Lilalu im Schepperland :-)

[Wolfgang]

There's a German puppet-show called "Augsburger Puppenkiste" and I liked to watch it when I was (much) younger. So I started recording their plays whenever they're on TV again some years ago. Last week they started airing a rerun of "Lilalu im Schepperland" - I haven't watched it yet - and to my surprise in the opening sequence they say it's based on motives of Enid Blyton's "A book of brownies". Has anyone already watched it and is able to tell how close it is to the book?

[Anita Bensoussane]

That's very interesting, Wolfgang. When you've watched it, perhaps you could let us know more.

[Wolfgang]

Well, Anita asked for it, and who am I to turn any wish from her down? Here's a short summary of all 13 parts.
Actually they took some liberties, but at least the first six episodes show elements of the book.


--- Spoiler ---



Part 1
The witch Synkopia in Kakophonien wants to create a magic potion to rule the world. It consists of sounds and noises. The most important one is the last ingredient, a high c sung by the one who’s going to rule. But Synkopia can’t sing it properly, so the potion is running danger of being wasted. Synkopia decides to kidnap Lilalu, princess in Melodanien, who shall teach her to sing properly.
Pimpernel, the royal cook in Melodanien, wants to impress Lilalu at her birthday, so Synkopia shows him how to make somebody vanish and reappear. Pimpernel blackmails the royal crow Lukulla to support him with his trick, so Synkopia is able to get hand on Lilalu. The king banishes Pimpernel who’ll try to rescue Lilalu.

Part 2
In Melodanien the situation becomes worse, without the Lilalu’s singing everything goes down. Pimpernel and Lukulla are hungry and enter a strange building. There they meet the assistant of the red goblin who provides them with two potions – one to grow things and one to minimize them. After their escape through the chimney – the door has vanished previously – they find themselves on a strange island. Lilalu has to teach Synkopia how to sing the high c but isn’t allowed to sing herself. On her investigation she meets the dragonbird and two musicians. People are not allowed to sing in Kakophonien, or Synkopia will turn them into machines.

Part 3
Pimpernel and Lukulla meet on this island the mermaid Meriana who has feet instead of a tail due to the red goblin. Pimpernel pretends to be a great magician and outwits the goblin making him to grow the mermaid a tail again and using the miniature paste on the red goblin so they can escape with a broom. Meriana shows them the way to the land of the clever people.

Part 4
Pimpernel and Lukulla arrive in the town of the clever people, and they even learn the way to Kakophonien, but their riddles and their rhyming abilities are poor, so they’re sentenced to go to school for one year to learn how to rhyme and make good riddles. At school they also learn that they’ll be banished if they’re far too bad in making riddles and rhymes. They managed to get banished just in time because the red goblin arrives, and he’s looking for revenge. By luck he becomes the new most clever person because his predecessor can’t tell how the red goblin arrived in town.
In Melodanien a liberation army starts to make its way to free Lilalu.
Lilalu learns a bit what effect “good” music has, and what “bad” causes...

Part 5
Pimpernel and Lukulla arrive in the Land of Giggles and learn the way to the “Silent Forest” where Silentio, the bottle man, lives. They also learn that Silentio collected all sounds of the forest. When the red goblin arrives, even Lukulla prefers to look for Lilalu instead of staying and facing the red goblin. In the Silent Forest they find Silentio and he tells them that Synkopia has blackmailed him to get her all sounds she needs for her magic potion. He agrees to accompany them to free his friend C-Dur after all the betrayals of Synkopia.
Synkopia spends a short visit at Melodanien and see the bad state it is in. She tells Lilalu about it who is more determined to stand against Synkopia. Lilalu also learns about the magic potion Synkopia is preparing to rule Melodanien.

Part 6
When Lilalu and her friends try to get hold of the potion, Synkopia turns her into steel. When Synkopia leaves to conquer Melodanien, Pimpernel, Lukulla and Silentio enter her castle and get hold of the potion. Just in time Pimpernel sings the high c and the potion is saved for him. Synkopia returns and tries to save the situation, but the red goblin arrives and becomes victim of her evil spell saving involuntarily Pimpernel, Lukulla and Silentio. Pimpernel turns Synkopia into Steel and lift off the evil magic spells that Kakophonien lies under.
Lilalu, 2 of her friends, dragonbird, Pimpernel, Lukulla and Silentio return to Melodanien which also recovers from its suffering.
Last thing we see is the red goblin and Ulox, the obedient servant and toad of Synkopia, entering Melodanien.

Part 7
Pimpernel is in love with Lilalu, and she’s with him, but the director of music insists that Pimpernel is no match for her so Pimpernel creates his own country Schlaraffia with him as ruler to be suitable for Lilalu.
The red goblin wants to be large again so he makes a bargain with wizards: if he hands over both Synkopia and Pimpernel’s magic potion, they will turn him into his right size again.
While the first part is quite easy (which leads to an uproar in Melodanien), getting the magic potion proves to be difficult. Every time he almost gets his hand on it, someone other takes it (first the director of music who wants to prevent the romance between Lilalu and Pimpernel, second an offspring of Lukulla that doesn’t want the director to spoil everything and third the Melodanien wine-grower who believes the bottle containing the magic potion is his last creation of wine and stores it in his cellar.
Due to the fact that Pimpernel can’t find the potion he declares that he’ll look for it to save Melodanien from ill fate.
In the meantime some witches takes possession of Kakophonien.

