I've seen some curious feats of British television in my time, but I'm not sure anything will beat the fever dream which is Darth Vader infused with the spirit of Sutekh from Pyramids of Mars fed through the shoestring budget of BBC Scotland in the early 1980s. But I've double and treble checked, this was no fever dream. It was broadcast and, to make matters even more confounding, it was performed entirely in Scottish Gaelic.
A couple of years ago, I unearthed a televisual cryptid known only to a few Gaelic eccentrics: Mag is Mog, broadcast exclusively on BBC1 Scotland in the early 1980s. This was not so much a programme, more a piece of folklore, whispered about only in the highlands and islands of western Scotland by a select few. It was a Gaelic puppet show, one of the few to make a splash in the mainstream. Naturally, this had my curiosity alarm going off at an ear-bleeding volume. But footage was scarce. In fact, all I could find was a single, murky publicity photo - BBC Scotland were bewildered if it still even existed.
Nonetheless, I managed to track down one of the Mag is Mog puppeteers, leading to a breadcrumb trail through the woods of obscurity which hinted at the show's absurd premise. But Curious British Telly demands more when it comes to these curious glances back at long-forgotten eras. I'm almost ashamed to sit on the internet opining about a programme I'm never watched a single second of. I need proof to pontificate so, for several years, I felt mildly irritated that Mag is Mog was out of reach.
Thankfully, as occasionally happens when I've behaved, the gods of British telly decided to smile upon me.
An individual, who wishes to remain nameless due to fears of recrimination from an endless stream of television anoraks, offered me a private viewing of an episode of Mag is Mog. Better yet, they even had an episode of the earlier, slightly related Bzzz to tickle my televisual antennas with. So, with my heart thudding like a ceilidh drum, I strapped myself in and prepared to journey into the wonderfully deranged psyche of Gaelic children's television.
Now, Gaelic is a language I have absolutely zero grasp of, I don’t speak a syllable of it. So watching Mag is Mog and Bzzz felt like being dropped into a dream recounted by someone else’s eccentric great-aunt who's invented her own language. But I expected no less. The draw, clearly, would be the visuals, and they delivered in the way that only early-1980s Scottish children’s television could.
Mog is an oddly shaped bundle of fur, with a striking pair of hypnotic eyes - all of which is combined with an alien voice which could only have been recorded in a plumbing pipe beneath the Mos Eisley cantina. Mag, the avian counterpart, is less eye-catching, a generic magpie coupled with a squawky, yet authentic, feathery voice. Presenter Rhoda MacLeod, meanwhile, is resplendent in her early 1980s wares and well coiffured hair. And the set? A simple, yet colourful affair with a green desk and huge tissue paper flowers adorning the wall.
So, what's going on in this episode of Mag is Mog? Well, I really don't know. The narrative - if I dare use such a term - involves Mag and Mog sporting head bandages concealing what appears to be cheese, a puppet otter with a medical degree, and a Gaelic chanteuse singing with a toe-tapping folk-pop lilt. I'd love to know what was unfolding, but even if I had a translation to hand, I dare say it would raise more questions than it answered.
But if the first half of Mag is Mog is a descent into madness, then the second half is beyond the realms of any psychiatrist's knowledge. Mag is Mog suddenly flings open the airlock and blasts us into outer space. The second half is less television, more a neurological episode.
Simon MacKenzie travels the galaxy in what appears to be a crofter’s cottage-cum-spaceship, accompanied by a disturbingly anthropomorphic pocketwatch. A second pocketwatch - this one malicious - teams up with a villain done up as Darth Vader’s lesser-known Caledonian cousin. There's a kidnapping, a flashing kitchen cupboard which appears to offer salvation, and all of it plays out like Doctor Who after a quick stop at Amsterdam's finest cafe. It is truly brilliant, an eye-catching spectacle which is now indelibly burnt into my retinas and hippocampus.
Bzzz is a more restrained affair. Opening with an instrumental version of Enola Gay by OMD - a cheery ditty about nuclear annihilation - Bzzz wastes no time introducing us to its presenting pair, Anna Latharna NicGillìosa and Domhnall Domhnallach, both squeezed into tight, matching yellow Bzzz t-shirts.
Alongside them is Hamish, a bee puppet who looks like he’s just been told the hive’s closing down and he’s out of work. He’s rather glum for a children’s programme, but still manages to flap about when needed. Soon enough, a third face appears—Eoghann Mac'Illebhain, playing a sort of oddball magician-artist hybrid who seems to have wandered in from another programme entirely.
What follows is your typical template for children's television: a mix of songs, stories, and smiling through the madness. One standout section finds Bzzz going on location to the Isle of Skye - here, Domhnall marches around the picturesque countryside with a gang of children and explores an old, abandoned and overgrown stone building. It feels eerily similar to Cornish folk horror Enys Men, but with more of a spring in its creepy step. And then it's over, save for Hamish jigging away to Enola Gay over the end credits.
So what do I make of all this? It’s lunacy. But it’s good lunacy. There’s a charm in the chaos, and the madness has a pleasing melody you can follow. Sure, most of the bafflement comes from the linguistic restrictions in place, and I was left filling in nothing but constant blanks. But even stripped of language, Mag is Mog delivers something unforgettable. The sci-fi section alone is worthy of cult canonisation - all nightmarishly surreal, as if Salvador Dali had gorged on cheese and Star Wars before going to bed.
Will the BBC ever dust these off and give them another spin? Highly unlikely. They’ve been buried in the vaults for forty years, and let’s be honest, anyone outside of this website's readership would turn off within seconds. But still, these are proper curiosities, from an ever-increasingly distant era where the limitations of budgets were scoffed at as people did the best they could with what little they had. And, temporarily, it pushed an endangered language into the mainstream with some style.
Once again, if you have any footage of Mag is Mog or Bzzz then please get in touch and maybe we can get them online. I'm unable to put the episodes online that I watched as I don't hold copies.
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