It was August 11th, 1991, thirty four years ago, that Nickelodeon ushered in a new era of “Creator Driven TV animation – the first new animated series made exclusively for cable television, changing the course of ‘series’ cartoons created for the tube.

‘Creator Driven’ became the buzz word at the time. This was Nickelodeon’s response to the “factory produced” look of television animation during the 70s and 80s – product primarily churned out by Saturday morning factories Hanna-Barbera, Ruby Spears, Filmation, Dic and others. ‘Creator-Driven’ essentially meant a show would be creatively designed around the visual style of a singular artist (or team) – stamped with its own unique look and feel. There was a little more to it than that – but nothing could have made the case better than those first three Nick series: Rugrats, Doug, and The Ren & Stimpy Show.

Yes there were several other creator-driven series before ‘Nicktoons’ – notably The Simpsons (which was aimed at adults, for network primetime in 1989) and perhaps the anthology Liquid Television (again, aimed at adults, on sister channel MTV) which debut just two months earlier. The concept was in the air by 1991 – but Nickelodeon firmly committed to it.

(Technically, one could call the first era of made-for-TV animation – debatably 1949-1964 – ‘creator driven’ – What with the likes of Jay Ward’s cartoons as radically different from Hanna Barbera’s beautifully original Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear – not forgetting Bob Clampett’s Beany & Cecil, or Format’s The Alvin Show; and the Hal Seeger shop in New York – good diverse stuff – all different in tone and look).

Those first three shows begat several new wave animation studios – and dozens of great (and some not-so-great) series that went beyond the borders of Nickelodeon. In due time, Cartoon Network was born, The Disney Channel eventually adopted creator driven, and the whole landscape of series animation took off (for better or worse).

My personal interactions with Nicktoons go back to the beginnings of it all. At one point I was developing animated features for the network (and Paramount), at several other points I wrote studio-sanctioned books about their history. I had the chance to interview ALL the creators of Nickelodeon shows in 2007 for the first book I did on the subject. Archive.org has the whole thing on their website – check it out here:

At the personal request of Steve Hillenberg, I wrote this history of Spongebob in 2013; The SpongeBob SquarePants Experience: A Deep Dive into the World of Bikini Bottom. In some ways – the Spongebob series is the culmination of what a Nicktoon show was supposed to be. Offbeat, kid-friendly, relatable – and wildly original. I hope the book reflects that. Check it out at archive.org or below:

Ten years ago I was commissioned to write another history for Nickelodeon, but this time is was the story of the network and all its programming. It was a big project taking a year to put together… and when it was published, the studio pulled the plug on the project. Let me repeat that: “when it was published”… it physically exists. I have a copy. Several animators and interview subjects got copies. But it never came out! I wrote about this situation, five years ago, on my other blog Animation Scoop. I see you can buy one on eBay for $1,500. – that’s not me selling mine. I’m sorry no one has scanned it for Archive.org yet.

Nickelodeon: I salute your shorts (pun intended), series and movies. In tribute today – let me open the comments section to get everyone’s opinion of the original Nicktoons or all those that followed. Like them or not – they changed the world of animation that came since – and I think we are the better for it.