Cartoon Network

The Cartoon Network is a cable TV channel created by Turner Broadcasting and dedicated to showing cartoons. It premiered on October 1, 1992 in the United States, and 17 September 1993 in the United Kingdom.

History

By the end of the 1980s, Ted Turner's cable TV conglomerate had acquired the MGM film library (which included the older catalog of Warner Bros. cartoons), and its cable channel Turner Network Television had gained an audience with its film library. In 1991, they purchased animation studio Hanna-Barbera Productions and acquired its large backlog. The Cartoon Network channel was created as an outlet for Turner's considerable library of animation, and the initial programming on the channel consisted exclusively of re-runs of classic Warner Bros. and MGM cartoons, with many Hanna-Barbera TV cartoons used as time fillers.

In 1996, Time Warner purchased Turner Broadcasting, and the Cartoon Network came under their corporate umbrella. This provided still more material for the Cartoon Network, as the channel now had access to the Warner Bros. cartoon library from the 1950s and 1960s.

Time Warner changed the direction of Hanna Barbera Productions, and focused the studio exclusively on creating new material for the Cartoon Network channel. Among the numerous shows the studio has produced are Dexter's Laboratory (1996), Johnny Bravo (1997), Cow and Chicken (1997), and The Powerpuff Girls (1998). Ed, Edd, n Eddy (1999), another original cartoon, was made by a.k.a. Cartoon and shown on Cartoon Network.

The changes made have practically eliminated the old Hanna-Barbera cartoons from the network's schedule, forcing them to move to the nostalgia-themed Boomerang sister network.

In recent years, Cartoon Network has also made attempts to attract viewers outside its core audience (young children). Their mid-afternoon cartoon block Toonami consists of reruns of acceptable-for-teens anime from Japan, while a late-night cartoon block called Adult Swim shows more risque, teenage- and adult-oriented cartoons (with a combination of anime and American-produced comedies such Futurama and Family Guy). On April 17, 2004, Toonami was moved to Saturday evenings and the afternoon slot was filled with Miguzi, showing action-oriented American TV shows aimed at a slightly younger age group than Toonami.

In October 2004, Cartoon Network finally removed the Looney Tunes show and additional classic cartoon programming making its schedule almost exclusively new programming. Excepting CN's broadcasts of Tom and Jerry (a longtime staple of the Turner networks), Turner Classic Movies and Boomerang are now the only networks left in the United States to showcase classic animation of the Golden Age and TV Eras. In Europe, Boomerang was still a part of the original Cartoon Network, meaning that from 5 pm GMT, no new cartoons are shown. In Brazil and Latin America, Boomerang is a separate channel.

In Britain, in September 2000, Toonami began broadcasting weekdays for two hours between 4pm - 6pm, and 9pm - 11pm, as well as weekends from 10am - 12pm and 10pm - 12am. It's output consisted almost solely of Japanese anime such as the cult Dragonball Z, Tenchi Muyo and Gundam Wing. The only non-Japanese shows for quite some time were the American produced The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest and Batman Beyond (called Batman of the Future in the UK). Around the same time, there was almost completely new programming on the channel, and so Boomerang began in a late night slot. On May 27, 2000, most 'classic' cartoons were removed from Cartoon Network and moved to Boomerang, which became a channel in Britain on that date, running from 6am - 12am. Before long, however, it became 24 hours, and the remaining shows were removed from Cartoon Network.

In June 2002, Toonami disappeared from Cartoon Network UK, and in October, a new channel was created called CNX. It was hailed as a high-octane, "'triple A' mix of Action, Adventure, and Anime". All American and Japanese animation shown on Toonami was broadcast on this 24 hour channel from 6am - 12am, and during the night, there were hard hitting American dramas such as The Shield, adventure shows such as Spawn, martial arts films and extreme sports programmes. In 2003, there was a slot between 9pm and 10pm showing Cartoon Network produced comedy such as Aqua Teen Hunger Force and Space Ghost Coast to Coast. The extreme sports and films were squashed into a small slot between 10pm and 2am. For the rest of the time, Toonami returned, on CNX, showing all it's previous output, plus a number of new shows. In September 2003, after just 11 months on air, CNX was shut down, and Toonami became a 24 hour channel, in line with Cartoon Network and Boomerang.

Cartoon Network is also broadcasting in other languages like Japanese, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, French, Italian, Polish, Hungarian, Romanian, Hindi etc. Most of the Cartoon Network channels in Europe are broadcast from the United Kingdom, including an English language audio channel). Most of the Kids WB shows are broadcast on Cartoon Network in locales where Kids WB does not exist, e.g. Latin America.

