Masha and the Bear (Russian: ????? ? ????????, translit. Masha i Medved Russian pronunciation: ['ma?? i m??d'vet?]) is a Russian animated television series created by Oleg Kuzovkov and produced by Animaccord Animation Studio (Moscow, the Russian Federation), loosely based on the oral children's folk story of the same name. The show focuses on the adventures of a little girl named Masha and a fatherly bear that always keeps her from disasters. The first episode was released in 2009.
The series has been translated into 25 languages and was broadcast in more than 100 countries. The series was released on Netflix and through NBCUniversal.
Many of the episodes have been successful on YouTube. In particular, the Russian-language version of the episode "???? ???? ????" ("Recipe for Disaster") has more than 3.2 billion views, making it the site's fourth most viewed video of all time, and the most viewed video on YouTube that is not a music video. The remaining top ten most viewed Masha and the Bear videos are: "Bon Appétit", with over 1.1 billion views; "Laundry Day", with over 1.0 billion views; "The Foundling", with over 720 million views; "La Dolce Vita", with over 710 million views; "Hocus-Pocus", with over 610 million views; "One, Two, Three! Light the Christmas Tree!", with over 520 million views; "Two Much", with over 480 million views; "Little Cousin", with over 450 million views; and "Home-Grown Ninjas", with over 350 million views. Masha and the Bear is the only non-music artist to have more than one video exceeding a billion views.
The show consists of three full seasons, with 26 episodes each. The first thirteen episodes of the fourth season have been launched already.
For the first season in English, Elsie Fisher--the voice of Agnes, the youngest of the three girls in the Despicable Me films--was chosen to dub the voice of Masha.
In 2015 the Slovak company COMUNIQUE acquired a license to create an ice show based on Masha and the Bear stories called Masha and the Bear on Ice. The show was presented for the first time on October 3, 2015, in Ko?ice, Slovakia, and has also been performed in the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, the United Arab Emirates and Estonia.
Video Masha and the Bear
Plot
Masha is a Russian girl who lives in the forest with her pig, goat and dog. All the animals in the forest are afraid of her as she is constantly forcing them to play with her. One morning, Masha sees a butterfly and inadvertently follows it inside the home of a bear who has gone fishing. While playing there, she makes a big mess. When the Bear returns, he sees the disaster caused by Masha. The Bear tries to get rid of Masha, but he is unsuccessful, and he and Masha become friends.
In each episode of the show, Masha is portrayed as a smart, kind, but mischievous little girl who is exploring the world around her. This leads to many funny and entertaining situations. The kind-hearted Bear is always trying to keep Masha out of trouble, but often ends up the unintended victim of her mischief. There are several supporting characters in the series, including Masha's cousin Dasha, a penguin adopted by the Bear, a young panda cub from China, who is the Bear's cousin, two wolves who live in an old UAZ ambulance car, a tiger that used to work with the Bear in the circus, and a Female Bear that is the object of the bear's affections. Characters also include a hare, squirrels and hedgehogs, a pig called Rosie, a goat, and a dog who all live in Masha's front yard.
Maps Masha and the Bear
Sources
According to the project's director, Denis Chervyatsov,
Masha was based on a real person... In the 1990s, the project's artistic director, Oleg Kuzovkov, was on holiday when he saw a little girl on the beach. The child was so genuine and open that she could easily walk up to a stranger and play chess with him or pick up his flippers and go swimming. However, after a few days, the vacationers began to hide...
Production
The series' production has been handled domestically at Animaccord Animation studio since 2008. The scenario for each episode is written by Oleg Kuzovkov, creator of the cartoon. Then the storyboarding is developed in accordance with the script and, in general, consists of at least 2000 slides. After the team finalizes the plot of an episode, the work for the 2D animatic kicks off. At this stage, animators define the duration of each scene in an episode, how characters are placed in it and interact with each other. After this step of the production is finished, the episode is passed for dubbing. Dubbing must be completed before 3D animation is applied, as the 3D animators need to know the characters' dialogue, intonations, and emotions in advance in order to keep their lip movements synchronized to the audio and make their facial expressions look realistic.
3D animation
The 3D animation process begins right after dubbing has been finished. Animators manipulate all the movements that happen during the scenes, such as opening doors, taking books from bookshelves, and creating all the bodily movements required to bring the characters to life.
Rendering
Rendering brings all the processes together. Renderers colorize grey 3D models and add such details as the Bear's fur, Masha's hair, etc. They create the lighting and weather in the scene as determined by the script.
Composing
Composing is the final stage of production, where the composers review all scenes of an episode, checking the color intensities, smoothing the edges of 3D models, and bringing all the components together to form a complete episode. Then the work is approved by the director and script-writer and uploaded to the show's official YouTube channel (MashaBearTV).
Voice actors
Masha, her cousin and Father Frost are the only characters who speak. The others communicate through pantomime or wordless sounds.
For the first two seasons, Masha's voice in the original Russian version was performed by Alina Kukushkina, who was 6 years old when she began to dub Masha. For the third season (seven years later in 2015), the officials of Animaccord studio confirmed that the new voice of Masha would be 6-year-old Varvara Sarantseva. The show's sound designer, Boris Kutnevich, provides the voice of The Bear. Mark Kutnevich provides the voice of The Hare.
For the English version, Elsie Fisher -- the voice of Agnes in the Despicable Me films - dubbed the voice of Masha in the first season. In subsequent seasons Masha was dubbed by Rebecca Bloom (ep. 27-39) and Angelica Keamy (ep. 40-52) and now is Giulia De Carvalho and Kaitlyn McCormick.
Music
The music for each episode is written by Russian composer Vasiliy Bogatirev. Most of the songs used in the cartoon, such as the soundtracks of "Laundry Day" and "The Grand Piano Lesson" episodes, became very popular in Russia and abroad.
Awards and achievements
- In January 2015, the cartoon was included into a list of "TV Shows Destined to be Classics," which was compiled by the cartoon industry's periodical Animation Magazine to mark its 250 issue.
- In February 2015, Masha and the Bear won a 2015 Kidscreen Award for Best Animation in the Creative Talent.
- In October 2015, Kidscreen Magazine named Animaccord Animation Studios as one of the top 50 leaders in the world of animation (Kidscreen Hot50) and the top 10 production companies of the year.
- As of August 2018, one copy of the video "Recipe For Disaster" has received over 3.2 billion views on YouTube, making it the site's fourth most viewed video of all time, the site's most viewed non-music video of all time, and the site's most viewed animated video of all time.
According to the Associated Press, "Masha, who is dressed in a folk costume with a headscarf, became a household name in many Muslim nations including Indonesia." Dmitry Loveyko, managing director of Animaccord, said that "It's a Muslim country, so we thought we're lucky she wears a headscarf and her legs are covered!"
Mobile apps
The first Masha and the Bear mobile app was released by Apps Ministry in August 2011. In 2013 the first mobile game "Masha and the Bear: Search and Rescue" was published by Apps Ministry. Later more publishers such as Indigo Kids, PSV Studio, Noviy Disk developed and released games and apps featuring Masha and the Bear.
Distribution
Netflix has released 27 of the first 29 episodes in 9 episodes of 3 segments each. Many of the videos were uploaded multiple times on three different YouTube channels ("???? ? ???????", "Get Movies" and "Masha and The Bear") so their view counts across up to three channels have been combined.
Episodes
Main series
Season 1: 2009-2012
Season 2: 2012-2015
Source of article : Wikipedia
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