Interviews – Robert N. Skir

Sentinel Online. Now loading the Beast Unleashed

podcast. This is Bob Skier, writer of X -Men

and Beast Machines, and you're listening to GeekCast

Radio Network. Hello and welcome to the Beast

Unleashed podcast. This is going to be an interview

with Robert N. Skeer. I am TF2 and Mike. I'm

joined with Pecan Court Michael. Hello. Hey,

how's it going? It's going. And Steve Megatron.

Hello. So we've been planning and plotting here

at Geekcast Radio Network and the Beast Unleashed

podcast. Since we started Beast Machines on TBU,

my whole plan was to eventually talk to Bob Skier,

and we've done that, and you're going to hear

that next. Do we want to say anything about it

before we go to the interview, guys? Awesome.

Yeah, it was great. We had a really good time

talking with Bob, and, you know, it may have

run a little long, but we enjoyed every minute

of it. It was a fantastic conversation. Yes,

and you're going to hear that fantastic conversation

now. And what did you do in the war, Daddy? Well,

honey, I made gardening equipment to help the

troops plant petunias. Really, Daddy? Although

our task does not appear glamorous or exciting,

these trees carry our best hope for the future.

Oh, I'm sorry. I was only thinking about myself

instead of all the homeless termites. And what

would you rather be doing? Sticking your tail

into a computer socket? Beats the heck out of

plowing your little field of dreams. I think

it's high time you dialed back on the attitude.

Oh, well... How about I make like a tree and

leave? That would be just fine by me, you imbued

and little - Your bark is bad as my bite! I can't

imagine where that came from. Yeah, it must have

been some kind of glitch. We must delete it from

memory. Yeah, done. Hello, and welcome to the

GeekCaster Radio Network. This will be an interview

featured on the Beast Unleashed podcast. I am

your host, TF2NMike, and joining me is Michael

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

And Steve Megatron. Hello. Hello. We are here

with the man who is responsible for writing on

shows such as Beetlejuice, X -Men, Batman the

Animated Series, Godzilla the Series, and of

course, Beast Machines. Hello to Robert N. Scurr.

Hey there, how are you? I hope I didn't mess

up your last name there. I heard Skier. That's

pretty much how it's pronounced. Okay. How are

you, sir? I'm doing very well. How about you

guys? Pretty good. Pretty good. What would you

like to talk about? Well, we're going to start

off with just some general stuff. Where did you

grow up? What was your childhood like and stuff

like that? What was my childhood like? That's

one of these come in, the doctor will see you

now kinds of questions. I grew up on Long Island

in Oyster Bay. I spent the first 18 years of

my life there. I went away to college to the

University of Virginia down in Charlottesville.

Then I came out to California, to Los Angeles,

and got a master's degree in screenwriting from

UCLA. I grew up in the 60s and 70s, really. That's

when I was watching the Adam West Batman on TV,

and that's when Dark Trek was brand new, and

I was much lost in space, and lots of other shows

that you guys probably don't remember because

they were so damn long ago. I grew up reading

comics, going to comic conventions, reading all

the science fiction I can get my hands on, and

just loving it. I mean, I spent more time in

the Marvel Universe when I was growing up than

the universe we inhabit right now. And just to

completely date myself, I was 16 when Star Wars

was released, and it was almost like witnessing

the atomic bomb. There was this giant, giant

change in the culture, first of all with Star

Wars being what seemed like a gargantuan fad,

and then seeing it growing into something that

was actually, it settled into being a myth after

a while. I mean, it entered our mythology and

our national consciousness, our cultural consciousness,

but when Star Wars was first released. For the

first two years, until Empire came out, it was

just like, oh, okay, Star Wars is everywhere,

okay, and when's the next thing going to come

along? That's what most people thought. People

like us just couldn't get enough of it. So anyway,

forgetting Star Wars for a minute, I grew up

on lots of science fiction, grew up on lots of

comic books. I was a voracious reader and loved

science fiction films, particularly universal

horror movies and all that kind of stuff. I guess

the bottom line is, whereas I am a professional

writer, whereas I am a college professor, I am

a huge, huge, first and foremost, a huge, huge

fan of all of this. And most of the people that

I know who are professionals in this industry

are huge, huge fans. What got you interested

in writing? Was it something that... happened

as a as a kid was it something that like like

like for me personally i started writing because

i write poetry and stuff like that i started

writing because i used to love to read i used

to i love reading so what got you interested

in writing you know i was always interested in

writing and storytelling and it's a very strange

thing to look back on but whenever i was a kid

watching cartoons like actually you know like

i'm talking like like as a little kid watching

cartoons things would strike my ear funny and

i'd say well would you have said that or would

you have said it more like this And so there

I am, four, five, six years old, dialogue editing

in my head. Because when people wouldn't say

things that sounded right, it kind of like broke

the kind of spell in storytelling and stuff.

And I realized very early that, to me, the really

cool thing, more than the animation or whatever

else, or, you know, in terms of film as I grew

older, more than the directing of films, the

story took real precedent for me. much more impressed

with George Lucas for writing Star Wars than

for directing it. I was much more impressed with

Steven Spielberg for coming up with Close Encounters

than directing it. And that movie is a directing

feat. I mean, I just absolutely love it. The

bottom line is, it was always the story that

came first for me. And when I was in high school,

when I was in college, I wrote short stories,

but I was always obsessed with film. And for

reasons unknown, It took until I was a sophomore

in college for me to finally put the two together

and say, I know I can be in film and be a writer

if I just write movies. So just from that point

on, it was sort of a single -minded thing for

me that I wanted to write screenplays and just,

well, basically, and write. Nice. Yeah, very

cool. Bob, we... Check the IMDB page. I'm not

sure if you update that or if you care. But it

doesn't show much for the last three years or

so. What are you currently doing? What I'm currently

doing is a preschool series that is going to

be premiering in the fall. It's being produced.

It's an Italian co -production. I'm writing it

with Craig Miller, who created the series Pocket

Dragons, and we're having an amazing time on

it. That's what I'm doing right now. I'm also

writing a romantic comedy screenplay. I've always

written screenplays while I was here, and sometimes

I will write a screenplay at the same time as

doing a series, and sometimes I'll just take

some time off and just concentrate on screenwriting.

So I did a series a few years ago called Dino

Squad, and then I took a few years off to continue

writing screenplays. So right now I'm back doing

a series. How do you juggle that with your assistant

professorship at UCLA? At UCLA, I teach animation

writing about once every other year, and then

I go back to writing. I love teaching at UCLA.

It's fantastic. It's great students. It's an

incredible workshop there. I don't know if you

know the people who come out of it, but historically,

the people who wrote Yellow Submarine were there.

Nancy Cartwright was in the animation workshop.

She went on to do a voice in an animated series.

I forget what it's called. Oh, yeah, The Simpsons.

David Silverman, who's one of their main directors,

is a UCLA guy as well. And so is Mike Anderson.

I mean, these are all names. These are people

who've won like Emmys and Emmys and Emmys working

on The Simpsons over the last 20 years. And,

you know, I'm surprised they're all on one show.

You can get other work, but they're just stuck

on The Simpsons. Who knows? A lot of great people

came from UCLA. It's kind of an ironic thing

as a grad student. I got my master's degree in

screenwriting. But while I was there, I took

animation classes because I was always fascinated

with animation. I made animated films when I

was a kid. I did all kinds of animation when

I was a kid. I mean, not well, but so. So I drew

and I did, you know, like puppet animation, like

the Ray Housen stuff. They had these Mego Star

Trek dolls in the mid -70s, and so I would animate

those and make little Star Trek movies. So I

always loved animation, and I could not justify

going to UCLA. and not partaking in their animation

workshop. So I started taking classes there.

And I made lifelong friends. And people who I

just became professionally bonded with. Audu

Payden was a friend of mine from the very first

class that we took in animation there. And we

went on to do Godzilla and Extreme Ghostbusters

together. And he has a gigantic career, but he's

most famous in a way, among all the other things

that he's done, for Animaniacs and Thinking in

the Brain. Those are the sort of groundbreaking

things that he worked on. But I've made incredible

friends while I was there. And ironically, because

my career went into animation writing for television,

people I went to school with and my professors

there have sort of recast me thinking I was an

animation student there, whereas I was actually

a screenwriting student. My parents were like,

well, you know, why are you wasting your time

with the animation class? And I'm like, well,

you never know. But you see, that's the thing

is that you do, in fact, never know. You follow

your passions and you see where they lead you.

When I was a kid, my best friend found an antique

store that was selling comic books. Like, you

know, here's a chest of drawers and here's an

ottoman and, oh, yeah, here's a stack of comic

books I came into. And he was selling off this

stuff like it was junk. And he knew it was worth

something, but it wasn't worth his time to track

down who would actually buy and pay for such

things. So he let this stuff go for what was,

in retrospect, a pittance. even though my friend

who discovered the place bought them for a lot

of money. You're probably wondering where I'm

going with all this. Anyway, I was reading comic

books voraciously, and my parents were disconcerted.

It was like I was 14, 15, 16. When are you going

to stop reading those joke books, the funny books,

whatever they were calling them? And they couldn't

figure out, like, you know, put them down and

grow up. So my friend has found these comics.

I bought one of them for $25. It was Silver Street

No. 6 or 7. It was the first appearance of the

original Daredevil. It was a World War II -era

comic book, and I spent $25 on it. And I sold

it at a convention for $250. And that was when

my parents stopped calling them joke books and

started referring to me as, oh, it's my son,

the speculator. Oh, he's such a genius. And so

I went to a comic book convention, and I came

back. with a whole bunch of comic books. My parents

were like, oh, my son, the speculator, what did

we come back today with? And I showed them a

comic book that I had bought, and they said,

oh, my God, that's fantastic. What's it worth?

And I looked at the cover, and it was like $0

.35. It's worth $0 .35. Well, we thought you

were going to buy comics that were worth something.

And I'm like, someday this comic will be worth

something. Well, to who? That comic book was,

and I'm not kidding, That comic book was Giant

Size X -Men number one. Wow. And I don't know

what the street value is for Giant Size X -Men

number one. All I know is that I have made more

money from that comic book, and I've never sold

it. I made my reputation working on X -Men, working

with those characters. And the reason I want

to work on that show is because I follow these

characters, and I love these characters. And

my parents thought that taking animation classes

was a waste of time. And my parents thought that

reading comic books was a waste of time. And

to find that particular comic book was, you know,

a waste of 35 cents. And you just have to follow...

If you follow things that excite you, they will

take you to exciting places. That sounds so trite,

but it really is true. And, you know, that's

a case in point. And also, I mean, parenthetically,

and, you know, I hate to drop names and shit,

but basically... What's really cool is that that

comic book was written by Glenn Wein, who is

now my best friend. So it all works out. You

follow things that are important to you, and

if you're single -minded about it, if you're

really serious about it, you never know where

it's going to take you. So yeah, I was a huge

fan of this stuff, and I've made it my life.

