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Frank Gorshin, RIP

I just read that Frank Gorshin passed away. I'm kinda bummed about it.

I didn't know him well, but I did meet him a couple of times. He played Professor Hugo Strange in "The Batman" episodes that I wrote. He was terrific.

I've seen him do George Burns (briefly) live, and he was amazing.

And of course, as a kid, I just loved him as the Riddler. And there was that strange-o Star Trek episode too.

Like I said, didn't know him all that well, but he was a very talented guy. He'll be missed.


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Since Chad spilled the beans...

WHAT WE KNOW
I've been authorized by Buena Vista Home Entertainment to confirm that there will indeed be another release of episodes from Gargoyles on DVD.

Obviously, those episodes will come from the second season... and I have been assured that in any case the episodes will be released in the correct order.

They are planning on involving me again.

WHAT WE DON'T KNOW
We don't know how may releases there are going to be to cover the second season.
We don't know how many discs. We don't know how many episodes per disc.
We don't know what the extras are going to be.
We don't know any release dates.

As I learn more, I'll keep you posted.

WHAT I'M HOPING FOR
My preference would be that they break up the 2nd Season into three separate releases.

The first release would include 23 episodes, running from "Leader of the Pack" through "Avalon, Part Three".

The second release would include 26 episodes, running from "Shadows of the Past" through "The Reckoning".

The third release would include 3 episodes, running from "Hunter's Moon, Part One" through "Hunter's Moon, Part Three".

I am not even vaguely implying that this is there plan. I don't know what they are planning. I'm simply expressing my personal preference, as many of you have done in the Station 8 Comment Room.

I will, of course, take whatever I can get.


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Correction...

I just received this very helpful missive from Greg Bishansky:

Hey Greg,

I just saw the latest question in Ask Greg about the stone Xanatos model
sheet, sounds to me like she may have been refering to the stone model of
Xanatos that Puck creates in "The Gathering Part Two" when we finally learn
his backstory.

Greg

MYSTERY SOLVED! Thanks, Greg!!


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Chapter LVI: "Future Tense"

Time to ramble...

Chapter LVI: "Future Tense"
Story Editor: Michael Reaves
Writers: Marty Isenberg & Bob Skir
Director: Bob Kline

CAVEAT
This episode is/was so jam-packed with stuff that I literally couldn't take notes fast enough. I'm bound to have missed a ton of stuff that I might have wished to comment on. So this ramble is going to be far from comprehensive.

I think the title was Michael's, by the way.

GOLIATH ON THE SKIFF
Take this opening scene for example. In less than a couple minutes, Goliath mentions the Gathering (setting up Puck's eventual motivation), wishes to be back home, longs to "see the Trio and Hudson" again and says he would "give much" to return home (all of which invites and allows Puck to interfere in mortal affairs)... and THEN gets hit by lightning.

I wonder how many of you remembered that odd lightning hit. Our hope was that with all that was going on in the ep, you'd forget about it.

PLANET OF THE APES & THE X-MEN
Hard to show the Statue of Liberty in ruins without summoning up that classic moment from the Heston film... a definite influence. Another influence, clearly, was the Claremont/Byrne run on X-Men in the eighties. That first time they sent the Kitty Pride from the future to the present and showed us some horrifying scenes in that alternate future stuck in my memory. Later, of course, I thought all that stuff got WAY out of control in X-Men. It wasn't one story. It became a source of endless regurgitated characters and over-grim (but no longer shocking) situations. It was tiresome to me. But the visceral shock of that first story was a clear inspiration for Future Tense.

Of course, Gargoyles has MUCH stricter time-travel rules than X-Men has.

Again, I wonder what you guys were thinking as shock after shock SMACKS Goliath and the audience. Starting with the explosion of the skiff. When the "face" of the skiff sinks away, I thought it was a chilling start to the festivities.

THE NEW STEEL CLAN
Putting the face of Xanatos on this new Steel Clan was Frank's idea, I believe. It seemed both odd and appropriate to the "new" Xanatos we were presenting.

FORTY YEARS
Did you buy it? Even for a moment? We tried to ramp up the shocks gradually, to suck you in. Claw without wings. An old Matt. The Talan Commandos. Chavez'sdaughter. (I love the baby crying symbolically as she looks at the picture of her mom Maria.) Xanatopia. ("They have better things to be afraid of.) The destruction of the Clock Tower. The late Hudson memorialized in bronze (so it was clear that it was just a statue of him and not him frozen in stone, as in "The Price".) Xanatos having achieved immortality. A Grown-up and Hostile Brooklyn. A grown-up and blind Broadway. The reported deaths of Maggie, Talan and Coldstone. Sevarius and the Ultra-Pack. The last free humans turned into mutates?

All this revealed in a matter of minutes. The idea of course is to try to keep both Goliath and you guys off balance for as long as possible. How many of you just went along for the ride? How many spent the half hour balking?

THE PHOENYX GATE
Step by careful step. When Brooklyn brings up the gate the first time, our hope was that it wouldn't come across as -- 'Hey, this is what this whole episode is really about?', but simply as a logical question that needed to be refuted by Goliath's great line: "Solutions lie not in the past, but in the present."

CLONE WARS
We wanted to play fair, but we still wanted to fool you.

Demona is introduced -- as Brooklyn's mate, no less. And for the first time it is Puck who is caught off guard, unaware that Demona and Thailog have hooked up. His Brooklyn is forced to vamp that Thailog was killed in the "Clone Wars". (I like to think that it was Puck who spur of the moment stole that reference from George Lucas as opposed to us.) And to justify it, he later shows the Thailog Shock Troops.

(Note that both the Talan Commandoes and the Thailog Shock Troops are cybernetically disfigured -- with a full hemisphere of their brains replaced.)

AND THE SHOCKS KEEP COMING...
A cybernetic Lexington, clearly influenced by Hyena & Jackal. (And as it turned out, more influenced than we knew.)

Fox not being Fox. But being F&X's son, Alexander, a.k.a. Fox 2.0. I love that VERY anime battle scene between them. Isn't that kick-ass animation. And Xanatos killing his own son because he no longer "required an heir"... woo.

Goliath: "...but to destroy his own son..."

This was ALSO us playing fair... on two levels. The Xanatos we all knew would NEVER murder his own son. So this must NOT be the real Xanatos. And it isn't. Not within Puck's vision (where this Xanatos is just a computer program with delusions of grandeur and the LACK of self-awareness necessary to be blind to the fact that Lex was actually calling the shocks) and not really AT ALL (as the whole thing was just an illusion of Puck's).

When Brooklyn says: "We better get out of here before Xanatos nukes the place," we were hoping that by this point the audience wouldn't be sure whether or not to take Brooklyn's statement/fear literally.

DEATH & CONSEQUENCES
I love Broadway's Sonar collar.

I love Demona's appeal to Goliath to save their daughter by sending her back in time with the Gate. If not to change history, at least to live out her natural life in a better era in safety.

The shocks AND hints proceed to escalate rapidly. Next up is the deaths of Claw, Matt and Bronx.

The death of Bronx, I feel is in some ways the biggest shock/clue of all. With all the other deaths up to that point, both those announced (Hudson, Maggie, etc.), implied (Chavez) and depicted (Claw, Matt), we may still see them as part of a future that we somehow hope to avoid. But Bronx is a rider on the skiff. If he dies, isn't he REALLY dead?

Then comes the abduction of Lex. Again, we were hoping that SO MUCH would follow this (especially the immediate death of Broadway) that you'd all forget about Lex until we were ready to reveal him as the big villain (of Puck's vision).

Then the death of Broadway. As I've said many times, we had a WONDERFUL S&P person with Adrienne Bello. But we still had a fight here. Showing these deaths -- or even talking about them -- would DEFINITELY be out in today's environment. The fact that eventually it was all revealed as an illusion would not stop today's S&P from K.O.ing the ENTIRE NOTION.

But even Adrienne balked at the death scene. She thought it would be too painful for our audience. My point, and I was adamant about it, was that we had to make it painful. That a violent death is painful and that the audience had to feel, really feel, the consequences -- the horrible consequences -- of that death. So Broadway and Bill Faggerbakke get that wonderful death scene. The most potent moment perhaps in the entire series (at least IN the moment, if not in hindsight -- given that it was all part of the illusion). The music there is just heart-breaking too. And the sun that never comes...

CYBER-DEATH & CONSEQUENCES
Tron is another influence of course. Digitized into the cyber-world, our last trio of heroes is immediately trapped. We learn that Xanatos is in fact DEAD.

I love Goliath's line: "You're not immortal. You're not even Xanatos."

Angela dies. Brooklyn dies. Demona is transformed to human. (Another clue: Puck can't resist praising his own handiwork.) Then she dies.

And then Goliath awakens while STILL in stone form. And Xanatos goes to work on him in a way that would make Jackal envious. I love the juxtaposition of Shakespeare and Monty Python...

"Alas Poor Goliath, I knew him well." and "What are you going to do? Bite my kneecaps off?"

And then I love how Goliath's floating stone debris SWALLOWS the Xanatos program whole.

The cyber-world dissolves and all Goliath can do is save Elisa. His last tie to this world. He is nearly back to the state he was in after the Wyvern massacre. Alone in a world that contains only horror and tragedy.

LEXINGTON
I think he was fairly effective and chilling as the ultimate villain here. Goliath KILLS him personally, which I thought was also quite chilling... The Eyrie "Pyramid" explodes and again, all Goliath can do is protect Elisa.

PUCK
But now Goliath lies, broken on the ground. Elisa again asks for the Phoenix gate. And he cannot even muster the strength to deny it to her. But Puck has overplayed his hand. Goliath is so weak, he cannot hand it to her. And the more Elisa begs, the more suspicious Goliath gets. And the more suspicious he gets, the more Puck's hold weakens. And the more Puck's hold weakens, the stronger Goliath gets. I know it sounds complicated, but I think it plays.

I love how not just Elisa, but the entire world (or BG anyway) is sucked together and transformed into Puck.

I love how Puck created this entire horrible torture device just to get Goliath to "fork over" the Gate, and that the only reason for that was so that Puck could have something to bribe Oberon with, so that he could skip out on the Gathering.

I love how Puck still torments Goliath with the "dream or prophesy" line. And I love how that line has similarly tormented the fans. Much has and still will come true from that "prophesy" and yet much already has not.

FINALLY
I remember we stuck in that line about Goliath falling into the water. I remember that we had a play-fair reason for putting that line in. But for the life of me, I cannot remember what that reason was.

I like how Goliath dispatches the Phoenix Gate and how it seems to rain a bit of magic on them all. (This was also the set up/inspiration for the TimeDancer spin-off.) The idea that the Gate would be "forever lost in time".

And finally, Goliath explains: "I had a nightmare, Elisa. And now we must make sure it does not come true."

Did you guys sense that the World Tour was FINALLY coming to an end?

And overall, what did you think? We wanted the episode to really effect you. We wanted to play fair. We didn't want you to walk away feeling cheated because the whole thing was a trick of Puck's (and ours).

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours...?


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Future Tense outline notes...

I don't know when I'll get around to rambling on Future Tense, but as it's up next, I'm posting my outline notes on that episode to Story Editor Michael Reaves.

The thing you need to know is that there was much discussion back then of doing the episode (or at least sections of it) in 3-D. Now I do NOT mean CGI. I mean the 3-D glasses kind of 3-D. So many of the notes below reflect that.

WEISMAN 4-23-95

Notes on "Future Tense" Outline...

Michael, I know this is exactly the kind of document that drives my story editors nuts. I apologize, but in the interests of time I believe this is the best solution.

I also want you to know that I considered your suggestion that we replace one of Cary or Gary's episodes with a from-scratch 3-D affair. But after reviewing the schedule it just wasn't practical. Aside from the fact (and budgetary concern) that those guys are already underway on those stories, we just don't have time to come up with a new story from scratch and get Gary Krisel's approval on it and still make all relevant deadlines.

I believe that what I've beated out below preserves all the essential stuff from Marty and Bob's outline, but gives us more opportunity for 3-D action in cyber-space. As usual, none of it is etched in stone. If this approach works for you, you can go right to script. If there's anything you, Marty or Bob want to discuss, that's cool too.

GENERAL NOTE ON 3-D ACTION IN CYBERSPACE
Please remember the nature of this particular 3-D process: some elements push backward or forward depending on their assigned color. You guys don't have to worry about assigning the colors. Leave that to the art director. Nor do you have to sweat the foregrounding and backgrounding. We'll leave that to the board artists, art director, line producer and Frank. What you do need to be aware of though is that this particular 3-D process only really works with characters and objects. They should not be interacting with the environment or backgrounds. That's not to say that Cyber-Xanatos or whoever can't form any specific object out of the "ether" or something. But we don't want scenes of Goliath tearing up Cyber-walls or Brooklyn being swallowed up by the cyber-ground or whatever. Energy beams might work, but "energy fields" could be problematic. If this is unclear, we can set up a meeting with our technical expert, Rob Hummell.

BEAT SHEET
ACT ONE
I. Streamline and combine your beats 1, 2, 3 & 4.
Open on the skiff and the mist with some specific line from Goliath, where he's saying that the odyssey they've been on has been rewarding, but that he really is starting to miss the clan and Manhattan, his adopted home. He feels woozy for a second. Then he sees the Statue of Liberty. (The wooziness is being done in the interest of fair play. Don't make too much of it. The audience will forget about it until the end of the episode, at which point, they'll think: "Of course.")

Combine the blowing up of the skiff with the capture of Elisa and Angela by the Steel Clan robots, (we don't need uniformed human sentries). Goliath and Bronx are rescued by Matt. As they make their way to rebel headquarters we can get Xanatos's brief big brother (3-D) message. We can see the statue of Hudson and find out he's dead. Meet the hostile Brooklyn.

II. Combines your beat 5 & part of beat 6.
Meet the Blind Broadway. And bring up the Phoenix Gate. Make sure Goliath states definitively that "HISTORY CANNOT BE CHANGED". The line about 'time as a river' is a good one, but don't count on that to be clear enough by itself. Intro Good Demona and establish that she is mated (as opposed to married) to Brooklyn. Don't forget to plant another "fairness clue" with our audience. When Goliath says that he thought Demona was in love with Thailog, it takes her a flustered minute to explain that Thailog also died fighting Xanatos. Or something like that. Also I think we can let the more sophisticated members of our audience see the irony that Demona is finally good again only to be lost to Goliath forever. We don't have to state that in dialogue. It raises a lot of complicated issues.

Suddenly Cyborg-Lexington enters and announces that Talon, their inside man, is transmitting all-important data even as they speak. He turns on a monitor and we see Talon getting his butt kicked by Xanatos (in 3-D). While they are watching this, Goliath should ask where this battle between Xanatos and Talon is taking place. All Lexington knows is that it was coming from somewhere inside the Eyrie Pyramid. Xanatos gloats about his plan to do to the entire planet what he has done to Manhattan, then he destroys Talon and the transmission is cut off.

ACT TWO
III. Combines just a bit of your beat 6 and both of your two beat 7s. (Don't feel bad. This late in the season, I'm having trouble counting too.)
We don't need the attack by the Thailog Stormtroopers. Brooklyn states that it's now or never. We have to launch a pre-emptive strike on Xanatos' lair. They'll divide into ground and air forces. Brooklyn, Demona, Cyborg-Lex, Blind Broadway and Goliath will wait for Matt and Bronx and the rebels to create a diversion downstairs. Then they will go in above.

As the five gargoyles wait atop a nearby building for their cue, Demona and Brooklyn again try to prevail on Goliath to use the Gate.

IV. Combines your beats 8 & 9.
Matt and Bronx's diversion begins. The gargoyles fly in, but Lex reports with his cyborg-sight that both Matt and Bronx have been killed. Brooklyn is determined that they won't have died in vain.

They get in, but Lex is quickly taken prisoner and Broadway dies. Goliath, Brooklyn and Demona make their way to Computer Mainframe/Banquet Hall. They aren't looking for any Chief Administrator. They're still looking for Xanatos, not realizing that he no longer exists on the physical plane.

V. Basically your beat 10.
Except instead of a VR helmet, have Goliath, Brooklyn and Demona digitized into (3-D) Cyber-Space ala TRON. No physical bodies left outside. If you die in there. You dead. Obliterated.

ACT THREE
VI. Your beat 11, greatly expanded to fill most of the act.
Xanatos has been holding Elisa and Angela prisoner inside cyber-space, anticipating Goliath's arrival. We get our explanation. Our fight. And the destruction of Brooklyn, Demona and Angela. Goliath finally manages to take out Xanatos, which causes the whole cyber-world to dissolve.

VII. Combines and abbreviates both of your beat 12s.
Goliath and Elisa are re-digitized in the real world. Only to discover that Lex used the opportunity to activate Xanatos' plan. Now he'll rule what's left of the world. Goliath lashes out at Lex, which knocks him back into the main frame and the whole thing starts to blow. Castle is destroyed taking out Lex. (No redemption possible.) Goliath barely manages to save Elisa, but he's broken by it. And Elisa tries to get the gate from him. She fails and melts into Puck. In fact the entire world seems to melt into her to become Puck.

VIII. Your beat 13.
Puck reveals what it has all been about. (Make sure to specifically mention that Oberon has begun "The Gathering".)

IX. Your beat 14.
Make it clear that Goliath passed out right after he said his line about missing his adopted home. So the audience in retrospect can place the exact moment when Puck's little adventure began.

And that's it. Feel free to call with questions or concerns.


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Chapter LV: "Ill Met by Moonlight"

Time to ramble...

Chapter LV: "Ill Met by Moonlight"
Story Editor: Michael Reaves
Story: Michael Reaves
Teleplay: Diane Duane & Peter Morwood
Director: Dennis Woodyard

TITLE
This was Michael's title, which he chose knowing it would appeal to the Shakespearean in me. I liked it, but it did concern me that people would misread it. Which is often the case. "I'll Meet by Moonlight" is the one I hear most often.

LORD & LADY
We'd been building toward this one since "The Mirror" -- i.e. from the moment we introduced the concept of the Third Race (a.k.a. Oberon's Children). Note that Oberon refers to himself as "Lord of the Third Race". It's interesting to me that he acknowledges that Gargoyles and Humans are first & second. Perhaps that's his version of humility. Supports my notion that the Oberati (as I wanted to call them originally) evolved last.

Anyway, when we first intro'd Titania's Mirror, I'm curious how many of you thought you'd eventually get to meet Titania?

Note also Oberon & Titania's skin color. This was intentional. Since I knew we had the Gathering coming up and that myth-figures from many cultures would be bowing to Oberon as Lord, I didn't want to depict him or Titania with traditional caucasoid skin. I wanted them a step removed.

We also establish that Oberon divorced Titania for her hybris and disdain for mortals. That he sent her and ALL the children out to learn humility. As I've stated many times, the problem that Oberon had is that 1001 years ago, relative to his fellows, he was already humble. But that's relative. They all go out, and Titania and Puck and a few others learn the lesson that he sent them to learn. But thinking he had no lesson to learn, he learned... nothing. So Titania has evolved, and Oberon has not.

FAMILIAL RELATIONS
Gabriel has been a bit bored on Avalon. Angela says: "Join us on the skiff, my brother." This seemed like a pretty clear indication to me that Angela & Gabriel's relationship was fraternal, not romantic. (I mean, after all, Demona's called Goliath a lot of things, but never "brother".) But still some people thought that these two were an item. They take evidence, I'm told, from the way they held hands over the volcano later in the episode. But I still see that as fraternal concern.

LINES I LIKE (all quotations approximate)
Angela: "I'm beginning to think that this Manhattan is a myth."
Seline: "Humans and Gargoyles profane your kingdom."
Oberon: "A minor nuisance" and "Insolent infestation!"
Titania: "Time for even Puck to mend his manners."
Oberon: "So proud Titania, the game's a foot." (Combines Shakespeare and Conan Doyle.)
Guardian: "No choice and only one chance."
Oberon: "Now, you're just quibbling." (One of my all time favorite lines in context.)
Angela: "Gargoyles stand together."
Titania: "Oberon's word is law."
Katharine: "But does that mean he's always right."
Titania: "Not while he's married."
Goliath: "All's well that ends well."

THE BELL
Silver, we're told is for vampires and weres. So Elisa loses ANOTHER gun to contribute a bit more iron.

I thought the iron bell was a VERY clever solution, and I even thought that Titania's clues were very clever. And the oblique exchange in the forge is clever.

But the forging itself is a disaster. No mold. Just pour hot iron on the ground? Then cool it BEFORE you start hammering it into shape? I picture a forgotten scene where the Guardian finally looks up from his work and says, "I gotta confess I don't know what I'm doing here." And then Elisa says, "Didn't you forge your armor?" And Princess Katharine says, "Actually that was two of the eggs: Michael and Raphael." And Ophelia sighs and says, "I'll go get them."

I do like the overlapping hammer sound effect onto the next scene though.

Ophelia's honesty is also very neat. She questions whether they are doing the right thing. And her arguments RING a lot truer than the rationalization we get from the rest of the gang. Lucky our guys are sympathetic, and Oberon is not.

OTHER TOUCHES
I like the pairing of Gabriel with Goliath and Angela to carry the action. That was fun.

The sound effects accompanying Oberon's flight -- a kind of more meaty version of what was done with Puck in "The Mirror" -- are pretty cool. I like his arrival as a pillar of flame too. He's got style, you have to admit.

I like the cool lighting in the volcano and my daughter Erin liked the lava hands ("That's so awesome.")

