Klasky Csupo
JuniorFan88, AsdfTheRevival, William Immendorf (WillWill45), JackLovesCLGLogos, Paperking99, BenIsRandom, TomTornados3 and BaldiBasicsFan
Captures by
mr3urious, V of Doom, EnormousRat, mario9000seven, and Logoboy95
Editions by
V of Doom, CuriousGeorge60, kidinbed, ZoDanma, EnormousRat, BenderRoblox, johndakingofawesome, shnick1985, KirbyGuy2001, DaBigLogoCollector, edunk5, MilkTheCouch, gameandwatchisawesome101, BenIsRandom, GoAnimateFan199Pro, TeddySunshine, Pumpkinman99, HifiSara9000seven, BaldiBasicsFan, Michael Kenchington, Amazing Cleos Productions, KosMir and Zachary Webb
Video captures courtesy of
YoshiLove5000 (ハイパースーパーヨッシー5000), P-Head (Victordaniel2008)NinJutsuDude1997 (AmantiDorian), billywws, FanCentralNetwork, Paperking99, and klaskycsupologofan
Background
In 1982, Klasky-Csupo (pronounced "CLASS-key CHEW-po") was formed in a bedroom apartment in Los Angeles, California. The name of the company derives from the last names of the two producers, Omaha native Arlene Klasky and Hungarian-born animator Gábor Csupó. During The Tracey Ullman Show's days, Klasky-Csupo produced the animated Simpsons shorts, consisting of 48, before The Simpsons became a full-time network series in 1989. After those initial skits, Klasky-Csupo worked with 20th Century Fox Television and Matt Groening to produce domestic animation for the first three seasons of the animated sitcom until 1992, when Film Roman took over production. In 1990, the duo cut a production deal with Nickelodeon, and there they made Rugrats, one of the first three Nicktoons, and one of the network's successful animated series. After that, Klasky-Csupo made other successful animated shows such as The Wild Thornberrys, Aaahh!!! Real Monsters, As Told By Ginger, Duckman (for USA Network and Paramount Network Television, distribution currently held by CBS), and The Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald (a promoted cartoon available exclusively at McDonald's restaurants from 1998 to early 2001), among others. The company also animated Spy vs. Spy and Don Martin cartoons for Mad TV on Fox. However, shortly after The Rugrats Movie came out in 1998, Nickelodeon and Klasky-Csupo started to get into contract disagreements combined with the rising popularity of the then-new SpongeBob SquarePants. But the straw that broke the camel's back was with the 2003 release of Rugrats Go Wild, which was a financial disappointment. As a result, many shows from the company were canceled in the following year, and All Grown Up! was put on hiatus in 2006 before officially being canceled in 2008. The company went dormant for a while, but Arlene Klasky and Gábor Csupó officially revived the company in 2012 and announced that they were working on some "top secret projects". On July 16, 2018, then Paramount Players and current Nickelodeon CEO Brian Robbins revealed that the pair, along with co-creator Paul Germain, officially confirmed that a revival of Rugrats was in the works, which would include 26 new episodes, and a new live-action movie, both featuring the babies re-imagined in CGI form, until the latter was pulled from the release plan. The revival debuted on the Paramount+ streaming service in 2021, though it was removed in late March 2024, with season 2 onwards being released on Apple TV shortly after their TV airings on Nicktoons.
1st Logo (October 30, 1989-September 15, 1990)
Visuals: Basically an in-credit logo, which includes their print logo that would be used for the next two logos.
Technique: A still superimposed graphic.
Audio: The closing theme.
Availability: Seen on Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day on HBO Storybook Musicals and the music video of "Shadrach" by the hip-hop group Beastie Boys. This logo doesn't appear on the first two seasons of The Simpsons, as the studio only did the animation for the show and did not produce it.
2nd Logo (August 11, 1991-August 7, 1999)
Visuals: A row of boxes pan across the screen at a rapid pace on a white background with a pattern of shapes that change frequently. Each box has an animation that becomes a letter, as described below:
- In the first box, blue cubic shapes form a green "K" in the Arial Bold font, which is placed at the left of its box.
- In the second box, a blue hat, first depicted as a top hat before it stretches into a peaked hat, turns into a boot, which then turns into an "L" in a font similar to Baskerville that is centered but shifted down a bit.
