| World Premiere Toons (1995-1996) What a Cartoon! Show (1996-2001) The Cartoon Cartoon Show (2001-2008) |
|
|---|---|
The intertitle to the first compilation of the shorts, titled The What a Cartoon! Show. (1997) |
|
| Genre | Animation, comedy, variety |
| Created by | Fred Seibert |
| Developed by | Fred Seibert Larry Hueber |
| Voices of | Various |
| Theme music composer | Gary Lionelli |
| Opening theme | "What a Cartoon!" (1995-2001) "The Cartoon Cartoon Show" (2001-2008) |
| Ending theme | "What a Cartoon!" (1995-2001) "The Cartoon Cartoon Show" (2001-2008) |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of episodes | 48 or more shorts |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Fred Seibert (1995-2008) Sam Register (2001-2008) |
| Running time | 21–23 minutes |
| Production company(s) | Hanna–Barbera Cartoons (1995-2000) Cartoon Network Studios (1997-2008) Rough Draft Studios (some or most episodes, 1995-2008) |
| Distributor | Warner Bros. Animation (1995-) |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | Cartoon Network |
| Picture format | SD: 480i/576i |
| Audio format | Stereo |
| Original run | February 20, 1995 – November 28, 1997 |
| Chronology | |
| Related shows | Oh Yeah! Cartoons Cartoon Cartoons |
What a Cartoon! (promotionally known as World Premiere Toons, later known as The What a Cartoon! Show and then, The Cartoon Cartoon Show), is an American animation showcase project created by Fred Seibert for Hanna-Barbera Cartoons to be run on Cartoon Network. The project consisted of 48 short cartoons, intended 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 or creator.
The shorts from the project first aired on February 20, 1995 and promoted as World Premiere Toons. During the original run of the shorts the series was retitled as The What a Cartoon! Show until the final short aired November 28, 1997. Then more shorts came from 1997 to 2008. The project served as the launching point for multiple successful Cartoon Network series, including Dexter's Laboratory, Johnny Bravo, Cow and Chicken, I Am Weasel, The Powerpuff Girls, and Courage the Cowardly Dog as well as a prequel to Fox TV's Family Guy. The series is influential for birthing a slew of original Cartoon Network hits and helping to revive television animation in the 1990s.
Contents |
Fred Seibert became president of Hanna-Barbera Cartoons in 1992 and helped guide the struggling animation studio into its greatest output in years with shows like 2 Stupid Dogs and SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron. Seibert wanted the studio to produce shortcartoons, in the vein of the Golden Age of American animation. Although a project consisting of 48 shorts would cost twice as much as a normal series,[1] Seibert's pitch to Cartoon Network involved promising 48 chances to "succeed or fail," opened up possibilities for new original programming, and offered several new shorts to the thousands already present in the Turner Entertainment library. According to Seibert, quality did not matter much to the cable operators distributing the struggling network, they were more interested in promising new programs.[2]
With Turner Entertainment owner Ted Turner and Seibert's boss Scott Sassa onboard, the studio fanned out across the world to spread the word that the studio was in an "unprecedented phase," in which animators had a better idea what cartoons should be than executives and Hanna-Barbera supported them.[3][4] The company starting taking pitches in earnest in 1993 and received over 5,000 pitches for the 48 slots. The diversity in the filmmakers included those from various nationalities, race, and gender. Seibert later described his hope for an idealistic diversity as "The wider the palette of creative influences, the wider and bigger the audiences."[4]
Seibert's idea for the project was influenced heavily by Looney Tunes.[4] Hanna-Barbera founders William Hanna and Joe Barbera, as well as veteran animator Friz Freleng, taught Seibert how the shorts of the Golden Age of American animation were produced. John Kricfalusi, creator of The Ren and Stimpy Show, became a teacher of sorts for Seibert and was the first person Seibert called whilst looking for new talent for the project.[5] As was the custom in live action film and television, the company did not pay each creator for the storyboard submitted and pitched. For the first time in the studio's history, individual creators could retain their rights, and earn royalties on their creations.[5] While most in the industry scoffed at the idea, encouragement, according to Seibert, came from the cartoonists who flocked to Hanna-Barbera with original ideas.[6]
