“Duck and the Broccoli Stalk”

Eat your greens and you'll be as green as the Count himself!

Season 1 Episode 25 (episode 25 overall)

Original broadcast date: 7 March 1989

Writer: Jimmy Hibbert
Additional voices: Dr. Von Goosewing/Mrs. G: Jimmy Hibbert

                               Giant: Jack May

                           

Joke credit: Veg – R.T. Yoke and Sons (purveyors to the Aristocracy)

Travel location: Sky castle (not via castle) 

Castle transport visual not used.

It should be fairly obvious from the title that this is a spoof of ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ and it is, although it doesn’t follow the tale exactly, but rather come up with its own story. It has the usual humour peppered throughout but the biggest impression it leaves is a strange kind of dreamlike quality helped by the ethereal backgrounds and wistful music choices.

 

I never promised you a rose garden, milord.

Duckula is out in the garden picking broccoli and showing a bit of interest in Igor’s more sinister patch of the garden. Wouldn’t it be pretty inadvisable to keep such gruesome plants so close to a vegetable patch? Oh well it’s not like it’d harm Duckula himself I guess and the carnivorous plants wouldn’t be too interested in eating the veg’ unless they're also cannibals! This is also one of two times in the series we see the garden mainly because it's relevant to the plot.

Meanwhile in his airship, Dr. Von Goosewing is testing out some hair restoring formula he has invented. He tries it on himself but nothing happens. This is kind of cute as it shows the Doctor has a bit of vanity, also demonstrated in ‘The Mutinous Penguins’. He gives up and absently pours it into a flower pot. The flower immediately starts growing rapidly and tears through the blimp, causing the ship to land in a lake. In a fun bit of continuity, we see the airship balloon patched up with a comedy plaster later in the episode. Goosewing’s plan now is to surround the castle with garlic and use the quick grow formula to make them grow thus trapping the Count and weakening him.

Jack May and the Beanstalk.

After a bedtime story of Jack and the Beanstalk, read by Igor (just how old is the Count? I like how he’s still treated like a kid at times though, he often acts it) Duckula is disturbed from his sleep by Goosewing’s chuntering so he and his servants confront him in the garden, giving him a shock. Goosewing drops the formula on the broccoli patch and when the trio go to look, the rapid growth takes effect. The broccoli rockets up into the sky (tearing Goosewing’s blimp again) with our heroes clinging to the broccoli stalks. Before we go on, it's worth noting that at one point during the bedtime story Duckula impersonates 'an Englishman' by giving us an over-the-top stereotype of a city gent. I wonder if this was a jab at American viewers? It also makes sense for Igor to being reading fairy tales to his master - some of those were pretty dark. Perhaps this is a rare bonding experience for the two of them!

Naturally the stalk stops growing in the clouds (which taste like cotton candy) and sure enough here is another castle, just like the one in the storybook. Another great little scene between the Count and the butler as they debate the wisdom of entering the castle to look for the golden eggs. I love how there’s a reference to the goose that laid the golden eggs, but no-one makes the obvious tie-in to Goosewing. I guess that might be considered a bit racist.

Describing the giant from the book:

Igor: Big sharp teeth that could bite you in half!
Nanny: Great big hands that could crush an ox!

Igor: Feet as big as fishponds that could squash a man as flat as a pancake!

Duckula: Yes, we all know he was big. But what else did he have?
Nanny: A big hat?

Nanny gets some of the best lines.

Meanwhile, inside the castle, Mr. Giant (Jack May doing a gentle, peaceful Welsh accent) decides it might be time to go into his act. He tries his best to sound fierce but doesn’t quite make it while chatting with Mrs. Giant who talks about poached eggs, toast and ‘faaairy cake’! The Giant raises a valid point too. In the original story Jack steals into the castle and nicks a bunch of stuff belonging to the giant. Why would it be unreasonable for anyone, giant or not, to get angry at that? This makes the Giants out to be sympathetic in the same manner as Count Duckula himself is, ‘monsters’ who are genuinely harmless and just want a decent life. He comes across as an almost tragic character and Jack's timid harmless voice acting really helps, accompanied by the sad-sounding music, which always makes me feel emotional. The only thing that takes the edge of it is Jimmy's Monty Python-esque Pepperpot type voice as Mrs. Giant.

