< What Could Have Been

What Could Have Been/Western Animation

  • Mickey Mouse was originally going to be named Mortimer Mouse, after Disney's pet mouse. However, a number of people, including his wife, convinced him that children wouldn't want to watch a character named Mortimer. That was when Disney's wife suggested the name be changed to Mickey.
  • Avatar: The Last Airbender:
    • The setting and plot of the series were originally supposed to be quite different from the finished result. The series was originally going to have a futuristic setting that was recreated into a pre-industrial society with heavy elements of Steampunk. The original series summary from the Universe Bible shows that the planned plot started out largely similar, but it deviated to a greater extent as time went on. Pretty much everything involving the Earth King and the invasion of the Fire Nation by the Earth Kingdom was the exact opposite of what was originally planned. The Grand Finale was also originally going to have a scene of Zuko finding his mother, which was compressed into a Sequel Hook.
    • Many of the characters were modified from their original concepts, in both small and important matters. Zuko originally had a pet messenger hawk, as seen in the Pilot, but the writers realized this would not work in the series and it never appeared. Zuko's and Mai's comic "Going Home Again" was also originally going to reveal that Zuko had always carried a rock of hardened lava shaped like a heart that Mai gave him when they were children. Katara's name in the pilot was Kya, a name they used for her mother. More fundamentally, many female characters were added to the cast as gender-swapped versions of male characters. Azula was originally supposed to be male, and the original plan for the second season shows no sign of any equivalents of Mai and Ty Lee. Toph was originally supposed to be a big man and look like the Earthbender in the opening, whose model appears to have been reused as Roku's earthbending teacher. After that but before her final designed Toph was changed into a teenaged boy and a love interest of Katara... which would explain a lot. Toph's original design even got a reference in the already very meta 'The Ember Island Players'. However, one of the most drastic alterations was the nature of Uncle Iroh who was, originally, supposed to be evil! The plan was for Zuko to fight his uncle in season 3 and learn that Iroh had taught him incorrect firebending all along, under Ozai's orders.
    • Behind the scenes, pacing issues necessitated changing the third season to twenty-one instead of twenty episodes, as Sozin's Comet was originally three episodes long instead of four. After realizing how rushed the finale would have been as a result, Mike and Bryan expanded it to four episodes.
    • The Beach Episode was originally going to have A LOT more Fan Service. Considering how much it DID have, that really gets you thinking...
    • Aang was originally going to be voiced by Mitchel Musso, yeah that Mitchel Musso
  • Aeon Flux: There was supposed to be a straight to dvd animated Aeon Flux feature that never materialized, Peter Chung and Japhet Asher colaborated on a script that would focus more on a visual storytelling than the hour hour episodes. For some reason at the last second the executives who green lit it decided to can it. The rumor mill says that Peter Chungs comments regarding the Aeon Flux movie and how bad it was, worked against him.
  • Futurama was originally the story of a gruff deliveryman Fry, working for evil overlord Mom in a dystopian future and was originally named Aloha Mars!
    • Phil Hartman was originally cast as Zapp Brannigan. Billy West took over after Hartman's murder and Fry's first name (Phillip) was used as a memorial to Hartman.
  • The ABC cartoon Sonic the Hedgehog (the SatAM version) would have gone on to feature Snively working together with Ixis Naugus as the new villains of the show...but it was canceled at the end of the second season. One of the writers has said that he's actually got ideas for most of the third season, but it's unlikely it'll be picked up again after so many years.
  • Woody Woodpecker's debut short, Knock Knock almost didn't get released because Bernie Kreiser, then distributor of Universal Cartoons, thought Woody was the ugliest thing he had ever seen. "You're not paying for these pictures," Walter Lantz told him. "All you're doing is distributing them, so release him, because I'm taking a chance". And so he did. The cartoon was a smash with moviegoers, and Kreisler asked for a series of comebacks, pretending nothing ever happened.
  • Several Transformers Animated characters' names were changed (implicitly changing the character they are supposed to be an alternate version of). Bumblebee was actually supposed to be named "Hot Shot" before it was changed due to the popularity of the movie version of Bumblebee, and Sentinel Prime was originally supposed to be "Rodimus Prime" but Hasbro didn't like the idea of the name being associated with the Jerkass the character was. Meanwhile, The Medic for the Autobots was originally supposed to be a female named Red Alert, but later became Ratchet, who in this continuity is an old guy. Blitzwing was originally conceived as a character that could change into anything and had an unstable personality. Since they couldn't make a toy from that they tried the Animated version of Sixshot, but Hasbro told them a six-changer was too expensive. Then they decided to make a triple-change with a changing face and split personality and they used Blitzwing.
    • The third season featured a team that has Red Alert and different characters named Rodimus Prime and Hot Shot (who are more like the characters they're named after).
    • Some scenes also had to be cut for time or for other reasons, as revealed in this interview. The most major one? Megatron beating the tar out of the Dinobots.
    • Another one was that Starscream was apparently supposed to have a fairly quiet voice, as Marty Isenberg really disliked the screechy voice G1 Starscream had. However, after advice from Derrick J. Wyatt and hearing Tom Kenny's performance he decided to compromise with a voice that was high and a bit whiny, but not outright shrill.
      • Speaking of G1 Screamer, his name was originally going to be either Ulchtar, Silver Snake or Pretty Poison.
    • Slipstream was originally intended to appear in "Endgame, Part II", in which she would revive Starscream after the Autobots left Earth, but the scene was cut for time.
    • The second Allspark Almanac mentions several plots the writers might have used if the series had gotten a fourth season. These included the team traveling to a 'Shattered Glass' Mirror Universe and a ghostly Prowl bodyhopping between various Transformers in an attempt to warn the Autobots of an oncoming threat.
      • They also apparently planned on Sentinel becoming a potential antagonist, with his status in the show, this would have been awesome.
      • Another plan was a Season 4 episode would introduce a new character, Primal Major, who would be a failed cloning experiment by Blackarachnia. The title of this episode? "Trukk vs. Munky!"
  • Beast Wars had an entire episode missing from its lineup known as "Dark Glass", dealing with Rattrap finding a copy of his friend/foil Dinobot's memory engrams and attempting to install them into Dinobot 2. While it never got past the script phase (replaced due to its extreme dark storytelling for the more lighthearted "Go with the Flow") many fans still consider it canon, if only because it fills up a nasty little Plot Hole during the show's finale. There was also going to be a series following Beast Machines called Transtech, possibly dealing with a resurgence in the Great War on a now technorganic Cybertron, but various factors canceled it.
      • The Merchandise-Driven nature of the franchise also played a part in cancelling Transtech. Hasbro suffered major losses from unsold Star Wars Episode 1 toys, so to save money, they imported the Japanese Car Robots anime to buy time and create the Unicron Trilogy.
      • The Transtech design sketches and toy prototypes eventually got used by Fun Publications by 2008.
  • Transformers Prime originally had Ironhide as a member of the main Five Bot Band, somewhere during the initial planning process, they realised that his personality was turning out far more like that of Animated Bulkhead, and the character was changed accordingly.
  • Greg Weisman had so many scrapped ideas for Gargoyles spin-off series. These included the continuing adventures of King Arthur, the New Olympians, and a few other characters introduced during the Avalon World Tour, a series where Brooklyn travels through time, and a number of Punch Clock Villains earning a measure of redemption. He has said that he will try to re-integrate these into the comic.
    • None of these ideas quite match the original series proposal: a comical derivative of Gummi Bears with Xanatos as the bumbling descendant of a wizard.
    • There was even originally going to be a brief revival of the show in 2002.
  • The original concept for Danny Phantom was quite different: Its title would have been called Danny Phantom and the Specter Detectors, about a Muggle who fought ghosts with his superpowered friends and an owl named Spooky. He and Sam were supposed to have a psychic link, and the creator wanted him to ride a motorcycle. The owl was ditched because the first Harry Potter movie was due to come out soon, and Danny didn't need the motorcycle since he could fly once he decided on giving him ghost powers. Also, Vlad was gonna be a vampire (makes sense considering his Plasmius design and the fact that the real-life inspiration for Dracula was Vlad Tepes.)
    • Steve Marmel, the once main writer for Danny Phantom has also stated his vision for Season Three would have been gravely different than what we have now. Don't know what they are, but what was most definitely confirmed was that the season would have been darker and Dark Danny would have return. Too bad Executive Meddling got in the way.
  • Codename: Kids Next Door: Numbuh 3 was going to be The Unintelligible who only spoke Japanese, and Numbuh 5, instead of just being The Quiet One and Only Sane Man, was going to be The Voiceless (which she got to fulfill in the dialogless episode "The Fly"). These plans were canceled because they (correctly) decided it would be unfair for neither of the girls to be allowed to speak.
    • Also, one of the latter seasons' 11 minute episodes, SPANKENSTINE, was originally penned as a Thanksgiving 30 minute special. Numbuh 2's addiction to chocolate sauce? Actually was supposed to be cranberry sauce.
    • In a crazy case of this, the official website (no less) for the show has under Numbuh 5's entry: "Her big secret: She wears glasses." Which is the case in the pilot (and CARAMEL, and her opposite-verse self in POOL), but not the character as we know her.
    • Originally, the kids of Sector V were side characters on the failed show Kenny and the Chimp. They were five friends who lived next door to Kenny, had a different name for themselves every time they appeared, and were just out for trouble. Also, their tech was originally supposed to be traditional shiny stuff, but Cartoon Network asked this to be changed since Dexter's Laboratory had already done the same thing.
    • And according to some rumours, OP ZERO the Big Damn Movie, was originally going to be the series finale, but a few more seasons were announced.
  • Hey Arnold!: Long before All Grown Up was a twinkle in Klasky and Csupo's eyes, Craig Bartlett had announced his intention to make a flash-forward series after Hey Arnold ended centering around Helga Pataki named "The Patakis". The jury is still out on whether that would have been a good thing, but in the end, none of the nets he pitched it to wanted it, due to its premise being too similar to MTV's Daria. He'd also pitched two movies to Nick, one for TV and one for cinemas. Only the one for TV was made... and it went into cinemas. The troubles with the other movie are well-documented.
  • The Angry Beavers: An episode was written, storyboarded, and even had lines of dialog recorded that had the Angry Beavers coming to grips with their show being canceled and Lampshading the fact it would be stuck in reruns for eternity. This went against Nickelodeon's guidelines, stating no show should ever acknowledge its own ending - a measure put in place to ensure kids would keep watching reruns with the hope that new episodes would soon follow.
    • Mary Harrington, the producer of this and multiple other Nicktoons, says that she thought this episode was brilliant but didn't want kids to be sad that Dag and Norb were being "killed off" (the episode ended with the brothers ascending to cartoon heaven.)
  • The Kim Possible episode "Rewriting History" was meant to have actually happened. But for some reason, it turned out to be a dream.
    • Or Was It a Dream?.
    • Also, Season 1 villainess Adrena Lynn was conceived as Kim's Evil Counterpart and recurring nemesis. Then Dr. Drakken and Shego were introduced and the producers decided Shego made a much more interesting threat. Well, that and Adrena Lynn was poorly received by the fanbase.
  • Originally, The Powerpuff Girls were going to be called "the Whoopass Girls", but this was objected to. It was also a "Can of Whoopass" and not "Chemical X" that gave them their powers. Not too different from the final product other than the naming being too "extreme"; but still.
