My Life ME, an anime-style Canada/France co-production, will debut on the French version of Télétoon September 2010, according to Teletoon publicist Megan Dunkley.  The English-language version is currently set to air in the fall of 2011.  Programming schedules, of course, are subject to change.

My Life ME has been in development since 2006, part of a slate that included The Dating Guy, Punch and Best Ed.  It will be the fourth cartoon from the 2006 slate to debut on Teletoon.

My Life ME has changed its international distributor since going into production in 2008.  Original distributor TV-Loonland AG filed for insolvency back in November 2009.  Classic Media has since picked up international distribution, licensing and merchandising rights for the show.

My Life ME differs from Teletoon’s upcoming non-Japanese anime The Amazing Spiez! in that there’s an actual manga pedigree, albeit of the original English-language (OEL) variety.  Russian-born Canadian Svetlana Chmakova is responsible for Dramacon and Nightschool.

I admittedly don’t know how properties are developed at the cable/network levels.  I realize shows die in development all the time.  Still, Best Ed came and went in the spring of 2009.  Punch! aired at the start of 2008.  The Dating Guy will debut this fall.  That’s a long wait from development to finished product.

I hope My Life ME will be more Azumanga Daioh than 6teen for manga fans.  The last thing Teletoon needs right now is another niche show catering to teens.  I’ll still support My Life ME over, say, Hot Wheels Battle Force 5 and Johnny Test.

I don’t usually post obituary notices on URBMN, but this obituary is appropriate enough for here.  John Callahan, the quadriplegic cartoonist/musician/satirist, died July 24, 2010 from complications resulting from a 2009 surgery.  He was 59.

John Callahan has had two shows based on his works, both from Nelvana.  Pelswick aired from 2000-02.  Nickelodeon broadcast the show in the United States, while CBC handled the Canadian airings.

John Callahan’s Quads! is Callahan’s adult show, which first aired on Teletoon and Australia’s Special Broadcasting Service from 2001-02.  Quads! is notable as one of the first Flash-animated series to air on television.

I’m admittedly most familiar with Callahan through Pelswick and Quads!  He’s infamous for his one-panel cartoons.  Callahan was not afraid of offending anyone.  This was balanced with blunt honesty about his struggles with alcoholism, even after the 1972 car accident which severed his spinal cord.

Here’s a link to a Cartoon Brew post about Callahan.  Said link contains I Think I Was an Alcoholic, a short animated film of Callahan’s from 1993.

Frankly, I Think I Was an Alcoholic captures Callahan’s essence much better than either Pelswick or Quads!  Pelswick and Quads! are serviceable shows, yet hardly essential.  I also dog Teletoon for reairing Quads! way too much, since the show does not hold up in reruns.

Callahan’s life is too varied for me to properly eulogize.  Portland, Oregon citizens do this far better than I ever could.

Teletoon introduced its 2010-11 lineup today, with a big shiny media site and everything.  This post will cover only Teletoon at Night.

The biggest change for TaN is that Teletoon Detour has been phased out completely.  Teletoon at Night was introduced in 2009 as a place for less raunchy adult-oriented shows, sort of a gateway to the Detour.  The shows common to Teletoon Detour have largely been moved past midnight, mimicking [adult swim]‘s format.

Acquisitions for TaN include the FX animated spy spoof/Frisky Dingo variant Archer, a new season of American Dad and new episodes of Robot Chicken.  Original programs include 26 episodes of The Dating Guy, plus nine of the ten Teletoon Pilot Project entries.

I notice that the Teletoon Detour at Night Pilot Project is missing The Wireless Family.  Commenters on Canadian Animation Resources have pretty much slammed that pilot, as has Mike Valiquette.  I recall the comments on the Teletoon Detour website ravaging the show, though it wasn’t as hated as Drop Dead Gorgeous.

If Teletoon isn’t airing The Wireless Family due to extreme negative reaction, I’ll understand.  I assume the slight has more to do with The Wireless Family being a French-language show dubbed into English, the only Pilot Project show carrying that distinction.  Either way, I doubt the average viewer notices or cares.

From looking at the media site, Teletoon will not air new episodes of Metalocalypse, The Venture Bros. or Futurama this fall.  This frustrates me.  The Venture Bros.‘ fourth-season DVD (well, Season 4 Volume 1) will come out October 26, 2010.  Futurama just made a triumphant return to Comedy Central.  Canadians want these shows, believe me.

I honestly hope Teletoon at Night is withholding shows for winter.  I’m glad Archer is on Teletoon, but the overall schedule is thin.  At least Teletoon at Night is airing new material this year.  I don’t think I could bear the possibility of more Quads!

