Talk:Spike and Mike's Sick and Twisted Festival of Animation

Inappropriate content
Hi friends,

The Spike and Mike Company (user: spikeandmike IP: 74.62.183.91) is repeatedly filling this page with press releases, heavy POV statements, and contact information on how to reach "us" and submit films. All of my efforts to revert these changes are being repeatedly "undone".

Their content does not even fit within Wikipedia's third-person writing policies ("WE also premiered this film..."). Spikeandmike does not seem to understand that Wikipedia is meant to be an encyclopedia and not a place to post spam: "Wikipedia is not an advertising service. Promotional articles about yourself, your friends, your company or products, or articles created as part of a marketing or promotional campaign, will be deleted in accordance with our deletion policies. For more information, see Wikipedia:Spam."

I have warned user: spikeandmike about this twice and there has been no change in his/her behavior. I am thusly submitting this page for deletion on the grounds of spam.

Sleepyjuly 03:08, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Inappropriate behavior
I don’t appreciate someone removing stuff I spent a lot of time researching and writing. I have been going to the Sick and Twisted and Festival of Animation (as well as the Tournee all those years ago and The Animation Show) show for many years. I have seen artists and talked to them and all have good things to say about Spike. There are some that talk bad about Sick and Twisted or don’t even recognize what it did for them, Don Hertzfeld (catch up to him if he has a booth at San Diego Comic Con, it seems like his favorite subjest is trashing Spike and Mike and Sick and Twisted) and Mike Judge, who went on to form their own show, The Animation Show, which is good but not an event like Sick and Twisted. So it seems that they, or someone associated with them, got this “sleepyjuly” person, to write libelous things about Sick and Twisted and Spike and Mike and even have the gall to link to their Animation Show site. Then they don’t even reedit my stuff but remove it completely. Please stop that.

If any of the past artists have problems and thing to say about Spike and Mike either positive or negative, they should use should do it in person not hide behind the anonymous skirts of ‘’sleepyjuly.’’

Spike and Mike have helped many animators who are very wealthy and successful today and probably wouldn’t be if it wasn’t for Spike and Mike. I bet most of them never felt they were cheated by Spike and Mike and when Mike Judge was given a huge check from MTV for ‘Beavis and Butt-head” I don’t think I remember reading in any interview him giving Spike and Mike any kind of credit. Did Spike and Mike make the millions Mike Judge did? I don’t think so. Do you think that the reason that all those artists stated don’t add anything to the Sick and Twisted show anymore is because they don’t have too. Danny Antonucci is having great success with “Ed, Edd, and Eddy.” Don Hertzfeldt, when he’s not taking pot shots at Spike and Mike, is having success with his Animation Show and also those great pop-tart commercials. Mike Judge, is a force is cult circles with his shows “Beavis and Butt-head”, “King of the Hill,” and his fantastic movie “Office Space” and the underrated and must see “Idiocracy.” Bill Plympton still contributes to Sick and Twisted as well as the “Animation Show.” Every new show there is a new “Happy Tree Friends” or “Dr. Tran.” These people are still working with Spike and Mike. Every year Sick and Twisted has new and innovated animation – and animation is animation whether it is flash, pixelation, claymation, computer digital or drawing on napkins!

So if you want to put things on this article, go ahead but don’t use this as your personal soapbox to say nasty things about someone unless you have facts and can document it. And then adding insult to injury linking to the site sight that is the quote – competition - unquote, who you are also contributing to.

--Marsneedswomen 17:50, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Um, I am not the one reverting your work. All I did was revert this article back to its original state (that I did not compose), after the Spike and Mike people vandalized it with POV promotional information about their company. Do you work for Spike and Mike too?

I did not add the link to the Animation Show site, but it's a totally relevant link anyway. Wikipedia is not about competitions, it's about linking related articles and stating facts. Of course those articles are related.

For somebody who claims to have done a lot of research, you certainly have a lot of things wrong. Please show me a single article or quote in which Judge or Hertzfeldt take a "pot shot" at Spike and Mike. I've never read or heard anything remotely of the sort. Those two are saints for doing what they do for animators. It's my understanding that the Animation Show was created to support the artists and to fill the void left by failed shows like Tournee and Spike and Mike. But I have never read anywhere about them badmouthing Spike and Mike or anybody.

