Kath Soucie Movies

From Fairly OddParents creator Butch Hartman, the half-hour animated series Danny Phantom was all about Danny Fenton, a shy, geekish freshman who attended Casper High. Thanks to an accident in the laboratory of his paranormal-expert father Jack, Danny was transformed into a half-human, half-phantom, endowed with ghostly superpowers. As "Danny Phantom", our hero periodically skipped out of school to save the world from a vast array of evil (and sidesplittingly funny) ghosts, spooks and phantoms. Meanwhile, Casper High's vice-principal and English teacher Mr. Lancer, in the anal-retentive tradition of all animated adult authority figures, imposed harsh punishments on Danny for his frequent absences--or at least, he tried to. Other characters included Danny's level-headed mom Maddie, his ultra-perfectionist sister Jazz, and his best friends, talkative techno-nerd Tucker Foley (whose various inventions were designed for maximum efficiency in the Ghost World where Danny spent of his time), and freewheeling Goth Girl and vegetarian Samantha "Sam" Manson. The bane of Danny's existence was bullying high school football star Dash Baxter, who often as not ended up embarrassed or humiliated thanks to Danny's spectral skills. Danny Phantom joined the Nickelodeon lineup on April 3, 2004, and later was seen as part of the weekend-morning schedule of Nickelodeon's sister network CBS. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Walt Disney Pictures presents this straight-to-video animated feature starring Winnie the Pooh and friends. It's Easter and the whole gang is excited because that means Rabbit will be playing the Easter Bunny as he has in years past. Unfortunately for Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, Eeyore, and Roo, Rabbit isn't interested in partaking in any festivities and would rather spend the day focusing on spring cleaning. After some unsuccessful attempts to rouse Rabbit into the spirit, Roo has an idea that just might save they day. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide

On Professor Farnsworth's 150th birthday, the Planet Express crew goes to Mars University to attend a party held in his honor. After the party, he reveals his latest creation: his 12-year-old clone, Cubert Farnsworth (Kath Soucie). The crew can't take the clone's obnoxious behavior and the Professor is distraught to learn that Cubert doesn't even want to be a scientist. Wanting to end his life, the Professor heads out to the Near Death Star, a place where people over the age of 160 go to die -- it turns out he had been lying about his age in order to avoid going there. The crew finds out where he is and heads out to rescue him. "A Clone of My Own" is the first Futurama episode to acknowledge the progression of time, as this episode takes place in the year 3001. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide

This animated NBC show's humor is centered around the eternal battle between God and Satan. In this incarnation, God is depicted as a laid-back aging hippie type (voice of James Garner) while Satan (voice of Alan Cumming) is slick, effete, and British. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

After the critical and commercial success of The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King, the Walt Disney Pictures animation studio embarked on their most serious and ambitious animated feature to date with this adaptation of Victor Hugo's classic novel Notre Dame de Paris. Quasimodo (voice of Tom Hulce) is a grotesquely deformed but kind-hearted young man who was abandoned by his parents as an infant and thrown down a well; he was rescued by the priests of Notre Dame, the massive cathedral in the heart of Paris, and he lives there, earning his keep as a bell ringer. Quasimodo has become the ward of Judge Frollo (voice of Tony Jay), an outwardly pious but deeply hateful man who treats Quasimodio with indifference and violently loathes the Gypsies who spend their days in the cathedral's courtyard. Frollo hopes to clear the Gypsies out of Paris with the help of Phoebus (voice of Kevin Kline), leader of the troops under Frollo's command. However, Phoebus does not share Frollo's racist views and harbors no ill will against the Gypsies. When Quasimodo is crowned King of the Fools after leaving Notre Dame during the annual festival of Topsy Turvy Day, the hunchback is ordered beaten by the guards as punishment, but Esmerelda (voice of Demi Moore), a hot-blooded but compassionate gypsy beauty, shows pity on him and helps free him from his chains. The lovely Esmerelda is the first woman to show kindness to the unfortunate Quasimodo, and the hunchback soon falls in love with her. However, the dashing Phoebus is also infatuated with her, and Esmerelda is attracted to Phoebus as well, though she feels a motherly affection for the hunchback. Judge Frollo finds that he also desires Esmerelda, which only inflames his hatred for the Gypsies when she refuses his proposals. Darker and less outwardly comic than most of Disney's features, The Hunchback of Notre Dame does feature comic relief in the form of Victor (voice of Charles Kimbrough) and Hugo (voice of Jason Alexander), a pair of gargoyles who befriend Quasimodo, as well as several songs from Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

This Hanna-Barbera version of "The Arabian Nights" goes to great pains not to offend any pressure or minority group--so much so that one suspects its political correctness was actually a gag. At any rate, such familiar Hanna-Barbera stars as Yogi Bear, Boo Boo, Magilla Gorilla, Scooby Doo and Shaggy are featured in a trilogy of familiar-looking stories. Episode one, "Alliyah-Din and His Magic Lamp", features Yogi and Boo Boo as genies and a female version of Alladin; episode two, "Sinbad", is a freewheeling spoof of both the original story and of Hanna-Barbera's rival Disney studios, built around the antics of Magilla Gorilla in the title role; and the closing segment, "Scheherezade", finds Scooby and (especially) Shaggy forsaking the solving of mysteries so that they'll have time to spin tales for a cranky caliph. The 90-minute Arabian Nights originally aired September 3, 1994, on the TBS superstation. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Beauty and the Beast is widely considered the best animated Disney feature of the studio's 1980s/1990s renewal of the form. Based on the classic French fairy tale, it tells the story of Belle (voiced by Paige O'Hara), an intelligent young woman scorned by her townspeople for being a bookworm, weary of fighting off the advances of the arrogant Gaston (Richard White), and dreaming of escape. When her father gets lost in the woods and captured by the forbidding Beast (Robby Benson), a once-handsome prince turned into a monster by a witch, Belle goes off to rescue him. Taken with her, the Beast agrees to release Belle's father if she agrees to stay with him forever. Initially repulsed, Belle soon finds much to appreciate in the Beast's hidden, tender nature. The Beast's servants -- a clock (David Ogden Stiers), a teapot (Angela Lansbury), and a candlestick (Jerry Orbach) -- see Belle as their salvation: if the Beast and a woman fall in love before his 21st birthday, he will be free from the curse. The songs are first-class, the tale is told with sincerity but not sentimentality, and the characters of Belle and the Beast, complex individuals who defy stereotyping and change over the course of the story, are more three-dimensional than in most live-action movies. The eye-popping animation is beautifully rendered, and Beauty and the Beast certainly deserves its place amongst Disney's animated classics. In 2002, a special 89-minute edition of the film was released in IMAX theaters with the addition of a newly animated song, ""Human Again."" ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide