| Creator: | Dominique Jolin |
| Starring: | Frank Meschkuleit |
| Opentheme: | "Toopy and Binoo Theme Song" |
| Music: | Daniel Scott |
| Country: | Canada |
| Producer: | Dominique Mendel |
| Company: | Spectra Animation |
| Network: | Treehouse TV Télévision de Radio-Canada Télé-Québec |
| Num Episodes: | 32 (104 segments) |
| Story: | Dominique Jolin |
Toopy and Binoo (French: Toupie et Binou) is a Canadian children's book series created by Dominique Jolin in 1996. In collaboration with Raymond Lebrun, it has been developed as an After Effect animated series produced by Echo Média (formerly Spectra Animation) and broadcast by Treehouse in English and Télévision de Radio-Canada and Télé-Québec in French. Another television series was produced as a live-action spin-off show titled Toopy and Binoo Vroom Vroom Zoom, produced by Echo Média (formerly Spectra Animation) which was developed into a mobile app.
A total of 175 episodes were produced overall.[1] A film adaptation based on the series titled Toopy and Binoo: The Movie was released on August 11, 2023 in Canadian theaters.
Toopy is a funny, friendly, optimistic, impulsive mouse whose insatiable zest for life is matched only by his love for his best friend, Binoo, a stuffed cat who is logical, sensible, and thinks before he acts. Binoo is devoted to his best friend Toopy. The characters are charming and endearing. The kindness, respect, and gentle aspects of childhood friendship are emphasized as the friends explore and discover the world around them with their colorful adventures. Toopy and Binoo allows for learning in a non-didactic manner. Individual segments are approximately five minutes in length, but five of them are frequently paired together into one 24-minute episode, both on television and DVD releases, and the mini-movies have other characters talk besides Toopy.
There are also short 2-minute episodes that are seen on the website in the second season, where, there are either "Magic You", "Captain You", or "Fabulous You" segments, featuring Toopy and Binoo as space captains, fairies, or, as superheroes who make things right by using magic (Toopy sometimes ends it by doing the same thing that's wrong on himself which he doesn't even notice), and they use the magic wand from "Godmother Toopy", explore things in their house and pretend to find out what they are, and, Binoo sometimes reveals what they are, such as a pillow, where, they use the same uniforms they had in "Strange New World", but, instead, the object they find is the entire form of the planet, and, help their friends when they have nothing to play with by playing games they can use with themselves. They use the same uniforms they had in "Super Toopy", however, Binoo does strikingly resemble Super Toopy. The segments encourage viewers (referred to in the show as "Magic You", "Captain You", or, "Fabulous You") to participate in the adventures and use their imaginations. Each DVD that has two half-hour specials has two of each of these three short mini-episode adventures, starting in this order: "Magic You", "Captain You", and then, "Fabulous You".
Toupie et Binou was the original title of the children's book series written by Dominique Jolin.
Binoo had his own book series. Echo Media (formerly Spectra Animation) then brought them to television, both in English versions, dubbing their English names to Toopy and Binoo.[2]
Seasons 1 and 2 have been broadcast in over 179 countries and dubbed into 30 languages, 1 million DVD's have been sold and YouTube videos have reached nearly 350 million views, for a total of 1.35 billion minutes viewed.
A third season of the television series, entiltled, Toopy and Binoo Vroom Vroom Zoom is produced in live 3D mode. Two Toopy and Binoo live shows, Marshmallow Moon and Fun and Games were presented across Canada and sold over 250,000 tickets.