Gecko Studios

Background
Gecko Studios was a production company that was formed by Elliot Strange in 1987, based in Tyler, 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 sought to fund and produce a greenlit syndication run for the show, leading to him creating Gecko and seeking out other producers interested in the project. Strange's association with producers Phil Sterns and Julia West from the syndicated season helped to finance a pet project Strange was working on, which would become The Key to Laurie Locke. The film was a modest success, but enabled Strange to build connections from there. He would later help acquire and produce an American dub of the anime film Gin no ōzara no yōsei (released in the US as The Fairies of Silver Platte.) From there, Gecko would produce animated commercials for local Texas businesses, but would later land major clients such as RadioShack, Whataburger, Mystic Pizza, Barq root beer, Rolling Rock beer, Yuengling and more notably, American advertising for NEC/Hudson Soft and SNK for the TurboExpress and the Neo Geo Pocket Color respectively. In between they would also produce some live-action content. The company closed in 2006 due to the financial failure of their last film. In 2019, Gecko's website relaunched and hinted at two new projects, later revealed to be remakes of the web series Princess Natasha and the obscure television series This Just In.... Princess Natasha ran on HBO Max and would later debut on Cartoon Network in the US at its conclusion, but a switch in show-runners (the new one had been outed for pro-police brutality tweets related to the Hong Kong protests) led to a sharp decline in viewership. The This Just In... reboot, produced under the name Sami, languished due to Strange's refusal to release the show on Netflix, feeling their original productions lacked quality (his views also owed to the Cuties controversy.), as well as his opposition to The Walt Disney Company leading him to reject offers from Fox and Hulu, both owned by or associated with Disney. His quality views also led him to not allowing companies like Bento Box Entertainment and Titmouse, Inc. to participate in the project, but he was able to land a deal with 6 Point Harness. The show was going to be released on AppleTV+, but was outbid by Pop. The creator of the original series, Steve Marmel, was set to be involved but was kicked off of the project due to his more radicalized takes on then president Donald Trump. The show lasted for a single season (said to have been intended as such) and Strange promptly retired from the professional animation industry. Gecko remains active as a producer of internet content, notably serving as the handle for Strange's NewGrounds account and related YouTube channel.

1st Logo (1987)
Logo: On a black background, we see a grey box containing a circular image of a girl with her hair arranged in a pony-tail fashion and wearing a red sports shirt with blue jeans, standing in a fighting stance. The girl throws a few rapid punches before the image freezes. Beneath the frame is the text "GECKO STUDIOS" in black.

Trivia: The girl in the logo is known as Judy. She was the first character ever created by Strange. She was intended to be included in The Halloween Gang, but as co-creator Byron Blessard had become more accepting of ABC's impending alterations, intended to revision her as a more submissive character (Blessard had also become infamous for a number of allegations of pedophilia, which would get confirmed years later.) The extent of the conflict led to Strange using Judy as a personal trophy to reflect his victory against Blessard and the network. Judy would appear in The Halloween Kids and would also appear in various commercials produced by Gecko.

FX/SFX: The punching.

Music/Sounds: Various punching sounds, ending with a bell sound.

Availability: Appeared on syndicated episodes of The Halloween Gang. This and the Sternwest Productions logos would wind up plastering the Blessard Animation Productions on local reruns of the first season and the eighth through thirteenth episodes of the second (those were traded off from the syndicated seasons) distributed through The Program Exchange. This principle also applies to earlier VHS releases through Family Home Entertainment.

2nd Logo (1989-1995)
Logo: We fade in to a white background with scribbles on it, as well as a black number "3". The area flashes a bit before cutting to the number "2" against the same background but with smaller, more faded blue scribbles, then cutting to "1" with green and yellow scribbles. Suddenly, the image from before fades in. The background flickers as Judy throws a punch before the image clears out, leaving an image of her in a circular frame, with "GECKO" above her in yellow and red squares (a gecko embryo replaces the "O" in "GECKO" and "STUDIOS" below in a spaced out font. All of this is on a grey stone background.

FX/SFX: Traditional animation.

Music/Sounds: Originally none. In 1994, it was given a fast paced techno theme

Availability: Seen on The Key to Laurie Locke, the Streamline Pictures dub of The Fairies of Silver Platte, The Milkman and the 1995 remake of The Beast of Yucca Flats.

3rd Logo (1999-2000, 2021-)
Logo: Inside of a room filled with posters (one of which being a white poster with a campfire and a hand holding a lit match, and above it is the word "GECKO" with a gecko embryo replacing the "O", formed by smoke from the fire), a green couch a window revealing a night sky (complete with crescent moon) a floor littered with junk and a game console (a TurboGrafx 16 with a five controller add-on), we see four girls on the couch playing on it (one has a purple mohawk and a nose-ring, one has a fade with sharp teeth, one is a normal girl with a barrette and the other is a girl with a beanie and glasses. As they play, the screen turns green.

Trivia: The girls had previously appeared in commercials produced by Strange for various products between 1992 and 2001. They would later be used for an unreleased video game produced for the Neo Geo Pocket Color.

Variant(s):


 * When this logo was brought back in 2020, half of the wall was removed revealing pure black and a woman standing in the space with a blank expression, referencing the cold openings on The Halloween Kids. The logo would also become still at that point.
 * On Sami, this shares the screen with the logo for Not the QB Productions, with the exception of the first episode that featured the logos individually (the episode was originally released on YouTube as a sneak preview, whereas network airings would condense most of the logos to share the same screen for time constraints (this is among eight logos to appear at the end of the show.)

FX/SFX: Flash animation.

Music/Sounds: Buttons clicking, followed by a distorted fanfare.

Availability: Appeared on the short-lived The Halloween Kids and first appeared on the ultra short-lived revival of Inner Sanctum. Was brought back for Sami.