- In the third box, several orange lines come together to form a pattern that shrinks, turning into a choppy, lowercase "a" in the Shatter font that is positioned in the upper right corner of its box.
- In the fourth box, a light blue cone with rings surrounding it turns into a crayon with a layer on it, then into a silhouette of a lizard, followed by a silhouette of a snake, and lastly into an "S" in the Futura Light font that sits in the bottom left of its box.
- In the fifth box, a pink silhouette of a cow turns into a butterfly, then quickly reverts back into a cow, but from a different point of view, then turns into an alligator, and finally a "K" in the Letraset Process font, and is properly centered.
- In the sixth box, an acrobatic performer jumps upside down and forms a beige "Y", which hangs a little off the bottom right corner of its box.
The remaining five squares have a scribble writing the stenciled "CSUPO" on them (in Helvetica); the first three letters are blue, the "P" is teal when it is being drawn but it becomes orange once complete, and the "O" is purple. After this, the screen zooms out, during which "INC." appears letter-by-letter in red. The logo has now completely formed, as shown below:
[C][S][U][P][O]I N C.
In "CSUPO", the "C" is now red, the "S" is yellow, and the "U" is blue. The logo then fades into a black, monochromatic tone, and the "Y" turns purple.
Variants:
- A still version of the logo (with graffiti still dancing and the logo already black and white with "Y" purple) was spotted on the British-produced Stressed Eric.
- An abridged and faster version exists, which appears on Duckman.
- A version also exists on the first two seasons of Aaahh!!! Real Monsters where the logo fades out early and the music trails off into the Nickelodeon "Scribble" logo.
- On prints of first-season The Wild Thornberrys episodes "Matadi or Bust", "Valley Girls", "Lost and Foundation", and "Born to be Wild", the first-season Aaahh!!! Real Monsters episode "Cold Hard Toenails/Attack of the Blobs", and on the Shout! Factory DVD releases of the two series, the logo itself is slowed down while the music plays at its normal speed, accompanied by a quote from each episode that would've played on the Nickelodeon Animation Studios "Haypile" logo (on Aaahh!!! Real Monsters, it was slowed down to accompany the trail-off into the NAS logo). This is due to the fact that said logo is omitted from these prints of the episodes.
- On December 2001 CBS airings (owned by Paramount) with the Rugrats episodes "The Santa Experience" and "A Rugrats Chanukah", the logo has been shortened so that it starts with the 6th box in "KLaSKY" and cuts to the Nickelodeon logo before the said "Y" becomes purple.
- On the DVD print of the Duckman episode "Psyche", the logo is brighter.
Technique: Traditional animation.
Audio: Throughout the entire logo, a 24-note synth-cello line (sounding much like an old portable Casio keyboard) plays that adds vibrato to its last two notes. A drum-machine loop (time signature possibly 5/4) and a film projector-like sound (sounding much like a bingo machine) play as well; the former stops once the logo zooms out, while the latter stops when the transition to black-and-white starts. Like the second Cartoon Network Productions logo, there are also corresponding sound effects with the actions of the letters as they pan:
- First K: There's no effect since the music hasn’t started yet.
- L: A rather abrupt “blocky” sound (possibly meant for the first letter).
- a: Two notes of a rock guitar.
- s: A fast-paced “twirling” sound.
- Second K: A beep, followed by a rising, choppy cowbell sound.
- Y: A boing sound that fits with the acrobat jumping.
During the formation of “CSUPO”, a scribbling sound is heard (which was omitted in 1992) along with two vintage car honks (abridged to one in 1992), soon followed by a dog “yipping” six times in a high-pitched fashion, similar to a Chihuahua dog’s barking. As the logo zooms out, a warm synth gradually glissandos to G-5 (on a piano scale) alongside a bass note playing in the same key, albeit four octaves lower, the latter of which sustains for the remaining time. A snippet of an elephant trumpet plays twice (reduced to once in the abridged variant) as the logo nearly finishes its transformation to black-and-white.
Audio Trivia:
- The early variant of the logo music appears at the end of the song "Alanis", from Neil Cicierega's mashup album Mouth Sounds alongside many other logos.
- The 1991 logo's jingle featured the hand clap as well as the toms and a closed hi-hat being played on the Roland TR-909 drum machine, as well as bass notes on a Casio keyboard. The 909 clap sounds were heard during the logo's sequence.
