Starring Liliana Mumy as the voice of Twinkle
Disney Junior may not have been nearly as popular as Nick Junior's hits of Blue's Clues, Dora the Explorer and Oswald, it is still a great show that I highly recommend because it is good at teaching lessons about everyday heroes, and much of the voice acting is also well-directed.
Sadly, Disney Junior did not really become as mainstream as Nick Junior until they got Jake and the Neverland Pirates, Doc McStuffins and Sofia the First in the early 2010s, which is a shame because I know I also enjoyed some of Bear in the Big Blue House, PB&J Otter and Stanley when I watched Playhouse Disney in the early-to-mid 2000s. Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and My Friends Tigger and Pooh had the advantage of brand recognition attached to them. This may have helped 10-year old Chloe Grace Moretz go a long way in the same way that A Bug's Life helped 9-year old Hayden Panettiere & 13-year old Ashley Tisdale, because Chloe voiced Darby in My Friends Tigger & Pooh. Sadly, 10-year old Liliana Mumy did not have the same luck with voicing Twinkle in Higglytown Heroes.
Starring Chloe Grace Moretz as the voice of Darby
Liliana Mumy is not yet as famous as Chloe Grace Moretz despite being less than three years older, which is a shame because I know she could make it if she was given the chance. Her father Bill Mumy was also a child actor in Lost in Space, so maybe she took his advice to not have big on-camera roles like her contemporaries, Alyson Stoner and Chloe Grace Moretz. She has had some live-action roles in the movies The Santa Clause 2 & 3 and Cheaper By the Dozen 1 & 2, but was not widely recognized for them. Most of the time, she sticks to animated roles. Outside of Higglytown Heroes, she has also voiced main or recurring characters in Catscratch, Lilo & Stitch: The Series, American Dragon: Jake Long, Bravest Warriors, Sofia the First, and The Loud House. While The Loud House is a very popular show currently airing on Nickelodeon and a very easy paycheck for Liliana, I know she could do much better than Leni Loud, and she has before with Higglytown Heroes and Bravest Warriors - which were her only leading girl roles so far, Twinkle and Beth Tezuka. If 29-year old Liliana can act on camera even one half as well as 26-year old Chloe, then I know she can work another live-action film role or three around her schedule with The Loud House. She can do what 29-year old Karen Fukuhara did by working in Craig of the Creek and Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts at the same time as Bullet Train. I know Liliana has potential to be great, if her 30-year old self has all the same charm and entertainment as her 10-year old self when she played Twinkle and Human Kimberly.
Before Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Higglytown Heroes was the most popular show on Disney Junior, and it is easy to see why. This was created and produced by Wild Brain producers George Evelyn, Holly Huckins, Denis Morella and Kent Redeker, and created and developed by Jeff Ulin. In the wake of 9/11, he wanted to create a cartoon that would teach children about everyday heroes when first responders like fire fighters were recognized as the heroes they are when they rescued loads of people from the burning World Trade Centers. September 11 celebrating firefighters for saving lives from the 9/11 terrorist attacks is what inspired him to make an animated series about everyday heroes, which I believe is why firefighters were the Higglytown Heroes of the first episode, Up a Tree. After September 11, 2001 got them started on Higglytown Heroes, it took its five co-creators 3 years to complete the whole first season and start airing the first episode. The standard formula of every Higglytown Heroes episode is that four kids and their talking pet squirrel Fran, voiced by the sweet old Edie McClurg, face an everyday situation or adventure, sing a song about something they are excited to learn about, and then they face a problem that they need a Higglytown Hero to solve. A celebrity guest hero comes in with the right occupation to help them solve that problem, and then gives a short lecture to Fran and the kids for how they can learn to be Higglytown Heroes. In the middle of every episode, Twinkle draws up a big idea that is either a silly plan to solve the problem, or an odd conspiracy theory about something else mysterious going on. The only episodes to have another character draw something for her are Eubie, Wayne and Kip in Twinkle Tooth and Pix in Twinkle's Wish.
