Interview with Christy Marx on Animation, Games, and Beast Wars

Hi, this is Christy Marks, the writer of Gem

and the Holograms and Beast Wars, and you're

listening to GeekCast Radio Network. I am TF2

and Mike, and I'm joined with Michael Wilson.

Hello, sir. Hey, how's it going? Pretty good,

pretty good. We are about to interview Kristy

Marks, head animation writer for GEM. She wrote

one episode of Beast Wars. She's done a bunch

of video game writing as well. She actually wrote

a book about animation, comics, and video games.

Most people will remember her from being the

head writer of Jim. I really got into that show

when I was a kid for some strange reason. So

it's just going to be really awesome to talk

to her and we're going to see what she has to

say next. Would you like to say anything else

before we go into the interview, sir? I had not

actually heard of Christy until I had, you know,

saw her credits on Beast Wars. But then again,

I didn't watch a whole lot of Gem when I was

younger either. No, you just watch Anna Montana

now. Well, you know, it's the same thing, basically.

It's, you know, girl with wig becomes rock star

at night. No, it's not the same thing. But anyways.

It was very nice to hear from her. Once we researched

her, I saw what a diverse background she had,

and she was actually involved with many things

that were near and dear to my heart at the time,

as well as video games currently, which again,

near and dear to my heart. So it was very cool

that we're going to be able to have this opportunity

to chat with her. Yes, and you're going to hear

that after the Gem theme song. Gymnastics at

me, ooh, gym Gymnastics at you, ooh Hello and

welcome to this special interview here on GeekCast

Radio, Tooncast, and the Beast Unleashed podcast.

I am your host Mike TFJU and Blanchard, and I

am joined by Michael Peekoncourt -Wilson. Hello,

sir. Hey, how's it going? It's going. How are

you? Hanging in there. Yes, and today we are

going to be talking with animation and television

writer Christy Marks. Hello, Christy. How are

you? Hello there. And don't forget game writer.

Oh, yes. Video game writer. See I knew I was

gonna screw the intro up Nobody can keep track

of everything that I do. Yeah, I know So what

have you been up to lately as far as upcoming

projects? What I'm working on currently is I'm

writing game dialogue for Warner Brothers interactive

I don't know if I'm allowed to say what the game

is or not. It has officially been announced but

When they put you under non -disclosure agreements,

sometimes you have to be careful about what you

say. Okay. That's cool. Are you working on anything

like anything in cartoons or anything recently

or anything like that? Not at the moment. I've

actually been working full -time on this game

writing project. Is this separate from the Sliffgate

Ironworks or is that a different project? It's

something entirely different tragically slipgate

ironworks met the demise of many game companies

and MMOs in particular and The project after

I was there for two and a half years and other

people were there even longer and the project

was cancelled Happens a lot in the games business.

I'm afraid to say and in fact just Yesterday,

I think the news broke of an MMO in Britain that

sank to the tune of a hundred million dollars

You know, we didn't do anything quite that badly,

but Unfortunately, it's the reality of the games

business that many games fail or just don't get

made for one reason or another and ours was one

of those that even though I think it was a brilliant

game and I had the opportunity to create an original

IP for it, but we ran into obstacles and They

decided not to keep funding it. Wow. That kind

of stinks. It's painful. It's painful to sink

that many years of your life into something and

wholly and completely put yourself into it and

then it just goes away. And it's not the first

time it's happened to me. I spent a couple of

years working on a Babylon 5 video game. Oh,

really? That's where I met my husband, Randy

Littlejohn. He was one of the narrative designers

on the game. And I was brought in because I have

written for Babylon 5, the TV series, and I knew

Joe Straczynski. And so I was actually originally

brought in as the person to bridge the gap between

Joe and the TV world and the game world, because

I can speak both languages fluently. Then I ended

up actually working as a narrative designer on

the game, and Randy and I ended up working very

closely together in the same office, and we've

been together for 13 years since then. But we

put two years of love and hard labor into that

game, and the same sort of thing happened. Sierra

Online was acquired by Havas, which was acquired

by... Universal, Vivendi, blah blah blah, and

the game. In the midst of all that, somewhere,

the game was killed. There was a bunch of games

lost in the trials and travails of Sierra Online,

if I remember right. Yes, there were. It was

a tragic thing. Long, involved, complex, and

utterly tragic. Getting into some background

questions here, where did you grow up? I grew

up in Danville, Illinois. I'm sorry. That makes

me giggle because Michael and I are both big

Phineas and Ferb fans. So when you say Danville,

it takes in. Danville, Illinois? Yeah. Okay.

I don't know about that one. What got you interested

in writing? I was born telling stories. I don't

know any other way to put it. I was simply born

with a desire and an interest in telling stories

and also very much visual storytelling from the

earliest ages that I can think of. I was fascinated

by colorful stories, fantasy stories. I would

sit down and Even before I could write, I think,

I was trying to draw out little sequential stories.

So for whatever reason, I think I was simply

born as a storyteller. And then from there, I

just discovered newspaper comic strips, became

a fanatic about newspaper comic strips, and then

comic books, and then reading. I was a voracious

reader. I just read just every kind of... fictional

thing, fantasy, science fiction, mythology, the

stories of operas. I mean, whatever it was, I

would read it. I'd go through the library and

just pretty quickly wipe through everything they

had. Wow, that's very interesting. I'm sorry,

the tangent there is for a bit. Did you have

any formal training? No, other than being...

a voracious reader and observing everything that

way and just the usual education that you get.