    • Also, the girls originally had slightly different designs such as different dress styles, having lines drawn on their hands to represent fingers, their hair being drawn slightly different, etc. However the biggest design change was that Bubbles was originally the green one and Buttercup the blue. No one knows whether that design would have an impact on their names and personalities (or even the show itself).
    • Not to mention that Buttercup's name was originally going to be Bud, to accentuate her tomboy attitude. The reason it didn't stick was because producers found the name too short and abrupt when compared to the other two, the current name was taken as it had a nice ring to it (also, it started with a B!)
    • The original premise for The Powerpuff Girls Movie was to have all the regular villains battle over who should rule Townsville, but it left little screen time for the girls. So creator Craig McCracken pitched the idea to make it an origin story with the conflict of having Mojo Jojo trick the girls into helping start a rule of superapes which in turn would try to usurp Mojo.
    • Season 5 was to have an episode, "Deja View," that had the girls being whisked to an alternate universe Townsville with their alternate counterparts, the "Powerpunk Girls," trading places with them. Deadline and budget issues (the alternate universe scenes were to be CGI) caused the episode to be scrapped but the storyline was retooled as issue #50 of the comic book.
  • Season 7 of the second Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon was originally supposed to be a second set of "Fast Forward" episodes, which would have included an appearance by SPAAAAAACEEEEEE Usagi, and a Stockman-focused episode featuring what appeared to be a Triceraton version of the Shredder. Said series was cancelled, and several rejected pitches for its replacement were made before all parties settled on "Back to the Sewer". Art for the rejected series is now being released here. There is also the scrapped Season 5 episode "Nightmares Recycled", which was left unfinished due to objections from standards and practices; although not all the details have been confirmed, it would have apparently have revealed that Hun and minor villain Garbageman were originally cojoined twins who were separated at birth, with the latter being supposedly then doused with acid and left in a dumpster.
    • Another thing that was ultimately scrapped was an arc called "The Shredder Wars" in Back To The Sewers, where we'd find out exactly how the conflict in the first episode of the season started, but these plans were discarded, possibly in favor of Turtles Forever.
  • Freakazoid! was originally designed as a fairly straitforward superhero show with comedic overtones. By the time it aired it was pure comedy with little action. On the DVD, the show's creators commented that the DCAU version of the Creeper is pretty much how the original Freakazoid would have been.
  • Code Lyoko was originally Garage Kids, with a darker theme and lacking Aelita. The digital world was called "Xanadu" instead of "Lyoko". Also, Yumi could use telekinesis in the real world. It was later revamped, with a clearer boundary between the digital world and real world.
  • The Secret Saturdays was originally pitched as the adventures of three animal heroes (all of them previously thought to be mythical in Real Life, like the okapi) as they prevented an evil dodo bird from exposing the existence of other cryptids. Nobody wanted the show like that, so it was reworked heavily into what we know today.
  • An unmade Wallace and Gromit story involved Wallace finding some dinosaur bones, opening a Jurassic Park with robotic dinosaurs, have them malfunction and go on a rampage. And much earlier in development, Gromit was going to be a cat.
    • Originally, Gromit was planned to talk. Then they filmed a scene in A Grand Day Out in which Wallace uses Gromit as a saw horse and Gromit looks disgusted and rolls his eyes. This cemented his position as the silent, suffering, Straight Man.
  • Ever since the Constant Payne pilot was leaked, many people have been sighing at What Could Have Been a pretty good (or at least cool-looking) series.
  • The Fairly OddParents: Originally Timmy was going to be a redhead because Butch Hartman hates brown hair, but forced to change his mind because he didn't want Timmy and Vicky to have matching hair color. Also Timmy was almost named Matt after Butch's other brother, but an argument with his brothers changed that. Timmy's shirt and hat were meant to be blue, but Hartman ran out of blue marker and grabbed the next nearest color, which just so happened to be pink. It stuck.
    • Also, the original script for Wishology Part III was very different from what was finally shown; In the final scenes, there was no Reset Button and Timmy in fact used his Turbo Pits to create a type of light show for the party celebrating the victory. It was also stated in the script that the Darkness' Eliminators were created from the weapons that Turbo Thunder's people fired into it.
    • And in the original script, Wanda's name was Venus. Why it was changed, we don't know...
  • The DC Animated Universe had quite a few things like this, given its long length and famous run-ins with characters being Exiled From Continuity and Executive Meddling:
    • There were talks of Neil Gaiman's Sandman appearing in a special Batman: The Animated Series episode- a Christmas episode, where Batman would meet Dream and Death.
    • Black Canary was originally going to be in a BTAS episode (a team-up with Catwoman that saw the usual Batfamily appear only near the end), but at the time Executive Meddling dictated that Robin had to be prominent in every episode, so the episode was scrapped.
    • Originally the "Justice Guild of America" from Justice League was going to be the actual Justice Society of America, but pressure from DC necessitated the change to not-quite-exact copies.
    • Plans were made for the Birds of Prey to guest star in an episode of Justice League Unlimited with a Broad Strokes retelling of their origin. Barbara Gordon, as Batgirl, would be hospitalized while on a mission and be forbidden by Batman from pursuing the matter further. Unwilling to let the mater go, she would recruit Black Canary and the Huntress and use them to finish the mission while monitoring them over the radio. Unfortunately, the 'Bat-Embargo,' a moratorium on using Batman related characters due to conflicts with The Batman and Batman Begins, necessitated the removal of Batgirl from the story and it was re-written into Double Date.
    • Tim Curry auditioned for the role of The Joker, but his preformance was deemed "too creey". Too creepy for the Joker. Think about that.
