From the moment they made and premiered Percy The Park Keeper’s seasonal specials on ITV in the mid-90s, Grand Slam Children’s Films became the cornerstone of low stimulating TV for younger children. Which meant before we had loud, overwhelming shows like Peppa Pig, Paw Patrol and even - groan - Cocomelon, Grand Slam delighted the nation’s preschoolers with cosy tales of friendship, family and mischief.
Most of their works are based on best selling books, most notably such classics as Sheeep, Angelina Ballerina, Toot & Puddle and most important of all, Kipper The Dog, the calmest, low stimulating cartoon ever to be made or drawn by any British animator ever. It mixed surrealism and everyday situations in a way preschoolers can take in, and the soothing vocals of Martin Clunes and Chris Lang playing Kipper and his friends all adds to the genuine perfection that made Kipper a modern day classic. Who could even forget the time Arnold went to a mountain made of candy? Classic.
There are times when Grand Slam made films outside of children’s content as well, such as two specials for Bosom Pals they produced for BBC Three, which of course are too raunchy and naughty for the younger set.
As always, we would’ve had it go on like that forever. But with every phase we love comes a variety of changes so big that it could fill up too much room in our hearts to even care about what Grand Slam did to inspire and entertain us, whether we are writers, artists, animators in training or kids at heart.
In 2005, Disney ventured into CGI outside their usual reliance on Pixar years after the success of Toy Story by producing Chicken Little, a noisy modern take on the classic tale meant to cash in on the success of Shrek, the 2001 classic about an ogre who becomes an unlikely hero to a princess.
The next year, Playhouse Disney, their preschool network, found success with Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and then the unthinkable happened. As a result of Mickey’s rise to popularity, every single preschool network made every single one of their animated shows CGi, leaving no room for any slow paced hand drawn animated shows, not even ones like Kipper.
And then, in 2010, things got even worse after that.
You’d have thought that Disney might’ve learnt their lesson and reverted back to hand drawn animation after their experimental attempts at CGI in Meet The Robinsons and Bolt, but with the release of Tangled, they attempted to relate their princesses more to teenage girls by turning Rapunzel, the main character, from a fair, kind princess you’d usually see in hand drawn animated features before this whole shebang into a dorky, screaming fangirl longing for freedom and - ulp - boys.
According to Disney’s standards, there’s no room for fair, kind princesses or gentle princes in the CGI world, so every single animated series or film ever reverted to CGI. And it wasn’t fair on Grand Slam, who found this whole trend so overwhelming they did more of the unthinkable and shut down.
But to me, they might just have a second chance.
They have got so many new works to finish off, such as an animated adaptation of John Birmingham’s picture book The Magic Bed, and millions of other hand drawn shows for preschoolers and parents alike, but now due to the horrid trend of using CGI in films, they’ve started moving on to co-productions instead.
And why should they only co produce shows like Ella Bella Bingo? Because now the animation industry has put a roadworks sign up near where the hand drawn characters stand, and we are one endless traffic jam, waiting until the end of the world for new traditionally animated content to happen.
The sad news is, the only time we see traditional hand drawn content is in British and Japanese movies. Examples include Wolf Children, Mirai and Little Wolf’s Book Of Badness.
But why only make films using hand drawn animation when you want to make TV series using this beautiful style? The TV and movie industries don’t have that much time these days, leaving more room for easy and cheap-to-produce CGI. And it’s not fair!
Back then, where would we be without another peaceful adventure from Kipper or Percy The Park Keeper? Now, the answer is simple:
Nowhere.
And nowhere is where today’s kids are right now. They are known as the iPad generation, and with so much overstimulating and noisy content their ears and eyes are forced to take in, childhood development is teetering on the edge of arrested development.
Giving Grand Slam a second chance could result in less brainrot and damage to a child’s development, and maybe if Grand Slam goes back into business and produces new original content, then maybe even companies like Disney can understand how beautiful and important hand drawn animated films and TV series are in their lives.
Ginger Gibbons, if you are reading this, I would like to give a big thank you to you and your team for making such wonderful shows and specials, especially such calming shows like Kipper.
You and your company deserve a second chance.
We all do, no matter what.
THE END.
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