Laika (company)
Laika Entertainment, LLC., or simply Laika, is an American stop-motion animation studio specializing in feature films, commercial content for all media, music videos and short films. The studio is best known for its stop-motion feature films, Coraline, ParaNorman, The Boxtrolls and Kubo and the Two Strings, all co-produced in partnership with Universal Pictures through its Focus Features label. It is owned by Nike co-founder and chairman Phil Knight and is located in Oregon's Portland metropolitan area. Knight's son, Travis, acts as Laika's current president and CEO.
Laika has two divisions, Laika Entertainment for the films and Laika/house for commercial content, later, the latter was ditch in July 2014, just to focus on film productions alone, the commercial division is made to be independent and they're now called HouseSpecial.
- Creator Thumbprint: Some of them.
- The stop-motion animation is very stunning, since this is Laika's main medium.
- Dark fantasy stories about young kids having to face frightening supernatural forces.
- Themes of family, mostly with abusive and/or villainous figures on top of familial love.
- Darker and Edgier: Their films are really darker and intense than their counterparts from Pixar or Aardman Animations.
- Shades of Conflict:
- Coraline: Black and Grey Morality
- ParaNorman: White and Grey Morality
- The Boxtrolls: Darker Shade of Grey vs White Morality
- Kubo and the Two Strings: White and Gray Morality
- Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: The endings of the films leans towards idealistic, no matter how difficult the situations are presented.
- Stop Motion: Their movies for the time being are stop motion animation, it's their specialty.