Rainbow Parade is a series of 26 animated shorts produced by Van Beuren Studios and distributed to theaters by RKO between 1934 and 1936.

The Van Beuren Corporation was struggling to make successful cartoon series and had multiple production struggles throughout the early 1930s, with a lawsuit from Walt Disney Productions over copyright infringement, and ill-fated attempts at cartoon series like Tom and Jerry and Cubby Bear.

[2] Gillett was lured by the Van Beuren studio with prospects of higher pay and full creative control over the animation staff, and he joined around April 1934.

This prompted independent distributors like Walter O. Gutlohn[7] and Commonwealth Pictures[8] to pick up rights for the films to be sold in home movie catalogues and syndicated for television throughout the decades.

The second half of the series is also in the process of being restored by Thunderbean, and is currently available from the best existing prints released by Image DVD/Blackhawk Films/Film Preservation Associates.