The Fairly OddParents director Butch Hartman
Production history
Development and Oh Yeah! Cartoons (1997–2001)
Prior to the creation of The Fairly OddParents, Butch Hartman was working at Cartoon Network on Dexter's Laboratory and Johnny Bravo. In 1997, Fred Seibert contacted Hartman about pitching ideas for Seibert's new company, Frederator Incorporated, as a part of their Oh Yeah! Cartoons series which the studio was developing for Nickelodeon. Hartman initially declined the offer. Several months later, Johnny Bravo finished and Hartman decided to create his own series instead of going back to working for other studios.Hartman started developing his own series by drawing a picture of a little boy who would become Timmy Turner. Hartman was originally going to name him Mike, after his brother Mike Hartman, but they had a fight that day, so Hartman named him after his other brother Timmy Hartman instead. Hartman wanted Timmy to be able to go anywhere because he never wanted to be stuck for a story transition. Hartman was originally going to give Timmy science powers, but decided against it due to Dexter's Laboratory having recently come out. Instead, he decided to give Timmy a magic friend. He drew Wanda first and then decided that she needs someone to talk to other than Timmy, and that was when he drew Cosmo. After coming up with the entire premise for the cartoon in about fifteen minutes, Hartman first pitched the idea to Hanna-Barbera and then to Cartoon Network, both of whom turned it down. Hartman then went back to Seibert at Nickelodeon and successfully pitched it to them for Oh Yeah! Cartoons.While in early development, the series was titled The Fairy GodParents and then it was briefly changed to Oh My GodParents. Bill Burnett came up with the title The Fairly OddParents, which they ended up sticking with. Hartman originally created The Fairly OddParents as a seven-minute short film, which was one of the thirty-nine short cartoons created for Oh Yeah! Cartoons. Hartman made ten seven-minute short films of The Fairly OddParents in total for Oh Yeah! Cartoons, which aired on Nickelodeon from September 4, 1998, to March 23, 2001. Due to the success of the shorts, Nickelodeon decided to pick up The Fairly OddParents for a full-length series alongside fellow Oh Yeah! Cartoons: ChalkZone and My Life as a Teenage Robot. In 2000, Nickelodeon ordered seven 23-minute episodes for the series' first season, which premiered on March 30, 2001 (just one week after the final Oh Yeah! short) in the half-hour before fellow Nicktoon Invader Zim made its debut.Unlike the later series, the animation in the original shorts is not as smooth and the designs are notably different (including Timmy's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Turner, who are only seen from the neck down with their faces hidden in the pilot episodes and appear to be more intelligent than they appeared to be in the proceeding series, yet still easily duped by Vicky's abhorrent actions). Other notable differences include Timmy Turner, who was voiced by Mary Kay Bergman in the Oh Yeah! shorts rather than Tara Strong in the series (Strong would dub over Bergman's dialogue in the Oh Yeah! shorts to establish better continuity). Cosmo is significantly more intelligent than he appears to be in the proceeding series while Wanda is shown to be ditzy. Vicky is also much less evil than in the current series; she also calls Timmy by his name as opposed to the more often used "twerp".
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