''Batibot'' is a Philippine television educational show produced by the Philippine Children's Television Foundation (PCTF). It debuted in 1984, a co-production of PCTV and the

Children's Television Workshop Sesame Workshop (SW), originally known as the Children's Television Workshop (CTW), is an American nonprofit organization and television company that has been responsible for the production of several educational children's programs—includin ...

(CTW) from 1983 to 1984.

History

''Sesame!'' (1983–1984)

The precursor of ''Batibot'' was ''Sesame!'', a Filipino version of the American children's show, ''

Sesame Street ''Sesame Street'' is an American educational television, educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation, and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Worksh ...

''. ''Sesame!'' was a co-production of the Philippine Children's Television Foundation (PCTF) and the Children's Television Workshop (CTW) with support from the Philippine government. It aired in 1983 as a

bilingual Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an individual speaker or by a group of speakers. When the languages are just two, it is usually called bilingualism. It is believed that multilingual speakers outnumber monolin ...

(Filipino and English) program. The series featured two Muppet-style characters Pong Pagong and Kiko Matsing. Both characters were inspired from a Filipino

fable Fable is a literary genre defined as a succinct fictional story, in prose or verse, that features animals, legendary creatures, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature that are anthropomorphized, and that illustrates or leads to a parti ...

, " The Monkey and the Turtle", which was annotated to English by

José Rizal José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (, ; June 19, 1861 – December 30, 1896) was a Filipino nationalist, writer and polymath active at the end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. He is popularly considered a na ...

in 1889. Government support ended in 1984 and the co-production arrangement with CTW was cancelled.

''Batibot'' (1985–2003)

PCTF decided to produce its own show titled ''Batibot'' and debuted in February 1985. ''Batibot'' was conceptualized and produced by Feny Delos Angeles-Bautista, a teacher from the Community of Learners Foundation and writer Rene Villanueva. Unlike the bilingual (Filipino and English) ''Sesame!'', ''Batibot'' was done entirely in Filipino and featured stories in a Philippine context. An arrangement with CTW was made in order for the characters Pong Pagong and Kiko Matsing to continue their appearance including one human character Kuya Mario. Airing on weekdays with a time slot of 10:30 AM, the series consistently ranked in 1985 among the top 10 daytime shows in the Philippines, outdoing the ratings of ''Sesame!'' and ''

'', which first aired in the country in

1970 Events January * January 1 – Unix time epoch reached at 00:00:00 UTC. * January 5 – The 7.1 1970 Tonghai earthquake, Tonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity scale, Mercalli ...

. By February 1989, the producers were experiencing financial constraints which placed uncertainty regarding the future airing of the show. PCTF were in negotiations for an Indonesian version of ''Batibot''; coincidentally, CTW were also in negotiations for an Indonesian version of ''Sesame Street''. Shortly thereafter, CTW informed PCTF of their decision to repossess the characters Pong Pagong and Kiko Matsing. PCTF negotiated with CTW for the continued use of the characters for four more years under a license arrangement. Despite, the extension to use the characters, PCTF decided to phase out their appearances because of the costs. By 1994, the two characters were returned to CTW and were never used again. In 1999, ''Batibot'' was relaunched as ''Batang Batibot'' airing on a Saturday morning timeslot. ''Batibot'' ended its run in 2003.

TV5's ''Batibot'' (2010–2013)

TV5 announced in 2010 that it would revive ''Batibot''. It premiered on November 27, 2010. TV5's version of ''Batibot'' featured a different set of human characters, Ate Maya and Kuya Fidel. Instead of a Monday–Friday broadcast format, the new series was aired on Saturday at 8:30 a.m. The airing of the series lasted until 2013.

Cast and characters

''Batibot'' featured characters portrayed by puppets as well as human characters. Most of the puppets used for the show were locally made. Kiko Matsing and Pong Pagong who were among the main characters of the original ''Batibot'' were owned and crafted by CTW.

''Sesame''

;Human characters *Kuya Mario portrayed by Junix Inocian *Ate Sylvia portrayed by

Susan Africa Susan Africa (born August 20, 1959) is a Filipinos, Filipino screen and stage actress, writer, painter, beauty queen and former television host with a career spanning four decades. After placing first runner-up at the Binibining Pilipinas, 1980 ...

