On opening night, 1.4 million viewers checked out The Strip, a more than respectable basic cable rating and a sizeable increase over the channel’s pre-Spike audiences. Yet by October all three series were shelved, supposedly to avoid over-exposure. Observers couldn’t help but notice that Stripperella and Gary the Rat went on hiatus in spite of unaired episodes, while John K. had only delivered three of nine ordered Ren & Stimpys.

The network denied rumors that it was bailing out of the animation game by pointing to a slew of projects in the works from high-profile creators, including a The Immigrants, a Klasky Csupo series about a pair of tenement-dwelling newcomers to America (voiced by Hank Azaria and Eric McCormack) set for a spring 2004 debut. Further down the pipeline, Howard Stern is developing a series starring himself as a misfit high schooler; John Leguizamo will portray both Zilch and Zero, a pair of movie-addled video store slackers in a one-shot special that more than likely would set the stage for a regular series; producer Warrington Hudlin (responsible for the little-seen, inner-city animated feature Bebe’s Kids) is working on Big Headed People, a political satire sending up everyone from Osama Bin Laden to black Republicans.

Spike TV is also putting together six half-hour compilations of shorts mined from the Spike and Mike features. According to the network, The Strip itself is due to return in early 2004, with the new shows added to the mix. Gary the Rat will return on its own, starting Dec. 2.

Pay cabler Showtime recently produced (with animation house Film Roman) seven episodes of Free for All, an animated series based on the five-year-old syndicated comic strip of the same name for late-night airing. It’s not the channel’s first cartoon effort if one counts its fey funny animal Web cartoon Queer Duck, but it is the first to go directly to air.

Free for All is Showtime’s sophomore effort at animation. © Showtime/Film Roman.

Why did Showtime go with Free for All over other animated series pitched to them — or decide to air animation in the first place? “We kept trying different forms,” explains Gary Levine, the channel’s executive VP of original programming. “We’re always trying to balance the range of programming we do and distinguish ourselves from what you can find on the advertiser-supported networks. “The development process was just very fruitful,” he adds. “We liked the people involved — both Brett Merhar, the comic strip’s creator, and Merriwether Williams, the exec producer/writer who ran SpongeBob SquarePants for years. We liked the talent [a voice cast that includes Jonathan Lewis and Juliette Lewis], we liked the tone, so we said this is something Showtime should give a try.”

With two ‘Generation-Y buddies, a murderous, sex-crazed grandmother and a drug-addicted lab ferret, the show definitely deserves to be described as ‘edgy,’ the adjective of the moment. In spite of good reviews and “some really positive buzz” (and without the ad revenue-pressure of having to produce ratings numbers) the show’s fate is up in the air. “We are heading towards a decision about renewal” is as far as Levine will go at the moment. Would Free for All be replaced — or joined — by another animated series? “We only do six or seven original series at any time,” says Levine. “It’s unlikely that more than one would be animation because that would start to take us out of balance. It’s not ever going to become something that overwhelms our programming.

“We probably get pitched one animated project a month, and we’re actively developing one that’s kind of exciting: The Adventures of Cheech and Chong. Through the miracle of animation they’re magically transformed into their old selves here in the present day. They’re involved in conceptualizing, writing and voicing their characters.” As for the small problem of Tommy Chong stuck in the slammer for the crime of selling bongs online, Levine is unworried: “He can do voice over from anywhere.”

Thomas Vitale of Sci Fi is prepping webisode Tripping the Rift for a CGI animated series. © Sci Fi Channel, DPS Film Roman and CinéGroupe.

An interested onlooker in Free for All’s fate is Sidney Clifton, svp head of development at DPS Film Roman (now part of IDT Entertainment), the show’s animation studio. “We’re just waiting to see if we’re going to get picked up or not. The networks don’t have to give us pickups right now because we want them.