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VIDEOTime Warner: Meet George Jetson... Again
Hanna-Barbera cartoon franchises are making a comeback.
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Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the latest in the popular series, was expected to prop up Warner's lousy 2008 numbers, but had its release date pushed back to summer 2009. And Warner's big release for 2009, Watchmen, was embroiled in a lawsuit between the studio and Twentieth Century Fox (NWS).
Making matters worse, the dissolution of the studio’s independent wing also saw the sale of one prominent property to Fox Searchlight. That film -- Slumdog Millionaire -- would go on to win 8 Academy Awards, including Best Picture.
Seeking to launch a comeback, Warner is now looking toward an animation brand that had all but disappeared.
Even if you don’t remember Elroy Jetson, his animators, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, should be familiar. Their animation studio created icons like Yogi Bear, the Jetsons, Scooby-Doo and the Flintstones. After being sold to Taft Broadcasting in 1967, Hanna-Barbera changed hands a few times more through the 1980s and '90s, and was relegated to basic Cartoon Network programming by the time Hanna passed away in 2001.
But following a successful Scooby Doo film franchise, the Hanna-Barbera roster is primed for a comeback.
The heavy Hanna-Barbera push starts this year, with the release of Jetsons, Tom and Jerry, and Scooby DVDs, including a direct-to-DVD animated feature, Scooby Doo and the Samurai Sword. From there, Warner Brothers is working on an upcoming Jetsons CGI/live-action film helmed by Sin City and Spy Kids director Robert Rodriguez, and a Yogi Bear feature from Italian Job producer Donald de Line.
But the biggest Hanna-Barbera rehash could be Tom & Jerry. Originally created by Hanna-Barbera for MGM (MGM), the cartoon cat and mouse will be getting their big-screen treatment courtesy of Dan Lin, producer of the upcoming Terminator Salvation and Sherlock Holmes.
The aggressive move to bring back Hanna-Barbera is hardly surprising, considering Warner Brothers' biggest animated property, Bugs Bunny, has practically dropped from public consciousness, and comes after the success of the 2007's Alvin and the Chipmunks live-action/CGI film, a modestly budgeted Fox release that went on to make over $360 million in global box office. Naturally, the "squeekuel" is currently in the pipeline.
And with all the marketing bric-a-brac (action figures, video games, pajamas, etc.) associated with these releases, the potential for profit goes far beyond the multiplex.
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