Count Duckula

Count Duckula
Genre	Animated series
Created by	Cosgrove Hall
Directed by	Chris Randall Carlos Alfonso
Starring	David Jason, et al.
Composer(s)	Mike Harding
Country of origin	United Kingdom
No. of series	4
No. of episodes	65 (List of episodes)
Production
Producer(s)	Brian Cosgrove Mark Hall
Running time	22 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	ITV Network (CITV) Nickelodeon (USA)
Picture format	4:3
Original run	6 September 1988 - 16 February 1993 (UK) – February 6, 1989 - December 26, 1993 (USA)
Chronology
Related shows	DangerMouse

Count Duckula is a British animated television series created by British studio Cosgrove Hall, and a spin-off from DangerMouse, a show in which the Count Duckula character was a recurring villain. The series first aired on September 6, 1988 and was produced by Thames Television for 3 seasons and Central Television for the fourth and final series. In all, 65 episodes were made, each about 22 minutes long. All 65 episodes have been released to DVD in the UK, while only the first series has been released in North America. Both the series as well as its characters continue to have a large following on the internet.

The show is a loose parody of the story of Count Dracula. Set in Transylvania, Duckula lives in a spooky castle known as Castle Duckula, alongside his butler Igor, and his large nanny (always referred to as "Nanny" and perpetually wearing an arm sling). Almost all of the characters in the show are anthropomorphised birds.

Plot

The story (as shown in the title sequence each episode) is that Duckula has been active as a vampire for centuries. He could only be destroyed by exposure to sunlight or by a wooden stake thrust through his heart. In fact, Duckula has died numerous deaths — but he always returns through a mystic ritual, performed once a century, "when the moon is in the Eighth House of Aquarius" (The opening credits depict Igor's incantation). Several episodes explore the theme that each resurrection creates a new incarnation with little to no memory of its past life; thus, every incarnation is free to develop its own personality and pursue its own personal interests. The vampire is thus able to pose as a "dreadful dynasty," the Counts of Duckula. The preceding generations included knights, sorcerers, scientists, artists, Egyptologists and even professional gamblers, all of whom were also secretly "vicious vampire ducks".

Yet, as the title sequence put it, "the latest reincarnation did not run according to plan." The successful conclusion of the ritual requires blood (A send up to the Hammer Dracula films), the source of sustenance for any vampire, but Nanny accidentally substituted tomato ketchup. Consequently, the newest version is not a blood-sucking vampire, but a vegetarian one. He is more interested in juicy carrots than hunting for victims. Naturally, Igor is appalled at this. Even worse, his "new" master is obsessed with pursuing wealth and fame as an entertainer.

The stories often centre around Duckula's adventures in search of riches and fame, assisted by the castle's ability to teleport around the world. Another regular theme is Igor's attempts to turn Duckula into a proper vampire. Some episodes feature Duckula's nemesis Doctor Von Goosewing (based on Dr. Abraham Van Helsing, the nemesis of Dracula), a vampire hunter who blindly refuses to believe the current incarnation of Duckula is harmless. There is also an array of bizarre, often supernatural foes, from zombies to mechanical werewolves. The show also features a cuckoo clock whose bat-like Russian-accented characters come out and make jokes about the current situation (or just corny jokes in general); the clock is also a vital part of the castle's travelling mechanism, and even has the ability to turn back time.

A series of annuals and monthly comics further detailing the adventures of Count Duckula and associated characters were released throughout the time that the series originally aired and for a short time after.

Voices

• Count Duckula…David Jason
• Igor…Jack May
• Nanny/Dimitri the Bat…Brian Trueman
• Dr Von Goosewing/Sviatoslav the Bat…Jimmy Hibbert
• Narrator…Barry Clayton
• Theme Song Vocalists…Mike Harding and Doreen Edwards
• Various…Ruby Wax, Barry Clayton, Brian Trueman, Jimmy Hibbert, Johni Keyworth

Characters

Protagonists

Count Duckula

Duckula is a short green duck with black parted hair and the traditional vampire evening wear complete with cape. He has no fangs, although his more old-fashioned relatives did. His favorite food is broccoli sandwiches. He has occasionally been seen wearing pajamas with a Danger Mouse logo, a reference to the character's origin (and somewhat based on the fact that David Jason voiced both characters).

