Mike, Lu & Og

Mike, Lu & Og
Title card
Genre	Animated television series
Created by	Mikhail Shindel Mikhail Aldashin Charles Swenson [1]
Directed by	Elena Rogeva Aleksandr Tatarskiy
Voices of	Nika Futterman Nancy Cartwright Dee Bradley Baker S. Scott Bullock Corey Burton Martin Rayner Kath Soucie Alison Larkin Brian George Chris Bonno Greg Proops Jim Ward Charlie Adler
Theme music composer	Vladimir Horunzhy
Country of origin	United States
Language(s)	English
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	26 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive producer(s)	Charles Swenson Mikhail Shindel Mikhail Aldashin
Producer(s)	Igor Gelashvili Vladimir Horunzhy Artem Vadiliev
Running time	22 minutes approx.
Production company(s)	Kinofilm Studios
Distributor	Cartoon Network
Broadcast
Original channel	Cartoon Network
Original run	November 12, 1999[2][3] – August 18, 2000
Chronology
Related shows	What a Cartoon! Show [4]

Mike, Lu & Og is an American animated television series produced by Kinofilm Studios that ran on Cartoon Network. The show was the seventh Cartoon Cartoon, based on a short for The What-A-Cartoon! Show.^[4] Created by Chuck Swenson, the show follows a girl named Mike, a foreign exchange student from Manhattan; a self-appointed island princess named Lu; and a boy-genius named Og. The trio takes part in a variety of adventures as Mike and the island's natives share their customs with each other. Twenty-six half-hour episodes were produced, featuring two stories per episode. The series featured voice actors Nika Frost as Mike, Nancy Cartwright as Lu, and Dee Bradley Baker as Og. It began airing on Boomerang in May 2006 as reruns and still continues to do so on an infrequent basis.

Plot

Mike applied as a foreign exchange student, and on a lark asked to be sent to a tropical island (which has the strange capability to briefly sink then and "pop up like a cork" every "few hundred years or so"). She found herself dumped on a forgotten, scantily mapped island populated by descendants of a British shipwreck. This island is called Albonquetine, named after one of their founders, Joshua Wendell Albonquetine. It may be based on the real-life Pitcairn Island. The castaways have "gone native" and are trying to behave like Polynesians, with varying degrees of success. Amongst other things, this explains Og's name and his fashion sense (or lack thereof).

Characters

Mike Mazinsky

From bottom to top: Mike, Lancelot, Lu, and Og

Manhattan-born Mike (short for Michelene) enjoys the features of the tropical island but, in return, misses the life that she had in New York and, as revealed in a particular instance, her school. Fortunately, Og is able to recreate many of the things that Mike misses most about the United States.

Lu

Lu, a 10-year-old self-proclaimed princess of the island and Og's cousin, is characterized by her loud and arrogant nature. She continually exploits Mike, Og, and her pet turtle, Lancelot. Og, being sagacious to a fault, frequently obliges to her will, even at the cost of her own well-being. Though she has a habit of tormenting everyone, she usually learns a lesson in humility by the end of each episode. Lu's unruly behavior is most likely a result of poor parenting on the part of her father, Wendell.

Og

Og, a 7-year-old native of Albonquetine and Lu's cousin, has a surprising predisposition to scientific theory and discovery. His inventions gone awry help develop the plots of many episodes. He is close friends with three animals; a pig named Pig, a goat named Goat and a porcupine named Spiney who are capable of speech and well learned in philosophy. Together, they form the Philosophical Society, discussing such "great thinkers" as Nietzsche, matters of existentialism, and the relevance of time.

Og enjoys experiencing new things. To name a few adventures, Og made a video game for himself in "A Boy's Game", performed nude in a fashion show in "Hot Couture" (possibly an homage to The Emperors New Clothes), and made jujubombs in an episode of the same name.

