Although he wrote them in 1859, Charles Dickens might have been thinking of animation in 2023 when he penned the celebrated lines, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us…”
Although the worst of the COVID pandemic had passed, the animation industry, like the entertainment industry in general, faced uncertainty about releasing strategies and box office earnings. Some films scored record-breaking successes in America and Japan, and earned critical raves. But there were also stunning critical and financial flops. Viewers returned to theaters in droves for Super Mario Bros. Movie and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, but they ignored Ruby Gillman: Teen-Age Kraken and The Amazing Maurice. The prolonged strikes by the Screen Writers Guild and SAG/AFTRA halted production for months; many animation artists joining the picket lines in solidarity. The future role of AI hung over the industry like a malign specter.
Looking over a year that see-sawed between Light and Darkness, I’m presenting the 11th annual awards for the year’s best and worst, named for the ultimate animation APM, Mikiko “Kuromi” Oguro.
“Suzume”
SEASON OF LIGHT
Wabbit Season/Duck Season/Awards Season
Makoto Shinkai’s Suzume was accepted in competition for the Berlin International Film Festival. The last anime feature to screen there was Miyazaki’s Spirited Away (2002), which won.
The New York Critics Circle kicked off the 2023 awards season by naming The Boy and the Heron the best animated feature of the year.
The Critics’ Circle (U.K.) proved much more accepting of anime in their nominations: In adding an animated film category (The Boy and the Heron, Suzume, Teen-Age Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, Robot Dreams, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse), Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron was nominated for Foreign Language Film. Sound designer Koji Kasamatsu received a nomination for Technical Achievement for The First Slam Dunk.
Pablo Berger’s Robot Dreams won the Animation Film Prize at the 36th European Film Awards. Chicken for Linda by Chiara Malta and Sébastien Laudenbach won at Animation Is Film.
After years of ignoring anime, the renascent Golden Globes nominated two Japanese films for animated feature: The Boy and the Heron and Suzume. Joe Hisaishi was also nominated for score for The Boy and the Heron. (Last year, Masaaki Yuasa’s Inu-Oh became the second anime feature to be nominated for a Globe, following Mamoru Hosoda’s Mirai in 2017.)
Pixar’s ELEMENTAL
All The Way To The Bank
Buoyed by the success of the franchise hits One Piece Film Red and The First Slam Dunk, Toei announced in January it had broken records with a total box office for 2022 of ¥32,563,660,570 (about $246 million US), almost doubling its previous high of JP¥17.98 billion in 2009.
Universal/Illumination’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie had the biggest opening of an animated movie of all time, with an estimated $204 million domestic and $377.5 million worldwide during its first five days. It also scored the highest second weekend tally for any animated film, passing the $1 billion mark its fourth weekend. It finished at the #2 domestic Box Office spot for the year with $574,934,300. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse was #3 with $381,311,319.
In June, pundits lamented that Elemental had scored one of the worst openings of a Pixar movie to date: $33.5 million in 4,035 theaters. The film remained stubbornly in the top ten in the US and did well overseas. It finished at #16 for the year at $154,426,697.
Hayao Miyazaki’s Kimitachi wa Do Ikiru Ka? (“How Do You Live?”), which was released in English as The Boy and the Heron, opened to good business and favorable reviews in Japan, despite—or due to–producer Toshio Suzuki’s decision not release trailers or mount a PR campaign. He said that too often, pre-release material showed too much of the story, spoiling the film for audiences. The film opened in IMAX, earning ¥2.14 billion (about $14 million US). It set a record for a Ghibli film in the US—and for distributor GKIDS–when it opened in first place the weekend of Dec. 8th at $10.4 million. It was the first 2D animated feature to top the box office since The Princess and the Frog in 2009.
The Boy and The Herron
Wait, There’s More
Nimona introduced Ballistir Blackheart, arguably the first real gay character in an American animated feature.
In October came the surprising announcement that Skydance would end its multi-picture deal with Apple—after producing only the dismal Luck—and would move to Netflix. Their line up includes Vicky Jenson’s Spellbound, Nathan Greno’s Pookoo, Brad Bird’s long-awaited Ray Gunn and a Jack and a “Beanstalk” film from Rich Moore.
In November, Skybound announced the re-introduction of three versions of the old Mike and Spike festivals.
Steven Spielberg donated his collection of original animation art from 1932-1952 to the Margaret Herrick Library of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in June. The collection includes important cels and cel-background set-up from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, classic Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny shorts, etc. ASIFA/ Hollywood spearheaded the fundraising effort to have the artworks curated and preserved.
