History
The series premiered originally on November 2, 1998 on TLC, but later moved to PBS Kids on June 11, 2001 with the same episodes plus new episodes in 2001 and in 2005. Home video releases were released by Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment through 2003 as part of their "Columbia TriStar Family Fun" collection. Distribution was then moved over to the children's division of book publisher Thomas Nelson.
Voice actor Mary Kay Bergman provided the original voice of Jay Jay and several other characters.
In 2006, new episodes were produced featuring new characters, including a red Latino plane named Lina. The new episodes feature a beginning segment called "Jay Jay's Mysteries", in which Jay Jay and Lina solve mysteries such as how planes fly and how the five senses are used. The mysteries segment is followed by a story pulled from the original version of the series, making the "new" episodes a repackaging of a new format with old episodes tacked on to the end.
Before the well-known animated series there was a short non-animated series made in 1995, where the plane characters were live action films of real models and human characters were of crafted models. They did not talk, but had the same personalities. The original series was narrated similarly to early episodes of Thomas The Tank Engine or Theodore Tugboat. It contained three videos: Jay Jay's First Flight, Old Oscar Leads the Parade, and Tracy's Handy Hideout. These three episodes were known as the "pilot series".
Within the series, the propeller speeds of all the plane characters have varied over the years. The first 20 stories show the propellers spinning very slowly. Beginning with the story "Picture Day", the propellors are made to look more believable. The remaining stories have the propellors spinning rapidly (unless a character is underwater). Before "Picture Day" the characters had lights but they did not appear to function. The opening theme has the propellers spin rapidly: this opening is used for the entire series.
Each of the plane characters seems to have a biological part, including a stomach that needs the same food humans do and a mechanical part that needs fuel and engine oil. Some of the things that the planes are reported as doing off-camera would require foldaway arms to handle items with, but those arms are never seen on camera.
Read more about this topic: Jay Jay The Jet Plane
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