#B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations

[francesthetraveller]

I've already posted this onto my youtube around late july, but since it is technically the GHOST MONTH !!! , I might as well repost this onto my tumblr...better to feed them fellow boobers :)

[fyeahfailedcartoonpilots]

B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations

Directed by Tony Leondis

DreamWorks Animation, 2015

[elreed]

Apparently B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations is releasing this year so fuck it, here’s an oc for it!

Moira Soto (She/Her) is B.O.O.’s top engineer, coming up with all the crazy gadgets the organization uses. While she originally died as a teenager, her ghost form has been with the company for decades. She’s wise beyond her years, but still retains some of that adolescent spunk and tenacity!

[spooky-jumpropes]

//Lookie at what arrived in the mail today! :D

[katy-133]

‘Drawing For Nothing’ Is A Free, Updating Chronicle Of Canceled And Troubled Animated Films Full Of Artwork, Videos, And BTS Stories

Linked in this article by Jamie Lang on CartoonBrew

Drawing For Nothing direct link for the art of behind the scenes digital booklet.

The 12 titles included in the current version of Drawing for Nothing are:

Me and My Shadow (Dreamworks Animation) – Canceled

Foodfight! (Threshold Entertainment) – Released

B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations (Dreamworks Animation) – Canceled

The Incredible Mr. Limpet (Warner Bros.) – Canceled

Joe Jump (Walt Disney Animation Studios) – Canceled

Dreaming Machine (Mad House) – Canceled

Dragon’s Lair: The Legend (Sullivan Bluth Studios) – Canceled

Jack and Ben (Laika) – Canceled

Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy (Al Brodax) – Canceled

Huck’s Landing (Tom Carter Productions) – Canceled

My Peoples (Walt Disney Animation Studios) – Canceled

Larrikins (Dreamworks Animation) – Canceled

The project is ongoing and has plans to update the pdf and booklet website with additional pages.

[floppersblooderakamonsterinamoik]

My Singing Monsters: Dawn of Fire, DreamWorks' movie is coming back after cancellation (NOT CONFIRMED)

DreamWorks apologizes Sony Animation for the movie, Sony Animation disabled the cancellation for honorable & ridiculous reasons.

-DreamWorks & Big Blue Bubble cast confirm-

Mindy Kaling as PomPom

Elizabeth Maxwell as Barrb

Craig Robinson as Mammott

Bruno Mars as Furcorn

David Grohl as Congle

James E. Jones as Entbrat

Emma Stone as Kayna

Ken Jeong as Pango

Dwayne Johnson as Flowah

Chris Pratt as PongPing

-My Singing Monsters: The Movie first movie cast confirm-

Mindy Kaling as PomPom

Craig Robinson as Mammott

Bruno Mars as Furcorn

Emma Stone as Kayna

David Ghorl as Congle

James E. Jones as Entbrat

Ken Jeong as Pango

Lil Nas X as Wubbox

Alan Walker as Rare Wubbox

Chris Pratt as Jellbilly

-Cancellation and rejection-

The reason, why DreamWorks made the movie for having fun.

The reason is: ridiculous artifacts, Ridiculous Artifacts is the reason, that movies are not verified for the reason.

-Release date and story-

One year ago, My Singing Monsters: Dawn of Fire was cancelled for ridiculous artifact reason by Sony Animation, just like Monkeys of Mumbai or B.O.O: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations. One year later, DreamWorks is working for the movie called: Ruby Gillman Teenage Kranken.

A few months later, DreamWorks apologizes Sony Animation, to let the project go. Sony Animation lets the project uncancelled, DreamWorks finally gives thanks to Sony Animation as well.

For the schedule, My Singing Monsters: Dawn of Fire should be released in 2025 or 2027 as well.