Count Duckula himself is a deliberate send-up of many traditional vampire traits. As his name would suggest, he is an anthropomorphic duck. Besides his vegetarianism and aspirations of fame, he is very squeamish and often cowardly. The Duckula Family Motto is Per Ardua ad Sanguina, which means "Work hard for blood".

He has a very modern outlook, and often despairs over the traditional vampire image he is expected to embody. He hates living in a dark, gloomy castle, and finds the behaviour of his servants to be depressing. Although he retains vampiric powers and qualities such as teleportation and not being able to appear in front of a mirror, he rarely uses them. In fact, the only one he has been shown using is teleportation, which consists of him plunging up into a small storm cloud and reappearing in a flash of lightning elsewhere (as opposed to his predecessor on Danger Mouse, who appeared in a vertical explosion of flames). This ability is used only when the Count truly desires speed, and is sometimes implied to be involuntary.

He often goes outside in the daytime without suffering any ill effects, but this is likely because of his own personal oddities. In one episode, a living statue of the previous Count of Duckula crumbles into a pile of stone when exposed to sunlight. In the episode "Doctor Goosewing and Mr. Duck", Count Duckula briefly turns into a "proper" vampire, desiring blood from the villagers outside the castle, but turns away from the door when he discovers that the sun is still out. On the other hand, the episode "Transylvanian Homesick Blues" features a prehistoric "first vampire duck" who goes out in daylight, and only returns to his coffin because Igor advises him to.

While often egotistical and selfish, Duckula is good natured. He often tries to help people, although he usually succeeds only in making them hate him. He is prone to short lived obsessions, in a manner somewhat similar to Toad of Toad Hall (another character voiced by Jason), which often form the plots for episodes attempting to become a blues musician in New Orleans, prospecting for gold, becoming a cowboy, etcetera.

The character differs considerably from his predecessor on the Danger Mouse show. In fact, the only similarities the two share are that they are vampire ducks with ambitions in show business, little actual talent in that area, and both are named Count Duckula. The previous version was an outright villain, willing to blackmail and force his way into stardom (as opposed to the current Count, who merely tries to get in the legitimate way) and was fixated on being a TV star, rather than settle for fame in some other branch of entertainment. He had far greater magical powers and made much more use of them, as well as having a thick accent consisting of lisping, stuttering and occasional squawks. Most notably, he was not a vegetarian; in his very first appearance he threatened to drink DM's blood, only to be chased away by the sun, which may suggest he was the previous ancestor/incarnation before being reincarnated as the accidental vegetarian Duckula.

Igor

Igor, the Count's Butler, is a traditional horror servant based on the stock character Igor, and adds a decidedly dark streak to some of the show's humour. He greatly dislikes his master's behaviour, and often encourages him to act in a far more ghastly manner. He remains convinced that, if he could only talk Duckula into biting, maiming, torturing and otherwise brutalizing people, it would be a return to the "good old days".

He is a hunched balding vulture with a deep, slow voice. He has served under several previous incarnations of Count Duckula, making his age uncertain. Seeing as he can only be brought back "once a century" and Igor has performed the task multiple times in his life, he is clearly very old and possibly ageless. In the episode "Arctic Circles" Igor mentions after he has been dismissed that he had served the Duckulas for seven and a half centuries, while in the family reunion episode, he says that he has been in Duckula's family for eight hundred years. It is possible that one of his ancestors may have been responsible for creating the Duckula reign in the first place.