The Nightmare Before Christmas and Lady and the Tramp were added to the National Film Registry.
In December at the Jump Festa 2024, Netflix announced a remake of Eiichiro Oda’s record-breaking One Piece, beginning with the “East Blue” saga. The One Piece will be produced by WIT Studio, known for Spy X Family and the first three season of Attack on Titan. The series will be streamed worldwide exclusively on Netflix; a premiere date has yet to be announced. Netflix also scored a big hit with their live action adaptation of One Piece; their violent live-action Yu Yu Hakusho received much less attention.
Ave Atque Vale (Hail and Farewell)
Ed Asner gave his last performance in Bob Peterson’s short Carl’s Date, which reunited Carl and Dug from Up. Asner left with dignity, as opposed to Christopher Plummer’s unfortunate turn in Heroes of the Golden Mask—the worst finale for a major star since Orson Wells’ performance in 1986’s Transformers: The Movie.
Reserve Tickets Now!
In February, Guillermo del Toro announced plans for a stop-motion feature based on the novel The Buried Giant by Nobel Prize-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro. At Annecy in June, Del Toro said he intends to shift his primary focus from live action to stop-motion: “Stop-motion in my opinion is the most beautiful form of animation because it’s the most intimate. There is always a strong connection between the animator and the physical model, It’s the closest thing to playing with your toys.” He concluded, “My dad was boring. I was boring. Everybody in my family was boring. We had no one-liners. We’re all fucked up. That’s what I want to see animated. I would love to see real life in animation. I actually think it’s urgent to see real life in animation.”
Disney’s “Phineas and Ferb”
Set The TiVo Now!
Jeff “Swampy” Marsh and Dan Povenmire signed a deal to create new episodes of their award-winning Phineas and Ferb show.
More Than Animation
The Annecy Festival and MIFA announced plans to reduce their carbon footprint, including reducing and recycling waste and providing food responsibly.
In August, Family Guy and American Dad! creator Seth MacFarlane donated $1 million to The Entertainment Community Fund to provide financial assistance to entertainment industry workers during the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes.
Testify!
“Anybody who works in filmmaking, I feel they’re my peers. I don’t think they look at me the same way… We put as much hard work into our films as any live-action filmmaker, but unfortunately, that’s not how it’s perceived. “—Sergio Pablos
“Animation is cinema. Animation is not a genre, and animation is ready to be taken to the next step. We are all ready for it. Please help us — keep animation in the conversation.”—Guillermo Del Toro
SEASON OF DARKNESS
Erasure
During the Oscar broadcast, a tribute to Warner Bros.’ 100th anniversary included not a frame of animation, not even a still of Bugs Bunny. Disney’s anniversary minute was a shameless plug for the live action re-make of The Little Mermaid.
Attn: Warner Bros. – This is Bugs Bunny
As 2023 began, HBO Max dumped 256 classic Warner Bros shorts from its service. The 1950-and-after films included many of the best work of Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng and Robert McKimson, What’s Opera, Doc? Knighty-Knight Bugs, Duck Amuck and One Froggy Evening among them.
In November, Warner Bros. shelved the completed Coyote Vs. Acme for a tax write-off. They used the same strategy to kill Scoob! Holiday Haunt last year. Stung by the vitriolic response, WB management announced a few days later that the filmmakers could shop the film to other studios to release. Texas Representative Joaquin Castro posted a call on social media for the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission to review the matter, saying the “…tactic of scrapping fully made films for tax breaks is predatory and anti-competitive.”
All The Way To The Bank—In Tears
In April, Deadline reported that two Disney animated features were the #1 and #3 box office bombs of 2022. Strange World topped the list with an estimated loss of $197.4 million; Lightyear was #3 at $106 million.
In July, the uninspired Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken chalked up the worst opening weekend for any DreamWorks feature at $5.5 million. It played in 3,400 theaters, earning a meagre $1,617 per screen.
Viva Pictures’ The Amazing Maurice bombed at the US box office, earning only $1 million in 1,694 theaters in early February.
Disney’s “Wish”
Disney’s Wish opened Thanksgiving weekend to a dismal 50% on Rotten Tomatoes: It was outscored by Trolls Band Together 64% and The Boy and the Heron at 97%. Wish‘s $31.7 million take at the box office for the holiday weekend, put it at #3, behind Hunger Games: Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes and Napoleon. It failed to follow the slow-but-steady model of Elemental, dropping 62% its second week to $7.4 million–5th place, behind Trolls—but at least its two-week domestic gross of $41.7 million passed 2022’s Strange World, which earned only $37.9 million in its domestic run.
