More Backyardigans Questions

Where are these dolls from?

Dear Backyardigans Fan:

I found these plush figures in Walmart that had Pablo dressed up like Mickey Mouse's "Sorcerer's Apprentice" (the wizard hat) and then a Uniqua with a pink bag, and she sang about solving mysteries, or being a detective or something. On the Wikipedia site they have a few unseen episodes listed, but neither of these would fit the bill. I was wondering if you could post something out on your blog to folks to get a consensus on what we have seen out there, so we can guess about future episodes coming out. I would be interested to hear what others have seen, heard, or know.

Curious

Dear Curious:

I'm assuming this is the Wizard Pablo you saw?
I have no idea what episode this is from. So far we know 18 of the second season episodes. This might be from one the last two episodes, or it might be from season three. Thanks for letting us know about this. Now we can have fun speculating about it!

I couldn't find anything like what you describe for Uniqua. The closest I came was this Lady Pink figure, from the International Super Spy episodes (yes, the plural is deliberate - that story line will be our first two part Backyardigans story!) Does she look anything like what you saw?

Jennifer

Scurvy Pirate lyrics, please!

Dear Backyardigans Fan:

I would like to know if you can find out the lyrics to a song from the Pirate Treasure episode. They sing about a 'scurvy pirate'.....can you help me?

Pirate Fan

Dear Pirate Fan:

That's such a great song! I love it. Unfortunately, I don't have that song on the blog right now, but you can find the lyrics to it at the Backyardigans Guild site. It's about a quarter of the way down the page.

Jennifer

Questions for the Backyardigans Fan? Drop me a line at backyardigansfan at comcast dot net and I'll answer it here.

Backyardigans Questions Answered Here!

Something I didn't expect when I put my address up here, was the number of letters I've started getting asking me questions about episodes, songs and trivia. I thought it might be fun to share some of those on here, kind of an irregular "Ask the Backyardigans Fan" column.

Today we have two letters:

What's this episode?

Dear Backyardigans Fan:

I need help!!! I am looking for the name of the episode where the song is "make the world nice fill it up with ice" and I think Tasha sings it. I know there is snow in this episode and they make a bunch of ice cubes. If you can help me with this......

Trying to Remember

Dear Trying:

That episode is "Secret of Snow". Tasha plays the Ice Lady, the person responsible for making ice throughout the world. Uniqua just wants it to snow, but Tasha doesn't want to be bothered when she's so busy making ice!

The ice song is titled "Make the Ice/Fill It Up With Ice" and is sung to the tunes of both Deck the Halls and Good King Wenceslas.

Have fun watching it!

Jennifer

DVD Preview

Dear Backyardigans Fan:

I read your blog every few days or so. My 2-year-old daughter is a die-hard Backyardigans fan. :-)

I was wondering if you knew what four episodes will be included in the upcoming dvd Movers & Shakers.

Oh...I saw a counting book --Deep Sea Countdown. Was there an episode related to this? I know most, if not all, of their books and toys are related to Backyardigans episodes, but this one isn't familiar to me.

Thanks for any info.

Wondering

Dear Wondering:

I haven't been able to find anything official about the DVD, yet. Based on past experience, however, Movers and Shakers should have the episodes "Movers of Arabia", "Cops and Robots", and "Save the Day". It appears the next episode to be aired should be "Sinbad Sails Alone", which should make that the fourth episode on the disc. They probably won't air that until around the release date, though, which is May 29, 2007. The only other future episodes we know of right now are "The Best Clowns in Town" and "Into the Deep".

Deep Sea Countdown has provoked a certain amount of discussion. Right now, (going by the cover) I would guess that its episode is "Into the Deep".

Jennifer

Questions for the Backyardigans Fan? Drop me a line at backyardigansfan at comcast dot net and I'll answer it here.

Trivia - Home Turf

There's a lot of speculation about why Pablo, Uniqua and Tyrone are seen in every Backyardigans episode and used so much in the marketing, but Austin and Tasha tend to be left out, much to the dismay of their fans. In working on this picture, showing where each Backyardigan lives, I noticed something interesting that might explain that (at least from the perspective inside the Backyardigans world - I'll leave out speculation about marketing decisions for now.)

Looking closely at the Backyardigans' houses, you can see that there are fences around Tasha's backyard and Austin's backyard. Pablo, Uniqua and Tyrone, however, live next to each other, with no fences separating the backyards. This area then becomes a sort of mega-backyard, an effect heightened by the unusual depth of the yard. In fact we can see the back fence is almost at the back door of the barely seen house behind the play area.

Austin, as we saw in the "Castaways" episode, goes into the main play area from his backyard through a gate in the fence. Tasha doesn't appear to have a direct route from her backyard to the main play area. Instead, she's more than once been shown to enter the play area from the front yard ("Key to the Nile", "Viking Voyage").

Could this be one of the reasons why we have seen so many episodes with Pablo, Uniqua and Tyrone, and fewer with Tasha and Austin? After all, if you can just walk into your backyard and start playing with the kid next door, you're going to be playing together a lot, if only because he's there every time you go outside. If you have to go around a high fence to get to the house of the kid next door, though, you're going to have days when you just play in your own backyard and never see them.

Interestingly, all the kids seem to feel equally comfortable playing in the common backyard, even though the play area technically belongs to Pablo, Uniqua and Tyrone. In "Cave Party", for instance, we see Austin and Tasha enter the play area with a clear lack of intent to play with the other three kids. Their decision to invite the other three to a party is an afterthought. In "High Tea", Tasha is sitting quite contentedly on Uniqua's picnic table, ignoring the other three, showing every sign of feeling as at-home as if she was in her own backyard.

