''The Adventures of Blinky Bill'' is an Australian

animated television series An animated series is a set of Animation, animated works with a common series title, usually related to one another. These episodes should typically share the same main characters, some different secondary characters and a basic theme. Series can ...

based on

Dorothy Wall Dorothy Wall (12 January 1894 – 21 January 1942) was a New Zealand-born writer and illustrator of children's fiction books. She is most famous for creating Blinky Bill, an anthropomorphic koala who was the central character in her books ''B ...

's books about Blinky Bill, and is a sequel series to the 1992 film '' Blinky Bill: The Mischievous Koala''. The series is produced by the Yoram Gross companies: Yoram Gross Film Studios (from 1993 to 1995) and Yoram Gross-EM.TV (from 2004 to 2005), with the main co-production of EM.TV and WDR. All three seasons of the series and the TV movie were animated overseas by Colorland Animation Productions Co., Ltd. in Hong Kong. Set in Greenpatch, a fictional Australian bushland town, the series presents stories through the activities and misadventures of Blinky Bill, as well as his family and friends.

Series

Season 1 (''The Adventures of Blinky Bill'', 1993)

In the first season of ''The Adventures of Blinky Bill'' (1993, 26 episodes), Blinky Bill and his friends rebuild the buildings and the community in Greenpatch, following its destruction by humans. They also come to terms with their new neighbours, the ill-famed Dingo family. The season first aired on

ABC Television ABC Television most commonly refers to: *ABC Television Network of the American Broadcasting Company, United States, or *ABC Television (Australian TV network), a division of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Australia ABC Television or ABC ...

in 1993. Yoram Gross (with his first studios Yoram Gross Film Studios) co-produced the first series with: EM.Entertainment (Germany), WDR/ ARD (Germany),

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

(Australia), and BBC (UK).

Season 2 (''Blinky Bill's Extraordinary Excursion'', 1995)

In the second season of ''Blinky Bill's Extraordinary Excursion'' (1995, 26 episodes), Blinky Bill and his friends become lost while on a school excursion in the bush. Finding their way home across different parts of Australia, they have many adventures helping out other animals in need, including a crocodile, penguins, and farm and circus animals. The second season was a Yoram Gross Film Studios co-production with EM.Entertainment, WDR/ ARD and VIDEAL of Germany, as well as the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. It was aired on

in Australia.

Season 3 (''Blinky Bill'', 2004)

In season 3 (alternatively known as ''Blinky Bill’s Extraordinary Balloon Adventure'' and ''Blinky Bill's Around the World Adventures'' in marketing), Blinky Bill, Nutsy, and Flap travel around the world in a hot air balloon that takes them on exciting adventures being chased by two humans named Basil and Cyril who are the Circus Bros. The animals he rescued were: Slippery, Leo, Ling-Ling, Tico, Yoyo, and Penelope (who originally works for the Circus Bros.). They went to Antarctica, the African plains, China, the

Amazon Rainforest The Amazon rainforest, Amazon jungle or ; es, Selva amazónica, , or usually ; french: Forêt amazonienne; nl, Amazoneregenwoud. In English, the names are sometimes capitalized further, as Amazon Rainforest, Amazon Forest, or Amazon Jungle. ...

, India and Paris. The season aired on 10 June 2004 on the Seven Network. The third series was a Yoram Gross-EM.TV co-production with EM.TV (Germany), WDR (Germany),

(Australia), and Wavery (Netherlands).

Spin-offs

Two

spin-off Spin-off may refer to: *Spin-off (media), a media work derived from an existing work *Corporate spin-off, a type of corporate action that forms a new company or entity * Government spin-off, civilian goods which are the result of military or gove ...

pilot episodes, ''Flap's Family'' and ''Flap's Island'', both following the story of supporting character Flap, were developed by Yoram Gross with the assistance of the

Australian Film Commission The Australian Film Commission (AFC) was an Australian government agency was founded in 1975 with a mandate to promote the creation and distribution of films in Australia as well as to preserve the country's film history. It also had a producti ...

and the New South Wales Film and Television Office in 1996, but both were not picked up.

