Warner Bros Pictures Movies 1998
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Credits
Background
Warner Bros. Pictures' origins trace back to 1918 when brothers Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack Warner established a studio on Sunset boulevard. Sam and Jack would handle the production of the films, while Harry and Albert were in charge of distribution. The studio was incorporated as "Warner Bros' Pictures Incorporated" on April 4, 1923, making it the third-oldest American movie studio in continuous operation, after Paramount Pictures, founded on May 8, 1912 as Famous Players Film Corporation, and Universal Pictures, founded on June 8, 1912. It is one of the "Big Five" studios alongside Paramount Pictures, RKO Radio Pictures, 20th Century Fox, and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures.
After remaining independent for its first 45 years in operation, the studio was subject to numerous acquisitions over the decades. Warner Bros. merged with Seven Arts Productions in 1967, renaming it to "Warner Bros.-Seven Arts". The studio was purchased by Kinney National Co. in 1969, which was later reincorporated as Warner Communications in 1972 when it spun-off its non-entertainment assets, due to a financial scandal over its parking operations. Since 1989, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner (WarnerMedia since 2018), formed as a merger between the conglomerates Time, Inc. and Warner Communications. In 1992, Time Warner formed "Time Warner Entertainment" by merging all of its entertainment operations for the first time. Internet giant AOL merged with Time Warner in January 2001, renaming the company as "AOL Time Warner", but in summer 2003, the conglomerate name was reverted back to Time Warner (often with no space in between the words) due to lawsuits and losing $99 billion from the collapse of the dot-com bubble. AOL officially split from Time Warner in 2009. In 2018, after numerous legal hurdles, AT&T acquired Time Warner. Subsequently, it was rebranded "WarnerMedia". The status of the acquisition was settled in February 2019 when it was upheld on appeal and the Justice Department declined to pursue their case against the acquisition any further. In May 2021, AT&T announced that it would spin-off its media properties to Discovery, Inc., creating the combined company "Warner Bros. Discovery". Today, with the exceptions of some films WB merely distributed, such as Sayonara (currently owned by the estate of the producer), Moby Dick (currently owned by MGM), Rope (currently owned by Universal Studios) and Hondo (owned by Batjac Productions with distribution exclusively handled by Paramount), the pre-1950 catalog is held by WB subsidiary Turner Entertainment Co.
1st Logo (August 1, 1925-March 24, 1929)
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B&W version
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Colored version
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Nicknames: "Brain Shield", "Studio Shield", "Brain WB Shield", "The Early Shield"
Logo: On a background that looks like a forest, a large, bizarrely shaped shield is seen, with a very wide top. The top part of the shield shows a picture of the original Warner studio in Hollywood, CA (now known as "Sunset Bronson Studios"), the bottom having a squashed, stylized "WB". "a WARNER BROTHERS" is above the shield (with "WARNER BROTHERS" in an arc around the shield, a la the first Columbia logo), with "CLASSIC of the SCREEN" below. Starting in 1926 or so, it changed to "PRODUCTION".
Closing Titles: There are two closing titles for this WB era:
- 1st Closing Title: We see the words " THE END " all in capitals on both sides of the WB shield, with " THE " on the left and " END " on the right. The "T" on "THE" and the "E" on "END" are bigger than the other letters. Below the shield, we see "A WARNER BROTHERS CLASSIC OF THE SCREEN" in big capital letters. But on some movies, the WB shield was omitted. For example, Beau Brummel (1924) had a BG with some books and two candles on both sides of the screen. Above the books, we see the "The End" in a small, fancy white script arched above a small "A WARNER BROTHERS "CLASSIC of the SCREEN"" text.
- 2nd Closing Title: The second variant is the one you see in the 3rd photo. On The Jazz Singer (1927), it was superimposed on a marble-like BG.
FX/SFX: None.
Music/Sounds: None or a film's opening theme.
Availability: Extremely rare. Evidence of it was seen on a Warner Bros. 75th Anniversary trailer on 1998 Warner videos. However, it has appeared at the start of the film The Jazz Singer, and was kept intact on the 75th Anniversary DVD as well as on the 1981 Magnetic Video release, where it's preceded by a United Artists "Transamerica T" logo. This is retained on all extant silent-era Warner Bros. films shown on TCM such as The Better 'Ole. The logo premiered at the beginning of Kiss Me Again and made its final appearance on Queen of the Night Clubs.
Editor's Note: The first design of the WB shield, it's noted by modern viewers for having a strange look to it. However, the addition of the WB Studios inside the shield wouldn't be referenced again until the 1998 logo.
2nd Logo (November 7, 1929-August 29, 1936)
Nicknames: "Vitaphone Shield", "Shield and Flag"
Logo: The words "WARNER BROS. PICTURES, Inc." appear, and below that "& THE VITAPHONE CORP." appears in a much smaller font, with the "VITAPHONE" in "electric" style letters. Below that is a very small WB shield (using the stylized WB seen in the 1st logo), and in script, "Present". Behind it we see a drawing of a flag, "waving" so it looks like it is in three sections. On the first one, "WARNER BROS." appears, followed by the electric-letter "VITAPHONE" logo and on section 3, "PICTURES".
Variant: On some films, the NRA logo is shown on the bottom right.
Closing Title:
- The closing variation has "The End" instead of "Present".
- A colorized version exists, in which the logo (the text, the flag, and the shield) are colored yellow and appear on a blue BG.
Trivia: The First National Company also used this logo, but modified with the words "FIRST NATIONAL" instead of "WARNER BROS. PICTURES". Also, on some features, only a very big banner saying "VITAPHONE", was shown, omitting the First National or the Warner Bros. logo.
FX/SFX: None.
Music/Sounds: None, or the opening theme to a movie.
Availability: Common. It's preserved on any film from Warner Bros. from this era, including pre-1999 video releases by Magnetic Video, CBS/Fox Video, Key Video, and MGM/UA Home Video. However, on the DVD version of G-Men, it has usually been replaced with the 1948 shield logo, although this logo is kept at the end of G-Men. The logo premiered on Paris and made its final appearance on Anthony Adverse. Also seen on Svengali.
Editor's Note: This logo would mark the first appearance of the shield without the Warner Bros. building on the top of it, and is therefore the more recognizable version of the shield.
3rd Logo (July 21, 1934-December 18, 1937)
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Turner Colorized version
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Cheap 1937 version
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Nicknames: "Zooming Shield", "Zooming WB Shield"
Logo: Over a cumulonimbus cloud setting, a superimposed WB shield design zooms in to the screen. The words "WARNER BROS. PICTURES, Inc. Present" appear over the shield.
Variants:
- For colorized releases, mainly Captain Blood, the cloud background is blue and the shield is yellow.
- On early films like Here Comes the Navy, Housewife, and Dames (all 1934), the shield is seen on a white backdrop. Instead of the shield zooming into the camera, the opposite takes place.
- On The Woman in Red (1935), the shield appears without the words.
- On The Goose and the Gander (1935), the shield is a still image, and is in the same style as the previous logo's shield.
Closing Title: We see, on a special BG, superimposed on the last scene of a movie or the cloud background of the opening logo, the words "The End" in a fancy script font, with either the WB or the FN logos and "Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc.", or rarely "Warner Bros. Productions Corporation", or "First National Pictures, Inc." below. Later, the disclaimer changed to either "A First National Picture" or "A Warner Bros. Picture" and the font for "The End" would change different times.
FX/SFX: The shield zooming in.
Music/Sounds: The opening theme of the movie.