- It is rumored that Mark Mothersbaugh (the frontman of Devo and composer for Rugrats) did this logo's music. It was actually done by Film Roman founder, Phil Roman.
Audio Variants:
- In rare cases, it uses the closing theme, like Stressed Eric and the Rugrats episode "I Remember Melville/No More Cookies".
- For the abridged variant, the music is higher pitched, sped-up, and out-of-sync as it begins at where the second K should form.
- On Bird in the Window, the logo is silent.
- A version exists on the 1998 pilot of The Wild Thornberrys where the logo plays as usual, but with the 1998 Splaat logo audio instead. The pilot first aired on October 17, 1998, nine days after the Splaat logo was introduced on The Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald. It's possible that logo may have been set to be introduced in this pilot (produced in 1997 and slated to air either that year or early-to-mid 1998, only for it to be pushed back), but for unknown reasons was changed back to the 1991 logo, while keeping the new logo's audio intact (likely due to sloppy editing). All other episodes with this logo use the normal music/sound variant.
- On Santo Bugito, a slightly shortened version of the music is heard.
- On a December 2001 CBS airing of the Rugrats episodes "Rugrats: The Santa Experience" and "A Rugrats Chanukah", a generic theme is playing.
- On Nickelodeon Friends Variety Pack, the closing theme (“Better Than No One” from Ren & Stimpy) plays over the logo.
Availability: Can be seen on Rugrats episodes before 1999, and it is retained on home video releases and streaming platforms like Paramount+.
- However, some episodes of Rugrats had this logo even after the show started using the next one; "The Magic Baby/Dil We Meet Again" (aired May 4, 2001) is one example. This is most likely because the episode was intended to air with the first part of season 6 (the last batch of episodes to use this logo), but it got pushed back.
- The 2002 holiday-themed VHS releases of Rugrats, Halloween being one of them, also used this logo in place of the next one.
- It also appears on home media releases of Duckman, Santo Bugito, and Aaahh!!! Real Monsters.
- Also seen on early episodes of The Wild Thornberrys.
- It can also be seen on the unaired Rocket Power pilot, which is available for viewing at the Paley Center.
- This logo doesn't appear on the third season of The Simpsons for the same reason stated above.
- This logo is also seen in Nickelodeon Friends Variety Pack.
Legacy: It may not be as well-known as the next logo below, but much like what follows, it is known for its airplay on Nickelodeon and low-quality remixes. It also earned the unofficial nickname of "Graffiti".
3rd Logo (October 8, 1998-October 20, 2008, March 2, 2021-)
Visuals: On a static purple background, a black ink stain on a blue background with a liquid effect appears by splattering all over the screen. A live-action hand comes in from the left and places a yellow piece of paper containing a red-lipped mouth onto the stain, while a pair of blue, round eyes (which seem to wiggle like Jell-O) appear and zoom in above the mouth, forming a bizarre-looking face. The face then says the company name as white blocks fly out from his mouth, which are revealed to be the parts of the K-C logo as they arrange themselves to form it (the parts have also been refined to match the print logo, with the "K" in a font like Futura, "L" in Permian Serif, "a" in a font similar to Linux Libertine or Times New Roman, "S" in Futura Book, the second "K" in a zig-zaggy font made possibly to match with the Letraset Process in the first logo, the "Y" and "CSUPO" set in Futura Bold). During the face's screen time, there are holes in the liquid background (which reveal smudges of the static background that emerge from the center and slide off-screen from many other directions). After that, the background and the face disappear like an old CRT television turning off, and the "Y" in "KLaSKY" turns purple and flashes faintly. The logo remains on-screen for a few seconds, and then it either fades out or cuts to black.
Alternate Descriptive Video Description: In a logo, someone puts cutout eyes and a mouth on a splattered shape: Klasky Csupo.
Trivia:
- As episodes of Nickelodeon shows and their pilots (including Rugrats and The Wild Thornberrys) take up to a year in advance to produce, this logo might have been produced in mid-1997.
- The face's official name is "Splaat".
- According to a reply on a post on Splaat's Facebook page, the logo was designed by Gabor Csupo, Laslo Nosek, and Sergei Shramkovsky, the latter of which is implied to have designed Splaat himself.
- Also in the reply, it is also revealed that the logo was never tested on test audiences.