-

"have a good day, monsterinamoik"

[towritecomicsonherarms]

Marks the voice acting debut of Seth Rogen in a theatrical movie. Later he went on to voice Hoqsueal in The Spiderwick Chronicles (2008), Morton the Mouse in Horton Hears a Who! (2008), Mantis in the Kung Fu Panda film franchise, B.O.B. in Monsters vs. Aliens (2009), the title character of Paul (2011), Frank the Talking Sausage in Sausage Party (2016), Pumbaa the Warthog in The Lion King (2019), Bob the Dwarf Viking in Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers (2022), Donkey Kong in The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023), Bebop in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem (2023), and Jackson Morris in B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations.

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

Long post and hyperfixation/infodump session incoming:

It's reminiscence time again... A) Life hasn't been great as of now, and B) I saw something pretty cool the other day...

So, there's a free book online called DRAWING FOR NOTHING, which was compiled by an individual named Ziggy Cashmere. It is a book chronicling unmade animated movies, or animated movies that got - more or less - cooked into something else...

The book, so far, has a treasure trove of concept art and stories for ME AND MY SHADOW, FOODFIGHT!, B.O.O.: BUREAU OF OTHERWORLDLY OPERATIONS, THE INCREDIBLE MR. LIMPET, JOE JUMP, DREAMING MACHINE, DRAGON'S LAIR: THE LEGEND, JACK AND BEN, CAPTAIN FANTASTIC AND THE BROWN DIRT COWBOY, and HUCK'S LANDING...

All kinds of animated films from different eras, some that weren't made, some that were re-imagined as something else entirely...

And their work isn't over yet!

The Drawing For Nothing's twitter account is posting all kinds of cool, unearthed stuff...

And the other day, they found some conceptual work for an unmade Disney animated movie called AMERICAN DOG...

Actually, AMERICAN DOG kind of... Was... Made?

This film was to be directed by Chris Sanders for Walt Disney Feature Animation, his sophomore directorial outing following the success of LILO & STITCH. If all had gone according to the plan, this movie would've likely debuted around fall/Thanksgiving 2007-ish, maybe a little earlier. Things were a little more fluid back then, when it seemed like The Walt Disney Company were to lose Pixar after their contract was up. Either way, it was aiming for 2007.

Of course, a lot had changed at Disney Animation after Michael Eisner was essentially ousted as CEO of the wider company. After Bob Iger succeeded Eisner, one of his first big moves was acquiring Pixar for over $7b, in early 2006... And then that move lead to the studio's veterans and founding fathers John Lasseter and Ed Catmull becoming the heads of that studio, on the heels of critically lambasted films like HOME ON THE RANGE and CHICKEN LITTLE.

And they took their way of doing things at Pixar with them, infamously. Chris Sanders was given lots of notes on AMERICAN DOG throughout 2006, until Lasseter took him off the movie at the end of the year. Lasseter had "reasoned" that the movie was "too quirky for its own good", and that Sanders wasn't getting it to where it needed to be. This was a shocking blow to animation fans everywhere, that not only was Sanders removed from his next movie, but that he was also leaving Disney Animation for DreamWorks. (Where he currently is at the moment, in twenty-twenty three!) Yet some suggested, "They're from Pixar, maybe we should trust them?"

Lasseter then had AMERICAN DOG completely re-imagined, working only off of the core concept of a dog TV star going on a cross-country trip with some animal friends, into an entirely new movie called BOLT.

Directors Byron Howard and Chris Williams, both first-timers at the helm of something, brought the film to the finish line for Thanksgiving of 2008 to critical acclaim and even an Oscar nod, but a low final gross at the box office... While it was generally liked, there was a sort-of lingering feeling of what kind of movie AMERICAN DOG would've been. BOLT has often been compared to it, negatively, because visually it's just sort of... There? It looks nice, it's cute, the animal character design is pretty appealing, while WDAS was still working out CG human designs pre-TANGLED. Some of the extras in BOLT are little strange-looking to these eyes, to go off on a tangent.

Anyways, the short version: BOLT's fine, but what could've been... AMERICAN DOG...

There have been other pieces of concept art for AMERICAN DOG that have available to view for years, especially pieces from when the movie was still in development...

So, now... I want to talk about the days when I first came across this project... Around November/December 2004...

At the time, 12-year-old Kyle was beginning to look up upcoming movie slates and such on various movie news websites. Stuff like ComingSoon-dot-net and stuff like that. Box office was reported in many places, not just the usual suspects...

