It’s a Festivus for the rest of us. Marc and Matt get together once again to discuss all the best holiday specials and films to watch this time of year.
Also discussed: Disney’s Frozen, Saving Mr. Banks, Golden Globe nominations, and the trailers for Rio 2 and The Nut Job.
(Recorded on 12/23/13)
It’s a Walt Disney Animation Top Ten episode, so who better to join Marc for this best of list other than Tom Fonss himself. Are any of your favorite films on either of their lists? Maybe… probably. But you can’t know for sure unless you listen.
Also discussed: Doctor Who, Rocky and Bullwinkle returning to the big screen, the 19 films that may or may not get nominated for a Best Animated Feature Oscar, and trailers for The Lego Movie, Maleficent, and Mr. Peabody and Sherman.
(Recorded on 11/24/13)
For the first time on the podcast we’re joined by an employee of DreamWorks Animation! Jessica Forer, a production coordinator at the studio joins us to co-host the entire episode as well as discuss her career.
Amongst things discussed are: Ms. Forer’s love of classic animation, the Mickey Mouse short “Get a Horse!”, and the closure of Pixar Canada.
(Recorded on 10/20/13)
DreamWorks Animation has released a new trailer for its highly anticipated sequel How to Train Your Dragon 2. The trailer is now available on the Awesomeness TV channel on YouTube.
Universal Pictures and Illumination Entertainment’s mega-hit Despicable Me 2 continues to break records. The animated comedy earned $80 million in Blu-ray, DVD, and digital download sales during its first week of availability in the home entertainment market.
The voice cast for the new English language version of The Wind Rises, Studio Ghibli’s latest film and the final animated feature film directed by the legendary Hayao Miyazaki, has been announced.
Author’s Note: We at Animation Fascination are fascinated with all things Big Hero 6, Walt Disney Animation Studios‘ 54th animated motion picture currently in production. We will be regularly publishing articles about the project and about the filmmakers. Today’s article discusses the origins of the project and Marvel’s involvement.
When The Walt Disney Company acquired Marvel in 2009, speculation ran rampant about what Marvel property would be the first to receive the full Disney animated treatment. It took almost four years for an announcement to come and it turned out to be a bit of a doozy. The first collaboration between Walt Disney Animation Studios and Marvel is an obscure comic title from the Marvel archives called Big Hero 6. Now, the film has been introduced to the public, is currently in production, and has an official release date—November 7, 2014.
Blue Sky Studios and 20th Century Fox keep cranking out the trailers for their upcoming animated feature Rio 2. This new trailer divulges a bit more of plot as well as showing additional character designs.
For the weekend of December 13-15, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug was the big winner at the U.S. box office, pulling in an estimated $73.7 million. While the weekend take was impressive for Smaug, Box Office Mojo reports that the films earnings were still 13 percent lower than the first film in Peter Jackson’s latest Middle Earth trilogy, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
Fifteen years ago, Disney was shown again that they aren’t the only animation company capable of captivating audiences with award-winning music, story and design. The Prince of Egypt was DreamWorks’ first hand-drawn film and follows the story of Moses as told in Exodus of the Bible. The film was critically acclaimed and enjoyed fantastic box office numbers, being the second non-Disney animated film to top $100 million (the first was [drumroll, wait for it] The Rugrats Movie). Its numbers wouldn’t be matched by a non-Disney film until The Simpsons Movie in 1997.
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