It seems as if the common backyard shared by Uniqua, Pablo and Tyrone functions more as a sort of park for the five children than as a conventional private backyard. Tyrone, Pablo and Uniqua are seen there more than Austin and Tasha only because it is the only backyard easily available to them. Tasha's backyard and Austin's backyard are, because of the fences, typical backyards, where the children probably only play when invited by Tasha and Austin. It is worth noting, too, that while we see evidence of the kids playing in Austin's backyard occasionally, to which there is access through the gate ("Cave Party"), we never have seen any indication that they have been playing in Tasha's backyard, to which there is no such easy access.

So, is there any great conspiracy involved in leaving Tasha and Austin out of so many episodes? Not at all. It is simply that those two Backyardigans have two backyards available to them, while the other three only have the one common play area.

(And does this topic really deserve this much attention? Of course not! But it's fun, isn't it?)

Quote of the Week

"You two row. I'll supervise."
Tyrone, Viking Voyage

Trivia - Snacktime

"We've got the whole wide world in our yard to explore, now it's time to have a snack, see you next time when we're back, with your friends the Backyardigans."

Ah, but what snack are Uniqua, Tasha, Austin, Pablo and Tyrone going to have? Here's a complete list of the episodes so far and the snacks the Backyardigans have at the end of the episode, as far as we know at least. Special thanks to Backyardiganteen, who did most of the work in putting this together!

• Knights Are Brave and Strong - Pretzels and juice, at Uniqua's house (Ben notes: Tasha is the one that offered the snack, right? Why did they go to Uniqua’s house instead of Tasha’s?)
• The Yeti - Hot chocolate, at Uniqua's house
• Pirate Treasure - Not specified, at Uniqua's house
• The Heart of the Jungle - Pretzels, at Uniqua's house
• Secret Mission - Brownies, at Uniqua's house
• Riding the Range - Cookies, at Pablo's house
• The Key to the Nile - Cheese, crackers and apple juice, at Tasha's house
• The Snow Fort - Not specified, at Tyrone's house
• It's Great to Be a Ghost - Apples, at Pablo's house
• Viking Voyage - Graham crackers, at Uniqua's house
• The Quest for the Flying Rock - Waffles, at Tyrone's house
• Surf's Up - Grilled cheese, at Pablo's house
• Race to the Tower of Power - Granola bars, at Tyrone's house
• Castaways - Applesauce, at Uniqua's house
• Cave Party - Cinnamon toast, at Pablo's house
• High Tea - Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwiches, at Pablo's house (Thanks to Grandpa Phil for this information.)
• Eureka! - Graham Crackers, at Uniqua's house
• Polka Palace Party - Strawberries, at Uniqua's house
• Race Around the World - Chocolate Chip Cookies, at Uniqua's house (Thanks to Grandpa Phil for this information.)
  
• Monster Detectives - Celery with hummus, at Tyrone's house

Brownie points to the first person to post in comments about a noticeable oddity here! Hint: His name starts with an "A".

Trivia - Who is Where?

So you're only interested in episodes that have Austin? Upset that Tasha doesn't seem to be getting her fair share of screen time? Well, here's a list of which Backyardigans are in each episode.

Episodes with all five Backyardigans:

• The Key to the Nile
• Knights Are Brave and Strong
• Cave People
• Race Around the World
• High Tea
  

Episodes with four of the Backyardigans:

• Pirate Treasure - Uniqua, Austin, Pablo and Tyrone
  
• Yeti - Pablo, Tyrone, Tasha and Uniqua
  
• The Heart of the Jungle - Tyrone, Pablo, Austin and Uniqua
• The Snow Fort - Pablo, Tyrone, Uniqua and Tasha
• It's Great to Be a Ghost - Tyrone, Pablo, Uniqua and Tasha
• Riding the Range - Tyrone, Uniqua, Pablo and Austin
  
• Viking Voyage - Pablo, Tyrone, Uniqua and Tasha
• Castaways - Uniqua, Tyrone, Pablo and Austin
• Race to the Tower of Power - Uniqua, Austin, Tyrone and Pablo
• The Quest for the Flying Rock - Uniqua, Tasha, Tyrone and Pablo
• Polka Palace Party - Tyrone, Uniqua, Pablo and Austin
• Surf's Up - Pablo, Tyrone, Uniqua and Austin
• Eureka! - Tyrone, Pablo, Tasha and Uniqua

Episodes with only three Backyardigans:

• Secret Mission - Uniqua, Pablo, Tyrone
  
• Monster Detectives - Pablo, Uniqua and Tyrone

It wasn't until I sat down and starting counting that I realized that Pablo, Uniqua and Tyrone are in every episode. Austin and Tasha are the two that trade off when there are less than all five Backyardigans. Of the 20 episodes so far, Austin is in 12 and Tasha is in 11.

Trivia - Musical Genres

Each Backyardigans episode is in a different musical style. Here is a list of each episode and the style of music used.

• Knights Are Brave and Strong - 40's Big-Band Jazz
• The Yeti - James Brown-Style Funk
• Pirate Treasure - Reggae/Ska
• The Heart of the Jungle - Gilbert and Sullivan
• Secret Mission - Tango
• Riding the Range - Hip-Hop
• The Key to the Nile - Broadway Musical (a la Rogers & Hammerstein)
• The Snow Fort - Western Swing
• It's Great to Be a Ghost - ‘20s Jazz
• Viking Voyage - Rockabilly
• The Quest for the Flying Rock - Disco
• Surf's Up - Afro-Pop
• Race to the Tower of Power - Salsa
• Castaways - Bossa Nova
• Cave People - Calypso
• High Tea - Irish Jig
• Eureka! - Township Jive
• Polka Palace Party - Polka
• Race Around the World - Zydeco
• Monster Detectives - 60's Rock/English Pop