The Powerpuff Girls Movie arrived in 2002 from Cartoon Network Studios and Warner Bros. Pictures, expanding Craig McCracken's hit series into a feature-length origin story for Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup. The film traced the girls' creation and early days in Townsville, giving longtime viewers a fuller mythology while introducing the franchise to a wider theatrical audience. Promotional material from this period, including trailers struck on 35mm, circulated through theaters ahead of the release, serving as a bridge between the television show's established fanbase and moviegoers encountering the characters for the first time.
This cell preserves a moment from that trailer featuring Mojo Jojo, the girls' recurring adversary and one of the franchise's most recognizable creations. As the chief antagonist, Mojo Jojo carries outsized appeal among collectors drawn to villain-centric material, since his presence in promotional reels often signals the film's comedic and dramatic stakes. A trailer cell like this one functions as advance artwork, a single frame excerpted from the reel used to build anticipation before the feature's release, making it a tangible artifact of the marketing campaign surrounding this early-2000s animated milestone.
Authentication Findings8 checks
Consistent with a 35mm release print trailer strip of The Powerpuff Girls Movie (2002).
Gauge
35mm layout with four perforations per frame along both edges; the strip holds three frames, with a slight curve to the strip on the panel.
Perforations
Four per frame on both edges, rounded-corner rectangles, evenly spaced and cleanly punched, with no torn or missing perforations seen.
Soundtrack
A variable-area optical track runs beside the picture as two parallel tracks, with a dashed cyan-edged line above them; no Dolby Digital blocks, DTS timecode or SDDS tracks are visible.
Edge print
Not visible in this capture
Base & colour
Light cyan-blue tint on the edge margins, and the dye image in the frames looks neutral to slightly warm, with no obvious fading or red shift.
Projection history
No lines, scratches, cue marks or splices seen at this size.
Picture
Positive image; the three frames run consecutively as one continuous shot, and the cartoon style is consistent with the film on record.
Era check
A two-track optical track on a cyan-tinted base with a positive image is consistent with a 2002 35mm release print, and the lack of digital data blocks does not contradict that.
Read from the original intake capture shown below. Observations only — film is authenticated, not graded.
This original motion picture film element has been examined and authenticated by Crown Grading in partnership with National Film Vault, and encapsulated for archival preservation.
Why so little survivesRelease prints were leased to theaters, not sold. When the run ended they went back to the distributor to be destroyed, and most were. What collectors hold today came from the prints that escaped that order, and no new 35mm prints of these films are being struck.
CROWN SERIAL 000071099
Original Film CaptureAs received
Photographed on the light panel at intake, before encapsulation — tap to open full size
Tap to enlarge
