Filmation lost a big opportunity

[monteeg]

I wondering what opportunity Filmation lost when did not produced a crossover between He-Man and Blackstar. I mean, folowing MOTU success, they could got up Blackstar's canceled show ( and all kind of merchandising) just doing a 2 parts episode in He-Man series. Something like Skeletor conquers Grayskull and Sorceress telling He-Man their only hope is he join forces with the great warrior from Sagar. So He-Man go to Sagar and convince John to go back with him to Eternia to defeat Skeletor. In the end, Blackstar meet Marlena and both remind their Earth's life. Unfortunatelly, Filmation was not interesting in that.

[coinilius]

Like I said in the action figure thread, there would have been all kinds of issues at the time that would have gotten in the way of them doing such a cross over, especially given that the Blackstar merchandise revenue wouldn't have been lining Mattel's pockets

Our own Zimraphael has written a Blackstar/He-Man crossover that is stickied in this section - it's a good read, although it is a different, more mature, intepretation of Blackstar than the Filmation version.

[monteeg]

Coinilius, MOTU debuted in 1981 as a toy line and hit some kind of success. When Mattel opened its eyes and realized what was in hands, hired Filmation to do a cartoon in 1983 (debuted in september 1983). In 1984 "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe" was really a big hit and ruled the world ! A second season was produced in late 84 till middle of 85, when "Secret of Sword" and She-Ra cartoon debuted. But in 1984/85 Galoob seen an opportunity and bought Blackstar rights, releasing their action figures. But before that, Blackstar was Filmation only son. They really could do a crossover in first season. If it works, maybe we get a second Blackstar season, much more elaborated. I think Filmation did a bad job in Blackstar series as well Galoob did in action figures toy line. Our hero should deserves more.

[monteeg]

Remembering I am talking about He-Man and Blackstar similarities only in cartoon series, just because both were produced by the same company (and same writers, artists, etc). MOTU's bible is completely different.

[Whitedwarf]

'Blackstar' was a moderate hit in the States, but performed "stellar" anywhere else.
Fact is, Filmation got the animation rights of the MOTU toyline, they were going to take a bigger fish, since the MOTU toyline was already a (HUGE) success by the year 1982.
So I think they just scrapped any (further) plan to give 'Blackstar' a second chance and make a second season. So silly, because 'Blackstar' was the one to feature a more intriguing world and lot of potential.

[monteeg]

I always think Blackstar would deserves more than Filmation did. Of course the show had only 13 episodes ! Filmation executives decided not to tell us the whole story. Only in his intro we can understand the Blackstar origins. There is no answers how John got the Star Sword or Klone's origin, for example. So, I am sure the audience was not as good as Filmation liked and they decided to cancel the series early. Only in Spacewrecked episode we can see a small part of his story. Filmation really lost a potencial big hit.

[monteeg]

They could develop a MOTU-Blackstar crossover to open the John's second season.

[coinilius]

Well, in the Pif Gadget comic we got an originin for Blackstar and the Star Sword (scans and a translation of which I have posted over at the Planet Sagar tahoo group: groups.yahoo.com/group/Planet_Sagar/ *shameless plug*), but while that story starts out well enough, it becomes non-canonical with the tv series when it introduces the idea that

SPOILER: Click to show

the Star Sword was made by human scientists as part of the ion drive of the ship Blackstar crashed in.

Also, Klone just sort of turns up at the end, after all the action is over (he seems to do that a lot in those French stories).

As for more episodes of Blackstar - it wasn't reallyFilmation that decided to not make any more, CBS just didn't commision them to make any more.

[zimraphel]

Filmation fell out with CBS in 1982 over Gilligan's Planet, before there could be a second season of Blackstar.

And remember that Blackstar was only one of seven animated series Filmation was working on at the time, so it isn't as though all the studio's resources went into it, as with He-Man.

[Whitedwarf]

On DVD, 'Blackstar' proved to be a huge cult classic.

This is coming from BCI Guy at the He-Man.org forum:

"Blackstar did OK. Not great, and less than expected. It did better than Bravestarr and Ghostbusters.

I'd say it was in the 4th tier of sales.

Tier 1: He-Man
Tier 2: She-Ra
Tier 3: Isis
Tier 4: Groovie Goolies, Blackstar
Tier 5: Everything else."

[monteeg]

Indeed, I asked this question to BCI Guy last week. I am so glad "Blackstar" sold very well. I purchased mine last year and it's amazing. I could remember my childhood when this show aired in Brazil (1982).

[vagtav]

So death and curse to CBS...