As Dreamers Do: American Magic Redux

Entertainment News for July 1982
Paramount has a tough decision to make with the release dates for The Thief and the Cobbler and Airplane II: The Sequel. They can either keep both titles scheduled for December 10th, or move one or the other to a Spring or Summer 1983 release.
- The Hollywood Reporter

Family Home Entertainment releases its first Gumby videocassette to rave reviews.
- TV Guide

Home Box Office, Superstation WTBS and USA Network enter a bidding war for the license to air 20th Century-Fox's English dub of Urusei Yatsura.
- The New York Times

North American rights to Speed Racer still in legal limbo as multiple companies squabble in a bloody bidding war.
- Variety
 

PNWKing

Banned
I'm hoping that this situation doesn't end the way that Harmony Gold did with the rights to the three series they used to make Robotech.
 

PNWKing

Banned
I'm thinking that it could be a TTL-original film. Remember the old book series, Hank the Cowdog. I'd say have it be a Disney animated film.
 
@OldNavy1988, what's the current composition of the Disney board of directors?

Walter Elias Disney, Jr.
Chairman of the Board of Disney Communications

Roy Edward Disney
Vice Chairman of Disney Communications

Ron Miller
CEO and President of Walt Disney Pictures

Frank G. Wells
Chairman and CEO of 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation

Stan Lee
Chief Executive Officer of Marvel Comics Group

Nolan Bushnell
Chief Executive Officer of Atari, Inc.

Sid Bass
Major shareholder

Stanley P. Gold
Major shareholder; Vice President of Shamrock Holdings

Donald V. "Don" Bluth
President; Walt Disney Classic Animation

Lee Gunther
President; Grantray-Lawrence (aka Walt Disney Television Animation)

Strategic and creative advisors
Diane Disney-Miller
Abigail Disney
Tim Disney
 
Questions submitted by @Mitch!

For one thing, there’s the surprising news that the NHL’s Colorado Rockies were bought out by Namco, the company responsible for the Pac-Man craze of the early 1980s. Why would Namco want to buy the rights to a hockey team, and how can the two brands co-exist in the near future?

"The NHL lagged behind the other three sports from a popularity standpoint. So any publicity they could get was perfectly fine with the owners. For a team to be sold for a bargain to the people that held the copyright for one of the biggest arcade games of the time was more than the NHL could hope for."
- Howard Baldwin; Hartford Whalers president

Then, there’s the curious case of Embassy winning their lawsuit against Hanna-Barbera, and the $16 million windfall that stemmed from it. In what ways will not only Embassy, but H-B and the joint venture they created with Jim Henson, Touchstone, be affected by all that led to this ruling?

"We trusted HB to keep the storylines kid appropriate and they failed. Simple as that."
- Norman Lear; Embassy Pictures chairman

"The Taft board of directors were looking to oust Bill and Joe amid the fallout from the Home Ec scandal. Jim [Henson] and I figured that would be our chance to buy out Taft's stake of Touchstone. And in turn, if Bill and Joe got the boot, Jim was very interested in taking over at HB."
- Michael Eisner

After that is the confirmation that Walt Disney, Jr., has officially replaced his father as the head of Disney Communications, better known today as The Walt Disney Company. By which means did Disney’s weekly anthology series allow its audience to better understand what would occur?

"I wanted to let Dad continue to host the anthology for as long as his health would allow, but he wanted to move on to his philanthropy work outside of the company."
- Walt Disney, Jr.

There’s also the reveal that a revival starring Woody Woodpecker, not An American Tail, will be Walter Lantz’s follow-up to the box-office success that was A Wrinkle in Time. Considering how Ralph Bakshi directed Lantz’s previous hits, how will his “style” affect Woody’s reintroduction?

"When I moved on to making animated pictures for adults, people suddenly forgot that I had been doing cartoons for kids decades before Fritz the Cat or Coonskin. With Woody, Walter and I agreed that we needed to bring him back to the over-the-top zany character that he was back in 1940."
- Ralph Bakshi

Finally, on a lesser note, there’s the sudden announcement that Paramount is going to release The Thief and the Cobbler in time for Christmas of 1982. Why did this particular studio get the rights to distribute Richard Williams’ magnum opus, and who said that it needs to debut on Christmas?

