North Korean Animation

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I found this channel with a new English 'translation' of Squirrel and Hedgehog. According to the description, it's more an interpretation than a direct translation though. Still, worth a watch.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6nfdp5gRa7qcHJPh4ZnMZg
Thanks for the channel, a shame he didn't do more.

For anyone looking for North Korean Stuff, here are some more channels
https://www.youtube.com/user/stimmekoreas/videos
https://www.youtube.com/user/sdmedianet/videos
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCd-7zEZGml91jA-SuoOM9A/videos
https://www.youtube.com/user/alunhill/videos

Here are some cartoons, enjoy



 
This thread needs more basters taken alone. Or is that a South Korean thing?
 
Road safety cartoons? Seriously? I'm sure the roads of Pyongyang aren't busy enought to warrant that.
(OK, cheap shot. These things are generally made in response to something after all)

Edit: This cartoon has actually grown on me. I don't know exactly what it is, but there's something quite charming about it.
 
Última edición:
I found this channel with a new English 'translation' of Squirrel and Hedgehog. According to the description, it's more an interpretation than a direct translation though. Still, worth a watch.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6nfdp5gRa7qcHJPh4ZnMZg

Edit: And interestingly, it turns out that Lt. Vixen isn't actually called that, it's just a name /co/ gave her. Apparently, she's never addressed by name in the show.
Oh well, wouldn't surprise me if they kept that a secret otherwise.
There is a whole movie devoted to the topic, lol
https://youtube.com/watch?v=_Ge2TQfqwX4
Keep living the dream!
 
So I’m starting up this thread again after five years. Why?

You can see earlier in this thread that the infamous Italian company Mondo TV bought up the rights to Squirrel and Hedgehog a number of years back and dubbed it as Brave Soldiers.

The thing is, that wasn’t the only piece of North Korean animation they bought the rights to...

Mondo TV’s YouTube channel has a number of series that are compilations of North Korean cartoons - Bugs Adventures, Toy Toons and The Great Book of Nature.

(Note that in the opening of the latter there are characters from the memorable masterwork Simba the King Lion.)

Most of the cartoons in these are ones not listed in any English-language filmography of North Korean films. Most are seemingly non-political and harmless, but a few, well, aren’t...
 
So I’m starting up this thread again after five years. Why?

You can see earlier in this thread that the infamous Italian company Mondo TV bought up the rights to Squirrel and Hedgehog a number of years back and dubbed it as Brave Soldiers.

The thing is, that wasn’t the only piece of North Korean animation they bought the rights to...

Mondo TV’s YouTube channel has a number of series that are compilations of North Korean cartoons - Bugs Adventures, Toy Toons and The Great Book of Nature.

(Note that in the opening of the latter there are characters from the memorable masterwork Simba the King Lion.)

Most of the cartoons in these are ones not listed in any English-language filmography of North Korean films. Most are seemingly non-political and harmless, but a few, well, aren’t...
Seems like whatever deal Mondo TV had in getting their stuff animated there gave them a trade in SEK's back catalog as well. Another series of note Mondo TV got to do is "The Clever Raccoon Dog", though they renamed it, "The Little Bear" (after a different character who's not really the main star).
 
You can see earlier in this thread that the infamous Italian company Mondo TV bought up the rights to Squirrel and Hedgehog a number of years back and dubbed it as Brave Soldiers.

The thing is, that wasn’t the only piece of North Korean animation they bought the rights to...

Mondo TV’s YouTube channel has a number of series that are compilations of North Korean cartoons - Bugs Adventures, Toy Toons and The Great Book of Nature.
Woah, kudos for the post man! To fill you in, Mondo TV has also incorporated SEK's animations on two others shows: Animal Games and Happy Adventures. Unlike the three you mentioned (Bugs Adventures and Toy Toons have stop-motion animation and Great Book of Nature has animation featuring at least one animal character), these two don't seem to have any particular theme. The prolific Italian company has also adapted two feature films, Prince Moon and Princess Sun (호동왕자와 락랑공주) and Young Fisherman & Black Dragon (어부총각과 검은룡), in English.

The funny thing about Animal Games is that it uses the Great Book of Nature intro and outro, except now there's a Korean title(!!) instead of the English one in front of the hardcover book, and the English dialogues are re-dubbed; some of the voices are more obnoxious.