The trio eventually sneak into the castle and are almost instantly assailed by the traditional booming cry of ‘FEE FY FO FUM!’ and Duckula panics and runs around the giant castle in terror. This is a good tense scene, my only gripe is it could have been a little longer just because I like it so much.

In this brief interim, Nanny and Igor have sat down with Mrs. Giant for a cup of tea and a chat. This is where the viewer will notice that Mrs. G (as Nanny calls her) is the same scale as our trio. Mr. Giant still hasn’t made an appearance alongside the other characters so it’s still vague as to how big he is. However he soon appears and Duckula’s terror turns to anger at having been apparently been the victim of some joke. The ‘giant’ was merely using a loud-hailer to fi and fy and fo and fum. This doesn’t quite explain the loud footsteps unless he was stamping really hard – which in turn, would explain his bad leg as Mrs G describes.

Soon it’s time to go, Duckula having given up his quest for golden eggs (initially through fear), which is pretty sensible as it would be wrong to portray him as an outright thief, especially if thieving from non-villainous characters. Duckula ties himself and Igor together and has Nanny lower them down – though he doesn’t explain how Nanny herself is to get down, so understandably she tries lowering herself down. While Duckula and Igor land on the ground, Nanny lands on Goosewing, who is still there! Obviously either waiting just in case Duckula made a reappearance or revisiting the area since he has his wampire zapper with him. That’s actually pretty sensible of him. Duckula laughs at Goosewing’s plight and we close the episode. For some reason I find this a bit dark! I never worry overmuch when Goosewing falls off the cliff, but Nanny falling on him? Ouch. That and he remains silent, so if this were his last appearance in the series one could assume he’d been killed! Duckula the Giant Slayer? More like Nanny the giant squasher.

Music: The title card is underscored with 'Mystery Place No.2' by Peter Knight. Throughout the episode, we hear a lot from the 'Storytellers' album by Paddy Kingsland. 'Without a Care' plays in Igor’s garden and it’s heard again in the countryside scene in‘Woof and Tumble’ (Victor & Hugo). The tune that plays when Von Goosewing’s airship is wrecked is 'Jailbreak' by Robert Gill. The tense slamming music as the stalk grows is also used in ‘Spacial Event’ (Victor & Hugo) and ‘Disgusting or What?’ (Avenger Penguins) for similarly threatening scenes. ‘Smouldering Fury’ (Trevor Duncan) crops up again as the broccoli stalk enters the clouds. There’s a wonderful, peaceful yet suspenseful piece that plays for a long time as Duckula gets read his bedtime story and Goosewing plants the garlic, but I’ve only ever heard it used here and partly in ‘Dear Diary.’  It is 'Homage to Dracula' (b) by Paul Lewis. As I said earlier there's a lot of weirdly peaceful tunes in this one. Again from the Storytellers album we have 'After Dark', which plays after Goosewing has finished surrounding the castle with garlic. 'Ghouls and Ghosts' (no not that one!) plays as Duckula tries to convince Igor & Nanny to advance to the castle. The Giants' theme is 'The Enchanted Wood(a)'.  The by-now-familiar plodding-to-rushing tune gets another outing when the three descend the stalk. It's 'Eccentric Walk' (Roger Roger). 'Shadowed' (Peter Francklyn) plays when Nanny crash lands on Goosewing. We close with the same stabbing theme ('Barrage' by Jack Trombey) as we'll hear in the next episode. Funnily enough, neither 'Lumbering Giant' nor 'Big Bad Giant' are used though they are in other entries in the series.

The backgrounds of the giants' castle and surrounding area indeed do have a very cotton candy feel to them with the dominant theme being stark bright pink and a few soft blues. It actually makes the whole scene a little spookier in my view, with the quiet music adding to the weird heavenly atmophere. This is in total contrast to the scenes at ground level which are, as is often the case for a horror-thematic series, dull, washed out and moody. Here are a few pans and backgrounds.

The opening pan looks a little different too. The shades are a little more defined and storybook-like, which fits.

 Very Good.

The blur in the middle is deliberately painted that way to aid a zip pan.

Spot the Count's cape resting on the chair.

 Some exterior shots of the giants' castle.

...and some interiors. Looks like a painting of a lightening god at the breakfast table.

