This awesome animated short has been floating around the net for a few weeks now, but hasn’t garnered a fraction of the views it deserves. Space Stallions was created by a group of students from The Animation Workshop attempting to capture the essence of 80’s cartoons like Voltron, Thunder Cats, and so on. Personally, I think they hit the nail on the head. The music was dead on with everything from sequenced arps and laser toms to its poorly written chorus. Visually, they touched on everything you’d expect to see like several of the characters rocking a mustache, Unicorn space-bikes, oh and a keytar sword. While I don’t think I’d ever want to sit through an actual episode should they ever make one, I have to applaud their awesome efforts here. Oh, and if you want to buy a copy of that theme song, you’re in luck. It’s available via BandCamp. Read more…
Posted by Chris Sobieniak on Feb 2, 2012 in Animation
At a time when animation was still being looked at as funny little shorts, one man tried to prove them wrong! Produced with the help of Edgar Rice Burrough’s son John Coleman, animation director Bob Clampett (Looney Tunes, Beany & Cecil) produced this short pilot to a potential theatrical cartoon series he tried to sell to MGM during his off hours from “Termite Terrace”. Unfortunately several divisions of the studio felt the project was a little too weird for the audience’s taste and suggested a rather tamed approach based on something else. Needless to say Clampett’s enthusiasm dropped very quickly and he was back to the same ‘ol grind for many years to come, but still gave us good laughs every time. Read more…
This Lego Cuusoo project has been around for awhile, but has remained a bit of a hidden gem. Cuusoo user MaxVF1 threw together these amazing VF-1 Valkyries — or Veritechs depending on your preference — in hopes of convincing Lego to license them for retail. As you can see from the video above, they’re pretty easy to snap together and make pretty good display models. They even let you shift between gear-walk, battloid, and fighter modes with ease. The problem, at least from Lego’s standpoint, is that they appear a bit fragile. Of course, that issue alone is just one of many hurdles to overcome.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Jan 24, 2012 in Animation
If you grew up with Star Blazers, Captain Harlock and Galaxy Express 999 the new Leiji Matsumoto series Ozma will bring a smile to your face! This new show will have a science fiction theme (of course!) and will start airing in Japan on March 16th this year. Below is a look at some of the character designs which remind me a great deal of Captain Harlock: Read more…
Last night marked the season 3 premiere of the animated FX series, and cult-favorite, Archer. For those of you who don’t watch, the series follows Sterling Archer, an over-the-top, self-absorbed spy who works for organization named ISIS, similar to MI-5, ran by his own mother. It often plays like a raunchy spoof of every Bond film ever made. Any way, it’s hilarious and definitely worth checking out. While you can find the first season readily available on Netflix, many viewers might want to play catch up. A lot can happen over the course of a season, so missing an one might leave you a bit dazed and confused. Fortunately, Amazon is having an amazing deal right now. You can get season one and two of Archer on Blu-ray for just $20 — that’s half off.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Jan 17, 2012 in Animation
It’s hard to believe but twenty years ago The Real World debuted on MTV and slowly the cable channel which was beloved by a generation went from from showing creative music videos to bland reality television. But before that there was a golden age of a cable channel which dared to be a bit artsy and take some chances. Even though the channel started out with small budgets from the early days they always had animated bumper spots that were just as entertaining as the music videos which were showcased. Here are a small selection of those spots which made a generation tell tell their parents that “I Want My MTV”: Read more…
Talk about growth spurts. Close to 900 people crowded into a midtown Manhattan hotel ballroom at last weekend’s Bronycon II, vs. perhaps 1/3 that number at its September predecessor. The new venue – a long corridor and ballroom at NYC’s Hotel Pennsylvania (the fading epitome of 1940’s swank) – might’ve been bigger than the Chinatown loft where the September con was held, but was nonetheless instantly overcrowded. After one made their way past the undermanned registration desk, the next bottleneck to brave was a narrow doorway leading to the ballroom. (When you have dealer’s tables, an autograph line and random attendees all trying to occupy the same space at the time, traffic can’t help but gum up a bit.) Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Jan 5, 2012 in Animation
When I first came across the Bronies my first thought was “this has to be some sort of 4chan scam”. But then I started following them on Google+ and was shocked to see a wealth of amazing humor and a fan culture that in many ways reminded me of shows like Ren and Stimpy in the 90s. Yet I still thought of this as some fringe movement lurking in the dark corners of comic cons — however then I stumbled upon BroNYCon and was blown out of the water! Read more…
This has to be the third or fourth spoof I’ve seen for The Dark Knight Rises trailer, and it’s probably the best one yet. Editor and director, Brad Hansen, decided to sync the audio from the trailer with clips from Disney’s The Lion King. It’s pretty amazing how it all fit together so well. It’s certainly more entertaining than the original trailer, but that’s not too hard to manage.