I also like the Firefalls. I remember those as being part of the pre-Byrne/pre-Salkind version of Krypton. And long ago, Yosemite National Park used to do firefalls too. The image always stuck with me as very cool. And I like the steam as the lava flows into the river. (Helping to keep the island warm and balmy, perhaps?)

At one point, Gabriel says: "This way!" but on the cut, Goliath is again in the lead. A small mistake, I'm afraid.

I love Goliath's fury as he attacks Oberon (Erin: "Whoa, that was cool!") And I love how Oberon shatters to become diamond-hard beneath. And I love how Goliath STILL doesn't give up, putting Oberon into a half-nelson.

RESOLUTION
Getting us to where I wanted us to go...

Oberon grants assylum, with no hard feelings. He makes the Gargoyles his Honor Guard, which I think is cool. He exempts Goliath and his "clan" from his magic (inadvertently granting this exemption to both the Avalon & Manhattan clans, since Goliath thinks of himself as a member of both.) Oberon & Titania are remarried simply by agreeing that it is so. I mean when you're at the top of the food chain, who needs anyone else to officiate?

Goliath learns that Titania feels indebted to him, though he doesn't learn why. How many of you guys put together that Titania and Anastasia were one and the same? Of course, our voice casting was a HUGE clue. But we have enough actors doubling characters who aren't related that I thought that few people would draw the conclusion that we already had in mind.

And of course, we pave the way for the Gathering...

That's my ramble. Where's yours?


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Chapter LIV: "Cloud Fathers"

Time to ramble...

Chapter LIV: "Cloud Fathers"
Story Editor: Brynne Chandler-Reaves
Writer: Lydia Marano
Director: Dennis Woodyard

PREVIOUSLY
Our recap emphasized Xanatos' near disinterest in Goliath. It's kinda funny. And I love how Xanatos spells out that he doesn't hold a grudge. I really do think that it's his reasonableness that sets him apart as a villain. That and the fact that he's such a big picture guy. His big plans are rarely about acquiring things he can get himself. He wants immortality.

Xanatos: "It's my first real step at cliched villainy. How am I doing?"

Still, it was fun at the very end to let him at least get annoyed: "...These last minute upsets you keep handing me are becoming... irritating." THAT in fact is the closest Xanatos comes to cliched villainy.

ARIZONA, 1960
Throughout the episode, the girls keep asking Peter if he wants to "visit" his own father. I'm curious as to how many of you realized that Carlos Maza had actually passed away.

I think the Cloud Fathers memo that I recently posted gives a pretty clear indication of what I was trying to go for here. This, in my mind, is an internal struggle: Peter vs. Peter. Were his actions as a young man reasonable? Are they justifiable? If he admits his mistakes can he live with them? Etc.

I like how dialogue from the Arizona flashback is referenced by Coyote later. My kids noticed it too. Erin also noticed how much Coyote looked like young Peter with his "rugged good looks". I'm glad that was clear.

BETH MAZA
We finally get to know Elisa's other sibling -- the non-mutated one. She seems like an interesting character. Very open-minded. Influenced by her mother's more academic and anthropological pursuits, but choosing to focus on the Native American side of her heritage as opposed to the African side that her mother studies.

It's interesting to me that Elisa is the only one of the siblings who really directly follows in a parent's footsteps.

And I like Beth & Elisa's exchange...
Beth: "They're kinda beautiful... but so alien."
Elisa: "After a while, all you notice is the beauty."

So is Elisa in love or what?!

And PLEASE don't tell me that Beth's line is further evidence that the gargs come from another planet.

THE SWIMMING POOL
I thought this was VERY clever having the skiff arrive in a pool. But I wonder how visually clear it was. that it was JUST a swimming pool.

I did like Elisa's line, when asked where she came from, she says: "The deep end." True in so many ways.

MORE LINES I LIKE
Coyote 4.0: "Once more with feeling."
Coyote 4.0: "Don't quit your day job." (This said to a gargoyle.)
Xanatos (regarding Angela): "She's lovely, Goliath."
Angela (while attacking): "I'm the lovely one, remember!"
Elisa: "Bronx, hit it!" (Didn't she say the same thing in Golem?)
Xanatos: "No way my luck is this bad."
Elisa to Peter re: the Gargs: "Are THESE guys figments of your imagination?" (Answer that one for yourself.)
Coyote re Coyote: "I should sue for trademark infringement."
Xanatos: "I've always considered myself a trickster at heart."
Xanatos to Coyote 4 re the Trickster: "Bottle him."
Coyote 4: "Curious."
Xanatos: "It's so hard to program good help these days."
Coyote 4: "I'm programmed for vengeance."

TRICKSTER STORIES
Coming up with Trickster plots -- for guys like Coyote or Puck or even Xanatos -- can be REALLY hellish. It's hard work making sure that you have all these twists and turns and contingencies figured out. Now try pitting TWO TRICKSTERS, Coyote and Xanatos, against each other. Man!

You can imagine why we were never quite able to tame our FOUR TRICKSTER story involving Puck, Coyote, Raven & Anansi. Not that I think it's impossible, but we just ran out of time and had to settle for the still incredibly complex "Possession".

EYES OF THE COYOTE
I wish the carving had had NO EYES until the acid created them.

Michael Horse, who played both Peter & Carlos in this story, advised us on this script. Obviously, we were trying to be respectful of the culture. He told us to make sure that the carving and the Kachina masks were NOT copies of actual sand-paintings or masks in use. That would be sacreligious.

We did get one letter of complaint about this episode, but it was clear from the letter that the writer hadn't yet seen the episode. So we sent them a tape. Got no more complaints.

COYOTE 4.0
He's a nice stand-in for X, but pales in comparison. Still it was fun always redesigning him. Making him tougher in new ways. And I really like that the Cauldron of Life was reincorporated into him. Nothing ever wasted on this series.

I was also highly amused by the Coyote/Roadrunner schtick. With the trickster in the role of the Roadrunner, tricking Wile E. 4.0 into destroying himself.

AND BACK TO PETER
Coyote had to get Peter back. I like that. And I like the bittersweet ending at Carlos' grave. It strikes me as a graveside victory.

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?


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W.I.T.C.H. news

I meant to post this LAST WEEK, but anyway...

A new animated series, W.I.T.C.H., has premiered both on ABC Family's Jetix block and on ABC (broadcast) Saturday Morning block. (Check local listings.)

Of course, I'm biased. I had nothing to do with this first season, but I do think this is a fun series, with on-going continuity, a large ensemble cast and a larger epic storyline that spans the season's 26 episodes.

I'm currently working on the series' SECOND season, which just got an official pick-up for 26 more episodes. They've done some cool stuff in Season One. And my team is doing some very cool stuff for Season Two. This is the most fun I've had working on a series since ROUGHNECKS & GARGOYLES. (My only real complaint is that it's non-union.)

I've got a great writing staff, but none of them worked on the first season either, so I'll save that for a later post.

In the meantime, I heartily recommend that you get in on the ground floor of W.I.T.C.H. now. They'll be airing the second part of the two-part pilot this Saturday. I assume they'll have a recap to bring everyone who missed part one up to speed. (And for all I know, they may still be rerunning part one on Jetix.)


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"Cloud Fathers" Outline notes...

Well, I'm not exactly sure when I'll be watching Cloud Fathers and doing that ramble, but it's obviously on deck, so while I'm thinking of it, I thought I'd present my notes on the Outline from May of 1995.

SPOILERS for the episode.

WEISMAN 5-1-95

Notes on "The Cloud Fathers" Outline...

PETER MAZA
Primary emotional conflict is between Peter and himself. It's an internal conflict. Think Field of Dreams. He can't admit that there was value to his father's Sioux Traditions or he'd have to admit that he wasted all those years being at war with his dad. Now that his dad is dead, he feels it's too late to see his pop's PoV. That's where his adamant stance comes from. But we won't objectively reveal that Peter's dad is dead until the last scene.

We'll illustrate this conflict by letting Coyote/Trickster/Kachina appear as young Peter. One of the trickster's goals is to recover the real Peter. Bring him back to the fold, so to speak.

We'll have less "obvious" magic up front, or else it's hard to keep the real Peter in complete denial. Replace shimmering trickster with trickster posing as mysterious "young Peter" in various guises. Very worldy and cynical the way young Peter was and old Peter believes he still is, but really isn't.

Not a Beth/Peter conflict, per se.

Maza family is Sioux. Not Hopi.

XANATOS
In retrospect, I was wrong to leave the real Xanatos out of this story. His presence will undercut Coyote, but we need someone for Coyote to talk to anyway, so we might as well put Xanatos on the scene and in charge. It's another one of his bids for immortality. And the narcissistic byplay between Xanatos and Coyote might be fun.

It's Coyote (Kachina Trickster) vs. Coyote (4.0 Robot & Xanatos) for the Trickster hall of fame.

Coyote-4.0 has been made from an alloy that includes the melted down Cauldron of Life, making him able to catch and contain a Kachina. The robot is also heavily upgraded with armor and weaponry, making him a lot tougher than the last three versions Goliath defeated.

RANDOM STUFF
No longer necessary to force the proximity between campus, construction site and "village".

Don't need the elders.

Keep the midnight ceremony, but I'm extremely nervous about the dancing -- it could be a real animation problem.

BEAT SHEET
ACT ONE
1. Teaser opening at seemingly deserted construction site. Something very weird and spooky is happening to the bulldozers. Don't show too much.

2. Flashback to 1960. Peter, an only child, is 18 years old. (Maybe he's got a brush cut, while his dad has very long hair.) Peter's fighting with his dad. Dad believes in old ways. Peter doesn't. He leaves for NYC.

3. Dissolve to Peter waking up from Flashback dream as his airplane comes in for a landing. He doesn't like to be back in Arizona.

4. Beth picks him up at airport. She's asked him to come because of Xanatos' building project on leased tribal land. (She can't tell authorities about Derek, but she knows X is probably up to no good.) Peter is equally suspicious of Xanatos. (As long as it's a real world thing.) Beth's driving Peter out to get a look at the construction site. Small talk en route: While he's in town does Peter want to "visit" grandpa? No, he does not. O.k., then, new topic. Any word on Elisa?

5. Mist to swimming pool. Elisa is alarmed to find out where they are. If Avalon sent them here, her sister Beth might be in danger.

6. Beth and Peter arrive at construction site. They are given permission to enter, even encouraged to enter, by a young security guard (whom the audience may or may not recognize as a dead ringer for the young Peter Maza, but who is in fact the kachina Coyote in disguise). Beth may say in an offhand way that the security guard looks familiar. Once inside the perimeter, we find the bizarre Stonehenge of vehicles and tires (in front of the large shed that hides the soil carving). And then Peter and Beth are surrounded by Xanatos and the tribal police. Arrested for trespassing and vandalism. Vandalism? They didn't do this. How could they? And the security guard gave them permission to enter. Xanatos says he has no security guards, but maybe he should hire some. Take them away.

7. The next day, Beth and Peter (a bit worse for wear) make it back to her off-campus apartment. They spent the rest of the night in jail, before making bail. Elisa is inside waiting for Beth. Reunion. Gargoyles are frozen in stone on the terrace. They discuss Xanatos situation. He must have set them up, which is a neat trick since he didn't know they were coming. Who was that security guard? He's the key to proving their innocence. And what is Xanatos up to on that land in the first place?

8. Meanwhile at construction site, Xanatos is in conversation with someone who's standing in the shadows. Someone who sounds a lot like Xanatos. (Coyote Robot, obviously.) Xanatos knows the Mazas didn't have anything to do with the "vandalism". But he let them take the rap because he didn't want the tribal police to investigate any further. Maybe he has a security camera video of "Young Peter/Phony Security Guard/Coyote/Trickster/Kachina" giving the Mazas permission to enter the site. Xanatos thinks that this security guy is the true vandal. He's positive he knows who the guy is. And he wants him.

9. Night. Goliath and Angela have been filled in. They are going to enter construction site by air to find out what Xanatos is up to. Peter has a few moral qualms about this, but the Gargoyles don't legally exist, so legally no one is trespassing. (Let's also not make Peter and Beth too comfortable too quickly around the gargoyles. Knowing they exist and seeing them frozen in stone, is not the same as seeing them walking and talking in all their glory.) After gargoyles head out, Elisa asks whether Peter might want to "visit" grandpa, after this is all over. No, Peter does not.

10. Goliath and Angela glide in. Enter the "shed". Find the soil carving and the land-sat pictures, though they don't know the significance of them. Then Coyote-4 shows. He was expecting Peter and Beth Maza, not Goliath and Angela, but he figures they'll do. We have a fight, which the gargoyles lose. They are down for the count.

ACT TWO
Intercut between beats 11 and 12.

11. Outside the construction site, Peter, Beth and Elisa spot "Young Peter" (no longer dressed as a security guard, but as we saw young Peter dressed in the flashback). With Bronx's help they "apprehend" him. Now that he doesn't have his security guard hat, both Beth and Elisa are startled by his resemblance to their father. "Dad, doesn't he remind you of someone?" But Peter doesn't notice the resemblance and doesn't give them much opportunity to comment on it. He wants some answers from this faux-security guard. Why did he help Xanatos frame them? The kid sidesteps the question by asking a question of his own. Why shouldn't he help Xanatos? Who cares if Xanatos destroys a soil carving sacred to the kachina Coyote? All that old indian stuff is just that: old indian stuff. Beth is shocked. If that's what Xanatos is up to, he definitely must be stopped. Peter begrudgingly agrees that the tribe should be informed. The soil carving has anthropological value at least. Oh, please, says the kid, scoffing at Peter, the way Peter once scoffed at his father. Xanatos is bringing jobs to the tribe. Real jobs. Real money. If you inform the tribe, they'll just rope the site off as sacred land and Xanatos' project won't get off the ground. No jobs. No cash inflow. The kid looks at Peter and says: Get with the program, old man. Besides, where are your priorities. Your worried about some scratches in the sand, while Xanatos is about to ice your two gargoyle friends. The Mazas look shocked. They instinctively turn to look toward the construction site. In that moment, Bronx starts howling, and when they turn back, the Trickster has vanished.

12. Goliath and Angela regain consciousness inside the shed. Coyote-4 has just finished securing them in some kind of James Bondian deathtrap. Xanatos is there and he's actually apologetic. He has no desire to kill either Goliath or this intriguing new female. But the death trap has to be real, and he must be prepared to follow through or else he couldn't hope to trap his true quarry. He's figured that out at least. For weeks he kept pretending that he was about to destroy the soil carving, but until he made up his mind to actually bulldoze the thing last night, he didn't even get a nibble. His prey obviously knows when he's sincere. The seconds tick away and soon the gargoyles will die.

13. Led by Elisa, the Mazas and Bronx are breaking into the construction site perimeter and shed. (If we need a legal rationale, Elisa feels they have probable cause at this point. They have reason to believe a homicide is about to take place.) Peter can't figure out how that strange kid got away so fast. Beth thinks she knows how and also who the kid really is. But before she has a chance to voice her theory, they're in. Unfortunately, Xanatos (in his battle armor) is waiting. It looks bad for all of our heroes. And then Xanatos is hit with a lot of bad luck. Outrageously bad luck. And Xanatos actually seems pleased. He knows his quarry is near. All our gargoyle and human heroes escape, but not before Beth sees "Young Peter" watching them from the rafters. Coyote-IV tries to sneak up on him, but "Young Peter" jumps out an open window (or something) to safety.

14. Our heroes head for the tribal police station to inform the authorities about Xanatos and the hidden soil carving. Beth finally has a chance to reveal what she's now convinced is the truth about the faux-Security Guard. She believes he is Coyote, the trickster. Peter can't believe that this nonsense is coming out of the mouth of one of his daughters. The guy was a punk working for Xanatos. But Beth spells it out. Why would Coyote try to grab one of Xanatos' employees? And c'mon, the guy looked exactly like old pictures of Peter. And he was clearly trying to goad Peter into action through some pretty amateurish reverse-psychology. Plus the soil carving is sacred to Coyote. And who else would have the power to set those bulldozers up that way? And how about the amazing string of luck that allowed them to escape unharmed? That "kid" was Coyote. And he was protecting his sacred carving and us. Peter is appalled. He appeals to the others. But Elisa knows that such beings exist. She's met them. And Goliath says that Beth's theory fits with what Xanatos said earlier about his "true quarry". Angela finds it hard to believe that Peter doesn't believe. Peter won't budge. This is about a rich guy trying to build a building by bulldozing a cultural icon. That's it.

15. Just before they get to town, the gargoyles hide. The Mazas arrive outside the tribal police station. It is dark. Around back, there is some kind of tribal ceremony going on. No spectators. Just participants in masks. Beth is a student of this stuff, but even she's stumped. Nothing was scheduled, and she's unfamiliar with this ritual. Reluctantly, Peter explains. It's a ceremony of gratitude to Coyote. He knows because when he was a kid, his father made him participate. In fact, he played Coyote in the ceremony. But this old rite was rarely performed even when he was a kid. Beth sees this as further proof. The dark, empty police station. The spectatorless ceremony to Coyote. But Peter just mumbles, "It's a coincidence." Then the 'Coyote dancer' takes off his mask, revealing himself to be the "Young Peter" and asking the real Peter if this is a coincidence too? Before Peter can respond, Coyote-4 rockets into the scene, grabs "Young Peter" and rockets away.

ACT THREE
16. Pick up more or less where we left off. The other dancers take off their masks as if waking from a trance. They are the tribal police we met in beat 5. They don't have a clue what they were doing out here, but are very interested to learn about the soil carving in the shed. The Mazas hook up with the gargoyles who saw the robot zoom in and out. Everyone is now sure they must save the true Coyote from Xanatos. Everyone but Peter. Xanatos was simply saving his employee from arrest. There's no one to rescue. Peter refuses to participate in any more of this foolishness. He is adamant in his denial. ADAMANT. This can't be true. It just can't.

17. But of course, it is. The Young Peter/trickster is locked in Coyote-4's grip. He's not exactly terrified, but he's a bit surprised he can't shape-shift himself free or vanish into smoke or something.
(NOTE: I don't know exactly where this should take place. Back in the "shed" makes logical sense, but we've staged all of our action there, and we might want to mix it up some.) Xanatos explains that Coyote-4 was made from an alloy that included the melted down Cauldron of Life -- a device which was supposed to grant Xanatos immortality, but fell short of his expectations. So he put it to a new use. The magic metal of the Cauldron allows Coyote-4 to hold onto Coyote-Trickster indefinitely. (And no, the irony of the names isn't lost on Xanatos. He's always considered himself something of a trickster at heart.) Now, with the trickster under his control, he can get his heart's desire. Starting with immortality. Just then Beth, Elisa and the gargoyles bust in. Still without the trickster's help, it isn't going well. Suddenly, a man appears in the Coyote mask from the midnight ceremony. His mere presence seems to bring bad luck to the villains. Xanatos is shaken. He thought he had the real coyote/trickster but now he isn't so sure. The tide turns. "Young Peter" is freed. Coyote-IV is destroyed. Xanatos is forced to flee or something. And of course, the masked man is revealed to be Peter Maza, who really doesn't know why his appearance helped turn things around. "Young Peter" explains that playing Coyote all those years ago connected them. They are part of each other, which, Young Peter says, is why he worked so hard to get him back. And with that Young Peter vanishes. Leaving the real Peter with the Coyote mask. Peter turns to his daughters and says. Let's go visit your grandfather.

18. We dissolve to the gravesite of Peter's father. The gargoyles keep a respectful distance. Elisa and Beth are closer, but also give Peter room. In a monologue to his dead dad, Peter reveals why he couldn't believe: if he admitted he had been wrong all those years ago, then he'd have had to admit that he lost all that time with his dad for nothing. He believes now, but it is too late. And he's so sorry, because he wishes there was some way his dad could know how much Peter always loved and respected him. Elisa and Beth approach to comfort their father. "I think he knows, dad. I think he knows."

O.K. That's it. As usual, NONE OF THIS is etched in stone. If you like it, you can go right to script. If you don't like it or any part of it, just come talk to me.


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Chapter LIII: "Bushido"

Time to ramble...

Chapter LIII: "Bushido"
Story Editor: Gary Sperling
Writer: Gary Sperling
Director: Dennis Woodyard

PREVIOUSLY
As with "Sentinel", which immediately proceeded this ep, the Previously scenes are all from "Awakening". Because again, we're going to use this episode to tell another story loaded with parallelism and "What ifs?"

My daughter Erin, who's seen this episode before of course -- but not recently, picked up on all of it immediately. Taro is a Japanese Xanatos. Kai a Japanese Goliath. Yama a Japanese Demona. Hiroshi a Japanese Elisa. Etc.

What if Xanatos' plan for the gargoyles had been more directly and publicly exploitive? What if Demona was tricked... but also maintained her sense of honor and need for redemption. And etc. Would things have worked out better or worse?

Fortunately, Goliath has (in a sense) been through all of this before. And fortunately, Taro is clever. But he's no Xanatos. So it all turns out all right.

But the parallels continue. Taro also parallels the Captain, and we even present a faux Wyvern to drive the Captain/Demona - Taro/Yama relationship home.

I also like how Yama uses Goliath as proof that the Ishimura Clan doesn't need to hide from the world. Goliath disabuses him of oversimplifying, but it reminds me of when Goliath cited Xanatos to Demona as proof that humans can be trusted.

