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Phineas and Ferb
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Phineas and Ferb is an Emmy-nominated Disney Channel animated television series that centers on two stepbrothers and their beyond-the-impossible adventures in their backyard during summer vacation. The series premiered on February 1, 2008 as the first Disney Channel Original Series (DCOS) to premiere simultaneously worldwide. The show's official U.S. premieres were marketed as Phineas and Ferb-uary, due to new episodes being shown every day during the month of February.
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Encyclopedia
Phineas and Ferb is an Emmy-nominated Disney Channel animated television series that centers on two stepbrothers and their beyond-the-impossible adventures in their backyard during summer vacation. The series premiered on February 1, 2008 as the first Disney Channel Original Series (DCOS) to premiere simultaneously worldwide. The show's official U.S. premieres were marketed as Phineas and Ferb-uary, due to new episodes being shown every day during the month of February. A sneak peak of the second season was shown January 23, 2009, as the episode "Tip of the Day," on Toon Disney.
Origins
Creators Dan Povenmire and Jeff "Swampy" Marsh met as layout artists on The Simpsons in the mid-1990s, where they sat across from each other as layout artists on that series. They bonded over a shared sense of humor and were eventually paired as a writing team on Rocko's Modern Life for Nickelodeon where they learned more and more aspects of the animation production business.
It was during this time that the pair started to develop a show that would allow them to continue working together as writers. At the Wild Thyme restaurant in South Pasadena, California, where they have butcher paper over the tables and crayons for you to draw with, Povenmire was sharing a meal with his wife when he drew the first sketch of a triangle-headed kid. Povenmire called Marsh that evening and told him the news: he had Phineas.
All the other characters grew from that simple triangle-headed kid. Phineas is a triangle, Ferb is a rectangle, and Candace is a half-circle. Then they decided to work geometric shapes into the background to tie the whole thing together. Marsh describes this homage to legendary Looney Tunes animator/director Tex Avery, "There's a little bit of Tex Avery in there — he had that very graphic style [in his later cartoons]. A lot of what I see now is borrowed from Tex."
Povenmire and Marsh
Povenmire and Marsh were no longer working together. Marsh had moved to London to work on an assortment of films and series including Postman Pat and Bounty Hamster. Povenmire had started animating and directing Family Guy episodes, but continued to shop the show around to Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, and Fox Kids.
Studios were worried about the complexity of the plots for the time allowed. At Fox, there were a few meetings, but negotiations fizzled out. Nickelodeon kept sending it up higher and higher in the production personnel ranks, but it was eventually deemed too complicated to pull off. Their stubbornness and persistence paid off when Povenmire finally got a meeting with Disney. According to Povenmire, "Disney was the first to say, 'Let's see if you can do it in 11 minutes.' We did it in the pilot and they said, 'Let's see if you can do it for 26 episodes.'"
Disney Channel's Senior VP of Original Series Adam Bonnet was a fan of Family Guy and wasn't scared off by Povenmire's work on the series. In fact, it was because of his connections to the primetime Fox animated sitcom known for its gross-out gags and raunchy humor that Bonnet wanted to see whatever Povenmire was working on. Povenmire recalls about Bonnet, "He called me for a meeting when I was working on a different pilot for them just to tell me how much he liked Family Guy. When I came back to pitch my own show, I think he was more open to it."
Povenmire brought "some of that primetime animation timing without any of the raunch" to Phineas and Ferb. In fact, many of the blank stares and sight gags have a primetime and Tex Avery charm to them. "People think Family Guy is a success because of how raunchy the gags are. I don't think it would have been a success at all if the timing wasn't absolutely crystal pitch perfect -- if there wasn't just the right amount of pause before or after the line. Comedy is all about timing and I think that's what people are responding to."
Unlike non-animated series, Povenmire and Marsh didn't pitch a script, they pitched a storyboard. A storyboard is a scene-by-scene visual breakdown of how the episode would look. When it came time to present it to the executives overseas, Povenmire edited the storyboards together into a film, adding music, sound effects and providing the voices for all the characters. This animatic can be found on the Phineas and Ferb: The Fast and the Phineas DVD.
