This year at the annual Lightbox Expo we met the artist Naomi VanDoren. Recently they’ve been branching out as an author, and after successful Kickstarter campaign they’ve released their first illustrated book, called Naiya and the Foxdragon. “Naiya is a young teen who has been hiding from her past and her unkind uncle most of her life until she befriends a foxdragon named Aru. When the last of the magic orbs that once powered their city is depleted, she faces her fears and embarks on an unexpected journey into the heart of the jungle to save her home. Along the way, Naiya discovers her own self-worth as she and her foxdragon friend navigate the treacherous jungle and learn about her own relationship with the world’s magic.” Visit their web site to see more.

image c. 2024 by Naomi VanDoren

Chris Sanders has only directed four animated features (plus a live action adaptation Call of the Wild), and the previous three (Lilo & Stitch, How to Train your Dragon and The Croods put him in four way tie for most nominations without a win in the Best Animated Feature category at the Oscars. It feels pretty certain that The Wild Robot will be the movie that finally wins him that Oscar, but we'll keep such speculation to a minimum.

Sanders's first feature, Lilo & Stitch, is probably the only truly great movie to come out of Walt Disney Animation Studios in the first decade of this century. (To be clear, you're allowed to like other movies from that decade, but most were flawed.) Anyway, the upshot of Lilo & Stitch becoming a beloved classic is that its directors, Sanders and his writing and directing partner, Dean Deblois, were driven out of Disney by John Lasseter a few years later (I don't like that guy).

Sanders and Deblois took their talents to DreamWorks Animation, where they delivered How to Train Your Dragon to the studio, often seen as one of the highlights of its output.

I've often seen Sanders cast as the "idea guy" in the Sanders/Deblois partnership, as well as being the guy who brings a lot of unique visual aspects to his projects, while Deblois is the more story-driven member of the partnership, bringing in the emotional aspects. I'm not so sure about that, especially after this movie, which features an emotional story just as potent as Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon, sans Deblois. The Wild Robot also features a visual design that echoes the original illustrations of the book it's based on, by Peter Brown, showing Sanders is more than just a recognizable art style.

It's a flood of reviews! Today's trailers are for:

Those are in increasing order of recommendation. The first three are for kids, the fourth is anime, and the last one isn't furry but is worth mentioning!

We’ve been missing out on this — so it’s good to get caught up! Kitsune is a full-color comic miniseries written by Luca Frigerio, with art by Emanuele Ercolani. “Kitsunichi Shimitzu is a ronin, a samurai who has become masterless. After twelve years of absence, he returns to his native lands and discovers that his master’s son is a weak man. Bandits terrorize the population, and strange rumors of a powerful enemy spread. Torn between past mistakes and a chance to redeem himself, Kitsunichi will have to fight for his life.” Familiar story, yes, but do give it a chance — by checking out the issues available at Scout Comics.

image c. 2024 Scout Comics

Another graphic novel for young readers that we stumbled across: Clementine Fox and the Great Island Adventure, written and illustrated by Leigh Luna. “Clementine is supposed to be on her way to school… but why not go out for a day of adventure and exploration instead? She recruits her friends Nubbins Squirrel and Penelope Rabbit and heads to the beach, where Jesse Otter is preparing to take his giant Turtle, Annabella, to a mysterious local island. Clementine’s great-aunt Marnie lives there — far away from math tests and tutors — so Clementine and her friends hitch a ride to the island as stowaways. What could go wrong?” Check out the preview pages over at Books of Wonder.

image c. 2024 Graphix

Sometimes, the publisher explains things perfectly well for us. Like this: “In this atmospheric tribute to the medieval folklore tradition of trickster tales starring Reynard the fox, beloved children’s cartoonist Ben Hatke turns his pen to a very special project for adult readers. Inspired by the 12th century tales of the indomitable trickster fox Reynard, this offbeat tribute to the archetypal rogue has a satisfyingly old-fashioned feeling to it. Although this Reynard adventure is entirely the creation of modern fairytale master Ben Hatke (Mighty Jack), it fits seamlessly into the body of Reynard tales still beloved in Europe to this day. Featuring evocative, charming black-and-white illustrations and a swiftly moving narrative, Reynard’s Tale follows our hero through a series of encounters with other classic figures from this body of folklore to piece together a headlong journey through a perilous landscape filled with murderers, kings, ex-lovers, mermaids, and even Death herself.” So there you have it. And it’s available now.

image c. 2024 First Second

I've already seen this movie twice, paying full price both times. Kung Fu Panda 4 is the first movie I've watched multiple times in theaters since Zootopia. I liked it, is what I'm saying. It is part of the Kung Fu Panda series of movies, which would be important to furry movie fans even if they weren't very good. No other fully-anthropomorphic-animal-populated movie franchise out there has gotten to four movies. Fortunately, the series has consistently been one of the better animated franchises, furry or not.

In this fourth instalment, directed by Oklahoma's own Mike Mitchell (with co-director Stephanie Ma Stine), the titular Kung Fu Panda, Po (voiced by Jack Black), first Dragon Warrior of the Valley of Peace, is tasked with finding his replacement by Master Shifu (Dustin Hoffmann) – explicitly identified as a red panda for the first time in the series. Unwilling to accept giving up his role as protector of the Valley, he instead joins sneaky fox thief Zhen (voiced by Awkwafina, Zhen is not one of the "big three" fox species of red, Arctic and fennec, but a rarely-seen Corsac fox) on a quest to defeat the Chameleon (Viola Davis; no bonus points for guessing her species), an evil sorceress with the ability to shapeshift and steal kung fu powers, like a PG funny animal version of Mortal Kombat's Shang Tsung.

