12-Year-Old Designs New Miguzi Character

A new monster designed by a 12-year-old contestant will be joining the cast of Miguzi, Cartoon Network’s afternoon action-adventure block on May 9. Kyler Spears of Sacramento conceived, drew and entered his creation, Yoke, for the cabler’s "Miguzi Make a Monsterpiece" contest, a seven-week on-air, online and print campaign that ran from Nov. 22, 2004 to Jan. 15, 2005.

Spears’ creation beat 100,000 other entries sent it by viewers.The top 10 entries, as judged by CN’s animation experts, were posted at CartoonNetwork.com and kids were able to vote for their favorite. The 12-year-old’s entry outdistanced the competition by more than 6,000 votes from the overall 570,000-plus votes cast.

"It was so cool to come to Atlanta and meet everyone involved with bringing Yoke to life," says Spears. "I wasn’t exactly sure how he would look but the Miguzi team made him look just like I thought he would!"

"The response to ‘Make a Monsterpiece’ overwhelmed all of us at Miguzi," says Sean Akins, creative director and executive producer of the Cartoon Network franchise. "It was amazing to see what kids came up with when we tapped into the power of their imagination."

CG animation will be used to create a full 3D look for the character and interaction with the cast members Erin, Big Stalks, Flip, Curly, Tre, Remo, Woofer and Tweet. Launched in April of last year, Miguzi is built around a fantastic undersea environment, where kids find compelling animated action-adventure programming along with comedic elements.