Yama is great at spouting half-truths that he has thoroughly embraced. Or put another way, Yama is right about a lot. But has chosen a really poor road with which to pave his good intentions. (Not quite the road to Hell, but the road to being a living walkaround character in a theme park!)

LOTS O' LINES
Yama (bored): "Yes, I know. We're terrifying."

Kai: "It's the best kept secret in Japan."

Goliath: "And you believe this problem will be solved by charging admission?"

Taro: "I was always a poor student." (Understatement of the year. And I love how Kai tries to deny it. That's good manners, cuz you gotta figure that for once Taro is being honest -- disarmingly honest.)

Kai: "Gargoyle must not fight Gargoyle" (A conscious tribute, believe it or not, to the semi-seminal "Battle for the Planet of the Apes" and the line "Ape has killed Ape!")

Elisa: "If you don't hurry, you're gonna wind up TV Stars!"
Goliath (horrified): "NO!" (See, we always blamed Disney for GARGOYLES low corporate profile, but Goliath himself was uncooperative.)

Taro: "Nobody ever got rich off Bushido."

Taro again: "Who else needs lessons in courtesy?"

And Taro again: "Bushido is not kind to you, Yama."

Reporter: "You've watched too many cartoons."

Elisa: "But it's a start."

Most of our guest actors began our voice recording playing different roles. But part way through the recording, Jamie and I realized that we needed to start over. They were all good actors but we hadn't worked with most of them before. Once we actually heard the SOUND of their voices, we knew we had to do some switching.

LITTLE TOUCHES
My son Benny immediately noticed that Elisa spent the last half of Act One in a kimono. (I assume her regular outfit was being cleaned -- QUICKLY.) Again, Elisa looks good in anything.

Hey, we actually do get attacked by "EVIL NINJAS"!

Also notice that Taro purchased the same brand of Tranq Gun that Bruno uses for Xanatos.

I love the cultural difference that the Ishimuran Gargoyles face IN, instead of out.

I love how Goliath crumbles the faux stone castle walls.

Hiroshi and Elisa both have some really nice moves. But she's WAY better looking.

And how about those electrified fans of Taro's. VERY COOL. Credit for those go to Dennis Woodyard and his team. The script had electro-disks on Taro's palms. But the fans are much cooler than what I had pictured. (Though I am gonna use those palm disks someday.)

LITTLE ANNOYANCES
Just exactly how many domes did Taro build? When Elisa & Hiroshi are behind the main dome, there ALWAYS seems to be another dome behind them from every angle.

More damn automated cannons shooting up the place. Sometimes, we fell back on old standards.

Way at the beginning of the World Tour, we had a meeting to decide what we were going to do about foreign languages. The majority felt we should ignore them. (I was on the fence, myself.) So when we wrote and recorded Bushido, we used no actual Japanese. Later, Frank wanted to put the first section in Japanese (with subtitles) -- right up until Kai meets Goliath, and then begins speaking English as a courtesy to his new friend. I felt it would work great (though I sure wish he had brought it up earlier). I felt that even our youngest non-literate audience would be okay with it, since the situation being presented was VERY straight-forward and easy to figure out.

Unfortunately, Frank came up with his plan too late, and Disney didn't want to spend the additional money to rerecord everything. (Many felt it was a dubious creative choice, and the cost settled it.) But in general, I wish we had played with foreign languages more. In Bushido and other World Tour eps.

BUSHIDO IN ISHIMURA
We also were interested in showing that Goliath's vision for human/Gargoyle relations wasn't just a pipe dream. For centuries, humans and Gargoyles have protected each other and lived in peace in Ishimura. It's not a perfect system. The younger human generation has (as the ep opens) lost interest in learning the ways of Bushido. And threats to their little community will always exist, both from within and without. But we felt it was important to demonstrate that peace is possible. And by the end, the pact between human & gargoyle, which we sense had begun to be taken for granted, is renewed. And the study of Bushido will be resumed. This struck me so keenly -- i.e. the notion of young humans and gargoyles studying together in the ways of Bushido (which I view to some degree at least as the Japanese version of the Gargoyle Way), that I incorporated the idea into Gargoyles 2198. Eventually, Ishimura will train both gargoyles and humans from across the globe. The former as protectors, the latter -- as GUARDIANS. All proving that Goliath was a garg ahead of his time.

Yama popped for me a bit. We bulked him up and added him to BAD GUYS as a guy who really wanted to redeem himself for betraying his clan.

We also wanted to do an episode set in Japan for our Japanese Animation Studio. At one point, I noticed that this specific episode was scheduled to go to our Korean sub-contractor. This seemed insane to me, so we juggled some stuff so that WDTVA-Tokyo could do Bushido. And they did a VERY nice job with it.

AND WHO CAN FORGET THE ANIMATRONIC GIANT GARGOYLE
Frank Welker is a lot of fun playing this guy. I want to bring him back. Or them rather. And I love how Taro is stranded up there and then falls. And I love how he says, "Not now." when the Garg starts talking.

Anyway, there's my ramble... Where's yours?


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Chapter LII: "Sentinel"

Time to ramble...

Chapter LII: "Sentinel"
Story Editor: Cary Bates
Writer: Cary Bates
Director: Bob Kline

PREVIOUSLY
All really old stuff to compare and contrast with this odd little attempt to present Goliath & Elisa's first meeting in an alternate universe, so to speak.

Lost already?

In "Awakening", Elisa accepts Goliath fairly quickly. In my mind, a lot of that acceptance comes because Elisa has a good sense of herself. She's secure in her black shirt, red jacket and genes. (Pun intended.) I believe that someone who is basically (and truly -as opposed to kidding his or herself) self-possessed, has a better chance at accepting those that are different. If I know who I am and am comfortable with that knowledge, than how does your being different effect me? It doesn't. So live and let live.

In "Awakening", Elisa knows Elisa. So Elisa accepts Goliath. But what if Goliath had met someone, even someElisa, who was not quite so self-assured?

Like, say, an Elisa with amnesia? In that alternate universe, how does their first meeting go? She takes a shot at him with her service piece, that's how it goes. Fortunately, she's out of bullets.

And ultimately, Elisa has good instincts. We left it intentionally ambiguous as to how much of her eventual turn around is credited to her returning memory and how much is a result of her instinct. But she quickly comes to believe that "this Goliath," or as I love to hear her call him, "Tiny," is a guy she can trust, even when she CANNOT trust herself.

SPEAKING OF TINY
Little changes are refreshing to me. So hearing Elisa call Goliath Tiny is like seeing her with her jacket off. Which we do, here, briefly. Long-sleeve shirt again. I know that she has both short and long sleeve black t-shirts. But has anyone kept track of whether or not we saw her in the short-sleeve t-shirt on the World Tour. Cuz that would be a continuity gaff that I could easily explain.... but I'm hoping I don't have to.

OTHER INSPIRATIONS
Well, for starters one notion that I wanted to put to rest, was some fan buzz after the first season that suggested that Gargoyles must be aliens from another planet. So I wanted to hit that idea head on with the intent of knocking it out once and for all. So Nokkar BELIEVES that the Gargoyles are servents of the Space-Spawn. But he's wrong.

And the result... I got even more fans thinking after this episode that the gargs must be from outer space. <sigh>

Another inspiration was of course, Rapa Nui/Easter Island itself. And those moai statues. This was another stop that seemed like a natural for our world tour. Famous strange statues always drew us to send the skiff to town. I love the image at the very end of Nokkar in profile beside the profiles of the moai.

Finally, when I was young there were tons of stories about forgotten Japanese soldiers assigned to remote South Pacific Islands who were still fighting World War II, because they were cut off from all communication and had no idea that the war had ended (let alone that Japan had lost). I think THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN did an episode about that. So Nokkar is a metaphor for that kind of (probably apocryphal) forgotten Sentinel.

A FEW LINES
(all quotations approximate)
*Goliath to Elisa when she agrees not to fight him at high altitude: "I suppose that's a start."

*Elisa to Tiny: "Just shut up and land."

*Nokkar to the Gargoyles: "Tell your Space-Spawn Masters that Nokkar will never abandon his post!"

Elisa to Tiny: "That's some story. Gargoyle Clans. Mutated Brothers. You threw in everything but King Arthur and the Holy Grail."
Tiny to Elisa: "Yes, well, we haven't encountered the Holy Grail yet." (HINT, HINT)

Elisa to Angela: "Stow the melodrama. I'm immune."

Goliath to Nokkar: "We are both Protectors. Guardians. Sentinels."

The way Avery Brooks (as Nokkar) says the words: "Little doubt" used to always strike me as odd. But I guess I've gotten used to it. Didn't bug me this time.

IT'S THE AMAZING NOKKAR SHOW
The way this ended, you'd almost think we were setting up yet another spin-off. "That wacky alien Nokkar teams up with a doctor and two archeologists to save the world from invasion and learn a little something about getting along... all in one hotel room!"

In fact, I did have a spin-off in mind, but set so far in the future that Arnada, Duane and Morwood-Smyth would be long gone, I'm afraid. (See the GARGOYLES 2198 archive, here at ASK GREG for more information.)

Have I mentioned that Arthur Morwood-Smyth was named after Peter Morwood and Arthur Byron Cover, and that Lydia Duane was named after Diane Duane and Lydia Marano? Yeah, I thought I had.

A FEW LITTLE TOUCHES
Goliath thinks Bronx is disoriented, because he's meandering around in front of the hill. In fact, he's meandering there, because that's the secret entrance to Nokkar's ship.

I like how Goliath gathers Elisa to him by scooping her up in a wing.

A real nice hand-to-hand battle between Goliath and Nokkar.

And Bronx jumps Nokkar TWICE!

Erin, who I believe is now TOO aware that I write down her comments thought it was cool the way Goliath sort of "ice-skated" backwards after Nokkar threw him aside.

AND SADLY
We destroy yet another archaeological treasure when Nokkar's ship topples a moai.

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?


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Will Eisner, RIP

Just taking a moment to note with sadness the passing of comic book (or I should say sequential art) genius, Will Eisner. I met Will only once, when he came to speak to a gathering of DC Comics staffers in the mid 80s. (I was a very junior editorial staffer at the time.) But I've admired his work forever and found every Spirit I've ever read to be extremely instructive. And THE DREAMERS... wow!

Bye Will, and thank you.


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HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Hey gang,

I'm back in town after a great holiday (tempered by the tragedy in Asia). I hope all of you are doing well.

Well, the holiday gift-giving season has passed, but please keep spreading the word about the Gargoyles DVD. Buena Vista Home Entertainment will begin discussing whether or not to produce a DVD of the second season in February, so the more sales we rack up between now and then, the better.


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Happy Holidays...

I'm heading out of town. Don't know how much (if any) net access I'll have, so this may be my last post until January 3rd of the new year.

So all of you, have a great Holiday Season. I am so grateful to have all of you in my life.


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Chapter LI: "The Green"

Time to ramble...

Chapter LI: "The Green"
Story Editor: Cary Bates
Writer: Cary Bates
Directors: Kazuo Terada, Takamitsu Kawamura

PREVIOUSLY
Use a voice actor. Pay a voice actor. That's the rule, and it's a good one. What that means practically is that even the guy who says, "Previously on Gargoyles" needs to be paid for that episode. Or rather, we won't use someone to say "Previously on Gargoyles" unless that actor is already appearing in the episode, because we don't want to pay someone JUST to say "Previously on Gargoyles..." Now, if you know that one fact, then when you hear our good friend Thom Adcox saying "Previously on Gargoyles" at the beginning of the episode, then it's a pretty safe bet that Lexington is going to appear... and yet, as the episode begins, it seems, at least by this time, to be a fairly standard World Tour Adventure: Goliath, Elisa, Angela & Bronx in the exotic locale of the week. So where in the world (since it ain't gonna be Guatemala) is Lexington going to pop in?

The origins of this episode ("The + [one word title]" attributable to me) come from two semi-competing desires. 1) I wanted to make sure we hit every continent, including South America on the World Tour. And I believed that the stunning visual image of Quetzacoatl, the Flying Serpent was another great inspiration for a Gargoyle character. 2) Frank felt strongly that we had not seen enough of Hudson & the Trio during the Tour. I'll admit, as I have before, that I underestimated their popularity and probably overestimated -- at least at the time -- the interest in our little odyssey 'round the world. But even then, I could see Frank's point. I didn't want to not do our Mayan adventure, so Cary & I constructed a story that would give us an interesting experience in the Green, but would also bring us back to the deep purples of Lex & Broadway's Manhattan.

IT'S ALL IN THE DELIVERY
Some great lines in this one, mostly from Hyena & Jackal:

Hyena...
"Hey, he's a fan."
"Have I mentioned how much I hate Gargoyles."
"They get no mercy." (This right before H&J get slammed by a pretty darn impressive throw of a bulldozer shovel.)
"Bowling for Gargoyles!" (To which my daughter Erin responded with: "That was disturbing." I found it interesting that in all the gonzo stuff in this episode, the thing she found most disturbing was Hyena rolling up into a ball. I mean is that really as disturbing as Jackal's dream of "resculpting" Goliath's head?!!)

Jackal...
"If a tree falls in the forest... do I get to hear it scream?"
"Timber!"

Zafiro had a good line too: "There's no such thing as a few trees."

And Goliath: "What's left of their world is rapidly dwindling."

And Broadway: "Leave our mothers out of this." (Broadway always thinks in clan-parentage mode. My son Benny wondered if they even knew whom their mothers were. Of course, they did. Not biologically, but they knew which females gargoyles were their rookery mothers. All gone now.)

And Morgan (to an unconscious Hyena): "You have the right to remain silent."

"WHAT IS THE GREEN?"
My kids wanted to know.

First off it's hot. Elisa takes off her jacket, revealing her (in this instance) short-sleeve black t-shirt. Even this slight clothing change for her comes off as exciting to me.

Second, it's full of potential herbal medicines, admirably demonstrated by Obsidiana.

Third, it's got Obsidiana. And Turquesa and Jade and the amazingly designed Zafiro. And the revelation, that long ago, Gargoyles were everywhere in the world. In hindsight, I wish that all four characters had had the serpentine lower body. Though I'm glad that only Zafiro had the feathered wings and snake-like head. There's a great Mayan/Aztec flavor to all four gargs. And you wouldn't believe the trouble we had figuring out their names. Now they seem so right. But we went through many permutations, before figuring them out. I think at one point, Zafiro was named Jose.

Fourth, it's got that cool pyramid.

Fifth, it's got amulets which defy the basic Day/stone dynamic. We had some fun with that. And my son Benny liked seeing them alive in the morning. It was different.

Sixth, what didn't get mentioned was Oxygen. I had a line in there which talked about the dilemma of losing the rain forest on the basic level of how much of our oxygen it produces. I felt that was a VERY important message. Frank felt it was preachy. I lost that battle, or ceded it or something. But the line's not in there.

FOR A CHANGE OF PACE
Elisa is accepted fairly easily by the Mayan Clan. Obsidiana takes a particular shine to her. Despite having undergone a Wyvernesque massacre, none of the Mayan gargs have a knee-jerk negative reaction to humans. And certainly nothing on the level of what Elisa had just experienced in New Olympus.

DID YOU NOTICE THE HOMAGE?
To THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN & THE BIONIC WOMAN? I think we did some cool things with Hyena's bionic ear and Jackal's seven-figure eye.

Also, Jackal has a built in hair dryer?

And there's a moment in the museum when Hyena activates her rear jetpacks, when both my kids and my wife thought that she had "rocket-boobies". The shot switches from front to back, and her jets emerge from bionic shoulder blades. But if you miss the camera-angle switch, it can certainly look briefly as if her breasts have become rocket powered. Top that Lyndsey Wagner!

Heck, Jackal even has a built-in Bionic wrist-watch. For some reason, I find that particularly hilarious. ("And he tells time...!")

VOGEL
Just a taste of him here. He's largely a place-holder. A bad employer of our two bad villains. But we tried to make even this little bit of Vogel interesting. He's still somewhat morally-challenged. And he reveals that he has gained more responsibility as Renard's affliction has worsened.

This episode is, by the way, loaded with references to OTHER World Tour episodes. That's supposed to be a no-no. We couldn't guarantee that they would all air in order within the World Tour Tier, i.e. between the AVALON Three-Parter and the GATHERING Two-Parter. But I guess, we had some confidence that "The Green" would air after "Golem", after "Grief", etc.

THE GOLIATH & ELISA FANCLUB
I love how they disagree with each other without losing respect or concern for each other. It's so DAMN mature.

WE TRASH ANOTHER LANDMARK
Yep, we're knocking down and burning down the rain forest right & left (in an attempt to save it by influencing public opinion, no less). But we also trash another museum. I was SO cavalier about it at the time, but when I see that Mammoth skeleton go down now, I cringe.

Cool amulet though. It rolls. It frisbees with a great sound effect. Since we had the NYC plot ending -- before the Guat-plot ended -- with Hyena's defeat, we wanted to maintain some suspense. So we have Broadway and Lex come to the incorrect but believable conclusion that the Amulet must be destroyed. Fortunately, they decided to confiscate it instead. And, yes, it survives the destruction of the Clock Tower in Hunter's Moon. Then back in Guatemala, we have Obsidiana lose her amulet so that we could see her in stone and wonder if Broadway had destroyed it so that all four Mayan gargs would be sleeping.

Speaking of Hyena's defeat, she goes down after a head injury. In today's world of S&P there's no way we would be allowed to give her that head injury in the first place.

WHAT IS THE GREEN PART TWO
Seventh, I hope, without getting TOO preachy, it managed to teach a lesson. Erin thought so. Which is perhaps good enough for me.

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?


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Gargoyles DVD

Still, don't have my copy. I ordered it from Amazon with Return of the King, so I guess I'm on Hobbit time waiting to get both DVDs.

I went to Target near my house. They didn't have it. No indication that they ever had it.

So I'm still waiting.

In the meantime, for those of you who do have it, I'd love to see DVD reviews posted here at ASK GREG.

Again, it helps to have one centrally located spot where I can direct the Powers That Be at Disney. So all of you... review!


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Buffyverse Stats

BUFFYVERSE STATS

TOP 40 CHARACTER LIST:

Once again, I'm wasting my semi-valuable time (and hopefully yours) to bring you the latest update in my attempt to catalogue the most significant characters in the BUFFYVERSE. The three previous CUMULATIVE updates covered the first, second and third seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The idea behind a cumulative tally is to mimic the original experience of following the Buffyverse. It's a horse race. Some of the winners and losers are a bit surprising. Others are decidedly predictable.

The task has gotten more complicated with Buffy's fourth season, which airs simultaneously (day for day, literally) with the first season of Angel. Since a normal season of Buffy (the first excepted) consists of 22 episodes, the fourth of Buffy added to the first of Angel will total 44 episodes, and that seemed too long to wait for an update. So I'm taking the pulse at the halfway point, after 11 episodes of each series.

As you may recall, I've tried to inform this subjective task with an objective formula. I tried, as much as possible, not to allow my knowledge of future events to influence the current standings. Still, I won't deny that subjectives have played a role. It's hard not to take extra notice of a character you know is going to be important later. And ties were broken based entirely on subjective criteria - i.e. my personal preference.

I have a list of ALL the characters that have appeared in both series up to this point. It's so long (including everything from leads to ridiculously minor characters) that I haven't even bothered to count how many there are. But my list of MOST significant currently tops out at 86 characters.

But I think listing the top 40 is plenty. Or largely. I just want to note a few characters introduced (or revisited) in these two half-seasons, who haven't yet or never will make the top 40, but whom I believe are memorable enough to merit honorable mention.

Starting with…

#84 - Lee Mercer. Lee was a cold-blooded Wolfram & Heart attorney that I remember being sure would become a recurring danger. During this first half, W&H didn't focus on any one recurring villain. And I kept thinking any minute now… Any minute now… And I was right. But I picked the wrong horse.

#82 - Dennis. The Ghost haunting Cordelia's rent-controlled apartment. He was a good roommate, who obviously had a crush on her. He was sweet, and I worried about him after Cordelia was gone.

#81 - The Gentlemen. The lead Gentleman in particular. The best single episode menaces - EVER. Terrifying in look. Terrifying in M.O. Stylish. In one of the most impressive hours of television I've ever watched.

#75 - Aura. Aura appeared as an incredibly minor character in the Buffy pilot. And never again. But her name stuck with me and obviously with the Whedon team as well. Because in an early Angel, when they needed a high school pal from Cordelia's past to give her a call, they used Aura.

#74 - Tom. Tom was a vampire, part of a clique who preyed on Freshman at UC Sunnydale. The rest of his crowd was staked, but Tom was the first "Hostile" we saw captured by the Initiative. He later helped Spike escape, and we never saw poor Tom again.

#70 - Trevor Lockley. Police Detective Kate Lockley's jerk of a dad.

#67 - Lyndsey. The first W&H lawyer we met wound up being the most important. But halfway through the season, we still hadn't seen him after the pilot.

#65 - D'Hoffryn. Anya's former boss as a Vengeance Demon. He offers Willow a job after Oz leaves. (We should have seen her sixth season rampage coming.)

#64 - Tara. Willow's fellow witch makes her first appearance, and although she has very little screentime, and doesn't immediately appear again, she does seem interesting from moment one.

#61 - Sunday. Buffy's first college Vampire. #74's boss. Some nice attitude.

#57 - Olivia. Giles' incredibly hot girlfriend from London. She appears twice, including memorably in "Hush". At the end of that episode, she says she isn't sure she can take Giles' "lifestyle". And then she never appears again…

#53 & #54 - Oracles. Male and female representatives of the Powers That Be. They're not particularly interesting, so they'll die soon.

