10 Creepy Theories That Ruin Your Favourite Kids TV Shows
2. Something Special Is A Dramatisation Of Psychoanalysis
Evergreen national treasure Justin Fletcher’s long-running, hugely successful BBC show Something Special is a peculiar creation. It follows his children’s clown character, Mr. Tumble, who lives in a large detached house along with his grandfather Grandad Tumble, two aunts, Polly and Sukey, and supposed peer of the realm Lord Tumble - all of whom are played by Fletcher, naturally.
The extended Tumble family never seem to leave the grounds of Tumble House, but Mr. Tumble himself, via magic that he doesn’t seem to fully understand, can communicate with Justin in the outside world by teleporting his ‘Spotty Bag’ to him with instructions about things he wishes Justin to find.
Justin, in turn, will visit locations like farms, seasides, and underground fight clubs (probably) with a selection of children with special needs, who assist him in exploring and finding the things Mr. Tumble needs. The narrator, an unseen child, guides Mr. Tumble and the other occupants of Tumble House in articulating their feelings and coming to conclusions.
Examining Something Special in isolation, you can clearly see that Mr. Tumble and all his assorted relatives in Tumble House are different aspects of Justin Fletcher’s own dissociative personality.
Tumble House itself represents his giant brain, with the simple but gregarious ‘Mr. Tumble’ the only alternate persona capable of communicating with ‘Justin’, the primary persona, who seems unaware of the existence of the others. The child narrator is Justin’s therapist, carefully helping his various personae coexist and get through day to day problems, with a view to making him well again.
Tumble House is a friendly, brightly-lit place, and the various alternate personae we’ve so far appear to get on well with each other. It does beg the question, then: what if there are other alternates we haven’t met yet? What if there are people living in Tumble House that even the other Tumbles don’t know about? When was the last time Lord Tumble explored his own grounds - the cellars, or the attic?
Perhaps there’s a Doctor Tumble in the basement, performing illegal medical experiments on the absent Aunt Sukey - or a gibbering murderer chained in the attic that Mr. Tumble is terrified to mention by name...