Availability: Uncommon. It's seen on films from the period and occasionally seen on TCM or preserved on Warner Archive DVD releases. Its first known appearance is on Here Comes the Navy and made its final theatrical appearance on She Loved a Fireman.
Editor's Note: Elements of this logo (the zooming shield especially) have been implemented in the opening of Warner Bros. Cartoons (Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies), which are regarded to be iconic. The zoom-in of the shield is rough, which is typical for logos made before the Scanimate era.
4th Logo (November 27, 1937-July 3, 1948)
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French version
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Turner Colorized version
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Alternate french version
Logo: Inside a shield, a more realistic version of the stylized "WB" as seen in the previous logo appears. Over the shield is a banner that reads "WARNER BROS. PICTURES, INC." Below the logo is the word " Presents " in script.
Variants:
- For color releases, the shield was bronze colored and the background was red.
- Starting in 1942, "JACK L. WARNER, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER" was seen below the Warner Bros. Pictures banner.
- Starting in 1944, the word "PRESENTS" is now in the same font as the Warner Bros. Pictures banner.
- A colorized version of this logo with a blue background, a gold shield and a red inside exists on The Maltese Falcon and Casablanca, among others.
- An ornate hand-drawn version of the shield against a parchment-like background was seen on some films, such as The Adventures of Robin Hood and The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex.
Closing Title: Superimposed on a special background or sometimes on the last scene of the movie, the huge words "The End" (with font varying on a movie) fade in, with the "WB" shield bug and "A WARNER BROS. PICTURE" in small letters below, but sometimes, due to the deal between WB and First National Pictures, the disclaimer was "A WARNER BROS.-FIRST NATIONAL PICTURE", or it was sometimes shortened to "A FIRST NATIONAL PICTURE" with the WB shield bug intact.
FX/SFX: None.
Music/Sounds: Usually the beginning of the movie's theme, or a majestic horn sounder, composed by Max Steiner. On at least three films, To Have and Have Not, Confidential Agent and Dark Passage, a different fanfare, composed by Franz Waxman, plays.
Availability: Fairly common. It's seen on Warner releases of the period, like Casablanca on TCM. It premiered on Submarine D-1 and made its final appearance on Romance on the High Seas.
Editor's Note: Perhaps the second most well known version of the shield, due to preceding classics such as Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon and The Treasure of Sierra Madre, all starring Humphrey Bogart, who was rated as the Greatest American Movie Star (Men's Category) by the American Film Institute in 1998.
5th Logo (July 31, 1948-November 1, 1967)
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German version
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Rare variant from 1957
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Cheap german version
Nicknames: "The Classic Shield", "The Golden Shield"
Logo: Same as before, only the design has been cleaned up a bit. The border of the shield, banner, text, and "WB" are now gold, and the inside of the shield is now blue. The banner phrase is now changed to " WARNER BROS. PICTURES " and is now gold. " Presents ", in the same font as the previous logo, usually appears below. Also, the background is now a cloud skyline (much like the logos of 1984 on). For the later years, this logo was usually superimposed onto the titles of Warner features of this period.
Variants:
- A color version of this logo appears on color releases, such as Rope, among others.
- There were many different cloud background variants throughout the years.
- A sepia-toned variant of this logo can be found on Jack and the Beanstalk and Bonnie and Clyde.
- Some movies, most notably The Crimson Pirate and The Master of Ballantrae, had this logo on a different cloud skyline.
- On 3D films and some 2D films that were originally planned to be made in 3D like House of Wax, Hondo, Dial M for Murder, Them!, The High and the Mighty, Rebel Without a Cause, and Drum Beat (where this variant is presented in CinemaScope), the WB shield looks more three-dimensional. This variant was used from 1953 until 1956. It was also used for logo plastering, as was the case for reissue prints of the 1951 film Force of Arms (aka A Girl for Joe).
- One or more film that had the "Presents" text absent appeared on Alfred Hitchcock's Under Capricorn, New York Confidential, and 1961 Canadian film The Mask.
- There is an another rare version seen on some Scope Gem travelogue found on FT Depot like Alpine Glory, when we see a WB shield on a different cloud background, then the 3D text "WARNER BROS. PICTURES PRESENTS" with "WARNER BROS. PICTURES" in a TCF CinemaScope-like font, zooms fast into the screen (a la Viacom's "V of Doom" logo) then stops after that.
- Some movies, most notably Battle of the Bulge and Cool Hand Luke, had the logo on a black background.
- Sometimes, the banner reads " WARNER BROS. PICTURES INC." like the previous logo, except the "INC." is really tiny and seen on the very right. This version can be seen on some movies, most notably The Prince and the Showgirl.
Closing Titles:
- 1st Closing Title: Was the same as above, seen only with the "A Warner Bros.-First National Picture" and "A First National Picture" text.
- 2nd Closing Title: Superimposed on the last scene of a movie or a special BG, the words "The End" with font varies on that movie fades in with the WB shield bug between two thick lines below. Sometimes, the following disclaimers were used:
- "Produced and Distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc."
- "Produced by Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc."
- "Produced and Distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures"
- "Distributed by Warner Bros."
These texts are seen sandwiched below "The End" and above the WB shield bug.
FX/SFX: None.
Music/Sounds: The Max Steiner majestic horn fanfare from the previous logo was used initially, and it was gradually phased out in favor of the movie's opening theme.
Music/Sounds Variant: On New York Confidential, the logo had a different fanfare, composed by Joseph Mullendore.
Availability: Fairly common. Seen on many of the Warner Bros. movies on AMC and TCM, and it's preserved on Warner Archive Collection or Warner Bros. Home Entertainment DVD releases. It has also been plastered onto the DVD version of G-Men. It premiered on Key Largo and the final movie to use this logo was Cool Hand Luke (but copyrighted to Warner Bros.-Seven Arts, as the merger had finished by the time the film was completed). Sometimes, this may be preceded by a later logo, as seen on the earliest home video releases of Them! (where the 10th logo preceded this one). This also appears on the VCI release of Drum Beat. The 1953-1956 variant logo was also made a surprise appearance on No Sudden Move, released on July 1, 2021.
Editor's Note: The most well known version of the Warner Bros. Shield, according to the Movie title stills collection Warner Bros. website. This particular design was listed as the 12th best corporate logo by Complex Magazine, for its longevity and "iconic" status.
6th Logo (January 20, 1968-November 12, 1970)
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German version
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Italian version
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French version
Nicknames: "WB-7", "W7", "W7 Shield" "Lucky Shield"
Logo: Just a superimposed, stylized shield which can be white, yellow or red. The shield features a combination of a "W" and a "7", representing Warner Bros.-Seven Arts. The "W7" is often drawn on-screen, a la the NBC Snake, although it's a still logo on a few films. Below the shield, "WARNER BROS.-SEVEN ARTS" is seen. The word "Presents" usually appears under the shield.
Variants:
- On some films, such as Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968) and Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed (1969), have a still version of the logo.
- A couple of European movies, that were distributed by Warner Bros., like Alexandre le bienheureux (1968) and The Bastard (1968), have only the letters without the shield outline. On The Bastard, the logo is on a cloudy background like the previous logo.
Closing title: After the words "The End" and the credits, the words "Distributed by Warner Bros.-Seven Arts" are seen in the screen superimposed in the last scene of the movie or a special BG with the W7 shield bug below.
FX/SFX: The "trace"; sometimes done over the backdrop of a specific movie.
Music/Sounds: None or the opening of the movie.
