Octonauts

Octonauts is an animated children's television series produced by Sony Pictures Television Kids for the BBC's CBeebies network. It is based on the children's books written by Meomi, the design team of Vicki Wong and Michael C. Murphy.
The show follows an underwater exploring crew made up of stylised anthropomorphic animals, a team of eight adventurers who live in an undersea base, the Octopod, from which they go on undersea adventures with the help of a fleet of aquatic vehicles. Although its technology is fictional, the exotic creatures and locations that the crew encounter are based on real marine animals in their natural habitats. The show's subject matter has been compared to that of Star Trek and Thunderbirds blended with Jacques Cousteau.
The show was animated in Ireland by Brown Bag Films for its first four series. The show was renewed for a fifth series in 2018, with Canada's Mainframe Studios taking over animation work. A Netflix-original spinoff, subtitled Above & Beyond, was released in September 2021, and featured the Octonauts venturing onto more land-based habitats of the natural world.
In March 2023, five new episodes under the original Octonauts branding and format were released via the BBC iPlayer.

Characters

Main characters

The Octonauts, consisting of the Octopod crew and captain, are the recurring main characters.

Name	Rank	Species	Voice cast	Description
Barnacles	Captain	Polar bear	Simon Greenall Ross Breen	Barnacles is the brave polar bear captain of the Octonauts. He knows how to drive any vehicle and is strong enough to lift a giant clam. However, despite his bravery, it was revealed in The Caves of Sac Actun that he was claustrophobic. Catchphrases: "Octonauts, let's do this!", "Sound the Octo-Alert!", "Octonauts, to your stations!", "Octonauts, to the HQ / launch bay!" and "Hold on, this could get bumpy!".
Kwazii	Lieutenant and Cryptozoologist	Cat	Rob Rackstraw	A cat who speaks in a Cockney accent. Kwazii is a daredevil cat with a mysterious pirate past. He believes in many sea monsters such as the Nackerwhack, Tri-Toothed-Terror, Giant Shrimp Monster and Monster of Creepy Cove. He likes to drive fast in the Gup-B. In the episode "The Octonauts and the Giant Spider Crab", it reveals that he has a fear of spiders. Catchphrases: "Shiver me whiskers" and "Yeow!".
Peso	Medic	Penguin	Paul Panting Wayne Grayson	He is a penguin with a British accent and the medic of the Octonauts. He is not fond of scary situations, but if someone is hurt or in trouble he can be the bravest Octonaut of all. He has a younger brother called Pinto. Catchphrase: "Flappity flippers!".
Inkling	Oceanographer and Founder	Dumbo octopus	Keith Wickham	An octopus who speaks in a posh accent. Inkling brought the Octonauts together, to study the oceans and have adventures. Catchphrase: "Fascinating!"
Shellington	Biologist	Sea otter	Keith Wickham	A sea otter who speaks with a Scottish accent. Dr. Shellington is a biologist who assists the Octonauts on missions. He is not a very good driver and once crashed the GUP-D. Catchphrase: "Jumping jellyfish!" and "Fascinating".
Tweak	Engineer	Rabbit	Jo Wyatt Jaimie Kelton	A rabbit who speaks with a Southern-US accent. Tweak lives and works in the launch bay. She often invents things like the GUP-X, GUP-S, the Octo-Max suit and the Friend Finder she made for her friend, Sandy the leatherback sea turtle. She often refers to Captain Barnacles as "Cap". Catchphrases: "Right away, Cap!", "...faster than you can say 'buncha munchy crunchy carrots'!", and "Oh, me, oh, my!".
Dashi	Computer programmer and photographer	Dog	Teresa Gallagher Mary Murphy Jenny Yokobori	A dog who speaks with an Australian accent. Dashi is the photographer for the Octonauts and takes care of all the computers aboard the Octopod. She's also a professional surfer. Catchphrase: "Already on it, Captain!"
Tunip	Chef and Horticulturist	Vegimal	Michael C. Murphy	Tunip is half-tuna, half-turnip, but has the outward appearance of a harbour seal mixed with a turnip. He loves to make kelp cakes and work in the greenhouse. He often faints at shocking news. Tunip the Vegimal is the Octonauts' head cook and gardener. He is a Vegimal, a half-animal, half-vegetable creature capable of breathing on land as well as underwater. Tunip is very childish and innocent, always wanting to help the Octonauts in any way he can. He is the smallest main character in the Octonauts crew. Aside from cooking the meals, Tunip works in the garden, cultivating vegetables he can use to cook meals. His two favourite meals are fish biscuits and kelp cakes. Tunip, like all Vegimals, speaks Vegimalese. Since he was born, his first words were "Cheepa cheepa!, Cheepa cheepa!" and "Zuupa zuupa!"

