Danger Mouse

Fandom
Name:	Danger Mouse
Abbreviation(s):	DM
Creator:	Cosgrove Hall Productions
Date(s):	1981-1992, 2015-
Medium:	TV series, Toys, Comics etc.
Country of Origin:	United Kingdom
External Links:	Wikipedia Official YouTube channel
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

He's the greatest! He's fantastic!
Wherever there's danger he'll be there!
He's the ace! He's amazing!
He's the strongest, he's the quickest, he's the best!
Danger Mouse! ... Danger Mouse! Danger Mouse!
-- Theme song

Danger Mouse was an extremely popular 1980s British children's animated television secret agent series, revived in 2015. It's a spin-off of Count Duckula, noted for its surreal humour and sight gags, and for parodies of spy movie tropes. All of the characters are anthropomorphic animals. The hero, Danger Mouse, is a one-eyed mouse who is Britain's top secret agent. He is invariably accompanied by his sidekick Ernest Penfold, a cowardly and extremely stupid hamster. They usually have a wide range of spy gear including a yellow flying car.

Other characters include their boss Colonel K, a bulldog, and a recurring villain, Baron Greenback, a toad, usually accompanied by a crow henchmen Stiletto and his pet caterpillar Nero, who takes the place of a Bond villain's white cat. Many other characters and villains were seen in the show's run. There is also an unseen narrator, who is usually confused by the events of the show. The new series introduces its first regular female character Squarkencluck, a chicken scientist working for MI5, who usually seems to be the most sensible person in the show. A male predecessor was seen in the original series. A female American agent, Jeopardy Mouse, is an occasional recurring character. They see each other as rivals for the coveted title of "World's best secret agent".

The series often uses metafiction tropes, with characters talking about the audience, the title of the episode or the implausibility of events in the episode, arguing with the narrator, and so forth.

In the original series Danger Mouse and Penfold were the size of real animals, living in a hollow kerbstone below a London post box; in the 2015 series they appear to be human sized, and the post box is the size of an office block, MI5's "camouflaged" headquarters. The original series depiction of a human-sized world with very few humans evident implied some catastrophic event that wiped out most of the human race, leaving animals running the world; it isn't yet clear how the 2015 incarnation of the show intends to handle this, since no humans have been depicted yet.

Stories typically involve the destruction of large parts of London, threatened global catastrophe, and other disasters, usually of a surreal nature; a typical description reads "Greenback is melting the polar ice caps to cause a flood and open up a market to sell rubber rafts at inflated prices." Other plots have included attacks by computerised washing machines and an invasion of bees from outer space.

Fan Activity

Fan works include fan art and a small amount of fiction. There are no common ships, but Danger Mouse/Penfold is seen occasionally. There are some crossovers with other spy series such as The Professionals.

Fanworks

Examples Wanted: Editors are encouraged to add more examples or a wider variety of examples.

Fics

• Pros/Danger Mouse by DebraHicks (2011-12) - crossover series with The Professionals, 4 stories.
• A Mountain out of a Molehill by spycandy (2012); "Who better to track down a mole than a mouse and a hamster?" (crossover with John Le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy)
• A Life Beyond This One by Claire (2008); "Life's not like that, not for you…" (Danger Mouse/Penfold)
• Stuck with You by BonnyMcL (2015); "Even the world's greatest secret agent needs to relax sometimes." (Danger Mouse/Penfold)

Archives & Fannish Links

• BBC iPlayer etc. for Danger Mouse
• Unofficial Danger Mouse Fan Club
• Fanfiction.net
• AO3
• Fan Art on Deviantart.com
• TV Tropes