Fuck Yeah Foodfight!

I UNDERSTAND THAT SOMEBODY ORDERED A RECAAAAAALLL

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once more into the bleach……

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

oficial foodfight! valentimes pack #1

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UPDATE: Interview With A Cast Member, Action Figures and More!

Hey everyone! It's time for another update. As mentioned in my previous post, I was lucky enough to be able to interview an actual cast member from Foodfight! a while ago about her experience on the movie. Her name is Holly Cruikshank (or at least it was when the movie was in production, today she goes by Holly Ireland) and she did the motion capture for Lady X, the movie's villainess! So yeah, I didn't score an interview with Charlie Sheen or Christopher Lloyd or anything- but did you really expect that from a small blog like this? Besides, it was wonderful talking to Holly and she made it clear from the start she had only good things to say about working on the movie- a far cry from a lot of crewmembers who unfortunately had a thoroughly miserable time on the project.

For example, this animator (who appropriately titles themself "tortured artist") talks about their experience on Foodfight! with nothing short of hatred. A large amount of said hate is directed towards the director, Lawrence Kasanoff, who the tortured artist claims made him clean up his dog's diarrhea and switched up what he was supposed to be working on on a whim. This really doesn't sound like an ideal work environment, and as much as I have a sincere apprecation for Foodfight! it's clear there was some poor project management going on behind the scenes. But there are two sides to every story, and in my interview with Holly she tells her story of working on Foodfight! with people who were genuinely excited to be there every day and thoroughly enjoyed their time on it. So without further ado, here's my full interview with her, taken directly from our emails with each other (the purple text is me, and the black text is her).

This was a really lovely interview, and I was so glad to talk to someone who was happy to talk about the movie and share their experience in a positive way. Some interesting things to note here are that the show she was doing was a Broadway show called "Movin' Out", and if you look up footage of that show online...

...the character Holly is playing in that show looks INCREDIBLY similar to Lady X! The dark hair, the red dress, etc... is it possible Lawrence Kasanoff cast her because of how closely she resembled the animated character he wanted her to play? I can't say for sure, but it's definitely interesting. It's also nice that she talks fondly of Kasanoff, recalling him as being kind, fun and supportive- with how negatively a lot of former crewmembers speak of him, it's nice to get a different perpective.

She also mentions filming all the motion capture, then having to come back around a year later to do some more scenes- presumably this was down to either not having correctly captured some scenes the first time (the motion capture technology seems like it was quite temperamental) or script revisions requiring some scenes to be redone. I think it's also a really funny and sweet anecdote to share that when she did the motion capture she was pregnant but not really showing- and by the time the movie finally came out her daughters were old enough to actually watch the movie! It really puts into perspective just how long the movie took to finish.

I also completely agree that the creative team behind Foodfight! had "an amazing story and idea" and I think it's fantastic she was excited to be a part of "something inventive and unique"- I really do think there's a hidden gem at the heart of Foodfight!, and that it's just hard to see past the barely-finished animation obfuscating it (I don't blame her daughters for not wanting to watch the finished film). Overall though, it was a pleasure talking to Holly, and she was so enthusiastic about talking about the movie- she was very kind and thankful for my email, and said to let her know if I had any further questions. A lot of people who worked on Foodfight! had their lives go in very different directions after they finished working on it, and there aren't many fans of the film either, so I imagine this was the first time anyone had asked her about it in a long time. It was really fantastic to get to talk to someone who worked on the movie, but I do have other things I'd like to share in this post as well!

That's right, Foodfight! action figures! No, not the plush toys that were actually released and sold off in arcades and carnivals as prizes, these were prototypes (seemingly made for showing to investors). These pictures were found in the trademark registration documents for Foodfight! and show off a wide variety of Foodfight figures and plush toys, none of which were ever actually sold in stores.