I went to the University of Illinois in liberal

arts but I ended up moving to LA and working

my way into being a scriptwriter through LA.

We kind of already covered the Slipgate and the

Slipgate Ironworks. I know you mentioned that

you have a gaming project that you're currently

working on. Is that just the only current project

you're working on? Yeah, I'm working on this

40 hours a week, so it doesn't really leave a

lot of time to do much else. Although we can

always visit your website for the list, please

tell our listeners some of the television credits

you've been in besides Gem and Beast Wars. Action,

adventure, are we talking live action or are

we talking animation? Just television in general.

Animation, live action, whichever. You know something?

I've been writing for so long and I've done so

many things that Sometimes I actually even have

trouble remembering everything. It sounds bizarre,

but in the live -action arena, I worked on Captain

Power and the Soldiers of the Future, which was

the first time I worked with Joe Strazinski,

was on that, and did a couple of episodes, Gemini

and Counting and Freedom One, for that series,

and then we were going to do a second season.

I wrote a... a mini -series five -parter for

the second season, but then it ended up never

being produced, unfortunately. And then on Twilight

Zone, I worked with Joe again, and I did an episode

of The Twilight Zone that was at the end of the

1980s, like 89, somewhere around there. And then

I worked with Joe again on Babylon 5, and did

an episode called Grail for the first season.

And then I worked on a half -hour Saturday morning

live -action show for ABC called Hypernauts.

And Hypernauts was sold to ABC by Ron Thornton,

who originally did the CG effects for Babylon

5. So there's that connection. As a matter of

fact, he even reused the knackling feeder from

my grail episode as a creature in the Hypernauts

series. That is pretty cool. It really all came

around in a way that was very interesting and

funny. So I developed that, I was hired to develop

the series and I was the executive story editor

and writer on that series. So that's live action.

And I've also done some feature length stuff

in animation. I did 20 ,000 Leagues into the

Sea adaptation for Nickelodeon movies and Randy

and I wrote a movie called Widowmaker for Stan

Lee for his pal, Entertainment. And in animation,

obviously we've covered Jem and the Holograms,

I started out writing for a couple of different

Spider -Man shows, then I wrote stuff for G .I.

Joe, Jem took up a couple of years of my life,

I wrote for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, then

I developed into a story editor and writer on

Bucky O 'Hare. based on Neil Adams' comic book,

then Conan the Adventurer, which was 65 half

hours. I've written for Darkstalkers, Reboot,

Beast Wars, Pocket Dragons, War Planets, which

is known as Shadow Raiders in Canada, X -Men

Evolution. Well, then Randy and I got together

and started writing as a team. So as a team,

we wrote for X -Men Evolution, Stargate Infinity,

He -Man, Legend of the Dragon, Zoro Generation

Z, a few other things besides, so I think I'll

stop there. That's a lot. Plus, he and I have

worked on game projects together. Right. As far

as, let's say, animated features, what was your

favorite show to work on? Oh, Gem. I mean, I

loved working on Spider -Man. I loved working

on G .I. Joe. But Gem, I had a great deal of

creative control. And that's really what it's

about. In fact, I had that pretty much also with

Conan into a large degree with Bucky O 'Hare,

although it was a more direct adaptation. But

what I enjoyed the most were shows where I had

some freedom and the ability to have some creative

direction on the show. That's great. Well, we

had a whole slew of gem questions next, so. Yes.

Well, we did gem already. No, no. These are like

in -depth questions. In season five, you know

that thing. Oh, no. Now, don't turn into a fanboy,

Michael. Besides, there was no season five. Yeah,

I know. Exactly, see? He doesn't know anything

about it. I read the Wikipedia page. Yeah, that's

all you do. Alright, so although the actual idea

of Gem came from Hasbro and their doll line,

how did you get involved in creating the backstory

for these characters? What was your process?

In terms of how I became involved, it actually

happened because of the writing that I did on

GI Joe, believe it or not. They knew me at Sunbow

Productions from working on G .I. Joe and they

liked my work on G .I. Joe so much that when

this project came along and they wanted it rather

naturally to have a woman do the development

work, they thought of me because I was one of

the few women that was writing for animation

at the time. So they came to me to do it and

I... I remember walking out of the meeting and

really elated and thinking, wow, this is terrific.

My first real development job was a big deal

for me. But at the same time, I was thinking,

this stuff is so soft compared to what I've been

writing, compared to G .I. Joe, Spider -Man.

