What RUINED Klasky Csupo? (The DOWNFALL of Nickelodeon's Original Studio)

[Music] in the early '90s and early 2000s you could not think of Nickelodeon without thinking of the name classy chupo well I'm sure most of you jump to certain yellow sponges Elemental martial arts or boy Geniuses Nickelodeon is very much the house that Rugrats built and clasy Chupa was the seemingly Unstoppable Powerhouse behind it they would go on to create an additional five shows for Nickelodeon and including a real monsters the Wild Thornberries and rocket power just in him a few but the massive influence and success of Rugrats as one of Nickelodeon's Greatest Hits turned out to have a rocky foundation with this legendary 9s Animation Studio toppling down due to intense creative differences what exactly happened to tear down such a popular Studio well stick around to find out this is a story filled with divorce colleagues fighting and executive shakeups all which lead to the downfall of one of the most prominent studios in animation history so let's find out what ruined clas 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British viewers magic spoon is now shipping to Canada and the UK so go hit him up all right on that note back to the video to understand clasy chupo we have to understand the dynamic between its two Founders Arlene clasy and Gabor chupo a married couple who began the company out of their spare bedro and their Hollywood apartment Arlene was a California Native and grew up at the beach towns of Orange County it was this environment that would familiarize her with surfing later serving as the main inspiration for their show Rocket power but hey let's not get ahead of ourselves the shoes can wait shoes Gabor chupo was born born and raised and hungry before fleeing communism to Stockholm Sweden it was there he would by chance meet Arlene who was vacationing there at the time the two would hit it off with Gabor immigrating to the United States in the late 1970s Gabor and Arlene got married in 1979 and settled down in Hollywood with Gabor beginning a job working as an animator for Hannah Barbara he animated on short-lived TV shows like Scooby and Scrappy dooo and the world's greatest Super Friends before in clasy chupo with Arlene out of the second bedroom in their apartment in 1982 much of clasky Cho's early work would consist mainly of advertising including logo designs film trailers and promo spots their first Big Break would come in 1987 when they would begin animating a series of one minute shorts about a family for the Tracy Ol Man show that family's name hm that's right without Bart Lisa Homer Marge and Maggie we probably would not have such a major pillar of Nickelodeon success story it's crazy to think but those one minute Simpson shorts are sort of a springboard for so much to come in the following decades despite being such a short recurring segment they would frequently be the most popular part of the Tracy Omen show this actually caused some friction on the show itself with man growing irritated at being upstage on her own show by the cartoons as reported in a Variety article from October 1992 Omen actually tried to sue 20th Century Fox as she wanted merchandising royalties related to The Simpsons being featured on her variety show she claimed their original contract involved awarding her 5 to 10% of net receipts for series characters depicted on the show this would have amounted roughly over $2 million or about 5 million today damn inflation really is just that bad these days however the judge dismissed the claims as she had no real involvement in their creation as they were developed by cartoonist Matt graining the demand was there for a clever animated sitcom as Fox moved to make The Simpsons its own independent series and well the rest is history in 1989 the world was introduced to our favorite yellow nuclear family to deal with the DraStic change in workload clasy chupo would handle the character and background layout with most of the color tweening and filming being handled by Acom an animation contractor in South Korea here at clasky chupo in Hollywood a brilliant team of artists create that special Simpsons look after the uh voice tracks are done uh we use uh both the script and the track to come up with the images that we need to tell the story this working relationship wouldn't last forever though tension arose when Gracie Films The Simpsons production company wanted to instill their own producer citing to satisfaction with clasy Cho's producer put put in charge of the production of The Simpsons Gabor took this as Gracie Films telling him how to run his business which he did not take well clasy chupo would exit The Simpsons after season 3 losing their contract was a massive Financial blow to the company resulting in klasy chupo having to lay off 2/3 of the staff losing 75 of their original 110 animators now I know that it sounds like I'm laying out a lot of this at gabor's feet and to be fair AR leene very could have had a hand in this decision as well for all intents and purposes it does seem like they Captain this ship together but in a lot of my research about this time frame at the studio Gabor seems to be the direct mouthpiece for