1996
January 14: The Simpsons Episode “ Two in the Bush” premieres and depicts Homer Simpson colliding with George Bush Sr, who in real life had criticized the show.
January 17: From Dusk till Dawn is released.
January 19: The first episode of
Detective Conan, AKA Case Closed, airs. The series follows a detective who is turned into a child.
February 18: Muppets go Medieval is released. Funny enough something the Simpsons predicted(OTL the Muppets were considering either doing Treasure Island or a King Arthur story. Since Disney, who they’ve partnered with as Jim Henson wanted, is doing Treasure Island, they make the King Arthur movie instead).
February 21: Wes Anderson’s first film
Bottle Rocket is released, Bill Murray appears as Abe Henry(did not happen OTL). When the film failed, star Owen Wilson joined the Marines(something he considered OTL).
March 4: Neil Gaiman’s
The Sandman concludes.
March 8: The film
Fargo is released.
March 9: The Final Season of Sailor Moon Airs. It will later air uncensored on Toonami, this includes the depiction of a lesbian relationship(OTL this was changed to make the two characters cousins but the romance was kept, making for some weird scenes of “Kissing Cousins”. Here they made on the characters more androgynous likely following on TTL’s Captain N, so you can’t say whether of not its a gay relationship or a straight one).
March 25: The 68th Academy Awards are held.
Braveheart wins best picture like OTL. Most of the other nominees such as Apollo 13, Babe and the Postman are unchanged. Nicholas Cage won best actor and Susan Sarandon won best actress for Leaving Las Vegas(ITTL the film includes a cameo from the real life man Nicholas Cage is based on, John O’Brien, OTL he committed suicide before the film’s release. Here he doesn’t). For best supporting actor Ed Harris wins for Apollo 13(OTL Kevin Spacey won for The Usual Suspects but here he’s been Metoo’d much earlier and didn’t appear in that film. Brad Pitt also was up for 12 Monkeys, which doesn’t exist ITTL ). Toy Story wins best screenplay. Wallace and Gromit’s “A Close Shave” wins best short animated film. For best original score “Treasure Planet’s “Always know where you Are” wins(OTL Pocahontas’s Colors of the Wind Won but that film doesn’t exist ITTL due t the butterflies of Katzenberg leaving and Treasure Planet being made earlier without him to delay its making. The song’s in Treasure Planet are also more plentiful due to the staff that would have worked on Pocahontas touching them up). Chuck Jones receives a lifetime achievement award for his career in animation.
April 1: Dennis the Menace airs in the UK(OTL the animated series was called Dennis and Masher, who is his dog. This is not the American Dennis the Menace but a character with the same name seemingly coincidentally created at the same time in Britain. The American Dennis the Menace will also have a show at this time and the two versions would have a crossover in a TV movie where the American Dennis travels the London and meets(and starts a prank war) with his British counterpart. Also while Dennis and Masher premiered on April 12 OTL. I moved it to April 1 since it seemed fitting for a prankster character to debut on April fool’s Day).
April 12: Henry Selick’s film
James and the Giant Peach is released.
April 14: The Simpsons Episode “22 minutes of Springfield” debuts and contains a now infamous “Steamed Buns” scene that became a meme much later.
April 28: Dexter’s Laboratory debuts on Cartoon Network.
The Simpsons Episode “Raging Abe and the Flying Hellfish” debuts as a throwback to Johnny Quest style adventures in which Grampa leads the Simpsons to retrieve stolen paintings, leading them to battle Mr.Burns and Nazis in South America.