    • Nocurna was meant to be in an episode of BTAS as a vampire. The episode was axed because the Fox censors didn't approve of the story, which involved Batman being turned into a vampire and craving human blood.
    • Captain Marvel was originally going to appear in Superman: The Animated Series, but both the infamous problems about his name (I Am Not Shazam) and trouble trying to figure out how to put him in without having to create a Justice League delayed his DCAU integration until Justice League Unlimited. Even then, they were only able to have him in one episode and name-check him in another.
      • Speaking of Superman: The Animated Series, Clancy Brown, who voiced Lex Luthor, originally auditioned for the role of Superman.
    • There was a planned DTV movie called Justice League: Worlds Collide that would have involved the Justice League facing the Crime Syndicate and would have served as a bridge between Starcrossed and Justice League Unlimited. The movie would have explained the formation of the expanded League and the newly built, much larger Watchtower. The movie never materialized and, after JLU was cancelled, the script was re-written to fit into the DC Original Animated Movies line and was published as Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths. The story remains nearly identical and addresses the same plot points, with only alterations in animation, cast and minor history references serving to distinguish it from he DCAU.
      • In an interview before the movie came out, Bruce Timm said that Vanessa Marshall, WW's voice in the movie, was also in the running for WW's voice during Justice League before they settled on Susan Eisenberg.
        • Likewise, on the commentary track for Superman: Doomsday, Bruce Timm said James Marsters was almost Green Arrow on Justice League Unlimited, but had to bow out at the last second.
          • Actor Sherman Howard had played Luthor in The Adventures of Superboy and apparently gave a great audition when the DCAU team was looking for their Lex. They were very interested in offering him the role until they heard Clancy Brown. Howard was subsequently cast as The Preserver in two episodes of Superman, and later Derek Powers on Batman Beyond.
    • While it probably would not have been integrated into the DCAU, Gotham High probably deserves a mention here. The premise was basically "What if all the Batman characters were in high school together"?
  • Jimmy Two-Shoes originally was going to have Jimmy dying in the first episode and ending up in Miseryville thanks to an administrative error. The fact that Jimmy was Dead to Begin With would allow him to do some pretty crazy things, like unscrew the top of his head and pull bones out of his body. Also, Heloise was originally going to be a Serial Killer arranged by Lucius to make Jimmy miserable, but she ended up falling in love with him instead.
  • Originally, the titular hero of Ben 10 would have transformed into HUMAN superheroes, with the show seeming to be more inspired by Dial H for Hero. Ben's first design had him as a freckled redhead as well. Gwen was originally going to be a classmate that he didn't get along with (this was probably changed because then it made no sense why she was on vacation with him), and she appeared in earlier concept art with a long ponytail and a pink shirt.
  • The writers for G.I. Joe had some intriguing plans that never materialized, mostly due to Executive Meddling—some of it understandable, some of it downright mind-boggling. The most notable is probably the original movie idea, "The Most Dangerous Man in the World", which would have offered a very different spin on Cobra's origins.
    • Specifically, "The Most Dangerous Man in the World" would have started with Cobra suspending all other schemes for a worldwide manhunt for a single man, and the Joes investigating the reason for this abrupt shift. The Joes would eventually find the subject, who would be revealed as a political science professor who invented the socio-political system that Cobra was based on. The professor was planning to publish a paper documenting a newly-discovered fatal flaw with the system; Cobra wanted to eliminate him to keep the weakness hidden. The entire storyline was scrapped when Hasbro insisted on including Serpentor in the movie and cartoon.
  • Static was supposed to join the Teen Titans but this was scrapped due to the latter airing far later than originally planned.
  • The "Kamp Krusty" episode of The Simpsons was originally conceived as the first Simpsons full-length film. They eventually scaled back their vision, and a Simpsons film would not be made until more than a decade had gone by.
    • The episode "Cape Feare" (in which Sideshow Bob tries to kill Bart and the family goes into hiding) was also considered for the film, but it was already too short to really be used. They had to use the Overly Long Gag of Bob stepping on rakes to pad out the episode.
    • Some of the DVD creator commentary mentions plotlines or episodes that never got off the ground. For example, the B-story of "New Kid on the Block" was originally going to involve Homer and Marge going to see Don Rickles, and a brawl breaking out between Rickles and Homer after Homer became the target of Rickles' insults. This never manifested because Rickles refused to lend his voice or image to the show (which might explain the gag in "Viva Ned Flanders" where Rickles is blown up and run over...)
    • The Simpsons has a lot of What Could Have Been moments, if you ever listen to the DVD commentaries.
      • The "Robot Richard Simmons" joke on the episode where Bart gets adopted by Mr. Burns got cut because test audiences didn't think it was funny (it didn't stop the writers from putting it on that clip show episode where Troy McClure narrates The Simpsons' history and behind-the-scenes moments).
      • The season 10 episode where Bart kills a mother bird and has to care for the eggs was originally a B-story that didn't have a place in any episode. The original B-story involved Homer saving a nest of eggs from being orphaned in the winter.
      • "New Kid on the Block" had another subplot idea involving Homer after the Don Rickles one fell through that had Homer trying to get a job as a barber (this was in season four, well before the episodes where Homer is put into a new job every other week and doesn't acknowledge that he's a nuclear plant safety inspector), but this was scrapped in favor of the subplot where Homer sues a seafood restaurant manager over not getting his fill at the "All You Can Eat" buffet.
      • Otto the bus driver's original name was supposed to be "Otto Mechanic," (instead of Otto Man) but the writers thought the joke was too predictable.
      • Originally at the end of "One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, Blue Fish", there was going to be a scene where Homer held a barbeque, and was being approached by the other characters for the actions he pulled earlier. Unfortunately, the scene couldn't be edited smoothly enough to fit near the end, so included instead was the shot of Homer watching TV and eating chips.
