The Fast & Furious franchise really is all about family. The billion-dollar speed saga is officially racing onto Netflix with a new animated series following the adventures of Dominic Toretto’s young cousin. We swear we’re not making this up.
A longtime boon to children looking to placate mothers who wish they’d read more, the Captain Underpants series of chapter books was the pinnacle of toilet humor to kids in the ’90s and early ’00s. Over 12 books and three spin-offs, author Dav Pilkey generated gaggles of giggles with the superheroic adventures of a crimefighter clad only in a red cape and tightened whiteys, who used a plunger in his unending battle against bathroom-appropriate crime. Such nefarious villains as Doctor Diaper, the Turbo Toilet 2000, and Professor Pippy Pee-Pee Poopypants (a phrase I like to imagine executives at 20th Century Fox saying out loud, usually while seated at a long conference table) all crossed paths with the minimally-clothed defender of truth, justice, and excretive freedoms.
The trailer for Trolls is DreamWorks’ greatest troll to date, somehow managing to encapsulate the most irritating aspects of the animation studio’s productions in a minute flat. The names of Anna Kendrick and Justin Timberlake pass by to hint at the promise of a good time with plenty of throaty musical numbers, but this is only misdirection for the volley of aggression to come.
Netflix’s plan to double its original content by 2016 proved undoubtedly ambitious, and it seems DreamWorks Animation may help it happen. The two have partnered up to add some major names to Netflix’s original programming slate, including a new Voltron series, as well as Guillermo del Toro’s Trollhunters project.
For several years now, Steven Spielberg’s production company DreamWorks has partnered with Disney to distribute their films, while Spielberg has been free to produce and direct films with and for other studios. But a major change is brewing, as DreamWorks is cutting free from Disney next year with the studio eyeing a leap over to Universal. This seems like a basic corporate maneuver, but with that change could come something that either excites or terrifies you: reboots of properties like Jaws and Back to the Future.