And I'm thinking, this is so soft. Can I write

something that's this soft? And then once I really

got into it, though, I discovered that, yeah,

it's a lot of fun writing this stuff. And I really,

really enjoyed it a lot. The process really involved

taking the couple of very sketchy, fundamental

ideas that Hasbro had, and they knew the product

names of the... Well, actually, they didn't even

know the product names of the dolls because they

kept changing them on me almost constantly during

the development process. Jem was originally just

called Em, and instead of being Jerica, her name

originally was Morgan. And they kept changing

all these names around But After begging and

begging and begging them quite a bit I finally

got some Polaroids of what the dolls look like

so that I could have some visual inspiration

I'm a very visually oriented storyteller writer

type of person and so Just just having the dolls

to look at simply it just simply helps it kind

of gets the creative juices going but Pretty

much everything was up to me. I had almost a

completely blank slate and was able to just do

whatever I wanted to do. And so I just went crazy

and had a fantastic time. But my process really

was just thinking about the fact that we needed

to do 65 episodes, because at the time, that

was a pretty standard syndication run, which

meant there had to be a lot of room. for development,

and this was not really an action show. It was

very much a character -driven show. It was more

of a action soap opera in a way. So I really

had to have the depth and the layers and the

interactions and lots of characters to play with.

I think I went a bit overboard on the Starlight

Girls. I don't think I really needed to create

quite that many, but nonetheless I did. Just

in thinking about the characters, I had to think

about the emotional hooks, the relationships,

all of the things that writers would want to

draw upon to come up with all of these stories.

And then I hit upon the notion of the romantic

triangle, this feeling that this... you know,

confusion that Rio is in, the boyfriend who's

caught between Jerika, who he's known for so

long and has been his girlfriend. And all of

a sudden, here's this mysterious and alluring

Jim, who really is Jerika, and he finds himself

just attracted and completely torn. And that

triangle just suddenly really brought it all

together and really made it work and just provided

so many avenues to have fun with it. Yeah, it's

kind of like multiple personality problems. Yeah,

we played with that a little bit too. Bob Budiansky,

who was an editor over at Marvel Comics, wrote

most of the backstory for the early Transformers

line over a Thanksgiving weekend in 1983. He's

still amazed at the popularity of the stuff that

he wrote way back then. How do you feel about

the ongoing wave of nostalgia for Jim? Well,

I think it's delightful I have actually been

in close touch with a very dedicated group of

gem fans for oh Over a decade now through through

an email list that a couple friends of mine set

up So I've been in ongoing contact with people

and I've no heard these stories and and now there's

even a gem con And so I've been the guest of

honor at a couple of those and they're small

and intimate, which is wonderful. But you know,

you have people, there are people there from

all over the world, from the Netherlands, from

Scotland. I mean, just all over the place and

it's just wonderful. It makes me completely happy.

I love hearing from these people and hearing

their stories and I love hearing, you know, how

Jim... inspired people or affected people. I

had one person wrote to tell me that he was inspired

and grew up to become a lawyer because of my

writing and talking about music and protecting

the rights of creators and things of that sort.

So there have been a lot of really, really nice

stories that have come out of that. Wow. Yes.

As we've said you've you wrote the original girl

with ordinary life transforming into rock star

by putting on a wig story Are you ready to take

credit for Hannah Montana? And I cannot believe

Michael included that question. I Thought I thought

you know what I well we watch way too much Disney

Channel in our house and You know that includes

the occasional Hannah Montana episode and it

occurs to me that you know, Jim is kind of You

know, she has a little magic involved, but, you

know, puts the wig on and she's somebody else.

Well, she doesn't put a wig on though. There

is no wig involved, because we're talking about

holographic projections. It's a holographic wig.

It's a holographic projection. Everything that

Jim is, you know, her identity is created by

this holographic projection around herself. So,

there's no wigs here, but I do have a funny story

for you, and you could be... You might be the

first people to hear this story. I'm not sure

about Probably close to a year ago. I get a call

from a lawyer at Disney and this lawyer says

that They're dealing with a lawsuit on Hannah

Montana from someone who claimed that he came

up with the idea for Hannah Montana the idea

of a rock star with a secret identity And so

he's suing Disney. And so Disney says, well,

we understand that this idea has been done before.

As they were contacting me to prove that Hannah

Montana was not an original concept, that the

idea of a rock star with a secret identity had

been done before so they can validate the basis

of this guy's lawsuit, which I just thought was

not only ironic, but completely hysterical. Yeah.

It's like, please sue us, because we realized

that we stole your idea, and yeah, that's funny.

Well, they were using me to protect Hannah Montana

from the lawsuit, which, I mean... See, if we

could retcon it so that Billy Ray Cyrus was actually

Jem's father, then we'd tie this all together.

No retconning. No, no, no retconning. Bad Wilson.

That's funny So as of 2008 Hasbro owns the distribution

rights for the gem series Now they recently put

out I know that I think that's probably the case

Well again somewhere in the wiki, you know, they

recently put out a really nice box set of the

Transformers series through Shout Factory. So

we're thinking, would it be outside of the realm

of possibility to get a call from Shout Factory

about a DVD bonus feature interview? I wish they

would. I think that would be fantastic. I mean

the fans are going crazy wishing that they would

put out the rest of the series. As you know,

Rhino did the first couple of seasons on DVD.

They had the rights to do the DVDs and so I did

interviews for them and we recorded things for

them. But they never got to finish the third

season the stingers and the last batch of shows

that had stingers And so the fans have just been

going crazy wanting to have full DVD sets And

of course you can find them pirated all over

the place on eBay So if they had any brains at

all, yes, they should be doing it and if they

do it without me, they're nuts I don't think

I was going to say Rhino managed to mess up the

Transformers series pretty well with their overdubbing

of sound effects that didn't belong and things

like that. Part of me, when I actually thought

of this question, was thinking maybe they already

did and she's going to say, oh yeah, heck yeah,

let me tell you about it. I have not heard anything

from Hasbro at all. That's too bad because that

would be nice to see. a big box set for Jim,

just to have it all in one place. Because I mean,

yeah, there are the Rhino DVDs, but I don't actually

have the Rhino versions, so I'm kind of holding

out and waiting to see. You can't even get them

now. They're so rare now that trying to get them,

I've heard of people spending $100, $200, whatever,

trying to get the damn things. That's not cool.

