Well then this is something that really did sneak up on us then didn't it thirty years ago a man and his dog landed on the moon and in the process stole our hearts. Ladies and gents as you might have guessed from the title thirty years ago this year Wallace And Gromit first debuted on UK screens and well since I like many of you grew up with the famous duo I thought that i'd take a look back at what they've been up as well as possibly tease you with their future.
As we all know the duo's first short film was called A Grand Day out and even tho it was released in 1989 it was first being made five years earlier in 1982. That's because the film started out as a film school project for creator and British animation legend Nick Park it was during that final year at film school that he invited Aardman founders Peter Lord and David Sproxton to give a talk at his school which they did and sometime later while still not having finished A Grand Day Out Nick was invited by the duo to finish the film at Aardman Studios to which both he and the school agreed to do.
Over the years the duo would star in four short films each around thirty minuets in length but in 2005 the duo went Hollywood. Altho this wasn't the first feature done by Aardman Animations that honour goes to Chicken Run it was their first film in which characters from the public already knew and loved and I have to say that i'm a huge fan of this film and I honestly that it's a must watch for any Aardman and Wallace And Gromit fan.
The duo have also been known to have an influence in the real world as well because in the early nineties Wensleydale cheese was about to close down due to poor sales. That all changed tho when the Wallace And Gromit shorts started because Wallace loves cheese and the cheese he loved the most is Wensleydale and due to those shorts being so popular the factory making them was saved and has been going strong every since in fact in 2005 when The Curse Of Were-Rabbit was being released Wensleydale sales went up again by twenty three percent.
Now i'm sorry if this post seems all over the place I didn't plan on doing it in fact I didn't even know it was there anniversary year but bare with me. I'd say that the most well known of the four short films is The Wrong Trousers and I say that because both The Wrong Trousers and A Close Shave won OSCARS and honestly it's not hard to see why because it is a fun short film with a ton of jokes and a great plot.
In fact there's a scene in this short that is actually quite well known and that's the capture of the villain Feathers Mcgraw. If i'm right that whole sequence starting with him flying and ending up with him landing in the milk bottle won an award for every single frame and it's the one scene that alot of people think of when they think of Wallace And Gromit and this is the one short film that they think of as well.
Now then this is something that not alot of people know about but there was a few Wallace And Gromit TV series the first being called Wallace and Gromit's Cracking Contraptions which was a series of ten episodes with each length being up to three minuets and would show some of the duo's other inventions. The second was called Wallace and Gromit's World of Invention which would show of inventions in the real world and would feature the duo in a side plot which would tie into the theme of the episode.
The duo also kind of did a concert and I say kind of because it was done for BBC Proms and it was called Wallace & Gromit's Musical Marvels and it's also known as Wallace & Gromit at the Proms. To be frank there's no real reason for anyone to watch this unless your a fan of the music there is kind of a plot about Wallace composing a piece of music but that's really it it's nothing really that special and that's all I can say about it.
As with anything popular there's a spin off series that's right ladies and gents Shaun The Sheep is a Wallace And Gromit spin off since the character of Shaun was first introduced in A Close Shave. The character and the show proved to be so popular that it not only spawned it's own spin off Timmy Time but also a feature film with a second one just being released so technically there's a Wallace And Gromit Cinematic Universe out there.
The duo have also made it a habit of appearing in many comic books over the years and since i've never even heard of the comic books I can't say if there any good or not. I can say that a 2005 comic book did sort of act as a sequel to the feature film which is kind of cool and from 2010 to 2013 the characters would appear daily in a comic strip published in The Sun newspaper and I have no idea why the strip was cancelled either but it's good to see that the characters are still going strong.
Now then we've seen where the characters have been and it was while doing to quick and I do mean quick research for this post that I came across this post from this year. It looks like we might be getting some new Wallace And Gromit content within the next five years I must stress that the post doesn't say if this means a new feature film or a new short film it just means that we can expect to see our favourite cheese loving inventor and his dog sometime soon.