Christ, that's two of their best shows gone already! They really need Savino, Wade and Antonucci on their side, otherwise given all that's happened and NOT happened to them ITTL, I'm starting to seriously doubt if they'll survive to 2001.
Basically, ITTL, Nickelodeon is in the same situation moneywise in the mid-late 90's as the companies below...
- Disney in the post-WWII period from the time Walt churned out "package features," until he managed to nurse the studio back to health with
Cinderella in 1950.
- Universal from the final years of the Laemmle family's ownership of the studio, until the sale to MCA in the early 1960's.
- Paramount from Adolph Zukor and Jesse Lasky's departures until the studio was sold to Gulf+Western in 1966.
- Columbia Pictures from the time founder Harry Cohn passed away in 1958, all the way until the mid 70's. Things turned around for Columbia when they imported
Monty Python and the Holy Grail to the US.
- 20th Century Fox from the mid-70's until the early 80's. Fox stayed afloat with the
Planet of the Apes franchise plus
Rocky Horror,
Silver Streak and
The Omen. Walt had beaten Fox to the punch for
Star Wars, so for a while, things for Fox looked bleak, until MGM sold off the rights to
Clash of the Titans to finance
Heaven's Gate.
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, from 1977 until 1983, was owned by Donald Trump. Under his watch, MGM sold off 15 films to other studios in order to finance Heaven's Gate. While Fox wound up picking up
Clash of the Titans, Walt Disney was actually gifted
Pink Floyd's The Wall. Trump afterwards sold MGM to Ted Turner. Since then, Turner has stacked the United Artists brand, which Ted bought from Transamerica before the first
Rocky came out, while MGM has yet to recover.
- Warner Bros, after the Superman Fallout from 1979 until about 1982. Ted Ashley meddled with
In the Night Kitchen and
Where the Wild Things Are, both of which Chuck Jones directed, and essentially, broke the bond between the studio and the former Termite Terrace veteran, for good. Ted Ashley then clashed with Alex Salkind during the making of the failed
Superman film from 1978. Christopher Reeve was reduced to cartoon voice acting, while Richard Donner redeemed himself with
The Goonies and the
Lethal Weapon franchise. Warner Communications then split up DC Comics in half and sold the two entities to CBS and Turner.
- Miramax in 1989 after the disastrous failure of
Sex, Lies and Videotape. Because of Harvey Weinstein's iron fisted grip on the studio, the board of directors were forced to go behind his back to sell Miramax's assets to Dr Pepper and Kodak, who then merged Miramax with Grand Diamond. Roger Corman has since stayed on as Grand Diamond's CEO. As for Weinstein, he has since been divorced, lost custody of Harvey Jr (now 8), is now working as a cashier at a Taco Bell in the South Bronx.
