Friday, January 09, 2009

Green Light

This morning, when I was out running around, Nickelodeon released this happy news:

Nickelodeon has greenlit 26 additional episodes of ... The Penguins of Madagascar, a co-production with DreamWorks Animation SKG, Inc. it was announced today ....

This news has already been batted around the internets, so I'm late to the party. But I'm happy for the sizable number of artists and c.g. folks who are working on this project at the Burbank studio. It means that, in one corner of Animationland, there will be longer-term employment.

Fifty-two half-hours is mothing to sneeze at. But Nick andDreamWorks Animation knew a good thing when they see it.

Nickelodeon's recent "sneak peeks" of the new series, which premiered over Thanksgiving weekend, drew an average of 14 million viewers (persons 2+, Nov. 28-30), including 7.2 million Kids 2-11.

Fourteen million is a nice round number. With those kinds of totals, you bet your Scooby-Doo lava lamp the cartoon companies were going to add another 26 installments to the original order. And may there be another 26 episodes beyond the 52.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

There's no doubt the show got looked at. But it still reeked. Some of the worse "comedy" I've ever seen in a cartoon, and that's factoring in The Fairly Oddparents!

Steve Hulett said...

Fairly Oddparents is an interesting point of comparison, since it's one of Nick's biggest and most enduring hits.

Which I like.

Anonymous said...

Britney Spears has also proven to be an enduring star. That doesn't automatically mean her "music" is of the highest quality.
The same can be said of the grating, and tedious "humor" of The Fairly OddParents

Anonymous said...

Nick is in the business of doing hit shows, not creating high art. You may not like Fairly Odd Parents nor Penguins, but the viewing public doesn't share your disdain. And THAT is all Nick cares about.

Yeah, it's great when you can do shows that are both critical and ratings hits, that both the target demographic and cynical animators can love, but at the end of the day its the hit shows that keep this business, and our livelihoods, going.

Anonymous said...

Isn't post one more of a Cartoon Brew thought?

Anonymous said...

spongebob is brilliant, and has made more maoney that all of their other shows combined. I think we are just using it as the measuring stick ehre - and "Fairly Oddparents" and their other shows don't measure up.

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