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American animated children's television series (1985–1991) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Adventures of the Gummi Bears is an American animated children's television series created by Jymn Magon and produced by Walt Disney Television Animation.[1] The series, loosely inspired by gummy bear candies,[2] takes place in a fantasy world of medieval lands and magic, and focuses on the lives of seven mystical beings known as Gummi Bears. The series focuses on the exploits of the main characters, as they tackle a series of problems, as well as aid their human friends and thwart the plans of various evil characters. Episodes consisted of either a single story, or two 11-minute stories.
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Genre | |
| Created by | |
| Voices of | |
| Theme music composer | Silversher & Silversher |
| Opening theme | "Gummi Bears Theme" by Joseph Williams |
| Ending theme | "Gummi Bears Theme" (instrumental) |
| Composers |
|
| Country of origin | United States of America |
| Original language | English |
| No. of seasons | 6 |
| No. of episodes | 65 (95 segments) (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Producers |
|
| Running time | 22 minutes |
| Production company | Walt Disney Television Animation |
| Original release | |
| Network |
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| Release | September 14, 1985 – February 22, 1991 |
The lavishly budgeted series became iconic for not only spearheading the style of Disney animated series that followed, but also starting an era of artistic improvement in television animation spurred on its success with competitors forced to improve their own artistic standards to avoid unfavorable comparisons.[3] The series was known for various elements, including its signature potion known as "gummiberry juice",[4][5] and the theme music - written by Michael and Patty Silversher, performed by Joseph Williams.[6] The animated series first premiered in the United States, running for six seasons between 1985 and 1991,[7] with the show later sold to other countries including the United Kingdom.
Adventures of the Gummi Bears takes place in a medieval fairy tale world and focuses on a group of six "Gummi Bears", a race of anthropomorphic bears with great skills in magic and technology. The group lives in the underground secret settlement of Gummi Glen within the forest of the kingdom of Dunwyn. Long ago, the Gummi Bears had a powerful and highly developed civilization, but were persecuted by human armies who sought access to the Gummi Bears' knowledge and ultimately drove almost all Gummi Bears north. Most of the Gummi Bears then settled on a continent unknown to humans and were forgotten over time. They are now generally considered a legend by humans, but few know that they still exist. Throughout the Gummi Bears' search for their heritage, old ruins and intact buildings with some high-tech devices are repeatedly discovered.
Despite their efforts to continue living free from human influence and safe from threats, the bears of Gummi Glen gradually encounter several humans. Contrary to all fears and prejudices, the encounters do not always result in confrontation and fighting; while most humans dismiss every encounter as an illusion and put it out of their mind, some humans (especially children) try to befriend the Gummi Bears. Only those who still believe in and know about the Gummi Bears and their magic try to capture them. The Gummi Bears' closest friends among humans are Princess Calla, the daughter of King Gregor and heir to Dunwyn's throne, and Cavin, the squire of Gregor's chief knight Sir Tuxford.
The Gummi Bears owe their name to a magic potion named "Gummiberry Juice", which allows them to bounce like a rubber ball. Gummiberry Juice is made by Grammi Gummi using an ancient and secret recipe from the Gummiberries that grow in the Dunwyn forest. The Gummiberry Juice gives humans and monsters superhuman strength for a short time, but unlike Gummi Bears, it only works on humans once a day. The evil and power-hungry Duke Igthorn is constantly trying to obtain the formula of the potion and the remaining secrets of the Gummi Bears with his servant Toadwart and his private army of simple-minded ogres. He seeks to conquer Dunwyn, dethrone the king and establish a reign of terror. The Gummi Bears often have to intervene - albeit secretly - to protect the king, their friends and their secrets from the machinations of Igthorn and other enemies.
The series premiered on NBC on September 14, 1985, and aired there for four seasons. The series moved to ABC (later acquired by Disney in 1996) for one season from 1989 to 1990 (airing alongside The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh as the Gummi Bears-Winnie the Pooh Hour) and concluded on September 6, 1991, as part of the syndicated programming block The Disney Afternoon.[9] The series was later rebroadcast on the Disney Afternoon block and rerun on that block through the summer of 1991. In later years, reruns were shown on The Disney Channel from October 7, 1991[10] to at least January 1997,[11] and later on Toon Disney, with its most recent televised airing occurring on December 28, 2001.
