Postman Pat (Original 1981 TV series)

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This article is dedicated to John Cunliffe, the man behind Postman Pat (16 June 1933 - 20 September 2018), who passed away due to cardiopulmonary failure at age 85. And Ken Barrie, the voice of Pat and all of the characters of Greendale (9 January 1933 - 29 July 2016), who unfortunately passed away due to liver cancer at age 83. May both deliver well in peace.

Postman Pat is a British stop-motion animated children's television series first produced by Woodland Animations. The first season premiered in 1981 with 13 episodes. 15 years later, a second season was made in 1996 with another 13 episodes. The show would later be revived in 2004 and later ended in 2006. After that, the show would rebooted in 2008 under the name Special Delivery Service, which ended in 2017.

Postman Pat

🎵Postman Pat, Postman Pat, Postman Pat and his black and white cat🎵

Genre:	Children's animation
Running Time:	15 minutes
Country:	United Kingdom
Release Date:	16 September 1981 – 20 March 2006
Network(s):	CBeebies (United Kingdom) ABC Kids (Australia) Canal J, Piwi/Piwi+, Nickelodeon (France)
Created by:	John Cunliffe
Distributed by:	Entertainment Rights (2003-2008) DreamWorks Distribution (2013-Present)
Starring:	Ken Barrie Carol Boyd Lewis Macleod Kulvinder Ghir Archie Panjabi Angela Griffin Bradley Clarkson Dan Milne Joel Trill
Seasons:	5
Episodes:	106

Plot

The postman delivers his good mood as well as letters and parcels to the friendly village of Greendale. Postman Pat's trusty kitten Jess is always with him on his travels and adventures as they ride together in a little red van.

Why It Can Be Delivered Well

The show has wonderful and natural stop-motion animation.
- The animation in Season 1, whilst not the absolute best, is pretty good and impressive for a stop-motion animation show produced in 1981.
- Season 2's animation is a step up from the animation in Season 1, as it looks a lot more colourful, cleaner, and smoother.
- Despite being more fast-paced, the animation in Seasons 3-5 is very good at trying to replicate Season 2's animation.
One of the few unique elements show is that unlike Bob the Builder, Fireman Sam, Pingu and Thomas & Friends, this show tries to be more relaxing, calming and slower paced, which actually works pretty well and it manages to avoid from coming across as boring.
It takes the idea of a Postman delivering mail to everyone and greeting his daily neighbourhood, and uses it very well to create enjoyable 15 minute long episodes with good comedic timing and a timeless feel that while might seem boring at first, are actually worth it with solid writing and good morals for children. The show even manages to be enjoyable for both kids and adults as well.
The stories are simple and easy to understand yet very entertaining and well-paced.
Teaches valuable life lessons about being helpful and being kind to neighbors.
Greendale is a beautiful little town with lush green planets and nice little homes. It has a good mix of brown and grey colors and a 1970s aesthetic that makes it feel nostalgic. Overall, it makes for a perfect setting for the show.
Iconic and catchy theme song. In fact, the music in general is fun to listen to and very enjoyable. It has a massive timeless appeal that fits the relaxing tone of the series. Ken Barrie's amazing musical ability and good songwriting complimented it.
Not only was the show pretty popular, but it became one of the most famous British preschool shows of all time.
Pat is a great postman and a likable person. He knows and does what's best for everyone. He makes sure everyone has their mail delivered by the end of the day. He cares about his family and his cat, and he treats everyone in Greendale with respect.
The late Ken Barrie is a great narrator who respects the pace of the show.
Apart from Pat, many of the characters are very likable, such as Reverend Peter Timms, Julian and Ted the mechanic.
Amazing voice acting, especially in seasons 1-5, every male character was voiced by Ken Barrie.
- Additionally, he voiced every single character in the first season.

Bad Qualities

The spin off Special Delivery Service, while not actually bad, it's inferior to the original series, and to an extent, the 2004 series due to abandoning its original gentle pace.
Jess, while funny, cute and adorable, can also be rather annoying, especially in the 2004 series and in Special Delivery Service.
The 2004 series (Seasons 3-5) while decent, it wasn't as good as the original two seasons and it did saw a minor decline in the series.
- These seasons had great animation that stepped up from the first two seasons, but at the same time, the new animation style didn't really suit the series as it was more faster paced.
- Instead of focusing on Pat and his friends, it focused way more on the kid characters, which doesn't really make that much sense since the original two seasons never really tried to focus on them that much and they were much better when they were only side characters though most fans enjoy it with no complaints.
- Some characters including Miss Hubbard, Sam Waldron, Peter Fogg, Granny Dryden and some other main characters were removed for unknown reasons.
- While the plots for the episode aren't bad by any means, they feel way too simplistic, generic and/or predictable for an episode of Postman Pat, such as delivering pizza, helping Pat who is stuck in a tree, helping Kate and Tom who are trapped over ice with their sled (in fact, that specific episode is a complete rip-off to the Fireman Sam episode Snow Business), etc.
- It doesn't exactly do a great job at trying to create continuity from the previous seasons, one example in the episode "Postman Pat and the Surprise Present", in which it reveals that Doctor Gilbertson never had a car, which is actually incorrect because there was one piece of dialogue in an episode from Season 1 where Doctor Gilbertson reveals that she already has a car.
- Many of the flaws that were in these seasons would later be carried over to Special Delivery Service except they are now much worse than they were in these seasons.
The show no longer airs in the United States after it was brought to the country in an unknown year, and also, there were basically no US DVD releases of the show, but of course there were a few US VHS tapes released, but they are extremely rare. Because of that, the show hardly had that much recognition in the US or even North America in general.
When Classic Media re-released the first two seasons on DVD, they altered the intros, instead of using the original theme song and intro, they reused the season 2 intro for both seasons and put the logo and theme song from Seasons 3-5 over it, the reason for this was because they weren't able to license the original theme song for some reason. Even though it isn't necessarily a bad thing since it doesn't alter the episodes that much, but it is still not that good of a decision.
Its slow pacing can sometimes get a bit boring, though it's still enjoyable nonetheless.

Trivia

The Independent Film Association of Schools in Ireland is in talks to start a petition, similar to their Fireman Sam one, to get this show translated into Irish for the culchies.
Including those shown in Postman Pat: Special Delivery Service (SDS), Pat has use of 8 vehicles:- Royal Mail van (Pat 1) SDS Van (Pat 2) SDS Helicopter (Pat 3) SDS Mini Van (Pat 4) SDS Motorbike (Pat 5) SDS Forklift Truck (Pat 6) SDS 4x4 (Pat 7) SDS Postcar (Pat 8).

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