Animation / Adventures of Captain Vrungel

”You won’t believe it, dear friends, but it does happen, on my word!”

—Captain Vrungel introducing the show in the opening of Episode 1.

Adventures of Captain Vrungel (Приключения капитана Врунгеля), the surname in the title alternatively translated as “Wrungel” or “Wrongel”, is a Soviet Ukrainian comedy/adventure/musical Animated Adaptation of the book by Andrei Nekrasov, spanning 13 episodes aired from 1976 to 1979. It was directed by David Cherkassky and starred Zinoviy Gerdt as Captain Christopher Bonifatyich Vrungel, Evgeniy Papernyy as First Mate Lom and Chief, Georgiy Kishko as Sailor Fuchs, Seymon Farada as Julico Banditto, and Aleksandr Burmistov as De La Voro Gangsteritto.

Adaptation-wise, this series takes a unique approach where instead of faithfully adapting the overall story and characters but changing the details, it faithfully adapts many of the details from the book, recreating many of the episodic plots, but changes the overall story and many of the characters.

Captain Vrungel, a teacher at a navigational school, decides to put on his uniform once again to participate in an around-the-world regatta hosted by the prestigious Yacht Club, taking his student, the loyal and strong but technically unskilled Lom as First Mate. The yacht they selected was originally called the Victory (ПОБЕДА or Pobeda) until an accident knocked off the first few letters which renamed it the Trouble (БЕДА or Beda).

Superstition has it that the name of a boat will determine how it handles on the water, and for the Trouble, that is certainly the case as the crew runs into everything from natural sea phenomena to illness to accidentally carrying squirrels as contraband. Along the way, Vrungel and Lom select a downtrodden man named Fuchs to add to the crew, but unbeknownst to the sailors, Fuchs had recently stolen the Venus de Milo at the command of an enigmatic criminal known only as Chief and is now smuggling the stolen sculpture aboard the ship.

Chief sends two of his goons, Banditto and Gangsteritto, to intercept Fuchs and get the relic from him by any means, but the criminals themselves are constantly pursued by Agent 00X, who always bounces back no matter what Banditto and Gangsteritto throw at him. Once all the characters are established, the cat-and-mouse chase begins, and all the while Vrungel and Lom are too focused on the regatta to notice both Fuchs’s crime as well as the true purpose of the race.

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Tropes Appearing Across Both the Book and Series

