"What a Cartoon!" Cartoon Network Shorts

[D'Snowth]

A thread for the discussion of those seven-minute shorts that dominated Cartoon Network's airwaves during the mid and late 90s known as "What A Cartoon!"s (original World Premiere Toons).

People from my generation SHOULD remember a vast majority of these, some of them spawned successful Cartoon Cartoon series (Dexter, Johnny Bravo, Cow and Chicken, Courage, Billy and Mandy, PPG, etc), but there were a LOT of WACs that ended up falling under the radar because they didn't get turned into series, but just about all of them were excellent.

So, discuss your favorite WACs... or, at least the ones you actually remember from the golden olden days of CN.

 

[Sgt Floyd]

I remember when they had it, though my memory is fuzzy on the actual content the showed...

eh...bad child from the 90s...

 

[GonzoLeaper]

Wow- don't know if I'd call that time the golden olden times of Cartoon Network- but the channel was certainly a lot better then. I remember the "What A Cartoon" segments- mainly I recall first seeing "The Powerpuff Girls" through one of the "World Premiere Toons". And all the other shows you mentioned- Cow and Chicken, Johnny Bravo, Dexter's Laboratory, Courage the Cowardly Dog, Billy and Mandy, I.M. Weasel, etc. - I remember all these various shows and when they first started airing, though I didn't really get into any of them.
One of my favorites though was 2 Stupid Dogs. That was hilarious! And it included a Secret Squirrel segment- that was way cool!

 

[D'Snowth]

I think many will argue that any time before the major overhaul of 2004 was the golden olden times of CN, lol.

I recently read that the concept of What A Cartoon! was supposed to be sort of like a mini film festival for animators, and aspiring animators, held by Hanna-Barbera; matter of fact, one WAC! was actually William Hanna's first solo cartoon: Hardluck Duck: basically an updated version of the Yacky Doodle cartoons, only the little duckling lived in the care of a friendly alligator, rather than a bulldog.

A few years ago, I discovered my cousin had actually taped an episode of Space Ghost Coast to Coast, where Space Ghost held a panel content for five of the WAC! shorts, and interviewing their respective directors, including Patrick Ventura of the "Yucky Duck" shorts, Van Partible for the original Johnny Bravo short, Eugene Mathos for Shake & Flick, Genndy Tartakovsky for the original Dexter short, and Craig McCracken for the original PPG short... even though the points from the panel didn't matter (much like the points of Whose Line), PPG won.

 

[Drtooth]

One of my favorites though was 2 Stupid Dogs. That was hilarious! And it included a Secret Squirrel segment- that was way cool!

2 Stupid Dogs came out well before Cartoon Network. It single handedly brought back HB productions leading to the eventual creation of that network, WAC! and all the shows that spun off from it. In fact, a lot of people that worked on that show were involved with WAC... Craig McCracken's first gig was 2SD, before he submitted the cleaned up named Powerpuff Girls cartoon. The characters existed before that with a different name (a certain wrestling term I can't say) and it was a student film. Dexter was also a student character... Johnny Bravo was based off a student character....

 

[D'Snowth]

On that subject, Cow and Chicken were derived from David Feiss being tired of having to tell his daughter a bedtime story every night, and suddenly thought of the story of a cow and a chicken named Cow and Chicken.

The Eds came into fruition when Danny Antonucci did a doodle of three characters, who were the prototypes of Ed, Edd n Eddy, faxed it to CN, and after five minutes the phone rang and they said they were interested in the project, and ended up becoming of the their biggest and most successful shows.

But then again, the Eds didn't come from a WAC! so that's a different story altogether.

But, getting back to WAC! I just recently found out that there was actually more than one Mina and The Count short. I had no idea, I just remember that very first one from 1995 (it was one of the first WAC!s I believe), but apparently during the late 90s and early 2000s, there were others that were made, only instead of CN, these were featured on Nick as their Oh Yeah! Cartoons.

Then again, I believe Pat Ventura of the Yuckie Duck, Sledgehammer O'Possum, and updated George & Junior cartoons did some shorts of Oh Yeah! as well, about a weird little frog named Jamal... I gotta be honest (and so not trying to be a racist here), but before I saw him, I was under the assumtion that Pat Ventura was Black, since he seems to use mostly Black voice actors in his cartoons.

 

[Drtooth]

The Eds came into fruition when Danny Antonucci did a doodle of three characters, who were the prototypes of Ed, Edd n Eddy, faxed it to CN, and after five minutes the phone rang and they said they were interested in the project, and ended up becoming of the their biggest and most successful shows.

I love them Eds... but I swear, that was a very unlikely success. It seemed to be mid-level popular if anything when it came out... then all of the sudden, it exploded with popularity years after it came out. Seemed that PPG and Dexter were always their main hits, but the Eds had a much slower climb to popularity, and they're still big today.

it would be something if WAC was released somehow... I mean, we had such a diverse bunch of shorts... Eddie Fitzgerald did one, I believe. Something about a worm. Clearly had the Spumco-ish style to it. Eddie, if you don't know, is an animator that got his start with Filmation, and I believe he worked with John K for a bit (at least on Mighty Mouse TNA... oddly enough after the Filmation TNA Mighty Mouse)... and he worked on Tiny Toons (most noticeably, that episode where Plucky has a cartoon the audience gives input to, and he becomes King Kong)... he was immortalized in caricature form as Pinky, right down to his habit of saying "Narf!"

Shocking how I know so much of this.

 

[D'Snowth]

I love them Eds... but I swear, that was a very unlikely success. It seemed to be mid-level popular if anything when it came out... then all of the sudden, it exploded with popularity years after it came out. Seemed that PPG and Dexter were always their main hits, but the Eds had a much slower climb to popularity, and they're still big today.

Yeah... you KNOW a CN show is big when after it's standard 52 episodes and 4 seasons are over, they then get renewed, and they did for one more season, just one "Season Six" episode, and a movie. Plus, the Eds are the only ones I know of that had holiday specials that WEREN'T regular episodes of the show.

it would be something if WAC was released somehow... I mean, we had such a diverse bunch of shorts... Eddie Fitzgerald did one, I believe. Something about a worm. Clearly had the Spumco-ish style to it.

OMG... I THINK I know which one you're talking about Drtooth... it was SUCH a FREAKY WAC!... yeah, the worm was like a peacenik, then after being stepped on repeatedly by a human, he becomes a psychopath Elmobent on wiping on the human race, while he 1940s gangster dame-esque girlfriend begged him not to do it.

 

[Xerus]

I loved the very first Johnny Bravo cartoon.

And I also like the cartoon Bloo's Gang about a gang of dogs who try to be pirates and steal stuff around the neighborhood.

O.Ratz. About a rat and a fly who try to look for shelter on a cold night.

And there was this cartoon by Seth MacFarlane called Larry and Steve. About a man and his talking dog. They had the same exact voices Family Guy's Peter and Brian had. Then later, Family Guy was created.

 

[D'Snowth]

And I also like the cartoon Bloo's Gang about a gang of dogs who try to be pirates and steal stuff around the neighborhood.

I really liked that one too, but I'm sad I can't seem to find my tape of it, lol.

O.Ratz. About a rat and a fly who try to look for shelter on a cold night.

I think that was one of the first ones that I saw.

And there was this cartoon by Seth MacFarlane called Larry and Steve. About a man and his talking dog. They had the same exact voices Family Guy's Peter and Brian had. Then later, Family Guy was created.

Actually, I believe it was supposed to be like a (clean) prototype of FG before FG was created.