u/Sonicfan19198282

I stumbled upon this old message from the Cartoon Research site (this is just the relevant part): "[Calvin and the Colonel] is still owned and copyrighted by Universal. Some people think that just because a show disappeared for many years, that automatically put it in PD. No! Universal renewed the copyrights on all 26 episodes in 1989 and 1990 respectively. What's out there now in the video market are unauthorized bootlegs."

The thing is: Calvin and the Colonel actually IS public domain.

If you look at the 1989-1990 United States Copyright Office renewal records, Universal did not renew any of the 26 episodes of the series. The commentor may have seen the rightsholder transfers and assignments, which sometimes get people mixed up. Universal (or its predecessors) shuffled corporate assets and documented those property transfers with the Copyright Office. However, transfers don't neccessarily mean they were renewed.

Thus, the show entered the public domain on January 1st, 1990. Mill Creek and Alpha Video were well within their right to release the show, and thank God they did; Universal wouldn't touch it with a 10 foot pole because of its history.

So yes, Calvin and the Colonel is public domain, and the United States Copyright Office doesn't lie.