Wendell

Lu's father and the Governor of the Island. He is wiry, weak-willed (as seen when he ate so many chocolates that he returned into his former, "pre-workout" shape in the course of a few hours), and is seemingly unable to control his daughter or of delivering any sort of punishment to her. He is then apt to start crying. He has been the island's Governor for many years. This was misinterpreted by Mike, who thought he was an American-esque governor, which lead to an "election" on the island, not realising that the Islanders came to the island from England (and, as seen in the episode with "King Bob", they hold the "King of England" in great respect).

He has a large collection of tea cosies, and speaks in a squeaky falsetto similar in style to Kenneth Williams, although whether this was intentional or not remains uncertain.

Veteran film, TV, and voice-over actor S. Scott Bullock provided Wendell's quirky voice.

Alfred

Alfred is Og's father and Margery's husband. He is eccentric and charismatic, and also has a noticeable speech impediment preventing him from pronouncing his Rs. He fancies himself to be the island's hunter, using suction-cup arrows to persistently hunt a single wombat. It appears that the island's inhabitants are vegetarian (though clams and chicken soup appear to be fair game), so one may wonder what happens if Alfred ever catches the wombat.

Margery

Og's mother and Alfred's wife, Margery fancies herself to be an artist and a writer. Her arts including painting, sculpting, and cooking. The majority of Margery's artwork has to do with the island's ancestors. For this, she often seen working on a sculpture of several ancestors on the side of a mountain, reminiscent of Mount Rushmore. Every once in a while she will also be found painting food, and often found cooking it. Margery is the island's chef, preparing meals and tea for everyone on her side of the island, as well as preparing buffets and elaborate meals for special occasions. In writing, she is something of a historian. Throughout the series she is working on a book about the island's history titled "Cuzzlewits End".

Margery is very level-headed compared to Alfred's eccentric behavior. An example of this is shown in "Scuba Dooby Doo" when Alfred valiantly offers to protect everyone from the mailman whereas Margery plans on serving tea and crumpets.

Old Queeks

The Island Elder and Medicine-Man, the Islanders seek advice from him. He is also seen to be able to perform a kind of magic, summoning dead spirits. He is often opposed to Mike's innovative ways, but sometimes gets caught up in the modern crazes to hit the island.

Old Queeks claims to be psychic and he claims to "know all and see all". In one episode, Mike becomes suspicious of Queeks and decides to investigate him. She climbed up the opposite side of the mountain and found that Old Queeks was not psychic but that he spied on the Islanders through a telescope. Even after Mike informed the Islanders about Old Queeks' telescope, they still held onto their beliefs that he was psychic and communicated with a higher power(s). In some respects, this is truth enough. He can see all with a telescope, and he did bring ghosts to the island to plague Mike for annoying him.

He lives alone on the top of a mountain in a cave, and enjoys using "bat products" (i.e.: products made with bat guano). This includes everything from toothpaste to snacks.

Lancelot

Is Lu's long-suffering pet land turtle. She dresses her up in gaudy outfits, forces her to perform weird and dangerous stunts, and often makes her carry Lu on her back. For this reason, Lancelot is always running away from Lu, which is why she keeps her on a leash. Despite this abuse, Lancelot tends to be the savior of Mike and the Islanders (especially Lu) when they're in trouble. Like the other animals on the island, Lancelot tends to exercise more common sense than the humans. Unlike the members of the Philosophical Society, she does not speak. According to a Cartoon Cartoons book from 2001, Lancelot is a girl, but everyone thinks she's male.^{[citation needed]}

The Pirates

Living nearby are three pirates, descended from the pirates who caused the Brits to be shipwrecked in the first place but were then shipwrecked themselves. Their leader is a captain with two wooden legs and two eyepatches. Despite these handicaps he seems to get around without any problems. The pirates sometimes attempt to catch and eat Lancelot but are always foiled by the three children.

