"Guys, let's all get along."
— Leopold
Leopold the Cat (Russian: Кот Леопольд, Kot Leopold) is a Soviet/Russian animation series about the pacifistic, and intelligent cat, Leopold.
Leopold always wears a bow tie even when swimming. He is always confronted by two mischievous mice, Grey and White (Mitya and Motya). It was filmed by T/O Ekran in 1975 - 1987 and its runtime is 87 min (10 episodes). As of 1987, there were 11 episodes in total. Eventually, in 1995, most of the episodes were released on VHS.
Fondly remembered by everyone for Leopold's Catchphrase which would definitely show up at the end of every episode, as well as somewhere in the middle of these.
A revival series was commissioned in 2015.
Tropes:
- Actual Pacifist: In the third episode. You can prank Leopold all you want, the most he'll do is turn the prank around back on you, with brilliantly hilarious results.
- All There in the Manual: Grey and White's names were mentioned only in scripts and merchandise rather than the cartoons themselves.
- Amusing Injuries: Averted for the most part, but played straight during the sillier parts of an episode when Toon Physics take over.
- Animation Bump: The first two episodes used the cut out format with a drastically different design style, and may come off as downright creepy. The following cartoons were hand drawn with much more cuddly Golden Age style designs and usually got slightly more fluid with each one.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Downplayed case. There are occasions Leopold will fight back, but he rarely takes it a very violent extreme.
- Played straight in the first two episodes, where he pulls far less punches. In the first he uses invisibility to torment the mice, while in the second, due to the influence of miracle tablets, he undergoes a Jekyll and Hyde transformation and beats the mice senseless for their earlier abuse.
- Catchphrase: Leopold says, "Guys, let's all get along" Once per Episode, and the mice always call him with "Come out, Leopold!" and "Come out, you foul coward!"
- Cats Are Mean: Inverted. Leopold is a quintessential Nice Guy, while the mice are the mean ones.
- Characterisation Marches On: In the original cut-out shorts, Leopold was far more of a Karmic Trickster, unafraid to use violence on the mice when they got too mean spirited. The earlier hand drawn shorts maintained a more harmless sense of mischief from Leopold and added his Defeat Equals Friendship approach, though shortly in his incredibly passive and oblivious personality took on.
- Defeat Equals Friendship: At the end of each short, the exasperated mice admit defeat and apologise to Leopold, leading to his Catchphrase. Most evident in the last episode, where they actually join in on it.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: May be the case with the first two episodes (which were animated in cut-out format instead of hand drawn), as it looks depressing from what evidence can be gleamed from Youtube today. Just LOOK at poor Leopold!
- Easily Forgiven: As his catchphrase at the end of each cartoon epitomises, Leopold never shows hard feelings towards any of the chaos the two mice try to cause for him.
- The Everyman: Leopold. There's rarely much significant about him aside from how alarmingly nice he is.
- The Fool: Most of the time, Leopold wins obliviously, sabotaging the mice's pranks by mistake or failing to notice them backfire from bad luck or incompetence on their part.
- Hakuna Matata: The opening song to "The car of Leopold the Cat" is impossible to listen to without breaking into a smile. It's a song about being cheerful and everything going well because you have a good attitude. That you must never loose your good nature, even in bad times "keep your tail up" and always believe in yourself, if you do that you will "move mountains". Alexander Kalyagin's kindly, optimistic nuncle voice definitely helps. Can be heard here: "The car of Leopold the Cat"
- Hero Antagonist: Leopold is very laid back, not making him a very proactive hero of the story. As such the focus is usually on the mice failing to harass him.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Every single time with the two mice. They try their damndest to have fun at Leopold's expense, only for their pranks to continually backfire at them.
- Mood Whiplash: In the absence of subtitles, non-Russian speakers can only assume this with the episode where Leopold gets "miracle tablets" from a
random physician appearing out of nowhere seemingly by magic. The rest is Leopold going on a musical rampage tormenting the mice for what they did to him just minutes ago. - Mythology Gag: The fourth short "Leopold's TV", starts with Leopold watching a cartoon of his monster form in "Leopold Cat's Revenge", the first short in the series. It even resembles his original design from the cut-out films.
- Nice Guy: Leopold's defining characteristic is that he is laid-back and peaceable. Barring Early-Installment Weirdness, no matter how much the mice prank and provoke him, he doesn't get angry, doesn't take revenge, and holds no grudges, urging them to get along Once per Episode.
- Oddball in the Series: Besides the Early-Installment Weirdness of the first two shorts, "Interview With Leopold the Cat" is just clips of animation of Leopold talking on a black screen (this is in fact a reel of footage used for a Roger Rabbit Effect promotional interview).
- Once an Episode: The mice will inevitably apologize to Leopold at the end of an episode, to which Leopold responds with his catchphrase.
- Rube Goldberg Device: The mice construct one to dump a watermelon on Leopold's head by luring him with a bottle of milk. When mice test it, it works as intended, but Leopold is more interested in the watermelon. So, he tugs on it and sends the whole contraption backwards.
- The Voiceless: Averted in the earlier episodes. In later ones, dialogue is very minimal, limited majorly to the catchphrase, whispering between the mice and conversation from random characters appearing at the time.
