bro'Town

bro'Town

bro'Town is New Zealand's first adult-targeted animated series. It is set amongst New Zealand's growing Pacific Islander community. bro'Town is regarded by its viewers as New Zealand's answer to The Simpsons (though its visual crassness is reminiscent of other animated series, and the central cast of five young boys invites comparison with South Park) and is based on the performance of the local four-man group The Naked Samoans.

Vale, Valea, Jeff da Māori, Sione and Mack live in the suburb of Morningside (catchphrase: "Morningside 4 Life!"), and attend the local college, St Sylvester’s, where their principal is a Fa’afafine and the P.E. teacher is the legendary ex-All Black Michael Jones.

Produced by New Zealand company Firehorse Films and funded by New Zealand On Air, bro'Town was made using three animation studios – two in New Zealand and one in India – and involved over 100 staff.

Each episode took up to six months to make and consists of 16,000 drawings, making it a huge undertaking for all involved. Despite the carefully planned nature of animation, the Samoans' performance style often gives the dialogue an improvisational, spontaneous feel. When successful this effect is fresh and funny but at times it renders the dialogue indistinct, with characters stepping on each other's lines.

The series have strong religious references, with most episodes starting with events between God, Jesus Christ and other historical figures, which leads to the theme of the episode and the subsequent events between the boys.