Their captain is known to force his men to put on blindfolds, so he can sneak into his treasury and put a rabbit finger puppet on his hand, engaging in conversations with it, speaking for it in a squeaky voice. In its first appearance, its mouth moved as the captain spoke. In its following appearance, the mouth stayed still.

Cuzzlewits

The other inhabitants of the island, whose very existence Lu eagerly denies, live on the other side of the island. Although they are shown to live in caves, one of their number, Hermione, a Cuzzlewit girl, is seen to be an extremely experienced thinker. She is accompanied by two Cuzzlewit boys, Haggis and Baggis, who constantly batter each other with clubs and appear to be dimwitted.

In the only episode taking place on the Cuzzlewits' side of the island, they are revealed to have a much larger population than the Albonquetanians. The elders of the Cuzzlewits and the Albonquetanians do not get along, hence their separation. This leads to a practical question: what do the Cuzzlewits call the island?

Despite the adults' squabbles, Mike and Hermione become friends in "The Three Amigas".

The Cuzzlewits are shown to all have the same genetic characteristics - an underbite which causes their lower central incisors to be bucked teeth.

Floyd and Jack

The mail delivery guy and his loyal canine copanian bring mail service to the island. In "Scooba Dooby Doo" Lu thinks of him as an invader trying to take her crown in her island paradise. Mike however tries to convince her that he's just delivering the mail and would be gone before she noticed, while she herself is awaiting letters and postcards from her best friends Melissa and Max. Floyd seems to be unintelligent, but is determined to get the job done.

Voice actors

• Nika Frost ^[5] - Michelene "Mike" Mazinsky
• Nancy Cartwright ^[6] - Lu
• Dee Bradley Baker ^[7] - Og/Goat
• S. Scott Bullock ^[8] - Wendell/Baggis
• Corey Burton ^[9] - Old Queeks/Bos'n
• Martin Rayner ^[10] - Alfred/Spiney/Mate
• Kath Soucie ^[11] - Margery/Pig
• Brian George ^[12] - Captain/Haggis
• Alison Larkin ^[13] - Hermione
• Chris Bonno ^[14] - Additional Voices
• Greg Proops ^[15] - Additional Voices
• Charlie Adler ^[16] - Additional Voices

Broadcast history

USA

• Cartoon Network (1999–2004)
• Boomerang (2006–present)

Poland

• Cartoon Network (2000–2005)
• Boomerang CEE+EMEA (2007–2010)

Turkey

• Cartoon Network (2008–present)

Latin-America

• Tooncast (2009–present)

Pakistan

• Cartoon Network (2004–present)

Romania

• Cartoon Network (2001–2005)

References

1. ^ Charles Swenson - IMDb
2. ^ Barbara Ensor (November 15, 1999). "On Screen Armchair Perestroika". New York. (Available at kino-film.com.) Accessed 2007-11-09.
3. ^ Jefferson Graham. "Cartoon networking from Moscow". USA Today. (Available at kino-film.com.) Accessed 2007-11-09.
4. ^ ^{a b} Mike, Lu And Og (1996) from the What A Cartoon! Show Cartoon Episode Guide
5. ^ Nika Futterman - IMDb
6. ^ Nancy Cartwright - IMDb
7. ^ Dee Bradley Baker - IMDb
8. ^ S. Scott Bullock - IMDb
9. ^ Corey Burton - IMDb
10. ^ Martin Rayner - IMDb
11. ^ Kath Soucie - IMDb
12. ^ Brian George - IMDb
13. ^ Alison Larkin, author
14. ^ Chris Bonno - IMDb
15. ^ Mike, Lu & Og - Cartoon Network Wiki - The TOONS Wiki
16. ^ Mike, Lu & Og TV Show History, Trivia, Photos and Episode Guide – Juggle.com

External links

• Big Cartoon Database episode guide (Page 1)
• Kinofilm Studios
• Mike, Lu & Og at the Internet Movie Database
• Mike, Lu & Og at TV.com