Velma, a “radical working” of the Scooby Doo character, opened at 53% on Rotten Tomatoes—and a 7% audience score.
Quick, Gromit, To The Chemistry Lab!
Newclay Products, the maker of the plasticine used in the Aardman films, closed. Aardman bought all the remaining stock and published a notice stating that A) they had plenty on hand and B) they were already arranging for a new supplier. The story was reported in the Telegraph and the New York Times.
There Are Bad Times Just Around The Corner
In February, Mattel announced plans to reboot the Barney franchise with a new animated series and, of course, scads of products for kids—and adults.
In February, Walt Disney Co.’s CEO Bob Iger announced plans for 7,000 layoffs—and sequels to Toy Story, Frozen and Zootopia. In November, Iger added at a press event in Hong Kong Disneyland, “Frozen 3 is in the works, and there might be a Frozen 4 in the works, too. But I don’t have much to say about those films right now. But Jenn Lee, who created Frozen, the original Frozen and Frozen 2, is hard at work with her team at Disney Animation on not one but actually two stories.”
“Frozen 2”
Iger later defended the Disney’s plans to make more sequels: “I think I don’t want to apologize for making sequels. Some of them have done extraordinarily well. And they’ve been good films too. I think there has to be a reason to make it, beyond commerce. You have to have a good story. And we have made too many. That doesn’t mean we’re not going to continue to make them.”
Dean Fleischer Camp, director of the inane Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, will direct the live action remake of Lilo and Stitch.
The trailer for Mark Dindal’s The Garfield Movie dropped in November. Has anyone really missed the character whose popularity peaked decades ago—long after the strip ceased to be funny?
Amid the brouhaha over Coyote Vs. Acme, Warner Bros. announced plans to use AI for an animated biopic of the beloved French chanteuse Edith Piaf—who died in 1963.
Thieves Among Honors
In February, Cartoon Brew reported that Bulgarian filmmaker Svilen Dimitrov’s 2012 short Rew Day was screening at festivals under the name Friday, with Iranian Ramtin Serajpour credited as the director. Serajpour subsequently removed images of himself holding a prize for Rew Day from LinkedIn and Instagram. Two months earlier, they had reported Natalia Chernysheva’s award-winning 2012 short Snowflake (2012) had been shown at festivals with a new name, new credits, and new director attached.
In March, reports surfaced of gangs of hooligans starting brawls in Russia. The teen-agers wore black clothes with designs of spiders, the symbol of Genei Ryodan, a villain in the series Hunter X Hunter. A Kremlin spokesman said the Russian government is monitoring the situation. A member of the Duma called for an investigation to see if “unfriendly countries” are behind the group.
“Boy And Dog”
It’s Artificial, But Is It Intelligence?
In February, Netflix Japan released the short Dog and Boy with backgrounds done using AI software. The studio claimed the use of AI was to compensate for the labor shortage in the anime industry. Complaints quickly arose, as there is no real labor shortage. Critics linked Netflix’s AI to ongoing problems with the underpayment of animation workers. Others noted that use of AI was unethical, as the databases take imagery from the Web without paying or crediting the artists.
At a Bloomberg New Economy panel in Singapore in November, Jeffrey Katzenberg said, AI would cut animation production time and labor by 90%: “In the good old days, when I made an animated movie, it took 500 artists five years to make a world-class animated movie. I think it won’t take 10% of that. Literally, I don’t think it will take 10% of that three years from now.”
How many executives will AI replace?
The Bigotry Agenda
Actor Jay Johnson was arrested in June and charged with felony obstruction of police officers in conjunction with his conduct during the January 6 insurrection. Johnson had worked on Bob’s Burgers but was dropped form the show in 2021, after he was accused of participating in the riot.
The Florida Department of Education launched an investigation in May after Jenna Barbee, a first-year teacher at Winding Waters School in Hernando County, showed her fifth-grade students Disney’s Strange World during a break from standardized testing. A complaint was filed by Shannon Rodriguez, a parent, and a member of both the local school board and the right-wing “Moms for Liberty”.
And…
Finally, to this writer for being curmudgeonly above and beyond the call of duty at times.
Internationally known animation historian and critic, Charles Solomon has written over 15 books books including Enchanted Drawings: The History Of Animation, The Art of Disney's Frozen,The Making of Peanuts Animation, and Tale as Old as Time: The Art and Making of Disney Beauty and the Beast .
