PJ Masks (1997 TV series)

PJ Masks was an American animated television series produced by Big Idea Productions in association with the first incarnation of Viacom. Originally aired as a short on November 19, 1995 (titled "The PJ Masks in: Enter the Firefly"), as part of Cartoon Network's What a Cartoon!, the series premiered on Nickelodeon in the United States on July 14, 1997, and on Cartoon Network in Latin America (where it was known as "PJ Masks: héroes en pijamas") a year later, on May 11, 1998. The series ended in the US on August 13, 1999, during "Henry & June's Nicktoons Summer Jam," and continued to rerun in Latin America until December 31, 2004, when the CN City era replaced the Powerhouse era. In 2015, the series was revived, and premiered on Disney Junior on September 18.

The Les Pyjamasques book series by French author Romuald is based on the original 1997 TV series, and was first started when the series was airing in France.

Broadcast
Following the series' cancellation in the U.S., reruns were aired from November 8, 1999, to May 19, 2000, as part of Nick's "PJ Masks Triple-2-Week Interval Event." Originally animated in Softimage, the whole series was re-animated in Maya from January to August 2001, due to Big Idea switching to the latter during the 2000s. The episodes animated in Maya were first seen on CN Latin America from November 2001 to December 2004 (replacing the original episodes animated in Softimage, which lasted on the channel from May 1998 to June 2001) before also being shown on Nicktoons Network beginning on its launch, May 1, 2002. They also aired on YTV in Canada from February 17 to September 12, 2003. The last time PJ Masks aired on Nicktoons was on December 30, 2005, as on the week before, the series was acquired by the Walt Disney Company. It premiered on Disney Channel a week later, using the same episodes with the same new animation as on Nicktoons, airing from January 2, 2006, to February 9, 2007. Additionally, this is the second series by Big Idea acquired by Disney, the first being VeggieTales for Playhouse Disney/Disney Junior, from 2002 to 2015, and the third being 3-2-1 Penguins! for Disney XD, in 2009. (So far, Larryboy is the only Big Idea series not acquired by Disney due to the release of only four videos.)

Just like its reboot, the series has also been distributed internationally by Disney Channels Worldwide from January 2006 to November 2010 for all of their pre-2011 Disney Channels around the world (however, it also aired on Pop in the UK and Ireland from 2005 to 2008, on Rai Gulp in Italy from 2008 to 2009, and on ABC3 (Now ABC ME) in Australia and New Zealand in 2010), except for in France, where it has aired on France 3 from September 22, 2006, to April 10, 2015.