Nicktoons of the Nineties. · 4:24pm Feb 19th, 2018

The stories behind the Nicktoons aired during the first decade of the brand - the one from Nick that was the beginning of the end for what TVTropes would dub the "All Animation is Disney" public prejudice. Included are video clips from the series as well as info on how to find them on home media.

DOUG
Debuted: August 11, 1991
Ended: January 2, 1994

Jim Jinkins cartoon revolving around the life and daydreams of Doug Funnie (Billy West on Nickeloden, Tom McHugh on ABC), who wants to stay low-key but unintentionally stands out with his active imagination and strong morals. The dreams he and his dog Porkchop have help him either find solutions to everyday problems or carry on projects of a certain complexity. Jinkins based Doug's hometown of Bluffington on Richmond, Virginia, where he was born and raised. The very first cartoon on Nick, it aired earlier than RUGRATS and REN & STIMPY, but was not quite as popular as either program, which led Jinkins to at one point deliver these remarks to Nick's executive producer Vanessa Coffey

REN & STIMPY is getting so much attention because of John Kricfalusi. I feel like the squeaky wheel gets the grease.

The program was noted for being gentler and quieter than the other new cartoons airing on Nick, which was attempting to break new ground with animation. The series ended production after fifty-two episodes in 1994, but resumed as BRAND SPANKING NEW DOUG in 1996, this time for ABC, as its new corporate parent, Disney, had acquired Jinkins' production company, Jumbo Pictures. 1997 saw it appear as part of the first season of ABC's One Saturday Morning, which also had RECESS (from Rugrats creator Paul Germain and Rugrats writer Joe Ansolabehere) and PEPPER ANN (created by Sue Rose). Seeing that THE RUGRATS MOVIE was the first cartoon outside of Mickey Mouse's premises to gross over $100 million, Disney took an erstwhile direct-to-VHS film, DOUG'S 1ST MOVIE and put it in theatres on March 26, 1999. Though the ABC version of Doug did well in the ratings, and made ABC the top network on Saturday mornings, both that version and DOUG'S 1ST MOVIE had overwhelmingly poor reception from fans, staff, and (for the most part) the creator of the original Nickelodeon series.

ON HOME VIDEO: The Nickelodeon Doug's lone VHS releases were from Sony Wonder (1993-96) although Paramount issued "Doug: Christmas Story". Four tapes of the ABC version were released on VHS by Walt Disney Home Video. In 2008, Nick partnered with Amazon.com to allow new and old programs to be made available on DVD through CreateSpace. The deal would have Amazon produce the discs (on DVD-R burn on demand) as well as cover and disc art. The season sets were issued in August 2008 (for the first two seasons) and December 2009 (last two seasons). Nick issued the last season on DVD through CreateSpace as "The Best of Season 4" because they couldn't find two episodes from the titular season. The complete Nickelodeon series was issued on June 26, 2014.

RUGRATS
Debuted: August 11, 1991
Ended: August 1, 2004

Top: A memorable clip from the 1991-93 production wave. Bottom: A memorable clip from the 1996-2004 production wave.

Klasky-Csupo, who had previously animated for THE SIMPSONS, as well as music videos and commercials, made their indelible mark on this animated series focusing on the lives of babies and toddlers from their perspective. The gang is led by Tommy Pickles (E.G. Daily, previously a recording star for A&M), and its members include Chuckie Finster (Christine Cavanaugh, replaced by Nancy Cartwright primarily and Candi Milo secondarily after her retirement) and twins Phil & Lil Deville (Kath Soucie). Their enemy is spoiled brat Angelica Pickles (Cheryl Chase). Later on, they were joined by Susie Carmichael (Cree Summer, who had starred in NBC's A DIFFERENT WORLD) who served to counter the tactics of Angelica and serve as a moderator to her ego, Dil Pickles (Tara Strong, nee Charendoff) who was born during THE RUGRATS MOVIE, and Kimi Watanabe-Finster (Dionne Quan) whom the babies encounter in RUGRATS IN PARIS: THE MOVIE.

