Happy Tree Friends

Happy Tree Friends (Commonly abbreviated to HTF) is an adult-oriented Flash animated cartoon series by Mondo Mini Shows, created by Kenn Navarro, Rhode Montijo, and Aubrey Ankrum, and developed by Montijo, Navarro, and Warren Graff. Disguised as a children's animated edutainment series, the show follows the misadventures of cute anthropomorphic forest animals, whose initially peaceful lives always end with sudden, usually accidental, graphically violent incidents. Since its debut, the show has become a popular internet phenomenon and has won a cult following. As is indicated on the official site, the show is "not recommended for small children". Notwithstanding the cute appearance of its characters, the show is extremely violent, with almost every episode featuring blood, gore, and violent deaths, to the point of being taken off the air in Russia. While the violence of these deaths is comparable to that of "The Itchy & Scratchy Show" (the short cartoon featured on "The Simpsons"), the portrayal of death in Happy Tree Friends is more graphic and anatomically correct, depicting bloodshed and dismemberment in more vivid, exaggerated detail. The show is nearly free of dialogue; however, when the characters do speak, their words are severely garbled. Though it is obvious what each character's reaction is, their words can barely be understood. Exceptions to this are Pop, Lumpy, and Disco Bear; they have garbled speech as well, but can actually be understood on most occasions. According to the website, the idea for Happy Tree Friends was conceived by Rhode Montijo when he drew a yellow rabbit, slightly resembling the character Cuddles, on a piece of paper and wrote "Resistance Is Futile" underneath it.
==History==
===Beginning===
While working on Mondo Mini Shows, Rhode Montijo drew on a little piece of scrap paper, a character who would later become Shifty. He then drew a yellow rabbit that bore some resemblance to Cuddles, on a piece of paper and wrote "Resistance Is Futile" underneath it. The drawing (of Cuddles) made several employees laugh. In 1999 Mondo gave Aubrey Ankrum, Montijo, and Kenn Navarro a chance to do a short for them. They came up with a short named Banjo Frenzy which featured a dinosaur (an earlier version of Lumpy) killing three woodland animals (earlier versions of Cuddles, Giggles, and Toothy) with a banjo. From there Mondo gave them their own internet series, which they first named it Star Wars, only to be changed to Happy Tree Friends to avoid confusion with the Lucasfilm franchise of the same name. They got new writers and animators to work on the show.
===Success===
Shortly after its original debut in 1999, Happy Tree Friends became an unexpected success, getting over 15 million hits each month, and being shown in film festivals. In some countries, the episodes were shown on television. They could be seen on MTV and Comedy Central channels in Europe and Latin America, the Czech Music TV Óčko (again in 2012 - 2013), the Greek Mad Music Channel, the Russian 2x2 channel (until it was taken off the air due to controversy), the Canadian television channel Razer (later MTV2), the American television channel G4, and on the Australian Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) network. On June 10, 2005, the shorts began showing during G4's "Attack of the Show!" A series, Happy Tree Friends and Friends, then began to air on August 29, 2005, as part of the late night the channel's Midnight Spank block. The series was then reformed into its own show, rather than as a part of a compilation as before. Happy Tree Friends has also gained a collection of Audibles and an "IMVironment" for Yahoo!'s instant messenger. It is featured on many websites on which flash cartoons can be watched, such as Newgrounds, YouTube, Atom Films, and the official Happy Tree Friends website. During select 2007 Ozzfests, some Happy Tree Friends episodes were even shown on the big screen. Encouraged by the show's success, its creators have released multiple DVDs containing the episodes shown on the website and in the TV Series (see below) and others that have not been released. Happy Tree Friends is currently one of the most downloaded iTunes podcasts and over 1,000 fan-made videos have appeared on YouTube.
Happy Tree Friends episodes have begun airing on American television again as of April 2019, as part of The Mondo Animation Hour series on the El Rey Network.
===TV Series===
Happy Tree Friends gained its own TV show in 2006, and it was first shown at Comic-Con with some of the segments being shown on the website a few weeks later. The Happy Tree Friends TV series premiered on September 25, 2006 at midnight (Eastern Time) on the original incarnation of the G4 network, at the time owned by G4 Media, a joint venture between Comcast and EchoStar (owners of Dish Network at the time). Each half hour episode of the TV series contains three 7-minute segments, with 39 segments having aired across 13 full episodes. Reruns would later air on MTV in 2007. The show also aired in Canada on Razer and City, MTV and Comedy Central channels in Europe and Latin America, MTV and Animax (now Sony Max) in South Africa, MTV, Comedy Central and FX in Asia, HBO Comedy, and MTV and Paramount Comedy 1 (now Comedy Central) in the UK. The series was also available on Netflix until April 15, 2018 and has been available on Crunchyroll since 2015. The series was rated TV-14 on G4 in the US for "intense violence", while on Netflix, it was rated TV-MA. Crunchyroll rates it the same. TV Series was banned in Russia for being too violent and gory "for the kids show".