Availability: Rare. It's seen on some Warner Bros. films of the period, though WB usually replaces it with a newer logo. Examples of this include pre-1998 prints of Bullitt, which were plastered by the 1984 Warner Communications "Shield of Staleness" with the exception of the 1980 WCI Home Video release, and the WCI release of The Green Berets, where the "Big W" plasters it. The current DVD/Blu-ray release of Bullitt, and current prints of Charro and The Wild Bunch have their logos intact/restored. Also seen after the 1984 Warner Communications shield logo on The Arrangement, which aired on an international version of TCM. It occasionally plastered the previous logo, such as on early VHS releases of East of Eden. The plaster originally was not used in Reflections in a Golden Eye (the first film to be distributed by W7) and Camelot, but it debuted on The Vengeance of Fu Manchu and made its final regular appearance on Last of the Mobile Hot Shots, subsequently appearing on Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed, Moon Zero Two, Once You Kiss a Stranger, The Phynx, Crescendo, and The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer.
Editor's Note: This is the first time the WB name (and its logo) has been altered in its 50+ year history.
7th Logo (February 4, 1970-February 25, 1972)
Nicknames: "Gasoline Shield", "Shield Stretch", "The Kinney Shield", "Long Shield", "The Kinney WB Shield"
Logo: Over a blue screen is an abstract shield (like those seen on WB movie posters in the '60s) in a golden color with a dark brownish color inside. A simple lettering of the WB appears at the upper part and a rectangle of the same colors appear at the lower part of the shield, with the Kinney byline inside. The word "PRESENTS" appears underneath the logo.
Bylines:
- February 4, 1970-June 25, 1971: "A KINNEY NATIONAL COMPANY"
- April 8-May 1, 1971: "A KINNEY SERVICES COMPANY"
- June 17-September 30, 1971: "A KINNEY LEISURE SERVICE"
- December 19, 1971-February 25, 1972: "A KINNEY COMPANY"
Variants:
- At the end of the film, we sometimes see the byline "Distributed by WARNER BROS." or "Distributed by WARNER BROS. INC." on top of (or in the case of THX-1138, underneath) a superimposed rendition of the company logo. (On earlier films from 1970, such as Chisum and The Battle of Cable Hogue, there is no banner/byline on the superimposed version.)
- German prints of There Was a Crooked Man... have a rare closing variant with the text in German and a cheaper version of the shield.
- Some films (including There Was a Crooked Man... and THX-1138) had the logo on a black background.
- Others (such as The Omega Man) had it superimposed over the opening credits.
- Dirty Harry and Billy Jack do not have the "PRESENTS" text.
- Some films, including McCabe and Mrs. Miller, had a two-dimensional version of the shield appearing in white over a black background.
- On the 1970 re-release print of the 1956 movie Giant, the Kinney Shield was set over the classic WB clouds. It is unknown if this appears on any home video release.
FX/SFX: None.
Music/Sounds: Again, the opening/closing theme of the movie's theme or silence.
Availability: As we all know, Warner was incredibly shoddy with logo preservation until 10 years ago. AMC and TCM showings of Warner movies MAY include this logo, but expect one of the more recent WB shield logos, most likely the Warner Communications and Time Warner (not Time Warner Entertainment) variations. No logo is seen at all on the 2007 DVD/Blu-ray release of A Clockwork Orange, though it is seen on the earlier 2000 DVD release. It can be found on movies such as Chisum, Dirty Harry, The Omega Man, The Cowboys, Billy Jack, and THX-1138, as well as the Criterion Collection Blu-Ray of Death in Venice (where it was previously plastered by 11th logo). It premiered on Start the Revolution Without Me and made its final appearance on Dealing: Or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues (What's Up, Doc?, the next film WB released, instead uses the classic WB shield as an in-credit logo and would be the first film to use the Warner Communications byline). It appears the reason why this was plastered so often is because Kinney still existed as a company at the time, having spun off Warner Communications following a parking scandal, similar to what happened with United Artists and its Transamerica logos. The cheaper German shield version was found on a 28th of August, 1982 ARD airing of There Was A Crooked Man.... The Kinney Services byline, the rarest of the byline variants, appeared on Billy Jack, and is also presumed to have appeared on Zeppelin and Summer of '42.
Editor's Note: The shield's simplistic design reflected the style of other logos produced in this time frame.
8th Logo (November 24, 1971-February 2, 1972?)
Nicknames: "Alternate Kinney Shield", "Off-Kilter Shield", "Bannerless WB Shield"
Logo: On a background similar to the last logo, a bannerless WB shield is seen, with the design closer resembling the classic WB shield. " A KINNEY LEISURE SERVICE " is seen below.
Trivia: This is based on the print logo Warner used during the Kinney era.
FX/SFX: None.
Music/Sounds: Silent, or in the case of The Man in the Wilderness, the opening audio.
Availability: Seen on The Man in the Wilderness, which is preserved on the Warner Archive Blu-ray. May have been seen on other films from this time period (it's confirmed to also be on a later Kinney-era film, possibly Snow Job), but it's hard to say between Warner's rampant plastering habits and more common usage of the 7th logo. Not helping matters is that even The Man in the Wilderness used the Kinney Shield as its closing logo.
Editor's Note: The shield looks very ugly.
9th Logo (May 24, 1972-January 31, 1973)
Nicknames: "WCI Shield", "Placeholder Shield", "Tiny Shield", "Mini Shield", "Bannerless WB Shield II"
Logo: The standard WB shield logo, without the banner. It is on a blue background with "A WARNER COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY" underneath. " Presents ", in script, may appear below.
Variants:
- On some Warner VHS releases of titles like Deliverance, the aspect ratio of the logo would be squeezed into 4:3 full screen from a wider ratio.
- On Get to Know Your Rabbit, a dark version of the logo is seen, and it is slightly tilted to the left.
- On the 2007 DVD and Blu-ray of Deliverance, "Presents" underneath the byline is not present. This is likely due to that release using the original negative as the basis for its restoration as opposed to a 35mm inter-positive.
FX/SFX: None.
Music/Sounds: Silence or the beginning of the movie's theme, though Get to Know Your Rabbit uses a horn-driven theme with a flute mixed in towards the end.
Availability: Ultra rare. This was another placeholder logo only used on a few films to begin with, with notable ones being Deliverance, The Candidate, and Super Fly. However, due to Warner Bros.' logo plastering habits, this was subject to being replaced with either the next logo below, or the 1984 shield logo and its later variations. It is currently intact on the DVD release of The Candidate, and the 2007 DVD and Blu-ray release of Deliverance, along with airings on TCM Australia and Fox Classics. This logo is also preserved on Warner's 1986 VHS and Betamax release of Rage, along with the 1994 VHS and Warner Archive Blu-ray of Dracula A.D. 1972 and the Warner Archive Blu-ray release of Super Fly. It premiered on Malcolm X (the previous WB feature, What's Up, Doc?, used a variant) and made its final theatrical appearance on Steelyard Blues.
Editor's Note: An attempt to bring back the classic WB shield. Scrapped in favor of the corporate logo a year later.
10th Logo (February 7, 1973-September 28, 1984, 1984-1989)
Nicknames: "The Big "W"", "(\\')", "The Worms", "The Round W"
Logo: On a black background, a red abstract " W " consisting of two slanted elongated circles and a shorter elongated circle zooms in towards us. Around halfway through, the words "WARNER BROS" (in the Warner Communications custom typeface) appear below it. The red logo overtakes the screen as a smaller white "W" zooms in. It stops at the middle of the screen and a black square field, whose corners have been rounded and softened, fades in around the logo. "A WARNER COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY" in the same font used for "WARNER BROS" fades in below. Most of the time, "PRESENTS" fades in below after that (in Helvetica).