• Ambiguous Time Period: The framing of Vrungel telling his story can be assumed to have happened in the then-present of the late 30's when the book was originally written, but neither version specifies exactly when the regatta itself took place, with Vrungel only saying that when he participated, he wasn't quite as old, but he wasn't a rookie, either. One hint that the book gives is the presence of the Italian fascists, meaning that the regatta, or at least the book's version of it, would have happened after the fascists took power in 1922.
• The Big Race: The regatta held by the Yacht Club which becomes global in the series and has extremely high bets on the competing ships.
• Chromosome Casting: There are no significant female characters, major or minor, the closest being one woman who briefly takes Fuchs's bass case in Hawaii in Episode 12 of the show.
• The Gambling Addict: Both versions of Fuchs tried and failed to support themselves by gambling; it's implied for book-Fuchs that he joined the crew to get away from trouble over it, while show-Fuchs met Banditto and Gangsteritto while he was playing cards and got roped into their scheme. However, Fuchs knows all the cards by heart, which Vrungel was able to utilize by sticking them onto various parts of the ship to teach him how to sail a ship.
• Gentle Giant: In the book, Vrungel says that Lom was 7'6", or 229 cm, in height. The animated adaptation downplays this: Lom is tall and well-built, but not so enormously tall. As for the gentle part, Lom always uses his immense strength to assist the crew and protect them from harm, the best example being Episode 10 of the show when, as the Trouble is about to crash onto a volcanic island, he puts his arms around Vrungel and Fuchs to shield them.
• Improvisational Ingenuity: Vrungel’s greatest strength is being able to come up with unconventional, if intentionally comical, solutions to various problems the Trouble comes across. One example out of many was when the ship was in danger of being arrested for carrying squirrels as contraband (when in reality they had rescued the squirrels from a forest fire and were unable to find somewhere to drop them off). So, Vrungel found a loophole by saying the squirrels were a part of the ship’s mechanisms, having giant wheels attached to the yacht, and then having the squirrels run on the wheels to propel the ship faster, therefore making them technically a necessary part of the ship, and not contraband.
• Inconsistent Spelling: There have been many different translations of Fuchs’s name into English by different sources, like Fuks, Fux, and Fooks, but the general consensus is that it’s supposed to be Fuchs.
• Lured into a Trap: In both versions of the story, Banditto pretended to be drowning in the ocean so that Vrungel, Fuchs, and Lom could rescue him, and then afterwards he would ask them to drop him off at a seemingly deserted island only for the three to get ambushed and captured, although the reasons for this were different for each story. In the book, Banditto had the crew sent to a plantation in Somalia where they were forced to try growing macaroni, while in the show, the gangsters forcefully took the Venus de Milo away and had the crew thrown into the bottom of a tower.
• Meaningful Name:
  • The vrun in Vrungel’s name means “liar”, hence his name often being translated into English as "Wrongel", and while Vrungel sometimes tells lies to get out of a situation, it doesn't appear at first glance to be a defining character trait for him, so it could potentially hint at the possibility that the whole story of the cartoon and book, or at least some of it, was simply a tall tale he’s telling to an audience (to the viewer in the cartoon, and to one of his students in the book). It seems more applicable to the book, while the cartoon seems to take Vrungel’s story literally until literally the last second.
  • Lom’s name can mean “scrap” or “crowbar”, the latter fitting his immense strength. Also, according to the book's author, it's meant to evoke the French word for man, l'omme, in reference to a First Mate he knew named Ivan Mann.
  • Fuchs is most likely referring to the German word for “fox”, though it fits the book character better, since there he is more cunning and sly, which are traits traditionally associated with foxes.
• Mistaken for Special Guest: When Vrungel and Fuchs wash up on Hawaii, a producer mistakes them for actors who were supposed to represent native Hawaiians and sing traditional songs on stage for tourists. When Vrungel corrects him, the producer doesn’t mind, and has them perform anyway.
• Named After Somebody Famous: Christopher Vrungel was named after Christopher Columbus, and like his namesake he is a sailor.
• Not So Stoic: Vrungel normally takes his duties as a captain very seriously, but when his crewmates go through the Equator for the first time, he performs the traditional Equator-crossing ceremony for them by dressing up as King Neptune and performing magic tricks. It’s so out of character to Lom and Fuchs that they assume he’s suffering from heatstroke, so they dump him into a barrel of water.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Captain Vrungel always looks out for Lom and Fuchs, and while he can sometimes get frustrated when they make mistakes and tells them off for it, he never holds a grudge.
• Sick Episode: At one point, Fuchs comes down with a fever and has to sleep it off in the cabin. His body heat causes the entire bunch of over fifty baby crocodile eggs on board (which Banditto and Gangsteritto had tricked the crew into buying in the show) to hatch, though fortunately, Lom is able to pick them all up and throw them out before they can cause any trouble.
• Skewed Priorities: When Vrungel and Lom are stuck between a cliffside overlooking the ocean and an approaching forest fire, Vrungel orders Lom to jump into the water, get back onto the ship, and drive the squirrels into the hold, but Lom is so afraid of the height that he says he'd rather burn to death than jump. To help him, Vrungel gives him his binoculars so that the distance doesn't seem so large.
• Totem Pole Trench: While trying to get out of Hawaii, Fuchs is only able to buy one airplane ticket. To get around this, Fuchs gets on Vrungel’s shoulders with a trench coat on to board the plane.
• What Did You Expect When You Named It ____?: The Russian Trope Namer. Vrungel names his boat Pobeda, "Victory", because "it will sail according to how you name it. You can name your boat 'Trough' or 'Sieve"', but don't expect it to not to sink at its first sailing." Ironically, at Pobeda's first sailing, two letters fall off and the ship becomes Beda: "Trouble" (the pun is "Courage" and "Rage" in the English translation). The four letters remaining are the only part of the ship to complete the journey. The animated adaptation averts the trope, and the yacht survives until the end.

