Sources
Help build the largest human-edited directory on the web.
Submit a site - Become an editor
Wikipedia. Licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Are you an expert in this subject? Join the discussion and share your knowledge at Wikipedia.org.
Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Format | Animated television series |
| Created by | Craig McCracken |
| Starring | Keith Ferguson Sean Marquette Candi Milo Tom Kenny Phil LaMarr Grey DeLisle Tom Kane Tara Strong |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| No. of seasons | 5 |
| No. of episodes | 65 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Running time | 22 minutes approx. |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | Cartoon Network |
| Picture format | 480i (SDTV), 1080i (HDTV) for Good Wilt Hunting |
| Original run | August 13, 2004 – present |
| External links | |
| Official website | |
| IMDb profile | |
| TV.com summary | |
| Common rating | |
|---|---|
| Australia | PG |
| United States | TV-Y7 |
Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends (sometimes called Foster's for short, and abbreviated as "FHIF"/"FHFIF") is an Emmy Award-Winning American animated television series created and produced at Cartoon Network Studios by animator Craig McCracken, who also created The Powerpuff Girls. It first premiered on Cartoon Network on August 13, 2004, as a 90-minute television movie, which led to a series of half-hour episodes. The series currently airs on Cartoon Network and its affiliates worldwide, except in Canada where it has aired on English and Francophone Teletoon networks due to Canadian television ownership regulations.
Contents |
Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends is a cartoon that takes place in a home where imaginary friends go when their creators outgrow them. The inspiration came when McCracken and his wife, Lauren Faust, adopted a pair of dogs from an adoption shelter. McCracken wondered how things would be if there was a similar place for childhood imaginary friends.
In this world, imaginary friends become real the instant a child imagines them; unlike how the concept often works on other shows, an Imaginary Friend is totally real, and can be seen, heard and felt by all under most circumstances. Unfortunately for the imaginary friends, the children outgrow them. When that happens, the friends are left to fend for themselves. Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends was founded by the elderly Madame Foster to provide a foster home (hence the title) for abandoned imaginary friends; their motto is "Where good ideas are not forgotten." There are (according to "Setting A President") 1,340 imaginary friends at Foster's Home. It has been suggested that the house itself may be imaginary, as well. In the end of "Emancipation Complication" Madame Foster states that there are 2,038 imaginary friends currently residing in the house plus Bloo and Mr. Herriman, suggesting that the house may have grown larger during the time.
Foster's home for imaginary friends is set in an unknown state in an unknown city on 1123 Wilson Way. The founder of the town is revealed in the episode "Challenge of the Superfriends" to be Elwood P. Dowd, the main character in the play and movie "Harvey". There is an 1123 Wilson Way in Stockton, California, but this could simply be a coincidence. In the episode "Squeeze The Day," the Foster's friends are at a beach while Bloo watches a weather station on cable, which is reporting on the weather in Spokane, Washington, but it also says the weather in Topeka, Kansas at least five times in the episode, whereas Spokane is mentioned once. In "A Lost Claus," it is seen that in winter there is snow. In "Imposter's Home For Um…Make 'Em Up Pals," the new imaginary friend, Goofball John McGee, says he is from Canada. And when his creator came with his parents to pick him up, they mentioned that they took train A, and that it only took 45 minutes, along with two stops. These clues place the setting somewhere vaguely in the northern half of United States. Lauren Faust did specifically state, in a thread on the "Never Forgotten Foster's Home Community Forum", that Foster's is located in the Pacific Northwest of the United States, which would place it anywhere from northern California to the Washington state/Canadian border.
In the episode "Bus The Two Of Us," a sign for Northern New Hampshire is partially seen during Bloo's road trip. In "Good Wilt Hunting", Wilt's first leg of his journey on a road map resembles Nevada, and it's clear that Wilt is traveling at that point in an east-southeasterly direction, but the map does not show his entire planned route. He backtracks at one point to return "Foofy Woogums", the teddy bear Imaginary Friend, to her creator, creating confusion among those trying to find HIM. Frankie exclaims that the destination is across the country, so if Foster's is located on the Pacific Northwestern coast as Lauren Faust stated, that would mean that Wilt's ultimate destination is on the east coast of the US. During Wilt's journey, he is seen traveling eastward through deserts along what could be Route 66, and along his way, he stops at a train station in the background of which can be seen an oil rig pumping away, which would seem to indicate that this stop was somewhere in Texas. As he progresses further eastward, the scenery changes from desert to more lush, forested climates, and the accents of the locals become decidedly Southern, as evidenced by the jailbirds that he encounters when he's jailed for unintentionally aiding the house robbers, so it would appear that Wilt's final destination is on the Southeastern coast of the United States. Given that Wilt's creator, Jordan Michaels, is a bit of a "reverse parody" of Michael Jordan, playing for a team called the "Cows" while Michael Jordan once played for the "Bulls", and Michael Jordan is from North Carolina, it would probably be reasonably to assume that Wilt's destination is in South Carolina. This would indeed be all the way across the country from where Foster's is located, as Frankie states.