Vegimals

Vegimals are half-animal, half-vegetable creatures. The vegimals were discovered by Shellington as eggs attached to the side of the Octopod. To protect them he brought them into his lab, where they hatched a few days later. After a few weeks, they established themselves as an integral part of the crew. They primarily speak Vegimalese, a language made of chirps and warbles, though they also speak a limited amount of English. Shellington is the only Octonaut who has some fluency in Vegimalese.

Name	Taxonomy	Description
Albachoy	half-bok choy and half-albacore
Barrot	half-bass, half-carrot.	Although nervous, he can go super fast in an emergency.
Carprika	half-paprika and half-carp
Charchard	half-chard and half-char
Codish	half-cod, half-radish.	He is very clumsy and also causes accidents.
Grouber	half-grouper, half-tuber.	He is big and can eat almost anything.
Halibeet	half-beet and half-halibut
Maccoli	half-broccoli and half-mackerel
Perchkin	half-pumpkin and half-perch
Pikato	half-tomato and half-pike
Tominnow	half-minnow, half-tomato.	She is the littlest one, but she is also a daredevil.
Tunip	half-tuna, half-turnip.	He is a recurring main character.
Salepeño	half-jalapeño and half-salmon
Sharchini	half-zucchini, half-shark
VegiBot	a vegimal robot
Wallabaga	half-rutabaga and half-walleye
Yamchovy	half-anchovy and half-yam

Minor characters

Vehicles

Books

The original books were first published in the US by Immedium in 2006 and were republished in the UK by HarperCollins in 2009. Six titles by Meomi have been published:

The Octonauts & the Only Lonely Monster, about an Architeuthis.
The Octonauts & the Sea of Shade, about a world where everyone's shadows have gone missing.
The Octonauts & the Frown Fish, about a glum-looking catfish.
The Octonauts & the Great Ghost Reef, about coral bleaching.
The Octonauts Explore the Great Big Ocean, about the search for the home of Tunip the Vegimal.
The Octonauts & the Growing Goldfish, about Dunkie, a giant goldfish who won't stop growing.

A series of shorter books based on individual episodes from the TV series is being published by Simon & Schuster.
These titles can be distinguished by the "As seen on TV" label on the covers and are not written or illustrated by Meomi. The books have the same titles as the episodes they are based on.

History

In 2010, The Octonauts was adapted into a 52-episode CGI animated television series co-produced by Chorion and Brown Bag Films. It first aired in the UK on 4 October 2010 on CBeebies, a BBC television channel for children under 7. The first series ended in February 2011 but continued to be aired as repeats. A second series of 22 episodes commenced in November 2012.
The Octonauts had its US premiere on the Disney Channel on 9 January 2012 In September 2014, Silvergate Media announced its sale of season 4 to the Disney Channel, to be aired in 2015. In Australia, in 2014, the Octonauts became the second most-watched children's TV show in the country, seen daily on ABC2 by 257,000 viewers nationally. By season 4, the Octonauts had been picked up in more than 100 countries, including RTÉ Two, Treehouse TV, ABC Television, TF1, SuperRTL, CCTV, Karusel, Disney Junior, and SVT.
The show has been translated and shown in French, Spanish and Portuguese, Finnish, Welsh, and Slovakian. The series was made with the help of marine biologists Dr. Lara A. Ferry-Graham and Dr. Michael H. Graham, who had previously worked on Finding Nemo.

Episodes

The TV show is episodic, with each 11-minute episode seeing them encountering an unusual but real sea creature as they explore strange underwater worlds. Often they must discover a vital biological or behavioral fact about that creature to rescue it or themselves from danger. The stories usually feature three main characters: Captain Barnacles, Kwazii, and Peso, with the other five Octonauts acting in supporting roles.
The opening theme tune finishes with the chant "Explore! – Rescue! – Protect!", the Octonauts' motto.

