What if DreamWorks Pictures/DreamWorks Animation was founded in 1934?/Frosty the Snowman

Frosty the Snowman is a 1969 American animated Christmas musical comedy-drama adventure film based on the song "Frosty the Snowman". It was produced by DreamWorks Cartoon Studio and Rankin/Bass Productions. It stars the voices of Jackie Vernon, June Foray, Billy De Wolfe, Mel Blanc, Dick Shawn, George S. Irving and Paul Fress and narrated by Jimmy Durante.

The film’s story follows a group of school children who build a snowman called Frosty and place a hat which made him come alive with magic, but after noticing the high hot temperature and fearing that he would get melted, Frosty, along with young girl Karen and a rabbit named Hocus Pocus, must go to the North Pole to be safe from melting.

Arthur Rankin, Jr. and Jules Bass wanted to give the film and its characters the look of a Christmas card, so Paul Coker, Jr., a greeting card and Mad magazine artist, was hired to do the character and background drawings. The animation was produced by Mushi Production in Japan, with then-Mushi staffer Osamu Dezaki among the animation staff.

Rankin/Bass veteran writer Romeo Muller adapted and expanded the story for works as he had done with Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

The film was released on December 7, 1969 in theaters, then broadcast on television on December TBD, 1970.

Plot
One December afternoon, a school girl named Karen and her friends create a snowman after school. After several suggestions of what to call their snowman (including "Oatmeal" and "Christopher Columbus"), Karen decides to name him "Frosty". They later acquire a top hat discarded by inept magician Professor Hinkle. When Karen places it on top of Frosty's head, the snowman comes to life (and always says "Happy Birthday!" in response). When Hinkle learns of the magic power his hat actually possesses, he takes it back and departs, pretending that he did not see Frosty come to life. However, the professor's pet rabbit, Hocus Pocus, returns the hat to Frosty.

Frosty soon senses the temperature is rising and worries about melting. The children suggest putting him on the next train to the North Pole, where he will never melt, and they all parade into the city on the way to the train station, where Frosty has his confrontation with the traffic cop mentioned in the song's lyrics. When Karen explains that Frosty came to life and doesn't know what a traffic light or a lamp post is, the traffic cop lets Frosty go, but get shocked shorty after realizing Frosty is a snowman. At the train station, Frosty stows away aboard a refrigerated train car, since neither he nor the children have any money for a train ticket. As the train is about to leave the station, Karen and Hocus decide to join Frosty for the ride to keep him company. With that, Frosty, Karen, and Hocus wave goodbye to the other kids as the train takes off. Unbeknownst to them, Hinkle has also hitched a ride on the same train, intending to get his hat back, after getting fired from his magic act job.

As the train continues up north, however, Frosty notices Karen is freezing and starting to catch a cold, so they jump off the train, leaving Hinkle behind once again. Hinkle, seeing them escape, jumps off the train too, but falls down a mountain and crashes into a tree where a pile of snow falls on him. At Frosty's request, Hocus convinces some forest animals who are preparing for Christmas to build a campfire for Karen. Fearing that Karen still cannot survive for long in the cold weather, Frosty asks Hocus who might be able to help them. Hocus suggests (by pantomiming) the President of the United States and the United States Marines, before suggesting Santa Claus. Frosty agrees, and promptly takes credit for the idea himself (much to Hocus' annoyance). Hocus hops off to get Santa, but Hinkle then confronts Frosty and Karen once more and blows out Karen's campfire. Frosty and Karen are again forced to flee, this time with Karen riding on Frosty's back as he slides head-first down a hill.

After escaping from Hinkle, Frosty and Karen come to a kingdom populated by mice, who get ambushed by three soilder-like cats. Karen tries to help the mice from the cats, but suddenly gets trapped inside the sack, before the three cats, mistaken as a large mouse, kidnaps her as Frosty views on helplessly. At the kingdom's castle, the cats' leader Majesty Meow, the King of Cats, takes over and, along with his minions of cats, celebrates their success of their take over, until three of the cats enters with a sack and unleashes out Karen, which provokes all the cats gasps in their shock. Until Majesty Meow schemes that they can use her to perform for them on the show. So at the castle's theater hall, as Majesty Meow's captain of the guard throws Karen on stage, Karen refuses to perform the cats. Of course, Majesty Meow activates his Power Crown to mesmerize her, and forces her dance and play a tambourine, while singing "I Need Some Help", to perform for the cats. As her song ends, the cats cheers while Karen then awakens from her hypnotic mind. As Majesty Meow one of his minion is sent on stage, with his saw and box, to ask her to get inside of the box before doing his box-sawing act, the terrified Karen refuses and escapes, until comes across Frosty, who comes to the rescue and grabs Karen before taking off. Unfortunately, two of got caught in the net after trying to escape and been sent to the dungeon by Majesty Meow's three guards.

