Gummi Bears Cartoon

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Adventuresof the Gummi Bears is an American animated children's television series created by Jymn Magon and produced by Walt Disney Television Animation.[1] The series, loosely inspired by gummy bear candies,[2] takes place in a fantasy world of medieval lands and magic, and focuses on the lives of seven mystical beings known as Gummi Bears. The series focuses on the exploits of the main characters, as they tackle a series of problems, as well as aid their human friends and thwart the plans of various evil characters. Episodes consisted of either a single story, or two 11-minute stories.

The lavishly budgeted series became iconic for not only spearheading the style of Disney animated series that followed, but also starting an era of artistic improvement in television animation spurred on its success with competitors forced to improve their own artistic standards to avoid unfavorable comparisons.[3] The series was known for various elements, including its signature potion known as "gummiberry juice",[4][5] and the theme music - written by Michael and Patty Silversher, performed by Joseph Williams.[6] The animated series first premiered in the United States, running for six seasons between 1985 and 1991,[7] with the show later sold to other countries including the United Kingdom.

Adventures of the Gummi Bears takes place in a medieval fairy tale world and focuses on a group of six "Gummi Bears", a race of anthropomorphic bears with great skills in magic and technology. The group lives in the underground secret settlement of Gummi Glen within the forest of the kingdom of Dunwyn. Long ago, the Gummi Bears had a powerful and highly developed civilization, but were persecuted by human armies who sought access to the Gummi Bears' knowledge and ultimately drove almost all Gummi Bears north. Most of the Gummi Bears then settled on a continent unknown to humans and were forgotten over time. They are now generally considered a legend by humans, but few know that they still exist. Throughout the Gummi Bears' search for their heritage, old ruins and intact buildings with some high-tech devices are repeatedly discovered.

Despite their efforts to continue living free from human influence and safe from threats, the bears of Gummi Glen gradually encounter several humans. Contrary to all fears and prejudices, the encounters do not always result in confrontation and fighting; while most humans dismiss every encounter as an illusion and put it out of their mind, some humans (especially children) try to befriend the Gummi Bears. Only those who still believe in and know about the Gummi Bears and their magic try to capture them. The Gummi Bears' closest friends among humans are Princess Calla, the daughter of King Gregor and heir to Dunwyn's throne, and Cavin, the squire of Gregor's chief knight Sir Tuxford.

The Gummi Bears owe their name to a magic potion named "Gummiberry Juice", which allows them to bounce like a rubber ball. Gummiberry Juice is made by Grammi Gummi using an ancient and secret recipe from the Gummiberries that grow in the Dunwyn forest. The Gummiberry Juice gives humans and monsters superhuman strength for a short time, but unlike Gummi Bears, it only works on humans once a day. The evil and power-hungry Duke Igthorn is constantly trying to obtain the formula of the potion and the remaining secrets of the Gummi Bears with his servant Toadwart and his private army of simple-minded ogres. He seeks to conquer Dunwyn, dethrone the king and establish a reign of terror. The Gummi Bears often have to intervene - albeit secretly - to protect the king, their friends and their secrets from the machinations of Igthorn and other enemies.

The series premiered on NBC on September 14, 1985, and aired there for four seasons. The series moved to ABC (later acquired by Disney in 1996) for one season from 1989 to 1990 (airing alongside The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh as the Gummi Bears-Winnie the Pooh Hour) and concluded on September 6, 1991, as part of the syndicated programming block The Disney Afternoon.[9] The series was later rebroadcast on the Disney Afternoon block and rerun on that block through the summer of 1991. In later years, reruns were shown on The Disney Channel from October 7, 1991[10] to at least January 1997,[11] and later on Toon Disney, with its most recent televised airing occurring on December 28, 2001.

Several VHS cassettes of the series were released internationally.[12][13] Of those, eight cassettes containing 32 episodes are listed below. The first four cassettes ("Welcome to Gummiglen!", "Creature Feature", "Hot Little Tot!", and "A Sky Full of Gummies!"), which contain 20 episodes, were released in English[12][13] in the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. These four cassettes were also released in some non-English-speaking countries (including Poland,[14][15][16] the Netherlands[17] and Germany). The other four cassettes, as well as the ones not listed below, were released exclusively in non-English-speaking countries (including the Netherlands,[13][18][19] Poland,[20][21] Finland,[22][23] and Italy[13][24]).

