Turner Broadcasting will soon be launching season 2 of ‘Mr. Bean: The Animated Series’ on Boomerang across all territories and on Pogo in India around April 2015, which is based on the original live-action series and ranked as one of the top-rating shows on the channel earlier.
Speaking exclusively to AnimationXpress.com Turner International Asia Pacific Limited, Hong Kong SAR, southeast Asia Pacific, content director, Gary Finnegan says: “Mr. Bean: The Animated Series has performed incredibly well in the past and we’re excited for the second season as well.”
The company recently announced the reboot of Boomerang and it certainly will help to have fresher seasons of tentpole shows like Mr. Bean in the catalogue.
“Next year also marks the 25th anniversary of Mr. Bean on television, and we are humbled by the response that we have received for the series globally,” Tiger Aspect Productions, head of animation and children’s programming, Tom Beattie exults. “We have a team of 50 artists involved in the project, including 4 art directors, 10 concept designers and 20 animators.”
The studio has continued to use 2D animation for the second season as well, but will be using a lot more technology support this time around as the earlier season had 500 animators working on the project which was made using completely hand drawn animation style.
Sharing his views on continuing to use 2D animation Tom expounds: “Well the first season managed to get the response it did because of the unique animation style it used, so we wouldn’t want to tamper with that style, though we have evolved since then and that will come across in the new season.”
“Rowan has been very hands on for us and very cooperative on the pre-production aspects of the show. He also recorded the audio of his mini cooper for better reproduction of the original sounds and create a more natural environment for the character,” reveals Tom.The studio is currently working on delivering 26 episodes of 30 minutes each, which will then be used as 52 episodes over 11 minute capsules on the channels. And this time there would be over 1,500 facial expressions that Mr. Bean will have apart from over 570 handshake movements as well.
Mr. Bean stars legendary British comedian and actor, Rowan Atkinson as the mumbling, bumbling title character, who appears alongside his confidante Teddy and long-suffering girlfriend Irma Gobb. Mr. Bean is the creation of Rowan Atkinson and Richard Curtis.
Mr. Bean and the animated version of the series have been shown in over 190 countries around the world. The series has won an International Emmy in the Popular Arts Category, a Golden Rose of Montreux, a Cable Ace award and a BANFF award.