Charlie the Wonder Dog

Who is Charlie the Wonder Dog - well here you go. And just so you get what its all about ...

From Wikipedia:

"Charlie the Wonderdog was a series of short episodes which first aired during The Late Show's second series. Charlie was a parody of fictitious animal shows, such as Lassie and Skippy the Bush Kangaroo in which the animal regularly ends up saving the day. Charlie was a dog owned by Gleisner.

The sketch featured purposely bad overacting from the children and usually involved an unimposing villain or disaster (such as a "poacher" stealing "native fauna" - sticks and twigs - from the bush) that had to be prevented. The actors would constantly praise Charlie as a highly intelligent "wonder dog", in contradiction of the behaviour of Charlie himself, who regularly had to be dragged around by a rope to perform stunts. When the dog was required to bark to alert the others of danger, obvious overdubbing was used over footage of Charlie with his mouth closed or looking distracted.

As the series went on, the problems and situations that Charlie faced became more and more over the top. Charlie was eventually assassinated in one of the sketches, only to come back in the Charlie the Wonderdog Christmas Episode.

Charlie the Wonder Dog ... along with Shit Scared were two of my favourite segments on the iconic The Late Show.