***This article originally appeared in the February ’23 issue of Animation Magazine (No. 237)***
Cat lovers of all ages will have reason to celebrate when SuperKitties, a new superhero series featuring four fierce felines, comes to Disney Junior and Disney+ in 2023. The show takes audiences along on adventures in the city of Kittydale with Ginny, Sparks, Buddy and Bitsy as they keep the metropolis safe and help their preschool audience better understand the actions of others.
The series is the brainchild of Emmy Award winner Paula Rosenthal, who is creator and executive producer on the show. Rosenthal previously worked on Sunny Day, Olivia and Peter Rabbit. Kirk Van Wormer, who is also an Emmy winner and previously worked on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, The LEGO Movie 2 and Transformers Prime, is co-executive producer on the series.
It’s Meow or Never
When Rosenthal was working on developing the series, she confesses she did have a bit of a cat-focused agenda in mind.
“Let me say, I’m an animal lover and that I love all animals,” says Rosenthal. “But I do love cats, and I didn’t think they were getting their due. There were lots of shows with puppies out there. There were lots of shows with lots of animals. But there weren’t a lot of shows with cats and I thought it would be fun to do something for people who love animals and cats.”
She adds, “I’d say that it came together even better than I initially imagined. I just imagined an homage to superheroes and making sure that our characters were real superheroes rather than just rescuers, and that they can do everything from having their own powers and their own poses to their own superhero uniforms and masks. With the incredible collaboration with Kirk and Disney, we got it to a place where it’s better than imagined.”
Rosenthal, Van Wormer and their team poured over hours of cat videos on sites like YouTube as they were looking for inspiration for the movement of the characters. They also looked back towards classic superhero series from decades past. Each kitty wears a color coordinated mask and superhero suit and has brightly-colored fur to set off the whole ensemble. This sort of striking look for the main characters was something they wanted to emphasize.
“We thought about 1960s-era Batman, and the bright colors, energy and humor of that time,” says Van Wormer. “We were all just thrilled with this idea of having that kind of farce in our series. We started to think about how to bring that pop of color and that Saul Bass sense of style into Kittydale, which is a big city. Some big cities can be dark, but we want ours to be bright and the kind of place where kids want to go. So, we built this world with some really talented people who helped us find our way around. We tried to get the best of this stylized environment and cute kitties that become powerful heroes, and over-the-top villains who are also just adorable. We were also able to work with teams who knew how to create maximum fluffiness for the kittens on a realistic budget and timeline, so were very fortunate.”
The brightly colored CG animation was done by Bardel Entertainment’s studio in Vancouver and Rainbow, which is located in Italy. The series is produced by Sony Pictures Television – Kids (formerly known as Silvergate Media) in association with Disney Junior.
As the series came together, Rosenthal also knew they’d have to keep their preschool audience in mind. The kitties all have their superhero gear which includes playful, stylized masks and a strong superhero stance but they’d have to craft the stories in a particular way. While superhero films and series often go into some very dark places with their villains, this show would have to take a different approach to work for its viewers.
“I wanted to tip my hat to Batman and similar shows that inspired the storytelling here,” says Rosenthal. “When we were creating our felines, we wanted to show children these characters who were smart and strong, brave and resilient in the face of danger. When I say ‘danger,’ I mean danger in the form of a pantheon of villains who create challenges for our kitties. So, there’s that element of classic superhero storytelling for sure.”
Rosenthal points out that even the rogues gallery of Kittydale has its charms and complexities. “One thing that really came out of the collaboration with Disney was that, once we had the spine of the stories and the storytelling, we understood that the villains weren’t really bad,” she adds “They were just they were just misunderstood and did a bad thing. We were able to create a path toward empathy for them. We were able to tell kinder, gentler stories about how sometimes people do something bad, but there may be a reason behind their actions. We can understand them better when we understand those reasons, which is very important for children. Once we understand the reasons behind a behavior, we might be able to help someone choose a better path.”
Viewers may also recognize some of the familiar voices when they watch the show, which features an experienced group of young performers. The voice cast includes Emma Berman from Disney-Pixar’s Luca as Ginny, Cruz Flateau from CoComelon as Sparks, JeCobi Swain from Home Economics as Buddy and Pyper Braun from Country Comfort as Bitsy.
Each of the SuperKitties also has their own superpower, which is designed to work well with the abilities of the other kitties. They’re all a nod to the powers we usually associated with cats.
“With Ginny, she’s already super powerful, but when she suits up her superpower is that she has these power claws that enhance her natural abilities as a cat, so she can stick to things you wouldn’t normally expect her to be able to stick to,” says Van Wormer. “She can swing through things or hop through spaces that would be difficult for a regular cat, so her powers make her super-duper incredible. Buddy is really strong like a big, strong cat that will just walk over and lay on top of things and just knock everything down. He’s that times 10 when he furball blitzes into a big puff ball and he can bounce off walls and just knock them down. His brother, Sparks, is that cat that can open doors — he’s very smart and he’s our tech guy.”
Adds Rosentha, “Ginny may be the leader of the pack, but you see the show through Bitsy’s eyes. She’s the one who comes back to the lesson or message of the day. She does a video blog about what they’ve learned and the lessons in the show for that day. This is the only time they break the fourth wall and Bitsy will wink to the audience, because she knows they’re in on her story. This way the audience gets to feel part of the story she tells them at the end of the episode.”
SuperKitties premieres on Disney Channel and Disney Junior at 10:30 a.m. on January 11. The first batch of episodes will also premiere the same day on Disney+.
