Immortality is timeless– Just one the perks of having cartoon characters as image carriers of a brand. Cartoon characters provide a lot of possibilities to adjust to the demands of the market. It’s possible to tweak their age and look and to have both personas from different generations exist at the same real-life time (e.g. Looney Tunes and Baby Looney, The Mupphets and Mupphet Babies.).
Now, even Dora needs to grow up!
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Mattel and Nick announced a new brand called Dora’s Explorer Girls that mixes Dora the Explorer’s nose for adventure with the fashion doll play and online interaction.
The premise has Dora living in the big city, attending middle school and getting into fashion while solving mysteries with her friends.
The line will be introduced with a line of fashion dolls that connect with the child’s computer and enable interactive play in an online world. The new look for Dora is being kept under wraps until the fall season, when the look of the doll will be unveiled.
Dora the Explorer was created by Chris Gifford, Valerie Walsh and Eric Weiner and has been a huge ratings winner for Nickelodeon and Noggin since it debuted in August of 2000. The series’ spin-off Go, Diego Go! has also developed a huge following since it was introduced in 2005. Both Dora and Diego also perform extremely well in the toys and licensing arena.
February has been a big month for the popular animated character as Dora won the Most Popular Property of the Year Award at the International Toy Fair and took home a prestigious NAACP Image award last week.
Source: animationmagazine.com
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