A je to / Mat & Pat

zegh8578

zegh8578

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I often forget these guys, but holy damn how hilarious they can be...
First impression is silly children's show, but give it a chance, I find it absolutely hysterical at times

In Norway they were widely known from childrens TV in the 80s, as "Two good neighbors"

Czechoslovak animation, based in Bratislava (Slovakia), although I see plenty of Czechs taking credit for it - I'll let Czechs and Slovaks fight this one out, and not get myself involved :V

If you want to youtube for more, beware of two things though:
1. Joke voice-overs, they seem very popular, but are obviously made by fans or jokesters
2. The most recent seasons, as they do indeed seem to be aimed more at children (the old classic episodes sometimes even had an adult-theme warning in some openings)
 
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Holy shit, A je to! A part of my childhood. :smile:
The credit goes to Czech director and animators though. Slovakia was interested due to political reasons solely - the first created part of this series raised some negative opinions in the communist party, so Czech studios refused to produce it. That's why the Czech authors moved its production to Bratislava, capital of today's Slovakia. As you have noticed zegh, the old parts are the best, so I strongly suggest to anyone interested to look for the first series (parts 1 to 50) produced in years 1979-1994, created by its original Czech authors. All the later parts are from other studios, created by other folks and different animators, it's not the same top-notch quality anymore.
 
Ah, thanks for clearing it up!

The level of detail is easy to miss if one were to casually dismiss it as childrens humor, but I love the absurd realism of it, the very detailed interiors, and as a responsible adult, their reckless destruction takes on almost a new level of humor, especially coupled with their absolutely optimistic attitude - like how quickly he grabs a broom and brushes away the smashed mini-stove, or keep throwing failed chickens out the allready smashed windows - as if a smashed window was just a convenience - and not a huge hastle and cost :D
 
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I remember these and also some other eastern European stop motion - animation stuff that I saw in the telly in the 80's. Another one was Sandmännchen from DDR. I like how he kind of looks like Ho Chi Minh. :grin: He always arrived in some strange vehicle and threw 'sleep sand' in kids faces who then became sleepy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandmännchen


Also we had Miś Uszatek, "the bear with floppy ears" from Poland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mi%C5%9B_Uszatek
 
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MutantScalper said:
I remember these and also some other eastern European stop motion - animation stuff that I saw in the telly in the 80's. Another one was Sandmännchen from DDR. I like how he kind of looks like Ho Chi Minh. :grin: He always arrived in some strange vehicle and threw 'sleep sand' in kids faces who then became sleepy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandmännchen


Also we had Miś Uszatek, "the bear with floppy ears" from Poland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mi%C5%9B_Uszatek
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I remember the sand man one, it was shown here for christmas times, and I always found him on the edge of creepy :D
Those really are for children though, while Mat & Pat have a more developed humor than most expect, and sometimes litterally adult themes, like an episode where they moonshine :D Well, the older episodes at least (in the same vein that many youtube animations are actually for teens or adults, and not for children simply because they are "cartoons" - or at least a bit more "layered" humor. Maybe I'm giving them too much credit here, but the point is that I still laugh right off my chair watching M&P)
 
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zegh8578 said:
Maybe I'm giving them too much credit here ..
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No, you are right. There's a lot of sharp and precise social satire hidden under that cartoony disguise! I'm quite surprised that someone not living behind the iron curtain for a while can see it actually.
 
Ah! Old cartoons. Not so much stop motion, but just puppetering. Still kinda cute. So turns out we Yugos, had a knack for Furries long before that was even a thing.



On the other side, Chicken Run and Wallace & Gromit, Fantastic Mr. Fox are all pretty good stop motion animation movies.
 
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I'm so glad I was raised in pre-CGI era! We had a plenty of such animated series for kids here, either Czech or Slovak, often world class quality since our animation studios scored big time in various international competitions. Every single series was a labour of love, created by aged, talented, and educated professionals. Perhaps it's just nostalgia, but any modern computer-animated series produced in world-renowned studios as Walt Disney seems to be flat and soulless to me in comparison.

Nah who am I kidding, not a nostalgia at all. Old animator moving his puppets for tens of thousands times just to animate couple of minutes long shot sure had much stronger emotional bonds to his creations than any computer wizard staring at the screen of his kick-ass Silicon Graphics workstation ten hours daily! :razz:
 
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I keep forgetting, but I met the guy behind Wallace and Gromit during a year of animation course
He showed us the various models, such as a series of mouths (mouths are pre made, with the impression that the whole head is a soft piece of animated clay), as well as a bust of Nemi, a Norwegian comic strip character.

WANNA TOUCH ME? :O

Oh, we also had a seminar with one of the animators of "The PJ's", where he told us straight up, that Eddie Murphy is an asshole. I believe him :D
He also talked about the realism of being an animator for big companies, focusing on impossible deadlines, and asshole employers^
 
Ha

This used to run in finnish television too, loved it. It was a part of program aimed for very small children and i used to watch it just for pat and mat till my 13s. Good stuff.
 
You guys should give it a gander again, which is why I'm posting it, beyond the nostalgia-factor
You might be surprised how well the humor still holds, to you as an adult
A friend of mine bought the whole collection on DVD after re-discovering them

To me, it is the... realism :D Yes I said it - because the props, the details, they are very realistic - the damage they do is realistic, so... as an adult watching, you can't help but notice all this costly havoc they're causing, instead of choosing much more affordable solutions.
This is an example of humor that makes the kids giggle - at the same time as deliberately trolling adult viewers with another "layer" of humor
 
That was my favourite part of childhood. Along with Krteček (The Mole) and Batman: The Animated Series.

The last one is not really related, I know. But hey, it was the 90s and I also had Cartoon Network. :grin:
 
Well even though it was before my time my evil babysitter had Gumby. We had to have watched that Gumby tape a thousand times. It started with this episode.
[video=youtube_share;wt87rvCPViQ]https://youtu.be/wt87rvCPViQ[/video]
 
rogerdv said:
The clumsy brothers! Cuban TV still broadcasts episodes sometimes.
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I watched Cuban TV on satellite, while visiting family in Spain
This was only a few years ago, but I felt taken right back to pedagogic socialist 80s TV (when we too showed then here)
 
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