The four GK232 Character Panoramas were printed in 1976, but all of them are reprints of earlier Waddington/Letraset Character Panoramas.
The release dates for the relevant films were:
Jungle Book:
— US: 18th October 1967
— UK: 21st March (or 18th November) 1968
— France: 11th December 1968
Aristocats:
— US: 11th December 1970
— UK: 27th December 1970 (or 22nd November 1971)
— France: 8th December 1971
Bedknobs & Broomsticks:
— UK: 7th October 1971
— US: 13th December 1971
The Aristocats Panoramas first appears in the Waddington's trade catalogue for 1971.
These Panoramas were originally produced for John Waddington Ltd., but after their divorce Letraset claimed ownership of the Panorama title & format by means of these reprints.
Letraset re-used the artwork & simply eliminated any references to John Waddington Ltd.
Here's the GK232/1 sheet. You can see that the cut sheet is divided into two panes.
However, these two panes form just the right-hand half of the four Mako Calco / Mako Calcorama sheets produced by Comano, as you can see from the following illustration, which shows the Mako sheets on the left (N.B.: there's also a "Mickey et ses Amis" sheet in there, too… whoops!):
The 1976 version of this Panorama would have come with the GK232/1 transfers shown, of course, but the 1971 version could have come with either the same pair of panes, or the two panes to the left of them — at random.
The Comano 1972 catalogue lists nine Calcoramas, four of which (shown here) have Panorama connections. "Aristocats" is at the top left of this scan. The three-foot wide background is only slightly similar to the much smaller Aristocats Panorama background.
The Aristocats Mako Calco sheets are numbered 4408, & the catalogue says they are "New for 1972". It looks like Waddington's published first, ahead of Comano's corresponding Mako Calcorama.
Picture Credit: The SPLAT Scan Archives
© Tom Vinelott 2023