What is the current state of GEM? How do you

feel about recent calls to bring back GEM as

a live -action movie? Do you think that you would

be involved if that were to happen? I would rather

see Gem brought back as another animation series

because I've already completely mapped out exactly

what I would want to do with it. Exactly how

to bring back the series, how to update it, make

it interesting, but make it new. I know exactly

what I want to do. I've got it all worked out.

So are you going to share that secret with us?

No. But as I said, I have not heard anything

from Hasbro. I have not been able to confirm

What appears to be just one person's story on

the net About the possibility of a live -action

movie. I have absolutely no idea if there's any

truth to that I have not been contacted by anyone

and Unfortunately Hollywood doesn't necessarily

have a lot of respect for the original writer

original creator of something So there's really

no guarantee at all that they would come to me

Let me throw this out real quick. You may or

may not know, Hasbro has recently teamed up with

Discovery Channel to create a new channel called

The Hub. Okay, and I didn't know that Yeah, they're

bringing back a lot of their older properties

and putting them on and at different times during

the day and I know that a lot of the shows from

the 80s including like the g1 transformers and

the I believe the original GI Joe they're gonna

show on those channels and I'm not sure why do

I wish I would get residuals for that? That animation

writers do not get residuals. Or not for the

old shows, anyway. Right, not for back then.

And not now most of the time. There are exceptions,

but mostly not. Well, would you be considered

not so much a writer, but like a... I don't know

what they would call that, since you actually

came up with the backstory and everything. Like

the... I don't know, the Bible author, if you

will. It doesn't matter because it wasn't done

under a Writers Guild agreement. Okay. But if

they were going to bring Gem to their hub, would

they even notify you, or do you think they would?

Probably not. Why would they? I don't know. I'm

not entirely sure how the process works. Yeah.

I mean, they have no obligation to tell me anything.

Hmm. Then maybe they'll rewrite a new one. Because

I know they're making like a new Strawberry Shortcake

and a new G .I. Joe and a new Transformers that

I may or may not enjoy. I don't know. We'll see.

I mean, it could happen. It absolutely could

happen. And there's no guarantee that they would

have me involved at all. Speaking of Transformers,

we're going to move into some Beast Wars questions.

How did you get involved with Beast Wars? Had

you worked with Larry DiTilio in the past? Oh

yeah, Larry and I had worked on Captain Power

and I think we probably worked on other shows

together but we had become very good friends

and so consequently I heard from him when Transformers

came along. Beast Wars, excuse me. Now the episode

Transmutate is widely considered to be controversial

among fans. How did the story come about and

were you requested to write this particular story

or was it something that you pitched to Larry?

Larry wanted pitches so I had to come up with

some pitch ideas and there were some very specific

parameters that had to be observed in writing

this show. When it comes to a CG show, one of

the most expensive things is having to create

any kind of a brand new character because that

involves a lot of work, putting everything together,

the whole rigging and the mesh and the design.

There's a lot of work involved to that. So the

basic guidelines were You can't create any new

characters. You can only use the existing characters.

That's it. Just the pool of East Wars characters

we have. That's all you've got to work with.

And there were some other limitations like that.

So I was writing my pitches and coming up with

various ideas. And having worked around CG and

knowing a bit about how CG works, I thought,

well, Okay, here's a really cool idea that I

think I could fudge my way around this requirement

because they could just take pieces of the existing

models and just glom them together to create

this sort of mismatched thing. And then they

wouldn't have to create anything new. Really,

they just kind of take these pieces and put them

together. And so with that in mind, I went ahead

and added it to the pitches. Well, Larry really

liked the idea. But he said I don't know if we

can do this one I know I explained to him how

I thought we could do a workaround he said I

don't know I don't know but I'm gonna go ahead

and you know pitch it anyway and Fortunately,

he he did and they really liked it and they liked

it so much that they actually did create the

new character They didn't they didn't just go

include things together. They actually did go

to the effort of creating the transformer character

the the new character for transmute a That's

very cool When I first saw that episode, I had

been watching the previous couple of seasons,

like one marathon watch. So when I got to it,

I was like, oh, OK. But I went back and I watched

it. And to me, and I said this in our Beast Wars

Review podcast episode when we talked about it,

to me, how I saw it was it's pretty much a peer

pressure episode. Would you agree or disagree

with that? Yeah, I guess that's one way of looking

at it. Tear pressure, to me, is a little bit

too high school. It's really, I think, a deeper,

more powerful conflict than that. It's kind of

like the use of an innocent for good or evil,

being drawn between two forces, the light and

the dark. Yeah. So it falls into that category.