You say Hertzfeldt's "favorite subject is trashing Spike and Mike" - so show me one quote. I'm not being sarcastic. I'm obviously a big Hertzfeldt fan and I think I've read every interview. So I'd like to know your sources. You also say, "catch up to him if he has a booth at San Diego Comic Con"... to my knowledge, Hertzfeldt has only attended the Comic Con once and didn't attend a booth. I know this because I live in SD and I check his website regularly and I have never had a chance to meet him! So again, please tell me where you're getting your facts. (Hertzfeldt also had nothing to do with Pop Tart commercials. Those are a well documented rip off of his stuff).

Maybe you should ask why, as you claim, if all these animators got so successful because of Spike and Mike, do none of these animators want anything to do with the festival anymore? If Mike Judge got where he is today because of Spike and Mike, as you claim, then why does he never talk about them in interviews? And why do none of these guys contribute to the Spike and Mike show anymore? Why do all the world's top indie animators (except for Plympton) only show their work in the Animation Show now? Are they all being selfish and disrespecful? I don't think so. That doesn't make sense. Obviously the Spike and Mike show must have done all of them repeated wrong somehow over the years. This is briefly touched on in Jerry Beck's book. It seems to me that when these guys have nothing nice to say about someone, they say nothing at all.

And I don't work for the Animation Show and I'm not "hiding" or "anonymous" (??) I'm a regular contributor to Wikipedia and I'd be happy to talk to you if you like.

Sleepyjuly 21:35, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

I apologize for implying that you have anything to do with reverting my work. The mind clouds up when these things happen. I don’t work for Spike and Mike; I am a big fan of animation, as obviously you are. My exposure to animation, other than Saturday Morning, was the 1977 Los Angeles Filmex, when I was exposed to the animation of Max and Dave Fleisher, Ub Iwerks, Paul Driessen and other foreign animators. I then would trek from Orange County to the Los Angeles to see the Torunee of Animation and then Spike and Mike Festival. Even though I liked the Original Festival better than the Sick and Twisted I was able to see new and innovated animation as well as the elusive Oscar nominated films. It does bother me that there hasn’t been an Original Festival for a few years but I guess I have a soft spot for Spike and Mike and their festivals and don’t like to see it or them attacked. You, obviously don’t like Spike and Mike by what you said in their article. As for the Animation Show, I always saw it as two things, filling a need that was missing when Spike and Mike stopped doing the Original Festival as much and two animators that didn’t want to work with Spike and Mike anymore. (I asked Spike about this one year at Comic Con at his booth and in his gruff and sarcastic manner he suggested this.) As for seeing Don Hertzfeld at the San Diego Comic Con, I saw him and Bill Plympton manning the booth the first year the Animation Show came out. Someone asked Mr. Hertzfeld (or someone who had his name tag on for you have said he never manned the booth) if the show was like Spike and Mike and he went off and said that they don’t show the Sick and Twisted kind of stuff and that he treated animators better than Spike and let them participate more in the profits than Spike and Mike does. That’s the only time I’ve heard anyone saying anything about Spike not treating them well. That’s why I deleted what you wrote about artists not working with Spike and Mike anymore and why I didn’t put what I heard. It is all heresy and not documented. I supposed the Jerry Beck book you are referring to is “Outlaw Animation,” which I have and read and not only did I not find anything said about artists being not treated well but the complete opposite. As for the animation boards saying those things, come on, only one person has to have a beef on the internet and then it is taken as gospel. As for Hertzfeld and Mike Judge being Saints to animators, dude, they’re doing the same thing Spike and Mike did for more than 25 years. They are exposing little, if not ever, seen animation and animators who wouldn’t get that kind of exposure. This is how both of them were exposed by Spike and Mike as well as, in Mike Judge’s case, funded, to make the first Beavis and Butt-head which IS document in Jerry Beck’s book. If they are Saints does that make Spike and Mike “gods”! Like I said before they are filling a void left by a lack of an Original Festival and they don’t do the Sick and Twisted. I heard rumors that there may be a new Spike and Mike Original Festival, who knows! I didn’t know about the Pop Tarts thing, I love those commercials and thought they came from the bizarre genius mind of Mr. Hertzfeld. Thank you for clearing that up. Let’s just be happy that there is a Spike and Mike and Animation Show, and we get to enjoy the fantastic animation that has shown through the years. Having both Spike and Mike and Animation Show is good for us fans, and that is well documented. You made a good point about Animation Show site being a totally relevant link, so I put it back. The more animation, the better!!!