- In another reply, Andrew S. (here on AVID as BoyOnTheMoon) states how the logo as a whole is a metaphor for the studio's rise to fame from its humble beginnings, quoteː "They took nothing (like paper scraps)," (represented by how Splaat is created out of 2 paper cutouts) "and established their own distinct style that represents who they are (a face representing a style that literally says who they are)".
- According to a reply on a post on Splaat's Facebook page, the logo was designed by Gabor Csupo, Laslo Nosek, and Sergei Shramkovsky, the latter of which is implied to have designed Splaat himself.
- This logo accidentally appeared on early airings of the SpongeBob SquarePants episode "Wet Painters/Krusty Krab Training Video". This was an editing mistake made by Nickelodeon when they first began using split-screen credits; normally, Nick makes custom credits for each of its series and its producers. K-C was the only company at the time, besides Frederator, that produced several Nicktoons, and Nickelodeon created a generic one for these shows (which mentioned Klasky and Csupo as producers and included Splaat), but, on the said episode of SpongeBob SquarePants, Nickelodeon accidentally used the K-C split-screen credits for that episode. This was fixed in 2006 and the United Plankton Pictures, Inc. logo has been seen on the episode ever since, but it's still considered one of the oddest editing mistakes ever made.
- On the VHS releases of Rugrats in Paris: The Movie, the "computerized voice" uttering the Klasky-Csupo name is actually closed-captioned. The same happens in The Wild Thornberrys Movie, but Splaat's voice is referred to as a "computerized voice". Additionally, the sound effects after Splaat's disappearance are also closed captioned (including the lip-flapping sound being referred to as a "voice blubbering" and the duck quacking sound labeled as "novelty horn honks").
- On October 2015 to May 2017 airings of Hey Arnold! on The Splat, this logo appeared instead of the Snee-Oosh logo for the same reason stated above. This was fixed by the time the programming block was rebranded into "NickSplat". Only TeenNick SD was affected by this error, as TeenNick HD had the correct logos.
- At the July 2012 Comic-Con venue in San Diego, California, a day before Klasky-Csupo was relaunched, Arlene Klasky mentioned that she found, as claimed, "a bunch of fan mashups" of their production logo, in which she also added that the mashups might have been created in part with how many people explained their experience with the logo as kids, and how it "scared" them, so she later decided to give the "robot" character a name: Splaat. Splaat was also given arms, legs, and a more noticeable ability to speak; his voice is done by Greg Cipes. The character was originally intended to be in an animated PSA, with Splaat stating his confusion about why these mashups exist, and then adding that he is, in fact, not a robot, but rather an ink splat, which is how his name originated. He stars in his own web series, which can be seen here. Splaat's PSA can be seen here, or the full Comic-Con event here. According to Klasky, this logo was not intended to be scary.
- On a February 12, 2016 airing of the Rocko's Modern Life episode "Fish-N-Chumps/Camera Shy" on The Splat, this logo appeared instead of the Games Animation logo for, again, the same reasons stated above.
Variants:
- Video games from the company have a still, slightly bigger logo that completely skips Splaat. All of the boxes and letters in "KLaSKY" (except for the "Y", which is smaller) are medium-gray, the letters in "CSUPO" are white, and "INC." (like in the first logo) is on the right of "CSUPO". The background can be either black or white.
- There is an alternate variant that was made in 2:35:1, where the animation is cheaper (the liquid just waves like a flag, there is a black background instead of a static purple background, since the logo transitions from black at the end of the credits (which explains that very few holes emerge from the center once the liquid background has splattered onto the screen), and the eyes of Splaat are flipped vertically instead of being animated to look down/up; as a consequence of this, Splaat's eyes are noticeably farther away from his mouth than usual when he speaks). Splaat and the ink background blur and cross-fade to the K-C logo rather than disappearing like a CRT turning off (alongside the the the purple "Y" in "KLaSKY" zooming in over the regular "Y") and, to top it all off, Splaat constantly looks at the viewer (in the normal logo, Splaat stares at the blocks, but the blocks are placed directly in the center of the screen, so it appears that Splaat is looking at the viewer) throughout his screen time and smiles before looking back up before the logo fades to black.
- On the studio's re-opening video, (which can be seen here), the variant is in 16:9 open-matte at 1080p high definition, it is cut to where the hand drops the magazine clippings, the background of the clippings is in a lighter shade of yellow, and after the duck quacks, the logo flies off to the right of the screen. The "boing" sound effect is not heard.
