Disney Afternoon

**The Disney Afternoon** (later known internally as the **Disney-Kellogg Alliance** when unbranded) was a created-for-syndication two-hour animated television programming block produced by Walt Disney Television Animation with distribution through their syndication affiliate Buena Vista Television. Before and after its cancelation, the shows in the block aired reruns both on Disney Channel (Some of them from 1994 through 2000, with some remaining until as late as 2007) and on Toon Disney (all of them from the time the channel launched in 1998 through 2004, with some remaining until as late as 2008). Starting on October 2, 1995, four of the shows (*Darkwing Duck*, *TaleSpin*, *DuckTales* and *Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers*) were rerun on Disney Channel as a two-hour programming block called "Block Party" which aired on weekdays in the late afternoon/early evening.[1] Several of the block's shows are available on DVD in the United States.

The Disney Afternoon's two-hour block was broken up into four half-hour segments, each of which contained an animated series. As each season ended, the first series shown in the lineup would typically be dropped while the remaining three would move up a time slot, and a new one would be added to the end. The Disney Afternoon itself featured unique animated segments consisting of its own opening and "wrappers" around the cartoon shows shown.

The Disney Afternoon originally ran from September 10, 1990 to August 29, 1997. For the 1997 and 1998 television seasons, it was replaced by an unnamed block, shortened to 90 minutes, followed by its replacement by Disney's One Too for UPN in 1999. The block did not air in every market across the United States, but for those markets that did not air the block in full, individual shows featured on The Disney Afternoon could be packaged by themselves, allowing the shows to be aired any time of the day (morning or afternoon), while The Disney Afternoon only aired on weekday afternoons. Some of the shows also aired on Saturday mornings on ABC or CBSconcurrently with their original syndicated runs on The Disney Afternoon. The only show to reach the 2000's was *Goof Troop* with the 2000 direct-to-video finale *An Extremely Goofy Movie*, and the only show to reach the 2010's was *DuckTales* with a reboot also called *DuckTales* on Disney XD at the time.

## History

Some of the early cartoon series on The Disney Afternoon came from already in-circulation cartoons, such as *Adventures of the Gummi Bears*, which aired on NBC from 1985 to 1988 and then moved to ABC in 1989. *DuckTales* premiered in 1987 as Disney was focused on incorporating animated series into its portfolio in the era of cartoons; it was Disney's only syndicated cartoon series until accompanied in 1989 by *Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers.* These two shows had been packaged together as an hour-long cartoon block from 1989 to 1990, until both shows were incorporated into The Disney Afternoon in September 1990.

Both *DuckTales* and *Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers* were syndicated and packaged at first through their original television affiliates, most of which evolved from independents to Foxaffiliates with successful children's lineups. However, due to disputes between Disney and Fox later on, both shows were pulled from many Fox affiliates by Disney and landed on other stations in the same markets that were still independents by the time The Disney Afternoon came to play. Other Fox affiliates simply passed it down to their independent competitors by choice due to shorter time frames for local programming, mainly with the debut of The Disney Afternoon's main competitor Fox Kids and more stations premiering local morning news programs. However, some Fox affiliates aired The Disney Afternoon during the first two years of their existence before they either passed it down to their independent competitors or packaged the shows individually. This is mainly due to Fox Kids expanding their afternoon lineup to two hours.

Some of The Disney Afternoon's later additions were inspired by shorter cartoon segments in the short-lived series *Raw Toonage*, which appeared on the CBS network in the fall of 1992. For example, the show's "Marsupilami" segment was spun off into the series *Marsupilami*, which in turn spawned *The Shnookums and Meat Funny Cartoon Show*, which aired on the block. Likewise, the *Raw Toonage* segment "He's Bonkers!" was spun off into the series *Bonkers*, which aired on the block.

Beginning with the 1994 season, Marvel Comics (which would eventually be acquired by Disney) began publishing a comic book series based on the programs featured on the block, as part of their line of comics based on modern Disney properties (the classic properties were licensed to Gladstone Publishing). The series mainly consisted of stories based on *Darkwing Duck*, with occasional stories featuring *Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers* and *TaleSpin*. It ended at 10 issues, but stories based on the block's shows continued in Marvel's *Disney Comic Hits!* and in the children's magazine *Disney Adventures*.

In October 1995, owing to decreasing business in the syndicated children's television market due to new competitors such as the cable networks Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon, and the children's blocks of the new UPN and The WB networks, Buena Vista entered into an agreement with the Leo Burnett agency to market and distribute a revamped version of the block for the 1997–98 and 1998–99 television seasons. Leo Burnett established a partnership with Kellogg's—who had been a major sponsor of The Disney Afternoon, to purchase an amount of dedicated advertising inventory. The revamped block, downsized to 90 minutes, debuted on September 1, 1997 to replace The Disney Afternoon. The new block did not carry any blanket branding, but was referred to internally as the "Disney-Kellogg Alliance." In 1998, Disney reached a deal to program a new children's block for UPN, Disney's One Too, as a replacement for that network's internal UPN Kids block. The syndicated block ran until the debut of One Too on September 6, 1999.

