Is the world ready for a new group of hilarious animated monsters? The team behind the new short-form comedy series Gleeful Beasts hope so. The CG-animated show, which is produced in Unreal Engine, is the brainchild of U.K.-based Sparklegoose (headed by Natt Tapley and Joel Veitch, the writing and performance team behind the recent Netflix series Bad Dinosaurs) and U.S.-based animation house, Sans Strings Studio (led by Ryan Corniel and Sébastien Deguy, Adobe’s head of 3D and Metaverse).
We were fortunate enough to catch up with the team to find out more about the new show, which was recently launched on YouTube. Here’s what they told us:
Animation Magazine: Congrats on the arrival of your new show. Can you tell us a bit about how this new venture started?
Joel Veitch: When Natt Tapley and I finished on Bad Dinosaurs, we decided to set up a partnership to develop comedy projects together. Thus was Sparklegoose born. We were absolutely blown away by the work Ryan Corniel and Seb Deguy at Sans Strings are doing with real-time CGI puppetry in Unreal so we reached out to them about a possible collaboration.
The format that we settled on is essentially short-form sketches. This works for us for a number of reasons. Firstly, we love sketch comedy and there has been a real dearth of this on broadcasters for some years now. The internet has made it difficult to produce TV sketch comedy that really cuts through. Rather than trying to fight this battle, we want to do two things: firstly, work with the new media world rather than against it and secondly, to reinvent sketch comedy in a way that can cut through in this new landscape. This project allows us to do all of that.
We wanted to think in a digital-first way that would allow us to push forward without having to wait for a broadcaster to give us permission. We also wanted to be able to capitalize on the benefits that taking this approach provides in terms of flexibility and fleet-footedness to react to audience feedback.
Our intention is to build this as a series of sub-one-minute shorts that can live in a vertical format on TikTok, YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels and work natively with the huge audience that lives there. We can then cut compilations of these together into a more conventional sketch show format for YouTube. We’ve tested this out and we are really excited by the results, it’s such a great show! We are making ourselves laugh and that is always the most important thing in any creative endeavor — you have to believe that what you are doing is funny, first and foremost.
Our intention is to reach out to commissioners with the sketch show format in the new year, but vitally, we are not dependent on them to begin work. We all know that times are hard in animation at the moment, and so we need to be able to find our own paths to getting things made. I find long periods of talking about ideas without making any of them terribly frustrating. We need to be making!
Bad Dinosaurs began life as a series of YouTube shorts called Dinosaurs: Terrible Lizards, and it is very clear that the advantage of being able to point to something that already exists and say “this is the idea” was a huge piece of the puzzle in getting it commissioned for Netflix. We are building on this experience, learning lessons and bending with the wind of change.
The fantastic creations that Ryan and Seb are producing are immediately evocative for us, and conjure up characters, worlds and possibilities galore. We have a backwards production pipeline where Ryan sends us the characters moving and we then invent the audio to explain what is happening. This is an absolute blast, and the creative restrictions it places us under are proving to be fabulous drivers of fun. It’s also remarkably efficient, enabling us to push ahead and create content at a surprising rate.
Natt Tapley: Also, we’re firmly of the opinion that the world needs more glee, more joy, and a little bit more nonsense. My background is in topical comedy and political satire, so Bad Dinosaurs was a revelation to me in its freedom to revel in silliness and character. We’re a world that seems to be deficient in delightful idiocy at the moment, so this is a chance to bring some of that back to people everywhere.
What were some of the inspirations behind these fun monsters?
Ryan Corniel: I’ve always been inspired by fun character designs, and the most enjoyable characters I’ve seen have been puppets — whether from the Henson Studio or other studios with a passion for handcrafted characters. While I’m not the most crafty individual when it comes to making physical puppets, I know tech, and I love pushing character designs that are a little unusual.
Joel: All of our work is driven by our reactions to the material Ryan sends us. A lot of these pieces are in a mockumentary format, and this is something that we dearly love; the original shorts that became Bad Dinosaurs were mockumentary. Sometimes we lean more into character comedy, often driven by a monologue. These are always driven by our reaction to the characters but our comic sensibilities are shaped by the huge history of sketch comedy (particularly British sketch comedy) which we grew up with.
