"Robbi, Tobbi und das Fliewatüüt" is a West German German-language mini-series from the early 1970s and next year it will have its 45th anniversary. The series was written by a handful writers and one of them was Armin Maiwald, who also directed all the episodes and he is known today mostly for his decade-long participation on the German children's television show "Die Sendung mit der Maus". This one here is an earlier career effort from him. It is the story of a little boy who makes friends with a robot and the two travel across the globe with a fictitious vehicle that can fly, drive and swim. On their travels, they have to solve several riddles as it is all a school project for the robot character. And these riddles take them for example to the Pole, to Scotland where they meet Loch Ness, to the sea (led by a hungry dolphin) and a very special lighthouse and eventually to a pretty dark place where they even manage to stop a criminal scientist in his bizarre attempts to turn silver into gold.There exist several versions of this one here. The overall duration from start to finish is more than 3.5 hours, so, with some patience you can watch it all in one sitting like I did. There is a version that consists of 4 episodes of about an hour and another one that consists of 11 episodes of slightly over 20 minutes. It is your choice which one you prefer. I believe the watch here is mostly for children, not too old ones actually, but I also think that grown-up who watched this fairly old series at some point in their childhood can have a good time again taking a look at it. It's tough to say what my favorite part is here, but if I had to, i'd probably pick the last one as the farewell between the boy (actually voices by a female) and the robot is pretty sentimental and somewhat sad, even if they stay friends of course. Robbi the Robot is also my favorite character here and I preferred him a lot over Tobbi, because the little robot had many involuntarily funny moments with the way he talked and what he said. I guess Tobbi is mostly in it, so that kids in the audience have somebody to identify with, but I myself enjoyed the robot way more. Then again, it's not really necessary to make a difference between the two as both are in this one in almost every scene from start to finish. The music is pretty good too. All in all, I enjoyed the watch here and I recommend checking it out, also because for younger audiences it is a really informative movie that will teach children more interesting stuff than any television series could.

Just wanted to say that the German DVD set (digitally restored)is wonderful. I just bought it. It still captures the early 1970s look of pioneering film/TV technology - but just a little cleaner so it still looks good in 2008 and in the future. The path of the story - obviously - is not as fast as it would be nowadays, but it still is great to watch. The main theme: we can have robots as our best friends, but what do they "feel" for us - is never really answered. And (excellent) adult stuff such as Ridley Scott's Blade Runner - more than a decade later - don't offer better answers. Robby the robot will be forever one of my best childhood friends. The story: oops, can't tell it. Just: there is suspense and enough story to keep it all very interesting. Thank you Armin Maiwald and your team and helping hands for creating such a classic. I hope this will be well dubbed and shown in other countries.

I have seen the movie several times. In fact this is meant as a mini series. It is one of the first blue screen puppet movies as far as i know. Surely you can see that the environment doesn't fit in exactly but this also has a charme on his own. Remember, these were the early 70's !!!Story: It is about a 9 y/o boy (3rd class) who is visited by surprise late in the evening by a robot which is also in the 3rd robot class of his robot school. The robot "ROBBI" asks "TOBBI" to help him with his school examination. He has been given 3 difficult questions to ask like "Who is standing at the north pole and starts with the letter P" (if i remember well). ROBBI the little robot can do a lot of tricks. So he is able to stretch his arm to 10 foot length for example. TOBBI is an inventor so he designed the "FLIEWATÜÜT" which is a German combination for a multi purpose vehicle which can FLIE (FLY) , ship on the water (WA) and drive on the road (TÜÜT=BEEP). The FLIWATÜÜT rans on raspberry juice or alternatively on cod-liver oil. As TOBBI calms down and ROBBI explains and asks for help, they become friends soon and starting an incredible adventure through Europe. Nice characters (a sweet little mice, a helpful dolphin) and suspense (the black castle) everything is in the right place here. You or your kids will learn from this movie that friendship solves almost any problem. Highly recommended to all of you who are open minded to puppet movies with an educational message. If you are not common to German language, you could at least admire the set which was very sophisticated for 1972.

This is really one of the best sci-fi mini-series for kids. But not only for kids - adults will also love it. Unfortunalety the series is only available in Germany :-( If you ever catch it on telly - than please WATCH IT! There's a DVD available with an making of the series. Bytheway: Armin Maiwald - the director of "Robbi, Tobbi und das Fliewatüüt" - is very famous in Germany because of the weekly show "Die Sendung mit der Maus". "Die Sendung mit der Maus" is a TV-show for kids, that maybe compared with the "Couriosity Show" (does anyone still know this show?) crossed with "Sesame Street". Back to "Robbi, Tobbi & das Fliewatüüt": Remember that this series is more than 30 years old - but it is IMHO the right movie to show "nowadays" kids that there don't have to be expensive special-effects like in "Harry Potter" or "The Chrinicles of Narnia" to tell a wonderful story that actually really work.