The series was initially a modest hit for Nickelodeon, its popularity being constantly overshadowed by REN & STIMPY. However, Nick's daily, successful broadcasts of repeats of that show took off when the show went on hiatus in 1993, and Nick knew they were in on the next big thing. Accordingly, Rugrats was back in production in 1996, first as three specials, then as a series the next year. The popularity has spawned a film, as THE RUGRATS MOVIE (1998) had, in the early 2000s, the largest gross ever for a non-Disney animated feature, having made $120 million at the domestic box office. The popularity of the film has led it to two sequels: RUGRATS IN PARIS: THE MOVIE (2000) and RUGRATS GO WILD (2003), the latter a crossover with THE WILD THORNBERRYS. Nick's first comic strip was presented by the RUGRATS in 1998 and the kids got Nickelodeon its first Nicktoon crossover, an episode done with AAAAH!!! REAL MONSTERS in 1999.

The series was highly-rated for Nick well into the early 2000s, was seen internationally in over 76 countries, and was the only one of the original three Nicktoons to form its own spinoff, ALL GROWN UP!, which ran a healthy life of five seasons. Talks about a revival are ongoing and were boosted in early February, when the main Nickelodeon channel ran repeats of certain episodes of this series.

ON HOME VIDEO: Sony Wonder issued 10 total tapes with Rugrats content embedded within. They issued four episode compilations and two specials with the RUGRATS, and the rest of the time put episodes of the show on video samplers. When Nickelodeon's parent corporation Viacom purchased Paramount Pictures, the studio recognized the series' potency, issuing many more episode compilations into 2003; to that end the compilations "Decade In Diapers", "Halloween", "Christmas" and "Mysteries" were among the first Nickelodeon DVDs to appear on the then-struggling DVD format. Episodes of RUGRATS also appeared on Nick Picks on DVD. The first four seasons of RUGRATS have been released on DVD as of this writing.

THE REN & STIMPY SHOW
Debuted: August 11, 1991
Ended: December 16, 1995

Anti-establishment cartoonist John Kricfalusi, of the Canadian province of Quebec, created this innovative series centering on a chichuahua named Ren (Mr. Kricfalusi during his tenure with Nickelodeon) and his feline partner Stimpy (Billy West, who assumed the Ren role after Nick fired Kricfalusi) who engage in antics with which most everyone would be uncomfortable. This was the only cartoon on Nick in which the stories and segments were interchangeable. This technique was most successful with projects from what was known in the '90s as the Children's Television Workshop (i.e. SESAME STREET, THE ELECTRIC COMPANY) but in REN & STIMPY's case, Nick demanded more episodes for the first season than they could deliver on time, and as such Nick had to stretch the episodes by showing the same stories repeatedly in different forms.

The series was the most popular cable television program of the early '90s, but almost instantly came under fire for in equal parts its adult humor, dark humor, off-color humor, sexual innuendos, and at times heavy violence. Nick disapproved of Kricfalusi's missed production deadlines and was uncomfortable with his lack of desire to produce an educational series. Tensions between the two rose to new heights during 1992, with the episode "Man's Best Friend", in which Ren - quite gruesomely - beats a character named George Liquor with an oar. The scene caused Nick to ban the episode from the airwaves. The network was known to edit certain other episodes of the show, though viewers could turn on co-owned MTV to see whatever they were missing if they watched the show on Nick, since MTV aired the show at 10PM weeknights. The episode "Nurse Stimpy" was not approved by him due to the low quality of its rough cut from the overseas studio who produced it, leading him to use attribute the directorial credit to Raymond Spum. Deciding that their time together was up, Nick fired John Kricfalusi and told him and his company Spümcø to take a hike. Nick produced the rest of the series on its own, via Games Animation Studio, then proceeded to push its grossouts and slapstick into overdrive, leading many to believe that the post Krickfalusi years of the series were when it hit an artistic nadir. The series ended production after 52 episodes (although it at one point was reported that there were 80 made) in 1995. After this, reruns of it aired on Nick along with MTV, Nicktoons and VH1. It was also syndicated to local stations.

