Skyscore

Skyscore is an American pay television channel owned by NBCUniversal through its Television and Streaming division. The channel was launched on April 1, 1994, and is aimed mainly at children and young teenagers between ages 7 and 16. Its programming consists of original first-run television series, theatrical and home media-exclusive movies, and select other third-party programming.

As of September 2018, Skyscore is available to 86.4 million households in America.

Development
On May 7, 1993, newspaper publisher and broadcaster Multimedia announced its plans to launch a cable television channel focused on animation. On October 6, 1993, its name was revealed to be Skyscore, was announced. It was also reported that they would acquire its animated programming from different studios.

1994–2000
On April 1, 1994, Skyscore was launched and was themed to each block, devoted to each planet. Its first major success was The Tooney Hour, which was a launchpad for various Skyscore original series. The channel hit increasing ratings, such as competition from Nickelodeon, The Disney Channel and Cartoon Network.

When Sean Santos moved to the channel a year later in 1995, which became an instant success and made it a household name for viewers. Additionally, it introduced a mascot named Clover (voiced by Frank Welker), an anthropomorphic green dog. Earlier, Skyscore partnered with CBS/Fox Video to release episode compilations of the network's programs, which became top sellers In early 1996, Multimedia was sold to MCA, which made Skyscore a sister block to USA Action Extreme Team and Sci-Fi's Animation Station. MCA began advertising Skyscore programming on their children's programming blocks on USA Network and Sci-Fi Channel and home video releases of feature films, and Skyscore acquired various animated programming from Universal Television Animation. Skyscore Unleashed was launched later on, and was devoted to various action series.

Skyscore switched its distribution to Universal Pictures Home Entertainment in 1997, with Universal re-releasing episode compilations of the network's shows on VHS. In 1998, Skyscore launched the block Skyscore on USA on USA Network, devoted to Skyscore series and animated cartoons, to replace the defunct USA Action Extreme Team.

The channel was a surprise hit, and in February 2000, all the planets were eliminated from the channel to become a standard-focused channel in order to boost up ratings from various children's channels. However, Clover remained the channel's mascot until 2006.

2000–2006
In July 2000, in order to compete with Cartoon Network's Cartoon Cartoon Fridays block, Skyscore launched Skyscore Zoom, which served as the channel's flagship Friday night block, featuring premieres of new episodes, movies, and original series. Due to poor ratings, Skyscore announced in August 2002 they would revamp their nighttime block as Skyscore Underworld and refocused it on more adult programming to compete with Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. In 2004, NBC and Universal merged together, creating NBCUniversal, which combined NBC's cable channels like Bravo, CNBC, and MSNBC with Universal's cable channels like USA Network, Sci-Fi, and Skyscore together. On December 30, 2004, USA Kids ended its run, so Skyscore picked up new episodes of Jurassic Park: Island Survivors. In 2005, the channel debuted the series Ace of All Trades and Worldwide Animals.

2006–present
In 2006, Skyscore revamped its programming identity, with the new slogan "Enjoy the Skyscore". In March 2007, Skyscore successfully purchased the 2005 Doraemon anime and began airing it in the United States. Also, the nighttime block Skyscore Underworld adopted the new name NightHouse. The last airing of Skyscore Zoom was on June 1, 2007.

In 2011, Comcast acquired NBCUniversal from Vivendi. This made Sprout a sister network to Skyscore. Also, NBCUniversal acquired competing studio DreamWorks Animation and launched DreamWorks on Skyscore in 2017. In 2017, Universal Kids was launched to replace Sprout, which aired Skyscore programs. In 2018, Skyscore's flagship series Sean Santos was revived.

British sitcoms
In its early years, Skyscore originally filled its schedule with obscure acquired programs. British sitcoms were used to fill prime time slots, and remained on the channel's late-night schedule for well over a decade, including the North American premiere of Red Dwarf and the TV series The Sooty Show.

Programs such as Are You Being Served?, Keeping Up Appearances, and Yes Minister were broadcast in late-night time slots, and aired free of time and content edits. However, in 2002 when Skyscore began marketing its late-night hours towards older youth viewers, it decided to remove the remaining shows from the schedule.

Anime
Skyscore hosted the U.S. debut of the 1979 Doraemon in November 1996. In 1999, Skyscore partnered with Saban Entertainment to air anime that had aired on Fox Kids on cable TV such as Digimon.

In 2007, Skyscore obtained the American rights to the 2005 Doraemon anime and began airing in the United States there. Its popularity with teen viewers brought about the creation in 2005 of an anime block, which aired on Saturday nights.

