Vancouver: The Comedy Network, through its commitment to developing new Canadian talent, is supporting two West Coast series in their second seasons, though neither resembles their inaugural productions much at all. In fact, producers are saying the new shows are not really connected to the predecessors.

Suckerpunch, which is in production until Oct. 20, is produced by the same team of comedy writers and producers that pulled off last year’s Slightly Bent tv, a skit comedy show. Glen Lougheed and Kelsey Kirvan, who won Leo Award nominations for Slightly Bent’s antics, including the outrageous Johnny Sparkle [Cock] skit, have reunited performers Pearce Visser, Diana Francis and Doug Funk, and will introduce Toby Berner and Tallulah Winkleman.

The producers say Suckerpunch is to comedy what punk is to music – loud, visceral and likely to piss off the neighbors. Nationalistic comedy themes include Canada’s relationship to the u.s., urban life in Canada, hockey, beavers and beer.

Lougheed says he and Kirvan have learned a lot year-over-year – in terms of planning, budgeting and writing. They’ve also hedged some skits with tamer alternative shots in the hopes that Comedy Central – which passed on Slightly Bent last year because it was too edgy, says Lougheed – will pick it up.

There will be 13 half-hour episodes of Suckerpunch compared to six half-hours of Slightly Bent.

Likewise, The Unprofessionals will do 13 half-hours compared to the six half-hours of Skullduggery shot and aired last year.

The premise of The Unprofessionals is similar to its surreal ancestor – two burglars have to pull off a series of heists – but there is some new cast and a larger, though still small, budget.

‘Being reordered allowed us to take all the lessons form the first season to make a better program,’ says executive producer Kellie Benz, who is doing the second season solo after her creative partner Ken Hegan pulled out.

‘We’ve reworked the concept for the series and focused the comedy on the characters rather than sight gags and absurdities.’

Randy Schooley returns in the role of Carl Carlson, while the other leads have been recast. Christopher Shyer is Marlon Carlson, Catherine Lough-Haggquist is the vixen Sadie and Tim Bissette is evil Mr. x.

What else has Benz learned? ‘That it is possible to build an indigenous industry in Canada with the continued support of a broadcaster like Comedy Network.’

Production on The Unprofessionals runs until Dec. 11 in Langley, b.c.

*Sudden death auditioning

What’s being called the first interactive sitcom debuts its first seven-minute episode Oct. 13 on the Web at www.suite218.com.

The brainchild of Vancouver Web designers Craig Lepan and Bryan Jones and television producer Kevin Shortt (collectively Vycast Entertainment Network), suite218.com will be 36 episodes about the comic adventures of a start-up Web design company.

However, the producers jumped on the Survivor! bandwagon in June and did an interactive casting session. Twenty-four actors were pitted against each other for three roles. The site visitors evaluated auditions, etc., and one by one the actors were voted off the show.

At press time, ‘Louis’ had won the role of the computer-hacking Hagan, while ‘Karl’ and ‘Jason’ were vying for the role of Web designer Clarence. ‘Aileen’ and ‘Tracy’ were squaring off for the role of Holly, Hagan’s girlfriend.

After each episode, site visitors will be asked questions about how the story should evolve.

*I stream, you stream

Since July 1, the Gulf Islands Film and Television School has been posting a new student film every day on its website www.youthfilms.com. Usually five minutes long, the streamed videos showcase some of the 150 new films generated by the 400 students that go through the Galiano Island facility every year. Most students are aged 14 to 19 and they take courses in Super 8, 16mm, scratch animation, computer animation, classical animation and digital video.

Site visitors can also access the 50 videos that are archived at any one time. The site gets about 10,000 page views a day and is used in high schools’ curricula, says school director George Harris. He adds films from the school have won 92 national and international awards since it opened in 1995

*En pointe

Vancouver-based dance filmmaker Kevin Cottam will complete this month the remaining installments of Sola, a trilogy by contemporary dancer Alvin Erasga Tolentino. Cottam shot Birth, the first of the three-part series, in 1997.

abo/ashes and Sadhana, the second and third parts, are produced with the support of Bravo!, British Columbia Film, Telefilm Canada and ctf-lfp. The executive producer for Sola is Gigi Boyd.

Cottam’s recent skating video for Bravo!, Liberato, won the Paladino d’Oro Award at the International SportFilm Festival in Palermo, Sicily, in December and was recently sold to Swissair and Sabena (Belgium) Airlines.

*Wubbies dub dub

CGI specialist Mainframe Entertainment has signed another service production deal – this time with Wubbies World International to develop a preschool television series and global merchandising and licensing program.

Mainframe will develop 26 half-hours of a computer-animated program based on the Wubbies characters, which have been developed by the Toronto-based duo John Martin Mokrenko and Christine Usvaltas.

The series will feature a boy named Wilbur Wiggins and a cast of furry characters called Wubbies. The world they inhabit is safe, soft and warm, and designed to entertain and educate young audiences by inviting them into a whimsical world of pretend and play, where learning is part of the adventure.

*These walls can talk

Vancouver-based documentary maker Cindy Leaney is currently directing Murals: Walls of Change. The project explores the political wall murals throughout Northern Ireland, Los Angeles and Vancouver’s downtown eastside neighborhood.

According to Leaney, filming has taken the crew inside paramilitary headquarters throughout Belfast, the alleys of Vancouver’s downtown eastside and the barrios of east and south central l.a.

Key participants include Gerry Adams, Chicano artist Judy Baca and Vancouver’s Richard Tetrault.

The documentary is produced in association with Global, Vision tv, Bravo!, Telefilm Canada and British Columbia Film.

Leaney’s next project is Automate, a documentary exploration of mechanical sculptures that satirize contemporary human mores and values. Production will take her crew through Canada, the u.k. and Japan.