| "On top of [a research and development program], I reinvigorated the 'who comes in the studio' equation. Now talented people wanted to show up. Some 5,000 people pitched us cartoons from all over the world. We got into business with Ralph Bakshi, with Bruno Bozzetto; we got into business with a broad range of people who never would’ve given Hanna-Barbera a passing chance. We worked with people who were 70 years old, who were 20 years old. We turned on its head the perception the people in the community had of us." |
| — Creator Fred Seibert on the variety of directors for What a Cartoon![5] |
The format for What a Cartoon! was ambitious, as no one had ever attempted anything similar in the television animation era.[4] The shorts produced would be a product of the original cartoonists' vision, with no executive intervention: for example, even the music would be an individually crafted score. Each "Looney Tunes length" (7 minutes) short would debut, by itself, as a stand-alone cartoon on Cartoon Network.[3][4]
Seibert explained the project's goal in a 2007 blog post: "We didn’t care what the sitcom trends were, what Nickelodeon was doing, what the sales departments wanted. [...] We wanted cartoons."[4]
The first cartoon from the What a Cartoon! project broadcast in its entirety was The Powerpuff Girls in Meat Fuzzy Lumkins, which made its world premiere on Monday, February 20, 1995 during a television special called the World Premiere Toon-In (termed "President's Day Nightmare" by its producers, Williams Street). The special was hosted by Space Ghost and the cast of Space Ghost: Coast to Coast, 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. To promote the shorts, Cartoon Network's marketing department came up with the concept of "Dive-In Theater" in 1995 to showcase the 48 cartoon shorts. The cartoons were shown at water parks and large municipal swimming pools, treating kids and their parents to exclusive poolside screenings on 9' x 12' movie screens.[7]
Beginning February 26, 1995, each What a Cartoon! short began to premiere on Sunday nights, promoted as a World Premiere Toon.[8] Every week after the premiere, Cartoon Network showcased a different World Premiere Toon made by a different artist. After an acclimation of cartoons, the network packaged the shorts as a half-hour show titled World Premiere Toons: The Next Generation, featuring reruns of the original shorts but also new premieres. Eventually, all of the cartoons were compiled into one program bearing the name of the original project: The What a Cartoon! Show.[5] The show's initial premieres for each short preceded Cartoon Network's Sunday night movie block, Mr. Spim's Cartoon Theatre. The shorts continued to air on Sundays until 1997, when the network moved the shorts to Wednesdays at 9pm.[9] Following the premiere of Johnny Bravo, Cow and Chicken and I Am Weasel as full series in July 1997, the series shifted to Thursday nights, where it remained.[10]
The What a Cartoon! Show continued airing new episodes until November 28, 1997, when the final short of the 48 contracted during Seibert's era aired. After that, more shorts were produced and aired between 1997 and 1998. In 2000, the pilot shorts appearing on the network's viewer's poll that lost (including the original Whatever Happened to Robot Jones? short, Ferret and Parrot, Foe Paws, Jeffrey Cat, Longhair and Doubledome, Lucky Lydia, Major Flake, Nikkie, Prickles, Trevor, Uncle Gus, Utica Cartoon, Commander Cork, Maktar and David Fiess's Lost Cat) were eventually added when The What a Cartoon! Show was re-titled The Cartoon Cartoon Show in the early 2000s (decade). In 1998, Cartoon Network debuted two new short pilots and advertised them as "World Premiere Toons": Mike, Lu & Og and Kenny and the Chimp in "Diseasy Does It!".[11] Both were produced by outside studios and are not part of the original 48 shorts specifically produced by Hanna-Barbera for What a Cartoon!. The two pilots were compiled into The Cartoon Cartoon Show, while both shorts eventually garnered their own series, Mike, Lu & Og in 1999 and Codename: Kids Next Door in 2002. A pilot King Crab: Space Crustacean (1999) was also retconned into The Cartoon Cartoon Show anthology.
