawn by someone who gave up halfway through and went for a cup of tea. For example -

Where the hell is the rest of her head?

Anyway. Today I am going to look at episode one - "Meg, Mog and Owl", which I assume was based on the first book in the series. As you might have gathered already, the stories center around a hapless witch and her familiars, getting into all kinds of hilarious and non-evil scrapes. I don't think there is one where Meg gets burnt at the stake by the witchfinder general, but don't quote me on that.

Here we go!

We start off with some pretty awesome, scary-without-being-too-scary-for-the-kiddywinks theme music, and then cut to Meg in bed. DOWNRIGHT PORN! In all seriousness, Meg looks like she's having a terrible dream. One can only speculate on what she's dreaming about, but my money's on that she's reliving the accident in which she lost half her fucking head.

Owl wakes her up by being as camp as humanly possible. If this owl ever got into a fight with Hedwig, Hedwig would tear him to pieces.

Notice that in silhouette, Meg has a full head.

Immediately Meg is cast as non-threatening by being northern. I like this logic - anything supernatural, make it from Leeds, Wigan or similar. That way they'll only be interested in spells about whippets and flat caps.

Mog is asleep downstairs, looking like he's covered in bloody spiders or something. Speaking of which, there's a spider in my bathroom. But it's one of those stupid fat spiders so I'm not too bothered, and anyway I can't reach it.

Meg 'accidentally' steps on Mog's tail, at which Mog wakes up and calls her a fucking whore (I'm paraphrasing).

This breakfast she makes is truly disgusting. Three eggs, bread, cocoa, 'some jam' (an as yet unspecified amount of jam), milk, and a kipper. By the time we get to the kipper, Mog is jizzing so much, the excitement can only be conveyed with a fanfare. Look at the kipper's cold, lifeless eyes staring out at you while a fanfare plays.

Meg puts all these ingredients into her cauldron. Fine, you might think, she's just going to magic up an entire meal, right? Wrong. All she does is make some kind of horrible porridge sludge containing kippers AND cocoa AND jam. Ugh. I'd rather have had the Welsh Rabbit. Owl comes and sits on Mog's head, which made me laugh.

A dead bird springs out of the cuckoo clock, and it's time for them to head off. Owl is going to stay behind and try on Meg's underwear.

Long intestine - it's the only way to travel these days -

Meg meets up with all her identical and equally non-threatening friends - Bess, Jess, Tess and Cress. Cress, the Scottish witch, just makes me think of THIS whenever I hear her voice -

Back to the plot. The witches land on top of the smallest hill in the world, and proceed to light a fire underneath the cauldron. And when I say 'they', I mean 'Meg does everything on her bloody own'.

Then they throw various Pogs into the cauldron and recite some Dr Seuss. The end result is...wait...what? the end result is that all the other witches are dead? Really? really really? Oh wait no, they're all just mice. That's fine then.

Hang the fuck on. Meg is really pleased about this, as if she did it on purpose. This is confirmed when she declares she isn't even going to change them back. WTF? I know they just stood there while she lit the fire, but really...what? How did they incur her wrath to this degree? She can't really be evil, she's from Wigan! My entire belief system has been shattered.

Then it ends. No surprise twist, just Meg turning her friends into mice. so I guess the moral of this story is that even witches from Wigan can't be trusted.

I am traumatised. I need to go for a cigarette now.

Night Out. In a cardboard box. With a man in a bear suit.

I haven't written about an episode of Rainbow in what feels like forever, which is quite a long time. So today I decided that, difficult and onerous as it was, I would spend my hard earned time watching Rainbow and then dicking about on the internet. Mine is a hard life indeed.

Today's episode is entitled "Night Out", in which the gang spend the evening in the Coach and Horses, followed by a kebab and a carrier bag full of sick.

Do they? Do they really? Well let's find out in part one -

The episode opens with the best, and most loaded, opening lines in history -

"Ooh go on Geoffrey, it will be fun!"

"Yes go on Geoffrey, you'll enjoy it!"

Immediately the reader is intrigued. Just what is Geoffrey being bullied into? Anal sex? Trying heroin for the first time? Going down the casino and putting everything on red?

Erm, no. "Let us sleep in the garden tonight like three hairy tramps please Geoffrey."

Geoffrey is hesitant to let them camp out, because he has to stay in and wait for "the man". Don't we all?

Zippy, meanwhile, is so excited he smacks the washing up liquid off the table. No one notices this, least of all the director. Zippy then sings "Home on the range". I love Zippy.

Hang on. Hang the fuck on. Geoffrey can't camp out tonight because he's waiting in for a delivery? Just what time is he expecting this delivery? Midnight?

