EXCLUSIVE: Misfit janitors in a mysterious research facility are the subject of Doomsweepers, an animated comedy-horror series out of Australia.
Monkie Kid series director Sarah Harper has created the “horror-action-comedy” show with Sydney 2D animation studio Flying Bark onboard as producer. Also attached are Lightfold, Olan Rogers’ comics and animation studio aimed at creators.
A crowdfunder round held in collaboration with Lightfold has launched to raise further financing. A first-look trailer has dropped on YouTube to support the raise. You can see that above.
Last week, Flying Bark and Lightfold dropped a teaser for the project, but no key details were dropped at the time. We’ve now got word on the fun-looking antics it could provide.
Here’s the Doomsweepers synopsis: “Set in a mysterious research facility, Doomsweepers follows a team of misfit janitors who go from cleaning the staff room one day, to saving the world the next, and in doing so they unravel the facility’s best kept secret.”
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Producers say the “candy-coloured art direction brings a unique, vibrant energy to the show that provides a visual point of difference from traditional dark, dystopian, apocalyptic content.”
Flying Bark is a 2D animation specialist based in Australia, with studio locations in Sydney, L.A. and Madrid. Recent productions include Netflix’s Stranger Things: Tales From ’85, Paramount’s Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender and original series Shaun Tan’s Tales from Outer Suburbia.
Lightfold, meanwhile, launched in 2023 to develop animated projects that have a direct connection to fans. Final Space creator Rogers and producer Forrester Kane created the biz, with the former’s crowdfunded animation pilot Godspeed its debut project. It launched on YouTube three years ago and has received more than 2.2 million views.
Harper – a writer, director and showrunner known for work on Lego’s Monkie Kid franchise and Nickelodeon’s Glitch Techs and Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles – developed the “deeply personal project inspired by unsung heroes.”
She added: “The idea for Doomsweepers was born in 2019, when Australia was battling catastrophic bushfires, only to be hit by a global pandemic soon after. In those moments of uncertainty, I found myself drawn to the stories of everyday people who stepped up when it mattered most.
“The Doomsweepers aren’t your typical heroes: they’re janitors in a tech facility, overlooked and underestimated. But when chaos erupts, they rise to the occasion, proving that courage can come from the most unexpected places.”
Here are a further selection of images.