In 2003, REN & STIMPY was revived as one of the first new products of Spike TV (previously TNN, currently Paramount Network) through a new, TV-MA-rated series: REN & STIMPY'S ADULT PARTY CARTOON. The series was clearly not meant for anyone under 17, yet the new series alienated most everyone over 17. For fairness, the first episode, "Onwards & Upwards" was his way of exacting vengance on its sister channel Nickelodeon and some praised Spike TV for giving Kricfalusi the chance to make the sort of cartoon that he wanted to make at Nick. Billy West remarked at the time that "['Man's Best Friend' was] one of the most violent and hilarious things ever done... now that the show's on a channel not aimed at kids, it may finally be seen." And during its run on Spike TV, it was. REN & STIMPY has remained an influential program, its influence seen on everything from SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS to SOUTH PARK.

ON HOME VIDEO: Sony Wonder issued episode compilations of the show on VHS, and one of them ("Have Yourself a Stinky Little Christmas") was issued on Paramount. Paramount released all of the seasons of this show on DVD; the cover art's claim that the episodes were "uncut" has been disputed over the years. One episode from season two, "Svën Höek", had a scene reinserted from a work-in-progress tape; however, there was an editing timecode visible on-screen, leading to an eventual fan restoration. "Powdered Toast Man", "Dog Show", and "Big House Blues" contain extra footage not previously aired on Nickelodeon and one of the DVD sets has the banned episode "Man's Best Friend" as an extra. The Spike TV series of REN & STIMPY was also issued on DVD in the form of "The Lost Episodes." Turbine Classics in Germany issued the show on October 4, 2013, as a 9-disc set, sending an uncensored disc with proof of purchase after complaints that two episodes on disc two weren't entirely uncensored. The first truly uncensored DVD of the series, it contains all scenes that were broadcast around the world. As a way of handling the disparity between Paramount's and Turbine's releases professionally, Paramount reissued the DVDs they already issued of the show in a box set called "The Mostly Complete Collection." This set was released on February 6, 2018. Lesser known are three 2003 DVDs of 14-episode compilations put out by, of all companies, Time Life.

ROCKO'S MODERN LIFE
Debuted: September 18, 1993
Ended: November 24, 1996

If you call this series REN & STIMPY-lite, chances are there would be many who would take that as a compliment. This sureallist portrait by Joe Murray centers on the life of Rocko (Carlos Alazraqui), an Australian wallaby who takes his dog (voiced by the same voice actor) to America and settles on the small place called O-Town, where he encounters such characters as a paranoid wolf-raised steer named Heffer (Tom Kenny), a emotional turtle named Filburt (Mr. Lawrence), and his bickering neighbors (Charlie Adler). During its run, it attracted a large audience of adults, just as REN & STIMPY had in its heyday; however, despite its bountiful adult humor, it never ran into the same censorship issues which plagued that series. The most censored episode of ROCKO'S MODERN LIFE was "Leap Frogs", which the creator attributed to its sexual humor, but it at least aired on Nick before the censorship. Much of the staff and voice actors would work on SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS long after ROCKO ended its run and two of the writers created PHINEAS AND FERB. ROCKO last ran on the main Nick channel in 2000; the series is set to debut a one-hour special in the spring of 2018.

Mr. Murray is from San Jose, California and did editorial work for the San Jose Mercury News, where then-President Jimmy Carter was a constant target of his drawings; he admired Carter's work post-Presidency. In his twenties, he was the owner of a small, self-named, independent production company, which was noted for designing two station IDs for Nick's sister channel MTV. ROCKO was the title character of an unpublished comic book series during the '80s; he didn't want to pitch the series to anyone, but reluctantly decided Nickelodeon would be a good habitat for the wallaby, since the network was spying on edgier cartoonists to be responsible for their Nicktoons. The network gave the staff exuberant amounts of creative freedom and the series targeted children and adults. After ROCKO ended its run, Mr. Murray wrote five children's books and created the hit series CAMP LAZLO for Cartoon Network. He has his own web channel, KaboingTV, and more recently is set to debut LUNA AROUND THE WORLD for PBS Kids. It is set to premiere on October 1, 2018.

