LA-based Skybound Entertainment’s new unscripted division has teamed up with New York’s reality series powerhouse DIGA Studios to co-produce a new competition series that’s all about finding the next visionary animator à la Hayao Miyazaki. Project details are still few and far between, but the show will feature animators flexing their skills in challenges, and it could put some up-and-coming talent on the industry’s radar.  

Skybound launched its unscripted division in April and tapped ex-Catalina Content development EVP Brent Jacoby (The Mighty Underdogs for Discovery+) to lead it. Meanwhile, DIGA Studios has sold its unscripted shows to major streaming services including Max (Selling the Hamptons), Netflix (Million Dollar Beach House) and Peacock (John Carpenter’s Suburban Screams).  

This new competition series could serve as a springboard for Skybound to stage a full-fledged revival of Spike & Mike’s Festival of Animation, which it acquired in November. The studio is reportedly planning to relaunch the festival—which screens animated shorts, traditionally in San Diego—next summer. So far, it has received more than 1,000 short film submissions, and Skybound may end up casting some of these entrants. 

This project may also spotlight an industry that experienced big demand growth during the pandemic (when animation was easier to make than live action), but that has struggled to regain its footing since. The genre is having a good year at the box office, where Inside Out 2 and Despicable Me 4 have respectively earned more than US$1.4 billion and US$580 million to date. 

Image courtesy of Frank Rolando Romero via Unsplash.