The Yes! era (also known as Red Campaign and Post-City) was the fifth era of Cartoon Network. It began on April 3, 2006, running concurrent with CN City; both the City and Yes! bumpers ended on May 31, 2007, with the Summer 2007 look replacing them. The last program to air under the Yes! era on that day was Courage the Cowardly Dog.
Many of the bumpers in the Yes! era consisted of characters saying and doing random things behind a plain red background. There were also new CN City bumpers created in this era. It was the last branding of Cartoon Network to be introduced under Jim Samples's lead and was supposed to be the lead-in to a entire brand revamp of Cartoon Network to begin in late 2007 to cater more towards younger kids with focus on live-action.
Bumpers[]
The Now/Then bumpers in this era were similar to those featured in the CN City era, but with a number of refinements. The sets used in the City bumpers were modified to use dark, flat, psychedelic colors and smoother animation, which gave them a more New Age feel. Some of these sets featured a silhouetted character from a show in their environment (i.e. Ed running past a mailbox in the cul-de-sac from Ed, Edd n Eddy). The white discs that were used in the CN City bumpers that showed the character's head were replaced with larger, sharper-quality red discs. In the Coming Up Next bumpers, a character would pop up in the same disc. The music in these bumpers was more electronic rock-oriented than the CN City ones. Nicole Vicius, who was the announcer for the Now/Then bumpers from 2004 to 2006, was mostly phased out in favor of Johnny Lancaster. However, in September 2006, some of the recycled City bumps featuring her were used, likely as a placeholder.
The CN City look was still in use during this time, and some new cityscape bumpers were made. One had CN characters doing a yard sale outside the Foster's mansion, and another featured Lumpus meeting Eduardo and Lupe who asked him "Why?". Starting on September 5, 2006, the City bumpers were edited to have a splash screen at the end with the CN logo on a red background. The City and Yes! bumpers were both phased out on May 31, 2007, replaced by Summer 2007.
From June to September 4, 2006, bumpers would air involving characters from Cartoon Network shows doing and saying random things behind a red background, sometimes accompanied by yellow and white text (similar to an Internet meme). The mascots for these bumpers were Fred Fredburger (The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy) and Cheese (Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends). The network's slogan during the summer was a simplistic "Cartoon Network: Yes!", as spoken by Fred Fredburger, a character from The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy. This ad campaign was relatively popular, being featured on billboards, cinema spots, and cross-channel commercials, as well as having an Internet presence.
On September 5, 2006, the Fred Fredburger and Cheese bumpers were gradually phased out, and new animated/live-action bumpers were created in the style of Adult Swim and Williams Street, which featured various CN characters in any situations, or often doing as stick puppets. These included "Karaoke", "Bloo Playing Catch", "Disco Club", "Random Clam", "Billy's Nose", "Bloo's Stature", "Irwin's Hot Tub Party", "Windsor's Wise Words of Wisdom", "Vacation with Bloo", and "Reapers Dayplanner". It also still use the "red background" bumpers, but they added graffiti clouds, leaves, rain droplets, lightning bolts, and paint drops in the same background. These bumpers ended in January 2007.
In January 2007, the Yes! branding was slightly refurbished. Two different styles of bumpers were aired during this time: the first style is "Lunchbox of Doom", featuring an assortment of show clips inside a CGI gothic lunchbox, a reference to the Billy & Mandy episode "Pandora's Lunch Box". The second is "VS.", comparing two cartoon characters. These bumpers ended on May 31, 2007. In May 2007, towards the end of the era, the Cartoon Network Invaded event aired, a special event featuring five alien-themed episodes of CN's original series.
Programming[]
During this era, most of the original Cartoon Cartoons were being re-run on The Cartoon Cartoon Show and The Top 5, and one of them, Dexter's Laboratory, also became available on Boomerang. At this point, the only Cartoon Cartoons to still be in production were The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy, Ed, Edd n Eddy, and Codename: Kids Next Door. Courage the Cowardly Dog re-ran standalone in October 2006, as part of The Grim & Courage Hour. The ratings were good enough that Stuart Snyder brought the show back into re-runs in 2007.