At great cost. I mean, I spent the entire 1980s

going to graduate school as a screenwriter, writing

screenplays. That was the yuppie era where everybody

was buying BMWs and having families and, you

know, getting really, you know, for what was

then, you know, kind of wealthy. And, you know,

there I was eating Doritos and staying in, you

know, Friday nights. And, you know, I didn't

have the great life and career that all these

people were having. But I stuck with what I wanted

and I wound up with what I wanted. and consequently

got to write for every character I've ever loved,

including Batman and the X -Men and Superman.

And I'm going to say this really loud, Wolverine!

So, you know, it's been a really wonderful ride.

That's all I'm going to say. Well, that's a good

lead -in for the next question, which is, although

we can always visit your website, or IMDb, for

that matter, for a complete list, could you tell

our listeners some of the television credits

that you've had besides Beast Machines? The first

show I did was Beetlejuice, and that was for

Fox Kids. And the studio editor I worked with

on that went on to develop X -Men, and I helped

him with some of that because he wasn't as familiar

with some of the characters. So I did some character

breakdowns for him so he would know who the characters

really, really were. And I was adamant about

that because I wanted to make sure that Wolverine

was not just the angry guy with the claws. I

wanted to make sure that Logan was really Logan.

That you wouldn't define Cyclops by his eye beans,

but more because of his relationship to Professor

X and because of the responsibility on his shoulders.

Anyway, I worked on X -Men, and it was really

important to me. And I worked on... The first

Batman, the animated series, which was a really

groundbreaking series. I was really proud of

that show because the show really came out so

wonderfully, and I'm very proud of that show

because it was an honor to be asked to write

for it, and I got to write three pretty good

episodes. I'm not proud of it in the way it's

like my series, but I'm proud that those guys

invited me along because that was a real game

changer. I got to write for Spider -Man when

they did the Spider -Man series for Fox in the

90s. They did an extreme Ghostbusters series

that was a lot of fun. Godzilla, which was a

dream come true for me. I mean, Godzilla was

like my guy when I was a kid, and I got to do

an animated series based on it that was really

smart and not just silly, because there were

silly Godzilla shows in the past, and I was determined

to let people know that this series would not

feature Godzuki. I got to write a Jim Henson

show, which was a lot of fun because you get

to write for Muppets and cartoon characters.

There's a show called Jim Henson's Dog City,

and it was great because you got to write for

Muppets, you got to write animation, you got

to write about writers making animation, you

got to write a detective show, and you got to

write a comedy about dogs. And so you had all

these plates spinning at the same time. It was

a remarkably difficult show to write because...

Everything had to be there all at the same time.

They had to think like detectives. They had to

think like dogs. They had to move like Muppets.

They had to be funny. They had to be noir. Those

guys who were like one of those plate -spinning

guys running around trying to make all these

things happen at the same time, and that was

tricky and fun and a really goofy show. I have

friends who just loved that show when they were

growing up, which makes me feel old. It sounds

like it would be a good thing to check out. It's

a good thing to check out. It was a fun, goofy

show. It was really good. And along the way,

I worked for other shows as well, like a few

episodes here and there of different shows. But

those were kind of like the bigger highlight.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I did the Mask as well.

Story edited and wrote a bunch of episodes in

the Mask, which was a lot of fun, too. It's funny

that you've worked on Batman the Animated Series

because after this podcast ends at episode 30,

Steve and I are going to be reviewing every episode

of Batman the Animated Series on a new show called

Legends of the Dark Knight. Well, that's cool.

Are you going to talk about all the different

Batman animated series or just like that one?

Just that one and Batman Beyond. I was going

to say, you know, you really got to talk about

Batman Beyond because that show was... That show

was, to me, a miracle. I was around. I wasn't

on the series in any way. But I was around. I

knew the guys who were putting it together. And

every time I would hear about what they were

doing, I was like, well, here's the mandate.

This is what they want. They want a teenage Batman.

They want him in the future. And I'm like, this

thing is genetically engineered for failure.

There are so many ways this thing can be awful.

And what they wound up with was when they showed

the pilot, when I watched the pilot, Within the

first ten minutes, I go, this is now part of

Batman's mythology. They made this fix so hard.

Before they even got to Kevin, it was already,

okay, they really sold this fucking thing. Excuse

me, I'm really sorry. It's okay. We're explicit,

so you don't have to worry about it. This thing

is now part of Batman's mythology. As the series

went on, I mean, I think it's the best... action

-adventure series that Warner Brothers ever did.

The look, the animation, the writing, everything

about it is utterly spectacular. So I would watch

that show, you know, day after day, and I would

just be amazed. I would just be in awe. And all

the different influences in there, all the stuff

from, like, Blade Runner, all the stuff from,

like, all of Jack Kirby's work. There's a lot

of Spider -Man thrown in there, but in the best

possible way. I mean, the series... harkened

back to a lot of things without feeling derivative

in any way. And my favorite part of the show

was it's Batman in the future fighting all new

villains. They only brought back Mr. Freeze.

They brought back the Joker for a single movie.

They brought back the Azal Ghul. In a really

cool story that answers a really important question.

And aside from that... A very creepy question,

actually. Say again? A very creepy question,

actually. Well, that's a very creepy answer.

Yeah. Okay, what question was that episode designed

to answer? In a world that needs Batman, why

does Batman allow himself to be old when the

Lazarus Pit is there? Why doesn't Bruce take

a bath in the Lazarus Pit, go back to being Batman,

and fight the good fight? And if you know Batman

mythology, you know that the Lazarus Pit is there.

It makes no sense that he's not using it. And

so you do that episode, and there it is for all

time, point blank. This is why Batman absolutely

positively will not use that thing. Because he's

not Ra's al Ghul. Because he would rather age

and die than become this immortal zombie sort

of... Death is natural, and he accepts that.

I mean, it's... And, yeah, how creepy was that

episode? Yeah, it was. It's a wonderfully corny

episode. It's a very, very sad episode. And it's

a very, very dark, sad episode. And the brilliance

is... I mean, this is Paul Dini in action here.

It starts out with the funniest sequence in the

entire series. Because it starts out with that

ridiculous Andrew Lloyd Webber play based on

Batman's life. And it's... so completely ridiculous.

And they go from this incredibly light, frothy,

silly sequence to an ending that you feel like

you've been, you've had your heart ripped out.

It's one of the reasons I think Paul Dini is

one of the best people in this business, and

he remains so, you know, into decades. I mean,

he's just an incredible writer. Getting on with

the DC cartoons, do you prefer writing for DC

or Marvel? An interesting question. My heart

is really in the Marvel universe because I just

have such an absolute love for that universe.

That being said, a lot of it was because it had

this incredible continuity and it was a place

with a timeline. And since then, they've kind

of decided to shuffle everything around in ways

that retrofit things and just make things, they

sort of jumble it up. But the bottom line is,

Whatever show I'm working on, it's like I love

that universe. There are so many things I love

in the DC universe. I love the characters there.

If the show is really good and the story is really

good, I'm there a thousand percent. So it doesn't

matter to me if it's Batman or if it's Spider

-Man, as long as the story is good and as long

as the hook in the characters is really good.

If I had to choose when I was a kid between the

companies, ultimately it came down to Marvel.

But my dog is named Big Barda. So that's got

to count for something. That is awesome. And

for those of you who don't know who Big Barda

is, give yourself some points. If you don't know

who Big Barda is, Google it, read Jack Kirby's

work, and he will grow. How big is your dog?

Oh, she's a German Shepherd. Oh, nice. Excellent.

So she's very beautiful, and if you cross her,

she'll rip your throat out, just like Big Barda.

Nice. Both of these franchises have long histories

and plenty of stories already written. When writing

for cartoons, do you go back to the old stories

and revise them for television, or do you try

to create your own new original stories? That

depends on the series, and it depends on if I'm

in charge of it or not. I was not in charge in

any way of the original X -Men series, and that's

a good thing ultimately. I mean, if I had been,

I would have just taken literally. I mean, I

really wanted to do this. Just take the burned

Claremont issues and just adapt them almost verbatim

in an exact timeline. But you took this piece

of history that was just so wonderful and just

rendered it. And it would have been perfect.

It would have been incredible. It would have

been flawless. But it wouldn't have been the

series that they did. And that was an incredible

series. And I think that the series should have

its own voice and be its own thing independent

from the comics. although it should be consistent

as well at the same time. It's a huge paradox.

But here's how it cuts for me. It all comes down

to the characters and the tone. It doesn't matter,

you know, the fidelity that you have to the book,

as long as you get the characters right. I developed

X -Men Evolution, and the idea was, hey, let's

put these kids in a high school, which is a really

radical idea, taking the X -Men and putting them

in a high school. I mean, that's the dumbest

thing I've ever heard. That's where they started.

They were initially teenagers in a school. After

a while, they became freedom fighters, and so

the X -Mansion stopped being a school for mutants

and started being a haven for refugees, which

I think is kind of a mistake, but that's just

my opinion. The bottom line is we did an X -Men

series where we took extreme liberties with a

lot of the characters and a lot of the timeline

and took characters and made them teenagers whereas

they had never been shown as teenagers before.

and took a series of characters and put them

in situations that were not anything resembling

what you'd seen in the Marvel Universe. But as

long as the tone was consistent with the X -Men's

tone, the amount of seriousness, as long as the

characters remained consistent with who the characters

were, then the series would work. So you can

take Jean Grey and you can take Scott Summers.

You can take Nightcrawler. As long as you are

true to who those characters are, you can put

them in any setting and it will ring as true

because the personalities are absolutely paramount

there. And so to me, it has less to do with are

these things faithful to the comic books? It

has more to do with are the characters true to

themselves? I've done adaptations of some of

the comics. and some of them have come out very

well and some of them have come out less well.

One of my favorite stories I ever did was Captive

Hearts, which is an episode about the love triangle

between Wolverine, Cyclops, and Jean Grey. Now,

that was something I came up with based on two

panels that Chris Claremont did back in the 70s.

that nobody ever picked up on or did anything

with. And I don't remember anybody ever doing

anything really with that love triangle. So I

put it in that episode, and then it started showing

up in the comics, and right now it is the central

thing between those three characters. So I take

great pride in the fact that I introduced that,

and if you can find an instance where they really

played that up that predates that episode, let

me know and I'll start taking credit for it.

