The last few days on this blog have been focused on the 1990 Jetsons animated film, so we should move forward and look at the rest of the Jetsons productions released in the 90s. Except, there is one small problem. There weren't any Jetsons productions! Apart from commercials for Cartoon Network, Radioshack, and a few others, the futuristic family sat out the rest of the decade. But that's not to say the folks at Hanna-Barbera weren't trying to do more with the franchise. As far as I am aware, there were at least two attempts to revitalize the series, and neither quite got off the ground. So sit tight as we discuss both plans in the second part of this three-part series!
The first attempt is one few people seem to know of, and that's probably because the only time it was ever mentioned was in a newspaper interview with Janet Waldo shortly after she was recast in the animated film. In this piece, she says the following (A big thank you to Yowp for preserving this!):
"The studio told me they want to continue with some more episodes replacing the cast where they need to," says Waldo. "It wasn't necessary to replace me completely. They just wanted to."
So, as far as Waldo was aware, there was some interest at Hanna-Barbera in doing more Jetsons after the film was released. Of course, as you know, no such episodes were produced, and the reason why is short and to the point. The failure of the film, both critically and financially, likely scared the studio off of doing anything more with the characters. Had the film been the commercial hit they thought it was going to be, I have no doubt that we would have gotten more Jetsons stuff in the decade, but that's not what ended up happening. As far as I've looked, no further details exist about these new episodes, and if I had to guess, I imagine they never got passed the conception stage. That's about all there is to say on this attempt, but we still have one more to look at.
We're now going to jump ahead a few years for the second attempt to bring the Jetsons back. By this point in time, Hanna-Barbera was now under the ownership of Turner, and they were quickly bringing back many of their properties through new specials and shows. The original shows were also getting new leases on life, as the recent introduction of the Cartoon Network gave them a new home, and new generations of fans to entertain. Maybe now, the time was right to dust off the Jetsons, or so Hanna-Barbera thought in 1995, when Ed Scharlach was brought in to write a pilot for a whole new series. That name might not ring a bell, so to bring you up to speed, Scharlach is an extremely prolific TV writer whose credits date all the way back to the 1960s. He's written episodes of shows like That Girl, Happy Days, and Mork & Mindy, just to name a few. In the '90s, Scharlach began to write in animation, and has since then worked on cartoons such as Duckman, Invader ZIM, and What's New, Scooby-Doo?. A writer with experience in animation and sitcoms, Scharlach seemed like a perfect fit for revitalizing The Jetsons, and he soon got to work on a pilot script.
As detailed in an interview with A Podcast Named Scooby-Doo!, the storyline for this pilot would've involved the Jetsons replacing their robotic maid Rosie with something completely different: a human maid! According to Scharlach, this would've been treated as if it was a completely new invention to citizens of the future. Unfortunately, Elroy and Judy aren't too happy with this new maid, especially with her constant crying and complaining, and so they eventually get Rosie back. The pilot was also apparently ready to enter production according to Scharlach, so it is possible that there's more material from this project that has yet to be seen by the public. But why did this revival never come to pass? Blame the world of media mergers, my good friend.
At the same time this was being developed, Turner was merging with Time Warner. Like what happens with any merger or acquisition, old executives leave, new ones replace them, and those replacements don't always have an interest in the things their predecessors did. Clearly, the new regime following the merger didn't find the prospect of rebooting the Jetsons appealing, so it was promptly axed. The exact reasons behind the decision are sketchy, but I have two theories. For one, around the same time this show was being developed, The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest premiered on TV. Like Scharlach's Jetsons, this was a reboot of a Hanna-Barbera classic, and it was one both the studio and Turner sunk a lot of money into. Accompanied by a blitz of merchandising and marketing material, it was arguably the biggest project Hanna-Barbera took on since the Turner acquisition. In the end, however, The Real Adventures was a bonafide bomb. Neither the show nor the merchandise took off, and as the show's failure happened around the same time as this merger, they likely didn't want to sink more expenses into a similar project. I theorize that the failure of the animated Jetsons film also played a role in Warner pulling the plug. After all, if you were in the shoes of an executive, would you really want to put a bunch of money into a project based around a franchise that already didn't perform well previously?
In the end, despite two separate attempts, it seemed there wasn't much of an interest in continuing The Jetsons following the release of the theatrical movie. It's a shame neither project got a chance in the end, especially Scharlach's, which sounded like it had a lot of potential, at least in my opinion. However, I'm not done with canceled Jetsons stuff just yet! Tune in next Friday as I wrap up both this series and Jetsons June with a look at the many, many attempts to bring George and the rest of the Jetsons to the realm of live-action!
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