Cartoon Network Television Network

When 14-year-old Ashley Rosario went looking for her favorite Cartoon Network shows such as "Chowder" and "The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack" and instead found reality programs, she did what any normal teenager does these days. She made a video complaining about it and posted it on YouTube. "I'm scared for Cartoon Network," said Ashley, of Melbourne, Fla., adding that she was "outraged" by the channel's new direction and that she wasn't "the only one who feels this way." She's right.

When 14-year-old Ashley Rosario went looking for her favorite Cartoon Network shows such as "Chowder" and "The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack" and instead found reality programs, she did what any normal teenager does these days. She made a video complaining about it and posted it on YouTube. "I'm scared for Cartoon Network," said Ashley, of Melbourne, Fla., adding that she was "outraged" by the channel's new direction and that she wasn't "the only one who feels this way." She's right.

Cartoon Network has signed a worldwide licensing deal with Mattel Inc. to produce action figures, puzzles and other toys tied to its children's TV shows. Cartoon Network Enterprises, the consumer products division of the cable TV network, said the multiyear agreement covered original programming for the 6- to 11-year-old age group and the rights to produce Cartoon Network-branded products. It also gives El Segundo-based Mattel a first-look option on newly created original series and programming.

The head of Turner Broadcasting System Inc.'s Cartoon Network resigned Friday in the wake of a promotional stunt that backfired in Boston when residents and police feared that electronic devices featuring characters from one of the cable channel's shows were actually bombs.

What's up, doc? Less than two months ago, the AOL Time Warner-owned Cartoon Network kicked up controversy over its decision not to show 12 Bugs Bunny cartoons considered to be too racially and politically charged as part of an otherwise-complete Bugs Bunny marathon. Now, the cable network is preparing to show at least parts of most of these "banned Bugs" cartoons in two upcoming specials to be seen in the evening and aimed at adults.

What's up, doc? "June Bugs 2001," a 49-hour marathon of Bugs Bunny cartoons airing on the Cartoon Network. The marathon, which kicks off today and continues until midnight Sunday, will run the cartoons in chronological order, from Bugs' first appearance in 1938's "Porky's Hare Hunt" to his most recent starring vehicle, 1997's "From Hare to Eternity." These cartoons highlight the talents of such legendary Warner Bros.

When Mike Lazzo was 15, he came home from school every day, made popcorn and watched "Speed Racer." One afternoon, in the middle of some epic tussle between Speed and Racer X, his mother told him to mow the lawn. He said no. He had to finish watching the show. "And she said, 'You know, son, these cartoons are not going to do you any good when you need to go out and find a job,' " Lazzo recalls. How wrong she was.

SUDDENLY Wednesday there was an unexpected front-runner in the competition for the 57th annual nighttime Emmy Awards. The ceremonies are still a month away but the Cartoon Network already has walked off with six. The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences announced winners in three areas -- what it calls juried categories. There are no nominations or voting by the membership in these, unlike other categories; instead, peer-group juries simply pick as many winners as they deem warranted.

On the planet Muunilist, an army of Clone Troopers attacks swarms of warrior Droids; Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi tells his student Anakin Skywalker that his abilities as a pilot are not in question but his maturity is; Master Yoda concurs. It's the cosmos of "Star Wars," but the animated characters have the elegant minimalism of "Samurai Jack."

Cartoon Network and the Warner Bros. Television Group announced today a new weekday morning franchise of original and acquired television targeted for preschool children to premiere in spring 2005 on cable's Cartoon Network. The joint venture marks the companies' first major production foray into the preschool market. The franchise's primary emphasis will be on "developing, nurturing and valuing a child's sense of humor, an essential aspect of a happy, well-adjusted child."

In the many-stationed world of cable television, where every niche channel is an isolated island or remote valley, new species of programs are born, new forms emerge. When Ted Turner had the idea to recycle cartoons from the massive film and TV libraries he had acquired into a 24-hour, all-animated network, he surely could not have imagined that he was creating the soup from which would crawl Adult Swim.

Cartoon Network has signed a worldwide licensing deal with Mattel Inc. to produce action figures, puzzles and other toys tied to its children's TV shows. Cartoon Network Enterprises, the consumer products division of the cable TV network, said the multiyear agreement covered original programming for the 6- to 11-year-old age group and the rights to produce Cartoon Network-branded products. It also gives El Segundo-based Mattel a first-look option on newly created original series and programming.

It's not exactly the highest-rated show on Cartoon Network's "Adult Swim" block. It airs at such a wee hour, even its creators admit they don't stay up to watch it. And its visual style is so unusual that purists say it doesn't even qualify as animation. But "Tom Goes to the Mayor," one of the most inventive shows on a channel that prides itself on unusual late-night programming, returns for a second season late Sunday night (actually 12:30 a.m.

Cartoon Network is plenty popular with school-age children. Now it's coming for the babies. Starting at 9 this morning, the Atlanta-based network begins a two-hour morning block of cartoons for preschoolers, even children under a year old. Other children's networks already create programs for children that young, and Cartoon Network's new "Tickle U" block is aimed at improving the network's ratings on weekday mornings, when it falls behind rivals such as Nickelodeon and Disney Channel.

SUDDENLY Wednesday there was an unexpected front-runner in the competition for the 57th annual nighttime Emmy Awards. The ceremonies are still a month away but the Cartoon Network already has walked off with six. The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences announced winners in three areas -- what it calls juried categories. There are no nominations or voting by the membership in these, unlike other categories; instead, peer-group juries simply pick as many winners as they deem warranted.

America Online has enlisted the help of a super-agent to boost revenue and improve relations with other Time Warner Inc. divisions. Her name: Princess Natasha. Five years ago, the idea behind the $99-billion marriage of new and old media -- a corporate union still rued by many employees and shareholders -- was that Time Warner would create the programming and AOL would help distribute it online.

America Online has enlisted the help of a super-agent to boost revenue and improve relations with other Time Warner Inc. divisions. Her name: Princess Natasha. Five years ago, the idea behind the $99-billion marriage of new and old media -- a corporate union still rued by many employees and shareholders -- was that Time Warner would create the programming and AOL would help distribute it online.

After building one of the most successful channels in cable television, Betty Cohen is resigning as president of the Cartoon Network to oversee a secretive project focusing on young adults for Cartoon's parent company, AOL Time Warner. Cartoon Network, which is battling with Viacom's more established Nickelodeon channel for the lead in children's television, will join AOL Time Warner's other advertising-supported cable channels under the management of Bradley Siegel.

Talking meatballs and bumbling sea explorers may have made the Cartoon Network's late-night lineup a monster hit among the young and hip. But some of its popularity is owed to a trendy corps of college students enlisted to market the network's "Adult Swim" cartoons on campuses nationwide. They come from 30 campuses to the network's Atlanta headquarters each August for some cartoon-marketing training before the start of their fall semester classes.

Cartoon Network and the Warner Bros. Television Group announced today a new weekday morning franchise of original and acquired television targeted for preschool children to premiere in spring 2005 on cable's Cartoon Network. The joint venture marks the companies' first major production foray into the preschool market. The franchise's primary emphasis will be on "developing, nurturing and valuing a child's sense of humor, an essential aspect of a happy, well-adjusted child."