Cyberchase

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Template:Infobox television Cyberchase is an American children's animated television series on PBS Kids GO!, produced by Thirteen/WNET New York and Nelvana. This television series premiered January 21 2002, although the episode "The Poddleville Case" was shown as a pilot on WNET in 2000. This show is for children ages 7 to 11.

Opening Theme:

Cyberchase! We're moving
We're beating Hacker at his game.
Don't tell me he's trying to hack the Motherboard
We'll get him every time
Cosmic worlds
Freaky places that we've seen
We've got the power!
Of one...two...three four!
Running in a Cyberchase
We'll meet him face to face
We'll stick together
All the time
Adventures in cyberspace
The chase is on! Just wait
And C-Y-B-E-R-CHASE!

Contents

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Plot

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The show stars three Earth children, Matt, Jackie, and Inez, and a bird-like cyborg called Digit who is a species of bird called a cyboid. The three kids and Digit have various adventures to stop the evil deeds of the Hacker and his two cyborg henchmen, Buzz and Delete.

The series takes place in Cyberspace, with planetlike bodies called "Cybersites." Each cybersite is inhabited by "Cyborgs", the virtual inhabitants of Cyberspace. Some are based on real-world places, such as ancient Egypt and the American Old West, or fantasy worlds, such as mythological Greece. The guardian of all Cyberspace is Motherboard; her repairman is Dr. Marbles.

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Season one

In the permiere episode, "Lost My Marbles", Hacker infects Motherboard with a computer virus. At a library on Earth, while looking at a library computer, Matt, Jackie, and Inez are sucked into a dimensional portal to Cyberspace. Their first adventure involves going to an island to rescue Dr. Marbles. In subsequent adventures, they return to Cyberspace and strive to defeat Hacker in his evil plans, which alternate from those focusing on ruining Motherboard to those on a smaller scale in which he tries to take over a Cybersite.

From then on the cybersquad continues to find a new incryptor chip for Motherboard while preventing Hacker from taking over Cyberspace.

In one episode the kids nearly retreived the encryptor chip but lose it in a dust storm.

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Season two

The kids continue their quest to stop Hacker from taking control of Cyberspace and find the incryptor chip. Among many of the new cybersites featured were:

  • Cybrary
  • Radapolis
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Season Three

In the third season, the kids meet Slider, a rebel-stylee skateboarder who lives in the cybersite, Radapolis. He first appeared in the episode The Borg of the Ring where he retrieves the Totally Rad Ring of Radapolis from Hacker. The kids also discovers his father, Coop, had orphaned him.

The most dramatic event in the season happened in a two part miniseries called The Snelfu Snafu. While Slider was searching for his father, he stumbles across a coordinate indicating the location of the elusive incryptor chip. As he alerts the cybersquad, they soon discover it was in the hands of an auctioneer. The kids eventually earn enough snelfus to earn it, but they unfortunately discover the chip was infected to override Motherboard replacing it with Hacker. The kids then find a way to retrieve the chip.

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Season Four

Coming soon.

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Cyberchase "For Real"

Each Cyberchase episode is followed by "Cyberchase for Real", a live-action educational supplement linking concepts learned in the show to real life experiences. The actors are in their twenties, but act in a manner similar to the children in the target audience, providing a source of amusement for anyone in or above the target age. "For Real" is produced by WNET on location in and around New York City after production is completed on the animated segments. These "For Real" segments are broadcast exclusively on PBS in the United States where the program runs longer (since public television does not intersperse commercials during its shows). "For Real" segments can also be viewed at Cyberchase Online.

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Cast

Template:Main

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Voice actors

  • The Hacker, dastardly villain - Christopher Lloyd
  • Digit, cyborg bird helper for the kid heroes - Gilbert Gottfried
  • Matt - Jacqueline Pillon
  • Jackie - Novie Edwards
  • Inez - Annick Obonsawin
  • Buzz, Hacker's minion - the late Len Carlson (Seasons 1-3)
  • Delete, Hacker's minion - Rob Tinkler
  • Motherboard, the benevolent ruler of Cyberspace - Kristina Nicoll
  • Dr. Marbles, inventor who works with Motherboard - Richard Binsley
  • Slider, a skateboarder - Tim Hamaguchi
  • Coop, Slider's father - Tony Hawk
  • Wicked, a witch who is Hacker's love interest and sometimes nemesis - Linda Ballantyne
  • Sam Vander Rom, newsman - Al Roker
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Cyberchase "For Real" cast

  • Bianca DeGroat - Bianca DeGroat
  • Harry Wilson - Matt Wilson
  • Kareem - Kareem Blackwell (pilot episode)
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Trivia

  • A couple of episodes of Cyberchase had a spoof on Harry Potter called Sharri Spotter.
  • Skateboard legend Tony Hawk voiced a character named Coop, father to a popular recurring character named Slider who is a James Dean-type character that rides and builds skateboards. "Sliders" is also the name of a popular science fiction television series about a group of people that slide into various parallel worlds.
  • Real life 19th century mathematician and early computer programmer Lady Ada Lovelace is a character in a Valentine's Day episode, "Hugs and Witches." She is played by Saturday Night Live founding cast member Jane Curtin.
  • In the live-action "For Real" segments, host Bianca DeGroat uses her real name on air, while host Matt Wilson uses the pseudonym "Harry" Wilson, to avoid confusion with the character Matt in the animated segment.
  • The pilot episode "The Poddleville Case" is aired as the seventh episode (#107) in the first season. Digit does not appear in this episode, and the animation is by Curious Pictures instead of Nelvana. The pilot aired in March 2000 on Thirteen/WNET New York and WPBT/Channel 2 Palm Beach.
  • "Chewcroca", a dinosaur is a take off on Chewbacca, a hairy creature from Star Wars.
  • In the episode Codename: Icky, the gatekeeper mermaid's name is Binary.
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See also

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External links

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