But right now, I came up with that. I'm very

proud of that. And this is a complete tangent

away from where I was going initially, which

was Captive Hearts is a story about those three

characters. It's based on an issue of the X -Men

in which Wolverine wasn't there, Cyclops wasn't

there, and Jean Grey was dead. So putting these

characters in the center of a story where none

of them were even in the book at that point,

it shows you what a departure you can make while

still keeping the story structure essentially

there. This is the story that introduced the

Morlocks, it introduced Callisto, and if you

look at it structurally, the structure of the

story is very close to the comics, but the cast

of characters is very different, and the theme

of the story is very different because we're

following the theme of these three characters,

and they weren't there initially. What happens

in the animated series is that Callisto kidnaps

Scott because he's a brave leader, and she figures

if he helps her sire children, then the Morlocks

will always have great leaders. Initially, what

she had done was she had kidnapped Angel, and

she was going to use him as breeding stock. But

because we used different characters, it changed

the theme of the whole thing. It wasn't faithful

to the original story. It was completely different.

but it was really, really good and it captured

a lot of the essence of what made the original

story good as well. I did an adaptation of Days

of Future Past, which was a lot closer to Days

of Future Past. I remember that episode. I remember

it in the actual comics. Right. And here's the

thing. It's one of the most unforgettable comics

of all time. It redefined the X -Men and in many

ways it redefined the Marvel Universe. The episode

that we did was one of the most forgettable half

hours of children's television ever done. So,

whereas I'm very proud of the things that I did

that worked out very, very well, I'm also very

cognizant of the fact that whereas I would love

to have done a faithful adaptation of Days of

Future Past, what we wound up with ultimately

when we did that story was something that did

not live up to anywhere near the original subject

matter. What I'm hoping is someday, you know

how Marvel does all these made -for -DVD movies?

I'm hoping that it sits down and says, okay,

you know what? Let's do Days of Future Past.

Let's do it the right way. Let's do it as the

story was told in the comics. Let's do it for

keeps, and let's do it right. I've never actually

read that comic, but I loved that episode. I

loved all the time -traveling episodes in the

X -Men series. I don't know. I'm a sucker for

time travel. Where's the DeLorean when you really

need one? Besides cartoons, our podcasts... What

were you going to say, Bob? Hold on. Before we

leave that topic, if you loved that episode,

I'm going to tell you something that I've never

admitted before, and it's going to get me beaten

up, but there you go. I know Harlan Ellison,

and I love the guy. I love him as a writer. For

those of you who don't know, he wrote the City

on the Edge of Forever episode of Star Trek,

which is one of the greatest time travel stories

of all time. He also wrote some episodes of Outer

Limits, including one called Soldier, which was

utterly incredible. And he also wrote Demon with

a Glass Hand, which is unbelievable. And the

reason I bring up those three is, if you put

those three together, you get The Terminator.

which is why, at the end of The Terminator, they

credit Harlan Ellison saying that they acknowledge

his works. Because when the movie first came

out, they didn't acknowledge it, and James Cameron

said that he really enjoyed and was influenced

by The Outer Limits when he was writing Terminator,

and Harlan Ellison was like, well, wait a minute,

that's my stuff. I mean, you can't just use all

my ideas and not credit me. What the hell is

that about? So they had... some discussion. The

next thing you know, there's an agreement reached

that nobody can talk about. But one of the facets

of it that is visible is Harlan Ellison's name

is on the Terminator. Why am I bringing all this

up? Oh, yeah, right. Okay. I know Harlan. I love

Harlan. I'm hoping he doesn't punch me in the

nose. In Demon with a Glass Hand, that episode

of Outer Limits, it's the actress Arlene Martell

who plays T 'Pring in Star Trek. I bring that

up for no reason whatsoever. Anyway, you have

these time -traveling aliens who are coming back

to Earth to stop the human race from being able

to survive this upcoming catastrophe. And the

way these guys are able to travel through time

is they wear these time -travel devices around

their necks. And when you fight them, if you

can grab onto it and rip it off, these guys get

thrown into the future. And, you know, goodbye.

You're not a problem anymore. So when... We were

coming up with the Days of Future Past story.

We decided to incorporate Bishop. And so Bishop

came back in time instead of Kitty Pryde, which

is how it was initially. So it's like, okay,

well, we need to have Bishop travel back through

time. He's not going to travel back into his

own mind in the past the way Kitty Pryde did.

How are we going to have him travel back in time?

And so why don't we have Forge as this old guy

who comes up with this device that sends him

back in time? And the question is, how do we

send him back forward in time when he gets to

be a problem for our guys? And so what I came

up with was, Forge comes up with this armband,

which is kind of a temporal device that enables

him to remain somewhat outside time, which enables

him to travel back in time. So he's got this

armband on so that when he's fighting our guys

and becomes a problem and we need to get him

out of the way, like Rogue or whoever grabs the

armband, rips it off, and he gets... shunted

right back into the future. So I'm hereby declaring

to my great shame and pride, I got that from

Harlan Ellison. I got that from Dean with a Glass

Hand. I freely admit it. It was a good lift because

it made the story happen. But I'm not going to

not admit the fact that I was heavily influenced

by and used a really cool device that Harlan

had come up with. Besides cartoons, our podcasts

mostly revolve around Transformers. Let's talk

about some Beast Machines stuff. How did you

first get involved with Beast Machines? I was

doing a lot of work at Fox in the 1990s. Fox

was fantastic to be at. It was a great place.

The executives were fantastic. They were doing

great shows, and they were doing them the right

way, and they really understood what the properties

were about and how to do them right instead of

dumbing them down and making them safe for children.

which is why the original X -Men series was so

much about civil rights and why the original

Batman series was so noir and dark and it was

all kind of, it wasn't silly or frothy. Anyway,

Fox was a great place to be. And when they were

doing all the Marvel shows, I said, I've got

to do Avengers. You've got to do Avengers. So

they got the rights to do a whole bunch of the

Marvel shows. And this will be back to Transformers,

I promise. They got the rights to a bunch of

the Marvel properties, and I said, I really,

really want to do Avengers. I really want to

do Avengers. I don't want to do Captain America.

I don't want to do Iron Man. I want to do all

the ones that no one's heard of before, because

it would be really cool to do the Vision and

the Scarlet Witch and Wonder Man and Tigra. And

lo and behold, I got to develop that because

the other characters, like Captain America and

Thor, weren't available. So it lined up really

nicely, and I got to develop my dream project.

I wrote this Bible that was fantastic. I was

really, really proud of my work on it. And I

was waiting with bated breath for them to greenlight

the show so I could do the show that I really

desperately wanted to do. Okay, that's backstory.

I was called in for some meetings to do a new

Transformers series because they were going to

do a new Transformers series. Beast Wars was

in syndication. It was wrapping up. Fox had an

interest in doing a CGI Transformers series to

follow on its heels. So they called me and my

writing partner, Marty, in to talk about the

series, and they told us what they were looking

for. And I was so eager to meet these people

because it was a new set of executives over at,

you know, like, to me, they were new executives

at Hasbro. These were people I'd never met before

over at Mainframe. So I got to meet a whole bunch

of new people. talk with them and sort of introduce

myself and they got to know, you know, hey, this

guy's a pretty good guy. We'd like to work with

him. Because I figured it would open doors for

me and I could work for Mainframe. As somebody

who worked on X -Men, who needed X -Men to be

right because I was such a big fan, I had absolute

respect for the fact that Transformers had a

fan base that was so excited about it. And I...

didn't think I was a viable candidate to work

on the show because I was not a huge Transformer

fan or a Transformer veteran or a Transformer

expert. So I figured, okay, I'm not going to

get this gig, but I'll meet these really cool

people. And they asked us if we had any ideas

for what we wanted to do with a Beast Wars sequel,

which then was called Beast Wars. which you couldn't

call Beast Wars anyway because around the world

they wanted to put the words war in the title

of a show, which is why the show was called Beasties.

Anyway, I didn't think I would get the show.

They would never hire us. I mean, no, we had

nothing to offer. They asked us what we would

do with the series if we were given a Beast Wars

series to do, and I kind of nodded politely and

smiled. made murmuring noises. He didn't come

up with any ideas because we didn't have any.

And then it turns out that there was a wonderful

development that was written by Marv Wolfman.

He did this, he wrote up a Bible and came up

with these incredible characters and some scenario

and it was really something terrific. And Marv

had not story edited any series for Fox and didn't

have a big relationship. with a lot of the executives

there whereas marty and i had a huge run of success

so the executives there knew us and liked us

and totally trusted us and so i take no pride

in the fact that they offered the gig to marty

and i to finalize development on and spearhead

the series that marv had developed so we kept

So, you know, we had Marv there to write a bunch

of the episodes and stuff. But I can take no

credit for the development on these machines,

which it ultimately became called. It was given

to us very, very much from Marv. So we were invited

to write for the series because we had a great

relationship at Fox. And 20 minutes after they

offered it to us and we said, yes, we'd love

to do it, sure. 20 minutes later, we get the

phone call saying, congratulations, we've greenlit

Avengers. And I'm like, that's my dream project.

That's fantastic. Oh, no. I can't say yes to

it because I just committed to another series.

And just so you guys know, as a professional,

if you commit to a series, you've committed.

So you can't just say, oh, the thing I like better

came along, so see ya. You can't do that. I was

committed to Beast Machines, and it cost me my

opportunity to write for my dream show. And,

you know, that's the way it goes. I mean, you

know you're in a wonderful position when you

can say no to a dream project because you're

working on something, you know, else, bigger,

whatever. Well, you mentioned Dream Project.

Are you, have any of the executives that are

doing Avengers, Earth, Mightiest Heroes now,

that new series, have they offered you to write

on any of those episodes? I'm not working on

that, no. I haven't seen it yet. I don't know

if it's airing yet. It's not bad. What I've seen

of it has looked really, really good. I would

love to have written for it, but I don't know

any of the executives currently at Marvel, and

I don't know the story editors who are working

there. So I wasn't really in the running. By

the time I found out about it and was able to

contact people, it was kind of too late. They've

got great people. It's going to be probably a

really, really terrific show. But, you know,

I wasn't there for that one, and I kind of regret

that. As far as Beast Machines goes, how much

of Marv's original Bible made it into the series?

Was it just copied from the Bible, or did you

guys take liberties here and there from his original

treatment? The answer is both. When we first

came in, they gave us a mandate. They said, we

want to do something really, really different.

We want to do a series, which is a science fiction

story, but we want to have a really, really spiritual

undertone. And I'm like, I'm sorry, what? You

know, we want to have like, you know, sort of

a, you know, you know, a very rich kind of spiritual.

And I'm thinking like, no, there's not really

seriously here. You make it sound like it's going

to be like a religious epic or something. And

they were like, well, you know, we want to do

something, you know, very spiritual. And I'm

like, okay. Now, Mars did not have that facet

to it. So all the stuff that you see that's spiritual

are things that Marty and I brought to it. And

a lot of it are things that, well, I came up

with the harebrained idea of, why don't we do

a 26 -episode for television novel? Why don't

we make this thing a singular story with a really

strong through line and just make it like one

long story? There's no filler there. If they

want to make it spiritual, why don't I put the

pedal to the floor and make it so outlandishly,

you know, like this giant religious epic, that

they're going to start pulling it back. I want

to see how far they'll let me go with this. And

the further we went, the more enthusiastic they

were and the more they let us do it. And I'm

like, okay, well, great. Because, I mean, I want

to do things that are new. I want to do things

that are meaningful. I don't want to tell stories

where things blow up for no apparent reason.