First off, we have a line of small collectible figurines, based on all your favorite characters from the film! There's Dex Dogtective, Daredevil Dan, Sunshine Goodness, Vlad Chocool, Cheazel the Weasel, Polar Penguin, Maximillus Moose, an X-O-Byte, Lord Flushington, a Brand X soldier, Hairy Hold, Lady X, a variant of Dex in his fancy tuxedo, Lieutenant X and General X. That's a pretty wide variety of figures, 15 in all! Towards the back, you can also see a set of 5 of these figures packaged up, and on the packaging we can see these were made by Playmates, as opposed to Nanco, who made the actual merchandise released for the movie. Honestly, the way these figures are designed, the way they're none-poseable, and the way they're packaged, these remind me a lot of Homies. You guys remember Homies, right? The little figures you could win in capsule machines (or buy sets of) that were various caricatures of Mexican-American culture? No? Well those would've been popular around the time these figures were made, so I wonder if they were an inspiration? In any case, these figures look ADORABLE and I wish they were fully produced, because I'd LOVE to have had a full set of them. They're so teeny and tiny and cartoony, I love them. At the very top of the first image, we can also see the packaging for something called "Dex Dogtective's Utility Belt", but since we can't see the rest of it, there's no knowing what it would've consisted of.

Onto the second image, and this is where it gets interesting. These are plush toys of various movie characters, but they're very different to the ones that were actually released (a given, considering these were prototypes and made by a different company). They're incredibly detailed and have hats and coats made out of different texture materials (with Dex's hat being a hard plastic for instance), and are seemingly the kind of plush toy with a hard wire interior so that you can actually pose them in various positions. A sign below also says "We're electronic! We say movie phrases!" Again, none of the official movie toys are electronic (but it's debatable if these even were given they're just prototypes). And of course it has to be said, these plush toys look FAR superior to the ones that were actually released. Just for fun, here's a comparison between the prototype Dex plush and the one that was actually released.

I've gotta admit, I actually started laughing out loud putting these two pictures side by side. I'm reminded of the popular internet joke (look it up if you're not aware of this) of a character saying "this edible ain't shit-" and then cutting to to them looking completely fucked up. With that being said though, it's not entirely fair to compare a prototype to a mass-produced plush toy, and I still find the released Foodfight! plush toys to be endearing enough that I'm currently in the process of collecting a full set of them. (I'll make a fantastic post about them when I have them all, I want to collect a full set of Foodfight! merchandise at some point then bore bemused houseguests to death talking about them). Regardless, it's an interesting look into what might've been with the world of Foodfight! merchandise, and it's fascinating to see them all presented this way- it makes me think of that scene from Toy Story 2 where Woody sees Al's "Woody's Roundup" collection and realizes he was famous, like they're presented in a way that makes Foodfight! look like it was a smash hit. Not in this world though...maybe in some other world.

Anyway, I have one more thing to talk about in this post. Remember a while ago, when I talked about the various Foodfight! websites over the years? It turns out I actually missed one! In around 2008, the Threshold Animation Studios website had a section on Foodfight! containing some very interesting information about the movie. You can view it here: https://web.archive.org/web/20081003194856/http://thresholdanimationstudios.com/foodfight.html

Unfortunately, only the plain text of the website has been preserved, so none of the images have been archived. There's a main page explaining the premise of the movie, a subpage showing the cast, but that's not what we're here to talk about. We're here to talk to you about the Foodfight! Foundation.

So yes, as bizarre as it sounds, Foodfight! was at one point planned to launch alongside a charity organization that helped cure world hunger and feed starving children. As admirable of a goal as this is, it's also insanely ambitious- cursory research will show the Foodfight! Foundation did exist at one point, but I highly doubt it was ever actually active or fed 10 million kids. It's fascinating to see how much of a hit Lawrence Kasanoff thought this movie was going to be- sometimes it's good to have realistic expectations in mind.

There's one more thing on this website worth talking about- there's a section called Merchandising Program, and on there we see a list of merchandise they had planned to tie into the movie. We see videogames, (of which we saw a clip of at E3 2006- see a previous post for my discussion of that) amusements (Nanco is mentioned here, who were the company who made the actual Foodfight! plush toys released in stores) but...what's this under publishing?

That's right, it's a mention of the novelization of the feature film! The book that started this whole blog! This is the ONLY official mention of the book anywhere on the internet, and it's fascinating to see it acknowledged in an official capacity by Threshold while the movie was still in development. (This website was from 2008 too, so it's right around the time it would've been published). This still doesn't answer my one lingering question about the book- WHY is there only one copy of it in the entire world? But if I had to guess, I'd say it was commissioned, written, published and a single copy printed just for the sake of showing off to potential investors in the project the merchandising potential the movie had. That's the only reason I can think of that there'd only be one copy, and it fits with the prototype action figures we saw above. But how did the novelization end up on eBay? How did the only existing copy end up in a Goodwill in Minnesota? (that's where it was shipped from) I have no idea... maybe some things are best left a mystery, for now.

