Old cartoons (among other shows) to be released online, or "Egad, Brain, we're back!"

[Anthonynotes]

AOL and Time-Warner have entered into an agreement to release dozens of old shows online for free, including (per the link I saw) various old cartoons...

The article describing the show service:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/14/bu.../14warner.html

(Registration possibly required)

And two articles describing the initial shows to be released:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10037170
http://informationweek.com/story/sho...leID=173602680

Quoting the desirable part of the article:
"At launch, the available shows will include:

Adventures of Brisco County Jr., Alice, Babylon 5, Beetlejuice, Chico and the Man, Dark Justice, Eight is Enough, F Troop, The F.B.I., Falcon Crest, Freakazoid, Freddy's Nightmares, The Fugitive, Growing Pains, Hangin' with Mr. Cooper, Head of the Class, Histeria!, Kung Fu, La Femme Nikita, Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, Maverick, The New Adventures of Batman, Perfect Strangers, Pinky and the Brain, Scarecrow and Mrs. King, Sisters, Spenser: For Hire, V, Welcome Back, Kotter, and Wonder Woman. "

Gee, finally Pinky and the Brain will get *some* respect... and nice to see that apparently the old Beetlejuice and Histeria cartoons included, as well. Perhaps this service might also be a gauge for future DVD box set releases... *cough*PinkyandtheBrain*cough*..

-B.

[King_of_doom]

The ones i want to see again are:
-Beetlejuice
-Freakazoid
-And of course Pinky and the Brain

[straw_hat]

This is without a doubt the best news I've heard in a long time.

[mojokingbee1]

Z! O! M! G! Time Warner did something GOOD for once! I hope they'll add Tiny Toons and Animaniacs soon.

[Anarky]

saw this news on cnbc's "On the Money"
their aim is to discourage online piracy: make it free to access programming while advertisers still get exposure.

the pundits also compared broadcast television to news print and how broadcast will soon be phased out in favor of selective, on-demand tv/pod viewing. Must See TV is dying. The medium is mutating. Hopefully this evolution won't impact the animation industry in a dooming manner.

[EscaflownePilot]

The more we move to an on-demand driven content distribution model, the closer we are to ditching the Nielson system and having a system where more than just one or two demographics count, so I honestly don't see this as a problem with the animation industry.

As for the news itself...
Pinky and the Brain, Histeria, Bettlejuice... sounds great to me!

[judyindisguise]

IMO, "Pinky and the Brain" was the one real contribution Steven Spielberg made to toondom. "Tiny Toons", "Animaniacs", eccchhh, who cares, but PatB were great. It had a terrific premise that allowed for a lot of plot invention and two great contrasting main characters. My fave toon of that series was the one where Brain invented a machine that made everything huge. He enlarged Pinky in order to pass him off as a Godzilla-like monster and attack a city. That episode is full of great touches, but my favorite is when the camera kept cutting away to a Raymond Burr caricature (Burr having been in all those grade-C horror movies) and in the end HE got enlarged and attacked the real Godzilla. I laughed my head off. I'm glad Pinky and the Brain are getting a re-launch of sorts.

[SimpsonGuy100]

I'm signing up as soon as it starts! And the fact that it's free is also excellent news. Thank you so much, WB! It shows they do care!

[Elven Moon]

Wait, so... you download the episode onto your harddrive, or are you forced to watch them only at a website?

Interesting idea, nonetheless.

[Juu-kuchi]

Pinky & the Brain given a chance as a webcasted rerun!!?

*throws his chair out the window in happiness*