Nearly a year after the pilot episode for a new animated series based on Tracy Butler’s Prohibition-era webcomic Lackadaisy premiered, since garnering some 12 million views on YouTube, viewers are still waiting for more episodes. After a BackerKit campaign surpassed the initial $1 million mark necessary to fund a five-episode first season, and the promise of three Lackadaisy mini-episodes on top of those episodes, one important question has been pressing fans: when will Lackadaisy Season 1 premiere?
Unfortunately for fans, there isn’t much in the way of a clear answer. When Iron Circus Comics started the crowdfunding campaign for the debut season back in July, they said they were “heading into this with a goal of debuting episode 1 in 2024,” though a more specific release window was not, and still hasn’t been, revealed. Once the season does premiere, it is also unclear how frequently new episodes will drop, the publisher explaining that episode releases would largely depend on the funds raised: “a bigger budget, we can stack episode production with an ‘A team’ and ‘B team’ who can work on different episodes simultaneously. In that situation, we’ll be able to release episodes more regularly. If we have funding just enough for a single team, we’ll still move ahead, but likely at a slower clip until we can find more production resources?” The BackerKit campaign had an initial goal of $1 million, but by the August 2023 closing date, had reached more than $2 million.
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Lackadaisy was first launched by Butler in July 2006. Set in a Prohibition-era St. Louis with a population of anthropomorphic cats, the webcomic centers around the employees of the titular speakeasy after its founder is murdered. Butler’s webcomic was nominated for Best Digital Comic at the 2011 Eisner Awards and has won multiple Web Cartoonists Choice Awards, and in March 2020, Iron Circus Comics launched a Kickstarter to fund an animated short based on the comic. That pilot episode, which you can watch here, dropped in April 2023 to critical acclaim and millions of views, pushing Iron Circus Comics to launch a campaign to fund one-episode order. After that campaign reached the $1 million, that episode order jumped to five, with Iron Circus Animation promising to produce three Lackadaisy mini-episodes on top of the five full episodes when the campaign reached $1.5 million.
“I’m utterly overwhelmed. Our crew worked their butts off for three years during a time of historical upheaval and – despite everything tossed at us – pulled through with an incredible pilot. I’m so incredibly proud of them and what they’ve accomplished and they’ve been my guiding stars throughout all this chaos,” pilot director Fable Siegel told Cartoon Brew. “The support from our audience means I can ensure they continue to benefit from that amazing effort. Thank you Lackacrew for making it happen.”
The Lackadaisy animated series features the voice talents of Michael Kovach, Lisa Reimold, and Belsheber Rusape as rumrunners Rocky, Ivy, and Freckle. SungWon Cho voices rival gangster Mordecai, with Malcolm Ray voicing Nicodeme and Benni Latham voicing Serafine. The pilot episode is available to stream on YouTube.