I had already seen THE INCREDIBLES maybe three times in theaters by this point (I saw it *five* times on a big screen total, during its one and only theatrical release), and that movie really rocked my world. It still does. I'm a huge fan of THE INCREDIBLES, and its sequel too. I was endlessly influenced by the movie, and it actually legit excited me at the possibilities of what CG animation could... Even though this was an era of hand-drawn animation being ushered out...

Still, I saw a lot of potential CGI before we got glomped with a ton of kiddie talking animal movies and such within a few years, that kinda cast CG in a more negative light online. It already got so much blame for ending 2D, for merely existing, so the kinds of movies that came out - like a dam burst - around late 2005-2007 certainly didn't help...

Anyways, I wanted to know... What was next???

For Pixar, since it seemed like they were splitting with the Disney Co. at the time, the future was a little less definite. A teaser for CARS was running before THE INCREDIBLES, and after that the plan was for RATATOUILLE to be next... Which it ultimately was. This was back when Jan Pinkava was still directing the movie, before he got taken off of it in early 2005 and replaced by INCREDIBLES director Brad Bird... And a lot of it was changed after that. Back in late 2004, it was simply a movie about a rat "living with" an eccentric famous chef.

Of course, per the original contract that Pixar signed with DizCo (to borrow from Steve Hulett, to save syllables), Pixar couldn't make any sequels to their hit movies. DizCo had those under lock and key if Pixar were to split with them, and they planned on taking advantage of that... DizCo opened up a CG animation studio called Circle 7 Animation, and tasked them to make TOY STORY 3, MONSTERS INC. 2, and FINDING NEMO 2... Quite different ones from the movies we ended up getting. At this stage, TOY STORY 3 might've still been about the whodunit story set at Andy's grandmother's house... Or, it had become the infamous "Buzz Lightyear recalled" story that got the green light.

Other studios had slates of sorts. DreamWorks, in addition to having MADAGASCAR and Aardman's WALLACE & GROMIT movie lined up for 2005, had OVER THE HEDGE and RATROPOLIS (changed to FLUSHED AWAY) on the horizon. They also had multiple SHREK movies lined up, up to five and a direct-to-video origin movie about Puss In Boots. KUNG FU PANDA was entering development at this time, but it wouldn't be announced officially until about a year later, ditto a few other pictures. Donkey made an appearance on the studio's CG animated primetime NBC sitcom FATHER OF THE PRIDE (a real trip of a show), in an episode that aired 9/21/2004, and remarked "But let your kid know that SHREK 3 is coming out in 2006!"

Other stuff was coming, too. Sony was getting OPEN SEASON fired up, I think Imagi was getting started on CAT TALE, there were a bunch of other random movies here and there... Most of them not made, I reckon...

Then there was Disney Animation's future stuff...

CHICKEN LITTLE already had a teaser that I first saw on the spring 2004 BROTHER BEAR DVD, and there was a much faster-paced trailer playing before THE INCREDIBLES (set to R.E.M.'s 'It's The End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)'). Next up were likes of A DAY WITH WILBUR ROBINSON, AMERICAN DOG, RAPUNZEL UNBRAIDED, and FRAIDY CAT I believe was announced as well.

I caught glimpses of AMERICAN DOG, and saw this particular action-packed image:

And I was draaaawn in. I was already hyped about how THE INCREDIBLES did such dynamic action, and this piece was reminding me of the scene where the Parr family use a news trailer to weave through Municiberg traffic to find the Omnidroid. I like a good car chase, so this was exciting.

At the time, I was already writing lots of stories about dogs, cats, stuff like that, dogs running away from dogcatchers and such. I was literally writing and picturing all these action sequences because THE INCREDIBLES really lit up my imagination on how action scenes could be done, especially in animation. All the wild angles and camera pans and swoops, it's like I was Incrediblizing everything I was writing at the time, my 12-year-old brain was just sooooo influenced by it. It was a formative film for me, m'kay?