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Charles Solomon’s Animation Year End Review 2023
Although he wrote them in 1859, Charles Dickens might have been thinking of animation in 2023 when he penned the celebrated lines, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us…”
Although the worst of the COVID pandemic had passed, the animation industry, like the entertainment industry in general, faced uncertainty about releasing strategies and box office earnings. Some films scored record-breaking successes in America and Japan, and earned critical raves. But there were also stunning critical and financial flops. Viewers returned to theaters in droves for Super Mario Bros. Movie and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, but they ignored Ruby Gillman: Teen-Age Kraken and The Amazing Maurice. The prolonged strikes by the Screen Writers Guild and SAG/AFTRA halted production for months; many animation artists joining the picket lines in solidarity. The future role of AI hung over the industry like a malign specter.
Looking over a year that see-sawed between Light and Darkness, I’m presenting the 11th annual awards for the year’s best and worst, named for the ultimate animation APM, Mikiko “Kuromi” Oguro.
“Suzume”
SEASON OF LIGHT
Wabbit Season/Duck Season/Awards Season
Makoto Shinkai’s Suzume was accepted in competition for the Berlin International Film Festival. The last anime feature to screen there was Miyazaki’s Spirited Away (2002), which won.
The New York Critics Circle kicked off the 2023 awards season by naming The Boy and the Heron the best animated feature of the year.
The Critics’ Circle (U.K.) proved much more accepting of anime in their nominations: In adding an animated film category (The Boy and the Heron, Suzume, Teen-Age Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, Robot Dreams, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse), Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron was nominated for Foreign Language Film. Sound designer Koji Kasamatsu received a nomination for Technical Achievement for The First Slam Dunk.
Pablo Berger’s Robot Dreams won the Animation Film Prize at the 36th European Film Awards. Chicken for Linda by Chiara Malta and Sébastien Laudenbach won at Animation Is Film.
After years of ignoring anime, the renascent Golden Globes nominated two Japanese films for animated feature: The Boy and the Heron and Suzume. Joe Hisaishi was also nominated for score for The Boy and the Heron. (Last year, Masaaki Yuasa’s Inu-Oh became the second anime feature to be nominated for a Globe, following Mamoru Hosoda’s Mirai in 2017.)
Pixar’s ELEMENTAL
All The Way To The Bank
Buoyed by the success of the franchise hits One Piece Film Red and The First Slam Dunk, Toei announced in January it had broken records with a total box office for 2022 of ¥32,563,660,570 (about $246 million US), almost doubling its previous high of JP¥17.98 billion in 2009.
Universal/Illumination’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie had the biggest opening of an animated movie of all time, with an estimated $204 million domestic and $377.5 million worldwide during its first five days. It also scored the highest second weekend tally for any animated film, passing the $1 billion mark its fourth weekend. It finished at the #2 domestic Box Office spot for the year with $574,934,300. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse was #3 with $381,311,319.
In June, pundits lamented that Elemental had scored one of the worst openings of a Pixar movie to date: $33.5 million in 4,035 theaters. The film remained stubbornly in the top ten in the US and did well overseas. It finished at #16 for the year at $154,426,697.
Hayao Miyazaki’s Kimitachi wa Do Ikiru Ka? (“How Do You Live?”), which was released in English as The Boy and the Heron, opened to good business and favorable reviews in Japan, despite—or due to–producer Toshio Suzuki’s decision not release trailers or mount a PR campaign. He said that too often, pre-release material showed too much of the story, spoiling the film for audiences. The film opened in IMAX, earning ¥2.14 billion (about $14 million US). It set a record for a Ghibli film in the US—and for distributor GKIDS–when it opened in first place the weekend of Dec. 8th at $10.4 million. It was the first 2D animated feature to top the box office since The Princess and the Frog in 2009.
The Boy and The Herron
Wait, There’s More
Nimona introduced Ballistir Blackheart, arguably the first real gay character in an American animated feature.
In October came the surprising announcement that Skydance would end its multi-picture deal with Apple—after producing only the dismal Luck—and would move to Netflix. Their line up includes Vicky Jenson’s Spellbound, Nathan Greno’s Pookoo, Brad Bird’s long-awaited Ray Gunn and a Jack and a “Beanstalk” film from Rich Moore.
In November, Skybound announced the re-introduction of three versions of the old Mike and Spike festivals.
