Let's Fail! Anime Jason vs. Discovery Family: Chapter 3: Where Everything Comes Together: The History of The Hub! - Part 3: Slow and Steady: The Hub's Early Beginnings.

The Hub Network: Where Everything Came Together!

After Fox Kids came to an end after a near decade of indulging in our childhood, Margaret Loesch continues to find success somewhere in all media. Some more than others, but none of them didn't have the same success Fox Kids and her time with Marvel Productions. However, things were starting to pick up by 2009, when she was hired by the higher ups of Discovery Communications, as they try to rebrand Discovery Kids after so many years of reruns and executive meddling among other things. And by 2010, the landscape of television changed forever, when everything, and I mean everything, comes together.

(MK3 Vs. Screen Fanfare)

Premiering on October 10th, 2010, that's 10/10/10 if you are keeping score, after a long marathon of Kenny the Shark, the Hub entered our living rooms and bedrooms and it didn't disappoint. Under Ms. Loesch leadership, along with assistance from Donna Epps, the Hub's channel premise was pretty much obvious. It combines everything we like, classic TV shows, educational shows for the preschoolers, and original content, most of them based on everything Hasbro related (mostly), hence their original slogan, "Where Everthing Comes Together". But, in its early days, it started off very, very slow, with shows that we never even saw before, which were shown recently on other channels, but sometimes never been released in North America. Shows like, Cosmic Quantum Ray, Dennis and Gnasher (which is the British version of Dennis the Menace, completely different from the other Dennis the Menace, namely Dennis Mitchell), The Twisted Whiskers Show, Atomic Betty (which aired on Cartoon Network long ago), and of course, the action adventure fantasy anime, Deltora Quest.

The main trio from Deltora Quest, Lief (middle), Barda (left) and Jasmine (right)

Deltora Quest was an anime based on the children's storybook series of the same name, written by Emily Rodda. In this one, the peaceful land of Deltora was taken over by the evil Shadow Lord, who has blanketed the entire land into darkness. And it's up to a young boy named Lief to stop the Shadow Lord and free all of Deltora. Along with his friend/bodyguard, Barda (not to be confused with Big Barda, the wife of magician superhero, Mr. Miracle from the New Gods) and forest-dweller, Jasmine, Lief travels across the kingdom to look for the 7 mystical Deltora Gems in order to defeat the Shadow Lord once and for all. That is basically the story of Deltora Quest in a nutshell. After all...

My life is but a quest.

A quest that has yet to be completed. ANYHOO...

The anime was done by OLM, Inc., formerly Oriental Light and Magic (Not to be confused with ILM, Industrial Light and Magic, a Lucasfilm company). 65 episodes were made in the original Japanese version, but only 52 episodes were dubbed in the English version, done by Ocean Productions aka Ocean Group and Blue Water Studios. It was originally aired in Australia on ABC3 and Cartoon Network, but didn't aired in the U.S. until the Hub premiered on Oct 10, 2010, like all other shows, mostly. The music in the English dub is the same as all the other shows produced by both Ocean Productions and Blue Water Studios, such as the Ruby-Spears Megaman cartoon, the Ocean dub Dragon Ball Z and Monster Rancher. 

Speaking of Ocean Group and Blue Water Studios, the English voice of Lief, Cole Howard, was also the voice of Megaman, in the PSP remake of the first Megaman game, Megaman Powered Up. That's right, folks, the one where he was addressed as Mega instead of his true civilian name, Rock. Obviously an homage to the Ruby-Spears Megaman cartoon, where everyone, even the villains, call Megaman, "Mega."

A small price to pay for looking back at all the nostalgia goodness I wanted to see. Anyway, to this day, Deltora Quest was the first AND only anime the Hub has ever aired. Granted, if it was still on the air, we would've seen more anime shows, such as Flint the Time Detective, Mon Colle Knights, the original Transformers: Robots in Disguise (known as Car Robots in Japan), Ronin Warriors, and even the original English dub of Sailor Moon. But we will never know now, since Discovery took the Hub away from us. And believe me, they haven't yet seen the full fury of my wrath, I can tell you THAT! Moving on...

The Hub had a few dozen blocks that formats the entire day. For starters, there is HubBub, which was a block for preschoolers (almost an answer to Disney Junior) with such shows like The Adventures of Chuck and Friends, Maryoku Yummy, In the Night Garden, Animal Mechanicals and The WotWots. Then, there was Huboom. When the Hub first aired, Huboom was originally a late night block, which consist on shows like the 60s Batman TV show, the original G.I. Joe and Transformers. But, by June of 2012, it evolved into an action block for action cartoons (more on that later).

The Haunted Hub was a Saturday afternoon block, consisting on programs that involved suspense and horror like Goosebumps and The Haunting Hour (straight from the mind of R.L. Stine).

For all your Hasbro related news and for the Hub itself, Hubworld was the show for you. It is like the Electric Playground, but with everything Hasbro. As for the shows in question, before we get to the original content, lets talk about the classic that aired on the Hub. For those in the animated and live action production perspective, most of the shows is a mixed bag, from those in the 80s from Sunbow and Marvel Productions to those that were once aired on Kids WB and Fox Kids, such as Batman: The Animated Series, Superman: The Animated Series, Batman Beyond, Men in Black: The Series, Tiny Toon Adventures, Animaniacs, Jem and the Holograms, Conan the Adventurer, Goosebumps, Fraggle Rock, Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation, Where on Earth is Carmen Sandiego?, G.I. Joe Sigma 6, and the aforementioned classic G.I. Joe and Transformers.

For those shows in the late afternoon and into the evening, these are as memorable as the cartoons, shows such as Doogie Howser, M.D., Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: The TV Show, Family Ties, The Wonder Years, Laverne & Shirley, Mork & Mindy, Sliders, Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, Sabrina: The Teenage Witch, Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, ALF, and my most favorite out of the bunch, Happy Days.

Fonzie: "AAAAAAY!!"

How can you not love The Fonz?

And from time to time, they occasionally air your favorite movies, mostly on the weekends (and like most networks, they mostly edited them for foul language, just like some of the TV shows they aired and having some of the scenes cut due to the time being allotted).

But like I said before, these classic shows (and movies) are not the only thing kept this channel going. To maintain its balance (and its audience), they got some original content, some of them based on every Hasbro property, and some that became cult classics in their own right. Either way, this little channel's small journey was getting underway.

To Be Continued...

Next Time: Part 4: Ponies, Robots, Soldiers, Monsters, Puppies and Anger-Driven Issues, Oh My!