Back in September, we told you about a rumor making the rounds about Nickelodeon possibly making a movie that would unite many of their best-loved cartoon characters from the ’90s in one big adventure. No official sources would confirm it at the time, but today they have, along with the news that Napoleon Dynamite and Nacho Libre helmer Jared Hess will direct. As Napoleon Dynamite felt like it was already in a weird time warp—last time I looked, IMDB’s trivia page even mistakenly claimed it was set in the ’80s—this could be a good match.

But how do you bring Rocko, Ren and Stimpy, the Real Monsters, Rugrats and more into one big adventure? We should point out that there are video games which have answered the question previously….


However, the story at Variety, like previous rumors, indicates that Who Framed Roger Rabbit? is the model. Considering that Paramount and Nickelodeon mustered up an impressive $55 million opening weekend for the last SpongeBob movie and marketed it based on a third-act twist that had the 2D characters become 3D CGI in the real world (in actuality, those scenes were only a small portion of the movie), that approach again would seem the most likely take. This would make it a more ambitious project than Hess has ever tackled before.

They could even make it an actual sequel to the existing film franchise: Think SpongeBob V Stimpy: Dawn of Nicktoons. We all understand that if it does well, standalone spinoffs would be in the works, yes?

Which character do you want to see return the most? My vote is for Catdog, but we’re sure your choices are varied. In comments below, sound off and name your ‘toon.

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Image Credit: Lilylicious17/DeviantART