Trivia: The Big \\' was designed by Saul Bass (1920-1996), who also designed the Geffen "G" logo. The "Worms" nickname is attributed to an audio commentary on the movie Gremlins, which brought back the shield logo. The \\' logo was seen in several other shapes, like a circle and a parallelogram, but these were prototypes, so they were scrapped.
Variants:
- On the 1976 film All the President's Men, the logo is in black-and-white and "PRESENTS" is absent. This variant is preserved on the DVD of the film. On old VHS releases, including the 1980 WCI release and the 1991 letterboxed French Canadian Warner release, the color is simply faded.
- On some films (including Oh, God!, The Frisco Kid, The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie, Just Tell Me What You Want, Private Benjamin, The Looney, Looney, Looney Bugs Bunny Movie, Firefox, The Man with Two Brains, National Lampoon's Vacation and Daffy Duck's Movie: Fantastic Island), "PRESENTS" fades in at the same time as the Warner Communications byline.
- On Superman: The Movie and Beyond the Poseidon Adventure, a white (\\') zooms in on a black background and stops in the middle. The words "RELEASED BY WARNER BROS" fade in below. (Superman retained this on early video releases, but it was replaced by the regular version on later releases, and the 1984 version of the shield on later video releases. It was restored on the film's DVD and Blu-ray releases. Current prints of the film as seen recently on Encore, HBO, and VUDU remove it and replace it with the variant seen on Flags of Our Fathers).
- On some other outside productions released by WB (including Superman III, among others), "RELEASED BY WARNER BROS" replaces "WARNER BROS" at the beginning of the logo (this version was retained on the original video release of Superman III).
- On Exorcist II: The Heretic, there is a still image of a black \\' inside a red square field, with "WARNER BROS, A WARNER COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY" below in red.
- On Night Moves and Dog Day Afternoon, the word "PRESENTATION" appears below the Warner Communications byline, making the phrase "A WARNER COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY PRESENTATION".
- On the 1984 VHS release of Class of '44, the logo's 2.35:1 aspect ratio was squeezed into 4:3 full screen.
- On trailers for re-releases, the logo has a copyright notice at the bottom, while on the top it says " A RE-RELEASE FROM WARNER BROS.". This has been seen on reissue trailers of Superman: The Movie and Around the World in 80 Days.
- There's a short version that starts with the white \\' zooming in. This can be seen on the trailer for McQ.
Closing Variants:
- The closing "DISTRIBUTED BY WARNER BROS" logo has the colors inside out, with the "W" in black and the field in white. This was seen as late as 1988 on Evil Angels, with an in-credit variation appearing as late as 1990 on The Witches. Sometimes, on redrawn Looney Tunes cartoons, it fades from the Looney Tunes end cards.
- An early version of this logo had a different font for the text as well (this version appeared at the beginning of some prints of The Shining).
- A black-and-white version appeared at the end of TCM's print of Onionhead, followed by the 2003 Warner Bros. Television logo.
- An ITV overnight showing of the 1968 film The Heart is a Lonely Hunter in early September 1996 had its original W7 logo at the beginning, but this logo, with "PRESENTS", oddly appeared at the end.
- Some early WCI Home Video releases have this closing variant sloppily tacked on at the end of some features, and replacing the Warner Bros. distribution logo at the end of early video prints of Mister Roberts (1955) and replacing the National General Pictures distribution logo at the end of the WCI print of Executive Action (1972).
FX/SFX: The zooming in of the "W". None for the closing variant.
Music/Sounds: Usually silent, but some movies have the beginning of the movie's theme playing over it. Oddly, on Warner Archive's Blu-ray release of The Drowning Pool, it has the second half of the 1999 fanfare playing due to a plastering error.
Availability: Rare.
- It premiered on The Train Robbers and made its final regular appearance on Lassiter, subsequently appearing on Finders Keepers and Irreconcilable Differences (as seen on the Vestron Video release and the 2009 Lionsgate DVD, as it uses the same VHS master).
- Warner Bros.' editing bug in the '80s and early '90s meant that Warner Communications and Time Warner shield logos were seen over this logo and, ironically enough, that this did some plastering of its own back when it was the current logo, as seen on early WCI/Warner VHS and Betamax releases of The Green Berets (originally had the 6th logo) and The Candidate (originally had the 9th logo).
- WB continues to plaster this logo with newer ones, even into the 21st century, due to the fact that Warner Music Group uses the \\' as their logo. Examples include The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie, The Looney, Looney, Looney Bugs Bunny Movie and Daffy Duck's Movie: Fantastic Island, which all have it replaced with the extended 2004 WB Family Entertainment logo.
- On the 2008 DVD and 2016 Twilight Time Blu-ray of Bobby Deerfield (a co-production of Columbia Pictures and Warner Bros.), this logo is plastered by the 2003 logo; however, the 1976 Columbia logo (which comes before the Warner Bros. logo) is kept, resulting in one of the strangest logo combos ever. It should be mentioned that the original VHS release, however, only has this logo, as no Columbia logo is seen.
- A few movies on Encore contain this logo (Oh, God! is one) after the 1992 WB logo.
- The 2007 remastered edition of the Led Zeppelin movie The Song Remains the Same retains this logo, and you can find this logo on early VHS, Laserdisc and Betamax releases by WCI/Warner Home Video.
- The 1984 VHS and some TV prints of What's Up Doc? has the "PRESENTS" variation of this preceding a variant of the logo.
- The 1986 VHS of Superman: The Movie has the "RELEASED BY" variant plastered by the "PRESENTS" variant of the 1984 logo, though early video prints, as well as DVD and Blu-Ray prints, keep the former intact; it is unknown if any TV airings in the past or present retain this as well.
- It is unknown if the "RELEASED BY" variant appeared in front of U.S. theatrical prints of Movie Movie (which was produced by ITC Entertainment and first released in North American theaters by Warner Bros.), although the 1980 Magnetic Video Corporation VHS release doesn't use any of the film's logos. While some DVD releases have the ITV Studios Home Entertainment logo at the end, the Scorpion Releasing Blu-Ray has the closing "DISTRIBUTED BY" variant at the end.
- The 1980 WCI Home Video videocassette, 1991 letterboxed French Canadian Warner Home Video videocassette, and 1997 Warner Home Video DVD releases of All the President's Men preserve the B&W/color-faded variant.
- On AMC's prints of the Dirty Harry films Magnum Force, The Enforcer, and Sudden Impact, this logo is retained, though the latter two films have their logo drastically trimmed down due to time, though these said films have the logo intact on recent DVD releases.
- Also seen intact on the HBO Family print and Amazon release of The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie, a 1997 reprint of the 1990 VHS of Oh, God!, most releases of Badlands, and the initial VHS releases of Twilight Zone: The Movie, and Enter the Dragon.
- Remains intact on the DVD release of Bugs Bunny's 3rd Movie: 1001 Rabbit Tales and can also be seen on Uptown Saturday Night, Outlaw Blues, the extended edition of The Outsiders, and Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore.
- It is also preserved on the original DVD releases of Barry Lyndon, and Mean Streets. The WHV Blu-ray releases of these films had the logo updated, while the Criterion Collection release of the former has it intact.
- This logo is also seen on the 1984 WHV print of The Great Race (where it's surprisingly followed by the Academy leader), as well as the 1985 U.S. and 1987 Canadian WHV print of Them! (where it precedes the 5th logo).
- It also appeared before the CBS Theatrical Films logo on all CBS theatrical releases from Table for Five to Finders Keepers (the last film to use this logo before the "Shield of Staleness").
- Strangely, the distribution logo was seen at the end of the first two volumes of Beetlejuice (the animated series) tapes from 1990.