ON HOME VIDEO: Sony Wonder (and Paramount) issued similar episode compilations of this series on VHS. The series was one of those issued on DVD through Amazon.com via the CreateSpace deal. More prominently, Shout! Factory has issued season sets (SF 12579, SF 12986, SF 13325) of the series, as well as a box set of the entire series (SF 13862). Some of the DVDs contain officially-commissioned artwork from Joe Murray.

AAAHH!!! REAL MONSTERS
Debuted: October 29, 1994
Ended: December 6, 1997

(The last known appearance of characters from this series, was, believe it or not, on RUGRATS.)

Klasky-Csupo's fourth program (after RUGRATS, DUCKMAN and the first couple seasons of THE SIMPSONS) was said by Nick's then-head Herb Scannell to be inspired in character design by the Beatles' 1968 cartoon YELLOW SUBMARINE. It centers on the goings-on at the Monster Academy with a probe as to how monsters scare, why humans are afraid of them, and how they time their scares. This is seen through the lives of a trio of workers for the Monster Academy, rabbit-eared Ickis (Charlie Adler), blobby Krumm (David Eccles) and feminine Oblina (Christine Cavanaugh). There's also the first transgender cartoon character, the nail-painted, ladies-pump-wearing headmaster Gromble (Gregg Berger), and an extremely judgmental principal by the name of The Snorch (also Mr. Eccles). Jim Belushi provided the voice of the fearless Simon the Monster Hunter. After a run of 52 episodes, AAAHH!!! REAL MONSTERS left Nick, with the RUGRATS episode "Ghost Story" as its send-off, in 1999.

ON HOME VIDEO: Paramount issued episode compilations of this series in 1997. In 2011, the series became only one of two from Klasky-Csupo (the other being THE WILD THORNBERRYS) to be leased to Shout! Factory for DVD release. All four seasons (respectively SF 12778, SF 13204, SF 13525 and SF 13997, the latter available exclusively through the Shout! Factory online store) were released individually and as part of a box set (SF 14329).

HEY ARNOLD!
Debuted: October 7, 1996
Ended: June 8, 2004

Hillwood, USA is the place occupied by one of the most charasmatic kids on television, 9-year-old Arnold (who went through four voice actors over the course of the show's run on Nick). He's part of a group led by Gerald (Jamil W. Smith and Benjamin Flores, Jr.) and bully/Arnold's romance-in-secret Helga (Francesca Marie Smith). Dan "D'oh!" Castellanetta and Tress MacNeille voice Arnold's free-spirited paternal grandparents, who live in the boarding house of Sunset Arms. Castellanetta and MacNeille are regulars on THE SIMPSONS, a show created by Matt Groening, the brother of creator Craig Bartlett's wife Lisa. The series attracted attention for its having actual kids lend the voices of the children, as well has having a jazzy soundtrack. In addition, many recognizable names voiced characters on episodes. The mailman was voiced by legendary R&B singer Lou Rawls. The late great Phyllis Diller, one of the legends of female-driven comedy, voiced Arnold's 81-year-old aunt Mitzi. George Takei, Zelda Rubenstein, Elliott Gould, Harvey Korman, Daniel Stern, Cathy Moriarty, Alfred Molina, Richard Mulligan, Christopher Lloyd, Henry Gibson, Paul Sorvino and Julia Louis-Dreyfus voiced certain other notable characters on this Nicktoon. The series was quite popular during its run on Nickelodeon, and is its fourth longest-running Nicktoon.

