A Town Called Panic


A Town Called Panic is a 2002-2003 French-language Belgian stop-motion sitcom created by Stéphane Aubier and Vincent Patar for La Parti and Pic Pic André. It follows the everyday events of the characters Cowboy, Indian and Horse who live together in a small rural town as they go about their lives. The animation is designed to appear crude, as if done by a child and the events of the characters' daily lives are extremely surreal and slapstick.
The first Panique au village was a 4-minute short film premiered in 1991. Its concept was developed into a television series, which was first broadcast from 2002 to 2003 and consists of 20 episodes each of roughly 5 minutes long. An English-language dub of the television series episodes was created and sold internationally by Aardman Animations.
Since then, a spinoff feature film, again titled A Town Called Panic, was completed in spring 2009 and debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in May of the same year. In 2013, the half-hour Christmas special "The Christmas Log" was made, which received an English dub that aired on CBBC in 2014 under the title "A Christmas Panic". The English dub for this special used different voice actors than the dub for the original series. In 2016 a new 3-minute short "The Noise of Grey" and later a second-half-hour special "Back to School!" were premiered, and a package film of "The Christmas Log" and "Back to School!" was released to cinemas worldwide under the name A Town Called Panic: Double Fun.
A Town Called Panic has been seen worldwide on channels such as ABC Rollercoaster in Australia, Nicktoons Network in the United States, EBS in South Korea, and Teletoon in Canada, and it was available online at Atom Films.
In the UK, A Town Called Panic aired on Nickelodeon. Much of the characters and scenery were later recycled for the Cravendale Milk adverts using a Pirate, a Cow and a bicyclist as the characters.

Characters

This is the list of major characters in the original 20-episode run, with short descriptions.
; Cowboy
Voiced By: Stéphane Aubier / David Holt
Cowboy is a toy figurine of a cowboy in a blue shirt and brown leather trousers, with a hat and, most of the time, a rifle. Cowboy is rather cowardly and not really bright, often getting himself into bad situations through his recklessness and childish behaviour. He has something of a sibling rivalry with Indian, and is intimidated by Horse.
; Indian
Voiced By: Bruce Ellison / Alan Marriott
Indian is a toy figurine of a stereotypical Native American tribal chief or elder, in a yellow shirt and brown leather trousers, with an elaborate and large feather headdress. He carries a ceremonial staff. Besides the usual standing position he is often seen in a Native American-style meditative pose. Other times he carries a bow and arrow. Indian is a little more mature than Cowboy, but still pursues foolhardy quests almost as much as his counterpart. He is also somewhat fearful of Horse. In the Christmas Special's English dub, his name is changed to Chief.
; Horse
Voiced By: Vincent Patar / Alexander Armstrong
Horse is a toy figurine of a brown horse. Although an animal, Horse is easily as intelligent as Cowboy and Indian and is the leader of the "family" he, Cowboy and Indian are part of. Even though he walks on all fours, he does most of the chores around their house, as both his charges are domestically useless. He maintains a cool head, doesn't engage in the foolish pursuits of Cowboy and Indian and keeps a semblance of normality in the house. When Cowboy and/or Indian infuriate him, he kicks them all over the house and usually into one of the walls, which is sufficient to keep the two in line most of the time. In the film, his birthday is June 21.
; Steven
Voiced By: Benoît Poelvoorde / John Sparkes
A farmer who owns the only other house in the village. Constantly yells, even when not angry, and is very possessive of his tractor.
; Jeanine
Voiced By: Lucy Montgomery
Steven's loving wife.
; Bernadette
Steven and Jeanine's daughter
; Policeman
Voiced By: David Holt
Lives in a guard shack by the side of the road that passes through the village.
; Farm animals
Various Voices
The animals on Steven's farm.
; The bear
Voiced By: Didier Odieu
This is a figurine of a black bear on its hind legs that chases many of the characters quite frequently, usually after having been disturbed by them from his sleep. It is never made clear if it is the same bear or a different one every time, though they all look the same.
; Robin Hood
Voiced By: David Holt
A hunter obviously parodied from the original Robin Hood stories. He is a peckish and sometimes extremely careless hunter who lives in a caravan in the woods. He can be recognised by his long blond hair, his green hunting clothes and his posh English accent, he carries an archery kit around with him.
; Simon
Simon is a citizen with orange hair, a green shirt, blue denim jeans and black boots, he lives alone in a strangely small shed that gets knocked down by Stevens red tractor in the episode "Cowboy goes Hunting". Simon is a fairly friendly man who occasionally appears in episodes, Simon is on neutral terms with Cowboy, Indian and Horse, never causing conflict with them. Simon is often shown doing odd jobs for Cowboy and Indian including managing the sound effects with Horse and Chicken in the episode "The Play", Simon lights a fire next to the microphone to give the illusion that Cowboy is about to get burnt alive in the play but the fire gets out of control and out of stress Simon faints and everyone has to evacuate the building, the barn completely burns down.

