Rocket Power: Race Across New Zealand

Like most Kiwis, I was overjoyed when I saw my normally ignored nation took a turn for international stardom, what with the success of the LOTR movies. But it gave me a real thrill to see a kids' cartoon showing the real New Zealand. However, the American producers obviously didn't do much research.

1.) The whole Vegemite thing. First off, Vegemite is Australian. MARMITE is from New Zealand. They taste virtually the same, although most will agree Marmite tastes slightly better and tangier, heh.

2.) Kiwis are almost extinct in New Zealand. You wouldn't see any wandering around, let alone eat Vegemite sandwiches! They're all protected under conservation units.

3.) Theo's Dad pronounces a very important NZ town as 'Wong-geary' where its pronunciation is really 'Fong-a-ray'. I cracked up at this, because the character is native Maori, and if any person would get this wrong it would least likely be a Maori, as the name is of that culture's language.

4.) The accents! My goodness, they were awful. I cringed when I heard a truly awful Australian accent - the producers could of least have cast some actors with New Zealand accents ... a lot more nicer-sounding I think.

There's definitely a lot more significant mistakes which make me quite peeved but that's all I can remember for now. Great feature, though!