Nostalgia: Aussie sci-fi/fantasy shows

BenSt

BenSt

The Lad Himself
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Aug 28, 2013
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Hello all,

I didn't see a topic on this. I was just looking through youtube and came across a load of openings for some classic tv shows from back in the day. When I was growing up on the BBC and Channel 4 and other stations there seemed to be a lot of Aussie/Kiwi kids sci-fi/fantasy shows on. I'm just wondering if any of you remember:

Escape from Jupiter
The Girl from Tomorrow
The Boy from Andromeda
Ocean Girl
Around the Twist
Halfway Across the Galaxy and Turn Left
The Tribe

There's probably a load more but these are the ones I remember. When I moved here to Canada we didn't get the Aussie shows so much, which is a shame because some of these were cracking. It's a bit strange now thinking how much Australian and New Zealand tv we had back in the early nineties in Britain. Were there any of your favourites you remember?
 
Around the Twist was released a few years ago on DVD and I have introduced it to my son. It was very popular in my house as a kid. Many of the episodes were out of Paul Jennings books - Not sure if you got them over the pond, but they were pretty awesome reads as a kid.

We had some great shows here when I was a kid.
 
I remember the Girl from Tomorrow and Round the Twist. Round the Twist was completely mental and utterly surreal.

Not from ages ago, but Farscape was pretty distinctive too. It was weird when Ben Browder and Claudia Black both popped up in Stargate: SG-1.
 
Farscape did far better overseas than it did here, not because people didn't like it, but because the network it was shown on would not show it at the regular time, and bump it to a different time slot every week or advertise it to be on and show something boring like cricket or 60 minutes.
 
Yep, Girl From Tomorrow and Round the Twist. (And Farscape, of course). Still remember the Round the Twist theme song and, unusually for me, what some of the characters looked like.
 
Mouse, likewise. It made a deep impression on me. I sometimes found it a bit troubling (I was very young), but loved the theme song. I can only remember Bronson's name off-hand.
 
thaddeus6th said:
Mouse, likewise. It made a deep impression on me. I sometimes found it a bit troubling (I was very young), but loved the theme song. I can only remember Bronson's name off-hand.
Click to expand...

You're better than me, I don't remember names!

Do remember one scene though, where the boy (I think it was) was eating 'flies' out of a fly swot but they turned out to be chocolate raisins. (Unless I dreamt the whole thing).
 
HareBrain said:
Gah, I'm too old. I only remember Skippy. (That was fantasy, right?)
Click to expand...

"What did you say, Skippy? There's a man fallen down this hole here and he can't get out? What's that? You're not the same Kangaroo as appeared last week? And these aren't your real hands?"

I'm too old too. Round the Twist was on at Children's TV time and I caught my kids watching it a few times. It did look totally surreal. Apart from Farscape I've never seen the others. Except Tribe - I think that was shown in late evenings.

Wasn't it around that same time we started to get Neighbours and Home and Away in the UK? They were extremely popular when they first started here. And also pure fantasy!
 
I remember the magic lipstick Older Brother found which made all girls (including, to his disgust, his teacher) want to kiss him :p
 
Hello all, sorry it took me a bit to get back to this. Some good memories there. I never got Farscape as a kid, I watched it in Canada when it was big. I think it's leagues above the kids shows, but there is something in kiwi/aussie sci-fi that is just so lovable.

Around the twist was great in it's day. I remember the lipstick vaguely, and the tree where if you blow into one of the leaves it causes mishaps to happen? That was good.

There was another one, more recent... Brannigan's Quest or something like that. Then there's Stormworld, which was a canadian/aussie collaboration... not bad in it's self.
 
Round the Twist, yes.
Ocean Girl, yes.
The Tribe, yes.

Of those Round the Twist was my fave. The Tribe was second fave, and Ocean Girl was third. I never got to see all of The Tribe; but I hear the ending was kinda average.

And as someone else said I still remember the words to Round The Twist.
 
My generation grew up on Skippy in the UK. I saw a few episodes of The Tribe on TV there years ago. I was already too old for the target market, but it seemed OK for a kids' post-apocalyptic show.

I have a couple of the others on my Amazon wishlist, but have never been willing to pay what Amazon are charging for the import DVDs when they're actually in stock :).
 
Round The Twist was utterly insane. It was as bonkers as a beagle wearing a fez.
 
Not a fantasy show, but during the 1980's (or, perhaps, even late 1970's) I used to enjoy a children's programme called Home (or, Home is the heart is). IIRC, each episode was about someone being put with an adopted family, and how everyone dealt with the issue. Because of this thread, the theme tune is now stuck in my head. :)
 
An old kiwi show. 1981
Under the mountain
Lovecraftian horror but for kids. The themetune haunts me to this day.
 
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