Meanwhile, Hocus Pocus finally locates the Santa's toy workshop at the North Pole, where he messages Santa Claus for help, which Santa agrees and the duo sets off on the reindeer sleigh, as back to the castle's dungeon where Karen is released for her next performance as she's taken away by Majesty Meow, leaving Frosty inside the cell to melt. But as the third cat guard continues to keep on guard duty in front of the cell before fallen asleep, Frosty tricks the guard by reading palm saying him about his future dream. Excited, the third cat guard unlocks the cell, with his claw (since earlier that he swallows a key) before stepping inside and forces Frosty to tell his future, but Frosty shuts and locks a cell to trap him and then got escape to save Karen. At the theater hall, Majesty Meow hypnotizes Karen again to force her to step inside the box before a cat minion starts to saw box to restart the act they left earlier. But as a cat almost cutting a box in half, Frosty frights the cats away by making loud barking noise before grabbing Karen, all fine, and heads out from the stage to make their escape from the castle, after avoiding the third cat who already escaped from the dungeon cell by using his claw to unlock himself out, which Frosty should've known before.

As the two finally escapes outside far away from the castle, Frosty uses a snowball to splat Karen to wake her up from her hypnotic mind, in he did. But the two hides behind a tree and quietly spies on Majesty Meow and his minions are setting out for their search for Frosty and Karen. Frosty tricks the cats by sending them to the place where they think they could find some big mice before taking both Frosty and Karen back to the castle, in which the place that Frosty sends Majesty Meow and the cats in is actually a local dog pound. As the result, the pound dogs chases the cats away.

As Frosty and Karen rushes back to the Kingdom of Mice to free the mice from the captivity by the cats, King Mouse, his royal family, and the rest already did escape, thanks to the King Mouse's mind by trying out the locks' code. They thanks Frosty and Karen to ban the cats away by saving their kingdom in peace. Frosty asks the mice to build a fire to warm up Karen, who's still cold, but the mice tells them that they have their fear of fire, but reminds them that their furs helps them to keep them warm during the cold season. So the sadden Frosty and Karen turns leave the Kingdom of Mice after saying goodbye to the mice, and continues on to find any warm place for Karen. Karen and Frosty then discover a greenhouse filled with Christmas poinsettias. Despite Karen's objections, Frosty steps inside the warm greenhouse with her, suggesting that he could afford to lose a little weight while she warms up. Unfortunately, Hinkle catches up to them immediately after and locks them in the greenhouse.

Hocus brings Santa Claus and the mice to the greenhouse only to find Karen in tears and Frosty melted on the floor due to Hinkle's cruel act. Santa explains to Karen that Frosty is made from Christmas snow, and that he can never completely disappear, only take the form of summer rain, until next December. With a gust of cold wind through the open greenhouse door, the puddle that was Frosty blows out the door and magically changes back into his typical snowman form. Before Santa can put the finishing touch on Frosty and bring him back to life, as Hocus arrives with the hat, Hinkle again arrives on the scene and again demands the return of his hat. He relents only when threatened with being removed from Santa's Christmas list for the rest of his life if he put so much as one finger on the hat. Santa states that if Hinkle is truly repentant for his mean attitude and harming Frosty, and if he goes home and writes "I am really sorry for what I did to Frosty" a hundred zillion times, he may find a gift in his stocking on Christmas morning, which makes Hinkle bid Frosty and Karen farewell and run home to repeatedly write his apologies, assuming he may get a new hat. But suddenly, Majesty Meow snatches Frosty's hat and puts it on his head, replacing his crown, which the magic turns him giant, before Santa can place it back on top of Frosty's head. Then the cat re-kidnaps Karen and runs away, which leads Santa and the mice went on for a chase, but Hocus hops at the top and attacks Majesty Meow, removing the hat and rescuing Karen. Hocus then gets the forest animals to attacking Majesty Meow, chasing him away while he swears revenge in the future. Finally, Santa places a hat back on Frosty's head, causing the snowman returns to life again. After celebrating, Santa takes Karen home and Frosty to the North Pole, but promises that Frosty will be back next winter. The film ends with Frosty proclaiming, "I'll be back on Christmas Day!"