Moving on... I was kind of in-and-out on what was happening with AMERICAN DOG once Chris Sanders was fired from the movie. I had found out that it become BOLT a little before the first trailer debuted, and I remember being down on it. Not to mention, I was going through a lot of other things at the time and I was kind of out of the loop on what was going on. There were some bad vibes going around in the circles too, that BOLT was sure to be bad because it wasn't AMERICAN DOG. It created a sense of "this is what we got instead", like we see a lot nowadays... And I saw the trailer before WALL-E in theaters, and just was not impressed.

The marketing for this movie was so weird. The posters, which pushed a lot of heavy reds, seemed to pass this picture off as "Dog INCREDIBLES". Anyone who has seen BOLT knows that the superhero stuff is literally a TV show he stars in, but the posters and covers really make it seem like it's a super-pets movie or something. And Disney had already done that live-action UNDERDOG movie a year prior. We were kind of at the tail-end of that weird period of Disney's movie output, the remains of the Eisner years and some very strange greenlights... I was starting to see movies in theaters again, following a depressive period where I didn't really go out in public much. And I was kinda softening on BOLT, but I missed it in theaters. I would later get the Blu-ray, as a blind present, around the end of 2009 I wanna say? And I finally gave it a watch, and I really dug it! I still do, actually, even if it is rather standard and workmanlike. Part of me assumes that Disney Animation, after years of critical and/or commercial bombs, were intentionally making something very familiar. Something cute and Disney-like and digestible, a fun little dog movie, as a way to ease back into the swing of things and get audiences to see their movies again.

After all, their last string of movies were... MEET THE ROBINSONS (lost money), CHICKEN LITTLE (made over $100m domestically but barely doubled its budget worldwide, got terrible reception), HOME ON THE RANGE (critical/commercial dud), BROTHER BEAR (critical flop but made its small budget back), and TREASURE PLANET (infamous massive bomb)... Maybe the rationale was, "Let's just make a classically Disney dog movie, but with some stuff that people like about the movies we make at Pixar!" It does feel a little assembled, it does feel like Lasseter using stuff from the movies he directed/oversaw at Pixar, mixing them with some "Disney" elements. The light satire of Hollywood and network television was an extra touch that gives it a little bit more flavor. In a way, I get it... Disney Animation hadn't had a genuine big hit in *years*, and maybe the thought process was "let's just make a straight-up family movie about a dog". Not something a little weirder or wilder, certainly not the utterly gonzo stuff Sanders was coming up with... But maybe, if they had taken a chance on it and kept the budget reasonable, they could've had a bigger hit on their hands? Who the heck knows...

BOLT ended up making around $309m worldwide against its $150m budget (I wonder how much of that came from the thrown-out AMERICAN DOG, since that got *very* far in pre-production), and managed to have spectacular legs in North America after such a blah opening weekend. I guess it's kind of a flop? Underperformer? The Hollywood math changes for each and every movie, it seems. But I think the positive critical reception and Oscar nod were taken into consideration, and so the movie was probably viewed as a stepping stone to the likes of THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG, TANGLED, WINNIE THE POOH, and WRECK-IT RALPH. The so-called "Revival"...

But I would loooooove to visit an alternate universe where AMERICAN DOG *did* happen. And that it was the unhinged Chris Sanders movie it was looking to be. Maybe not an alternate universe where David Stainton is running Disney Animation, by all means he really had to go. Lasseter was not exactly an exemplary replacement, as we'd learn in later years, but someone should've let the movie happen. I think a second Sanders WDAS movie could've not only been a major hit, but it could've down as one of Disney Animation's most interesting and experimental films... Much like his own LILO & STITCH was! And to think John Lasseter despised that movie... It's no wonder Sanders left the dog movie and left the studio, though he did negotiate with Lasseter to keep at least one of the characters from his concept and use it elsewhere... Namely the one-eyed cat who became the main character of his comic, KISKALOO.