Current

 * Skyscore Junior – Skyscore programs series targeted at preschool-age children daily every morning on Monday through Fridays from 8:30 am- 2:00 pm Eastern and Pacific Time (7-10 am during the summer months, other designated school break periods, and on national holidays).
 * NightHouse – a late-night block targeted towards teens and adults, airing every night from 10 p.m. EST to 6 a.m. EST.
 * DreamWorks on Skyscore – a block of animated series produced by DreamWorks Animation that airs from 8:00 to 9:30 a.m. Eastern Time, which resulted from NBCUniversal's 2016 acquisition of DreamWorks Animation.
 * Skyscore Cinema - A block that aired movies every Saturday at 6:00 p.m. EST (formerly at 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. EST) and every Sunday morning with two movies.

Yearly

 * Epic Summer - The Epic Summer block replaces morning programming during the summer vacation period from July to early September, containing some of the channel's popular programs, and daily movies. The block also featured contests.
 * Creep Night - This block features Halloween specials.
 * Skyscore's Snowy Specials – This block features holiday specials.

Former

 * Original blocks – In 1994, Skyscore chose a different style of animation for each block. Each block was represented as planets: Morning Planet for Preschoolers (claymation animation; 5:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. EST), Afternoon Planet for Kids (2D cel animation; 12:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.), Evening Planet for Family (collage animation; 6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. EST) and Night Planet for Adult (paper-mâché animation; 9:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. EST). In February 2000, all three planets were removed permanently.
 * Anizami - It was the block for action-adventure animated and anime programming.
 * The Big Crunch - It was the block for classic animated programming. It also featured several live-action series.
 * Skyscore Zoom - The network's premiere night block aired on Friday nights from 7:00 to 11:00 p.m. EST. It was known for airing new episodes of Skyscore programming. The last airing of Skyscore Zoom was on June 1, 2007.
 * Double Pack – A weekday programming block featuring back-to-back episodes of network programming.
 * Toasted Saturdays - Launched in 2007, Toasted Saturdays was a Saturday morning and afternoon block. It was similar in format to the Australian children's television program Toasted TV.

Cross-programming with other networks
From 1998 to 2004, USA Network also ran a Skyscore programming block under the name USA Kids (originally titled Skyscore on USA until October 2001), replacing the USA Action Extreme Team block which closed in 1998.

Death tributes
Skyscore occasionally airs bumpers that pay tribute to a recent celebrity death, in which there is no music or sound effects, but only a fade-in, showing the person's name and picture, along with the year of their birth and the year of their death, followed by a fade-out.

Skyscore.com
Skyscore.com is Skyscore's main website, which launched in 1996 as a component of America Online's Kids Only channel before eventually moving to the full World Wide Web. It provides content, as well as video clips and full episodes of Skyscore series available for streaming.

Mobile apps
Skyscore released a free mobile app for smartphones and tablet computers operating on the Apple and Android platforms in December 2012. Like Skyscore.com, a TV Everywhere login code provided by participating subscription providers is required to view individual episodes of Skyscore's series.

Skyscore Animation
Skyscore Animation is a production firm located in North Hollywood, California, which serves as the animation facilities for many of the network's animated series.

NightHouse Animation
NightHouse Animation is the adult production studio division that produces adult-oriented animated feature films and television series and provides an original program to Skyscore's late-night program NightHouse, which is located in Burbank, California, along with the main headquarters of the Skyscore animation studio.

Skyscore Games
Skyscore Games (formerly Skyscore Interactive) is the video game publisher of video games based on Skyscore shows since 1998.

Skyscore Movies
Skyscore Movies is a motion picture production unit that was founded in March 1996, as a secondary feature animation division of Universal Pictures (owned by Skyscore corporate parent NBCUniversal).

Skyscore Magazine
'Skyscore Magazine was a print magazine that was launched in 1997. It incorporated informative non-fiction pieces, humor (including pranks and parodical pieces), interviews, recipes, and a comic book section in the center of each issue featuring original comics by leading underground cartoonists as well as strips about popular Skyscore and non-Skyscore properties.

Video games
Since 2004, Skyscore characters were featured in a four-player mascot brawler fighting game series similar to Nintendo's Super Smash Bros. video game series called Skyscore Fighting Royale. The Skyscore website also features various Flash games incorporating characters from various Skyscore series.

Slogans

 * "The Perfect Place for Animation" (1994–2006)
 * "Enjoy the Skyscore" (2006–2010)
 * "Be Creative" (2010–2014)
 * "So Epic" (2014–present)