The show continued to air for many years afterward until eventually being dropped from the schedule. Recently, reruns have played on Cartoon Network's retro animation sister channel, Boomerang. The Big Cartoon DataBase cites What a Cartoon! as a "venture combining classic 1940s production methods with the originality, enthusiasm and comedy of the 1990s."
The What a Cartoon! staff had creators from Europe and Canada (Bruno Bozzetto), Asia (Achiu So), the heartland of the US (Jerry Reynolds), and colleague (Seth MacFarlane). The crew also contained young series first timers (like Genndy Tartakovsky, Craig McCraken, Rob Renzetti, Butch Hartman, and John Dilworth), but veterans as well (like Don Jurwich, Jerry Eisenberg, and Ralph Bakshi). In addition to the veterans, Hanna-Barbera founders William Hanna and Joseph Barbera each produced two shorts each for What a Cartoon!. Many of the key crew members from previous Hanna-Barbera series 2 Stupid Dogs joined the team of What a Cartoon! as well.[5]
Many of the crew members of What a Cartoon! later went on to write and direct for Dexter's Laboratory, Johnny Bravo, Cow and Chicken, I Am Weasel, and The Powerpuff Girls, including those named above. The Kitchen Casanova director John McIntyre is particularly known for directing several Dexter episodes. Initially, Ralph Bakshi's two shorts (Malcom and Melvin and Babe! He... Calls Me) were considered too risqué to be shown.[12] It has been rumored that John Kricfalusi was slated to direct several new What a Cartoon! shorts of his own (produced by his production company, Spümcø).[11] However, both Yogi Bear-influenced cartoons were commissioned separately by Seibert, and instead premiered as their own: Boo Boo Runs Wild and A Day in the Life of Ranger Smith both premiered in 1999.[13]
Inspired by Seibert's interest in the modern rock posters of Frank Kozik, each of the shows' creators worked with the internal Hanna-Barbera "Creative Corps" Creative Director Bill Burnett, and 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.[14]
Cartoon Network's decision to air original cartoons in the evening was a bold move for a network that primarily had been a re-run haven since its launch in 1992.[15] The fact that Cartoon Network was financing and broadcasting the new cartoons is a testament to how far the network had come since its debut: its viewership had stretched from an initial 2 million homes to 43.6 million in 1997, and the network was slowly developing into one of the most popular offerings on cable.[16] Dexter’s Laboratory was the most popular short series according to a vote held in 1995 and eventually became the first spin-off of What a Cartoon! in 1996. Two more series based on shorts, Johnny Bravo and Cow and Chicken, premiered in 1997, and popular short series The Powerpuff Girls became a weekly half-hour show in 1998. Courage the Cowardly Dog (spun-off from the Oscar-nominated short The Chicken from Outer Space) followed as the final spin-off in 1999. In addition, the Cow and Chicken short I Am Weasel eventually was also spun-off into a separate series: in all, six cartoon series were ultimately launched by the What a Cartoon! project, any one of which earned enough money for the company to pay for the whole program.[5] In addition to the eventual spin-offs, the What a Cartoon! short Larry and Steve by Seth MacFarlane featured prototypes of characters that would later go on to become MacFarlane's massively successful Family Guy.
The What a Cartoon! project and its assorted spin-offs brought Cartoon Network major commercial and critical success, and the network became an animation industry leader as the 1990s drew to a close. In 2001, coinciding with the death of William Hanna, Hanna-Barbera merged with Warner Bros. Animation and Cartoon Network opened its own production arm, Cartoon Network Studios in Burbank, as the rightful H-B successor to produce original programming for the network and future projects. Two What a Cartoon! shorts, Windup Wolf and Hard Luck Duck, were the last cartoon shorts directed and produced by William Hanna, co-founder of Hanna-Barbera. In addition, The What a Cartoon! Show and spin-offs were the final original productions released by Hanna-Barbera.
