Transformers ("G1", the original series) has been
completely released on DVD, but fans of
G.I. Joe and
Jem are not satisfied because Rhino has left them hanging. The studio has left
Joe fans with DVDs up to the middle of the 2nd Season out of the 4 years the program ran, and leaving
Jem fans just a half-season shy of completing the run of the series! Why did they do that?
Because, as we first reported last Summer, Rhino's rights to these properties, part of the Sunbow group of animated series, expired. This was mentioned in passing in a
June 25, 2004 report where it was said that "
G.I. Joe S2 P2 and Jem S3 P2 depend on Sunbow renewing with Rhino." Now, we know that a lot of the info in that report was later
disputed by Rhino, but the fact that their Sunbow license was expiring was never in contention. In fact, this was mentioned in passing in several other news posts we've made since then.
What we haven't known, though, is which studio would take over the line-up since Rhino didn't get the renewal? Speculation was that Paramount had the inside edge, since they had successfully gotten rights to newer
Transformer and
G.I. Joe DVD releases. However, that doesn't seem to be what's happened.
Fans of these shows write in to Rhino all the time, sending e-mail to the "Ask Dr. Rhino" address asking what's happening with continuing DVD releases of the programs. In the past few days, a LOT of our readers have forwarded us the reply that Dr. Rhino finally sent out in response (thanks to everybody who wrote in):
Rhino's deal with Sunbow, the licensor of Transformers, GI Joe and Jem, has expired. Sony Music has acquired them and will reissue these titles at some point.
Wow, so according to the old distributor, the new distributor is Sony Music, the same folks who put out the
Bullwinkle DVDs, among others. However, we've checked Sony Music's press-available list of upcoming titles, and none of the Sunbow properties are listed there yet. We'll try to get more info from them on this, but right now we're relying on Dr. Rhino's word that this is indeed the situation. Stay tuned, and we'll try to find out more!
