Go Jetters
Season 1, Episode 35: "St Basil's Cathedral, Russia" (11 minutes)
UK / Ireland: Boulder Media / Giant Animation
CBeebies, Monday 27 November, 08:00
Hold on to your hats, folks, because here comes the funkiest kid's theme tune ever!
Go Jetters is about a team of humanoid heroes, each with a special talent (Xuli is a pilot, Kyan a gymnast, Lars a mechanic, and Foz a mathematician), who travel the world on missions given to them by Ubercorn, a disco unicorn (obviously).
In this episode, Ubercorn tells the Jetters that they are visiting St Basil's Cathedral in Moscow. He presents them with some "funky facts": the location, the fact that the cathedral is built from multicoloured bricks and is unlike any other building in Russia, that it was built 500 years ago by Ivan the Terrible, and that it is in Red Square, which was named because the Russian word "krasnaya" originally meant "beautiful" but now means "red". That's a hell of a lot of facts to face a pre-schooler with, and may actually be in there for the parents' interest.
Meanwhile, the designated villain, Grandmaster Glitch, is celebrating his birthday with his robot minions. He shows the camera a drawing of his ideal cake, which looks like a green version of the cathedral. However, the robots have only made him a small cupcake, so he is not very happy.
The robots therefore take Glitch to Moscow, where they reveal that they have coated the cathedral with green icing! Glitch is happy, because he only likes the icing on a cake anyway. However, the icing has frozen, trapping people inside.
The Jetters arrive to save the day. The robots freeze Lars and Foz in icing. Ubercorn provides Xuli with a heat gun so that she can melt the icing, so that she can free everyone while Kyan distracts Glitch by cossack dancing. Glich gets carried away in a river of melted icing, which the Jetters re-freeze so that it doesn't spread all over the city. The day is saved! (except for poor Glitch), and the Jetters celebrate by taking a selfie as a souvenir.
Cultural enrichment
This show is rich in educational value: not only does it teach children some geographical and historical facts, with heavy use of maps to illustrate where the Jetters are going, but it also provides the young viewers with a snapshot of different cultures around the world. This episode also touches elements of the science curriculum, including the effects of weather, and how temperature causes materials to freeze and thaw.
It also provides some moral content, such as the importace of teamwork but also following instructions, and how people are different, as each character has their own area of strength. One issue I did pick up on, however, is that Glitch did not do anything villanous; he just wanted to eat some icing! It was his robots who misguidedly covered the cathedral with icing. Nevertheless he is presented as a villain, which seems rather unfair.
This aside, I think this was a fantastic show. I appreciate that some of the educational content might go over the heads of the target audience of 4 - 6 years, but it is full of opportunities for learning, while remaining entertaining, upbeat and engaging, and with a fantastic soundtrack.
Go go! Go go!
Available to watch online until 27 December 2017
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