Creator of The What a Cartoon! Show, Fred Seibert, left Hanna-Barbera in late 1996 to open up his own studio, Frederator Studios, and to produce Nickelodeon's own version of What a Cartoon!, titled Oh Yeah! Cartoons.[17] The showcase contained familiar What a Cartoon! alumni (Butch Hartman, Rob Renzetti) and launched several successful Nickelodeon series, including The Fairly OddParents, ChalkZone and My Life as a Teenage Robot. Frederator Studios launched another animation showcase in 2006, titled Random! Cartoons, which in turn produced Nickelodeon's Fanboy and Chum Chum in 2009 and Cartoon Network's Adventure Time in 2010.
A sequel-of-sorts to the What a Cartoon! project, a Cartoon Network project titled The Cartoonstitute was announced in April 2008. Created by Cartoon Network executive Rob Sorcher and headed by The Powerpuff Girls creator Craig McCracken, the project was to "establish a think tank and create an environment in which animators can create characters and stories," and also create new possible Cartoon Network series.[18][19]
However, the project was eventually scrapped as a result of the late 2000s recession and only fourteen of the 39 planned were completed.[20] Nevertheless, J.G. Quintel's Regular Show short and Pete Browngardt's Secret Mountain Fort Awesome were greenlit to become full series and Regular Show premiered in September 2010 with Secret Mountain Fort Awesome slated to premiere in 2011.[21]
The following is a list of all 48 original shorts produced under Fred Seibert's management for What a Cartoon! by Hanna-Barbera. The shorts are listed in order of which they aired, and do not contain extra cartoons added on by Cartoon Network when the show was re-titled The Cartoon Cartoon Show.
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| # | Title | Directed by | Original airdate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2–2 | "Dexter's Laboratory" | Genndy Tartakovsky | February 26, 1995[22] |
| Dee Dee takes Dexter's newest invention and changes him into a bunny. They start changing each other into animals. The earliest popular short from What a Cartoon!, it was immediately developed into Dexter's Laboratory and began airing in 1996. Dexter's Laboratory, later retitled "Changes" for the series, was also nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour) in 1995, losing to The Simpsons episode "Lisa's Wedding". | |||
| 3–3 | "Yuckie Duck in "Short Orders"" | Pat Ventura | March 5, 1995 |
| Yuckie Duck is a waiter in a restaurant. He keeps having problems, because the Limburger sandwich he gave to a man smelled bad and a steak he gave to a lady was too hard to cut. | |||
| 1–1 | "The Powerpuff Girls in "Meat Fuzzy Lumpkins"" | Craig McCracken | March 12, 1995 |
| The Powerpuff Girls are judges in Townsville's yearly jam contest. Fuzzy Lumpkins is upset when his meat jam doesn't win and is looking for revenge by turning Townsville(& its inhabitants) into meat so he can eat them all. He soon turns Bubbles's right ponytail into a chicken leg, making her beat Fuzzy senseless,which ends when Fuzzy zips through the air and Bubbles uses the Meat-Ray to turn Fuzzy into a burger patty. The short laid foundations for the massively successful The Powerpuff Girls to premiere in 1998. | |||
| 4–4 | "Dino in "Stay Out!"" | Joseph Barbera | March 19, 1995 |
| Fred Flintstone goes bowling with Barney and tells Dino to keep Baby Puss out. The cat always gets in, however, disguised as a baby, a tiger skinned rug and Santa Claus. | |||
| 5–5 | "Johnny Bravo" | Van Partible | March 26, 1995 |
| Johnny Bravo decides to catch a gorilla that escaped from the zoo, because he thinks that the zoo owner will love him then. A series based on the character, also titled Johnny Bravo, premiered in 1997. | |||
| 6–6 | "George and Junior in "Look Out Below"" | Pat Ventura | April 9, 1995 |