I hope you all enjoyed this post! I know the topics I discussed here weren't particularly connected to each other and don't segue into one another very well, but I had a whole bunch of Foodfight! stuff I wanted to share and I didn't want to just post my interview with Holly by itself, since it was pretty short. So that's it for this round of Foodfight! facts, knowledge, and wild speculation! Tune in next time for something rather exciting...

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

I reblogged some great posts from Tiffany Amber’s blog, which you all should check out if you haven’t already. Really good stuff.

I’ve been focusing on different, non-Foodfight hobbies lately but I read the junior novelization in one sitting— it’s really fascinating. A huge thank you to our fellow fan for finding and scanning it.

I’d like to make some analysis posts about it later, too.. The breakdown on this blog is really good, but like. Can we talk about the failures of the fascism allegory? Brand X invokes Nazi imagery with the armbands and goose-stepping, but they’re introduced (even more obviously in the book) as ‘oh no! this is a New Thing, and changes to the status quo are scary! Everything was great the way it was!’ When really, appealing to tradition is more the fascist M.O… Shouldn’t Lady X have presented herself as a ‘traditional’ laundry detergent, and all the other brands as new things that don’t belong? Much to think about, when you take Foodfight as seriously as I do.

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Interlude: I Can Find It! Children's Book and Early Storyboards by Gary Clair

Okay, we're in the some stretch of the novelization now, so here's yet another interlude where I talk about something a little different. This time though, we're really gonna dig deep and try to unravel the mystery of how this movie changed throughout production. As I mentioned in my introduction post, there were other forms of Foodfight! merchandise released outside of the novelization. To be more precise, there was a Deluxe Sound Storybook (basically a children's picture book but with buttons you can press that make sounds representative of the various characters) a number of soft toys/stuffed animals, and this- The I Can Find It! book.

Now I don't actually own this book for myself, someone on the Internet Archive actually scanned and uploaded their copy and that's what we'll be looking at here. (Someone else out there as obsessed with this movie as I am? What a world!) According to the inside cover, this was published in around 2007, which makes sense as that's when all the other merchandise was released, the tie-in videogame was intended to come out, and of course the movie itself was supposed to be in theaters (even though it ultimately wasn't). Anyway, aside from having a vastly more appealing artstyle than the final film (seriously, it's SO much nicer to look at) what's there to talk about with this book?

Well, a WHOLE LOT actually! Let's strawberry jam...into this? As you might remember from our chapter-by-chapter analysis, there's a scene in both the novelization and the movie itself where Dex and Dan get trapped in a dryer and are almost melted alive. However HERE, they aren't trapped in a dryer at all-instead they're trapped in a giant washing machine. This makes a lot more sense- Lady X is a detergent Ike, so of course they'd be trapped in a washing machine. And even in the novelization, the Brand X display in the grocery store is a giant washing machine, explaining how one ends up in Marketropolis. It's a dryer in both the novelization and the movie itself however, so why was this changed? We'll get to it! This is the first of the major differences and it's one that's entirely unique to the picture book (unlike the next one, which is shared with the novelization) On the following page, Dex and Dan escape and find themselves in Brand X's headquarters.

Now this scene is in both the novelization and the movie, but there's a difference here. Can you spot it yet? While you look, I just want to say the picture book incorporating shelves and grocery products into Marketropolis itself is a great idea- it really sells the idea that this is a supermarket come to life. In the movie itself, it far too often just feels like a generic cartoon city, and the supermarket aesthetic ends up practically unnoticeable under regular-looking buildings and streets. Anyway, did you notice what's different here? He's hidden in the binding of the pages but he's here- it's the Brand X Mashed Potato Man!

If you've been keeping up with the chapter by chapter analysis of the novelization, you'll know the Brand X Mashed Potato Man is a character who isn't in the movie itself- in the movie, there's a character called the Brand X Lunchlady who fills basically the same role. The Brand X Mashed Potato Man is still present in the novelization, likely owing to it being written and published before this character was written out of the movie. However, here in this picture book we actually get to SEE this elusive character instead of just reading about him. And...honestly he looks kinda gross! I know that's the point of the Brand X villains, but his head is all lumpy and weird and it's just very unpleasant to look at. But hey, at least now we know what this character was supposed to look like before he was cut from the movie and replaced with the Lunchlady! So that's ANOTHER interesting thing about the picture book.

