When people hear “animation,” they might think of Cartoon Network or one of the many animated series available on Netflix. Adult animation, though, is a very unique genre. It lives in a world parallel to mainstream porn, and the level of complexity involved in its creation makes it unappealing to both traditional studios and self-produced amateurs.
Since the possibilities of animation are limitless, it leads to places where craziness isn’t just part of the norm, it’s expected! Cartoonists have long understood the humorous potential of animated porn, even going back to the 1929 short film “Buried Treasure” with Eveready Harton, to Tex Avery’s Screwball Classics.
The first porn was drawn on cave walls, millennia before the invention of a camera able to photograph the human figure.
But nowadays, when you think of animated adult content, you think of tentacle porn, giant sex monsters or enslaved sex demons (at least that’s what I think about). It’s in part because the first big release of what would become known as “hentai” content in the United States was a Penthouse-distributed smutfest called “Urotsukidoji,” which set the tone with its towering fornicating devils and shape-shifting creatures with way too many penises.
Because of its sometimes shocking reputation, its specialized production approach and its unique member base, animated adult entertainment remains untamed.
This year, Adult Time endeavored to tame that beast.
In February 2020, we launched our very first animated project, “Hentai Sex School,” in collaboration with animation studio Animeshin Club.
“When my partner and I started animating adult content in early 2018, the world of adult animation fell into two categories, stolen intellectual property and forbidden acts” Aaron Nathaniel, who comprises half of the team behind Animeshin, shared with me. “Our mission was to recreate an industry founded on great stories featuring original characters engaging in hot, consensual sex. It feels extremely rewarding seeing the success of the animated series on Adult Time.”
Of course, before you can tame a beast as unruly as adult animation, you first have to truly understand it.
To that end, the co-creator and main writer of “Hentai Sex School,” 3XWest, explained, “We knew we would have to approach this project very differently. Normally, we give producers and cast some creative freedom to improvise on set [during a live shoot]. But when writing for animation, you don’t have that same luxury; the dialogue, the movements of the characters and everything has to be carefully planned.”
3XWest is also the pre-production manager for Adult Time. His team is responsible for planning all of our studio updates and original series, like Pure Taboo and Girlsway. He is also a big anime fan, so “Hentai Sex School” was a passion project.
As for my part, I work as marketing director for Adult Time, and have been with the company long enough to be heavily involved in the development of its various content brands. I would consider myself a casual anime viewer. I saw some of the classics, but I’m more likely to rewatch Go Nagai’s over-the-top ‘80s films than to spend time on the anime section of Netflix.
Where my interests converge with adult animation, is where pop culture concepts can be blended with a porn twist. After all, sometimes the best ideas come from just people nerding out over something they love to talk about. We joke to this day that “Hentai Sex School” was just the product of a lot of passionate coffee break conversations.
This way of creating adult content based on our personal passions is not unlike Adult Time Chief Creative Officer Bree Mills’ approach, whether it’s her take on coming-of-age indie cinema with “Teenage Lesbian,” or modern-day docu-series like the “We Like Girls” project. As for “Hentai Sex School,” Bree directed the voice acting and supervised the recording.
“I had an amazing time getting to work with our actors on this unique series,” Mills told me. “It was my first experience directing voice-over work and I realized just how much I enjoy it. The actors also seemed to get a kick out of doing something different and getting to transform themselves into animated characters! I look forward to more adult animation projects!”
Much to our delight, the release of “Hentai Sex School” was a significantly bigger success than anticipated, especially considering how out of our comfort zone it was. Our members loved it, whether they were fans of animated porn before or not. New fans liked it enough to join Adult Time to watch it. And many models saw in the project a new way to show their acting range and participate in a new form of content creation. The reception was good enough for us to pitch our second animated series almost immediately after, and it was instantly greenlit.
“F.U.T.A. Sentai Squad,” our newest venture, is a whole other level of insane. It should come as no surprise that the project started as a joke. I stopped at 3XWest’s desk to tell him our next big thing should be a post-apocalyptic series with giant futanari robots. He laughed, and I thought that meant he had brushed the idea off, but that same night he shared with me a 10-pages long vision for it.
The show is an homage to the mecha genre. It’s equal parts “Evangelion,” “Pacific Rim” and “Devilman.” It’s about an unseen evil turning women into giant monsters hell-bent on destroying the world and the humongous sex robots that stand in their way. Also, the robots can only be driven by futanari girls. Yep.
AgentRed Girl, Adult Time’s partner on “F.U.T.A. Sentai Squad,” had this to say about the series: “This project is actually quite a bit different from the work that we normally do. Typically, we are more focused on light-hearted, silly sexual situations. However, this has a much more serious tone to it, so it took a little while to adjust our thinking when planning and animating.”
Aside from the body language differences, we also had to create unique sets that are very far away from what we normally create. Luckily, we were able to get some really nice, interesting, cyberpunk-ish sets put together that I think look really convincing and appealing.”
“F.U.T.A. Sentai Squad” can be viewed on our streaming platform following a two-part pilot debut as part of a lineup of planned series coming to Adult Time in the next few months. Another is an anthology series called “Bambi Fontaine’s Midnight Stories,” created in collaboration with French animation studio Bobbypills, well known for their Netflix series “Vermin” and “Crisis Jung” (available in France) and their hilarious cartoon “Peepoodo and the Super Fuck Friends” (that will be on Adult Time as well). It will be our first 2D animated project. More releases are planned in 2021, including more futanari content and Bree’s own retro space series titled “Escape From Planet O.”
As Aaron from Animeshin puts it: “The first porn was drawn on cave walls, millennia before the invention of a camera able to photograph the human figure. I think those cave people would be proud of how far we’ve come.”
I can’t speak for the cave people, but I’m certainly very proud of how far we’ve come in taming the mythical beast of adult animation. Hopefully once you see these new series, you’ll agree.