#47 - Kathy. Buffy's original Freshman roommate. A Celine fan. Brrrrrr.

#44 - Veruca. The werewolf that broke up Oz and Willow, and sent Oz running from Sunnydale.

AND NOW THE TOP 40

#40 - Graham. No previous rank. Riley Finn's second best friend. Laconic.

#39 - Scott Hope. 3rd Season Rank: 33. Buffy's one real normal boyfriend. He's still holding on to the top 40, but down 6 places, and not likely to still be around by the end of the year.

#38 - Deputy Mayor Finch. 3rd Season Rank: 32. Also down six places. Faith's murder victim.

#37 - Whistler. 3Season: 31. 2Season: 18. The Demon who set Angel on the right path. Kind of the guy I figured to take the Doyle role on Angel. But he's lost 6 rankings (19 since Season 2) and is falling fast.

#36 - Kendra. 3S: 30. 2S: 17. This whole crowd is dropping six rankings. Kendra the original auxilary Vampire Slayer deserves a bit better, I think.

#35 - Ethan Rayne. 3S: 29. 2S: 22. Giles former friend still looms larger in my memory than his ranking suggests. I keep thinking he's going to appear again, because I find it hard to believe he registered so well in so few appearances.

#34 - Devon. 3S: 28. 2S: 37. Oz's bandmate, has peeked.

#33 - Forrest. NPR. Riley's best buddie at the Initiative and the Fraternity.

#32 - Principal Flutie. 3S: 24. 2S: 16. 1S: 9. The original Principal of Sunnydale High is still hanging on.

#31 - Willy the Snitch. 3S: 21. 2S: 24. Looks like Willy has peeked also.

#30 - Larry. 3S: 25. 2S: 35. Hard not to peek when your dead. But I always liked Larry. A former bully, he became one of the White Hats and was killed by the Mayor. And he's still in the top 30.

#29 - Darla. 3S:23. 2S: 23. 1S:11. Hard not to slip when you're a vampire who's been staked. But Darla's poised for a comeback.

#28 - Percy. 3S: 26. I'm stunned Percy's holding on. He's not even vaguely interesting. But he keeps showing up.

#27 - Parker Abrams. NPR. The second guy that Buffy ever slept with. A real jerk. Makes me miss Scott Hope.

#26 - The Annointed One. 3S: 19. 2S: 14. 1S: 10. The Master's mini-me.

#25 - Mr. Trick. 3S: 18. Staked and falling. But his attitude is missed.

#24 - Amy. 3S: 27. 2S: 23. 1S: 17. Her continuing appearances as a Rat, are keeping her in the top 25.

#23 - Kate Lockley. NPR. Angel's cop friend seemed like a potential love interest, but has at the first season's halfway point, become something closer to an enemy.

#22 - Jonathan. 3S: 17. 2S: 19. Jonathan's falling, but his presence is missed, and he'll be staging a comeback.

#21 - The Master. 3S: 16. 2S: 13. 1S: 8. Buffy's first big bad appeared in a shortened first season, so has fallen out of the top twenty.

#20 - Harmony. 3S: 20. 2S: 26. 1S: 18. Harmony's emergence as a vampire was a stroke of comic genius, and has allowed her to hold onto her #20 ranking.

#19 - Maggie Walsh. NPR. The Ice Queen enters the rankings as a real comer.

#18 - Anya. 3S: 22. Halfway through the season, and Anya's admirably filling the Cordelia role, but she's still not a regular. Still she's moved up four rankings already.

#17 - Riley Finn. NPR. But the big news is Riley. Entering the rankings at 17. A new regular (hopscotching over Anya) before the Season's half over. He's Buffy's new boy. A soldier and a nice guy. Cornfed Iowa boy.

#16 - The Mayor. 3s: 14. 1S: 40. The Mayor's only lost a couple slots. Probably the best of the big bads - unless you count Angelus.

#15 - Wesley. 3S: 15. Wesley's midseason reappearance on Angel, allows him to hold onto his #15 ranking.

#14 - Jenny Calendar. 3S: 13. 2S: 11. 1S: 15. Still maintaining a good number.

#13 - Drusilla. 3s: 11. 2s: 8. Dru has fallen a couple ranks, but she's still up there.

#12 - Doyle. NPR. Okay, bigger news than Riley is Doyle. Although with his midseason death, he's got nowhere to go but down. But I loved this character. He was a blast. And his death really did catch me off guard. His ranking was really helped by Angel having such a small regular cast initially. It gave him a lot of screen time and story points.

#11 - Faith. 3s: 10. Faith only loses one rank (thanks to Spike).

#10 - Principal Snyder. 3S: 9. 2s: 10. 1s: 12. Snyder falls one rank, to equal his 2season score. But he's still in the top ten, which is pretty good for a dead guy.

#9 - Spike. 3s: 12. 2s: 9. Spike jumps (finally) past Dru, past Snyder, past Faith, as he becomes a regular. The start of something truly beautiful. (I'm choking up here.)

#8 - Joyce. 3s: 8. 2s: 7. 1s:7. Joyce has barely appeared this season, but she's got points to spare to keep her up in the high numbers.

#7 - Oz. 3s: 7. 2s: 12. Well, Oz'll be back, briefly, but he's clearly peeked. So it's all downhill from here. Still, I'm sure he'll remain in the top 40 forever.

#6 - Angel. 3s: 6 2s:6. 1s:6. This surprised me. Though Angel is climbing fast, even his own series hasn't been enough for him to catch up - yet - with Buffy's main Scoobies.

#5 - Willow. 3s: 4. 2S: 4. 1s: 4. But THIS just stunned me - and frankly makes me question my system entirely. Yes, Cordelia's position as Angel's Gal Friday on Angel gives her a ton of screen and story time. And she was close enough to Willow, to allow her to pass our young Wicca. But perception of course, suggests that Willow should be #3 or even #2 behind only Buffy. This may still end up to be the case. Figure by the end of the horse race, to see Buffy & Angel in the one/two slots, but I'd assume that Willow would pass Cordelia (once Angel gains more cast members) and maybe even Xander. (And certainly Giles).

#4 - Cordelia. 3s:5, 2S: 5. 1S: 5. See above. She's #2 in a tiny regular cast.

#3 - Xander. 3s: 3. 2s:3. 1s: 3. Xander hasn't quite found his place in Buffy's college life. But then neither has Giles. So both of them are cruising on old points.

#2 - Giles. 3s: 2. 2s:2. 1s: 2. Giles still hanging on to the #2 slot.

#1 - Buffy. 3s: 1; 2s: 1; 1s: 1. Duh.


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I GOT MINE!!

Just got back from the Amazon my friends -- went their via the Gathering 2005 site at www.gatheringofthegargoyles.com -- where I purchased my copy of the GARGOYLES SEASON ONE on DVD. I'm pretty excited. Nervous too.

I want to thank all of you who are supporting this product. Supporting this property, this fandom and my emotional state.

But let's try this. Everybody contact SOMEBODY from the fandom whom you haven't heard from in a while. Someone maybe who attended a Gathering in 1998, maybe. Or someone who used to frequent Station 8, but just sort of drifted off. Search these people down. Odds are they'd love to get the DVD, but if they've been out of the loop, they may not know it's available NOW!!!

If all of you contact just one lost fan, it would really help to spread the word!!

Thanks!


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TOMORROW OR NEVER

Well, guys, tomorrow -- December 7th, 2004 -- is the big day. The GARGOYLES first season comes out on DVD.

I know I'm preaching to the converted, but I can't emphasize enough how important it is to the fandom that this DVD sells well.

Good sales on the first day, particularly a nice Amazon turnout, are important, but what's more important are PHENOMENAL SALES over the next month or two.

If you can't get it at Amazon, get it somewhere else.

If you can't get it tomorrow, get it soon.

But get it. And more than that get everyone you know to get it.

Get strangers to get it.

Yes, I know we're all a bit disappointed in the way Disney has somewhat failed to support the DVD with advertising. But as I've always maintained... the burden is on the fans. They need to prove to Disney that Disney needs to spend money to make money on Gargoyles.

They need to prove to Disney that the fandom is rabid and large and ready to support the property with actual dollars and cents.

A very small part of me feels bad about asking you to spend money. But keep in mind if this DVD doesn't do EXTREMELY well, it will be very difficult to convince Disney to support the property in other ways -- including a second season on DVD, let alone new and original material set in the Gargoyles Universe.

By the way, we did get a nice write-up here:

http://www.silverbulletcomicbooks.com/rage/index1.htm

Check it out.

But mostly, take advantage of this opportunity to demonstrate your love for the show. Again this is NOT just about money. This is about SPREADING THE WORD WITH RELIGIOUS FERVOR!!!

Good luck to us all.


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Chapter L: "The New Olympians"

Time to ramble...

Chapter L: "The New Olympians"
Story Editor: Gary Sperling
Writer: Adam Gilad
Director: Bob Kline

ORIGINS
Well, the Greek Myths of course. But that's not really what I'm talking about. As many of you know, The New Olympians was a concept -- originally created by Bob Kline -- that we began developing at Disney TV Animation even BEFORE Gargoyles. It was definitely a concept that evolved, but it was also a concept that we felt fit nicely into the Gargoyles Universe. So this episode was created as a backdoor pilot. At the time we had big plans for the Gargoyles Universe. Hopes that it would eventually evolve into Disney's equivalent of the Marvel or DC Universe. The World Tour expanded our Universe in many ways -- mostly for the sake of the Gargoyles series itself. But also to demonstrate that our universe had the "chops" to go the distance.

So the New Olympians were imported whole, like Athena from Zeus' head -- into the gargverse. The development for "The New Olympians" series focused on four major characters: Terry, Sphinx, Talos and Taurus. Terry and Sphinx were kept out of this episode on purpose -- so that we'd have fresh faces for the series if it went. Talos has a very minor role. But Taurus took a lead here. Other characters, such as Kiron, Ekidna, Helios, Boreas and, of course, Proteus were also part of the N.O. development. Though again, we left out a bunch of other characters: Xetes, Kalais, Medusa, Jove and Xanatos (yes, Xanatos) so that the whole series didn't become old news, should it get going.

The basic concept of the series, familiar to anyone who's attended a Gathering and seen the original pitch, was Romeo & Juliet. Terry is a human. Sphinx is a New Olympian. They are in love. But their "families" aren't making that love easy. This episode, would in essence be a PREQUEL to that series. Terry hasn't arrived yet. Elisa will help pave the way for Boreas' decision to finally reveal the New Olympians to the human world.

But another important inspiration was the work of Jack Kirby. In my recent ramble on "Eye of the Storm", I commented on how we strove to avoid a Kirbyesque Odin -- and didn't entirely succeed. Here, Kirby was a clear influence. I hope The New Olympians weren't a rip-off, but I can't deny that his Inhumans, his Eternals and his New Gods influenced us -- or me, at least -- when we were creating both New Olympus and our cast of characters.

Creating the cast was also interesting. We basically compiled a list of Greek & Roman myth-figures. Gods. Monsters. Titans. Etc. Then we tried to think about their descendants... Tried to think about which would be the most visually interesting. (A lot of the gods, for example, just look like glorified humans, so we tended to ignore them.) Originally, Kiron had the Taurus role and Medusa had the Sphinx role. But after talking with the artists, we made the double switch, because it was felt that having to animate a centaur and a woman with snaky hair on a regular basis was just inviting difficulties. As with many of these pragmatic decisions, I eventually fell in love with the new version -- and wouldn't want to go back, even if I could be assured of the highest possible animation quality.

In order to import this diverse group into the Gargverse, I posited that these were the descendents of mortals who mated with the Children of Oberon (or Mab). They therefore have incredible abilities and amazing appearances, but they are mortal. Some may have extremely long lives, but they do age. Still, before they left the human world behind, many of the original Olympians were treated as Gods. But some were treated as Monsters. As in Gargoyles, PREJUDICE would be a major theme of the series. In fact, if you look at the PREVIOUSLY of this episode, you'll see that it's fully thematic. All stuff about humans being prejudiced about Gargoyles. That's because we had nothing content-wise that we needed to set up. But if we set-up human prejudice, than it helped forge the twist of prejudice against humans, which Elisa would face in the episode. (I do wish we had thought to include Goliath's line: "Humans fear what they do not understand...")

So the New Olympians fled the Human World. They established a secret island and developed astounding technology... including a cloaking device. (I was always a touch disappointed with all the fog and mist in the opening scene. I wanted the skiff to suddenly be on the open sea, with nothing around for miles. The fog allowed for the notion that something might be hiding BEHIND it. I didn't want that. Still, I think the idea gets across. And the shimmer effect is nice. Plus, I like how Goliath abruptly spreads his wings when he enters it. When my daughter Erin saw the city finally materialize, she said: "Wow!")

OLD LINES IN NEW CONTEXT
Were we just out of dialogue ideas, or were we trying to make a point or an inside joke or something. I'll let you decide...
Goliath: "We cannot wage war against an entire city."
Elisa: "You'll have to do better than that."

VOICE WORK
Michael Dorn wound up playing Taurus and the late Roddy McDowell as Proteus. Dorian Harewood, who was originally cast as Boreas, also wound up playing Talos. But none of these three were our original choices for those rolls. Instead we cast three people who I thought would be perfect for their parts. But none hit it. It was one of our rare recordings that DIDN'T work. So we fell back on Michael to play the very Worf-like Taurus. (This sometimes bothers me as the voice is exactly the same as Coldstone's. But ultimately you go with the best hand you have at the time.) Dorian ended up doing double duty as Talos and was terrific. And of course, Roddy was just brilliant as Proteus.

What's interesting is that Proteus himself is not the greatest actor. Erin noticed... "There's something different in his voice." Of course, it's Keith David PLAYING Proteus playing Goliath. (Which is always fun.) And Keith hits the mark with precision. As does Salli & Michael when they're playing Proteus playing Elisa & Taurus. Sure Proteus always LOOKS the part -- thanks to his shape-shifting abilities. And I suppose he's less of a ham than Sevarius. But he never quite takes the time to truly "inhabit" his roles. Certainly, while playing Elisa and then Goliath, there are a number of small tip-offs in his choice of words that are just wrong. Like can you really imagine Goliath saying: "Who's that guy?" One assumes that his performance as Taurus' dad is equally off the mark.

The walla in the Senate House when Elisa is on trial isn't my favorite. We just didn't get enough coverage, so it repeats and repeats.

PREJUDICE
All of the New Olympians we see are prejudiced. Every one. Some are worse than others. Boreas is well-meaning, but wrong. Taurus is narrow-minded. Talos is, at best, only pragmatic -- not morally outraged by Elisa's treatment. Most of the others are just flat out racists. "New Olympians fear what they don't understand." I'm sure somewhere on the island there were some more enlightened individuals, but we made a point of NOT showing them.

I wanted to do a few things with that theme. (1) Show that prejudice breeds prejudice. The New Olympians have some legitimate grievances against the human race, but they've learned the wrong lessons from their ancient persecution. (2) Of course, we wanted to play the irony of the monsters being afraid of the "Humans of Legend". Elisa tells the Gargoyles to hide when they first land on the island. And she's the one that the New Olympians fear. They have "no quarrel" with the Gargoyles. And the best solution that even Boreas and Taurus can come up with is to "Quarantine" our girl. (3) There was a three. I had it in my head a minute ago. Now, for the life of me, I can't remember what it was.

Maybe it had something to do with Prejudice only truly being able to be attacked one person at a time. I went to an all boys high school. We were all so deathly afraid of being called homosexuals that a culture of homophobia was ingrained into all of us. It wasn't like I was going around gay-bashing. I like to think that even then, I had the sense and the control to stifle my prejudices. But I can't deny I had them -- probably still have them to some extent, unfortunately. Anyway, then I went to college. Acted in a couple plays with a guy I really admired -- both as an actor and as a human being. Became good friends with this guy (who had the amazing name Steve Wraith). THEN I discovered he was gay. By that time, I didn't care. He had personally won me over -- in a slightly less dramatic fashion then how Homer Simpson learned to accept gays after John Waters saved his life. Steve never saved my life, but I'm afraid the metaphor is VERY apt. I haven't seen Steve in twenty years, but I owe him a lot. A few years later my cousin came out. After that, many if not most of my friends came out. My sister. Etc. Steve paved the way to make me a better person. Conceptually, we can all talk about dismissing prejudice, but I have this sneaking suspicion that the only way we really learn is one human being at a time. That's why Goliath vouching for Elisa was ineffective. People are doomed to HAVE to figure things out for themselves. And unfortunately, some never do.

WHO KNEW THESEUS WAS SUCH A BASTARD?
And so we put Taurus through that process. He meets a human. His distaste is palpable. He knows the story of the Minotaur, his ancestor. [Now Theseus is one of my all time favorite characters from Myth. But I couldn't resist flipping the tale of the Labyrinth and telling it, if just for a few seconds, from the Minotaur's point of view.] But Taurus will learn to respect humans - one human at at time. Elisa and Taurus actually have a lot in common. Both are cops. Both have/had fathers who are/were cops. But as Elisa says, he's "got some funny ideas about justice."

Elisa is clearly more enlightened. In part, that may come from her own history. She grew up as a person of color in a largely white society. She's no stranger to prejudice. Being both African-American and Native American, it's possible that she has even faced some rejection from African-Americans and Native Americans as well. Clearly, based on her openness with regards to Goliath and the Gargoyles, she learned her lessons long before we met her. Pretty much from the moment she realized that Goliath could talk -- and was therefore sentient by human standards, she treated him as an equal. I always admired her for that. Unlike the New Olympians, she didn't let the prejudice she faced turn her into a bigot.

Taurus will eventually get the message. His prejudices don't just vanish. But he's learned something.

SOME NEAT MOVES
I like the sequence where Goliath comes to break Elisa out, and Proteus takes advantage of the situation by first turning into Elisa and then Goliath. (When Erin first saw him as Elisa, she said, "Uh oh." which is pretty much exactly what he was going for.

I like how Taurus threatens to fire Helios.

I like how Goliath turns to stone in Proteus' cell.

I like how Elisa takes charge -- and basically FORCES Taurus to partner up with her. She has two tip offs that Proteus is posing as Goliath. First the fact that he didn't turn to stone and blames it on the cloaking device affecting the sun's rays. Of course, Elisa knows that it's not literally the sun that turns a gargoyle to stone. It's his or her biological clock, which is often triggered by sunrise. But the real clincher is Proteus' plan to blow up the Collonadium. Elisa knows Goliath would NEVER do that.

I like when Taurus tries to express his admiration -- and still can't do it without insulting her species. Elisa takes it in stride: "I'll choose to take that as a compliment." Progress is slow.

THE NEW OLYMPIANS
We end the episode with a pretty blatant pitch for giving the New Olympians their own show. It's certainly shameless. But I make no apologies. I still contend that THE NEW OLYMPIANS would make a GREAT t.v. series.

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?


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Chapter XLIX: "Eye of the Storm"

Time to ramble...

Chapter XLIX: "Eye of the Storm"
Story Editor: Cary Bates
Writer: Cary Bates
Director: Bob Kline

FAMOUS LAST WORDS (PART TWO)
Goliath at the end of "Avalon, Part Three" (and in the PREVIOUSLY of this episode): "I am personally going to make sure that the Eye of Odin and the Phoenix Gate are never used again." Of course, he's thinking he won't let anyone else use them. But he neglects to protect them against himself. We've already seen him use the Phoenix Gate -- mostly to positive effect -- in M.I.A. Now, we'll see him don the Eye of Odin...

ENVIRONMENTS
Elisa's cold. Cold enough to put her life in danger. Cold enough to force us to add a sweater and parka to her ensemble as the episode progresses. As Angela says, "It's enough to take your breath away." To which Elisa responds: "I can vouch for that."

(I do wonder what sport it was that Gunther was playing in the middle of winter that he did so well at.)

VOICE ACTORS RETURN
J.D. Daniels -- formerly Tom and Young Luach and Young Canmore -- is here playing Gunther Sturlusson. As I write this in 2004, J.D. would have to be in his late teens or early twenties. He was a great child actor -- which is rarer than you might think. I hope he's doing well.

Morgan Sheppard -- formerly Petros Xanatos -- also returns, as Odin. I would later cast Morgan in "Atlantis: Milo's Return" as a crazy guy who THOUGHT he was Odin. I love working with Morgan.

ODIN & THE STURLUSSONS
The name Sturlusson is a direct steal from Snorri Sturlusson (I hope I'm spelling this right), the author of the Eddas -- the more-or-less original source materials that we have as reference to the Norse Myths.

We tried to paint an Odin that would make Snorri proud, one "well-versed in myths and legends". Having him pose as an old man with a cloak of stars. That's out of the myths. Making him a storm god. That's right out of the myths. Giving him the ability to transform into animals (in this case a VERY cool one-eyed polar bear). Right out of the myths. The rainbow bridge at the end. Right out of the myths. Giving him a flying battle steed named Sleipnir is right out of the myths too, if you forgive the fact that Sleipner is supposed to have eight legs, but Bob and Frank balked at our ability to animate that decently. [Note: I do worry whether or not the final GOD-ODIN design was a bit too Marvel/Kirby influenced. Jack Kirby's seminal work is so all-pervasive in American visual vernacular, it's hard to avoid, even when you're consciously attempting to avoid it.]

