Jattwood1

They don't make cartoons like this anymore this is yet another classic of those geniuses behind "Danger Mouse" and "Count Duckula" the pure brilliance that is Cosgrove Hall in my opinion the greatest cartoon studio ever. "Alias the jester" stands up against other CH cartoons and is itself a very amusing cartoon with excellent voice talent. It ran for only 13 episodes, which is just not long enough. And is the only reason I haven't given this superb show ten stars as I think that it should have had a second series but for whatever reason it didn't, which is for me and other fans of this program a great shame. The key to this cartoon is its voice talent two clearly stick out: the excellent Richard Briers who is always good value and Brian Wilde who you may know from such comedy classics as "Porridge" and "Last of the Summer Wine" both give great performances and of course posses masterful comic timing which makes this cartoon feel a little like a sitcom at times. Its script is written by CH regular Brian Trueman and as you'd expect is a very witty one an example is:

Meredith is stirring a large pot, in walks King Arthur. King Arthur: Well? Meredith: A touch of Lumbago. King Arthur: I mean have you finished the potion.

The clear quality of this program was not lost on the critics and in 1986 it won a BAFTA for Best Animation. The show revolves around Alias who as the titles say "is a time traveller bold, by sheer bad luck his ship got caught in the earth's magnetic hold" he crash lands into the kingdom of Houghton Bottoms that just happens to be the land of King Arthur "from the middle of space, to the, middle ages" as the titles muse. He disguises himself as a Jester and with the help of Meredith, the courts magician (of sorts) and the only person who knows that Alias crash-landed in a space ship, he becomes court jester. Then we join him and a host of other characters on a fun filled journey through 13 episodes of hilarious adventures. The episode titles are:

Alias the Jester

The Ring

The Amazing Dancing Bear

The Viking Airship

Ready when you are, King Arthur!

The Giant's Visit

The Walking Island

Monster of the Lake

Magic Metal

The Lost Ark

Revenge of the Najjer

Fiery Fred

Amaranth and the Beast

This is a must see and if you haven't seen it go out and buy the DVD (Amazon price is £5.99 and you get all 13 episodes) you won't be disappointed even if you're not a fan of Cosgrove Hall, although how anyone could not be a fan of Cosgrove Hall is beyond me.

Series 1 of "The Detectives" is finally coming to DVD on the 12th June 2006, that's according to play.com and amazon.co.uk, so at last we can enjoy these excellent shows again without having to hunt for the out of print VHS tapes. The DVD is being released by Cinema Club, according to amazon, so yet again the BBC have not got their act together and released it themselves. As with the classic comedy "Goodnight Sweetheart", released by Revelation Films, it seems it has taken another studio to release this wonderful show to the eagerly awaiting public. Although I'll bet that the BBC get royalties from the release because most DVD producers go to the BBC for permission unlike Revelation Films who seem to find another route which enables them to by-pass that permission. Anyway, it's still a big thank you to Cinema Club for finally getting the DVD out there. Now we just have to hope that all 30 episodes will be released, we don't want another fiasco like the "People Like Us" release where the subsequent series don't appear.

I, like most, haven't seen this film as short films very rarely get shown in a medium accessible to everyone that's the case in England at least. But I happen to know, by browsing through www.play.com, that there is a Region 2 DVD release scheduled for this film on 30th April 2006, this date, as in most cases, is subject to change but I for one will certainly be buying a copy of this award wining short. I think that we as consumers should be putting more pressure 'on the powers that be' to release more interesting shorts such as this. For instance the Oscar nominated animated short The Sandman directed by the late Paul Berry or the very popular animation by Daniel Greaves, Flatworld and many other such classics which for some unknown reason never get released. I hope that this film lives up to expectation so its DVD release can be justified. And then maybe one day other great shorts will follow it on to DVD.