DreamWorks Animation is going back to beginning of human civilization for a sixth season of The Croods: Family Tree, premiering with six all-new episodes on Hulu and Peacock on March 30.
Synopsis: The Croods and the Bettermans are back and battling over which kooky croodimal to crown “best pet” while Eep is skeptical of the farm’s newest visitor, and Gran’s feathered frenemy, Malachi. Thunk recruits Dawn on a quest for an ancient stash of legendary snacks, and Phil’s “Greatest Inventor Whoever Lived” title is tested when Grug discovers an old, subterranean cave filled with inventions far more advanced than anything prehistory has ever seen.
Exec produced by Mark Banker & Todd Grimes, Family Tree features the voices of Kiff VandenHeuvel as Grug, Amy Landecker as Ugga, Ally Dixon as Eep , AJ Locascio as Thunk, Artemis Pebdani as Gran, Dee Bradley Baker as Sandy, Darin Brooks as Guy, Matthew Waterson as Phil, Amy Rosoff as Hope and Abby Trott as Dawn.
Baby Shark creator The Pinkfong Company has another pod of aquatic stars on its hands as its newest 3D animated short film series Sealook swims past the 1 million subscriber mark on YouTube! The cute, silly seal adventures are the first Pinkfong brand to reach that milestone within 40 days of attaining 100,000 subscribers.
Produced in partnership with Million Volt, the non-dialog series has an average monthly growth rate on YouTube of 630% in views and 620% in subscribers. The channel has also achieved 1 billion total views, with 25-34s accounting for 40% of the audience and 18-24s another 22%. The series is particularly popular in the U.S., U.K., South Korea, Brazil, Indonesia, Vietnam and India.
Sealook has also connected with fans on social media, surpassing 700K followers and 38M views on TikTok as of March 21.
Sealook follows a group of lovable seals with different looks and personalities on comedic adventures full of laughter and music. Centering on the tagged seals observed in a wildlife sanctuary, each episode spotlights different seals navigating life’s strange and silly challenges in heartwarming ways. New episodes launch every Thursday and Saturday.
The Fairly OddParents creator Butch Hartman has announced plans to introduce his new Christian faith-based animated series The Garden via a subscription-based app. Aimed at children ages 3-8, the app will offer 24/7 access to episodes of the cartoon as well as exclusive Bible-based curriculum, games, music and online shop, with new episodes rolling out monthly. The official launch April 1 will be commemorated with an event at The Museum of the Bible in DC with a livestream from Butch and his wife and collaborator Julianne.
As previously announced, The Garden follows the adventures of Lenny the Lion and Lucy the Lamb, best friends who work carrying out tasks from God, whom they call “The Boss,” in a magical garden where anything can grow. Each episode sees eager but incautious Lenny and kind-hearted and adventurous but imperfect Lucy learn how to tackle their assignment through scripture and an original song.
As part of the launch of the new app and cartoon series, Thomas Nelson has published The Garden Children’s Bible, illustrated by Hartman and featuring The Garden characters. Additionally, the eight-track series soundtrack, Songs from The Garden, is available now on Apple Music, Spotify and wherever music is sold.
Grom Social Enterprises Inc. announced that its subsidiary Top Draw Animation will lend its animation expertise to Season 2 of Mansour, the emerging animated hit series from Bidaya Media (Iftah Ya Simsim, the Arabic language version of Sesame Street).
For Adventures of Mansour: Age of A.I., Top Draw will tap into its team of 400 animation pros to oversee production on the animated action adventure series about tech whiz Mansour and his friends as they confront a mischievous artificial intelligence known as Blink who is intent on causing as much trouble as possible for Mansour and the people of his home city.
Series Sales Recap:
- French production and distribution company Prime Entertainment Group, has closed a new deal with RTS in Switzerland for the historical fantasy animated series Runes (26 x 22’).
- Banijay Kids & Family announced Warner Bros. Discovery Latin America as regional broadcast partner for the new CGI kids’ action-comedy Shasha & Milo (25 x 22′ + 12 x 2′ shorts), following Tencent Video’s pickup in China. Zodiak Kids & Family France (a Banijay Kids & Family co.) and South Korean studio Pingo Entertainment are co-producing the series.
- Moonbug Entertainment (a subsidiary of Candle Media) inked a streaming partnership agreement with Vidio (a division of Emtek Group), Indonesia’s largest OTT. Vidio began offering Moonbug programming (such as CoComelon, Blippi, ARPO, Go Buster, Lellobee City Farm, Morphle, Little Angel and Oddbods) on its platform on February 6. The SVOD content deal also includes select hours of programming on Emtek’s pay-TV channel, Horee, plus a block on FTA channel, Mentari TV. Content will be made available in English and Bahasa Indonesia.