Episodes

Up to 24 November 2011, 20 episodes of "A Town Called Panic" had been made.
  1. "Cake" - Horse bakes a delicious cake, so Cowboy and Indian plan a midnight feast which is scuppered by the arrival of an angry bear.
  2. "Cow Hulk" - After Cowboy accidentally swallows a little pebble, things go out of hand when he suddenly turns into a caveman, gorilla, and a dinosaur.
  3. "The Easy Chair" - Cowboy cannot resist messing around with Horse's new lounger, which can change itself into a sun-bed, waffle-maker or Jacuzzi.
  4. "Still Life" - Indian decides to take up painting, but the flower he chooses as his first subject is stolen first by Jeanine, then by Steven, then by the Cow.
  5. "Lisa and Jan" - Two backpackers arrive in town, but Constable's attempts to find them somewhere to pitch their tent leads to a series of disasters.
  6. "Robin" - Robin's appalling archery skills result in Jeanine's kitchen catching fire. But when Bernadette gets the blame, her friends plot revenge.
  7. "Fox Hunt" - Cowboy and Indian are on the trail of the same fox, but when Cowboy incurs the wrath of a ferocious bison, trouble soon escalates.
  8. "A Grand Day Out" - Joseph takes Steven and his family on a day trip to see a farm run entirely by animals. But the place is not all that it seems.
  9. "Indian Treasure" - Horse and Indian send Cowboy off on a wild goose chase. But what lies at the end of their mysterious trail?
  10. "The Cycle Race" - Cowboy and Indian are determined to win the Cycling Cup, and they don't care what underhand means they use to achieve this.
  11. "Constable's Fantastic Voyage" - A mysterious time machine takes Constable back to medieval times. But has the town really changed?
  12. "Donkey Gets Kidnapped" - Cowboy and Indian lure Steven's animals into a glitzy disco, and take Donkey hostage in exchange for Steven's tractor.
  13. "The Big Sleep" - A series of bizarre accidents sends Cowboy, Indian and Horse to sleep for centuries, and they awake to find a strange new world.
  14. "Cowboy and Indian Go Camping" - Cowboy attempts to build a campfire while Indian goes off hunting, a sure-fire recipe for disaster.
  15. "The Picnic" - Horse digs up a bus containing the 1986 Mexican World Cup squad, who challenge our heroes to a bizarre soccer match.
  16. "The Card Thieves" - Steven's pack of cards is stolen, and the trail leads to the duckpond, and eventually to the underwater world of Atlantis.
  17. "Cowboy Goes Hunting" - Cowboy's attempts to bag a wild boar cause chaos when they end up concussing Steven at the wheel of his tractor.
  18. "Horse's Nephew" - When Horse's mischievous nephew Lawrence comes to stay, Cowboy and Indian get blamed for a series of naughty pranks.
  19. "Jeanine and Steven's Vacation" - Steven leaves Cowboy and Indian in charge of the farm, but the animals have plans for a vacation of their own.
  20. "The Play" - The townsfolk put on a play in Steven's barn. Simon is charge of the special effects, so does disastrous results.

    Availability

In the United States and Canada, the original 20 television episodes, the 2014 special "The Christmas Log", the 2016 short "The Noise of Grey" and the 2016 special "Back to School!" were released together on Blu-ray Disc under the title A Town Called Panic: The Collection by GKIDS on December 19, 2017. They have also released the series and specials on video on demand services.