Creature Reports

Creature Reports are one-minute, musical, poem-like sequences that recap the facts learned about the sea creature that the Octonauts encountered in the associated episode. In the UK, these were shown as separately scheduled items, but in the American version, they were used after each regular episode. The exception is the episode of "The Surfing Snails", where it was replaced with a surf rock song called, "Surf's Up, Bubbles Up ".
The Creature Report's addictive, repetitive nature has been postulated to have psychological benefits. For children, it provides a sense of predictability that promotes good feelings and mental balance. For adults, it provides a sense of virtual participation via the principle of involuntary musical imagery.
The initial working title of the 2017 American superhero film Thor: Ragnarok was Creature Report, a reference to the Octonauts, which acted as the movie production's code word.

Video services

Seasons of The Octonauts are available on variety of streaming and direct purchase video services.

Streaming services

Direct purchase services

and Microsoft Store organise their episodes into packages, similar to the region 4 DVD titles.

Package	Episodes
Meet the Octonauts	Series 1
To the Gups!	Series 1
Ready for Action!	Series 1
Sound the Octoalert!	Series 1
Jumpin' Jelly Fish	Series 1
Shiver me Whiskers	Series 1
The Great Penguin Race	Series 1 & Special 1
GUP X to the Rescue!	Series 2 & Special 2
Amazon Adventure	Series 2 & Special 3
Calling All Gups!	Series 2
Deep Sea Adventures!	Series 2 & Season 3 & Special 4
Flappity Flippers	Series 2, Season 3
Great Arctic Adventure	Series 2, Season 3 & Special 7
Here Come the Vegimals	Series 3 & Special 5
Over Under Adventure	Series 3 & Special 6
The Great Swamp Search	Series 4 & Special 9
Octopod Mystery	Series 4
Operation Deep Freeze	Series 4 & Special 8
ABC Kids	Series 4

Reception

The TV series was well received when shown on CBeebies in the UK and by ABC in Australia. According to the authors' website, it was the No. 1 pre-school age show in the UK, and the first pre-school show to be ranked in the top ten by older audiences. The show was the top-ranked ABC programme for 5- to 12-year-olds in January 2011 in Australia, with the ABC calling its first month an "unprecedented success online and on-air". The Octonauts DVD boxset was the 4th best-selling Children's TV DVD at Amazon UK as of 7 April 2013.

Awards and nominations

In 2013, Octonauts was nominated for two awards: an International Emmy Award in the "Kids—Preschool" category
and an Irish Film and Television Award in the "Best Children's/Youth Programme" category.
In 2017, the series took home the Annie Award for Best Animated Television Production in the Preschool category for the episode "Operation: Deep Freeze".

Year	Award	Category	Nominee	Result
2011	British Academy Children's Awards	Pre-School Animation	Octonauts	Nomitated
2013	International Emmy Award	Kids-Preschool	Octonauts	Nomitated
2013	11th Irish Film & Television Awards	Children's/Youth Programme	Octonauts	Won
2013	British Academy Children's Awards	Pre-School Animation	Octonauts	Nomitated
2017	45th Annie Awards	Best Animated Television Production	"Operation: Deep Freeze"	Won
2018	British Academy Children's Awards	Pre-School Animation	Octonauts	Nomitated

Films

In 2020, two new movies were released on Netflix: on 14 August, The Octonauts Movie: The Caves of Sac Actun and on 13 October, The Octonauts & the Great Barrier Reef. In 2021, The Octonauts Movie: The Ring of Fire was released 30 March on Netflix in the United States.

Spin-offs

The Octonauts brand has been licensed by the production company for numerous spin-off activities. These include Octonauts Rollercoaster Adventure, a themed rollercoaster within the CBeebies Land of Alton Towers theme park and themed bedrooms with the CBeebies Land Hotel. There is also a travelling live show called Octonauts Live, which has toured in the U.S. and other countries.
An Octonauts app was launched for iOS on 17 November 2016, produced in partnership with Night and Day Studios.
A spin off series, titled Octonauts: Above and Beyond, premiered on 7 September 2021, with the full first episode being released on YouTube on 25 August. Rather than an aquatic setting, Above and Beyond features the crew exploring and assisting in natural habitats such as forests and deserts; essentially all terrestrial habitats.
In 2024, a new spin-off set in China aired exclusively on Chinese broadcast stations, with no news for an international release date.

Channels

Other links