Maggie and the Ferocious Beast

Maggie and the Ferocious Beast is a Canadian-American animated children's television series created by Michael and Betty Paraskevas. The program was based on the 1996 book The Ferocious Beast with the Polka-Dot Hide and its sequels, all of which were also written by the Paraskevases.

The show began as a series of shorts aired on the Canadian channel Teletoon in 1998. The first full-length episode premiered on June 5, 2000 on Nick Jr. in the USA.

Plot

A young girl named Maggie creates her own map of an imaginary world known as "Nowhere Land" that, in reality, takes the characters nowhere. She imagines that characters Beast and Hamilton Hocks are her friends.

Characters

Main

• Maggie (voiced by Kristen Bone) is a five-year-old girl and the human protagonist of the show. She is Hamilton's and the Beast's best friend. They both look up to Maggie very much and always turn to her for advice. Maggie is the leader of the group and is always there to be the compassionate voice of reason to her dear friends.
• The Ferocious Beast (voiced by Stephen Ouimette) does not appear very scary or ferocious, however, he can shout louder than anybody. He is yellow, with big red removable spots, and three horns on his head. His favorite catchphrase is "Great googly moogly!", which he says several times per episode. In "Hide And Go Beast", it is shown that he is allergic to pollen. He is just a big softie, despite his bold appearance. Beast loves pumpkins, which is convenient since there is an impressive pumpkin patch in Nowhere Land. As a matter of fact, Beast loves pretty much any kind of food, including Hamilton's cooking and is almost always hungry. He even loves baths. Maggie and Hamilton are his best friends. He wears multi-colored Galoshes which he pronounces as "Goo-lashes". Hamilton always corrects him about the pronunciation, but he does not believe him.
• Hamilton Hocks (voiced by Michael Caruana) is a pig who can be bossy and quite fussy, but he has a warm heart. He lives inside a portable cardboard box which he loves, is the best cook in Nowhere Land, and is a total clean freak. Hamilton's most prized possessions are his beautiful "H" sweater and his cardboard box. Maggie and the Beast are his best friends.

Recurring

• Rudy the Mouse: Rudy is a cheese-loving mouse who lives in a large wheel of Swiss cheese in a part of Nowhere Land called Cheese Town. It is revealed in one episode that Rudy's hat and boots do not come off because they are glued to him. Strangely enough, this character started off with the name Pippy but was renamed by the writers soon after for some reason.
• Nedley the Rabbit: Nedley speaks in rhymes. He says rhymes almost all through every episode that he appears in, but sometimes he talks normally a little bit before starting his rhyme again. Nedley lives in a rabbit hole next to his carrot patch in Nowhere Land.
• The Moo Sisters: They are the three cows who live in a part of Nowhere Land called Mooville. They love to sing and do it often. They are sisters and their names are Mavis, Millicent, and Marge.
• Mr. Moon: He is the only non-human and non-animal character in the episode, "Blue Moon". He is usually grumpy because people say he is made of green cheese.
• The Kindly Giant: The Kindly Giant is not at all scary but instead kind-hearted. The others are scared at first but they soon get used to him and they sometimes go to him for advice or a favor. He refers to Maggie, Hamilton and the Beast as "little ones." He owns a garden full of fruit and vegetables, of which he always lets the ever-hungry Beast scarf up a giant blueberry or two. His face is never shown and he only appears in a few episodes. He is big and strong. Even the Beast seems small compared to the giant. The Kindly Giant lives in an area of Nowhere Land where all the fruits and vegetables are giant sized. Usually, only his shoes and ankles are seen due to his largeness.
• The Dream Sheep: White sheep that make "baa" noises. They are occasionally up in the clouds.
• The Jellybean Team: They are a group of seven jellybeans. There is a red one, orange one, yellow one, purple one, black one and two green ones. They are small, of course, but have big personalities. They also tend to argue with each other a lot because they all think they are more important than each other.
• The Triplets: Maggie's baby cousins (Zack, Max, and Oscar). They only appear in four episodes, "One Two Three", "Home of the Kindly Giant", "The New Rubber Ball", and "Which Way Did They Go?".
• Big Duck: A large duck with white feathers who lives in a river. She is the focus of the episode "The Big Duck" and appears in the series' theme song.
• Reggie Van Beast: Beast's cousin. His coloring is the inverse of Beast's, being red with yellow spots, and he wears a monocle. He is rather stuck-up and rude, and never really seems to enjoy anything that Beast and his friends want to do. He also often speaks in rhymes, similar to Nedley. He first appeared in "Guess Who's Coming to Visit".

Production

The theme song for the show is "Maggie and the Ferocious Beast in Nowhere Land," which is an original song by Isabella Molley. Maggie and the Ferocious Beast is produced by Nelvana and directed by Jamie Whitney and Stuart Shankly. The series debuted in 2000 and the series aired its last episode in 2002. The show was distributed by Nelvana, which owned the distribution rights. In the UK, the show was dubbed with British voice actors, replacing the original Canadian soundtrack.

Broadcast

In Canada, Maggie and the Ferocious Beast aired on Teletoon and later Treehouse TV. In the United States, it aired on Nickelodeon as part of its Nick Jr. block from June 5, 2000 to September 3, 2004 and US children's channel Noggin (now Nick Jr.) from April 7, 2003 until September 27, 2009 when Noggin was re-branded as Nick Jr. and continued to rerun until October 30, 2010. Eight years later, the show is also aired on the now-defunct Qubo.