The Legend of Calamity Jane
Genre	Animation Action Adventure Western
Written by	Mark Zaslove
Directed by	Pascal Morelli
Starring	Barbara Scaff Frank Welker Clancy Brown Michael Horse Tim Matheson
Composer	La Belle Equipe
Country of origin	France United States
No. of episodes	13
Production
Executive producers	Michel P. Pinard Jean-Paul Gaspari
Producer	Thierry Rivard
Running time	22–23 minutes
Production companies	Itel Gangster Production Contre Allée
Original release
Network	Canal+ (France) The WB (Kids' WB) (United States)
Release	September 13, 1997 (1997-09-13) – June 26, 1998 (1998-06-26)

The Legend of Calamity Jane is a 1997–98 animated television series. The series followed the adventures of a fictionalizedCalamity Jane inDeadwood, South Dakota.^[1] The episode "I'd Rather Be in Philadelphia" takes place during the opening of theCentennial Exposition, establishing the timeline setting in 1876. The series had "fuller and richer animation than was customary onSaturday-morning TV."^[2]

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 acult following.^[3]

In the United States, three episodes were aired onThe WB in 1997.^[4] 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,^[5] and thatSuperman: The Animated Series would be filling in for its timeslot,^[6] but this proved to be untrue.^[4] 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.^[7]

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.^[8] 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.

• Calamity Jane (voiced by Barbara Scaff) – Although based on the historical frontierswoman, her appearance and background are fictionalized. For example, in the series, she is literate and claims to have grown up inPortsmouth, Rhode Island andAtlanta, Georgia while the real Martha Jane Canary was illiterate and raised inMissouri. She also claims to be a member of theComanche tribe. Depicted as 24 years old, with green eyes, pale skin and red hair, she fights on the side of "law and order". Jane prefers to use a whip and drink milk. She rides a black horse named Dakota.
• Joe Presto (voiced byFrank Welker) – He serves as a helpful sidekick to Jane and shows great care and concern for her throughout the series. He prefers not to kill, as evidenced by his shotgun only being loaded withrock salt. He rides a mule named Tessy.
• Wild Bill Hickok (voiced byClancy Brown) – Based on the realWild Bill Hickok, he is depicted as an old friend of Jane's who helps her on several occasions despite his reservations toward the law.
• Quanna Parker (voiced byMichael Horse) – Jane's "blood brother" and Chief of the Comanche tribe with a fondness for existential philosophy. In "Troubled Waters", his tribe become millionaires after discovering oil on their land.
• Captain John O'Rourke (voiced byTim Matheson) – A polite, law-abiding cavalry officer who assists Jane throughout the series and is hinted to have romantic feelings for her. In "The Final Curtain", it is revealed he witnessed theassassination of Abraham Lincoln as a child and felt responsible because his older brother, a Secret Service agent, chose to sit by him instead.

On October 3, 2022, a Texas-based company named Comix.tv launched aKickstarter campaign to fund a special DVD box set and special edition comic to celebrate the series' 25th anniversary in 2022.^[9] The company previously did a Kickstarter campaign for a DVD release ofStone 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.Discotek Media released the series on Blu-ray on September 28, 2023.^[10][11]

The series is currently available onTubi as of March 31, 2023.

• Official website
• The Legend of Calamity Jane atIMDb

• 1997 American animated television series debuts
• 1998 American television series endings
• 1990s American animated television series
• 1990s American children's television series
• 1990s French animated television series
• Fiction set in 1876
• Television series set in the 1870s
• American children's animated action television series
• American children's animated adventure television series
• Western (genre) animated television series
• French children's animated action television series
• French children's animated adventure television series
• Kids' WB original shows
• 1990s Western (genre) television series
• Animated television shows based on films
• Television shows set in South Dakota
• The WB animated television series
• Cultural depictions of Calamity Jane
• Cultural depictions of Wild Bill Hickok

• CS1: unfit URL
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Use mdy dates from June 2012