Tropes Exclusive to the Animated Series

• Actually Pretty Funny: Banditto and Gangsteritto are spying on the Trouble as Vrungel is acting uncharacteristically silly by dressing up as King Neptune, singing, and performing magic tricks, which the criminals find so hilarious they repeatedly hit each other while laughing.
• Adaptational Expansion:
  • Banditto and Archibald Dandy (the Speaker of the Yacht Club) only appear in one chapter each in the book but are given larger roles in the series.
  • In the book, the race held by the yacht club happens in just one chapter (the one involving Archibald Dandy), with Vrungel's motivation for going on a potentially dangerous global cruise being simple boredom, but in the show, the entire plot hinges on it.
• Adaptational Nice Guy:
  • A downplayed example with Fuchs. In the show, he only got into crime out of desperation for money, never stealing anything after the Venus de Milo, his only problem being that he’s still on the fence over whether or not to deliver it and he doesn’t tell Vrungel and Lom the truth. In the book, Fuchs is practically a kleptomaniac, stealing things when he doesn’t need to and he doesn’t clean up his act even after Vrungel tells him off for it; however, book-Fuchs is still fundamentally a decent person and loyal crewmember, and his thieving actually saves the crew on several occasions.
  • Also downplayed with Banditto, who goes from being a proud member of the Italian fascist party who runs a slave plantation in Somalia, to being a proud member of the Italian mafia who engages in thievery. It's just that his animated version doesn't stoop down to the same level as his book version, and the change was probably made so that Banditto and Gangsteritto could be portrayed as funny cartoon villains without coming across as too tasteless.
• Adaptational Villainy: In the book, despite Archibald Dandy getting into a scuffle with Vrungel and Fuchs over a misunderstanding, once they clear that up, he proves to be a helpful person, assisting the crew in getting over the finish line of the yacht club race using the champagne. The only similarity to his show counterpart is that he organizes the regatta. In fact, he is the true identity of the mobster Chief.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: Originally, Lom was already an established sailor whom Vrungel hired after being recommended to him, and they had no prior relationship before going on the around-the-world trip. In the series, Lom is one of Vrungel's students at the navigational school, and he went along on the voyage to raise his grades, with Vrungel occasionally still acting as his teacher along the way.
• Adapted Out: The overarching villain of the book is Kusaki, an Imperial Japanese admiral who had a bone to pick with Vrungel after his first encounter with him and presents the final challenge for the crew of the Trouble, but he was replaced with Chief as the main villain.
• Anachronism Stew: Although both the book and show aren't set in a specific year, it can be assumed that it takes place in the early 20th century, but the show, which is somewhat Denser and Wackier than the book, has technology and transportation used later on sprinkled in throughout, like TV sets, as well as technology that hadn't even been invented yet in the 70's, such as Fuchs's mobile phone.
• Animated Musical: Most episodes have at least one song each where the characters sing.
• Art Shift:
  • For most of its runtime, the show utilizes the paper-doll style of animation, but on some occasions for more complicated shots it switches over to cel animation that utilizes the same style of unique perspective shots that would be improved upon in David Cherkassky’s later works, Doctor Aybolit and Treasure Island (1988).
  • For the scene where Fuchs finally confesses about his crime to Vrungel and explains how he got into that situation, there's a flashback done in desaturated ink and watercolor stills.
• As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Whenever Gangsteritto feels any extreme emotion, whether it be joy or anger, he trails off into a string of both completely random stereotypical Italian words and total gibberish.
• Big Bad: Chief orders around the gangsters under him and has influence on an international scale. He desires to get his hands on the Venus de Milo no matter what.
• Big Damn Reunion: In the final episode, after having been separated from Lom and the ship, Fuchs and Vrungel parachute back on board, the three men giving each other hugs in relief.
• Big Guy, Little Guy:
  • On the heroes’ side, Lom is the Big Guy to Vrungel and Fuchs’ Little Guys.
  • On the villains’ side, Gangsteritto is the Big Guy and Banditto is the Little Guy. The former tends to fly off the handle and beat up any object or person near him, while the latter is able to put on a charming façade when conning others.
