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Avoid the Yak-Nog…

Nov 25th, 2011
by rodney.
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And speaking of dragons, this one managed to sneak on by us… They’re fast critters sometimes! Following the current trend of releasing holiday-themed specials, Dreamworks Animation has released Dragons: The Gift of the Night Fury direct to Blu-Ray and DVD. Directed by Tom Owens, this short film introduces us to holiday traditions in the viking village of Berk, where folk are now living in peace with dragons. But, when the dragons mysteriously all fly off one day, the kids try to think up new traditions to cheer up the devastated village-folk. Some work… some, not so much. Also on the DVD is the short film Book of Dragons (directed by Steve Hickner), a sort of dragon encyclopedia overview guided by Hiccup and his friends. Of note to furry fans: Unlike Legend of the Boneknapper, these two shorts feature Toothless the Night Fury — a lot.

image c. 2011 Dreamworks Animation

Pixar Scripts in Color

Nov 21st, 2011
by rodney.
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Folks who’d like to learn more about how animation is made — especially award-winning, box-0ffice conquering animation — might want to check out The Art of Pixar: Complete Color Scripts from 25 Years of Animation, written by Pixar Studio’s own John Lasseter and edited by Cartoon Brew’s own Amid Amidi. It’s available now in hardcover from Chronicle Books. Here’s the write-up from Amazon: “Over the past 25 years, Pixar s team of artists, writers, and directors have shaped the world of contemporary animation with their feature films and shorts. From classics such as Toy Story and A Bug s Life to recent masterpieces such as Up, Toy Story 3, and Cars 2, this comprehensive collection offers a behind-the-scenes tour of every Pixar film to date. Featuring a foreword by Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter, the complete color scripts for every film published in full for the first time as well as stunning visual development art, The Art of Pixar is a treasure trove of rare artwork and an essential addition to the library of animation fans and Pixar enthusiasts.”

Woody Woodpecker on the Big Screen

Nov 17th, 2011
by rodney.
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We swiped this bit from Cartoon Brew, since they put it so well: “The Hollywood Reporter is reporting about Universal Pictures new plans to revive Walter Lantz’ classic cartoon star Woody Woodpecker in a CG feature film.  Illumination Entertainment (Despicable Me, Hop, and The Lorax) is now developing the film with Blades of Glory co-writers John Altschuler and Dave Krinsky, who are planning to ‘modernize the character for contemporary audiences’. Altschuler and Krinsky were exec producers and writers on Fox’s King of the Hill and currently on MTV’s Beavis and Butt-head.” Should classic cartoon fans rejoice or shudder? Stay tooned and we’ll find out!

image c. 2011 Cartoon Brew

Christmas in the Ice Age

Nov 11th, 2011
by rodney.
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Word is out that 20th Century Fox will be presenting Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas on Fox Network on Thanksgiving — with a later re-broadcast in December. The special concerns what happens when Sid the Sloth winds up on Santa’s naughty list… and Sid and his friends journey to the North Pole to try and get the old elf’s forgiveness! Along for the journey are voice actors Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Seann William Scott, Queen Latifah, and Denis Leary from the Ice Age trilogy of movies. Also in December, Boom! Studios’ Kaboom! imprint will release the Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas one-shot full-color comic book, written by Caleb Monroe and illustrated by Shelli Paroline and Braden Lamb. There’s a write-up and more pictures at Cinemablend.com.

image c. 20th Century Fox

Training Dragons on TV

Nov 3rd, 2011
by rodney.
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Here’s a scoop that we stumbled across recently: Dreamworks Animation is not only hard at work on a sequel to 2010’s Ursa Major Award-winning film How to Train Your Dragon, but they are also working on a TV series to be aired on Cartoon Network beginning in late 2012. ScreenRant.com have been following the story closely, and they recently featured an article that includes an interview with executive producer Tim Johnson from BadTaste.it. According to Mr. Johnson, How to Train Your Dragon 2 (the working title) will be released in the latter part of 2013. Dean Deblois, co-director of the original film, will this time serve as sole writer and director for the sequel. Original co-director Chris Sanders will be on as an executive producer, along with original producer Bonnie Arnold. Most of the original voice cast will return for the sequel, including Jay Baruchel, Craig Ferguson, America Ferrera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, TJ Miller, and Kristen Wiig. It’s unclear right now if any of them will also be involved in the TV series. Also unclear at this point is what the plot of either the TV series or the sequel film will be like, although Tim Johnson has said that the TV series will likely be a bit more mature, perhaps even darker, than the current Dreamworks TV spin-off series, Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness.