Higglytown Heroes consists of six main characters, voiced by four kids and two adults. Of the four kids; Taylor Masamitsu voices Eubie, the tallest kid in the red, orange and yellow shirt, Frankie Ryan Manriquez voices Wayne, the boy with the glasses and the dark green overalls, Liliana Mumy voices Twinkle, the girl in the pink sparkly shirt with a picture of a duck, and Rory Charles Thost voices Kip, the shortest kid in the blue hoodie and the robot T-shirt. The other two main characters are Edie McClurg as Fran, the red squirrel who is their guide in most of their endeavors away from their parents, and Dee Bradley Baker as Pizza Guy, the friendly silly pizza delivery dude who visits them in almost every episode. The episode Say What? kind of explains why Fran is one of the few animals in HH who can talk when Kip's dog Shadow and most other animals do not; when the four kids could not talk to a girl who only speaks Spanish, Fran explains that the new girl at school speaks a different language than them. "Squirrelish" is Fran's first language, and she can communicate with English-speaking humans because she learned to speak English as a second language.
Higglytown Heroes, like Phineas and Ferb, is very formulaic, actually more formulaic than Phineas and Ferb, but what gives them rewatchable quality lies in their good directing, voice acting, and variety in humor and songs. Liliana Mumy and Dee Bradley Baker are both talented actors who have had many cartoon roles in their lives, but in my humble opinion, Twinkle and Pizza Guy from Higglytown Heroes are each one of their best roles ever because they put a lot of positive energy into voicing them, and it makes their characters very endearing and funny to watch. Twinkle and Pizza Guy are the funniest parts of the show, and the only reason to watch it if you like nothing else about HH, simply because their actors are given tons of good material to have with them and never blow it. I think Dee Bradley Baker had so much fun voicing Pizza Guy, it is in his contract to have Pizza Guy appear in almost every episode, unless Dee Baker has another character he can voice in the episode. While Pizza Guy does have some HH episodes that give him a major role in the story and he gets to appear for more than a single minute, Dee Baker has several other recurring characters to voice when Pizza Guy is not around - Uncle Zooter, Grandpop Krink, Shadow, and the Weird Beard Bunch.
As a simple preschool show, Higglytown Heroes does not demand much in the story department or the personality department, but I definitely give it credit for giving most of its main characters an entertaining personality to watch. Fran is an adorable squirrel who is normally the straight woman to the four Higgly Kids, but she also has flaws and quirks of her own, like when she causes a problem in Wayne's 100 Special Somethings and 12-Pie Abe by eating something she was not supposed to eat. Pizza Guy is always a funny man to watch in little doses. Twinkle has always been my most favorite character in Higglytown Heroes because I adore her imagination and optimism. She has a cheery colorful demeanor about her, draws up a silly solution to almost every problem, and no matter what Fran tells her for why her silly plan does not work, she never gives up on drawing new ideas. However, I actually relate more to Wayne because I also grew up as a shy kid who wears glasses and likes eating toast. Wayne and Twinkle are a very fun pair of cartoon siblings to watch onscreen because they have contrasting personalities that play well off of one another. Wayne is the shy, rational introvert and Twinkle is the outgoing, imaginative extrovert. I enjoy seeing the same sibling dynamic between cousins in a later Disney Junior show, Mira, Royal Detective. Mira is the outgoing one like Twinkle, and Priya is the shy one like Wayne. The only weak spots in the main cast of Higglytown Heroes are Eubie and Kip. While they have some different interests, since Eubie likes animals and nature and Kip likes robots and rocket science, I always viewed them as the same character with two different appearances and voices. I think Kip and Eubie were just written with the same generic nice kid personality.
It might not be easy to see how well Wayne and Twinkle function together as a brother and sister, because they appear to be just as close as siblings with their friends Eubie and Kip, even though the four kids come from three different families and homes who live in close proximity to one another. Unless you see a storyline about Twinkle going to the North Pole or Wayne getting lost, it is very rare to see the four main kids apart from one another. However, I do find it rather interesting to see the variety in families between the four kids; Eubie is the only one of the main kids to be an only child and parents are gone so he instead lives with his uncle and aunt, Wayne and Twinkle live with their mother and uncle but no father (like me!) and Kip is the only kid with a traditional family of both parents. He has a baby sister and two older sisters who are in middle or high school, which have both given HH opportunities to have storylines to which audiences in younger or older age groups than the main kids can relate. My mom is okay with Higglytown Heroes having only one girl among three boys, because Twinkle has a very entertaining personality that helps make her as memorable as the three main boys combined. However, among the three boys, I really see Wayne as the heart of the show. In fact, I think he most embodies the spirit of the show Higglytown Heroes. He does not have the same imagination for art as his sister, but they both have the same curious spirit about their world. Wayne is a shy kid who almost always fears the worst, but is also always happy to have someone special to help him and his friends through their problem.
