The Care Bears Movie - Legacy

Legacy

In the words of Jerry Beck, " box-office gross signalled to Hollywood a renewed interest in animated features, albeit for children. This is something The Secret of NIMH tried to accomplish but failed to do." A plethora of children's and family film entertainment followed in its wake, such as Sesame Street Presents Follow That Bird from Warner Bros., and a re-issue of Universal Studios' E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Atlantic Releasing joined this movement by establishing Clubhouse Pictures, which showed G-rated films during 1986. Nelvana's film helped to bring back matinee engagements to prominence across North America.

Mentioning The Care Bears Movie as "the most recent example", Charles Solomon brought up the subject of feature-length toy adaptations in an April 1985 interview on Los Angeles' KUSC-FM. He spoke to Warner Bros. animator Chuck Jones, who replied: "I feel that it's proper—after all, that's the way Alice in Wonderland was written: the dolls were all made first, then they made the picture about the dolls, right?" In July 1985 Sarah Stiansen of United Press International (UPI) called The Care Bears Movie "another licensing innovation for TCFC", following the department's previous endeavours. UPI's Vernon Scott (in 1985), and Bruce A. Austin (in his 1989 book Immediate Seating), observed how the merchandising arrived in advance of the film's release. In forthcoming years, several media adaptations based on established toy lines would follow a similar marketing tactic. Examples included films based on Hasbro's Transformers (in 1986 and 2007) and My Little Pony; features with Tonka's Gobots (Battle of the Rock Lords) and Pound Puppies (Legend of Big Paw); and a television series and feature with Hallmark's Rainbow Brite. The Care Bears Movie was parodied in "At the Movies", a 1991 episode of Nickelodeon and Klasky Csupo's animated series Rugrats. In that episode, the Pickles family goes to see The Land Without Smiles, starring the Dummi Bears (who are patterned after the Care Bears).