Several VHS cassettes of the series were released internationally.[12][13] Of those, eight cassettes containing 32 episodes are listed below. The first four cassettes ("Welcome to Gummiglen!", "Creature Feature", "Hot Little Tot!", and "A Sky Full of Gummies!"), which contain 20 episodes, were released in English[12][13] in the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. These four cassettes were also released in some non-English-speaking countries (including Poland,[14][15][16] the Netherlands[17] and Germany). The other four cassettes, as well as the ones not listed below, were released exclusively in non-English-speaking countries (including the Netherlands,[13][18][19] Poland,[20][21] Finland,[22][23] and Italy[13][24]).
| VHS name | Episode titles | Release date |
|---|---|---|
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 1): Welcome to Gummiglen! | "A New Beginning" "Zummi Makes it Hot" "The Sinister Sculptor" "Someday My Prints Will Come" "Can I Keep Him?" | September 11, 1996 |
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 2): Creature Feature | "The Fence Sitter" "Night of the Gargoyle" "Loopy, Go Home" "A-Hunting We Will Go" "The Secret of the Juice" | September 11, 1996 |
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 3): Hot Little Tot! | "Sweet and Sour Gruffi" "Duel of the Wizards" "What You See is Me" "Bubble Trouble" "Toadie's Wild Ride" "Gummi in a Strange Land" | September 11, 1996 |
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 4): A Sky Full of Gummies! | "A Gummi in a Gilded Cage" "The Oracle" "When You Wish Upon a Stone" "A Gummi by Any Other Name" | September 11, 1996 |
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 5): The Crimson Avenger | "The Crimson Avenger" "You Snooze, You Loose" "Over the River and Through the Trolls" | September 10, 1997 |
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 6): Wild Ride | "Toadie's Wild Ride" "Sweet and Sour Gruffi" "Duel of the Wizards" "What You See is Me" | September 10, 1997 |
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 7): Up, Up, and Away | "Up, Up, and Away" "Faster Than a Speeding Tummi" | September 10, 1997 |
| Adventures of the Gummi Bears (Volume 8): For Whom the Spell Holds | "For Whom the Spell Holds" "Little Bears Lost" "Guess Who's Gumming to Dinner?" | September 10, 1997 |
Seasons 1 to 3 of the series were released on DVD on November 14, 2006,[25] when Walt Disney Home Entertainment released Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears: Volume 1 on DVD in Region 1. The 3-disc set features seasons 1 to 3 and does not contain any bonus features, save for subtitles for the hearing impaired.
| DVD name | Ep# | Release date |
|---|---|---|
| Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears: Volume 1 | 47 | November 14, 2006 |
To date, the series has never officially been released on DVD in the UK, but since November 2016 the show has been available on the UK Disney streaming site DisneyLife.
In Australia, Disney released nine volumes, which have now long been discontinued. They are all in complete storyline production order, but the first volume starts from episode 19 in series 2. Episodes 1-18 have not been released on DVD in Australia and are only available on the USA Region 1 collection, but the Region 4 Australian DVDs do finish off the series and go right up to episode 65 of the series' final two-part double episode adventure.
The series became available to stream on Disney+ as of November 12, 2019.[26]
Gummi Bears was adapted into a daily newspaper comic, which ran from September 1, 1986, to April 1, 1989. The strip was written by Lee Nordling and illustrated by Rich Hoover.[27]
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. (February 2013) |
Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears was Disney's first major serialized animated television series (it was released back to back with another show, The Wuzzles, which lasted only 13 episodes), and is often credited as having helped jump start the television animation boom of the late 1980s and 1990s.[3][28] Consequently, it also became the forerunner to Disney's famous Disney Afternoon timeslot, which gave way to other famous serialized Disney television series, such as DuckTales, Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers and Gargoyles. Although many of these subsequently-created shows exceeded Gummi Bears in budget and length, the show is often credited as a sort of prototype for all of the animation which followed it.[29]
The show was so successful in the United Kingdom that the episodes "A New Beginning" and "Faster Than a Speeding Tummi" were released as theatrical featurettes there in 1986 and 1987, alongside The Great Mouse Detective and a re-release of Disney's Pinocchio.[29]
Appearances of Gummi Bears in other media include one of Gruffi Gummi in a D-TV music video of the Elvis Presley song "Teddy Bear", in 1986.
The show's popularity led to a re-theming of Disneyland's Motor Boat Cruise, along with a small part of Disneyland that became known as "Disney Afternoon Avenue". The Motor Boat Cruise became the "Motor Boat Cruise to Gummi Glen" and plywood characters from the show made Gummiberry Juice along the waterway. The Gummi Bears have been featured as meetable characters who greet guests in Disney theme parks.[citation needed]
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