The April 13 Cartoon Network Walk-around

Today's studio visit by Yours Truly was at Cartoon Network, high in the sunlit uplands of Burbank, California... CN has enjoyed a red-hot run of late. After a stretch where the studio was relying on a lot of old stalwarts ("Power Puff Girls", "Johnny Bravo," etc.), the Network is on a tear. Shows currently in production include "Squirrel Boy," "Ben 10" (#1 in its time slot), "My Gym Partner's a Monkey," "Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy," "Camp Lazlo," "Class of 3000," "Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends," and "The Life & Times of Juniper Lee." "Juniper Lee" is wrapping its third season, but its prospects for a fourth are currently up in the air. "Lee's" creator Judd Winick recently returned from Atlanta headquarters and told the crew that the execs in Georgia want to wait and look at rating numbers before ordering a new batch of shows -- which means that the board artists, designers, layout and background artists will most likely be looking for new work as they roll off the final episodes. "Nobody," one of the artists told me, "can hang around and wait until the big boys decide. They won't okay new shows before August, and I don't think many of us can wait that long..." Elsewhere in the CN universe, a shorts program is being launched under the watchful eye of Craig McCracken. The plan is to do theatrical shorts and pieces for cell phones (isn't everybody?). Some of the shorts on tap are "Korgoth the Barbarian," "Flapjack," and "Life in Wackamo." If the results are slam-bang, some or all of it will likely end up as CN series.