*Luz portrayed by Dessa Quesada *Aling Nena portrayed by Angie Ferro *Mang Lino portrayed by Joe Gruta *Ben portrayed by Tito Quesada ;Puppets *Kiko Matsing performed by Sammy Badon and assisted by Toots Javellana *Pong Pagong performed by Deo Noveno

''Batibot''

;Human characters *Kuya Mario portrayed by Junix Inocian *Kuya Bodjie portrayed by Bodjie Pascua *Ate Sienna portrayed by Sienna Olaso *Kuya Ching portrayed by Ching Arellano *Kuya Dwight portrayed by Dwight Gaston *Ate Isay portrayed by Isay Alvarez-Seña *Mang Mokyo portrayed by Soliman Cruz *Popoy portrayed by Alvin Froy Alemania *Ate Jojie portrayed by Adriana Agcaoili *Rap Rap portrayed by Rafael Mallanes *Ate Celia portrayed by Sheila Gamo *Kuya Mola portrayed by Gerry Sanga ;Puppets *Kiko Matsing performed by Sammy Badon and assisted by Toots Javellana *Pong Pagong performed by Deo Noveno *Filimon - a duck with telescope *Irma Daldal - very talkative TV field reporter *Direk - loud-mouth director from segment of "Sa Likod Ng Tabing". *Koko Kwik-Kwak – a bird character inspired from the

Philippine Eagle The Philippine eagle (''Pithecophaga jefferyi''), also known as the monkey-eating eagle or great Philippine eagle, is a critically endangered species of eagle of the family Accipitridae which is Endemism, endemic to forests in the Geography of ...

, based from Big Bird of ''

'' *Manang Bola – a forgetful fortuneteller *Kapitan Basa – a character who has a magic book which he uses to answer questions from children *Sitsiritsit and AlibangBang – a curious duo of space aliens *Ningning and Gingging– characters based from

Ernie Ernie is a masculine given name, frequently a short form (hypocorism) of Ernest, Ernald, Ernesto, or Verner. It may refer to: People * Ernie Accorsi (born 1941), American football executive * Ernie Adams (disambiguation) * Ernie Afaganis ...

and Bert of ''

'' *Kuya Derms (inspired by German Moreno aka "Kuya Germs") - a TV-host for ''Negoshowbiz'' (parody of ''NegoSiyete'' GMA-7) *Noli de Casio (inspired by Noli de Castro) - a News anchor for ''Magandang Araw Bayan'' (parody of '' Magandang Gabi, Bayan'' ABS-CBN 2) *Angelique Baso (inspired by Angelique Lazo) - a TV-host for ''Balitang Bituin'' (parody of "Star News" segment of ''

TV Patrol ''TV Patrol'' is a Philippine television news broadcasting show broadcast by ABS-CBN, Kapamilya Channel, A2Z and All TV. Originally anchored by Noli de Castro, Mel Tiangco and Robert Arevalo, it premiered on March 2, 1987, on the netw ...

'' ABS-CBN 2) *The Byaps-Byaps

''Batibot'' (2010)

;Human characters *Kuya Fidel portrayed by Abner Delina *Ate Maya portrayed by Kakki Teodoro ;Puppets *Irma Daldal* *Koko Kwik-Kwak* *Manang Bola* *Kapitan Basa* *Sitsiritsit* and AlibangBang* *Ningning* and Gingging* *Tarsi - a

tarsier Tarsiers ( ) are haplorhine primates of the family Tarsiidae, which is the lone extant family within the infraorder Tarsiiformes. Although the group was prehistorically more globally widespread, all of the existing species are restricted to M ...

* – from the original ''Batibot''

Spin-offs

''Batibot'' has its own spin-off program ''Koko Kwik Kwak'' (named after a bird character), which also aired on GMA Network from 1999 to 2002 every weekday mornings.

Mobile app

On August 14, 2015,

Smart Communications Smart Communications Inc., commonly referred to as Smart, is a wholly owned wireless communications and digital services subsidiary of PLDT Inc., a telecommunications and digital services provider based in the Philippines. As of November ...

launched a mobile app for Android devices based on the show. Smart together with the Community of Learners Foundation commissioned OrangeFix to develop the app. The development of the app content costed around . The ''Batibot'' app is specifically targeted to children from kindergarten to Grade 3. It is aligned with the

Department of Education An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...

's kindergarten curriculum and is in Filipino. An

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

version of the app was released on July 5, 2017.

References

External links

* {{ABS-CBN Franchised Formats TV5 (Philippine TV network) original programming 1984 Philippine television series debuts 2003 Philippine television series endings 2010 Philippine television series debuts 2013 Philippine television series endings ABS-CBN educational shows Filipino-language television shows GMA Network infotainment shows People's Television Network original programming Philippine animated television series Philippine children's television series Philippine television series based on American television series Philippine television shows featuring puppetry Puppetry in the Philippines Radio Philippines Network original programming Sesame Street international co-productions Television series about monkeys Television series about turtles