December Catch-Up: Spy vs. Spy on Mad - Season 3

A big chunk of this year was spent animating Spy vs. Spy for Cartoon Network's Mad. Last year, I got to animate 10 of the Spy vs. Spy shorts for the 26-episode second season of Mad. For season three, I would be venturing into a world in which I was completely submerged in Spy vs. Spy, animating all 26 shorts for the 26 episodes of season three. In this season, the spies would go to space, have a movie premiere, fight with giant robots and monster apes, travel back in time, and become superheroes, among many, many other adventures.

It was a real honor to get a chance to help shape a part of the history of these iconic characters. I feel like I contributed a lot to the visual vocabulary that we're establishing for the stop motion spies. It's poppy, cartoony animation and by necessity, animation needs to be economic and easy-to-read to communicate everything in 30 seconds or less.

On top of animating 26 episodes, Stoopid Buddy Stoodios asked me to direct three of the episodes as well. It was a lot of fun to get out from my animation stage and work with the storyboard artist, set builders, puppet fabricators, costume designers, and visual effects artists to bring these to life.

Looks like someone on YouTube has edited together all the season three episodes. Hard to believe I animated almost all 12 minutes of this: Looking forward to animating and directing more Spy vs. Spy shorts with Stoopid Buddy in the new year!

In the United States, Mad currently airs on Cartoon Network on Mondays at 8:30pm, Thursdays at 8pm, and older episodes on Saturday at 1:30pm.