Greg responds...

1. I'm not sure I understand the question. The Outsiders from the comics are an influence, but this is Earth-16 continuity. The Outsiders refer to a state of mind, a social phenomenon and, ultimately, a new team of heroes, founded by Beast Boy.

2. That's part of it.

Greg responds...

1. No spoilers.

2. No spoilers. For now, what you see is what you get.

3. They use their real first names and have adopted surnames.

4. Not at this time.

Greg responds...

Geo-Force - Brandon had worked with Troy Baker before and knew he was a good candidate to play Geo-Force/Brion Markov. We did have him audition (against no competition) just to confirm he could do the Eastern European accent without it sliding into Boris Badenov territory. He could. So we cast him. And he's been great as Brion and other characters ever since.

Terra - We held auditions for Terra/Tara Markov, and Tara Strong just nailed it.

Halo - I knew I wanted to cast Zehra Fazal as Halo / Violet Harper / Gabrielle Daou, and basically wrote the part with her in mind. Brandon and Jamie and I went to see her in a stage play, where she played multiple roles, so that they could confirm just how great and versatile she was.

Forager - With Wally West largely out of the picture, we knew we wanted to find something else to keep Jason Spisak in our cast. Brandon thought Forager would be a good bet and talked about the character with Jason, who loved the idea. We hired him without any try-out, and he was instantly great.

Cyborg - We held auditions for Victor Stone/Cyborg under the false flag of a pretend show with a fake character name. Zeno Robinson was our clear favorite for the role. We brought him in for a callback (with no competition), mostly to see if he had the versatility to play any other roles (such as Steel). We decided then and there that he was our Vic, and seeing Brandon and I in the Control Room, he had already begun to suspect whom he might be playing. We told him he had the role and confirmed he was playing Cyborg, and he practically BURST right in front of us. It was great fun.

Darkseid - We had already discussed a number of potential people to find YJ's version of Darkseid, when Brandon remembered Michael Leon Wooley's performance of the character from Batman: The Brave and the Bold. Jamie and I listened, and immediately Michael had the job.

Vandal Savage - We held auditions to see who could do the best job performing in the giant shoes that the late, great Miguel Ferrer had left behind. David Kaye was the clear favorite.

Beast Boy - When it became clear that Logan Grove was not going to be available to us, we talked with Jamie about who might be able to take his place. After we described the character's journey in Season Three, Jamie suggested Greg Cipes, knowing that we might not go for it, but feeling like Greg'd be perfect for the part. I'd worked with Greg on W.I.T.C.H. and agreed, but our upper management had been pretty adamant about us not using Titans' lead actors to play the same roles they had played on Titans. (Other Titans' actors were kiboshed for certain parts for that reason.) It was something Brandon and I initially agreed with way back in Season One, but by this time, we felt YJ had established itself as its own thing, and we were less afraid of comparisons. And for whatever reason, TPTB were fine with us casting Greg as Beast Boy.

Greg responds...

1. I do know exactly who the numbers are for. But, no, I won't be revealing any of that here.

2. The A-Designations are first name first. The G-Designations, hacked into the system by Dick Grayson are "[Last Name]-comma-[First Name]-G-[Two-Digit-Number]"

Greg responds...

1. Brandon and I met a couple times when I was at Sony and when I was freelancing for WB. But, honestly, we really didn't meet for real until Sam Register teamed us up to develop a new series for WB Animation. (That series was a Green Lantern series that was never made, followed by a Space Ghost series that was never made, before we finally were assigned to Young Justice.)

2. Rich and I go way back to my Disney days. He and Mark Seidenberg were partnered up, editing Gummi Bears. We've kept in touch, on and off, over the years. And more recently, we were both staff writers on Shimmer & Shine. I truly loved the Shimmer & Shine writing staff (Stephanie Simpson, Dustin Ferrer, Kevin Hopps, Cisco Paredes, Andrew Blanchette and Rich), so when YJ started up again I tried to get everyone to write an episode for Season Three and/or Four. Stephanie and Dustin haven't had the time, but the rest have all pitched in for an episode or two. (Of course, Kevin was already a YJ writer.)

Greg responds...

Again, this has been covered in the ASK GREG ARCHIVES multiple times. But generally, we think it allows us to show the growth and maturation of our young characters.

The length of the time jump is generally determined by both what we want to hide (and later reveal) about our characters and when in the timeline does the story fall that we want/need to tell.

Greg responds...

It's a legal decision that's way above my paygrade to credit the creation of all Milestone characters to the Milestone company. That's all I know. But I don't think it began with Season Three. Didn't we do the same thing in Seasons One and Two?

Greg responds...

For the effect it would have on the League, Team and Outsiders - and because they felt they could leverage his death into creating a super-hero registry, which they could then exploit.

Greg responds...

It seems pretty self-explanatory in the show. What seems unclear?

Greg responds...

As we've seen many times over - starting when Speedy changed his name to Red Arrow - changing your alias doesn't change your designation number.