The age-old schoolyard technique for settling any serious kid question gets an imaginative, animated interpretation in Rock Paper Scissors — the new Nickelodeon animated series created by Robot Chicken alums Kyle Stegina and Josh Lehrman. Already gaining fans on YouTube and due to make their television debut on February 12, the show is the first to be picked up from Nickelodeon’s Intergalactic Shorts Program.
The series follows big-hearted Rock, affectatious intellectual Paper and overly confident Scissors — voiced by Ron Funches (Trolls, Trolls Band Together), Thomas Lennon (Zoey 102, 17 Again, Reno 911!) and Carlos Alazraqui (Rocko’s Modern Life, Reno 911!), respectively — a trio of best friends and roommates who lovingly compete over everything in hilarious but mostly wildly absurd ways. In the original short, which will air exclusively this Christmas Day (December 25) during the Nickelodeon NFL Nickmas Game, they go from fighting over what to watch on TV to being the stars of a successful Broadway musical.
Produced by Nickelodeon Animation, the original Rock Paper Scissors short and series are created, written and executive produced by Stegina and Lehrman, with Conrad Vernon (Sausage Party) and Bob Boyle (The Fairly OddParents) serving as executive producers on the series. Development is overseen by Nickelodeon Animation’s Kari Kim, VP Animation Development, and Daniel Wineman, VP Original Animation Development. The series is overseen by executive in charge Jason Oliveri.
The show’s creators recently took a quick recess break to answer a few questions about their energetic new comedy toon for us!
Animation Magazine: Can you tell us a bit about how you came up with the idea for the show?
Josh Lehrman: Most of our projects come from long brainstorming sessions where Kyle and I ask each other, “What are we going through in our lives?” or “What themes do we want to explore?” This idea came to me in the shower.
Kyle Stegina: Josh came to my apartment and said, “How about a show starring Rock, Paper and Scissors. They’re roommates, and they’re competitive over everything?” It just made me laugh. It’s such a simple and fun premise that anyone can get on board with and, truthfully, the ideas you can pitch in one breath and visualize immediately are often the best ideas.
Josh: Or the dumbest ideas.
Kyle: And this show is a mix of both — in the best way.
What do you love about these characters and what do you think makes the show stand out?
Kyle: I really love Rock, Paper and Scissors’ unique friendship: equal parts love and bickering. One minute they’ll be knitting a three-person friendship blanket or doing synchronized dressage, and the next minute they’ll be fighting and yelling over each other. We think that balance is a pretty realistic portrayal of friendship that you don’t see a lot of in kids’ TV.
Josh: And I think one of the things that makes the show stand out is the unpredictability of the storytelling. Because this show isn’t bound by many rules, we can really go anywhere and do anything.
Kyle: Yeah, we have an episode that takes place over the course of 50 years and another episode that takes place entirely in Scissors’ head.
Josh: I’ll add, too, that I love when we take a really silly idea and build it to a surprisingly emotional moment at the end. We do it sparingly, and I won’t give away any episodes, but I think viewers will be moved by some episodes this season.
How did you put the terrific voice cast together?
Josh: Oh man, we got so lucky with the cast.
Kyle: Yeah, we essentially got our first choice for everybody.
Josh: I remember, in the early stages of development, Nickelodeon asked us who we wanted for the trio. And in the car ride back to one of our places, we pitched Ron Funches for Rock and Thomas Lennon for Paper. Scissors took us a little more time to figure out because we needed to find someone who could be a jerk and be vulnerable, but then we thought of Carlos Alazraqui because we worked with him on an episode of a Comedy Central show we wrote, and he really elevated the role.
Kyle: Also, he was Rocko.
Josh: That, too. Kyle and I were big Rocko’s Modern Life fans when we were kids.
Kyle: And all three of them said yes. The talent we’ve gotten on this show is still surprising to us — even for the recurring roles.
Josh: Yeah, Melissa Villaseñor is wonderful as Pencil, and there was no one other than Eddie Pepitone for Lou.
Kyle: We wrote the part for him.
Josh: We didn’t tell him that, though, because we didn’t want it to come out wrong.
Kyle: Like, “Hey Eddie, we wrote this miserable, talking garbage can with only you in mind!”
Can you describe the visual style and designs of the show?
Kyle: Our show uses semi-photorealistic backgrounds with 2D cartoony characters, and it’s such an inviting contrast that’s just fun to watch.
Josh: And by the way, most of the credit for the visual style goes to Amanda Li and Paul Watling. They worked on the pilot presentation with us when this show was in development and crafted the initial look. Then two more amazing artists, Bob Boyle and John Won, came on and perfected the style when we started the series.
Kyle: Also, we were very ambitious in series with how many places our characters go, and the background designers worked tirelessly to deliver on everything.
Josh: Again, I won’t give away any episodes, but there are several where Kyle and I saw the backgrounds in a design meeting, and they were so beautiful we were like, “What is this doing in our show? This belongs in a museum!”
The Intergalactic Short TV Time airs December 25 at 1 p.m. PT / 4 p.m. ET ahead of the series premiere of Rock Paper Scissors on Nickelodeon on Monday, February 12 at 5:30 p.m. ET/PT. New episodes will continue to air weekdays at 5:30 p.m., with international roll-out later in the month.
Shorts and clips starring the titular trio and their friends are now available on the Nicktoons YouTube channel, as well as full episodes.
