Squiggly Tommy

Squiggly Tommy is an animated preschool show that has aired from 2005 to 2007 on Nick Jr. and 2006 to 2009 on Nickelodeon. It was produced by Andrew Hjœnn from Seasons 1-2, and Oxa Bellvellem from Seasons 3-6.

Tommy Cart (main protagonist)
The show centres on Tommy Cart, a creative, playful boy who likes to paint and draw, but mostly draw. His friends are figurines that can speak and have their own personality. They “live” in a structured mini-building in Tommy’s room. Tommy’s best friend is Floaty, an astronaut figurine that he keeps with him at all times.

Tommy owns a small, red box which glows whenever he needs to be transported to the World of Pens, a world where everything is made out of drawings.

Premise
Every episode starts with Tommy talking to the viewer about how much he loves drawing and painting. He shows the viewer a picture of what he drew/painted earlier that day (which is a different picture every episode). Afterwards he teaches the viewer how to draw a certain object/animal with some card and a marker pen. When he is finshed, the small, red box glows, meaning he has to be transported into the World of Pens. Tommy then walks to the box, jumps into the box, and he gets transported.

Every time Tommy visits the World of Pens, all the citizens are in danger. This is because Mr. Evil (the main antagonist) hates art, and he wants to destroy the World of Pens. Only Tommy and his friends can save the World of Pens and defeat Mr. Evil.

2004 Pilot
In 2004, Keggy Aschute created a test pilot for Cartoon Network called The Adventures of Squiggly Tommy. The pilot had the same premise as the actual show, but with many differences, such as Tommy being a redhead instead of having brown hair, and Floaty’s design being completely different. Cartoon Network turned down the pilot, calling it “strange” and saying it did not have much quality.

Aschute sent the pilot to Nickelodeon later in 2004, where they decided to make it into an actual television series on Nick Jr.