Steven Spielberg donated his collection of original animation art from 1932-1952 to the Margaret Herrick Library of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in June. The collection includes important cels and cel-background set-up from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, classic Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny shorts, etc. ASIFA/ Hollywood spearheaded the fundraising effort to have the artworks curated and preserved.
The Nightmare Before Christmas and Lady and the Tramp were added to the National Film Registry.
In December at the Jump Festa 2024, Netflix announced a remake of Eiichiro Oda’s record-breaking One Piece, beginning with the “East Blue” saga. The One Piece will be produced by WIT Studio, known for Spy X Family and the first three season of Attack on Titan. The series will be streamed worldwide exclusively on Netflix; a premiere date has yet to be announced. Netflix also scored a big hit with their live action adaptation of One Piece; their violent live-action Yu Yu Hakusho received much less attention.
Ave Atque Vale (Hail and Farewell)
Ed Asner gave his last performance in Bob Peterson’s short Carl’s Date, which reunited Carl and Dug from Up. Asner left with dignity, as opposed to Christopher Plummer’s unfortunate turn in Heroes of the Golden Mask—the worst finale for a major star since Orson Wells’ performance in 1986’s Transformers: The Movie.
Reserve Tickets Now!
In February, Guillermo del Toro announced plans for a stop-motion feature based on the novel The Buried Giant by Nobel Prize-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro. At Annecy in June, Del Toro said he intends to shift his primary focus from live action to stop-motion: “Stop-motion in my opinion is the most beautiful form of animation because it’s the most intimate. There is always a strong connection between the animator and the physical model, It’s the closest thing to playing with your toys.” He concluded, “My dad was boring. I was boring. Everybody in my family was boring. We had no one-liners. We’re all fucked up. That’s what I want to see animated. I would love to see real life in animation. I actually think it’s urgent to see real life in animation.”
Disney’s “Phineas and Ferb”
Set The TiVo Now!
Jeff “Swampy” Marsh and Dan Povenmire signed a deal to create new episodes of their award-winning Phineas and Ferb show.
More Than Animation
The Annecy Festival and MIFA announced plans to reduce their carbon footprint, including reducing and recycling waste and providing food responsibly.
In August, Family Guy and American Dad! creator Seth MacFarlane donated $1 million to The Entertainment Community Fund to provide financial assistance to entertainment industry workers during the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes.
Testify!
“Anybody who works in filmmaking, I feel they’re my peers. I don’t think they look at me the same way… We put as much hard work into our films as any live-action filmmaker, but unfortunately, that’s not how it’s perceived. “—Sergio Pablos
“Animation is cinema. Animation is not a genre, and animation is ready to be taken to the next step. We are all ready for it. Please help us — keep animation in the conversation.”—Guillermo Del Toro
SEASON OF DARKNESS
Erasure
During the Oscar broadcast, a tribute to Warner Bros.’ 100th anniversary included not a frame of animation, not even a still of Bugs Bunny. Disney’s anniversary minute was a shameless plug for the live action re-make of The Little Mermaid.
Attn: Warner Bros. – This is Bugs Bunny
As 2023 began, HBO Max dumped 256 classic Warner Bros shorts from its service. The 1950-and-after films included many of the best work of Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng and Robert McKimson, What’s Opera, Doc? Knighty-Knight Bugs, Duck Amuck and One Froggy Evening among them.
In November, Warner Bros. shelved the completed Coyote Vs. Acme for a tax write-off. They used the same strategy to kill Scoob! Holiday Haunt last year. Stung by the vitriolic response, WB management announced a few days later that the filmmakers could shop the film to other studios to release. Texas Representative Joaquin Castro posted a call on social media for the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission to review the matter, saying the “…tactic of scrapping fully made films for tax breaks is predatory and anti-competitive.”
All The Way To The Bank—In Tears
In April, Deadline reported that two Disney animated features were the #1 and #3 box office bombs of 2022. Strange World topped the list with an estimated loss of $197.4 million; Lightyear was #3 at $106 million.
In July, the uninspired Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken chalked up the worst opening weekend for any DreamWorks feature at $5.5 million. It played in 3,400 theaters, earning a meagre $1,617 per screen.
Viva Pictures’ The Amazing Maurice bombed at the US box office, earning only $1 million in 1,694 theaters in early February.
