History Main / ProductionLeadTime

->''"Doing an animated film is like building a cruise ship - you start it in one economy and launch it in another."''\\

** One episode was about the R. Kelly statutory rape case. Even when the episode was ''written'', the case was rapidly losing its relevance; by the time it aired, nobody had any idea what they were talking about anymore (or, for that matter, really cared).

* ''[[WesternAnimation/TheJetsons Jetsons]]: TheMovie'' infamously replaced Janet Waldo (the original voice of Judy Jetson) with '80s pop singer Tiffany as a bit of StuntCasting intended to draw in a teenage audience. By the time the film actually opened, Tiffany's flash-in-the-pan career was pretty much over. Waldo – who wasn't told she had been replaced – did not take it well. (incidentally, this movie took long enough to make that by the time it came out, two of the principal actors had ''died'')

* Same for most shows on Creator/CartoonNetwork's Adult Swim. One episode of ''WesternAnimation/RobotChicken'' did a LampshadeHanging on this, however. During a spoof of the film ''IntoTheBlue'', Seth Green (in stop-motion animated form) interrupted the skit to briefly explain how animation takes time and therefore some skits may be irrelevant. He then went on to state (with obvious irony) that he was confident that by now, ''Into the Blue'' had become a box office hit and won several Academy Awards, then closed by apologizing for any inconvenience.

** The long lead time also had a less positive outcome. Her appearance in "The Last Roundup" led to [[PoliticalCorrectnessGoneMad accusations of insensitivity against the handicapped]], and Hasbro made the animators [[{{Bowdlerise}} re-edit her scene]], causing a backlash. Derpy appeared throughout the rest of Season 2 without incident. But Season 3 – which was in production at the time of the controversy – features no Derpy cameos at all until the finale. She was also absent from the first nine episodes of Season 4.

* Teasers for ''WesternAnimation/ThePagemaster'' were in theaters 4 years before the movie came out.

->''"Doing an animated film is like building a cruise ship - you make it in one economy and launch it in another."''\\

* While they'd been notorious for their string of [[DuelingMovies loose copycat productions of Pixar films]], only once was DreamWorksAnimation able to use this trope to beat another film to the punch: ''TheWild'', an obscure co-production between {{Disney}} and an independent Canadian company, had been in the works for six years before DreamWorks made it's pre-emptive strike with the suspiciously similar (and more heavily stylized) ''{{Madagascar}}''. Like ''TheTheifAndTheCobbler'', the end result was the movie in production first released ''after'' the film that borrowed it's concept became hugely successful, resulting in the ''original'' being accused of a ripoff.

*** Similarly, the episode "Obama Wins!" aired right after Obama's reelection, but the plot of the episode also dealt with the Walt Disney Company purchasing Lucasfilm.

--Jim Hill (paraphrased)

* One of the reasons ''Disney/TheEmperorsNewGroove'' suffered a ReTool was because the 2000 release date was set, but by 1998 it was clear that the TroubledProduction wouldn't be ready by then.

* Happens a lot in the Franchise/DisneyAnimatedCanon. Sometimes three to five years will pass between the initial announcement of a project and the theatrical release of the movie, thus occasionally having the final picture entering into a social or economic market it is ill-prepared for.
** Also, in the early 90's it was not uncommon for Disney to include rough pencil tests and storyboards in the trailers for their movies, simply because there wasn't enough finished footage to make a complete trailer. This practice seems to have stopped, probably because it looks sloppy. The response has been to make initial teaser trailers merely describing the premise of the film using little to no footage from the actual movie; creating a custom short. Both ''Disney/LiloAndStitch'' and ''Disney/ThePrincessAndTheFrog'' did this.

* {{Lampshaded}} in ''ComicStrip/FoxTrot'' [[http://www.gocomics.com/foxtrot/2002/05/18 here]].

** [[SuperMode Rainbow Power]] ponies appeared in the toyline about six months before their show debut in Part 2 of the Season 4 finale.

** [[SuperMode Rainbow Power]] ponies appeared in the toyline about six months before their official debut in Part 2 of the Season 4 finale.

