Status Report

Hi everyone. It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Took some time, but I managed to recover all of the posts of this blog from a little over a decade ago (Our last post was in 2014). We had switched webhosts, but the blog database had gotten left behind in the transfer. It has been resurfaced with the last backup I had. The formatting may be off, but the content is all there for those who are feeling nostalgic and want to go back in time.

For current state, there are no plans to continue updating this site. Luckily, there is an active fan base alive on Reddit, and Scholastic is still producing Animorphs rereleases as audiobooks, e-books, and graphic novels (although these are adaptations and not new stories).

The movie is basically stuck ‘in development’, and Michael & Katherine have creatively parted ways with PictureStart. I’ve gone ahead and broken things down for those who have been out of the loop:

Official Releases

• Audiobooks
• Ebooks
• Graphic Novels

Active Communities

• /r/Animorphs on Reddit

Movie News (as of 2024)

Michael & Katherine left PictureStart’s Animorphs Movie in 2021 (Interview by the Animorphs Anonymous fan podcast), one year after the series was announced for development.

• Watch the interview here: Movie update starts at 31:25
• Read Fan Discussion about the Interview on Reddit
• animorphsmovie.com is still owned by Sony Pictures, however it continues to be a redirect to a generic page.

No further updates have been made. And since Michael & Katherine are no longer involved, we likely won’t hear anything unless PictureStart makes the announcement or updates their Animorphs page.

Cassie Short Story (as of 2024)

A mock interview was planned to be published on Katherine’s website in the summer of 2022, however it was never released (Source: Reddit & Twitter). It’s possible it may come out eventually, but we have no further news to provide there:

That is all the new info I can think of, but if you want to stay connected then there are still pockets of the fanbase out there creating projects and discussing the series.

As far as the state of this site goes, it will remain as an archive, even if updates are rare. The original intent for this site was to have a place where fans could look back on the series, and I think for the most part we’ve accomplished that, even if we couldn’t fill in all the blanks.

Thank you to everyone that has regularly visited, contributed, shared their thoughts and creative projects with us. This website started as a personal passion project, and I ended up connecting with some really cool people on the way that made it so much better as a community. Thank you.

 

Both seasons of the ’90s Animorphs TV Show will be available on Netflix in U.S and Canada starting July 01, 2014. The upcoming release list was posted on Huffington Post yesterday.

No word yet regarding Canada, UK, or releases for any other country. We’ll be sure to keep you updated if that information becomes available.

Thanks to the folks at RAF for letting us know!

Update#1: Photo by Lisa (@lenaorgana) on Twitter!

Update #2: Animorphs is on Netflix Canada now too! Can any of our U.K subscribers confirm release as well?

 

The first season of the Animorphs TV show is now available on Amazon Instant Video! Episodes can be purchased for $1.99 each, to stream and digitally download, and the Instant Video app is available to download on Xbox, Playstation, Wii, Apple, and Kindle stores.

The announcement comes from Scholastic as they release other ’90s favourites, such as Goosebumps and The Magic School Bus. No news yet regarding the release of the second season, but we’ll keep you posted.

 

Thanks to Jenny, an Animorphs adaptation has been pushed for today’s PopWatch column in Entertainment Weekly. Here’s an excerpt:

 

Even though Applegate’s characters all had highly developed senses of humor, the series was also surprisingly dark — at least for the pre-Hunger Games era. Back then, most mass-market middle-grade tales didn’t bother exploring the shades of gray that lie between the poles of good and evil. But as the Animorphs books progressed, the Animorphs themselves grew increasingly jaded and shell-shocked. They did terrible things in the name of their worthy cause, then struggled to live with their decisions; they grew increasingly alienated from their families and non-Animorph friends, who couldn’t possibly understand the harsh realities of war. The book’s battles were reasonably graphic, but not in a way that glorified violence. Even morphing scenes, in which the kids transformed into tigers or dolphins or houseflies, emphasized how grotesque and disturbing it was for the characters to watch each other suddenly sprout claws or tails or a proboscis. (Also, the books taught kids cool words like “proboscis.”)