The shows that aired from 1997 to 1998 were *DuckTales*, *Quack Pack*, *Mighty Ducks* and *101 Dalmatians: The Series*, and from 1998 to 1999, it was formed by *DuckTales*, *Disney's Doug* and *Hercules*.

## Toon Disney and cancellation of the block

By 1997, *The Disney Afternoon* was terminated as a formally named series. An eighth season, only 90 minutes long, was no longer named *The Disney Afternoon* or *TDA*, and was by accounts essentially a simple 90 minute syndicated block of cartoons.

On December 8, 1997, Disney announced the planned launch of Toon Disney, a 24-hour cable cartoon network, effective on April 18, 1998. At the same time, local stations found it hard to comply with FCC restrictions on children's advertising in terms of allowed quantity and content and still remain profitable in such blocks. Still FOX, UPN, and WB wanted to try to hold on to children's programming during the week. Disney continued the 90-minute syndicated block until the fall of 1999, at which time Disney and UPN teamed up for a UPN Kids block. Also, a two-hour Sunday Morning kids' block of shows from Disney aired on UPN stations.

By the 1999-2000 television season, some remnants of *The Disney Afternoon* package were moved to Saturday mornings, solely on the ABC network, under the name Disney's One Saturday Morning. Weekdays, the remnants of this block aired on UPN affiliates. By early 2001, *One Saturday Morning* had begun broadcasting a weekday afternoon spinoff called *Disney's One Too*, which bore virtually no resemblance to the Disney Afternoon.

#### Saturday Mornings

Some of these cartoons, when originally airing on Disney Afternoon also had Saturday morning episodes that were being broadcast for ABC and CBS. These are:

* *Darkwing Duck* 1991-1993, ABC
* *Goof Troop* 1992-1993, ABC
* *Aladdin* 1994-1996, CBS
* *Timon & Pumbaa* 1995-1997, CBS
* *Mighty Ducks* 1996-1997, ABC

*Gargoyles* does not fall into this category because only the third season, subtitled *The Goliath Chronicles*, aired during the 1996-1997 season on ABC, while The Disney Afternoon was only showing reruns of the first 2 seasons. *Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears* continued running on Saturday mornings during the 1990-1991 season on ABC, but ABC was only showing new episodes while the Disney Afternoon was also showing only reruns.

## Status on Television

As of February 2014, *Gargoyles* is no longer broadcasting on Disney XD in the US (in which it aired from February 13, 2009 to March 31, 2012), while edited reruns of *Timon & Pumbaa* are no longer airing on the Disney Junior channel in the US.

In foreign countries outside of the US, *DuckTales*, *Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers*, *Darkwing Duck*, *Goof Troop*, *Gargoyles*, *Timon & Pumbaa*, and *Bonkers* have aired on Disney XD in other countries while *Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears*, *Aladdin*, *Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers*, *Timon & Pumbaa*, *Goof Troop*, and *DuckTales* have aired on Disney Junior in other countries. In addition, *Goof Troop*, *Timon & Pumbaa*, *Aladdin*, *Gargoyles*, *The Gummi Bears*, *Darkwing Duck*, *The Mighty Ducks*, *The Rescue Rangers*, *DuckTales*, *TaleSpin*, and *Quack Pack*have aired on Disney Channel in other countries. *DuckTales*, *TaleSpin*, *Timon & Pumbaa*, and *Aladdin* have aired on Disney Cinemagic, which is a Disney channel not available in the US. This list has the countries in which they still air in, and there is a notification if the show does not air in that country anymore.

## International broadcasts

Some of The Disney Afternoon's shows also aired on international versions of Disney Channel (including Disney Channel Southeast Asia), Toon Disney (later Disney XD), Disney Junior (including Disney Junior in Southeast Asia) and Disney Cinemagic, and on several local channels in various countries. In Europe, blocks similar to The Disney Afternoon were produced, mostly with names which translate in English as "Walt Disney Presents" (not related to the anthology series). Furthermore, shows that never aired on the American version of The Disney Afternoon (such as *The Little Mermaid* and *The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh*) did air on foreign versions of the block.

In Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, the city's then-independent TV station ITV (now Global Edmonton) produced its own version of The Disney Afternoon over roughly the same period as the American block, but only once per week in a two-hour block on Saturday afternoons, though using the same cartoon lineup as the American weekday block. Apart from the animated introduction, the block did not use any Disney-produced wrapper segments, instead using locally produced live-action segments between programs with host Mike Sobel. ITV (and thus the Sobel-hosted version of the block) was at that time also available on cable in various mid-sized and smaller markets across Canada, as far away as St. John's.

## Trivia

* Saturday Disney, the Australian television show which most of the cartoons that aired on the Disney Afternoon (and other Disney cartoons airing after the block finished) aired, used all three openings of the Disney Afternoon Block as opening, with slight modifications.