Also, in all these shows and films that have in-house North Korean animation dubbed in English, all original music is replaced by compositions of John Sposito, Italian composer who has worked on numerous Mondo TV originals. I assume they did that partly maybe because they couldn't obtain the dialogueless audio due to the original masters' age. Music of him that's heard in these, has also been used in newer Mondo TV productions, such as the Cat Leopold reboot. (for those of you wondering what this CPM Cinematografica company listed under "Music" in the end credits of some of these shows, I scrutinized the web, and I believe it's John Sposito's music publisher) The only adaptation that retains the original soundtrack is Little Bear.

The video in a few of these Mondo TV distributions is worse than in the original version, from what I see; take for example a look at Young Fisherman & Black Dragon (in Korean). The first is a rip from KCTV and the second one is an upload from one of the YouTube channels that distribute Mondo TV material (Little Bear is also available in Korean on the Asian Mondo World channel, meaning that Mondo TV also holds distribution rights to the productions in their original language).

A short production that in my opinion stands out from the rest is 새로 사귄 동무 (2004). It was included on Happy Adventures as episode 9, under the title Animate Toys. Since it's SEK's first computer-animated short and revolves around toys, I guess it's a rip-off of Toy Story. The Korean title also translates to A new companion.

As far as voice acting goes, these dubs are the equivelant of 4Kids's anime dubs. However, unlike 4Kids, the folks over Mondo TV are so cheap that they don't even bother to localize the on-screen Korean text. Also, the only two adaptations where there are detailed end credits (that mention in great detail directors, animators etc.) instead of the usual Mondo TV ones (which list Matteo Corradi as planner, Valentina Maselli as script writer, Gian Claudio Galatori as production director etc.), are Little Bear and Prince Moon and Princess Sun.

The one of these productions I have watched a lot is Great Book of Nature. It's a pretty innocent and colorful show to watch every once in a while, though the pacing may bore the audience.
 
Woah, kudos for the post man! To fill you in, Mondo TV has also incorporated SEK's animations on two others shows: Animal Games and Happy Adventures. Unlike the three you mentioned (Bugs Adventures and Toy Toons have stop-motion animation and Great Book of Nature has animation featuring at least one animal character), these two don't seem to have any particular theme. The prolific Italian company has also adapted two feature films, Prince Moon and Princess Sun (호동왕자와 락랑공주) and Young Fisherman & Black Dragon (어부총각과 검은룡), in English.

The funny thing about Animal Games is that it uses the Great Book of Nature intro and outro, except now there's a Korean title(!!) instead of the English one in front of the hardcover book, and the English dialogues are re-dubbed; some of the voices are more obnoxious.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=0Em-X0LT-94
Also, in all these shows and films that have in-house North Korean animation dubbed in English, all original music is replaced by compositions of John Sposito, Italian composer who has worked on numerous Mondo TV originals. I assume they did that partly maybe because they couldn't obtain the dialogueless audio due to the original masters' age. Music of him that's heard in these, has also been used in newer Mondo TV productions, such as the Cat Leopold reboot. (for those of you wondering what this CPM Cinematografica company listed under "Music" in the end credits of some of these shows, I scrutinized the web, and I believe it's John Sposito's music publisher) The only adaptation that retains the original soundtrack is Little Bear.

The video in a few of these Mondo TV distributions is worse than in the original version, from what I see; take for example a look at Young Fisherman & Black Dragon (in Korean). The first is a rip from KCTV and the second one is an upload from one of the YouTube channels that distribute Mondo TV material (Little Bear is also available in Korean on the Asian Mondo World channel, meaning that Mondo TV also holds distribution rights to the productions in their original language).

A short production that in my opinion stands out from the rest is 새로 사귄 동무 (2004). It was included on Happy Adventures as episode 9, under the title Animate Toys. Since it's SEK's first computer-animated short and revolves around toys, I guess it's a rip-off of Toy Story. The Korean title also translates to A new companion.

As far as voice acting goes, these dubs are the equivelant of 4Kids's anime dubs. However, unlike 4Kids, the folks over Mondo TV are so cheap that they don't even bother to localize the on-screen Korean text. Also, the only two adaptations where there are detailed end credits (that mention in great detail directors, animators etc.) instead of the usual Mondo TV ones (which list Matteo Corradi as planner, Valentina Maselli as script writer, Gian Claudio Galatori as production director etc.), are Little Bear and Prince Moon and Princess Sun.