April 30: The First major crossover Marvel vs DC, is released. It has a different plot than OTL similar to the later JLA. Avengers. The Grandmaster and Krona make a deal to force the two universes to fight each other to collect several items while Darkseid and Thanos also clash. Eventually the Heroes team up and part on good terms. An Amalgam Universe is briefly created when two worlds are merged, later revealed to still exist. This universe includes Captain American in the Steve Trevor role as being the one who first met Wonder Woman and introduced her to the outside world, the two being a couple. Batman meeting and training Spider-Man, causing a rift as Dick Grayson leaves as Robin due to Batman’s favoritism towards Spider-Man. The Fantastic Four spaceflight being a journey to discover Krypton with Superman’s help sabotaged by Lex Luthor and Superman joining the Fantastic Four with the symbol of his chest being a “5” while all the other members have different numbers instead of the same 4 logo) and so on. This universe continues to be visited so long as both companies approve the stories.
Garth Ennis’s
Hitman, a series about a genetically engineered assassin who hunts down and kills only evil and corrupt people is released(Compositing the comic’s Hitman with the later Video Game series just for fun).
May: Alex Ross’s and Mark Waid’s
Kingdom Come is released as a huge epic tale of a possible future of the DC Universe.
May 10: The film
Twister is released.
May 14: A made for TV movie is released in an attempt to revive Doctor Who’s success as the show’s cancellation in the 80’s. The Film’s plot was changed to center on a war breaking out between the Daleks and the Time Lords with the Doctor’s archenemy the Master joining the Daleks and tracking the Doctor to Earth with a handful of Daleks. The Seventh Doctor and the Master die in battle with each other but both regenerate. The new Doctor is played by Tim Curry while he battles the Master in the form of Eric Roberts(OTL Paul McGann played the Doctor and the film did well in the UK but failed to gain an American audience and so Doctor who remained cancelled until it was rebooted in 2005. Here a different plot and Tim Curry. One of the candidates to play the Doctor help out a lot).
The Simpsons Episode HomerPalooza about Homer reuniting the Be Sharps at LolaPalooze debuts. Many bands Guest star, including Nirvana and Kurt Cobain.
May 16: The Series Finale of
Murder, She Wrote, the longest running murder mystery series, ends.
May 17: FOX renews
My So-Called Life for a third season just 1 day after the show’s season finale airs.
May 22: Mission Impossible: Starring Tom Cruise and directed by Brian De Palma is released.
June 7: The Phantom, directed by Joe Dante(who took over after Sergio Leone died before finishing the film) is released. It is based on the comic strip character. The film is a modest success and is seen as part of a Pulp Hero Cinematic Universe started with Sam Raimi’s The Shadow, and growing to include plans for Doc Savage and Tarzan.
The Rock, with Sean Connery and Nicholas Cage and directed by Michael Bay is released.
June 14: The Cable Guy with Chris Farley and Ben Stiller is released(Without the rewrites to include Jim Carrey, the film is far less dark, think something along the lines of Planes, Trains and Automobiles with Farley as the John Candy character and Stiller as the Steve Martin character).
June 21: Disney releases Gary Trousdale’s and Kirk Wise’s
Song of the Sea based on the Greek Myth of Orpheus and Eurydice but setting it in the ocean with the main character being a hunchback whale. The film follows the myth of Orpheus, a hunchback whale who’s call summons the sun. Then his love dies(killed by hunters in the film, which like in Bambi are never directly seen, only as silhouettes) and he Ventures into the Underworld(the dark abyss of the ocean) to find and saver her soul. He is told not to look back or he will lose her forever, but hears nothing as he is told that she will follow him out. He fails to resist the temptation to look and her spirit fades away. Orpheus himself dies soon after. His son, who he’s been teaching the whale call to, successfully brings up the sun(OTL this film was what Trousdale and Wise were working on before Katzenberg told them “Stop everything you’re working on Hunchback of Notre Dame”. He’s not here to make that command so the film is finished)The film is a break from Disney’s happy endings. It does provide a unique problem: it is difficult to make a show for. Something that’s been done with every Disney film recently. Instead it is decided to make a show based on Greek Mythology, albeit toned down for kids(yup, I’m butterflying Hercules. The film wouldn’t have been made anyway because it was a request from Katzenberg to make the film in order to fund Treasure Planet).
