Celebrity Deathmatch is an adult stop-motion claymated series created by Eric Fogel and produced by John Worth Lynn Jr. for MTV. A parody of sports entertainment programs Celebrity Deathmatch depicted various celebrities engaging in highly stylized professional wrestling matches. The series was known for its large amount of gory violence including combatants employing different abilities and weapons to deliver particularly brutal attacks resulting in exaggerated physical injuries. Two television pilots were broadcast on MTV on January 1 and 25 1998. The series properly premiered on May 14 1998 and ended on June 6 2002 airing for 93 episodes. During its run it was one of MTV's most popular cartoons alongside Beavis and Butt-Head and Daria. A series of German shorts Celebrity Deathmatch Hits Germany aired on June 21 2001 but it was poorly received from the fans which was rumored to be the source of the show's cancellation. For a brief period during that year reruns of the series aired on broadcast network UPN. Early in 2003 a film based on the series was announced by MTV to be in production but the project was canceled by the end of the year.