The one of these productions I have watched a lot is Great Book of Nature. It's a pretty innocent and colorful show to watch every once in a while, though the pacing may bore the audience.
Brave Soldiers has the 4Kids cast dubbing it.

I don't know where exactly these other ones were dubbed, but I think Great Book of Nature may have been partly done in Montreal.
 
Brave Soldiers has the 4Kids cast dubbing it.

I don't know where exactly these other ones were dubbed, but I think Great Book of Nature may have been partly done in Montreal.
At the end credits of Little Bear, Brave Soldiers and Happy Adventures, New York-based Audioworks Producers Group is listed as the dubbing studio; on the latter two, its founder Kip Kaplan is credited as the dubbing director.

I don't understand why Mondo TV doesn't bother to list the voice actors on these adaptations at all. To top it all off, on The Great Book of Nature and its subsequent international versions (minus the Italian one), there are zero credits at the intro and outro.
 
At the end credits of Little Bear, Brave Soldiers and Happy Adventures, New York-based Audioworks Producers Group is listed as the dubbing studio; on the latter two, its founder Kip Kaplan is credited as the dubbing director.

I don't understand why Mondo TV doesn't bother to list the voice actors on these adaptations at all. To top it all off, on The Great Book of Nature and its subsequent international versions (minus the Italian one), there are zero credits at the intro and outro.
Cheap, non-union dubs traditionally never credit the voice actors, and if they do, it's under pseudonyms. Of course, there are other ways to tell where a show was dubbed, like listing the voice director, but Mondo TV doesn't even usually do that.

When that fails, of course, you have to listen, which is how I figured out some of these were done in Montreal. Take this one:


Doesn't one of the butterflies have the same voice as Buster from Arthur?

(The cartoon, incidentally, is 1976's The Butterfly and the Cock, adapted from a fairy tale supposedly told by Kim Il-Sung himself.)
 
These shows and films are also available in other languages:
The Great Book of Nature (Arabic, Greek, Italian, Russian, European Spanish)
Toy Toons (Arabic, Bulgarian, Greek, Russian, European Spanish)
Bug's Adventures (Arabic, Bulgarian, French, Greek, Russian, European Spanish)
Happy Adventures (Arabic, Bulgarian, French, European Spanish)
Animal Games (European Spanish)
The Little Bear (Bulgarian, French, European Spanish)
Brave Soldiers (European Spanish)
Young Fisherman and Black Dragon (none)
Prince Moon and Princess Sun (Arabic)
Enchanted Mountain (Arabic)

While I don't get why that many YouTube channels have the rights to Mondo TV shows (since if a cartoon is once upload then uploading it twice is pointless), other than because they are cheap,
1. some channels of a particular language tend to have films and shows that others of the same don't have
2. there can be cases where videos get taken down
3. there are some country restrictions, from what I can gather.
Therefore, I collected these links below:
Main MONDO WORLD channel:
The Great Book of Nature (Arabic, Greek, Russian, European Spanish)
Toy Toons (Arabic, Bulgarian, Greek, Russian, European Spanish)
Bug's Adventures (Arabic, Bulgarian, French, Greek, Italian, Russian, European Spanish)
Happy Adventures (Arabic, Bulgarian, French, European Spanish)
Animal Games (European Spanish)
The Little Bear (Bulgarian)
Brave Soldiers (European Spanish)
Prince Moon and Princess Sun (Arabic)
Enchanted Mountain (Arabic, Russian)

KIDFLIX channels:
Young Fisherman and Black Dragon (European Spanish)
Prince Moon and Princess Sun (Arabic, European Spanish)
Enchanted Mountain (Arabic, European Portuguese, Russian, European Spanish)
The Queen of the Swallows

NAN Toons:
Young Fisherman and Black Dragon (Arabic, Italian, European Spanish)
Prince Moon and Princess Sun (Arabic, European Spanish)
Enchanted Mountain (Arabic, European Portuguese, Russian, European Spanish)
The Queen of the Swallows (Arabic)

Digital Minds (Greece) kids channels:
The Great Book of Nature (Arabic, Greek)
Toy Toons (Arabic, Greek)
Bug's Adventures (Arabic, Greek)
Happy Adventures (Arabic)
The Little Bear
Young Fisherman and Black Dragon
(Arabic, Greek)
Prince Moon and Princess Sun (Arabic, Greek)
The Queen of the Swallows (Arabic)

There are also Greek dubs of Animal Games and Brave Soldiers, according to this pdf by a former Greek distributor, but they have yet to be uploaded.

