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Object Oblivion is an American animated object show created by Brent Bond and Greg Grinder for The CW. The series uses a now-clichéd show-within-a-show format, and it's yet another fucking game show thing where anthropomorphic inanimate objects fight to the death or some shit to win God knows what. The series premiered on September 28, 2013, and ended on May 16, 2020 after seven seasons.
After the Adult Swim cult classic Nyaa Meow Neko Power! was cancelled in 2011, its creator, Bond, joined forces with Grinder to develop a network television project. The series' pilot episode was originally written for NBC and "made rounds" during the 2011–2012 pilot season, but Broadcast Standards and Practices voiced objections (DO YOU SEE WHAT I FUCKING DID THERE LOLOLOL) to its content, the series was greenlit by The CW, with Brad Bristol and Keith Crocker also serving as executive producers. The series was produced by Brent Bond Movies, Grinder Photoplays, Bristol-Crocker Entertainment, Universal Television, and Warner Bros. Television. Object Oblivion garnered extensive media attention for featuring music composed by Will Toledo of the incredibly overrated furry band Car Seat Headrest, which basically carried the ratings.
Due to censorship challenges and creative differences, Bond and Grinder abruptly departed as showrunners from Object Oblivion after season 4, so J. Caesar and Jake Schmitt replaced Bond and Grinder in season 5. Viewership declined and critical reception soured after the creators left the show. Due to this decrease in public approval combined with significant increases in production costs and financial problems, the series was cancelled after seven seasons in 2020. The show's two-part finale, "The Final Eliminations", ended the show on May 16, 2020, and was watched by 0.01 million viewers (a.k.a. virtually nobody) during its initial airing. Reruns of Object Oblivion have aired in syndication on other Warner Bros. Discovery channels and a bunch of local television stations you've probably never heard of since 2017.
Contemporary reviews of the first season of Object Oblivion were negative, with many unfavorably comparing it to fellow CW object shit show Battle for Dumb Island and fellow BFDI clones Object Objection, Inanimate Poverty, and Object à la Mode. However, the network kept it going because it was a noticeable significant ratings draw, with its pilot peaking at 75 million viewers. However, its second season's introductions of a darker tone and legitimate storylines, attributable to the writers trying too hard to win over the Arrowverse's audience, received critical acclaim and boosted public interest in the series. Object Oblivion was the recipient of more accolades than it deserved, including 22 Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards, 13 Primetime Emmy Awards, six Writers Guild of America Awards, six Hum Awards, and two AVN Awards. Following its rise in popularity, the show received numerous tie-in products because the producers really, really wanted social validation. A video game adaptation, OOVG: Object Oblivion Video Game, was developed by NetherRealm Studios, published by Warner Bros. Games, and released in March 2018 to negative reviews. A limited-run comic book series serving as a continuation of the show titled Object Oblivion: After/Show was published by DC Comics from April 2022 to April 2023.
Production[]
Development[]
As with many other TV shows, the story behind this show is two guys teaming up to make—get this—a TV show.
Before Object Oblivion, animator, cartoonist, and screenwriter Brent Bond worked with television writer and producer Greg Grinder on numerous projects for Adult Swim, including the series Nyaa Meow Neko Power!, on which Bond served as an executive producer and showrunner and Grinder served as a writer and producer. In 2011, Nyaa Meow Neko Power! was cancelled after Bond went on a rant on social media about "how stupid Adult Swim is" and he was subsequently banned from ever returning to Cartoon Network. He immediately took a vacation to Tijuana, Mexico to traffic drugs and brainstorm. While there, he watched an episode of Battle for Dumb Island on Nueve, recalling in an interview, "i was in tijuana chillaxin with mis amigos and bfdi was on my tv and i was like bro imagine if i like plagiarized that and like made it my own thing and gained my own fanbase of weird submissive terminally online 9 y/os lol". However, after watching Nyaa Neko Meow Power! get flushed down the toilet, Bond felt "burnt out" by character writing. Thus, one night at the end of his vacation, Bond called Grinder at "something like 4:30 in the morning", screamed "I'M WRI'IN' ME A OBJECT SHOW AN' YER GONNA BE MAH BEE-ITCH!!!", and hung up.