Plot
The main plot focuses on Phineas and Ferb, two young kids bent
on making their summer vacation a "roller coaster" (as seen in the first episode.) A minor scenario involves Candace attempting to bust her brothers, which always fails. The other major element involves Secret Agent P (Perry the Platypus) and Dr. Doofenshmirtz in a good-versus-evil subplot.
Phineas Flynn (Vincent Martella) and Ferb Fletcher (Thomas Sangster) are 2 stepbrothers who live with their older sister Candace Flynn (Ashley Tisdale) and their parents Linda Flynn (Caroline Rhea) and Lawrence Fletcher (Richard O'Brien). The brothers find themselves wondering what to do with their summer vacation, so they pull off unbelievable and often outlandish stunts (i.e. making a movie, getting a band back together, racing cars, making a space observatory, etc.), in order to add excitement to their vacation. Their sister Candace is aware of their unusual activities and is often pictured attempting to reveal their activities to their mother.
Agent P side-plot
Phineas and Ferb's pet, who is named Perry the Platypus (voiced by Dee Bradley Baker), has a secret identity under which he uses the alias "Agent P." Normally, Perry's first appearance in an episode is after a character (most commonly Phineas) notices his absence, and usually responds to his absence by saying "Hey, where's Perry?"
After the question is asked, the scene generally advances to a scene where Perry enters secret chutes or entrances that provide transport to an underground agency headquarters where he receives instructions, via a monitor, from his superior Major Monogram (Jeff "Swampy" Marsh). Major Monogram then assigns Perry a mission that generally involves Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz (Dan Povenmire), and his nefarious (usually unsuccessful) plans to wreak havoc on the "Entire Tri-State area" with a machine that most of the time ends with the suffix -inator.
A majority of the Perry subplot involves him battling Dr. Doofenshmirtz in knowingly hackneyed fashion.
Agent P. always ends up being captured in a booby trap set by Dr. Doofenshmirtz, but usually escapes.
Inevitably, these battles take place in close proximity to the unknowing Phineas and Ferb, who are in the midst of their daily activities, and generally aid in the removal of all evidence related to what they were doing before Candace can show her mother.
The subplot ends in Perry's return, back in his disguise as "pet," usually ending with the line, "Oh, there you are Perry.", and Perry making his Purring noise.
Candace side-plot
Occasionally, there are subplots relating to Candace during the stories. They generally involve either Candace (voiced by Ashley Tisdale) speaking to or spending time with her friend Stacy (voiced by Kelly Hu), or attempting to win the attention of Jeremy (voiced by Mitchel Musso) on whom she is fixated. These subplots take place intermittently with Candace's many attempts to disable Phineas and Ferb's activities, which are always unsuccessful since all the proof is either removed or destroyed. Despite this, the story usually ends on a happy note for Candace, with Jeremy confirming in some way or another that he likes her. Phineas & Ferb seem to bear no ill-will towards their sister, often attempting to include her in their adventures; in one instance they even carved her face into Mount Rushmore as a birthday present.
Characters
Main
- Phineas Flynn - Phineas is a friendly and creative 10 year old boy inspired to make the summer as great as it can be by coming up with ideas for unusual, exciting, and sometimes impossible activities from things of his everyday life from TV commercials to random conversation topics. Phineas is also shown to have a wide array of musical abilities such as singing and songwriting and can play many different instruments His stepbrother, Ferb, is his partner in their activities. He loves his sister Candace, and often tries to please or help her, as in putting her face on Mount Rushmore for her birthday, making her tree house better, or helping her learn how to drive. However, he usually and accidentally upsets her with his schemes. He has a normal relationship with his mom and his step-dad. He often wonders about the whereabouts of his pet platypus Perry, unaware of his pet's double life. A current theme is when people ask if he is too young to be working on his current project to which he almost always responds, "Yes, yes I am" with pure honesty. His friend, Isabella, has a strong crush on him, though he seems not to notice.