• Bond Gun Barrel: Agent 00X does a variation of this during his intro song by jamming the bullet he fires right into the opponent’s barrel, blocking the sight of him.
• Bookends: The first song is Vrungel introducing the story, framing the show as him telling the audience about his adventure. The final song has Lom and Fuchs join in to wrap things up, the former saying he’s now a true sea dog, and the latter being grateful that his troubles are finally over.
• Canon Character All Along: If you notice below, Chief is not listed in the Canon Foreigner entry for a reason.
• Canon Foreigner: Gangsteritto, the Black Cuttlefish crew, and Agent 00X were created for the cartoon.
• The Caper: Right as the regatta has been announced, Fuchs steals the Venus de Milo, which he conceals in a double bass case. He was once a security guard for the museum it was located in, but Banditto and Gangsteritto took him to the Chief to force him to steal the sculpture, and because he was so poor, Fuchs felt like he had no choice.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Julico Banditto and De La Voro Gangsteritto love their criminal life, are proud of how they don't care about the law and get terrified when the Chief threatens to kick them out of the gang and force them to become law-abiding citizens as a punishment.
• Clip-Art Animation: The show mostly uses this technique, which was quite common in Soviet animation at the time, most famously done by Yuri Norstein and Francheska Yarbusova.
• Conspicuous Trenchcoat: After Agent 00X was left trapped in Chief’s castle, a very tall man in a trench coat approaches him, taking large and slow steps as if he has trouble balancing. It turns out to be 00X’s robot dog sidekick in a disguise who had arrived to rescue him.
• Cool and Unusual Punishment: When Chief becomes frustrated with Banditto and Gansteritto’s repeated failures, he threatens to give them the worst punishment he can think of… forcing them to become law-abiding citizens. Being the card-carrying villains they are, Banditto and Gangsteritto are terrified at the idea, openly weeping, begging on their knees for Chief to do anything else, after which Chief gives them one last chance.
• Denser and Wackier: The book was already not concerned with realism, having fanciful plot points like using champagne to win a regatta and a kite being able to lift a huge adult man from the ocean all the way to Japan, but the cartoon turns it up a notch by including slapstick, anachronistic technology, and a character who is seemingly unable to be killed no matter what happens to him.
• Dumb Muscle: Lom is not dumb so much as he seems to have trouble with the technical aspects of sailing as a student of Vrungel, since he’s a fine sailor on the practical side of things but went along with Vrungel to raise his grades and still managed to fail his re-examination test halfway through the voyage.
• Early Installment Character-Design Difference:
  • This show has a rare example of this trope happening not just across 2 back-to-back episodes, but within one episode multiple times. The first introduction of Banditto and Gangsteritto comes at the end of episode 3, where they wear completely different outfits (full suits and ties) and have different body and facial proportions. The beginning of episode 4 has a quick recap of the ending of episode three, therefore happening at the same time as the end of the previous episode, where they're closer to their standard designs, but still look like different characters. Then there's a cut to the same shot, but they're different yet again, but still getting closer. Finally, towards the end of the scene, the two have the designs they'll maintain for the rest of the series.
  • Agent 00X's first appearance in Episode 2 shows him with an oval nose, a gold tooth, darker blond hair, a clean-shaven face, and no lips. His next appearance in Episode 4 and onwards shows him with a hooked nose, no noticeably false teeth, light blond hair, a moustache, and red lips.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: After all the struggles they went through, the Trouble wins the regatta, Archibald Dandy is exposed as Chief, and Agent 00X chases after the criminals for hopefully the last time.
• Easily Forgiven: Once Fuchs finally confesses to his crime and explains why he did it, Vrungel hears him out and instantly understands despite everything the crew had gone through as a result, because Vrungel knows that Fuchs is still a good person, anyway, and had proven his loyalty to his new friends before.
• Evil All Along: Turns out that Archibald Dandy is actually the Chief.
• The Faceless: A variant for Chief, since he is a Blofeld Expy to go along with Agent 00X being a James Bond parody, where only the top half of his face isn’t shown, with scenes of him speaking only showing a close-up of his lips moving.
• Foreshadowing:
