The next project for Anthony Bell (director of last year’s Alpha and Omega) is an animated film called Norm of the North. It stars Rob Schneider (Deuce Bigalow, Male Gigolo) as the voice of Norm, a polar bear who (along with his lemming friends) ends up in New York City, “where Norm becomes the mascot of a corporation he soon learns is tied to the fate of his homeland”. The writers, Daniel and Steven Altiere, have previously written several furry-themed direct-to-video sequels, including Scooby Doo! The Mystery Begins and Dr. Dolittle: Million Dollar Mutts. Now in post-production, Norm of the North is set for release by Lionsgate Films in 2012.
Animation
More Furries Voting!
Voting has closed for the 2011 Ursa Major Awards, celebrating all your favorite furry stuff from 2010. Can’t tell you who won yet — that’ll be announced at a special awards ceremony at Morphicon, taking place May 12th through 15th in Columbus, Ohio. Definitely looks as if there will be some surprises though! We can tell you that this year over 1,300 fur fans from around the world took part in voting for their favorite furry-themed movies, TV series, comic strips, games, and more. That’s a growth of more than 200 voters from last year! As usual, visit the Ursa Major Awards web site to find out more about the award winners and nominees, past and present.
Rio Takes On The World
In an unusual move, 20th Century Fox has released the next Blue Sky Studios move Rio in 72 countries outside of North America, a full week before releasing it in the U.S. on April 15th. According to reports the film is already doing quite well in Russia, and a few other countries as well. Like the Ice Age films from Blue Sky, this new film is directed by Carlos Saldanha. It tells the story of a blue macaw named (appropriately) Blu. Domesticated, it seems that Blu has never learned to fly. It also seems that he is the last mail blue macaw — and so begins his journey to the title city, where folks hope he will mate with the one remaining female blue (named Jewel) to save the species. Fox has released the first two minutes of the film as a video, and (in an only-these-days bit of tie-in) there is also a video advertising the Angry Birds/Rio game app for your I-Phone.
image c. 2011 Blue Sky Studios
Thundercats Return with a Roar
Looks like they’re getting serious about the return of Thundercats this time around… This footage was recently shown at Wondercon — to, reportedly, thunderous applause. It’s interesting to note that this new show from Cartoon Network looks much more anime in style than the old original series. It also spends a lot more time setting things up on the Thundercats’ home world. We’ll find out more when Thundercats comes to Cartoon Network this July.
image c. 2011 Cartoon Network
New Looney Tunes
In case you haven’t got the word yet: Cartoon Network will be premiering a brand new Looney Tunes Show on Tuesday, May 3rd. They’ve set up a web site with lots of pictures, video clips, and even a fan discussion board. Needless to say there’s already a lot of discussion (to put it mildly) on places like Cartoon Brew about the ups and downs of the new show and the new character designs.
Dragons and Pandas coming to TV
Not long after announcing that the sequel to the wildly popular film How to Train Your Dragon will be released to theaters in 2013, Dreamworks Animation let it be known that a brand new How to Train Your Dragon weekly TV series will be premiering on Cartoon Network in 2012. IGN has a lot of information about the new series up on line. Although we’ve been told that the TV series will feature the same characters in the same world as the feature film, it’s not been announced if any of the cast or crew from the feature will be working on the new series. And speaking of television: Don’t forget that sometime this fall, the much-delayed Kung Fu Panda TV series Kung Fu Panda: Legends of Awesomeness is set to premier on Nickelodeon.
You Don’t Have Nine Lives
Humans really do use anthropomorphic characters for everything… we mean everything! Recently in France there appeared this animated public service announcement, explaining the need for sexually active people to protect themselves from AIDS… which uses the medium of cartoon animals, animated to look like something out of the 1930’s. Seriously. Where on earth did they show this thing, we wonder? Well it’s viewable on YouTube, but take warning: There’s nothing terribly explicit in this, but it is most certainly for adults only! Need more proof? The production company that created it is called Passion Pictures.
The Fat Cat is Back
Well this sort of came out of nowhere… A brand new CGI show featuring Jim Davis’ inescapable cat Garfield was made in France in 2008. Then, in 2009, episodes of The Garfield Show began airing in North America on Cartoon Network, with all-around voice actor Frank Welker voicing Garfield in place of the late Lorenzo Music. One of the main writers and voice directors for the series is Mark Evanier, who was also lead writer for the original 2D series Garfield and Friends in the 1980’s. Now it seems that Papercutz (home of the Geronimo Stilton series) is creating a series of hardcover full-color comic collections based on The Garfield Show. The collections are titled Garfield & Co., and they come to stores this May.
The Ballad of Nessie
And yet more interesting news on Cartoon Brew: The Ballad of Nessie is a brand new, 2-D animated short from Walt Disney Pictures. It’s scheduled to be released in front of the upcoming Winnie the Pooh movie this summer, which you may recall is also in 2-D. The film is directed by Stevie Wermers-Skelton and Kevin Deters, who both worked on How to Hook Up Your Home Theater and Prep and Landing. Several well-known animators worked on Nessie, including Andreas Deja, Mark Henn, Randy Haycock, Dale Baer, and Rubin Aquino. No video sneaks yet, but Cartoon Brew has pictures from the film, including the one you see below.
image c. 2011 Walt Disney Pictures