Nanny

Nanny is, as her name suggests, Duckula's nanny, as well as housekeeper. She is an extremely large and clumsy hen, possessing incredible strength and inevitably messing up whatever task she is set to do. In particular, she has a blind spot regarding doors, and often crashes through a door without opening it first, or (more commonly) even walks right through the wall, especially a few feet off from the door's position. Not surprisingly, she is the one who mistook ketchup for blood in Duckula's resurrection.

As this behaviour suggests, she is supremely unintelligent, and completely unreliable. She is devoted to her "Ducky-Boos", as she calls Duckula, and has a deep maternal affection for him, though her clumsiness often inadvertently causes him harm. A recurring gag is her inability to understand what people around her are talking about, often mixing up words and taking insult at conversations not directed at her. She is also very ditzy and motherly. She sometimes hugs Duckula so tightly, it suffocates him.

Like Igor, her age is uncertain, as she has apparently been with Duckula for several of his incarnations. Her right arm is perpetually in a sling, though it is revealed in a later episode that she in fact is only wearing it to cover up a tattoo. The sling itself seems to have unlimited carrying capacity, as she is able to produce any number of items from it, in the style of Harpo Marx's recurring joke.

Castle Duckula

An archetypal Transylvanian castle with all the trimmings: dungeon, torture chamber, library of macabre texts, laboratory, etc. The castle has an often referred-to-but-never-seen werewolf named Towser living in it. This could be a reference to a cartoon dog of the early 1980s of the same name.

The castle can teleport to any place on earth (and beyond) but returns automatically at dawn, "Eastern Transylvanian standard time" as mentioned by Igor in the show (although he refers to it as "Eastern standard Transylvanian time" in the episode "Private beak"). It is activated when Duckula enters an upright coffin while saying where he wants it to take him (often, he would have to come up with a rhyme to activate it properly).

The controls to this device are inside an old fashioned cuckoo clock that hangs on the wall. Inside the clock live two mechanical bats, Dmitri and Sviatoslav, who punctuate each episode by coming out and delivering stale jokes to each other. These jokes were so bad that they actually drove a character who had been given the clock insane. The characters' thick Slavic accents, and Sviatoslav's frequent failure to understand the punchlines, do not help matters.

The castle itself may be at least partly sentient, and may also have a degree of self-awareness. The other characters make references to this, though this may simply be their own superstition.

Antagonists

Dr Von Goosewing

Von Goosewing is a mad scientist and vampire hunter, who is a spoof of Abraham Van Helsing. He is a goose, as his name suggests, and speaks in a German accent. Von Goosewing wears an outfit not unlike that of Sherlock Holmes with a pair of spats. Von Goosewing often flies a dirigible with 'VG' written on it.

He pursues Count Duckula relentlessly, never able to comprehend that he is harmless. When not inventing some new machine to hunt vampires with, he relies on an old fashioned blunderbuss which is loaded with a wooden stake (although, curiously, it sometimes actually fires laser beams).

He is a terrible scientist, often getting maimed by his own crack-pot inventions. He is also supremely unobservant, and often bumps into Duckula and converses with him for several minutes without realising to whom he is talking.

Von Goosewing has an assistant (who never appears on screen) named "Heinrich". Von Goosewing often calls for Heinrich, and Heinrich is often blamed for Von Goosewing's mistakes. In the TV series, "Heinrich" seems to be just a figment of Von Goosewing's imagination, an imaginary friend, but the comic book version of the characters by Marvel reveal that Heinrich is actually his former assistant who is always complaining about his paltry wages. Von Goosewing mentions that Heinrich threatened to resign but is still with him. Apparently Heinrich quit, but his former employer failed to realise it.

The Marvel comic books based on the show also add a supporting character to him: his niece Vanna, on whom Duckula has a crush. This affection is reciprocated and the two have a romance during the comic's run, much to Von Goosewing's chagrin; Goosewing pursues Duckula with greater fervour as he seeks to 'protect' his niece from him.

The Crow Brothers

Four criminally-inclined crows named Ruffles, Burt, Junior (name not called on-screen) and an unnamed brother. They are typically seen scaling the walls of Castle Duckula with the aid of climbing equipment. They are always seen hanging off one another with the use of bungee cords to climb the walls of whatever building they plan to scale. Their goal is to get at the treasure inside the castle, but they rarely make it to the top.