The same day Dreamworks releases
The Hunchback of Notre Dame. The film is a big hit and praised for its dark story. This along with Disney’s somber entry at the same time helps to challenge the notion that animation is for kids(Naturally with Katzenberg wanting to make the Hunchback of Notre Dame anyway, he made it at Dreamworks instead, resulting in a movie that doesn’t get the same backlash as it did when it was a Disney film and is praised on the same level as The Prince of Egypt).
A warehouse worker finds the original, uncensored, cut of
The Land Before Time at a Don Bluth Animation warehouse. It is decided to restore and rerelease the film for its tenth anniversary in 1998.
June 28: The Nutty Professor, a remake of the Jerry Lewis film with Eddie Murphy in the lead, is released.
July: The Japanese Animation Studio Brainbase is founded.
Avengers #400 is released. The original draft was rejected for being “Too Rapey” and involved the heroine Miss Marvel being brainwashed into having a baby which ended up being a clone body of the brainwasher, which she happily left with. This resulted in a quick rewrite. It is instead as story about the Avengers time traveling villain King the Conqueror traveling through time with the Avengers trying to stop him as he intervenes in moments from Avengers history with the art style changing with every period to reflect the different art styles of the book at the time(for example when the formation of the Avengers is told the style is similar to the 1960’s Jack Kirby drawings).
July 3: The film
Independence Day is released.
July 6: The Soap Opera
Another World receives many letters and messages from fans who can tell that beloved character Anne Stewart will be the victim of a serial killer on the show. They ignore the letters and go through with killing off the character(OTL they caved in and killed off another character).
July 7: in the wake of many scandals, the WWF is falling apart and many move to WCW or to smaller independent wrestling organizations. Hulk Hogan debuts on WCW as a “heel” i.e. a villain in the Wrestling storylines in the face of his real life accusations.
July 8: The Spice Girl’s debut single “Wannabe” becomes a global hit.
July 10: Nickelodeon releases its first film:
Harriet the Spy. Launching the career of child actress Michelle Trachtenberg.
July 17: Shazam! A comedy film starring Sinbad, is released. The film faces a lawsuit from DC Comics due to the character of Captain Marvel saying Shazam as the magic word to transform. This leads to DC rebranding the character of Captain Marvel, killing off the wizard Shazam and having him transfer his powers to Captain Marvel, basically making him the new Shazam (This is one of the biggest cases for the Mandela effect. People misremember the movie Kazaam with Shaquille O’Neal playing a Genie as Shazam with Sinbad. No such movie exists. Sinbad dressed as a Genie during a screening of old movies of the Arabian hero Sinbad, and there is a comic character who said Shazam and now has that as his name due to lawsuits. Also yes people ITTL will falsely remember this movie as Kazaam and recall Shaquille O'Neal starring in it).
July 19: Peter Jackson’s
Tales of the Crypt: The Frighteners is released. The film’s success leads to Peter Jackson’s plan to remake King Kong being greenlit(OTL the film was almost part of the Tales of the Crypt but was ultimately not. ITTL the title is kept and the film does better through association. Jackson even included the Crypt Keeper into the story as one of the undead characters. When the Frighteners failed, support from the studio for Peter Jackson’s King Kong remake was removed and it was cancelled until years later. Here Jackson is making it much sooner, which would please him as he always felt the unmade film was better.
The film
Trainspotting is released.
August 2: The film
Matilda is released.
August 8: As part of their partnership, Marvel and DC swap some characters for awhile, allowing the companies to reinterpret the origins or each of the other’s superheroes(Butterflying away Stan Lee’s Just imagine. OTL, Marvel did something similar with Heroes’ Reborn with Image which was controversial, effectively killing off many of the Marvel characters including the Avengers and the Fantastic Four. Another butterfly is its entirely possible Mark Gruenwald had a heart attack as he was found dead with a copy of Rob Liefeld’s Captain America #1, an infamously bad issue. While old, he was healthy enough to do cart wheels around the office the day before. Here Gruenwald survives and after Jim Shooter steps down, Tom DeFalco takes over and then after him Gruenwald).
