ROCKET RODENTS

ROCKET RODENTS is a somewhat animated project. By somewhat, it started off as a live action comedy - starring live rodents. I have a thing for Guinea Pigs. I think that talking Guinea Pigs are about the funniest things in the world - especially if what they're talking is absolutely filthy.



This clip is from test footage that we shot as part of a pilot for Rocket Rodents. There was more - but it's not really suitable for polite viewing. Needless to say, the Rodents were talking trash. The pilot was produced under a developement deal with a local TV station. They saw the designs, read the script, knew the intent - and when they screened the finished film... well, everyone laughed their heads off - except the station's general manager who kinda flipped out.

I took the pilot - re-edited it (took out the nasty words) and Voila! instant kids show. YTV gave me a development deal and shortly thereafter, Breakthrough Animation came on board.

Here, the show went through the usual heartbreaking development permuations. Breakthrough introduced me to the good folks at Cuppa Coffee Animation. We were going to do the show in STOP MOTION. The designs that Cuppa Coffee produced were frankly AMAZING!!!


This was the original sculpt of our lead character Vic Vermin. They nailed the character right from the get go. When I walked into their boardroom and saw this, I knew that I was in the right place. All of their designs were equally amazing - but alas, the cost was too much for our budget.

Breakthrough shopped it around to other studios and we found a home at Atomic Cartoons, with whom Breakthrough had partnered on their hit series, Atomic Betty....

More on this development saga later...