the company or at the very least he was the most vocal about calling the shots which paints him and a new light to me on one hand I can appreciate that he wanted to run their business the way he saw fit after all the Simpsons was a giant success so surely the there was something to the way they were doing things on the other hand though why would you purposely bite the hand that feeds you especially when you're risking the livelihood of more than half of your Workforce over a power play at its core the animation industry is a highly collaborative one and you have to be able to compromise sometimes but this dark period would not last long for clasy chupo in 1991 a little Channel called Nickelodeon was beginning to take shape with the goal of the very first all kids Network Nickelodeon wanted to differentiate their cartoons from others on the scene that were seemingly only there to sell stuff to kids no Nickelodeon would be different with their Nick Tunes seeking to create great shows with substance for children that also put the Reigns back into the hands of the creators not the advertisers oh God how the mighty and Noble have fallen Nickelodeon's creatively bankrupt nowadays huh the the first round of Nick Tunes would include Jim Jenkins Doug John K's yeah ritten stmy and of course Arlene and gabor's Rugrats now we've already done a what ruined Rugrats video where I break down what the show is in depth so for now I won't beat that drum again but for a brief overview Rugrats is a show about a group of babies trying to make sense of the world around them through the power of their imaginations you've got Tommy our main character Chucky his kind but cowardly BFF Phil and Lil are gross out comedic relief and of course the main antagonist and Tommy's older cousin Angelica these children would be the main cast for a while until the introduction of Dill Tommy's baby brother and Kimmy Chucky stepsister during two of the three rug RP movies yep you heard that right three movies a Trilogy of toddlers taking the World by a storm if you weren't around in the 1990s it's hard to describe what a massive cultural phenomenon Rugrats was for Nickelodeon it was absolutely everywhere for a modern example I compare it to being as heavily marketed as Frozen is now everything from holiday specials figures dolls party supplies school supplies even mac and cheese with baby-shaped noodles hell the soundtrack to the first movie has no doubt and Buster Rhymes in it which char a 19 on the Billboard Hot 100 Rugrats were everywhere and more importantly we're launching classy chupo into meteor success the crazy part is that Rugrats wasn't even their only Nick Tunes in those early days with ah real Monsters launching in 1994 if a slice of life story about babies isn't your thing there's always creepy monsters terrorizing New York City with armpit hair and giant lips jumping out of the toilet you know something for everyone the show was popular enough for Four Seasons running from October 1994 to November 1997 but with massive success comes the opportunity for massive missteps and oh boy did the success of Rugrats create a lot of missteps I previously covered some of this information and the what Rune Rugrats F but it's important context for this topic so Arlene and Gabor were the namesakes behind the company and both were integral to their branding it seems like it was just the two of them behind Rugrats as a series and Nickelodeon went out of their way to make you think that but no there was a mysterious third collaborator who I would argue was just as responsible for not just the success of the show but in giving it its voice and that person is Paul Germain Paul was brought on as a writer for the initial 65 episode run for Rugrats and felt that they could be doing more to give of the character's depth and personality while rewatching a few episodes of the show before writing this review I actually found myself appreciating the quality of the scripts and the humor even more as an adult like there's some really good uh mature humor in this show sure I loved the imaginative scenarios of the kids experiencing the world in their own naive way but mostly I was blown away at how well a lot of the humor has aged especially from the early Seasons like how can you not think of this meme when you're completely exhausted late at night St what are you doing making chocolate pudding it's 4:00 in the morning why on Earth are you making chocolate pudding because I've lost control of my life here's your pudding Angelica oh that's okay Uncle steu I'm not hungry anymore Paul also believed that opposition more importantly bullying was such a critical part of childhood that they'd be doing their audience a disservice by not addressing it so he came up with a character of Angelica who is based on his own childhood boldly growing up but this caused some friction with arleene who found Angelica to be too mean-spirited for the kind and sweet show she wanted to make she also found that Germaine and the other writers wanted to make the babies too grown up as in she did not like seeing them in situations that she found too unbelievable which is kind of like hilarious because isn't that like the whole point of the