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| Wonder Pets At first I cultivated an intense dislike of Wonder Pets. I wrote dark blog posts about cooking the duck and couldn't stand the sight of the cutesy Guinea Pig. However as Daughter The Eldest has become increasingly obsessed with it, rather like a particularly aggressive foot fungus, the show has grown on me. Wonder Pets features the adventures of Linny The Guinea Pig, Ming-Ming The Duck and Tuck the Turtle. Classroom pets by day, dangerous meddlers with delicate eco-systems by night. (Rather like Diego, we are a little concerned about the environmental impact of the characters.) The fact that the whole show is done in the style of a Gilbert and Sullivan Comic Opera will, in turns, amuse you and cause you to throw heavy objects at your TV screen. Most shows begin with the phone ringing and an emergency call from yet another animal in trouble. For reasons unexplained, this causes music to begin playing and the three Wonder Pets to launch into song. Off the Wonder Pets pop to the rescue in their fly-boat and, via another several musical numbers, the animal concerned is rescued and your pre-schooler learns something deep and meaningful about the values of team work. All very worthy. However, like all the best children's shows and films, the adults are catered for too. The bickering between Tuck and Ming-Ming can be genuinely amusing and many programmes are packed with cultural references for the grown-ups - our favourite being The Wonder Pets Save The Beetles, complete with four Liverpudlian Beetles stuck underground in a submarine. We also love Ollie The Bunny, the meddlesome occasional character from the classroom next door. Current number one favourite show in our house. Back to Parents Guide to Kids TV |
| This article was written by Duncan Conner. When not annoying television executives, he runs Bus Stop Toy Shop and sells some great toys for kids of all ages. Why not have a glance around the main Bus Stop Toy Shop website while your here? Better still you can sign up to our monthly newsletter (details at the top right of every page) and keep up to date with the very best in toys. If you enjoyed the article, you can share it with others from your blog/facebook/twitter/bebo/myspace/etc by copying and pasting the following code: <a href="http://www.busstoptoyshop.com/wonderpets">A Parent's Guide to Wonder Pets</a> |