JOIN USBowled over by toons
A kids’ event of a different type, ‘Toon Cricket’ let kids cheer for their favourite cartoon characters as they danced around on stage and tried their hand at the much-loved sport of cricket.
Toon characters like Tom and Jerry, the Powerpuff Girls, Scooby Doo, and Johnny Bravo danced on stage to popular songs like ‘Bodyguard’, Dhinka Chika and Singham.
Instead of being tested for their actual cricketing skills, these characters had to dance and use cricket bats and balls as props to make it to the cricket team of ‘Ben 10’, a popular show on the channel.
“Ben is here to select his ‘Ultimate Eleven’. His team already has six toon stars and five of you kids will get to join his team and feature on Cartoon Network as a toon superstar,” explained MC Amar, the host for the evening.
The children had to drop registration forms into Cartoon Network boxes so that five of them could be chosen from a lucky draw and be part of Ben’s team. There were a lot of attractions for children other than the character appearances.
There were plenty of cricket-related game stalls — ‘One Bounce Dunk’, ‘Knock Over’, ‘Putt It’, ‘Basket the Ball’, ‘Krishna’s Keeper’ and ‘Bounce the Ball’. Lured by the idea of winning authentic Cartoon Network sticks and pencils, kids stood in long queues for each of the game stalls and waited patiently for their turns to come. The cartoonetworkindia.com stall was also very popular since kids could play online games sitting at the stall and watch the action projected on the big screen.
‘Toon Cricket’ was the ideal Sunday afternoon plan for parents to keep their kids busy. “I think it’s a nice way of bringing what we see on screen closer to children. They get to see life-size versions of their favourite cartoon characters, which must be delightful while growing up,” says Shalini Naik, who was at the event with her four-year-old daughter.
Now in its eighth successful year, ‘Toon Cricket’ is the perfect combination of India’s most popular sport, cricket, and kids’ favourite cartoon stars like Ben 10, Tom and Jerry, and Scooby Doo.
“It was a lot of fun seeing Tom and Jerry dance together on stage rather than fight like they always do,” says Prashasti Mukherjee, an 11-year-old who thoroughly enjoyed the show.