User blog:TrickyMario76543/Simspons DVD Releases Closing Logos Guide (Season 1)

Introduction
Hi and welcome to what I would like to see into a Wikia Blog series. In this series, I would like to showcase to you guys (& gals) the closing logos used at the end of each episodes to see how well the original closing logos (& also note variations used at the end of episodes and sometimes with in episodes too) used on each episode were preserved. Most info you'll likely see here will come courtesy of either The Simpsons Archive or The CLG Wiki (I'm an administrator on the latter site, also I'm not promoting the site here, I'm just linking it here to let you know that I've gather some of the info from). Anyways, I though we'll start off with the first season which ran from December 17th 1989 to May 13th 1990, airing 13 episodes on FOX. At the time, the Fox network was in a pickle with many shows bombing pretty quickly. It's often considered that the Simpsons was one of the things that launched FOX into a massive rival of the big three networks (ABC, CBS, & NBC). Without further ado, let's get started on analyzing the closing logos seen on the first season boxset.

Release date & information
The Complete First Season boxset was released by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (previously known as Magnetic Video, 20th Century Fox Video, CBS/FOX Video, and FOX Video) on September 25, 2001 in Region 1 and September 24, 2001 in Regions 2 and 4. It contains all 13 season 1 episodes and bonus features such as the 'Some Enchanted Evening' workprint. The packaging has the has a pale blue background with the outlines of regular Simpsons characters in white. In the middle is the TV that the Simpsons own. On the screen is a picture of a rather washed-out Simpsons family sitting on the brown soft with Snowball II ontop of it. Maggie can't be seen on it anywhere on the packaging.

Logos used on the First Season
Now we'll look at what logos were used on the first season of the show. Drumroll please! TADA!

The first you should all be familiar with. The Gracie Films logo depicts a cinema which contains rather noisy film goers. A woman in the back row then puts her finger up to her mouth and makes a "Shhhhh!" noise. The title, and the company's name is then projected onto the cinema screen. A 9-note electric piano theme with drums is then heard.

DYK?: This segment will be used to let people know of things they might not be aware of unless they do some research.

DYK?: That the theme was composed by Jeffrey Townsend?

The animation of the logo is rather choppy and might be considered creepy by some people, nonetheless, this logo is rather well known and is sometimes spoofed by others.

The other logo will be looking at is the 20th Century Fox Television logo used from 1981-1992. While most of you should be familiar with Fox. You might not be so familiar with this logo. When I've finished describing it, you'll be more familiar with it. This logo was used on all programs made by TCF-TV from 1981 to 1992. (The first know program to use this logo is the Trapper John, M.D episode "Hate Is Enough" (aired on October 25th, 1981.) This is not 100% confirmed due to a reason I'll describe later. While the last program to use this logo was season 4 episode 10 of In Living Color (Aired November 29, 1992)). It was also used on the first three seasons of The Simpsons.

To describe it, we see their then current film logo (from 1981), cropped to fullscreen (4:3) of course. The back searchlights can be seen moving behind the tower while the front ones stand still. We then see the word "TELEVISION" (which varies in color depending on the print quality). zoom up from the screen and slam straight onto the word "CENTURY" on the TCF Tower. (Most earlier versions of the logo followed a similar concept to this one, but the "TELEVISION" zoom out was more rougher than the 1981 logo.) After a second or two, the logo fades out. Interestingly, there's a slide in between the two logos that read "IN ASSOCIATION WITH" in white. The logo's theme is basically a bombastic & sped up version of the famous 20th Century Fox Theme. If you watched the TCF-TV logo history from before, you may have noticed the on the 1981 logo, there were two different theme variations. The first one was originally recorded in 1965 and was used along with a longer version of the theme recorded in 1960/61. Circa 1969. Only the shortened version was used. (You may also noticed that on some versions of the 1965 logo, the logo was shifted to the left and part of the "C" in "CENTURY" can be seen. Intentional or not, it's rather silly). Anyways, this version of the theme was used on all TCF-TV logos until 1991. From around 1988 or 1989 to 1991, it was used simultaneously with the second version of the theme. The second version is a shortened version of the 1979 Fox fanfare. This version is must less bombastic than the first version. There's a version of the theme were the last note echos out & another version without it echoing out. This version of the theme was used on the TCF-TV logo on the first three seasons. The 20th Television logo used on Seasons 4-6 of the show had the same theme as did all shows from the era. In the next section, we'll finally begin to look at what logos are present on each Season 1 episode on DVD.