The crows always wear masks. Ruffles wears a balaclava; Burt wears a longer balaclava; Junior wears a Peruvian chullo that seems to extend to his eyes; and the fourth crow brother wears a sock that covers his face entirely. The four brothers are led by the tallest crow, Ruffles, who often has plans that do not work.

Duckula, himself, is always oblivious to the Crow's criminal intentions, and often enlists them in endeavours to become an entertainer. At one point they break into Castle Duckula while a play is being put on, and the Count needs fairies, toadstools and dwarves. The Crows' masculinity hilariously comes into play here, as they discuss their coming debut: "Toadstool, all right. Dwarf, all right. But I ain't going to be no bloomin' fairy!".

The Egg

A supervillain egg with a grudge against anyone that is alive, because he was never able to hatch from his egg. Along with his insidious schemes and plans is a parrot with an chinese stereotype complexion known as Oddbeak (a play on the James Bond villain Oddjob), who is very careful not to use words with the prefix "Egg", as he knows that it will offend his master. For example, he cannot say "Exactly, master" because his phoney-bologna Asian accent makes the word sound like "EGGSactally" so he tries hard to say "HIS-actally" instead.

Gaston and Pierre

A pair of French criminals who serve as occasional villains. Although they are both undeniably incompetent, the arrogant Gaston is ostensibly the brains of the outfit.

Gaston is a tall, thin black stork, while Pierre is a stubby, short parakeet who sounds similar to Bluebottle from The Goon Show. The characters were adapted into non-bird form for yet another Cosgrove-Hall animated series - Victor and Hugo.

The Phantom of the Opera and Cruel

A duo of characters who, at one point seek revenge on Count Duckula for foiling their plans. The Phantom is a tall, thin bird with the same mask worn by the original Phantom and dressed in dandified clothes (complete with a cape), while Cruel (a parody of Peter Lorre) is a short, misshapen bird who acts as the Phantom's manservant.

Morris the Strongman and Charlie the Clown

A pair of baleful circus performers who held a grudge against Duckula; both were bumbling (though Charlie was slightly less so) and Morris was the brawn of their misdeeds.

The Pirate Penguins

A ruthless crew of piratical penguins who are hired by Count Duckula at one time, but this crew of seafarers also turn on Count Duckula when his antics crash their ship. All of the penguins are typical pirate stereotypes one of which is known as Mr. Mate and shouts that he will "bite their heads off!"

Neutrals

Narrator

The narrator opens and closes every episode, in a voice which parodies Vincent Price's iconic voiceovers. Episodes usually began with him describing Castle Duckula and its gloomy atmosphere, and usually close with him saying a phrase popularized in the 1950s and 60s by American TV horror host Zacherley: "Goodnight out there...WHATever you are!"^[1] Variants of this line are also used to close certain programmes.

Relatives

Duckula has any number of vampiric relatives all over the world. These are more classic vampires than Duckula, possessing fangs, red eyes and evil personalities. Only a small number, such as Don Diego, show any affinity or friendship toward the benign Count Duckula.

They come from many different countries, such as Spain and Scotland, and represent the culture they are from in their outfits. Some such relatives were Don Diego, a Spanish vampire duck who makes his fun and games by burning down villages, and Rory McDuckula, a Scottish vampire duck who later makes himself an enemy of Duckula.^[2]

The peasants

The town situated below Castle Duckula is home to many peasants who live in constant fear of the Count, despite his harmless current incarnation. A recurring joke in the series and associated books is that "the peasants are revolting" (a pun that works because the word "revolting" can mean "rebelling" or "foul"). Their local pub is called "The Teeth and Jugular", a reference to vampires' practice of biting into blood vessels in their victims' necks. The regulars are often seen singing a variation of the traditional song "One man went to mow a meadow" replacing the words "mow a meadow" with "kill a vampire."

