Casper the Friendly Ghost

Creation and success at Paramount

Casper was created in the late 1930s by Seymour Reit and Joe Oriolo, the former devising the idea for the character and the latter providing illustrations.^[4] Intended initially as the basis for a 1939 children's storybook, there was at first little interest in their idea. When Reit was away on military service during the Second World War before the book was released, Oriolo sold the rights to the book to Paramount Pictures' Famous Studios animation division.

The Friendly Ghost, the first Noveltoon to feature Casper, was released by Paramount in 1945 with a few differences from the book. In the cartoon adaptation, Casper is a cute ghost-child with a New York accent, who inhabits a haunted house along with a community of adult ghosts who delight in scaring the living. Casper, however, is a noncomformist among ghosts: he would prefer to make friends with people. He packs up his belongings and goes out into the world, hoping to find friends. However, the animals that he meets (a rooster, a mole, a cat, a mouse named Herman, and a group of hens) take one horrified look at him, scream: "A Ghost!" and run off in the other direction. Distraught, Casper unsuccessfully attempts to commit suicide (apparently forgetting that he is already dead) by lying down on a railway track before an oncoming train, before he meets two children named Bonnie and Johnny who become his friends. The children's mother—apparently widowed and impoverished—at first is frightened of Casper, but later welcomes him into the family after he (unintentionally) frightens off a greedy landlord, who, unwilling to own a "haunted" house, tears up the mortgage and gives her the house outright. The short ends with the mother kissing Bonnie, Johnny, and Casper as she sends them off to school, with Casper wearing clothing as if he were a living child.

Casper appeared in two more subsequent cartoons by Seymour Reit and Joe Oriolo, There's Good Boos To-Night and A Haunting We Will Go. There's Good Boos To-Night differs wildly from later Casper cartoons: although the theme of Casper trying to find a friend and failing in these attempts before succeeding also occurs in later cartoons, the tone of this short turns remarkably dark when a hunter and his dogs appear, chasing the little fox cub named Ferdie that Casper has befriended. Although Casper scares the hunter and dogs away, Casper discovers Ferdie dead after a harrowing chase scene. Happily, however, Ferdie returns as a ghost to join his friend Casper in the afterlife.

These were later adapted into 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 (now slightly thinner than the pudgy figure that appeared in the earlier cartoons) escapes from the afterlife of a regular ghost because he finds that scaring people can be tiresome year after year, tries to find friends but inadvertently scares almost everyone, and finally finds a (cute little) friend, whom he saves from some sort of fate, leading to his acceptance by those initially scared of him. In 1955, composer Winston Sharples composed an instrumental theme for Casper's cartoons.

Harvey Comics, television, and films

Casper went on to become one of the most famous properties from Famous Studios. Casper was first published in comics form in 1949 by St. John Publications; Alfred Harvey, founder and publisher of Harvey Comics began producing Casper comic books in 1952, and in 1959, Harvey purchased the rights to the character outright.

After Harvey bought the rights to Casper and many other Famous properties in 1959 (including Herman and Katnip, Little Audrey, and Baby Huey), they began broadcasting the post-September 1950 theatrical Famous shorts on a television show sponsored by Mattel Toys titled Matty's Funday Funnies on ABC in 1959 which introduced the Barbie doll to the public. The other Famous produced Casper cartoons had already been acquired by television distributor U.M. & M. TV Corporation in 1956. U.M. & M. retitled just "A Haunting We Will Go", but credited "Featuring Casper The Friendly Ghost" as "Featuring Casper's Friendly Ghost".

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 (initially repackaged as Casper and Company) in 1962 and ran continually until the mid-90s. 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 (aka Casper Saves Halloween), and also the Saturday morning cartoon series Casper and the Angels (an animated takeoff on two live action hit shows Charlie's Angels and "CHiPS") 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). None of Casper's original co-stars appeared in the show.

The Famous Studios version of Casper was scheduled to appear as a cameo in the deleted scene "Acme's Funeral" from the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit.^[5]

Computer-animated Casper as he appears in the live action films

Numerous Casper cartoons were released on home video by Universal Studios (via MCA Inc.), which also adapted the friendly ghost into a live-action feature film titled Casper in 1995, where he and his wicked uncles, the Ghostly Trio, were rendered via computer animation, which initially created the first CGI lead character in a film. The film constructed a back-story for the character 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.

