The first series of Mr. Bean: The Animated Series premiered in 2 March 2002 on ITV for Spring 2002 and Summer 2003 blocks and 5 October 2004 on CITV for Autumn 2004 block.
Production[]
Tiger Aspect Productions announced the series in October 2000. Valued at $15 million, the series was already pre-sold to ITV but did not have an animation studio tied into the production. The following month, it was announced that Varga would handle animation production. In February 2001, Entertainment Rights acquired all UK merchandising and licensing rights to the series
Prior to the series' UK premiere in March 2002, Fremantle International Distribution pre-sold the series in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Portugal, Cyprus and French-speaking Belgium, with Super RTL securing rights in Germany. Fremantle held all rights except in the US, UK, Hungary and Japan. Varga, who handled all Hungarian rights, pre-sold the series to RTL Klub and it premiered in April, a month after its UK premiere. By December, the series was pre-sold in Sweden and Finland.
In April 2003, the series made its debut in the United States through various public television stations, with A&E Home Video acquiring home media rights. Sharpe, the North American license holder for the show, signed a deal with Toy Play to release a toyline based on the show for the US and Canadian markets in September. In December, Fremantle International continued to pre-sell the series internationally while BBC Worldwide acquired Japanese licensing and home media rights.
In February 2004, Tiger Aspect announced that they had pre-sold UK Pay-TV rights to the series to Nickelodeon UK to air on their Nicktoons TV channel for a three-year deal.
The first and second block in 2002-2003 were broadcast in a prime-time Saturday night slot on ITV, and featured two segments in a half-hour episode. However, the third block in 2004 got rid of the half-hour episode format and aired segments separately, this including it being booted from the prime-time Saturday night slot. But in 2004, when the series wasn't meeting expectations with ITV staff and the audience, it was shifted onto CITV and broadcast daily there.
Episodes[]
| No. overall | No. in series | Title | Directed by | Written by | Storyboarded by | Original Air Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | "In The Wild" | Richard Purdum | Robin Driscoll | Richard Purdum | 2 March 2002 |
| Mr Bean goes deep into the countryside in search of the perfect wildlife photograph. | ||||||
| 2 | 2 | "Missing Teddy" | Miklós Varga | Robin Driscoll | Katalin Bross | 2 March 2002 |
| Bean tracks down the men responsible for kidnapping his teddy - only to find he is not their only captive! | ||||||
| 3 | 3 | "Artful Bean" | Katalin Móré | Robin Driscoll | Dean Roberts | 9 March 2002 |
| Mr Bean gets a real bug for painting. Then several bugs ... and flies and slugs and mice. | ||||||
| 4 | 4 | "The Fly" | Katalin Móré | Jon Canter | Trevor Ricketts | 9 March 2002 |
| Mr Bean declares war when he finds a fly in his room, and searches for ever more outlandish weapons. | ||||||
| 5 | 5 | "No Parking" | Katalin Móré | Jon Canter | Dean Roberts | 16 March 2002 |
| Mr Bean takes his teddy to the cinema but has trouble finding a parking space. | ||||||
| 6 | 6 | "Bean's Bounty" | Katalin Móré | Robin Driscoll | Trevor Ricketts | 16 March 2002 |
| A local archaeology dig inspires Mr Bean to go hunting for treasure. | ||||||
| 7 | 7 | "Mime Games" | Miklós Varga | Robin Driscoll | Dean Roberts | 23 March 2002 |
| Mr Bean is chased home by an angry mime artist. | ||||||
| 8 | 8 | "Spring Clean" | Miklós Varga | Robin Driscoll | Trevor Ricketts | 23 March 2002 |
| Mr Bean tries his hand at a spot of DIY plumbing. | ||||||
| 9 | 9 | "No Pets" | Miklós Varga | Robin Driscoll | Miklós Varga | 1 April 2002 |