Since this was your first Transformers script,

were you familiar with the franchise before writing

the story? I think I was at least somewhat familiar

with Transformers in general, but of course Beast

Wars with his own thing. It was quite different

than the previous Transformers, so I don't think

I had any familiarity with this particular new

approach. I think I had to sit down, I'm trying

to recall, it's been a while, but I think I had

to sit down and learn it. pretty much from the

beginning. I know that the G1 Transformers and

G .I. Joe tended to trade writers back and forth

very often, writers and voice actors, so I was

surprised not to see any Transformers credits.

For me? Yeah. Yes. Oh, I think, well, at the

time I think I was working on Jim. Yeah, you

were. And I mean, I was working flat out on Jim.

Don't forget. I mean, I was doing all the development

work. I wrote 22 out of 65 episodes. At the end,

did some story editing. And let me tell you,

I was putting a lot of work into that series.

I didn't have a lot of time for anything else.

Yeah, that makes sense. Oh, I'm sorry. Back to

Tries to Mutate. Did you mean for the character

to be female? Or was it too far damaged to be

considered gender specific? I think... I'm trying

to remember whether that actually was my original

intention or if that's just how it came out.

I don't actually remember. I think it must have

been my intention from the beginning. I think.

You know, but it's actually been long enough

that I don't precisely remember that. You would

think that I would, but I know. Actually, because

of the way they created the character, it seems

to me that I must have given some indication

in that direction. Yeah, and I think the other

indication in the direction is obviously that

Sue Blue voiced the character. There is that

too, yeah. To me, it kind of came across a little

androgynous. Like you really couldn't tell. You

know, I do like to play with things like that.

There was a character I created for Jem called

TechRat. I don't know if you remember TechRat

or not. And when I first created TechRat, I very

specifically referred to him as a completely

androgynous character. Very cool. When we reviewed

the episode, there was some contention between

us about the ending. Please settle this for us.

Did Transmutate knowingly sacrifice herself,

or did she just happen to fall between the oncoming

missiles when it jumped over the cliff? If so,

what was the point? Yes. There you go! Yes, she

knowingly sacrificed herself. You know, I attempted

to just really leave it up to an individual's

idea of what they would like it to be. However,

I wrote here that in this split second of the

simultaneous exchange of fire, the transmutate

leaps from her safe position to shield both of

them taking their combined blast from two sides.

So based on what I wrote in the script, I would

say that sounds pretty deliberate. I had actually

thought that the capacity for that type of will

wasn't there with this particular character.

So it's like, well, you can't actually sacrifice

yourself if you don't have that force of will.

At that moment, the idea was that it had been

developing in her and developing in her, and

right at that moment, The crisis just all brought

it to a head and I think her intention was not

to destroy herself, her intention was to stop

what was happening and save two beings that she

cared about. Wow. That's great. Yeah, I hadn't

thought of it quite that way. Yeah, that's a

nice explanation. Hmm. Um, did you get a transmutate

figure from the Beast Wars 10th anniversary line?

I did not, and I am so disappointed. I would

love to have one. I never ever got it. Oh, it

required you to purchase each figure in the set.

Yeah, I know. And each figure then had a chunk

of it that you put together. Yes. I've seen them

on eBay. I just kind of imagine there being a

transmutate on your desk somewhere. I wish. I

had a fan who had promised me that he was going

to put one together and give it to me, but he

never did. Nice. You wrote a script for Beast

Wars Season 3 episode called Dark Glass, which

was rejected by the series distributor. It is

rumored that the episode involved Rattrap returning

to Dinobots. Returning Dinobot's consciousness

to a clone of his body. What can you tell us

about that script? Did you base it on anything

like Star Trek 3? No. The search for Spock? Come

on. No, I don't quite remember the origin of

that one. I'm not sure whether that was an idea

that I pitched or whether that was an idea that

might possibly have come from Larry. I'm not

sure. Let me think, that was... What number was

that script? Number 47. Do you have it? Oh yes,

of course I have it. Of course I have it! Okay,

this has just turned to a live script reading.

Yeah, really, because... Because the next question

is, is there a copy of the script of Darkglass

out there? We noticed that you can buy an autographed

script of Transmutate off your website, but no

Darkglass. We're interested in picking up a copy

of Darkglass and Transmutate. Well, it's weird.

There was kind of an odd history to this script.

One of the problems is that I actually don't

have a copy of my original first draft of the

script. Somehow that has been lost. I don't know

how, but it has. And I have a copy of the one

that Larry DiTilio did a rewrite on as the story

editor. And so I feel there's a bit of an ethical

conflict there because Larry was at the time,

which was a long time ago, but at the time he

was very much opposed to... Having the script

out there and in fact there may have been legal

reasons why he had to be opposed to it being

out there It's been a long time since then but

it's not something I'd want to do without Probably

without checking with him and making sure he

was still okay with it Okay, cool. I think one

of the reasons why We're interested in it is

because our other Co -host on beast unleashed

the co -creator with me Stephen Phillips. He

Asked me about dark glass because he what he

does voices. He does voiceover He doesn't do

it professionally yet, but we're trying to get

him to there but he voices Beast Wars Megatron

almost just like David Kay does and He wanted

to look at that script to see You know if he

could actually voice out the episode So that's

why we're interested in dark glass. I see so

maybe you could Ask Larry and get back with us

maybe at a later date. Yeah, maybe so we'll see

how that goes That would be very interesting

to see that surface after so long Yeah, I mean

I It was I thought it was a worthwhile script

from what I recall at the time Hasbro felt it

was too dark whatever that means Something about

it that they just didn't like getting into I

don't quite know And consequently, it didn't

get made. Well, they sure love their Dinobot

episodes, because there was plenty of them. I

don't know why they wouldn't want to do this

one, quite frankly. From what little I had read

about it, it seemed like it was straightforward

enough. It would have pushed the storyline. It

looked like elements of that script actually

showed up later on in the continuity. Oh, probably.

