Talk to the Snail

Fred must be sick.

I’ve been waiting nearly two weeks for him to post a re-cap of the remarkable things Frederator Studios got its mitts into throughout 2005. For some reason, he hasn’t done it. So, I’ll uncharacteristically take the initiative, presenting to you now a few of the things that made this recently passed year such a busy one for us.

It was year of endings, a year of beginnings, and a year of things, er, kind of going on like they did before at some point.

– 2005 saw us - with our primary partners, Nickelodeon - wrap up production of the forty-episode run of the award-winning ChalkZone, created by Larry Huber and Bill Burnett.

– Also wrapping up production was Butch Hartman�s The Fairly OddParents, one of Nick’s most popular cartoons ever. And while the final touches are being put on the original eighty episodes, inside word is that there’s life in Cosmo and Wanda yet.

– As the year came to a close, creator Rob Renzetti was also winding down My Life as a Teenage Robot. There will have been forty episodes in all, and you can still look forward to a chunk of unseen shows on Nick throughout 2006.

– This summer we had the pleasure to produce for Nicktoons the second season of Nextoons: The Nicktoons Film Festival. We received entries from nearly every state in the union (let’s get it together, West Virginia) and from almost as many countries (hats off to you, China and Portugal). (If you thought Nextoons was big in 2005, wait until this summer. - Ed.)

– Former Oh Yeah!/FOP stalwart Bob Boyle kicked off production on his Flash show, Wow, Wow Wubbzy! Being made over with our good friends at Film Roman, this pre-school series is scheduled to hit Nick Jr this summer.

– Speaking of WWW!, our pre-school book series - of which Wubbzy is a major part - kicked into overdrive this year with a very, very big partner in the kids’ book business. Look for these Bolder Books in 2007.

– Thanks to the fine folks at Nickelodeon, we started production on Oh Yeah! Cartoons!, season 4, in July. As I’m sure you know, that’s 39 shorts we’re making for Nick, of which we’ve already chosen about thirty. (That’s more cartoons greenlit for air in 2005 than by Nick, Cartoon Network, and Disney combined. Then doubled.)

– And how can I forget the premiere of Channel Frederator (believe me, I can’t)? The World’s Original Cartoon Podcast debuted in November to the joy of animation lovers, tech-heads, and lunatics worldwide. I hope you fit into one of those categories.

Okay. Enough. My head’s swimming. Maybe Fred’ll muster up the energy to add to this list. In the meantime, just keep in mind as awesome as 2005 was for Frederator, it’ll pale in comparison to what we’ve got brewing for 2006.

Thanks for the support, everyone.