show yeah I uh I don't agree with you there Arlene I don't know how many of you guys have been around real babies before but uh they're pretty boring they they don't make for compelling television fight fight fight baby fights anyway these disagreements would apparently get really tense eyes would turn to Gabor who was expected to play mediator and make sure things stay civil now if you read any interviews with Gabor where he talks about the creative process he often mentions the importance of nailing down the script here's a stamp it from an interview with hype and Hyper with Gabor discussing it during his time working on The Simpsons quote during the production of The Simpsons we learned how important a quality script is showing the layers of our characters to capture the audience and providing little Snippets that would make them feel included in the story We Thrive to come up with characters and story lines that would also interest us as adults sitting in armchair in front of our TVs our goal has always been to create intriguing characters Rich story lines humor and emotional connection you can use the latest most interesting design elements in your work but what's the point if it doesn't have a soul end quote so a probably surprising no one Gabor tended to sign with Paul Germain and his other writers over Arlene most of the times and one major roadblock that drove them apart was Tommy's cousin Angelica she was more than than just a spoiled brat as reported in a New Yorker article by writer Mimi Schwarz Angelica was an incredibly contentious character in The Writer's room with a lot of arguments stemming over how to handle her in the series Arlene was insistent that she was too mean and cruel with her nasty Behavior being played for Laughs Angelica represented an obvious sore spot within the show that she had no interest in expanding on however Paul argue getting into her backstory and establishing the depth of her behavior was necessary he claimed that she was the result of emotional neglect by her self-absorbed parents Drew and Charlotte who gave her everything except for their attention even with Gabor taking his side though Paul and the other writers would eventually leave the show now we'll never know the exact specifics of what went down as things got so bad it ended up in a court settlement but Rugrats would continue on though albe it in a lesser form than it was in when Germaine was on board or at least so in the eyes of a lot of fans despite all this chaos though Rugrat really exploded in popularity after it hit syndication in 1994 there were no new episodes airing so the network was relying on reruns but those episodes consistently reached some incredible highs for Nickelodeon at its peak Rugrats was hitting 26 million viewers a week for contrast that's roughly a qu of the views the Super Bowl received in 2023 so yeah we're talking a certified hit it's also important to note that Gabor and Arlene ultimately ended their marriage divorcing in 1995 but to their credit they still continued to work together for many years to come after the huge boost and ratings for the show they went right back to work on new Rugrats episodes in 1996 the two of them seemed very uninterested in airing their dirty laundry to the world which is honest ly Fair however in an interview with the New York Post leading up to the release of Rugrats in Paris and rocket power both arene and Gore eventually opened up slightly about the situation they admitted that their relationship actually became a lot easier because they were no longer bringing their baggage from work back home not wanting to reveal too much Arlene stated quote we basically share the same vision creatively I think we trust each other we have good reason to stay together as partners and I bet if you really looked in the world it's not that unusual where people like us do manage to work together it's not that hard taking this kind of mature and diplomatic approach is important especially as they had two young children together and almost certainly wanted to keep things private to avoid public scrutiny I mean let's be honest in an age of family YouTubers over sharing everything to strangers online this kind of restraint is incredible to see espe especially in the early 2000s gor continues saying quote we're very good friends we share children and we respect each other people are always trying to dig up dirt but there's really nothing to hide we have a very good friendly relationship that's what everyone should know frankly I think this is an excellent way of approaching conflict too working with a close friend or a loved one can be a really positive experience because you have an understanding of how they think and their best strengths as a worker but there's a delicate balance to it boundaries and communication are critical because it can get a lot more stressful with that lingering emotional component along with expectations from a larger company innocuous criticisms can feel like personal attacks if you're not careful it takes both mutual respect and honesty from both sides to make things easier to deal with now I'm glad they were able to work things out even if they couldn't be together anymore it's genuinely