BC Battlers

Producer: London, England-based Kickback Media and One31 Media

Premise: With their polluted planet on the verge of self-destructing, two races – telepathic humanoids and chromed dinosaurs called Battlers – join forces and embark on an intergalactic space odyssey in search of a new home. But their quest is marred by the appearance of villain Caledon, who has trailed them from Jura in order to wipe them out. Kickback Media managing director John Bullivant is overseeing development of the series (based on an original concept from Vision 3 Productions) for rights holder One31 Media. Battlers marks Kickback and One31’s first foray into the boys action realm. To help build awareness for the property, British toyco Impact International began shipping a Battlers RC toy in the U.K. last month.

Style: 2-D animation

Format: 52 x 26 minutes

Demo: six to 11

Budget: US$300,000 per episode

Status: In development, with Kickback looking for additional partners

Delivery: Q3 2005

Mia, Cool Hunter

Producers: London, England-based Lupus Films

Premise: For its first-ever tween girl series, Lupus Films will be catering heavily to the demo’s interest in all things couture-related. A student by day at the Fashion Academy, super-hip teen Mia works as an undercover cool-hunter for a mysterious benefactor, who also owns a chic overseas-based fashion label. Each episode begins with Mia receiving an e-mail or text message from her patron providing details on her next cool-hunting mission. With the help of her adoptive father (the flamboyant professor Lamm, who also teaches at the academy) and computer nerd pal Clive, Mia fulfills her role of trendspotter, whether it’s picking out the latest high-tech gadget in Japan or traveling to Alaska to find out about the latest winter look. Juggling work with school and friendships is no easy task for Mia, who must be ever-wary of rivals like the Barton sisters, who run the academy and would like nothing better than to take her down a peg or two.

Style: Flash animation

Format: 26 x 11 minutes

Demo: nine to 13

Budget: US$3.82 million

Status: In development

Delivery: early 2005

Monster Allergy

Producer: Italy’s Rainbow

Premise: This comedy/action toon centers around the adventures of 10-year-old Zick, an everyboy who is blessed/cursed with the ability to see a world of monsters that’s invisible to humans. As a master monster tamer, Zick is charged with rounding up and neutralizing the monsters, which, though harmless, can still cause havoc in the real world. Zick’s powers also enable him to see ghosts (including his grandparents) who carry on with the same mundane tasks that occupied their corporeal lives, like waiting in line for the bus or ordering cappuccinos. Monster Allergy is based on the same-name Éditions Soleil comic book series that debuted in France last April and will be available in the rest of Europe this fall.

Style: 2-D animation

Format: 26 x half hours

Demo: six to 11

Budget: US$270,000 per ep

Status: In development, with Rainbow looking for partners

Delivery: Q1 2005

Charlie & Lola

Producer: London, England-based Tiger Aspect

Premise: With tween-targeted Mr. Bean The Animated Series already in its stable of TV properties, Tiger Aspect has opted to skew its latest animated offering younger. Adapted from the same-name book series by Lauren Child, Charlie & Lola delves into the everyday musings of a seven-year-old boy and his four-year-old sister. Most episodes will find Charlie trying to come up with clever ways to convince Lola to do what’s right, such as attending school or going to bed on time. To remain faithful to Child’s books, which are told from a young child’s perspective, Tiger Aspect will use real children to voice the series and employ a mixture of animated styles, including 2-D cel animation, paper cut-outs, fabric designs, photo montages and archival footage.

Style: Mixed-media

Format: 26 x 10 minutes

Demo: preschool

Budget: US$140,000 per ep

Status: Looking for financing and distributors

Delivery: 2005

Future is Wild

Producers: Toronto, Canada’s Nelvana

Premise: Based on a same-name doc from John Adams Television and Big Rock Productions that imagines how animals might evolve in several millennia, this sci-fi/adventure series tracks the endeavors of a group of time-traveling kids who get stuck 200 million years in the future. In each episode, Ethan, Emily and Luis try to adapt to their new environment and co-exist with the gnarly-looking animals they encounter, like the Deathgleaner (a massive bat with a four-foot wingspan) and Flish (a part bird, part fish species with projectile jaws). Although the kids want to get home, they are committed to documenting the future and its inhabitants from their time machine/vehicle, which was given to them by a mysterious person from the future.

Style: 2-D and 3-D animation

Format: 26 x half hours

Demo: six to 11

Budget: US$250,000 to US$350,000 per ep

Status: In development

Delivery: Fall 2005

The Mildudes

Producer: L.A.’s Animax

Premise: When the fridge door closes, the Mildudes – a clan of rotting fruit, vegetables and other perishable foods – come to life and get up to all kinds of capers. Though they’re way past their best-before dates, the dudes find ingenious ways of preventing Al, the messy owner of their refrigerator home, from trashing them or, worse yet, throwing them into the fry pan. Promising heaping helpings of gross-out humor, Mildudes will feature the voice talents of Tom Kenney (who does SpongeBob SquarePants) and Animax creative director and SCTV alum Dave Thomas.

Style: Flash and 2-D animation

Format: 13 x half hours

Demo: seven to 11

Budget: US$290,000 to US$300,000 per episode

Status: In development

Delivery: Q3 2004

Village People

Producer: London, England-based Illuminated Films

Premise: Domestic dysfunction reigns in this animated nod to traditional British sitcoms. Led by a Pollyannaish patriarch (Malcolm) whose hare-brained get-rich-quick schemes inevitably backfire, the series focuses on the lives of the Village family – wife (Lillian), teen daughter (Emily), mischievous eight-year-old son (Charlie) and their super-intelligent family dog. In one episode, handyman Malcom drags the clan to a castle that he’s been hired to renovate. Though all family members are enamored by their surroundings at first, even temporarily imagining themselves as royalty, interest quickly turns to horror when they realize that the castle is haunted. In another episode, Emily plans to submit a video depicting the Villages as the perfect family as part of a contest to win a day with a popular daytime TV host. But somehow the tape gets switched with footage of Malcolm performing stunts that he hopes to sell to the trashy home video TV show You’ve Been Maimed, resulting in a major family embarrassment.

Style: 2-D animation

Format: 26 x 24 minutes

Demo: family

Budget: US$200,000 to US$250,000 per episode

Status: In development

Delivery: Q3 2005