        • The Barbeque gag was finally used over a decade later, with an episode ending with everyone gathering for Homer's latest "Everything is Back to Normal Barbeque." It's implied he has one after the end of every single episode.
      • O.J. Simpson turned down an opportunity in appear in "Last Exit to Springfield," what is often held up as the series' greatest episode.
      • In that vein, Anthony Perkins was supposed to voice the dentist in Last Exit to Springfield, but passed away before he could record his dialogue, with the role ultimately going to Hank Azaria.. Additionally, Clint Eastwood and Anthony Hopkins were offered the part, but both turned it down.
      • "Stark Raving Dad" (the season three episode where Homer meets a big, bald mental patient who thinks he's Michael Jackson) was originally supposed to have a sequel where that big, bald mental patient returns and now thinks he's Prince and encourages everyone in town to be free and open with their sexual lives. While the premise of Springfield being free and open with their lives (with disastrous results) would be visited on the season five episode "Bart's Inner Child" (only it would be changed to everyone acting like Bart, from skateboarding to making wisecracks in class), the original episode was written, but never made, due to Prince refusing to do voicework.
        • There's another "what could have been" to that story...Prince decided he didn't like the episode's script and demanded they produce a script he gave them (which he may or may not have written himself.) Reportedly, the script was not up to the show's standards (and was also completely insane.) When the producers refused to use it, Prince backed out.
  • The original Mega Man cartoon would apparently have had a third season, rumors circulate that in the third season, Proto Man would finally switch sides, given that episode quality and story quality was increasing at the time, it looked like it was going to be great... But the toys weren't selling, despite good ratings, the show was canceled, gipping everybody of what would have probably been one of the best seasons on the show, even with all the inaccuracies.
    • Early drafts of the series also suggest that, originally, the characters would have their child-like looks from the games. The whole "teenagery muscled"-look was used since, according to the higher ups, boys would never identify with a hero who looked like a little kid. Or something.
  • Hello? Invader Zim, anyone? According the shows post production supervisor, 40 episodes were originally contracted, while only 27 were made. One can only speculate what might have happened in the unmade episodes like "Nubs of Doom", "Day of Da Spookies", and "Return of Keef" if the show hadn't gotten the axe. And just when the tone of the stories was getting darker and it looked like the writers were going to put a bit less of their body weight on the Reset Button and introduce a story arc.
    • Also, Skooge (the Irken Butt Monkey from Hobo-13) would have gone on to be a regular character and a pseudo-sidekick of Zim's alongside Gir and Mini-Moose as well as a finale that involved Dib taking on the Irken Empire.
    • Also, Jhonen Vasquez's original idea would have been about Zim flying around space rather than being stationed on Earth.
    • The hour long final episode would have ended with Zim finally taking over Earth, with Dib stranded on a moon/planet.
  • The original premise for Total Drama Island was called "Camp TV" and would have had 12 main campers instead of the 22 we know now (although some of the others would've appeared, just not been very important). Some of them looked exactly like their present counterparts (i.e. Geoff), some had minor differences (e.g. Lindsay, Harold, Trent, Duncan, Leshawna, & Owen) and some looked nothing like they do now (e.g. Tyler, Ezekiel, Katie, Sadie, DJ & Cody). Also, Heather, Noah, Izzy, & Courtney didn't exist in the original pitch, although the concept art for Eva has her looking very much like Heather. While some characters had the same personalities in the final product (e.g. Geoff being the party guy, Duncan being a delinquent, & Harold and Beth being the resident nerds/geeks), others had totally different personalities or had different relations with their fellow campers (e.g. Gwen was still a loner but was originally Geoff's girlfriend and hated Trent, & Lindsay was the intended main antagonist, though she still maintained a relationship with Tyler). More information can be found at the official TD Wiki.
    • If Sierra wasn't made, It would have been very likely for Beth to take her role as Cody's Stalker with a Crush
    • According to the Fresh blog, one of the locations they decided not to do for World Tour was Hershey, Pennsylvania. Toronto, Russia, Scotland, Taiwan, and Mexico were also left out, though the cast did spend some time crossing Mexico in the second to last episode, and Russia appeared in Bridgette's post-elimination bonus video.
  • The Pilot of Phineas and Ferb shows a few original ideas that were scrapped: Phineas was more sarcastic (Word of God says they wanted him to act like an annoying little brother), Doofenshmirtz's name was "Meddleshmirtz," and the boys were going to be canonically nine instead of canonically indeterminate. Also, Ferb never spoke, implying he might have been planned to be The Voiceless instead of just The Quiet One.
    • The theme song was originally meant to be sung Barbershop Quartet style. Disney decided kids wouldn't identify with a musical genre that stopped being popular a hundred years ago, so they had a rock band record it. Interestingly, the lyrics and melody were barely changed.
  • The Animaniacs bible reveals some of the concepts that were considered but never used for the show, such as a soap opera parody about amoebas called As the Petri Dish Turns. Additionally, one of the original ideas for Pinky and The Brain was that the scientists would continue experimenting on the mice, and that in each episode they would have different powers. In the end, producer Tom Ruegger said, "We decided maybe vivisection wasn't the best idea for a kids' show."
    • The earliest concept for the show didn't feature the Warners at all. Instead, it centered around three duck brothers: Smakky, Yakky, and Wakky. The latter two were pretty close to the personalities of Yakko and Wakko, but Smakky was completely different: he was a sourpuss with a short temper, and also the trio's leader. The original idea was that Smakky would be the lead character, having to put up with his two insane brothers. A few scripts later it became clear that this dynamic wasn't working, as it was very difficult to sympathize with the humorless Smakky, while the other two seemed more funny without him. So Smakky was replaced with a sister, the three were renamed, and it was eventually decided that they shouldn't be ducks, because Disney already had two duck shows on the air at the time.