| Mr Bean decides he needs some new and exciting friends in the shape of pets. | ||||||
| 10 | 10 | "Ray of Sunshine" | Miklós Varga | Robin Driscoll | Andrei Kolpin | 1 April 2002 |
| Mr Bean is in pursuit of sunshine but only manages to cause chaos on the beach! | ||||||
| 11 | 11 | "Birthday Bear" | Mihály Sikur | Stephen Powell | Chris Butler | 13 April 2002 |
| Mr Bean is shocked when Teddy receives a birthday card from Bean's girlfriend. | ||||||
| 12 | 12 | "The Mole" | Miklós Varga | Robin Driscoll | Arna Selznick | 13 April 2002 |
| Mr Bean's landlady is hopping mad when she finds mole hills on her lovely croquet lawn. | ||||||
| 13 | 13 | "Roadworks" | Andrei Ignatenko | Lee Cornes | Chris Butler | 20 April 2002 |
| Mr Bean's tranquillity is shattered by deafening roadworks outside his bedroom window. Threats, sabotage and subterfuge all fail to quell the cacophony until Bean has the ingenious idea of feeding the workmen into peaceful submission. But the silence ends with a bang! | ||||||
| 14 | 14 | "The Sofa" | Miklós Varga | Andrew Clifford | Andrei Kolpin | 20 April 2002 |
| The sofa's springs explode under Mr Bean. Can he afford to buy a new sofa? Or will relaxing in front of the telly be a thing of the past? | ||||||
| 15 | 15 | "Nurse!" | Evgueni Pavlenko & Elena Rogova | Rebecca Stevens | Trevor Ricketts | 7 June 2003 |
| Envious of all the attention his landlady receives when she breaks her leg, Mr Bean pretends to break his leg too. Then in hospital, he encounters the matron from hell! | ||||||
| 16 | 16 | "Dead Cat" | Miklós Varga | Gary Parker | Ben Lewis | 7 June 2003 |
| While trying to redecorate the hall, Bean is obstructed at every turn by his landlady's vile one-eyed cat. Bean pops it in the dustbin to keep it out of the way for a while. Just his luck that it is rubbish collection day. | ||||||
| 17 | 17 | "Gadget Kid" | Miklós Varga | Gary Parker | Ben Lewis | 14 June 2003 |
| Mr Bean is dogged by a young Japanese boy in the Science Museum and takes an instant dislike to the scallywag, until he sees what he has in his knapsack - gadgets so cool that you cannot get them in the West. So when a security guard tries to ruin their fun, they run away together - to Mars! | ||||||
| 18 | 18 | "The Visitor" | Ildikó Táborita | Robin Driscoll | Sharon Smith | 14 June 2003 |
| Mr Bean cannot place the face of the uninvited fat bloke on his doorstep. This blast from the past proves to be a blasted pain in the neck - eating him out of house and home. | ||||||
| 19 | 19 | "Royal Bean" | Evgueni Pavlenko & Elena Rogova | Rebecca Stevens | Chris Butler | 21 June 2003 |
| Mr Bean meets the Queen during a visit to Buckingham Palace to replace his favourite, but broken, mug. | ||||||
| 20 | 20 | "Young Bean" | Evgueni Pavlenko & Elena Rogova | Tony Haase | Sharon Smith | 21 June 2003 |
| When did Mr Bean first meet his teddy bear? Did he really learn to drive his Mini at the age of ten? He takes us on a journey into the past. | ||||||
| 21 | 21 | "Goldfish" | Katalin Móré | Andrew Clifford | Chris Drew | 28 June 2003 |
| With his beloved teddy bear at the dry cleaners, Mr Bean finds a new playmate from the garden pond. | ||||||
| 22 | 22 | "Inventor" | Mihály Sikur | Tony Haase | Ben Lewis | 28 June 2003 |
| When an inventor moves into the empty room in the attic, he and Bean try to out-invent each other. | ||||||
| 23 | 23 | "Car Trouble" | Mihály Sikur | Lee Cornes | David Brown | 5 July 2003 |
| When his car gives up the ghost and he is forced to sell it to the junkyard, Bean builds a hot-air balloon to get around town. | ||||||
| 24 | 24 | "Restaurant" | Sergey Gordeev | Lee Cornes | David Brown | 5 July 2003 |
| Mr Bean makes a meal out of his birthday celebration. | ||||||
| 25 | 25 | "Hot Date" | Sergey Gordeev | Rebecca Stevens | Chris Butler | 12 July 2003 |
