The Raccoons

The Raccoons - 1985 to 1992

The Raccoons was an animated show played from 1985 to 1992 on the Canadian Broadcasting Channel (CBC) and Disney. The show started as special half hour episodes brought out each year at Christmas such as 'The Christmas Raccoons', 'The Raccoons on Ice' and 'The Raccoons: Let's Dance' which was a compilation of the previous specials. There was also an hour long special 'The raccoons and the Lost Star' that I believe was shown in two half hour parts. After the success of the specials the series was created using all the same characters, introducing new characters as the series progressed. The series played once a week rather than each year and all the episodes were 25 minutes long.

The show had the basic structure of having three environmentally aware Raccoons, Bert Ralph and Melissa, involved in various adventurous settings to stop the financially minded Cyril Sneer from destroying the forest in his pursuit of self gain. Their friends Schaeffer and Cedric Sneer help them to this end in a majority of episodes. Main storylines revolve around friendship, love and loyalty overcoming personnal gain.

These cute characters interact perfectly with one another and although the pictures may be 2D the characterisations certainly are not. Of particular note is the dual nature of Cyril Sneer, the fact that he is not a typical villain without emotion develops through the series. He feels guilt and tries to be a better father even though he doesn't always do this in the best ways.