In 1996, Amblin Entertainment and Universal Cartoon Studios created a new Casper series for Fox Kids, based on the 1995 feature, that lasted two years and was never seen on television again after 1998. Two live-action direct-to-video follow-ups to the film, Casper: A Spirited Beginning and Casper Meets Wendy (which introduced Hilary Duff as fellow Harvey Comics character Wendy the Good Little Witch), were made. They were followed by Casper's Haunted Christmas (starring Spooky and Poil from the comics and animated spin-off of the first movie), and Casper's Scare School, which were done entirely in CGI with no live-action elements. These films are often referred to as being "prequels" to the 1995 feature despite the fact that they heartily contradict the feature and do not appear to even take place in the same universe.

In 2001, Harvey Entertainment was acquired by Classic Media which, until 2012, licensed the Harvey properties including Casper.^[6]

In 2007, MoonScoop Group, in association with Classic Media, TF1 et DQ, produced a TV show of 52 X 12 named Casper's Scare School.

In 2009, a new Casper comic was published, called Casper and the Spectrals by Arden Entertainment. Much like The Man of Steel and Batman: Year One did with their respective characters, it revamped Casper and several other Harvey characters for a new audience. After selling 6,400 copies of the first comic, the last two issues were published in 2010.

Casper made a cameo in a MetLife commercial along with several other cartoon characters in 2012. Later that same year, Classic Media was acquired by DreamWorks Animation, which in turn would be acquired by NBCUniversal in 2016, and thus Universal Studios, the producer of the original live-action feature film, now manages the rights to the character and other related characters in addition to regaining the rights to Casper's Haunted Christmas (which Universal itself originally released in late 2000).

Casper

Several video games were based on the 1995 film for PC, Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Game Boy, Sega Saturn, 3DO, PlayStation, and Game Boy Color. In subsequent years Windows 95 and Game Boy Advance games were released serving as sequels to the film.

Casper: A Spirited Beginning Activity Center

Developed by Sound Source Interactive, published by WayForward Technologies and released in 1998 for PC it is based on the film of the same name and is similar in format to Disney's Activity Center. Set at Ghost Central Station the player earns Casper coins by completing Casper's Spinning Squares, Strech's Memory Game, Fatso's Kitchen, Stinkie's Goo Toss and Snivel's Mix & Match. The player must collect at least 15 Casper coins from these five games to unlock Kibosh's Magic Puzzle.

Casper: Friends Around the World

Developed by Realtime Associates, published by TDK Mediactive and released in 2000 on PlayStation. It is a mostly 2D side-scrolling platform game with occasional forward and backward movements. The evil Kibosh has invented a device to send Casper's human friends to a place where they "would not have a ghost of a chance of being found" and has hypnotized the Ghostly Trio into doing his bidding. However Casper finds a page from a map of Hollywood giving him a clue on where to start his quest to find his friends and the three missing pieces for Kibosh's imprisoning device to get them back home safely. The game is played across ten levels set around the world with 40 friendship crystals on each level to collect in order to advance to the bonus level at the end.

Casper: Spirit Dimensions

Developed by Lucky Chicken Games and published by TDK Mediactive it was the first 3D game, to have a movable game camera, based on Casper. It released in 2001 for PlayStation 2 and in 2002 for Nintendo Gamecube. The evil Kibosh has taken over the Spirit World and is intent on also taking over the mortal world. Meanwhile Wendy the Good Little Witch summons Casper, the only remaining free ghost, and opens the portals to the Spirit Dimensions to help in their only chance to defeat Kibosh.

Casper and the Ghostly Trio

Developed by Data Design Interactive and Published by Blast! Entertainment it was released in 2007 on PlayStation 2. It is a 3D game in which Casper has legs and is affected by gravity though he can glide, unlike his flying ability in Spirit Dimensions. The Ghostly Trio have kidnapped Wendy the Good Little Witch in an attempt to use her magic to create a potion that would give them the power to rule Ghostland. Wendy manages to use her magic to get the message across to Casper who must find his way through six levels to rescue her. At the end of the first five levels is a bonus stage in which Casper must collect as many jewels as he can while avoiding the Trio's lightning which is chasing him.

Casper's Scare School

A series of three games, for PlayStation 2, Nintendo DS and Wii, based on the computer animated film and TV series of the same name released in 2008 and 2009.