I want to do something where people argue about

things and they're all defensible and right.

I didn't want Megatron to be, you know, a villain.

I wanted him to have a point of view. I wanted

all of our characters to see the world very,

very differently. And so as a consequence, people

who watch the show, some people started with

Megatron because they really, really liked the

idea of, you know, let's make them all robots.

And for me, initially when we talked about what

the core concept was going to be, the initial

idea was, well, you know, nature versus technology.

Like, you know, that seems kind of obvious. And

my personal feeling was, It's not that simple.

I mean, if we got rid of all our technology and

went back to nature, we'd all have dysentery.

We'd be dying of the plague. Excuse my language.

There'd be shit everywhere because we don't have

plumbing. Renaissance pleasure fairs aside, we

don't want to go back to nature. What we really

want is a balance. between technology and nature

so that we get the best of both and so that they're

both kind of fused together in the best possible

balance. And so that's where the series became

about the characters being, you know, techno

-organic, which I didn't come up with that. I'm

not saying I came up with all the techno -organic

stuff because that was part of the design they

were coming up with. They wanted to do a series

that was very, very original and since they had

done robots. Since they had done animals into

robots, why not do things that were half robot

and half animal and make them kind of like you

can't tell where one ends and where it begins?

And so the idea of having it, why don't we do

this techno -organic thing where it becomes a

series about finding a balance as opposed to

going to one extreme or another. So Megatron

represents being in the extreme of only technology.

Whereas our heroes come to a place, and it takes

them a while to come to it, come to a place where

it's like, okay, this is about finding a balance.

So that was, to me, the core conflict. And it

served us very well. And I'm very glad it wasn't

just nature versus technology because that's

very obvious. And it's also, to my way of thinking,

very, very wrong. But this is the kind of stuff

that we talked about after Marv's involvement.

Marv came up with the idea of, you know, they

go back to Cybertron. Megatron's in charge. All

guys are on the run. There was these things called

Viacons. You know, one of them is Tank or one

of them is... I think it was like... Originally,

it was like... Some of the characters had different...

Skybolt. Jetstorm was initially called something

else. And we changed some of the names. But most

of what you see there, including the fact that,

you know, some of the characters that we see

were other characters before who have changed.

I don't remember if Pankra was initially Rionox

or not. I don't know if that was something that

we added to it or it was initially there with

Marv. I don't recall that. All I know is that

pretty much we used everything Marv had. We didn't

throw any of that over the side, but we added

a lot to it. And so all the spiritual stuff and

a lot of the characterization stuff were things

that we added on to what he was doing. But the

things that he gave, every one of his ideas were

incredible. And to this day, I feel bad that

I got the job that kind of rightfully should

have been his because if he had a great Bible,

he's the one who should have been hired. But,

you know, I can't feel bad that, you know, I

can't feel guilty that they wanted to hire Marty

and I because they wanted to hire us based on

a good relationship they had with us. I just

feel bad that Mark got in a way very, very slighted

that way. So I'm hereby acknowledging everything

that Marv did because it was so absolutely critical

to that series. Speaking of the series changing,

as the series progressed, we noticed that more

and more of the Beast Wars personalities began

to emerge. For example, Rattrap began to joke

around more, invent gadgets. With the end of

the second season, just as Megatron started to

go back to his old personality, Inserting more

of the yes and more of his original personality

traits. Were you purposely trying to incorporate

things from the previous series? The honest answer

to that is really no. The honest answer is we

just followed the characters. As Rattrap was

there, we just had to find more and more things

for Rattrap to do, so he'd be building stuff

and finding fun things to do. His character was

always a funny character. If we found progressively

funnier things for him to say or to do or whatever,

then great, we did. Like making out with Botanica?

Say that again now? Like making out with Botanica?

Now, that is one of the most interesting moments

in the entire series for me. Because I wrote

the outline for that. That was entirely mine.

And I did not know they were going to kiss until

they were kissing. That's God's honest truth.

Those characters decided on their own that they

were right for each other. It's one of these

things where when you put two people in a room

together and they absolutely don't belong together,

they're going to gravitate to each other. You

know, Princess Leia is prim and proper. She'd

like to be. Han Solo is, you know, a pirate at

heart. He's a rogue. So you put the two together,

you're going to have fireworks. What happened

with Britannica and Rattrap where it was, these

two people did not belong in a scene together.

Absolutely didn't. So I'm like, hey, let's throw

these two together. It'd be fun having them locked

in a room together, you know? Now they're going

to deal with each other. And the next thing I

knew, we're locking lips. Like, all right, guys.

Go to it. But I didn't do that. They did it.

And I think that's when you can tell something's

really working for you, when the characters start

making decisions without you making the decisions

for them. I had read something similar to that,

where I had read something that you had said

before, which was that it happened without you

knowing it was going to happen. And I thought

that that meant that... Oh, he sent off the giraffe

to the animators, and the animators thought,

oh, it wouldn't be funny if they started smooching.

No, it's kind of the opposite, actually, because

at first what happened was they kissed. Then

they stopped and kind of looked at each other,

you know, like shabby, and go, oh, I don't know

what happened. Then they kissed again. And then

we had a note back going, okay, they're just

going to kiss once. And I thought, well, it's

more funny if they kiss and they're embarrassed

about it than they go back again. than if they

just do it and they're just locked there. So

my initial idea was they realize that they've

kissed after they kiss, and then they start kissing.

But what happened was I didn't know they were

going to do this until the characters. The animators,

you know, we came up with that because the characters

came up with that. I had no idea they were going

to do that until I was writing it. So for those

of you out there who are, like, aspiring writers,

there comes a point where your characters start

talking to you, and there comes a point when

your characters start doing things that you didn't

know they were going to do. The truism, like

they said in writing, you know you're a great

writer when your characters are kind of alive,

and when your characters, you know your writing

is working for you when your characters begin

to surprise you. I thought I knew what that meant,

but I really didn't know what that meant until

I wrote a scene like that where I looked at the

page and I'm like, what are you people doing?

So there you go. If you could do another Transformers

series today, what would you do? If I could do

another Transformers series today, I would do

the one they're doing now. Have you guys watched

Transformers Prime yet? Oh, yeah. I've seen the

first three episodes of the five -parter, and

it's just amazing. Well, I'm not involved with

the series. I have no vested interest in the

series whatsoever. That being said, I have read

the first 26 episodes, and you guys have no idea

what you're in for. It is so great. And I'm reading

the scripts with awe and envy. I'm like, I would

love to work on this thing because the writing

is fantastic. The stories are fantastic. And

the characters, I mean, I'm reading this thing

and I'm like salivating. I'm having a wonderful

time. So if you guys like what you're seeing

so far, okay, this is an analogy for you. You

know the Padre sequence in Phantom Menace? Yeah.

Okay. Imagine at the very end of the pod racing,

you realize that's what it's like when they're

just revving up their engines. The time you finish

this five -part episode, you're going to realize,

as amazing as that was, they're just revving

up their engines. So where the series goes, it's

great. So you guys are in for a real, real treat.

Yeah, I'm... I'm loving everything about it so

far, and I've only seen the first three episodes

of the five -parter. I can't wait until February.

You have no idea what's coming. It's so great.

So the short answer is, if I could do a Transformers

series, I want to do one just like the one they're

doing now. Well, maybe you can get in on season

two, maybe run an episode for season two if they

get a callback for season two. There is going

to be a season two, and I think they're going

to do a spectacular job. Once again, I would

love to be on board. I'm not on board. But the

bottom line is, wow, it's really something to

look forward to. So, yeah, there's... Much better

than the movies. Anything, but I will say, wow.

Nice. Very nice. For me, it's thrilling when

I can read people's work and instead of saying,

well, I would have said it this way or I would

have said it that way or, oh, I saw that coming

or, oh, that would have been better. Instead,

I'm reading these scripts going, oh, wow. And

that's what you want. Yeah. So, yeah. Very nice.

Yeah, I remember saying a while back to these

two, that Ortsey and Kurtzman are capable of

writing a very good Transformers story, as long

as you don't have Michael Bay coming in and putting

a stamp on it. Oh, yes. That would be awesome.

But we won't get into that. Anyway, the next

question. We like to hear it when voice actors

have action figures. from all the characters

that they've given voices to. Did you collect

the action figures from the Beast Machines line?

I didn't because most of the designs didn't look

like the characters that they were on a series.

So whereas I would buy the X -Men characters

that I wrote because Wolverine looks like Wolverine,

and whereas I was thrilled to buy the Spike action

figure, the X -Men Spike, not Buffy. I was thrilled

to buy that because I created that character.

So I was like, oh, my God, here's an X -Man,

and I created him, and he's a doll. When I saw

the Transformers characters, I mean, you know,

refresh my memory. I mean, maybe I'm wrong about

this, but as I recall, the Beast Machines figures

weren't based completely on what the characters

looked like on screen. No, they weren't. They

were way off in most cases. Very different. So

because they weren't on model, I didn't feel

like, You know, it's like, hey, look at this.

I created this because I did. So if they had

made them look like they looked in the TV show,

I would have been, you know, thrilled. But I

didn't want to have the figures that there was

something other than what I created because I

would have felt almost fraudulent having them

on my wall. But if I write a series, I want some

action figures based on the characters that I

wrote because it just, you know, it's a matter

of pride saying, yes, I have some. investment

in that character. So I have this great maquette

of Rogue in my room because I wrote the Rogue's

Tale and I am so proud of that episode. Nice.

Yeah, it took a little while for the Beast Machines

figures to really start looking like the characters

on the TV. Speaking of one they never made was

the Cloak Megatron. Right. If they had made figures

that looked like those shows, I would have loved

to have had them. Especially Grand Maul Megatron,

the giant Megatron head. I would love to have

had that. Well, they had the head, but it didn't

turn into a ship. It turned into a robot. Okay.

But they didn't have the first form of Megatron

where you turn from the dragon to the cloak.

