# Dreamworks bastardizes Aardman?? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 14, 2006, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664 "2006-08-14T14:10:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2006, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/21 "2006-08-15T13:37:03Z")
[QUOTE=Shirley Ujest] I am very excited about this movie. It’s not going to be a Wallace & Gromit, but you know the characters will be fully fleshed out. When is the release date, she asked excitedly. [/QUOTE] November 3. Let me know if you miss the clay. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![NoCoolUserName](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5fc32e/32.png) [@NoCoolUserName](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NoCoolUserName)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2006, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/22 "2006-08-15T19:07:50Z")
[QUOTE=Shirley Ujest] …the characters will be fully fleshed out… [/QUOTE] Uh, I think that should be…(wait for it)…fully FLUSHED out. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2006, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/23 "2006-08-15T21:39:32Z")
[QUOTE=MrDibble] While you are somewhat right about signature style and such (although [Morph](http://www.toonhound.com/morph.htm) looks nothing like Wallace, BTW), you do make what I like to think of as the “Jethro Tull” mistake - there is _no_ person called “Aardman” at [Aardman Animations](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aardman_Animations) . [/QUOTE] Rather, Aardman was named after a hand-drawn character created by one of Aardman’s founders. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2006, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/24 "2006-08-15T23:57:56Z")
[QUOTE=MrDibble] While you are somewhat right about signature style and such (although [Morph](http://www.toonhound.com/morph.htm) looks nothing like Wallace, BTW), you do make what I like to think of as the “Jethro Tull” mistake - there is _no_ person called “Aardman” at [Aardman Animations](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aardman_Animations) . [/QUOTE] :smack: Gah. I knew that. I meant Nick Park. Or possibly Aardman as a corporate entity. Or something. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/25 "2006-08-16T05:35:21Z")
FYI, “Claymation” is a [registered trademark](http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=35lf4f.2.5) of [Will Vinton](http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0899139/), an American animator with no connection to Aardman. He is probably best known for the California Raisins commercials. So from a technical POV, it’s incorrect to call Aardman’s work “claymation,” and I’ll bet Mr. Vinton pretty damn tired of it. Of course, people are no more likely to stop than they are to stop saying they’re “xeroxing” when they use some other manufacturer’s copy machine. But I thought you should know. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/26 "2006-08-16T07:19:45Z")
[QUOTE=commasense] FYI, “Claymation” is a [registered trademark](http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=35lf4f.2.5) of [Will Vinton](http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0899139/), an American animator with no connection to Aardman. He is probably best known for the California Raisins commercials. [/QUOTE] It’s really sad that he isn’t best-known for the _PJs_, IMO. I can take or leave Motown, but damn, Eddie Murphy can be real funny when riffing on ghetto stereotypes. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/27 "2006-08-16T11:20:28Z")
I am rather annoyed that Dreamworks is responsible for another stealing of concepts from Pixar (who are doing _Ratatouille_) ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/28 "2006-08-16T13:15:08Z")
Like no one ever thought of doing a rat movie before Pixar? And how do you know that Ratatouille was developed first? ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/29 "2006-08-16T15:44:12Z")
[QUOTE=MrDibble] It’s really sad that he isn’t best-known for the _PJs_, IMO. [/QUOTE] I enjoyed _The PJs_ when it was on, but it wouldn’t really be a good example of Will Vinton Studios (now Laika Entertainment) Claymation®- as it wasn’t animated in clay. Rather, they used a process they called “foamation,” as the characters were made of foam rather than clay. > [@GuanoLad](#): > > I am rather annoyed that Dreamworks is responsible for another stealing of concepts from Pixar (who are doing Ratatouille) Wikipedia can’t always be trusted, but according to them, the original plot for _Flushed Away_ involved pirates, not rats. Besides, as one of my favorite _Simpsons_ quotes of all time points out, animation is based on plagarism. There have been a number of films in the past that have taken unique views on similar subjects (Pixar’s _A Bug’s Life_, DreamWorks’s _Antz_, and Warner Bros./DNA’s _The Ant Bully_; Pixar’s _Finding Nemo_ and DreamWorks’s _Shark Tale_). Of course, it isn’t really a case of plagarism per se as that both Pixar and Aardman both had ideas for a film about rats. This is nothing new in animation- one of my favorite animation stories of all time is about the 1946 Oscar and the two cartoons with a similar plot that went up for it- Warner Bros.'s _Rhapsody Rabbit_ vs. MGM’s _The Cat Concerto_. _Rabbit_ was made first, but _Cat_ was shown first and ended up winning the Oscar. (Both involved a character- Bugs Bunny or Tom- playing Lizst’s Second Hungarian Rhaposdy in concert while fighting a mouse.) ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664/30 "2006-08-16T19:14:34Z")
[QUOTE=mobo85] There have been a number of films in the past that have taken unique views on similar subjects (Pixar’s _A Bug’s Life_, DreamWorks’s _Antz_, and Warner Bros./DNA’s _The Ant Bully_; Pixar’s _Finding Nemo_ and DreamWorks’s _Shark Tale_). [/quote] _A Bug’s Life/Antz_ is a bad example, because the latter was rushed specifically to beat the former to the theaters: > [@](#): > > [**Antz vs. Bugs: The inside story of how Dreamworks beat Pixar to the screen**](http://www.electric-escape.net/node/1162) > > …Given a standing invitation to drop by, [John Lasseter] and [Andrew] Stanton visited Katzenberg in his offices at Dreamworks in the fall of 1995 while in Los Angeles to do post-production work on Toy Story, which came out that November. “We told him all about _Bugs,_” says Lasseter. After all, Lasseter had been pushing for more than a decade to get computer animation on the map as a respected medium. And given his high hopes for _Toy Story,_ he was telling friends throughout the tight-knit computer-animation business to get cracking on their own movies. “If this hits, it’s going to be like space movies after _Star Wars_” for computer-animation companies, he says he told various friends. > > …Sometime later, Pixar learned it had been “betrayed,” to use Lasseter’s words. Pixar sources say PDI chief Carl Rosendahl set up a lunch with Lasseter to tell him some news that was weighing on him: that Katzenberg had agreed to do the deal with PDI only if PDI committed to deliver _Antz_ before Pixar’s _Bugs_ came out. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dreamworks-bastardizes-aardman/368664.md?page=1)