Spliced! (Teletoon: 7:00 PM ET/PT starting April 8, 2010) is part of an unwelcome trend in Teletoon’s programming.  Like The Dating Guy, Spliced! has premiered outside of its home country months before its Canadian debut.

I don’t understand why Teletoon does this.  Why withhold programming for so long?  I’m not saying I want the fourth season of The Venture Bros. the same day as [adult swim], but Teletoon has a terrible habit of letting fine wine age way after its time.  Why debut Spliced! in Latin America, of all places?

Wait, it’s the television industry.  Screw me for thinking common sense exists there.

I’m also aware that show creators Simon Racioppa and Richard Elliott have written for cartoon also-rans like Mr. Meaty, Best Ed, Pig City and Grossology.  Screw it.  I like Spliced!  It’s one of the best things going for Teletoon right now.

I realize how sweeping a statement that is, but I defend it.  Sometimes, Teletoon airs an obvious kids’ cartoon like Wayside, Johnny Test and the George of the Jungle remake.  The Total Drama franchise, Stoked and 6teen are teen-oriented sitcoms, doubling as decent ratings-grabbers for Cartoon Network.

What Teletoon hasn’t attempted is a classic Nicktoons-style show, where adults and children can watch the show on different levels.  Spliced! is currently the closest to that ideal, taking the mantle over from Jimmy Two Shoes.  Spliced! isn’t on the level of Ren & Stimpy or Bob Clampett, but few cartoons are.

“Honorary Freak” is a good enough introduction to the show.  Spliced! establishes Peri (Rob Stefaniuk) and Entrée (Joe Pingue), two of the many mutants on Keep Away Island.  The inaugural short’s plot centers around Patricia (Katie Crown), a platypus and the only normal on the island.

Patricia feels lonely because she isn’t a mutant.  Peri and Entrée decide to cheer her up, mainly by avalanching her with flowers and forcing her to fight in the Mayo-Dome.  Peri and Entrée also rap, which isn’t needed and feels out-of-place.

“Honorary Freak” lays bare Spliced!‘s desire to be SpongeBob SquarePants.  Peri and Entrée are SpongeBob and Patrick.  Patricia is a monotreme Sandy Cheeks.  Mind you, Peri and Entrée aren’t as annoying as SpongeBob and Patrick, as P&E aren’t nearly as oblivious.

“Come to the Dorkside” has its moments.  The friendship-related Aesop is a little ham-fisted, but it’s balanced out by some brainwashing gags and an obligatory reference to A Clockwork Orange.  Mister Smarty Smarts (Mike Kiss) and Octocat are Spliced!‘s nominal villains, Mister Smarty Smarts filling the Plankton role well.

I hope Spliced! sticks around.  Any show that has a male character squeeze milk out his udders deserves at least some mention.  Having typed that, I hope the lactation fetishists don’t embrace Spliced!  God knows they’re turned on enough by Rocko’s Modern Life and Cow and Chicken.

Spliced!, a Nelvana cartoon, makes its Canadian debut on Teletoon April 1, 2010.  The cartoon debuts 8:30 PM ET/PT, after five episodes of Johnny Test.  A repeat of the debut airs April 4 at 8:30 PM ET/PT.  Spliced! settles into a Thursday night 7:00 PM ET/PT time slot on April 8.

Spliced! is about a bunch of genetic recombinants stranded on a desert island, as they try to build a civilization from the ground up.  Characters include Entrée, a cow-pig-chicken-tuna-shrimp thing that walks on its udder.  There’s also a dolphin/chimp/Jack Russell terrier with three Internet degrees.  Yeah, it’s that kind of show.

Spliced! has already debuted on Jetix in Latin America, having first aired anywhere April 20, 2009.  Spliced!‘s brief run in the United States was on ION’s digital subchannel qubo, from September 19 to October 24, 2009.

Matt Ferguson directs this show.  He’s responsible for Harold Rosenbaum, Chartered Accountant Extreme, a fairly spot-on parody of limited-animation cartoons.  Viewers may remember Harold Rosenbaum from YTV’s Funpak (2005)…not that many people have watched Funpak.

Spliced! could very well outstrip every other Canadian show on Teletoon’s pre-watershed schedule, which isn’t hard when it’s flanking Johnny Test, Wayside and Stoked.  I’ll admit to liking Jimmy Two Shoes a bit (a bit), but I have a good feeling about Spliced!  Here’s a clip parodying The More You Know:

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6teen will air its two-part final episode February 11, 2010, at 8:00 PM ET/PT.  The series has aired on Teletoon since 2004, albeit in staggered seasons.  In America, 6teen aired on Nickelodeon before moving to Cartoon Network in 2008.