image c. 2011 Dreamworks Animation

 

Awesome Pandas on TV

Oct 25th, 2011
by rodney.
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Word is out that Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness, the long-awaited TV spinoff from Dreamworks’ Kung Fu Panda movies, will finally be coming to television on Monday, November 7th. It will premier on Nickelodeon at 5:30 pm, Eastern and Pacific time. First up will be a full week of brand new episodes every week day, followed by weekly new episodes on Friday nights starting December 2nd. The series takes place in between the two Kung Fu Panda movies, following adventures of Po the Panda — also known as the Dragon Warrior — and the Furious Five, along with their mentor, the red panda Master Shifu. Several new characters and villains will be introduced as well. From the feature films, only Lucy Liu (Viper) and James Hong (Mr. Ping, Po’s adoptive father) reprise their roles; other voices are handled by the likes of Mick Wingert, Kari Wahlgren, Amir Talai, Max Koch, Fred Tatasciore, and James Sie. Cartoon Brew has a write-up directly from Dreamworks that has even more information. By the way: Kung Fu Panda 2 comes to DVD and Blu-Ray on December 13th. Though its performance was perhaps disappointing in the USA, around the world it is the #1 animated feature of the year, having taken in $664 million total. Which virtually assures that there will in fact be a Kung Fu Panda 3, as KFP2 surpassed Dreamworks’ self-imposed $500 million worldwide “magic number” for making a film into a franchise.

image c. 2011 Dreamworlds/Nickelodeon

The Legend of Tembo

Aug 18th, 2011
by rodney.
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The well-known special effects house Digitial Domain is trying (once again) to start up its own animation house, this time in Florida. It’s dubbed the new studio Tradition — which is perhaps odd, as it will be working on CGI films, rather than the “traditional” hand-painted sort. Anyway, it’s been announced that Tradition’s first film will be called The Legend of Tembo, slated for release in 2014. Directed by Disney veterans Aaron Blaise (Brother Bear) and Chuck Williams (Glago’s Guest), Tembo tells the story of an African elephant calf who is captured and taken to India — where he is trained to battle in a deadly war.

image c. 2011 Tradition Studio

Battle Bears!

Jul 31st, 2011
by rodney.
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It’s a game series, a comic book, a collection of plushies, an animation project in the works… It’s Battle Bears! It tells the story of a well-armed little bear named Oliver — and his well-armed companions — who crash-land on an alien world populated by cute pink teddy-bears called Huggies… who, if they get your mitts on you, will promptly hug you to death! Fortunately Oliver has guns to spare — he’s well-prepared to blow off the huggies’ heads, at which point rainbows shoot out of their necks. Yes. It’s all the creation of one Benjamin Vu (a graduate of the animation program at Cal Arts) and his company, SkyVu Pictures. Seriously, this just scratches the fuzzy surface of what SkyVu is up to. Visit their Battle Bears web site to find out more about new games and other projects they’re still busily developing.

Battle Bears at San Diego Comic Con. Photo by your ever-lovin' Ed-Otter

 

Apes and Kitties

Jun 21st, 2011
by rodney.
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Two newly-released trailers give us some further insight on a pair of films coming up later this year — films that furry fen might find interesting. Rise of the Planet of the Apes is directed by Rupert Wyatt, previously best known for his film The Escapist. Rise tells the story of a genetic scientist (played by current hot property James Franco) whose experiments with a brain-cell regenerating treatment lead to the creation of Caesar, a chimpanzee with the intelligence and will to lead his fellow apes in revolution against humans. Besides Mr. Franco and Andy Serkis (who plays the body-model for Caesar much as he did for Gollum in Lord of the Rings and King Kong in King Kong), Rise also stars Brian Cox, John  Lithgow, Freida Pinto, and Tom Felton (Draco from the Harry Potter movies). The film is set for release on August 5th, and the latest trailer up on YouTube shows how Caesar is raised by hand by humans, coming to care for them — and later, to resent them. Okay, so… from chimpanzees on to kitties. The newest trailer for Puss in Boots is out, though the film won’t hit theaters until November 4th. Antonio Banderas (of course) plays Puss, who hooks up with Humpty Dumpty (yes, the egg) and a flirty filcher of a feline named Kitty Softpaws, voiced by Selma Hayek.

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