Let's Watch This - An Episode of "Flipper and Lopaka"

Today, we're looking at a show starring everyone's favorite dolphin...

No, no, there was never a TV show spinoff of this movie.
I sure as heck am not talking about THIS dolphin.

In 1963, the world was introduced to a dolphin named Flipper. The following year, a TV series starring the faster-than-lightning sea mammal was spawned. With a sequel, a remake and a couple other shows under his belt, it's safe to say that America flipped for Flipper. And clearly the Australians did too, considering that in the 1990s they created a cartoon show starring him!

Flipper and Lopaka premiered in 1999. It starred Flipper alongside some kid that didn't appear in any of the movies or the previous shows. Since this is a cartoon, Flipper now has the ability to speak. His voice is provided by the great Keith Scott, an Australian voice actor who over the years has done the voices of such characters as Bugs Bunny, Popeye (that's him doing Popeye and Bluto on the Popeye raft ride at Universal Orlando), Inspector Gadget, and Tony the Tiger. You probably know him best as the narrator of the 1997 George of the Jungle movie. In addition to all of this - and being a super-nice guy - Keith is also an animation historian.

And apparently in this show Flipper could fly, too, considering that he seems to be levitating.

Now, I've never seen an episode of this show before - which I think might stem from the fact that it never aired in the United States (to my knowledge, anyway). The main thing that draws me in is the fact that Keith Scott voices a large percentage of the show's characters. Thus, today we'll be watching the first episode of this show, "The Drought".

The sun is shining down on the island of Illoka. A bit too much, in fact - the island is having a drought (hence the title of the episode). The leader of Lopaka's tribe tells everyone that they must find more water. Another member of the tribe, Kerava (also voiced by Keith Scott), brings up his visit to islands made of ice and how rasssa-frassin' cold it is on them. Little does he know that a sea snake named Serge (Keith Scott as well) is spying on them from the water.

So, as it turns out this Kerava guy is Lopaka's father. Lopaka (voiced by Jamie Oxenbould) asks his dad about the ice islands, resulting in a flashback. Apparently, one day Kerava took a ride in his canoe, then like an idiot fell asleep and ended up drifting far north. Upon waking up, he encountered icebergs and assumed that they were islands made of ice. Then Chief Weighs-a-Lot shows up again to mock Kerava.

"Dad, will my chin be as long as yours is someday?"

Lopaka and Kerava get started digging a well. Some old guy (Keith Scott) tells them that all the water on the island comes from an underground lake. This fat kid named Bolo (who sounds like Popeye) doesn't believe him and claims it's just a load of poppycock like the ice islands. Lopaka is all "The ice islands DO exist, Tubby!" then runs off, Bolo in hot pursuit on his, uh, bicycle?

Ah, so we're doing that whole "bamboo technology" thing? Oh-kaaaaaaaaaay...

Question - where the heck is Flipper? We're, like, seven minutes in and it's just been Brown-Haired Mowgli and his dad being ridiculed.

Anyhow, Lopaka uses a series of underground tunnels to reach an underground lake, where he meets up with an old sea turtle named Calabash (Keith Scott).  I couldn't help but notice that he looks very much like the old guy from earlier. Are they intended to be the same character? Is Calabash a shapeshifter or something?

Seriously, the eyebrows, the chins, the noses... ARE they supposed to be the same character?

So anyway, Calabash is yet another example of the "turtles that are wise" stereotype. As it turns out, he knows about the ice islands, and he tells Lopaka and Flipper (who finally shows up about eight minutes in) that as I've stated before they are not islands but rather icebergs. He heard about them and Kerava's visit there from a pod of whales.

Flipper tells Lopaka that he'll do his best to find water for the island. He swims to this underwater Atlantis-esque city (maybe it's actually supposed to BE Atlantis?) and overhears Serge (remember him?) talking to a giant octopus named Dexter about how all the humans are hot. Dexter (Keith Scott) demands, "Why should those miserable land-lovers get all the heat while I'm freezing my tentacles off here in this bitterly-cold ice box?!" Serge says that it doesn't feel cold to HIM, to which Dexter is all, "Of course you're not cold! You're a cold-blooded reptile!" He then says that nobody likes the cold - well, unless you're a penguin or a polar bear or something. Dexter's three idiot shark henchmen agree with him that it's cold because they're the idiot henchmen.

