Gîbus (partially found Belgian animated series; 1965)

Gîbus, the main character of the series..

Status: Partially Lost

Gîbus is a 1965 animated series produced by the Belgian studio Belvision. It had 26 episodes of 6 minutes in length each.

Premise

The series was about the random adventures of a small stage magician named Gîbus (his name is a French word for the collapsible type of top hat stage magicians wear). He often confronts a large and brutish villain called Biceps, and is sometimes helped by a pretty female agent called Mademoiselle Pépée.

In order to avoid confusion with multiple other uses of the word "gibus", the series is frequently referred as "Gibus le magicien" (Gibus the magician) among watchers (not to mention the circumflex accent is very often omitted).

Availability

The series was aired only a few times ever since its creation. According to some witnesses, the last time it was aired was in 1993 on French cable channel Canal J.

Gîbus only had very rare VHS releases, or a DVD release in any form, and its episodes are now very hard to find. For a long time, only two episodes were available on the Internet.

In October of 2017, French nostalgia forum Le Pays du Manga ("The Land of Manga", aka LPDM) has managed to find 8 other episodes apart from the two already online.

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  Front of a rare VHS release.

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  Back of this rare VHS release.

Appearances on Tintin VHS tapes

Animation studio Belvision also created the first Adventures of Tintin animated series in the 1960s, so, when some of its episodes were released on VHS, they would sometimes come with an episode of Gîbus as well.

This is similar to what was done with the old French animated series Virgul, of which two episodes would often appear at the beginning and the end of Fil à Film VHS tapes for children's media.

A VHS of two-part episode The Calculus Affair came with a Gîbus episode at the end of the tape: Gîbus perd la boule ("Gîbus loses his mind"), where Gîbus and a female agent, Mademoiselle Pépée, pursue a crystal ball.

Cable channel CFI (Canal France International) once aired the Calculus Affair episodes along with that same Gîbus episode.

There is also a VHS of the 1969 animated feature Tintin and the Temple of The Sun that included a Gîbus episode: Gîbus et les gogos (Biceps steals Gîbus' laughing hand puppets, the gogos, and turns them evil).

List of known episode titles

1. Gîbus est un héros ("Gîbus is a hero") - on Tintin VHS?
2. Gîbus contre Biceps ("Gîbus VS. Biceps")
3. Gîbus joue et gagne ("Gîbus plays and wins")
4. Gîbus et le rhinocéros ("Gîbus and the rhinoceros")
5. Gîbus vainqueur à Waterloo ("Gîbus wins Waterloo") - available
6. Gîbus pique-nique ("Gîbus goes on a picnic")
7. Gîbus contre le bonhomme de neige ("Gîbus VS. the Snowman")
8. Gîbus et Pharaon  ("Gîbus and the Pharaoh") - found by LPDM
9. Gîbus perd la boule  ("Gîbus loses his mind") - found by LPDM
10. Gîbus toréro  ("Bullfighter Gîbus") - found by LPDM
11. Gîbus et l'auto magique  ("Gîbus and the magical car")
12. Gîbus et les pêcheurs de perles ("Gîbus and the pearl fishers") - available
13. Gîbus contre le fakir  ("Gîbus VS. the fakir")
14. Gîbus fait ses preuves  ("Gîbus proves himself")
15. Gîbus et les gogos ("Gîbus and the gogos") - on Tintin VHS, found by LPDM
16. Gîbus au Texas ("Gîbus in Texas")
17. Gîbus somnambule ("Sleepwalking Gîbus")
18. Gîbus et l'île au trésor ("Gîbus and the treasure island")
19. Gîbus 1er de cordée ("Gîbus leading the rope team") - found by LPDM
20. Gîbus au bal masqué ("Gîbus at the costume party") - found by LPDM

Available episodes

An episode.

An episode.

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References

• IMDB page. Retrieved 12 Apr '15
• Forum topic talking about the series. Retrieved 12 Apr '15
• VHS website talking about the Tintin VHS. Retrieved 12 Apr '15
• Original list of episodes (partial). Retrieved 12 Apr '15