** [[SuperMode Rainbow Power]] ponies appeared in the toyline about six months before the Season 4 finale.

* The whole phenomenon surrounding [[AscendedExtra Derpy Hooves]] from ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' is an interesting case. After fans latched onto her appearance in the first episode – which was an error or a joke (or both), depending on who you ask – she appeared throughout the first half of season one with perfectly normal eyes. It wasn't until "Feeling Pinkie Keen" that Derpy reappeared with her now-famous googly eyes, as at that point the animators learned of her popularity and decided to intentionally "derp" her eyes in the remaining in-production Season 1 episodes ([[FunnyBackgroundEvent and give her random background cameos to liven up a scene]]). By Season 2, the staff started working her appearances into the actual scripts.

** The long lead time also had a less positive outcome. Her appearance in "The Last Roundup" led to [[PoliticalCorrectnessGoneMad accusations of insensitivity against the handicapped]], and Hasbro made the animators [[{{Bowdlerise}} re-edit her scene]], causing a backlash. Derpy appeared throughout the rest of Season 2 without incident. But Season 3 – which was in production at the time of the controversy – features no Derpy cameos at all until the finale.

** There was also a case of this in the form of the Second Season finale cashing in on the Royal Wedding phenomenon... almost a year after it happened.

** They ''try'' to overcome it with overdubs and lampshade hanging, but they still fall victim to this trope big time. Combined with the occasional tendency of episodes to air a season or more after they were completed – due to Fox's seasons and ''Simpsons'' production seasons not always lining up – this trope has (for instance) caused parody episodes to be released ''years'' after the works they were mocking. Case in point, "Simpson Tide", a parody of the 1995 film ''Crimson Tide'', was first shown in 1998.

-->'''WebVideo/TheNostalgiaCritic:''' So basically, this was the result of ''animated inbreeding''. Starting to make a lot more sense now, is it?

* Same for most shows on Creator/CartoonNetwork's Adult Swim. One episode of ''WesternAnimation/RobotChicken'' did a LampshadeHanging on this, however. During a spoof of the film ''Into the Blue'', Seth Green (in stop-motion animated form) interrupted the skit to briefly explain how animation takes time and therefore some skits may be irrelevant. He then went on to state (with obvious irony) that he was confident that by now, ''Into the Blue'' had become a box office hit and won several Academy Awards, then closed by apologizing for any inconvenience.

* Happens a lot in the DisneyAnimatedCanon. Sometimes three to five years will pass between the initial announcement of a project and the theatrical release of the movie, thus occasionally having the final picture entering into a social or economic market it is ill-prepared for.
** Also, in the early 90's it was not uncommon for Disney to include rough pencil tests and storyboards in the trailers for their movies, simply because there wasn't enough finished footage to make a complete trailer. This practice seems to have stopped, probably because it looks sloppy. The response has been to make initial teaser trailers merely describing the premise of the film using little to no footage from the actual movie; creating a custom short. Both ''LiloAndStitch'' and ''Disney/ThePrincessAndTheFrog'' did this.
* ''[[TheJetsons Jetsons]]: TheMovie'' infamously replaced Janet Waldo (the original voice of Judy Jetson) with '80s pop singer Tiffany as a bit of StuntCasting intended to draw in a teenage audience. By the time the film actually opened, Tiffany's flash-in-the-pan career was pretty much over. Waldo – who wasn't told she had been replaced – did not take it well. (incidentally, this movie took long enough to make that by the time it came out, two of the principal actors had ''died'')

* Newspaper comics are often written a long time in advance – usually around eight weeks for dailies and twelve weeks for Sunday strips – which can cause problems for more topical comics like ''{{Doonesbury}}'', as [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] [[http://images.ucomics.com/comics/db/2008/db080830.gif here]].

* Fans of the bygone comic strip version of ''TheBoondocks'' may regret that the TV series can't joke about current events nearly so much.

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* Teasers for ''ThePagemaster'' were in theaters 4 years before the movie came out.