  • American Dragon: Jake Long is a show that's pretty hard to view outside the context of its positively epic and vindictive degree of Executive Meddling. After it finally got cancelled, much of the key staff stayed together afterward. Once out from under Disney's abusive shadow, their very next project was...Avatar: The Last Airbender. Now imagine what the former show might have been without Disney being idiots.
    • A few specifics: the Huntsclan's plot with the Aztec skulls was originally going to last the entire second season, with the third season dedicated to Chang resurrecting the Dark Dragon. "Homecoming" would have been a two-parter involving Sun Kim being Killed Off for Real and a revelation that Chang was Jake's grandmother. However, when it became clear the series would not be renewed, the two seasons were crammed together, and Disney vetoed the above ideas, declaring it too dark (and resulting in Writers Cannot Do Math, since they couldn't say Jake's mother was born out of wedlock). Also, Rose was supposed to stay in New York after losing her memories, with Jake attempting to rebuild their relationship, but Disney decided this was "too confusing", so she was relocated.
  • KaBlam! was just only going to be made up of Action League NOW and reruns and/or revivals of older Nick shorts from the early 90's. Henry and June were still there, but not as the hosts, They would have their own shorts. It also was going to take place in a live-action comic book. Then in 1995, different studios created shorts for the show, and Henry and June became the hosts. The old Nicktoons shorts? Sniz and Fondue made it. That was it.
  • WITCH never got a third season, but Greg Weisman, showrunner for season two, gave some details on how he envisioned how the season would've gone down: "I have to admit that my memory on WITCH's never-happened third season are a bit vague now. But Sylla and Riddle were very important, and Taranee, and I think Martin and Cornelia would transfer to Riddle's school. The Guardians would take on a temporary new member, as in the comics. There were other elements from the comic, including characters I can now picture in my head -- but whose names I can't immediately call to mind. But Irma's mom would have been very important."
    • Pieces of the original pilot animation can be found around YouTube and the US opening, but the original idea would have put the girls (minus Will again) at full power in civilian form. As well, Irma's Guardian form color scheme was reversed in the pilot, but set back to normal when the series started.
  • Galaxy Rangers: In the initial demo real, Zachary's children were also captured and implied to have shared in their mom's Fate Worse Than Death. The reaction from the fanbase?
  • Many people would like to see the third, fourth, maybe further, seasons of The Ren and Stimpy Show produced and envisioned by Spumco, considering that towards the end of the second season, they were getting incredibly good at what they were doing, with episodes like "Son of Stimpy" and "The Royal Canadian Kilted Yaksmen". The later episodes, made by Games Animation, aren't even comparable to any of the earlier seasons' cartoons. If only John K weren't busy being fired...
  • ... and now, we can definitely add The Spectacular Spider-Man. It was planned for a five-season run (ending with Peter's graduation from High School) - the timing of the Disney/Marvel buyout would have limited it to only three seasons, but because the show also switched networks, it only got two. And because of that, we wind up ending with the revelation that all of Peter's friends save Mary Jane are alienated from him, Harry hates Spider-Man, Gwen remains his girfriend after some emotional blackmail from Harry, and Peter didn't even stop the bad guy. One assumes later seasons (even just one more given a few episodes' warning it was about to end) would have chosen a more upbeat coda. Some fans have even went as far as to pretend the non-canon Spidey/Gargoyles radio play produced months later is a more upbeat and hopeful conclusion to the series.
    • Greg Weisman has stated that the third season was to include Hobgoblin and Scorpion. Norman Osborne was not to return until at least Season 4. Carnage and Hydro-Man had both appeared in non-powered form during Season 2. Dr. Miles Warren might have finally gotten to upgrade himself and become a proper supervillain. And some statements made online indicated that Molten Man was being groomed to join the fight alongside Spider-Man.
    • Apparently Weisman had more backstory for the nature of Flash and Peter's rivlary planned out and how they stopped being friends. Also although the rights were tied up, Weismen said he would have liked to have been able to have had a Spidey/Human Torch crossover. The Big Man/Tombstone was going to be Wilson Fisk, but his rights were tied strictly to Daredevil adapations and thus couldn't be used. He apparently approached Marvel about continuing the series in comic form, but they never got back to him (Disney/Marvel and Sony's iffy-ness about the rights probably played a factor).
  • Spider-Man: The Animated Series' adaptation of Secret Wars was originally going to feature a number of additional characters, most notably Mister Sinister. These were later scrapped for numerous reasons, namely costs since Sinister's voice actor, Chris Britton, is Canadian based (the cast of the X-Men series had previously been flown to LA from Canada for their appearance in the crossover, which proved expensive).
    • The oddest of the bunch for the heroes of that storyline was the Lizard. That was because originally, it was supposed to have been the Hulk. However, he had his own cartoon at the time and was replaced with She-Hulk. However, she ended up joining the Hulk in his series so the green-skinned character was replaced again with the Lizard.
  • Had the series continued, Peter and Madame Web would have found the real Mary Jane in an alternate Earth version of Victorian London around the time of Jack The Ripper, with the ripper turning out to be Carnage.
  • The South Park episode "The Coon" was intended to be more of a parody of Watchmen, with all the kids as superheroes. It also had a main plot of The Coon trying to fix the economy. However, Matt and Trey realized that Cartman was stealing the show, so they scaled it back and used the economy plotline in the next episode. The original concept seems to have returned with "Coon and Friends" trying to fix another BP oil spill.
    • In "Wacky Molestation Adventure", Cartman was originally going to block out the sun. However, after learning that It's Been Done by The Simpsons, they scrapped the idea. Their frustration made its way into "The Simpsons Did It."
