While the Sundance Film Festival is usually a launching ground for the best in independent cinema, festival regulars Mark and Jay Duplass are shaking things up this year by unveiling their new independently produced, animated TV series Animals.  The show was made possible through private financing, which means co-creators Phil Matarese and Mike Luciano were given extensive creative freedom and the time necessary to complete the show on their own schedule.  The series takes place in New York City and revolves around “the downtrodden creatures native to planet Earth’s least habitable environment”, with a minimalist animation style and adult-geared tone reminiscent of Archer.  The voice cast is great and the scenes shown in the trailer are really funny, so I’m eager to see where the series ends up.

Watch the Animals trailer after the jump.  The first two episodes will premiere Monday, January 26th at the Sundance Film Festival in the Special Events section in hopes of landing distribution.  The voice cast includes Mark Duplass, Aziz Ansari, Nick Kroll, Katie Aselton, Rob Corddry, Ellie Kemper, Mark Maron, Ike Barinholtz, Jason Mantzoukas, Nathan Fielder, Paul Scheer, Matt Walsh, Chelsea Peretti, Zach Woods, and Adam Scott.

Here’s the logline for Animals.:

An animated comedy series from co-creators Phil Matarese & Mike Luciano and produced by the Duplass Brothers, ANIMALS. focuses on the downtrodden creatures native to planet Earth's least habitable environment: New York City. Whether it’s lovelorn rats, gender-questioning pigeons or aging bed bugs steeped in midlife crisis, the existential woes of non-human urbanites prove startlingly similar to our own.

Watch the Animals trailer below (via Deadline).

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