- Ferb Fletcher - Ferb is Phineas's intelligent but laconic stepbrother from Britain. Ferb is a very quiet boy, but he is not exactly shy. He is incredibly brilliant and has a great sense of mechanics and electronics. He almost single-handedly built a roller coaster and a giant track, a real radio-controlled race car, several arenas and stadiums, a space ray, a monster truck, and a time machine. He is always willing to help Phineas in his incredible plans, no matter what the circumstances are. In the series, Ferb almost always speaks at the end of each episode for a few seconds. Whenever the usually reticent Ferb talks, it is most often a one-liner. Ferb is talented at changing his voice, usually using a deep voice while singing. Like Phineas, Ferb is also talented and can play a large variety of instruments, which include trumpet, guitar, keyboards, rock n roll drums, harmonica, and Jamaican drums. Ferb is also shown to have a knack for rollerskating.
- Candace Flynn - Candace is 15 years old and entering 10th grade. She is always aware of the boys' plans. She is generally a spoil-sport and always attempts to get the boys in trouble with their mom. But when she finally gets her mother's attention to see what they are doing they appear innocent and normal on account of the unaccounted doings of Perry the Platypus and Dr. Doofenshmirtz. Candace nurtures a permanent crush on Jeremy Jonson. In a sense, she is the exact opposite of her brothers, being terribly afraid of heights and easily getting sick or dizzy. She has a "Panic Room" in their basement to hide in when she freaks out on account of her brothers' tricks. While Candace is constantly angry at her brothers, there are indications that underneath she loves them. In "Traffic Cam Caper" she saves Phineas at the expense of losing the evidence(though that was only after she had lost the evidence anyway), and in the episode "Dude, We're Getting the Band Back Together" she gives Phineas a big smile and a hug. In "It's A Mud, Mud, Mud World" she cannot tell on her brothers, presumably because they were helping her, maybe because her stepfather was present. Candace is good at singing (even when her voice changes due to an allergic reaction to wild parsnips) and can play a number of instruments, all of which begin with the letter "B" (bass, bongos, basoon, etc). She is also the only character that has seen Perry as a secret agent but at the time believed to be under the effect of wild moss. In "Phineas And Ferb Get Busted" she finally succeeds in busting her brothers, but misses her brothers and decides to rescue them from military school which was actually her dream then shown it was Perry's dream.
- Perry the Platypus - Phineas's and Ferb's pet, who lives a parallel life as a secret agent. He has a lair under the Flynn-Fletcher's house that can be entered through various passages around the house.
His nemesis is the evil scientist Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz, whom Perry always stops. His missions end up covering up evidence of Phineas and Ferb's activities by accident, therefore the boys' mom never finds out about their schemes and antics. While Perry never says anything throughout the show, he can make a growling and blubbering noise or teeth chattering that he uses at significant times. Perry works for his boss Major Monogram - who appears to be a stern, hard-boiled spy master. Perry is equipped with many hi-tech gadgets and instruments, including whistles that call certain animals, a grappling hook gun, a parachute, several guns, a pocket helicopter, a jet-pack etc. He also can drive a scooter and has his own flying car and jet pack.
Perry wears a little brown fedora while he goes on his missions. Perry has his own theme song called "Perry the Platypus". In one episode, the boys stumble on to Perry's headquarters and his missions by accident, but they do not discover his secret identity. This is evident since after this episode, they never mention again the existence of the secret hideout. Usually, whenever Phineas says, "Hey, where's Perry?", Perry changes from pet into a secret agent and starts his mission. At the end of the mission he returns to his normal identity at which time Phineas says, "Oh, there you are, Perry." The most witty recurring gag of the show is the often-repeated remark about Phineas saying "He's a platypus, they don't do much". Also, Perry the Platypus never shows feelings on his face when he isn't on duty (as a part of his cover-identity as a mindless, domestic pet).
- Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz - Doofenshmirtz is a divorced and very unhappy German American man (according to his accent), he is also a mad scientist and the main antagonist. He is the head of his own single-person company, Doofenshmirtz Evil, Incorporated. All his evil plans tend to be thwarted by Perry the Platypus. The Doctor has turned evil because of his unhappy, unprovided and sad childhood in an unknown European town named "Druselstein," and also references Doofenstein, perhaps the state he lived in, where his family were poor farmers and he was forced to be a lawn gnome. Doofenshmirtz was born in the month of June, as his birthday occurs in the episode "Raging Bully", and his parents never showed up for his birthday.
Coming from this background, presently he attempts to wreak havoc across "the entire tri-state area,". He is divorced and his ex-wife, Charlene, actually pays him alimony. He has a teenage daughter named Vanessa who is less-than-thrilled with him or his schemes. She constantly tries to "bust" her father, like Candace tries to bust her brothers. His elder brother Roger—the favorite of their mother—is a respected politician in Danville and holds the mayoral post. Heinz is not really a doctor, as pointed out by his daughter, as his Doctorate Degree has a $15 price tag on it. Doofenshmirtz seems to have an active love life, since in "I, Brobot," he has relationship problems with his "new" girlfriend, and leaves a ton of pathetic messages on her answering machine.
Major
- Isabella Garcia-Shapiro - Best friend of Phineas and Ferb. She's also the leader of the Fireside Girls. She can change her voice as Ferb can, and often assists the boys in their plans, enlisting the whole troop of girls in the process (often to obtain new badges or other credits related to the scouts). In the episode 'One Good Scare Ought to Do It!' it is revealed that her biggest fear is losing Phineas. This is because she couldn't live without him since she has a really big crush on him, which can be seen in the very first episode. She always enters into the scene with the catchphrase "What'cha doin'?" and usually offers help from the Fireside Girls. She sings well, as demonstrated in the episodes "Flop Starz".
- Linda Flynn - Mother to Phineas and Candace, stepmother to Ferb. She is married to Lawrence Fletcher, but she seems not to use his last name as most other characters call her "Ms. Flynn", except for one time when she was referred to as "Mrs. Fletcher" by Isabella in "Candace Loses Her Head". Linda is portrayed as a regular American mother, although she plays in a free-form jazz band with Isabella and Jeremy's mother, and was once a one-hit wonder pop star under the name 'Lindana'. She is generally busy or trying to relax, when her daughter tries to get her to see that the boys are up to some crazy plan. She seems to think Candace is crazy and needs professional help. When the boys reveal their schemes and accomplishments, she thinks they have an "overactive" yet "adorable" imagination.
- Lawrence Fletcher - The father of Ferb, stepfather of Phineas and Candace. Lawrence is an archaeologist from the United Kingdom. He keeps his treasured memories in a toolbox. It has been shown how he agrees to follow Phineas' instructions and even forces Candace to cooperate, as if he considers Phineas' and Ferb's skills normal.
Episodes
| Season | Ep # | First Airdate | Last Airdate |
|---|
| Season 1 | 47 | August 17, 2007 | December 5, 2008 | | | Season 2 | 39 | January 23, 2009 | February 2010 |
Cast
List of songs (by episode)
According to Tommy2.net, the soundtrack of the series will now be released on August 4.
Every episode has at least one musical performance, and some have two or three in a row. The music on Phineas & Ferb goes from the whimsical to heavy metal. Some are just little jingles which lasts for only a few seconds, while others are full songs.
- "Rollercoaster"-"Perry the Platypus"
- "Lawn Gnome Beach Party of Terror!" - "We'll Hit The Beach," "Backyard Beach," "The Moment Has Arrived," ,"If Summer Only Lasted One Day",and "Perry the Platypus"
- "Flop Starz" - "Gitchi Gitchi Goo" and "I'm Lindana And I Wanna Have Fun"
- "The Fast and the Phineas" - "Go, Phineas, Go" and "If Summer Only Lasted One Day"
- "Lights, Candace, Action"-"Curse Of The Princess Monster"
- "Raging Bully" - "He's a Bully!" and "It's Looking Like the End"
- 'Candace Loses Her Head"-"Candace"
- "I, Brobot" - "Phinedroids and Ferbots" and "Gitchi Gitchi Goo"
- "Run Away Runway" - "Summer All The Time"
- "The Magnificent Few" - "On the Trail" and "In the Mall"
- "S'Winter"-"S'Winter"
- "Jerk de Soleil" - "Evil Boys"
- "Are You My Mummy?"- "My Undead Mummy And Me"
- "Ready For The Bettys"- "Ready For The Bettys"
- "I Scream, You Scream" - "Busted!"
