Les Schtroumpfs

I absolutely loved watching the smurfs, i first watched it after the series finished in 1990, i never knew that there was a good cartoon series called the smurfs, when i first heard about them in 1996 i thought they were new for the 1990's but then i heard that they were popular in the 1980's. I was mad on smurfs when they released their song "I've got a little puppy". I thought that song was fantastic.

There's no competition there. This is THE series of my childhood. I considered myself the biggest fan ever. I bought every kind of Smurfs merchandise I could afford and even dressed up as Papa Smurf at Purim (the Jewish equivalent of Halloween).

The series was cute without pushing it. The Smurfs were charming and adorable. The storyline were child friendly, but still clever and inventive. I will never forget my favorite episode where a spooky mosquito bites a smurf and turns him to a purple zombie who then bites other smurfs, turning them all to zombies one by one. It was quite spooky and the climax was better than many horror-thriller movies I've seen. Classic magical stuff.

*Sigh* Today's series are either too quirky or too mushy.

A wise portrait of community. Seductive and inspired and useful. Amusing and lovely. Because it propose the expected stories about relations and about the importance of the other, about wisedome and generosity, about innocence and way to discover reality in delicate - courageous way.

Anyone who flipped on cartoons from 1981-1989, or was under 10 in those years, knows The Smurfs. It's as standard as Superfriends, and just as Hanna Barbara -esque. As such, you'll never not see it on Cartoon Network.

Still a good percentage of the classical music I know I first met through the background music on The Smurfs.

Retrospectively, the thing that amazes me the most was how much of a springboard it was for all the actors involved. Click on any name above, and you'll see that almost every character is still making major features. You'll recognize those whom they became. Azrael was the voice of the Martians on Mars Attacks! and Bandit on Johnny Quest. Gargamel became Dick Dastardly. Vanity Smurf was Skeletor. Papa Smurf was the same as Droopy Dog.

Basically, everyone who ever touched this show became an industry-standard in voice-overs.

I used to watch "Smurfs" every day as a kid, and at 18 I remember the show with such fondness. It is a real shame I haven't seen Smurfs on TV for such a long time, it was a cartoon classic. It had great animation with nice, clean colouring and well drawn characters, a catchy theme tune and clever background music, fun, gripping story lines that often taught something, strong writing and most of all unique and endearing characters. Who can forget Papa Smurf, Handy, Clumsy, Smurfette, Greedy, Smurfy, Vanity and Baby? And of course villainous Gargamel and his somewhat cute feline sidekick Azrael? These are great characters and are well voiced by the likes of June Foray, Don Messick, Frank Welker, Alan Oppenheimer, Alan Young and Lucille Bliss. Overall, a cartoon that I will always revere as a classic. 10/10 Bethany Cox