Ever heard of the Cinderella syndrome? Okay, if you haven't heard the story of Cinderella outside the House of Mouse treatment, here's the skinny. You and your parent marry into another family. Your new stepmother/father already has kids, whom they love and adore a great deal more than you. You stick by your parent as a sign of comfort. Then, without warning, your parent leaves, in most cases by death. You're basically stuck with the unloving stepparent and your stepsiblings. You try your damnedest to try to impress them doing a lot of work, but the stepparent still loves your stepsibling a lot more. Worse case scenario, you help out your stepsibling, and the stepsibling gets almost all of the credit and even more praise by your stepparent.
Where's a fairy godmother when you need one?
Anyway, this scenario isn't from a children's storybook. This is happening to one of our favorite networks, and the home to one of the best blocks on television, Cartoon Network. CN is the Cinderella to the wicked stepfather, Jamie Kellner, and his favorite son, The WB.
The Marriage and the Brief Honeymoon
Here's a story of a lovely lady, who developed a very lovely net. It had lots of cartoons loved by their mother, including some we haven't seen yet.
Here's a story of a man named Kellner, who was busy with a network of his own. They were popular with teens and youngsters, yet they were all alone.
Okay, so it isn't exactly the Brady Bunch. This marriage began as a result of a major coup de'tat at the upper management of Turner Broadcasting. Bob Pittman, President of AOL Time Warner (read: the #5 man in charge) led a rebellion to cleanse the management of Turner Broadcasting, which led the former president and CEO to become depowered in his position and have a new man in charge of the popular Turner nets like TBS, TNT, CNN, and Cartoon Network. The new president and CEO of Turner Broadcasting (and if you're wondering why I'm being repetitive with the word Turner, it's to remind people who built up this mighty empire many moons ago) is familiar to a lot of people in the entertainment industry. This leader not only created two popular broadcast networks, but he also co-created two equally popular children's entertaiment blocks, Fox Kids and Kids' WB. In numerous fanbases, particularly in the Warner Bros. animation fanbase, he is public enemy number one. He is Jamie Kellner, president and CEO (and minority owner) of The WB Television Network. His network became absorbed by Turner Broadcasting, and now, Kellner was in charge of one of the largest cable empires on the planet.
And the fans were livid. How in the heck could a man like Kellner, who basically hates Warner Brothers animation, be in charge of Turner Broadcasting, which has access to a network chock full of WB cartoons? What will he do to TBS? What will he do to CNN? What will Kellner do to CARTOON NETWORK?!?
Smiling at a press conference, Kellner announced that Headline News would be revamped with a leggy blonde former actress as the new lead anchor (I am not kidding), WB dramas like Charmed, Gilmore Girls, and Smallville will air on TNT and TBS as well as The WB, and that Kids' WB and Cartoon Network will share sales divisions and possibly co-create shows that will air on both networks. No changes will be made in the first year of transition at Cartoon Network, according to Kellner. Weeks later, the announcement of a Toonami block airing on Kids' WB, cutting down Cartoon Network's Toonami by an hour was made. Weeks after that, due to a difference of opinions, Ms. Cohen stepped down from the head of the network she created, and moved to another position within ATW, and hasn't been heard from since. Kellner was virtually given free reign within Turner Broadcasting, with his bosses thinking he could do no wrong. The honeymoon was over, and the way of the world has shifted towards a more demonic side.
The Robot Who Wore Kids' WB! Shoes
There are some days that you tend to remember. As a Toonami webmaster, there's a few noteworthy dates that are worthwhile.
March 17, 1997. The premiere date of Toonami.
June 1, 1998, August 31, 1998, and March 15, 1999. The premiere dates of Sailor Moon, Dragon Ball Z, and ReBoot on Toonami, respectively.
July 10, 1999. The premiere of Toonami Midnight Run and first appearance of TOM and the Absolution.
There are also some dates you want to eradicate from your mind. Here's one for the worst days in Toonami history book (on sale February 30, 2121) . . . July 30, 2001. On this day in Toonami history, Kids' WB premiered a block that had a few familiar elements and, for the first two weeks, a familiar series. The music, announcer, and lineup (which included a pair of non-action shows for a little over two months, Detention and Generation O!) were very unsavory. They called it Toonami. It was obvious to anyone who saw it that is was nothing more than Kids' WB with a Toonami candy coating. And the sad part is that the new audience that's now discovering Toonami are only familiar with the Kids' WB version. What's worse is that these youngsters have no idea that Toonami airs on Cartoon Network.
You can't blame the programmers of Toonami nor the creators. The only person to blame is Kellner himself. He used the Toonami brand to make his slumping Kids' WB lineup look fresher. The fact that his whole plan to bridge the broadcast version of Toonami to Cartoon Network's Toonami isn't working to Kellner's expectations. The weirdest thing is that in a lot of markets, Kids' WB isn't on. In Chicago, the KWB lineup is not only on a different network, but it's shown in a very early timeslot, far, far away from the Toonami block. In numerous markets, the Toonami-ized KWB is either seen in the morning or an hour earlier than the network demands. Ohhhhhh, I forgot! Kids' WB's ratings haven't increased at all thanks to the addition of the Toonami-ized lineup. It's basically the same. But you won't hear Kellner complaining. He got what he want.
Cohen's gone, Toonami's decreased by an hour, and Kellner has basically vanquished the competition from within. Kellner also sanctioned the Dragon Ball Zone that Toonami devolved into for a couple of weeks recently. Not only that, but Kellner also has an outlet to further promote his favorite child, The WB. Think about it. Haven't you seen a lot of commercials for KWB shows like Cardcaptors, Yu-Gi-Oh, The Mummy, and the general lineup and shows from the regular WB lineup like 7th Heaven and Sabrina air sporadically on Cartoon Network? Same here. How about commercials for Cartoon Network shows on KWB? Me neither. There's also a Kids WB spotlight show that blatantly plugs away at their shows and critically wounding the flow of Cartoon Cartoon Fridays. Budgets are strangely being cut at Cartoon Network and the other Turner networks. Kellner's not the antichrist, but he's no boy scout either. His tyrannical hand has all but killed Cartoon Network and the Toonami block.
Luckily, things changed over time, but that's a whole other conversation.