Sanders made some really cool movies at DreamWorks. HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON is good stuff, and THE CROODS is a lot of fun. I even enjoyed that live-action CALL OF THE WILD movie he did for 20th Century Studios, with the CG'ed dog... And I'm excited as heck for THE WILD ROBOT, his third DreamWorks movie... But, part of me feels like AMERICAN DOG would've been Chris Sanders at his most Chris Sanders. Something totally uncorked and wild and unlike anything else... Whereas, two of his DreamWorks movies are based on books, and the other was someone else's movie first. He had expressed interest in turning KISKALOO into a feature, and if he gets to do that after WILD ROBOT... At DreamWorks... That would be pretty amazing, honestly. It'd probably be the closest thing we get to what AMERICAN DOG was shaping up to be...

Anyways, I wanted to talk about where I was at with upcoming animation in 2004 as a young, weirdo enthusiast... And just talk about an unmade movie and the director's stuff in general and such. Hope you're having a great holiday!

(And go read DRAWING FOR NOTHING!)

[disneycritical]

I know this blog is mainly Disney, but what are the mods thoughts on other animation studios movies? Like laika / cartoon saloon

Mod K: I love animation as a whole, and Cartoon Saloon, Laika, Sony Animations, they've all had good output. Sure, not all of them were hits, but not everything can be. That said, I was recently talking with a friend of mine about how much we respect DreamWorks Animation as well. Where Disney tends to play it safe, DreamWorks has a history of saying "Hey, what if...?" "Yes, and..." "Sounds wild, let's do it!" They throw so many different movies and genres at the wall and see what sticks, the reason they have such a mixed bag of output is because they'll do almost anything they want, because it would be fun.

That said, DreamWorks, I hope you guys pick up Me and My Shadow and B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations again someday.

EDIT

Mod Pink:

I freaking love Laika! I love that it's basically a trust-fund kid's passion project where they just make stop-motion films! Most of their stuff is fantastic and I think it's a crime they haven't won an Oscar yet Kubo was robbed!!

I haven't seen all of Cartoon Saloon's stuff, but I absolutely love their style- Secret of Kells was a huge inspiration for my final project in my animation program in college.

I agree with K on Dreamworks, I just wish they would tighten up their vision for films so their output was more consistent rather than hit-or-miss. They've done better since they stopped trying to compete/mock Disney and just started making movies that were their own. also, Me and My Shadow is brilliant and they'd better pick it back up.

Blue Sky had so much potential before it was shut down, I was sad to see it leave. They were just on the cusp of finding their creative voice.

Sony Animation is absolutely the game changer and I'm so excited for the future of animation~

[clownkiwi]

finished reading everything thats availabe in "Drawing for Nothing", i really like how comprehensive it currently is!!! despite still being a work in progress. i love the dedication of trying to get every art piece thats available for said canned/ruined films, and how concise the excerpts for each film is

(because there's just about as big of a story that goes into some of these films as do their art pieces. we know about most of their stories and how they got here, but we never get too much of a look at how they look like Before they were cancelled or changed radically. only exceptions have been, for me at least, "The Thief and The Cobbler" and "Kingdom of the Sun" and even recently like "Me and My Shadows" and "B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations")

[francesthetraveller]

Watch me go ham about the art book!!! (in a positive manner)

Lately from January to this month I've gotten REALLY into B.O.O. due to a false rumour going around that resulted in me drawing my first OC for it and I spent the eventual first half of my year trying my best to research EVERYTHING I could about the movie, even if some of them were scarce at best or non-existent at worst. But in April of this year, an early copy of the art book itself got leaked online, and I was so ECSTATIC about it that I spent almost an entire school day trying to look through the art and read through the script of it inorder to peice together what the movie was completely about. I was originally going to save it earlier, however they took it off of The Wayback Machine, and I was only able to screenshot a few images before doing so. HOWEVER!! They did infact also save it onto a Mega file, and so I spent an entire friday afternoon downloading both the art book and the guide-book/pitch bible onto my computer incase I would need it for either my art, writing or for research (I am,,, normal,,, about this movie,,,) It's not actually that hard to find it's both on The Lost Media page for it and also for The Cancelled Movie wiki page. Although you do have to download them first because they're both zip-files. Regardless of the fact, I'm going to dwelve into parts of the art book that particularly caught my interest (I plan to do the guide-book for another post). This might take me more than one post to do but I'll try my best.