The exact information about Imaginary Friends (or "Friends" for short) is given in bits and pieces throughout the show. Imaginary Friends are fully "real" once created, and can be seen by anyone, not only their creators. Often, they take the form of something strange and bizarre from the child's imagination-, such as Dutchess or Coco. Other Imaginary Friends seem to be very simple, especially those made by younger children, such as Bloo or the Scribbles. Many Friends (particularly unimportant ones) seem to be nothing more than normal objects brought to life; such examples include a refridgerator friend named Fridgey, an oven friend named Oveny, etc. Still other Friends look human-; or example, at Christmas time children often become so excited they imagine up Friends who look like Santa Claus, leading to a high concentration of them at Foster's each December.
Two "subspecies" of Imaginary Friend are known: Scribbles, which are created by very small children, and Extremosauruses, created by teenagers. The former are small and look, essentially, like scribbled lines a child might draw; they are very bothersome and, as a result, Foster's kept them locked in a single room of the house for a long while. They are not very intelligent, but the other Friends of the house eventually realized they could teach each one a single task to do. They also appear to have no structural form, as imaginary friends can walk, swim, or lie on them (in Bloo's case, he was able to lay down on an entire chair, which was constructed entirely from scribbles). In "The Trouble With Scribbles", they proved to be very popular with adults, because of their ability to do household chores with sufficient ease, and this in turn resulted in many of them being adopted, to the point where only one scribble remained.
Extremosauruses are more varied, and are incredibly dangerous; they usually appear as monsters. Despite this, however, in "Eddie Monster", Extremosauruses are shown to be loyal to their creators, much like ordinary friends. Extremosauruses also vary greatly in design, and make several connections to manga, anime, and various illustrative styles. In 'House of Bloos', an Extremosaurus that attacks Mac, resembles nothing more that a massive sphere supported by four legs, constructed of mines. But in the episode mentioned, they range from evil reptilian- like creatures, to knights, aliens, and to a more humourus extent, a Pikachu-like being with tentacles. Extremosauruses are normally locked up in a cage behind the house, which is first seen in the pilot episode, "House of Bloo's". It is unknown to what species ordinary friends (such as Bloo, Wilt, or Eduardo) belong, or if they are known to have a species at all. It is also unknown if adults create imaginary friends, and if they have a separate species as well. It should also be noted that in the episode "Room With a Feud", Wilt, Eduardo and Coco were asked to look after some of the younger friends, to put them to sleep. These friends were slightly smaller than the average baby, yet still had the appearance of an ordinary friend. It is unknown to what species these friends belong. Imaginary friends are sometimes designated as a specific type of friend. For example, Eduardo is commonly referred to as a 'guardian' friend, due to his protective nature. In "Sight for Sore Eyes", Ivan states that he is a "seeing- eye" friend, as he helps his blind creator, Stevie, and although it has never been mentioned in the series, Wilt is regarded as a 'helper' friend, because of his helpful nature, and inability to refuse tasks handed to him by other imaginary friends.
Imaginary Friends very rarely age or change their appearance at any point in their lives. It is unknown if Friends marry or have children---a character once thought Mr. Herriman and Coco were married, however, he was also shown to be very ignorant about Friends, so this may have been an error on his part. There is some indication Imaginary Friends can have children. such as Bloo, pretending to be an old man, claiming Mac was his descendant (with no one even arguing about the issue of species). Imaginary Friends imagined by the same person can be called "siblings," however, as if their creators were a parent (though, in one case, Imaginary Friends created by real-life siblings referred to each other as brother and sister, rather than cousins). It is unknown how old Imaginary Friends can live to be, or indeed, if they die at all. In "Say It Isn't Sew", in a dream sequence, Bloo is shown considerably aged, although this is probably an exaggeration of Bloo's thoughts at the present time. In "Bloo Done It", an imaginary friend named Mr. Pockets is shown to have been around for decades, with no change in appearance. Imaginary Friends may only 'die' if they are forgotten entirely, hence the Foster's motto. But apparently in the episode "Seeing Red", Terrence creates an imaginary friend that is literally a slice of pizza, and proceeds to eat him. It's unknown if this is supposed to be a joke, or imaginary friends made to become food items and be eaten, and killed. A similar occurrence happened in the episode "Cookie Dough" when the afore-mentioned Oveny (an imaginary friend created to bake cookies) apparently exploded when Bloo set his temperature to 2500 degrees (although, it could have been an ordinary oven instead) causing the kitchen roof to explode.