I don't remember, but if they ever got around

to bringing Dinobot back, Then they had to use

some elements of it. Well, they brought him back

as a clone, but they didn't actually bring him

back specifically. Yeah, that's true. The clone

existed, but was a Predacon. And this episode

had to do with Rattrap attempting to restore

his original spark to the clone, which created

an internal conflict. So that within the within

the battleground of the mind within Dinobots

mind there was a conflict between the two Dinobots

And at the end of the script the idea is to you're

not supposed to be quite sure it looks like the

Predacon won out and that he's he remains a Predacon

and I There's just a little element of doubt

in there, and I think what Michael is actually

referring to is In the season three finale nemesis

the two -parter Depth Charge kills Rampage, thus

the half of the spark of Rampage that was in

the Dinobot clone was cleansed of Rampage and

he started feeling the original Dinobots, so

actually they did take stuff from Darkglass.

That doesn't surprise me. Yeah. Very interesting.

This would have made a lot more sense if they

had used that. Yeah. That would have figured

into the canon. Yep. Would have been nice. I

would have liked it. Behind -the -scenes stuff.

Yeah The animated series that you wrote for usually

had lots of other writers each doing their own

episodes taking like GI Joe, for example, were

there any Communications between writers in order

to help continuity or focus the characters and

looking well Yeah, no not between writers because

that's the story editors job and the story editor

on GI Joe when I was working on it was, well,

there are a couple of different ones, obviously,

because it was 65 half hours. But I was working

closely with Steve Gerber. So it's the story

editor's job to make sure that the continuity

is correct and to catch all of that stuff. So

I worked closely with Steve in that case. Do

they just change the script or do they consult

with you first? Or how does that, I mean, do

they say this is what we're looking for? This

is the relationship between the characters? Well,

we're talking specifically about G .I. Joe. Well,

as an example, yes. Well, G .I. Joe is kind of

its own thing. And the reason it's kind of its

own thing is because in order to work on G .I.

Joe, I had a Bible that was like 10 inches thick.

And I had this monstrous giant binder because

there are so many characters and there are so

many vehicles, so many elements that went into

it. And the way they did G .I. Joe was really

kind of unique. quite different than other series

because they would, the story editors, producers

would sit down and figure out, okay, in this

episode we want to have these three characters

and these two vehicles. And then, and to make

sure that it all balanced out and that they,

all the characters got abused and so forth, they

spread that out over the episodes. And so basically

the brief I got was, okay, now pitch aside some

ideas using these characters and these vehicles.

And so I had to look at those things and then

find a story for them. So it was different really

a different way of doing it and in that case

you had to have a lot of Coordination of course

between the story editor writers and producers

and everybody like that Right, but that's quite

different And it was it was complex just the

sheer volume of stuff. They're dealing with was

was fairly complex That's not Really a way I've

worked on any other series before generally overall

however And as someone who has worked as a story

editor, it's very common for a story editor to

do rewrites if needed. If it's possible, I would

rather give notes to the writer and have the

writer do a second draft, but if you're really

crunched for time, if it's a very tight schedule,

you may not have a choice. You may just need

to go ahead and do it yourself. because you don't

have the time to go back to the writer. So it

depends on the luxury of time, it depends on

scheduling, it depends on the story editor, and

so on and so forth. I mean, personally, as a

story editor, I would always rather let the writer

have that option of doing it. Much prefer to

let the writer do that. Some other story editors

just, they just want to put their own gloss on

it or fix it or whatever, or their schedule doesn't

let them send it back. It just varies it's gonna

be different for every show We noticed that oh

you said Michael That's very interesting because

I'm not really privy to that whole process so

that's pretty cool Yeah, I know just from watching

other DVD features like on Like Justice League,

I know that a lot of that crew there was a lot

of you know collaboration between writers, so

It's not totally uncommon for that to happen.

Every show is going to be its own unique creature

because it really just depends on who's in charge,

how they like to work. The nature of the show

is just affected by a lot of different things,

a lot of different elements, and so every show

can have really its own kind of feel to it. Right.

We noticed that the legendary Wally Burr was

the voice director for Gem. Did you have any

contact with the voice actors or were you secluded

from that arm of the show? We love to interview

voice actors. Yeah, I never had any contact whatsoever

with the voice actors. None. I mean, writers

just weren't involved in that process. And it's

funny, I didn't meet Wally Burr until quite a

bit later. It was delightful. When I first met

him, I think it was at a party or a gathering

somewhere, he paid me the highest compliment

he could think of to pay me. He said, oh, you

write like a man. And I knew what he meant, because

he's of a certain generation. And I knew he was

trying to really genuinely pay me a very high

compliment. And so that was his way of doing

it. And I took it in that regard. Fantastic.

Just a couple of random questions for you. What

is your favorite character type to write for?