Episode list

Main article: List of Count Duckula episodes

Airing history

• UK
  • Channel 4
  • ITV Network (CITV) (1988–1993)
  • The Children's Channel
  • Nickelodeon (1995–1996)
  • Sky One (1998–2001)
  • Boomerang (Coming Soon)

• USA
  • Nickelodeon (1989–1993)

• Australia
  • ABC TV
  • Network Ten
  • Nickelodeon
  • 7Two

• France
  • Canal J (as "Comte Mordicus")

• Italy
  • Italia 1 (1989)

• Iran
  • Channel 2 IRIB (1990's & 2000's) (as "The Castle Of Thousand Ducks")

• Germany
  • ARD (1991–1994)
  • Kabel 1 (1997-?)
  • KI.KA (2004-?)

• Greece
  • Boomerang (Greece)

• UAE
  • Channel 33

• Serbia
  • Happy TV

• Saudi Arabia
  • Channel 3

• Canada
  • YTV
  • Canal Famille (now known as VRAK.TV) The French Canadian version was named "Mordicus".

• The Czech Republic
  • Supermax

• South Africa
  • Boomerang

• Mexico
  • Televisa still aired the show up to January, 2006, on Canal 5. The success of the animated series in Mexico is partly attributed to its translation and voicework in Spanish, which was the very first to be done in a loose style, translating not only languages but cultural references and humor as well, uncommon in movies or television shows until Count Duckula, or "Conde Pátula" as it is known in Spanish^{[citation needed]}.

• Malaysia
  • TV3 (2002)
  • TV9 (2009)

• Spain
  • TVE 1 (1991. Only seasons 1 and 2)
  • Antena 3 Televisión (1992. The seasons 1 and 2 were emitted by the same TVE's Spanish dubbing, but the seasons 3 and 4 were doubled by Antena 3 Televisión because they did not manage to be emitted in TVE 1. Duckula, Igor and Nanny possess the same names that in the original version. The title in Spain is "El Conde Duckula", and the main theme song also is the same that the original version (in English).

• Netherlands
  • Boomerang

• Poland
  • TVP1 (in 1993; some episodes, but was removed due to decision to dubbing)
  • TVP2
  • Boomerang

• Bulgaria
  • Diema Family

• Israel
  • Channel 1 (Israel)

• Sweden
  • TV3 (Sweden)

• Philippines
  • GMA 7

• Portugal
  • RTP 2

• Iceland
  • Stöð 2 (Icelandic dub-over, under the title "Brakúla greifi")

Spinoffs

• In a move mirroring Duckula's adaptation from DangerMouse, the characters of Gaston and Pierre were re-invented and given a spin-off series as the now-human Victor and Hugo.^[3]
• Count Duckula appeared in North American comics under Star Comics (an imprint of Marvel Comics) as well as in the UK (1st issue released in 1988).
• Aardman Animation has confirmed through their forums that a Count Duckula film is in the works.^{[citation needed]}

DVD releases

Despite being mostly available in the UK, the Count Duckula disks from Freemantle Media are in Region 0, PAL format. The first season was released on Region 1 DVD on October 4, 2005. Seasons 2 and 3 have as of 2011 been released in North America.

Complete Set

Title	Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
Count Duckula: The Complete Collection	Not yet released in Region 1	27 October 2008	Not yet released in Region 4

Individual Series

Series	Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
Series 1	4 October 2005 (as "The Complete First Season")But is not currently available.	17 July 2006 (as "The Complete First Series")	11 October 2007 (as "From Duck til Dawn", containing the first 18 episodes only)
Series 2	Not yet released in Region 1	26 March 2007 (as "The Complete Second Series")	Not yet released in Region 4
Series 3 and 4	Not yet released in Region 1	3 September 2007 (as "The Complete Third Series", but containing all episodes from Series 3 and 4)	Not yet released in Region 4

Individual Episodes

Title	Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
Count Duckula: Vampire Vacation	Not yet released in Region 1	14 October 2002	Not yet released in Region 4
Count Duckula: The Vampire Strikes Back	Not yet released in Region 1	11 August 2008	Not yet released in Region 4

VHS releases

During the show's original run, Count Duckula episodes were released on numerous VHS titles from Thames Video Collection, often in a different order to that when televised. Amongst others were;

• Count Duckula: The Vampire Strikes Back (TV8038) - Released: 1988.