Right. Which would have been cool. I spend a

lot of time talking about the Marvel shows and

stuff, I guess because there's so much history

there. But I want to really focus on Beast Machines

to say, just so it's said out loud, that is the

piece of work I am most proud of. That's the

piece of work that I think was the most thematically

rich. It was the characters that were the most

vibrant and alive for me that I got to explore

and really kind of grow with. I felt like because

we came up with a story on such a grand scale

and got to follow our whims with it, being guided

by Hasbro and Mainframe, I mean, it wasn't like

we did things without them. I mean, they weren't

uninvolved, but they also gave us such incredible

latitude that they gave us guidance and they

didn't inhibit us from doing anything we really,

really wanted to do. I just want to say out loud

that I absolutely, positively loved working on

that show, and I am more proud of that show than

anything else I have worked on because we got

to work on such a big scale and because we got

to work with such incredible characters. I did

not want that to get lost with all my gobbledygook

talking about Marvel and X -Men and stuff like

that. We like to hear about everything you've

done. But good as an experience as you had writing

on Beast Machines, You also had a lot of grief

from the fans, and I wanted to talk about that

a little bit, if we could. Sure. It's well known

that you prefer to write about characters that

use their brains instead of their guns, and Batman

falls into this category. But at one point, this

was bent all out of context by certain fans.

To paraphrase, let's say... Bob Skeer hates America

and policemen and freedom because he hates people

that use guns. What can you tell us about this?

I can tell you a hell of a lot about that. I'm

not a big fan of guns overall. I'm just not.

We're coming up to next week, the 30th anniversary

of John Lennon's murder, and that was one of

the most terrible moments of my life. when I

heard that he had been killed so utterly senselessly

because some guy with a history of mental problems

was able to just blithely walk up, buy a gun,

cross the street, and shoot one of the most pivotal

figures of the 20th century. I mean, I don't

have the words. I've always hated handguns. That

being said, it had nothing to do with beast machines.

The bottom line on beast machines is, that we

were doing a series for a network. And the network's,

you know, mandate was no guns. They were able

to sneak them in on shows like Batman by being

able to, you know, we were using Doc Deco machines,

which were Tommy guns, but because they were

able to, you know, sneak them through that way.

If you used guns in any of the shows, they had

to be futuristic blasters and ray guns and things

like that. And a lot of the shows, a lot of the

stuff on Beast Wars, although they were futuristic

plasma guns, they were very clearly Gatling guns.

They were very clearly rifles. They were very,

very clearly. They were using guns to the point

where they were doing like Sergio Leone movies,

which I thought was the coolest thing I'd ever

seen. They were even doing this. The good, the

bad, the ugly stuff where time would just stand

still. Right. The John Woo diving through the

air in slow motion with all the shell casings

flying out. Yeah. But they also did that thing

that Sergio Leone did where you have these three

guys in a standoff that takes one instant for

them to look at each other, but it takes five

minutes to experience because time stretches.

And I'm watching this stuff in Beast Wars and

going, this is fucking great. But when we did

Beast Wars, It's like, well, okay, you're on

a network now. You can't use guns. And I'm thinking,

I don't want to use guns. Not because I'm against

guns, although I am, although I'm not. I mean,

when I write screenplays, I have characters using

guns. When I watch TV, I watch people using guns.

I'm not like, oh, my God, there are guns. I mean,

my personal preference is against them. In drama,

it's a different thing. But here's the bottom

line. If you have robots that can turn into all

these different forms and you do all these different

things, then they themselves are inherently weapons.

They don't need weapons. They are weapons. The

X -Men don't need weapons. Why? They are weapons.

You're not going to give Cyclops a gun because

anybody can hold a gun. Cyclops has these eye

beams. The more impressive, the more interesting

things you can make him do with those beams,

the cooler he is with the character. You put

a gun in his hand, he just becomes a guy with

a gun. He did a joke cover with the Hulk once

where the Hulk is holding this giant gun that's

bigger than he is. And it's a hilarious cover.

It's a gag because he's the Hulk. He doesn't

need a gun. This is Elektra, where, you know,

Elektra has this, she's holding this gun, once

again, bigger than she is. And it's a gag because

Elektra could kill you with a paperclip from

500 yards. She don't need no gun. So it's kind

of a joke, too. So when you have characters who

can do these magnificent things, you don't need

to give them guns. They can do magnificent things.

They don't need a gun. Now, And on the board,

somebody was like, well, wait a minute. You think

the people who use guns are cowards? They're

bad? Well, what about my dad was a police officer,

and he saved the lives of six people because

he had a gun. And if he didn't have that gun,

those people would be dead right now. So you're

calling him a coward? He was a hero. And then

suddenly everybody chimes in going, yeah, Bob

Skier says this guy's a coward. And, oh, my God,

he hates heroes, and he hates police. And I'm

thinking, how did this happen? Yeah. And my argument

to that is very simple, is I don't even know

if this story, maybe this guy's father was a

cop, maybe his father wasn't a cop, maybe the

whole thing is made up. I mean, let's take the

position that the story is absolutely 100 % true,

that this guy's father is a cop, that the situation

did happen, that he saved these people's lives,

he saved their lives using a gun, and that everything

he said is completely true and that's how it

really happened. And I'm thinking, Godspeed,

it's wonderful he saved those people's lives,

and I'm sorry he had to use a gun. I'm sure he

did too. But sometimes you have to use the force

that you have. Sometimes you have to use the

weapons that you have. Okay, well, that's fine.

Would he have been as heroic if he had the power

to cling to walls, shoot webs from his wrists,

move at spider speed with spider strength, and

had used a gun? No. He would have been more heroic.

If he had the ability to do these other things,

he wouldn't have needed to use that gun. So my

point is, if you have a superhero with superpowers,

you don't diminish him by using something that

pretty much anybody can pick up and use. You

have him do things that nobody else can do. So

if you have Spider -Man, you make him do things

that only Spider -Man can do. If you have Optimus,

you have him do things that only Optimus can

do. If you have... Rat Trap, you have them do

things that only Rat Trap can do. And that makes

the characters distinct and unique. So my argument

against having guns for heroes is that heroes,

superheroes, don't need guns. If I say that heroes

don't need guns, then you think, oh, so some

guy in Iraq, he's not a hero if he uses a gun?

That's certainly not what I'm saying. So does

that figure that out? That's an excellent explanation.

Thank you very much for that. Now, the way I

see it is that the Internet is a dark, scary,

and very anonymous place, and there are people

who will say things and make allegations for

no real good reason and because they know that

it can't be traced back to them in real life.

So if things get blown out of proportion, it's

no fault of your own. It's just, like I said,

the Internet's a dark, scary place. Just call

it what it is. I mean, it's cyberbullying. I

mean, these are people who are probably science

fiction fans. They're probably, you know, into

all kinds of stuff that gets them a lot of unwanted

attention at school. Maybe they get pushed around,

maybe not. But they have real strong opinions

about the things that they like. And they have

such strong opinions that they're going to air

them. And online, people can be as extreme as

they want to be. Right. With anonymity. So whereas

these people ordinarily be like, I get bullied.

I would never be a bully. Well, maybe they don't

see it as bullying. But when you hide in the

anonymity of your room and you say the most hurtful

things you can say to people and you do a community

because they're not going to. Elvis Costello

has a song where he says, you know what? You're

going to put this stuff on the Internet. If you

think that makes you brave, say it when you're

standing in front of me. Yeah. And I don't think

anybody who said the things that they were saying,

you know, would be so vastly impolite in person.

I don't think that they would, you know, I'm

not saying, oh, they're all cowards. They're

just hiding. I don't think that people would

be that strident standing in front of somebody

else. I just don't think it's natural for them.

Exactly. I think that whereas these people would

not think of themselves as bullying. what they

were doing was there was a lot of cyberbullying

going on. And whereas I was really disappointed

by how hurtful that they were being toward me,

what was more hurtful would be how some of them

were treating each other. Such that if somebody

was there saying, and this virtually happened,

like almost literally, oh, Bob Skeer sucks. He's

horrible. All these shows are terrible. He should

never work again. This is horrible. And somebody

else would respond. you know, I think you're

being a little, you know, closed -minded. I think

that you're being a little extreme in your points

of view. And the response to that from the original

poster was, you're trying to censor me. You're

horrible. You're a Nazi. You won't let me express

my opinions. And I'm like, you have simply got

to be joking. Exactly. Speaking of a loud and

opinionated fandom. The story goes that you received

death threats from old -school Transformer fans

that didn't appreciate the path that the Beast

Machine story took. Is this true? And if so,

what exactly was said? There were no death threats.

I mean, there were people who would say things

like, you know, oh, Bob Skeeter should die and

so should his family. I mean, things like, not

literally, but so. And they would say things

that were that bald -faced. Insulting. But nobody

said, I'm going to hunt him down and shoot him.

Nobody said, if he shows up at VodCon, I'm going

to punch him in the face or I'm going to string

him up or anything. I mean, nobody actually made

an actual tangible threat to me. They didn't.

If they had, you would have the evidence of it

because people would just repost it and say,

you know, they would cut and paste it into an

email saying, hey, look at what this guy is saying.

Or if somebody had said that directly to me,

I would have cut and pasted it and said, hey,

Transformer fans, is this really one of you?

And then people would have weighed in saying,

hey, he's right, we should kill you. Or they

would have chimed in saying, hey, what a dick.

We're sorry that people are like that. We're

not all dicks. You once bowed out of a BotCon

appearance. The rumor is going that you were

uncomfortable with some of the fans. What is

the real story there? The real story is very

simple, and I'm very sorry that I did that, because

in retrospect, I realized, I let them know at

short notice I wasn't going to be there, which

is something I would never do again, for the

simple reason that they advertise people's presence

as being there. So they sold people's tickets

saying, you know, these eight people will be

there, and one of them is Bob Skier. And I'm

not saying that I was a big draw. I'm just saying

that if they're going to advertise I'm going

to be there and I commit to being there, I have

a commitment to be there. And I'm sorry I backed

out on that. And I'm also sorry because they

went to, I'm sure that they made arrangements

and did all kinds of things to make it possible

for me to be there. And so I just feel it was,

in retrospect, irresponsible of me to back out

virtually at the last minute. The bottom line

is simply this. I was approached by a fan. to

have an interaction with the fans early on in

Beast Machines. They said, hey, the fans would

love to know what's going to happen. They'd love

to talk with you. You know, Transformer fans

are wonderful, and we'd really love to have an

open dialogue. And I'm thinking, I've never had

this opportunity that sounds like fun. So I went

online, and I answered questions, and the next

thing I know, you know, everyone's parsing every...

every comma in whatever I'm posting. Everybody's

taking me overly literally. Everybody's like

becoming really, really unpleasant. And then

when the show aired, the people who were out

there who were extremely insulting and extremely

nasty and extremely antagonistic toward each

other and toward me, I mean, there was such a

bad attitude out there that I felt like, you

know what? Why should I fly hundreds of miles

to be in a hotel surrounded by people who are

going to be nasty. So I wasn't afraid someone

was going to, like, kill me. I wasn't afraid

someone was going to, like, punch me in the nose.

But I also, my experience with the loudest of

the fans was so unpleasant that I just imagined

I'm going to go there and be surrounded by unpleasantness.