- This logo was retained on the 1997 Warner Home Video region 1 DVD release of Mad Max 2, as well as on the Australian Roadshow Entertainment DVD from the 2000s (that particular release was also later used in a trilogy set along with Roadshow's DVDs of first and third films).
- This logo also makes an appearance on the Warner Archive Blu-Ray release of The Satanic Rites of Dracula, though it is absent on all older releases.
- It may have been seen on theatrical prints of Black Christmas (1974), but it's unknown as current prints skip to the film.
- It also appeared on the original 1984 WHV VHS of Never Say Never Again; it would later be plastered by the 1984 shield on later VHS reissues and recent prints open with the 1997 Orion Pictures logo instead.
- It may be seen on foreign prints of, among others, Mad Max and Friday the 13th.
- This makes strange appearances on the Warner Archive Blu-Ray of "Summer of '42" (originally released when the 7th logo was in use), pay TV and WCI VHS releases of Orion's The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu and the original WHV releases of Filmways-owned The Amityville Horror and New World-owned Rabid.
Editor's Note: This logo was noted as "drastically simpler" than the previous Warner Bros. logos, and was even considered to be a touch "Nazi-like" by Fast Company magazine. Despite that, it is a favorite of some in the logo community and the movie industry, including Ben Affleck, Steven Soderbergh, and Todd Phillips; who opted to use this logo on their respective movies, Argo, Magic Mike, and Joker.
11th Logo (April 13, 1984-February 2, 2001)
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PROCHAINES SORTIES CINEMA variant
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Nicknames: "The Shield Returns (for real this time)", "Shield of Staleness", "Shield in the Sky", "Shield of Plastering", "Shield of Steel"
Logo: Over a set of clouds (exactly the design of the clouds used in some versions of the 1948 logo), the WB shield appears (including the banner reading " WARNER BROS. PICTURES "), with the name of the owner at the bottom.
Bylines:
- June 8, 1984-September 14, 1990: " A WARNER COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY "
- March 9, 1990-February 26, 1993: " A TIME WARNER COMPANY "
- August 14, 1992-February 2, 2001: " A TIME WARNER ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY "
Variants:
- For some of their earlier films, and for films that had this logo plastered on over older logos, the word " PRESENTS " faded in a couple of seconds afterward, like on WB films that originally used the 9th logo. This logo was also seen in black and white when added to the beginning of some films, such as Onionhead.
- Scope films used a different cloud background, which was also used for this logo's television counterpart during the Warner Communications era.
- A French variant used an animation of the shield and byline (which strangely still uses the Warner Communications text despite it being replaced by Time Warner by then) glowing on a black background, before flashing to the shield and background, with the text "PROCHAINES SORTIES CINEMA" (French for "UPCOMING CINEMA RELEASES") zooming out and shining. An announcer says "Et maintenant découvrez en exclusivité les bandes annonces des prochaines sorties Warner Bros disponible d'ici quelques mois chez Warner Home Video", roughly translating to "And now discover exclusive trailers for the next Warner Bros. releases, available in a few months from Warner Home Video".
Closing Variants:
- 1984-1998: The end logo, seen at the end of most movies, features a simple superimposed WB shield (without a banner), much like the short lived logo from mid-1972. The phrase "DISTRIBUTED BY WARNER BROS." appears above the shield with the owner byline at the bottom. On films from 1984-roughly 1989, it would use the "Big W" logo, such as Swing Shift, Gremlins, Cannonball Run II, The NeverEnding Story, Purple Rain, Tightrope, Oh, God!, You Devil, US prints of Razorback, City Heat, Protocol, Fandango, Vision Quest, Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment, The Goonies, Pale Rider, National Lampoon's European Vacation, Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird, Pee-wee's Big Adventure, American Flyers, Better Off Dead, Krush Groove, Spies Like Us, The Color Purple, The Clan of the Cave Bear, Wildcats, Police Academy 3: Back in Training, Cobra, Under the Cherry Moon, Club Paradise, One Crazy Summer, Ratboy, Over the Top, It's Alive III: Island of the Alive, Innerspace, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, Surrender, Empire of the Sun, Moving, Stand and Deliver, Hot to Trot, Running on Empty, Imagine: John Lennon, Clara's Heart, Feds, Dangerous Liaisons, Bert Rigby, You're a Fool, Lean on Me, Police Academy 6: City Under Siege, Cookie, Next of Kin, Second Sight, and The Witches (completed in 1989, but not released until 1990).
- A few movies had a variant where the "Big W" logo was bigger than normal. This appeared on Deadly Friend, Lethal Weapon, Funny Farm, Crossing Delancey, Tequila Sunrise, The Accidental Tourist, and Dead Bang.
- On films from 1986-1990, such as Heartbreak Ridge, Burglar, Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol, The Witches of Eastwick, The Lost Boys, Who's That Girl, Nuts, Frantic, Police Academy 5: Assignment Miami Beach, Above the Law, Arthur 2: On the Rocks, The Dead Pool, Caddyshack II, Clean and Sober, Stealing Home, Bird, Her Alibi, Pink Cadillac, Lethal Weapon 2, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, Driving Miss Daisy, Tango & Cash, Hard to Kill, and White Hunter, Black Heart, the credit logo used the previous logo font with a WB shield. A variation of the credit logo can be seen at the end of The Bonfire of the Vanities and Curly Sue with the WB shield and below that "Distributed by Warner Bros., A Time Warner Company".
- December 8, 1988-March 22, 2000: Another ending variation features the movie logo, but modified with the words " DISTRIBUTED BY WARNER BROS. " above the shield. This was also used for the beginning of Freejack. Beginning with The Perfect Storm on June 30, 2000, the above text is changed to "DISTRIBUTED BY WARNER BROS. PICTURES" and a web address is added below the byline.
- May 12, 2000-February 2, 2001: Only the words " DISTRIBUTED BY " appear above the shield; the " DISTRIBUTED BY WARNER BROS. PICTURES " text is redone. Some releases like The In Crowd, Get Carter, and Miss Congeniality have the banner reading simply " WARNER BROS. ". Also added is the URL byline, "www.warnerbros.com", below the owner disclaimer. There is also the print closing logo, but it's very rare and was seen on Invictus.
FX/SFX: None, except for the "PRESENTS" text fading in on the original Warner Communications variation.
Music/Sounds: In most cases, silent or the beginning of the film's audio is used. For some of the first few releases with this logo (such as Gremlins), the 1930s/40s Max Steiner fanfare is heard.
Music/Sounds Variant: On the Warner Archive DVD-R release of How Sweet It Is!, the logo is accompanied with the National General fanfare (the original distributors of the film) due to a sloppy plaster job.
Availability: Ultra common. In fact, the 1992 logo is usually the one that plasters older logos (hence the nickname "Shield of Plastering"); and it's probably the most common movie logo ever. Fortunately, WB has eased up on this somewhat, and older logos have been seen more often in recent years on newer prints/masters.
- The "PRESENTS" version can be found on Gremlins (the first film to have this logo and to also use the classic Max Steiner fanfare), Vision Quest, National Lampoon's European Vacation, Pee-wee's Big Adventure, American Flyers, Cobra, Ratboy, Instant Justice, Everybody's All-American, and the 1986 VHS releases of Superman: The Movie and National Lampoon's Vacation.