  • When a member of the Yacht Club points out to Archibald Dandy that the regatta is in danger of being cancelled due to the stealing of the Venus de Milo, Dandy answers that he has arranged for an exception to be made for the regatta. His reveal as Chief answers the question of how he was able to accomplish this, since he’s a powerful mob boss with international connections.
  • Chief originally wanted Fuchs to board the Black Cuttlefish ship to smuggle the sculpture in, only for Fuchs to accidentally get dragged onto the Trouble instead. The Black Cuttlefish is the Yacht Club’s own representative ship in the regatta, meaning they’re working for Chief/Dandy.
• Gratuitous English: When Vrungel and Fuchs meet back up in Episode 12 after the volcano eruption, Vrungel greets Fuchs by saying, “How do you do, Fuchs?” then repeating the question in Russian, to which Fuchs responds, also in English, “Alright, Christopher Bonifatyich.” He then also switches back to Russian. There’s seemingly no reason for this, since it’s not Played for Laughs and it’s in the middle of a somber scene. It could be the result of the two characters being dazed from the eruption.
• Gratuitous Italian: Aside from the aforementioned Italian-sounding gibberish that Gangsteritto likes to throw out, Banditto's catchphrase is an exclamation of "Va bene!", which seems to be him basically saying "okay" or "alright" as an expression of surprise in the same vein as "mamma mia". However, "va bene" is meant to be a response to a question of whether something is okay.
• He Knows Too Much: When the heroes are captured and thrown into a tower, Chief orders Banditto and Gangsteritto to kill Fuchs, Vrungel, and Lom for knowing too much about the Venus plot, although at this point the latter two were still totally unaware of it. Fortunately, they’re able to escape before anything can happen.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Banditto and Gangsteritto put Agent 00X into a box and send him away via mail. The box ultimately arrives right at their boss' lair, and he emerges from it perfectly fine and ready to fight.
• "I Am" Song:
  • Fuchs sings about his sad state in life, and how he knows that Chief holds all the trump cards over him.
  • Agent 00X's is him bragging about being a superman and gentleman as he absorbs a bunch of bullets without breaking a sweat and swoons over a still image of live-action women in dresses.
• Implacable Man: Nothing can stop Agent 00X from pursuing the bandits, not even buildings falling on him. He finally shows up in the end right in the mafia den, and the bandits have nowhere to run this time.
• Iron Butt Monkey: Agent 00X is beaten up, squished beneath entire collapsed buildings, burned alive, electrocuted, thrown off of extreme heights, and much more by Banditto and Gangsteritto, but no matter what, he always manages to fix himself back together and continue his pursuit of justice, and for the few times he can’t get himself out of a scrap, his trusty robot dog sidekick will eventually come along to make him good as new, and all the while the grin almost never leaves his face.
• Made of Iron: Agent 00X's extreme durability is acknowledged in-universe in one of the lyrics of his theme song where he says that he's "been with armor since birth", and the series goes on to prove that he is not exaggerating.
• The Mafia: What Banditto and Gangsteritto are a part of, and Chief is their boss.
• Meaningful Name: The gangsters, besides having surnames based on words "bandit" and "gangster", are given first names with clear hints, too:
  • Julico Banditto; "Julic" means "rogue", "fraud" or "scammer".
  • De La Voro Gangsteritto; "Vor" means "thief".
• Non-Human Sidekick: Agent 00X’s robot dog that he is able to fit inside of and use as a helicopter. The dog is also smart enough to be able to rescue 00X if necessary.
• Non-Standard Character Design: While most of the characters are depicted with exaggerated and usually rounded proportions with paper-doll animation, the close-ups of the bottom of Chief's face are cel-animated lips and a cigar moving on top of a still painting with the facial features and clothing being rendered somewhat more realistically. This is to hide his true identity as Archibald Dandy, and when in that persona his design matches the rest of the cast.
• Obviously Evil: The Cuttlefish crew looks like blatant pirates. They turn out to be a part of the Chief's gang.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: At a couple points, Banditto and Gangsteritto put on costumes to make themselves look like locals of an area to lure Vrungel, Lom, and even Fuchs into a false sense of security, and they're fooled each time, even after Banditto got them captured and imprisoned once.