    • "A Million Little Fibers" was originally going to be about Towlie on Intervention. However, they couldn't fit it in right, so they ended up revamping it. The original idea was later used in "Cripple Summer".
    • "Pinewood Derby" was going to be an hour long special where Randy finds out that dinosaurs had killed themselves off after inventing guns, and convinces everyone to do away with them. After this, an alien would have arrived and taken over the world with a handgun, with no one able to stop him. The entire plot was torpedoed by, once again, The Simpsons have done it earlier.
    • Kenny's semi-permanent death in season 5 was originally considered for Kyle, who Butters would then replace, allegedly because they felt that Stan and Kyle were too similar. In the end, they decided they didn't want to kill Kyle, but Kenny, being basically an overused Running Gag, was expendable. (Stan and Kyle, meanwhile, eventually underwent enough Divergent Character Evolution to fix any problems.)
    • Nancy Cartwright was the original choice for the female characters on the show, she dropped out because of the vulgarity.
    • Same thing with Barry White, who was supposed to be the original voice of Chef, but declined because the show went against his Christian values.
  • Storm Hawks: In the original concepts for this show, the Storm Hawks are a bunch of prison kids who escape into the Wastelands, where they meet Oriole(Piper). In addition to the war against Cyclonia, the plot involves their quest for the Helix, an artifact holding the world together. The Helix is broken up into numerous crystal fragments around the world and it's the Storm Hawks' job to find them with help from the Guardian of the Helix, the White Hawk. (Who, incidentally, is the one who leads Piper Oriole to the others in the first place.) Instead of Master Cyclonis, we have Master Anarchis (Cyclonis's mother?), a fashionista who was formerly exiled to the Terra of Thorns by her brother, Heron, the rightful king of Cyclonia. Piper is a well-traveled, crossbow-wielding adventurer. Finn is younger and smaller (but still the main turrets guy), has a knack for telling tall tales, and fights with energy blades in hand-to-hand combat. Junko has a temper, although he tries to control it. Stork is an expert metal-smith and a loyal friend who is largely confined to the Condor due to a leg injury. Also, there are living storms that have their own names and personalities. Some of this can be found here, although other things like the Helix plot are no longer up.
  • Season 4 of ReBoot was originally going to comprise of 3 TV movies, followed by a musical episode. Unfortunately, only the first two movies were actually produced, resulting in a nasty cliffhanger.
  • A scraggly young man once walked into the Spumco offices stating his intention to write a song for Ren and Stimpy; that song was then promptly tossed in the trash. That young man was Kurt Cobain.
  • In 2006, a pilot of a new interpretation of Plastic Man was offered to Cartoon Network. Sadly, it was never picked up, despite being impressively well animated, containing a lot of both visual and verbal fun and managing to gain quite the fandom (that still hopes to "pull an Adventure Time").
    • It pulled an Adventure Time, now being on the brand new DC Nation block.
  • After the animated special Snoopy's Reunion was aired, Charles Schulz thought of working on a miniseries about each of Snoopy's siblings, but the network declined.
  • Apparently, there were originally plans to make another Batman TV Show... Centered on Bruce Wayne's High School years. Yes, this existed.
  • The original pitch for Darkwing Duck was very different. It was originally going to be a James Bond spoof called Double-O Duck, with Drake Mallard as a globe-trotting spy working for SHUSH. All the villains were going to be agents of FOWL (Fiendish Organization of World Larceny) with Steelbeak overseeing them as the show's big bad.
    • The Ducktales episode "The Masked Mallard" inspired the writers to think up some more episodes featuring Scrooge's heroic alter-ego. Eventually, they came up with so many episodes, they decided to create a new show starring a different character.
      • The writers came up with the idea of a spin-off set Twenty Minutes into the Future, featuring Gosalyn as either a teenager or young adult, and featuring her own superhero alter-ego, Quiverwing Quack (who had previously appeared on Darkwing, and was a Green Arrow parody, right down to the trick arrows). It never got past the planning stages.
      • There were also several episodes planned that never got produced, including the return of such baddies as Paddywhack and Taurus Bulba.
      • Also, Darkwing and Morgana were eventually going to get married and have kids together down the line if the show had continued.
      • There were plans for an episode where DW and Evil Twin Negaduck had to team up to defeat a somehow revived Manifest Dark Side Negaduck.
  • Heavy Gear deserves a mention. The original plotline for the show was much closer to the Tabletop Game it was based on, with the Heavy Gear Tournament only taking up the first arc of its run. The story after that involved renewed conflict between the North and South, and then with both factions having to team up to fight off an Invasion from Earth. This storyline was however scrapped because the executives thought the plotline would be too hard for Children to follow (despite the fact that the Tabletop Game was originally NOT marketed at that demographic). As a result, the Tournament Arc was kept, but the episodes after that became mostly Exhibition Matches and a pair of Clip Shows.
  • The main six kids in Recess had very different character desings at first. The first drawing of the kids from early 1996 had a much more realistic design, and the characters looked nothing like they usually do. In mid 1996, when the pilot was made, a "cuter" character design was made for them. But they all looked very different. T.J. looked nothing like he does in the series proper. He had messy dark brown hair, green eyes, a different outfit, and was much taller and skinnier. Gretchen had a darker hair color, and the blue part to her dress was white (or a very light yellow). Vince had a different hairstyle (heck, he went through ten before the creators decided on one) and a slightly different outfit, Spinelli had three pigtails, had a different outfit, and looked like a kindergartener, Mikey didn't look any different, and Gus was dropped. By the time the series aired, they brought Gus back, and everyone was re-designed.
  • My Little Pony:
    • There's a pony in the G1 pilot that doesn't look like any pony ever created. She has the colors of Confetti but the wrong Cutie Mark. So fans have decided that she's a scrapped design for a pony or an early design of either Confetti or Peachy.