Episodes: The Vampire Strikes Back/Hardluck Hotlel/Dear Diary.

• Count Duckula: A Fright At The Opera (TV8045) — Released: 1988.

Episodes contained: A Fright At The Opera/Hunchbudgie Of Notre Dame/Dr Goosewing & Mr Duck.

• Count Duckula: Special Bumper Edition — Released: 1989.

Consisted of several episodes from series two, but in a different order to that when first televised. Episodes contained: Ghostly Gold/Prime Time Duck/The Incredible Shrinking Duck/Ducknapped/Bloodsucking Bats Of The Lower Amazon.

• Count Duckula: OO Duck (TV8105) — Released: 1990.

Episodes contained: '00' Duck/A Mountie Always Gets His Duck/Manhattan Duck

• Count Duckula: Astro Duck — Released: 1990.

Episodes contained: Astro Duck/The Rest is History/Around The World in a Total Daze/The Zombie Awakes

• Count Duckula: Bombay Duck — Released: 1990.

Episodes contained: Bombay Duck/Mississippi Duck/Mystery Cruise

Interestingly, this VHS title appeared in 1990, but at the time the episodes contained were somewhat exclusive to video (the first was not televised until 1991, neither were the latter until 1993).

Count Duckula episodes were also released on special VHS compilations with episodes of other series. In 1989, the episode 'Down Under Duckula' was released on Thames' VHS title 'More Children's Summer Stories', with episodes from Dangermouse and The Wind In The Willows. In 2001, in the twilight years of VHS, the episodes 'The Ghost Of Castle McDuckula' and 'Venice A Duck, Not A Duck' were featured on two cult kids' collection tapes, with episodes of Rainbow, Chorlton & The Wheelies, Button Moon and Jamie & The Magic Torch.

Computer Games

Alternative Software released a computer game based on Count Duckula called - No Sax Please We're Egyptian. In the game Igor, Nanny and Count Duckula have decided to search the tomb of the great Pharaoh Upanatem (Up-N-At 'Em pun) to find the Mystical Saxophone. What they do not know is they have brought along some unwanted guests in the shape of the Crow Brothers.

The game was a basic jump and run platform type game at the start the castle was transported to an ancient Pyramid. Then you had so long to go through the castle evading the various baddies, inside the castle to retrieve the mystic sax before the Count's castle automatically returns to Transylvania leaving you stranded in Egypt.

The title of the game was a parody on the title of a British comedy play No Sex Please, We're British.

The game was available for various 8-bit computers such as the ZX Spectrum, C64 & Amstrad CPC and was also released as a Kid's Pack with other TV shows that Alternative Software had turned into games - Postman Pat, Sooty And Sweep, Count Duckula, Popeye 2, The Wombles and Superted. Alternative Software are one of the few software companies of the 80's who still survive today as an independent software producer.

There was also a sequel in 1992, which was poorly received.

External links

• Count Duckula at the Internet Movie Database
• Count Duckula at the Big Cartoon DataBase
• Count Duckula at TV.com
• Cosgrove Hall's official Duckula page

Footnotes

1. ^ Watson, Elena M. (2000). Television Horror Movie Hosts: 68 Vampires, Mad Scientists and Other Denizens of the Late Night Airwaves Examined and Interviewed. Jefferson, North Carolina, United States: McFarland & Company. p. 265. ISBN 978-0-7864-0940-2. http://www.mcfarlandpub.com/book-2.php?id=978-0-7864-0940-2. 
2. ^ Count Duckula
3. ^ Victor and Hugo, Bunglers in Crime