An interesting fantasy graphic novel series we somehow missed before: Fox and Willow, written by Alison Pang and illustrated by Irma Ahmed. “When Jessa, the miller’s daughter, offers simple comforts to Willow and Gideon in return for a bit of work, the runaway princess and her fox spirit companion are more than willing to take Jessa up on it. After all, being on the road has its dangers, and the respite while they search for answers to Gideon’s cursed collar is more than welcome. But when the discovery of a murdered royal and a forsaken ghost comes to light, the two travelers realize they’ve stumbled into something far more sinister.” Volume 1, Came A Harper, and Volume 2, To The Sea, are both still available in hardcover from CEX Publishing.

image c. 2024 CEX Publishing

After 16 years since his first movie and eight years since his last, in Kung Fu Panda 4, the titular panda Po will return March 8 of next year. He's been holding something back for a while now, and as this trailer shows, he's finally going to get it all out of his system. (People might have been expecting it to be bit bigger, actually.)

There are two movies that came out this year based on The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi, the story of a marionette who gains life and then proceeds to, well, go on adventures. Both for all intents and purposes went straight to streaming services, but were treated on the higher "prestige" end of streaming movies, though we're still, as a culture, not sure if streaming first is on par with theatrical releases or more along the lines of straight to video trash (or are they TV movies?). Both were directed by Best Picture/Best Director Oscar winning directors. I personally found them both not actually very interesting, one being ridiculously over-hated, the other just as ridiculously over-loved.

The first was Robert Zemeckis's Pinocchio, which is less a straight adaptation of Collodi's novel than another one of those "live action Disney remakes" that everyone loves so much, this time of the 1940 version of Pinocchio. It released on Disney+ back in September, so I've been very efficient getting around to it. The second is Gillermo Del Toro's Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio. Normally, I hate when they do that "Director's Name's Whatever" thing to titles, it comes off as pretentious and boastful, but given the circumstances, I'm going to have to allow it this time. It released to Netflix this month.

There’s a new graphic novel out called Fox Fires, written and illustrated by Emilia Ojala. “Fox Fires is a fantasy-adventure that is inspired by Finnish folklore. ‘Fox Fires’ refers to the Northern Lights… The Fox Fires are a gate between this world and the land of the dead – it allows souls to visit their loved ones. But suddenly, the Fox Fires disappear. Our main character, a young raccoon dog named Raate, heads north to find what’s happened to Repo, the fire fox whose burning fur is said to make the Fox Fires appear in the sky. On her journey, Raate meets all kinds of interesting creatures, and also new friends.” The first volume is available in hardcover from Simon & Schuster.

image c. 2022 Rocketship Entertainment

Recently we made a trip to this year’s Lightbox animation industry trade-show in Pasadena, California. We met a lot of very cool and talented artists, including Shawn E. Russell. Here’s how her web site describes her: “Shawn is a wildlife and imaginative realism artist specializing in creating detailed depictions of animals melded with plants and fungi in symbiotic relationships… Shawn has worked with independent board game creators, food & beverage packaging, & private art collectors. She offers her personal work for sale online and at art fairs, comic/anime conventions across the US where she enjoys connecting with fans, collectors, and clients in person.” As you can see, the artist works a lot in highly detailed black-and-white. If you happen to find yourself in Terre Haute, Indiana, make sure to visit their personal gallery called Seek.

image c. 2022 by Shawn E. Russell

This game is going to be tough to review, in essence the game’s strength only remains a strength the less I say about it and what makes it so good. I suppose the best way to approach it is how it displays on its surface. A fox protagonist in a green tunic raises his sword and blue shield to go on an adventure. Many would instantly connect this iconography to the Zelda franchise.

The game can be Zelda-like for sure, but it’s important to know that not all of Zelda’s Link’s outings are created equal. So the best way I can describe this is that it’s a Zelda-like, also known as a “Hero’s Adventure” game, that feels very much like the franchise before it went into a heavy handed narrative focus.

On March 5 this year, a large stone in the volcanic mountains near the town of Nasu in Japan's Tochigi Prefecture was found to have succumbed to what seems like a normal case of freeze-thaw weathering and split in two. Even setting aside that this occurred over two months ago (though, to be fair, that's a blink in the lifespan of your average rock), such geological processes are hardly news even for mainstream sources, much less a furry news site. But this wasn't just any rock.

The rock in question was the Sessho-seki (or Killing Stone), the rumored earthly remains of Tamamo-no-Mae, the Jewel Maiden, a legendary nine-tailed fox said to have spread chaos throughout Eastern Asia for nearly 2000 years before finally being hunted down in Nasu. Though finally killed and transformed into the stone, you can't keep a good evil fox spirit down; so her final resting place was obviously haunted by it, poisoning anyone who came near. Though she'd apparently calmed down a bit after an encounter with a Buddhist priest, the stone suddenly breaking in two is a bit ominous.

Contributors this month include 2cross2affliction, dronon, GreenReaper, Rakuen Growlithe, and Sonious.