Timmy will be played by a border collie. Wrong. Just so wrong.

[PretzelKnot]

According to Wikipedia, Timmy will be played by a border collie in the new BBC Famous Five adaptation.

This is outrageous. I know some of the 80s editions of the books had Timmy on their cover as a border collie but he’s not. He’s a huge, fearsome, loyal protective mongrel who can hold back a bunch of bad guys in a tunnel allowing the kids to escape. Border collies are lovely and highly intelligent but no border collie could hold back a tunnel full of armed bad guys.

Here is the original description of Timmy-

“They sat up and looked to see what Timothy was like. They saw no
fisher-boy—but instead a big brown mongrel dog with an absurdly long
tail and a big wide mouth that really seemed to grin! He was bounding
all round George, mad with delight. She came running down to them.

‘This is Timothy,’ she said. ‘Don’t you think he is simply perfect?’

As a dog, Timothy was far from perfect. He was the wrong shape, his head
was too big, his ears were too pricked, his tail was too long and it was
quite impossible to say what kind of a dog he was supposed to be. But he
was such a mad, friendly, clumsy, laughable creature that every one of
the children adored him at once.”

Border collies already get a lot of glory in movies and TV shows. Now they are stealing a mongrel’s chance to shine.

He's not what i think of as a border collie (even though he clearly is) and not what most would think of as one either! He's a beautiful dog!

I was always a bit sus of the kids in the Fatty books and the Secret Seven. Most of them just attended a day school and I felt this meant they weren't quite top drawer.

(I of course was very much not top drawer myself)

He is bee-yooooooo-tiful 😍😍😍

@RitzyMcFitzy First four were good - the series was supposed to enid with "Rubadub" (i.e Barney finds his father) but publisher (and children) pressure ensured to much poorer books after (Rat-a-tat and Ragamuffin).

Many of the later book in the series are not as good (Famous five, Find-outers etc)

That's not from the original series. He was a black and white collie.

Yes, definitely a spaniel of some kind in the Secret Seven.

I don't understand why we need another Famous Five adaption though, there are loads of more modern "kids solving crime" books they could turn into films/TV instead (Anisha, Accidental Detective by Serena Patel and the Mystery series by Helen Moss are favourites in our house)

I hated the Secret Seven. The girls always got left behind which never happened in any of the other series.

Timmy was on of the five because he was active muscle. He bit bad guys, bailed up bad guys, stole a ham from bad guys when the kids were hungry. He stood van guard and rear guard.

Scamper didn’t do any of that. He was too small.

That's 'cause he's a Bearded Collie 😁

@RitzyMcFitzy Other than Bets, who was educated at home (or potentially a local day school) as she was younger than the others all the find-outers went to boarding school.

I always loved the line 'just leave a clue and leave the rest to the Famous Five' - it always made me think of dangerous, ruthless criminals who did nevertheless at least have enough of a sense of fair play to make sure they deliberately followed the FF's rule and dropped some evidence in the ruined rocks!

I’m guessing the kids weren’t hired for their singing ability 🙉

I saw an interview with the three surviving members of the Five and apparently ‘Anne’ was shit scared of horses. So the bit in the titles that focuses on her face, she’s actually on a bloke’s shoulders 😂

Rubadub should have been the last book. Such a beautiful scene when Barney finally meets his dad on the beach.

I’m confused as to what era the new series is set in?

You're underestimating border collies ime.

No, it's from the new series. The picture is from the Radio Times

Ah that's interesting. I'm going to go and read the synopses for the books and jolt my memory. The one that sticks out is the Ring O Bells mystery. I read that one so many times. It had a pleasing eeriness to it.

@FatNoMoreSue ..me too
As I said George looks like she has time travelled from current times and landed in 1950's.
Dick looks weedy...he wasn't ...

He's not what I think of as a bearded Collie either. I think of Pippin or a dog like pippin - grey and white with longer fur.

I was also thinking of the dog in Johnny Briggs but Google shows me that's a Jack Russell

there are loads of more modern "kids solving crime" books they could turn into films/TV instead

And, for balance, they probably should have a few "kids doing crimes" series as well"!

I read somewhere that the FF was supposed to be six books, then it went to 12 (which included Hike and Sea which were two of the classics) but then extended again as they were a good earner. The teen ones are a bit indifferent.

I think Enid was supposed to be starting with dementia at the end of her career which is possibly why the last FF and the last FFO books are virtually the same plot.

@PretzelKnot It was supposed to be - there was five years between Rub-a-dub and Rat-a-tat. But publishers wanted more and Blyton did receive huge amounts of post from children asking for more books in all her series.

Google also says the new Timmy is a mongrel - bearded Collie cross (presumably with a border going by his colouring and patterns!)

Oh an adaptation, brilliant! I loved The Famous Five so much that my childhood dog was called Timmy!

Anne and Julian look right. George is far too tall- she was the same age as Dick.

I also don’t get how George is dressed in modern clothes and the others aren’t. Maybe she is from our time and Uncle Quentin invented a Time Machine and she got sent back.

He was a border collie on the cover of my edition. And a border collie could definitely hold back a tunnel full of bad guys, if you met my ddog at night you wouldn't mess with him! They are fiercely protective of their families being a herding dog.