Arnold first appeared as a series of short claymation sketches for PEE-WEE'S PLAYHOUSE entitled "Penny", and Bartlett made three cartoons with the boy (one of which aired as an interchangeable segment on SESAME STREET). He pitched them to a Nickelodeon that found the cartoons to be a test of patience. As a final step, he pitched the Penny cartoons intending to highlight Penny as a lead character; Nick, however, went wild at the more minor character of Arnold. Following that last meeting, Bartlett developed him, giving him oomphs of personality and converting him from clay to cel. He modeled the characters on the show on the sort of childhood characters he encountered while growing up in western Washington state.

The series was popular enough to spawn a feature film, HEY ARNOLD! THE MOVIE, in 2002. The film, much like DOUG'S 1ST MOVIE, was commissioned as a TV movie entitled ARNOLD SAVES THE NEIGHBORHOOD, but was pushed to theatres to get in on the mega-success of the RUGRATS' film ventures. As a result, it was a box office bomb and was poorly received by professional critics; it was also competing against THE POWERPUFF GIRLS MOVIE and the two films cancelled each other out at the box office despite the GIRLS being slightly better received by professional critics. Mr. Bartlett was working on another TV movie called THE JUNGLE MOVIE, a would-be follow-up to the episode "Parents Day" which was shelved after HEY ARNOLD! THE MOVIE tanked. To spare time after the shelving of the project, Bartlett created the short-lived PARTY WAGON for Cartoon Network and worked on the hit PBS Kids shows SID THE SCIENCE KID and DINOSAUR TRAIN, the latter of which he created and both of which were productions of the Jim Henson Company. In light of the tidal wave of '90s nostalgia earlier this decade, THE JUNGLE MOVIE was taken off the shelf and Bartlett worked on the project for what would amount to two years. The results, well-received, aired on November 24, 2017.

ON HOME VIDEO: Another of those shows Nick released through CreateSpace at Amazon.com, and also another of those Shout! Factory issued on DVD afterwards. The first two commercially released seasons (SF 12666, SF 13075 for half of season 2, SF 13341 for the remaining portion of that season) were followed by three seasons that were available exclusively through Shout! Factory's online store (SF 13788, SF 14011, SF 14238). The complete series is in print from Shout! Factory as SF 15362.

KABLAM!
Debuted: October 11, 1996
Ended: January 22, 2000

(Couldn't find a clip!)

"Where cartoons and comics combine," there exists Nick's first animated anthology series, hosted by a badly drawn couple named Henry & June (creations of Mark Marek, a well-known alt-cartoonist) who involve themselves in quirky situations in between short segments, and who introduce such shorts simply by "turning the pages." Regulars of this series included ACTION LEAGUE NOW! (in which various action figures fight crime), LIFE WITH LOOPY (in which a girl does unconventional things that drive her family up the wall), SNIZ & FONDUE (about a cat family) THE OFFBEATS (kids who prefer to be free-spirits and who face off against The Populars, their rivals). There are shorts that only appear once in a blue moon as well, like, for instance, ANGELA ANACONDA. Sue Rose created this character for the first season of KABLAM! in a CGI climate where she put the lead character, a girl who wants to be ahead of her game both at home and at school. She eventually got her own series on Fox Family Channel (later ABC Family and now Freeform). UNTALKATIVE BUNNY got his own series, but it never aired in the US.

ON HOME MEDIA: While KABLAM! itself never got the home entertainment treatment, two of the shows based on segments of KABLAM! did in some or other countries. ANGELA ANACONDA DVDs were mostly issued in Australia and the UK, for example. Koch International (now known as Entertainment One) issued DVDs of UNTALKATIVE BUNNY.