• Party Scattering: Later on, Banditto and Gangsteritto cause a volcano the heroes are on to erupt, making the whole island sink into the ocean. Vrungel and Fuchs reunite in the debris, but Lom and the Trouble are nowhere to be found. Fuchs assumes he’s dead, but Vrungel assures him that Lom is strong enough to take care of himself, so he and Fuchs go on without him.
• Perpetual Smiler: Agent 00X is always smiling.
• Red Right Hand: Chief has a missing index finger. He covers it up with gloves as Archibald Dandy.
• The Reveal:
  • Chief and Archibald Dandy are one and the same, and the regatta was nothing more than a cover-up for the smuggling of Venus de Milo to get around the national borders that were closed once it had been stolen.
  • Vrungel and Fuchs mailed the Venus de Milo back to its museum right after they got to Hawaii, and the bass case which Fuchs had used to carry it was empty from then on.
• The Rival: The Black Cuttlefish ship is the Trouble’s main competitor in the regatta, and as the race goes on, it’s always either one of those two in first place.
• Singing Voice Dissonance: 00X's singing voice is deep and loud, but his speaking voice is much higher-pitched and softer-spoken.
• Shrinking Violet: Fuchs is very soft-spoken and has trouble asserting himself, getting swept up by Lom asking him to join the crew of the Trouble and unable to board his actual destination, the Black Cuttlefish, and he blushes when Lom introduces him to Vrungel. As he spends more time with the other two, Fuchs warms up, though he’s still quiet.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: Chief almost always speaks in a cold, measured tone even when he's threatening violence, never raising his voice until the last episode when he shouts while trying to blame the theft of the Venus on Vrungel and his crew at the Yacht Club.
• Spared by the Adaptation: In the book, the Trouble eventually sank, and the crew had to complete their round-the-world trip through several different means, though at the very end they acquire a similar ship from Admiral Kusaki that they give the same name. In the series, it makes it through the whole regatta in one piece.
• Tranquil Fury: When Chief finds out that the Trouble has been detained by Customs for carrying squirrels on the news, he silently crumples up the television set as if it were a piece of paper, probably because this would increase the risk of the Venus de Milo being found if the whole boat were to be searched.
• Tuxedo and Martini: Agent 00X dresses in a white tux and sometimes uses gadgets to help him try and catch the gangsters, though he mostly sticks with a gun.
• Villain Song:
  • Banditto and Gangsteritto’s is about how much they love being mobsters and robbing banks, and that they’re so great at it that they should get a movie made about them.
  • After Vrungel, Lom, and Fuchs are thrown into the tower and the Venus de Milo is secured, all the gangsters gather together to sing a song about money, and how they love it so much that they aren't people, they're just pockets to put more money into.
• Villainous Friendship: Banditto and Gangsteritto sometimes argue with each other, but otherwise are almost never seen separately. Banditto calls Gangsteritto “bambino” at one point, and when Gangsteritto launched Banditto out of their submarine for his fake drowning scheme, he takes off his hat and sheds a tear for him, possibly out of worry.
• Vocal Evolution: Gangsteritto's first several appearances have him speaking in a gravelly, growling voice, but starting with episode 10 onwards his voice switches to be raspier and not quite as deep.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: The squirrels are never seen again after Vrungel has the propulsion device built for them. Averted in the book, where someone comes along to buy the device and take the squirrels soon afterwards, so it can be assumed the same thing happened to the show's squirrels, just offscreen.
• Where the Hell Is Springfield?: The Yacht Club is referred to as being in "N-Land", the Russian term "N-sk" being the rough equivalent to Springfield when referring to a generic setting, although the book averts this by explicitly placing it in England, more specifically the Isle of Wight in the English Channel.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: This trope is handwaved away at first by Chief requesting Banditto and Gangsteritto to not use guns or any other weapons that could produce loud noises, so they don't draw attention to themselves on their mission, hence why the two use many other means to dispose of Agent 00X. Although, it's not like guns would have done anything to him, anyway, since at one point he gets hit with one of his own bullets that ricocheted onto him, and he was still fine.
  • Subverted during the final leg of the regatta, when all bets are off and Chief demands that the gangsters seize Venera by any means necessary. Guns come out, but the gangsters don't get the chance to use them.

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