Seasons 1 to 3 of the series were released on DVD on November 14, 2006,[25] when Walt Disney Home Entertainment released Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears: Volume 1 on DVD in Region 1. The 3-disc set features seasons 1 to 3 and does not contain any bonus features, save for subtitles for the hearing impaired.

In Australia, Disney released nine volumes, which have now long been discontinued. They are all in complete storyline production order, but the first volume starts from episode 19 in series 2. Episodes 1-18 have not been released on DVD in Australia and are only available on the USA Region 1 collection, but the Region 4 Australian DVDs do finish off the series and go right up to episode 65 of the series' final two-part double episode adventure.

Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears was Disney's first major serialized animated television series (it was released back to back with another show, The Wuzzles, which lasted only 13 episodes), and is often credited as having helped jump start the television animation boom of the late 1980s and 1990s.[3][28] Consequently, it also became the forerunner to Disney's famous Disney Afternoon timeslot, which gave way to other famous serialized Disney television series, such as DuckTales, Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers and Gargoyles. Although many of these subsequently-created shows exceeded Gummi Bears in budget and length, the show is often credited as a sort of prototype for all of the animation which followed it.[29]

The show was so successful in the United Kingdom that the episodes "A New Beginning" and "Faster Than a Speeding Tummi" were released as theatrical featurettes there in 1986 and 1987, alongside The Great Mouse Detective and a re-release of Disney's Pinocchio.[29]

The show's popularity led to a re-theming of Disneyland's Motor Boat Cruise, along with a small part of Disneyland that became known as "Disney Afternoon Avenue". The Motor Boat Cruise became the "Motor Boat Cruise to Gummi Glen" and plywood characters from the show made Gummiberry Juice along the waterway. The Gummi Bears have been featured as meetable characters who greet guests in Disney theme parks.[citation needed]

The series was later rebroadcast on the syndicated Disney Afternoon block, and rerun on the Disney Afternoon through the summer of 1991. In later years, it was shown in reruns on the Disney Channel and Toon Disney, with its most recent televised airing occurring on Toon Disney on December 28, 2001. Seasons 1 to 3 of the series were released on DVD on November 14, 2006. Presently (2020) all seasons are available on Disney+.

The series focuses on the escapades of the eponymous "Gummi Bears," anthropomorphic bears who are the last remnants of a once-great civilization of Gummies that fled the land centuries ago when humans, jealous of the advancements and magical skills of the Gummi Bears, forced the species into exile. Now regarded by most of humankind as fairytales, the show's main cast of Gummi Bears (six in number at the outset of the series, increased to seven during the third season) live in the vast subterranean warren of Gummi Glen in the medieval kingdom of Dunwyn.

The Gummies' modern adventures begin when they are discovered by a human boy named Cavin who happens to have a Gummi Bear Medallion, found by his grandfather many years earlier. After he accidentally enters the colony's underground home of Gummi Glen, they capture and interrogate the boy as to how he gained the medallion. During the questioning, Cavin escapes after one of the bears inadvertently gives him Gummiberry Juice to drink, but refuses to cause any harm and attempts to befriend the reclusive bears. Impressed by this civilized behavior, they make him swear to keep their confidence and make him a privileged friend of the colony. The medallion helps their eldest bear to magically unlock the colony's Great Book of Gummi, an essential reference guide to the forgotten knowledge of the Gummi Bears. Inspired by its writings, the colony resolves to rediscover their heritage and help Dunwyn defend against evil. Later, another human from Dunwyn accidentally learns that the Gummi Bears are real: the young daughter of the king, Princess Calla. She also promises to keep the Gummies' existence a secret. In subsequent seasons, the Gummies would befriend or be discovered by other friendly humans.

The main antagonist of both Dunwyn and the Gummies is Duke Sigmund Igthorn, a renegade noble with an army of Ogres, from the neighboring province of Drekmore. Unfortunately, in stopping Igthorn's attempt to bombard his enemies with a grand catapult, the Gummi Bears alert him to their presence. Igthorn will stop at nothing to discover and exploit their secrets to become invincible and capture Dunwyn Castle. Chief among his primary goals is gaining a reliable supply of the Gummi Bears' vital strategic substance, Gummiberry Juice, a magic potion that endows Gummi bears with bouncing abilities, but gifts humans (or Ogres) with momentary super-strength as well as other numerous uses, including serving as fuel for machines.

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