- This variant would later be remastered for 2021, which uses the same animation, but with glitchy computer screen effects placed over it. The Klasky-Csupo logo then zooms in at the last half-second before cutting to the right-facing, blue "energy blaster"-type muzzle flash.
- On the studio's re-opening video, (which can be seen here), the variant is in 16:9 open-matte at 1080p high definition, it is cut to where the hand drops the magazine clippings, the background of the clippings is in a lighter shade of yellow, and after the duck quacks, the logo flies off to the right of the screen. The "boing" sound effect is not heard.
- This logo comes in three versions: a standard 4:3 version (for TV shows and full-frame versions of their film output, though some films have slight letterboxing), a 1.55:1 widescreen version (matted to 1.85:1 for theatrical features released in the US (1.66:1 in Europe) and to 1.78:1 for both home video releases of those films), a 16:9 HD version (for the studio's reopening video and the remastered version) and a 2.35:1 scope version (seen at the end of The Wild Thornberrys Movie).
- A filmed variant exists on The Rugrats Movie and Rugrats in Paris: The Movie. The animation is at a lower frame rate and in a more washed-out color scheme, moves at a much faster pace, is higher quality and is zoomed in to fill the screen.
- On the first two The Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald videotapes and airings of their Nicktoons with split-screen credits, the logo cuts to black just as the "boing" sound effect plays without fading out.
- On NickSplat's airings of their shows, the logo starts when Splaat is on-screen, silent due to the credits being superimposed, and it's in warp speed. The logo also seems to glitch out, kind of like a TV screen. It is also worth noting that the filmed version logo is used, considering the graininess at the end of the logo.
- On some Nickelodeon split-screen airings of shows from the company, Splaat's mouth movement is delayed.
- On the Klasky Csupo website, only the part with Splaat is used.
- On a Region 4 DVD release of Rugrats in Paris: The Movie, the logo is cut off after the lip-flapping sound (presumably due to a manufacturing error).
Technique: CGI done on a Silicon Graphics computer with Softimage software, plus a chroma-keyed live-action hand and 2D computer animation for the face.
- For the still variants, digital graphics.
Audio: A splatter sound is heard when the ink appears and a bouncy "beeping" version of the 24-note bass jingle (which sounds like a clarinet) is played. Another "beepy" instrument plays the same jingle in the background, only it comes in a quarter measure late. The company name is stated in a robotic voice with significant amounts of clipping to make it louder (hence the "Robot" nickname; the voice was supplied by the "Boing" novelty voice in the text-to-speech program used on a PowerMac G3 workstation). After Splaat finishes talking and the company logo appears, there are four cartoon sound effects: a tiny twang, a lip-flapping sound that sounds similar to the "trombone gobble" sound heard in Warner Bros. cartoons accompanied by a slap, a duck quacking twice, and the classic Hanna-Barbera/Hoyt Curtin boing. The music was composed in C♭ major by Mark Mothersbaugh's brother (and fellow Devo member and Rugrats composer) Bob.
Audio Variants:
- The "boing" sound effect sometimes has a reverb effect applied to it.
- The Splaat-only variant cuts off the audio after Splaat says the company name.
- On the still variants, it's silent.
- On The Rugrats Movie and Rugrats in Paris, the audio is out-of-sync. To accommodate this, the ending sound effects are closer together and the quacking sound is sped-up (this also occurs on the cheaply-animated alternate variant).
- On television airings of Rugrats episodes with this logo from November 1999 to early spring 2000, the logo theme is low-pitched.
- In 2010-2013 Nickelodeon re-airings of Rugrats with the split-screen credits omit the boing sound at the end.
- On the first season of The Wild Thornberrys, the episode, "Nigel Knows Best" (the only season one episode from the show to have this logo), the boing sound gets cut-off before it fully finishes and in between the transition from this logo to the Nickelodeon Animation Studios "Haypile", the last note from the last logo is heard.
- Splaat's voice will be clipped more or less, depending on the show or the film.
- On Rocket Power, the last note of the end theme of said show trails off into the logo (a rock chord before the jingle plays). Some Rugrats episodes also had the last note of the end theme echo into the logo.
- On 2000-2009 airings of the K-C shows, the boing sound trails off and cuts off into the kids laughing sound (before August 2001, an airplane-like sound with 7 xylophone notes heard over it) of the Nickelodeon logo of the time.