really refreshing so massive props to them for figuring it out so Rugrats reigned Supreme and Nickelodeon during the early 99s but what about classy chupo as a company what else were they involved with outside of that honestly quite a lot they've never been short on work creating commercials for over 120 different companies over the years now I had not realized this at the time but they were also involved in a ton of different smaller projects promotional bumpers music videos and even TV show intros like the original 21 Jump Street series and my personal favorite of theirs In Living Color I swear this theme song is still such a Bop and I distinctly remember watching the reruns on Comedy Central back in the day God I'm old but independent of that clasy chubo is also trying to explore the world of adult animation with the widespread appeal of The Simpsons showing a clear demand for more programming they decided to team up with independent cartoon tunist everick pek he wanted to bring his One-Shot Comic character Duckman to the small screen and enlisted clasy chupo to help produce and animate the show portrayed by Jason Alexander AKA George castanza from Seinfeld the premise follows a foul mouth perverted duck working as a private detective and living with his extended family in Los Angeles with a slew of memorable and bizarre Side characters Duckman quickly gained a cult following and and ultimately had four seasons airing from March 5th 1994 until September 6th 1997 with a jokey Cliffhanger ending fans still looking for more content could check out the pointand click adventure game that came out in May 1997 because yes that was a trend that happened with movies and TV shows in the 1990s nowadays you just get Candy Crush knockoffs is it better though was this was this a better thing to have before nah it wasn't but it's definitely cheaper and that is what matters the most these days surprisingly a Duckman was the most successful Venture classy chipo had outside of Children's Entertainment eventually earning three nominations at The Prime Time Emy they had tried to Branch out developing two short series geared more towards adults but both of them were incredibly short-lived and poorly received by critics Santo bagito was a TexMex themed show about bugs living in a Border Town that had one season airing on CBS from September 1995 to August 1996 across the pond they developed stressed Eric for BBC 2 with Creator Carl Goram but were only involved in the first season later being replaced by Vargas Studio based in Budapest Hungary H what a Twist being swapped from one partly Hungarian Studio to another it might not be a foul play but it is pretty coincidental then there's a 1996 jamanji animated series based on the class classic children's book and the 1995 liveaction children's film starring Robin Williams huh well how about that classic chupo actually had nothing to do with this show what how is that possible just look at it we're classy chupo core here so initially I wanted to get my conspiracy board out for this one hoping there was some widespread theories about what went down or or corporate meddling from the top but no it has a straightforward boring answer which is substantially less fun it's mostly the Mandela effect with some standard animation industry networking junk thrown in despite the look of the show clasy chupo was not involved with its creation but one of their former collaborators was Everett peek the same cartoonist behind Duckman was hired as a character designer for four animated TV series for Sony pictures under their newly formed Animation Studio Adela Productions most of these projects were short-lived but seemed to be shows geared more toward subjects boys would be interested in jamong extreme Ghostbusters Men In Black the animated series and Godzilla the series there's some cool ass monsters in that show also the intro for uh men and black one of the hardest ever I love that intro now Jam's visual style definitely seems to be the most upfront about looking like a nod to classy chupo but again this was just one straight up coincidence but one project that I truly wish was a terrible mistake was an animated minseries commission by the world's biggest fast food giant The Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald I'll buckle up during a brief and ill-advised decision to expand on the characters of McDonald Land clasy chupo was commissioned to make a six part animated miniseries to be sold as individual VHS tapes at local McDonald's restaurants they were released between early October 1998 to late January 2003 priced at $3.50 per tape what a bargain now I'm planning on doing a deep dive video involving this bizarre Series in the near future but I wanted to make sure I included it too so I didn't leave anything out I got to be thorough uh so keep an eye out for that one as we'll be getting into topics including but not limited to the development recycling music from Ro R to save money the Hamburglar getting a Tumblr sexy men makeover Ronald's sizable dump truck ass and the absolutely terrifying animatronic puppets from the tape intros you've been warned now I see where William Afton got his influence it's not Jackie cheese