Happy Tree Friends

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Happy Tree Friends is a flash cartoon series by Mondo Mini Shows, created by Kenn Navarro, Aubrey Ankrum and Rhode Montijo. Warren Graff is also credited in creating the Happy Tree Friends.

As indicated on the official site, the show is "not recommended for small children ." Notwithstanding the cuteness of its characters, the show is extremely violent. Every episode features at least one character's violent and bloody death, except the three episodes: "Out on a Limb", "Nuttin' but the Tooth" and possibly "House Warming" (which still featured blood and gore and characters who would have possibly died of blood loss or shock).

While the violence of these deaths is compared to that of The Itchy & Scratchy Show (a short cartoon featured on The Simpsons), the deaths in Happy Tree Friends are even more graphic and more drawn out.

The show is nearly free of dialogue; when the characters do speak, their words are severely garbled. Though it is obvious what each character's reaction is, their words can barely be understood. According to the website, the idea for Happy Tree Friends was conceived by Rhode Montijo when he drew a yellow rabbit (slightly resembling Cuddles) on a piece of paper and wrote "Resistance Is Futile" underneath it.

Contents

History

Beginning

Resistance is Futile drawn by Rhode Montijo

While working on Mondo Mini Shows, Rhode Montijo drew a yellow rabbit (slightly resembling Cuddles) on a piece of paper and wrote "Resistance Is Futile" underneath it which made several employees laugh. In 1999 Mondo gave Aubrey Ankrum, Rhode Montijo and Kenn Navarro a chance to do a short for them. They came up with a short named Banjo Frenzy which featured a dinosaur(an earlier version of Lumpy) killing three cute woodland animals (earlier versions of Cuddles, Giggles and Toothy) with a banjo. From there Mondo gave them their own internet series which they decided to name Happy Tree Friends. From there they hired new writers and animators to work on the show.

Success

Shortly after its internet debut in 2002 Happy Tree Friends became a success and shorts started to be shown in film festivals. In some countries, the episodes can be seen on television, such as the French, Dutch, German, Polish, Filipino, Brazilian, Italian and Latin American MTV channels, the Greek Mad Music Channel and it has begun to be shown on Paramount Comedy 1 from May 11, 2007, Canadian television channel Razer and on the Australian Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) network. On June 10, 2005, the shorts began showing during Attack of the Show!. A series, Happy Tree Friends and Friends, began to air on August 29, 2005, as part of the late night Midnight Spank block, which are all part of G4 (a TV channel for young adults 18-34). The series has been reformed into its own show rather than as a part of a compilation as before. Happy Tree Friends has also gained a collection of Audibles and an "IMVironment" for Yahoo!'s instant messenger. It is featured on many websites in which flash cartoons can be watched, such as Newgrounds, Atom Films, Purple Twinkie, The Official HTF Gang Website and Albino Black Sheep.

Encouraged by the show's success, its creators have released four DVDs (First Blood, Second Serving, Third Strike and Winter Break) containing the episodes shown on the website and others that have not been released. A collection consisting of the first three DVDs (with five bonus episodes), Overkill, has also been released.

TV Series

Happy Tree Friends gained its own show in 2006. It premiered on October 2, 2006. This makes sense, seeing as how the characters are already part of G4's Late Night Peep Show, a show currently airing on the network. The half-hour TV series debuted on October 2, 2006 at Midnight on G4. This TV series is entirely about the Happy Tree Friends. Each half hour episode of the TV series contains three 7 minute segments, The TV series got a sneak premiere at San Diego Comic Con]] on July 20, 2006 at 6:00 P.M. local time. The website has also announced that fans will be able to see 7 minute episode segments once each month starting September 1 through the end of the year. So far 39 segments have been aired meaning 13 episodes for Season 1. Pictures of the first 6 episodes can be seen on G4's website. Canadian channel, Razer, currently airs the show in syndication. The show is also worldwide broadcasted on MTV. It has also shown on Paramount Comedy 1 in the UK from May 11, 2007. It is still unknown if there is going to be a second season but the writers of the show said that a second season is very possible and that a second season is planned.

