The most iconic Cyborg of the 1980s was originally a Japanese/French Gentleman Thief's..... DESCANDANT?

I've known about this for a long time but many of my readers might not be aware of this.

But did you know that INSPECTOR GADGET,

a Mid-1980s Cartoon Cyborg from your Bygone Millennial Childhood days of ASSEMBLY LINE-DRIVEN CARTOONS, originally was a pitch to have a more......

AMERICAN/EUROPEAN Lupin that was localized and made for the NORTH AMERICAN Market?

It's true.

There are sources that the reason why INSPECTOR GADGET even exists was because both DIC & TOKYO MOVIE SHINSHA had to recoup the costs left behind by the then abandoned LUPIN VIII project which was a planned collaboration between the two companies and actually had animation made but that project fell through due to financial disputes with the LEBLANC ESTATE.

First, let's start off with the LUPIN VIII project.

What was it about?

The thing was set in the future....

Don't know what year but it's hinted that these characters are the descendants of the original LUPIN Characters from MONKEY PUNCH's manga.

Other changes happened like for example:

LUPIN is not a thief but rather more of an Anti-Hero Detective,

Also, Violence and Blood had to be toned WAY DOWN due to STANDARDS being firmly in place by most networks,

JIGEN was not allowed to smoke,

and sexual attraction had to be kept at the strict minimums such as not showing as much skin as the anime would love to show off.

But when the LEBLANC ESTATE demanded Royalty Money that did not exist,

the project was abandoned and that's why Inspector Gadget exists.

The LUPIN character became INSPECTOR GADGET.

And Fujiko's descendant became the ever Popular PENNY...... albeit aged down due to Network standards.

And that was for the USA Market.

TMS must have been pretty annoyed about having been forced to abandon their collaboration with DIC to create an AMERICAN Series for that particular market that they had to create a new LUPIN for the JAPANESE Market.

And that gave birth to the PINK JACKET Series

I guess an abandoned project does allow the salvaging of original ideas to blossom to alternative products but rarely has it managed to branch into two.

"HE'S DEAD YOU EEDIOT!!!!"-Acting, Composition & Sound effects can really enhance a scene 01: BIG HOUSE BLUES

With the right tools used in your arsenal when it comes to making cartoons, you can take advantage of said tools to not only turn in a well made scene but some scenes which are lacking can actually be enhanced with simple SOUND SOLUTIONS as well as Layout techniques.

A Prime example is in the REN & STIMPY 1990 Pilot BIG HOUSE BLUES.

The animation is Crude and all over the place but with the right set of tools, scenes can be enhanced so that you are really getting into the story:

Which in this PILOT's case is THE TITULAR DUO needing to be adopted before something bad happens to them in the DOG POUND.

Anyway, here's an example of what additional edits can do to enhance a scene during production.

Here, REN asks a dog named JASPER about what happened to another dog named PHIL..

"Hey Jasper."

"Where's Phil?"

Jasper explains,

"I told ya. They put him...."

"to...."

"SLEEP!!"

Notice the way JASPER emphasizes his mouth movements when he says "TO SLEEP"?

Ren, not getting the context of what Jasper says, responds.....

"So, wake him up then."

But Jasper's unperturbed that Ren doesn't get what's going on.....

So....He leans forward

And says...

"You don't wake up...."

"From the....."

"BIIIIiiiigggg...."

"Sleep...."

Look at how much emphasis was put into JASPER's poses as he explains to REN what has happened to PHIL.

Ren seems content about the idea of "BIG SLEEP"....

But then Suddenly, 

*Sudden springy sounds of realization*

"THE...."

"B....."

"I"

"G"

"SL"

"EEEEEEE"

"PPPPP"

All while a Siren plays during his sudden realization.

That's how you can tell your audience that your character is SCREWED BIG TIME!!!

That and there's no need to in-between Ren's sudden realization animation as it's already effective enough to have him tell the audience what's he just realized just by snapping from one emotion to the next.

Ren repeats this FRIGHTENED MANTRA two more times...

"THE BIG SLEEP!!!!"

"THE BIG SLEEP!!!!"

Ever had realizations of your mortality to a point where your heart starts to beat faster?

And you also suddenly feel short of breath?

I've been there, but this exaggerated animation of REN's heart beating is a clear indication of what's gonna happen to our Asthma Hound Chihuahua.


STIMPY on the other hand is just as dumbfounded as the EEDIOT he is...

All while REN is crying offscreen in the background...

This tongue animation is inspired by the CATS from the Looney Tunes Cartoon

KITTY KORNERED.

REN is now reduced to a blubbering whimpering mess....

But curiosity strikes the MANX CAT.....

"What's the big sleep Ren?"

This surprises REN, as he's noticed STIMPY has just become concerned.

All while SAD violin music plays in the background....

Ren whispers to STIMPY to come closer to....

You might think that it's REN feeling pity for the dumb animal....

But then.....

"IT'S DEATH!!!!!"

"DEAD YOU EEDIOT!!!!

YOU KNOW WHAT DEAD IS!!!!!!????"

"JUST LIKE WE'LL BE IF WE DON'T GET OUT OF HERE!!!!!"

