gcarras — 14 years ago(January 05, 2012 08:05 PM)

I've wondered why HB still relied on UNI to do these, afer mid 1990s what with WB ENTIRELY taking over Hanna Barbera beforeUniversal stole Walt Disney's Oswald in 1927 and woulda taken over EVERY cartoon franchise LOL but then Disney finally and for keeps got the silent star [replaced by a certain Disney mouse] back a fcew years ago..Warner could have easily made this and the Flintstones Viva Rock Vegas flick, by the late 1990s, but then Josie and the Pussycats did not even originate in animaiton but in 1963 as a comic published by Archie Comics and created by Dan DeCarlo whose WIFE is named Josie [NO coincidence THERE!], so there then was no oblication by Archie Comics, Inc. folk to have HB's owner Warner Brothers to Josie [they would today].
Also, I read bac in 1996 about such a project, when the HB/WB deal hadn't yet fully been donein addition to what I have written above in the last paragraph the whole licensed [from comics] deal.
So in short, Warners couldn't have done this one, H-B or no, since:

1. there legally in would have been NO way in HECK that even if a HB movie could be freelanced out the way that Marvel COmics is, to Universal themselves, Sony, Paramount, just because of the CURRENT ownership, since the property wasn't theirs to begin with
2. The deal seems to have been in talks before the merger. Even if Universal Studios hadn't had the modern day deal [of course thye could have handled the Warners, MGM, cartoons, too, but that would be handling a competing MAJOR dsitributor's poperties].