{{Infobox television , image = , caption = , alt_name = , genre = Animation , creator =

Tony Ross Anthony Lee Ross (born 10 August 1938) is a British author and illustrator of children's picture books. In Britain, he is best known for writing and illustrating his Little Princess books and for illustrating the Horrid Henry series by Franc ...

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, director = , creative_director = , presenter = , starring = , judges = , voices = , narrated =

Roy Kinnear Roy Mitchell Kinnear (8 January 1934 – 20 September 1988) was a British character actor. He was known for his roles in films such as The Beatles' '' Help!'' (1965), Clapper in '' How I Won the War'' (1967) and Planchet in ''The Three Musketee ...

, theme_music_composer =

Duncan Lamont Duncan William Ferguson Lamont (17 June 1918 – 19 December 1978) was a British actor.Brian McFarlane (Ed): ''The Encyclopedia of British Film'' (BFI/Methuen • London • 2000) p397''Picture Show Who's Who on the Screen'' (Amalgamated Pre ...

, opentheme = , endtheme = , composer = Duncan Lamont , country = United Kingdom , language = English , num_series = 1 , num_episodes = 26 , list_episodes = , executive_producer = , producer =

Clive Juster Clive is a name. People and fictional characters with the name include: People Given name * Clive Allen (born 1961), English football player * Clive Anderson (born 1952), British television, radio presenter, comedy writer and former barrister * ...

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David McKee David John McKee (2 January 1935 – 6 April 2022) was a British writer and illustrator, chiefly of children's books and animations. For his contribution as a children's illustrator, he was UK nominee for the biennial, international Hans Chris ...

, location = , cinematography = , camera = , runtime = 5 minutes , company = King Rollo Films , distributor = , channel = ITV , picture_format = , audio_format = , first_aired = {{start date, 1984, 9, 11, df=y , last_aired = {{end date, 1984, 10, 16, df=y , preceded_by = , followed_by = , related = Towser is a British series of children's books created by veteran children's writer and illustrator

and published by Anderson Press. The series is about an intelligent dog, Towser, and his friends The King, Dr. Smelly, and Sadie; and a variety of adversaries such as the Terrible Thing, the Water Rats, and Goblin Gobble.

Television series

The book series spawned an animated television series narrated by

and made by British animation studios King Rollo Films (best known for making well known animated works for children such as '' King Rollo'', ''

Mr Benn Mr Benn is a character created by David McKee who originally appeared in several children's books. The first, ''Mr Benn Red Knight'', was published in 1967, followed by three more; these became the basis for an animated television series of the ...

'' and '' Spot'') for

ITV Central ITV Central, previously known as Central Independent Television, Carlton Central, ITV1 for Central England and commonly referred to as simply Central, is the Independent Television franchisee for the Midlands. It was created following the res ...

which ran for one season of 26 episodes. It was made in 1982 and aired on ITV as part of Children's ITV on 11 September 1984 and ending on 16 October on the same year. The series was also repeated on ITV in 1988 for a short while and aired one last time in August of that year as part of the summer morning programming on Children's ITV. Towser later aired on

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

in 1990 and was shown as part of their block of classic children's television series ''Take 5'' in 1994 along with other children's programmes that had previously aired on other networks such as ''

Paddington Paddington is an area within the City of Westminster, in Central London. First a medieval parish then a metropolitan borough, it was integrated with Westminster and Greater London in 1965. Three important landmarks of the district are Padd ...

'', ''

Mio Mao Mio or MIO may refer to: shortened form of Mioritic Shepherd dog or Mioritic sheepdog; a Romanian mountain dog. Places * Mio, Michigan, a town in the US Music * ''Mío'', 2011 album by David Bustamante * "Mío "Mío" ''(English: "Mine")'' i ...

'', ''

The Magic Roundabout ''The Magic Roundabout'' is an English-language children's television programme that ran from 1965 to 1977. It used the footage of the French stop motion animation show ''Le Manège enchanté'' but with completely different scripts and characte ...

'', '' Willo the Wisp'', ''

Tales of the Riverbank ''Tales of the Riverbank'', sometimes called ''Hammy Hamster'' and ''Once Upon a Hamster'' for the Canadian version, is a British children's television series developed from a Canadian pilot. The original series was later broadcast on Canadian ...

