What is the film about?

BEST FRIEND STYLE follows three underage friends who attempt to sneak into a Sydney (Inner West) night club (Cool Club).

What influenced it?

Haein Kim is my number biggest source of inspiration. Everything she does is funny, fresh and original. Her art and her identity are symbiotic of each other. She is the best artist working in animation today.

When I was studying animation I looked at Ben Jones (Paper Rad) and Alex Schubert (Blobby Boys Comics) ALOT. Those guys are the OGs and the reasons why I draw the way I do. They pushed hard in the digital space in a way that makes perfect sense to me. You can see their energy echoing through BFS.

The BFS universe is heavily riddled with connections and references to my upbringing in Western/Inner West Sydney. Western Sydney is one of Australia’s biggest immigrant hot spots. It’s a massive cultural and religious hot pot that is not often seen in mainstream media and definitely not in Animation. The voice actors Theodore and Nathan Saidden are my childhood friends too.

BEST FRIEND STYLE (Paul Rhodes/Adult Swim Smalls)

My early teen memories always seem like a funny place to mine stories. I have this memory of sneaking into Sefton Playhouse (strip club in the area) when I was like 15. A mate of mine didn’t have a fake 18+ I.D. but some how he convinced the security guard with a 15+ high school card to let him in. I was shitting myself cause all I could think was ‘I’m definitely going to hell now’ but telling my friends the next day at school and making them laugh was everything I lived for.

Reliving childhood memories through the medium of animation is a wild thing.

Best Friend Style acts as not a sequel but as a thematic sequel to PEEPIN – young kids skirting the edges of the forbidden adult world. This episode acts as episode one in a 15 episode story arc.

A little background information...

Adult Swim Smalls is designed to take in shorts that are story and character focused with the intention that if they do well they can evolve into full series for television.

The program is responsible for some of the best animation on the internet RN. Space Man by Dan Britt and Haha You Clowns by Joe Cappa are making animation in 2024 an exciting place to be.

The Adult Swim Smalls program is willing to take risks and produce animated shorts that are offbeat and fresh.

BEST FRIEND STYLE (Paul Rhodes/Adult Swim Smalls)

How was the film made?

All the Adobe programs. Adobe: Illustrator, Animate, Premier, After Effects and Garage Band.

Haein Kim and I have been developing our unique style and pipeline for almost 10 years now. Everything we touch is always fresh, super funny, and very difficult to look away.

Dave Hughes and Mike Cowap worked on BFS as executive producers. Dave Hughes from Adult Swim has produced hundreds of shorts and has razor sharp instincts for storytelling. Likewise Mike Cowap (YOLO:Crystal Fantasies, Smiling Friends) jumped onboard as exec prod too and steered BFS in the right direction from day dot.