Bond and Grinder began developing Object Oblivion in September 2011 under the working title Yet Another Object Show Because Apparently There Ain't Enough Already. While Grinder focused on creating the series' characters, Bond designed them and developed the series' setting. The original plot differed from other object shows as it abandoned that stupid faux game show format in favor of an equally stupid cable reality television-style format. However, the two threw out this draft because it was too unique and object shows are supposed to be exactly the same as one another. They then rewrote the series using the generic "not game show" format. By January 2012, Bond and Grinder had prepared a 220-page slideshow presentation to pitch the show. In October, Bond and Grinder presented the slideshow to television producer and gambling addict Brad Bristol and his business partner Keith Crocker, who was bewildered by its existence but ultimately decided, "Yeah, sure. I'll do whatever. Now go away. Jesus fucking Christ."
The show was first pitched to NBC during the 2011–2012 pilot season. Bond and Grinder initially expressed nervousness about pitching to the live action-focused NBC, but Bristol was a close friend and ex-boyfriend of Robert Greenblatt, then-president of NBC Entertainment. The slideshow was shown multiple times because most of the network's executives kept falling asleep. In January 2011, the network ordered an Object Oblivion television pilot. Bond and Grinder wrote and revised the original draft of the series' pilot episode, known amongst the show's fandom as the "NBC Draft", in less than two hours in Grinder's van, which was parked outside a Burger King in Calabasas, California, and expressed immediate confidence in the network picking Object Oblivion up. However, the network voiced objections (THERE IT IS AGAIN LOLOLOLOL) to the series' graphic, gruesome violence and found Object Oblivion, an animated reality TV parody, to be a "black sheep" on a network as "serious" and "sophisticated" as NBC. Bond and Grinder were thus ejected from the building using one of those cartoon spring things, sustaining brain injuries.
Shortly after NBC rejected Object Oblivion, The CW began expressing interest in the series and its executives pressured Bond and Grinder to pitch it to that network instead. In May 2012, before the pitch meeting even ended, the network picked up the pilot episode as a Universal Television–Warner Bros. Television co-production. In July 2012, it was reported that the network had greenlit a full 22-episode first season.
Writing[]
After writing the pilot, Bond and Grinder—in true network TV fashion—quit scripting Object Oblivion episodes because it was too much work to write a TV show. It was at this point that they conceived the idea of rounding up an eclectic team of scriptwriters to work on the project. The first season's writing team consisted of J. Caesar, Jake Schmitt, Eric Adams, Kevin Chucky, Keiko Nobumoto, and Makoto Fukami.
During the first season, Bond would decide the scriptwriter of each episode by playing duck, duck, goose with the writers, and the "goose" would write the script. This game was originally played in a McDonald's parking lot at 3:00 a.m., but this stopped after a restaurant manager accused the writers of loitering and complained about them to the Los Angeles Police Department. Moving forward, the game was played outside the LAPD station. The police didn't mind because it allowed them to keep an eye on the writers. After the "goose" wrote the episode and before any animation or voice acting began, the script would be sent to the executives at Warner Bros. Television and The CW so the former can ensure the series' budget will not be exceeded when it comes time to animate the episode and the latter can make sure the writers have appeased their masters at Broadcast Standards and Practices. If either party was dissatisfied with whatever the hell kinda gibberish they're reading, a sack would be placed over the writer's head and they would be dragged into a Boeing 727 and flown to Kabul, where Taliban guys would hold them at gunpoint to keep rewriting the episode from scratch until the script could be accepted by Warner Bros. and the network. This stopped after Fukami reported the show's crew to Interpol and was subsequently fired from the show.