Animorphs‘ moral universe was also a lot more sophisticated than non-readers might expect. (…)

The full article can be found at popwatch.ew.com

 

While the Animorphs movie may be on hold indefinitely, there is some good news for fans of the Gone series by Michael Grant (co-author/co-creator of Animorphs). Confirmed via Twitter by Michael Grant himself, Sony Pictures has agreed to acquire the TV rights to the Gone series:

 

 

As Michael states above, please remember that this does not confirm an actual Gone series on television at the moment, but it does significantly increase the chances of one. Fans of the series can follow Michael Grant on his Facebook and Twitter for further info and future announcements.

 

Thanks to Noah once again, Sony Pictures has now renewed all those Animorphs movie domains we previously listed in December, 2012. The new expiration date for all of them are June, 2014.

Once again, here are the domains that were renewed:

• animorphsmovie.com
• animorphs-movie.com
• animorphs-movie.net

As you can see, nothing has really changed once you click on them. They just forward onto Sony Pictures as before. No official announcements or press releases have been made regarding an Animorphs movie either, but we’ll definitely take the renewal as a good sign that there is still a possibility, however little it may be at this point.

 

A real interesting piece of news has recently surfaced, thanks to Greg from The Pop Arena. It looks like the Nickelodeon Animorphs show from the ’90s is now re-airing (possibly in High Definition) on Qubo, every Saturday at 9 PM. Here is the video announcing the news:

 

 

Thanks to Illa for informing us, the new Relaunch editions for #1-3 are now available in French on Gallimard Jeunesse, the French publisher for the series, and Amazon.fr.

It looks like #1 & 2 were released in September 2012, and #3 was released this year in February 2013. Since these were released after the cancellation of the series, it may be an indication that the rest of the books are also being planned to be released in French, provided that they sell well. They were also released with translated covers:

 

These have been added in our relaunch pages. At the moment, there is no new information regarding other language translations, but if you come across anything, then please let us know!

 

K.A Applegate has won the 2013 Newbery Medal for The One and Only Ivan! A big congrats from all of us here at Hirac Delest! (If you haven’t had the chance to read it yet: Please do. The award is entirely well deserved.)

There have been many publications about this over the last week, but Publisher’s Weekly got a hold of K.A’s reaction approximately two hours after winning:

Normally Katherine Applegate would have been in her house in San Francisco the morning that “the call” came in. But she’d been visiting family in Richmond, Va., with her 13-year-old daughter, and found herself in a hotel room 3000 miles from home when the phone rang. Her daughter had caught a bug and was running a fever, and Applegate’s mind was not on the Newbery committee. “It just never crossed my radar screen,” she said. “They told me it was the medal, and I asked, ‘Are you sure?’ ”

As the news sunk in, Applegate said she told the committee, “ ‘It’s the best thing that happened to me since I gave birth, adopted my daughter, and got married.’ I heard a great deal of laughter on the phone. It was fun.”

…

Then, she recalled, “I just sat tight and watched the webcast. It was so much easier because I already knew what the outcome would be.” As soon as her Newbery was announced, “the phone started ringing immediately and incessantly. My husband texted me and said, ‘OMG you’re trending on Twitter!’ ”

Read the full article on Publishers Weekly:
Katherine Applegate on Winning the 2013 Newbery: ‘Stunned Disbelief’

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In other news: An amusing article has popped up on The Buzz where a new Mississippi bill has been introduced that forbids human-animal hybrids, such as the Animorphs. The HB 819 is The Protection of the Human Person Act, and would have slapped the Animorphs with a fine should they have ever gone public in our time.

The article explains a bit more in depth regarding the circumstances and intent behind the hybrids, and can be read in full at The Buzz.

Thanks to Jason for forwarding this to us!

 

As a response to our previous post regarding the cancellation of the Animorphs movie, a member named Xaq proposed an idea to create a fan documentary to highlight the Animorphs community for Scholastic. You can read his post here.

Please note: Hirac Delest is not involved in the co-ordination of this project, so Xaq would be the one in charge. To submit content/videos to him, you can either email him at Qaximorp209@gmail.com, or send it directly to his Youtube Channel.

Again, the deadline to convince Scholastic, and to have any kind of impact in their decision to continue Animorphs in one form or another is June 2013. That is the month when the Animorphs movie domains expire. Fans are welcome to use our community board should they wish to discuss or organize this project in a more public forum.

That’s all for now. As always, we’ll keep you updated if there is any further official progress regarding the Animorphs series in any way.