Heroes, villains, or is there another type of

character that you like better? And who gets

the best lines? I like characters that have multiple

dimensions and layers and depth to them and that's

why when I create characters I try to make sure

I give them as much of that as I can. One example

is Stormer from Gem and the Holograms. She belongs

to the Misfits, but at the same time, she's a

very conflicted character who sometimes goes

behind the backs of the Misfits in order to help

the Jam or the Starlight Girls. And so she's

a great character to play with because she had

this depth. She had these other things going

on with her. So any kind of a character like

that. is going to be a character that I love

to write. And of course, I love to write really

strong, interesting female characters. So any

time I get a chance to do that, that's fantastic.

Yeah. As a writer, what is the weirdest thing

that has happened to you? Ever been asked to

write something that you didn't want to? Asked

to write something I didn't want to. Kinda. After

Sunbeau stopped producing the G .I. Joe series,

Deke picked it up. I'm actually familiar with

the studio, Deke. But Deke tended to do things

kinda on the cheap. They weren't as well -funded

as Sunbeau. Right. Dear friend of mine, a wonderful

person, became the story editor on that series.

And he called me up one day and asked me if I

would write for it. And I said, no, because they're

not paying what they should be paying on this

show. And he asked and asked. And so kind of

as a favor, I went ahead and wrote a couple of

these other G .I. Joe episodes, which had tremendous

restrictions on the number of voices you could

use and this and that kind of a thing. So that

was something I wasn't quite as wildly enthusiastic

to write for. I mean, I still do the best I can

do regardless. But I mean, in most cases, if

something doesn't feel right to me or I don't

like it or it doesn't interest me, I don't do

it. I remember back when Smurfs was on, I got

a call from Hannah Barbera and they sent me the

Bible and they wanted me to pitch for the show

and I had never watched the Smurfs. It's just

not the kind of show that interested me at all.

And I read the Bible and I felt my brain just

start melting out of my ears and I said, I can't

do this. This is just not the kind of thing I

can do. I just can't write this stuff. I am not

a comedy writer. I'm not a joke writer. I'm not

that kind of a writer. There was a funny moment

a while back, a couple of very good friends of

mine, Craig Miller and Marv Wolfman in fact,

created, managed to sell the first animation

series that was covered by a Writers Guild contract.

It was called Pocket Dragons. And it was based

on a line of sculptures of these cute little

dragons. And they were done, they were half hour

shows, but they were done as like two 11 minute

segments, separate segments. And so I knew they

were doing them, and it was like, oh, it's cute.

It looks really cute, little cutie pie kind of

show. And so they asked me if I'd write for it.

And I said, oh, no, no, no. And they asked me

again. I said, oh, no, no, no. And finally one

time, Craig butthold me at a party. And he said,

you know, I'm really hurt that you didn't want

to write for our show. Why don't you want to

write for our show? And I said, oh, well, I just

don't know how to write that kind of thing. It's

really soft. It's really young. I don't know.

I just thought it'd be good. I don't know how

to write that. And he goes, no, no, no. We want

your kind of writing. Don't worry about that.

Just write us a good story. So I actually ended

up writing two of them and really having a good

time at it. And I thought they came out really

well. I had a lot of fun with it. So sometimes

you can be wrong. The moral of the story is sometimes

you can be wrong about what you think you can

do. You see, the Smurfs, they really needed some

strong characters. Yeah, maybe I should have

done the Smurfs. I don't know. How could you

pass on the Smurfs? I was into hard action stuff.

You know, if you choke a Smurf, it turns green.

What kills me is that the Smurfs are going to

get a live action movie. Yeah, they already have

a live action movie. I see the trailers for it.

They're awful. Just terrible. I have no interest.

I'm actually on the lookout for further signs

of the apocalypse. Yes, there we go. That's one

of the first signs. While I love Hank Azaria

as an actor, I'm sorry. Him as Gargamel, he looks

like a stalker and a rapist. He just does. He

just looks like a pedophile. Yeah. Okay, this

isn't Beast Unleashed. You can take the last

question, Michael. How am I going to follow that?

We found your book on Amazon .com, Writing for

Animation Comics and Games. What is the biggest

difference in writing for animation versus writing

for, let's say, video games? Any plans to write

an update? Let's take the second question first

and get that out of the way. There are no plans

to do a second edition of that particular book

just yet, but I did get hired to edit and co

-author and put together a second book that's

out called Write Your Way Into Animation and

Games and it used chapters from my book and plus

I had about... five other books from other focal

press authors, and they wanted me to draw material

from all of these books and put it all together

into a new book. So I edited that all together

into a new book that focuses, half of it focuses

on animation, half of it focuses on game writing.

So that came out just a couple of months ago.

