Babar the Elephant King (original title: Babar ) is a French - Canadian cartoon series . It was produced from 1989 to 1994 in France and Canada by the Ellipse Program and Nelvana Limited studios under the direction of Peter Hudecki, Raymond Jafelice, Laura Shepherd, Dale Schott and Larry Jacobs. The scripts were written by David Finley, JD Smith, Mary Crawford, Alan Templeton, Peter Sauder, Steven Dewar, Elaine Waisglass and Alex Boon, and Jean and Laurent de Brunhoff. The title song was composed and sung by Milan Kymlicka. The German first broadcast was on November 13, 1990 on ARD . 6 seasons with 13 episodes each were produced. In Germany, however, only the first 5 seasons were broadcast. The story is based on the children's books about Babar by Jean and Laurent de Brunhoff. A characteristic of this series is that its drawings are very much based on the original illustrations of the books.
Babar is a small elephant who lives with his mother in a herd of elephants in the jungle. One day his mother is shot by a hunter and Babar has to flee. He gets lost in search of his flock and finally comes to a city in his search. Here he meets an elderly lady who takes him in and shows him human civilization. She teaches him to read, write and arithmetic and educates him to be an educated elephant. Finally, Babar returns to the jungle, where he meets his childhood friend Celeste and marries. He pacifies the old conflict with the rhinos over King Rataxes and is crowned the new king by the elephants. With Celeste he founds an elephant city that he calls Celesteville.