| Based on the classic cartoon characters by Tex Avery, a bird crashes a light bulb so it doesn't disturb his sleep and sits in the empty socket. George and Junior, the building's janitors/engineers, are sent to fix it. | |||
| 7–7 | "Hard Luck Duck" | William Hanna | April 16, 1995 |
| Hard Luck Duck, after venturing away from Crocodile Harley's watch, is a hungry fox's target to be cooked. The cartoon contains many similarities to one of Hanna-Barbera's previous characters, Yakky Doodle. | |||
| 8–8 | "Wind-Up Wolf" | William Hanna | May 12, 1995 |
| Big Bad Wolf wants to catch the three little pigs again. He decides the only way he can do it is to build a robot wolf to take his place. | |||
| 9–9 | "Shake & Flick in "Raw Deal in Rome"" | Eugene Mattos | June 18, 1995 |
| Shake the dog is invaded by Flick the flea. They are both accomplished musicians and find themselves in the competition of a lifetime as each one tries to outdo the other. | |||
| 10–10 | "The Adventures of Captain Buzz Cheeply in "A Clean Getaway"" | Meinert Hansen | June 25, 1995 |
| Captain Buzz Cheeply and his robot sidekick, Slide, must escape a planet whose inhabitants have abnormally sized foreheads but small sized brains, while finding a place to do their laundry. | |||
| 11–11 | "The Chicken from Outer Space" | John R. Dilworth | July 1, 1995 |
| A fearful dog tries to stop an alien chicken's plans to invade Earth while in his owners' farm. The short was developed into the final series spun-off from What a Cartoon!, Courage the Cowardly Dog, in 1999. The Chicken from Outer Space was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in 1995, losing to Aardman Animations' A Close Shave. | |||
| 12–12 | "Bloo's Gang in "Bow-Wow Buccaneers"" | Mike Milo | July 1, 1995 |
| Bloo and his dog friends sneak out of their owner's houses at midnight to set on a pirate adventure in the city. | |||
| 13–13 | "O. Ratz with Dave D. Fly in "Rat in a Hot Tin Can"" | Jerry Reynolds | July 2, 1995 |
| Friends O. Ratz and Dave D. Fly live together in a trash can. One night it gets so cold that O. Ratz can't take it anymore and tries to sneak into a hotel with disastrous results. | |||
| 14–14 | "Phish and Chip in "Short Pfuse"" | Butch Hartman | July 9, 1995 |
| The Bomb Squad (Phish, a wacky shark and Chip, a lynx) is told by their chief to catch a mad bomber. | |||
| 15–15 | "The Fat Cats in "Drip Dry Drips"" | Jon McClenahan | July 16, 1995 |
| Louie and Elmo open a dry cleaning business together. Their first customer in the President of the United States and they have until 5:00 to get his suit clean. They run into a few problems and are running out of time. | |||
| 16–16 | "George and Junior's Christmas Spectacular" | Pat Ventura | July 23, 1995 |
| George and Junior are forced to deliver Santa's presents to the kids, as they fail to deliver one of Santa's letters. | |||
| 17–17 | "Yoink! of the Yukon" | Don Jurwich & Jerry Eisenberg | July 30, 1995 |
| The mounted police of the Yukon has its uniforms stolen by a grizzly bear planning revenge on them when they skinned his animal friends. Yoink and Sergeant Thumbsworth Tharplung is sent to retrieve them. | |||
| 18–18 | "Yuckie Duck in "I'm On My Way"" | Pat Ventura | August 6, 1995 |
| Yuckie Duck is a paramedic and he has to perform life-saving feats such as pulling a tack out of a lion's posterior. | |||
| 19–19 | "Mina and the Count in "Interlude with a Vampire"" | Rob Renzetti | November 5, 1995 |
| A girl named Mina is visited by a vampire named Count after she goes to sleep. They go through a series of events as the Count tries to get home before sunrise. Created by Rob Renzetti, Renzetti would later produce more Mina and the Count shorts for Nickelodeon's Oh Yeah! Cartoons in the late 1990s. | |||
| 20–20 | "Cow and Chicken in "No Smoking"" | David Feiss | November 12, 1995 |
