Latest in Animation

Apple’s hit animated musical comedy series Central Park will be back for a third go-round. Series co-creator Loren Bouchard announced the early Season 3 renewal Wednesday on social media. The news comes ahead of the series’ Season 2 premiere. “Seasons 2 and 3 of Central Park mean twenty-nine more episodes, and…

Scoring another record with a local title in Japan, Imax has had its best opening day ever for a film there with Shin Evangelion. Overall, the movie, which is the fourth and final installment in the Rebuild of Evangelion series, grossed nearly 828 million yen ($7.6 million). Of that, the Imax portion was $740,000. The…

EXCLUSIVE: Slam!, a graphic novel series set in the world of all-female roller derby, is being adapted as an animated series for HBO Max. Pamela Ribon, who co-created the comic with Veronica Fish and co-wrote feature films including Moana and Ralph Breaks the Internet, is adapting her book, with WarnerMedia-owned Roost…

EXCLUSIVE: The late Audrey Wells was a prolific screenwriter and director whose work focused on strong female characters, from 2003’s Under the Tuscan Sun and 1999’s Guinevere through to 2018’s The Hate U Give. That trend continued with Over the Moon, Netflix’s animated musical about based on a Chinese myth about a…

When visual effects supervisor Michael Fong and effects supervisor Bill Watral boarded Soul, they were each a bit intimidated, immediately recognizing the film as one of frighteningly novel ambitions. Meditating on the origins of the human personality, Pixar's latest would require them to bring to life characters and…

Pepe Le Pew, the cartoon French skunk whose amorous attentions have chased generations of females, has been targeted by the New York Times. Columnist Charles M. Blow claims in a tweet today that the Looney Tunes character “added to rape culture.” “RW blogs are mad bc I said Pepe Le Pew added to rape culture. Let's…

HBO Max has released a trailer and key art for The Runaway Bunny, an animated special based on the classic children’s book by Margaret Wise Brown. Tracee Ellis Ross narrates and performs an original lullaby by Brown in the special which premieres March 25 on HBO Max. The special also includes songs performed by…

In Disney’s Raya and the Last Dragon, the titular character is strong, resilient, clever, has a strong bond to her community of the world of Kumandra and, above all, hopeful. That said, it’s no wonder that Kelly Marie Tran was chosen to voice the titular heroine. The Vietnamese-American actress emits those qualities…

Nickelodeon has given an official series greenlight to SpongeBob SquarePants spinoff The Patrick Star Show. Nick has ordered 13 episodes of the animated series centered on SpongeBob's best friend Patrick Star, voiced by Bill Fagerbakke. The series hails from the creative team behind the mothership series. Produced by…

During The Great North‘s TCA slot on Wednesday, creators Wendy Molyneux and Lizzie Molyneux-Logelin had a message for networks with new shows in progress: “Pick up those seasons early.” Months before the Molyneux sisters’ Alaska comedy made its debut on Fox in January, the network ordered a sophomore reason, granting…

EXCLUSIVE: Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o is partnering with Nairobi-based media and tech startup Kukua in support of their franchise Super Sema, a new YouTube Originals kids and family program. Super Sema marks Africa's first kid superhero animated series and will debut the first eight episodes on March 8…

Two very different animated features lead the way as the 48th annual Annie Awards nominations were announced today. Disney/Pixar’s Soul and Apple Original Films/Gkids’ Wolfwalkers scored 10 noms apiece ahead of the virtual trophy show on April 16. Read the full list of nominees in 31 categories below. Wolfwalkers, a…