TV Movie (''Blinky Bill's White Christmas'', 2005)

In 2005 a television movie entitled ''Blinky Bill’s White Christmas'' was produced by Yoram Gross-EM.TV, with the co-production of WDR (Germany). The telemovie first aired on the Seven Network on 24 December 2005. Its theme song, "Christmas in Australia", was performed by

Christine Anu Christine Anu (born 15 March 1970) is an Australian singer, songwriter and actress. She gained popularity with the cover song release of the Warumpi Band's song " My Island Home". Anu has been nominated for 17 ARIA Awards. Early life Anu was bo ...

. In the Philippines, the special was aired across two parts on GMA Network on 1 and 2 December 2020.

Characters

Soundtracks

* ''Blinky Bill and Friends Singing Songs Based On the TV Series'' (1994) * ''Blinky Bill and his "Extraordinary" Christmas Sing-Along!'' (1999) * ''Don and Blinky's Outback Adventure - The Lost Cooee'' (2002)

Video games

* ''Blinky Bill's Ghost Cave'' (1996) * ''Blinky Bill's Extraordinary Balloon Adventure'' (1997) * ''Blinky Bill and the Magician'' (1998) * ''Blinky Bill's Play & Learn'' (1999) * ''Blinky Bill's Cartoon Maker'' (2001)

Home Media Releases

VHS releases

* ''Blinky Bill's Favourite Café'' (1994) * ''Blinky Rescues the Budgie'' (1994) * ''Blinky and the Red Car'' (1995) * ''Detective Blinky'' (1995) * ''Blinky Bill Down On the Farm'' (1996) * ''Blinky Bill and the Lost Puppy'' (1996) * ''Sing A Song with Blinky Bill'' (1997) * ''Blinky Bill and the Polar Bears'' (1998) * ''Blinky Remembers Nutsy's Birthday'' (1998) * ''Blinky Bill's Holiday'' (1998) * ''Blinky Bill and the Blue Mystery'' (1999) * ''Blinky Bill Goes Camping'' (2000) * ''Blinky Bill and the Magician'' (2002) * ''Blinky Bill and the Winter's Tale'' (2002) * ''Mayor Blinky Bill'' (2003)

DVD releases

* ''Blinky Bill to the Rescue'' (2015) * ''Blinky Bill's Red Car'' (2015) * ''Blinky Saves Granny's Glasses'' (2015) * ''Detective Blinky'' (2016) * ''Blinky Bill and the Strange Koala'' (2017) * ''Blinky Bill's Treasure Hunt'' (2017)

Miscellaneous releases

* ''ABC For Kids Featuring Banana Holiday and Lots of Other Great Songs'' (1994) * ''ABC For Kids Bumper Collection'' (1999)

Forest industry controversy

The theme of the first series carried a strong anti-woodchip message, with the second line saying "Save us from that woodchip mill", together with scenes of forest destruction. There were also obvious environmental messages in most episodes. Some forest industry groups lobbied the

arguing that the opening scene showed illegal wood chipping, which was not fair to the timber industry. In the following two series, these song lyrics and the opening credits sequence were different (the line in the theme became "You'll never catch him standing still"), reflecting the change in storylines and locations.Blinky Bill’s Fire Brigade (1992) curator's notes on ASO – Australia's audio and visual heritage online
/ref>

Reception

The Adventures of Blinky Bill received generally positive reviews.

References

External links

''The Adventures of Blinky Bill''
at IMDb
''Blinky Bill's Extraordinary Excursion''
at IMDb
''Blinky Bill's Extraordinary Balloon Adventure''
at IMDb
''Blinky Bill's White Christmas''
at IMDb

at Big Cartoon Database

at Big Cartoon Database
''Blinky Bill's White Christmas''
at Oz Movies {{DEFAULTSORT:Adventures Of Blinky Bill, The Blinky Bill Australian Broadcasting Corporation original programming Seven Network original programming 1993 Australian television series debuts 2004 Australian television series endings Australian children's animated adventure television series Television series about koalas Australian television shows based on children's books 1990s Australian animated television series 2000s Australian animated television series Blinky Bill Talking animals in fiction English-language television shows