Animated Voices

I can’t believe this!

I just saw some pictures of what is a horrible bastardized version of Looney Tunes.

The show “Loonatics Unleashed” is a spin off of the regular version of Looney Tunes but more “extreme” and “action packed” for this day and age.

In the year 2772 a meteor strikes the planet and almost destroys the town Acmetropolis. The meteor then gives off radiation that super powers a certain number of people on the planet. Six super powered characters are called together to protect the city and defend it from others who wish to destroy it.

The team is made up of horrible twisted “bad ass” versions of Bugs Bunny, Lola Bunny (no relation) Daffy Duck, Taz, Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner.

Mel Blanc must be rolling in his grave and trying to make a deal with the devil to get this show off the air never to be seen again.

The show is supposed to be airing a third season but has yet to be shown on any TV station’s line up.

When it first aired an 11 year-old boy started an online petition to get the show taken off the air. I would like to applaud this young man for knowing the difference of what is right and what is wrong in this world.

The large success of CG movies attracted many celebrities to start lending their voices. With the amount of celebrities rising you would think that eventually celebrities would start voicing cartoons.

This is not necessarily the case. I believe that many celebrities have been voicing movies because the amount of money they are offered is high enough to peak their interest. In some cases the actors might like the theme of the movie and are truly interested in the idea and the meaning of the movie. Otherwise the celebrity gets paid for speaking lines in their own voice and mannerisms and doesn’t have to do any kind of live acting, which all sounds a lot easier and less time consuming than shooting a traditional type of movie.

In order for celebrities to start voicing cartoons the amount of money offered to them would have to be high enough to be worth their time away from other higher paying and more prestigious jobs.

So here’s hoping that the amount of money offered for voicing cartoons doesn’t rise enough to become noticed my “movie stars.” I think it would ruin cartoons greatly and would take away from the creative process that goes into making the shows.

So I did some more researching on who or what will be providing the voice of Wall-E and I found out some interesting information.

Ben Burtt, who is a “sound designer” and sound editor, will be providing the “vocals” electronically for Wall-E. To create voices for the movie, Burtt is taking various mechanical sounds and combining them to resemble dialogue.

Burtt is best known for creating many of the sound effects for the Star Wars movies. From creating the “voice” of R2-D2, Darth Vaders’ breathing effects, sound effects for the lightsabers, speederbikes and much more.

He has been awarded two Oscars for Best Sound Editing on E.T. the Extra Terrestrial and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

A personal favorite, The Nightmare Before Christmas is out in theaters again for the next couple of weeks. Not only is it back in theaters but it’s in a 3D format. Last year was the first year it was shown in 3D and I guess it sold well enough to come back for another year.

Hopefully Tim Burton will make a remake and improve the quality of the movie. Don’t get me wrong, the movie is fantastic, but with technology as it is and so many movies nowadays get digitally remastered I’m more than sure it’s about time for The Nightmare Before Christmas to get a digitally cleaned up.

Maybe next year.

When Pixar studios was almost done with Toy Story the creators got together and talked about ideas for their next bunch of animated movies. Ideas were tossed around and later grew into movies known as A Bug’s Life, Monsters Inc. and Finding Nemo. The last idea they had was for a movie called Wall-E.

Wall-E is in development and should be released in summer of 2008. After watching the teaser trailer for this movie what interests me the most (besides the story) is the voice for the main character Wall-E.

Based on the teaser trailer the only time you get to hear Wall-E speak is at the end when he says his name. It is more of an voice with an electronic/computerized effect put over the voice. I have visited many sites looking for who, or what, will be used to “voice” Wall-E but I can’t find any answers. But when I do I will be sure to make a post.

November 22, 1995, the start of what would come to be a very popular way to make movies. This is the day that Toy Story was released. Toy Story was the first complete CGI movie to be made. It stared Tom Hanks as the voice of Woody and Tim Allen as the voice of Buzz Lightyear. (Billy Crystal was offered the role for Buzz first but turned it down, and Bill Murray was next in line but lost the number of the producer and was never able to reach him)

Ever since Toy Story was released CG movies have been popping up everywhere and there is no sign of the production of these movies slowing down.

The only problem I have against most of these films is that they are voiced by the wrong people and sadly will continue this way for as long as anyone can tell.

Voice actors should be the ones cast for the parts of an animated movie not “movie stars.” Voice actors train themselves for the line of work they are in. They practice and perfect there skills and get character voices down to a fine art.

“Movie stars” get paid to use their own voice for a movie. I believe this cheapens the movie because the character and personality traits of the animated characters are lost.

A voice actor makes his/her character their own. They spend countless hours coming up with the personality of their newest character. They create reasons why a person sounds, acts, thinks, and moves the way they do and then use that inspiration to help create a voice for the character.

If animated movies continue to use the voices of well known actors and celebrities I believe that CG movies will not be as good as they could be if the casting directors would do their jobs and cast actual voice actors.

I feel sorry for the children growing up nowadays because there is a drastic shortage of cartoons on TV.

Nickelodeon used to be the TV channel to watch when I was growing up. It was loaded with quality cartoons such as Doug, Rugrats, Rocko’s Modern Life, AHHH! Real Monsters, Ren & Stempy, Hey Arnold!, Rocket Power and so much more.

Now when you turn on the TV you’ll be lucky if you get to watch an hours worth of animated shows on Nickelodeon. There are more non animated shows on Nickelodeon because they are trying to keep up with the other networks that the younger audience believes to be cooler.

Nickelodeon has excommunicated the best of the best of animated programing to one of their side stations, which does not come on basic cable, in favor for live action sitcoms.

The same thing can be said about the Disney channel. It is a rarity to see a Mickey Mouse cartoon on the channel that was built off of the very same rodent. The Disney channel has also gone the way of live action sitcoms for kids just as Nickelodeon.

Here’s hoping that Cartoon Network keeps the animated torch lit for the years to come.

The new background picture is called “Speechless.” It is a copy of a picture made in memory of Mel Blanc. He was known as “The Man of a Thousand Voices” and was the original voice actor for Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Woody Woodpecker along with many many more famous cartoon characters.

The original picture of Speechless, according to Warner Bros., is the highest selling piece of animation art to date.

    Sonny Strait will be appearing at the Wizzard World Texas comic convention in Arlington, Texas. The convention will be held at the Arlington Convention Center on Friday November 16 to Sunday November 18.

Sonny Strait has voiced characters from very well known anime TV shows. He is the voice behind characters such as Krillin, from Dragon Ball Z,  Maes Hughes, from Fullmetal Alchemist along with many other character.

In the words of Professor Farnsworth “Good news everyone.”

When I met with Billy West over the summer, he told me that four Futurama movies were still being worked on and were going to be sold to Comedy Central. He said that Comedy Central will be airing the movies later on in the year around November and December.