NOTICE: Disney has cancelled this show! This is confirmed here.
American Dragon: Jake Long is one of the best Disney Television Animation projects in this decade. With a new crew, this show has evolved into one of the better series on Disney Channel. Jake Long, a skateboarding teenager who has the ability to morph into a fire-breathing dragon, is the magical protector from New York City. Now, Jake is the one, who has to be protected from an old unwritten policy.
Although Jake has plenty of fans, his show has been cancelled. The only way that American Dragon: Jake Long will get a third season is if the fans make it happen. We have maybe year and a half before it his becomes impractable to bring it back. The show still has potential that needs to be exploited. Given the amazing success of the Save Kim Possible Campaign has made, this movement has a significant chance of success if we start now.
At this time, Walt Disney offers a video game based on the series. Also, episodes of the series are offer on iTunes. However, no DVDs are offered at this time. You can support our movement by buying products through our affiliate program here. If you have ideas you'd like to share with the SDS community then visit the SDS forum. If you have ideas specific to saving the AmDrag visit our Yahoo Group.
For the first time in ages, Disney Channel suffered a ratings decrease.
Hannah Montana’s ratings are down ever sense Miley’s Vanity Fair photos. The original Suite Life series is ending. KP and ADJL are over. And the only new show getting any decent promotion is Phineas and Ferb. And I doubt few would disagree with the statement that Camp Rock was no High School Musical.
My hope is that now Disney realizes that they cannot endlessly manufacture hits. At some point the fans really will begin to walk away in noticeable amounts.
Disney Channel lacked stability in Second Quarter of this year, with an uneven stream of weekly performances throughout much of the Quarter. Although select growth could be found following the launch of key episode premieres or following various television specials, Disney Channel saw a plethora of audience losses, with demographic losses in each month of analysis. April saw a decline with Kids 6-11 of roughly -08%, recorded through the Total Program Day, which although much, was the children’s channel’s smallest decline of the Quarter.
The Tweens 9-14 audience showed a consistent decline (Total Program Day), throughout April 2008 for the Disney Channel. Although the cartoon and live-action kid sitcom network has previously helped guide the tween audience, in a year-to-year comparison, the Tweens 9-14 demographic dropped -11% (down to 375,000) on average for this month.
Moving on to the month of May, Disney Channel, with Kids 6-11, similarly declined another -08% (Total Program Day). May 2008 was a difficult month on some level for almost all kids cable networks, but Disney Channel, for its loss, showed modest growth in Total Program Day with Kids 2-11 as the weeks continued; and likewise, in Primetime, Kids 6-11 viewers grew from week to week, if not every so slightly, while other kid networks showed a decline viewers at least one week in said month.
Disney Channel’s June saw double-digit declines in every notable kids demographic. The network saw a decline with the Kids 2-11 audience, when compared to the previous year, of -10% (TPD) and -14% (Primetime), and a similar drop in viewer delivery of -11% (TPD) and -15% (Primetime) with Kids 6-11. From a larger perspective, Disney Channel lost more viewers in Primetime than throughout the entire day of programming, in each demographic. The largest of such losses, in June 2008, were with Tweens. Tweens 9-14 viewership decreased -16% (TPD) and down another -21% (Primetime).
Regardless of Disney Channel’s multi-media dominance among all kid’s entertainment channels due to household reach — Disney Channel averaged a 1.55 Primetime rating in June as based on total U.S. household projection — Second Quarter 2008 saw a decrease of -09% (K6-11, TPD) overall. One key highlight though, specific to the network’s animated programming, was an episode of Phineas and Ferb in Q2 2008, which pulled in a commendable 1.29 million Kids 6-11.
Disney to target boys with rebranded cable channel
The entertainment giant plans to relaunch Toon Disney as Disney XD, which will be aimed at boys ages 6 to 14.
Someday, Disney hopes its princes will come.
The entertainment giant, which has made billions catering to the princess fantasies of young girls, plans to relaunch Toon Disney as Disney XD, a cable channel that will target boys. The move, under wraps for more than a year, is an attempt by the company to capture a market that has long eluded it.
Starting in February, Disney XD will seek to become to young dudes what Disney Channel, with its lineup of tweeny bopper programs such as “High School Musical,” “Hannah Montana” and “Camp Rock” is to girls. Disney XD, aiming at boys ages 6 to 14, will offer original action-adventure and comedy series, movies, animation and sports-themed shows developed with Walt Disney Co.-owned ESPN.