Now we reach the picture book's biggest change yet- in both the movie AND the novelization (spoilers since we're not there yet) Brand X is defeated by the Ikes creating lighting rods and starting a lightning storm that destroys all of Brand X's buildings. Here however, that's not the case at all! Instead Brand X is defeated using the store's sprinkler system, flooding the place and washing the bad guys away. This again makes sense with Lady X being a detergent icon- like sure, of course you can wash away detergent with water. Using the store's sprinkler system also fits more with this taking place in a grocery store- that's something supermarkets typically have, whereas I can't remember the last time I went to a Walmart and was fried to death by an unexpected lightning storm. The book is only 10 pages long so that's all there is to talk about here, but have you noticed both changes unique to the picture book's version of the story involve water?

I have a theory as to why. The initial version of the script must've contained both of these- Dex and Dan getting trapped in a washing machine filled with hot water, and Brand X getting defeated by a flood. However when it came to actually animating the movie, the animation software they were using was unable to render water convincingly (on the occassion we see fluid effects in the actual movie they look AWFUL), leading to the script being rewritten to change the washing machine to a dryer and the flood to a lightning storm. This must've been the version of the script the novelization was based off, as it has both the dryer and lightning storm but the Brand X Mashed Potato Man is still part of the story. Then for the actual movie itself, a few more changes were made and the Brand X Mashed Potato Man was written entirely out of the story and replaced with the Brand X Lunchlady. You might be saying "Tiffany, that's just a theory. Do you have any proof?" And I say to that YES! Yes actually I do! Linked below are early storyboards for the movie by concept artist Gary Clair.

These storyboards are clearly based on a much earlier draft of the script- among other differences, there are more actual brand mascots present in some scenes. During the Ikes' attack on Brand X, we see Sugar Bear, the Golden Crisp mascot, and Oscar Mayer, mascot for a brand of hot dogs and cold cuts. There's also an additonal sequence not present in the movie OR novelization where Polar Penguin gets tossed around during the big fight, landing next to Dex, then eventually passing out.

We also see an early version of the scene where Lieutenant X confronts Cheazel about luring Dex to the Brand X tower, and aside from the artstyle here being SO SO much more appealing than anything in the actual movie (seriously, it looks like a Looney Tunes cartoon or something) it ALSO takes place at a canal, just like the novelization's version of the scene does. In the actual movie it takes place atop a building, and once again I posit my theory that this was changed because they couldn't convincingly render water effects and so wouldn't be able to animate Cheazel falling into the canal at the end of the scene.

Not only that, we see an early version of a scene late in the movie where Cheazel attempts to start the lightning storm by cutting the power lines. Only HERE, he's not cutting the power lines at all-he's cutting the cable to the fire alarm... much like a fire alarm that'd say, set off the sprinklers and cause a flood just like at the end of the I Can Find It! book?

The Brand X Mashed Potato Man is also present here, confirming my theory that the earliest draft of the script (or at least the one the picture book was based on) contained both Brand X being destroyed by a flood AND the Mashed Potato Man. I don't have any definitive confirmation that the reason these scenes were changed is due to being unable to convincingly render water, but why ELSE would all the scenes involving water in a 3D animated movie be conspicuously changed later in production to remove all mention of water? So, with the picture book and early storyboards talked about, the proof is in the chocolate pudding and we now have a definitive timeline for at least some parts of the evolution of Foodfight's script:

Initial draft: Dex and Dan trapped in washing machine, Brand X defeated by flood, Mashed Potato Man present (version the I Can Find it! Picture Book is based off)

Secondary draft: Dex and Dan trapped in dryer, Brand X defeated by lightning storm, Mashed Potato Man present (version the novelization is based off)

Final draft: Dex and Dan trapped in dryer, Brand X defeated by lightning storm, Brand X Lunchlady replaces Mashed Potato Man among other changes (version the final film is based off)

