Pingu in the City
Pingu in the City is a Japanese animated children's television series co-produced by Mattel Creations, NHK, NHK Enterprises, and Polygon Pictures. It is a spin-off/continuation of the stop-motion television series Pingu. The series first aired on NHK Educational TV in Japan from to.
Premise
The series was adapted from the famous stop-motion animated series Pingu, which was created in 1986 by Otmar Gutmann and Erika Brueggemann for the SRF in Switzerland. In this series, Pingu and his family move from their home in the Antarctic to a large city, where the inhabitants are all very different. The mischievous and curious Pingu makes a big effort to help the citizens with their jobs, but his attempts to do so often result in trouble.Production
The series is co-produced by American company Mattel Creations and Japanese companies NHK, NHK Enterprises and Polygon Pictures, with animation produced by DandeLion Animation Studios in the same style as the original stop-motion series through computer-animation. and distributed across the world by Sony Creative Products, the Japanese license holders for the Pingu franchise.It was directed by Naomi Iwata and written by both Kimiko Ueno and Shigenori Tanabe, with music by Ken Arai. It features voices by Ryota Iwasaki and Fumiya Tanaka, in a similar style to Carlo Bonomi, David Sant, and Marcello Magni, who voiced characters in the original series.
A second season premiered from October 6, 2018 to March 30, 2019.
International airings
The series was first screened outside of Japan at the MIPJunior 2017 event at Cannes. In Australia, the show premiered on June 4, 2018 on ABC Kids. In the United States, the show was first screened at the Chicago International Television Festival and the 2018 Animation Block Party.In October 2018, Sony Creative Products sub-licensed distribution rights to the series to Sony Music Entertainment España for Latin America and most of Europe.
In the United Kingdom, the show premiered on February 25, 2019 on ITVBe's preschool block LittleBe. In Brazil, the show premiered in April 2019 through the preschool channel Gloobinho. On Hop! Channel in Israel, the show premiered in summer 2019.