Johnny Bravo (series)/Season 1

The first season of Johnny Bravo premiered with a trio of shorts previously aired on World Premiere Toons (later renamed to What A Cartoon!) on July 7, 1997. New episodes began premiering on July 14, 1997, and the season ended on December 15, 1997.

Next:Second Season

History

In 1993, creator Van Partible was a student at Loyola Marymount University. He decided to pursue animation, and started work on a senior thesis short film called Mess O' Blues. Partible's animation professor, Dan McLaughlin, presented the completed short film (alongside student films by others) to Buzz Potamkin, a friend of his working at Hanna-Barbera. Soon after, Partible was asked by Ellen Cockrill, one of the heads of development at the studio, if he was interested in pitching a 7-minute cartoon based on the film for their shorts program What A Cartoon! on Cartoon Network. When Partible pitched his polished idea of Johnny Bravo, it was met with some hesitancy until Cockrill and two other women fought to get the project made. Partible produced a total of three shorts for the program from 1995 to 1997: "Johnny Bravo", "Jungle Boy in "Mr. Monkeyman"" and "Johnny Bravo and the Amazon Women". This eventually led to a full first season of Johnny Bravo being green-lit on the network. While Partible had designed Johnny and Jungle Boy, crew member Julian Chaney drew the final designs for Bunny Bravo and Little Suzy, two new main characters for the series.

Writers and crew members on the first season included Butch Hartman (who was a writer and director), Seth MacFarlane, Steve Marmel, and Michael Ryan. Main cast members included Jeff Bennett, Brenda Vaccaro, and Mae Whitman, a then child actor.

Partible wanted the series to be reminiscent of older Hanna-Barbera cartoons. A few writers' room meetings were joined by Joe Barbera himself after he had been acquainted with Partible, however this proved to be too expensive. One H-B veteran, Ed Benedict, was convinced by Partible to come out of retirement to draw and mail out concept art for the show, as long as he was not given any deadlines.

While 'Jungle Boy' was originally planned to be the middle segment between Johnny Bravo shorts, the network was not on-board with the idea. This resulted in 'Johnny Bravo Meets', a series of The New Scooby-Doo Movies-esque episodes featuring Johnny meeting various guest stars, such as Adam West and Donny Osmond. The first of these was "Bravo Dooby-Doo", a Hanna-Barbera crossover which involved Johnny meeting the cast of Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!.

Season 1 has received mostly positive reception from critics and is often considered the best of the series. It is also known for its risque adult humor and innuendos, which were possible due to Cartoon Network's lack of popularity at the time. A second season was planned in 1997, with a series bible written and revised by Partible and MacFarlane. However, this plan fell through as Van was soon fired from the network due to his management skills at the time. This resulted in a retool of the series, under the new direction of Gary Hartle and Kirk Tingblad.

Episodes

This is a list of shorts (or segments) in Season 1:

1. Johnny Bravo (Pilot)
2. Jungle Boy in "Mr. Monkeyman"
3. Johnny Bravo and the Amazon Women
4. Super Duped
5. Bungled in the Jungle
6. Bearly Enough Time
7. The Sensitive Male!
8. Bravo Dooby Doo
9. Date With An Antelope
10. Did You See A Bull Run By Here?
11. Cookie Crisis
12. I Used to Be Funny
13. My Fair Dork
14. Twas the Night
15. Blarney Buddies
16. Over the Hump!
17. Johnny Meets Farrah Fawcett
18. Blanky Hanky Panky
19. Talk to Me, Baby
20. Hip-Hop Flop!
21. Beach Blanket Bravo
22. The Day The Earth Didn't Move Around Very Much
23. The Aisle Of Mixed-Up Toys
24. Substitute Teacher
25. A Wolf In Chick's Clothing
26. Intensive Care
27. Jumbo Johnny
28. The Perfect Gift
29. Bravo, James Bravo
30. Going Batty
31. Berry The Butler
32. Red Faced In The White House
33. The Man Who Cried "Clown"
34. Johnny, Real Good
35. Little Talky Tabitha!
36. Johnny Bravo Meets Adam West!
37. Under The Big Flop
38. Johnny Meets Donny Osmond

Trivia

• This season introduced Suzy having a puppy dog crush on Johnny, a concept that was given less focus throughout the series' run, although it made more of a return in Season 4.
• This season included two Scooby-Doo crossovers, the first being "Bravo Dooby-Doo" and the other being a cameo of Scooby in "Twas The Night."
• "The Sensitive Male!" and "Bravo Dooby-Doo" are the only 11-minute shorts in the season. This run-time is not used again until Season 4, where it becomes the show's usual format.
• Both the first and fourth seasons contain a few religious references, as Van Partible went to a Catholic university and some writers such as Butch Hartman were openly Christian. One of the most notable instances during this season is a blind man saying "God bless you." in "Jumbo Johnny".
• This is the first season to use traditional cel animation.