Main Page | See live article | Alphabetical index ReBoot is a Canadian animated television series for children produced by Mainframe Entertainment, the first one that was completely computer animated. The setting, which seems to been inspired by the Walt Disney Company film, Tron, is in the inner world of a computer in a city called Mainframe. It is populated primarily by binomes, little creatures that either represent 1's or 0's, and a handful of Sprites who are primarily humanoid creatures of more complex design and are the principle characters of the series. The lead character of the first two seasons is Bob, a guardian whose function is to mend and defend Mainframe. In addition, there is Dot Matrix who runs much of Mainframe in conjunction with the sage Phong as well as her younger brother, Enzo and his dog Frisket. Together, they must continually oppose the threats of the viruses, Megabyte and his insane sister, Hexadecimal, who are out to conquer and/or destroy Mainframe. In addition, Mainframe is frequently invaded by giant gamecubes from the mysterious User which land on random parts of the city. Inside, various computer games are played and if the User wins, the city region within the cube is devastated and the unlucky denzins trapped inside the cube are reduce to mindless slugs called Nulls. To prevent that, Bob and his friends must enter the cube, adapt to the game's environment by rebooting, and compete against the User to win the game which will allow the cube to harmlessly withdraw. In the third season, the status quo is shattered when Bob is doublecrossed and exiled by Megabyte in their joint effort to prevent a monstorous invasion from the Web. What follows is a season long epic where Enzo is forced to take over and although he and his girlfriend, AndraAIa, prove to be effective, they soon become trapped in the games and must spend years searching both for Bob and a way back to Mainframe. This series, first broadcast on Saturday mornings in 1994 by the ABC Television Network, proved to be an instant hit with children and their parents, only to be abruptly cancelled when the Walt Disney Company purchased the network. Episodes from the second season could still be seen when Claster Television distributed them for a short period of time during the 1996-97 season. Later, a third season was produced which, while it did not have American distribution for years, enjoyed more content freedom from the network censors who frustrated the producers earlier. In 2001, an additional season was produced. Unfortunately, with the freedom from the network censors the series became yet another general "shoot-em-up" with little of the sight gags, sarcastic undertones and sub-text which was frequent in the first years. Nearly each episode of the first seasons seemed to have some element meant to foil the ABC network censors in an indirect way, or to tweak their noses, by including things which the children might not "catch" but which adults could understand. For instance, in the episode "Talent night" centered around a surprise birthday party for Enzo, Dot and a cubistic binome called Emma Fee are giving auditions for the birthday party show. Emma Fee is a prog sensor (program censor, wink-wink!) who keeps rejecting nearly every act for trivial reasons or to preserve morality or prevent depictions of violence. She heartily approves, however, of a group of male singers and dancers called the "small town binomes" who sing "It's fun to play in a non-violent way, with the B, S and P". They are singing this to the tune of "YMCA" , a hit tune of a 1970s disco group called The Village People, which was notorious for the homosexual undertones and double meanings of the words of their songs. The "small town binomes" are also dressed in the same "macho" costumes The Village People wore on stage. In addition, "BS and P " happens to be the initials of the Bureau of Standards and Practices, the censors of the ABC network. The success of this series helped establish Mainframe Entertainment as one of the predominant computer animation studios in the world. Most tend to forget that when the series started in 1994 Toy Story had not been born yet. This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.