3-2-1 Penguins!

Our family recently received the complete season of 3-2-1 Penguins! for review.  Since we don't receive any tv channels, I had never heard of the show (although it had four highly rated seasons on NBC as a Saturday morning cartoon), so I didn't know what to expect.  I was pleasantly surprised and amused by the program.

The gist of the story is that 8 year old twins Michelle and Jason go to spend part of the summer with their Grandmum.  While there, they discover the attic, and when Jason crams 4 figurine penguins into a rocket ship it takes off and flies into the air.  The penguins (Zidgel, Midgel, Fidgel and Kevin) are the crew of the spaceship and shrink Jason, scooping him inside the rocket for an adventure.

The beauty of each adventure is that while in space the twins always learn a moral lesson dealing with some sort of dilemma they were having during the start of the show.  Lessons that are totally real for my kids - things like sharing and taking turns. 

After watching several episodes, I could tell all 3 boys were quite taken with the show.  I asked Pierce about his favorite thing.  He loves the antagonist - Baron von Cavitus - who was Fidgel's pet hamster in school.  Cavitus hated that everyone thought he was so cute, so he decided to become bad, built himself a robot costume to live in, and is trying to take over the galaxy (how can you not love this stuff?!?)

Pierce wanted to be Baron von Cavitus so badly.  So he came up with an idea.  He put his stuffed Alvin the Chipmunk inside a hat.

Behold, Baron von Cavitus, right in my living room!

In case you want to see the real thing, I took a picture of him on my television.  He can slide the robot head back to reveal himself, although he prefers to have the robot head on so he can talk in his creepy voice and no one will call him cute.  His favorite snack?  Radioactive raspberry ice cream of course! 

Seriously, this is a great cartoon - even I got pulled into it. Running time is 4 hours 46 minutes, and it retails for $19.97.  Each episode runs 22 minutes, and the dvd set includes 13 episodes.  If you're looking for the sort of cartoon that teaches wholesome morals but involves plenty of fun action and humor, this is an excellent choice.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this dvd for review purposes.  The opinions stated above are my own.