- "Toy to the World" - "Shimmy Jimmy," "Toy Factory" and "Brick"
- "It's a Mud, Mud, Mud, Mud World" - "She's a Truck Drivin' Girl"
- "Journey to the Center of Candace" - "Hemoglobin Highway"
- "It's About Time! - "My Nemesis," and "Missing My Nemesis/Moment"
- "Dude, We're Getting the Band Back Together!" - "Danny's Story," "You're Fabulous," "I Ain't Got Rhythm," "You Snuck Your Way Right Into My Heart," and "Music Makes Us Better"
- "Tree to Get Ready" -"My Goody-Two-Shoes Brother"
- "The Ballad of Badbeard" - "The Ballad of Badbeard"
- "Greece Lightning" - "My Chariot"
- "Leave the Busting to Us!" -"Leave The Busting To Us" and "Summer"
- "Mom's Birthday" - "Mom, It's Your Birthday"
- "Crack That Whip! - "The Ring of Fun"
- "The Best Lazy Day Ever!" - "Everything Nice" (performed by Mitchell Musso) and "Our Do-Nothing Day"
- "Boyfriend From 27,000 B.C.-"Sandwich Man Theme Song"
- "Voyage to the Bottom of Buford" - "The Only Fish for Me"
- "A Hard Day's Knight" - "The Black Knight of Worcestershire"
- "Traffic Cam Caper" - "That's How The Ammals Go"
- "Bowl-R-Rama Drama" - "Pinballin' Along"
- "Got Game?" - "Gimme a "F"!"
- "Comet Kermillian" - "Comet Observatory" and "Squirrels in My Pants"
- "Put That Putter Away" - "She's a Disco Miniature Golfing Queen" and Mini Golf (Parts 1 and 2)
- "Does this Duckbill Make Me Look Fat?" - "Perry The Teenage Girl" (credits) and "Slushy The Clown"
- "The Flying Fishmonger" - "He's A Fishmonger" and "He's A Flying Fishmonger"
- "One Good Scare Ought to Do It" - "Perry the Platypus (extended version)", "Candace (Who's That Girl)" and "One Good Scare Ought to Do You Some Good"
- "The Monster of Phineas-n-Ferbenstein" - "He's Evil-er"
- "Oil On Candace"-"I Must Impress My Professor"
- "Out of Toon" - "Pinhead Pierre Theme Song", "Team Improbable Theme Song"
- "Hail Doofania!" - "Hail Doofania","Gitchi Gitchi Goo"
- "Out to Launch" - "Let's Take a Rocket Ship", "Shooting Star Milkshake Bar"
- "Tip of the Day" - "AGLET"
- "Phineas and Ferb get Busted" - "You Can Do What You Want", "Little Brothers", "Funky Sounds in the Bathroom", and "They're My Chains"
- "Unfair Science Fair" - "Destroyed Dreams"
- "Unfair Science Fair: Redux" - "Queen of Mars"
- "Lake Nose Monster" - "You're Gonna Get a Mission", "I'll Save You", and "My Wettest Friend"
- "Attack of the 50 Foot Sister" - "Flawless Girl"
- "Backyard Aquarium" - "When Will He Call Me?"
- "Interview With a Platypus" - "It's a Perfect Day"
- "The Day of Living Gelatin" - "Squirt the Gelatin Monster"
- "Elementary, My Dear Stacy" - "Elementary"
External links
Footnotes
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