Sunbow Entertainment (known as Sunbow Productions until 1995) was an American animation studio and distributor, founded on June 23, 1980, and owned until May 4, 1998, by Griffin-Bacal Advertising in New York City and in the United States. Griffin-Bacal's first animations were animated commercials for Hasbro's G.I. Joe toy line. The success of the animated commercials led partners Tom Griffin and Joe Bacal to form the company. Due to their close working relationship with Hasbro, Sunbow came to be recognized as the toy giant's unofficial television arm.
Sunbow is noted for many cartoons aired during the 1980s. Most of their work was co-produced with Marvel Productions. Although it is not limited to Hasbro's various toy lines its reputation is linked to the cartoon series tied to them. Its animation was initially produced by the Japanese animation studio Toei Animation, supplemented by the South Korean animation studio AKOM later on.
By 1987, most of Hasbro's toy lines were losing money and internal struggles forced the company to end popular series such as Jem, G.I. Joe and Transformers. Two of Sunbow's animated movies, The Transformers: The Movie and My Little Pony: The Movie, flopped at the box office, forcing a third project, G.I. Joe: The Movie, to be released directly to video. It also led to end the partnership with Marvel Productions in late 1980s. Sunbow also worked with TMS Entertainment with Hasbro's Visionaries: Knights of the Magical Light.
In a bid to produce original material, Sunbow produced several cartoons through the early 1990s such as The Tick and Conan the Adventurer. Only The Tick managed to gain popularity and critical acclaim.
On May 4, 1998, Sony Wonder, a division of Sony Music, bought Sunbow Productions[2] in order to expand to more original programming for their television division. On May 1, 1999, Sunbow took over European distribution of Sony Wonder's TV IPs.[3][4]
On October 3, 2000, German-based company TV-Loonland AG purchased Sony Wonder's television business assets including Sunbow Entertainment.[5][6] In exchange for the purchase, Sony Wonder retained US distribution rights to the Sunbow catalogue. Previously, Rhino Entertainment owned the U.S. home video distribution rights to the Sunbow catalogue. The rights then changed hands to Sony Wonder with its acquisition of the catalogue.
On September 5, 2001, the company announced a co-production deal with Rumpus Toys to produce Kappa Mikey, with TV-Loonland holding worldwide and home video distribution rights.[7] On May 29, 2002, the project was picked up by Noggin for its teen-oriented programming block The N.[8] Noggin/The N signed a co-development deal for the series,[9] For unknown reasons, Sunbow and TV-Loonland would later silently pull out of the deal, with the final produced show having no involvement with the two companies.
On October 12, 2001, Sunbow announced a co-development deal with Nickelodeon to produce Skeleton Key, an animated series based on a comic book of the same name[10][11] for an initial run of 13 episodes. However, the series never materialized. On November 6, production on TV special Donner was completed (originally started in June 2001[12]), and aired as planned on December 1, on ABC Family.[13]
On April 10, 2002, the studio announced two additional projects - The Many Adventures of Johnny Mutton, and Mr Stick & Slug Boy.[14][15] Another pickup came on October 8 with a television adaptation of the book The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish in development;[15] however, none of these projects would come into fruition.
After the announcement that The Cramp Twins' second season would be produced by fellow-Loonland owned studio Telemagination on October 23, 2002,[16] Sunbow later became dormant after their existing projects were shelved, although they still remained as a company until at least 2009.[17]
On March 29, 2007, Sony Music Entertainment announced they would shut down Sony Wonder, leaving the US deal under limbo.[18] However, on June 20, 2007, it was announced that Sony Wonder had been moved into Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, which eventually it renamed as Sony Pictures Family Fun in 2015.[19][20] However, the Sunbow licenses were not included in the purchase.
On May 14, 2008, Hasbro announced that it had obtained the rights to all the Sunbow Productions animated series based on Hasbro properties for $7 million. This includes Transformers, G.I. Joe, My Little Pony, Jem and the Holograms, and many more.[21][22][23][24] These titles are currently managed as part of the Hasbro Entertainment library.
TV-Loonland filed for bankruptcy on December 9, 2009;[25] its catalogue was acquired by German distributor Made 4 Entertainment on April 5, 2011.[26] In February 2017, Belgian production company Studio 100 purchased a majority stake in m4e.[27]
Hasbro properties
Sunbow Entertainment and The N, Noggin's new network for tweens, have signed a co-development deal for the anime comedy KAPPA MIKEY.