“What was clear to me, and clear to us, is we had a huge opportunity to create content that were boys’ favorites,” said Rich Ross, president of Disney Channels Worldwide.
Tween boys, ages 9 to 14, account for about $50 billion in spending worldwide, said Greg Kahn, senior vice president of strategic insights for media buying firm Optimedia International USA Inc. Advertisers are eager to reach these young consumers, not just snag a portion of their disposable income, but to build a loyalty they hope will extend into even more free-spending teen years, he said.
But the Disney Channel has struggled for years to find the right programming formula to lure boys, who tend to gravitate to Viacom’s Nickelodeon and Time Warner’s Cartoon Network — that is, when they’re not spending time playing video games. Disney Channel’s popular live-action shows, from its early tween phenomenon, “Lizzie McGuire,” through its current pop-culture sensation, “Hannah Montana,” mainly attract girls.
Efforts to bring in more boys, through male-led series such as “Even Stevens” or “The Suite Life of Zack and Cody,” still haven’t succeeded enough to close the gender gap between female and male viewers.
Animation, traditionally a draw for boys, has been a struggle for Disney Channel, although its newest series, “Phineas and Ferb,” appears to be building a strong male following.
But so far, the network has failed to produce a blockbuster to compete with Nickelodeon’s “SpongeBob SquarePants;” or match the guy-centric focus of Cartoon Network, which one ad buyer described as the ESPN of animation.
“You’re fighting the brand perception, the very, very strong brand equity that’s been in the marketplace for many, many years,” Kahn said of Disney Channel. “It would almost require a completely separate effort to reach tween boys, with a completely different name somehow associated with the Disney property, to reach these tween males.”
None of this is news to Ross, who, with his executive team, spent more than a year with focus groups pondering the eternal verities: “What do boys want?”
The answer, perhaps not surprisingly, is that boys want it all. “What we heard, loud and clear, is they expect from Disney this broad array,” Ross said, with programs running the gamut from animation to action-adventure to comedy. “They expect from Disney the whole thing, including movies.” In short, tween boys are looking for more than a show or two wedged in the midst of the musical theater-inspired programs that have come to define Disney Channel. They want, Disney says, a channel they can call their own.
“They want a place, essentially a headquarters for them where their favorite content exists, that has this broad array of shapes and sizes and tenors and complexities, and treats them with the respect that Disney Channel treats all kids, and the girls are fanatical about,” Ross said.
Instead of tinkering with what works — Disney Channel, which has spawned two billion-dollar creative franchises in High School Musical and Hannah — Ross relaunched a struggling cable asset, Toon Disney, into this destination for boys.
Toon Disney pulls only 10% to 15% of the viewers of Disney Channel, despite the cable network’s reach into nearly 70 million U.S. households. The Nielsen ratings reflect its hodgepodge lineup of geriatric kids shows, such as as “Power Rangers Jungle Fury” and recycled animated offerings such as “Batman: The Animated Series,” and “Jackie Chan Adventures,” and movies.
As the rebranded Disney XD, the ad-supported cable network will boast original series, such as “Aaron Stone,” a live-action show about a video game virtuoso who leads a secret double life as a crime fighter. The show boils down to a male fantasy version of “Hannah Montana,” in which an ordinary teen leads a double life as a rock star.
Former “The Wonder Years” child star Fred Savage directed the pilot for “Mongoose & Luther,” a mock documentary series about two best friends who set out to become the world’s greatest skateboarders.
The project was created by Matt Dearborn and Tom Burkhard, who worked on Disney Channel’s “Even Stevens.”
Established animated series, from “Phineas and Ferb,” to “Batman: The Animated Series,” will air on Disney XD alongside new offerings, such as RoboDz, a short-form series developed in partnership with Toei Animation Co. of Japan, in which robotic life forms defend Earth from space invaders. Plans for an online presence and mobile offerings are also in the works.
“We know we have a huge opportunity to take that asset and make it every bit as powerful as Disney Channel or Playhouse Disney,” Ross said.
dawn.chmielewski @latimes.com
Now, In one aspect, this is brilliant. DC does have a predominately female audience, and to relaunch TD as this new channel could be a brilliant business decision. So as a shareholder, I must salute Rich Ross.
