Nicktoons Shows 2010
Dallas Querry
1999 marked the premiere of SpongeBob SquarePants, which would later become the longest-running Nicktoon. During the same year, Nickelodeon opened a second animation facility in New York City. A spin-off channel named after Nicktoons was established on May 1, 2002.
The Nicktoons brand also extends to other media, such as crossover games featuring the Nicktoon characters (including Nicktoons Unite! and the Nickelodeon Super Brawl series). Since 2001, the official slogan for the brand has been "[They're] Not just cartoons, they're Nicktoons".
Pinwheel, the first Nickelodeon series which began in 1977, was formatted as an hour-long program with two forms of segments: original content with its cast of puppet and human characters, and showcases of foreign-made short films. Many of these films were animated series dating back to the 1950s. These were the first form of animated content on what would become Nickelodeon.[1]
For its first years, Nickelodeon continued to play foreign-made animation in a similar fashion as part of two anthology series called First Row Features and Special Delivery. In 1980, the channel aired its first original series that was not live-action: Video Comic Book. It could best be described as a "motion comic" that consisted of illustrated scenes with animated elements, like speech bubbles and moving backgrounds.[2]
Nickelodeon's first attempt at a fully-animated series occurred later in 1980, when Geraldine Laybourne produced test pilots for Video Dream Theatre. It holds the title of Nickelodeon's first true animated series. However, it was left unaired when test audiences did not give the reactions Laybourne wanted.[3]
Throughout the 1980s, the amount of acquired animated series on Nickelodeon increased, with reruns of western animation and japanese anime such as Bananaman, Danger Mouse, The Little Prince, and The Mysterious Cities of Gold.[4] Blocks dedicated to animated programming such as Looney Tunes on Nickelodeon ran from the mid-1980s well into the late 1990s. When Nick Jr. premiered on Nickelodeon as a block in January 1988, much of its shows were imported animation.
Profits from Nickelodeon's expanding audience at the time helped it fund its own original animation: the first three "Nicktoons", Doug, Rugrats and The Ren & Stimpy Show. Nickelodeon executive Vanessa Coffey discovered all three of these programs after traveling to Los Angeles in 1988. Her goal was to find "three projects that looked completely different" in order to counter the homogeneous, toy-centric animated series of the 1980s.[5]
Nickelodeon's animation production studio was originally known as Games Animation, located in Studio City, California. In 1993, Nickelodeon approached Joe Murray to create its first fully original in-house series: Rocko's Modern Life.[6] In March 1998, the then-new Nickelodeon Animation Studio was opened in Burbank, California.[7] In September 1999, Nickelodeon opened a digital animation studio in Manhattan, which took over animation of Nick Jr. series such as Blue's Clues.[8]
Throughout the 1990s, Nickelodeon continued with its "experimental" approach to animation. Hey Arnold! creator Craig Bartlett explained that the network gradually shifted away from creator-driven content during the later years of Herb Scannell's tenure as Nick president. In his opinion, the animation department "grew more and more corporate, and less like you had a personal touch".[9]
The following shows were spun off from DreamWorks Animation's film franchises. While they were co-produced by Nickelodeon Animation Studio and Viacom owns half of each show's copyright, Nickelodeon has excluded them from their Nicktoon compilations since 2016, when DreamWorks was purchased by NBCUniversal and stopped licensing their characters to Nick.
List of popular NickToons Network shows, ranked from best to worst. This list of the top current and cancelled NickToons Network TV series includes the date when each show first aired, as well as which actors starred in the show. The best NickToons Network TV programs of all time include the most viewed shows on NickToons Network, as this list covers the entire history of the network. This list is sorted by popularity, so the shows with the most votes are at the top of the list.
Although television fans in different locations grew up with NickToons Network on different channels, most of us got the same shows, so don't let your favorite NickToons Network TV shows sink to the bottom of the list! The list of top NickToons Network television shown below includes cast, creator, and premiere date when available. This list contains only TV series on the NickToons Network network, even ones that are no longer on the air.
Five years ago, in 2014, I wrote an article proclaiming we were in the midst of the Cartoon Network Renaissance. Regular Show and Adventure Time were in their prime, leading the pack of highly entertaining shows along with Steven Universe which had premiered just a year earlier. Toonami had also returned after a five year hiatus bringing back adult-oriented anime. That year, we also saw one of, if not the, best shows on Cartoon Network ever, Over the Garden Wall. It was a far cry from just five years before where Cartoon Network was going through its Dark Age, a time of low quality programs, saturated with live-action shows.