And of course, there's the Eye itself. Traditionally, Odin traded his eye to the wise Jotun Mimir for wisdom and insight. Obviously, Mimir lost it at some point, perhaps after losing his own head (another story) and the Eye floated around for centuries before David found it and gave it to Fox who lost it to Goliath who had it stolen by the Weird Sisters who gave it the Archmage who lost it to Goliath again. Now Odin's claiming that HE directed Goliath's skiff to Norway. This time it isn't Avalon that's sent them here, but Odin who has waylaid them so that he can FINALLY get his darn eye back in its socket. I do regret that our "Eye-as-a-piece-of-Jewelry" design always looked more Egyptian than Nordic to me. The gang over at Disney Interactive who created the concept of the Eye for their game, had a much more runic/nordic/ravenesque design.

But I am curious -- how many of you were surprised to discover that the Eye of Odin was actually Odin's eye?

Odin also refers to Elisa as a Maiden. I wonder if he felt that she would have made a good Valkyrie?

{My ten-year-old daughter Erin asked: "Why doesn't [Goliath] give it to Odin. It's his eye. Of course, she's seen the episode before and knows what's coming vis-a-vis Goliath's behavior, but it's still interesting to me that she placed the burden for the misunderstanding on Goliath and not on Odin.}

Odin -- as Odin sees it -- is playing by the rules. He tries barter and then fair combat and then takes a hostage, which in ancient times did not have the same cowardly (if not downright terrorist) connotation that it carries today. All of which might have been avoided, if at the beginning he had just -- i don't know -- offered Elisa the cloak with no strings attached and sat down with Goliath to discuss the whole eye thing. Odds are, when he was not being confrontational, Bronx would have slid up to get his chin scratched. Angela would have said something like, "Well, Bronx likes him." And Goliath might have realized that giving the darn thing back to Odin was the safest possible outcome. BUT NO! Odin, as he admits, is not the most patient of gods and a bit rusty when it comes to the whole dealing directly with mortals thing.

AVATAR
So, instead, Odin comes on strong (rules or no rules) and Goliath is pushed into thinking that he has no choice but to use the Eye's power himself. (I think that was adequately motivated.) And thus Goliath and NOT Odin quickly becomes the VILLAIN of our piece. Which was interesting for us. We'd seen Zombie-Goliath in "Temptations". We'd seen Goliath's "evil twin" in "Double Jeopardy" and "Sanctuary". But we'd never seen Goliath himself go bad until now. He becomes more of who he is. A protector -- a tyrant -- a fascist. Someone who cannot brook disobedience. Someone unaccustomed to dealing with gods or being one. (A good line, I thought.)

His new attitude is, I think, embodied by the casualness and callousness of him saying: "We will pack them too." This in regards to moving Bronx and his DAUGHTER, currently frozen in stone.

At first, everything he says is pretty darn rational-sounding. But Elisa and Angela and Erik quickly develop their suspicions. They are just naturally slow to believe that their Goliath -- OUR Goliath -- could be the bad guy. Eye or no eye.

Goliath also succeeds in becoming an Avatar for Odin, much like Jackal and the Emir each became Avatars for Anubis. It's not quite as literal, but his wings take on Odin's starry pattern. His helmet is similar (although on my tape his horns are doing some FUNKY animation things). And everytime Odin uses one of his powers, Goliath acquires and mimics that power.

I'll admit that Goliath's turnaround at the end plays on screen a bit too quick for my tastes now. But ultimately, we were still counting on Goliath's protective nature, his basic decency. His love for his daughter. It's not as strong for me as, say, Renard's turnaround or the Captain's (from "Golem" and "Shadows of the Past" respectively), but I think it basically works.

OTHER NEAT LINES (all approximate)
Erik: "I am rich in sweaters."
Goliath: "Now that Elisa is safe, we can rest in peace." (Okay, this is more of an odd line than a neat one.)
Odin (understated): "This calls for a change in strategy."
Goliath (once they're all on to him): "Is there a problem."
Elisa: "The Eye! The Eye has gone to your head!"
Goliath: "That is all you need to know."
Odin: "I have more than gained in wisdom, what I have lost in strength."
Odin: "You're on my turf with my property."
Odin: "I am not the threat."
Goliath: "So close to Death and Rejuvenation at the same time."
Elisa: "You took a big chance. Wish I'd thought of it."
Odin: "Then we have both gained rare enlightenment. The Eye's standard gift." This last one was important to me. I wanted (from the moment we intro'd the eye into the series back in "The Edge" to play the Eye true to it's Eddaesque roots.

JALAPEÑA
Goliath removes the Eye and speaks that word again. This caught me off guard last night, cuz I had thought Hudson's Pendragon Jalapeña was the last one until "The Journey". But I guess we squeezed one more in.

And Odin finally gets the Eye back. And ... and... NOTHING HAPPENS. He just sticks it back into his eye socket and it becomes... his eye. I LOVED the anti-climax of that. Generally -- not such a big fan of anti-climax, but the irony and the RIGHTNESS of it just thrilled me.

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?


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Chapter XLVIII: "Pendragon"

Time to ramble...

Chapter XLVIII: "Pendragon"
Story Editor: Brynne Chandler Reaves
Writer: Lydia Marano
Director: Dennis Woodyard

SOMETHING'S COMING
There's a wonderful children's book called "Something's Coming" about three stuffed animals and [SPOILERS] a sneeze. I hadn't read that book when we did this episode, but it was all I could think of reviewing the opening minutes now.

In fact, what's coming, according to Macbeth, is the "Harmonic Convergence". When I heard that, I immediately jumped to the conclusion that this was a Cary Bates episode. (Cary, at least for a time, was very into incorporating all sorts of New Agey schtick into his work [cf. his comic book series SILVERBLADE published in the late 80s by DC Comics].)

Of course, as noted above, this was a Brynne/Lydia/Greg collaboration. No Cary at all.

A BRIEF STOPOVER IN LONDON
Arthur arrives in his "City of Wonders", i.e. modern day London. We throw in some beauty shots of the city from "M.I.A." here. It helped us trim a few bad seconds of animation later in the episode, and helped establish the mood a bit better.

With Arthur arriving at what must have been his final destination from Avalon's point of view (minus a quick Stone of Destiny hop to NYC's Guggenheim Museum), his skiff sinks down into the water. I always imagined that the skiff resurfaced back on Avalon. Having shown this here, I didn't feel bad about NOT showing the sinking skiff in "Gathering, One" when our quartet returned to Manhattan. Allowed us to keep some surprise at their arrival at the Clock Tower.

Arthur makes a point of using a mace, since his quest is to find EXCALIBUR and we didn't want to confuse the issue by having him simply exchange one decent sword for the subtlety of a better sword. Or at least not until the end of the ep.

We also made a point of him missing Merlin, which was a bit of foreshadowing to the proposed Pendragon spin-off, where Arthur and Griff's first order of business would be a Quest for Merlin.

Speaking of Griff, his silhouette is a bit too distinctive here for my tastes. I wish it hadn't quite given away his indentity so soon. His design is somewhat inconsistent in this episode. As I mentioned during my "M.I.A." episode, Frank, Greg Guler and I were never 100% satisfied with the design. In this episode, in particular, he has some real Foghorn Leghorn moments.

The first real stop on Arthur's tour is Westminster Abbey. The door is locked, which makes sense in the Twentieth Century but not to a guy from the Sixth Century. And it perhaps makes even less sense to us in the 21st-Century. Is that all the security that exists there: a locked door? And of course, GARGOYLES continues its traditions of wantonly damaging historical sites, when Arthur uses his mace to enter.

Inside we find the Stone of Destiny in it's 1990s home beneath the throne. Shortly thereafter, the Stone would be moved to Edinburgh Castle. As for the Stone, I perpetrated one of my favorite mythological devices, which is conflating various similar concepts... so the Stone of Destiny (i.e. Jacob's pillow) also becomes the Stone from the Sword in the Stone, i.e. the stone from which Arthur drew Excalibur. And the thing talks!! What's interesting to me now, is that Arthur doesn't seem surprised by the fact that it talks. Legends state that an inscription revealed that "Whosoever pulleth this sword from this stone [and anvil] will become King of Britain." But perhaps there was no inscription, and the stone talked from day one. One question: Is the Stone itself one of Oberon's Children (in stone form) or is it magically enchanted? (I lean toward the latter, but it's interesting to ponder the former.)

Arthur, without Excalibur, had hoped that the sword would have returned to the stone. He's frustrated when he finds it hasn't. But he doesn't doubt his "ownership" of it, until much later in the episode. The Powers That Be are much less sure of Arthur's claim on it. They are constantly reminding him that at best, all he has is a shot at it: "It belongs to the True King. Are you still he?"

I also love how Arthur says that he hates riddles. It just feels so right for my interpretation of Arthur as a man who LEARNED to be a thinker, but to whom it didn't necessarily come naturally. Said interpretation of course heavily influenced by the works of T.H. White. Anyway, that poem/riddle which Griff recites (an unknowing trust past down across generations of the London Clan) was written, as I recall, by Lydia. It was hearing this poem that reminded me that she had written this episode and not Cary.

Note that everytime he sees a gargoyle, Arthur asks if he's "of Goliath's Clan".

BACK AT THE RANCH
Once again, we abandon our travelers to focus on life on the homefront with the Trio & Hudson. We will, once they've met up with Griff & Arthur, get a bit of an update on how updated our left-behinders are. They've heard from Halcyon Renard that he spotted Goliath, Elisa & Bronx in Prague. They've heard from Diane Maza that she spotted them in Nigeria. [I have to assume that all communications were channelled, per Elisa's suggestion, through Matt.] Now they learn about the travelers stop-overs in London (from Griff) and Avalon (from Arthur). [All of this was a bit of a risk, as we couldn't guarantee the airing order of the World Tour episodes. But I guess we felt it was a risk worth taking in order to give us a bit of legitimate continuity. Fortunately, it all worked out.] I'm curious if Angela was mentioned by either Renard or Diane (or Griff or Arthur after the adventure was over), and if so how prominently. Also, Griff demonstrably proves that other Gargoyles still exist in the world. Though the ramifications of that and of Angela clearly don't sink in with Hudson and the others until "The Gathering, Part One".

You'll see flashes of Brooklyn taking charge in this episode. With no one (including him) questioning it or even making an issue of it. I guess the lessons of "Kingdom" stuck.

You'll also see Broadway destroying one of Macbeth's lightning guns. But in contrast, Griff -- a man of HIS era, i.e. the forties -- comandeers the other one and makes it a part of his arsenal. I liked that, even -- or especially -- with the spin-off series in mind.

WILL OF THE WHISP AND OTHER STRANGERS...
I've since revealed here at ASK GREG, that the Will of the Whisp (introduced here by Macbeth, who uses both science and sorcery to control and utilize it) is the primitive magical entity that Oberon's Children evolved from. Sort of the Homo Erectus of the magical set. (Or maybe something even more primitive like a lemur or lungfish.)

The Lady of the Lake surfaces (literally). I like Lexington's "And she was right in our own lake.." for its understated humor. Also, this gives Hudson an excuse to say "Jalapeña", thus fulfilling another of the verbal challenges that Voice Director Jamie Thomason set for me -- and thus further pissing off the contingent of artists who truly HATED that expression. I think this may be one of the last times, until "The Journey", that we used it.

Anyway, we constantly raise the question of why the sword and the Lady associated with it were now in New York and not in Britain. Of course, the short answer was that we wanted to involve Hudson & the Trio without sending them on their own World Tour. But in fact, we did have a larger purpose. We wanted Arthur to become a player on the World Stage. A larger stage, as the Lady says.

I wasn't wild about that Water Djinn sequence. We wanted Arthur to solve the problem through leadership. But having him order Griff to use the Lightning weapon seems a fairly feeble solution to me (even though I endorsed it at the time). Wouldn't Arthur simply be electrocuted?

PEN... DRAGON
It's a goofy joke, but I still chuckle at Lex saying "Brooklyn" and Brooklyn answering.

I also am amused by the fact that it's Banquo in his slow pondering way that gives Macbeth the idea -- if not the ambition -- to take Excalibur for his own: "Hey Boss, you're a king. And you've been alive a long time..." Mac, an established Arthurphile, may seem an unlikely person to try to supplant his own hero. But it perfectly suits my interpretation of the character. Our Macbeth may not have the ambition of Shakespeare's Macbeth. But he's always been a man to sieze an appropriate opportunity. And he's always been a man in search of his own purpose. Perhaps this business of being a "Timeless King" and everything else that Excalibur represents in the past and future provides the reason for why he's lived for a largely tormented nine hundred years. Of course, Mac is also a man of honor. He vies for the sword. But when it becomes clear at the VERY end that Arthur is indeed its true master, he swears fealty to the (Whitean) Once and Future King. The thought DID cross my mind to add Macbeth to the cast of regulars in my PENDRAGON development. To give Arthur, in essence, two knights: Griff & Macbeth. But the dilemma comes in the fact that any spin-off has to stand on its own two feet. Characters can have backstories, but you can't assume that the audience has seen x amount of episodes of Gargoyles. I felt that telling Arthur's GARGOYLES-related backstory was going to be difficult enough. Throw in Griff's complicated story and you've set yourself a real challenge. Throw in Macbeth and that boat is just going to sink under two much backstory-weight. Much better to use him as guest star. Then if it seemed to work, over time he might spend MORE time in Pendragon. You never know. [NOTE: I was considerably less worried about adding Blanchfleur, Merlin and Duval to the cast, as we would be introducing them IN Pendragon.] So in the end, Mac accepts a more separate but equal arrangement. This was still cool to me. It reminded me of Arthur's relationship with King Pellinore. King Pellinore was also a King, but he was a wandering King. He didn't always sit at the Round Table, but he always came to Arthur's side, when Arthur needed him. They maintained a certain equality between them, and yet unspoken was the acknowledgement that Arthur was the one true king.

Speaking of Banquo... note his "Popeye" expression throughout most of the episode. This is a result of his model sheet, which showed him squinting through one eye. That was just supposed to be a single expression, but many of the overseas artists naturally assumed that it was a permanent condition -- because of course, we didn't have another model sheet with a different expression. Also, what did you think of Banquo & Fleance's power armor. I'm not sure it really came across as power armor. It was supposed to make them tougher and stronger. But I think it just looked like a flight suit for their sky-cycles. [But I did love those sky-cycles, especially the way Lex used them as a staircase for the Gargoyles to get some air. That was really cool and clever, I think.]

Random fact: My ten-year-old daughter Erin was fascinated with the topiary monkey.

An episode called Pendragon needed... a Dragon. I think this one is positively glorious. I love those steam vents. And the stone flight. And the fire. GREAT FIRE. But before it wakes up, I like how in essence this stone statue becomes the NEW Stone of Destiny. Macbeth draws the (faux) Excalibur from the dragon's stone grip and declares: "Macbeth, son of Findlaech, is the one true king." Arthur for a minute seems a sore loser. But his better nature wins out, after Macbeth points out that he's being a jerk. [Macbeth is great about being right when he's wrong.] When, as a youngster, Arthur drew the sword, many opposed his rule. It's a lesson that he's learned from. Griff resists, but Arthur kneels. He will not be an obstructionist if Macbeth is the new true king. Erin also felt that Arthur was being a sore loser. But Benny, my seven-year-old, disagreed, calling Arthur "the World's best fighter" and therefore the guy who deserved the sword. What's interesting, is that was NEVER my intent. I don't think of Arthur as the world's best FIGHTER. Even in his own legends, there were many knights who could outfight him. Arthur was a decent fighter, but his greatest strength was as a LEADER of men. That's what we tried to get across, both here and in "Avalon, Part Three".

It's also a cool play on words, I think, that this time the phrase "Sword IN the Stone" needs to be taken literally. The dragon statue surrounds the true sword inside it. I love the steps Arthur goes through to figure this out, primarily that moment when he recovers the faux Excalibur and can instantly sense that it isn't the genuine article. That was us trying to DEMONSTRATE with clarity that Excalibur wasn't just any sword, but rather something special. But what exactly was it? That, to be honest, we still needed to figure out. But we were hoping we'd have an entire spin-off to explore that question.

SOME GOOD LINES
Fleance: "No free rides, Bat-boy."

Broadway: "Now you stay put." And Banquo: "No problem."

Lex: "Take the stairs."

Arthur: "Arise... SIR Griff."

Plus a bunch of great British Griffisms:
"In for a penny, in for a pound."
"Well, that just about tears it."
"You are the Once and Future King."
"Right with you, Your Majesty"
"That's the stuff!"

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?


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THE LEOPARD QUEEN

And here are my notes on the second draft outline... note we were approaching ever closer to the correct big cat.

WEISMAN 3-12-95

Notes on "Leopard Queen" Outline...

Hi, Brynne. Well, I'm at it again. Basically, I didn't feel we were there with the last draft of the outline, and given how far behind things are, I felt that it was necessary to beat it out here. My main problem was a lack of true jeopardy. The poachers were never any real threat to our gargoyles. In the end, neither were Tea or Fara Maku. The traps in the lost city had no effect on either Tea or the Poachers, so it was hard to believe that they would give Goliath and Co. a hard time. I just felt we really needed to escalate the situation, so I've added in the only character from African Mythology that I know anything about: Anansi the Spider. (And of course, I have no idea if Anansi is part of Nigerian myth, and unfortunately no time to check.) And just so you know, I wasn't secretly hoping you'd add Anansi. But he was the only thing in my head that felt authentic when I addressed the Jeopardy problem myself. Giant Spider. Worked for me. I tried to preserve what I felt was best from all the various versions we've had of this story. In reworking the legend of Kara Digi to include Anansi, I went for an animal folk tale feeling, instead of a curse, since you told me that African Myth tended in that direction. As usual, if you have problems with all or part of this thing, just call me.

BEAT SHEET
ACT ONE
I. RIVER WILD SEQUENCE.

II. On landing safely, no one is completely sure where they are.

A. Africa maybe, ELISA thinks, but she's not sure. She and her brother and sister came here as a child with their parents. Her mother's side of the family is from Nigeria.

B. ANGELA makes some semi-bitter comment about how she wishes her father would talk to her about her roots. GOLIATH gives the gargoyle company line in response. But it's clear that Angela wants something more personal from G.

C. Suddenly they spot something horrifying. We don't see what it is, but we can tell from their faces that it is something disgusting. Goliath is appalled. He cannot understand why any hunter would skin, defang and declaw an animal, only to leave the meat behind. Elisa explains that these jungle cats weren't hunted; they were obviously poached. An illegal practice, that's destroying the wild. Goliath thinks that may be the reason Avalon sent them here. To stop the poaching. They move off into the jungle. We do not follow them. We cut away.

III. Tribal clearing. A woman (DIANE) is telling a story to a bunch of native children. A few adults are gathered too (including FARA MAKU who has a claw mark tatoo or scar on his shoulder). In a cage nearby, a black leopard paces back and forth. We segue into her folk tale, told in arealistic "primitive" animation.

IV. The Tale of the LEOPARD QUEEN and ANANSI THE SPIDER.
A. The Leopard Queen was the most beautiful creature in the
jungle.
1. Beautiful black fur. Razor Sharp Claws. Huge white
teeth.
B. But she was also very vain.
1. She mocked the Hippo.
2. She mocked the Crocodile.
3. Then she made the mistake of mocking Anansi the
Spider.
C. Anansi weaved a magic spell in his web that transformed
the Leopard Queen into the first human.
1. No beautiful fur. No sharp claws. Puny little teeth.
D. The Leopard Queen begged Anansi to return her to her proper
form.
1. He promised he would on one condition.
2. That she build him a great city shaped like a giant
web.
3. She agreed.
E. But she could not do it alone. So she gave birth to the
human race to help her build the city of Kara Digi.
1. They followed Anansi's plans to the letter.
2. Anansi was very pleased.
F. When the city was built, Anansi kept his promise and
weaved a spell that returned the leopard Queen to her
true form.
1. With the beautiful fur, sharp claws and big teeth.
(Keep emphasizing these three elements.)
G. But Anansi had tricked the Queen. For now she was lonely
for her children.
1. She asked Anansi to turn her children into leopards.
2. He refused, because they tended his city.
3. But he told the Queen that if she hunted for him and
brought him food, she could choose one of her
children by marking him, and Anansi would turn
that child into a leopard.
H. So the Leopard Queen hunted for Anansi and brought him
food.
1. Anansi got fat and happy. He promised to grant her
request.
2. The Leopard Queen made her mark on her oldest son,
who was the wisest, bravest and most handsome
man of the tribe.
3. Anansi didn't want to let this great man leave his
city, but he had given his word.
I. Anansi called the Prince to him and told him of his promise.
1. The Prince did not want to become a leopard.
a. He had been born a human and wanted to stay
that way.
2. He asked Anansi if there was any way to escape this
fate.
3. Anansi told the Prince that if he killed the Leopard
Queen, Anansi would no longer be obligated to her.
J. So the Prince hunted the Queen.
1. But when he found her, he saw the beauty of her fur,
the sharpness of her claws and the hugeness? of
her teeth.
2. And he realized that she had chosen him out of love.
3. He decided not to kill her.
4. And so Anansi was forced to transform the Prince into
a Black Leopard.
K. Anansi was so furious, he banished all of the humans from
Kara Digi.
1. But that was foolish, because now he had no one to
tend his needs.
2. And so the spider went hungry.

