'Angry Birds Toons' set for global domination

Have you ever stopped in the middle of playing Angry Birds and thought, “I wish these angry birds would do something vaguely narrative and three-dimensional”?

If so, you’ll be happy to hear that developer Rovio is finally ready with Angry Birds Toons, to be available on the app and Xfinity on-demand on March 17, as well as international broadcast markets including Australia, Korea, France, Israel, and Germany on March 16. This is a bigger deal than it may seem: There are 52 episodes planned — a prelude to an Angry Birds movie — and Activision, Paramount, and Sony are partners in the launch.

On first brush, your reaction may be curiosity — or confusion: What will the cartoon be about? Will I still be able to play it? Is this another example of all that new transmedia content I’m always not-reading about?

At Cannes last year, Rovio’s head of animation, Nick Dorra, said the show would be about “telling more engaging stories,” according to Deadline. Judging by the just-released preview clip, the birds in question will, in fact, be angry. They will also fall off of cliffs and be named Terrence. Watch a preview below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_7JjB0At_s

First things first: there will probably be no story, insofar as Angry Birds Toons is likely to be about a bunch of colorful animated creatures and objects who obsess over a nest of smaller angry bird eggs whilst also zipping around to samples of the honking horns from Austin Powers. But! The ‘toons will probably also be zany, insofar as each installment will maintain the game’s original dialectic: angry birds fight stubbornly inscrutable pigs amidst streaks of monochrome.

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