- The one with the Warner Communications byline can be found on the 1997 DVD release of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (the 2003 DVD has the 1998 logo with the AOL Time Warner byline), current DVD and Blu-ray prints of The Dead Pool with Clint Eastwood, TCM's print of The Goodbye Girl and the Blu-ray of Full Metal Jacket, but is not as easy to spot as the 1992 logo, as many DVDs and Encore/Starz prints have it plastered with the Time Warner Entertainment byline, such as on the DVD of Pee-wee's Big Adventure or even with the next logo below (occurs on the Police Academy films and Moving). It appears on the original videocassette release of Horror of Dracula plastering the original Universal International logo, and also plasters the W7 logo on the 1993 VHS release of Dracula Has Risen from the Grave.
- This variant unfortunately plasters the 6th logo on the 1990s VHS re-issue of the Elvis Presley movie Charro!.
- Even the 1990 Time Warner byline has been plastered on 1990-92 films with the next logo on most of Encore's prints, though the Time Warner byline version is intact on the Blu-ray of Goodfellas, the 1999 DVD and 2017 Warner Archive Blu-ray of My Blue Heaven and the 2000 Director's Cut DVD of Lethal Weapon 3. One instance where the Time Warner byline does some plastering of its own was on The Ballad of Cable Hogue, where it plastered the Kinney Shield.
- The logo is plastered by the 1985 Warner Home Video logo (w/ Time Warner Entertainment byline) on a '90s VHS release of Razorback.
- The movie ending variation can be seen on films such as Joe Versus the Volcano, Gremlins 2: The New Batch, Quick Change, Presumed Innocent, GoodFellas, Memphis Belle, US prints of Hamlet (1990), Ricochet, Strictly Business, Under Siege, The Bodyguard, Forever Young, The Man Without a Face, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, On Deadly Ground, Natural Born Killers, Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls, US prints of Twister, My Fellow Americans, Vegas Vacation, and Conspiracy Theory, as well as the original VHS releases of Thumbelina and A Troll in Central Park.
- Strangely, the logo does not appear on most prints of the 1985 film Ladyhawke (a co-production with 20th Century Fox), aside from an older pay-TV copy that aired on Cinemax in 1987.
- A silent version of the "PRESENTS" version can be seen (in color) on the 1989 VHS of Bugs Bunny in King Arthur's Court and (in black and white) on TCM's broadcast of the 1958 film Onionhead, followed by a black & white "Big W" closing logo at the end, and the 2003 Warner Bros. Television logo in color after that.
- The logo premiered on (as mentioned above) Gremlins and made its final appearance on Valentine.
- The variant without "PRESENTS" first appeared on Cannonball Run II, the second film to use this logo.
- Don't expect to see this on most video prints at least of CBS Theatrical Films releases of this time, though it is retained on the CBS/Fox VHS and Kino Lorber Blu-Ray release of Grandview, U.S.A. (without "PRESENTS").
- The Warner Communications "Distributed by" variant can be found at the end of the 1999 DVD release of The American President (a 1995 Castle Rock film) of all places, likely due to a printing error when editing out the Columbia Pictures in-credit closing logo.
- It also appears on the U.S. theatrical and VHS releases of The Nutcracker Prince, but the GoodTimes DVD release trims off this logo and only contains the Lacewood logo. The most likely reason was because it used a master prepared by the new rights holders that removed Warner references and added overseas opening credits (sourced from a VHS master) onto a higher quality U.S. master.
- It may have been seen on theatrical prints of the Handmade Films productions Checking Out and How to Get Ahead in Advertising, but video prints remove this logo.
- It can also be seen on Freeform airings of Rankin-Bass specials such as Rudolph's Shiny New Year (though the ending to that special before the compressed credits used the 1998 Warner Bros. TV logo), and at the end of Frosty's Winter Wonderland, and Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July.
- Strangely, it appears on a 1988 reissue of the AIP film Grayeagle, after the Warner Home Video logo.
- The 1992 opening variant makes a surprise appearance at the end of the 2001 widescreen DVD of Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory, instead of the 2000 closing variant with URL (which the fullscreen DVD used).
Editor's Note: A throwback to the 50s shield. However, this logo is rather infamous (mainly the 1992 variant) for plastering so many older logos (hence the said nickname in the availability), and is disliked by several people due to its Sony Pictures Television level of omnipresence.
12th Logo (January 16, 1998-March 24, 2021)
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With copyright stamp
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"WARNER BROS." banner variant with copyright stamp
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Nicknames: "CGI Shield", "Shield in the Sky II", "CGI WB Shield", "Shield of Staleness II", "The Reflection of the WB Backlot", "Shield of Steel II"
Logo: A picture of the Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank is seen with a gold tint. The picture "ripples" slowly before rotating to reveal itself as the WB shield, redone in CGI over a new computer-generated cloud background. The shield rotates and zooms out to its usual position, with the company byline fading in underneath.
Trivia: If one pauses right before the transition from the backlot photograph to the shield animation, some posters can be seen on the studio wall, including posters for Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, Friends and Space Jam, dating the photograph to somewhere between late-1996 and early-1997.
Bylines:
- January 16, 1998-February 2, 2001: " A TIME WARNER ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY " (in the Garamond font, but in the 75 Years variant, it's in the Bodoni font)
- On some scope films starting in 1999, the byline is noticeably larger.
- February 16, 2001-September 12, 2003: " An AOL Time Warner Company " (also in Garamond)
- On some scope films such as Training Day, the byline is noticeably larger.
- November 5-December 5, 2003: " A Time Warner Company " (in Adobe Garamond Pro)
- December 12, 2003-June 15, 2018: "A TimeWarner Company" (with " TimeWarner " in its own custom font, called Bodoni BE Regular, while the rest of the byline is in FF Meta)
- September 23, 2016-September 22, 2017: "A TimeWarner Company" (with " TimeWarner " in its own logo font, called Bodoni BE Regular, while the rest of the byline is in the Proxima Nova font and is smaller than the Time Warner logo). This was only used on the Warner Animation Group films Storks and The LEGO Batman Movie.
- July 27, 2018-November 26, 2020: "A WARNERMEDIA Company", with "WARNERMEDIA " in its own logo font, called AT&T Aleck Sans Bold, while the rest of the byline is in the standard variation of the same font. The shadow behind " MEDIA " is not there.
- October 29, 2019; March 24, 2021: "a WarnerMedia company", with "WarnerMedia" in its own logo font, called AT&T Aleck Sans (modified), while the rest of the byline is in the standard variation of the same font. (It was only seen on Godzilla vs. Kong, albelt using a variant respectively. Strangely, both films use the 14th logo at the end. It was also spotted in the debut trailer of the 2021 Tom & Jerry movie and at HBO Max's unveiling at WarnerMedia Day on October 29, 2019.)
- Sometimes, the logo doesn't have a byline, like the Warner Bros. Family Entertainment logo. This was seen on the 2003 Warner Home Video DVD of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.
Variants:
- January 16-December 18, 1998: For this logo's first year, when the logo is zooming out, " 75 " and " YEARS " appear from behind the shield and move away to surround it. " Entertaining The World " fades in underneath, followed by the Time Warner Entertainment byline in white instead of orange. Also, the shield and the background are slightly enhanced. Sometimes, the banner may just read " WARNER BROS. " instead of " WARNER BROS. PICTURES ".
- On the WB 75 Years montage intro, a version exists where a copyright stamp reading "© Warner Bros. 1998" (uppercased in the Warner Bros. banner) fades in with the Time Warner Entertainment byline (a la the 1997 Universal Pictures logo).
- A French VHS promo has the " WARNER BROS. "-shield variant zooming out to its place, but it freeze-frames, and the text " 75 ANS A VOUS FAIRE RÈVER " fades in.
- February 5, 1999-2011: The logo is reanimated to remove the 75th Anniversary wordings. Also, the byline is now in orange. This version would stay the same until it was re-animated once again in 2011 (not counting the changes in bylines and color grading).
