‘The Paloni Show’: Justin Roiland on Highlighting Animation Talent Amid Industry Cuts (Exclusive)

Hulu just released The Paloni Show Halloween Special, which highlights many different artists and animators in a variety show format full of different sketches. The special is created by Rick and Morty‘s Justin Roiland, who has a lot of weight to throw around in the ailing animation industry these days. In an exclusive interview with PopCulture.com, Roiland reflected on what this variety show meant in the midst of all the job cuts animation is seeing these days.

I asked Roiland if The Paloni Show special was meant to counteract the spate of layoffs the animation industry has seen in recent months, and he responded: “Interesting, I didn’t think of it that way because this was going on so, so much earlier before any of that news hit. But I certainly have been wanting to bring the people I love over into this world, you know? Because there’s a lot of amazing talented people, and I would love to see those folks make more stuff.”

“It’s scary, right?” Roiland continued, referencing the canceled projects all over the animation industry this summer. “I mean, I don’t know, the whole thing of all these just getting axed is really scary… It’s sort of like, ‘How many times is this company going to exchange hands, and is it going to happen again?’ I mean, people are very shell-shocked.”

Roiland’s fellow executive producer, Ben Bayouth, noted that the format of The Paloni Show just happened to work well for the fractured animation industry. He said: “Making a short for something like this as a creator has way less stakes and takes way less time. And so, it’s not like you’re working your, you know, working your life away for 10 episodes a year, getting plugged, getting pulled…”

From there, Roiland grieved for those creators who have lost access to their work altogether since it was pulled from streaming services. He said: “We have friends that have literally, for years, have been creating seasons of TV that’s just gone. There’s no way to find it. There’s no DVD’s, you know. it’s like, it’s just torrents.” He noted that one of the many tragedies here was that fans would be pushed to illegal downloads to find their favorite content, saying: “It’s an access problem, a service problem not a money problem. Not a price problem… People are going to – if it’s really easy to get to their content, they’re not going to pirate it, but you’re creating a scenario where people are going to get into the habit of pirating.”

Still, Roiland, Bayouth and actor Zach Hadel all reiterated that it’s hard to judge a situation without having all the relevant information. Roiland felt that it did not make much sense to not only cancel these shows but remove them from streaming services, but noted that “tax write-offs” remain the most plausible explanation.

Hopefully, Roiland can continue to provide venues for talent in the animation industry. The Paloni Show Halloween Special is streaming now on Hulu.