==Episodes==
See more: List of Episodes
Season	Season 	Episodes	Originally aired 	Originally aired
Season	Season 	Episodes	First aired 	Last aired
 	1 	27 	December 24, 1999 	October 20, 2001
 	2 	27 	September 1, 2002 	December 15, 2005
 	TV Season 	39 	September 25, 2006	December 25, 2006
 	3 	25 	November 2, 2007 	March 29, 2013
 	4 	9 	June 14, 2013 	March 6, 2014
 	5 	6 	December 7, 2016 	Ongoing
 	Irregular Episodes	17 	1999 	2023
 	Ka-Pow! 	3 	2008 	2011
 	HTF Break 	13 	2008 	2012
 	Smoochies 	15 	2003 	2008
 	Love Bites 	15 	2009 	2012
 	Kringles 	15 	2004 	2004
==Show Characteristics==
All of the show's main characters are anthropomorphic colorful forest animals. Many of them show two front large buckteeth when they smile. All of the Happy Tree Friends, with the exceptions of Lumpy, Mr. Pickels, and Sniffles, have the same pink Care Bear or Care Bear Cousin heart-shaped noses. In early episodes, most characters played the roles of children doing childish games. However, as the series progressed the age concept was dropped, and now characters act variously like children, teenagers and adults in different episodes. The only characters who are unaffected by this concept are Lumpy, Handy, Disco Bear, The Mole, Cro-Marmot, Lifty, Shifty, Pop, Cub, Flippy, and Splendid, who always act like adults (except for Cub, who is always a child) respectively. At the beginning of each episode, the characters are typically found in everyday situations. However, these situations always escalate into violence and the inevitable deaths of those involved and/or innocent bystanders, mostly because of very unfortunate, surprising accidents with otherwise harmless instruments. The show's characters sometimes appear not to notice other character's deaths/injuries, despite clear indications (such as blood coming out of the latter's mouths), or they seem to quickly overcome their fellows' deaths. The only regular episodes where none of the characters died were Nuttin' but the Tooth, Out on a Limb, Dream Job, and House Warming. Other than those, every episode has had at least one death. Kenn Navarro has stated that, despite all of deaths in the show, no character is going to be killed directly by a gun as that would be "too easy".https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/2afqop/comment/ciun4sx/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 The continuity of the series does not seem to be affected by the frequent deaths of the characters, as they always appear alive and well in episodes subsequent to those in which they were killed.
Each episode starts with introduction credits resembling a children's book, which portray the show's logo, the episode's name, which is usually a pun, and cast. Internet episodes have a typical duration of less than three minutes. Usually only a few of the characters are used in a single episode, but occasionally larger episodes have been released where most of the characters appear. TV episodes last about half an hour, having three segments of about seven minutes. Each episode ends with a moral that has some (or sometimes not) connection to the story.
Although most of the characters are mammals, there are few that are not. Those characters are Sneaky, Mr. Pickels, The Ants, Man-O-War, Webster, and Tick-Talk. This leaves the possibility that more non-mammal characters will be featured in future episodes.﻿
==Fall Out Boy Music Video==
Fall Out Boy's music video for "The Carpal Tunnel of Love", which has been released in 2007, is an episode of Happy Tree Friends. Fall Out Boy is featured in the music video, appearing as cartoon bears, along with Cuddles, Giggles, Nutty, Toothy and the Mole. Lumpy causes the death of all the characters in the video, including himself. All of them die the same type of graphic, bloody deaths that are featured in the TV show.
==Characters==
There are 22 main characters (formerly 20 until 2010 when Lammy and Mr. Pickels were added to the show) in the Happy Tree Friends series, all of which have unique personalities and appearances, but there have been many 'minor' characters that have appeared on the show, some appearing many times and some have only appeared once.
==Video game==
A video game titled Happy Tree Friends: False Alarm was released on June 25, 2008. It was developed by Stainless Games and Sega for Xbox Live Arcade and for the PC. Before the game was released, writer Ken Pontac posted a blog on the Happy Tree Friends website telling fans about the adventures of the staff making the game.
==Controversies==
300px|right300px|rightMany parents were concerned about the graphic content of Happy Tree Friends. One parent even complained about the show in a letter to the Washington Post when she saw her 6-year old son watching the show. The warning "(CV CARTOON VIOLENCE Not recommended for small children or big babies)" is displayed in two places on the home page of the Happy Tree Friends website in very small type in the bottom left hand corner, and in larger, but subdued type on the right hand side under the bulletin board section. Neither the "About the Show" nor the FAQ page indicates that the show is not appropriate for young children. However, the episodes themselves contain the warning in large font before the cartoon begins. In February 2008 Russian Media Culture Protection Department (Rossvyazohrankultura, a regulatory body for TV in Russia) issued warnings about Happy Tree Friends and The Adventures of Big Jeff, claiming that the shows "promote violence and brutality, harm the psychic health and moral development of children, attack the social morality; all of this being a violation of license agreement". The department warned the 2x2 TV Channel, which broadcasts the show, to remove it from air to avoid legal issues. The channel appealed to the evaluation ordered to Versia company (versia.org), which denied the accusations.