Three new episodes will air before the series finale, starting at 6:30 PM ET/PT.  While it’s nice to see a proper sendoff for 6teen, five new episodes back-to-back smells of a burnoff.

No new 6teen episodes have aired since November 2009, so Teletoon has washed its hands of the show.  Four seasons on that network isn’t half bad.  I tolerate 6teen a lot more than Wayside, World of Quest and Stoked.

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According to Tiffany Astle of Holmes Creative Communications, The Dating Guy will debut on Teletoon September 2010.  HCC does PR for marblemedia, the company producing The Dating Guy.  Teletoon has the final say in scheduling, so The Dating Guy‘s airdate is not set in stone.

In America, The Dating Guy has been renewed for a second season on HDNet.  No second-season premiere date has been set.  I don’t get the logic of a Canadian show debuting in America a full season before it debuts in its home country, but whatever.

My guess is that Teletoon’s stockpiling shows for Teletoon Detour and Teletoon at Night.  It’s not a bad strategy, better than debuting one or two shows a year and hoping for the best.  I wish next season wouldn’t come at the expense of this season, but baby steps.

After three months and ten shows, Nerdland has emerged the English-language “winner” of the Teletoon Pilot Project.  The Cuppa Coffee Studios show attracted 185,342 votes.

Interestingly, ledetour.ca visitors voted Lenz Entertainment’s Ninjamaica their favourite, with 76,014 votes.  Having not been to ledetour.ca at all before January 15, I’m not sure whether Nerdland won the overall vote.

It should be noted that Nerdland will not automatically commit to series as a result of the Teletoon Pilot Project.  Other factors will be considered – if and/or where it fits on Teletoon’s schedule, comments, voting, overall online buzz and so on.

The voting process itself had its good and bad points.  The “vote for your favourite” was too simplistic, and staggering the release dates for pilots wasn’t the most sensible tactic.

At least the comments were by and large honest.  For instance, Drop Dead Gorgeous won’t make it past pilot stage.  That pilot was Popcultured with Elvira Kurt levels of hated.

I sincerely hope this is part of a larger effort to revitalize Teletoon Detour/At Night.  Teletoon would be stupid not to greenlight at least one cartoon, even mimic the [adult swim] preference for fifteen-minute shows.  If Teletoon doesn’t greenlight at least one regular series from the Pilot Project, what’s the point of mounting it?

All pilots will remain online until February 1, 2010.  Pilots participating in the Teletoon Pilot Project will air this coming fall.

Two years after it was first announced, the Teletoon Pilot Project will finally be streamed online through teletoon.sympatico.ca and thedetour.ca.  teletoon.sympatico.ca will contain the WebHD stream, while those flocking to thedetour.ca will have to make do with standard definition.

French-speaking viewers can go to detour.sympatico.ca (WebHD) and ledetour.ca (SD.)  One pilot will debut every Friday starting October 23, 2009.

The ten pilots will also be screened at the 2009 Ottawa International Animation Festival from tonight until Saturday, October 17.  Each screening starts at 11:30 PM, with three to four pilots being screened each night.  The titles being screened are as follows:

Ninjamaica (Lenz Entertainment: October 16)
Angora Napkin (Mugisha Enterprises: October 15)
Dunce Bucket (Nunchucks Pilot Inc./Fresh TV Inc.: October 16)
Nerdland (Cuppa Coffee Studios: October 15)
Drop Dead Gorgeous (CINEMARIA: October 17)
The Wireless Family (Encore Television: October 15)
Celebutard Nation (Nelvana: October 16)
Space Knights (Fatkat Animation: October 17)
Chinatown Cops (Portfolio Entertainment: October 17)
Fugget About It (9 Story Entertainment: October 16)

Off the bat, I know one show might not make it to series, Space Knights.  Fatkat Animation is dead, to the point that it liquidated a foosball table.  Fatkat founder Gene Fowler has since founded Loogaroo.

It’s nice to see Teletoon finally go ahead with the Pilot Project, although I’d like to see conventional television debuts down the line.  Teletoon recently greenlit Crash Canyon for Teletoon at Night, so it’s taken steps to pump new adult animation into the pipeline.  It’s about time.  One can’t subsist on a diet of Clone High and Tripping the Rift forever.

Note: as of the time I publish this, the sympatico.ca sites are not yet active.  You’d think Teletoon would have the sites up before prepping its media release, but no.  This channel is goofy at times.