Trivia

*Another episode with the word duck in the title.

*Igor’s garden contains fly agaric (poisonous and hallucinogenic, but apparently still edible), death cap (very deadly!), deadly nightshade (also known as Belladonna) and death camas (also highly poisonous). Of course he also has some carnivorous plants, which, when you think about it, are the mirror opposite of his master. All are drawn pretty accurately.

*Duckula does a Goosewing in that he walks off the castle mountain without looking and falls. Mrs. G does a Nanny by saying ‘Ooooh, that’s nice!’
*Another appearance of Von Goosewing’s blimp.
*Goosewing inventions: "Rapid Growth und Qvickly Getting Big Fertilizer Mixture", wampire-zapper gun. 
*Igor wears reading glasses.

*A BatMan (or more specifically BatDuck) portrait can be seen on the wall at one point. See images above.

*Igor gives another oblique reference to his respect for Goosewing when Duckula suggests the Doctor is up to no good.

*A bit of Nanny and Igor stock animation is used, some of it repurposed (Nanny drinking the tea for instance).

*The broccoli stalk destroys the bell-tower as it grows. Maybe this would explain why it isn’t seen very well from some angles in other stock backgrounds?

*Duckula does another couple of alliteration lines. ‘Money, mopus, mazuma and maybe this giant’s got some too!’ and ‘Silence, stealth, slyness and SAY HOW ABOUT THAT HE’S LEFT THE DOOR OPEN COME ON!’

*Duckula extols the bravery of several historical figures and botches a load of their names. Stanley Livingstone (mixing Henry Morton Stanley and David Livingstone together), Walter Scott (really meaning Robert Falcon Scott), General 'Wild Bill' (meaning George) Custer (mistakenly calling the Battle of Little Bighorn, the Battle of Little French Horns) and Davy Crockett (he got that last one right!) to which Igor counters that they were all most unwise ‘and all of them very dead.’

*Igor and Nanny reminisce about Duckula’s grandfather, his strict governess and the werewolf. Duckula doesn’t react too much to mention of the werewolf, but he’s not really paying attention, he just wants them to keep quiet.

*The Giants are either an older married couple, or a mother and son, though I’m leaning towards the former. Mr. Giant calls her ‘Mother’ (could be in the manner of how a husband may refer to his wife if they have children) and Nanny calls her Mrs. G.

*The size of the two Giants is kept deliberately ambiguous. We don’t see them onscreen together until after it’s been established that Mrs. Giant and thereafter Mr. Giant are regular sized. Most of their home appears to be scaled-up for a more traditional giant but they have certain areas scaled down for them.

From the old CHAMB site.

*When Mr. Giant refers to grinding bones to make bread, Mrs. G offers some more toast.
*Igor's pose when he immitates the stamp of a giant's foot appears on some production art.

*Duckula briefly sprouts fangs when describing how scary the giant must be. Also buck teeth when he impersonates an Englishman.
* Igor seems to show respect for the giant as, in spite of him being small for his size and not very threatening, he is at least trying to live up to his birthright, unlike Duckula.
*The last character to use a loud-hailer was the pirate Captain in ‘The Mutinous Penguins’

*Episode doesn’t begin with a scream, but (almost) ends on Nanny screaming as she falls. This is the scream the narrator refers to along with Duckula’s chuckling.
*The joke credit is a pun on artichoke.

*Malcolm McGookin animates on this one. He would later write for ‘Avenger Penguins.’
*This episode was released on a Lollipop VHS (volume 1) along with an episode of Danger Mouse ('The Good, The Bad and the Motionless') and  'Wind in the Willows' ('Gadget Mad').

Goofs and Nitpicks
*A sliver of Duckula's cloak is coloured as his leg for a single frame when he's mocking Igor in the garden.

*Some cel numbers can be briefly seen when Nanny tells Duckula to apologise to Mrs. Giant. Looks like dust or scratches on the floor thankfully. I think some prints of UK animated episodes are zoomed out a bit too far.

*Brief continuity error with the rope after Nanny lands on Goosewing.

 

FI FY FO FUM! I SMELL THE BLOOD OF A TRANSYLVANIAN! BE HE ALIVE OR BE HE UNDEAD! I'LL GRIND HIS BONES TO MAKE MY BREAD!