Cast

 * Jackie Vernon as Frosty the Snowman
 * June Foray as Karen, the kids, old lady, Queen Mouse and the Teacher
 * Jimmy Durante as the Narrator
 * Billy De Wolfe as Professor Hinkle
 * Paul Lynde as Majesty Meow
 * Paul Frees as Traffic cop, ticket man, King Cat's Captain, King Mouse and Santa Claus
 * Mel Blanc as Cat Guard#3, Elves, Cat#3 and 4
 * Dick Shawn as Cat Guard#1
 * George S. Irving as Cat Guard#2
 * Sid Raymond as Cat#3 and 5
 * Jack Mercer as Cat#1, Elf
 * Suzanne Davidson as Karen (later television airing; uncredited)

Songs

 * Frosty the Snowman (sung by Jimmy Durante and an children's chorus)
 * Frosty the Snowman (Reprise 1) (sung by Jimmy Durante and an children's chorus)
 * It's So Great To Be a Living Thing (sung by Frosty the Snowman, voiced by Jackie Vernon)
 * Frosty the Snowman (Reprise 2) (sung by Jimmy Durante and an children's chorus)
 * Where Is My Hat? (sung by Professor Hinkle, voiced by Billy De Wolfe)
 * King of the Cats (sung by the Cats and Majesty Meow, voiced by Mel Blanc, Dick Shawn, George S. Irving, Paul Fress, Jack Mercer, Sid Raymond and Paul Lynde; used later in the Tom and Jerry direct-to-video film Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale, which was used under permission)
 * I Need Some Help (sung by Karen, voiced by June Foray)
 * We are the Santa's Elves (sung by the elves, voiced by Mel Blanc; taken from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer)
 * Frosty the Snowman (Sad Reprise) (sung by Jimmy Durante)
 * Frosty the Snowman (Reprise 3) (sung by an children's chorus)
 * Frosty the Snowman (Final) (sung by Jimmy Durante and an children's chorus)

Sequels
Frosty returned in several sequels:
 * The Return of Frosty the Snowman – A canceled sequel was brought up by DreamWorks Pictures and with a parnetship with Rankin/Bass before it got canceled after General Electric acquired the rights to the 1969 film.
 * Frosty's Winter Wonderland – This 1976 sequel by Rankin/Bass was also written by Romeo Muller. Narration is provided by Andy Griffith (Durante had suffered a stroke that had forced his retirement in 1972 and eventually killed him). Jackie Vernon once again reprised his role as the voice of Frosty. Animation is produced by Topcraft in Japan. Unlike the original, the sequel takes place later in the winter season and is based upon the 1934 song "Winter Wonderland;" it features Frosty's pursuit of a wife and efforts to preserve him into the springtime. As the special takes place in the late winter, it makes no mention of Christmas (the original song likewise did not mention Christmas).
 * Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July – This 1979 Rankin/Bass feature-length sequel was filmed in "Animagic" stop-motion animation in the style of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Rudolph's Shiny New Year. While the Frosty specials were 30 minutes long, and the Rudolph specials were 60 minutes, this ambitious special was feature length, at 97 minutes long (120 minutes on television, including commercials). Vernon once again played the role of Frosty, in his last time for Rankin/Bass playing the voice of Frosty. This film features Frosty and his family as supporting characters. This is the only other Frosty cartoon to mention Christmas or Santa Claus in addition to the 1969 original.
 * Frosty Returns – This 1992 half-hour special is not truly a sequel to the 1969 classic, as it was produced not by Rankin/Bass but by CBS. The characters, setting, voices and animation (by Bill Melendez) are vastly different. Despite this, it is shown with the original special every year on CBS and was even included as a bonus on its DVD release.John Goodman provides the voice of Frosty in this special, and Jonathan Winters serves as narrator. Frosty's appearance is physically different, his personality and humor have changed, and he has the ability to live without his top hat, in direct contrast with the original and its other sequels. Also in contrast to the original specials, the special avoids all mention of Christmas (despite the special portraying the beginning of winter) and has an environmentalist theme, as Frosty works to stop a corporate executive whose product wipes out snow packs with one spray.
 * The Legend of Frosty the Snowman – This 2005 straight-to-video film was produced by Classic Media, the previous rights holder for the original film, and the remainder of the pre-1974 Rankin/Bass library. This movie has been bundled with the original 1969 film and the CBS TV sequel, and has also aired on Cartoon Network. The appearance of Frosty resembles much more the DreamWorks/Rankin/Bass character design from the film, and Professor Hinkle returns in two cameo appearances – shown in a picture and flashback. Frosty is voiced by Bill Fagerbakke, best known as the voice of Patrick Star on SpongeBob SquarePants. Lke Frosty Returns and Frosty's Winter Wonderland, it also never mentions anything to do with Christmas whatsoever.
 * Frosty the Snowman 2 – A direct-to-DVD film which is the film's official sequel, being produced by DreamWorks Animation, since the studio's re-acquisition to the film upon acquiring Classic Media since 2012. The film reuses the original plot from The Return of Frosty the Snowman.

Trivia

 * To this day, it remains debatable who is the main antagonist: Professor Hinkle or Majesty Meow.