Casting and voice acting[]
- Main article: List of Object Oblivion characters#Cast
Voice casting for Object Oblivion was handled by the Vancouver-based Ocean Productions, while voice recording was handled by the New York City-based NYAV Post—whose founder, Michael Sinterniklaas, was coerced into being the series' voice director. During the production of the pilot, Bond and Grinder specifically requested. As with many other earlier object shows, Object Oblivion starred a wide array of equally mediocre and/or questionable voice actors. The show was "unique" in that its voice actors came from various countries from around the world, such as the United States (duh), Canada, Australia, and the depths of fucking Hell.
The only cast member to whose character was a main character across all of the show's seven seasons was Frank Steppenwolf, who voiced the in-universe Object Oblivion host, Speaker. He was also the first voice actor cast for the series as, near the end of The Room's run on the network, he signed a talent holding deal with the network at gunpoint and... uh... "this was the best we could do". The first-season voice cast also included Bailey Bluish as Machete, Derek Davies as Crowbar, Benjamin Diskin as Tablet, Billie Goodall as Flower, Ryan Higa as Sandwich, JoAndra Jacobs as Bookmark, Lucy-Lynn Lewis as Paddle, Isaiah Lima as Piñata, David Packager as Diamond, Trey Parker as Towel, Kevin Scurvy as Cookie, Wendell Whooper as Peanut, Waukesha Williams as Ice Cream, and Philippe Yancy as Notebook. Many of these voice actors voiced other characters later in the show's run: Bluish was cast as Spoon in season 3; Davies went on to voice Apple in season 2 and Donut in seasons 4–6; Goodall went on to voice Marker in seasons 3–4; Higa voiced Hot Sauce in seasons 3–5; Lima voiced Taco in seasons 2–3, Burrito in season 4, and Enchilada in seasons 5–6; Whooper voiced Camera in season 3, Potato in season 4, Lamp in seasons 5–6, and Sneaker in season 7; and Williams voiced Paintbrush in seasons 3–6. Packager, Parker, and Scurvy only stuck around for one season: Parker left the show to focus on a different show reliant on juvenile shock humor, Packager quit due to creative differences with Bond and Grinder, and Scurvy left to focus on his own animation career.
Scott Steiner, who voiced the recurring character Syringe, was promoted to the main cast in season 2, and was joined by newcomer Winnie Mays as Bottle; Mays went on to voice Seashell in seasons 5–6. Dan Povenmire's recurring role as Wheel was also introduced. Diskin and Goodall's were reduced to simple guest appearances before Diskin naturally left the show due to Tablet's in-universe demise. Jacobs quit after that season due to the hectic recording schedule, and Yancy quit after an alleged physical altercation between himself and Bond. In season 3, Eileen DasAguas, Scott Honeycomb, and Sadie Hoo joined the cast in the respective roles of Lemon, Soda, and Plate; after this season, Bluish also quit the show and filed a lawsuit against Warner Bros. Entertainment alleging that he wasn't properly compensated for "the amount of hours I spent in front of my fucking microphone" recording dialogue for the show, though it was ultimately settled out of court for $5. DasAguas later voiced Cube in seasons 4–6 and Mailbox in season 7. Season 4 introduced Michael Ian Black's Spork, and Povenmire was promoted to the main cast after hurriedly agreeing to a "100% pay cut". Goodall didn't return that season to focus on her musical career. Griffin Myers' Cigarette and Simon Saucer's Coffee Pot were introduced in season 5, the season after which Higa and Povenmire left out of boredom. In season 6, Black voiced Coffin, a role he carried in to season 7; Saucer voiced a new role, Dollar; and Harry Enfield's Gin Bottle was introduced. After season 6, Davies was fired after posting a bunch of controversial tweets, Saucer quit due to the hectic production schedule, Lima quit because he felt uncomfortable around the new showrunners, Mays left due to conflicting filming commitments with Middle of Nowhere Murders, and Lewis rage-quit because IDK. During season 7, the main voice cast consisted of Steppenwolf, Black, DasAguas, Enfield, Honeycomb, Hoo, Steiner, Whooper, and five newcomers: Dan Harmon as DVD, Joanna Hausmann as Old Parr Bottle, Reed Omen as Stress Ball, Raine Rabanne as Raindrop, and Hu Yu as Tennis Ball; Packager returned to guest star in the first two episodes.
