|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Casper the Friendly Ghost is the main character of the Famous Studios theatrical animated cartoon series of the same name. As his name indicates, he is a ghost, but is quite personable. According to the 1995 feature film Casper, his last name, when he was alive, was McFadden, making his "real" name Casper McFadden.
HistoryCreation and success at Paramount
The Friendly Ghost, the first Noveltoon to feature Casper, was released by Paramount in 1945. In the cartoon, Casper is a cute, pudgy ghost-child, who prefers making friends with people instead of scaring them. He leaves his home at the local haunted house and goes out to make friends. However, every person or animal he meets takes one horrified look at him and runs off in the other direction. Distraught, Casper unsuccessfully attempts to commit suicide (apparently forgetting that he's already dead) before he meets two little children who become his friends. The children's mother at first rejects Casper, but later welcomes him into the family after he wards off a greedy landlord. Casper appeared in two subsequent Noveltoons before Paramount started a Casper the Friendly Ghost series in 1950, and ran the theatrical releases until the summer of 1959. Nearly every entry in the series was the same: Casper leaves the (after)life of a regular ghost, tries to find friends but scares nearly everyone, and finally finds a (cute little) friend, whom he saves from some sort of fate. The cartoon series also boasted a catchy title song which was written by Jerry Livingston and Mack David. Harvey Comics, television and filmsCasper went on to become one of the most famous properties from the Famous Studio. Alfred Harvey, founder and publisher of Harvey Comics began producing Casper comic books in 1952, and in 1957, purchased the rights to the character outright.
New cartoons were created for the New Casper Cartoon Show in 1963, also on ABC. The original Casper cartoons were syndicated under the title Harveytoons in 1962 and ran continually until 1990. Casper has remained popular in reruns and merchandising, and Hanna-Barbera produced two holiday specials, Casper's First Christmas (which also starred Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound, Snagglepuss, Quick Draw McGraw, Augie Doggie and Doggie Daddy) and Casper's Halloween Special, and also the Saturday morning cartoon series Casper and the Angels in the autumn of 1979, all on NBC. Also featured on the NBC version was a big ghost named Hairy Scary (voiced by John Stephenson).  In 1995, the friendly ghost was adapted into a live-action feature film entitled Casper, where he and his wicked uncles, the Ghostly Trio, were created with computer animation. The film constructed a backstory for Casper and is the only time in the series that the question of his death has been addressed. According to the film, Casper was a twelve-year-old boy living in Whipstaff Manor with his inventor father J. T. McFadden until he died from pneumonia after playing out in the cold until it was past nightfall. Much of the backstory he is given in the film is contradicted by other Casper media. In 1996, Fox created a new Casper series, based on the 1995 feature, that lasted two years. Two live-action direct-to-video follow-ups, Casper: A Spirited Beginning and Casper Meets Wendy, to the film were later made. They were followed by Casper's Haunted Christmas and Casper's Scare School, which were done entirely in CGI with no live-action elements. These films are often referred to as being "sequels" to the 1995 feature despite the fact that they heartily contract the feature and do not appear to even take place in the same universe. In Casper's Scare School, Casper's personality remains unchanged, but he had new friends, enemies, etc. Casper was not really the only friendly ghost however. Kibosh also was friendly back when he was a child like Casper. Unlike the previous Casper films, Casper's uncles appear to care for him and when he goes to scare school, they are not really happy about him leaving. Actors to play CasperCasper was voiced by Malachi Pearson in Casper and The Spooktacular New Adventures of Casper, by Jeremy Foley in Casper: A Spirited Beginning and Casper Meets Wendy, by Brendon Ryan Barrett in Casper's Haunted Christmas and by Devon Werkheiser in Casper's Scare School. Devon Sawa is the only actor to play the character in live-action, portraying him in a sequence from the 1995 film in which Casper was temporarily brought back to life. Other appearances, trivia and references
Supporting characters
Comic book titles
See alsoTransparencyAlthough scholars have debated the subject for the good part of the last century, the general consensus among experts is that Casper should be categorized as "semi-transparent", due to the fact that his opacity varies with factors such as his emotions and surroundings. Although many notable researches (see Robert Herchenston) have argued that this title is a misnomer, little evidence exists to support the completely opaque and completely transparent hypotheses, while the amount of data that suggests semi-transparency has been steadily increasing for the last 10 years.
|
Sites |
Searched sites for "Casper the Friendly Ghost" |
|
No sites found. |
Sorry, no matching site records were found. |
Want your site listed here?
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
