Previously on Cartoon Brew

Animators

Watch John Lasseter’s Raucous CalArts Commencement Speech

John Lasseter, who became a doctor for the second time last week, delivered the commencement speech to this year’s graduating CalArts class. Lasseter’s speech is a cross between a revival meeting and a rock concert, complete with rowdy audience members chiming in, like in this exchange.

Awards

The ASIFA-East Animation Awards Were Classier This Year

The 45th annual ASIFA-East Animation Festival Awards took place last Sunday in Manhattan. The long-running ceremony, which celebrates achievements in East Coast animation, is making an effort to gradually transform its annual ceremony into a more upscale affair.

Advertising

McDonald’s Introduces New Mascot Called Happy [UPDATED]

If Ronald McDonald wasn’t disturbing enough, McDonald’s has unveiled a creepy-looking animated mascot in the United States called Happy. The Happy Meal box-shaped creature has rubber-hose arms, a huge set of realistic chompers, bulging eyballs, and the McDonald’s arches as eyebrows.

Cartoon Brew Pick

‘A Dangerous Journey’ by Ruth Beni

“A Dangerous Journey” (part funded by Comic Relief) warns young African women of the dangers of being coerced and tricked into prostitution by traffickers who use scare tactics perpetrated by native doctors and false promises.

Business

‘Legends of Oz’ Investors, Who Each Paid $100,000, Believe Hollywood Conspiracy Destroyed Film [UPDATED]

Although Greg Centineo, the producer of “Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return,” had hoped for a big second weekend, the film plummeted 48% this weekend and ended up with a sophomore frame of $1.9 million. The movie has struggled to find a fan following, except for the film’s Facebook page which is filled with a curiously large number of middle-aged and elderly people who absolutely adore the film.

Animators

John Lasseter Becomes A Doctor…Again

This evening John Lasseter received an honorary doctorate from his alma mater California Institute of the Arts. He also delivered the commencement address to the graduating class. Five years ago, Lasseter received his first honorary doctorate from Pepperdine University, the school that he dropped out of to attend CalArts. So, does this mean we have to call him Dr.² Lasseter now?

Ideas/Commentary

‘Legends of Oz’ Producer Greg Centineo Knows Why The Film Flopped

Last weekend, “The Legends of Oz: Dorothy’s Return” recorded the worst opening ever for an animated film in more than 2,500 theaters. The film’s exec producer, Greg Centineo, a former Florida coffee shop owner who raised over $100 million from investors to produce this film and its followups, thinks he knows what went wrong.

Advertising

Watch the Banned Danish Election Cartoon ‘Voteman’ (NSFW)

What’s the best way to encourage young people to vote? The Danish parliament (or Folketinget) decided that the answer was an ultra-violent, sex-filled Adult Swim-style cartoon. To encourage young Danes to vote in the upcoming European elections, the Folketinget commissioned a 90-second piece of animation starring a leather-clad dolphin-riding muscleman named Voteman who gets blowjobs from an army of women when he’s not busy decapitating Danish people who don’t vote. The reported budget for the piece was $30,000.

TV

Watch 2 New CN Pilots By ‘Regular Show’ Staffers

Tonight, Cartoon Network quietly released two new pilots that were produced in 2013: “AJ’s Infinite Summer” created by Toby Jones and “Long Live the Royals” by Sean Szeles. Both Jones and Szeles work on “Regular Show”—Jones as a writer/storyboard artist and Szeles as a supervising director/writer/storyboard artist.

Recaps

‘Steven Universe’ Recap: ‘Rose’s Room’

Reading beforehand what this episode was supposed to be about, my mind completely went somewhere else. Steven’s at that age when boys want alone time for a very specific reason and while I was 99.9% sure Cartoon Network wasn’t going to go that far, I thought they’d at least allude to that idea of adolescence and growing up. Instead we dived into the real reason (sort of) that Steven wanted to be left alone, and dug a little deeper into the idea of his parental units via a room and a weird, very strange world created by said room.

Awards

This Sunday in NYC: 45th Annual ASIFA-East Animation Festival Awards Ceremony

There is just one annual animation award in the United States that is older than the Oscars and that’s the ASIFA-East Animation Festival. This year’s ceremony will mark the 45th year in a row that the festival has been presented. It takes place this Sunday, May 18th, at the New School’s newly built Tishman Auditorium (63 5th Avenue in Manhattan).

Cartoon Brew Pick

‘The Begun of Tigtone’ by Andrew Koehler

“The Begun of Tigtone” is a parody of every fantasy convention there is, from movies to games. And the star character of this story is Tigtone, a man whose personality is intentionally modeled after a two-dimnesional, anti-hero cliche. Along his journey, he is challenged by pointless puzzles, preposterously clad goddesses, and generic quest goals. Not even the dialog is safe from skewering, as the fantasy convention of convoluted language is parodied right down to the very title of the story.

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