The Flumps

THE FLUMPS
Made by: David Yates
Shown on: BBC
Years shown: 1977 onwards

The Flumps were a nuclear family of what looked like owl-pellets or mothballs, who popped up on the garden wall at the start of each episode. There was Father, with a woolly hat and moustache; Mother, with her matronly head-scarf and rolling-pin; and Grandad, who no-one wanted around, and who wore a knotted hanky and glasses. The children were Posy, with a bow where her hair should have been; Perkin, taking after dad in his choice of head attire; and little Pootle, in his bobble-hat, who was always deemed too small to join in with anything but the most mundane of activities.

The Flumps were how a British family should be: they played together, women knew their place (Mother was reduced to baking, comforting Pootle when the others had excluded him, and singing songs), they tolerated the elderly (although Grandad did ask for it, what with playing his Flumpet all day), men were handy at DIY (Father did very little except for building things), and the children were respectful to their elders. Ah, them were the days. They should have advertised Hovis. This was they heyday of stop-motion animating, and there can be fewer greater triumphs than seeing the Flump family on their Flumpcycle, peddling like maniacs to nowhere in particular.

SQUARE EYES RATING: 6/10

(Thanks to www.80snostalgia.com for the borrowed pic)