The CN City era was the first era of CN to air live-action programming, and the Yes! era continued this trend, much to the chagrin of long-time fans. In April, teen sitcom Saved by the Bell aired on Adult Swim for two weeks. The 1980s Saturday morning program Pee-wee's Playhouse also began airing Mondays-Thursdays on July 10, 2006. On December 8, 2006, the network debuted their first original live-action television movie titled Re-Animated, a collaboration between both live-action and animation. In 2007, the film was spun-off into its own half-hour series entitled Out of Jimmy's Head, which continues the events of the film.
- Ed, Edd n Eddy
- Codename: Kids Next Door
- The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy
- Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends
- Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi (ended June 27, 2006)
- The Life and Times of Juniper Lee (ended April 9, 2007)
- Camp Lazlo
- My Gym Partner's a Monkey
- Ben 10
- Squirrel Boy (premiered May 29, 2006)
- Class of 3000 (premiered November 3, 2006)
Cast[]
- Andre 3000—Sunny Bridges
- Ben Diskin—Numbuh 1, Numbuh 2
- C.H. Greenblatt—Fred Fredburger
- Candi Milo—Coco; Cheese, Madame Foster
- Carlos Alazraqui—Lazlo; Clam; Salty Mike; Monroe
- Crystal Scales—Tamika Jones
- Cree Summer—Numbuh 5
- Dee Bradley Baker—Numbuh 4; Wildmutt
- Grey DeLisle—Mandy; Frankie; Yumi; Ingrid Giraffe; Lupe Toucan
- Janice Kawaye—Ami, Kim Chin, Kam Chin
- Jeff Bennett—Raj; Samson
- Johnny Lancaster—Announcer
- Jennifer Hale—Madison Spaghettini Papadopoulos
- Keith Ferguson—Blooregard Q. Kazoo
- Keone Young—Kaz Harada
- Lara Jill Miller—Juniper Lee
- Lauren Tom—Numbuh 3
- Matt Hill—Ed
- Maurice LaMarche—Principal Pixiefrog; Father
- Mirabelle Kirkland—Yumi Ishiyama (Now/Then bumpers only)
- Nicole Vicius—Announcer (Now/Then bumpers only)
- Pamela Adlon—Andy Johnson
- Paul Eiding—Max Tennyson
- Peter Kelamis—Rolf
- Phil LaMarr—Wilt, Philly Phil
- Tara Strong—Ben Tennyson
- Tom Kane—Mr. Herriman, Professor Utonium
- Tom Kenny—Eduardo; Jake Spidermonkey; Scoutmaster Lumpus; Henry Armadillo, Eddie Lawrence III
- Tony Sampson—Eddy
- Rachael MacFarlane—Mindy
- Richard Horvitz—Rodney J. Squirrel; Billy
- Rick Gomez—Slips Python; Windsor Gorilla
- Samuel Vincent—Edd (Double "D")
- Scott Menville—Bobby
- Sean Marquette—Mac
- Small Fire—Li'l D
- Steve Blum—Heatblast
- Steve Little—Chip; Skip
- Vanessa Marshall—Irwin
Trivia[]
- The on-screen logo used during this era was a translucent version of the 2004 logo with a red shadow, which was also used during the Summer 2007 era and the beginning of the Fall era.
- In 2011, a similar era, named "YEEEAUHHHH!", was a nod to the Yes! era, as it uses a quote from Regular Show, much like the other one did by using a quote from The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy.
- In the original ending for Cartoon Network Invaded (aired on May 28th, 2007), that era was referenced by the alien general who said the words after sucking the brain juice of the notable dumb CN characters (which has Fred, Ed, Skip, Cheese and Slips in the pods) from multiple shows.
- In the OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes episode, "Crossover Nexus", the Yes! logo made an appearance.