V. As the tale ends, we see that Goliath, Elisa, Angela and Bronx have been listening from just beyond the clearing. They are enraptured by the story.
A. We get Angela's line about: Who is that woman? Magus?
Queen?
1. Elisa responds definitively: "No, that's my mother."
2. Probably at some point someone should remark on the
coincidence of her mother being there when our
travellers arrive, and someone else should point
out that with Avalon it is no coincidence, it is fate.
Maybe not here, but somewhere.
B. When the story's over, the adults (except for Fara Maku and
Diane) lead the children from the clearing for the
festival meal in the nearby Hauka village. We find
out that after the feast, the Black Panther will be set
free to honor the Leopard Queen.
C. Once the clearing is empty, Diane asks Fara with some
trepidation whether she told the story well. She'd been
studying to do this for months.
1. Fara praises her.
2. And Elisa steps into the clearing to tell her mother
she did a great job for someone born and raised in
New York.
D. That smart-ass remark is followed by a tremendous hug
between Elisa and Diane. Diane is very releaved Elisa is
all right.
1. But now that she knows that Elisa is all right, Diane
is furious that Elisa just vanished the way she did.
a. Elisa is surprised that she didn't get the
message from Matt.
b. But Diane can't believe that Elisa didn't call
home herself.
i. And Elisa's excuse that there hasn't been
time, doesn't cut a lot of mustard here.
2. Diane was so worried she nearly didn't come to
Nigeria for the Leopard festival, even though she
had been preparing to participate for a year. Peter
had to practically force her to get on the plane.
And he had to skip the festival, in case any word
came about Elisa back home.
3. So what is Elisa doing in Africa?
a. Elisa fumfers a lame excuse.
b. Diane recognizes it as lame, and is more pissed.
c. From the clearing, ANGELA doesn't understand
why Elisa doesn't tell her mother the truth.
d. Goliath explains that Elisa has some problems
sharing her secret with people. Though he
agrees that she SHOULD be able to tell her
parents.
e. Angela remarks pointedly that Goliath's right.
Parents and children should be able to talk
about anything. Goliath burns but says
nothing.
E. Suddenly, Poacher's attack led by TEA. (Please find a
different last name for her than MAKA, it's just too close
to Fara's MAKU. We're asking for confusion problems.)
Tea and the poachers want to kill the ceremonial leopard.
(Though for very different reasons.) And we may notice
that Tea also has what we might take as a claw mark
tatoo or scar on her shoulder.
1. Angela is prepared to jump in right then. But the
Poachers have guns which can fire faster than even
the gargoyles can move. Goliath wants to give
Elisa a chance to try to diffuse the situation.
2. Elisa, Fara Maku and Diane obviously have no intention
of letting Tea and her men kill the leopard. Fara
seems to know Tea. He can't believe she's working
with Poachers. This is what comes of leaving the
tribe for the big city. (Doesn't have to be America,
in fact it probably shouldn't. It's a bit distracting.
What's the biggest city in Nigeria or near Nigeria?)
We see Fara's getting very upset by all this.
3. Tea doesn't want to hurt Fara, but he doesn't know
what happened to her when she went to the big city.
And one way or the other that Leopard is going to
die. If necessary, every leopard in the jungle.
4. An increasingly agitated Fara places himself in front
of the leopard. The poachers are getting angry.
Let's just get rid of them all. We don't want
witnesses anyway. Things are reaching a boiling
point, and left with no choice, Goliath is just about
to go in.
5. When Fara Maku transforms into a HUGE black leopard
-- at any rate, considerably bigger than the
ceremonial leopard in the cage.

ACT TWO
VI. All hell breaks loose. Tea says something like "It was you!!". The poachers panic and start shooting at Fara, who attacks and is wounded. Goliath, Angela and Bronx wade into the battle. Short work is made of the poachers, but Fara/leopard flees into the jungle pursued by Tea. (We still think Tea is a villain at this point.)

Diane is stunned at all that's happened. And the appearance of the Gargoyles doesn't help. But the straw that breaks the camel's back is that Elisa clearly knows these monsters. Elisa is quickly able to convince her mom that Goliath and company are friendly, but that only raises more questions. How long have you known about this? Why didn't you tell me? Etc. Elisa doesn't want to deal with this, so she changes subject. What's the deal with Fara's transformation? Diane doesn't know. She thought the legend was just a legend. Goliath says that in his experience most legends have a seed of truth in them. At any rate, Fara's in obvious danger from that Tea-woman. They need to protect him. Elisa wants her mom to stay behind. Fat chance, young lady.

Just before they leave, they free the ceremonial panther and put the poachers in his cage.

VII. In the jungle, Tea hunts the Fara/leopard like a woman possessed. We get a sense that she and Fara once cared for each other and that for some reason she feels betrayed by him. She nearly kills him, but is prevented by Goliath and co. But when they try to apprehend her, she too transforms into a HUGE black leopard (though she seems to be trying to fight the transformation in a way that Fara didn't earlier.) Tea/leopard escapes, still pursuing the wounded Fara/leopard.

VIII. With Bronx's help, our intrepid band track Fara and Tea to the gates of legendary Kara Digi -- home of Anansi the Spider. Diane can't believe it's real, but then again, what isn't real these days? The city is layed out like a spider's web. Bronx seems confused. There are multiple cob-web filled pathways, and he seems conflicted between two of them. Angela realizes that Fara and Tea must have gone down separate paths. Angela, Elisa and Bronx will follow one path. Goliath and Diane will follow the other. (Elisa probably wants Goliath with Diane so that the big guy can keep mom safe.)

IX. The two teams split up. But both fall into death traps. Spider-themed death-traps ideally.

ACT THREE
X. Both groups separately escape their respective death traps and continue pursuit.

XI. Along the way, Angela has a discussion with Elisa, that chastens Elisa. (Angela wishes that her father would talk to her the way Diane seems to want to talk to Elisa, or something like that). Diane has a conversation with Goliath that chastens him. (As you said, the difference between the human and gargoyle way; the unreasonableness of children, the fact that Goliath treating Angela like a daughter doesn't preclude him from loving his non-biological kids back on Avalon. Diane has three kids, and she loves them all, but that doesn't mean she can't try to be as close as possible to Elisa. You might even get in the fact that Elisa's always been Daddy's girl. In fact, maybe we should run this through Elisa and Diane's whole conflict. Or maybe not. I'll leave that up to you.)
Note: Both Elisa and Goliath should be chastened but unconvinced at this point. Also, plant little spiders throughout their treks through the city.

XII. Anyway, all paths lead to the heart of Kara Digi, the heart of the web. Everyone converges there. Fara arrives first and transforms back into a wounded human. Tea isn't far behind. She too transforms back, and pulls a primitive weapon off the wall to use on Fara. She's intercepted by the several arrivals of all our heroes. And finally we get some answers. Tea was attacked by a leopard just before she left for the big city. Now everytime she gets upset she transforms into a black leopard. Made life difficult in the big city. She knew the Tale of the Leopard Queen and figured that if she killed the Leopard who marked her, it would break the spell. So she teamed with the Poachers. They helped her kill the leopards to get the fur, claws and teeth. She still can't believe that it was Fara that marked her. She loved Fara. Fara protests that he loved her too. That is why he marked her, to force her to come back to the jungle and stay with him. That isn't love, Diane says, that's selfishness. Fara realizes that now, but he really does love Tea. (Man this jungle's just filled with lousy communication skills.) But Elisa doesn't understand. How did Fara get cursed himself. Fara's reluctant to answer....so Anansi answers for him. Anansi lowers himself on a web from the darkness of the ceiling. He is a GIANT INTELLIGENT SPIDER. Fara knew the legends and searched for the city. He found it and Anansi, who was just a hungry little thing. Fara made the old deal. He would hunt for Anansi and bring him food in exchange for the Leopard "curse". Anansi's pleased with the arrangement. He's obviously eaten well. Now Fara begs Anansi to remove the curse from Tea, even if Fara has to serve Anansi forever. Tea's touched, but Anansi figures if one hunter is good, seven might be better. Anansi knows from his little spider children (who "bugged" Elisa and Goliath's respective conversations with Angela and Diane) that each of them has a loved one here. He may send a few of them out at a time to hunt while the others serve him and act as hostages. Of course this doesn't sit well with anyone, so we have a fight. Fara transforms again, so we have gargoyles, Fara/leopard, Tea, Elisa and Diane against this giant spider, and frankly, it doesn't look good for our guys. Fara is still wounded, and Tea has to transform to a leopard to save him at some point. She still loves him. Anansi is ultimately destroyed in some cool way that ANGELA thinks of. But with Anansi gone, now there's no way to remove the curse from Fara and Tea.

XIII. Epilogue. A bandaged Fara and Tea are reconciled. Both have done bad things that they need to atone for. But they are together, and like the Leopard Queen and her son, they choose to stay together out of love. If that means occasionally turning into black leopards to protect their jungle. Well, so be it.

Goliath tells Angela that he is very proud of how his Daughter defeated Anansi. She gets the message and gives him a huge hug, as dawn breaks and they turn to stone in each other's arms.

Diane is once more, suitably impressed. She and Elisa share a nice quiet moment alone. When night falls again, Elisa plans on continuing the world tour with her gargoyle friends, but she promises to tell her Mom EVERYTHING about it when she gets home.

THE END

So that's that. I'm not sure about the break between the second and third act. You can move it if you want. And if this doesn't play for you, all or in part, give me a call and we'll talk.

Finally, this may be sticky from an S&P standpoint. I can't really justify the poachers having futuristic guns. Their rifles can be semi-hi-tech, but they can't be laser guns. Also, I want to deal as realistically as possible with Fara's wound. Both as a leopard and as a man. I'm going to copy Adrienne on this. After you've both read this, you might want to confab with her to discuss perimeters.


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THE JAGUAR QUEEN

Below are my notes on Brynne & Lydia's first outline for what would eventually become "Mark of the Panther". (Unfortunately, I no longer have copies of the actual outlines. Just my notes.)

WEISMAN 3-1-95

Notes on "Jaguar Queen" Outline...

FOCUS & THEME
"Emotional Distance" would be my best guess.
Goliath and Angela.
What is key issue/theme?
--He treated her more like a daughter before she knew he was her father.
--He is fighting a loving instinct inside himself.
--She doesn't grasp Gargoyle heritage on the subject.
--Distance? Coldness? Heritage? Self-control? Acknowledgement?

Diane and Elisa.
What is key issue?
--Distance? Coldness? Heritage? Self-control? Acknowledgement?
--Elisa is Daddy's girl.
--Is she distanced from her mom and/or her mom's heritage.
--Is mom shocked by Elisa's secret life with gargoyles?
--Is respect the issue?
--How does it relate to G&A arc?

Fara Maku and Tea.
What is key issue?
--Distance? Coldness? Heritage? Self-control? Acknowledgement?
--How does it relate to G&A and/or D&E?
--Do we need another set of parent & child?

Maybe we need to team Goliath and Diane?

ACT STRUCTURE
--Got to get more happening in Act One.
--Act One currently feels like it's all prologue, except that emotional issues aren't introduced until Act Two.
--Act Two seems too late to bring up Angela's arc.
--And Goliath's side doesn't get any play.
--It seems tacked on, not a dynamic element in the story.
--Must intro emotional arcs by end of Act One.
--Definitively for Goliath, Angela, Elisa and Diane.
--At least hint at them for Tea and Fara Maku.
--By end of Act One we need a jaguar transformation.
--By end of Act Two we need to get to the city if we're going there at all.

DIANE MAZA
--She's not personally from Nigeria. Her ancestors are from Nigeria.
--I frankly don't want to distance Diane & Elisa from the most negative side of the African-American Experience.
--Diane's been to Nigeria before, though.
--Searched out her ancestors.
--Studied there traditions.
--Has Elisa been here before? Probably.
--But how 'into it' is Elisa?
--Can she sense a monsoon coming?
--Much more of a Daddy's girl.
--Diane's an expert on "oral storytelling traditions"
--Not on all things Nigerian.
--Not on healing herbs for example.

FRENCH
--Elisa can't speak it.
--Maybe Angela can, but do we need it?
--Can't it all be in English?
--Ellipsis between 4 Heroes leaving the skiff and there arrival in village.
--We wipe from riverside to the village.
--Start hearing the story.
--Segue to depiction of story.
--When we return from 'telling', we see that the heroes are there and heard most of it.
--Elisa recognized her mom's voice right away, but doesn't tell the others right away.
--Stunned to see her there.
--Lost in the tale. etc.

THE CURSE - Simplify & Clarify
--Jaguar Queen's Logic seems confused.
--Curses conditions seem unclear and "Multiple"
--Why doesn't Tea turn into a jaguar?
--Was she turning into a jaguar in America?
--Does she want vengence on Fara Maku or does she want to kill the tribe's Jaguar?
--If she knows Maku is the jaguar that bit her, why try to kill the tribe's Jaguar?
--If she doesn't know, why does she want specific vengeance on him?
--What initiates Fara Maku's transformation into a Jaguar?
--Greed? Anger? How does it fit the curse we heard about?
--What initiates his transformation back at the end?
--How did he get cursed in first place?
--Do we want him to be the villain?
--Does their love story seems off point? Can we bring it on point?
--His motivation for cursing her seems pretty reprehensible.
--Tia's not bad for wanting to leave, per se.
--His vengeance being motivated by her greed, is fishy too.
--Why can't Tea end her curse by killing Fara Maku?
--How can she keep it from "being passed along"?
--Why do they reconcile?
--Who or what are we rooting for?

LOGISTICS
--When does Diane first see Elisa?
--How do gargoyles take out poachers without being seen?
--Why does Elisa feel it's necessary to reveal gargoyles at page 8?
--Beware set-ups that don't pay off.
--Straw man dangers.
--Spiked pit.
--Everyone notices and glides or "edges" around.
--Rope bridge - same deal. Whole set up feels artificial since Goliath could have glided over to rescue Tia in first place.
--Settled things that become unsettle.
--P.6 Tea's down, then is up again, with knife.
--Even gets her rifle back.

S&P CONCERNS
--Spear in Fara Maku's shoulder.
--Tea's rifle or shotgun at end of show.

LOST CITY
--Also discovered too late to not feel tacked on.
--Why is city booby-trapped? What is it protecting?
--A city doesn't only have one way to proceed.

POACHERS
--Aren't poaching.
--So why were they helping Tea?
--Was Tea a poacher?
--Has she been killing Jaguars looking for the one that bit her?


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Chapter XLVII: "Mark of the Panther"

Time to ramble...

Chapter XLVII: "Mark of the Panther"
Story Editor: Brynne Chandler Reaves
Writer: Lydia Marano
Director: Dennis Woodyard

PREVIOUSLY
We reestablish Elisa's reluctance to share the Gargoyles even with people she trusts. And we reestablish Angela & Goliath's conflict over her parentage.

TITLE
This one went through a number of permutations, as you'll see from the various drafts of outline that I'll try to remember to post tomorrow. We kept changing the title as we kept learning more about the myths of the area. Here was one time where our research helped to keep us honest. Since it's not a one-word title, it probably came from Brynne and/or Lydia.

NOTE THE WATERFALL
We did Elisa falling and Goliath saving her so often -- even as we tried to avoid relegating Elisa to a mere damsel in distress -- that we always had to find variations on the theme. This time he catches her, but then gets slammed by Angela and they all fall into the water. Fortunately, he split the distance on the drop, so they're all okay. Compare this to Hunter's Moon III and... well, maybe I'll wait until I get to that ramble to elaborate...

THE LEGEND OF THE PANTHER QUEEN: TEETH, FUR & CLAWS
I've always been interested in Tricksters. Tricksters and Bastards are my two favorite archetypes. So I'd already done a bit of reading on Anansi legends. This one isn't authentic. The words that Nichelle Nichols speaks in narration as Diane Maza were written by Lydia, but the story itself was mine... though I had made it more of a tribal creation myth. Anansi creates a human being by removing the things about the Panther Queen that were the root of her vanity: her pelt, teeth and claws. The Panther Queen then mothers (at least this segment of) the human race, the ancestors of Fara Maku and Tea. Brynne felt that might be disresepectful to the peoples of the area, so we modified things so that the Queen had her own individual children but was no longer mother to the ENTIRE tribe. (Although I like to think that Fara Maku, at least, was an ancestor of the Queen.) From the beginning, we kept the emphasis on the fur, teeth and claws. Even the poachers are the most interested in those three items.

And how about our little mini cartoon within a cartoon? I love it, myself. (He says without a hint of bias ;) I think Dennis and his team did an amazing job at designing an entirely different art style appropriate to the fable. And I think Nichelle's reading is amazing. She did that in two takes. The first half in one take, the second half in the second take.

But as good as I think it is, I think it's most amazing for its daring. We stopped our episode and ran another cartoon of a totally different style for minutes there. Imagine someone tuning in late to see Gargoyles and finding themselves in the midst of the Tale of The Panther Queen... That was one of the things that was just magic about working on Gargoyles. We took RISKS.

OUT OF CONFLICT...
Some of our best stuff came out of conflict, I hate to admit. Like "The Mirror", this episode was one that Brynne and I fought over a lot. In general, I "won" those fights, because, after all, I was the boss -- and because, even if I had trouble at times articulating it, I had a clear vision (or would eventually find a clear vision) of what I was looking for. But Brynne (and everyone else) would influence me, temper me, moderate me. And the result was usually pretty darn cool. In the end, I think this was one of Brynne & Lydia's favorite episodes. They asked Nichelle to autograph their scripts -- and Nichelle asked THEM to autograph her script. I think she was quite taken with it as well.

PARENTS & CHILDREN
The Panther Queen & her son. Goliath & Angela. Diane & Elisa. Obviously, the theme of parents and children ran throughout the episode. But because of that, we made a conscious decision to make Tea into Fara's lover, not his daughter. We didn't want things to seem TOO pat by having every observable relationship be a parent/child relationship. But Tea & Fara still provide a cautionary example of someone attempting to hold on too tight...

Diane: "That's not love, Fara, that's selfishness."

It applies to any relationship.

Still, we get some fun mother/daughter and father/daughter and mother/son stuff from the three parental relationships we did have in the episode.

As with Fox and Anastasia in "Walkabout" you get moments of the old dynamic emerging between Diane and Elisa. Elisa comes up with a lame excuse for being in Africa ("I'm on a case.") and Diane responds with the kind of "Oh, please," that you know she must have used a hundred times on the 16-year-old Elisa.

But Elisa is still impressed by her mom and proud of her. She listens in some reverence -- and without interrupting -- to her mother telling the tale of the Panther Queen. Angela, also impressed, asks if Diane is a queen or magus (trying to relate her own reverence to her experience). And Elisa responds simply, but eloquently: "Actually, that's my mother."

We also get to see how much ALIKE Diane and Elisa actually are. Both hate spiders. ("Spiders. Why did it have to be spiders?" is of course a riff from Raiders of the Lost Ark.) Both hate to be seen as weak or needy. (I love Goliath's intimidated reaction when Diane tells him: "I don't need watching over." I wonder if he's already regarding her as his mother-in-law?)

My kids listened to Elisa being pissed off at Diane in front of Angela. She seems to be making sense at first, but it soon becomes clear -- even to an embarrassed Elisa -- that she's being unreasonable. Angela does a very Goliath-esque reality check for her (remember when Goliath reprimanded Elisa & Derek in "Her Brother's Keeper"?), which also served to remind us that Angela is Goliath's daughter in more ways than one.

Erin said: "I don't always understand Elisa." Goliath gets her. She doesn't like to share her secrets. She doesn't seem to trust easily. But she also views knowledge as power, and she doesn't want to share that power. The "THAT" which makes her special.

We also get some nice Angela resolution here, as well. Goliath's obviously so concerned about Angela focusing on her biological parentage (because he fears what that means vis-a-vis Demona) that he's totally blind to his duties as her only present (if not surviving) rookery father. He's there. She needs him to act as a father to her, not just as a leader. He refuses. And then Diane sets him straight, simply and clearly. Later, when he says he's proud of her, it's a bit of a sappy moment, but I like to think we've earned it.

And I like to think we've earned the better executed moment at the end between Elisa and Diane. Diane knows that loving sometimes means letting go. (Fara helped remind her of that.) But Elisa now doesn't want her mother to let go so soon. While the gargs sleep she has a full day to tell her story. *You know... Chapters I - XLVI.

Diane's last line is cute: "There aren't any more spiders are there?" But I wish we had ended there or with Elisa's little chuckle. When Elisa ends by saying, "No." it flattens out the moment. Oh, well...

ANANSI
During the Tale of the Panther Queen, Anansi laughs when the Queen attacks him because "creatures such as he cannot die." This is a tip off -- along with the little tiny spider we see at episode's end -- that we weren't actually killing Anansi by having Goliath plunge that spear into him. As my son Benny asked: "Is that all magic that's coming out of him?" Yes, indeed. He's being bled, in essence, of some of his magical energy. He's weakened but not destroyed. And he escapes as a little spider, to reappear in cameo during the Gathering. This was ALSO designed as a hint that Banshee was still alive too. I'm not saying that Oberon's Children cannot be destroyed. I think they can. But it's tough. They have to be utterly wiped out. Otherwise, they are simply weakened. It's easy enough for them to flee to recharge later and fight or trick or whatever another day.

Anansi was played wonderfully by LeVar Burton. But Frank Paur felt that his voice wasn't threatening enough to play the giant spider. So he was enhanced by the good folk at Advantage Audio. (Love those guys.) I think they did a marvelous job of merging LeVar's voice with the effect. We lost none of the acting. But we gained a lot of presence. And Anansi has some great lines:
"I know. Company's coming"
"I'll spin you wishes!"

