A MOUSE OF MANY FACES

Communist Mickey

Recently, Cartoon Brew has posted two articles about a different type of Mickey Mouse.

This first is a Nash car commercial produced by Disney in 1955. The redesign, by Tom Oreb, adapted the mouse and Pluto into a very 50s 'modern' style.

This was the first and only time that Mickey Mouse has ever appeared in this modern style. Apparently, Walt received many letters from a kid blasting Walt's modern art Mickey, calling it Communistic. Walt got so mad that he forbade Mickey from ever appearing in commercials that were not promoting Disney products.

Sputnik Mickey

This second version of Mickey and the video below is a pilot for a video game called Neo-Mickey.

Based on a Neo-comic style, Mickey exists in a world of transluscent imagery, shape shifting creatures and detailed patterns. With the help of a power-packed Neo-Suit full of gadgets, Mickey encounters extraordinary creatures from many new worlds, with stories and adventures that extend way beyond our galaxy.

This Flash animation was made by Barry Baker and Matt Cruickshank and has wonderful imagery and incredible imagination. I really like this Mickey and I hope that the video game takes off and we see more of this style.

THURSDAY THEME SONG: PAC-MAN

This week is the last installment of 'Toons Based on Video Games' Month. This week's theme is arguably the most popular video game of all time.

Pac-Man

Pac-Man followed the adventures of Pac-Man, his wife, Mrs. Pac-Man and their child Pac-Baby. Together they live in Pac-Land and spend their time stopping the evil Mezmeron from getting his hands on the 'power pellets', the source of Pac-Man's power.

Mezmeron's hired help consists of Pac-Man's well known video game adversaries, the Ghost-Monsters: Inky, Blinky, Pinky, Clyde and Sue. They are the typical bumbling villains that always seem to be menacing at the beginning of the episode but goofballs by the end of the episode.

Pac-Man was created by Namco Games in 1978. Its popularity grew to epic proportions over the next decade and Hanna-Barbera decided to created their own show based on the game. This series lasted 43 episodes from 1982-1983. Originally, Pac-Man was part of a 90 minute programming block in 1982 by Hanna-Barbera called The Pac-Man/Little Rascals/Ritchie Rich Show but then broke of into its own half hour show in 1983.

The Pac-Man series also had its own video game spin-off, called Pac-Land which was a side-scrolling platform game, like Super Mario Bros.



Here is an interesting fact about the Pac-Man video game that I got from Wikipedia:

A "perfect Pac-Man game" is defined as one where the player completes all 256 levels with a maximum point score and without losing a life. The first such game was verified by the Twin Galaxies Intergalactic Scoreboard on July 3, 1999. Billy Mitchell, of Hollywood, FL, achieved the feat in six hours. To attain the maximum possible score of 3,333,360 points, it was necessary for Mitchell to eat every fruit, every energizer, every blue ghost and every dot for 256 boards.

THURSDAY THEME SONG: EARTHWORM JIM

It's week three of "Toons Based on Video Games" month here at Animated Toast and this week's entry is a funny one!

Earthworm Jim

Based on the popular video game series, Earthworm Jim ran two seasons, 23 episodes, from 1995-1996. The video game was notable for its completely absurd and surreal humour. The titular character was voiced by Dan Castellaneta (The Simpsons' Homer Simpson) with many other popular voice actors and comedians filling the other roles: Andrea Martin (SCTV), Jim Cummings (Winnie the Pooh), John Kassir (Cryptkeeper), Kath Soucie (Rugrats' Phil and Lil), Jeff Bennet (Johnny Bravo), Charles Adler (Tiny Toons' Buster Bunny) and Edward Hibbert (Frasier's Gil Chesterton).

Jim was just an ordinary earthworm until a robotic suit fell on him and gave him superpowers. From that day on Earthworm Jim saved the world and the galaxy from evil. Each episode ended with a cow falling from the sky, which is the same way each level of the video game ended.

Many of the secondary characters and villains from the games made it to the series, including Jim's sidekick, Peter Puppy and love interest, Princess What's-Her-Name. The regular cast of villains included Professor Monkey-For-A-Head, Psy-Crow, Evil the Cat, Queen Slug-For-A-Butt and Bob the Killer Goldfish. The series also created a bunch of new characters, including Evil Jim who made it into one of the later video games.

Earthworm Jim was a laugh out loud cartoon. Its completely absurd humour made it a joy to watch and the animation was great. The only problem was that its humour was also its crutch. Many people, younger kids especially, didn't get that particular brand of humour and thus the rating dropped and the show was ultimately canceled.

A few episode have been released but no DVD is in the works for the near future. But you can guarantee that once the DVD set is announced the cult following will ensure good sales.

Master television and film composer William Kevin Anderson wrote the music, lyrics, orchestration and even sang it the theme for Earthworm Jim! Anderson also did themes for X-Men: Evolution, Biker Mice From Mars, Astroboy and Fantastic Four.

THURSDAY THEME SONG: LEGEND OF ZELDA

February's theme for THURSDAY THEME SONG is "Toons Based on Video Games" with the first installment being one of the most popular video games of all time:

The Legend of Zelda

The Super Mario Bros Super Show ran Monday to Friday from 1989 to 1990. The highlight of every boy's and girl's week was Friday when the normal Mario Bros episode was replaced with an episode of Legend of Zelda.

The premise was loosely based on the video games. Link and Princess Zelda are guardians of the Tri-Force of Wisdom. Every episode had the evil Ganon attacking the castle Hyrule in order to gain the Tri-Force's power. His plans were always thwarted by the heroic Link.

While the games played up a super heroic Link, the TV show played him more as a comedian. He would always be trying to get a kiss from the princess (which he would never succeed at) and many of the plot points would come from Link being a total klutz. He also had an extremely annoying catchphrase that you would be sure to hear a few times in each episode! Here's a taste:

The character designs were based on the video game with drastic changes made to the designs of the Princess Zelda. Her dress was replaced by a more practical outfit to fit her new, headstrong personality. Link's hair was also changed from blonde to brown.



The theme song, as well as the show's score, was all based on the video game themes by Koji Kondo.