Last Week in Animation: October 9th

Welcome to Overly Animated’s Last Week in Animation! This is a recurring series where we aggregate the news items most relevant to fans of the shows we cover regularly, as well as interesting tidbits on other animated television and film projects.

New York Comic-Con Recap

As has been tradition for the past couple of years, Steven Universe was the most anticipated panel at this year’s New York Comic-Con. Unlike the two teasers premiered at San Diego Comic-Con earlier this year (which are still floating around only via unofficial avenues), the NYCC preview, which consisted of the first two minutes of the upcoming episode “Dewey Wins”, has been uploaded to Cartoon Network’s official accounts. After the clip was premiered, panel moderator Eric Thurm (who writes reviews of this show and others on The AV Club) mentioned that this would begin a group of new episodes coming “this winter”. While a return date for this show is still wholly vague, it’s just a little more information than what we had prior to this panel.

The other major news items to come out of New York Comic-Con this year have to do with new clips for Voltron: Legendary Defender and Hey Arnold! The Jungle Movie. The former, which will debut its fourth season on Netflix this Friday, released a new trailer as well as a collection of images from this upcoming batch of episodes. Warning: the clip does contain what some Voltron fans may consider spoilers. As for the latter, both a trailer and a release date—November 24—have been announced for the film based on the popular early 2000s Nickelodeon program.

Constantine, which had a brief run as a NBC live-action drama, is getting ready for an animated romp in a new series, which is expected to premiere on CW Seed (The CW’s digital service) in early 2018. At New York Comic-Con, viewers got a lengthy preview of what the show is looking like so far. Matt Ryan, who played the character on the original show as well as cameo appearances on Arrow, has been confirmed as the voice actor for the animated show’s leader.

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to”

https://instagram.com/p/BZ9jVipgFqb/

Star Vs. The Forces of Evil did not have a New York Comic-Con presence, but they joined in on the teaser frenzy, dropping an artistically unique promo for the upcoming “Starvember” event. Unlike Disney XD’s previous promos, which have focused more on the sillier side of the show, this promo touches on a couple of the more relevant plot elements the show has recently been setting up. Star Vs. The Forces of Evil begins its Season 3 event November 6.

Other News and Notes

Bob’s Burgers joins the recent surge in animated shows getting to the big screen, as 20^th Century Fox announced a Bob’s Burgers movie is expected to hit theaters on July 17, 2020. Bob’s Burgers is coming off its second Emmy win in the Outstanding Animated Series category. [Deadline Hollywood]

Batman: The Animated Series, which still has its ardent fans 25 years since its premiere, will be remastered and released as a Blu-Ray collection in 2018 according to Waner Bros. Home Entertainment. It’s probable that this was spurred by a remaster of Batman: Mask of the Phantasm from the same era, which released to moderate success in home media. [Polygon]

Futurama continues to keep its hold on the syndication circuit, as Syfy is new owner of off-network rights to the show after a new deal was signed with 20^th Century Fox Television. Syfy plans to begin its ownership of the Matt Groening classic with a bang, airing marathons on Monday and Tuesday nights from 8 PM to 2 AM. [Hollywood Reporter]

Paramount Pictures has obtained the rights to the film adaptation of Sonic the Hedgehog, and is already in the early stages of developing a live action/CGI blended feature around the character. The project has Tim Miller (Deadpool) attached as an executive producer, while Jeff Fowler is currently slated to direct the film. Fowler was nominated for a Best Animated Short Film Oscar in 2004 for Gopher Broke, but this would mark his theatrical directorial debut. [Hollywood Reporter]

I’m keeping an eye on Final Space, an upcoming animated sci-fi series that will form part of TBS’ animation block in 2018, alongside J.G. Quintel’s Close Enough. While the pilot has been around for several months, TBS released the first official trailer for the show over the weekend. This project is backed by TBS late night host Conan O’Brien and is the creative child of Olan Rogers. The trailer boasts a star-studded voice cast, including veteran talents Ron Perlman, Tom Kenny and Keith David.

And finally, in today’s edition of Weird Animation of the Week, here’s a trailer for the upcoming SyFy show Happy!, which stars Christopher Meloni (Law & Order: SVU, Oz) as a hitman accompanied by an imaginary unicorn named Happy, voiced by Patton Oswalt. Warning: blood and general incoherence.