The TED-Ed YouTube channel is no stranger to animation—it’s used for all its educational shorts, but soon something different will arrive in the form of a new story-based animated show called Ada.
The series is written and directed by Elizabeth Cox, founder of independent production company Should We Studio, which, as its name suggests, was set up to tackle weighty topics.
The show’s protagonist is a young woman who wants to make a mark on the world by making it better and explores the world’s numerous issues and problems in her head ranging from post-apocalyptic energy sources, and artificial wombs to the consequences of creating super-intelligent AI.
You know, the small stuff.
Unlike the traditional TED-Ed shorts, the series will aim to educate and stimulate debate on the issues it raises via a narrative, and based on the two episodes that I’ve seen so far, it should succeed handsomely.
The Power of Animation
As was recently brought home to me by the short film Survivor, which depicts the real-life story of a child enduring the horrors of the Holocaust, animation is arguably the most effective medium for representing challenging subjects on screen.
Ada has already attracted positive attention and towards the end of last year, was voted Best Animated Series at the Portland Festival of Cinema, Animation & Technology, won the award for Best Professional Series Animation at the Raw Science Film Festival, and was showcased at the Dances With Film festival.
While the subjects might be heavyweight, the colorful animation, bouncing music, and vivid voice acting bring a light touch to proceedings, so everyone can have fun while engaging with the topics.
Subjects That Matter
Speaking with Cox, it’s easy to see how invested she is in the topics, chosen because they, “provided a rich ethical space to explore and don’t have a clear yes or no answer to the question of should we do this, should we make this?”
They also had to offer something new. Climate change isn’t tacked as she felt that this is already widely covered. Naturally, personal experiences also informed the process. An episode that discusses organ donation is based on the experience of watching her grandfather requiring a kidney transplant, and ultimately, not receiving one.
Animation Inspiration
With Ada almost living a double life — one in the mundane real world and one in her head Cox explained why animation worked so well for this.
“Animation is a medium that allows you to create an impact and requires you to create an entire world completely from scratch, so I think it’s ideal for talking about worlds that don’t exist yet,” she observed.
The animation style switches between 2D and 3D, representing the “real world” and that of Ada’s imagination. Cox describes the style as “retro-futuristic” and for influences namechecks the concept art from Samurai Jack and the fast-paced colors in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and its sequel.
A team of four animators worked on the project with each episode taking about eight to nine weeks, with several being worked on at the same time. The process involved creating the storyboards, finalizing the script, recording the voiceovers and animatics, and then combining the two into the final product.
Despite the big screen acclaim, Cox says she’s happy that it will live on the TED-Ed YouTube channel as preferable to being buried on a streaming platform where no one will see it. Cox says she hopes that what comes across in Ada is an “exuberant spirit of inquiry and a willingness to engage with potentially off-putting questions and to be open to being surprised by the answers.”
Some may believe that in today’s political environment, this could be challenging. Animations such as Ada, however, are therefore just what’s needed to bring ideas into conversations that could otherwise be easily not heard or dismissed.
Most importantly though, Ada is a fun watch and demonstrates that animation as a medium is in fine fettle as a medium that proves that you don’t have to be a huge studio to bring great storytelling to the screen.