| Bean agrees to go on a date with Irma. | ||||||
| 26 | 26 | "Wanted" | Ildikó Táborita | Stephen Powell | Chris Butler | 12 July 2003 |
| Bean is mistaken for an escaped convict and carted off to jail. | ||||||
| 27 | 27 | "Big TV" | Andrei Ignatenko | Tony Haase | Trevor Ricketts | 16 August 2003 |
| When the television blows up during Mr Bean and Irma's squabble over what to watch, Mr Bean invents his own ingenious form of home entertainment. | ||||||
| 28 | 28 | "Keyboard Capers" | Andrei Ignatenko & Mihály Sikur | Mark Clompus | Chris Butler | 16 August 2003 |
| Determined to finish Beethoven's symphony, Mr Bean wangles himself a grand piano, a music book, a candelabra - and a very patient piano teacher. Liberace, eat your heart out! | ||||||
| 29 | 29 | "Camping" | Mihály Sikur | Tony Haase | Sharon Smith | 23 August 2003 |
| An old photo album causes Bean to reminisce about summers at Scout camp as a boy, and sets him planning a night under the stars with Teddy. Purchasing a tent proves a problem, but nothing is going to stop him having a good time - even if he has to get the garden shed over the roof of his house. | ||||||
| 30 | 30 | "Chocks Away" | Andrei Ignatenko | Lee Cornes | Chris Butler | 23 August 2003 |
| When his model aeroplane is blown out of the sky by a rival kid's, Mr Bean sets his sights on revenge. Next day, his newly-constructed fighter plane is almost ready for take-off. But it lacks a vital part - and the model shop is shut! No matter, it is chocks away with Teddy at the controls, fighting for airspace over London N10. | ||||||
| 31 | 31 | "Super Trolley" | Sergey Gordeev & Andrei Ignatenko | Lee Cornes | Sharon Smith | 30 August 2003 |
| Nipping to the shops for a few provisions proves a nightmare for Bean when a mile-long shopping list from his landlady and a clapped-out trolley with a wonky wheel conspire to ruin his day. So he constructs his own trolley, with a petrol mower, pram wheels and an extra pair of hydraulic hands. | ||||||
| 32 | 32 | "Magpie" | Miklós Varga | Tony Haase | David Brown | 30 August 2003 |
| When nursing an injured magpie in his room, Mr Bean makes the discovery that magpies steal things that sparkle. When the police arrive to investigate the theft of his landlady's jewellery, it is not just Mr Bean who needs to take flight. | ||||||
| 33 | 33 | "Cat-Sitting" | Andrei Ignatenko & Vladimir Nikitin | Stephen Powell | Sharon Smith | 5 October 2004 |
| When his landlady is involved in an accident, Mr Bean is left to care for her vicious cat Scrapper. | ||||||
| 34 | 34 | "The Bottle" | Miklós Varga | Lee Cornes | Chris Butler | 6 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean's prized ship in a bottle ends up on a milkman's float, leading to a mission to get it back from the local dairy. | ||||||
| 35 | 35 | "Art Thief" | Katalin Móré | Rebecca Stevens | Trevor Ricketts | 7 October 2004 |
| When Mr Bean witnesses the theft of a major artwork on a trip to the National Gallery, he gives chase to the culprit and meets all manner of obstacles along the way. | ||||||
| 36 | 36 | "Scaredy Bean" | Miklós Varga | Jon Canter | Sharon Smith | 8 October 2004 |
| A trip to the cinema makes Mr Bean's imagination play tricks on him. | ||||||
| 37 | 37 | "Bean In Love" | Katalin Móré | Tony Haase | Chris Butler | 11 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean's heart-throb, Roxy, is singing in a concert at the London Palladium, and he sets his sights on getting her signature in his autograph book. A difficult feat, but will love prevail? | ||||||