==Music and sound-effects==
Sound Engineer Jim Lively
*The music featured before, after, and during each and every episode of Happy Tree Friends is composed by Jim Lively, the sound engineer for Happy Tree Friends. Lively has been in the sound business since the age of 16, and plans to continue his career of "making sounds for a living," as described by Jim Lively himself. Jim Lively primarily works in sound design and dialog editing, although he continues to mix music.
Foley Artist Francis Carr
*Foley artist Francis Carr joined the team later on in development. Usually working with sound engineer Jim Lively, he has been able to expand his career. Francis Carr is also noted for being the voice of the character Russell.
==Crew==
Name 	Position 	Years
Kenn Navarro 	Director, Animation Director, Writer 	1999 - 2016
Rhode Montijo 	Director, Art Director, Writer 	1999 - 2004
Aubrey Ankrum 	Director, Writer, Storyboard artist 	1999 - 2006
Warren Graff 	Story Editor, Writer 	1999 - 2016
Ken Pontac 	Story Editor, Writer 	2004 - 2016
Dana Belben 	Story Editor 	1999 - 2003
Jeff Biancalana 	Writer, Animator, Storyboard artist 	2001 - 2005
David Winn 	Writer, Animator 	2003 - 2016
Alan Lau 	Animator, Writer, Director, Storyboard artist	2001 - 2016
Jason Sadler 	Animator, Writer, Director 	2001 - 2016
Mark Fiorenza 	Writer 	2000 - 2003
Brad Rau 	Animator, Storyboard artist 	2001 - 2016
Roque Ballesteros 	Writer, Animator, Director, Storyboard artist	2001 - 2016
Paul Allan 	Writer, Animator, Director 	2000 - 2016
Nica Lorber 	Animator 	2000 - 2016
Michael "Lippy" Lipman	Storyboard artist, Animator, Director, Writer	2000 - 2016
Peter Herrmann 	Storyboard artist 	2000 - 2016
Jim Lively 	Sound Designer, Music 	2000 - 2016
Francis Carr 	Foley artist 	2004 - 2016
Jerome Rossen 	Music Composer 	2005 - 2016
John Evershed 	Executive Producer 	2000 - 2016
Liz Stuart 	Producer 	2000 - 2016
==Awards==
Show 	Year	Category 	Episode
Annecy International Animated Film Festival	2003	Best Animated Short Film Made for the Internet	Eye Candy
Annecy International Animated Film Festival	2007	Best Television Series for Adults 	From Hero to Eternity
Ottawa International Animation Festival 	2004	Best Animated Short Film Made for the Internet	Out on a Limb
Ottawa International Animation Festival 	2005	Best Animated Short Film Made for the Internet	Mole in the City
Ottawa International Animation Festival 	2007	Best Television Series for Adults 	"Autopsy Turvy (Double Whammy, Part 2)"
==Trivia==
*Kenn Navarro said on a tweet the the cartoon Peanuts served as some inspiration for the show.
**Warren Graff has also stated in a Reddit AMAhttps://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/2afqop/were_kenn_navarro_and_warren_graff_we_created/ciumhfo/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3 that Looney Tunes and inoffensive saccharine 80s cartoons (i.e. Care Bears and The Smurfs) were major inspirations for the show. 
**As a fun fact, it is also the one item that Flaky is highly allergic to, as is shown in Party Animal.
*According to a website, the idea of Happy Tree Friends also arose because a MondoMedia employee wanted a few minutes of animated carnage for a commercial, from there the idea of violence in the series was born.
*The video Dumb Ways To Die is similar to Happy Tree Friends, given the fact that both resemble a children's cartoon, and both contain bloody violence. A Happy Tree Friends parody of Dumb Ways to Die was created, and was also made into a mobile game.
*Aside from Happy Tree Friends, Kenn Navarro and Warren Graff created a series for their channel, Zwak, known as D_Void, which also involves animals dying in humorous ways. Only two episodes of it have been created, and it is most likely discontinued.
*An advertisement for the show was podcast on MTV, where an advertisement for Alejo and Valentina was also being presented. It exclusively aired in foreign countries. The advertisement can be found here.
*Happy Tree Friends is one of the most viewed animated web series in the world, with over a billion views and counting.https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20130624005458/en/Cinedigm-and-Mondo-Media-Announce-Strategic-Distribution-Relationshiphttps://www.aes.org/events/135/presenters/?ID=1852
==External links==
*Official Happy Tree Friends Website
Category:Controversy
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