These were all done by animation legend Shamus Culhane and ran on independent stations and HBO throughout the 80s. It was a trilogy of sorts: The first was "Noah's Animals," which played out much as the biblical story itself, with several interesting songs along the way. Perhaps the most widely seen one, this introduced us to Croc, here a jaded skeptic who believes with his hyena and raven associates that the ark is going nowhere and, despite the pleas of Polar Bear and those who support his non-violent approach advocates either abandoning ship or reeacting the mutiny on the bounty. Eventually he gets the raven to fly and look for the said to come dry land and leaves with the rest of his merry band, getting in the chance to taunt the ark as it floats by their island--only to stop at Ararat and let all the water drain away ("All that water going down gives me a sinking feeling!" Croc groans as he wathces his would-be empire evaporate. The hyenas and ravens see the light from above and go back to the ark, ignoring Croc's, "You'll be sorry!"
A still somewhat unrepentant Croc decides to drop by anyway at the beginning of the trilogy's second, King of the Beasts, where Noah forgivingly gives him a pair of eggs which quickly hatch into his sons, shattering Croc's hard-heart. I can remember much more, but the lion in the party got his due, I presume
I'm more familiar with the climactic Last of the Red-Hot Dragons. The titular character pops out of Croc's Egyptian mud pit, unable to blow fire anymore. When word get to him (via Animal Worldwide Union, the fastest way for animals to send news)that old nemesis Polar Bear and associates are trapped deep in a cave-in behind a wall of ice at the North Pole, a now reformed Croc leads his own friends, the lion from the last story, plus an elephant and the dragon, on a heroicesque quest to get them out. After several botched attempts, including one unique one where Croc himself tries to drill through the ice with his tail, but runs out of gas just before he can, the dragon finally restarts his fire and free the polar animals to much celebration and song.
So my question now that I've gone into such elaborate detail on them, is has anyone else seen these, and are they available anywhere, even if it be Ebay?