It makes sense to me that Frankie Ryan Manriquez and Liliana Mumy got the best parts of the four Higglytown children, because they also had the most experience before this show. Frankie Ryan Manriquez was in the TV shows Life With Bonnie and That's So Raven, and I already told you about Liliana Mumy's roles in Cheaper By the Dozen and My Wife and Kids. Liliana is not as famous as Chloe yet, but she still stands out amongst her fellow child stars of Higglytown for having more name recognition through her dad Bill Mumy, and for being the only one of the four kid actors to have a regular acting career after Higglytown Heroes. Statistically, girls are more likely than boys to continue acting into adulthood because their voices change less than boys as they get older. The three boys have also gone onto their own great alternate careers in show business after HH. Rory Charles Thost makes film documentaries from around the world, Taylor Masamitsu became the CEO of Creating for Justice to allow LGBTs and people of color like himself to get into the business, and Frankie Ryan Manriquez became a musician named Band-Ade. It is nice to see that his love of singing songs stuck with him through the Higglytown Heroes years and afterwards. I liked Wayne and I wish I could get Frankie to be a voice actor again in one of my own cartoons in the future, even if he does not get to work with Liliana Mumy again. The fact that Frankie continues to sing in his post-Higglytown Heroes life means I have a better chance of getting him to voice act again than the other two main boys, since his singing career is the closest to acting out of all three of their new careers after Higglytown.
Since December 16, 2021, I have made a living on YouTube as the first person to make videos that talk about Higglytown Heroes, starting with a funny observation on how The Day The Diner Stood Still, an episode that was named after the old sci-fi film The Day The Earth Stood Still, had a double meaning to its title that gave it more in common with that movie that I thought because (spoiler alert!) everybody who avoided the diner of Gloria and Lemmo did it because they thought there were aliens there. If you are searching the internet for somebody to talk about Higglytown Heroes to you, I am just your guy. However, I have also made loads of blogs and vlogs about Spongebob Squarepants, The Patrick Star Show, Craig of the Creek, Amphibia, and many more cartoons. I have loads I want to share about Cybersix because that is easily Cathy Weseluck's best cartoon she ever did before My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and Littlest Pet Shop.
Higglytown Heroes is similar to the Thunderbirds and Shazam! cartoons from when my Uncle Chris and Uncle David were kids, because they never have any Vigglytown Villains to cause the problems. The only occasion I can remember when Higglytown Heroes came close to having a Vigglytown Villain to be the Higglytown Hero's enemy was Halloween Heroes, when Lemmo told Fran and the four Higgly kids a Halloween story in which they needed a farmer to give them a giant pumpkin to be the Pumpkin King's friend so he would set Fran free. In some episodes, other adults the kids regularly see in their lives get to be the Higglytown Hero of the week. Eubie's Grandpop Krink was the hero of The Egg-cellent Adventure, Miss Fern was the hero of Wayne's Good Guesses, and Kip's Grandmama was the hero of First Snow. What made the special Valentine's Day episode extra-special was that the two non-kid main characters, Pizza Guy and Fran were the Higglytown Heroes, and I thought this episode doubled as a nice love letter to reward them for all the help they are to the four main kids and for touching our hearts as an audience.
I thought Higglytown Heroes had a passable series finale with Calling All Heroes having all of the heroes the kids, Fran and Pizza Guy met in the previous 64 episodes come together to help them out after a big rainstorm on Wayne's birthday. The only disappointment I had for the ending of Higglytown Heroes is that it never ended with any of the kids working real hard to be heroes just like every other hero to which they sing that message in almost every episode. After Twinkle's Wish had Pix do a work-around for the problem Fran told him in the silly idea he drew up when Twinkle was not there to do it, and Pix got to be the Higglytown Hero of Twinkle's Wish, I wished that Higglytown Heroes would end with Twinkle doing the same and become a Higglytown Hero when she fixes a hole in one of her silly ideas. My mom explained to me why it would go against the vision of the show to have one of the kids learn to be a Higglytown Hero, but I still think it could work as a spectacular final episode, to have Twinkle be a hero with a good execution of one of her silly ideas and give the other three boys hope that they can also be a hero like her.