Ok, so I used https://watannetwork.com/tools/blocked/ to see where are some of these videos restricted. For the most part, they are banned in these countries:
IMG_20210207_133048.JPG

I don't get why Greece and Turkey are there since they have their own themed Mondo World channels. Some aren't banned at all (including a lot on the main Mondo channel), and others are also banned in the United States, Canada, Denmark and Bolivia.

There's also this old Russian dub of Prince Moon and Princess Sun that Mondo TV has acquired; unlike the rest, which are all dubs of the adaptations commissioned by Mondo, this used the original Korean version as a source.

Turns out there also two other SEK animated films Mondo TV distributed: Enchanted Mountain, based on the Korean legend, and The Queen of Swallows, based on the Heungbu and Nolbu fairy tale. These two, Prince Moon and Princess Sun and Young Fisherman and Black Dragon, are all uploaded on NAN Toons in their original versions.


Some links:

Toy Toons and Bug's Adventures to be presented at MIPCOM in 1999

A (scrapped) theme song for The Great Book of Nature, sung by Paola Granatelli. All versions of the final show retain only the instrumental.
 
I'm genuinely surprised that animation has such a large presence in NK. Maybe I'm just prejudiced because I thought it wasn't allowed unless it towed the party line.
Most Communist countries had state-owned animation studios back in the day that, for the most part, didn't produce propaganda (though they did do that), and did produce a lot of stuff that's very well-remembered.

The thing about North Korea's state studio, however, is that its cartoons, for years, were probably the most old-fashioned in the Communist bloc. Take a look at this one:


As you can see there's a date on it - 1989 (Pyongyang hosted the World Festival of Youth and Students that year), but it looks like something that would have been made 40 years before. Soviet cartoons from the same period look so much more advanced - so do those made in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary...

But given that the North Koreans considered even Soviet and Chinese stuff to be ideologically suspicious...
 
Most Communist countries had state-owned animation studios back in the day that, for the most part, didn't produce propaganda (though they did do that), and did produce a lot of stuff that's very well-remembered.

The thing about North Korea's state studio, however, is that its cartoons, for years, were probably the most old-fashioned in the Communist bloc. Take a look at this one:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=o8XifOkAArI
As you can see there's a date on it - 1989 (Pyongyang hosted the World Festival of Youth and Students that year), but it looks like something that would have been made 40 years before. Soviet cartoons from the same period look so much more advanced - so do those made in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary...

But given that the North Koreans considered even Soviet and Chinese stuff to be ideologically suspicious...
Yep, they're not very open to new ideas and keep recycling the same look/approach they've been using for over 60 years.
 
As you can see there's a date on it - 1989 (Pyongyang hosted the World Festival of Youth and Students that year), but it looks like something that would have been made 40 years before. Soviet cartoons from the same period look so much more advanced - so do those made in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary...
I had never heard of this festival so I looked it up afterwards with the assumption that there were no Americans present, particularly after the bit were the evil American stand-in is defeated by North Korean missiles doves of peace. Only to discover that we sent around 100 delegates there. They must've hated having us there.

And I won't go so far as to say it looks like it was made in the 40's, but it definitely looks like it could've been a product of the mid to late 50's or 60's.
 
I had never heard of this festival so I looked it up afterwards with the assumption that there were no Americans present, particularly after the bit were the evil American stand-in is defeated by North Korean missiles doves of peace. Only to discover that we sent around 100 delegates there. They must've hated having us there.
It was a Communist-sponsored youth festival that was held every few years somewhere in the Eastern Bloc. Of course there weren't many attendees from the capitalist states... much less the U.S.

It's still going on today, in fact, but it's not as big as it used to be.
 
It was a Communist-sponsored youth festival that was held every few years somewhere in the Eastern Bloc. Of course there weren't many attendees from the capitalist states... much less the U.S.

It's still going on today, in fact, but it's not as big as it used to be.
Reminded some footage from this festival can be found on YouTube but I do like this one of a guy jamming on a keyboard at a store during the festival!
 
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