But most of those shows are done. And the programs that exploded Cartoon Network back into the limelight and made it fantastic again, Regular Show and Adventure Time, ended in 2017 and 2018 respectively. Once Gumball ends, only Steven Universe and Teen Titans Go! remain from 2014.
As of this writing, the Amazing World of Gumball is at 8.2 making it second place of the 2019 as of June 2019, just behind Steven Universe at 8.3. If nothing else changes, 2020 will continue the downward trend that started in 2017. Thankfully, we may not have to worry about this as Cartoon Network might be getting a much deserved adrenaline shot.
The Golden Age continued strongly until the early 2000s even when some of its original shows were canceled. Amazing DC shows began premiering on Cartoon Network like Justice League and Teen Titans. You also see other shows make their mark during this era such as Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, Kids Next Door, and Megas XLR. Genndy Tartarkovsky also created two of his most acclaimed series ever, Samurai Jack, and Star Wars: Clone Wars (not to be confused with the 3d incarnation of the series) during this time.
As such, I put the Dark Age starting at 2006 when the average quality of the shows decreased to a point that Cartoon Network never fully recovered from. Megas XLR and Star Wars: Clone Wars were the last high quality shows in the Golden Age that kept CN afloat until they ended in 2005. The original Powerpuff Girls also ended in 2005 leaving just Ed, Edd n Eddy as the original Cartoon Cartoon Fridays cartoons standing.
The Nicktoons Show is an American animated anthology sketch comedy series that is based on the cartoons of Nickelodeon. It is hosted by SpongeBob SquarePants, who also acts as main showrunner, and shows remakes of episodes of various Nicktoons, some reanimated in 16:9 format, along with other recurring sketches and various plotlines. Other Nicktoon characters as well as the animated Nick Jr characters, known in universe as The Juniors, also appear. The show also features animated guests in each episode. Its' theme song, "It's the Nicktoons Show", is sung to the tune of "Secret Agent Man" by Johnny Rivers. Three additional seasons have been ordered. It is set to premiere on August 3, 2022 on Paramount+.
The Nicktoons ShowGenreAnthology
Sketch comedyBased on"Nicktoons"Developed byEric MimsDirected byEric Mims
Marc Ceccarelli
Vincent Waller
Opening theme"It's the Nicktoons Show" by Tom KennyEnding theme"It's the Nicktoons Show" (Instrumental)Composer(s)Andy SturmerCountry of originUnited StatesLanguage(s)EnglishNo. of seasons4ProductionProduction company(s)Nickelodeon ProductionsDistributorViacomCBSBroadcastOriginal networkParamount+Picture formatHDTV 1080iChronology
Much like its' sister show, The Cartoon Cartoons Show, the premise of The Nicktoons Show is similar to that of The Muppet Show, Saturday Night Live, The Bugs Bunny Show and Disney's House of Mouse. Most episodes start off with SpongeBob SquarePants, the main showrunner and host of the series, welcoming the audience and introducing a live-action person as the special guest(s). Along with various sketches, three remastered episodes of different Nicktoons are then shown (some reanimated in the 16:9 aspect ratio), while the wraparounds mainly centered on conversations between SpongeBob, the Juniors, the other Nicktoons and the special guest(s), as well as plotlines taking place backstage and in other areas.
Wraparounds: The X's stay on high alert to keep everything secure while SpongeBob is hosting. This soon gets out of control when the family goes overboard with their way of keeping everyone safe.
Wraparounds: After hearing about the adventures of Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, Julius is inspired to help others under his superhero alias Captain Invention. However, he unintentionally ends up causing more problems than he solves and SpongeBob and Ryder are able to show him what it truly means to be a hero.
Wraparounds: When Heffer accidentally signs a contract to be the Flying Dutchman's eternal servant, Rocko and Filburt turn to the Top Wing cadets to help save their friend before his soul becomes property of the Dutchman.
Wraparounds: With his dentist appointment just around the corner, the Nicktoons suggest a nervous SpongeBob should introduce some of the best teeth-related episodes to try to calm his nerves.
Wraparounds: When a struggling talent scout (Steve Carell) wants to take Kai-Lan's Dragon Dance worldwide, Mr. Krabs, in typical fashion, gets greedy and tries to cash in on she and her friends' new dance group and the dance's "newfound popularity" himself.