--Marsneedswomen 01:11, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi there,

Glad to see another fan of animation festivals here and thanks for the response. Here's a few bits and bobs:

- I too used to love Spike and Mike but I feel there has been a real steady decline over the years and maybe that's why I'm bitter towards them now. The last time I went to their festival it was literally all internet flash animation blown up on the big screen. I couldn't believe how cheap that was, a real disappointment. But I don't just mean a steady decline in quality, which is subjective, but in all areas. I think there should be some reference to their current state of affairs in the Wikipedia article: basically, how they are playing fewer and fewer theaters than ever before and no longer doing their Classic Festival (which I think were some of the key circumstances that created the need for the Animation Show). They're not really the same festival they used to be. As I understand it, Spike simply was not making as much money doing the Classic Festival than he was with the Sick and Twisted version, so that's why they're only doing Sick and Twisted from now on. If that's true, it's sure disappointing. I doubt the Animation Show makes very much money either but at least those guys continue to push the harder-to-sell, "classy" stuff out there every year anyway. Which is why I referred to them as saints :)  Whereas I've always got the impression that Spike and Mike were mainly interested in money and exploitation.

- Overall you may want to revise many of the POV statements in your article... such as "Spike continues to produce touring theatrical festivals of animated short film collections with the highest standards of artistic and subversive excellence." Not because I personally disagree with the "highest standards" comment :) but because it is basically an unsourced point of view comment and violates Wikipedia's policy of neutrality. At the moment, much of the piece reads very much like something from a press kit rather than an objective article. That may be why your material is being revised (it may also be getting confused with that other contributer who did work for Spike and Mike).

- You're right, I must have read that other negative stuff about Spike and Mike in a different article or book. The Jerry Beck book was a bit of a fluff piece since it was obviously paid for by Spike and Mike, but it was enjoyable. It did mention that Spike and Mike "stole" the original idea for their festival in 1977 from the guys that put on the Fantastic Animation Festival (and had hired Spike and Mike to do their flyering!), which I was surprised to see in there! I guess there is no such thing as an original idea :)

- Are you 100% certain you met Hertzfeldt the first year of the Animation Show (in 2003)? According to the Bitter Films site, the only recent time Hertzfeldt attended SD Comic Con was in 2006 to support an Animation Show screening. And as far as I know he did not even visit the AS booth there at all because I repeatedly went back there to find him and couldn't :)  Maybe you very well met an imposter wearing a Hertzfeldt name tag in 2003 ??!

Happy animating, Sleepyjuly 02:27, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi there back,

I agree with nearly every thing that you said. The Classic show had always been the best show, but the flash and other stuff doesn’t bother me too much. I mean Spike and Mike use to show pencil tests even in their Classic shows. I think if it is a cool idea it doesn’t matter how it’s done – “Bambi meets Godzilla” is a perfect example, an even better one is “Ah L’Amour” by Hertzfeld, which is brilliant in its simplicity and humor. I read he never meant that to show publicly but it always gets a terrific reaction especially when the audience read along. Reading Beck’s book it seems that Spike and Mike were more in it for the girls and the partying than money. And I don’t think Spike paid for the book, even though it does focus on them.

As for the quote – I didn’t write it. And it looks like someone already edited it away which frankly I think it deserves to be. Sick and Twisted isn’t even remote “highest standards,” if it is, it is definitely the end of Civilization as we know it.

Now that you mention it, I am not 100% sure that was Hertzfeld, like I said he had a badge that said his name but I know that exhibitors will get a certain number of badges and then spread them around. So, no, if you say he wasn’t there I can’t be sure.

It’s good to know there are more SDCC geeks out there I’ve been going steadily for more than 20 years and everyday for the last 10. It’s the time I desert my family and spend five days inside the convention center geeking out.

--Marsneedswomen 02:51, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Ottawa fest?
Why does article have that external link to Ottawa International Animation Festival? (is in External links section) --EarthFurst (talk) 23:04, 11 October 2008 (UTC)