Please do watch the above and have your mind gently blown before reading the following. But you might want to wait…
I had never heard of the Czech-born International cartoon legends Pat & Mat until today. It’s very likely that you had not either. I discovered them while trying to find some fun new games for my son to play – browsing the offerings in the Steam Autumn Sale. He’s five, and he loves Pajama Sam and puzzles. There do not seem to be a ton of age-appropriate point-and-click adventure games for him out there currently. We mostly pick up older games that will still run in the classic environment on his iMac. It’s one of the last ones that Apple made that will still support it. So, at some point I stumbled on the Steam page for the Pat & Mat game. Oh no! This doesn’t seem to work right! Can we fix it?
The description makes a big point of playing up the international brand recognition of these two schlubs that I had never heard of nor seen before. Google power to the rescue and it is little wonder why. Despite having logged 78 episodes in over a quarter of a century and being shown worldwide (apparently being quite popular in most of the middle east and even Iceland!), they have somehow skipped any sort of US TV programming or video release. You can score More Pat & Mat – Series Two [Region 2]
The shorts are astounding. They are mind-rendingly funny. The two clear animated decedents of the show in both style and content are Bob The Builder (Which could be read as an elaborate apologia of it’s Slavic ancestor) and Wallace & Gromit, which pays clear homage in several moments, especially Wallace’s chin-grabbing pondering.
The short I picked to show above brought many great attempts at audio art to mind, including the various vinyl-de(con)structive releases by the Haters. Remember the slab of vinyl, needle and set of instructions LP they did? No? Ok…
Seriously, whoever can sell me the North American distribution rights to these cartoons, please get in touch soon. Oh, was that too crass? Sorry. Have a happy Macy’s Day.