Part 8
The wizards grow tired of Synkopia and decide to scrap her, but her faithful servant manages to make Synkopia partly alive again. Synkopia returns to Kakophonien by bewitching the dragon bird again due to the feather she still owns. Back in Kakophonien Synkopia gets the witches under her spell who entered it during her absence.
Pimpernel and Lukulla find Silentio and ask him for assistance, but he can only advise them to ask the fog women for support against Synkopia. The Fog women are quite shy, but Pimpernel manages to get their help after passing a test. They can free the dragon-bird but have to realize that Synkopia doesn’t have the magic potion.

Part 9.
Pimpernel places a bottle of wine in his palace of Schlaraffia to mislead anyone looking for the magic potion.
The wizards kidnap him, Lukulla and one of her off-springs to get them out of their way. Being suspicious they order Lukulla to get the bottle for them. In the meantime they sentence Pimpernel incarceration for a thousand years because he wasn’t allowed to use the potion. Synkopia and the other witches are also hunting for the potion and head to the wizards once they learned that Lukulla is on the way to them. In the following battle between the wizards and the witches Pimpernel and Lukulla manage to escape.
By chance the red goblin got hold of the potion and is heading to the wizards as well so they’ll have to return him to his right size according to their agreement. When Synkopia leaves the wizards with the wrong bottle, the red goblin and the bottle with the right potion falls into the sea and a big fish swallows it. Back in Kakophonien Synkopia realizes that this is not he potion and plans to attack Melodanien.

Part 10
Synkopia makes the witches attack Schlaraffia, but Lilalu’s singing repels the attack, and Schlaraffia recovers from it. The flowers of Melodanien are part of the magic protection, so Synkopia transforms the witches into snails and orders them to eat every plant of Melodanien. The Melodaniens soon realize what kind of snails they’re and how much they like garbage, so Pimpernel fetches some trash of Schlamponien, home of the witches, and lures the snails to their home, but Synkopia almost at once fetches them back to Kakophonien.
When the red goblin almost got hold of the bottle with the magic potion, the wizards fetch him to their castle and order him to go to Synkopia and fetch the magic potion. Synkopia immediately sees him and put a trash bin over him.

Part 11
Synkopia transforms her faithful servant into a prince (Uloxander) who shall propose to Lilalu. He shall lure her away from Melodanien. She also gives him two potions, a love potion and a poison for the well which is also part of the protection against evil spells. After the love potion works, Pimpernel becomes suspicious and fetches a truth-root which he works into Lilalu’s farewell meal. The truth root breaks the love-spell and forces Ulox to confess that Synkopia has sent him. He manages to poison the well before Synkopia returns him to Kakophonien. Lilalu says that if she’s to marry someone, it’s Pimpernel.
The red goblin finally gets hold of the bottle with the magic potion.

Part 12
The well of Melodanien loses its strength, and the director of music confesses that he had stolen the magic potion. Pimpernel and Lukulla can trace it to the red goblin who had tried in vain to get his right size again and almost consumed it completely. They can outwit him and get the rest of it.
The director of music volunteers to fetch Silentio and some pure tones to win some time for Pimpernel and Melodanien.

Part 13
The citizen of Melodanien manage to fight off an attack of the witches, but they threaten to return next morning.
After finding their way home to Melodanien Pimpernel wants to make sure that no magic can harm Melodanien and Schlaraffia, so he challenge the wizards for a duel hoping they’ll arrive together with the witches so he can use the rest of the magic potion to neutralize them.
His daring plan work out and all witches and wizards are friendly now.
The red goblin manage to become large again and plans to start a shop with magic equipment. Ulox leaves Synkopia, for he doesn’t like her new style.
Pimpernel and Lilalu marry.

[Anita Bensoussane]

Well, Anita asked for it, and who am I to turn any wish from her down?

* Starts compiling a list of preposterous wishes! *

Thanks very much for the further details, Wolfgang. As you say, liberties have certainly been taken with the storyline but it's interesting nevertheless to see plotlines inspired by some elements of The Enid Blyton Book of Brownies - at least in the first few episodes.

[Wolfgang]

The German station Hessischer Rundfunk will air the series, starting 14.05.12 for all those who are interested.

[Soenke Rahn]

Hallo, Wolfang. I have seen your thread, some weeks ago and have placed also message in the Fünf Freunde Forum.

http://108500.forumromanum.com/member/f ... onsearch=1

I am sorry that I do not receive Hr3. But interestings, that this serial exists. This was new for me.

Friendly Greetings from Flensburg , Soenke