The Gravity Falls 2013 Comic-Con had Kristen Schaal, Jason Ritter, Alex Hirsch and Matt Chapman read a short script Alex Hirsch probably wrote about the Pines family and Soos going to a Comic-Con. It inspired me to write a script like that for Higglytown Heroes to reunite the cast in 2024 and have Twinkle become a Higglytown Hero by creating a search engine to restore polar ice caps in the same way that Ecosia restores trees. I scheduled the filming for April 16, 2024 in Los Angeles to celebrate Liliana's 30th birthday and coincide with Earth Day six days later, so I need to make enough money from views on this blog and my YouTube channel to pay for the trip in April, and maybe another trip in June for the 2024 Summer Olympics. The video of my Earth Day reunion script will be a live chat to raise funds for restoring glaciers and be posted on Wild Brain's channel, or the home channel of Bill & Liliana Mumy on April 20 through 22, 2024. Anyone who runs the YouTube channel of a professional production company, or an actor with a YouTube channel that is already years old would know how to raise funds with a live stream much better than I do because they already have more subscribers and experience with the job, even if they never tried to do a livestream with super chats before now. While Edie McClurg, Dee Bradley Baker and the rest of the regular adult cast of HH who have characters in my script are still alive today and will likely live to read it in 2024, I need a new round of five kids to voice the four main Higglytown kids, plus Kip's older and younger sisters since his older sisters are a big part of the story.
My 20th anniversary reunion/Earth Day special reunion of Higglytown Heroes, should Liliana Mumy's agent and the president of Wild Brain and Happy Nest choose to accept my pitch, will be the finale that Higglytown Heroes deserved but never got to have in 2007. Even though there will be another kid voicing Twinkle who is 20 years younger than Liliana, I will still allow Liliana to do Twinkle's singing parts so she can sing "I'm a Higglytown Hero, brave and true" at the end, and give her another big part in the story to voice. The other big last-episode event that my Higglytown Heroes mini-scene will have in addition to the kids, Fran and Pizza Guy celebrating Twinkle graduating to a hero-in-training, is to reunite Twinkle and Wayne with their dad when his computer business in Higgly City is exactly what they need to launch the Cap-Ice search engine. I might even get Liliana's real dad, Bill Mumy to do his voice, so they can both sing the Higglytown Heroes song.
I am not the only person to write a blog post on Higglytown Heroes, but I have set the record for the most comprehensive post on the whole show. To reward you kids for making it this far, I will give you a free sneak preview list of new actors I have in mind to voice all the HH kids. I originally chose them on December 28, 2021, but a lot can change in two years if I need to find a new assortment of kids by then, and I did not originally know of them because they started making a name for themselves in a new animated series two years after I originally wrote this script.
New actor key: 2004 = 2024
Frankie Ryan Manriquez = Jakari Fraser as Wayne
Liliana Mumy = Amari McCoy as Twinkle
Taylor Masamitsu = Gracen Newton as Eubie
Rory Charles Thost = Maximus Riegel as Kip
Gayla Goehl/Lara Jill Miller = Grace Rolek as Tini and Wiki
Grown-up actors from the original series I want to invite to the table read to reprise their characters one more time are Edie McClurg as Fran, Dee Bradley Baker as Pizza Guy, Anne Heche as Gloria, Kevin Michael Richardson as Wayne and Twinkle's Uncle Lemmo, Jamie-Lynn Sigler as Miss Fern, and Alana Ubach as Wayne and Twinkle's Mother Plunkie.
To end this blog post, I will ask: Do you want me to reunite the cast of Higglytown Heroes one-time-only so they can tell my story about Twinkle becoming a hero and saving Earth from global warming with one of her imaginative, far-fetched artistic ideas? That wild brain of hers can take Twinkle a long way.
