LOS ANGELES—Aaron Nathaniel, the AVN award-winning animator behind adult hentai studio Animeshin Club, made his way to Porn Valley via a decidedly esteemed route.
Nathaniel attended film school at the University of North Carolina (UNC) and was hired at Pixar shortly after. There—working at scale in the art department—he was involved in Oscar-winning titles like Toy Story 3, Brave, and other well-known family-friendly pictures. But Nathaniel encountered the infamous "golden handcuffs" dilemma while working for the prestigious animation house. He opted to leave and embark on a different animated career. Within six months of departing Pixar, Nathaniel responded to a job advertisement for an editing position at an adult entertainment studio ... Digital Playground.
His time at DP was before the studio got acquired by MindGeek (now Aylo), and he would go on to launch Animeshin Club, which saw its breakthrough with the critically acclaimed Adult Time original series Hentai Sex School. Backed by Bree Mills and the team at Adult Time, the series scored the award for Best Niche Series or Channel at the 2023 AVN Awards. That honor, Nathaniel explains, led to him creating Animeshin Club's latest opus, the superhero-themed ASGmax animated series Sodomy Squad.
Sodomy Squad takes a new spin on superheroes. Jessica Jasmin, an executive director involved with the project, said this series is a “perfect mix” of cinematic gay content and the near-universal love for superheroes. “Except with animation, there were no limits,” Jasmin said. “It was a lot of fun fully developing those crazy ideas with Animeshin Club.’’
“It's the beginning of a new era for adult animation,” Nathaniel shared in a recent interview. “I don't mean that for us [at Animeshin Club] in particular, but it's indicative of everything going [on]. Adult animation, and I mean adult animation with sex, is growing. It’s the number-one search in the world ... it’s not going anywhere.”
He’s not wrong. The 2023 edition of Pornhub Insights found that “hentai” was the most searched-for term for the third year in a row last year.
In this spirit, Nathaniel explained that Sodomy Squad is something that speaks to this new era he refers to and the enduring popularity of hentai content.
“It's a gay series that I encourage anyone who likes animation to watch, gay or straight, because it's a great story that just so happens to involve gay characters,” Nathaniel said.
“I'm straight, but I thoroughly enjoyed producing that series.”
He said that episode two is his favorite, and that his favorite character is Dr. Power.
“Listening to his performance and watching his character interact with the others, I feel confident saying he is the greatest gay cartoon porn character of all time,” Nathaniel said with a chuckle.
Asked about his overall thoughts on shifting from straight to gay hentai production, Nathanial offered: “When you're animating, it's all imaginary, and it's all about sex. I think fans of gay material will really go ga-ga over something that shares their interests and goals and matches their sexual desires.”
Sodomy Squad is currently rolling out at ASGmax. For more information about Animeshin Club, email Aaron Nathaniel at [email protected].
