Alliance Atlantis's Lunar Jim

TV Kids Weekly, June 27, 2006

NAME: Lunar Jim

ORIGIN: Lunar Jim is an
original series, developed by The Halifax Film Company and Alliance Atlantis.
The series centers around Jim and his friends, including Rover the Robot Dog,
Ripple the Super Space Mechanic, Eco the Farmer and T.E.D., the Technical Equipment
Device, as they explore and discover exciting things about the world around
them—on the moon! The series, aimed at preschool children between
two-and-a-half and five years old, promotes problem-solving skills through
persistence, creativity and cooperation.

CREATORS: Lunar Jim is
co-produced by The Halifax Film Company and Alliance Atlantis and is based on
an original concept created by Alexander Bar.

TV SHOW: Lunar Jim is a
stop-motion animated property comprised of 52 11-minute episodes. A second
series of 52 episodes is in the works.

EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: Charles Bishop, Ken Faier, Alan Gregg and Jeff Rosen.

MAIN BROADCASTER: The main broadcasters are the CBC in Canada, BBC in the
U.K. and ZDF in Germany.

TV SALES: To date, the series has been sold to numerous territories,
including: Discovery Kids (Latin America), CBC, SRC and BBC Kids (Canada), ABC
Kids (Australia), BBC and CBeebies (U.K.), Kika and ZDF (Germany) and France 5
(France), with additional deals under negotiation. Broadcast launches for
previously announced pre-sales began rolling out early this year.

MAJOR TOY LICENSEES: Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. and Fisher-Price have
signed a worldwide master toy licensing agreement for Lunar Jim, where Fisher-Price will develop, manufacture and
distribute toys that include action figures, vehicles, and role play. The toy
launch is scheduled for this fall in Canada and the U.K.

BBC Worldwide (U.K.), m4e
(Germany) and ABC (Australia) have also been appointed licensing agents for Lunar
Jim and will work alongside Fisher-Price
to oversee the licensing programs, secure new licenses and manage product
launches in their respective territories.

OTHER PRODUCTS: Alliance Atlantis recently announced agreements in Canada
to develop lines of apparel and accessories to accompany the series. Meanwhile,
the company is continuing to finalize agreements with other key merchandising
partners around the world in several categories.

STRATEGY FOR ROLLOUT: Lunar Jim product
will launch six to 12 months after the initial television broadcast and each
merchandising program will be subject to the needs and demands of the
respective territories and categories. Licensees are currently being signed on
in a number of territories across a variety of categories and product
development is underway.

“A beautiful line of toys will be
coming out in Canada and in Britain in late August early September,” says Alan
Gregg, the VP of Production and Distribution, Children’s Television at Alliance
Atlantis. “These will be the flagship ancillary products—vehicles and
figurines—[reflecting] the main play pattern from the show. This will
lead to all kinds of merchandising and we have deals signed or pending in
publishing in Britain and in Canada.” These will include picture books as well
as magnet books, which feature photographs of the lunar landscape and magnetic
characters that kids [can move around the page] and make up their own little
stories.”

Fisher-Price is also developing
interactive toys. “One is Jim’s wrist communicator, which is fairly amazing
technology,” explains Gregg. “It’s like a little wristwatch that kids can put
on, and they slide a card into the slot, and the card has pictures of each
character. Kids can turn the little slide wheel and a character will enter the
screen on the communicator, and its voice will be activated and say, ‘Hi Jim,’
so the child who is wearing the wristwatch becomes Jim, and can talk to
whatever character appears on the screen.”

Gregg’s priority now is to allow
the property to gain momentum around the world and Lunar Jim has already sold to a number of key territories. “We were
pitched the show about four years ago. The key was getting a major Canadian
broadcaster because that triggers a considerable amount of funding,” he explains.
“The CBC, which is very strong with preschool, came in as our commissioning
broadcaster. Once they were on board we also got BBC Kids in Canada as a second
window English-language broadcaster, and we also have Radio Canada in Quebec.

Gregg’s attention then turned to
the international market and finding broadcast partners. “We’ve been very
careful not to just go with a broadcaster that offered a large license fee,
which, of course, is extremely tempting, but you also want a great platform
that will reach the audience you are going after. We were delighted to sell Lunar
Jim to the BBC in the U.K., which is the
place to be in Britain and covers Ireland as well. ZDF came in as a pre-sale,
the series will air on ZDF and on the children’s channel KiKa.” Lunar Jim has also sold to ABC Australia, France 5 and Discovery
Kids Latin America.

As Gregg explains, “Ultimately,
the end game is getting Lunar Jim on TV
in the U.S. But the market is crowded and we have a soft peddle approach to the
U.S. right now. I want to create international momentum. With the show
launching around the world and then toys and other products launching this
fall, I would hope to go back to the U.S. with a really great positive story
that would be hard for [American channels] to ignore.”

To receive a
kids’ property profile in your inbox every Tuesday, subscribe to TV Kids Weekly.