The Art Book Itself

Since it is pretty much an unfinished version of what would've been the final product (the date underneath each pages say that this was worked on around September 30th of 2014), text from every page had the HTTYD2 art book text added in as a temporary placeholder. The actual text itself is within another file that you have to open separately.

It's also important to note that some of the images haven't been completely added in yet as of the time this early draft was created, so it is mainly left to interpretation on what was originally going to be added there.

The Worldbuilding

Ever since clips of the movie surfaced around, some people were speculating on where the movie itself was going to take place (aside from the cosmic realm). And We've actually got an answer for that right here! The town where most of the hauntings happen is called Gateway, which is somewhere around Illinois.

I very much love the whole vibe of the town, as it looks almost like an early, dreamworkish version of the New York City shown in Soul (oh no,, the afterlife hyperfixations clash !!).

The mixture between the different architecture from both the past and the current era really shows how much this town changed overtime and emphasizes a reason to feel close towards it. It also gives more meaning towards its name (while also tying into the whole ghost plot)

The Character Designs (For the humans, that is)

Although not that visible within the rendered animated models, it was actually intended that humans and ghosts would have followed the teardrop theory way of character design, with humans being wider from below while ghosts were more wider from above to showcase how ghosts are more lighter since their forms aren't actually corporeal.

(I actually followed this when doing the second designs for my OCs!)

[mortallyclearwonderland]

Canceled Dreamworks movies

Truckers: DreamWorks was supposed to do an adaptation of Terry Pratchett's book With Simon Beaufoy writing the script and a set release date of 2012. The talks of making the film seemed to die down once the script was completed and everyone has since moved on.

It looks to me like some of the designs inspired the Trolls.

Pearls Before Swine: Dreamworks purchased the rights to make a film adaptation of the comic strip Pearls Before Swine in 2006, shortly before they released their adaption of fellow comic strip Over the Hedge. Since then nothing has come of it.

The Tortoise and the Hare: An Aardman/Dreamworks project retelling "The Tortoise and the Hare" that might have featured Michael Caine as one of the voiceover performers withered on the vine.

Tales From The Aniverse: Dreamworks also planned to adapt a character from the extremely obscure 1980s black-and-white furry comic Tales From The Aniverse in the early 2000s, but reps had a hard time comprehending the treatment that the comics' creator gave them.

Me and My Shadow: A film about a man's friendship with his Living Shadow that would have featured a unique blend of 3D and traditional animation, was scheduled to be released in early 2014 but seems to have fallen through the cracks after Dreamworks's split with Paramount.

B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations: A film centering on an agency of ghosts, was set to be released in the summer of 2015. It has now been put on the back burner due to DreamWorks' restructuring plans.

What do you think? Is there hope these movies might be seen on the big screen?

With 2D and 3D being mixed together more and more ''Me and My Shadow'' has the biggest chance of returning.

Also, ''Tales From The Aniverse'' sound and look interesting. An animated sci-fi franchise of movies and maybe series?

[fyeahfailedcartoonpilots]

B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations

Visual development by Peter Zaslav

[spooky-jumpropes]

//I made a couple Miis in Miitopia… Thought I could share ‘em with y’all under the cut, in case any y’all are interested. If you wanna access any of these Miis, the access key is 7VX33CY.

June 29th 2021 update: They used to be on my own Switch, but I had to delete the Miitopia demo to make room for Kazuya in SSBU.

Ongo, from Jelly Jamm

Zizi, from Spookiz

Pucca

Grookey, from Pokémon Gen 8

Gloria Sato, from Big City Greens

Skid & Pump, from Spooky Month + Friday Night Funkin’

Pong

Addison Drake, from B.O.O. Bureau of Otherworldly Operations, and lastly for now...

Huaca, from Kingdom of the Sun

[franciscomaldo]

Matt Bomer cumple 40 años √ @MattBomer ACTUAL Pone su voz en el film animado en producción B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations. / Actuará en la película en pre-producción