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The latest in face animation.

Last Sunday, Blur Studio completed its crowdfunding effort for the proposed animated feature, The Goon, based on Eric Powell’s comic book. They exceeded their $400,000 goal, and set a new crowdfunding record for an animation project by raising $441,900 from 7,576 backers. The previous record-holder, Starburns Industries, had raised $406,237 in September for their stop motion film Anomalisa.

During The Goon campaign, I wrote a critique of the fundraising effort owing to the fact that the money wouldn’t be used to produce any animation. Instead, the money will be spent to create a story reel for a feature film, at which point Blur and film director David Fincher will shop the project around to various studios for additional funding.

Among my critiques of the campaign was that the majority of backers wouldn’t be able to see the story reel. Following our piece though, The Goon filmmakers revised the campaign and promised that they would hold a screening of the story reel in Los Angeles for the backers. There is, of course, still no guarantee that an animated film will result from all of this, but Blur Studio should rightfully be proud of raising a record-setting amount of money for a crowdfunded animation project. And at the very least, fans of The Goon can be assured of a slick half-million dollar story reel.

Kickstarter launched with the promise of helping independent artists fulfill their ideas by raising funding for projects that otherwise couldn’t easily procure funding. As I wrote last month though, the site’s animation category has more recently turned into a place where established creators are raising six-figure dollar amounts from their fanbases. That’s not to say there aren’t plenty of independent projects on Kickstarter too, but those projects have been drowned out by the established creators who are drawing much of the attention nowadays.

While Cartoon Brew has a longstanding policy to not promote active crowdfunding campaigns, the prominence of crowdfunding demands that we report on key campaigns that have news value to the community. The project discussed within has already received plenty of media attention, but it also has broader relevance to the animation crowdfunding discussion.

Last week, a Kickstarter was launched to fund an animated adaptation of Eric Powell’s Dark Horse-published comic The Goon. The project has a lot of high-profile names attached to it including live-action director David Fincher (Fight Club, Se7en), vfx/animation outfit Blur Studio, and actors Paul Giamatti and Clancy Brown.

The idea has been around for a while—a proof-of-concept trailer for The Goon

Why?

Because they are asking for $400,000 to create a story reel for the feature film. Curiously, the story reel that will be produced won’t be made available to the backers of the campaign. While plenty of other rewards are being offered, The Goon represents a first for an animated project on Kickstarter—asking people to donate money to something they can’t see.

So what, you ask? We’ll be able to see the finished animated feature. Well, maybe. If these guys require nearly half a million to create a story reel, that means they’re budgeting it as a traditional mid-sized studio feature, which will run in the range of $40-70 million (give or take ten million). There’s no guarantee the film will be made unless they can get that funding from a major studio, something that they haven’t been able to do so far.

Should the film be made by a corporate film studio, that company just saved themselves half a million dollars on the backs of dedicated animation fans who believe they’re funding an indie project, when in reality they’re funding a mainstream Hollywood feature. There is nothing “indie” about the way Fincher and Blur are setting up the film, and they have a responsibility to be upfront about the reality of what they’re creating.

Of course, the Kickstarter crowd is a savvy group, and a number of contributors to the project smell a fish. Here are some of the most recent comments on the project’s page:

The problem with The Goon Kickstarter boils down to this: They’re not producing a story reel that will be made available to the project’s backers. That means it’s an open-ended project, and if that’s the case, then it’s a clear violation of Kickstarter’s policies.

Further, while I’m sure Fincher and Blur Studios are well intentioned in their desire to make an animated feature, their approach of mixing their fans’ money with those of media corporations, the latter of whom will receive all the profit from a Goon feature, leads to an uncomfortable situation that is contrary to the entire spirit of Kickstarter. Artists should use the generosity of backers in crowdfunding campaigns to fulfill a creative vision, not to help corporations make money, as The Goon Kickstarter is currently set up to do.

[UPDATE]: Blur Studio’s Tim Miller just posted a comment on the Goon‘s comments page in which he said he wouldn’t share the story reel online because, “[W]e believe having the whole film online would cause serious issues with any studio who wants to back the project.” This confirms my thoughts above that this project wouldn’t be possible without a major studio’s support. It also turns the Kickstarter campaign (in its current form) into an open-ended project with no complete project delivered to backers and no funding in place to take it further. This, as I mentioned above, is a violation of Kickstarter’s policies.