Badger Badger Badger

Badgers (aka Badger Badger Badger ) is a Macromedia Flash animation by Jonti Picking, the creator of Weebl and Bob, consisting mainly of images of badgers doing calisthenics, a mushroom in front of a tree, and a snake in the desert.

The cartoon was released via the B3ta weekly E-mail newsletter on September 5, 2003. It spread wildly as an Internet meme or internet phenomenon.

==Lyrics==

The lyrics of the animation are set to a gabber music-style techno music loop written by Jonti. The first snake line in the lyrics is under wide dispute; various interpretations include Argh! It s a snake , Argh snake! Argh snake! , and Panic - a snake! . Jonti himself says that the line is Argh snake! Argh snake!

A few people claim that the lyrics actually say Magic instead of Badger , but careful listening reveals that this is plainly not the case. The words are more distinct on the CD version of Badger Badger Badger which was published on the album Pure Yak Frenzy by Weebl and Chums (Jonti and Rob Manuel).

There is some contention that rather than Badger the words are actually Badgers , plural. However, the most common belief is that Badger is in the singular. (It is also possible that the song switches between the two.) Stanzas 2—4 contain only eleven repetitions of Badger rather than the regular twelve due to a beat being skipped between the mushroom scene and the badger scene. The sound between the beats is thought to be either an intake of breath or the indefinite article a .

The audio doesn t match up exactly with the visuals. This becomes plainly discernible after 30 minutes of continuous playing. At this point, the audio is at the twelfth badger in the first line while the visuals show the mushroom. Over the next few hours, the visuals continue to play faster than the audio, achieving maximum separation at 4 hours 12 minutes. Thereafter the gap begins to close, and becomes synchronized again at about 8 hours 30 minutes. This process continues cyclically.

==Football Badgers==

. The badgers are seen wearing England shirts and playing football, scoring endless goals against a snake goalkeeper. Instead of badger badger badger , we hear footy footy footy , England England! , Goal, it s a goal, Ooh it s a goal! [Scored by] England England England... , etc. Each time England scores a goal, the animation displays England s score increased by one, essentially showing how many times the animation has looped.

==Christmas Badgers==

On Christmas Eve, 2004, Jonti released another special edition of Badgers for a Samsung Group Advent calendar screensaver, for which he made one animation for each of the 24 days before Christmas. Christmas Badgers was the animation for December 24. The badgers are dancing while wearing Santa suits; then there are presents under a tree; and then the exclamation Hallelujah! appears, followed by a baby Jesus. The lyrics go Santa Santa Santa , Presents, presents! , and Christ! It s a Christ! Ooh, it s a Christ...

==Pure Yak Frenzy==

Through the Weebl and Bob web-store, Jonti released a CD titled Pure Yak Frenzy containing extended versions of the music from several of his animations, including Badger Badger Badger . (The CD is only referred to on the store page as Weebl and Chums Audio CD , possibly because some viewers wrongly thought that the mention of Yak was a reference to Jeff Minter, but the title remains printed on the CD) The extended version of the original song appears as the first track: it begins with a section with only the drums and bass, followed by the song as heard in the Flash movie. The song is then repeated with a phasing effect applied, followed by a short instrumental bridge before the original song is repeated for a third time.

Later printings of the CD also included, as the last track, a remixed version (simply titled Badger Remix ) which retained the same chord structure but radically altered the rhythm (it is somewhat slower) and lyrics. This version is not at present known to be available anywhere other than on the CD. (It does not match any of the various badger remixes written by third parties.)

=Domain war – badgerbadgerbadger.com vs. badgerx3.com =

Shortly after the animation was first published, a person known as Kay0909 created the site badgerbadgerbadger.com and placed a copy of the badgers animation there, without permission from Jonti. Kay used the hosting services of Joako.net, who ultimately owned the domain name. Kay later reached an agreement with Jonti, which permitted Kay to use the animation provided only Google advertisements were shown on the site and he linked back to the original weebls-stuff.com site. Kay registered his own domain, badgerx3.com (hosted at ipaska.com) and made badgerbadgerbadger.com visits automatically redirect to there.

Due to a disagreement over advert revenues, Joako locked Kay out of badgerbadgerbadger.com and took over the site. Joako removed the redirection, claimed Kay had hacked the site, claimed badgerbadgerbadger.com was the official site for the badgers animation and wrote to Kay s new hosting providers, demanding they take down badgerx3.com .

Jonti has publicly stated his support for badgerx3.com , due to giving his permission to Kay rather than Joako, and Joako s violation of Jonti s requirements.

=See also=

*Bananaphone, another popular internet cartoon that parodies some elements of the badger cartoon. *Inherently funny word

=External links=

*[http://weebls-stuff.com/toons/badgers/ The original Badger animation] ([http://weebls-stuff.com/flash/badger.swf direct link]) *[http://www.weebls-stuff.com/toons/24/ Halloween edition of the badger animation] ([http://70.84.131.212/data/toons/lovely.swf direct link]) *[http://www.weebls-stuff.com/toons/25/ Lord of the Rings edition of the badger animation] ([http://www.weebls-stuff.com/flash/badgers_ring.swf direct link]) *[http://www.weebls-stuff.com/toons/35/ Euro 2004 edition of the badger animation] ([http://www.weebls-stuff.com/flash/footy.swf direct link]) *[http://www.ebaumsworld.com/santabadger.html Christmas 2004 edition: Santa Santa Santa ] ([http://media.ebaumsworld.com/badgersanta.swf direct link]) *[http://thefifthdistrict.com/potter/ Harry Potter version of the badger animation] (non-Weebl) ([http://thefifthdistrict.com/potter/PotterPotterMovie.swf direct link]) *[http://www.weebls-stuff.com/ Author s Page] *[http://www.b3ta.com/newsletter/issue103/ b3ta newsletter where the cartoon was originally released] *[http://www.weebls-stuff.com/forums/showpost.phpp=467862&postcount=29 Jonti discusses the Domain War (link is dead)] *[http://www.4inthemorn.com/artsy.phpid=10 Zombie, Zombie, Zombie done as Tribute]