NOTHING GETS BY THEM
Benny noticed the mark on Tea's shoulder, indicating that she was a were-panther. He wondered if Tea and Fara were the actual Queen and Prince from the legends...

Erin noticed that when Goliath was gliding with Tea and she transforms, she seems to scratch Goliath with her claws. She wondered if that meant Goliath would become a panther-goyle? THAT thought never even occured to me before. Should have though. I'm contemplating adding that to the list of missed bets along with the Pack killing everyone in "Grief" and Cu Chullain's armor and bones being in the tomb in "The Hound of Ulster".

RANDOM STUFF
Goliath has his own version of the Weird Sisters: "All Things Are True" line when Diane expresses surprise that the legend she had just faithfully related might have had some basis in fact.

Bronx is a great old smell hound. (I miss Norman. After watching this episode, my kids went to bed... and then an hour later my daughter had another grief-attack over our late dog. I can't help thinking that subconsciously, Bronx reminded her of Norman in this episode. Not that Norman ever hunted down were-panthers for us, but you get the idea.)

There's also a wonderfully animated moment, where Bronx knocks Tea over, just as she's about to spear Fara. The way she stumbles before crumbling is just gorgeous.

Fara Maku echoes the Captain of the Guard when he says: "It wasn't supposed to be that way." One could argue that it's us just being unoriginal. Or self-indulgent. But I like to think we were creating thematic echoes that ran across the entire tapestry of our 66 episodes.

"Dream on, Spider-Man!"

DID WE CHEAT?
Tea spends most of the episode trying to take revenge on Fara Maku. Then at the end they reconcile? I like to think that the events with Anansi really served to take the steam out of her need for vengeance. That seeing him threatened reawakened her feelings for him. And the fact that he admitted his mistake and apologized didn't hurt either. She makes a conscious decision to forgive him. But did that forgiveness come too cheap? Was it too pat? Maybe. I'm pretty confident about Renard's turnaround in "Golem" and the Captain's in "Shadows of the Past". We only had 22 minutes, and I think we planted all the necessary seeds to justify those last minute changes of heart. I'm less confident about this one. But I can live with it. And we created two more heroes for down the road...

Anyway, that's my ramble...

Where's yours?


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Chapter XLVI: "Walkabout"

Time to ramble...

Chapter XLVI: "Walkabout"
Story Editor: Michael Reaves
Story: Michael Reaves
Teleplay: Steve Perry
Director: Dennis Woodyard

PREVIOUSLY
Focus here was on Fox being in the family way and on Dingo. At this point, I often (almost) forget that Fox was ever in the Pack, she seems so beyond them now. But there are a couple of nice reminders throughout the episode, that as "Grief" dealt with Jackal, Hyena, Wolf and Coyote (i.e. the LEAST human members of the Pack), "Walkabout" reunites the MOST human (former) members.

TITLE & ORIGINS
"Walkabout," is one of my typical one-word titles. I kind of had an ambition to hit every inhabited continent at least once on our World Tour. Couldn't skip the land down under therefore, and couldn't go to Australia without Dingo, of course. But this was also our opportunity to present a demonstrably pregnant Fox and to introduce her mother Anastasia, voiced by the incomparable Kate Mulgrew -- whom I've loved since her amazing run as Mary Ryan on Ryan's Hope.

When the skiff first appears, my kids (Erin & Benny) attempted to guess the location: Asia, Africa. Then they see the kangaroo.

Then they see the advancing "Gray Goo". Or silver sheen. That was another concept that Michael and I wanted to cover: nanotechnology and the threat it presents, i.e. the Gray Goo Scenario that Anastasia describes later. Oh, and artificial intelligence. More on that down below...

Unfortunately, the Gray Goo as executed here never really worked for me visually in the episode. It gets the idea across, but it's never got the precision that I wanted. And it's terribly inconsistent for a mono-maniacal computer program. It's kind of all over the map.

DINGO
He's seeking a clean slate, a fresh start. But it's not that easy. When Goliath spots him later, and Angela asks who he is, Elisa says: "He's not one of the Good Guys." Erin countered: "Trying to be."

Benny saw him activating his armor and immediately figured out what he was up to. How did he know? Because he's seen the concept more recently on the new "The Batman" series. Dingo's using Batwave!!!! (Dingowave?)

I love the visual of Dingo's armor opening up in back to let him step right in. Then closing up around him. There are some great armor moments in this episode.

[But some awkward movement throughout. There's a shot of Goliath falling to the ground and landing on his back, before rapidly flipping over onto his hands and knees to hold his head. It's very clumsy. And Fox runs very well for a pregnant woman, don't you think?]

Dingo also has some nice lines... (particularly: "Always did fancy a trip to Disneyland.") ...and Jim Cummings-provided Australian slang like "Ripper" and "Sheila" (referring to Elisa -- though Sheila is also my mother's name)

MATRIX
Erin wanted to know if we got sued for calling the computer program "The Matrix". I explained that this episode pre-dated the movie. So a couple of minutes later she asked why WE didn't sue the movie. (Where did she get so law-suit happy, huh?)

ANASTASIA & DAUGHTER
There are some great moments between Fox & Anastasia. Some moments where you can hear Fox practically reverting to her teen self with lines like "Mo-ther!" And I like when Anastasia plays on that by saying, "Humor your mother." Relationships trump science fiction.

When Fox says, "Your grandson just kicked me..." Erin said, "I'm her grandson," referring to the fact that Erin provided the voice of Alex Xanatos in "The Journey." But this was a bit of a reveal. In "Outfoxed", we revealed that Fox was pregnant. Now we reveal the baby's gender.

I also like Fox's "Where are my manners?" line.

And we get a bit more feeling for the Renard clan as Goliath realizes that Fox is Halcyon's daughter, and as Anastasia dismisses discussion of her "ex-husband."

THERAMIN
I never knew what that "instrument" was called before working on this episode. Carl did a great job of providing some unique scoring to this episode (as he had with Hound of Ulster). The Theramin work. And the Didgeridoo (am I spelling that right?) Cool stuff. Both added greatly to the ambiance and helped compensate for some weakly executed gray goo.

SHAMAN
Mr. One-Note, huh? You must use the Dream-Time. Find the Dream-Time. Enter the Dream-Time. Okay, okay. We get it.

There's potential in that character, which I wanted to explore in Bad Guys. But I don't think we found it here. Part of the problem is the accent. I don't know what I'm hearing exactly, but it doesn't sound like the accent of an Australian aborigine. I like James Avery's performance, and I'm not being critical of him, but he was hampered by our accentual ignorance and the one-note nature (as written) of the character. Still he has some decent moments, I suppose. At least enough that I wanted to make him Harry Monmouth's surrogate father in Bad Guys. I just wanted to get the accent right by that time.

And what is the Dreamtime, exactly? I'm not sure we got THAT right either, really. I think we just played it like the inside of Coldstone's head. That was probably my fault. Again, we just didn't always have the time to do all the research we would have loved to do.

SPEAKING OF BAD GUYS
I haven't watched "Walkabout" in a few years, but I see the Bad Guys Reel EVERY year at the Gathering. So I'm used to hearing Jeff Bennett as Matrix. But here we have Jim Cummings as Matrix, and it does sound very different, despite all the electronic filtering and futzing we did on both actors in the part. In the episode, we cast Jim as Matrix because he was already there as Dingo, so it saved us money.

But when we developed Bad Guys as its own series, I decided to recast Matrix. Not because Jim isn't great or because he couldn't handle doing two voices on a regular basis, but because we wanted to have the freedom to play with Matrix's voice a lot. And we didn't ever want him to sound like Dingo. So I brought in Jeff, because, well, I just love Jeff.

FINAL BATTLE
There's some interesting visuals in the Dreamtime. I liked how each of the combatants used what they know. Goliath uses a medieval shield and recreates the Trio & Hudson to fight with/for him. (It was also a conscious attempt on our part to get those four in the episode -- at least visually. We knew even then that we were short-changing them during the tour and that the audience would be missing them.) Dingo "upgrades" his armor again, saying with relish "I like it." _I_ like how he dived down into the "stuff of dreams" to revamp the armor. And Matrix uses waldo-like arms to fight and capture his opponents.

Of course, Dingo (and the writers including me) are grasping at straws with that whole "Law and Order" thing at the end. It's Artificial... but, hey, so is Matrix's Intelligence. As Dingo says as his armor tranforms yet again (looking positively gorillaish for a second or two), "Australia's got a new kind of hero, mates!" And I like how he revealed that he liked PLAYING the hero when he and Fox were on the Pack TV Show. You never know what you've got until it's gone, eh, Harry?

Of course, we were building up our international cast of heroes, but the idea behind Dingo & Matrix soon evolved into Bad Guys. And I think they work very well together and as part of the larger group in that piece.

Erin thought that the Shaman was the real hero of the episode. I like that she thinks that. Accent or no accent.

Anyway, that's my ramble...

Where's yours?


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OUTLINE NOTES ON WHAT WOULD BECOME "THE HOUND OF ULSTER"

These are the notes I gave to Michael Reaves based on his outline for the episode...

WEISMAN 3-21-95

Notes on "A Bronx Tail" Outline...

Play a lot of Bronx PoV throughout.

ACT ONE
1. Night. Rory and SEANA (Finuala/Banshee) escape coppers. We see that she encourages him to delinquency. We hear about Hound. They split up. We hear Bronx howl. (Seana/Banshee hears it too?)

2. Night. Cut to Bronx howling by riverside. Banshee screech. Some sign of Banshee/Woman for Bronx to sniff.

3. Rory and Mom or Dad (not both). Day.

4. Switch with beat Five. Dungeon. Angela and Goliath wake up. Chained. (Combine Castle and Cairn) Gargs and Elisa in unbreakable chains.

5. Swith with beat 4. Rory leaves home to meet Seana. Bronx pursues Rory. (Tracking scent of Seana/Banshee on Rory.)

6. Rory falls into quarry.

6.5. Unconscious Rory has Vision of Ulster past - still a bit confused. Bronx might still be threat or ally.

7. Banshee attacks G, A, E. in dungeon.

ACT TWO
8. Bronx helps Rory out of Quarry.

9. Banshee ceases her assault on G,A, E. Senses that Rory is with Bronx. And/or she gets some info from G, A, E.

10. At bog. Bronx playing Lassie. Rory has a vision of Cairn/Castle.

11. Cut.

12. Seana appears. Bronx growls at her. Rory rejects Bronx for rejecting Seana. Bronx attacks. Rory cannot stop him. Seana/Banshee forced to reveal herself to protect herself. Bronx knocked out. Rory is shocked. Afraid of Banshee. Banshee does siren number on Rory. He leaves with her. How ominous.

13. Cut.

ACT THREE
14. Cut.

15. Cut.

16. Late Morning, early afternoon. Rory awakens at home probably. Parent bitching, he's a bum who's out all night and sleeps all day. Previous night feels like a good/bad dream. Seana shows up. Doesn't know what he's talking about. But Place from his vision sounds like Cairn/Castle. He insists on going there. She's frightened but she loves him. She'll go with.

17. They arrive after dark. Banshee/Seana is prepared to kill him... She was hoping to keep him from realizing his potential. But if that's not going to work than the ancient battle begins again.
Bronx arrives nick-o-time. (G,E and A hear commotion but can't do anything to help.) Bronx saves Rory, who gets spear and transforms. They battle and ultimately defeat or destroy deathworm. They free G,E and A. Rory returns to normal, but Ireland has a New Hero.


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Chapter XLV: "The Hound of Ulster"

Time to ramble...

Chapter XLV: "The Hound of Ulster"
Story Editor: Michael Reaves
Story: Michael Reaves
Teleplay: Diane Duane & Peter Morwood
Director: Bob Kline

THE TITLE/ORIGINS
I think my original title for this episode was "A Bronx Tail" or "A Bronx Tale". They wound up using that title for an episode of Goliath Chronicles, I think.

Then I think I wanted to change the title to "The Barghest". But Michael and Peter & Diane protested that the Barghest was a Northern English legend, not an Irish one. They wanted "The Hero of Ulster". I changed it to "The Hound of Ulster," which was a compromise we could all live with.

But somewhere in here we confused the legend of Cu Chullain, with the legend of the Barghest/Great Beast (not to mention tossing in and combining the Banshee and Crom-Cruach).

I've since gathered fromt the fans that Cu Chullain himself was the Hound of Ulster, a title he won by having to act as a watchdog for another lord for a period of time.

Oh, well. I just wasn't that familiar with this legend at the time. And I didn't do or have time to do all the necessary research, I'm afraid.

I guess in the Gargoyles Universe, things might have been a bit different. Or maybe not. Actually, the on-going story of Rory & Molly a.k.a. Cu Chullain & the Banshee still fascinates me. Eventually, I'd love to be able to bring them back and have the excuse to really research the topic thoroughly.

PREVIOUSLY ON GARGOYLES
Sometimes we struggled to fill out that 30 seconds of footage. This looked like one of those times. We emphasized Bronx moments and Avalon's past abandonment.

LIFE IN LISCOO
And then we're in Liscoo. Again, I like the relationship between Rory & Molly. Her manipulations are subtle... she encourages his delinquincy. Tries to convince him to leave town... to leave Ireland even, for America.

Rory believes he's nothing. He's a quitter... as his father later says, "Ah, Rory, you always gave up to easy." Rory's arc is to move from being a boy who's a quitter to a man who refuses to quit. Even in the face of inhuman opposition.

But there's a real economic undercurrent to all this. Rory's dad is explicitly on the Dole. Rory is shoplifting and has no trade. It's a relatively sophisticated, young adult dilemma he's facing.

I really like Rory's dad Mr. Dugan -- and Colm Meany, the actor who played him. Love the exchange between him and Molly...
Molly: "Hello, Mr. Dugan."
Dugan: "Hmph. Molly."
(So much ... unfondness... in so few words.)

Of course Molly IS a bad influence on Mr. Dugan's boy Rory. Cuz she's a Banshee trying to keep Rory from realizing who he really is. DUH!

FUTURE STORY IDEAS OR RANDOM REFERENCES: YOU DECIDE!
Rory: "And dwarves made me shoes."
Elisa: "I don't know whether to expect vampires or Sherlock Holmes."
Banshee: "The time of the Gathering approaches." (That was a freebee.)

WHEN THE BANSHEE KEENS...
...lots of people have to work really hard to make it sound really cool. Start with Sheena Easton's vocals directed by Jamie Thomason. Throw in music effects by Carl Johnson, edited by Marc Perlman. Throw in Sound Effects by Paca Thomas, all mixed by the great crew at Advantage Audio. We have many great shows. And the Advantage guys, our composer and voice actors always did a great job on them. But the soundwork on this episode, is just STUNNING.

WIZARD OF OZ REFERENCES
Elisa: "I don't think we're in Scotland. Or Kansas either."
Banshee: "But more than enough to deal with a noisy young hero -- and his little dog too!"
(Frankly, I don't think you can ever have too many Oz references. Erin, my ten-year-old daughter recognized the latter line as a reference to something, but couldn't immediately place what it was from. She guessed Scooby Doo episodes. Odds are that "little dog too" line has been used once or twice over the hundreds of adventures that Scooby has had. So she may not have been wrong. But when I mentioned Wizard, she immediately remembered.)

CAIRN NA CHULLAIN
The site of one of my most annoying missed opportunities. When Elisa, Angela and Goliath wake up in Cu Chullain's tomb, his armor and bones should have been in there with them.

It's interesting to me that the Banshee gets so annoyed by their denials that she doesn't try to mesmerize the info that she thinks she needs from Elisa, Angela or Goliath. She says that her voice can mesmerize (a little forshadowing for what she's about to do to Rory) but instead she just tries to torture the travelers into telling her what she wants to know.

RANDOM OTHER LINES I LIKE
Elisa (sing-song): "We've got company."

Banshee: "You have recently been in Avalon -- the scent of its magic is all about you." (I love the idea that magic has a scent to the carefully trained nose.)

Banshee: "I like it here."

Rory: "About last night... you don't recall putting on a foot of height and a yard of hair--?"
Molly: "Huh! In your dreams..."
(If she can do anything to convince him it was all just a dream...)

Goliath: "A land with a hero soon finds other deeds for him to do." (Is this the old Batman argument that Batman's mere presence draws the Joker and his ilk to Gotham..?)

DELAYED REACTION
Rory comes to as Bronx licks him awake. There's a funny delayed reaction. And a real Elisa-in-Awakening moment, as Rory says: "This can't be happening."

In general, it's hard for someone of my generation to avoid making a Lassie comparison with Bronx here. Timmy may not be in the well, but Angela, Elisa & Goliath are stuck in the Cairn. And Bronx is finding the one person he believes can help get them out.

When Molly first turned into Banshee on screen, I'm curious what you guys thought. Did you think that Molly was Banshee or that just in THAT scene the Banshee had posed as Molly until Bronx figured out the truth?

(When Rory walks off with Banshee at the end of the act, Erin said: "Bad idea." And my seven-year-old son Benny said, "He's tranced. He can't do anything.")

We were trying to generally confuse you guys by having Rory leave with the Banshee and then wake up unharmed in his home. Molly shows up... is she to be trusted? Is this the real Molly? Is the real Molly a Banshee? Was the whole thing a dream?

The whole thing was actually pretty linear. But we wanted to keep Rory and the audience off balance.

In the end, I think we played pretty fair. Even Molly's initial reaction to hearing Bronx's howl in the opening minutes of the episode plays well I think, both as the kind of reaction a superstitious Molly would have AND as the reaction the Banshee would have to hearing the sound of a Gargoyle Beast for the first time in centuries.

SO THORY
The Cu Chullain design and concept we wound up with is a little too close to Marvel's THOR for my tastes. I'm not worried about the legalities, but I'd have liked to have come up with a better design for old Cu and a fresher idea than leaving Rory with a walking stick that transforms into the Spear of Light. We just didn't have the time to dance with it enough to come up with something better.

SO CLEVERDON
Actor Scott Cleverdon, who played Rory came up with Cu's battle cry at the end, insisting that it was authentic. Sounded cool. So we trusted him.

REINCARNATION
So if Rory is the reincarnation of the Hero of Ulster, does that make Bronx the reincarnation of (Buena Vista's Gargoyles') Hound of Ulster. Or is he just another Great Beast? We intentionally left that vague.

A BRONX TALE
But we did want this story to BELONG to Bronx as much as possible. I had to kinda push to keep Goliath, Elisa and Angela from joining in the heroics, leaving the heavy lifting to Bronx and Rory.

The episode inevitably became Rory's story. But by removing our three regulars from the action, I felt that Bronx got more of a showcase than he would have.

I love the "smug" Bronx at the end.

Anyway, that's my ramble. Where's yours?


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W.I.T.C.H.

Hey gang,

I got a job!!!!

I'll be producing the SECOND season of a series called W.I.T.C.H. for SIP Animation and ABC Family's Jetix block.

I had nothing to do with the FIRST season, but I'm rooting for its success... because frankly if it doesn't do well, then you'll never get to see the neatokeen stuff I'm planning for season two.

The first W.I.T.C.H. "minisode" premieres on Jetix on Saturday morning, October 30th. (Check your local listings.) Again, I had nothing to do with it, but I do think it's fun stuff. (And if you love me, you'll support it ;)

Oh, and while I'm at it, I think my first episode of THE BATMAN, "The Big Chill" featuring Mr. Freeze airs THIS Saturday, October 23rd on Kids WB. (Again, check your local listings.) It features the voice of Clancy Brown (Hakon, Wolf) as Freeze.

And also keep an eye out for the two episodes of SUPER ROBOT MONKEY TEAM HYPERFORCE GO! which I wrote for Jetix. I'm not sure exactly when they're airing, but I'll keep you posted.

Thanks!!


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Little things...

It's amazing how nothing major has changed in my life.

It's also amazing how many little things have changed.

I'm up VERY late. I generally work until midnight and then try to wind down from 12am to 2am. I try to go to bed around 2, but often I'm up until 3am or later.

All of this was time I used to spend with Norman. Beth and the kids were long asleep. Sure the cats stopped by occasionally, but Norman was my constant companion. He'd be on the floor or on his old recliner chai (the one he commandeered when Beth wouldn't let him on the new couch). I'd pet him some, but mostly it was just his presence.

Now his hair-covered blanket is off the chair. It makes it available for human seatage -- but I'm not that big a fan of humans, and in any case there are none around at those hours. So I'm just alone at my desk. Or alone on the couch. And it's just strange. And very lonely.

Erin and I walked into Larchmont yesterday. (Saw Matt Dillon, by the way.) It was weird not having Norman on the leash, our walking smile-magnet. And every dog we did see on someone else's leash kinda broke our hearts.

Beth said she's been hearing him at the back door, crying to get in. So I open the door occassionally.

We see Bassetts on tv ALL the time. Two just on the "er" episode I recorded the other night. (One on a commercial and one in the actual show.)

We can now leave chalah out on the kitchen table. Cause he's not there to swipe it.

And I can leave the front door open when I bring the groceries in from Beth's car, because he's not there to bolt out into the middle of the street.

And when the doorbell rings, he doesn't bark and howl like a lunatic.

But mostly, he's not waiting in the living room window when we get home anymore.

No. Mostly, he's just not there on his chair at night.

It's the little things. Not the big things. There are no big things, frankly. Our lives haven't changed. (Less pooper-scooping, I suppose, but I'd be lying if I said we missed that.) School, work, etc. Life goes on, of course.