Now hey, that's a little confusing and messy- but what IS Foodfight! if not that? And thanks to the novelization, the storyboards, a children's picture book, and my definitely autistic, borderline obsession with this thing, we've put together all the pieces and found out how the movie evolved (or perhaps, devolved) over the course of production. It's crazy to think we now have so many answers about this movie, all thanks to the novelization. A novelization so obscure only one copy seems to exist, and if I hadn't found and started writing we never would've even heard about. But maybe it's the destination that counts, and not the weird, obscure path we took to get there. In any case, the novelization is still my favorite version of the Foodfight! story, and I hope you'll come back next time when we plough our way through the last chapters of this epic parable. If you made it this far into the blog, I love you, and thank you for sticking with me on my strange, wet journey for answers.

[foodfightnovelization]

Interlude: Every Real-World Brand Mascot in the Movie

Time for another interlude! Cool, huh? Okay, this admittedly isn't super interesting since it's just a game of "spot the cameo" with characters that are already in the movie, but I felt the need to trek my way through and point out just how many brand mascots (that is, ones based on actual grocery store products) we see in the movie. I'm aware there's already a list like this on Foodfight's Lost Media Wiki page, but it's slightly inaccurate and anyway mine has pictures. So let's do this!

(Sidenote: This doesn't include products that are shown or mentioned throughout the movie but have no notable mascot to speak of. For example, we see Crest toothpaste on the shelves as the store closes, but there's no Crest mascot so I'm not including it)

#1: The Vlasic Stork: Okay so this one is obvious, since he's on the DVD cover and all, he's the first one we see in the whole movie, at around 1:50!

#2: Mr Clean. Again this one's super obvious and notable, I'm just getting all of these for completion's sake. I chose the screenshot of him with sewage on his clothes because I think it's funny.

#3: Mama Celeste. I'm talking about the woman in the foreground in a red dress and a white apron- she just looks like a regular old woman but she's actually the mascot for a bunch of microwavable meals (like Celeste Pizza For One, which a friend of mine says is a very sad pizza for sad lonely men)

#4: Punchy. Not much to say about this one in particular, but it's Punchy, the mascot for Hawaiian Punch. He has no lines but he DOES perform his signature move of offering someone a drink before punching them in the face.

#5: Twinkie The Kid: The mascot for Twinkies, this character appears multiple times throughout the movie, but I'm just including the first time he shows up because it's easier (this is during a crowd scene early on where lots of cameos can be seen)

#6: Spammy. See, I wasn't even aware Spam had a mascot? But apparently they do, and he can be seen right here staring right at you, the person reading this! He's basically just a can of Spam with a face and arms.

#7: The Dinty Moore Lumberjack. The mascot for Dinty Moore stew, he can be seen here waving his hands in the air and being stared at by a rabbi. (The rabbi in question is called Rabbi Kayman in case anyone's wondering, he's an original character created for the movie and is the mascot for a brand of granola bars and cookies. God, I know way too much about this movie)

#8 and #9: Tootsie Roll Owl and Tootsie Roll Man. In the background of the same scene, we can see these two characters. The owl, famous for the "How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop?" commercials, and a walking Tootsie Roll (on the right, he's kinda blurry) who Google tells me is just called Tootsie Roll Man.

#10: The California Raisins. I don't have much to say about these guys, other than that they're the California Raisins. In the scene this screenshot is from, their band is singing a cover of "I Heard it Through The Grapevine" which is cute. Fun fact, they're also one of the only real-world brand mascots from the movie to actually get merchandise too, as there was a plush released of one of the band members! (The only other real-world mascot to get a plush, or indeed any form of merchandise, was Charlie The Tuna. Speaking of...)

#11: Charlie The Tuna. The mascot for Starkist Tuna, he's notable in this movie for being one of the few brand mascots to get actual dialogue . I like his Brooklyn accent, and as mentioned above he's one of only two real-world mascots to get any merchandise released tying in with the movie. There were a whole line of plush toys released- Dex Dogtective, Daredevil Dan (I have this one!), Maximilius Moose, Cheasel the Weasel, Polar Penguin, a California Raisin, and Charlie the Tuna. But the majority of these are the movie's original characters, not mascots for real brands. He's also on the DVD cover! So Charlie the Tuna must be quite the star, getting his own plush and everything... either that or tuna companies typically don't get the chance to sell merchandise based around their canned fish mascot and jumped at the opportunity.