August 13: The
Aladdin TV Series concludes with an arc about Aladdin meeting his father, who turns out to be the leader of 40 thieves and tries to steal the treasure from the Palace.
August 14: Stickin’ Around. A Canadian show using stick figures is released. The protagonist is the somewhat silent Henry Stickman, who is joined by the dimwitted pilot Charles and his friend and possible love interest Ellie in battling the evil Toppat clan(Yeah I decided to cheat a bit and make the show feature characters from the flash game series, Henry Stickmin. The humor is about on par with the games).
The Show is basically this kind of humor and jokes but with a narrative running through it and some serious moments including the death of a certain character
August 30: The Crow: City of Angels, the second Crow film and the first to follow new protagonist played by Mark William Callaway
The Disney film
First Kid, where Shaquille O’Neal plays the bodyguard to the President’s son, is released and receives negative reviews(OTL the film starred Sinbad but he’s doing Kazaam instead so why not make Shaquille O’Neal take his place. O’Neal’s track record on movies means it likely bombs given Kazaam and Steel both did OTL).
September 3: Treasure Galaxy, a show based on Treasure Planet, premieres following the same characters and cast. The show introduces Jim Hawkins to Kate, a love interest and classmate at the Royal Interstellar Academy. Long John Silver returns and teams up with Hawkins to stop the villain Ironbeard, voiced by Wilhelm Defoe, who frees the criminals from the Botany Bay Prison Asteroid(This date was chosen because OTL Quack Pack aired. Here it had a different plot and released earlier).
(Photo of Ben Affleck as Superman actor George Reeves from Hollywoodland, illustrating how he'd look as the character).
September 6: Superman: The Animated Series premieres, at the same time as a new Superman film. The film in question is titled “The Death of Superman” and is an adaptation of the comic book storyline of the same name with some tweaks. Interestingly, instead of retconning away the worse Superman films, the film actually concludes them. In the film Christopher Reeves begins playing the Superman role, now married to Lois Lane. He mentions visiting Krypton and is shown working alongside Supergirl(played once more by Helen Slater). It’s revealed a Kryptonian probe from the ruins of Krypton followed him and crashes into Metropolis. Superman and Supergirl fight the probe and defeat it. Supergirl recognizes it as the part of the Kryptonian super computer Brainiac, who went rogue and that Supergirl hoped was destroyed. When both Kryptonians leave, the Probe reactivate and escapes. Lex Luthor detects and finds it. He begins to work with it and Brainiac calls his ship, summoning a monster named Doomsday to attack Metropolis. The battle is brutal. Supergirl dies in Superman’s arms and Superman himself sacrifices his life to finally kill the monster, himself dying in Lois’s arms. He is honored as a hero. Lois discovers that his body was stolen from his grave. Soon after a new Superman appears(played by Ben Affleck). Lois is suspicious but eventually discovers along with this new Superman that he is a clone created by Brainiac to eventually betray Earth. With Lois’s help he breaks free of Brainiac’s control due to wanting to be a hero. Brainiac is seemingly destroyed but when Lex Luthor gets too close the parts fuse with him, turning him into a hybrid of the two villains that Superman finally destroys. The World embraces the new Superman, who takes on the name Connor Kent(OTL, there was a long process of unmade Superman films at this time, the most infamous of which is Tim Burton’s unmade Superman Lives. Here with the film being made earlier its closer to Superman: Reborn, the pitch at the time).
September 7: Tupac Shakur survives an attempt on his life.
September 8: Blue’s Clues premieres on Nickelodeon. ITTL Blue and most of the cast are Puppets due to Jim Henson being involved.
September 10: The Cartoon
Billy the Cat premieres.
September 28: The Dana Carvey show introduces a running gag called “The Ambigously Gay Duo” about a duo of Superheroes who make comments and gestures to each other implying they are gay but not confirming it.
October 7: The First Episode of the PBS show
Arthur airs. ITTL it has different designs, closer to the original book.