THE ANGRY BEAVERS
Debuted: April 19, 1997
Ended: November 11, 2001

A sort of an odd couple for Nicktoons. This series, created by Mitch Schauer, centers on brothers Norbert (Nick Bakay) and Daggett (Richard Horvitz) Beaver, who live in a built dam for themselves in Oregon, and get into trouble all the time. It was cancelled by Nick after four seasons, one of which was split into two. In 1998, the 24th episode of the series, "Alley Oops", had Norb telling Dag to shut up, which was bleeped. The final episode, "Bye Bye Beavers", contained this noteworthy exchange:

Dag: "Norbie, what happens when you're 'over'?"
Norb: "Aw, it's not so bad."
Dag: "No?"
Norb: "New Cartoon's good, even if it isn't. It's rerun-incarnated!"
Dag: Oooh... Does that hurt?
Norb: No, only when you get the later checks. The cartoon programming guys re-run it over and over and they make lots of well-deserved money.
Dag: Which they share with the people who made the cartoon right?
Norb: NO-HAHAOOOOOOHHHBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!!! Uh ha! Woah Yeah right. (Calming down, trying to soothe Dag). Uh, right. So yo see it's all for the better.
Dag: Right.
Norb: Even though we're vanishing, we'll be back over and over again at VIRTUALLY NO COST TO THE NETWORK!

Staffer Micah Wright stated that this exchange was why Nick was so angry about this episode. The episode mocked Nick's then-current practice of not making new episodes of their Nicktoons and choosing instead to delight in the profits they made out of re-running them. It also broke one sacred rule at Nick: it at the time didn't allow a program to acknowledge its end. As a result, Nick gave the show seedy time slots, to prevent many viewers from having to watch the series. Nick would also withhold the last 7 episodes of the 4th season from its American viewers. However, this did not stop Nick from selling the entire ANGRY BEAVERS run to the international market.

ON HOME VIDEO: Seasons 1, 2, (SF 12688) 3 (SF 13039, SF 13435) and 4 (SF 14000) were issued on DVD by Shout! Factory, along with the complete series (SF 14140).

THE WILD THORNBERRYS
Debuted: September 1, 1998
Ended: June 11, 2004

Another of Klasky-Csupo's creations, this decidedly dramatic series centers on an adventurous 47-year old (Tim Curry), his cantankerous wife (Jodi Carlisle), their adventurous daughter (Lacey Chabert), and her older sister (Danielle Harris). Curry's the voice of the host for a nature documentary entitled "Nigel Thornberry's Animal World", with his wife doing the camerawork. Their adopted 4-year-old son Donnie (Flea) is a hyperactive little boy, their daughter Eliza is asked to hide her natural, Dr. Dolitte-esque talent for talking to animals, Eliza's pet chimp Darwin (Tom Kane) takes a dim view of the wild, and their teenage daughter Debbie wishes to live a normal life. Another popular show for Nick, it has spawned two films. THE WILD THORNBERRYS MOVIE was Nickelodeon's most critically successful adaptation of a Nicktoon to date (at 80% on Rotten Tomatoes, tying with THE SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS MOVIE: SPONGE OUT OF WATER in that regard) while RUGRATS GO WILD flopped and was reviewed poorly.

ON HOME MEDIA: Season sets (SF 12505, SF 12858, SF 13153, SF 13870, SF 13778, SF 14241) and the complete series of this show (SF 16367) were released on DVD by Shout! Factory, one of two Klasky-Csupo shows they issued (the other being AAAHH!!! REAL MONSTERS). As well, it was yet another show Nick released through CreateSpace at Amazon.com.

OH YEAH! CARTOONS
Debuted: July 17, 1998
Ended: May 25, 2001

(Interview with Butch Hartman about one of the cartoons this series spawned, THE FAIRLY ODDPARENTS.)

Former MTV and Hanna-Barbera employee Fred Seibert, in association with Fredator Incorporated, created by far the most successful animation development program by sheer volume. Over 100 seven-minute cartoons were created by several dozen filmmakers. More often than not, it was used to present pilotes of cartoons that had the potential to air on Nickelodeon, most successfully THE FAIRLY ODDPARENTS, CHALKZONE and MY LIFE AS A TEENAGE ROBOT. Like KABLAM!, it was a cartoon anthology series, but it deviates from KABLAM! in that it had no recurring segments of any kind. For the first season, there was also no host. The hosts wound up being Kenan Thompson (1999-2000) and Josh Server (2000-end)

ON HOME MEDIA: OH YEAH! CARTOONS never got a proper home entertainment release, this in contrast to the shows that it spawned.