#12: Mrs Buttersworth. One of the few other brand mascots with dialogue, she throws pancakes at the Brand X army at one point and spills a glass of juice on Mr Clean. You have to wonder, with only three or four of these (relatively) popular characters getting speaking roles, if more of them had dialogue but it was cut before the movie was released. Mr Clean is credited as having a voice actor but never talks in the movie. Makes you think, right?

#13: Energizer Bunny. This one is a real "blink and you'll miss it" type cameo in the USDA meeting scene, but this is undoubtedly the Energizer Bunny. (Energizer Batteries also feature in a scene in the real-world grocery store)

#14: Mr Bubble. The mascot for a now-discontinued (as far as I'm aware) brand of bubble bath, Mr Bubble appears multiple times throughout the movie.

#15: Kid Cuisine Penguin. Another "blink and you'll miss it" cameo, the Kid Cuisine Penguin shows up in a few scenes, but he's really hard to spot. It's almost like they don't want you to see him...?

#16: Chef Boyardee. He shows up in a few scenes throughout the movie, and they've made sure to put the Chef Boyardee logo on his uniform because otherwise he just looks like a kinda normal chef.

#17: Hungry-Man. We're really getting into the pits of the cameos now. Hungry-Man is a brand of frozen dinners... but they don't have a mascot. I looked it up, they definitely don't. So for this movie they've created a mascot for Hungry-Man by just taking a regular-looking guy and slapping a shirt that says "Hungry-Man" on him. The only interesting thing about this is it implies that in the world of Foodfight!, even products without mascots in the real world still have an Ike in the Marketropolis world.

#18: Duncan Hines. Okay, last one now. I watched this movie a BUNCH and I had idea who this was supposed to be, only to spot a logo on his apron right towards the end and realize this is supposed to be Duncan Hines. He doesn't look anything like the real-life Duncan Hines (a restaurant critic who definitely does not have a mustache) and as far as I know Duncan Hines cake mix doesn't HAVE a mascot. So for this movie I guess they just...created a mascot that looks nothing like the real-world man the company is named after? Okay FINE.

So all in all that makes 18 cameos from 18 different brand mascots...in a previous post I said there were around 15 and that I'd have to pore through and catalogue them all at some point. And here I am! My guess was surprisingly accurate. A lot of these are so obscure and so easy to miss though, that I'd barely say they even count as cameos. The only real notable ones are the ones that get a shot focusing on them or some actual dialogue, like Charlie Tuna, Twinkie The Kid, Mrs Buttersworth and the Vlasic Stork. It makes sense those are the ones featured on the DVD cover and poster- they're the most recognizable of all these and some of the only actual mascots with a notable role in the plot.

Sidenote: This particular variation of the DVD cover/poster (the same art is used for both) lists a bunch of cameos featured in the movie. Charlie The Tuna, Vlasic The Stork, Twinkie The Kid, Mr Clean, Mrs Buttersworth, Hawaiian Punchy, California Raisins, Chef Boyardee and...Chiquita Banana?? But the Chiquita Banana lady isn't in this movie at all! I should know, I just spent way too long wading through every second of it trying to pick out every last cameo. So either she was removed very late into production (considering this poster was released in 2012, just before the movie came out) or whoever wrote the text for this poster made a mistake. I genuinely don't know which though? The mystery of this movie really never ends...

[foodfightnovelization]

Interlude: M&Ms, What Happened in 2001, and a Tie-In Video Game

Hey! So analyzing each chapter of the novelization is fun and all, but I just want to take a break and discuss a few other things about Foodfight! that fascinate me. We'll call this an interlude, how about that? I'm gonna talk (with no real direction) about other miscellaneous trivia relating to the movie and its production for a while and just see where it goes. Ready? Okay SO fun fact, at one point during production of Foodfight! the M&Ms mascots were supposed to be in the movie (as seen by the concept art on the left). As seen in the article to the right, they were hoping to have one of them making a joke about having "Peanut envy"...get it, like penis envy. You have to wonder if a lot of brands pulled out of this movie because Larry Kasanoff was just using their famously child-friendly mascots to make unoriginal penis jokes.

