Best Motion Picture
Alpha and Omega
How to Train Your Dragon
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole
Toy Story 3
The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Editor’s Choice: You gotta go with How to Train Your Dragon on this one, right? Granted, Toy Story 3 is a far superior film, but it’s not a furry film. The other three films in the category are nowhere near as good, despite what certain dragons keep trying to tell me.

Best Dramatic Short Work or Series
Adventure Time With Finn and Jake
“Foxy Bingo”
Mongrels
“Orangina Naturally”
The Regular Show
Wallace & Gromit’s World of Invention

Editor’s Choice: Honestly as long as anything but Foxy Bingo and the Orangina campaign win, I’d be fine. Yes, I know what fox was a dancing machine, and yes, god yes, that gay cougar is hot, but there is no way in hell the fandom should give an award to commercials for gambling and sugar water when some of the smartest written shows on television are in the same category.

Best Novel
Basecraft Cirrostratus by Justin Lamar
Descent by Phil Guesz
Otters in Space by Mary Lowd
Save the Day by DJ Fahl
The Seventh Chakra by Kevin Frane
Shadow of the Father by Kyell Gold

Editor’s Choice: Wow, this is an exciting year for novels, and I can see it being a close race. That said, I’ve got to go with The Seventh Chakra. It’s definitely the most ambitious novel on the list, and Frane pulled off an exciting original thriller, and one of the most unique novels I’ve read from the fandom.

Best Short Fiction
Bridges by Kyell Gold
“False Dawn” by Kyell Gold
“Felis ex Machina” by EO Costello
“Gerty and the Doesn’t-Smell-Like-a-Melon” by Mary E Lowd
The Peculiar Quandary of Simon Canopus Artyle by Kevin Frane

Editor’s Choice: I’m leaning towards Bridges in this category. It was one of those experiments that did something new, even if it was a bit… superfluous. It’s hard to argue the literary merits of writing the same spit-roasting scene three times, but hey, there it is. That said, Simon Canopus also has a cool experimental writing feel to is, as the Cupcake branded books tend to have.

Best Other Literary Work
Furpiled #4 by Leo Magna
Different Worlds, Different Skins edited by Will A Sanborn
Iron Claw Bestiary by Chris Goodwin
i.s.o. #1 by Vince Suzukawa
Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: A Modest Bestiary by Dave Sedaris

Editor’s Choice: In any other situation I’d automatically say Dave Sedaris, but his latest book is actually one of his weakest, so go for one of the fandom made choices. Furpiled and i.s.o. both are cool for slice of life stuff, and the Iron Claw Bestiary is something that nerds tell me is pretty cool.

Best Graphic Story
Concession by Immelmann
Furthia High by QuetzaDrake
Cruelty by Rukis
Lackadaisy by Tracy J. Butler
Twokinds by Tim Fischbach

Editor’s Choice: Lackadaisy. No question. The others are good, but don;t really compare, except maybe Cruelty for it’s potential. Rukis has the art talent, and if she can tighten up her storytelling I can easily see her winning this award in the future, but not this year.

Best Comic Strip
“Broken Plot Device” by Lis Boriss
“Faux Pas” by Robert and Margaret Carspecken
“Little Tales” by Genesis Eve Whitmore
“Housepets!” by Rick Griffin
“Sandra and Woo” by Powree and Oliver Knörzer

Editor’s Choice: Everyone’s got a favorite, just pick one. They’re all good.

Best Magazine
Anthropomorphic Dreams Podcast by Will A. Sanborn
Heat #7 published by Sofawolf
New Fables Summer 2010 edited by Tim Susman
South Fur Lands edited by Bernard Doove
Tales of the Tai-Pan Universe edited by Gene Breshears

Editor’s Choice: I’m tempted to say go for Anthro Dreams because it might spur an entire Podcast category next year (God knows there are enough of them to warrant it). But there are so many great stories in New Fables that I can’t snub it. Go with that.

Best Published Illustration
Big Red: Lady Sings the Blues by Richard Bartrop
Cenotaph by Susan Rankin-Pollard
The Seventh Chakra by Kamui
Shadow of the Father by Sara Palmer
New Fables Summer 2010 by Mary Mouse

Editor’s Choice: All of these illustrations are fantastic and every one of them is deserving of the award. These are some of the best talent the fandom has to offer. Personally, Kamui’s The Seventh Chakra is one of the most eye catching covers I’ve seen. It also has an array of symbolism that tie it in with the book. Plus it’s bright fucking yellow.

Best Game
Disney Epic Mickey
Furry Basketball Association
Rocket Knight
Sam & Max: Season 3, Episode 1: The Penal Zone
Sonic Colors

Editor’s Choice: There’s only one game on here that is done by the fandom, for the fandom. I don’t care if you like basketball, or like roleplaying, the Furry Basketball Association is a beast that is fueled by talented and dedicated players. Add on to that, it’s fun to follow even if you’re not participating. That’s way cooler than an XBLA game about a franchise everyone forgot about.

Voting for the Ursa Majors ends April 17. Visit the official site to cast your vote.

Check out the trailer, featuring a bunny rocking out to Blur.

