Parker and Stone have made their feelings about Hollywood known, voicing concerns about the restrictions studios often put on creative freedom.
Now approaching the series’ twentieth season on the air, the social satire is as relevant as ever with its open opinions on issues of politics and celebrity. South Park has been creators' Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s baby since 1997 when the foul-mouthed escapades of four fourth grade boys in a small Colorado town first premiered on Comedy Central.
The name of the studio says it all, really.
What other big projects lie in store remains to be seen, but if their past series are any indication, there should be no shortage of work for this studio anytime soon.
Of the feature films that have used their services, their name has been attached to both SpongeBob SquarePants movies, The Simpsons Movie as well as the Futurama films. With over a hundred different productions under their belt, Rough Draft has been on the receiving end of some of the industry’s most prestigious awards for more than a decade. While most of the studio's series are outsourced projects, many of them have proven to be groundbreaking achievements. The studio now has three separate locations - two in Glendale, CA and one in Seoul, South Korea - where it has produced shows like Beavis and Butt-Head, Futurama, Drawn Together and the first volume of Star Wars: Clone Wars in 2003. Started in a garage in Van Nuys, California, Rough Draft Studios has had a hand in quality animation in both film and television since 1991 when the company’s founders Gregg Vanzo and his wife Nikki Vanzo were working on The Ren and Stimpy Show. Their most recent series Bordertown opened to negative reviews and poor ratings after it premiered in early January this year. Other releases for the studio have included McFarlane’s feature films Ted, Ted 2 and A Million Ways to Die in the West. The series would be cancelled after four years, but their other show, American Dad!, has proven more consistent, having been on the air since 2005. Since then, McFarlane's self-started company Fuzzy Door Productions has seen the release of many spin-off shows along with some successful theatrical films.Īmong the notable projects the privately held company has managed over the years, there was The Cleveland Show, which followed the Griffin family’s neighbor Cleveland Brown as he settled in a new town with his dysfunctional family. After a short cancellation in 2003, which saw a renewed interest in the series, Peter Griffin and the rest of Quahog would return to the small screen in 2005. Seth McFarlane has been hot on the scene since 1999 when he launched one of the most influential adult animated sitcoms on television with Family Guy. Based on all their many accomplishments, we think you’ll agree. From the biggest companies with long histories and hundreds of employees to the smaller, more obscure production houses, these are the 20 Best Animation Studios, Ranked. Either way, it’s likely you’ve heard of their creations. You may know some of these studios by name already, while some may be new.
With children and their parents pouring money into the already lucrative animated world, every studio with a gift for the imaginative is taking a risk to bring the latest animated ideas to an ever-growing audience.
Meanwhile, many of our favorite small screen cartoons returned for second seasons while The Powerpuff Girls was revived and we caught word of TV movie specials for shows like Hey Arnold! and Rocko’s Modern Life. At the movies, we’ve witnessed the return of a certain blue tang fish, the secret lives of our pets and the adventure of a foul-mouthed hot dog. So far, 2016 has been yet another stellar year is animation. From the writer's desk to the storyboarding to the computer-generated images, sometimes it can be a taxing process to breathe life into a character. With so many animated stories dominating our televisions and movie theaters, it’s easy to forget just how many people it takes to complete a cartoon.