At one point, Cap'n Crunch, the Keebler Elves, Pringles and many other mascots were all also supposed to be in the movie too. I have to say, I think the movie would have sold the idea of a supermarket coming to life a lot better had there been more recognizable branded characters populating the store. As it stands, in the finished movie there are only about 15 (I think? I'll pore through the movie and give an exact number in a later post) brand icons present, and I don't think any of them are as recognizable in the same way something as iconic as the M&Ms mascots are. To really sell the concept you need a BUNCH (a banana bunch, if you will?) of heavy hitters, otherwise it comes across less like a grocery store and more like a random city filled with generic cartoon characters- Mr Clean and Charlie the Tuna just aren't enough to carry this movie on their own...

Actually though- all that concept art I just showed, the M&Ms, Cap'n Crunch, the Keebler Elves... that wasn't concept art for the movie itself, but for the the Foodfight! videogame that was in development alongside the movie for a while! That's right, I pulled a bait-and-switch on you. I didn't want to just talk about M&Ms, I wanted to talk about VIDEOGAMES too. Of course, these characters were intended to be in the movie as well, but I'm using them to segue into a discussion about the game because I'm an epic gamer girl.

So, at various points throughout Foodfight's production, there was supposed to be a tie-in videogame released alongside the movie. The earliest the tie-in game goes back to is 2001, which is when Foodfight was in its earliest stages of production. At this point in development, Dex Dogtective wasn't even a dog- he was just a regular-looking man vaguely resembling Rick from Casablanca, and at this point in production he was known simply as Dex Detective. There's very little information about what the movie was like this early on, but some very brief snippets of footage from it can be found online, as well as this piece of concept art from this early stage of production:

I think this piece of concept art really shows the strength of the core idea behind the movie and how incredible it could've been had it been executed properly. You can really look at it and see what they were going for, and I would have loved to have seen this version of the movie on the big screen. Grocery stores ARE kinda like cities, and you have to admit this piece really shows how rich of an idea that is.

There also exist a few articles online from around 2001 mentioning a villain called Professor Plotnick, who creates genetically giant prunes for unspecified evil purposes. This character isn't in the final movie at all, so we can say for sure in 2001 that there were a BUNCH of differences in the plot and characters of the movie compared to the finished film, and that can absolutely be seen on the website of concept artist Jason Leong. There are a LOT of storyboards from a planned Foodfight tie-in game, and these are evidently based on the 2001 version of the movie mentioned above (which is why I spent some time talking about it). They can all be found here:

Storyboards

Console: Midway Games West, Inc., 2001

Notably this concept art includes far more licensed characters than the movie ever did (including the M&Ms characters I showed at the beginning of this article). We can also see concept art for various minigames, such as shooting pieces of cereal so Cap'n Crunch can get across a shark-infested ocean to an island treasure chest. Also in this concept art there seems to be a proposal for a fully-open world Marketropolis to explore, with Hamburger Helper hands as shortcuts catapulting you to different areas of the supermarket. This all sounds really fun! My personal favorite piece of concept art is this:

I can't be 100% sure if this was intended to be in the movie itself or not...but I'm about 90% sure it was, and the idea of these two tiny guys fighting each other with boxcutters on fast-moving carts through a chaotic supermarket is honestly really cool and sounds like it would've been a treat to watch. Unfortunately it seems like this iteration of the game didn't get much further than just the concept art linked above as Jason Leong mentions this is basically all he did for it, and so it was shelved (..get it? shelved?) for years. Until...

A different (seemingly entirely separate) Foodfight videogame was shown at E3 2006! This makes sense- the movie was planned to release in 2007 at one point, and the novelization and other merchandise were all released around 2007-2008 too. They must have been really confident about the 2007 release date to usher so many different tie-ins into production, which really makes you wonder why it didn't release back then.

Anyway, there's really not much to say about this version of the game, as this few seconds of footage is all that exists. All we can see of it is that it would've been a third person platformer in which you play as Dex, and that the footage we see includes some sort of area with moving platforms. There appears to be a HUD showing health and also ammunition for his price tag gun, and that's... about it? The footage is too grainy and there's too little of it to make much else out, other than that the poster above it mentions it would've released on Gameboy Advance, Playstation 2 and Gamecube. There's also a cast list above it that seems to suggest the cast of the movie would've reprised their roles for this game, but unfortunately without seeing more of it there's no way we can know for sure. So unless someday in the future I find the only copy of this game left in existence and write a blog about that too, we're done here for today.