On the other hand, my initial reaction would be to hit Ross with a 2 by 4. I don’t watch Toon Disney for three reasons. 1) It requires using the digital cable box, and that only works with one TV in the house and not with my TiVo. 2) I cannot obtain a reliable schedule guide for that channel, so I never know what’s on. 3) Most of what I would want to watch (KP & ADJL) I can just watch on DC.
Honestly, I think what they should have done is not turn DC so blatantly female biased. In the article they make the point:”Animation, traditionally a draw for boys, has been a struggle for Disney Channel,” And I was freakin’ screaming “KIM POSSIBLE. IDIOTS.”
They had a chance with KP to court the male fans and the female fans. They chose to make everything pink and marginalize the male fans. They had a chance, and they lost it. And now, they’re taking out KP’s future with the end of Toon Disney.
And even worse, by making a new “DC for Boys” they’re gonna be intentionally writing off all males from DC and all females from the new channel. Further narrowing the audience for both channels.
Disney is supposed to be family entertainment - programing for EVERYONE. And further narrowing the demographic targets is not the Disney way.
Walt Disney Co.’s (DIS) fiscal third-quarter net income 9% as growth in its media networks and theme-park operations more than offset a decline in studio entertainment.
In the quarter ended June 28, the media and entertainment giant reported net income of $1.28 billion, or 66 cents a share, compared with $1.18 billion, or 57 cents a share, a year earlier. Unusual items added 4 cents a share to the latest quarter’s earnings.
Revenue climbed 2% to $9.24 billion.
The breakdown per division was:
Media Networks Oper Rev $4.12B Vs $3.83B
Media Networks Oper Net $1.47B Vs $1.36B
Parks And Resorts Oper Rev $3.04B Vs $2.90B
Parks And Resorts Oper Net $641M Vs $621M
Studio Entertainment Oper Rev $1.43B Vs $1.78B
Studio Entertainment Oper Net $97M Vs $190M
Consumer Pdts Oper Rev $642M Vs $537M
Consumer Pdts Oper Net $113M Vs $118M
This new WordPress powered blog replaces the old Save Disney Shows news section. Articles contained within the old data base are still available here. All new articles will be posted in this blog.
Webmaster Greg has decided to impliment this change after his experience building Disney Channel Fans. DC Fans uses a WordPress blog to manage news on the site, and to syndicate news to it’s affiliated websites. Using the same system we will now be able to syndicate news from the news section to our affiliated websites, like savekp.com, and savejakelong.com. Not only does this simply our updating system, but it allows persons following more than one campaign to see the news for all the campaigns in one place.
Also, please consider adding the RSS feed to your news aggregator.
There a Save Jake “Mini-Day” coming up on 2/7/08 (Rat Day).
What’s a “Mini-Day” you ask? Red explains it like this:
MINI-DAYS can come up on short notice. It’s close to an official day, Just do as much as you can with the time you have. And that type of stuff.
That type of stuff, indeed. There will be no mailed version of the email or paper petition for this event, so it’s more important than ever that as many people as possible call in on the 7th. Once again, the toll free number is (800) 874-1687. You may also want to consider making and mailing postcards! More information on that can be found at http://savedisneyshows.org/flyers/index.php
Save Jake Long Day #6 is both January 19th and 20th in honor of the third anniversary of Jake. Make use of this week to get your paper letters written and ready to send!
Today’s Save the Shows Rally went great. Thanks to all who showed up!
This Sunday we’re having another chat for the KP & ADJL Alliance. This show will be in the SOS chat room at 7PM Pacific, 8PM Mountain, 9PM Central, and 10PM Eastern.
The Next Save Jake Rally (Hosted by Save the shows) is Friday November 30th.
It will run from roughly 7PM - 12AM Eastern Time. That’s 6-11 Central Time, 5-10 Mountain Time, and 4-9 Pacific Time.
If You’re using a stand alone IRC client like Trillian, here’s the connection information for the chat:
Server: irc.savetheshows.com
Channel: #Savetheshows
Or you can use our online Java chat here: http://savejakelong.com/chat/index.html Just enter a nickname, click chat, and wait for the applet to load. If you receive any security warnings, just click yes or continue.
I’m very proud to announce our new screencap gallery. You can access it by clicking the “Screencaps” button in the menu to the left, or you can bookmark the url http://savejakelong.com/gallery/.
We only have Captures for six episodes so far, but as time allows I will be making and adding more.
