Mad Monster Party DVD Gets New Cover!

			It appears that Anchor Bay Entertainment has reissued one of our R/B favorites on DVD with a new cover! The new version of Mad Monster Party became available as of August 23rd, and although we really liked their first cover design, this one is quite appealing as well! It has a nice spider web border and features more of the main characters. And they still have "The Rankin/Bass Classic" prominently displayed at the top! And just in time for pre-Halloween sales! If you don't own this one yet - we highly recommend it! Hats off to Anchor Bay for keeping this cult classic alive! Click here for more details at amazon.com!

Another Animation Great Leaves Us

	R.I.P. Joe Ranft
	Pixar's Joe Ranft was suddenly taken from us on August 16th when the automobile he was riding in veered off California's Highway 1 and plunged into the ocean. His untimely death has sent shockwaves throughout the animation industry. Joe was also the voice of Heimlich the Caterpillar in "A Bug's Life" and Wheezy in "Toy Story 2". JOE was one of Rick Goldschmidt's closest friends at PIXAR and had just spoken with him around the time THE INCREDIBLES came out. He assisted with the RUDOLPH book and RICK included many comments from his dear friend. As busy as JOE was, he always took time out to send us many items and was very giving of his time. There is a HUGE outpouring of sympathy from the animation community because JOE was a such a GREAT guy! Joe was always very kind to us and we will miss him dearly. He was 45. Read Joe's obituary here.

Rick Interviewed for Toy Shop Article!

	Writer CHRISTINE SPARTA interviewed RICK for an article in TOY SHOP magazine about RANKIN/BASS Collectibles. RICK was featured in a front page article for TOY SHOP a few years back and it was very well done. He gave his thoughts on the recent merchandise and what could and should be done with the merchandise in the future. Also, not many people know this BUT before the release of the book THE ENCHANTED WORLD OF RANKIN/BASS: A PORTFOLIO there wasn't any merchandising on the GREAT Classic Holiday Specials. STUFFINS actually got the idea to do BEAN BAG DOLLS for the CVS PHARMACY Chain, while reading Rick's book on a flight to TOKYO for a toy convention. When the STUFFINS dolls hit the EAST COAST it created quite a sensation and this resulted in ENESCO and PLAYING MANTIS (Which RICK wrote years before to do RANKIN/BASS Products) coming on board with RUDOLPH items. ENESCO called RICK up at a book signing, after seeing him on WGN MORNING NEWS and asked him to come to their showroom in ITASCA, IL to see their first line of the figurines for their RUDOLPH line and asked him to design several more lines based on the classic RANKIN/BASS Specials. Many of the subsequent releases used the concept art that Rick created from these early meetings with the company. RICK wants to see some accurate ANIMAGIC figure replicas made on the characters and talks about this in the article for TOY SHOP.

Rudolph's Official CBS Web Page!

	Check out this web page CBS.com posted during the holidays last year. There are video clips to watch, a photo gallery to view, wallpaper and screensaver downloads, coloring book pages to print, a viewer's poll and a link to purchase the dvd! Click here to visit Rudolph's page!

Gin Blossoms & Rankin/Bass!

	The entire RANKINBASS.COM staff turned out to see the Gin Bossoms perform in Chicago Ridge, IL this past July! They sounded great and put on an outstanding show! A good time was had by all! Also, we are pleased to announce that the Gin Blossoms are slated to record a new theme and video based on the old THUNDERCATS theme for the upcoming third set of the Thundercats DVDs! Also, RICK will be going back to TEMPE, AZ to record more of his solo CD this Fall with ROBIN Producing and PHILLIP and SCOTTY performing along with ROBIN on the tracks.

Mad Monster Party & Funko!

	Coming Soon! The good folks at Funko have begun production on a new series of figurines for their "Spastik Plastik" line: characters from the Rankin/Bass Feature Film Mad Monster Party! Funko has been in contact with rankinbass.com and solicited our input on the design concepts to ensure the accuracy of the sculpts! Expect to see some of your favorite monsters in all of their plastic glory on store shelves in the near future, as Funko is trying to get them out before Halloween this year! Yea!

- Rick and Mark