- From September 2000 to August 2001, on some split-screen credit airings of their shows, the audio of the promo from the split-screen credits sometimes played over this logo's audio (including Splaat's voiceover).
- When CBS aired The Rugrats Movie and Rugrats in Paris: The Movie, a generic theme played instead.
- On DVD and VHS releases of their Nicktoons as well as the pilot episode of As Told by Ginger, the ending sound effects have a reverb trailing into the Nickelodeon "haypile". This can also be found on the VHS releases of The Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald starting with the third tape, "The Visitors From Outer Space".
- There is a bizarre audio variant found on the Russian-language dub of As Told by Ginger, which has a grumpy-sounding male voiceover speaking over the logo's music: "Klasky-Csupo (pronounced like "zupa"). Blblbllblblblbllblbl. (trying to imitate the lip-flapping sound)". The timing varies depending on the episode, as does the tone, as different voiceovers were recorded for every episode this version appeared on (this can be identified through the exhausted-sounding voice in some episodes). In later episodes, the voiceover has a weird echo/reverb effect.
- Another audio variant found on the Russian-language dub of The Wild Thornberrys features a male voiceover (different from the one above) saying "Film Klasky-Csupo Incorporated" after Splaat speaks.
- On early episodes of Rugrats after the "Graffiti" logo's retired, the logo has the audio from the previous logo. This also happens on a Nickelodeon airing of Rugrats on March 4, 2000, but the audio itself was shortened down significantly causing the logo to be silent a bit after the finished product is formed.
- On the 2021 remastered version, the logo's audio is sped-up. However, the last boing is replaced with a whoosh sound, which goes in-sync with the logo disappearing.
Availability:
- It can be found on episodes such as those of later Rugrats seasons (starting with the season 6 special "Runaway Reptar"), the short-lived Rugrats Pre-School Daze, Rocket Power, The Wild Thornberrys (earlier episodes had the "Graffiti" logo), As Told By Ginger, and on All Grown Up!, all of which aired on TeenNick's now-defunct block NickRewind; it is also shown in place of the previous logo on airings with split-screen credits.
- First introduced on the rather obscure cartoon The Wacky Adventures of Ronald McDonald (as part of promotion with the fast-food restaurant). This logo was used on K-C films from The Rugrats Movie to The Wild Thornberrys Movie, though on the first two Rugrats movies' digital prints, it is plastered by the regular variant. It's also on the company's website too.
- The part with only Splaat could be found on the company's website when first opened, though it and the website no longer work as of late 2021. This is because Adobe Flash was discontinued that year.
- The 2002 alternate variant was only seen at the end of The Wild Thornberrys Movie and the video for the studio's re-opening. However, the remastered version of the variant was first introduced on Gábor Csupó's official YouTube account; it later appeared as a vanity plate on the 2021 revival of Rugrats (which is produced at Nickelodeon Animation Studio instead of Klasky Csupo, due to KC ceasing to function as an animation studio in 2006, despite several attempts to restart operations). The latter was available on Paramount+ until late March 2024, with Nickelodeon also scrubbing all mentions of the reboot from their website.
- The still variant appears on Rugrats in Paris: The Movie for PS1, Rugrats: Royal Ransom for PS2 and GameCube (both with the white background) and Rocket Power: Beach Bandits, also for PS2 and GameCube (with the black background), among others. Also appeared on Psyko Ferret.
- This did not appear on Klasky-Csupo's first live-action series, What's Inside Heidi's Head?, because it was a series of interstitials as opposed to a series, which is made by Noggin (now as "Nick Jr.").
- The split-screen credits variant made a surprise reappearance in August 2020 on a NickRewind rerun of a Rugrats episode due to the fact the episode used Nickelodeon's split-screen credits template for the show.
- The filmed variant appears on The Rugrats Movie and Rugrats in Paris: The Movie, but it doesn't appear on Rugrats Go Wild as it uses the 4th logo instead.
Legacy: The logo has been regarded as a metaphor for Klasky-Csupo's inspirational rise to fame from humble beginnings as an animation studio. However, the logo's visuals and nature have given scares to children, and earned it the unofficial nickname "Super Scary Face". Not helping is that it has constant airplay on Nickelodeon to give it more recognition to viewers. It has also been the subject of "logo edit/remix" videos and older GoAnimate/Vyond videos (often under the "gets sent to [logo]" category), and has returned in 2021 for the Rugrats CGI reboot, to presumingly give out a new generation of scares and unofficial remixes.