Imaginary Friends are created by humans, and their creation seems to be a mixture of conscious and subconscious on the part of the creator---for example, Nina Valarossa (Eduardo's creator) explained that she consciously created Eduardo to protect her from bullies and be her playmate; however, she unconsciously created his timid personality because it allowed her to stand up in defense of him, teaching her to be braver. It is interesting to note that often, Friends and their creators have differing personalities (such as well-behaved Mac producing selfish Bloo, or wild Madame Foster creating stuffy Mr. Herriman); this may be related to how a Friend is made in a child's mind.
Imaginary friends are often created when a child needs something, like Terrence imagined two imaginary friends in "Seeing Red", a talking slice of pizza because he was hungry and Red because he needed someone to beat up Bloo. In the episode "Good Wilt Hunting" another fact about imaginary friends is discovered, that they can lose or break their limbs, like Wilt, when he played with his creator against a heavy basketball-headed friend that almost crushed his creator. Wilt quickly pushed his creator and got his arm severely crushed and his eye-stalk broken. Imaginary Food friends are the most endangered Imaginary friends of all because they can be eaten, as seen in "Dinner Is Swerved" where a chicken leg like friend told Mac and Bloo that he escaped from fat camp because they ate them there.
In the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, a float is seen with puppet versions of the characters on it for two straight years in 2006 and 2007. In 2006, Wilt, Eduardo, Coco and Bloo sang The Beatles' "With A Little Help From My Friends", and in 2007, Cheese joined others as Fluffer Nutter, Jackie Khones and Bloppy Pants joined in singing Queen's "You're My Best Friend."
The show currently has 65 episodes spanning across five seasons, and also has aired 19 shorts. Most Cartoon Network shows last up to the 65-episode range, which has always been the standard for many cable cartoons.
The show was nominated for four Annie Awards in 2004, and five more in 2005, winning two awards that year for Best Original Music in a Television Series (James L. Venable and Jennifer Kes Remington for "Duchess of Wails") and Production Design in an Animated TV Series (McCracken with Mike Moon, David Dunnet and Martin Ansolabehere for the Christmas episode "A Lost Claus"). Five more nominations came in 2006, with three wins as Best Animated Television Production, Best Original Music in a TV Series (Venable and Remington winning again for "One False Movie") and Production Design in a TV Series (Ansolabehere by himself for the one-hour "Good Wilt Hunting" episode). Venable and Remington teamed up for the show's lone Annie nominee in 2007, for their original music in a TV series for "The Bloo Superdude and the Magic Potato of Power".
The show has won a total of five Emmy Awards. The episode "House of Bloo's" won two Emmy Awards for art direction (Mike Moon) and character design (Craig McCracken). "World Wide Wabbit" won an Emmy for best storyboard (Ed Baker). The show's theme song (described by McCracken as "psychedelic ragtime" and written by Venable) was nominated for Best TV Show Theme in 2005, but lost to Danny Elfman's theme to Desperate Housewives. The episode "Go Goo Go" was nominated for Best Animated Program Under One Hour in 2006, and Character Design supervisor Shannon Tindle won an Emmy that same year for that same episode. The 2006 episode "Good Wilt Hunting" was nominated in 2007 for Best Animated Program One Hour or Longer, but lost to the Camp Lazlo episode "Where's Lazlo?". However, David Dunnet won an Emmy for his background key design for said episode.
- In "House of Bloo's", we see Frankie wear a Powerpuff T-shirt with colored silouettes of Blossom, Bubbles and Buttercup as part of her standard outfit. Also, during the tour of the house, Mojo Jojo is seen.
- In "Challenge of the Superfriends", a news announcer starts the episode by saying "The City...is being attacked!" This is based off the line "The City of Townsville..." that started most PPG episodes, and at the end Bloo says "And once again, the day is saved by Blooregard Q. Kazoo!" which was similar to the ending of most.
- In "Cheese A Go-Go", the observatory that Cheese and Bloo are at closely resembles that of Mojo Jojo's.
- In the Halloween episode "Nightmare on Wilson Way", Frankie is dressed as Blossom as is One-Eyed Cy who later appears as a zombified version of Bubbles (because he changed costumes due to Fankie having the bow and the costumes would be the same). Also, in a flashback, Bloo is dressed as Mojo Jojo.
