Gecko Studios

Background
Gecko Studios was a production company that was formed by Elliot Strange in 1987, based in Houston, Texas. Following creative issues at ABC centering on The Halloween Gang and them restructuring their programs under the guidance of the Q5 Corporation for that year's television season. Strange initially created Gecko to fulfill executive producer obligations due to him agreeing to helm the show's syndication package. After getting officially launched in 1992, Gecko would later expand to producing art assets and cutscenes for video games, as well as acquiring anime releases for localization and distribution on cable and independent junctures, along with producing animated programs (albeit only landing two successful pitches.) Gecko would also produce commercials, namely for clients like Subway, Frito Lay (Munchos), The Coca-Cola Company (Barq Root Beer) and Winstar Communications, but are perhaps best known for producing advertisements for Japanese and Korean clients like Sharp, JVC, KEC Corporation and Funai, the latter mainly for their Symphonic line of televisions. Gecko would shut down professionally in 2005 and relaunch as a producer of Java and flash content, producing Hudson Soft conversions along with original titles in collaboration with Namco and Konami/PlayFirst. The name would be retired by 2009, as Strange would focus more on his social media presence, though Strange would promise to try and return to producing upon reaching 10 million subscribers. In 2020, upon earning his Diamond Play Button, Strange revived Gecko alongside his wife Madelyne Dern.

1st Logo (1987)
Logo: Against a blackboard-like background, we see four characters; a girl with braids with a sad look, a freckled girl with a dazed look and open mouth, a short-haired brunette laughing and a similar girl with an overbite donning visible braces and looking confused. "GECKO STUDIOS" is in the center in a scrawled font.

Trivia: These characters would also be used in the logo for It's Time for Cake in 1999. The characters would appear in a series of shorts Strange would create in 2007.

FX/SFX: None, beyond the fade-in.

Music/Sounds: The closing theme of the show.

Availability: Ultra rare. Appeared on the syndicated season of The Halloween Gang, as well as syndicated reruns of the first season through The Program Exchange. The latter had the Gecko Studios and Sternwest Productions logo plaster that for Blessard Animation Production, this also applying to episodes eight through thirteen of the show's second network season as they were traded off previously. Early home video releases by Family Home Entertainment used the syndicated prints of these episodes, so the logo appears on those. Unfortunately, Sternwest agreed to sell the show's rights back to Blessard, thus leading to Gecko's logo getting plastered on newer releases; also as customary on shows produced by DiC Entertainment and distributed by Coca-Cola Telecommunications (early syndie episodes), this would lead to plasters by Cookie Jar Entertainment and the bars of boredom respectively.

2nd Logo (1992-2003)
Logo: On a black background, we see the word "GECKO" in a Century Gothic font, with a gecko embryo in place of the "O". Suddenly, the background flashes as the text pulsates and becomes electrified before returning to its previous state.

FX/SFX: The flashing and the jolts.

Music/Sounds: A tense synth pad drone.

Availability: Used primarily on anime acquisitions. It appeared on the 1992 Streamline Pictures dub of The Fairies of Silver Platte and the ADV dub of Titanic. This was plastered on re-releases by Media Blasters/AnimeWorks. This doesn't appear on the Central Park Media dub of Primal Rage, which has a version of the next logo below.

3rd Logo (1992-2008, 2020)
Logo: Same concept as the first logo, but this time featuring the logotype from the second logo in the middle of the screen.

Variant:


 * On Green Jean for the SEGA Genesis, the logo is letterboxed and has text above it reading: "Art direction handled by"
 * On Green Jean 2: The Meaner and Greener Edition, similar to above, text is above the logo reading "Contains cutscenes and art assets provided by Gecko Studios.". There is also text below listing the company's location and web URL.
 * On the Central Park Media dub of the Primal Rage OVA, this shares the screen with the logos for SEGA, Broadway Video, Distant Horizon and Central Park Media.
 * At the start of Strange's 1999 demo reel, text is beneath the Gecko logotype, reading: "Elliot Strange's demo reel. Contact at ERStrange@aol.com."

FX/SFX: None, unless you count the fade in on most uses.

Music/Sounds: None or the opening theme of the game.

Availability: Used mainly on video games where Strange handled the art direction and cutscenes. Seen on Green Jean for the SEGA Genesis and SEGA CD, Green Jean 2: Enter the Nega Jean for the SEGA Saturn and PlayStation (along with its expansion Green Jean 2: The Meaner and Greener Edition for PC and the SEGA Dreamcast), Green Jean (2002) for the GameCube, PlayStation 2 and XBOX and WorldBuilders for the Game Boy Advance. It also appeared on various mobile phone games, such as the java conversion of Binary Land and original titles like Tricky Pac-Man and Hotel Manager. Strangely appeared on the Central Park Media dub of the Primal Rage OVA in spite of a dedicated logo existing (lest this was to play on the fact it was based on a video game.) It was brought back for the freeware game Spongey Dev Kit.

4th Logo (1996-2005, 2020-)
Logo: We see a gecko embryo illuminate against a sandy background. The sand slowly parts as a gecko emerges from the embryo and begins crawling around. Enough sand is moved to reveal the white word "GECK" etched into a rocky background. The gecko crawls next to the "K" and bursts into flames, forming into the embryo from earlier.

Variant:


 * A shortened version exists, where it shows the last few seconds.
 * This shares the screen with the logo for Abominable Pictures on most episodes of Dark Materials.
 * The first episode of Dark Materials also included the logo for Front Street Pictures to the right of the Gecko Studios logo, with Abominable Pictures' logo below.

FX/SFX: 2D animation.

Music/Sounds: A tribal tune.

Music/Sounds/Variant: In 2022, the shortened variant features two scorching sounds.

Availability: Appeared on the film Tonka: Search and Rescue. The short version appeared on the unsold pilots for Hang in there, Yogi Bear!, Rockett to Earth, Foxtrot and Hailey's Debts, The Halloween Kids, Forget Tess and the miniseries WorldBuilders. The short and long versions were brought back for Dark Materials and Memory respectively. The long version had also plastered the second logo on re-releases of Gecko's anime acquisitions by Media Blasters/AnimeWorks. The combo variant only appears on episodes of Dark Materials that run past 35 minutes.