- A somewhat enhanced WB shield in 3D was spotted on NASCAR 3D: The IMAX Experience, Clash of the Titans, Hubble 3D, Born to Be Wild 3D, and 3D international releases of Beowulf. The animation revealing the shield is quicker, the flash reflection on the banner when the shield is revealed is not as bright, the inside of the shield is a brighter blue, the banner around the shield is shinier, the cloud background is further back, and the shield zooms out further more.
- A version of the logo exists in which Bugs Bunny walks from the shield, does a Vanna pose, and eats a carrot. This version was used for Warner Bros. Family Entertainment for a short time.
- Starting with Dolphin Tale in 2011, the shield is sleeker, the banner is shinier, the byline is orange-yellow, and the animation revealing the shield is enhanced. Some films like The Dark Knight Rises, Gangster Squad, and most foreign films released by the company at the time used the 2003 version.
- On a TV airing of Miss Congeniality, the byline underneath the 2001 version of the logo is blurred and showed " A TIME WARNER ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY " in the Arial font. It is unknown whether the logo is remade by technicians or not.
- The intro video of Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood replaces " WARNER BROS. PICTURES " into " WARNER BROS. STUDIOS " in both the normal version and the New Line Cinema variant. A scene from Casablanca plays out before transitioning into the logo, in black and white then color.
Closing Variants:
- 1998-February 2, 2001, May 17, 2002, March 5, 2004: Same as the previous logo.
- February 16, 2001-November 26, 2020: This closing logo features the 1984 shield with the banner inscription updated to match that of the current opening logo; the words "Distributed by" (in the font depending on the version of the closing variant) appear over the shield with the "www.warnerbros.com" URL address underneath the byline (also depending on the version). This is pretty much a modified version of the 2001 Warner Bros. Television logo.
- February 16, 2001-December 5, 2003 (AOL Time Warner and prototype Time Warner bylines): The text " Distributed by " is in Garamond, like its television counterpart, while the "www.warnerbros.com" URL address is in bold below the byline reading either " An AOL Time Warner Company " or " A Time Warner Company ".
- December 12, 2003-August 24, 2018 (official TimeWarner byline): When the byline was changed to "A TimeWarner Company", the " Distributed by " is now updated to the custom Didot/Bodoni hybrid font with the URL in FF Meta. Also, starting with this version, the sky background is different.
- July 27, 2018-November 26, 2020 (WarnerMedia byline): Once again, the text above and below the logo and the byline was changed in favor of the byline change to "A WARNERMEDIA Company". Here, both "Distributed by" and the "www.warnerbros.com" URL are now in AT&T Aleck Sans typeface. Like the opening variant, the shadow behind " MEDIA " is not there.
- A scope version of the closing logo has a much zoomed out shield, much like the IMAX variant. This was spotted on We Are Marshall.
FX/SFX: Amazing CGI animation done by Intralink Film Graphic Design (for the original 1998 and 1999 versions) and Devastudios (for the 2011 version).
Music/Sounds:
- January 16-December 18, 1998: The original 75th Anniversary version of this logo used a wind-blowing chime theme.
- February 12, 1999-March 24, 2021: An 8-note piano tune that builds into a powerful, moving fanfare, based on the theme from Casablanca, "As Time Goes By", originally used in the broadway musical, Everybody's Welcome. It is a shortened version of an instrumental of "As Time Goes By" that appeared in a Warner Bros. 75th Anniversary promo that had been shown theatrically a year earlier. The fanfare made its debut in Message in a Bottle.
- In other cases, it uses the opening theme of the movie or silence.
Music/Sounds Variants:
- On current prints and HBO airings of U.S. Marshals and The Negotiator, the 2003 version with the TimeWarner byline is used with the original 75th Anniversary music.
- On current prints of Innerspace and Caddyshack II, this plasters the Warner Communications version of the previous shield, but keeps that logo's fanfare.
- A low tone version of the "As Time Goes By" theme was heard on an AMC print of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
- The 16mm montage intro for the 75th anniversary of Warner Bros. uses an extended version of the "As Time Goes By" theme on the 75th Anniversary logo. The voiceover thanks audiences around the world for celebrating 75 years.
- On current prints of Stealing Home and Cookie, the theme is high pitched.
- The intro video of Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood has "As Time Goes By" from Casablanca transitioning into the 1998 fanfare.
Availability: Very common.
- Seen on most WB films from 1998 until it was retired in 2020. The first film to use this logo was Fallen and the final films to use this logo on a regular basis were the HBO Max original The Witches (2020) and The Sun Does Not Move (2021). The final film to use the 1998 shield design altogether was Godzilla vs. Kong (as a variant) released in 2021, despite using the 14th logo at the end.
- The last film to use the closing variant of this logo was Superintelligence.
- The 75th Anniversary variant first appeared on Fallen and last appeared on You've Got Mail. However, probably due to the 75th Anniversary wordings, it is almost always plastered with the 2003 version on newer prints of such films, although some releases may retain it.
- The 1999-2000 version was also spotted plastering older logos on some 1999-2001 prints of older films, such as the May 2001 DVD of Superman II (where it plasters the 1972 logo).
- The one with the AOL Time Warner byline can be found on pre-2003 films like Exit Wounds, Scooby-Doo, and The Powerpuff Girls Movie, among others. It also plasters previous logos on some 2001-2003 prints of older films.
- In most cases, the logo uses music, especially post-2001 when the AOL Time Warner byline version was used.
- The prototype Time Warner byline was rare and first appeared on The Matrix Revolutions (as a variant). It last appeared on The Last Samurai.
- The official TimeWarner byline debuted on Something's Gotta Give, and made its last appearance at the end of the IMAX re-release of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Just like the AOL Time Warner version, this byline plasters previous logos on post-2003 prints of pre-2003 films (in addition, also plastering the 75th Anniversary, Time Warner Entertainment, and AOL Time Warner versions of the same logo).
- Several classic films, including the first two Lethal Weapon films (current prints of Lethal Weapon 3 still retain the Time Warner variant of the 1984 logo), Superman II, The Exorcist, Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (though the "Big W" has been retained on the original 1997 DVD release), The Lost Boys, Blazing Saddles, All the President's Men, Falling Down, Return of the Living Dead Part II, and current prints of the National Lampoon's Vacation series (with the exception of European Vacation) have had their old logos plastered with this one in lieu of the "Shield of Staleness", though this one is mainly found on the most recent releases.
- The WarnerMedia byline version made its first official appearance on Teen Titans Go! To the Movies.
- This logo may or may not be plastered by the Toho logo on Japanese prints of Godzilla.
- The Gintama anime movies and live action movies usually plays this logo multiple times, like 3 times in Gintama: The Movie for example.
- The AOL Time Warner byline variant makes surprise appearances at the end of Amazon Prime Video's print of Blue Collar Comedy Tour: The Movie and a TCM France airing of Ransom.
Editor's Note: It has held up remarkably well over the twenty-two years it was used, though some people might be annoyed due to it (especially the opening and closing variants with the 2001-2003 AOL Time Warner and the 2003-2018 Time Warner bylines) plastering some older logos, just like its predecessor. Also, despite WarnerMedia updating their logo in October 2019, the variant with the previous WarnerMedia byline continued to be used until 2020 (possibly due to the debut of the newer logos shortly thereafter).