This was just intended to be a short interlude to talk about things other than the novelization itself, but I really went down quite the rabbithole, right? (the...Trix Rabbit hole? I can do food puns too!) It's honestly impossible for me to talk about anything from this movie without spinning off into at least 5 other things about it that I find completely fascinating, but I hope you enjoyed this. I'll be posting a few more of these interludes between analysis/discussion of the various book chapters, so stay tuned for more!

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

Foodfight! The Junior Novelization

Oh aweseome, this blog IS still active! In that case I'd also like to share Foodfight! The Junior Novelization with you all. It's the official novelization of the movie, released in 2008 (yes, four years before the actual movie came out) and based on a much earlier draft of the script. Even more baffling is that there also seems to only be one copy left in existence... I know that sounds like the beginning of an ARG or something, but it's true. This movie is just weird like that. I scanned the novelization in full and made it available on archive.org if you're interested in reading it: https://archive.org/details/foodfight-novelization-hq-scans/

And if you'd like to know more about the novelization and its differences from the movie (among other fascinating Foodfight! trivia) you can check out my blog where I analyze the novelization in depth like a piece of fine literature: https://foodfightnovelization.tumblr.com/

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

Foodfight! Video Game

Hey, I don't know if this blog is still running but I just recently released a retro-style Foodfight! fangame and thought you might get a kick out of it, you can download it for FREE on itch.io here: https://tiffyamber.itch.io/foodfight-the-video-game

[eyezehuhh]

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off

[metalbatteryzone]

[yekkes]

Can you believe Clifford the big red dog and Biscuit are Jewish? Icons.

[magicalgirlenergy]

[tangledloversandfrozenhearts]

Why are all these dogs Jewish?

[yekkes]

Because I said so

[themesozoicsperm]

You guys are forgeting Jake!

[yekkes]

Chag Sameach!

[miyapoststhings]

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

Maybe Dex goes to their synagogue

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

oficial foodfight! valentimes pack #1

[communistkenobi-archive]

the actual reason I consume mediocre media is because I have bad taste. the deeper secret pretentious reason is because I think there’s something very revealing about bad media that you don’t get with good media. when you watch a poorly executed plot point unfold, you see the machinery behind it. you see the gap between what’s actually on screen and the true goal the author is striving for. if it’s particularly awful, you can even measure just how poorly mismatched the author’s skills are with the story they’re trying to tell you. watching a poorly executed narrative play out feels like you’re discovering something, because you see all the wiring and guts underneath that better authors hide from you, in the same way that movies hide boom mics and books make you forget you’re turning the pages. if a story is good and executed well you just see the story. but I want to see the guts and wires!

[communistkenobi-archive]

also I like complaining a lot

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

On the topic of Foodfight's anniversary: I was there when it got leaked and finally officially released a little while later, I played Charlie Sheen Dog as background noise while writing essays in highschool, I. Own a copy. On DVD, regrettably, the whole shebang - and recently, my online friends were like, hey, let's watch Foodfight! And I, naively, agreed, because I had watched it multiple times in the past, so surely I've got some immunity to it, right? On the contrary, Foodfight Groupwatch 2022 felt like a 7-hour long shittiness endurance test. This movie is like a mold that only mutates into a worse, deadlier beast as time marches on

You're exactly right. The only way to keep your immunity up is to get boosted at least once a year. Even then, there's no guarantee exposure won't make you sick.

Back then, I used Charlie Sheen Dog as background noise too. To this day I have several Foodfight! quotes committed to memory in the same file as, like, actual pop culture references people would get. My life is just me undergoing an endless onslaught of quotes springing to mind and I have to judge which ones to say out loud and which should remain inside jokes with myself (foodfight mostly).

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

god this brings back so many memories - i rewatched foodfight earlier this year and honest to god the history and production of this trainwreck was a hyperfixation for me back in 2014. it's so surreal knowing it's 10 now

Damn. I hadn't even stopped to think about how it's 10 now. This ask turned me from Lady X into Priscilla Pusley

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

YOU’RE BACK!

DEX DOGTECTIVE IS BACK IN THE HOUSE

[fuckyeahfoodfight]

we put sunshine goodness in ffxiv endwalker benchmark