it's that that dog right there so with all of these other projects in mind their best and most loyal client was unsurprisingly Nickelodeon For Better or For Worse at least that was how things seemed for a while what started off as a highly symbiotic relationship was growing stale and unexciting and it's not like clasy chupo wasn't trying to make a wide variety of shows for Nickelodeon on the contrary they definitely were between the late '90s and early 2000s clasy chupo started embracing the tween generation they had three distinct series that all Incorporated the same kind of Slice of Life Dynamic but for different audiences we have the Wild Thornberries an educational Adventure Show following the life of 12-year-old Eliza Thornberry and her family as they travel around the world producing Nature Documentaries I I actually watched the premiere of this when I was a kid along with cousin sker I will never forget that night it was it was something secretly Eliza can talk to animals and uses her powers to help protect the local ecosystem in a number of exotic locations like I really appreciate their dedication to showing off a wide variety of animals that kids may not otherwise have any exposure to Also let's just give it up you know I'm going to clap right now uh let's give it up for the man himself the legend Thornberry Maran you know just just for being himself a voed by Tim Curry no less what a legendary Dynamic nobody threatens a Thornberry what a what a design look at this guy's nose the the most British character who ever lived marvelous the great giant elephant but if that is not your speed then get ready for rocket power bum bum bum bum bum bum shoes uh rocket power was an action comedy show following the lives of Otto Reggie twister and Squid four friends living in Southern California and their adventures dabbling in extreme sports and eating uh microwavable burritos at the gas station originally broadcast from August 16th 1999 to July 30th 2004 it is a very youth oriented show designed for the sporty crowd who were all into latest trends and fads of the early 2000s BMX bikes inline skating street hockey razor scooters you know that sort of thing they also really leaned into the kids using a ton of slang that feels super dated by today's standards with words like chuie and dank but then again today's standards are like you know Ohio and and Riz and uh on God I maybe we're all old it's all a passing thing whether it be shoes or or on God you know I can't complain that much I got to say the way they say shoes in that show it almost feels like a slur you've been invaded by shoes and last but not least we have my personal favorite from this era As Told by Ginger broadcast from October 25th 2000 to November 14th 2006 the story follows Ginger foutley and her friends as they navigate The Perils of junior high social issues clicks family problems Etc rewatching this show now it's kind of remarkable how seriously they treat the characters and their individual arcs personally I see it as the sister show to Craig Bartlett's Hey Arnold which also put a ton of attention into exploring what makes their characters tick you got a rich popular girl who's not a mean-spirited stereotype and takes an act of interest in the lead protagonist wow uh look there she is it's Courtney it can be done and it's in the show one of the most notable features of As Told by Ginger is the characters progressing from one school year to the next so viewers can literally age along with them every season right down to changing clothes every episode I don't think I've ever seen another show give their cast so many outfit options it's a ton of extra work to put in as most cartoon characters are shown wearing the same clothes to cut down on expenses but it makes their world feel so lived in like they're real people with changing taste and styles each series had their own fan base faes some being more outspoken than others but none of them got to the same levels that Rugrats did without intending to glassy chupo had pigeon hold themselves into one style of entertainment public perception LED fans to believe that any media classy chupo was behind was going to be geared towards children so I think that really impacted their ability to Branch out to new audiences not to mention the executives and Nick getting tired of classy chupo visual Style for character designs while it's definitely iconic they've gotten a fair amount of criticism in the past for their character designs being divisive sometimes they've been called downright ugly I couldn't tell you why Eliza has a peanut-shaped head or why bernes from Duckman is so dummy thick but their Silhouettes are still very memorable and yeah they're not going to be everybody's cup of tea it's a visual style that definitely takes them getting used to but I think it also carries on the same grungy aesthetic that felt so distinct to the 1990s like you don't see this stuff anymore by the early 2000s a lot of the most popular shows on Cartoon Network Nickelodeon's biggest rival also leaned into distinctive Styles Johnny Bravo The Powerpuff Girls duxter lab and Samurai Jack all Ed cleaner extra thick lines for their characters it was a bold but familiar