After Manjadi and Poopy, its Kathu

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:  Poopy can now take a break. The makers of the animated series for children are in the market with a new character, Kathu. She is a cat who is set to woo kids along with her brother Kittu and friend Appu, a squirrel. The animation CD Kathu was launched in the city on Wednesday by filmmaker Shaji N Karun. Deviating a bit from their usual pattern, Hibiscus Digital Media Private Ltd, who had created ripples with their animation series Manjadi and Poopy, are presenting Kathu in a short story style. Twinkle, the animated character who has been anchoring all the animation CDs of Hibiscus Media so far, would not appear in Kathu. Instead, it will begin on a filmy style with a title song and move on to a story which is however broken by a couple of songs in between.  While Poopy had based its stories on science, Kathu will talk about values, quite subtly like Poopy had done. The story and dialogues are by Manu K S, who is by now quite well-versed in the language for young ones. ‘’We have localised the language. It is a deliberate attempt so that children get to know Malayalam words, which have gone out of use. The same way, we have included trees and birds which are totally alien to today’s generation though they were a part of our childhood,’’ says Manu. Madhu K S, who is the director of the animated series, says the success of Manjadi and Poopy had added to their responsibility of coming out with a children’s work. ‘’Every word uttered, every scene, every expression and feeling that is being conveyed through the CD is taken care of,’’ Madhu says.  It was in 2002 that Hibiscus Media first came out with the Manjadi series. Though it was first envisaged as a television series, it evoked less response. However, when it was converted to a CD, the magic was done. After the tremendous success of Manjadi 1 and 2, it was the turn of Poopy 1 to hit the screens. Manjadi 3 and Poopy 2 followed.  ‘’There is no story-teller now in families. It is into that space that we have entered. We used to wonder whether kids would sit through the stories, but from what we know, they are sitting through the 45 minutes over and over again and not getting bored anytime. So, when we created Kathu, we had this in mind,’’ Madhu says.  Sunilkumar B, Deepu Prasad, Jacob Umman, Rajesh Amal, Joby Varghese, Saratchandran J and Hemanth M R are the others behind the venture. The CDs have already hit the market and are available at all leading music stores.