CITV is dead. As of today, it has been collapsed into a streaming submenu and renamed ITVX Kids. It is only right that things should move with the times, but it is an ignoble end for one of ITV’s most enduring brands.
Introduced in 1983 as Children’s ITV, first as a slab of daily after-school programming and then as a standalone channel, CITV was always smaller and scrappier than its BBC counterpart, CBBC. But that was its charm. For years, schoolchildren could easily be identified by whether they watched CBBC or CITV at home; the former may have been better behaved, but the latter were always more fun.
To mark the end of CITV, let’s look back at some of its greatest hits. For the sake of brevity, I am excluding foreign imports. You are obviously going to disagree with all of this, but that’s what the comments are for.
Art Attack (1990-2007)
The beauty of Neil Buchanan’s wonderful art series was in its scale. For every Big Art Attack, where Buchanan would piece together a large-scale time-lapse artwork using everyday items, there were smaller makes kids could easily do at home.
Bernard’s Watch (1997-2005)
Perhaps the most successful children’s television programme ever to be based on a segment from The Twilight Zone – where a man is given a watch that can stop time, breaks it and finds himself permanently frozen in limbo. Bernard’s Watch, meanwhile, is a show about a kid who uses the same magic power to go to the zoo quite often. Still good, though.
Children’s Ward (1989-2000)
CITV’s Grange Hill equivalent, this drama series was aimed at older children and set in the children’s ward of a hospital, which allowed it to cover a range of serious issues. Writers from Sally Wainwright to Russell T Davies cut their teeth on the show, and actors included Will Mellor, Stephen Graham and Danny Dyer.
Fun House (1989-1999)
Fun House might also qualify as the perfect kids’ gameshow. It was set in a giant soft play barn before soft play was popular. If you were a child when Fun House was on the air, it is a given that you wanted to be a contestant.
How 2 (1991-2006)
Based on the previous series How (which doesn’t qualify for this list on the basis that it pre-dated CITV, which is also why Chorlton and the Wheelies isn’t here), How 2 was an educational series starring Fred Dinenage, Gaz Top and Carol Vorderman. An earnest and fun mix of science and maths, How 2 is best known for a segment where the presenters unwisely explained how flammable flour is to an audience of impressionable children.
Knightmare (1987-1994)
A terrifying, cutting edge gameshow where a child with a bucket on their head was guided through a series of puzzles by their teammates. Hugo Myatt’s dungeonmaster Tregard acted as ringmaster, either encouraging or chiding the children as he saw fit. Genuinely scary in a way that children’s television no longer is, competitors often discovered they were being eliminated when they saw a computer graphic of a human face decay and fall apart in front of them.
Mr Majeika (1988-1990)
Based on Humphrey Carpenter’s series of children’s books about a bumbling wizard who somehow finds gainful employment as a teacher, this series starred comedian and impressionist Stanley Baxter at his most charming. Think Bewitched, but about an old man who could waggle his hair instead of a housewife who could scrunch up her nose and you’re there.
My Parents Are Aliens (1999-2006)
A four-time Royal Television Society award winner, My Parents Are Aliens managed to hide a lot of big ideas in its simplistic premise. Perhaps this is down to the quality of writing; episodes were variously written by Paul Rose (The Armstrong and Miller Show), Jamie Mathieson (Doctor Who), Joanna Scanlon (Getting On), Trevor and Simon (Trevor and Simon) and Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain (Peep Show, and something apparently called Succession).
Press Gang (1989-1993)
Speaking of people who went on to bigger things, Press Gang (a TV show about a children’s newspaper) was written by Steven Moffatt and starred Julia Sawalha and Dexter Fletcher. Funny and gripping in equal measure, it could stand up today, except that children no longer know what newspapers are.
Rosie and Jim (1990-2000)
A gentle, whimsical show about a pair of curious dolls who explore the world from a narrowboat. Perfectly charming by itself, it is also the work of the legendary Anne Wood, who would go on to produce bangers such as Twirlywoos, Tots TV, In the Night Garden and Teletubbies.
Round the Bend (1989-1991)
Co-created and written by Private Eye cartoonist Tony Husband, this was a satirical puppet show about some animals producing a comic in a sewer. The loose sketch format allowed the show to produce boundary pushing moments of children’s entertainment such as Pzycho the Magnificent and Wee-Man and the Masters of the Looniverse. As close to Viz as kid’s television ever got.
Sooty and Co (1993-1998)
Yes, Sooty predates CITV by several decades, but Sooty and Co represents the puppet’s definitive form. Two decades after inheriting Sooty from his father, Matthew Corbett finally found his own voice with a show about Sooty and his friends running a shop. The secret to Sooty and Co’s success was Sweep, whose psychopathic tendencies Corbett ramped up to 11.
T-Bag (1985-1992)
T-Bag was a collection of serialised stories about a power-hungry witch and T-Shirt, the young assistant she would routinely bully. Included in this list because it was gripping and often very scary, and not because I had an enormous crush on Elizabeth Estensen when I was seven.
Your Mother Wouldn’t Like It (1985-1988)
A rough and ready, fully anarchic sketch show that delighted in spoofing the pop culture of the day. Your Mother Wouldn’t Like It routinely mocked Grange Hill, the royal family, Michael Parkinson, Cannon and Ball and – in one episode – the popular French resistance sitcom ‘Allo ‘Allo! Plus it was co-presented by a tapeworm, so that’s something.