throwback to to animation in the ' 50s and 60s like at UPA and Hannah Barbara these outlines looked especially good when used with digital animation they were also easier to draw and help the colors pop separate from the background now this trend has only gotten more popular but subsequently made classy Cha's visual stand out for all the wrong reasons unfortunately for them change was around the corner and it would bring the eventual downfall of this once Mighty Studio that was my bike I earned it with my paper root it was still usable I only bet the handlebars a little and that was on account of what you did to my skateboard skateboard skatebo as we moved into the 2000s this is when classy Chupa would really start to begin winding down but not before taking one final stand to see if Tommy and the crew could still be the hits they originally were by 2001 Rugrats had begun to wne in popularity in 1999 a certain yellow sponge had come along completely taking Nickelodeon's Audience by storm and very much so changed the hierarchy in terms of popularity for the network hell even Jimmy Neutron was outranking Rugrats in the ratings but still Rugrats was a valuable IP for Nickelodeon and clasy chupo had delivered their fair share of hits for the network up to that point so in 2001 Nickelodeon decided to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Rugrats by producing the TV special Rugrats all growed up side note but um all growed up is the name of the special and all grownup is the name of the series spin-off is it brand consistent sure but it's also confusing and kind of lazy yeah it's it's lazy anyway the special would start with our usual cast of characters watching a sci-fi movie about a time machine and attempting to Jerry rig their own out of a karaoke machine it seemingly works as the story jumps 10 years in the future where we see the characters dealing with typical pre-team problems like having crushes and getting grounded the special was a massive hit like by the way I I was waiting for this special as a kid it was so incredibly hyped everybody wanted to see it this was a global event at least to me and my friends Nickelodeon aggressively marketed the crap out of it touting the Special as a can't miss event in the leadup to the release they even put out a two VHS set as the 10 best episodes as voted on by fans calling it The Decade and diaper set hell one of my writers on this piece remembers having to be out of town the night it was airing and begging and pleading with his grandfather to tape it for him because Nickelodeon was pushing it as this onetime thing so much that he was scared he'd never get the chance to see it again again if you missed it now that is what I call effective marketing all growed up was a massive rating success for Nickelodeon premiering in the coveted post Kids Choice Awards time slot all growed up with a mass 12 million viewers Nickelodeon's president at the time herbs canel declared it was a network Super Bowl what was supposed to be a onetime thing was very quickly ordered to become a full series the very next day and yeah that makes sense a lot of the kids who were babies or toddlers when Rugrats first aired had outgrown the show but weren't so old that they completely forgotten about it the chance to see the same characters age with them is such a rarity in cartoons that it's no wonder the special did so well and Nickelodeon wanted more of it bringing classy chupo back into their good graces all grown up which is what the series would eventually be called went into production almost immediately and premiered on April 12th 2003 at first all grownup was a massive hit for Nickelodeon bringing in big ratings for the network to separate it from Rugrats all Grown Up would ditch the two 11 minute stories format and instead focus on one 22-minute long narrative this change gave the characters new conflicts and personalities rooms to breathe and develop the show would also go through slight aesthetic changes over time as well in order to age with the audience being mindful of their character's original Legacy clasy chupo wanted to avoid any issues that were too serious for all grown up instead stating that their other show As Told by Ginger would be their outlet for those types of stories as a result Ginger is 100% the better show as the characters are afforded a lot more depth and conflict seriously try rewatching it now I'm genuinely blown away at how well it handles interpersonal conflict and real problems teenagers phase in contrast all grown up is growing up in Aesthetics only and often times feels scared to do anything real with its characters the title itself remained just a marketing gimmick all frosting no cake all grown up would end up taking a massive ratings hit over its five season run though and it appears to have run into some production problems as well now there is no official source for this but in doing research I fell down a rabbit hole of Reddit thread where people discuss what went wrong with the show and brought up that after season 3 Nickelodeon released the show in a strange way there would be a stretch of episodes released normally followed by weeks sometime month-long gaps or large batches of episodes