Disney’s “Wish”
Disney’s Wish opened Thanksgiving weekend to a dismal 50% on Rotten Tomatoes: It was outscored by Trolls Band Together 64% and The Boy and the Heron at 97%. Wish‘s $31.7 million take at the box office for the holiday weekend, put it at #3, behind Hunger Games: Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes and Napoleon. It failed to follow the slow-but-steady model of Elemental, dropping 62% its second week to $7.4 million–5th place, behind Trolls—but at least its two-week domestic gross of $41.7 million passed 2022’s Strange World, which earned only $37.9 million in its domestic run.
Velma, a “radical working” of the Scooby Doo character, opened at 53% on Rotten Tomatoes—and a 7% audience score.
Quick, Gromit, To The Chemistry Lab!
Newclay Products, the maker of the plasticine used in the Aardman films, closed. Aardman bought all the remaining stock and published a notice stating that A) they had plenty on hand and B) they were already arranging for a new supplier. The story was reported in the Telegraph and the New York Times.
There Are Bad Times Just Around The Corner
In February, Mattel announced plans to reboot the Barney franchise with a new animated series and, of course, scads of products for kids—and adults.
In February, Walt Disney Co.’s CEO Bob Iger announced plans for 7,000 layoffs—and sequels to Toy Story, Frozen and Zootopia. In November, Iger added at a press event in Hong Kong Disneyland, “Frozen 3 is in the works, and there might be a Frozen 4 in the works, too. But I don’t have much to say about those films right now. But Jenn Lee, who created Frozen, the original Frozen and Frozen 2, is hard at work with her team at Disney Animation on not one but actually two stories.”
“Frozen 2”
Iger later defended the Disney’s plans to make more sequels: “I think I don’t want to apologize for making sequels. Some of them have done extraordinarily well. And they’ve been good films too. I think there has to be a reason to make it, beyond commerce. You have to have a good story. And we have made too many. That doesn’t mean we’re not going to continue to make them.”
Dean Fleischer Camp, director of the inane Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, will direct the live action remake of Lilo and Stitch.
The trailer for Mark Dindal’s The Garfield Movie dropped in November. Has anyone really missed the character whose popularity peaked decades ago—long after the strip ceased to be funny?
Amid the brouhaha over Coyote Vs. Acme, Warner Bros. announced plans to use AI for an animated biopic of the beloved French chanteuse Edith Piaf—who died in 1963.
Thieves Among Honors
In February, Cartoon Brew reported that Bulgarian filmmaker Svilen Dimitrov’s 2012 short Rew Day was screening at festivals under the name Friday, with Iranian Ramtin Serajpour credited as the director. Serajpour subsequently removed images of himself holding a prize for Rew Day from LinkedIn and Instagram. Two months earlier, they had reported Natalia Chernysheva’s award-winning 2012 short Snowflake (2012) had been shown at festivals with a new name, new credits, and new director attached.
In March, reports surfaced of gangs of hooligans starting brawls in Russia. The teen-agers wore black clothes with designs of spiders, the symbol of Genei Ryodan, a villain in the series Hunter X Hunter. A Kremlin spokesman said the Russian government is monitoring the situation. A member of the Duma called for an investigation to see if “unfriendly countries” are behind the group.
“Boy And Dog”
It’s Artificial, But Is It Intelligence?
In February, Netflix Japan released the short Dog and Boy with backgrounds done using AI software. The studio claimed the use of AI was to compensate for the labor shortage in the anime industry. Complaints quickly arose, as there is no real labor shortage. Critics linked Netflix’s AI to ongoing problems with the underpayment of animation workers. Others noted that use of AI was unethical, as the databases take imagery from the Web without paying or crediting the artists.
At a Bloomberg New Economy panel in Singapore in November, Jeffrey Katzenberg said, AI would cut animation production time and labor by 90%: “In the good old days, when I made an animated movie, it took 500 artists five years to make a world-class animated movie. I think it won’t take 10% of that. Literally, I don’t think it will take 10% of that three years from now.”
How many executives will AI replace?
The Bigotry Agenda
Actor Jay Johnson was arrested in June and charged with felony obstruction of police officers in conjunction with his conduct during the January 6 insurrection. Johnson had worked on Bob’s Burgers but was dropped form the show in 2021, after he was accused of participating in the riot.
The Florida Department of Education launched an investigation in May after Jenna Barbee, a first-year teacher at Winding Waters School in Hernando County, showed her fifth-grade students Disney’s Strange World during a break from standardized testing. A complaint was filed by Shannon Rodriguez, a parent, and a member of both the local school board and the right-wing “Moms for Liberty”.
And…
Finally, to this writer for being curmudgeonly above and beyond the call of duty at times.