Seeking: One Small Girl Lost on a Robot Planet

[NikZane]

Being a rather resourceful bunch, I hoping that someone can help me out here. I'm trying to find the name of an animated series I watched once, and my memory of it is rather sketchy, so please forgive the description I give as it may be somewhat inaccurate. Here goes...

I saw this series many moons ago on the ABC channel in Australia. It consisted of a small orange (or was it blonde?) haired girl, and possibley her dog, who were both stranded on a planet of robots. She befriended a bunch of the "good guy" robots, which from memory were of varying designs. The most recognizable feature however that may jog someones memory, is the design of the bad guys. They were short and squat, awkward looking little robots with big heads in the shape of a kind of squashed bell, or upside down bucket. A little like the Darth Vader helmet, but more Space Balls looking, as they were oversized in proportion to the bodies. I think there was a small (ned-kelly like) slot thru which their eyes could see.

There was a "leader" type character for the bad guys (same design), who was rather comical and commanded armies of these little squat bad guys. I think I remember there being black and white armies of them.

I'm pretty sure the good guys were mostly grey and didn't have the same upside down bucket heads. I think they were all different shapes and varying sizes, almost like "junkyard" robots; small ones, large ones, skinny ones etc. I do remember them be repressed for whatever reason by the bad guys however (that's what bad guys do best after all ).

The little girl was the main character of the series and I think she was trying to leave the planet and find a way to return to Earth, but I'm really not sure on this either.

I know all that's pretty vague, and probably completely innaccurate, but I'm hoping that perhaps there's some key element in there that may spark someones memory. To date, I have not yet met anyone else who remembers this animated series, except for (ironically) my girlfriend, who once given my vague description, knew exactly the series I was talking about, and had also been trying to remember, or find someone to help her remember, it's name.

We both have memories of it being a lovely tale, and somewhat sad considering it's (familiar) issues: a little girl lost in a foreign world and a struggling culture of repressed robots dominated by an evil, facist regime.

 

[Don'tLiveonMoon]

I don't have any recollection of this show (well, it might not have even played in the US) but I did some looking around and it sounds like the show you're looking for is "Robostory," which I guess was originally a French cartoon. This is the poorly translated version of the theme song, from French to English:

Robostory

Refrain:
Mirtille with the country of the robots
Tender P' tite girl like a bird
Pretty, with the gilded hair all
She likes to be made like

Loufi his/her faithful companion
Puppy, confidant caramel
He is a little rascal, malignant
It is a joker the air of nothing

Mirtille discovered a planet
It is the green planet
It learns with these friendly robots
What is the world, which is the life

Mirtille has the heart full with tenderness
Very full with kindness
It is perhaps a little shameless
But it is which makes that she is liked!

Refrain

It is the history of malicious robots
And even affectionate
Fatties and of all the colors
P' **** robots, which have a heart

Of course there are always the retords
Who do not know that they are wrong
They would like to destroy all our friends
Fortunately, there is Mirtille!

Refrain

As in all the beautiful fairy tales
There is the love, the friendship
And there is in Robostory
Machines which include/understand the life

Refrain

Refrain

Loufi with Mirtille
Mirtille with Loufi
It is the life of Robostory
Ouah!

Erin

 

[NikZane]

That's it!!! That's it!!! Thank you!!! Thank you!!!

Nice work Erin, you are a LEGEND!!!

A google search on Robostory doesn't yield much except for the theme song transcript you found, and a bunch of other people writing to forums asking the same question. I found a promo picture which looks like the cover of a magazine, but I was really hoping for some more pictures, or perhaps video/dvd links (yeh right). Sadly, this seemingly much loved cartoon appears to have been a once off, likely never to reappear. Shame.

Thanks again Erin, you have no idea how much of a relief it is to finally know the title of this animation!

 

[Don'tLiveonMoon]

That's it!!! That's it!!! Thank you!!! Thank you!!!

Nice work Erin, you are a LEGEND!!!

A google search on Robostory doesn't yield much except for the theme song transcript you found, and a bunch of other people writing to forums asking the same question. I found a promo picture which looks like the cover of a magazine, but I was really hoping for some more pictures, or perhaps video/dvd links (yeh right). Sadly, this seemingly much loved cartoon appears to have been a once off, likely never to reappear. Shame.

Thanks again Erin, you have no idea how much of a relief it is to finally know the title of this animation!

Glad I could be of help! It's a bummer that they didn't make it available on video though.
Erin

 

[rwgray]

WRITE TO Cosgrove Hall Films (politely) about dvd:
animation@chf.co.uk
They did the English language version;
They might just take notice!!

 

[NikZane]

Wow, neat! Thanks rwgray, I'll do that.

Man, it's been a gazillion years since I wandered these parts of the internets, possibly more. It's lucky I'm still getting random reply notifications, else I would have totally missed your message!

Thanks again

 

[NikZane]

Hello 15 years later! For some reason I just found myself trawling through these old (ancient?) forum posts, had a read through this thread and went onto Youtube and did a search. Someone by the name of Sarah Avory has uploaded a bunch of episodes of this show and created a playlist. Enjoy!