
It started all the way back in 1980 when Carl Rosendahl founded Pacific Data Images, a company that would go on to help found the DreamWorks Animation world. For a good part of the ’80s, PDI created mostly just animated logos and worked on some television advertisements, but their first foray into film work was a huge one, contributing special effects to James Cameron’s landmark Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen founded DreamWorks SKG (the first initials of their last names) in 1994 and the two companies, PDI and SKG, eventually formed a co-production deal in 1996 which led to their first big-screen animated feature the next year, the CGI comedy Antz.
In 2000, DreamWorks SKG officially split off from the DreamWorks live-action studio, forming their own business division called DreamWorks Animation and the company bought Pacific Data Images. It would be a huge year for DreamWorks because it marked the first animated critical hit for the fledgling studio and the beginning of a relationship that would be a part of the studio for the next few years.
That future was cemented in May of 2001 when a little guy named Shrek forever changed the animation game, and that’s no exaggeration. Before Shrek, Disney ruled everything in the world of big-screen animation, but a smart, well-told fractured fairy tale starring Mike Myers, Cameron Diaz, and Eddie Murphy changed that immediately. Shrek was a huge hit, both critically and commercially. Based on William Steig’s 1990 fairy tale picture book, Shrek was the first film to win an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and made almost half a billion dollars worldwide. Beyond that, Shrek even changed the way that animated films are written, with more and more features incorporating pop culture references and other Shrek-isms.
It wasn’t until May of 2005, four years after the first Shrek, that DreamWorks Animation SKG found their second franchise with a lion, zebra, giraffe, and hippo. Madagascar wasn’t the same size hit as Shrek, but the film starring Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, Jada Pinkett Smith, and David Schwimmer proved that the studio could maintain another franchise while Shrek was still in full force. Madagascar 2: The Crate Escape is currently scheduled for November of 2008.
The DreamWorks Animation SKG entry for Summer 2006 was Over the Hedge, another film more on a level of success with Shark Tale than Shrek. The fall entry, Flushed Away, performed even more disappointingly, and, for now, it looks like all of the DreamWorks Animations eggs are placed firmly in two baskets - Shrek and Madagascar.