| 38 | 38 | "Double Trouble" | Zhenia Pavlenko & Elena Rogova | Robin Driscoll | Sharon Smith | 12 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean is over the moon when he meets Mr Pod - the two men have so much in common: the same shirt, jacket, trousers and even underpants. And to top it all, Pod is Bean's spitting image. But Mr Bean falls to earth with a bump when his girlfriend, Irma Gobb, finds Mr Pod much better looking than him. | ||||||
| 39 | 39 | "Hopping Mad!" | Andrei Ignatenko | Lee Cornes | Chris Drew | 13 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean's landlady has invited the Mayor for tea. But the frogspawn in Mr Bean's bath have hatched out and hundreds of agitated amphibians invite themselves as well. Can Mr Bean catch all the slippery little things? | ||||||
| 40 | 40 | "A Grand Invitation" | Andrei Ignatenko; Igor Veichtaguin (co-director) | Gary Parker | Trevor Ricketts | 14 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean meets an aristocratic old lady when he nearly runs over her dog in his Mini. He is thrilled to be invited for luncheon at her grand but strangely shabby mansion. He is so busy with matters of protocol that he does not notice that the lady and her sinister butler are not quite what they seem. | ||||||
| 41 | 41 | "A Royal Makeover" | Katalin Móré | Robin Driscoll | Chris Drew | 15 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean decides to decorate his room in the style of Buckingham Palace and selects the same wallpaper as the Queen has. Meanwhile, his landlady, Mrs Wicket, suffers from delusions of grandeur and crowns herself Queen of the Street! | ||||||
| 42 | 42 | "SuperMarrow" | Sergey Gordeev | Jon Canter | Ben Lewis | 18 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean finds himself in a race to grow a giant marrow with his next-door neighbour. There is prize money at stake and a chance to get his photo in the papers. As the competition hots up, Mr Bean's gardening techniques become more inventive, unconventional and desperate. | ||||||
| 43 | 43 | "A Running Battle" | Mihály Sikur; Mikhail Tumelia (co-director) | Jon Canter | Chris Drew | 19 October 2004 |
| It is the start of a Fun Run and Mr Bean lines up beside his deadly enemy - the fat bloke who stole his parking space. Fun Run or not, nothing will stop Mr Bean beating this man to the finishing post - even if he has to flag a cab! | ||||||
| 44 | 44 | "Egg and Bean" | Sergey Gordeev; Mikhail Tumelia (co-director) | Lee Cornes | Sharon Smith | 20 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean gets in a flap when a monster turns up in his cake mix. The good news is that the monster turns out to be a harmless baby bird. The bad news is that it grows into a huge stork and takes over Mr Bean's home! He tries to return it to the wild and finds that teaching it to fly makes his arms ache! | ||||||
| 45 | 45 | "Haircut" | Sergey Gordeev | Jon Canter | Sharon Smith | 21 October 2004 |
| After accidentally rescuing a kitten from a tree, Mr Bean is about to get his picture in the newspaper. The photographer arrives with the grateful owner but disaster strikes when Mr Bean is upstaged by his hair! | ||||||
| 46 | 46 | "Neighbourly Bean" | Miklós Varga | Stephen Powell | Sharon Smith | 22 October 2004 |
| As Mr Bean settles down to watch his favourite TV programme he hears loud noises from next door. He moves from house to garden but can't escape the relentless racket of trumpets, electric drills and screaming babies. Mr Bean's mind turns to thoughts of revenge. | ||||||
| 47 | 47 | "The Ball" | Mihály Sikur | Jon Canter | Ben Lewis | 25 October 2004 |
| The nasty tennis player is big and angry and wants his ball back - the one Mr Bean managed to throw onto the roof of a house across the road. Paralysed with vertigo, 60ft up on a window sill, Bean is eventually brought to earth by the helpful intervention of a neighbour's pet hamster. | ||||||
| 48 | 48 | "Toothache" | Katalin Móré | Lee Cornes | Chris Drew | 26 October 2004 |