Now, I realized in retrospect from years of going

to, like, Comic -Con that I would be approached

by people who would be very complimentary about

the show, and that if I had gone there, I think

that a lot of people would have been a lot more

polite and a lot nicer, and it probably would

have been a good experience. I'd love to go to

a sitcom in the future and would never back out

again. But at that point, I looked at things

in terms of a big picture. Comic -Con was like

the week before. I was going to spend an entire

weekend inside a hotel. It was the middle of

the summer, and I'm thinking, I'm going to spend

the whole, the nicest weekend in the summer in

a hotel in San Diego instead of, like, using

the time outside. The following week, I can fly

800 miles, be surrendered by people who hate

me, and be stuck in a hotel again. Or I can drive

up to Malibu. I can lie on the beach. I can look

at, I'm going to be really shallow here, beautiful

women. I can watch dolphins swimming back and

forth. Angry Transformer fans, dolphins. Angry

Transformer fans, the beach. Angry Transformer

fans, lobster salad for dinner. Angry Transformer

fans, I'm going to be very shallow, beautiful

women in bikinis. It's an easy choice. My resistance

was not to fly 8 ,000 miles, but to drive 20

miles, go to the beach and have a nice day, as

opposed to... you know, subjecting myself to

some people who are going to be very unpleasant.

Once again, I would never do that again. Having

committed to being at an event, I would certainly

go. And if I was ever invited to VodCon again,

I would love to go, especially since so much

time has passed since the series first aired

that I think a lot of the heated passions that

people felt about the series would have long

since abated. And I think that people would have

a much more, circumspect way of looking at things,

being that it's not the latest series, that the

universe has moved on since then, and since they

could look at that series in isolation and not

as the latest, last, final word that is. I think

people were afraid that, you know, from now on,

Transformers will go down this road and we'll

never see our Transformers again. And now that

enough time has passed, we can see, okay, well,

this was, you know... a small segment of, you

know, the Transformers mythology, which we can

accept or not accept. And we have all this other

stuff we've moved on to and all these other things

they're doing now. So I think that people would

be, I think that people today, people who even

hated the series back then, would be a lot less

hateful about it now. I think that right now

the same people who are like, hey, Bob Skeer

should die, his whole family should be suffering.

You know, those same people today would probably

be like, you know, I really hated that series.

Yeah. Well, plus, when you're at a convention,

the anonymity is not there anymore. I really

hated your series rather than, you know, Bob

Skewer and his family should die. And actually,

the hurtful thing was that my father had just

passed away. And hearing people say such hateful

things at a time when I was dealing with something

so profound. And in fact, here's the thing is

that my father died while we were doing the Transformers

series. And so... We were on these incredibly

tight deadlines. We were working very much under

the gun. We were working really, really hard.

And I put every bit of myself into that series.

And when you're dealing with something that's

such a profound loss, and at the same time, you're

working as hard as you can work, and you're working

a series, when your story's in a series, when

you're shepherding a series, as opposed to just

running episodes, that show is with you 24 -7.

Your last thought... At night is, what do I need

to do tomorrow? Your first thought when you wake

up is, what do I have to do today? And it's with

you literally 24 -7, to the point where this

is true. At one point, I met a friend for lunch

one day. And I thought to myself, I hope nobody

knows I'm out here doing this. I suddenly realized,

oh, my God, I'm working so hard on this series.

I don't think I'm entitled to leave my house

to eat. And it's a feeling because it's all -consuming

because you feel like it's really, really in

that universe. But at the same time, I mean,

how much more could I possibly put into a series?

How much more could I possibly, you know, invest

myself? And then you turn around and have people

say such hateful things to me. So, was I afraid

for my life? No. Was my life threatened? No.

Did I back out of a convention? Yes. because

I had given people everything I had and they

treated me with such disdain and such disrespect.

It didn't have to do with fear. It had to do

with disrespect. And I don't know that I've ever

treated anybody with that level of disrespect.

And for me to deal with something that I was

dealing with at that point in my life and to

be greeted for my efforts would be such vehemence

and mindless vehemence. That's perfectly understandable.

For me, because I was like, like I said to you

a little bit before we started, I said to you

off -air that I wasn't really in, I've been a

Transformers fan since the first series, the

G1 series, but I knew of Beast Wars and Beast

Machines, but I didn't really get into it. So

during that whole time that those two series

were running, I wasn't that into it. I had just

started re -watching Beast Machines, I don't

know, about two years ago, and I got the DVD

set late last year, actually. When I first got

this DVD set, I was like, okay, I'm going to

put this in. I put it in disc one, and the next

thing I know, it was a day and a half later,

and I had watched all 26 episodes in a row, and

I love it. It's just amazing. So with that said...

That's very gratifying to hear. Thank you very

much for saying that. I'm very touched, so thank

you. We were surprised to not see you listed

next to Marty Eisenberg in the Transformers animated

credits. Is this because of the bad treatment

that you had received from your last role as

a TF writer? Did they ever approach you on the

previous series, the animated show that was done

in 2008? They did not. Marty and I parted ways

in 2002. We broke up our partnership and the

two of us were working very, very independently.

Marty was offered the series. As the two of us

were not working together, I did not work on

it. So, you know, it has nothing to do with me

and the Transformers or anything. It was just

a matter of me and Marty no longer being partners.

Can we ask what happened between the two of you

in 2002? Yeah, it's very simple. It's that we

grew apart, you know? I mean, the two of us were

friends for a very long time, and we decided

it would be fun to work together and write together,

so we did. We had a great time working together.

Because we were both really good writers, because

we had a really strong partnership, we made up

for strengths and weaknesses and whatever. We

made up for each other's weaknesses and we increased

each other's strengths, which is what you'd want

from a partnership. We were really, really good

writing partners. But over time, we were writing

much more and more independently from each other.

And we would each take a show and write an episode

and send it back and forth to each other. And

we found that over time, we needed less and less

help from each other. And so we just felt like

it was almost stifling being tied to each other.

I mean, there were just times where I just felt

like I just want to work on something myself

and he wanted to work on something himself. So

over time, it just felt like we just wanted to

be more independent. Marty got married and had

kids. I did not get married and didn't have kids.

And so we had very, very different life priorities.

And so just by virtue of that, we just found

ourselves growing apart. And so it reached a

point where it's like, you know what? You know,

let's just shake hands and go our separate ways

and just, you know, have our own lives and have

our own careers. And that's kind of what we did.

What is your favorite character type to write

for? Heroes, villains, or is there another type

of character you like better? And for you, who

gets the best lines? I think everybody gets the

best lines as long as they're writing from their

own point of view. I think that a tertiary character

like Gambit can be just as funny or add just

as much to a story as a character who really

belongs in the forefront like Cyclops or Wolverine.

So the short answer to your question is my favorite

character to write is the one with the strongest

point of view and the most inner conflict. which

is why Wolverine to me is the ultimate character

because he is so deeply driven by so many different

conflicting forces. He's really, really noble

at the same time as he's really, really savage.

They keep finding new things for him to sort

of be or have, which was wonderful for a very

long time but became counterproductive. So for

a long time it was like... He was sort of this

military secret agent guy. Then they added the

whole fallen samurai thing, and that was all

really, really cool. When they started adding

all the counter -espionage stuff and how his

memories are implanted and this and that, he

just became too muddled for me. But at his core,

what you're dealing with is a character who is

so dark and so driven and so complex, and that,

to me, is the most interesting character. The

same thing is one of the reasons that people

find Batman so much more interesting than Superman.

is Superman is very, very stalwart. He's like

this very square -jawed Boy Scout trying to do

the right thing. Batman is driven by very dark

and painful memories. Now, Superman and Batman

are essentially very, very similar. They both

lost their parents. They're both dedicated to

saving the world because of what happened to

their parents. Superman saves the world on a

global level. His planet blew up. Batman wants

to deal with street crime and things on a much

more urban sort of street level. because his

parents were gunned down in an alley. But the

two of them are driven to make the world right

based on the fact that they lost their parents

and see that the world should be better than

it is. Batman is more of an Avenger. Superman

is more of a Protector. But Batman is more fascinating

to people because he is driven by demons that

Superman would probably never have. And watching

Batman as somebody who is... Dark and conflicted

makes him inherently more interesting. So you

see, the more the characters have going on, the

more layered the characters are, the more interesting

they become to write and to perceive. I brought

back one of the characters in the second season

of Transformers, Beast Machines. Silverbolt?

I brought Silverbolt back having had him be Skybolt.

Does that mean Sky was... What was the name of

the character? It's been so long. It was Jet

Storm originally was the original character,

and then you would sit in the commentary on the

DVD that the original name for Jet Storm was

Skybolt. But people would always get it. It was

actually Silverbolt. So anyway, Jet Storm was

this incredibly horrible villain who turns out

to be this white knight. And when they first

introduced the character when he was in Beast

Wars, To me, he sounded like Adam West's Batman.

He was so noble. He was so square -jawed. And

it was kind of like the joke. The character is

so noble that he's sort of like Sir Lancelot

as a Transformer. And I'm not saying he was just

a joke. I'm not mocking the character. I'm saying

it's sort of like being in the joke. He was more

noble than noble, and that made him at once admirable

and somewhat goofy. So when I brought him back,

I replaced Adam West. with frank miller i brought

him back as the dark knight i brought him back

as somebody who had done these terrible things

not because he had hypnotized that i've been

hypnotized or whatever because he was mind controlled

it was because something dark was unleashed inside

him that he now has to deal with so it's like

what do you remember from what you did i remember

everything and i liked it so he's gonna deal

with this and so he came back as this extremely

fallen samurai character as somebody who really,

really needed redemption because he had been

taken somewhere darker than you can possibly

imagine. And he had to find his way to make himself

feel right again. And it was the perfect pair

up with Arachnia because Arachnia was somebody

who had been a villain, who had become a hero,

who herself had very, very dark layers to her.

So having her, having been villainous, now being

a hero, looking at somebody who had been a hero,

like the most noble of heroes, who had been made

into the most nasty, vicious of villains. He's

trying to find redemption, and she only wants

to help him, and she only wants to love him,

and she can't reach him because he is darker

than she's ever been. So I thought that was...

So he became a very, very interesting character

to spearhead there because... Well, as I say,

he's dark, he's conflicted, and he's dealing

with things that are not so easily resolved.

This isn't goodwill hunting. You can't just look

at him and say, it's not your fault, it's not

your fault, it's not your fault, it's not your

fault. Five minutes of it's not your fault, the

guy's like, oh, you know what? It's not my fault.

I'm happy chocolate. It's more like, okay, I'm

dealing with things I have to live with. That's

really fucking hard. And in life, we all make

decisions. We all make mistakes. Things happen

that may or may not even be our fault. And we

have to live with the consequences, you know?