Show characteristics

The show usually takes place somewhere in the woodlands of North America (except for buddhist Monkey); Cuddles, Giggles, Toothy, Lumpy, Petunia, Nutty, Sniffles, Flaky, Handy, The Mole, Splendid, Disco Bear, Russell, Mime, Lifty, Shifty, Cro-Marmot, Flippy, Pop, and Cub are all from the United States of America, and Buddhist Monkey is from Asia. All are drawn in a sweet and innocent style that makes their deaths (or their actions leading to other's deaths) all the more shocking. Many of them show two front large buckteeth when they smile, except Lumpy, Sniffles, Cro-Marmot, flipped-out Flippy, with The Mole being unknown. All the Happy Tree Friends except for Lumpy and Sniffles have the same pink Care Bear heart-shaped noses. Happy Tree Friends have old-fashion style eyes which were used in very old cartoons except for Lumpy, Nutty, Flipped-Out Flippy and (sometimes) Lifty and Shifty, with The Mole and Cro-Marmot being unknown.

At the beginning of each episode, the characters are typically found in everyday situations. However, these situations always escalate into violence, mostly because of very unfortunate, surprising accidents with common, otherwise harmless props.

Each episode starts with introduction credits resembling a children's book, which portrays the show's logo, the episode's name (which is usually a pun) and cast. After the ending credits, a moral follows. Examples are "Wash behind your ears!" and "Don't bite off more than you can chew!". While adding to the children's book theme, the moral sharply contrasts with the violence previously portrayed by the episode. Since the episode "Happy Trails Part 2", the moral is an ironic reference to what happened to the characters in that episode.

Internet episodes have a typical duration of less than three minutes. Usually only a few of the characters are used in a single episode, but occasionally larger episodes have been released where most of the characters appear. TV episodes last about half an hour each having three segments of about seven minutes.

Currently, new episodes are released once a month. An episode list can be seen on the official website, which contains a list of older episodes available on demand from the site. However, these episodes are only available for a limited time, as this list is exchanged with other episodes every other week.

Fall Out Boy music video

Fall Out Boy's music video for The Carpal Tunnel Of Love is an episode of Happy Tree Friends. Fall Out Boy is featured in the music video (they appear as cartoon bears) as are Cuddles, Giggles, Nutty, Toothy and The Mole. Lumpy (the moose) causes the death of all the characters in the video, including his own. All of them die the same type of graphic, bloody deaths that are featured in the TV show.

Video Game

A video game titled Happy Tree Friends: False Alarm is planned for release in Fall 2007. It is being developed by Stainless Games and Sega for Xbox Live Arcade on the Xbox 360 and the PC. Writer Ken Pontac currently posts a blog in the Happy Tree Friends website telling fans about the adventures of the staff making the game.

Controversies

Several parents are concerned about the contents of Happy Tree Friends. Despite the warning of "Cartoon Violence: Not for Small Children or Big Babies," the show attracted some children to watch in spite of the violence in a child-like cartoon setting. A concerned parent even complains about the show in an article at Washington Post when she caught her 6-year old son watching the show.

Music and Sound-effects

Sound Engineer Jim Lively

  • The music featured before, after, and during each and every episode of Happy Tree Friends are composed by Jim Lively. Sound engineer for Happy Tree Friends. Lively has been in the sound business since the age of 16, and plans to continue his career of "making sounds for a living," as described by Jim Lively himself. Lively primarily works in sound design and dialog editing, although he continues to mix music.

Foley Artist Francis Carr

  • Foley artist Francis Carr joined the team later on in development. Usually working with sound engineer Jim Lively, he has been able to expand his career. Francis Carr also is noted for being the voice of Russel, later on in development as well.


Staff

Creators

Writers

Animators

External links

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