Cartoon Zone

***Cartoon Zone*** (later known as ***The Cartoon Zone Hour*** and ***The Nicktoon Show***) is an American animated anthology series created by Zaiden Fischer for Nickelodeon. The shorts were produced by Games Animation; by the end of the run, a Nickelodeon Animation Studio production tag was added to some shorts to signal they were original to the network. The project consisted of 48 short cartoons, intended to return creative power to animators and artists, by recreating the atmospheres that spawned the iconic cartoon characters of the 20th century. Each of the shorts mirrored the structure of a theatrical cartoon, with each film being based on an original storyboard drawn and written by its artist or creator.

The series first aired on September 2, 1990, and the shorts were promoted as ***Nickelodeon's Premiere Cartoons***. During the original run of the shorts, the series was retitled to *The Cartoon Zone Hour* and later to *The Nicktoon Show* until the final shorts aired on September 10, 2004. The project served as the launching point for multiple Nickelodeon animated television series, including *Rugrats*, *The Ren & Stimpy Show*, *Doug*, *Charity the Wicked Witch*, *Rocko's Modern Life*, *Aaahh!!! Real Monsters*, *Hey Arnold!*, *The Angry Beavers*, *CatDog*, *SpongeBob SquarePants*, *The Wild Thornberrys*, *Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius*, *Invader Zim*, *Danny Phantom*, *Avatar: The Last Airbender*, *Sailor Duo*, and *Catscratch*.

The series is influential for birthing a slew of original Nickelodeon hits and helping to revive television animation in the 1990s. Once it had several original shorts, those became the first Nicktoons (a collective term for Nickelodeon original animated series).

## History

### Origins and production

On February 13, 1988, following Viacom's purchase of Games Animation, William Mathews and River Becker met with Nickelodeon president Geraldine Laybourne to discuss the original animated series for the network, an offer that Mathews and Becker immediately accepted. Zaiden Fischer has been hired to produce short cartoons, in the vein of the Golden age of American animation. Although a project consisting of shorts would cost twice as much as a normal series, Fischer's pitch to Nickelodeon involved promising chances to "succeed or fail", opened up possibilities for new original programming, and offered several new shorts to the thousands already present in the Viacom library. According to Fischer, quality did not matter much to the cable operators distributing the struggling network, they were more interested in promising new programs.

*More coming soon!*

### Broadcast

The first cartoon from the *Cartoon Zone* project broadcast in its entirety was *Rugrats: Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing*, which made its world premiere on Sunday, September 2, 1990, during a television special called the *Nickelodeon's Premiere Cartoon Special*.

*More coming soon!*

## List of shorts

### Original show (1990–92)

The following is a list of the original shorts produced under Zaiden Fischer's management for *Cartoon Zone* by Games Animation. The shorts are listed in the order that they originally aired.

1. *Rugrats in: Tommy Pickles and the Great White Thing* / *Ren & Stimpy in: Big House Blues* / *The Crowville Chronicles* - 09/2/90
2. *Rascal and Lacey in: Stay In, Stay Out!* / *Doug in: Doug Can't Dance* / *Trash* - 9/16/90
3. *Terry and Penny in: Tried Your Best* / *Big Beast Quintet* / *Thunder Lizards* - 9/23/90
4. *The Weasel Patrol* / *Tough Luck Lady* / *The Space Twins in: The Arrival on Earth* - 9/30/90
5. *Hard Work Cat in: Building Royale* / *Terry and Penny in: Spooky Halloween Spectacular* / *Yonk of the Yolk!* - 10/7/90

*More coming soon!*

### Nicktoon segments

From 1998 to 2004, *The Nicktoon Show* featured new episodes and reruns of the full-series Nicktoons (which were introduced in 2001 for the primetime hours), interspersed with premieres and reruns of the Nicktoon pilot shorts (some of which were retconned shorts from *Cartoon Zone* and *Oh Yeah! Cartoons*).

Episodes from each show were anthologized into 7 or 11-minute segments. This is a list of shows that were presented on the block:

* *Rugrats* (2001–2004)
* *The Ren & Stimpy Show* (2001–2004)
* *Rocko's Modern Life* (2001–2004)
* *Aaahh!!! Real Monsters* (2001–2004)
* *Hey Arnold!* (2001–2004)
* *The Angry Beavers* (2001–2004)
* *CatDog* (2001–2004)
* *SpongeBob SquarePants* (2001–2004)
* *Rocket Power* (2001–2004)
* *Invader Zim* (2001–2004)
* *The Fairly OddParents* (2001–2004)
* *ChalkZone* (2001–2004)
* *The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius* (2002–2004)
* *My Life as a Teenage Robot* (2003–2004)

## See also

* *Oh Yeah! Cartoons*
* *Random! Cartoons*