And that makes interesting drama. That makes

interesting characters. And keeping with the

same vibe of favorite writing, what was your

favorite show to work on? You know, the weird

thing is, it's that any given show that I'm working

on, becomes my favorite show at the time, because

when you find something to hook into that makes

the show yours, you just invest yourself 100%.

I'm doing a preschool series right now, and I'm

finding that I'm working just as hard, being

just as inventive, thinking just as hard into

the characters, even though they're simple, bright

-colored characters, than I would be on any other

show. It's not like, oh, this show's easy and

that show's hard. It's more like... how much

of yourself are you investing in it? Are you

really, really present when you're doing the

show? And so with each of the shows that I've

written, any show that I can find myself getting

lost in, any show that I can work on for eight

hours, look up and feel really guilty and go,

what am I doing? I have to get to work now. And

realizing that that's what I've been doing. So

I want to equate working really hard with having

fun. then that's my favorite show to work on.

And I've worked on a lot of shows where that's

been the case. So I guess the short answer is

my favorite show is all of them. It's kind of

pithy. But with a lot of the shows, I mean, I've

had the pleasure of working on shows that I could

just invest myself wholeheartedly in. And one

of the reasons that I have such an abiding love

for Beast Machines is that Because we did this

26 -episode novel for television, we needed to

be present 1 ,000 % of the time. We needed to

come up with an arc. We needed to outline each

of the episodes ourselves. We needed to make

sure that the dialogue matched up in a way that

each character was along a trajectory in an arc

so that they were growing and changing in every

episode in a way that linearly made sense. I

had to work so hard on that series, harder than

anything I've ever had to do before, since, or

whatever, because we did this thing as a 26 -episode

singular monolithic thing. And so for the duration

of the series, which was about a year, for a

year, it was 24 -7 living in a universe and having

these characters and following every one of them.

many of whom were extremely complex. And to immerse

yourself for a year in a universe like that is

an experience that you, I just treasure it. It

was just, it was so immersive. And it was like

living in a video game, but, you know, like your

whole life. I mean, it was so immersive and so

all -encompassing that I just, I loved it. But

there was a price to be paid because, you know,

when it's over, I was feeling so burnt. Because,

I mean, burnt out, I mean. It's just like when

you invest so much, you come away and it's like

you've been playing basketball for a year. You

just want to collapse. So I gave that series

everything I had and I did it for a year straight.

It's one of the reasons that when you read online,

ah, Bob Skeer should die. It's like, well, kick

me in the teeth, why don't you? And then my favorite

part about that, though, with the fans, the bad

reaction was, there were these fans going, I

hate the show. It's horrible. It's terrible.

And they're making us wait another year before

they show us the rest of the episode. Exactly.

And the funny thing about Beast Wars and Beast

Machines now is that a lot of the fans, us included,

a lot of the fans think that Beast Wars and Beast

Machines is easily the best fictional writing

in Transformers in the entire fandom. You know

what, that's very gratifying to hear, but my

response to that is that, you know, that's a

group of people whose opinion I find very, very

complimentary. But for that number of people,

there's an equal number that thought that G1

is the only Transformers, or, I don't know, Armada

is the only... I mean, everybody's... Well, see,

there's a different Transformers for every generation,

however. Most IHR Transformers fans have since

moved on from their Beast Machines hatred and

realized, hey, it's an actually good show, and

have pushed their hatred towards the imported

shows such as Robots in Disguise, Armada, Gunner

John, and Cybertron. It could have been worse.

It could have been imported from Japan. Yeah,

but the bottom line is that... For every series

out there, there are people who will argue, this

is mine. This is the one that I treasure the

most. This is the definitive one for me. And

I find that gratifying that there's this thing

out there that people have such affection for.

I love that there are people out there who love

Transformers with such passion, have so much

invested in it. There are people who are fans.

I love that there are things out there that give

people this kind of passion, you know? Star Wars

was out there, and it filled me with incredible

passion. X -Men, at its best, filled me with

an incredible passion. And to the fact that Transformers,

I mean, Transformer fans are simply, I mean,

because you're on the phone with you guys, I

mean, this is a simple fact, they are the most

passionate fans I've ever experienced in all

of fandom. Oh, yeah. are more passionate than

Star Trek fans, Star Wars fans, anybody. They

are the absolute most passionate fans out there.

And I just think it's wonderful that there are

people out there who are so invested in it and

that each generation, you know, people find things

that they like. In fact, what I said when I first

was on the... when we were putting Beast Machines

together and we had the fan outreach, what I

said was, listen... I need to let you know I'm

not coming from this as a Transformers professional.

I did not work in the original series. Also,

I did not follow the original series with the

kind of passion and focus that a lot of fans

did. So if this series is not what you're expecting,

I need you to know that you should not expect

this to be the show as you've seen it before.

This is something different. So I'm hoping that

you come to it with a slightly open mind. because

you're going to have to. And I also felt a certain

amount of guilt about it, because there are these

incredible fans, I mean, with such incredible

passion. And I knew that when I was doing X -Men,

the changes that they made, I'm sorry, there's

a little beeping coming through, the changes

that people made to the X -Men mythology, inconsistencies

or whatever, made me insane. And so I'm thinking,

If I'm this passionate about X -Men and I don't

want to see them tampering with what I consider

to be my holy grail, I'm forever mindful that

I'm dealing with something and tampering with

something that are other people's holy grail.

So I need to let them know that this is not going

to be, you know, their traditional Transformers

series. Right, right. And I wasn't trying to

steal them by going, hey, you don't want to watch

this show. But it's more like... This is going

to be different from what you're expecting. Please

keep an open mind. You may love it, and it may

not be for you, and if it isn't, the next series

will be. And also, this needs to be said out

loud, the reason they hired Marty and I is because

we didn't have a history with Transformers. They

wanted people with a very fresh perspective on

it. and they were creating a series for a new

generation of fans. They were basically, they

weren't looking to harken back to nostalgia for

the past. They were looking to create nostalgia

for the future. So they hired us because we were

coming to it with a fresh perspective. And when

we asked, hey, do you want to watch all the old

shows? The answer was, we'd rather you didn't.

We'd rather you just, you know, took what you

were doing here and made it your own, which we

did, which some people appreciated and some people

apparently did not. As a writer, what is the

weirdest thing that has happened to you? Oh,

God, I've had no end of weird things happen to

me. I mean, wow. I'll give you two stories. Okay.

I'm going to give you two stories, and I will

tell you right now, okay? They are 100 % true.

I'm not embellishing on them in any way. These

are things that actually happened, as I'm telling

you. One is that I have a license plate on my

car that says snicked. Okay, that's weird right

there. I live in an apartment building that doesn't

have like hoses or whatever. And I live in Los

Angeles and the car gets really, really dusty.

And I drive up the block to go get something

to eat. And there's a newsstand there where somebody's

hosing down the sidewalk. And I'm like, hey,

that guy's got a hose and it's on. Why don't

I hose all the dust off my car? And I look at

the guy and I go, hey, can I use your hose for

a second? And English is not his first language.

So I don't think he quite understands what I'm

saying. But he kind of nods. And so I take the

hose and I start hosing off my car. And suddenly

he's making this face like he's kind of put out

by what I'm doing. And he starts stepping on

the hose to kind of like kill the water pressure.

And he's kind of like making faces at me. And

I'm thinking, I just want to hose off my car.

I'm not going to use all your water, dude. I

just want to hose off my car a little bit. And

he's kind of like attitude. And I'm like, okay,

well, maybe I'll just put the hose down and move

on with my life. And he goes, so what does that

mean? I'm like, excuse me? Your license plate.

What does that mean? I go, oh, that's, yeah,

snicked. It's, you know, it's a sign of Wolverine's

claws. You know, like in the X -Men, I write

the cartoon, and the next thing you know, he's

got a pail out. He's putting soap in it, and

he's soaping down my car. I'm like, oh, my God.

This is an attitude change. I was thinking that

maybe snicked meant something rude in his language.

No. No. Anyway, another story. Once again, this

is 100 % true. I'm not making this up. I'm not

embellishing. This happened. I work in Los Angeles

on these machines. An executive from Mainframe

flies down, and we have a meeting. He flies back.

And I fly back at the same time on the same flight

because I'm going back for a voice record session.

The two of us are on the flight together. But

he's flying, you know, back home, and I'm flying

up there to come home. So we go to customs. And

the customs are like, well, are you here for

business or, you know, personal? I'm here for

business. Are you flying alone, sir? Yeah, I'm

flying alone. Who is that man you just looked

at? Excuse me? Now, this is before 9 -11, so,

I mean, But still, people are just fanatical

about security and whatever. I've looked over

at the producer to figure out what the right

answer would be. Am I traveling with someone

or am I traveling by myself? And I'm like, who

is that man you looked at, sir? And I'm thinking,

okay. Busted. Am I doing a strip search now?

And I'm like, oh, well, you know. He's someone

that I was flying with, but we're not traveling

together. I mean, he came down for a meeting,

and I'm flying up for a meeting, and I'm flying

home. So we flew together, but we're not traveling

together. And now I'm just word sounding, right?

Because I know I'm in for a cavity search. And

I'm like, whatever words fly out of my mouth,

I hope they make sense to somebody. Because in

five seconds, I'm going to be in a room, and

it's going to be really unpleasant. I'm like,

oh, well, I'm, you know, flying up for a TV show.

They work at Mainframe. They do cartoons, CGI,

you know, a toy story, you know, CGI. I'm doing

a show. It's a Transformers series. Transformers?

Is Starscream coming back? Yeah. And my jaw drops.

And I'm like, yeah, Starscream's coming back.

Oh, my God. That is so funny. There are so many

Transformer fans out there. Nice. We are everywhere.

We are Legion. We are Legion. All I know is I

was really damn glad I was working on the Transformer

series at that particular moment. I bet you are.

No backroom searches for you. Have you ever been

asked to write something that you didn't want

to write? Like, oh, I don't know, morph? Just

to throw that out there. You know what? There

have been times out there where I have not taken

opportunities that I have since said, oh, wait

a minute, kind of wish I had done that. There

was a character I hated on The Mask called Dr.

Pretorius. Now, first off, I hate the character

because the name is such an obvious list. For

those people out there who remember the old Universal

horror movies, like Bride of Frankenstein, where

Dr. Pretorius' name was lifted from. Okay, fine.

Didn't like the name of the character. But I

hated the character. He was a stupid character.

He was a ridiculous character. So I did not write

the character. And then I'm like, when the series

is over, Tim Curry did the voice for that guy.

I could have written for Tim Curry. I could have

met Dr. Frankenfurter. I kind of like hanging

out with Tim Curry. Oh, man, I wish I wrote that

fucking character. So I really regret that one.

There was a time, oh, this one breaks my heart.

When I did Batman, it was an episode called Lockup.

And Lockup begins where they're bringing a villain

back to Arkham Asylum. And what they suggested

was, you know, yeah, they're bringing the Mad

Hatter back. And I'm like, they're bringing the

Mad Hatter back and he's afraid to go inside.