would drop all at once followed by more silence hey check it out all grownup technically did the Steven bomb before Steven Universe for instance the show would lose its prime time slot and instead be shoved tooo early in the mornings on on Saturdays we're talking like 6:30 in the morning early what kid is even up by that time in fact Nickelodeon held on to the final 17 episodes and just sort of unceremoniously dropped them between 2007 and 8 during this no man's land time slot now like I said earlier in the video Arlene and Gabor are not the types to air their dirty laundry to the public so we'll never fully know what happened with all grownup but it is obvious that something behind the scenes whether it was the network meddling or an issue within classy chupo itself had a profound effect on the show's success or lack thereof while it's hard to nail down an official timeline what we can somewhat pieced together may even imply that arleene and Gabor were gone while the show was still technically in production either way the once Mighty diaper Titan would limp its way to the finish line by 2008 Nickelodeon had changed in a lot of ways they were growing up and evolving more than the Rugrats characters were the shows that built it had ended the types of shows It produced changed wildly and the executives who originally decided to work with clasy chupo were gone as well with their exit it seems like loyalties were also absent the executives at Nickelodean decided to end their long-standing development deal that they had with the studio this would end up being a massive blow to the studio Nick was very much their ever reliable Golden Goose investor but hey nothing lasts forever clasy Chupa would try their hand at a few things over the years but none of them would seem to click the way their Nickelodeon work did there was a web comic about a skateboarding zombie named Ali that never went anywhere there was also an attempt at a web series starring their logo character Splat but like who wants a show about that you know cool logo but uh but it uh does not exactly scream compelling character here in 2015 Nickelodeon announced that it would begin experimenting with some of its older and dormant IP including Rugrats at a Comic Con in 2016 Arlene said she would be interested in working on a reboot so long as Gabor and Paul Germaine were involved as well huh wow she really changed her tune on that one huh now as I'm sure you figured out by now the this would all lead the way to the Rugrats 2021 CGI reboot what's notable about this reboot is that the classy chupo logo does appear on it seemingly implying that the studio is back Arlene Gabor and Paul are all listed as executive producers on it however it's hard to tell just how involved they actually are after all Gabor has quoted the same hype and Hyper interview mentioned earlier brings up that he's not too keen on the look of the show and he does not seem like the type to give in on something like that it's also not uncommon for showrunners to have contracts that guarantee them executive production credits on other projects that involve worlds and characters they've created despite having no involvement Beyond getting paid which is a you know Fair go get that bag folks get that paycheck in my research I kept trying to find anything I could to pinpoint their involvement but really the only things I could find were from everyone else involved in the uction besides them according to this Variety article written by Amber Dowling it sounds like most of the show's assets and Designs are handled in-house at Nickelodeon with the animation being outsourced to an Indian Studio Technicolor this leads me to think that Arlene Gabor and Paul are likely almost entirely hands off but still why slap the logo of a dead or at best dormant company on your new show unless they were actually still around in some way uh I guess we'll have to wait and see on that one so in conclusion I think if we needed to boil down what ruin class kupo it involves a combination of factors number one being our main creative Force Arlene and Gabor now I want to be upfront that I really admire their relationship and how even in the face of their marriage falling apart they remain kind to each other for the sake of their friendship business and kids but it is apparent that the patients they afforded each other did not always extend to their staff it's hard to look at how Gabor acted when it came to the Simpsons incident Arlene's conflict with Paul or the muddy history of all grown up and not come to the conclusion that they maybe weren't the easiest people to work with you can get away with that for a while but it is one of those things that can continue to chip away at people over time the other reason is in an ironic sense Nickelodeon now what I mean by that is I think they likely put tooo much of their stock into Nick after the run on The Simpsons six of their nine Network television shows all aired on Nickelodeon they had a pretty lucrative production deal with them that basically kept the lights on but I think in tying themselves so closely to Nickelodeon it would go on to Define them as a studio that exclusively worked with Nickelodeon so much so that