Cool Guy Goes to Las Vegas

Cool Guy Goes to Las Vegas is a 1996 American animated teen comedy movie written and directed by Carl Andy Jr. in his only animated film under the alias "CAJ" and the first film produced by the children's channel Cartoon Network. the film starred the voices of Seth Green, Paul Rudd, Michael Ironside, Amy Poehler (in her feature film debut) and Chris Rock with animation by Film Roman. It is the only Cartoon Network Studios production not to be released by Warner Bros. (who's owner Time Warner would eventually merge with CN's owner Turner later that year).

The film tells the story of Coulson "Cool" Guy (Seth Green), a thrill seeking teenager who for a weekend goes to Las Vegas without the supervision of his parents, along with his overly eccentric girlfriend Annie (Amy Poehler) and best pals Jake (Paul Rudd) and Jared (Chris Rock) all while avoiding their ruthless teacher Mr. Barnes (Michael Ironside).

Plot
TBA

Origins
Cool Guy had originated as a character Andy had created back in 1989 when he auditioned for Saturday Night Live durring the 1989-90 season, intending to portray him as a recurring character in sketches, however Andy's audition was passed. After which Andy decided to enroll in the California Institure of the Arts (Calarts), creating Il Piccolo Pugile, a parody of neorealist dramas from Italy about a boxer kid (partly inspired by The Ballad of Tobio), the short got the attention of Prudence Fenton, an executive producer for MTV's Liquid Television series, which lead to a deal for the short to be broadcast on the series.

After this, Andy decided to revive the Cool Guy character for his follow-up short, Cool Guy's Night Out, which depicted the character going to a strip club, Andy voiced the title character and would continue to do so in the next two shorts, Cool Guy Returns (1992) and Cool Guy in 3-D (1994).

Development
After the release of his debut film, 2069: A Funk Odyssey in 1994, Andy decided on a feature based on the Cool Guy character as his first studio project, owing to the character's surprise popularity thanks to Liquid Television. He pitched the idea to MTV and Geffen Pictures, however they suggested a live action feature, an idea Andy felt wasn't the right move. Fortunately, due to still owning trademark on the character, he was free to take the idea to other studios, he eventually settled with Turner Pictures and Cartoon Network, the latter of whom agreed to finance the project as their first feature film production, however New Line Cinema passed on releasing the film, with founder Robert Shaye considering it "Too childish for adults and too adultish for children". One night while at his home, directors Joel Coen, Richard Linklater and Steven Soderbergh were visiting, Andy shared with them the screenplay, all three enjoyed it with Linklater considering it "Pretty damn funny for an animated film" and when they heard about New Line having passed on, they were surprised, that prompted them to show the script to Gramercy Pictures, to which they gave the film the immediate greenlight.

Unlike Andy's original shorts which were mainly animated by himself, Cartoon Network demanded more professional looking animation in an effort to make it more cinematic, Andy suggested Film Roman as animation studio, citing their work on Garfield and Friends and The Critic, from there Film Roman joined as part of the production.

Marketing
Marketing for Cool Guy Goes to Las Vegas included $20 million spent by Turner Broadcasting and MCA for advertising as well as advertisers such as Taco Bell, PepsiCo, Ford Mustang and Kenner Products paying $120 million in promotions for the film. A behind-the-scenes documentary was broadcast on Cartoon Network around May 1996, along with ads appearing on other Turner networks such as TBS, TNT and CNN.

A video game adaptation was released for the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo Entertainment System on June 26, a week after it's initial theatrical release. The game was developed by British developer Traveller's Tales in conjunction with the film. Andy, an avid video game player, was impressed so much by the finished product that he considered starting a video game development studio of his own, leading to co-forming Andyson Games in 2001 with backing from Microsoft.

Due to the character's unfamiliarity in Japan, the film was titled Road Story for it's Japanese release, promoting it as if it were an original movie. Another aspect to the film's marketing that was different from the rest of the world was the more mellow tone, giving the impression as if it were a sentimental road drama rather than the Ferris Bueller-esque comedy that it was.

Home Media

 * 1996 MCA/Universal Home Video VHS/Laserdisc
 * 2002 Universal Studios Home Entertainment DVD
 * 2012 Universal Vault Series DVD (reprint of 2002 release)
 * 2021 Kino Lorber Blu-ray (under license from Universal)