Closing Logos Seen
Now, we'll finally look at the logos seen at the end of each episode on this boxset. Each sub-header will contain the production code, episode name, and original airdate. Underneath it, it should contain photos of what logos are seen. The caption underneath will also note (if any,) sound or visual variations are used or if the closing theme plays over any logos.

Episode 7G08: Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire (December 17, 1989)
DYK?: That this was the only Simpsons episode to air in the 1980's?

Episode 7G03: Homer's Odyssey (January 21, 1990)
DYK?: This episode has Waylon Smithers, Jr.'s skin tone mistakenly set as black instead of yellow?

Episode 7G04: There's No Disgrace Like Home (January 28, 1990)
DYK?:


 * 1) That the scene where the family shock each other on the electric chairs appeared in . It's appears on Holly McClane's flight right after when a stewardess says that passengers are getting restless about not landing (terrorists had captured the runways and prevented any flights from landing), and the captain suggests to her "TV, that usually calms the passengers down."?
 * 2) This was the first episode to be shown on Australian TV where Channel 10 showed the series for the first time sometime between January 27th to February 3th? (Airdate for 7G04 is not entirely confirmed).

Results
This section will contain statics on what logos appeared on each episode.
 * Episodes with the Gracie Films logo (13/13) (100%)
 * Episodes with the 20th Century Fox Television 1981 logo (2/13) (15.38%)
 * Episodes with the 20th Television logo (11/13) (84.62%)

Analysis
Now we will look at the results and analyze them. Obviously, all 13 Season 1 episodes had the regular Gracie Films logo. There were no sounds or visual variants of the logo used in Season 1. The Fox logo on the other hand, is a different story. As mentioned before the first three seasons originally had the 20th Century Fox Television 1981 logo. However, with the exception of two episodes ("There's No Disgrace Like Home" & "Krusty Gets Busted"), the Fox logo seen here is the 20th Television logo instead of the 20th Century Fox Television 1981 logo. Why is this, you ask? Well hold on tight as I'm gonna explain it to you right now!

Plastering
What I just mentioned above is an example of logo plastering, where a studio or company takes an older or another company's logo and slaps a newer one in place of it. Due to this, it can make older logos harder to find on TV and home media. Fox tends to have an annoying habit of deleting older logos (sometimes even current logos!) and replacing them with the 20th Television logo. The Simpsons is not the only show to suffer from plastering. Other shows like Lost In Space, Family Guy, Batman, and M*A*S*H have suffered this treatment too. (This is the reason why the first program to use the 1981 logo is not 100% know as M*A*S*H used the 1981 logo in later episodes, however... It's not known what's the first episode of the show to use the 1981 logo due to it always being plastered over with the 20th Television logo. However, I did see one airing of a 1979 episode which surprisingly left the original TCF-TV logo intact). Fox is also not the only Television production company to endorse in this trend. Other companies such as Sony Pictures Television (Often said to be the most notorious of them all), CBS Television Distribution, DHX Media, and others too tend to do this annoying habit as well! It also can happen to movie logos too. (How long has it been since you saw a Paramount logo on Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory? You probably haven't...) MGM are likely the king of plastering when it comes to movies. Thank god WB (though Turner Entertainment Co.) own pretty much every pre-1986 MGM film. That's why you still see the MGM logo on films like The Wizard of Oz, Network (Plaster-hole if you live outside of the US as MGM still own international rights to the film.), Fame, and many others too.

Conclusion
Now I'll I'll be grading every boxset based on how well they preserved the closing logos. This boxset gets a D. While most episodes have the 20th Television logo plastered over the original logo, the inclusion of the original Fox logo on two episodes bump it to a passing grade. Not that bad, but not that good. It should of preserved the Fox logo on every episode of the season, not just two. I might do more of these in the future based on how well the reception to this post is. This is TrickyMario7654 signing off.