Special Programming Blocks

Miguzi

Miguzi is a cartoon block that premiered on April 19 2004 and currently airs every night from 5–7 P.M. (E/P) on Cartoon Network in the U.S. This block is themed around Erin, a girl who finds refuge within the confines of a strange spaceship that is trapped underwater and inhabited by aquatic creatures. Not surprisingly, this lighter-toned action block is from Williams Street Productions, the producers of late-night programming block Adult Swim and Toonami, a block of programming which Miguzi replaced in the weekday-afternoon timeslot.

Miguzi airs lighter-toned action fare based on comic book titles like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Static Shock; pseudoanime like Totally Spies, France's Code Lyoko, and the American series Teen Titans; and anime like Rave Master.

Programs that have been on Miguzi

• Code Lyoko
• Megas XLR
• TMNT: The Series (2003 Cartoon Version)
• Transformers: Energon
• Rave Master

Miguzi characters

• Bass
• Big Stalks
• Curly
• Erin
• Flip
• The Leviathan
• Small Squid (name unknown)
• Remo
• Tre
• Tweet
• Yoke

Toonami

Toonami (a pun on tsunami, suggesting a "tidal wave" of animated cartoons) is a trademark of Cartoon Network, used initially for action-oriented programming blocks on the US and UK Cartoon Network television channels, among other countries. The name was subsequently used in the United Kingdom as the title of a UK channel in its own right in 2003, a year after the network launched as CNX.

(See Toonami)

Adult Swim

Adult Swim is the name for the adult-oriented television programming block on Cartoon Network, which premiered on September 2, 2001.

Originally a Sunday-only block (that also reran on Thursdays), Adult Swim airs Saturday through Thursday nights at 11 PM (E/P) with an encore airing at 2 AM and then ending with an hour of old classics. The block, programmed by Williams Street Productions, the same group that created Toonami and Miguzi, plays American animated comedy series and shorts geared towards adults and a wide variety of anime series and OVAs, all intended for mature audiences. The name comes from the name for hours designated at public swimming pools where only adults can swim in the pool. On March 28, 2005, the programming block was spun off for Nielsen Ratings purposes.

(See Adult Swim)

External links

English

• Cartoon Network US homepage (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com/)
• Cartoon Network United Kingdom (http://www.cartoonnetwork.co.uk/)
• Cartoon Network India (http://www.cartoonnetworkindia.com/)
• Cartoon Network Australia (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.au/)
• Cartoon Network Latin America (English) (http://www.cartoonnetworkla.com/english/)
• Cartoon Network Philippines (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.ph/) (leads to legal information)
• Cartoon Network Japan (English) (http://www.cartoonnetwork.jp/english/)
• Toonami US homepage (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com/toonami)
• Toonami UK (http://www.toonami.co.uk/)

Chinese

• Cartoon Network Taiwan (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.tw/)

Danish

• Cartoon Network Denmark (http://dk.cartoonnetwork.nu/)

Dutch

• Cartoon Network Netherlands (http://www.cartoonnetwork.nl/)

French

• Cartoon Network France (http://www.cartoonnetwork.fr/)

Italian

• Cartoon Network Italy (http://www.cartoonnetwork.it/)

Japanese

• Cartoon Network Japan (http://www.cartoonnetwork.co.jp/)

Norwegian

• Cartoon Network Norway (http://no.cartoonnetwork.nu/)

Polish

• Cartoon Network Poland (http://www.cartoonnetwork.pl/)

Portuguese

• Cartoon Network Brazil (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.br/)

Spanish

• Cartoon Network Argentina (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.ar/)
• Cartoon Network Chile (http://www.cartoonnetwork.cl/)
• Cartoon Network Latin America (Spanish) (http://www.cartoonnetworkla.com/spanish/)
• Cartoon Network Mexico (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.mx/)
• Cartoon Network Spain (http://www.cartoonnetwork.es/)
• Cartoon Network Venezuela (http://www.cartoonnetwork.com.ve/)

Swedish

• Cartoon Network Sweden (http://se.cartoonnetwork.nu/)

Multi-language

• Homepage of Cartoon Network European and list of international websites (http://www.cartoonnetworkhq.net/)
• Cartoon Network Europe (http://www.cartoonnetworkeurope.com/)
• Cartoon Network Latin America (http://www.cartoonnetworkla.com/)

Others

• Adult Swim (http://www.adultswim.com/)
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See also: List of programs broadcast by Cartoon Networkaf:Cartoon Network el:Cartoon Network es:Cartoon Network la:Cartoon Network ja:カートゥーン ネットワーク pl:Cartoon Network pt:Cartoon Network