The First Episode of the show
Hey! Arnold. Airs on Nickelodeon. The show is a hit and helps the network recover from the loss of Ren and Stimpy. Due to being more emblazoned with the show, it will get more seasons, concluding with a TV movie exploring the fate of Arnold’s parents.
October 27: Treehouse of Horror VII airs. It has a different plot than OTL where aliens misunderstand Homer when they ask who is their leader and kidnap every living President(and Richard Nixon, which was apparently only thought to be dead). This means Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford(a friend of Homer who he is very similar to), George H.W. Bush(still Homer’s enemy), Jimmy Carter(with plenty of Peanut Jokes), Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. The Ex Presidents are saved though Richard Nixon is decapitated by the aliens and his head is kept still alive with alien technology. He is still at that state by the end of episode
October 30: The 30th Asterix story is published. In it, Obelix drinks the magic potion, something he has been warned against doing in every story. This ends up having dire consequences.
October 31: The Comic
Batman: the Long Halloween is released. It will serve as the inspiration for scenes from later Batman films.
November: In Blackest Night, a DC Comic event occurs and kills off Hal Jordan in a great sacrifice when the dead are brought back to life by Nekron.
November 2: The Final Season of
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ends with the destruction of the Technodrome and seeming death of Shredder and Krang. Leonardo succeeds Master Splinter and the Ninja Turtles are revealed to the world but accepted as heroes. April and Casey Jones get married(This is different ITTL due to Jim Henson still working on the films which have Bebop and Rocksteady in the Second film and Krang and the Technodrome in the third film).
November 3: The Simpsons introduces recurring antagonist Hank Scorpio.
November 15: Space Jam is released. It has a slightly different plot than OTL. The Looney Tunes are actors who are forced into a game of Basketball when a corrupt CEO threatens to demolish Toontown unless they can beat his champion’s the Monstars in a game(Bugs Bunny noticed that the Corrupt CEO had a thing for Basketball when he went to his office and convinced him to make the deal). Michael Jordan is brought on to teach the Toons how to play(my idea for an alternate version of this film is one with Michael Jackson as originally planned but that only works if the POD is before Jackson had a chance to commit the actions that resulted in allegations against him which would be much further back). The success of the film inspires Warner Bros to commission a Looney Tunes series involving modern versions of the characters.
November 27: A live action remake of
101 Dalmations is released with Cathy Moriarty as Cruella De Vill(OTL she was rejected for being too frightening).
December 5: Frank Film from 1973 is entered into the National Film Registry.
December 13: Jerry Maguire starring Tom Hanks(the original choice) is released.
Tim Burtons’
Dinosaurs Attack is released. It is a homage to 50’s monster movies(OTL it was toss up between Mars Attacks! Of Dinosaurs Attack. Jurassic Park was out at the time but this film was delayed, as such Burton ends up making his Dinosaur movie anyway and cashes in one the craze. He sees it as dodging a bullet because of Independence Day coming out at the same time.
December 18: Wes Craven's
Scary Movie(Working Title for
Scream) is released.
December 20: Warner Bros released a live action Beavis and Butthead film with David Spade and Adam Sandler, it bombs hard(OTL this was what MTV and Warner Bros wanted to do despite protests from creator Mike Judge. It became Beavis and Butthead Do America OTL and was animated. Here…no such luck).
An Action figure of Spider-Man 2's Doctor Octopus
December 27: Spider-Man 2 by James Cameron is released. Cameron was reluctant to return but decided after seeing his own track record with sequels. Keeping with his tradition he casted Arnold Schwarzenegger as Doctor Octopus and had Norman Osborn become the Green Goblin. The Goblin is responsible for Doctor Octopus’s origin when one of his bombs goes off and fuses Dr.Otto Octavius’s arms to his body. This turns the film into a three way battle between Green Goblin, Doctor Octopus, and Spider-Man, which ends in a battle to save Mary Jane from the Goblin on the Brooklyn Bridge while the two villains fight.