The Legend of Calamity Jane is a 1997–98 American-French animated television series. The series followed the adventures of a fictionalized Calamity Jane in Deadwood, South Dakota. The episode "I'd Rather Be in Philadelphia" takes place during the opening of the Centennial Exposition, establishing the timeline setting in 1876. The series had "fuller and richer animation than was customary on Saturday-morning TV." It aired in France and Canada from 1997–98, in Portugal in 2002, and in the United Kingdom via the POP TV channel from 2003–04. Despite its short run, the series developed a cult following.

Series run

In the United States, three episodes were aired on The WB in 1997. The network gave the series heavy promotion, but they quietly pulled it from their line-up after only three weeks. It was stated on Warner Bros.' website that the show would return later in the year, and that Superman: The Animated Series would be filling in for its timeslot, but this proved to be untrue. The series did run complete in Latin America and several European countries, and was dubbed into languages like French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Swedish and Serbian.

Production

Jennifer Jason Leigh was originally cast as the voice of Calamity Jane. However, two weeks before the show was to premiere, the producers decided to re-cast the role. Barbara Scaff got the part. None of the dialogue recorded by Leigh was used in the final show. However, due to the short notice, the promotional ads aired on the WB used the lines by Leigh.

Main characters

Episodes

Home media

On October 3, 2022, a Texas-based company named Comix.tv launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund a special DVD box set and special edition comic to celebrate the series’ 25th anniversary in 2022. The company previously did a Kickstarter campaign for a DVD release of Stone Protectors in 2021 which was successful. It would be the first time the remaining episodes were released in the United States. This campaign was successfully funded with $24,284 on 426 backers. On January 30, 2023, it was announced Discotek Media will release the series on Blu-ray. The series is currently available on Tubi as of March 31, 2023.