Maggot's Magick Block
2026 · 8m
Directed by Erika Salazar
Genres: animation, coming-of-age, fantasy
Tones: contemplative, surreal, whimsical
A young witch suffering a magick block instead of an art block is sent on a quest to regain her powers after a strange visit.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
A witch with a magick block is the kind of cute-clever premise that sounds like it landed in a thousand pitch meetings—but Salazar's execution either transcends the concept entirely or disappears into it, and I genuinely can't tell which until I see the film.
The animation's formal control over the surreal-to-contemplative tonal shift will either sit within a recognizable lineage of indie animation practice or forge its own conversation; the craft decisions in how whimsy meets introspection will determine which.
A magick block as a direct stand-in for creative paralysis could be heavy-handed, but if Salazar commits to one visual or sonic language that makes the abstraction *feel* earned rather than just illustrated, that's where an 8-minute animation transcends the concept.