Cartoon Network in General

Generally networks want creators to be with them exclusively. If your show proves a hit and the other networks come courting, they want to be sure only they have access to your talent.

"They say I'm old fashioned, and live in the past, but sometimes I think progress progresses too fast."

Well I can't blame Nick for that, but I also can't blame Bartlett for declining.

"That's a to-go order. See! It's already gone!!"

I can echo a lot of issues with both pilots, but these comparisons to Regular Show seem spurious. "[Apple & Onion] would just be a more mundane Regular Show"? So what you're saying is it would be a sitcom?

Bottom's Butte has a similar tone (the creator is a Regular Show writer), but neither one is trying for Regular Show's distinct mundane/bizarre contrast, is a Work Com, or has any real similarities besides having two main characters that are twenty-something friends. Apple & Onion is a late-bloomer Fish out of Water story. Bottom's Butte seems to be something of a Dom Com given the focus on the main character's mom and brother. You can call either one uninspired, but I'm not seeing a resemblance to any specific show.

How? Both main characters are immature, but they aren't lazy or standoffish like Mordecai or Rigby. I guess they're kind of like Pops, but you can say that about any naive adult character.

If I'd compare them to anyone, it's be Darwin and Gumball in the first season of The Amazing World of Gumball—including how they're not very distinct from each other.

People saying this is some sort of poor sign for CN's future are showing some unrealistic expectations and/or nostalgia filter. Pilots are rarely any good—in terms of quality or originality. Look through some of the What a Cartoon! or other CN pilots. Can you honestly say their average quality—in terms of premise or writing—was ever noticeable better than today's? Even the pilots that became shows, and decent ones at that, look way worse in hindsight.

I'm not sure what you mean by "indie" in this case. Both had worked on TV animation before. If you mean "hadn't worked for Cartoon Network specifically before", Dilworth was involved in the initial wave of What a Cartoon!, which was essentially the first Cartoon Network anything.

From what I can gather, it was never common. Discounting ones which started in the initial wave of What a Cartoon! (because, again, there was no Cartoon Network before then) and ones made for Adult Swim, the full list of Cartoon Network-made shows whose creator had never worked on a previous one is (and other networks/studios they'd worked for):

• Ed, Edd n' Eddy (MTV)
• Time Squad
• Megas XLR
• The Life and Times of Juniper Lee
• Camp Lazlo (Nickelodeon)
• My Gym Partner's a Monkey (WB)
• Ben 10 (though Man of Action is a collective, not one person)
• Squirrelboy (USA)
• Class of 3000 (Nickelodeon)
• Robotomy
• The Problem Solverz
• The Amazing World of Gumball
• We Bare Bears (Pixar)

It's completely reasonable to mostly take pilots from writers on your currently-airing shows, especially given how often that will be the first show they work on. I think like half the storyboard artists for Adventure Time and Steven Universe (including Rebecca Sugar) had backgrounds as independent comic book writers instead of animation.

My problem with the pilots isn't that they're bad, though they certainly aren't good, it's that their outlook doesn't really look good. I don't see how Bottom's Butte could work as its own standout show without making some revisions to its, well, vision. Maybe it could work more as a more dramatic look at Bottom's family life? Maybe it could turn down the hypercolors? Especially with Apple and Peanut that, while having better writing, doesn't have a better outlook for where its plot could go. Because it's based around these wild and wacky plots that wouldn't really stick, we're left with a core premise that can't really go anywhere. Romance drama? Forced friendship tensions? More fish out of water scenarios? It just doesn't have anything new to add.

As far so much as the Regular Show comparisons, it's the premise of "two guys and the weird wacky world they inhabit". If they don't share some other qualities of Regular Show it's a merit to Regular Show itself, because unlike these other shows it has a solid foundation to go off. It's a work comedy, so it can reach into plots that would make sense for a work comedy, whether it's catching a movie with friends or slacking off from work or hanging around the place. Then the Regular Show wackiness comes in and puts various spins on these lots, throwing a solid cast of characters with interesting dynamics into them and seeing how they react.

Apple and Onion is a more mundane Regular Show in the sense that it's the "two guys and the weird world they inhabit" without the solid foundation that made Regular Show work, with the overall weirdness of the world turned from an 11 to more of a 6. And Bottom's Butte is incredibly similar stylistically, just without (again) the solid foundation for plots or characters and the mundane/surreal split pushed off into the background. Whether or not that still makes them Regular Show-esques is a bit more of a debatable question, but they're certainly fit in with this current brand of post 2009 CN television shows.

Danny Antonucci and John Dilworth were out of the Hollywood mainstream. Antonucci was in Canada and Dilworth in New York. Plus they'd made two great indie films. Antonucci gave us Lupo the Butcher and Dilworth The Dirdy Birdy.

What A Cartoon at least had variety.

edited 4th May '16 6:19:38 PM by Aldo930

"They say I'm old fashioned, and live in the past, but sometimes I think progress progresses too fast."

When a pilot knocks it out of the park is a bad sign, frankly. That means it's a show that's going to peak early and burn out (like Megas XLR) or a show that's going to wear out it's gimmick very quickly (Regular Show before it Grew the Beard and settled on more character-focused stories).

I always had the same theory about anime, especially short (12-ep) ones. If the first episode kicks ass, then the show often goes in a weird place or wears itself out by the halfway mark or sooner.

In anime, a first episode having great animation also tends to mean the rest of the series will mostly be plagued by QUALITY all around.

