Hergé’s Adventures Of Tintin

1 9 6 1 – 1 9 6 2 (France)
50 x 5 minute episodes

Tintin was created in 1929 for the Belgian weekly Le Petit Vingtième. The little redheaded cub reporter was the creation of Georges Rémi, alias Hergé – an amalgam of his initials RG (as pronounced in French) – and soon became a cult figure around the world.

Tintin and his dog Snowy made their TV debut in 1961 in a series of breathless five-minute episodes, complete with cliff-hanger endings, and arrived in Britain a year later dubbed into English by Peter Hawkins (who also provided voices for The Flowerpot Men, Captain Pugwash and The Daleks).

Five of the original Tintin books were adapted for the TV series – The Crab With The Golden Claws, Star of Mystery, Red Rakham’s Treasure, Black Island, Objective Moon and The Calculus Affair.

Tintin was accompanied on his adventures by grog-swilling Captain Haddock (the black-bearded skipper of the ship Karaboudjan), two inept bowler-hatted Scotland Yard detectives called the Thompson Twins (who also provided the name of the 1980s pop group), and the audibly challenged and forgetful Professor Cuthbert Calculus.

By the time narrator Peter Hawkins had finished reminding you what happened last week and had asked the cliff-hanger questions which marked the climax of this five-minute cartoon, there really wasn’t much time left for Tin Tin and dog Snowy to do anything . . .

In 1986 Tintin and Alpha-Art, the last (unfinished) adventure of Tintin was published, three years after the death of Georges Rémi.

Voices
Peter Hawkins

Video