- In "Say It Isn't Sew", Bloo momentarily picks up a sticker, or patch-like object resembling Blossom.
 |
This article or section contains information about scheduled or expected future events. It may contain tentative information; the content may change as the event approaches and more information becomes available. |
| Title | Release date | Episodes |
|---|---|---|
| Season 1 | March 6, 2007 | 1-13 |
|
All 13 episodes from Season One, including the Pilot movie, "House of Bloos" (released here as three separate parts). Also included:
|
||
| Title | Release date | Episodes |
| Season 2 | September 11, 2007 | 14-26 |
|
All 13 episodes from Season Two. Also included:
|
||
| Title | Release date | Episodes |
| Season 3 | March 4, 2008 | 27-40 |
|
Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: The Complete Season 3, is scheduled to be released on March 4, 2008, according to reports. Bonus features included in The Complete Season Three will be:
|
||
| Title | Release date | Episodes |
| Season 4 | Unknown | 41-53 |
|
According to Never Forgotten, there is no known release date for Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: The Complete Season 4, yet. |
||
- Cartoon Network Halloween Vol. 3: Sweet, Sweet Fear! — "Bloooo"
- Cartoon Network Fridays, Vol. 1 — "Bloo's Brothers"
- Cartoon Network Christmas Vol. 3 — "Store Wars"
Other than in-house items such as Cartoon Network's internet shop (T-Shirts, a Bloo plush, etc.), there has not been much as far as major products. As of 2006, there has been a statue series with Bloo, Mac, and Eduardo featured in the first statue. A second statue features Frankie, Madame Foster, and Mr. Herriman released in December of 2006, and the third in the series featuring Wilt and Coco was released in January of 2007. Two limited edition giclée cels — one with the cast posing for a picture, the other styled like a cross-stitch — were also created. Since then, the merchandising has begun to pick up steam. Burger King had nine toys in a kids meal give-away promotion in April and May of 2006, Scholastic Books has printed activity and story books based on episodes, and the complete first season of episodes were made available on Apple's iTunes downloading service as well as a Game Boy Advance game created by CRAVE Entertainment made its' debut in the Fall of 2006. A new game for Nintendo DS will debut in the fall of 2007 titled "Imagination Invaders", and computerized toy makers Leap Frog has an educational spelling game starring the characters. In September, two Foster's toys was part of a McDonald's Happy Meal toy giveaway.
Since January of 2007, as part of an overall deal with Cartoon Network, Mattel has released items related to the mass marketing of the show. Additionally, T-shirts and other merchandise featuring the characters made by punk rock clothing maker Mighty Fine and accessories made by Loungefly have been appearing in popular stores such as Hot Topic, who have also produced a gift card featuring Mac and Cheese.
On May 15, 2006, Cartoon Network introduced a new online game, Big Fat Awesome House Party, which allows players to create an online friend to join Bloo and the others in a one-year game online, and earn points that would give them gifts cards and other on-line "merchandise" for their albums and that friend made from one of over 900,000 possible characters could wind up in a future episode of Foster's. The game has become so popular, in May of 2007, Cartoon Network announced that the game would continue for six more months, into November of that year.[1]
Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends can be seen in many languages on various channels worldwide. While most of these are Cartoon Network affiliates (except in Canada, where due to Canadian television rules the show has aired on the English and French Teletoon networks), a few are not, mostly over-the-air or terrestrial channels.
In France, it airs on France 3 during the France Truc block, in Brazil on SBT, in Mexico on Televisa, in Spain on Cuatro TV, in Ireland on TG4, in Germany on Super RTL, and in the Philippines on GMA Network, In Israel On Logi Channel.
Because of translation, the title for the show is not always the same in each language. The titles for the show vary from country to country.
- Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends at the Internet Movie Database
- Official UK Website
- Super Cartoon Network
- BLOGregard Q. Kazoo, the official production blog for the show.
- The Very Unofficial Guide to Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, a fan site with an interview with McCracken and show information hosted by Toon Zone.
- Never Forgotten, A Foster's fansite maintained by Cynthia "Sparky" Read.
- Official US Website
- Imagination Companions, A Foster's Wiki maintained at Wikia.
|
Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends
|
|
|---|---|
| Media | List of episodes |
| Games | Big Fat Awesome House Party • Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends |
| Other | Characters • Craig McCracken • Lauren Faust |
|
|
|---|
| Cartoon Cartoons |
| Codename: Kids Next Door · Courage the Cowardly Dog · Cow and Chicken · Dexter's Laboratory · Ed, Edd n Eddy · Evil Con Carne · The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy · Grim and Evil · I Am Weasel · Johnny Bravo · Mike, Lu & Og · The Powerpuff Girls · Samurai Jack · Sheep in the Big City · Time Squad · What a Cartoon! · Whatever Happened to Robot Jones? |
| Other Cartoon Network original series |
| Ben 10 · Camp Lazlo · Chowder · Class of 3000 · Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends · Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi · The Life and Times of Juniper Lee · Megas XLR · My Gym Partner's a Monkey · Out of Jimmy's Head · Squirrel Boy |
| Future Cartoon Network Series |
| The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack · The Secret Saturdays · Transformers: Animated |