4th Logo (June 13, 2003-October 20, 2008)
Visuals: The logo fades into a city silhouette, with a red rooster on one of the buildings and a few palm trees on the right. The sun rises, revealing the city (which is green) and the rooster. The rooster wakes up and opens its eyes (sourced from the previous logo, as evidenced by yellow edges around them). It crows loudly as its eyes get bigger and smaller and the blocks in the K-C logo float around, as described below:
- The "KLaSKY" blocks, close to the screen, fade in. They flicker as they scroll to the right.
- "LaS", tilted, glides to the right.
- Some blocks fly in from the top-right corner.
- "LaS" appears from the top-left corner and spins around.
- A "K" spins in and out from the bottom-right corner.
- Another "K", flipped, zooms in and takes up part of the screen.
When the rooster is finished crowing, the sun brightens, as the rooster mysteriously disappears, and the K-C logo appears in the center. It looks "grungier" than the one in the past three logos, with the "KLaSKY" being set in Garish Monde and "CSUPO" being set in Keedy Sans. The logo shakes, sometimes having overlaid copies over it, and flickers for the remainder as the sun's rays spin.
Variants:
- The logo comes in three formats: a 4:3 fullscreen version, a 16:9 version, and a 2.35:1 scope version.
- Depending on the aspect ratio used, the rooster will be either near the top-left corner of the screen (4:3/16:9) or at the center (2:35:1).
- On later 4:3 prints of Rugrats Go Wild (both opening and closing), the logo (along with the film itself and the closing credits) is in open matte and zooms out to a much farther distance than usual. This only occurs on NickSplat and NickRewind airings of the movie in 4:3 standard definition.
- A short version appears on Nickelodeon airings of Rugrats Go Wild.
Technique: CGI. The rooster appears to be 2D-animated.
Audio: A fading in early 2000s style techno theme, made using samples from Zero-G's Chemical Beats sample library. A camera shutter sound can be heard when the sun brightens. There's a "POP!" sound when the rooster opens its eyes, as well as a robotic high-pitched male voice saying "Wake up!". Like the first logo, there's a similar-sounding projector-like sound heard as the blocks fly around. A faint robotic whisper of the company name can be heard at the end. The music and vocal effects for the rooster were done by co-founder Gábor Csupó.
Audio Variants:
- On a special "sizzle reel" Klasky-Csupo made for their 25th anniversary, the faint robotic whisper can barely be heard and there is a techno-like theme that starts the video.
- On Immigrants, the faint robotic whisper is not heard.
Availability: Seen on Rugrats Go Wild (both opening and closing), the company's sizzle reel and Immigrants. Also appeared on Gabor Csupo's 2018 demo reel.
Legacy: Despite being considered an improvement over the 3rd logo by some, it has an infamous reputation for its loud music, its sound effects and its usage on/association with Rugrats Go Wild.
5th Logo (December 22, 2016-)
![](/w/thumb.php?f=GW399H230.png&width=300)
Visuals: On a white background, there is a very small Klasky Csupo logo in the same grungy font as the previous logo. Suddenly, Splaat (in his web series appearance) comes in from the left side of the screen and pushes the logo off-screen.
Technique: 2D computer animation.
Audio: The same sound effects from the end of the 3rd logo (without the boing) as well as some different sound effects when Splaat appears, such as a cartoon "bonk" sound and a glass shattering sound.
Audio Variant: At the end of episode 1 of Scraatch-O-Rama ("I'm RoboSplaat"), before the logo appears, a DJ playing the turntable presses a hot cue on it that plays what seems to be a prototype version of the logo's audio. The cartoon sound effects of the 3rd logo start at the twang, the duck only quacks once, and the crashing sound is different. The glass shattering is absent, and instead is more like a bell twanging combined with a boing, and to top it all off, all of the logo's sounds play at a lower pitch (which is most likely the fault of the DJ playing the sounds slower than normal).
Availability: It's a special logo created for the web series RoboSplaat. However, it doesn't appear on the Rugrats 2021 reboot, which uses the 3rd logo instead. Uncertain if it will appear on future projects from the company.