The Trap Door
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| The Trap Door | |
|---|---|
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| Creator(s) | Terry Brain Charlie Mills |
| Starring | Willie Rushton |
| Country of origin | UK |
| No. of episodes | 40 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Running time | 5 minutes |
| Broadcast | |
| Original run | 1984 – 1986 |
| Links | |
| IMDb profile | |
| TV.com summary | |
The Trap Door is a children's claymation-style animated television series, shown in the United Kingdom in 1984. It was created by Terry Brain and Charlie Mills. The programme ran for two series and numbered 40 episodes. Each episode was around five minutes long. All the character voices were provided by Willie Rushton. The theme song was written by songwriter Bob Heatlie.
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[edit] Characters
- Berk, servant to the Thing Upstairs. He is a blue creature who enjoys cooking up exotic things in his kitchen and is usually cheery unless he's having a hard time dealing with a monster from the trap door. Lighthearted and optimistic, Berk is also a bit careless and irresponsible, not only opening the trap door when forbidden, but leaving it wide open most of the time. He also tends to shrug off Boni's (usually rather paranoid) warnings and often forces him to do things Boni would like to skip, such as taking him fishing. His usual exclamation is "Globbits!".
- Boni, Berk's best friend. He is a talking skull (hence the name "boney"), who spends most of his time moaning from his alcove in the wall or unsuccessfully trying to warn Berk about monsters. While some of his constant complaining is unwarranted, his warning often have merit, mostly when trying to convince Berk to close the unattended trap door.
- Drutt, Berk's pet spider. Berk often finds him unhelpful and annoying. He often causes trouble when chasing after worms and other creepy-crawlies to eat. Halfway through the second series Drutt has four pink babies, however the others still refer to him as "he".
- The Thing Upstairs, master of the castle, he rarely leaves his room, flying out when he does, and consequently is never seen. He always has a job for Berk, usually preparing meals made from interesting creatures.
- Trap door monsters. Many different monsters emerged ranging from annoying to dangerous. They are often referred as "horrible things". Some of the repeat appearances include:
- Rogg, a large pink creature. He is not very intelligent but he likes Berk and often helps him out. They eventually become friends. The most intelligent thing he's ever said is; "I think... um... I dunno..."
- Bubo, a mischievous small yellow creature who was initially invisible, he occasionally returns and causes Berk further annoyance.
[edit] Plot
Berk, Boni and Drutt live in a castle in "the dark and nasty regions, where nobody goes", where Berk serves The Thing Upstairs. In almost every episode, something will emerge from the trap door which is in the floor of the cellar and leads to dark and mysterious caverns. Though mostly hostile or mischievous occasionally a helpful or friendly creature did emerge. Rogg became friends with Berk and frequently returns to visit. See List of The Trap Door episodes.
[edit] Video and game releases
Although selected episodes of the series were available on various videotapes in the UK at various times, only a rare double videocassette released in Canada at one point actually contained every single episode. It was not until 2005 that all the episodes were finally made available on DVD in the UK.
The television series spawned a video game in the mid-80s called The Trap Door and a sequel called Through The Trap Door. These games were available for the ZX Spectrum, the Amstrad CPC and the Commodore 64.
In addition, a board game was released entitled Berk's Trapdoor Game which involved going around the board while trying to knock one's opponent off the edge with a die hidden behind a trapdoor in the game board.[citation needed]