So I have writing for animation, comics, and

games, which is entirely mine, and then also

right the way into animation and games, which

is a number of authors. The big difference, of

course, is that any kind of TV writing, animation

writing, comic book writing, film writing, whatever,

is linear writing. It's just straightforward

linear writing where the writer sits down and

tells a story from beginning to end, regardless

of what... It may have a different chronological

sequence, that's not so important, but nonetheless,

the writer... compiles, puts together a linear

story, even if it's told and jumping around in

different time periods or what have you. It still

ends up being a linear story. Games, however,

is a non -passive experience. You're not just

passively sitting back and having a story fed

to you. It's an active experience where the player

is a part of building that game. They're part

of building that story. They're part of building

their character. They're a significant component

and so everything you do has to take into account

the fact that you have an active participant

in your story and you have to deal with that

so it's nonlinear writing and it's also thinking

about How you give the player? agency or some

sense of control or input or however you want

to put it. Whether you give them a wide open

world where they have a huge amount of agency

and can and just can impact a lot of things or

whether like many console games you you they

almost are linear in a way you kind of drive

them through a main storyline with maybe other

alternatives. I mean there's all kinds of different

games obviously there's not just one kind of

game and so there's not just one kind of approach.

But that's just the thing you have to be so variable

and flexible and adaptable working in games,

it requires a certain amount of technical knowledge,

it requires understanding games and interactivity,

and it requires being able to think of all of

the variables and track them all and keep them

all in your head and deal with all of them. The

linear writer sits down and says, okay, if I

did this, then this would happen. But if I did

this, then this would happen. And I like this

better than that. So OK, I'm going to decide

that this happens. And you make that choice.

And then you move forward to the next choice.

As an interactive writer, more often you go,

if this happens, then this happens. And I have

to cover it and write it. And then if this happens

and then that happens, I have to cover that too.

But then this other thing can happen. I have

to cover that too. And you have to think of all

those things. And you have to actually deal with

them in one way or another. You don't have the

luxury of just setting it aside and saying, okay,

I'm just going to narrow this down to one choice.

You have to deal with those variables. So it's

the difference between linear and nonlinear,

and it's the difference between a passive experience

and an active experience. Wow. Yeah, that's very,

very cool. And there's a lot more. I mean, I

have a whole book written about it, so there's

more to it. Yeah, we'll have to check that out.

more toward people who are already writers or

is that more toward a general audience? I had

three different kinds of people in mind when

I wrote the book. One would be the person who

is a brand new or a student or whatever who wants

to learn about this stuff in order to try and

break in. So that was one big intended audience.

Another big intended audience would be someone

who's already an established professional in

another field who wants to shift out of, say,

writing for comics into writing for games, or

maybe they've written for comics and want to

write for animation, and they need to know about

the craft and the ins and outs of that other

field. So that was another person I had in mind.

And the third category would be someone who,

say, works in the field of games, but not as

a writer, who wants to maybe move into the writing

end and wants to learn about that. So, you know,

say maybe someone who's A producer wants to know

more about the writing end of games, and so they

might look at my book to get clued in on the

writing end. That's probably not the best analogy.

But that was another category of person, someone

who was within that business, but maybe wanted

to know more about just the writing end of things.

So those are kind of the three main types of

people that I was thinking about. Wow. Very nice.

Yes. We would like to thank Ms. Marks for taking

the time to talk with us. If people wanted to

interact with you, where can they go on the internet?

Good question. My website is just ChristyMarks

.com, but there's not a lot of interacting there.

I blog a little bit on LiveJournal under Christy

Marks, and so I post things there from time to

time. I do have a Facebook page. It's Christy

marks from a numeral two after it and I also

have a Christy marks clubhouse Which is a bit

more of a fan page and I don't yeah, I just post

things there every once in a while Okay, I just

joined that too. Yeah Yeah, we're all about the

Facebook now Yeah, so I spend way too much time

on Facebook. I think I actually shared a story

that you that you linked earlier today before

we did the interview about Facebook suing teach

book Oh yes, yes. That's a very interesting news

article. And very annoying. Yes, very, very annoying.

So thank you for joining us here on the Geekcast

Radio Network. I have been TFG1 Mike and I've

been joined with Michael Wilson. We'd like to

wish Ms. Marks good luck with her current work

and future work. And don't forget to get in touch

with us when you get permission to release Dark

Glass. Don't hold your breath too long. We'll

see. Alright guys, you take care. Talk to you

later. Yeah, hang on the line and we will talk

to you in a bit. That was very cool of Christy

Marks to talk with us for almost an hour. Very,

very interesting stuff as well. Yeah, it was

a very cool conversation. Yes. And we actually

got the skinny on dark glass. which is very cool.

Yeah, straight from the author. Yes, yes, yes.

And maybe, possibly, not saying anything because

I haven't made the contact yet, but maybe possibly

we could get an interview from Larry DiTilio

out of this. That would be nice. I mean, if she

still keeps in contact with him and you kind

of implied that she does, shoot him an email

and get us in touch with him. Yes, very, very

cool. So yes, this interview will be featured

on GeekCast Radio podcast, Tooncast, and the

Beast Unleashed podcast. And then also on Beast

Unleashed, coming up we have another interview,

this time with another voice actor. Steve got

David Soboloff, voice of DeathCharge. So that

will be coming up on Beast Unleashed as well.

Exciting. So I guess for now I am TFG on Mike

with Michael Wilson until next time Yay, we actually

didn't screw that up Oh Christy why don't you

just say some stuff so I can see the audio levels

on my program here Well blither blither a blather

blather to us brilligan the slidy toes to gyre

and gimbal on the waves I'll fear the noxious

Jabberwock. There, that works. Michael, why don't

you say some stuff? I don't see how I could possibly

follow that. Exactly. I wish to speak to my lawyer.