Animated Series Jumps From Newsprint To 'Net

Market Wire, 20050229

An intrepid terrier with a nose for distinctive humor in newsprint has found his home on the Internet. A one-time regular on the editorial pages of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, "Sam the Dog" will launch www.SamtheDog.com, a web site delivering intelligent and unique animated and streaming media entertainment. Sam and his fellow characters depict the "good, evil and off-center" of modern society, and will appear in a regular animated series and related streaming media features published to the Internet site.

"'Sam the Dog' has a rich and controversial past as a poke-in-the-side of St. Louis--now he's anxious to share his world with a larger audience," said D.B. Dowd, president and creative director of Sam the Dog, Inc.

As the central and title character, Sam the Dog is the "good guy" in the face of almost constant adversity. He provides an individual's perspective in a world that grows exponentially more complex, bizarre and dangerous with every passing week.

Sam is a can-do mutt and an inventor of various devices, some of them clever, some of them flops. His colorful mates include Cockeyed Neil, a peg-legged lunatic bunny who suffers from talk radio intoxication and delusional beliefs. Sam battles wits with his perennial opponent, Parker Longsnout, an aristocratic, villainous pig who tries to leverage his vast wealth into increasingly mad schemes of political, financial and technological control.

The metropolitan backdrop of Sam the Dog's world is a quintessential American place, with pockets of wealth alongside burnt-out zones. Sam's curiosity, and the demands of his career as an inventor, often lead Sam out of his own somewhat dreary neighborhood. As the episodes unfold, Sam travels to gleaming office parks, sleazy gambling boats, tony mansions, upscale golf courses, and to the city's expensive new sports facility, the Extorto Dome.

"In much the same way that Walt Kelly's 'Pogo' did in his era, we think that 'Sam the Dog' will have a broad popular appeal yet also deliver a unique satirical approach," said Terry Cawley, vice president of Sam the Dog, Inc. "Today's audience is looking for a more evolved entertainment experience, and the Internet enables that. 'Sam the Dog' is delivered online, animated, with voice and music, and with interactivity, vivid colors and cinematic action."

Sam the Dog differs from many online animation start-ups in that the detailed characters, settings and the oddly textured satire will sustain a closer and longer scrutiny than is possible for sites featuring exploding critters and topical celebrity-bashing.

"Our sense of humor can be fairly warped, and is not above the occasional slapstick or juvenile sight gag," said Cawley. "But on the other hand, our stuff has a level of detail, a cinematic quality and an approach to the writing and illustration that will reward a second and third look."

The animated series is produced using Macromedia Flash software. In addition to the regular three-minute animated series, visitors to the site will enjoy other, shorter features that will be delivered more frequently. The rich audio and visual characteristics of the site are examples of the capabilities afforded with new software and broadband data pipelines.

Dowd, a writer and illustrator, created the character Sam the Dog, featured in 108 weekly installments of "Metro Trap" on the editorial opinion pages of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch from 1997 to 1999. Taken together, these episodes comprised a complete graphic novel serialized over time in a major metropolitan daily newspaper¾an unusual event in the world of print journalism.

"When Sam the Dog was launched in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 1997, we knew we were pushing the envelope. The cartoon was unlike anything our readers had seen in our newspaper before," said Christine Bertelson, editorial page editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "Sam's alter ego, D.B. Dowd, used Sam and his anthropomorphic pals to satirize key issues facing many aging urban areas in late 20th Century America: race, class, the gap between rich and poor, health care for the indigent, corporate hypocrisy, homelessness, sprawl and mental illness. With humor that ranged from the sly to slapstick, Sam's bite was always worse than his bark. We wish Sam the Dog the best of luck as it goes online as an animated short."

Sam the Dog, Inc. was formed in 2000 by D.B. Dowd and Terry Cawley to develop and produce streaming entertainment for the Internet. Currently, Sam the Dog, Inc. is self-financed. Although the company is open to the possibility of outside investors, Sam the Dog, Inc. is looking to fund the animated series primarily with its production, advertising and consulting revenue as much as possible.

Dowd and Cawley will approach the roll-out of SamtheDog.com's features with an eye towards the possible migration of the Sam the Dog characters to off-line realms including television, film, games and print media. They will pursue meetings with representatives of the new media industry to explore development, production, distribution and merchandising opportunities for the characters and the company's animated series and features.