when Nick Executives would eventually get bored of them I'd imagine it became hard to find other Studios that wanted to take them on their main benefactor was also a major downfall to their image you don't put all your eggs in one basket because sometimes that basket discovers your eggs aren't selling as well and it wants to hold a greater variety of different looking eggs you know some that look like sponges baskets are weird like that I guess and listen I get it animation production is an incredibly hard and competitive field when a Lifeline comes along and says not only can we make you sustainable but also profitable anybody's first inclination would be to get on board as fast as you can and ride that sucker out as long as you can but I have to wonder if maybe they had spread themselves further across other networks over the years we'd still be talking about them in a more active sense today rather than trying to figure out if they're alive or dead obviously their rise would have taken longer with that route hell it very well could have just not worked out for them but it's hard not to wonder what if and the final reason for the fall of clasy chupo well it's all grown up all grownup had a lot of weight on its shoulders their predecessor had gone from a Titan of cartoons to being constantly outranked by other shows on the network then in a totally unexpected twist of fate its TV special became quite possibly the biggest thing the channel had ever aired to that point when the full series was ordered the pressure would be imposs possible to live up to even if it had been good but unfortunately all grownup would go on to really disappoint fans leading to declining ratings which of course resulted in all the stuff we talked about earlier in the video all grown up just played things way too safe and sanitized isolating the group of kids who are most excited for it who then moved on to other things that were speaking to them on a deeper level I guess you could say the kids who once called Rugrats their friends head H all grown up independent of the Paramount plus reboots clasy chupo still seems to be a mostly dormant company with no other announced projects on the horizon as of writing this since leaving Nickelodeon they've tried to Branch out into other Ventures outside of family entertainment including one adult oriented film called immigrants I've watched it it's not that good it's the most recent feature film released by clasy chupo as a production company but also has a very troubled past the story follows two friends yosa and Vlad sharing an apartment in LA and trying to pursue the American dream as Eastern European transplants it was supposed to be a series intended for Spike TV but was never aired after they lost their contract with Viacom the parent company of Spike and Nickelodeon the film was eventually released on DVD in 2008 in Hungary with the English dub readily available on YouTube if you want to check it out after that goodby eventually pivoted into film Direction working on a number of domestic and Hungarian films including the secret of moonacre papa pia and the Bridge to Terabithia arleene seems to have some upcoming writing work related to The Rugrats reboot but there are no real specifics just yet it just sucks that things for classy chupo have more or less ended in a whimper but hey it's not like that kind of growth could last forever and they achieve the level of success in a production company would dream of before bowing out clasy chupo provided a wide variety of smartly written funny and entertaining shows with a signature style they could call their own and to me that is a definite win plus I'm sure the merchandising money helps to Dole the pain oh Tommy Pickles toy please give me money now I still love rewatching old episodes of Rugrats As Told by Ginger and Duckman to Marvel at how one small company could earn so much success I hope that whatever creative projects Arlene and Gabor are pursuing now are providing the same quality of entertainment I grew up with Nickelodeon would never have been the same network without their influence and I'm glad to know that folks still have so many fun memories of these classic shows to this day so I raised my bottle to clasy chupo and may Stu never have to make another chocolate pudding for the rest of his life I'm not going out at 3:00 in the morning to buy your chocolate pudding and that's final hey folks I just want to thank you all for making it to the end of this video if you'd like subscribe to the channel like or dislike this video and leave a comment it really helps and for this week's Indie Spotlight I'm giving a shout out to listrat Hugo's mind Palace it gives me Steven Universe and OK KO Vibes cute cast like the designs go check it out it's up on YouTube link is in the description down below thank you all for watching and I'll see you all next [Music] time [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: Saberspark

Views: 498,435

Keywords: saberspark, saber, animation, nickelodeon, klasky csupo, rugrats, as told by ginger, rocket power, video essay, 1990s, 2000s, downfall

Id: r29eiujhA3g

Length: 48min 36sec (2916 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 28 2024