Metalheads         (2003)
  
   producers: Telemagination for TV-Loonland
                     and ZDF Enterprises
   animation: 2D animation
     episodes: 26 x 12mins

 
    "The honour, the glory, the knightly stuff!
     That could be me!"
 

    The Metalheads are a quintent of medieval misfit kids who attend Metalhead
    Academy, a school for budding knights in armour, run by the addlebrained
    academic Sir Fuddleby in the grounds of their cracked-up castle. Lester is
    an over-eager young servant, Lady Liddy is less of lady and more of a lad,
    Shmed is a welsh wizard-in-training, Bob is the droll dry jester's son, and
    Drucilla is an ever-hungry Hun. Quite how these five young roustabouts
    managed to inveigle their way into Knight School is revealed in the first
    episode. But suffice it to say, there's always plenty of trouble and strife
    left in their wake...

    Sir Fuddleby's academy is run out of a castle extension that's shaped
    like a knight's helmet. It even has a front wall fashioned after a visor,
    that swings up to open the school up, al fresco style. And as for our
    feisty five youngsters, well, they're forever giving the other castle folks
    the runaround with their madcap schemes. Amongst the regulars they
    encounter are Dangling Dan the wiley prisoner, who's always found
    manacled somewhere around the castle grounds. Then there's Bob's
    over-eager Mother who's just too keen to see her son follow in his
    father's foolish footsteps. Haughty Barron Gruff is the man in charge
    of this cracked-up keep, but the canniving Sheriff of Nothingham is
    never too far from his side with a sneaky scheme up his sleeve to
    be rid of our pesky mob...

    "Metalheads" was animated by Telemagination for TV-Toonland and
    ZDF and the folks at CBBC. The show's creator, Steve Moore, is the
    US writer of the syndicated comic strip "In the Bleachers", and more
    recently, he concocted the storyline for Sony Pictures' CGI-toon
    "Open Season". He had the idea for "Metalheads" back in the mid-90s,
    and initially struck a deal with Sunbow Entertainment to bring it to life.
    But the show didn't really get off the ground until Sunbow were bought
    out by euro-toonhouse TV-Loonland. TV-Loonland also own UK
    firm Telemagination, and thus the team were tapped to bring this
    knockabout knight school to our screens...

  


    

    How civil...

    The very first episode "An Uncivil Suit" reveals how our five Metalheads
    ended up in the academy. You see, the quintet teamed up inside a suit
    of armour that got out of control, and after many acrobatics they and the
    suit found themselves interrupting a castle joust. Le Duke Nez du Grande
    (that's "Big Nose" to you and I) had just bested the castle's best knights.
    But now he was bested by our five youngsters. A delighted Barron Gruff
    decreed that this brave and mysterious knight should step forward and
    claim anything he so desired. And even after the five revealed themselves
    and their biggest desire, the generous Barron kept to his word:

   "Harold the Herald, sound the trumpet!
    These five brave.. er.. well, these five children
    are to be enrolled in the Metalheads Academy!"     
    
  
 
    Metalheads episodes

   An Uncivil Suit
   The End of Time
   Watch Ye Birdie
   Dangling Dan's Day Off
   Closed Circuit Tapestry
   Olde soldiers Never Die, Alas
   Ye Kitchen Maids
   Beseiged
   Send in the King
   My Life as a Page
   The Stick in the Stone
   Ye Sandwich of Destruction
   First Impressions
   The Not So Magic Kingdom
   A Kingdom For a Horse
   Last Hun Standing
   The King and the Pauper
   Metal Dads
   Knight of Disillusion
   The Schmed With the Golden Wand
   The Art of Courtly Love
   Sir Lester and the Green Knight
   Pygmalihon
   Lay on, MacGruff
   All or Nothingham
   None Shall Pass

 

    Broadcast info

    "An Uncivil Suit", premiered on BBC1, on 1st September 2003...

 

     Metalheads on DVD


       Metalheads
                 Region 2 / 8 episodes / Metrodome / May 2004

 

    a Telemagination Production for TV-Loonland

    a TV-Loonland, ZDF Enterprises, ZDF Co-production
    in conjunction with CBBC

   Created by Steve Moore