Constant Payne

This is an anime directed by Micah Ian Wright. While he is an American, it was animated in Japan by the Japanese animation studio Madhouse. Basically it was to be the first "action" genre show on Nickelodeon Channel, but the people there were hesitant due to the "violent" nature of it (though nothing worse than any Batman cartoon on Fox Kids). After the 9/11 attacks though, it was considered in poor taste to have any new violent TV programming, at which point Nickelodeon definitely refused the idea. Even though now it's 10 years later, Mr. Wright has not tried to approach any other TV network with the show. Sadly, it seems that he's given up trying. No full length 20+ minute episodes have ever been produced. Only the 10 minute pilot exists. However, Mr. Wright feels that the public has the right to see his work, so he has posted the 10 minute pilot on his Youtube account.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBgkLxw-6Xk

After watching it, what do you think of it? Does it look good? Do you think it should be aired? What do you think the chance is that Mr. Wright will successfully convince a TV network to carry the show at some point in the future?

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Originally Posted by Videogamer555

After watching it, what do you think of it? Does it look good? Do you think it should be aired? What do you think the chance is that Mr. Wright will successfully convince a TV network to carry the show at some point in the future?

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I will just quickly point out that the show isn't an anime, but an American cartoon (if we threw that word in each time Japan stepped in to do the animation for something, we would be in trouble), but I digress...

After watching the pilot, the show does look like it had potential...10 years ago. As someone on YouTube pointed out, CN is chock full of action shows like this, with Ben 10 being the biggest one. It doesn't help that Ben 10 has the same formula: a family that gets involved in constant action hi-jinks, only to brush it off as "average-day-at-the-office" fair over dinner the same night (hell, I believe Pixar made an entire movie out of this same concept with The Incredibles). So if this show aired today to compete against CN, they would just laugh their butts off.

If he can brush up the animation and effects (the age is showing and the characters look as if they popped out of a "How to Draw Anime" book) and if the concept can be flushed out a bit (if he's going for steampunk, he's not doing a very good job at it), then I think it could potentially do rather well on television. However, it will be difficult for it to even make it to that point. Both CN and Nickelodeon have plenty have action shows by now. He has an interesting idea, but as I said before, it has been done already, several times, and in a better fashion.

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Originally Posted by wolfgirl90

I will just quickly point out that the show isn't an anime, but an American cartoon (if we threw that word in each time Japan stepped in to do the animation for something, we would be in trouble), but I digress...

After watching the pilot, the show does look like it had potential...10 years ago. As someone on YouTube pointed out, CN is chock full of action shows like this, with Ben 10 being the biggest one. It doesn't help that Ben 10 has the same formula: a family that gets involved in constant action hi-jinks, only to brush it off as "average-day-at-the-office" fair over dinner the same night (hell, I believe Pixar made an entire movie out of this same concept with The Incredibles). So if this show aired today to compete against CN, they would just laugh their butts off.

If he can brush up the animation and effects (the age is showing and the characters look as if they popped out of a "How to Draw Anime" book) and if the concept can be flushed out a bit, then I think it could potentially do rather well on television. However, it will be difficult for it to even make it to that point. Both CN and Nickelodeon have plenty have action shows by now. He has an interesting idea, but as I said before, it has been done already, several times, and in a better fashion.

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I like the idea that the girl's own uncle was the villain, and that he was the leader of some terrorist group bent on world domination or something. I called it anime because when I did a Google search last year for "how the 9/11 attacks affected anime", or "how the 9/11 attacks increased censorship of anime", or something like that (which had the word anime in the search terms) this was one of the first results. Thus I assumed it would properly be called an anime, not a cartoon. Noticing that it was animated in Japan only confirmed what I already believed.

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Originally Posted by Videogamer555

I like the idea that the girl's own uncle was the villain, and that he was the leader of some terrorist group bent on world domination or something. I called it anime because when I did a Google search last year for "how the 9/11 attacks affected anime", or "how the 9/11 attacks increased censorship of anime", or something like that (which had the word anime in the search terms) this was one of the first results. Thus I assumed it would properly be called an anime, not a cartoon. Noticing that it was animated in Japan only confirmed what I already believed.

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Indeed. But I make a distinction between "show that was merely animated in Japan" versus "show FROM Japan" if only for simplicity (getting into style would isolate even Japanese shows that don't fit the typical style, so I don't go there). Hunchback of Notre Dame II was animated in Japan, but its not an anime (and I don't think anyone thinks otherwise).

It was slightly interesting that the villain was Amanda's uncle (but come on, a family member pulling the evil strings? we've been there before), but her reaction to Welton was rather lax compared to her father's. Doc Payne obviously wants to get back at his brother for something he did in the past (a "family reunion") but Amanda reacts to him as if he's a mere annoyance ("later, Uncle Weirdo") versus somebody who apparently doesn't give too much of a crap about human life (his blowing up an airship full of henchmen and her father isn't new...Doc even says so). It might be simple tolerance, but if Welton is a recurring threat, to the point where he is blowing up crap all the time, then she should being taking him a bit more seriously, especially since whatever he's doing isn't too far away from what killed her mother.:closedeye