| Cow and Chicken are sister and brother. Chicken is taken to the roasting center of the earth by the Devil (called "The Red Guy" in the series) and it's up to his sister Cow to save him as SuperCow.. The short was picked up to become the series Cow and Chicken beginning in 1997. No Smoking was also nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour), losing to the Pinky and the Brain episode "A Pinky and the Brain Christmas Special". | |||
| 21–21 | "Pizza Boy in "No Tip"" | Robert Alvarez | January 1, 1996 |
| Pizza Boy tries to deliver a pizza to the Arctic Circle in five minutes to get a big tip. He has many problems on the way, like getting thrown out of a plane. | |||
| 22–22 | "The Powerpuff Girls in "Crime 101"" | Craig McCracken | January 28, 1996 |
| The Amoeba Boys try to commit a crime and the Powerpuff Girls help them commit a crime. The second and final short from What a Cartoon! to star The Powerpuff Girls, the series would later premiere in 1998. | |||
| 23–23 | "Dexter's Laboratory in "The Big Sister"" | Genndy Tartakovsky | March 10, 1996 |
| Dexter's sister Dee-Dee eats some of his experimental cookies and she grows into a giant. The second and final short from What a Cartoon! to star Dexter and sister Dee-Dee, Dexter's Laboratory would premiere the same year. "The Big Sister" was later adapted into an episode of the series, which was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour) in 1996, losing to the Pinky and the Brain episode "A Pinky and the Brain Christmas Special". | |||
| 24–24 | "Podunk Possum in "One Step Beyond"" | Joe Orrantia | July 1, 1996 |
| A possum named Podunk acquires an abandoned farm with 3 chickens to lay eggs for him, and has to defend them from a fried chicken titan, Major Portions. However, he is unaware of a major alien conspiracy. | |||
| 25–25 | "Gramps" | Butch Hartman | August 7, 1996 |
| Gramps tells his grandchildren about his battle against invading aliens, and gets corrected by the children repeatedly. | |||
| 26–26 | "Hillbilly Blue" | Butch Hartman | August 21, 1996 |
| Crawdad Eustace is fed-up with being treated as food and goes with possum pal Mordechai on a cross-country trip to New Orleans and being "served" in royal fashion. | |||
| 27–27 | "Jof in "Help?"" | Bruno Bozzetto | September 1, 1996 |
| A cat that pinches his finger while sewing asks for help at the hospital, but its ruthless personnel offer only pain. | |||
| 28–28 | "Jungle Boy in "Mr. Monkeyman"" | Van Partible | October 9, 1996 |
| Jealous King Raymond stains the hero Jungle Boy's reputation by impersonating him and causing mayhem. Jungle Boy would later go on to serve as filler shorts in Johnny Bravo (1997). | |||
| 29–29 | "Godfrey and Zeek in "Lost Control"" | Zac Moncrief | October 16, 1996 |
| Godfrey the giraffe accidentally flushes his TV remote down the toilet. He and his friend Zeek spend the rest of the episode trying to get it back from the water plant. | |||
| 30–30 | "Tumbleweed Tex in "School Daze"" | Robert Alvarez | October 23, 1996 |
| A Wild West outlaw needs to finish the fourth grade, and deal with his obnoxious class rival, little Timmy. | |||
| 31–31 | "Buy One, Get One Free" | Charlie Bean, Carey Yost & Don Shank | October 30, 1996 |
| A man named Reilly gets a cat named Flinch in order to impress a female cat lover named Sofie and threatens the cat that if there is a scratch on anything while he's away, he will send him to the violin factory. It won't be easy when Sophie leaves Flinch a feline playmate named Fix that ends up wrecking everything. | |||
| 33–32 | "The Kitchen Casanova" | John McIntyre | November 6, 1996 |
| Casanova has a date with Doris. He can think of no better way to impress her than to cook her a meal. Unfortunately, things don't go as well as he had planned. | |||
| 33–33 | "The Ignoramooses" | Mike Milo | November 13, 1996 |