| Bean is tormented by the toothache from hell, but his DIY attempts to pull it out fail, and he is left with no choice but to visit the dreaded dentist. Can Bean face the dentist's chair? Or will the dentist despair of him? | ||||||
| 49 | 49 | "In The Pink" | Katalin Móré | Robin Driscoll | Chris Drew | 27 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean finds himself lumbered with an unwanted pet in the form of a four-legged ball of pink fur with piggy eyes and a penchant for earthworms. Encyclopaedias leave him none the wiser as to the identity of the pesky creature, but Bean cannot bring himself to abandon it. | ||||||
| 50 | 50 | "Dinner for Two" | Andrei Ignatenko | Jon Canter | Trevor Ricketts | 28 October 2004 |
| Mr Bean forgets the golden rule - never fall asleep in the bath when you have got a chicken in the oven. So what romantic meal can he quickly rustle up for his luckless girlfriend, Irma Gobb? The cheese from the mousetrap? The flower from the vase? A meal is eventually provided by an uninvited guest. | ||||||
| 51 | 51 | "Treasure!" | Katalin Móré | Tony Haase | Trevor Ricketts | 29 October 2004 |
| In a dark and cobwebby corner of his attic, Mr Bean finds a treasure map. But tricky clues lead Bean up the chimney, round the bend, down the garden path, up the blinking wall and nearly all the way to Australia! | ||||||
| 52 | 52 | "Homeless" | Andrei Ignatenko | Robin Driscoll | Sharon Smith | 1 November 2004 |
| After a regrettable episode involving his landlady sleepwalking into his room, Mr Bean suddenly finds himself out on his ear with nowhere to live. Near to tears, he yearns for the cosy familiarity of his old home. But a scarecrow and a pair of false teeth come to his rescue. | ||||||
| No. in series | Title | No. in series | Title | No. in series | Title | No. in series | Title |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | "In The Wild" | 14 | "The Sofa" | 27 | "Nurse!" | 40 | "Wanted" |
| 2 | "Missing Teddy" | 15 | "Treasure!" | 28 | "Dead Cat" | 41 | "Gadget Kid" |
| 3 | "No Parking" | 16 | "Homeless" | 29 | "Super Trolley" | 42 | "The Visitor" |
| 4 | "Bean's Bounty" | 17 | "Camping" | 30 | "Magpie" | 43 | "Big TV" |
| 5 | "Artful Bean" | 18 | "Chocks Away" | 31 | "Cat-Sitting" | 44 | "Keyboard Capers" |
| 6 | "The Fly" | 19 | "Royal Bean" | 32 | "The Bottle" | 45 | "Bean In Love" |
| 7 | "Mime Games" | 20 | "Young Bean (Xmas)" | 33 | "Goldfish" | 46 | "Double Trouble" |
| 8 | "A Spring Clean" | 21 | "In The Pink" | 34 | "Inventor" | 47 | "Hopping Mad!" |
| 9 | "No Pets" | 22 | "Dinner for Two" | 35 | "Car Trouble" | 48 | "A Grand Invitation" |
| 10 | "A Ray of Sunshine" | 23 | "The Ball" | 36 | "Restaurant" | 49 | "A Royal Makeover" |
| 11 | "Birthday Bear" | 24 | "Toothache" | 37 | "Art Thief" | 50 | "SuperMarrow" |
| 12 | "The Mole" | 25 | "Haircut" | 38 | "Scaredy Bean" | 51 | "A Running Battle" |
| 13 | "Roadworks" | 26 | "Neighbourly Bean" | 39 | "Hot Date" | 52 | "Egg and Bean" |
Cast[]
Main[]
- Rowan Atkinson as Mr. Bean (all episodes) and Mr. Pod (only in Double Trouble)
Various Voices[]
- Sally Grace
- Jon Glover
- Enn Reitel
- Gary Martin
- Laura Shavin
- Toyah Willcox
- Geraldine McRulity
- William Roberts
- Matilda Ziegler
- Susie Blake
- Toby Longworth
- Jill Shilling
- Mervyn Stutter
- Simon Treves
- Michael Roberts
- Claudia Lloyd
- Helen Lederer
- Rupert Degas
- Robin Driscoll
- Lorelei King
- Jan Ravens
- Togo Igawa
- Akemi Otani
- Thomas Beattie
- Sophie-Louise Dann
- Dirk Maggs
- Neal Wright
Trivia[]
- 48 episodes (from In the Wild to A Grand Invitation) have a copyright of 2002 and the last four (including A Royal Makeover, Super Marrow, A Running Battle and Egg and Bean) have a copyright of 2003.
- This series holds a record of the biggest voice cast of the entire animated series, ranking first place for 28 people.