We don’t know much about the movie, Hop other than that the rabbit, who is in fact the Easter Bunny, is voiced by Russel Brand. It also stars James Marsden as the live action lead. According to the trailer, Hop is being done by the Despicable Me creators.

Hop hits theaters April 1, 2011.

From the press release: “Directed by Peter Chung (Aeon Flux) and based on the comic book series by Phil Hester and Andy Kuhn, Firebreather delivers fierce action in the clash of two worlds where monsters roam the Earth and past secrets are exposed. At the center of it all, a teenage boy named Duncan struggles to find his place as half-Kaiju and half-human.”

It’s cool to see Cartoon Network taking smaller comic series and turning them into a movie that I can only assume is just a really long pilot for a potential TV series (see: Star Wars: The Clone Wars).

Also, there are like a ton of paws and stompy parts, so you macros are probably already setting your Tivo to record.

Firebreather premieres on Wednesday, November 24 at 7 p.m. (ET/PT)

Best Novel: Out of Position by Kyell Gold
Best Motion Picture: Avatar, directed by James Cameron
Best Graphic Story: Concession by Immelmann
Best Magazine: Heat #6, published by Sofawolf Press
Best Other Literary Work: Draw Furries: How to Create Anthropomorphic and Fantasy Animals by Lindsay Cibos and Jared Hodges
Best Comic Strip: Housepets! by Rick Griffin
Best Published Illustration: Out of Position Cover by Blotch
Best Short Fiction: “Drifting” by Kyell Gold
Best Short Subject or Series: The Penguins of Madagascar, produced by Dreamworks Animation
Best Game: Ratchet and Clank Future: A Crack in Time, for the PS3, developed by Insomniac Games

With two more awards under his belt, Kyell Gold has passed Stan Sakai as the recipient of the most UMAs.

The full list of nominees can be viewed on the Ursa Major Awards official website.

This is actually a pretty big year for the awards, in the sense that someone as important as me is actually familiar with most of the nominees.

In the Best Motion Picture category I’m really curious to see if people will pick the best film on the list (which is Up by the way, don’t fucking kid yourself), or if Avatar or even The Fantastic Mr Fox takes it.

I’m pleased to see that two of the novels I listed in my Year in Review feature are nominated for Best Novel. Out of Position is a definite front runner, but David Benedictus’ revival of Winnie the Pooh in Return to the Hundred Acre Woods is a great story (though I’m not sure it’s even near 40,000 words). Also of note is Cheetah’s Win by Phil Geusz, which I read as part of Roar Volume 2 a little while back. Oh and who stuck a Patricia Briggs novel in there? I know that a hot were-coyote mechanic chick marrying the alpha werewolf and fighting a vampire queen sounds awesome– wait, no it doesn’t!

The Short Fiction category is stuffed full of great entries, all of which deserve the award. I really enjoyed “Moonthief” by Not Tube, it was one of my favorite entries in X.

I’m going to glaze over these next few categories (Housepets! is cute though).

Best Magazine is another category full of great entries. I wish I had read all five, but Anthro, Heat, and New Fables are all great magazines.

Best Published Illustration really needs to have the damn illustrations on display. Here, let me fix that for you:
“Gaia’s Strange Seedlike Brood (Homage to Lynn Margulis)” by Patrick Farley
”It’s Beautiful” by Jailbird
”Jazmyn” by Sara Palmer
”New Coyote” by Kenket
”Out of Position” by Blotch

I think the winner is pretty obvious.

How is it that only one of the video games on my Year in Review feature got nominated for Best Game? And why the fuck is G-Force on there? I swear to god, furries, you would probably vote Settlers of Catan as best game every damn year if they let you.

Now remember kids. Nobody wins unless you get out there and vote. And for those of you that think your vote won’t count, remember that the Ursa Majors have an abysmally low amount of participation, so just a few Livejournal entries and you too might one day tie Stan Sakai’s record for most awards.

Meet Will Christensen, a totally normal looking guy who, like thousands of other people across the country, has submitted a video to be on the next season of Survivor. In a competition to stand out through the show’s new social network style submission system, Will has chosen to highlight what makes him unique: His tiger suit.

Yeah yeah, I’m sure Will isn’t the first furry to apply to Survivor, but this is the first time the videos have been available online, giving fans of the show the ability to comment on them. If Will gets popular on here, he’s more likely to be on the show, and I think we can all agree that at the very least it’d be hilarious.

We’re not really sure how the fursuit factors in to this, since he can’t really bring it to the island, but whatever, go Will!

If you go to Will’s Survivor audition page you can comment and show your support.

The livejournal group, To the Hometree was started earlier this month as a community for people that finally realized that all this time they’ve been blue alien cats with ponytail penises.

This sounds a lot like the rhetoric of the entire Otherkin community (people that believe they have a spiritual connection to nature, oftentimes believing to be a different species in spirit than they are in flesh), but it seems like even they aren’t buying this.

Any and all criticisms over the validity of “Na’vi Kin” is met with a quick rebuttal accusing the dissenter of being a furry, and thus a pervert.

The official Twitter page (which I assume plugs in through their USB ponytail penis) is currently bouncing back and forth between calling Dragoneer a pervert who wants to abduct people, and claiming the Na’vi are too forgiving to start a flamewar. Too late, guys, you started a big enough flamewar to burn down your Hometree. Again.