I'm writing a script for a video I'm making called "The History of Goosebumps" I've written most of the script already, but I want to make sure that I didn't leave anything out. Please Tell me if I should add anything to it.
R.L. Stine was doing well with his popular Young Adult horror series, Fear Street. Following the success of Fear Street, the Co-Founder of Parachute Press, Joan Waricha, approached Stine with the idea to write horror stories for children. Stine was interested in the idea, but only had one problem - the title. So, how did this great author come up with the title for what would soon-to-be his magnum opus? He found it in a TV guide.
Yep, apparently a TV Guide ad for “Goosebumps week on Channel 11” gave Stine the idea to name his new series “Goosebumps”. Nonetheless, now with his new series titled, Stine made a six-book deal with Scholastic, and was given the greenlight. And in July 1992, the world was first given Goosebumps with the first Goosebumps book, Welcome to Dead House. Following the first book, 5 more books followed, including Stay Out of the Basement, and Monster Blood. The series soon became a surprising success. In fact, the series was actually supposed to be for girls, but fan mail proved that the series was enjoyed by both Boys and Girls. The series got so popular, that Scholastic extended Stine’s book deal, giving him the freedom to write many more books for the series. Many more books for the series were soon written, paving the way for many iconic characters to surface, including Cuddles the Hamster, The Haunted Mask, and of course, Slappy the Living Dummy. Following the success of the Goosebumps series, September 1994 marked the first Goosebumps spin-off series, Tales to Give you Goosebumps, a series which consists of 10 stories in each book. Another spin off series to soon follow would be Give Yourself Goosebumps. This series was very similar to the popular Choose your Own Adventure series, with a story that the reader chooses the path which can end in certain ways.
Meanwhile, the main series was doing very well, with many books still coming out monthly. But the Goosebumps series got even more popular, when on October 28th, 1995, the Goosebumps TV series premiered on Fox Kids. The TV series consisted of adaptations of the Goosebumps books. The Show became really popular, with 74 episodes, some of them being released on Home Video from 20th Century Fox. Around this time, Goosebumps had become a phenomenon. A Goosebumps fan club was launched in 1996, there were toys, board games, audiobooks, clothes, costumes, it was nuts! There were video games for the series as well, being based off of certain books in the series, including Attack of the Mutant and One Day at HorrorLand. There was even a Goosebumps show at Disney’s MGM studios in Florida! Many more books were released until the untimely date of December 1997, when the main Goosebumps series ended, with 62nd book, Monster Blood IV. In an attempt to keep the Goosebumps series alive, another series was launched called Goosebumps Series 2000. The series did well for it’s run, going on for 25 books. But then, the Downward spiral arrived. Many of the Goosebumps spin offs were beginning to end, including Give Yourself Goosebumps in February 2000, Tales to give you Goosebumps in October 1997, and even the Goosebumps TV series was cancelled in November 1998. On top of that, Goosebumps was starting to lose its popularity and book sales were going down with the arrival of the new millenium. Scholastic had one more attempt to keep the series alive, but then something terrible happened. Stine left Scholastic.
Yep, on top of decreasing sales, as well as many legal disputes between Parachute Press and Scholastic, Stine didn’t renew his contract with Scholastic for the year 2000, causing Stine to stop writing Goosebumps. This caused many projects to be dropped including the 26th Series 2000 book, the 43rd Give Yourself Goosebumps book, and even stopped a whole new series called Goosebumps Gold from ever seeing the light of day. With Stine gone, the Goosebumps series officially came to a stop. After he left, Scholastic bought all the rights to the franchise, releasing re-releases of the classic books, and releasing many of the Goosebumps episodes on DVD. But aside from that, Goosebumps was no longer popular, and was starting to become forgotten. It had seem that the once popular series was now officially over.
Except that it wasn’t
During his time away, Stine was working on other series, including the comedy books series, Rotten School, but they never reached the same popularity as his other series. Stine still continued to receive fan mail about Goosebumps, with many fans wanting the series to return. In late 2007, Stine finally decided to renew his contract with Scholastic, and in April 2008, 8 years since the last book, Goosebumps returned from the grave with the new series, Goosebumps HorrorLand. This series was very different from previous Goosebumps series, there was a continuing story throughout all the books. Taking place in a previously known Goosebumps landmark, the series brought together old and new characters into a big thrilling plot. But that wasn’t all that came out that year. The exact same time HorrorLand debuted, a new line of books called Classic Goosebumps debuted, which re-released many Classic Goosebumps books, to tie in with the releases of the HorrorLand books. Both series were a big success. And just like a car battery hooked up to jumper cables, it jolted new life into the series. On top of that, a new video game called Goosebumps HorrorLand was released for Playstation 2, Wii, and Nintendo DS. Fox also released more new DVDs with episodes from the Goosebumps TV series. Also, Cartoon Network held Goosebumps marathons for Halloween of 2008 and 2009. The HorrorLand series ended after 19 books, and was soon followed by Goosebumps Hall of Horrors in 2011 and Goosebumps Most Wanted in 2012, which the latter was released in celebration of the series’ 20th anniversary. The Goosebumps TV Show also began airing reruns year round on the new Hub Network, alongside Stine’s other new show, The Haunting Hour. The Goosebumps series stayed steady for the few following years, until 2014 when an incredible announcement was made:
A Goosebumps Movie. *Play “Hallelujah”*
What a Time to be a Goosebumps fan. A Goosebumps movie had been in the works since 1998. In fact, Tim Burton was supposed to direct it. But since it was around the time when Goosebumps was starting to decline in popularity, the idea was scrapped. But in 2012, the idea was revived by screenwriter Darren Lemke and Director Rob Letterman. The movie was officially announced at Comic Con 2014, and was officially released on October 16th, 2015. Where Goosebumps HorrorLand made the franchise popular again, The Goosebumps Movie exploded the franchise. Now Goosebumps was everywhere, and bringing in many fans, some long time readers, and even newcomers into the series. Many other things happened as well. There was a brand new RPG video game for Nintendo 3DS, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC. In 2017 A costume company called Trick or Treat Studios also released official Goosebumps masks and props to resemble the creatures from the Goosebumps TV show. After Most Wanted concluded, a new series called Goosebumps Slappyworld was released in early 2017, and mostly focuses on Slappy the dummy, who has grown to be the most recognizable character in the franchise. Nowadays, Goosebumps still seems to be relevant, with new collectible re-releases of the original books, shows and plays based off the books, a new comic book series, Slappy being the mascot of 2017’s Trick or Treat for Unicef campaign, and even a second movie currently in production.