Badger Badger Badger

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The opening badger scene of "Badger Badger Badger"

"Badger Badger Badger" or "Badgers" is a Flash cartoon by British animator Jonti Picking. It consists of images of badgers doing calisthenics, a toadstool in front of a tree, and a snake in the desert. Accompanied by electronic music, a voice drones "Badger, badger, badger" over the animation, breaking tone to point out either "Mushroom!" or "A snake!"^[1] One point of contention over the actual lyrics is exactly what the voice-over says at the beginning of the snake announcement; it sounds like "A naked snake!" or "a freakin' snake!" but has many other conjectures.

The cartoon, published 2 September 2003, loops indefinitely. The first two badger scenes contain twelve badgers; subsequent badger scenes contain eleven badgers. After a long running time, the song becomes out of sync with the animation. The animation was reportedly inspired by a page of A4 that Chris Hengler, one of Jonti Picking's friends, had scribbled some nonsense on.^[2]

The cartoon brought Picking to the attention of MTV Europe, for whom Picking produced Weebl and Bob.^[1] That cartoon series, together with the dancing badgers, helped Picking's website Weebl's Stuff win a People's Choice award from users of Yahoo! in the UK.^[3]

1 Follow-up versions
2 In popular culture
3 See also
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Follow-up versions

There have been several follow ups to the "Badger Badger Badger" cartoon, including editions with holiday themes and those that parody of major films.

Holiday specials include both Halloween and Christmas versions. The "Halloween Edition", known as "Badgers 2", was the first follow up, created in 2003. It features zombie badgers on a black background with a scratching sound added to the music.^[4] The next year, the "Christmas Edition" was debuted. The badgers wear Santa Claus hats in the snow. Rather than "badger badger badger", the music says, "Santa Santa Santa", "mushroom mushroom" becomes "presents presents", with a wrapped gift being shown, and an infant Jesus Christ in a manger is appears instead of the snake, set to "Hallelujah! Christ, it's a Christ, ooh, it's a Christ!"^[5]

Several films are also parodied, including The Lord of the Rings, Snakes on a Plane, and Transformers. "The Lord of the Rings Special Edition" is based on a scene from The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. In this version, the song says, "Aragorn, Aragorn, here come the badgers" and the snake has the eye of Sauron.^[6] "Badgers On A Plane" consists of a scene from a Snakes On a Plane trailer that includes badgers and a mushroom, which have been digitally edited into the scene, tumbling from their seats while a bit of the song plays in the background.^[7] In 2007, "Big Ass Badgers" was released to spoof the Transformers film.^[8]

A "Euro 2004 Edition" was also created during the UEFA Euro 2004 football championship, where the badgers wore England football jerseys to "footy, footy, footy" and "England! England! Goal! A goal! Oh, it's a goal, scored by England, England..."^[9]

[edit] In popular culture

[edit] On Television

On the CBBC television show Chute! the Badger Badger Badger song was shown in the episode with Ian Macneese. It was described as "something soothing and calm".

[edit] Parody animations

Andrew Kepple released a spoof of "Badger Badger Badger" called "Badger Badger Polka" with polka music in the background and the head of the badgers superimposed over the head of men wearing lederhosen doing calisthenics with a circus tent in background.^[10]
The Free State Project released "Porcupine Run", a cartoon featuring porcupines running for New Hampshire, which is based on the "Euro 2004 Edition".^[11]
Valerie Kaplan and Steve Singer produced a Narbonic-themed version called "Gerbil, Gerbil, Gerbil".^[12]
A group of artists put together a spoof of the Badger Badger Badger animation entitled "Potter Potter Potter", which features Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Severus Snape to the lyrics "Potter, Potter, Potter", "Weasley, Weasley!", and "Snape! Snape! Ooh, it's a Snape!"^[13]
A very similar cartoon was used by PETA, but it was later withdrawn after controversy aroused due to the striking similarities becoming widely known.^[14]

[edit] Allusions in the media

In Nickelodeon's Drake and Josh, Drake and Josh's school football team is called the Badgers, and a poster repeats the word badger numerous times.
The video series "Shortlist" made a clip on internet memes, listing the "Badger Badger Badger" animation as one of the top five internet fads of all time.^[15]
Brick Frenzy has a lego mechanized version of a badger moving his arms up and down to the tune briefly.^[16]
The animation has been referenced in the User Friendly comic several times in January 2004.^[17]^[18]^[19]^[20]
Musician Tom Smith performs a version of the music entitled "Badger Pajamas".^[21]
The arrangement of the bots is a subtle hint to the original animation in the top panel of Megatokyo 462: Tragic Deployments.^[22]
In the popular online community Gaiaonline, if you examine one of the police badges in the shop, it has the description, "Badge badge badge badge mushroom mushroom..." ^[23]

[edit] Other tributes

The London Red Bull Flugtag on June 7th 2008 featured Team Badger Badger Badger Badger, comprising of four people (Helen Crook, Alex Davis, Chris Sadler and Chris Perry) paying tribute to the track by jumping into the Serpentine lake in Hyde Park aboard an enormous flying badger (equipped with bi-plane wings) wearing badger, snake and mushroom masks, with Weebls Badger Badger Badger Badger music playing in the background. They came joint 17th out of a total of 40 competitors. ^[24] ^[25]