Greg responds...

Nope. Sorry.

Greg responds...

Probably. But it wasn't a high priority for me. Sometimes it's fun just to have a couple characters who are nuts. Characters who don't have complex reasons for their actions. I'm very proud of the complexity that abounds in both Demona and Xanatos. But sometimes it's fun just to cut loose.

Greg responds...

I. Sorry, I did work on Darkwing, but it wasn't my show, and I'm not that intimate with the details. And no, it didn't influence TimeDancer.

II. It didn't directly give me the idea, but it may have been one of many airship influences floating around in my head.

As per our new rules, I invite you to resubmit your remaining questions as multiple separate posts.

Greg responds...

I suppose many are ambidextrous. Since in animation, that's not a detail we have the luxury of paying much attention to.

Greg responds...

I don't know. It was originally going to be one episode. Just one inside what became THE GOLIATH CHRONICLES. (How it morphed into "Runaways" is beyond me.) Then it would hang out there as a potential spin-off or back-door pilot. If that never got picked up, I'd eventually have told some of Brooklyn's adventures in various scattered flashback episodes within the main series. Some might have wound up as multi-parters. But I don't pretend, I worked that much out. I was hoping it would spin off -- at which point I'd have forty years worth of material to cover.

Greg responds...

I won't be held to this, but....

I think I would skip all of TGC except "The Journey". In a comic book, I'd have the opportunity to include a Text Feature, where I could explain what I was doing and why. That Text Feature would also allow me to bring new readers up to speed on what they need to know. That would give me the freedom to limit cannon to the first 66 episodes as opposed to the whole 78.

Greg responds...

Honestly, I can't answer that without knowing the circumstances of our proposed ressurection.

Are we coming back on TV or in some form of print media or both?

If TV: Are we coming back as an hour show or a half-hour again? Are we coming back as a daily or weekly? As prime time or in kids?

To take your specific example, lets say we came back in 2002 as a kid's show. I'd probably just set things in 2002, and assume that most of my audience hasn't seen any of the old episodes. I would maintain continuity for my old audience, but I would clearly have to introduce the show and its characters anew. Some things would seem to pick up right where we left off. Others would be different, and we'd occasionally do flashback stories (both from the distant past and from the 1997-2002 gap) to bring both audiences up to speed.

Also keep in mind that although I had planned to do, for example, TimeDancer in 1996, I didn't get to. So there's nothing to stop me from introducing TimeDancer as a brand new concept in 2002.

As to doing 2158. I'd be happy to do that anytime. But it doesn't prevent or preclude me from doing stories in the present. In fact, I'd love to do BOTH.

Greg responds...

Hi Derek,
1. A Leica Reel is a storyboard shot onto film or video (or into a computer) and cut to time. Dialogue, temp music and temp sound effect tracks are often added so that, you FEEL like you are watching a reel of actual footage. It's LIKE-A-REEL. (I'm told that's the real origin of the term, though I don't know if I believe that.)

The rest of your questions are on multiple different topics. So based on our new rules, you'll have to resubmit them as multiple separate posts. I welcome you to do just that.

Thanks.

Greg responds...

Once again, I'll attempt to recreate an answer I already typed up once.

First caveat: Keep in mind that every series, every studio, has
slightly different definitions for most of these terms. I'm describing
how we defined things, how we worked on Gargoyles.

1. Story Editors edit stories.

All right, I guess I can do better than that. Once a month, I met with
our story editors (Michael Reaves, Brynne Chandler Reaves, Gary Sperling
and Cary Bates) and we talked about stories. I'd usually start by
tossing out "springboards", i.e. notions for episodes that I had. The
Story Editors would each pick the ones that interested them and that fit
in with their delivery deadlines. We'd talk about the stories in the
conference room, and then the story editors would go off to work with
their stable of writers. (Some stables were bigger than others. Cary,
for example, personally wrote all the episodes that he story edited.
That decision is partially based on speed and financial issues. Cary
was a free-lance story editor who was very fast. He could make more
money by writing and editing his episodes. Gary Sperling, on the other
hand, was on staff. He made the same amount of money whether he wrote
the episodes or not. So he wrote the ones he had a personal affinity
for, and passed the others off to his free-lance writers.)

The editors would coach their writers through premise, outline and
script -- sometimes multiple drafts of each. (I would in turn coach the
editors.) Then the editors would take their pass on the work --
literally editing the stuff for content, quality, page count, spelling,
everything. Finally, they'd turn the documents over to me, and I'd do
my "Producer/Creator" pass. My job was to make sure that the show was
consistent. That four story editors and multiple writers all wrote with
one voice.

1b. Frank Paur and I were the original Producers on Gargoyles. I was
in charge of writing; Frank, of art. Both of us kibbitzed on the
other's guys territory. We were a real team. We both worked together
on voice and post-production. Basically, it was our job to follow
through on every single aspect of the show.

Later, Dennis Woodyard and Bob Kline were brought in to direct episodes,
and at some point they were "promoted" to Producer level. They were in
effect, "Line Producers", in charge of all the nuts and bolts of
production, making sure the individual episodes they directed were
completed. That freed Frank up to focus more on the big picture. When
Dennis and Bob got their "promotion", Frank and I were bumped up to
"Supervising Producers" to indicate that we still outranked the other
two, basically.

*Note: The reason "promotion" is in quotes is because the only thing
that changed for any of us was the credit we got at the end of the
show. It's not like we got a raise or anything. Nothing really
changed.

2. Tim was great fun. Professional, but he had a good time, and really
did a great job cutting loose on the bizarre (and hammy) Dr. S.
2b. Can't think of any off the top of my head. Sorry.

Now, let's pray this posts this time.

7-21-99

Greg responds...

1. I was aware that NYC had a ton of gargoyles. (I lived there for two plus years in my DC Comics days.) But I didn't have the stats. So I guess the answer is both.

2. We did and didn't, just for starters. What was revealed was not comprehensive, as I think I've mentioned. But the main behind-the-scenes reason was that we had this ready-made show NEW OLYMPIANS that I wanted to try and get on the air via a "back-door pilot" on Gargoyles. Didn't happen, but I'm glad we tried, and I felt the concept fit rather nicely into the Gargs Universe.

3. I haven't seen Eric in years, but he and his wife Julia Roberts Lewald are good people, who I like a lot. (I attended their wedding.) They're good writers too. And no, that doesn't mean I like what was done on Goliath Chronicles, but I don't think I COULD have liked anything that anyone else did. Anyway, any further speculation on my part is, I believe, inappropriate.

4. Plenty.