Apparently, Ursula has a brother that we didn't know about.
Who would've thunk?

Okay, so as you might have guessed, Dexter is the show's main villain. He hates the surface-dwellers because I don't know.

Flipper gets an idea to help Lopaka and his people from this. He imitates Serge's voice and calls out, "Freeze them off the island, sir!" Sharing a voice actor with another character on your show comes in handy, I guess. Dexter loves the idea, but how are they going to do it? Flipper plants the idea of bringing an iceberg to Illoka in Discount Sir Hiss' head.

Here's a picture of Serge. I'm not sure if he's supposed to be a sea snake or an eel, but Wikipedia calls him a sea snake so...

Meanwhile, Lopaka and Kerava are still digging that well and they STILL haven't foudn water. Lopaka comments on how annoying it is that Chief Fatso and Bolo don't believe Kerava's story about the ice islands, but Kerava is all, "Oh, you can't make folks believe EVERYTHING, especially when you don't have any proof."

Back underwater, Flipper encounters his pals Ottie the otter, Puffy the pufferfish and Ray the stingray (all of whom are ALSO voiced by Keith Scott). They tell him that Dexter's shark henchmen have gone mad. Flipper suggests that maybe they're looking for something and that he should follow them.

Here's a screencap of Flipper for no other reason than because I haven't featured one yet and it feels weird not to include a screencap of one of the show's title characters.

Flipper's able to find the shark henchmen, who are talking about how they can't find any icebergs around. One of them worries that Dexter will be so mad that he'll feed them to the sharks. "We ARE the sharks, dum-dum!" another snaps. Flipper comments that the sharks are dumber than he thought (boy howdy) and that they'll NEVER find an iceberg at THIS rate. When the sharks return to Dexter, he is indeed angry and growls, "What am I payin' you for if you can't do a simple little job?!" One of the sharks replies, "You don't pay us, Mr. Dexter. We're sea animals, where are we supposed to get money?"

Dexter tells them that there aren't any icebergs where THEY live and that they have to go up NORTH where it's COLD. In their defense, Dexter, you could've just told them that BEFORE you sent them out to look for them. Or, you know, you could've just gone out to look for an iceberg YOURSELF - which is exactly what he does.

Rule of animation: if it takes place underwater, chances are that there's gonna be at least one villainous shark.
Unless it's Finding Nemo, because the sharks in that film were friendly (it's not Bruce's fault his instincts kicked in after smelling blood).

Flipper follows Dexter and the sharks all the way up north, where they do indeed find an iceberg. After an unfunny scene where Dexter has to guess what it is that they've found, Dexter commands that the sharks push the iceberg back to Illoka. Of course they can't push it because it's, you know, an ICEBERG. Perhaps you should've thought your plan through a little more, Dexter.

Thus, Dexter tricks a young whale into pushing the iceberg for them. He's all, "Bwahahaha, I'm going to make things DIFFICULT for those humans who I hate for no reason! Heheheheheh!"

Back on the island, Kerava discovers the underground lake - and that it's been dried-up. Then we cut back to the whale and Dexter, who've finally gotten the iceberg to the island. Dexter then for whatever reason brags that he tricked the whale, which angers the whale, and Dexter exits the episode trying very hard not to end up lunch. Some whales actually DO eat octopi, by the way.

Suddenly, I have a craving for calamari.

The next morning, all the villagers wake up and discover the iceberg. Nobody questions where a giant mass of ice came from or what it's doing on a tropical island, but nonetheless, Chief Tubby apologizes to Kerava for not believing him, and the water that the ice's melting creates flows into the well and down to the underground lake. Afterwards, we cut to Flipper and Lopaka. Lopaka guesses that Flipper had something to do with the iceberg showing up. "Yep!" Flipper replies. "With a little help from my friend Dexter!"

"Aloha, Krakatoa!"

So, that was Flipper and Lopaka. While I didn't find it GREAT, it was by no means bad. Keith Scott's work on this show is very impressive - he voices almost EVERYONE and they all manage to sound different. The animation is solid. The characters are engaging. My one complaint is that it wasn't a particularly funny show, but I did get a few chuckles. I don't know if fans of the live-action Flipper would like it, but I thought it was a pretty solid show.

I dunno if I'll be reviewing any more episodes of this show, but who knows? I might. In the meantime, my next review will likely be another movie review... maybe one of the Disney sequels...