The Cartoon Cartoon Show

Infobox_television
show_name = What a Cartoon! Show


caption = The "What a Cartoon! Show" logo
format = Variety show
runtime = 22 minutes approx. (7 minutes per segment)
creator = Fred Seibert
starring = Various voice actors
country = United States
network = Cartoon Network
first_aired = February 20, 1995
last_aired =
num_episodes = 63 (21 shows)
imdb_id = 0181266
tv_com_id = 22801|

"World Premiere Toons" (later known as "What a Cartoon! Show", now known as "The Cartoon Cartoon Show"), is the mid-1990s animation showcase that appeared on Cartoon Network. It served as the launching point for multiple original cartoons including "Dexter's Laboratory", "Johnny Bravo", "Cow and Chicken", "The Powerpuff Girls", and "Courage the Cowardly Dog". "What a Cartoon!" now airs on Boomerang.

Overview

"World Premiere Toons" was an animation project conceived and produced by Fred Seibert, the original creative director of MTV and Nickelodeon who served as the president of Hanna-Barbera Cartoons, Inc., prior to founding Frederator Studios. Its mission was to return creative power to animators and artists, by recreating the atmospheres that spawned the great cartoon characters of the mid-20th century. Each of 48 short cartoons mirrored the structure of a theatrical cartoon, with each film being based on an original storyboard drawn and written by its artist/creator.

Each of the shows' creators worked with the internal Hanna-Barbera "Creative Corps" Art Director Jesse Stagg and designer Kelly Wheeler to craft a series of high quality, limited edition, fluorescent art posters. The Corps launched a prolonged Guerrilla mailing campaign, targeting animation heavyweights and critics leading up to the launch of "World Premiere Toons". The first poster campaign of its kind introduced the world to the groundbreaking new stable of characters.

Shorts

The first "World Premiere Toon" broadcasted in its entirety was "Yuckie Duck in Short Orders", which made its world premiere on February 20, 1995 during a television special called the "World Premiere Toon-In" (termed "President's Day Nightmare" by its producers, Williams Street). "Meat Fuzzy Lumpkins" aired on March 12, 1995. The special was hosted by Space Ghost and the cast of "", and featured comic interviews and a mock contest with the creators of the various cartoons. The "Toon-In" was simulcast on Cartoon Network, TBS Superstation, and TNT. The special, without the "Powerpuff Girls" cartoon or any of the clips from the other WPT cartoons featured in the special, was later included in the "Space Ghost: Coast to Coast" Volume 3 DVD. The version with the other WPT cartoons was later included in the "Powerpuff Girls" Season 1 DVD, with "Meat Fuzzy Lumkins" included as a separate special feature. Most of the WAC shorts that were voted into shows had more than 1 short. In fact, "Cow and Chicken" and "Courage the Cowardly Dog" were the only exceptions.Shake & Flick (a WAC short set in Rome about a conceited poodle and a ferocious flea) was nominated for a run by Cartoon Network, but it was Johnny Bravo that won the contract. Shake & Flick, however, still received popular reception even though it never went past being a one-shot, and Cartoon Network never found the proper way to continue it past its WAC pilot.

The "What a Cartoon!" experiment introduced many of today's top animation talent and was repeated several times. The Big Cartoon DataBase cites "What a Cartoon!"/"World Premiere Toons" as a "venture combining classic 1940s production methods with the originality, enthusiasm and comedy of the 1990s." A similar program, also created by Fred Seibert, was introduced on Nickelodeon in 1998, titled "Oh Yeah! Cartoons".

The "What a Cartoon!" shorts ended with silent clips of the cartoons squeezed in with the credits and sometimes the cartoon's full title would show up along with the clips above the credits. A vast majority of the shorts have never received their own runs as series on the Cartoon Network schedule (especially if the short only had one original "What a Cartoon!" pilot). In fact, some shorts were even created as the type that were better off as one shots and would never perform well beyond stand alone status (like "Awfully Lucky" which centered around a pearl that granted good luck, and bad luck following each moment of good luck it brought).

Episode list

External links

*
* [http://tv.com/what-a-cartoon/show/22801/summary.html?q=What%20a%20Cartoon&tag=search_results;title;0 What a Cartoon!] at TV.com
* [http://frederator.com/content.php?id=185 What a Cartoon! at Frederator]