CATDOG
Debuted: April 4, 1998
Ended: June 15, 2005

Peter Hannan's unsung hero of Nickelodeon in the late 1990s is a cat and a dog (Jim Cummings and Tom Kenny) forced to occupy the same body, skin, legs, and feet of each other, learning to cope with one another and share their interests, which one of them may disapprove of; they must also escape the biker gang The Greasers. The series was the first Nicktoon to air new episodes five days a week, as opposed to once or twice a week. As with ANGRY BEAVERS, CATDOG happened to be out of production by 2000. A season was seen in many countries except in the US, where the episodes of the season were rolled out slowly over five years.

ON HOME VIDEO: CATDOG had two VHS tapes ("Together Forever" on 835803 and "CatDog vs. The Greasers" on 835813) that were issued by Paramount on March 30, 1999, the same day as THE RUGRATS MOVIE. It is possible that there were only two issued since the series was simply a modest success. On DVD, season sets (SF 12817, SF 13083, SF 13250, SF 13540, SF 13914, SF 14225) and the complete series (SF 15467) were issued by Shout! Factory.

SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS
Debuted: May 1, 1999

By now, SpongeBob is recognized as a milestone in animation. As with Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny, he's hailed in contemporary times as a cartoon character who has risen from a mere national celebrity to an American institution, generating $13 billion in merchandising revenue as of late 2017. Of course, everyone knows by now that this is about a sea sponge (Tom Kenny) who lives with his starfish buddy (Bill Fagerbakke, previously Michael Dybinski on ABC's COACH) and their cantankerous neighbor (Rodger Bumpass). Everyone ought to know the names of everyone in Bikini Bottom, including the three lead residents. The series, in addition to being Nickelodeon's longest-running series, ran briefly on MTV and was very popular in the LGBT community at one point. Many of the ideas for the series originated in an unpublished educational comic book titled The Intertidal Zone, which Stephen Hillenburg created in 1989. He started to develop SPONGEBOB into a television program in 1996 shortly after ROCKO'S MODERN LIFE was cancelled, and the title character was to be voiced by Tom Kenny. SpongeBob was originally going to be named SpongeBoy, and the series was to be called SPONGEBOY AHOY!, but both of these were changed, as the name was already trademarked. While it can be argued that it declined creatively after the first SPONGEBOB movie in 2004, the popularity of the multi-award winning series certainly hasn't declined and to date it has spawned another film, several theme park rides, comic books, video games, and even a widely-hailed off-Broadway musical.

ON HOME MEDIA: I don't suppose you will be needing THIS as a guide to home media releases of this show, since quite a few people know there were a lot of them over the years, all from Paramount. DVDs of episode compilations began in March 2002 and ended in September 2015; prior to the February 21, 2006 release of the compilation "Lost in Time" (88954), these compilations had VHS counterparts. The first nine seasons of this show are available on DVD.

ROCKET POWER
Debuted: August 16, 1999
Ended: July 30, 2004

The subject of this Klasky-Csupo series, by count their fourth for Nickelodeon, is XTREME SPORTS!!!1!!!11!!!111! Specifically, a group of kids who specialize in them: expert skateboarder Otto Rocket (Joseph Ashton), his magazine publishing sister Reggie (Shayna Fox), videographer Maurice (Ulysses Cuadra and later Gilbert Leal), and science and safety expert Sam the Squid (Gary LeRoi Gray and later Sean Marquette). The series has spawned a video game, an arena play called THE BATTLE FOR MADTOWN PARK that was cancelled due to low ticket sales after a brief tour of the Midwestern United States, and a soundtrack on Nick Records 01241 49504-2 that was released to tie in with the episode "Race Across New Zealand."

ON HOME MEDIA: The episode "Island of the Menehune" (87985) was released on DVD by Paramount Home Entertainment on July 27, 2004. All four seasons of this show were released through CreateSpace at Amazon.com.

Next chapter of this will be "Nicktoons of the 2000s."