Avenger Penguins

Avenger Penguins was an animated series produced by Cosgrove Hall Films in 1993, it was animated by Alfonso Productions, a Spanish based animation studio also responsible for bringing Cosgrove's previous show Fantomcat to life. It aired largely on Children's ITV and was originally to be called "Hell's Penguins". It has the distinction of being the last Cosgrove Hall cartoon to be animated using hand painted animation cells, as all 2D animated series from the studio thereafter would use computers for the ink and paint process; with the animation drawings scanned and then digitally coloured.

The story revolves around three bike riding Penguins that inhabit Big City, uniting to protect it and its citizens from the evil Caractacus P. Doom, an insane and reclusive criminal scientist. The Penguins attempt to prevent Doom's schemes but find themselves often hampered by their own miscommunicating and occasional scraps with other biker gangs infesting Big City, such as The Stink Brothers, a rodent squad of Hell's Angels. As with most Cosgrove Hall cartoons, the series poked fun at the popular concepts of having creatures performing inhuman action feats and stunts in an animated medium, made popular by the then enormously successful Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise, and at its core the show's themes heavily rung of Biker Mice from Mars. The cast, like Danger Mouse and Count Duckula had with David Jason, boasted a star talent in a major role, this time in the form of Mike McShane as the Penguin's un-coordinated but brash leader Marlon, as well as the villainous Doom. To show how the series was mocking the often rushed animation style of the original TMNT series, two supporting characters known as "The Badly Drawn Brothers" were always left with the design construction lines still showing out of deliberate neglect.

Pop culture references were found in abundance in many of the episodes and in the characters, Doom himself is patterned on an elderly Orson Welles, Harry Slime (who talks like Peter Lorre) in the meantime is based somewhat on Harry Lime, a character from the movie The Third Man. The season 2 episode, "The 23rd Century" also served as a parody of Star Trek.

The entire series was released on a three disc DVD box set in March 2006 alongside Alias the Jester.