Crystal Tipps and Alastair

CRYSTAL TIPPS AND ALASTAIR
Made by: Q3 London
Shown on: BBC
Years shown: 1971 onwards

No-one needs to tell you when this animated series was made - it gives itself away in ten seconds. Crystal Tipps was a girl with big frizzy hair, who lived with her dog, Alastair. Alastair lived pretty much as a human would, including eating with cutlery at the table - the whole thing was so suspect that some have even speculated that Alastair was a little more than just a girl’s best friend. Ahem.

There were an impressive fifty of these five-minute episodes made, and never a word was spoken - the characters were mute, and there was no narration. Just surreal hallucinogenic adventures in a brightly coloured fantastical world. A case in point would be an episode where Alastair brings Crystal a giant egg, which then hatches into a crazy, psychedelic bird. Like, far out....

Just for the record, I’m including this show mainly because I have a friend who has achieved the rare feat of growing her hair like Crystal Tipps.

SQUARE EYES RATING: 3/10

(Thanks to www.sausagenet.com for the borrowed pic)