Because the show's voice actors came from different countries and many of them weren't about to buy plane tickets to head to some poorly maintained Los Angeles County recording facility just to record dialogue for a fucking object show, voice recording primarily took place remotely, though studios would occasionally be used in an attempt to make conversations between characters sound natural enough for the absurdness of the actual dialogue to be overlooked. (It didn't work.) Most of the series' voice actors recorded from Atlanta, Los Angeles, New York, Toronto, and Vancouver. Voice recording took place before actual animation production to allow the voice actors to "spread their wings" and stress out the animators.
Animation[]
Seasons 1 to 3 of Object Oblivion were animated on an extremely low budget by a heavily intoxicated skeleton crew at Studio B Productions in Vancouver that largely consisted of the same people who brought you My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. After an episode's script was completed, it would be sent to a pre-production team at Studio B, who would quickly scribble a storyboard, design the episode, and make a storyboard animatic from the voice recordings. The animatic would then be sent back to the production team in Los Angeles, which would give the OK or no-K. Once the animatic is approved, Studio B would then use Microsoft PowerPoint to prepare character poses, layouts, background art, etc. before actually animating the episode. The episodes were mostly animated in PowerPoint using slide transitions and individual object animations and cheap Studio B shit like that, while the presentation was recorded with Bandicam. That screen recording would then be put into Windows Movie Maker to be "finalized" before being run through some other video editing program to reduce the frame rate to a primetime TV-friendly 23.976 frames per second.
After Studio B was yeeted shortly before season 4 entered animation production, animation duties were overtaken by DHX Studios, which used Adobe Animate and Adobe After Effects to make the show.
Music[]
Original music for Object Oblivion was composed by "musician" and reason why people stereotype Will Toledo and performed by hisfurries pedo-enabling indie band Car Seat Headrest.
Series overview[]
- Main article: List of Object Oblivion episodes
Broadcast[]
Object Oblivion premiered on The CW on September 28, 2013 in the Saturday 10:00 p.m. time slot, and was simulcast in Canada on Citytv, cutting into Canadian content time and resulting in a bunch of the network's employees being round up and hanged. The CW moved the show to 9:30 p.m. in season 2 and remained in this time slot for the remainder of its run, while Citytv aired it Sunday at 10:00 p.m. until it dropped the show after six seasons. The series finale was broadcast on May 16, 2020 in the United States.
In fall 2016, Warner Bros. Television Distribution Domestic Cable Pay-TV Features or whatever the fuck the one division with the rare logo is called began distributing the show to local television stations. Warner Bros.' sister, TBS (both owned by AOL Time WarnerMedia Cable or whatever it's called) started airing low-definition reruns of the show starting September 23, 2017. Extremely edited-for-content episodes have aired on Warner Bros.' newfound sister channel, Discovery Family, since January 2, 2024.
In the United Kingdom and Ireland, Object Oblivion's first six seasons aired on Sky One from November 6, 2014 to August 1, 2020, but the channel later confirmed it had no plans to air season 7, which aired on Sky Replay in 2022. In Australia, the show aired on Nine Network from January 2015 to February 2021 and has been rerun on 9Gem since 2020. The series was broadcast in New Zealand on TVNZ 1 from January 2015 to November 2022. In South Africa, Object Oblivion premiered on the government mouthpiece known as SABC 1 on April 1, 2015.