Part 2
Part 3

After writing about The Smoggies last week, I started looking for ways to watch a couple episodes online as I don’t think I’ve even seen an episode of The Smoggies in 20 years. Turns out YouTube has most of the episodes!

In seeing it again, there are a few things that I’ve noticed:

1. Whoa… The Smurfs? The Carebears? Sooo similar. I guess, when you find an efficient model for reaching children, why not!
2. Every episode seems to have the same style of eco moment “What will you do with the rest?” “Dump it in the sea!” “Those walruses are in mortal danger!” It’s great – very straightforward but the voices are so kid-friendly and the images used are so to-the-point that they’re sure to understand the message.
3. Those Suntots are some cheerful, helpful little dudes.

Now, unlike Captain Planet, I did actually watch this show. I remember being quite concerned about the size of the characters heads… but that’s not the point. The point is that many children, myself included, learned some very valuable lessons about the earth and the environment — most specifically pollution — from the Smoggies and the Suntots.

This Canadian cartoon (woo! Go Canada!) began airing in 1988 but didn’t make it’s way to the US until 1994 (under the name “Stop The Smoggies”).

Almost every episode had the environmentalist Suntots outsmart the Smoggies in their latest scheme (usually involving dumping oil into the river or turning their smoke stacks on high and pumping out thick, black smoke), after which the Smoggies invariably hatched another scheme.

A recurring theme in the episodes is the Smoggies attempt to steal the island’s ‘magic coral’ (which they believe grants eternal youth), or find some alternative way to maintain youth. The show often implied that the magic coral did not actually exist, however, and were just manifestations of the Smoggies’ (mainly Emma Smoggie’s) greed and vanity.

Looking back on this now, I’m not sure how I ever kept these plots straight as a kid — I’m confused now! But apparently it was affective because admittedly, most of what I know about coral and water pollution comes from this very show.