| Two moose (called Ignoramooses by a watching specialist) believe they're going to be adopted by a rich hunter, and wreak havoc in his manssion. | |||
| 34–34 | "Johnny Bravo and the Amazon Women" | Van Partible | January 1, 1997[9] |
| Johnny Bravo is left stranded in an island filled with beautiful tall women, and their bodyguard elephant. The final Johnny Bravo short to air, the half-hour series premiered in the same year. | |||
| 35–35 | "Phish and Chip in "Blammo the Clown"" | Butch Hartman | January 7, 1997[9] |
| Blammo the Clown comes back to town and setting up bombs trying to blow up Phish and Chip. | |||
| 36–36 | "Awfully Lucky" | Davis Doi | January 15, 1997[9] |
| A geeky guy finds the Paradox Pearl and gives him good luck. Then he discovers that for everything good it brings, it also brings something bad. | |||
| 37–37 | "Strange Things" | Mike Wellins | January 22, 1997[9] |
| A robot finds a job as a janitor, but winds up working for an obnoxious chief of security named Mel. He also must remember that if it says "Don't Touch", don't touch. The only computer animated short produced for What a Cartoon!, it is one of television's first exposures to computer animation. | |||
| 38–38 | "Snoot's New Squat" | Victor Ortado & Jeret Ochi | January 29, 1997[9] |
| Snoot, the flea-like extra-terrestrial who can imitate pop culture, finds a new home at a pain-suffering dog named Al who drives his doctor crazy. | |||
| 39–39 | "Larry and Steve" | Seth MacFarlane | February 5, 1997[9] |
| Steve, a homeless dog, is adopted by dimwit Larry (the only man to understand what he's saying), and lives disaster after disaster when Larry takes him shopping. The style developed into creator Seth MacFarlane's Family Guy. | |||
| 40–40 | "Sledgehammer O'Possum in "What's Goin' On Back There?!"" | Pat Ventura | February 12, 1997[9] |
| Sledgehammer O'Possum takes shelter from the cold in a mailbox, much to the dismay of a mailman named Ethel who will stop at nothing to make him leave. | |||
| 41–41 | "Zoonatics in "Home Sweet Home"" | Joey Ahlbum | February 19, 1997[9] |
| Three acrobatic animals plot to escape their lousy circus lifestyle, for a better life at the new Hackensack Zoo. | |||
| 42–42 | "Swamp and Tad in "Mission Imfrogable"" | John Rice | February 26, 1997[9] |
| Swamp and Tad are frogs from outer space. | |||
| 43–43 | "Dino in "The Great Egg-Scape"" | Joseph Barbera | March 5, 1997[9] |
| Dino is a night watchman at the Bedrock Museum. A last-of-it's-kind egg is stolen while he is sleeping on duty and he must find it if he is to keep his job. | |||
| 44–44 | "Sledgehammer Opossum in "Out and About"" | Pat Ventura | August 1, 1997 |
| A troublemaking possum frustrates a dog's plans to enjoy a quiet summer day out. | |||
| 45–45 | "Boid 'N' Woim" | C. Miles Thompson | August 13, 1997 |
| Hitchhiker Woim is going to the sunny California. Boid drives him there, but on the way, they crash into a cactus. Boid gets hungry and tries to eat Woim. | |||
| 46–46 | "Malcom and Melvin" | Ralph Bakshi | November 28, 1997 |
| Melvin is lonely and is having trouble making friends. It gets so bad that he even attempts suicide. He runs into a trumpet playing roach named Malcom and the two become friends. | |||
| 47–47 | "Tales of Worm Paranoia" | Eddie Fitzgerald | November 28, 1997 |
| A worm named Johnny keeps getting stepped on by a human, which pushes him over the edge. His girlfriend Sally tries to keep him in check. Style reminiscent of John Kricfalusi's The Ren & Stimpy Show. Kricfalusi is listed with a "Special Thanks" credit. | |||
| 48–48 | "Babe! He... Calls Me" | Ralph Bakshi | November 28, 1997 |
| Malcom and Melvin play music in bars to try and pick up women. Melvin's mother thinks that her son was kidnapped by Malcom and hired a private detective to find him. | |||
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