Animation Outlaws is the insane story of how Craig “Spike” Decker and Mike Gribble, popularly known as “Spike & Mike,” began a series of animation festivals in the 1970’s. They simultaneously brought animation to the masses, while creating from whole cloth the audience and market for it. 

Affirming the legacy of two hustling entrepreneurs with an eye for talent and boundless energy for DIY marketing, Kat Alioshin's Animation Outlaws celebrates the colorful personalities known to fans only as Spike & Mike: two Californians who went from promoting rock shows to assembling a decades-long series of showcases for animated shorts.

Craig ‘Spike’ Decker and Kat Alioshin discuss her new documentary that skillfully captures the raucous energy and infectious spirit of the infamous, riotous, and hugely influential ‘Sick & Twisted Animation Festival.

‘Animation Outlaws’: How Spike & Mike Turned Indie Shorts Into a Cultural Phenomenon

Without Spike & Mike, two hippie friends from Riverside, California, who pioneered the animation festival in the late ’70s, the indie short wouldn’t have become the cultural phenomenon that has helped shaped the industry today.

Terry Ibele - Animation Industry Podcast

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Craig ‘Spike’ Decker and Director Kat Alioshin on the New Doc ‘Animation Outlaws’

We were very pleased to chat with Decker and Alioshin about Animation Outlaws and Spike & Mike’s contribution to the animation short scene:

#AnimationOutlaws director #KatAlioshin and #CraigSpikeDecker chat about the early days of underground animation and the #SpikeandMike #AnimationFilmFestivals and the careers they helped launch.