Honestly, when it comes right down to it, most pilots suck. A pilot is more about showing where your show can go or setting up the basic premise of the show rather than delving into relatively more interesting things.

@thatother1dude: Wait, when did André 3000 work with Nickelodeon?

Insert witty 'n clever quip here.

By "out of", do mean where they were born, grew up, were educated, or worked before Cartoon Network? CalArts graduates are infamously overrepresented, but it's not like they're all there is. By at least some metric George Gendi (Apple & Onion) is out of London, Minty Lewis (Bottom's Butte) is out of Connecticut, Rebecca Sugar and Ian Jones-Quartey are out of New York (from the exact same college as Dilworth even). As far as "mainstream" goes, New York and Toronto are far from the sticks.

It's extremely common for animators to make short, self-produced films before they have a regular job.

He was the show's co-creator. The other one created and produced a bunch of shows in Nick, though none of them were cartoons.

Ed Edd N Eddy was made in Canada with Canadian voice actors. Courage was done in New York with New York voice actors.

You didn't think they were made in Hollywood, did you?

"They say I'm old fashioned, and live in the past, but sometimes I think progress progresses too fast."

Yeah I remember Courage had VA's that don't really have a track record for much else (They got Jim Cummings like, once though)

Ed Edd N Eddy had a cast that did other things (Ed and Edd's VA probably has done the most work, their IMDB and Wikipedia pages are humongous)

It's not Ogre, It's Never Ogre.

Eddy's VA is retired, from my understanding, but Ed and Edd's VA's dubbed for some animes, I think. A lot of Canadian voice actors dub for anime. Tabitha St. Germain does a lot of anime dubbing and she voices numerous characters in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.

Have you any dreams you'd like to sell?

Lionel Wilson, the original Eustace, had been every voice in Gene Deitch's Tom Terrific back in the 50s.

And Eustace's mother, Billie Lou Watt, was Kimba The White Lion.

"They say I'm old fashioned, and live in the past, but sometimes I think progress progresses too fast."

What about Muriel and Courage's VA's?

Have you any dreams you'd like to sell?

courage's va hasn't really done much else notable besides being in Law and Order.

muriel's va has only one other VA credit for some obscure anime.

I knew Ed Edd N' Eddy was produced by a.k.a. cartoon (Toronto, although the voice acting was done in Vancouver), and Codename: Kids Next Door was Curious Picture (New York, though the voice work is Californian), but I thought Courage was Burbank-produced because Cartoon Network Studios logo was in the credits (though I do remember the different, additional vanity plate that I'm now finding out was for Dilworth's studio).

More to the point, I did not know you meant whole independent production studios, not creators. The "Hollywood mainstream" comment made that part even more confusing, because they could hire an independent studio that's still based in the same area or a remote studio that's owned by the same parent company —the latter is exactly what Cartoon Network Development Studio Europe is.

Wait, didn't Numbah 1's VA do some anime dubbing too? The other members of Sector V were voiced by American voice actors, I know that much.

Have you any dreams you'd like to sell?

Numbuh 1 VA DOES anime/va dubbing yes. He's Joseph in Jojo and Young Xehanort in KH.

I just looked him up. Benjamin Diskin apparently also did VA work for Naruto, Kill La Kill, and Sailor Moon Crystal.

Have you any dreams you'd like to sell?

Ben Diskin does anime dubs now, but didn't start that until years after he'd been a voice actor for American cartoons (he was one voice for Eugene in Hey Arnold). The opposite is more common (e.g. Crispin Freeman, Troy Baker).

Plus most dubs that aren't NYAV Post or in Texas are also done in California. The reason relatively few actors do both, besides requiring different skills, is that English-original voice is usually union, but most anime dubbing is not.

edited 4th May '16 9:03:45 PM by thatother1dude

I'm extremely impressed by actors who do both Anime and Western Animation, because most voice actors who do Western despise doing anime, at least from what I've read

It's not Ogre, It's Never Ogre.

He's also done voices for Spectacular-Spider-Man, Young Justice, Hey Arnold, Avatar, Miraculous Ladybug.

He's actually been doing anime for quite awhile, his first anime was Sailor Moon back in 92. Although the was the only one until 2005 with Naruto.

I'm not so sure about that, I know a ton who do both anime and western animation.

edited 4th May '16 9:19:09 PM by diyedas

"That's a to-go order. See! It's already gone!!"

You're looking at the dates those shows were made, not when he was in them: Ben Diskin was ten in 1992, he's listed on the Sailor Moon cast for the Viz redub that started like a year ago. On Naruto he had a minor role in a filler episode before playing Sai, so that was probably like 2009-2010.

edited 4th May '16 9:36:09 PM by thatother1dude

Oh, shows how much I know about Sailor Moon. Maybe IMDB should take into an account when something dubbed a different year and list it accordingly. That site is terrible with some anime, I mean some people have a thing about needing the anime titles to be in the original Japanese when there are alternate English titles that are actually used a lot with Western fans.

"That's a to-go order. See! It's already gone!!"

All this talk about VA's their work and their locations make me kind of sad. Why?

Well, I kind of want to be a VA myself. I think I have the talent. I've been told by others I have the talent. I want to be able to show my talent. The problem? I basically live in the middle of nowhere. There's really nowhere for me to go to be able to do VA stuff. The closest big city I live to is Atlanta, which is about an hour away, and as far as I know, there's no place of work for VA's there. Which makes me sad.

It's not Ogre, It's Never Ogre.