"Barry [Diller] and Frank [Mancuso, Sr.] both wanted The Thief on Christmas even though they had the sequel to Airplane! locked in well before I made the deal with Paramount."

"United Artists tore up the contract I had with them after Wardrobe. RKO and Warner both wanted to take the film away from me. Universal would only buy the rights if I transferred directorial control to Ralph Bakshi. I went to Paramount because A: They were the only ones willing to let me retain creative control and B: They were the only ones willing to give Daniel Abbott a second chance because by that point he languished at Filmation and was helping the Feds nail John K."
- Richard Williams
 
"When I moved on to making animated pictures for adults, people suddenly forgot that I had been doing cartoons for kids decades before Fritz the Cat or Coonskin. With Woody, Walter and I agreed that we needed to bring him back to the over-the-top zany character that he was back in 1940."
- Ralph Bakshi
I can only assume Bakshi will want to use Woody's pre-Barber of Seville* design in order to enforce this "revisiting the roots" approach? Maybe even get Mel Blanc to reprise Woody?

*For those who need a refresher/don't know how Woody looked pre-1944:
1610346878703.png
 
Oldnavy do you remeaber my idea for an orignail cartoon called the totems. You intially said that that sound like a 80's toon and even though the oringal american magic timeline was in the 90's by the time you suggested you said that it could still work in the 2010's when 80's nogilist became hip. You ended changing your mind and had released in 2005. Do you thik the totems could released in the 80's in american magic 2.0 and remade in the 2010's
 
Oldnavy do you remeaber my idea for an orignail cartoon called the totems. You intially said that that sound like a 80's toon and even though the oringal american magic timeline was in the 90's by the time you suggested you said that it could still work in the 2010's when 80's nogilist became hip. You ended changing your mind and had released in 2005. Do you thik the totems could released in the 80's in american magic 2.0 and remade in the 2010's

The Totems came off a little derivative.
 
The Totems came off a little derivative.
The totems may have been a little itle dertive but they were only comtley oringal cartoon in american besides my zomie high and zombie didn't even have it own post. It was only mention as being one the deubt cartoon on the hub network
 
Man, is it good to be back! Now, let's see what I ended up missing since last we--
Home Box Office, Superstation WTBS and USA Network enter a bidding war for the license to air 20th Century-Fox's English dub of Urusei Yatsura.
- The New York Times

North American rights to Speed Racer still in legal limbo as multiple companies squabble in a bloody bidding war.
- Variety
Oh.

Well, it looks like I'll have to look this over...

First off, the Fox dub of Urusei Yatsura. I have got to say, this does show some promise. I mean, HBO could pair this up with a Hanna-Barbera dub of Dr. Slump for a girl power hour unlike any other. Add in the Fraggles before or after that hour, and HBO just might have it's biggest increase in subscribers since its initial launch in the 70's. Then again, the prospect of Rumiko Takahashi's first major work being on the same network as reruns of Looney Tunes prior to the existence of Cartoon Network is something, considering how unusual UY can get from time to time. Not to mention how similar "Urusei" and "USA" sound when you say them out loud, which would be a benefit for the marketing division...

Overall, I'd go with HBO getting the rights to the anime, with eventual reruns in the early 90's on TBS, while USA Network would unfortunately not get my vote at all.

Next, the North American rights to Speed Racer. Personally, I only have one betting horse in this race, and that's Warner Bros. I mean, it just fits all too well! WB owns the rights to the English dub of Marine Boy, said dub uses a lot of the cast from SR, and in addition, the Mach 5 would be a great counterpart to the likes of the Batmobile and the General Lee in terms of famous cars from film and television that Bugs Bunny owns.

I've been wanting to comment on those two news bites since they were delivered to the public days ago, so it kind of built up over time.
 
Top