13th Logo (August 26, 2020-July 13, 2021)
Nicknames: "CGI Shield II", "Shield in the Sky III", "The Reflection of the WB Backlot II", "Shield of Steel III", "The AT&T Shield", "CGI WB Shield II", "Bannerless WB Shield III"
Logo: It starts the same way as the previous logo (now blue-tinted), then we see the new 2019 Warner Bros. shield without a banner swing in fully upright from the left of screen against the same cloudy sky background as the previous logo. The "WB" text reflects various other clouds. As the shield zooms out into position, the sky background fades to black and the 2019 WarnerMedia byline now reading "a WarnerMedia company" in a modified AT&T Aleck Sans font fades in below. The shield shines throughout.
Trivia:
- The new WarnerMedia logo was introduced on October 17, 2019 alongside with the byline, and was created by Wolff Olins.
- The new WB shield was introduced on November 13, 2019, and was created by Pentagram.
Variant: On Judas and the Black Messiah, a still variant of the finished product was used. However, on Gintama: THE FINAL / Gintama: THE VERY FINAL, an animated variant of the finished product was used instead.
Closing Variant: Just the finished logo, with "Distributed by" above and the URL below. This would be the final closing variant to feature the "Distributed by" and URL texts. It was used from August 26 until December 25, 2020 and June 29, 2021.
FX/SFX: Decent CGI.
Music/Sounds: The opening theme of the movie.
Availability: This debuted on Tenet and recently appeared on Wonder Woman 1984 albeit using a variant; it also appeared at the opening of Gintama: THE FINAL / Gintama: THE VERY FINAL, and the end of Cats and Dogs 3: Paws Unite!, and A Cinderella Story: Starstruck. Since the debut of the next logo, this may or may not be a placeholder that'll be retired soon. A still of this logo can be seen on the opening of Judas and the Black Messiah.
Editor's Note: This is Warner Bros.' first attempt at an animated logo based on their current print logo, and as it shows, it's far less grand compared to the previous logo due to the stiffer animation. It's also the first logo since 1972 to not have a banner around the shield. Because the films with this logo either use variants or only show the last portion so far, there is no actual original variant of the opening version of this logo (although recreations exist).
14th Logo (January 14, 2021- )
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The studio lot
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Nicknames: "CGI Shield III", "Shield in the Sky IV", "Studio Over Sunset", "The AT&T Shield II", "The Reflection of the WB Backlot III", "Shield of Steel IV", "CGI WB Shield III", "CGI WB Backlot", "Bannerless WB Shield IV"
Logo: Starts off similarly to the last two logos, but this time, instead of a simple rippling image, the camera pans across a photorealistic CGI rendering of the Warner Bros. Studios backlot (which has the numbers on the sound stages, a red carpet outside the Steven J. Ross Theater, and the smoking roofs on top of various buildings), with the iconic water tower (displaying the "dimensional" version of the 2019 WB shield and "WARNER BROS. STUDIOS" in three rows on it, in the new corporate font, Warner Bros. Sans) taking center stage, á la the Searchlight Pictures logo. After a few seconds, it continues the same way the previous 2 logos did, with the same 2019 WB shield from the previous logo (now more brighter and realistic) turning upright as it zooms out like the 12th logo (although the letters and shield outline starts off in gold when it zooms out, a homage to its previous gold color, before subtly changing to the new platinum silver), revealing a new, more realistic and detailed cloud background. The WarnerMedia byline fades in below as the shield shines, with a bright gleam on the shield's top left corner, like in the previous logo.
Trivia: In Space Jam: A New Legacy, the still version of the logo without the WarnerMedia byline was shown in the boardroom monitors at the end of the Warner 3000 pitch, although showing in a different shield animation at the end of the pitch transitioning into the same logo as shown above. The same studio lot shown in the logo was also shown during the scene leading into the Warner Bros. Serververse. The cloud background in the logo (with the WB shield covered up by windows) was used as the desktop background in a Dell monitor on the Warner Bros. executive's computer.
Variants:
- Sometimes, the sun appears first, and then its glow and the rest of the footage of the studio lot fades in.
- On films shot in scope (2.39:1), the shield and byline are smaller.
- A version exists where the logo doesn't fade in or fade out. This version may or may not have music. This can be seen on Devastudios' website, on Dune (2021, albeit using a variant with a fade out) and the end of the 4K Blu-ray release of the director's cut of The Outsiders: The Complete Novel.
- A "behind-the-scenes" version of this logo exists, showcasing the different production stages of the backlot, water tower, clouds, and the WB shield. It can be seen here.
- Sometimes on the closing variant, the logo is entirely still. This can be seen at the end of YouTube prints of Thir13en Ghosts, plastering the 12th logo.
- The intro video of Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood follows the same transition from the 12th logo.
Closing Variant: The tail end of the opening logo with no extra text. Here, the logo stays on-screen for at least 4 extra seconds before fading out. This is the first time that the "Distributed by" text above is not used, and the first time since 2000 that the URL below is absent.
FX/SFX: Spectacular CGI, all done and provided by the folks at Devastudios, who also did the 2011 Paramount Pictures logo. According to Devastudios themselves, the backlot was created using drone footage, original blueprints and available photography, all in order to reconstruct it in CGI. The sky and clouds were done using Terragen from Planetside Software. You can read more about how this logo was made here.
Music/Sounds: A re-orchestrated version of the 12th logo's theme, now played in a different key (this time in E♭ major). It has a more powerful build-up and the opening notes are now played on a guitar as opposed to a piano. This was composed by Ludwig Göransson.
Music/Sounds Variants:
- Some films, most notably the first few films to use this logo, have either the opening theme of the movie or silence.
- An upload of the logo on Billy Mallery's Vimeo page has an alternate fanfare which is based on the "As Time Goes By" theme, composed by Mallery himself. It wasn't used on any films as this was a "runner up" score.
- On the intro video for Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood, the 1998 arrangement of the fanfare is used, transitioning from "As Time Goes By" from Casablanca.
Availability: Brand new. It debuted on the HBO Max original movie Locked Down, and will likely be used on future Warner Bros. films. The logo with its fanfare debuted on Non Mi Uccidere and Rurouni Kenshin: Final Act - Part 1: The Final, released on April 21 and 23, 2021 in Italy and Japan respectively; and later made its North American debut with King Richard, released on November 19, 2021. This also appeared at the end of Judas and the Black Messiah, despite using the previous logo at the beginning of the film, and also at the end of Godzilla vs. Kong, despite the 12th logo appearing at the beginning of the film. This logo is also beginning to plaster the 12th logo as seen on the 2021 director's cut of Justice League on HBO Max and the end of YouTube prints of Thir13en Ghosts, originally released in 2001. It also appeared at the end of the 4K Blu-ray release of the director's cut of The Outsiders: The Complete Novel.
Editor's Note: A much more fulfilling and worthy effort from Warner Bros. this time around, with more realistic effects, better animation and a fresh take on the fanfare, all of which makes this logo an appropriate successor to the 12th logo and a perfect way for the studio to celebrate its upcoming 100th anniversary.
Copyright stamps
- 1923-1967: Copyright © by Warner Bros. Pictures, Inc.
- 1934-1936: Copyright © by Warner Bros. Productions Corp.
- 1926-1960: Copyright © by The Vitaphone Corp. (short subjects only)
- 1967-1970: Copyright © by Warner Bros.-Seven Arts, Inc.
- 1970-1992: Copyright © by Warner Bros. Inc.
- 1992-2003: Copyright © by Warner Bros.
- 2003-: Copyright © by Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.
External Links
- Warner Bros. Pictures on Wikipedia
- Warner Bros. Pictures filmography on IMDb
- Official website for Warner Bros. Pictures
Warner Bros Pictures Movies 1998
Source: https://closinglogosgroup.miraheze.org/wiki/Warner_Bros._Pictures