The third category we have are pieces that are just a delightful moment in time, often dominated by a music bed. These pieces have an ethereal and joyful feel and we have tried to translate that fundamental nature of the characters into music. I feel that the old 2000s animated sketch show Monkey Dust is generally at the back of my mind with these things, it did a wonderful job of conjuring up a mood with the music it used.
Natt: Seeing Ryan’s work, doing silly voices and always, always David Attenborough.
When did you start working on the show?
Joel: We (Sparklegoose) teamed up with the Sans Strings guys in the late summer of this year and we have spent the fall beavering away on an initial batch of material to launch with. Ryan and Seb have been developing their technology for a good while before we teamed up!
Where is the animation done and which animation tools are used?
Ryan: Animation is done at Sans Strings Studio, based in the Bay Area, California. Tools used for modelling include ZBrush, Adobe Substance 3D Modeler, Adobe Substance 3D Painter, Houdini (for grooms and skeleton binding) and Cinema 4D (for grooms). The animation itself is handled through real-time animation within Unreal Engine 5. All animations are live-action performances, screen-captured in real time and puppeteered using Valve Index Controllers.
Can you tell us about your plans for the show and why you opted for a soft-launch?
Joel: We are soft-launching the project for a number of reasons. The main one is that we want to be able to get material out and start to gauge reactions before we have spent an overwhelming amount of time producing work. This will enable us to tailor our output as we move forward, building on success and dropping things that are not resonating so well. It is a key advantage of working digital-first and forms a key part of our content strategy. It also allows us to gamble on ideas that might or might not be worthwhile, to take risks and allow some things to fail.
It also allows us to start releasing things early. As we are doing this ourselves, we do not want to be beavering away for years before we start getting material out into the world, we want to be releasing work. The main reason, though, is absolutely that we want to be malleable in terms of what we are doing and allow some ideas to fail.
Natt: We’re very aware of the opportunities the internet brings to iterate on both ideas and execution. By staggering the various releases of what we put out and where, we can discover exactly what works, and which of our marvelous doofuses (doofi?) the audience wants more of.
Are there plans for new episodes of Bad Dinosaurs? Will we see crossover episodes?
Joel: We are not currently planning any more Bad Dinosaurs, I am sad to say. Netflix declined to renew the show so, absent a miraculous rebirth, that will be all there is.
What do you love about this new project?
Joel: I love everything about Gleeful Beasts! Sorry, that is not a very useful answer let me be more specific. Working with Ryan and Seb at Sans Strings is wonderful. Ryan’s genius creations are such delightful material to work with. Every time we hear that something new is coming across we get a thrill of excitement, and they never, ever disappoint.
I love the backwards pipeline we are working with because it gives Natt and I a whole new game to play, making up characters, worlds and situations to fit these fantastic visuals we are receiving. The whole process is utterly joyful.
I love that we are doing something so fleet-footed and quick. There is a place in the world, obviously, for really intensive production, but the ability to capture a magical character in real time, and then find the comedy to bring it to life, then get it out into the world and get reactions immediately, is a real breath of fresh air. It’s good to be able to find space for both approaches.
Natt: Its deep silliness. These are moments to enjoy, to bring a bit of light, a laugh, something you can share with a friend. There’s a purity to that aim — to delight in silliness — that is very appealing.
Biggest challenges ahead?
Joel: For us, the main thing is going to be to build a production business with an eye on innovative ways of building and monetizing IP. The animation industry will still be facing challenges, and so we will be working with new technologies and new media to make sure that we can produce content that is both making us laugh and financially viable.
Why should everyone check out these clever new shorts?
Joel: Because they are funny! Hopefully we are making something different to what you have seen before. The visual wizardry that Ryan performs makes it feel unlike any other animation product out there. We think we have found a synergy of visual and writing approaches that should make you laugh, but also really draws you in with the immediacy of the characters’ performance.
Natt: You’re going to see unbelievably cute and strange creatures doing funny stuff. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen before.
What do you think Sir David Attenborough would think of Gleeful Beasts?
Joel: I am sure he would love them! He has always had a soft spot for the less competent creatures of the world, and our beasts certainly lack competence! Honestly, I’d love to show him a few of these pieces and get his reaction, that would be wonderful!
Natt: I imagine he’ll find them as funny and joyous as we do. If not, we’ll just write a voiceover that implies he does and stick it on one of the videos…
Learn more at gleefulbeasts.com and follow the toons on YouTube (@gleeful.beasts), TikTok (@gleeful.beasts) and Instagram (gleeful.beasts)