The reason he's afraid to go inside is because

the guard lockup, who works in there, is insane

and brutalizes everybody. And I'm thinking, they're

bringing the Mad Hatter back, and he's afraid

to go inside. That doesn't mean anything. The

Mad Hatter's a puss. If it's a master of fear,

and he's afraid of this guy, that's carrying

some weight. And I'm going, hey, this should

be the scarecrow. And the guy's like, yeah, but...

We really want to work with Roddy McDowell. And

I'm like, Roddy McDowell? Yeah, he's the Mad

Hatter. You know, the Mad Hatter is the perfect

guy for this scene. And so I write this scene

with the Mad Hatter. And I'm really, really psyched

because I've come up with, like, some really

cool shit for him. Like, at one point, they're

dragging him in, and he's going hysterical, and

he shoves his face into Robin's and says, Beware

the Jabberwock, my son! The teeth that claw!

The claws that tear! And I'm like, oh, crap.

It's like, hey, that's great. So what happens?

I get the rewriting script and they put the scarecrow

in it because the scarecrow is the master of

fear and it means so much more if it's the scarecrow

than if it's the Mad Hatter. Of course. And I'm

like thinking, I blew my chance to write for

Roddy McDowell. I made such a great argument

that I talked myself out of writing for Roddy

McDowell. So I got to write for Monty McDowell,

but it got unwritten because I'm too clever by

half. Let me see. I know there are things I walked

away from because I didn't want to do them. Oh,

yeah. Oh, this is terrible. They did a series

based on a movie that they had done that was

kind of successful, not really successful, but

successful enough. It was middling. It was sort

of, you know, science. fictiony undersea movie

that was really good but was just okay and anyway

they're doing a series based on it and they brought

my partner and i in to work on the series based

on the movie and the movie is based in an incredible

land and i'm thinking it would be wonderful to

explore this land so i show up for the first

day of work and i find out oh yeah we're not

actually going to explore that land we're back

in our world trying to find their way back into

that land. And I'm like, so we're not in that

magical land. Oh, no, no, no, no. So we're like

here trying to get back. Yeah, with lots of adventures

trying to get back. Oh. At least I get to work

at this incredible studio, which is, you know,

so beautiful and beautifully sculpted and is

an incredible place to work filled with magic.

Yeah, we're not working on the studio. We're

working down the block at this bank building.

So I get to work in a bank on a show about people

who are trying to get somewhere magical but are

not actually in and of themselves in some place

magical. Wow. Art imitates life. Yeah, you know

what? Can I... And the next day, I had my agent

call up and say, yeah, he's not on your show

anymore. That's funny. That was one of the biggest

mistakes I ever made professionally because my

agent worked hard to get me on that show, and

I said I would do the show. And then I backed

out of the show once I realized that the show

I agreed to do wasn't the show that I thought

it was when I agreed to do it, which is really

unfair to my agent. So I felt really terrible

that I had done that. Not something I would have

done again necessarily, but it was a case where

I looked at a property, I realized I didn't really

believe in the property, and I didn't want to

just go there and collect a paycheck. Eight weeks

later, the show got shuttered, and they sent

everybody home and said, yeah, we're not going

to do the show. So my instincts were right, my

tastes were right. I followed my heart and my

gut. And I was right. I was vindicated ultimately

because the series wasn't worth doing. But in

the meantime, it made me look kind of stupid

and flaky to the studio. And I'm not stupid or

flaky. And it also made me look unreliable to

my agent, which was unfair to her. So I made

the right choice, but I made it the wrong way.

And so I kind of regret doing that. It's just

that that particular situation, was not a situation

that I felt like I would walk away from with

any degree of pride. I need to work on things

where when I'm finished with them, I say, I did

the job, we did a great show, and I invested

myself in that and I got something for it. And

I didn't feel that that was the case where that

was going to be the case. And I did not, and

today could not, just take a gig just to take

somebody's money because... That's just how I

do things. In fact, there was a case, a similar

situation, where I was offered a chance to write

a pilot. And I read a previous draft of the pilot,

and I'm like, okay, well, if you do this, this,

this, and this, I think it would work. And they're

like, yeah, we don't want to do that, that, that,

and that. We want to do the other, the other,

the other, the other. And I'm like, yeah, but

that's why it doesn't work. And they're like,

okay. I see what you're saying. Now, we want

to hire you to write this, but we want to do

the other, the other, the other. And I'm like,

you want me to write a script knowing that everything

that I think will make this work, you don't want

me to do, and you want me to make me do everything

that I think is the reason this isn't working.

And I'm like, you know, I just don't feel like

this is a good fit. I'm sorry, but... I can't

take your money and give you something that will

not make you happy, and I don't know how to make

this make you happy. So with all due respect,

this is not a slam. I feel like I cannot in good

conscience take this job because I can't make

you happy. Well, there's the artistic integrity.

It isn't even a matter of artistic integrity.

It's more a matter of professionalism and professional

integrity. It isn't like, you know, hey, you

can't do that with Wolverine. I'm going to shut

you all down. It's more like, if you make me

write this, you're not going to be happy, I'm

going to be miserable, and I'm going to feel

like a thief for cashing your check. Right. What

advice would you have for people who would want

to get into television writing, movie writing,

or anything like that? It's what I said before,

you know, find the things that drive you and

follow them. And conversely, don't try and follow

trends. There are people out there who say, oh,

this kind of movie is hot right now. I'm going

to write one. That kind of movie is hot right

now because there are seven of them in theaters,

14 of them in the pipeline, and they want something

else. So I'm writing right now a romantic comedy

because I have one that I've been working on

for a long time. I would not begin to work in

a romantic comedy today because that seems like

the hot thing to do. And once it's the hot thing

to do, it's no longer the hot thing to be doing.

So don't look at what the trends are. Look at

what you want to do and follow what you want

to do. A million people out there have tried

to do Star Wars, and they failed because George

Lucas did Star Wars when no one else was doing

Star Wars. because he wanted to do that movie.

If you follow what you want to do, and no one

else is doing that kind of thing, and you're

that crazy -ass passionate about it, follow that.

You know, back in the early 90s, there were these

guys that said, you know what, I'm going to do

a film noir. No one does film noir. I'm going

to do a film noir. I'm going to reference all

kinds of TV shows from the 70s, and I'm going

to use has -been actors. And I'm going to tell

the story completely out of order. There you

go. And the next thing you know, you have Pulp

Fiction and everybody wants to be Clinton Tarantino.

Before he did Pulp Fiction, if this guy walked

in and said, this is what I want to do, they

would have taken his name down and put him on

a list of people never to be allowed in the building

again. The thing is, if you are passionate about

something, if you're quirky, if you're weird,

if you have a different way of looking at shit,

Follow that. Don't follow everybody else. Basically,

follow your own instincts because they will serve

you. Exactly. And don't write for money. Write

things that are important to you. If it's important

enough to you that you can invest all the time

to write something, 120 pages, it could take

you forever to write a screenplay. If you are

that crazy about writing something and nobody

else is doing that kind of thing, then clearly

somebody else is going to be as passionate as

you are about that kind of thing and want to

do it. Quentin Tarantino found people who looked

into this weird -ass screenplay because they

saw the same things in his ideas that he saw

in them to make him write them. I mean, he already

made the critically acclaimed Reservoir Dogs,

but even that was, once again, noir, shot out

of order, using, you know, weird character actors

who had never been heard of before. Because if

you look at that movie, right, I mean, Lawrence

Tierney was a movie star in the 40s. Nobody even

remembered he was alive. Steve Buscemi, who?

All these weird character actors no one had ever

heard of before. Now they're household names.

But back then, they were like, you know, like,

I'm sorry, who do you want to put in this movie?

And so he followed his weird whims. He based

a lot of that movie on City on Fire. Some Hong

Kong movie nobody knew before. He gets all of

his influences from bad 70s movies, bad 70s TV

series, and Hong Kong action movies and Chopsaki

movies. Now, he's not someone you want to follow

into a battlefield in 1991. Ever since 1994,

everybody wants to be him. Yep. Yep. So, by the

way, if you have a weird, quirky way of looking

at something, if you have passions, follow your

passions. They will take you where you want to

end up, ultimately. It's what Joseph Campbell

said. You follow your bliss. We would like to

thank Mr. Skier for taking the time to talk with

us. If people wanted to interact with you, where

can they go to do this? Huh. I've gone down that

road before. You know what? I'm on stage. If

you want to... Send me an email. Message me through

Facebook. I'll respond to emails and messages

through Facebook. So, you know, feel free to

do that. Just keep hoping my family all dies

to a minimum is all I ask. Yeah. Well, thank

you for joining us here, and good luck with all

your current work. We'll ask you to hold the

line, and we will be back after this. So I'm

a tree hugger. Deal with it. Wow. That was awesome.

Longest interview ever. Is that spelled with

an E -V -A -R? Yes. Nice. Lulz. Yeah. Try to

keep your internet memes out of the interview.

That's what she said. It was great to talk to

Bob Scare. It was just awesome. It was a good

conversation. Yeah. We were schooled. I mean,

the guy is a UCLA professor. We got an actual

lesson here. We got pwned. Yeah. Pwned. Yeah.

Very, very cool. That Bob Skeer is probably what

we're going to end on for interviews for Beast

Unleashed. Which is, you know, a very good note

to end on. Yeah, very good. Yeah, very awesome

guy. Yeah. Great. I know what I'm going to do

next time I don't want to go to BotCon. I'm going

to head out to Malibu and, you know, check out

the hot chicks out on the beach. Me and Bob checking

out the chicks in Malibu. That's what she said.

Maybe she did. I don't know. And your wife would

kill you. That's a risk I'll have to take. How

many licks does it take? Oh, wait, wrong question.

Okay, so we hope everybody enjoyed the interview

with Bob Skeer. Up next, you'll hear episode

29 coming up in the schedule for releases for

Beast Unleashed. Actually, I think I'm going

to have Steve release the interview and episode

29 same day, maybe next day. I don't know yet.

So that's going to do it for us, and we'll see

you next time. Prepare to - What used to be Cybertron.

I don't get it. I felt Megatron reaching into

my spark, and then... poof. No, there was another

voice, remember? Optimus. What about Botanica?

Somebody call my name? Sprouts! It could use

a little something. can truly be together, dark

venom of my heart. Of all the corny... Waspinator

won glory! Waspinator won power! And what Waspinator

did... Waspinator never did what Waspinator won!

It just doesn't feel like victory without the

boss monkey. He's with us, Rattrap. As long as

Cybertron is alive, Optimus lives on. In our

hearts and our memories. As will Megatron, who

also played a vital role in the grand scheme.

The vision from the Oracle has come to pass.

Optimus finally achieved his mission.