Zippy, rather sensibly, points out that "you can't go camping in a house." No, because camping overnight in a house is called 'going to bed'.

Oh look, the washing up liquid's back. They use 'Mansion' washing up liquid. Jus' putting that out there.

We cut to later, and the gang are erecting their tent. It's actually quite a good tent considering (considering they're morons) -

Of course, Bungle manages to break the tent. How the FUCK does Bungle manage to break this tent? He must have pulled the washing line completely down. I don't know whose fault that is, but it's definitely not mine. Oh I see. Bungle did it on purpose just so he could be proved right. Fuck you Bungle, FUCK YOU!

Ha ha, Geoffrey ends up blaming Bungle anyway. Also, it looks like "the man" has been, judging by the boxes.

I'm just curious. Which one of these is the washing machine, and which one is the dryer?

Because one of these boxes obviously contained a fridge.

Bungle declares he wants to live in the boxes. So, you couldn't fit in the tent that was twice the size of these boxes, but now you want to squeeze into one of these boxes and spend the night there, accompanied by two friends? do you know something about spacetime that we don't?

Bungle wees himself with excitement over the boxes. "This could be the door!" (pointing at a box flap). "Or this!" (pointing at an entire box). What? Oh Bungle, your insanity never fails to amuse me.

George, however, surpasses even Bungle's level of insanity. His idea of building a temporary, weather-proof abode is to "put the little box on top of the big box." How will that help? Just...what? Mercifully, we are interrupted by an animation of a cat that turns into a dragon, which is less disturbing than the plot.

Part two!

Ok, how the hell did Bungle manage to make that

massive box using those two boxes of very different sizes?

"What else do we need?" "Ooh, some blankets...like these!" Well bungle, I would suggest using blankets like those, yes, but not ones that have been sat on the wheelie bin for months.

Apples are not food. They are plants. Zippy has the right idea.

Zippy is also right when he says "We don't need a torch!" This is because (Spolier alert!) They will be back while it's still bloody light.

"We have to be self-deficient." Ironically, he is so right.

Geoffrey says goodnight, and notice that it's about three in the afternoon.

Zippy has the idea of singing a song "around the campfire." This is a beautiful sentiment, and encapsulated everything that is glorious and spiritually enriching about spending time with nature, underneath the stars. unfortunately, Bungle fucking ruins it, so the gang end up singing around the...space.

"HOME, HOME ON THE RANGE...."

Notice that when the three are singing it is Roy Skelton doing the voices for both Zippy and George, at the same time. The man was a vocal genius.

I notice the box tent has become even bigger.

The three argue about space and habits. It's like they're used to having their own space, and have never ever shared a bed before. Also, Bungle feels a sharp pain beneath the covers and swiftly berates Zippy for sticking his hand in places where it doesn't belong. Or for eating biscuits. Whichever's more interesting. It's like a 'choose your own adventure' book. I know which one I'd choose.

Oh my god, an owl is about to kill them to death! And they don't even have a torch, so they can't even see their own death clearly!

Something's coming! Is it a tiger? No! It's........Geoffrey! I'd almost rather have had the tiger. Geoffrey is as orange as one in this episode though.

"Here's the story book...under the sheets...hang on, just let the producer pass it up to us..."

Bungle reads a story about the whispering trees, which also appears in an episode entitled (amazingly) - "Whispers". Since "Whispers" was one of my favourite episodes as a kid, I'm sure I'll be writing about this story in the future. Suffice to say, it;s about some trees that whisper.

Note - it is definitely morning now. It's light (it's not the torch, the sunlight is streaming in through the 'window'), and the birds are singing. Keep that in mind.

The gang go inside to get Geoffrey his breakfast, only to find that Geoffrey didn't go to bed last night - he went out with "the man" and is now fixing himself some Alka Seltzer -

I love that they intended to make breakfast for Geoffrey, but instead end up saying "I'm starving, I'll have some cornflakes please".

Were you fooled? I know I was. IT'S NOT MORNING AT ALL! HAHAHAHA etc. It's half 7 at night, time for Geoffrey to go to bed (before he begins his new life at the convent the next day). the gang are really disappointed, not to mention about to pass out from hunger after having spent three weeks in the wilderness with no food or water.

They haven't been out half an hour. This whole fucking episode hasn't taken half an hour.

Why is Geoffrey being a bastard to them on purpose? He does this sometimes, I notice.

Luckily he was joking all along, and he soon reveals this. Look at his pleased face -

FIN.

PS I have no idea why these posts keep changing size/font/alignment halfway though. I'm no good with things like this. Rest assured, if I tried to fix it it would end up ten times worse.