And the SAD VIOLIN has been replaced with the sound of 

AN ANGRY SWARM OF BEES....

Hey... AN ANGRY SWARM OF BEES is enough to scare the bejesus out of us so the sound of their swarm to heighten the fear of Death is plausible....

That alongside a heavy emphasis on REDs for the Backdrops.

What a way to enhance your art.....

Sound effects, Musical Queues, understanding of the meaning of what color can do for a setting, that all helps to enhance the feel of a Cartoon.

For example, here's some animation done by an old COLLEGE friend of mine:

Here, TIAGO OLIVIERA did the animation but I enhanced it with some sound effects, which made sense since I was the editor of the entire 2022 Thesis Animation.

This scene took place outside of the tower where NEKO fell from so I used the sound of the wind blowing. Man it must have been COLD that day but hey, it was early MARCH 2022 when I edited this piece so..... it's only natural.

The bone cracking sound was to make sure NEKO the Cat didn't hurt his spine.

And when NEKO tosses the diamond in the air slightly, I used the sound of the PLAYSTATION 5's PLATINUM TROPHY RETRIEVAL to show that NEKO still has the DIAMOND he stole.

This is quite important for you editors.

Pay attention to what the scene calls for before you go to your DATA LIBRARY of SOUND EFFECT whether they be in your HDDs or NAS Drives.

A WARBURTONY drawing of DOUG & a surprising connection between Disney, Nickelodeon, and Cartoon Network

The number of people who've worked on DOUG whether its within Nickelodeon or Disney is staggering.

Some are there for each era, some have worked for both eras for the entirety of all 117 episodes, 

And then there are some who are barely within the show for less than a Season or two.

One person who is of the latter is THOMAS WARBURTON.

Better known to us CARTOON NETWORK fans as MR. WARBURTON.

He's known for his famous CODENAME:KIDS NEXT DOOR Cartoon in Early 2000s CARTOON NETWORK.

Yes, I've watched this show before, as a matter of fact, It's a show I watched as a 6 year old back in 2004 when I was under the care of GREGORIA.

Anyway, it's not important for me to talk about this show now since it's not a dedicated KND post but rather it's connected to what I'm about to talk about.

The interesting thing I found out about MR. WARBURTON himself is that he was a layout artist on the first Season of NICKELDEON'S DOUG back in 1991.

Even ROGER is shocked about this Revelation.

And I have a photo of a drawing to back that up:

This is an actual drawing done by WARBURTON himself.

The inaugural 1991 Season of DOUG is a mixed bag for me due to a number of animation errors that pop up as well as the floatier animation of that Season but hey, someone's gotta start somewhere

WARBURTON however left after the first season so he never got to work on the later parts of the show during the rest of the Nickelodeon years or even the Disney years...... sort of.

While he did not work on the DISNEY version, he did work for an Internal Competitor within the network.

PEPPER-ANN, a cartoon made by Disney's first female Creator SUE ROSE of FIDO DIDO fame with MR. WARBURTON being the lead designer just because his art style was similar to ROSE's.

The funny thing is that PEPPER-ANN was originally susposed to be a NICKTOON but I guess in the aftermath of the firing of JOHN K. as well as VIACOM freezing DOUG's Budget in February 1994 which led to the SLIME FACTORY selling the series to MOUSE HOUSE in February 1996,

NICK wanted tighter CREATIVE CONTROL with their newer I.Ps so PEPPER-ANN was instead pitched to DISNEY, they accepted and allowed CREATIVE CONTROL to remain with ROSE, and the rest is history.

One thing that didn't change was MR. WARBURTON's preference to remain in NEW YORK 

This was common for people who knew they had to help with production but sometimes the production was in LOS ANGELES and some people in the art industry are hesitant or refuse to move out of their home town.

But I have a hunch late 90s DISNEY was flexible with WARBURTON to allow him to remain in NYC.

Even though COMPUTERS were advanced for TELECONFERENCING back in the late 90s,

It was still the days of DIAL-UP so nobody was using ZOOM, MICROSOFT TEAMS, or even DROPBOX back in the late 90s as those apps and services didn't exist back then.

So WARBURTON had to FAX his drawings to his employers,

often late at night due to the 4-5 hour time zone difference between NEW YORK & L.A.

I have a hunch MR. WARBURTON must have been pretty annoyed that DOUG, a former Cartoon he worked on in 1991, was with DISNEY when PEPPER-ANN premiered on September 1997......

I don't think he'll buy the whole picture on why NICK sold the show to DISNEY just because of an infamous Budget FREEZE from VIACOM and contractual loopholes.

But the funny thing is, that's Internet Logic where people on SOCIAL MEDIA are expected to discredit VIACOM's infamous 1994 budget freeze for the sake of preserving the perfect nostalgia.

But at least the people I talked to in person regarding DOUG have at least acknowledge the events that have happened since February '94.

As for MR. WARBURTON, he's since moved to LOS ANGELES since 2009 and most of his newer work is with DISNEY with MUPPETS BABIES being his most recent work.

But for me, I'll always remember MR. WARBURTON as the guy who made KND for early 2000s CARTOON NETWORK.