The Cramp Twins

The Cramp Twins is an British-Canadian-American animated series created by Brian Wood. It was based on the 1995 graphic novel of the same name. The series was the second Cartoon Network European co-production (after Fat Dog Mendoza).

Overview
Main article: List of The Cramp Twins episodes

The series follows the adventures of Wayne Cramp (Tom Kenny) and Lucien Cramp (Kath Soucie), non-identical twin brothers who live with their germophobic mother Dorothy (Nicole Oliver) and their Western-obsessed father Horace (Ian James Corlett) in the fictional town of Soap City. Wayne and Lucien's personalities clash, and they rarely get along. Wayne has a friend called Dirty Joe (Lee Tockar), who owns a dump, and neighbour Wendy Winkle (Jayne Peterson) has a crush on him, but he hates her. Wayne's and Lucien's teacher is Miss Hillary Hissy (Cathy Weseluck who also plays Mrs. Winkle). Lucien's friends include environment-friendly Tony Parsons (Terry Klassen, who also plays Tony's dad, Seth) and Mari Phelps (Tabitha St. Germain).

Two seasons of The Cramp Twins were made altogether. In the United States, season 1 aired as two separate seasons, and did not get broadcast until long after it had aired in its home country. All episodes were aired 2–3 years earlier in the UK leaving one episode from season 2 (4 in the US) unaired.

Characters

 * Wayne Cramp (voiced by Tom Kenny) is the younger of the twins, but is taller than Lucien. Wayne is energetic, egotistical, manipulative, rude and descriptive, and the less intelligent of the two. He is also the bully of their class and feared by most kids. Wayne is obsessed with junk, which he collects and hides in his room; he spends most of his time at the junkyard, owned by his only friend, Dirty Joe Muldoon. Unlike Lucien, who loves the swamp, Wayne is terrified of the place, and also has a fear of frogs. Wayne's only love is anything sugary, his main source of energy, and if he is deprived from it, he becomes tired and speaks nonsense. Apart from sweet stuff, he also likes fast-food. He is also shown to be a self-taught mechanical genius in various episodes, like building an entire "Road-Ready Drag Racer" out of his bed, turning his bed into a trampoline, welding together various junk to create an Egyptian-style temple or taking good care of the Junkyard when Joe's out of town. He is shown to have a softer side when he creates his own imaginary brother out of an old arcade board after being banned from playing with Lucien.


 * Lucien Cramp (voiced by Kath Soucie) is Wayne's older twin brother, as the opening credits indicate. Lucien is the smarter of the twins, and is considered an "eco-nerd." Despite being the older twin, Lucien is the favorite target of Wayne's bullying nature, and Wayne frequently refers to him with the nickname "Girl Pants". Lucien enjoys science, nature and is a vegetarian. Lucien longs for a pet, either a cat, a dog, or a hamster, but due to his mother's extreme cleanliness rules, he cannot have one. To combat this, Lucien secretly keeps a worm farm under his bed, that only Tony, Mari, Wayne and Wendy know about; his mom and dad are unaware that he has it. It is shown in many episodes that Lucien has a fear of clowns. He has many skills, including knitting, and has shown interest in playing the harp. Lucien likes going to Soap City's only swamp (the only place he gets peace from Wayne, who is afraid of the place) where Tony lives. Lucien is often seen trying to promote environmental awareness, usually through protesting against the environmentally unfriendly products or activities rife in Soap City. However, due to the disinterest or, in some cases, dislike many of its residents have towards nature (and especially the swamp), these attempts are almost always ignored, belittled or ridiculed; he is frequently teased by other children. He has a crush on Tony's mom as shown in one episode.


 * Dorothy Cramp (née O'Neil) (voiced by Nicole Oliver), is the yellow-skinned short-tempered, strict mother to the twins, and wife of Horace Cramp. She is a complete germaphobe and neat freak. Her obsession for cleanliness is a major source of comedy in the show. She once raided the twins' rooms and husband's storage to check their cleanliness, which resulted in her kicking them out of the house due to Wayne's junk, Lucien's mud for his worms, and Horace's Rodeo Rita picture. She is something of a scientist by way of cleaning products, for she often mixes home-made cleaning formulas to seek out the strongest germ-killer, which seems to awaken her twisted desire to clean everything "to the brim". This is described by Horace as having "The Cleanies" and happens every once in a while which results in everyone preparing for shelter because she always desires to test it on them first "for safety". She has a crush on fellow clean-freak Agent X, who is suspected by Lucien to be an alien and is a frequent fuel of jealousy for Horace.


 * Horace Cramp (voiced by Ian James Corlett) is the green-skinned and dim-witted man-child father of Wayne and Lucien and husband of Dorothy Cramp. He works at the local soap and cleaner products factory. He is also a third-rate cowboy, being obsessed with pretty much anything Western-oriented, including "cowgirl" Rodeo Rita, much to his wife's disapproval. He is always fruitlessly trying to impress his boss, Mr. Winkle, although is quite incompetent, and hated by his mother-in-law. By the 4th season his cowardice has almost completely disappeared as a result of Wayne's attempt to use him as a source of income in one episode.


 * Tony Parsons (voiced by Terry Klassen) is Lucien's best friend (although they have been known to fall out) and a swamp child. He possesses a vast knowledge about the swamp, its people's traditions, and natural history. He has many brothers and sisters. Tony's dad's name is Seth and his mom's is Lily. Tony is extremely short (about a half meter tall) and finds it hampers his day-to-day life, e.g. riding a bicycle, but uses equipment to aid him, e.g. he wears a flag-meet-helmet whilst riding his specially-designed bike so other road users can see him. Apart from this, Tony's height doesn't seem to effect his self-esteem. As his father also used to be very short, it can be presumed that Tony is also going to grow taller. He and Mari are Lucien's only friends in the show. A running gag in the show is Tony's belief in supernatural things, like magic and aliens. Lucien often tries to argue against Tony's beliefs, using vague scientific facts, though Lucien always ends up standing corrected


 * Wendy Winkle (voiced by Jayne Paterson) is the only daughter of Walter Winkle. Wendy is a bubbly but very spoiled brat who has an obvious crush on Wayne. Because of her immense wealth she has a tendency to get her way and bullies pretty much anyone. Throughout the series, she tries everything to win Wayne's heart, yet is always unsuccessful. However, she seems to exhibit an attraction to even Lucien sometimes, but she always ends up backing away from it in the end, with little regard to what happened and why.


 * Mari Phelps (voiced by Tabitha St. Germain) is Lucien's other friend. She often co-operates with Lucien on his environment-conserving efforts, but often can't help desiring a bit of power. She is a foster child and is looked after by a happiness-obsessed, brown-haired family with strange mormonist based customs. She is the black sheep of her foster family and is often embarrassed by their habits. Lucien briefly had a crush on Mari when she felt sorry for him during a time he felt certain he would never have a girlfriend, but nothing came of it. However, they remain good friends