Meet the beetles

Toronto – Decode Entertainment has gone to camera with the latest of its many kids shows, Freaks of Nature, and will deliver the results to Family Channel and Nickelodeon U.K. in the spring. It’s the 26 x 22 preteen-aimed story of a girl with a keen interest in bugs, fungi, people and the natural world. Decode partner Neil Court was showing off the results at MIPCOM and the company is said to be closing in on further sales.

Freaks is produced by John May and Suzanne Bolch on a budget of approximately $400,000 per ep, backed by the CTF, the Shaw Rocket Fund (formerly the Shaw Television Broadcast Fund), The Harold Greenberg Fund and VRAK.TV.

While in France, Decode (Radio Free Roscoe, Undergrads) also struck a deal with Aardman Animation (Chicken Run, the Wallace & Gromit shorts) to produce the CG series Sketch Show for Teletoon and the U.K.’s CiTV. The toon series is made up of 13 11-minute shorts aimed at the six- to 11-year-old set and is Aardman’s first kids series in more than 20 years. Sean Davidson

Mainframe to the Max

Vancouver – Mainframe Entertainment has signed a production deal with Mattel to create the DVD feature Max Steel: Endangered Species, based on the ‘extreme’ secret agent character.

‘With this new production deal, we continue our successful, long-standing relationship with Mattel,’ says Rick Mischel, CEO at Mainframe, which is owned by U.S.-based IDT Entertainment Company.

In the 66-minute CGI-animated feature, Max Steel takes on two ‘wicked’ threats in South America. Other Mattel titles by Mainframe include Barbie of Swan Lake. Ian Edwards