As Variety noted late yesterday: After a dozen-plus years of existence, Kids' WB has now been vaporized to fine, reddish ash...
The last network out on Saturday mornings, the CW is turning off the lights.
The CW announced late Tuesday it will shut down the nearly 13-year-old Kids' WB! franchise at the end of this season and turn Saturday mornings over to 4Kids Entertainment, which has handled Fox's Saturday morning kids block for the past six years.
Cartoon Brew wasn't thrilled with this turn of events, and neither are we.
So I talked to a Time-Warner exec to find out why Kids WB is giving up the ghost. This is what I was told:
"They just weren't making money. The business model wasn't working any more. They didn't make a profit on the shows, and they didn't make enough money from merchandising. So they rented the space out to 4Kids the way Fox does.
"Nobody makes a lot of money on broadcast animation blocks today, there's just way too many things occupying kids now: the internet, video games, lots of cable channels. You've got to produce a hit show to make money, and that's not easy to do..."
Lately, Kids' WB hasn't come up with many hits.
I've got my own theories about why animation on broadcast television doesn't work well in 2007. It's certainly true that the market has been divided and subdivided; it's also true that the quality has (mostly) declined year by year, hence fewer boffo television half-hours of the cartoon persuasion.
No corporate entity appears willing to deficit finance animation. Nobody's interested in breaking even ten years out. Profits have to happen in the same fiscal year, or the stuff won't get made. That pretty much preempts Tiny Toons quality, for product now has to be way cheaper than the shows that relaunched Warner Bros. Animation eighteen years ago.
Kind of self-defeating, but that's the way the business seems to be.
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"Nobody makes a lot of money on broadcast animation blocks today, there's just way too many things occupying kids now: the internet, video games, lots of cable channels. You've got to produce a hit show to make money, and that's not easy to do..."
I'm so sick of this lame-assed excuse. It's utter bullshit. Making hit cartoons isn't rocket science. You just have to put people who know how to do it in positions of power.
Kids are turning to the internet and video games because they've got GOOD CONTENT to choose from.
KWB drove their audience away by producing pile-of-shit after pile-of-shit. They had a lot of amazing talent at their disposal and they chose not to utilize them.
People like S.S. and B.W. and the other shitslingers at KWB are the ones to blame. Not the marketplace. Not videogames. Not the internet. This is 100% the fault of the ineptitude of their executive branch. Nothing more. This comes as absolutely no surprise. Now a bunch of talented artists are going to be out of work. Rot in hell KWB executives.
I agree with Anonymous above. When I read this article yesterday in Variety my head was ready to pop of my neck.
I have been dealing with "Creative Executives" for the last 4 years trying to pitch and sell shows and one undeniable fact I have come away with is that most of them no nothing about animation, kids, or the industry they are in.
I had a show WB/CW was interested in had a contract and everything, but they dragged their feet for such a long time that by the time something was going to happen they changed executives and the new guy decided the show was not for them.
I know not all shows are going to make it but to make the excuses that these Executives are making its just sad. Meanwhile I'm off to MIPCOM on Friday to try and pitch some more ideas to these money hungry talentless morons. I can hardly wait to hear the wonderful reasons the shows I'm pitching won't appeal to kids. I've been in the animation industry for 15 years and have 3 children, I think I know what kids want.
Its a shame that there are a few good folks and companies out there swimming in a swamp of mediocrity.
Why is it that shit never sticks to these people.
If a true creative shoots himself in the foot you never hear the end of it. But when a suit rides project after project into the ground they they are time and time again rewarded for their failures?
Crap always rises to the top, I guess. Maybe we should drive a stake through their hearts, or use a silver bullet.
Naw, they would still come back.
"Nobody makes a lot of money on broadcast animation blocks today..."
Well, therein lies the problem. Who gives a shit about making money? WB has so much money, that it really shouldn't be an issue.
It's not about the money, it's about entertaining your audience. And if you can't entertain your audience, then damn, you better hire talented people who can!
All I know is that Loonatics could have made it big if it weren't for the whole "OMG LUNATIKS IZ FREEKY I GOTZ ME SUM NITEMARRS" deal.
I remember when Tiny Toons was first launched. I thought that even TV animation was suddenly making a huge surge in quality. Alas, it was not to last. Oh well, back to my Popeye DVD.
Lot's of people will be losing their jobs because of this decisions ... I guess I understand ... but thanks for the warning WB All we ever heard was that things were going to be better with the new president. Unfortunately, things remain the same. We were told we would not be moving the company to Burbank if we did not intend to continue making cartoons. A pep rally was held when we moved in regarding the opportunities for growth and a better relationship with Cartoon Network. In the end, it was all lies ... just tell us the truth please .. we at least deserve that. And where has our president been hiding? What happened to her promise to meet everyone at the studio, get ideas and keep us informed? More lies, more BS
As an artist who first hand got screwed by KWB and specifically CK, SS, and RP I have to say that I am glad they're gone. Sad, for the artists and people like HS who was a good guy, but bastards like SS was like a freakin Galactus eating planets. He sucked Sony dry, then moved to WB and sucked that dry. Now he's moved on to Europe and I'm sure he'll do damage there as well. I am afraid for Nick because his Silver Surfer is over there and God knows what she'll do to it if she can.
Over the last twenty five years I have sold 4 pilots to KWB and they have stolen two additional concepts from me, most notably Loonatics. Of course when I pitched it to CK, it wasn't with stupid ass Bugs Bunny in the future but with other characters and it was obviously good enough to steal. Good ol' WB stole it, switched it to Looney Tunes (CK's solution for everything towards the end due to DTV taking over) characters and then promptly made it suck because their development group was at best abysmal. They also forced me to take deals with them and bullied me out of contracts they signed with me and told me that if I didn't do what they asked then they would blacklist me.
Don't believe me? It's true... every word of it, and I'm sure SS was behind it; bastard that he is. He even went so far as to call other studio heads and tell them that they shouldn't hire me either. He was pure evil.
I will miss the good old days with Tom and Jean but those days are long gone... replaced with Corporate World Order.
They are a greasy spot on the pavement that I will not miss.
The scariest part though is that their development execs have moved to Nick and that might spell trouble for that Network too. Bad ideas equals pulled plugs and a Test Pattern these days and with only three networks left, one of which is moving to live action, these are some of the scariest times in animation history IMHO.
It's a damn good thing I am near retirement.
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