- "This is a local shop for local people, there's nothing for you here!"
Tubbs Tattsyrup (recurring phrase, now a part of popular culture)
Tulip "Tubbs" Tattsyrup is the deuteragonist of The League of Gentlemen. She is the wife and sister to Edward Tattsyrup. She is portrayed by Steve Pemberton
Biography[]
Tubbs is the co-proprietor of the Local Shop, situated on a hill just above Royston Vasey. It is a Local Shop for local people. Tubbs and her husband (and brother), Edward, do not approve of non-local outsiders who do not understand their local customs and local ways. They are extremely distrustful of anyone non-local, and usually end up killing them. Although their shop (which they inherited from their mother) is full of "precious things", they are incredibly hesitant to part with their stock. Tubbs wears a wedding band made of string, eats hair sandwiches, and eats onions as though they were apples. Although she's a killer, there is a childlike innocence to her.
Appearances[]
Series One[]
Although controlled by her domineering husband, Tubbs begins to see that there are things worth seeing outside of Royston Vasey. Apparently Edward has kept information from Tubbs for a long time. Feeling betrayed and curious, she is delighted when her estranged son David returns and offers to take her to London. Unfortunately, Edward "does" something to David, and Tubbs has no choice but to remain local.
Series Two[]
Eventually, she and Edward strike out to find David (who has mutated a bit) a bride. After a few failed attempts at finding the proper "local" stock, they manage to capture Barbara, who agrees to wed their son. Sadly, on their son's wedding night, the Shop is burned to the ground (by locals who wrongly believe that they are responsible for the plague -- for once Tubbs and Edward are actually innocent of any crime). Barbara escapes, and eventually bares Tubbs' grandchildren -- twins!
Series Three[]
At the beginning of the third season we discover that Tubbs and Edward survived the burning of the local shop (a little worse for wear) and they set out to find someplace new to call "local". Unfortunately, Tubbs doesn't realize that she's leading them down train-tracks, and she and Edward are soon mowed down by a train.
Anniversary Specials[]
Tubbs and Edward are revealed to have survived the train, and are currently living in a block of flats: inside No. 9, no less. They eventually capture and torture a reporter and a councillor. The Tattsyrups are made aware of the boundary changes to Royston Vasey, and the two hold Ellie and Lindsey (the reporter and council worker respectively) hostage. Tubbs takes Ellie’s ‘Tephelome’ and records Edward committing atrocities, the footage comes into the public, and Edward becomes quite a prominent face in the media. Eventually, the boundary changes are reversed by Tubbs and Edward speaking to the Prime Minister. Whilst inspecting their flat, a hostage negotiator comes across Ellie and Lindsey’s bodies with their faces cut off. The Tattsyrups run from the negotiator and Tubbs hides in a photobooth, but not just any photobooth. It’s the one that has been kidnapping women all throughout the series and keeping them underground. The booth is owned by the one and only Papa Lazarou, and Tubbs has become his new wife…
..Are Behind You![]
In Act Two, Mickey, upon climbing the magic beanstalk, appears in the Local Shop (although substantially larger than it tends to be). Tubbs is her regular size, but Edward is seemingly giant - as his face appears in the window, Tubbs warns Mickey to hide, which he then does - until he enters the shop wielding some very large shoes, laughing about how good his new deterrent is. It is then revealed that Tubbs is bound to the shop by magic, and unless someone was to say her full name, she would not be able to escape. As she wished to go to the ball, she requested that Mickey (still present) break the curse, which results in Edward shrinking to the size of a flea.
As she goes to the ball, she runs into Papa Lazarou, who is on an avid hunt for the owner of the Crystal Moonboot - he chases her in circles for a short while, believing her to be the wife he's been searching for, but the shoe simply does not fit her.
The Local Book for Local People[]
The Local Book is portrayed as Tubbs' scrapbook, and is canonically placed after the events of Series Two. Within this, she writes about her love for collecting goods found when herself and Edward are disposing of bodies - this, of course, gives a reason for the presence of so many different characters' items within the book - alongside a variety of different ramblings and annotations, such as a newspaper with every use of the word 'local' circled. The book gives an insight into the relationship between Tubbs and Edward - he is shown to be going on frequent trips away, some even being international (which he describes as wars to Tubbs), and there is pictures of him with another woman as well as an advertisement for a prostitute (which implies he may well be cheating on her).
Trivia[]
- Tubbs is based on a real-life shopkeeper in a little town near Brighton called Rottindean. Whilst on their first tour, the League-members wandered into her shop, and she proceeded to watch them all warily as though she didn't trust them. She also had a lot of snowglobes and tourist-y tat. She was so defensive of the "strangers" in her shop that the League (who are all nice guys, really) got rather offended at her distrust.
- Tubbs eats onions as though they were apples -- an idea gleaned from an episode of "The Time, The Place" watched by Mark and Reece. The episode was on the abuse of hypnotism, and was also where they got the idea of Professor Erno Breastpinch'd.