    • My Little Pony the Movie was supposed to have a Transformers crossover.
    • Storyboard sketches show that originally G3.5 looked more like G3 except the characters were smaller; even their manes were the same. Eventually though they decided to change the proportions and gave everyone unique manes.
    • My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic:
      • The whole show got started because Lauren Faust was pitching to Hasbro a cartoon based on her independent doll-line Milky Way and The Galaxy Girls. Hasbro liked her designs and concepts and thought she'd be great for a My Little Pony reboot, and if you go to the official Milky Way website you'll notice some of the girls have similar personality traits to the ponies in My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic. Imagine if Galaxy Girls got made and MLP was still in G3.5, or someone else did the reboot.
      • Ever notice why a lot of the gang don't act like, and/or resemble, their previous incarnations? That's because several of them weren't meant to be those horses. Due to legal issues, a few of them [dead link] had to have their designs and names changed. For example, Pinkie was originally supposed to be a Pegasus and Fluttershy an Earth Pony.
      • One of the background characters (Mr. Greenhooves, an old stallion) was originally meant to have a corncob pipe to smoke real tobacco. The corncob pipe was part of a gag, as his pipe would overheat and randomly shoot popcorn while he minded his own business, but of course, the idea wasn't approved and the pipe was replaced with a hay straw.
      • Lauren Faust revealed a synopsis for an episode that was turned down, which would have centered around Big Macintosh, taking on a Silent Snarker role. The concept generated an overwhelingly positive response from bronies, wishing the episode had been made.
  • In the DVD commentary of the Family Guy episode "And then there were fewer", they said that there was a deleted scene after Derek's death in which Jillian revealed to be pregnant. However, since the scene wad deleted, this may not be the case anymore.
    • In a similar fashion, Chris originally was supposed to be as fat as Peter or even fatter, but the creators decided to slim him down, claiming that Chris being so morbidly obese just looked too damn sad.
  • The 1980s Filmation series Hero High was originally meant to be a new entry in their line of Archie-based cartoons, but was changed at the last-minute due to their rights to Archie having expired!
  • The children's show TUGS ended when TVS went bankrupt. David Mitton claimed to have around 96 scripts written, and said Series 2 was in planning while the original 13 shows were shot. Shortly before his passing, Mitton revealed a few points about what Season 2 would've been:
    • New tugboat characters in central roles - though he revealed this would've been curbed somewhat so the original Star Tugs and Z-Stacks wouldn't be neglected.
    • More stories would've taken place "Up River," in part because they found filming in the Bigg City Harbour set very complicated.
  • The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang. A notoriously terrible Recycled in Space version of Happy Days that came about when Hanna-Barbera couldn't get the rights to another live action show that they'd wanted to make. And what was that other show? The BBC's Doctor Who!
  • Quack Pack was meant as a direct sequel to DuckTales (1987), where Donald returned from the Navy and Scrooge, realizing that Donald would inherit his business one day, returns his nephews to him to teach him some responsibility. Considering the amount of negative press the finished product got, maybe the original idea would have worked better.
  • Attentive viewers of The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes might have noticed a few fleeting references to Wolverine and the X-Men, such as Nick Fury asking one of his agents to send Whirlwind to the Mutant Response Division. Josh Fine, associate producer of Wolverine and supervising producer for the first season of The Avengers, later revealed to have considered making some crossovers between those two shows. Wolverine would have gone on a SHIELD mission with Hawkeye and Black Widow. The Beast would have teamed up with Ant-Man in a different episode. However, Wolverine and the X-Men underwent cancellation before Marvel could make those crossovers. Christopher Yost, head story writer of The Avengers, still went on to publicly confirm that Wolverine and The Avengers take place in the same universe.
  • Speaking of The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, some early choices for the first villain the Avengers would capture together included Doctor Doom and Magneto. However, it apparently seemed inappropriate for "Earth's mightiest heroes" to team up and defeat a villain who another superhero team had already fought several times before. Thus, the episode about the Avengers' founding saw them overcoming Graviton, whose control over the forces of gravity made him a worthy opponent despite his obscurity. The heroes would later get to fight Doctor Doom in the second season premiere.
    • As well, Captain America was supposed to fight the Nazis during World War II instead of HYDRA. However, the censors told Marvel that they could either use real ammo for fight scenes, or they could have their Nazis. They went with the real ammo.
  • At the time of Marvel's near-bankruptcy in the mid-1990s, they were planning solo shows based on two of their heroes: Daredevil and Captain America (comics).
  • Dastardly and Muttley in Their Flying Machines was originally conceived as Stop That Pigeon (the show's theme song), and the two principals, along with Klunk and Zilly, was a jelly-bellied Red Baron-esque character and an orange dachshund with flying goggles. Dick Dastardly and Muttley were originally meant to be on The Perils of Penelope Pitstop as the protectors of Penelope's brother. The two were instead drafted into Stop That Pigeon, replacing the Baron figure and dachshund, and that show renamed.
  • Originally, Scooby Doo was meant to be about a traveling band that solved mysteries. However, Scooby Doo wasn't going to be the main character, and he was originally going to be named Too Much. However, the studio rejected the initial proposal. However, during a plane ride, producer Fred Silverman was inspired by a Frank Sinatra song, where the titular singer ad-libbed a line by singing "dooby-dooby-doo". Silverman liked the sound of that line so much that he changed Too Much's to Scooby and decided to make him the main character of the series.
  • Haim Saban was once in talks with Gene Simmons for a Kiss cartoon in the 90s. Then Saban made the big mistake in insulting Gene in Hebrew... and Gene replied back in the same tongue.

"You asshole! I am one of you."

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