Biff, Chip and Kipper is a series of children's books written by Roderick Hunt and illustrated by Alex Brychta, featuring the adventures of three siblings and their dog Floppy. The books are part of the Oxford Reading Tree, a reading scheme for primary schools in the UK and other countries. The books have been adapted into a TV series by CBeebies 2.
The books are divided into different stages, depending on the reading level of the children. The stories range from simple phonics-based texts to more complex narratives with themes such as history, science, and culture. The books are known for their colourful illustrations, humorous situations, and recurring characters.
The series has received two television adaptations: a cartoon called The Magic Key in 2000, and a live-action series known as Biff and Chip in 2021.
Provides examples of:
- An Aesop: Many of the stories have a moral lesson or a message, such as the importance of friendship, honesty, kindness, or curiosity.
- Barbershop Episode: The Stage 1 picture book "The Haircut" features Kipper and Dad visiting Snips Hair Salon, and return home sporting short haircuts that shock Mum. Status Quo Is God, though, and they get their regular hairstyles back the next book.
- Beach Episode: The Stage 3 book "On the Sand", has Biff and Chip visit the beach with Dad, who plays a trick on them.
- Bewitched Amphibians: In the Stage 5 book "Castle Adventure", the children and Gran find a king who was turned into a frog by three Wicked Witches. They later find more frogs who used to be members of the castle's household. The four travellers incapacitate the witches, reverse the spell on the people, and turn the witches into frogs, with Gran burning their spellbook so that they cannot turn back.
- Big Friendly Dog: Floppy, Biff, Chip and Kipper's dog, is nearly as tall as Kipper while sitting down in some illustrations, and is usually depicted to be cheerful and curious. The friendliness is played up in "Come In!", where Floppy is seen inviting a dozen of his canine friends over to his family's house.
- Big Storm Episode: In the Stage 4 book "The Storm", a large storm ravages the neighbourhood.
- Bilingual Bonus: In "The Magic Key", a shrunken Chip picks up a pencil; in the illustration, the words on the pencil read, approximately translated, "Golden Cup Printing Inc." in Chinese.
- The Bully: Rosie from "The Bully". First, she gets Chip into trouble when she draws on his picture and he retaliates by doing the same, insults Biff, Chip, Nadim, Aneena, Wilf and Wilma, nicks Biff's crisps, pulls Aneena's hair, knocks over Wilma for trying to stand up for Aneena, then forces Chip to tell her about the Magic Key. She has a change of heart after the Key teaches her a lesson using its magic and after Chip and Wilma save her from getting bullied herself.
- Chekhov's Gun: At the end of "The Storm", Floppy finds a box with a key inside after the titular storm, which Chip decides to keep. The key turns out to be the Magic Key, a MacGuffin driving many of the children's future adventures.
- Cool Teacher: The children have several teachers who are supportive, friendly, and fun. They often join the children on their adventures or help them with their projects.
- Dastardly Whiplash: The Baron from "The Great Race" certainly counts with the mustache, the prospenity for cheating in races and the Sinister Schnoz.
- Edible Theme Naming: In one book, the family visits a buffet, and Chip and Kipper point out both of them share names with the breakfast food items served there.
- Fantasy Kitchen Sink: The Magic Key can take the children to any place or time, real or fictional. They can meet pirates, dinosaurs, aliens, robots, fairies, knights, and more.
- Five-Token Band: Downplayed. Biff, Chip and Kipper are Caucasian, Wilf and Wilma are Black, and Nadim and Aneena are Indian.
- Gender-Blender Name: Biff
is a girl. - Incredible Shrinking Man: In the Stage 5 book "The Magic Key", Biff and Chip find the Magic Key glowing, which shrinks them down to size and allows them to explore Biff's room from a different perspective.
- Lethal Chef: In the Stage 2 book "The Toys' Party", Kipper tries to make a cake out of cornflakes, tomato sauce (ketchup), milk, strawberry jam, sugar, and baked beans for a party he's hosting for his toys, with incredibly messy results. Justified as he's still a young child at the time.
- Meaningful Background Event: As Biff, Chip and Kipper invite over their friends to play throughout the Stage 4 book "Come In!", Floppy is seen inviting enough friends to match each of the children in the illustrations. After Mum sends all her children's human friends home, on the very last page, she finds Floppy's dozen dog friends playing outside the house, to her surprise.
- Nice Guy: While Biff, Chip and Kipper, as well as their friends, are far from flawless and have had moments of holding the Jerkass Ball, they're all sweet and friendly kids who all care about each other and anyone who needs help most of the time.
- One of the Kids: Played for Drama. Gran, introduced in the Stage 5 book "Gran", is just as carefree as her grandchildren and her friends. She even goes on a Jumping Castle labelled "Children Only" with the children, and causes enough accidents to cause Mum and the man who owned the Jumping Castle to get cross with her.
- Power Glows: The Magic Key glows whenever its powers are activated, signifying the beginning or end of a magical adventure.
- Power Outage Plot: "The Power Cut" invokes this trope when Wilf and Wilma's parents shut off the power when Wilf, Wilma and their friends get addicted to video games and TV while they're on a holiday.
- School Play: In the Stage 4 book "The Play", Mrs May's class reads The Wizard of Oz and put on a play of it because they couldn't go outside for playtime during a storm. They initially use simple costume hats and sticks as props, but Mrs May likes "the little play" enough to organize a full-scale production with full-body costumes, make-up, props like fake axes and wands, and even set design with help from the children's parents.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story: In "The Storm", the children find a run-down tree house outside their garden, and with Dad's help, they mend it and turn it into a Treehouse of Fun where they can have a party. However, a day-long storm later, the tree is uprooted and the tree house is destroyed. That being said, they do find the Magic Key hidden in a strange locked box at the base of the tree and choose to keep it…
- Slice of Life: The first four stages cover snapshots of Biff, Chip and Kipper's life, like moving, getting a dog, going to school, etc. Stage 5 is where fantastic elements like the Magic Key start becoming relevant, bringing the children on various adventures across time and space.
- Straw Misogynist: The Knights of the Round Table are portrayed this way in "It's Not Fair", where they act sexist towards Biff and refuse to let her join them, despite her honest-to-god efforts to show her how good a knight she can be, on the sole basis that she's a girl.
- Team Pet: Floppy is Biff, Chip and Kipper's pet dog who joins them in their adventures.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Biff and Anneena are both girls who are friends with the boys, but they have different personalities and preferences. Biff is more adventurous, sporty, and mischievous, while Anneena is more calm, artistic, and polite.
- Treehouse of Fun: In "The Storm", the children find a run-down tree house outside their garden, and with Dad's help, they renovate it and "put things inside" like books, a stereo, miscellaneous trinkets, and food and drinks so they can have a party.
- Wicked Witch: The main antagonists of "Castle Adventure" are three witches, dressed in black, red, and green, who have turned the king into a frog and taken over his castle. The three of them also wear pointed hats of their respective colours and each have a Sinister Schnoz, with the red witch having prominent warts on her nose.
- Wrench Wench: A G-rated version. In "The Storm", both Biff and Wilma have been stated to help renovate the broken tree house by mending the door; the illustration shows Biff screwing the door back on its hinges while Wilma holds it in place.