'', '' Mr Men'', '' Fred Basset'', ''

Ivor the Engine ''Ivor the Engine'' is a British cutout animation television series created by Oliver Postgate and Peter Firmin's Smallfilms company. It follows the adventures of a small green steam locomotive who lives in the "top left-hand corner of Wale ...

'' and ''

Roobarb ''Roobarb'' (also known as ''Roobarb and Custard'') is a British animated children's television series, created by Grange Calveley and originally shown on BBC1 just before the evening news. Each cartoon, written by Calveley and directed by Bo ...

''. It has also been broadcast on cable television on

The Children's Channel The Children's Channel, also known as TCC, was a British-based pan-European children's television channel in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, which was owned by Flextech in London, England, UK. It began broadcasting on the original Eutelsat ...

and was shown there numerous of times from 1985 to 1996.

''Play It Again''

Towser was later joined by King Rollo Films' other television programmes ''

'', '' King Rollo'' and '' Victor and Maria'' and both of them aired with a 40-minute compilation programme called ''

Play It Again ''Play It Again'' is a documentary television series on BBC One, featuring celebrities trying to learn to play musical instruments. The series is produced by Diverse Production and started on 25 March 2007 and is narrated by Tamsin Greig. E ...

''. The theme song was sung by jazz and blues singer

George Melly Alan George Heywood Melly (17 August 1926 – 5 July 2007) was an English jazz and blues singer, critic, writer, and lecturer. From 1965 to 1973 he was a film and television critic for ''The Observer''; he also lectured on art history, with an ...

Global broadcasts

Towser also aired in several different countries such as ABC TV in Australia (it first aired on the ABC in early 1984 several months before its UK television debut), TV One and TV2 in New Zealand, TV2, TV3 and

M-Net M-Net (an abbreviation of Electronic Media Network) is a South African pay television channel established by Naspers in 1986. The channel broadcasts both local and international programming, including general entertainment, children's series, ...

in South Africa, XEIPN-TV 11 in Mexico, Channel 5 in Singapore (as part of ''Play It Again''),

NTA NTA may refer to: * Nanoparticle Tracking Analysis, a method for visualizing and analyzing particles * National Tax Agency, the official tax collecting agency of Japan * National Tax Association, a non-profit organization in United States * Nati ...

in Nigeria and

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television television channel, channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its List of assets owned by Param ...

(being shown on the Nick Jr. series ''

Eureeka's Castle ''Eureeka's Castle'' is an American children's television series created by Debby Beece and Judy Katschke. It originally aired on Nickelodeon's Nick Jr. block from September 4, 1989 to November 10, 1991. The program featured various puppet ch ...

'') and Cartoon Network (being shown on the children's anthology series '' Small World'') in the US.

Availability

All 26 episodes of the show were released on DVD in the UK by Demand DVD in 2013.

Episodes

:01. Towser and the Terrible Thing :02. Towser and Sadie's Birthday :03. Towser and the Lion :04. Towser and the Water Rats :05. Towser and the Smile Machine :06. Towser and Goblin Gobble :07. Towser and the Magic Apple :08. Towser and the Nosey Parker :09. Towser and Sadie's Robot :10. Towser and the Holiday :11. Towser and the Alien Invader :12. Towser and the Funny Face :13. Towser and the Secret :14. Towser and the Wizard :15. Towser and the Dinner Party :16. Towser and the Dentist :17. Towser and Uncle Bosco :18. Towser and the Snowman :19. Towser and the Space Shot :20. Towser and the Flight :21. Towser and the Black Hole :22. Towser and the Haunted House :23. Towser and the Black Knight :24. Towser and the Dragon :25. Towser and the Slight Accident* :26. Towser and the Conjuror** *This was broadcast as the 26th and final episode **Despite being the final episode, this was broadcast as the very first one

External links

Toonhound
1984 British television series debuts 1984 British television series endings 1980s British children's television series 1980s British animated television series Animated television series about dogs British children's animated television shows British television shows based on children's books ITV children's television shows