Bob in a Bottle

Bob in a Bottle is a Saban produced dub of the 1969 Tatsunoko Pro anime series Hakushon Daimaō/The Genie Family. The original series ran from 1969-1970 in Japan and ran for 52 episodes consisting of 104 11 minute segments, sometimes, the 2nd segment in the episode being continuations of the first segment. Saban Entertainment got the rights in 1991 alongside other Tatsunoko Pro. series in a package, such as what became Samurai Pizza Cats. It did not air in America until 1994-1995 on the premium cable channel PRISM. It aired in other places in 1992, such as YTV in Canada, and Seven Network in Australia. The North American copyright was terminated in 1998, would not expire until 12/19/2000, and the copyright has since reverted back to Tatsunoko Pro. In some places outside of North America, it aired as late as 2004.

All 52 English episodes are currently archived at The Library of Congress. As of June 2023, no distributors such as Discotek Media or RetroCrush (who have the streaming rights to Samurai Pizza Cats) have picked up the license for the dub.

Plot
Joey Carter finds a ladder in his room that leads into the attic. Due to kicking up dust, he sneezes, which causes a strange bottle to come his way. It turns out that he summoned a genie named Bob Achoo, who is Joey's servant until he sneezes again; However, Bob's magic isn't very good, and it often causes more trouble than the initial situation they try to solve. Bob's daughter, Ilana, is summoned with a yawn, and she is much more intentionally mischievous with her magic.

Episodes

 * 1) I Wasn’t Sneezing Achoo / It’s A Dog’s Life
 * 2) My Numbers Are Dazed / Bob In A Pickle
 * 3) The Bob Cat / Master Bob
 * 4) Real Genie-Us / Rags, The Rich Man
 * 5) School Daze / Who Needs Scary Movies
 * 6) Popular Opinion / Not Available In Any Store
 * 7) Two’s Company, Thirty’s A Crowd / ???
 * 8) Captain Bonecrusher Takes Command / Bob Joins The Mob
 * 9) Bully For Bob / Homework Or Else
 * 10) Billion Dollar Bottle / In The Poor House
 * 11) Too Doggone Bad / Fun With Mitzi
 * 12) The Great Fishpond Free-For-All / Puppy Love
 * 13) Martial Arts Mayhem / As The Cookie Crumbles
 * 14) Mayhem on Mother’s Day / Bob On The Ball
 * 15) For The Love Of Betty / Too Many Genies
 * 16) Quiz Whiz / Dibble Trouble
 * 17) I Would Gladly Pay You Tuesday / Who Napped My Kid
 * 18) Tickets, Please / Sumo Time
 * 19) Malice In Magic-Land
 * 20) The Crazy Carpet Caper / The Trouble With Tina
 * 21) Cinder Stella / Cheering Up Father
 * 22) Chaos In The Kitchen / A Circus Worth Saving
 * 23) If You Knew Sushi, Like I Know Sushi / ???
 * 24) The Dog And Genie Show / To The Moon, Chauncey
 * 25) Tarzan Of The Aches / Wrestle Maniac
 * 26) Split Hairs / Earn Your Learn
 * 27) The Magic Hand / The Battle of the Bottle
 * 28) Sweet Dad Of Youth / Joined In Mutt-Rimony
 * 29) Horsing Around At The Track / Kidnapping Chaos
 * 30) ??? / No Strings Attached
 * 31) The Abominable Snow Job / Crime Doesn’t Pay
 * 32) A Fishy Story / All Play And No Work
 * 33) Who Was That Masked Man / Bob Gets Farmed Out
 * 34) I’ll Be Loving You, Walrus / Substitute Teacher
 * 35) Horsesmoke and Gunplay / Prince Harry
 * 36) Raiders Of The Lost Bark / Bob The Robot
 * 37) My Genie Can Whip Your Genie / Bob’s Job Review
 * 38) Ninja Kung-Foolery / Taming Tilly
 * 39) Beach Bummer / Pirate Bob
 * 40) Homework Can Be Fun / The Magic Skates
 * 41) My Tail Is Told / Madam Butterfly
 * 42) Kid Country / Bad News
 * 43) High Fashion / Ole Bob
 * 44) Money-Mad / Wolves in Sheik’s Clothing
 * 45) Fair Play
 * 46) A Bride for Bob / Silliness - Cast In Stone
 * 47) It’s Snow Joke / Face-Off With Fear
 * 48) Birthday Blues / I’m Looking Through
 * 49) Hoax Pocus / Who Loves Ya, Baby
 * 50) Curse Of The Creepy Crawlies / His Master’s Voice
 * 51) You Think You Have Problems! / The New Neighbors
 * 52) Bob and Ilana - The Final Farewell?

Changes
Aside from the names, there are a few general changes throughout the dub. Known visual edits will be listed on the respective episode pages.


 * Generally, the episodes have been truncated to cut long segments of silence or repetitive scenes to speed up the pacing, so that they fit within the allocated 22 minute runtime (including the opening and credits), which is especially true with Pinocchio: The Series.
 * The segment ending transitions (such as the bottle-shaped iris wipe) are often cut out in favor of a fade to black which is placed before the original transition.
 * The music and sound effects are completely new for the dub.
 * Music that doesn't have the Bob in a Bottle theme lemotif seem to be general Saban tracks, which can be heard in other dubs such as Samurai Pizza Cats, and Pinocchio: The Series
 * Sometimes, hamburg steak is referred to as cookies or cake.

Project Goal
As previously stated, it seems no distributors are interested in the license for Bob in a Bottle. This is why AriesArtist is currently focused on preserving the series. The current goals for it are as follows:


 * 1) Visual restoration using Hakushon Daimaō Remaster
 * 2) Use official English episode titles for title cards (some titles are missing, may not be proper, as well as most writer credits, need to hire someone to go to LOC to do research on this or plan a weekend trip)
 * 3) Translate episodes from other dubs languages (German, Hebrew, etc.) and subtitle if necessary (some audio chunks are missing, and some episodes dubs are not available in any language)
 * 4) (Hopefully) gain interest in the dub from subtitling the episodes, which could lead to an official release.