Nothing has changed.

But nothing is quite the same either.

I really miss my dog.


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Air Commander Bentley Norman

Our Basset Hound, Norman, died today. Beth and I were with him as he was put to sleep.

He had lymphoma, which came on quickly and was only discovered while he was recuperating (or rather failing to recuperate) from his last ear surgery. He was completely deaf and nearly blind. He couldn't eat, couldn't drink, couldn't walk or even stand. I carried him out to the yard -- which only a few weeks ago would have been impossible, but he's lost so much weight that it was depressingly easy -- but he couldn't even go to the bathroom. His stomach was hard as a rock. He was having a lot of trouble breathing. He had stopped barking and howling completely. He could barely wag his tail.

So it was time. But it was very hard.

He was truly a joy of a dog. And dashingly handsome. I'm really going to miss him.


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IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT ABOUT THE DVD

Gang,

I just talked to the folks at Buena Vista Home Entertainment.

I asked them what was the best date for us to MASS ORDER/PURCHASE the 1st Season Gargoyles Series DVD.

My contact was unequivocal in his response.

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 7th, 2004.

Yep, that's right the day of the release. I guess anything earlier is nice but winds up being too early to be useful. But day and date with the release is exactly what we need.

In the meantime, BV encourages ALL OF YOU to go to Amazon and rave in the comments/reviews section. Leading up to Dec 7, the more good buzz on Amazon's site the better.

(Remember this is the make or break event in the fandom. It's time to prove to Disney once and for all that we have the bodies and the dollars and the fanbase and the communications skills to support more Gargoyles product -- both merchandise and creative. If we can't prove it with this DVD release... well, we're not likely to get another chance.)

So spread the word. SPREAD THE WORD!!!!!!!!

The DVD is coming out December 7th. And we'd like EVERYBODY to ORDER/PURCHASE it on THAT DAY!!!!!!!!!


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More info...

Greg Bishansky's going to town (to save my reputation, I guess)...

Okay, just went and did some research...

The Hunter's Moon is technically not the first full moon of October. It's
the first full moon after the Harvest Moon, which is associated with the
beginning of autumn... usually close to mid-September.

So, the September 28th date is still possible :)

That's great. Although it was my understanding that if a month had a second full moon, it was a BLUE MOON. But thanks, Greg.


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APOLOGIES

I just received the following e-mail from Greg Bishansky:

Hey Greg,

I was reading your newest update, and you had this answer in there...

"I didn't MISS anything. Yes, I chose that date because it was my birthday.
But I also never claimed that the confrontation with Charles took place on
the Hunter's Moon. It was the final confrontation between Demona, the other
Gargoyles and the Hunters which took place at St. Damien's Cathedral on the
Hunter's Moon."

Now, I really hate to be nitpicky, but to be fair, in the actual episode,
during the flashback Charles Canmore says...

"Tonight is the Hunter's Moon. Our moon, my children."

Now... considering Charles' line, I thought your answer was a little on the unfair side.

That it was, Greg. Thank you for keeping me honest and pointing out my error. Double error, it seems. Both in the original series and in my answer to Richard of Portugal's question.

My apologies on both counts.


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THE BUFFYVERSE [SEASONS 1-3] TOP FORTY

Yes, we're back with another look at the most memorable characters in the Buffyverse.

[For more information on what I'm doing here and why I'm doing this, I recommend an archive search using the word "Buffyverse". That'll show you the character countdowns for the first two seasons.]

Keep in mind, this is a subjective exercise that I've tried to make as objective as possible.

The following horserace takes the first three seasons into account. All three seasons. NOT just Season Three. However, it does not include the last four seasons of Buffy or any season of Angel.

First some honorable mentions from the third season (in reverse order of importance)...

*The Lunch Lady who tried to poison the entire student body.
*D'Hoffryn, the Demon who gave Anya her powers and refused to give them back when she lost them. This is cheating a bit. He may not have made that much of an impression if I didn't know he'd be more important later.
*Tucker Wells - The student who sent hellhounds to the Prom. This is WAY cheating. If I didn't know Tucker's brother Andrew would become important, I'm not sure I'd have remembered this guy much at all.
*Mr. Platt - A sympathetic guidance councelor killed by a Mr. Hyde like student. He just had a couple of great scenes with Buffy.
*The Shrouded Sorceror who helped Angel and Buffy con Faith and the Mayor into thinking Angel had lost his soul. Two memorable things. The way he'd exit a room backwards into darkness. And the fact that Giles had introduced him to his wife.
*Ms. Gwendolyn Post - The fallen watcher who cons everybody.
*Zackary Kralik - The serial killer turned vampire, that Buffy tricks into drinking holy water. A real fun sick puppy, played by the always interesting Jeff Kober.
*Balthazar - You may not remember the name, but I'm sure you'd remember the obese demon body sitting in a wine vat, with vamp slaves ladeling some liquid onto his skin. One of the best and most fun creatures they ever created. Funny too. "Unacceptable. Unacceptable." The Wallace Shawn of the Demon World.
*The First - Makes its first appearance this season, trying to turn Angel. Mostly uses Ms. Calendar's form.
*Sheila Rosenberg - Willow's mom. Wish we had seen more of her.
*Lily (alias Chanterelle alias Sister Sunshine alias Anne). The former Vamp-wannabe reappears in Buffy's life as a homeless girl. Buffy seems to set her on a more positive path... and I know that in Angel, the actress Julia Lee who plays Lily winds up playing a homeless advocate. I'm looking forward to seeing whether or not I can discern if she's playing the same character -- now with her act together.
*Quentin Travers - Head of the Watcher's Council has a neat first appearance.
*Mr. Miller - The one teacher at Sunnydale High who keeps making continuity appearances over and over across Buffy's Junior & Senior years. Has one fun scene in the Graduation 2-parter where he's leading the class in a game of Hangman: "They always go for the E."

And now the top 40...

#40 THE JUDGE (Previous Rank: 30)
Dropping ten slots from last season, the big blue smurf is still holding on to the top 40. Barely.

#39 NORMAN PFISTER THE WORM GUY (PR:29)
Also dropping 10 slots. But still a cool idea a year later.

#38 LUKE (Previous Ranks: 14 (1st Season), 27 (2nd Season))
Our first episodic villain is still pretty memorable, though this may be his last season in the rankings. He's fallen eleven slots from last season. 24 from the first. Of course, it's still impressive that actor Brian Thompson still has two characters (Luke & the Judge) in the top 40.

#37 HANK SUMMERS (PR:21, 25)
Hank's falling fast (12 slots this season alone), as the guy rapidly becomes a dead-beat dad -- due more to story space constraints than anything we would have gleaned from the times we've seen him in person. He goes from taking Buffy for an entire summer to not even showing up for her birthday. And his inattention is only going to get worse.

#36 DETECTIVE STEIN (PR:32)
Down only four slots, and I'm sure you're all asking, "Who?" But if you had just finished the third season, you'd know. This guy is a subplot that never quite came to life. He's an honest cop, who suspects Buffy's up to no good -- or at least that something no good is happening around her. He's interrogated (or tried to interrogate) her three times. After the deaths of Ted, Kendra and the Deputy Mayor. He interests me. But I don't think we'll be seeing him again.

#35 UNCLE ENYOS THE GYPSEY MAN (PR:21)
Still holding on in points from Season Two. But he's fallen 14 slots, and counting.

#34 JESSE (PR:13, 20)
Falling another 14 slots, Jesse, the forgotten sacrificial lamb of the pilot is still hanging on.

#33 SCOTT HOPE (First appearance)
Scott's the nice guy who tries to date Buffy on the rebound from Angel's "death" in Season Two -- and while she's trying to nurse Angel back to health in Season Three. He winds up dumping her because she's so angsty. Wish we had seen a bit of him at the end of the season, but he vanishes after Homecoming.

#32 DEPUTY MAYOR ALLAN FINCH (First appearance)
The Mayor's right hand man -- until he decides to betray the Mayor to Buffy. He goes to find her, and winds up getting accidentally killed by Faith. He then becomes a guilt trip for both slayers.

#31 WHISTLER (PR:18)
Falls 13 slots in the rankings. But still a memorable character. The guy who brought Angel back from the brink.

#30 KENDRA (PR:17)
The first supplemental slayer. Begins to pale now that we've met Faith.

#29 ETHAN RAYNE (PR:22)
Ethan falls seven slots despite another interesting appearance as a Band Candy distibutor.

#28 DEVON (PR:37)
The lead singer for Oz's band (Dingoes ate my baby), has multiple brief funny appearances. He's likely to fade after Oz leaves the show.

#27 AMY MADISON THE RAT (PR: 17, 23)
She's fallen four slots, but that's more a factor of so many more characters coming in. I even gave her partial credit when she appeared ONLY as a rat.

#26 PERCY WEST (First appearance)
Percy was the Basketball Player that Willow was forced to tutor. He tried to take advantage of her, but VampWillow put a stop to that. He makes a number of appearances afterward and joins the final battle against the Mayor. I keep watching that last episode, but I can't see if they show us his final fate.

#25 LARRY (PR:35)
Larry actually gains ten slots, as he continues to make appearances. He's memorable as one of the "White Hats" in the alternate universe that Anya creates for Cordy. He's also fun as the jock who comes out as gay and mistakenly tries to help Xander come out as well. He appears to die heroically fighting the Mayor, but I like Larry, and I'm hoping he was merely knocked unconscious.

#24 PRINCIPAL BOB FLUTIE (PR:9, 16)
Falling another 8 slots. But still with enough first season points to keep him a fond memory.

#23 DARLA (PR: 11, 15)
Also falls eight slots. Still a potent memory. And she'll make a comeback.

#22 ANYA/ANYANKA (First appearance)
Who knew? She was fairly disposable in her first appearance, and I'm convinced she was only brought back a second time, because Joss was fascinated with VampWillow. But Anya made a strong enough impression in her second appearance, to warrant a comeback for the Prom. She quickly becomes fascinating opposite Xander. She bolts from Sunnydale during the pilot. But I should have known she'd be back.

#21 WILLY THE SNITCH (PR:24)
Up three slots. Just fun to be around. He'll start to fade as actor Saverio Guerra became a regular on Becker...

#20 HARMONY KENDALL (PR: 18, 26)
Up six slots from last season (although still down two from season one), she just has a few memorable bitchy/ditzy/comic appearances. And a couple of really great lines. If you look carefully, you can in fact see her get bitten by a vamp during graduation.

#19 COLIN THE ANNOINTED ONE (PR:10, 14)
Fallen five slots and still coasting on big point totals from season one and the beginning of season two.

#18 MR. TRICK (First appearance)
A breath of fresh air who I was really sorry to see get staked by Faith.

#17 JONATHAN (PR:19)
Jonathan moves up two slots (in an increasingly tougher field) based on strong appearances as a near-suicide and as the guy who gives Buffy her School Protector award at the Prom. Hard not to love.

#16 THE MASTER (PR: 8, 13)
The Big Bad of Season One falls three slots, despite having a delicious appearance (where he gets to kill Buffy AGAIN) in the alternate universe episode.

#15 WESLEY WYNDAM-PRICE (First appearance)
It's amazing how this goofball got us to care about him more with every year. He may be the single character who grew the most over the course of the serieses. Maybe even more than Spike.

#14 MAYOR RICHARD WILKINS III (PR:40)
The Mayor barely leaps 26 slots -- which would be even more impressive if he had actually appeared in Season Two, instead of just getting some points there for interesting foreshadowing. He certainly lived up to the bill.

#13 JENNY CALENDER (PR:15, 11)
Jenny falls a couple slots (though she's still ahead of her season one ranking) despite appearing as The First.

#12 SPIKE (PR: 9)
Spike, who'll be making quite a comeback of course, falls three slots, despite a very fun appearance as a drunken lout who wants Dru back.

#11 DRUSILLA (PR: 8)
Dru still manages to just barely stay ahead of Spike, based on her Season Two point total.

#10 FAITH (First appearance)
Faith is number ten with a bullet (or at least a very fancy knife). It's a stunning accomplishment to see how she enters partway through this season and rises so far, so fast.

#9 PRINCIPAL SNYDER (PR: 12, 10)
Snyder continues his slow rise, up another slot. But after being eaten by the mayor, he's poised to begin a slow slide. Always thought that his death was great, but it did surprise me as I thought the Mayor was less of an ingrate than that.

#8 JOYCE SUMMERS (PR:7, 7)
Joyce drops down a slot from seventh place to make room for Oz.

#7 OZ (PR:12)
Oz leapfrogs five hard-earned slots. Has some nice werewolf moments too.

#6 ANGEL (PR:6,6)
The top six haven't changed. Angel just can't quite pull up even with Cordy. Of course, next season, his own show'll put him on the fast track. Maybe even for #2.

#5 CORDELIA CHASE (PR:5,5)
Got some real great moments this year.

#4 WILLOW ROSENBERG (PR:4,4)
Inching closer to Xander, but doesn't quite pull up even in points.

#3 XANDER HARRIS (PR:3,3)
Nuf said.

#2 RUPERT GILES (PR: 2,2)
I keep expecting Giles to slip relative to Xander & Willow, but in fact he extended his lead this season. Probably, because they so evenly split each other's screentime as Buffy's best buds.

#1 BUFFY ANNE SUMMERS (PR:1,1)

That's it for now. But here's my plan... I'm going to get the DVD's for Buffy Season Four AND Angel Season One. I'm going to watch the episodes (44 total) in AIRING ORDER. When I've gone through 22 episodes (the equivalent of one season), I'll be back with another update.

Hope this is at least mildly interesting. If not, well, then just skip it. Who's holding a gun to your head, anyway?


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25%

Nothing to sneeze at -- and with gratitude to those who have participated -- but right now, Todd tells me, we only have about 38 Gathering Journals posted at ASK GREG.

That's about 25%. I was hoping for at least FIFTY PERCENT cooperation. C'mon, guys. Put your keyboard where your mouth is!!

You only have until midnight on the 31st!!

Thanks


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THE GATHERING OF THE GARGOYLES 2004 JOURNAL - Sunday, August 8 (The Voyage Home)

So I showered and packed. Carol came knocking to say good-bye.

Then I headed down to the lobby.

Said good-bye to Zehra.

Then Patrick and I headed out.

I'd like to be able to tell GXB that our journey was something out of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, but the truth is it went incredibly smoothly and we arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare.

Sorry, Greg. But you're still my best Gathering Travel story.

Anyway, Patrick & I shook hands on a great convention. And off I went.

I went through American Customs up in Montreal somehow. Then I had some Burger King.

Got on the plane. Slept finally. Missed the meal and the movie. Woke up. Read a bit. Landed. Was picked up VERY promptly by the driver, who seemed surprised to see me coming out so soon.

Got home to my family. Gave my family stuff. T-shirts, pins, Canadian coinage, sketches drawn by someone whose name escapes me at the moment.

Then I shaved off the beard for my newly ten-year-old daughter. Just as well. I'm growing too dependent on the beard anyway. But it seemed to make things official. The Gathering was Over.

EPILOGUE:

We had an extended family birthday dinner for Erin that night, which included my parents, my 94 year-old-grandmother, my sister, my brother and his wife and TWO kids, ages not-quite-two-years-old and not-quite-one-week. Plus of course, me, Beth and Benny.

The next day we drove down to San Diego for a little family vacation. We were staying with Gary & Jane Krisel. Gary was my boss during the Gargoyles years at Disney. He was a big contributor to the show's development. A big believer in the concept. And the guy who basically left me alone to run it. So tip of the hat to Gary. When I told him about the Gathering, he thought I was kidding at first. ("An entire convention dedicated to one cartoon?") I thought HE was kidding about me kidding him, because I'm POSITIVE that I invited him to G2001 in L.A.

Anyway, it was great to see him again.

We did the Theme Park rounds. A day at SeaWorld. A day at the Wild Animal Park. A day at Legoland. Then we headed home again, picking up Norman at the vets on the way.

Norman's wearing a cone/lampshade around his head. But he's doing well.

I finished "I Dreamed I Married Perry Mason". I really liked it and am looking forward to Cece's next adventure: "Nancy Drew Blue".

Then I read Walter Mosely's "Fear Itself". Which was also great.

Today, I saw an early cut of the DVD Documentary. David Grabias and his editor Amy did a terrific job. I'm not going to go into any specifics, because (a) it's not a final cut and (b) I don't want to spoil anything. But trust me it's very cool. And you all look great!

That's about it for now. See you when I get back from Vegas.

Oh, and one last time -- SPREAD THE WORD. GATHERING REPORTS/JOURNALS/DIARIES need to be posted here by AUGUST 31st. PLEASE!!!!


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THE GATHERING OF THE GARGOYLES 2004 JOURNAL - Saturday, August 7 (Nightpart III - The Long Goodbye)

With the costume & cosplay contests over, things started to relax. My assignments were over, and I could just kick back. Unfortunately, I was leaving the hotel at 6am the next morning. For the first time, I'd miss Closing Ceremonies, which was a huge bummer. I'd also miss spending any real time with Keith. But my daughter's TENTH birthday was Sunday the 8th. I had hoped to bring the whole family to the Gathering this year, but I just couldn't afford it, and I wasn't going to miss her birthday. In fact, Erin was very gracious about allowing me to fly home Sunday on her birthday instead of Saturday night. The trade-off was I agreed to shave off the beard when I got home. Benny likes it, but Erin doesn't. So it's gone now.

I promise though that next year, the whole family's coming to Las Vegas. In fact, we're leaving for Vegas the day after tomorrow. That's right, I'm so anxious to get back to the Gathering, I'm leaving an entire year early. (Or maybe, it's because my in-laws live in Vegas, and we're going to see them. I get confused sometimes.)

Anyway, we hung out downstairs for awhile. I had a number of nice chats... with Crazyman Marty Lund and his decidedly saner wife Lexy... with Kathy... with Ellen... with Carol... with Shaun... with Tony & Andrea...

Keith and his kids came back down for the Karaoke. Keith couldn't find a song he liked, so he just sang (wearing a baby no less). He truly is one of the coolest and smoothest individuals on the planet.

We've got some great singers in the fandom. Taylor sang the Love Boat theme AND better still "The Summer Winds". Cindy, Zehra & Jen all have amazing voices too. And that YMCA was a classic.

There is no way you're ever going to get me to sing. Never gonna happen. Have to maintain some dignity. But just because I'm a thrill-seeker, here is a brief list of songs I sometimes sing in my car...

Nat King Cole's "When I Grow To Old To Dream"
Joe Jackson's "The Other Me"
Joe Jackson's "Hometown"
Bruce Springsteen's "One Step Up"
Don McLean's "American Pie"

Karine dragged me onto the dance floor. After I made her promise not to go into labor, we did a couple of swing moves which was fun (especially when she eventually let me lead). I definitely think the Gatherings need more swing in general.

Around 2am-ish the downstairs party began to break up. I know I was saying good-bye all night. I was really on the fence about whether or not to stay up all night and take off at six, or try to go to bed and worse try to wake up at five.

Because, I was having too much fun, I opted (mostly by default) for staying up all night.

Karine, Jen, Zehra, Patrick, Tony, Andrea and I went up to the consuite to hang. Had an apple and some chips. Liz, Kelly, Karlyle & Chameleon Girl showed up for a bit, and Liz dropped off a very cool hand-drawn Angela conbadge for me. We watched a surreal live-action Sailor Moon. This is something my kids would go nuts for, so if anyone can copy this stuff to VHS, I'd be interested...

It was all very punchy and silly and cosy and fun. I made one of the most truly tasteless jokes I've EVER made in my life. It was semi-avian in nature.

I love all-nighters. And I loved spending time with these people.

Then finally at about 5:15 it was time to hit the showers. I said goodbye to Karine, Tony & Andrea at the Consuite. To Jen in front of my room.

Of course by this time, it was way past officially Sunday, so I'll finish my last Journal entry tomorrow...

NEXT: The Trip to the Airport: ¿Can Toman top Bishansky?


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THE GATHERING OF THE GARGOYLES 2004 - JOURNAL (Nightpart II - The Masquerade)

I had time to run upstairs once more. Talked to Beth. Norman, our basset had had his surgery and was doing fine. Though, unfortunately, he was now completely deaf. (Although, today, when the doorbell rang, Norman started barking just like old times. It was the first time I had heard him bark since the surgery. But I have no idea how he could possibly have known that there was someone at the door. Freaky, but cool.)

While I was upstairs, various members of Keith's family began to straggle in. His son Owen. His lovely wife Dionne, Dionne's niece (whose name escapes me, I'm afraid) and Keith & Dionne's daughters: Maelee and Ruby. Many of you know that Dionne and Keith's first date was his appearance at G1997. That's right. Those of you who saw Keith's surprise entrance might also have noticed a beautiful woman standing in the back watching him. That was Dionne. After he and I did our Q&A, I was so grateful, I treated the two of them to dinner. (How's that for slick? The guy didn't even buy dinner for his wife-to-be. ;)

I came back downstairs and joined Keith as we prepared to judge the Masquerade. Daniel, our hotel contact, was the third judge. His girlfriend Lucy also kinda participated, and we drafted Christine to help us keep everything straight.

Idiot that I am, I forgot to keep my notes, so I tried to recreate them from memory on a groggy Sunday. I apologize in advance for any errors or ommissions.

I will say that the costumes this year were truly amazing -- both in quality and QUANTITY. The last couple years, we've had plenty of the former, but were kinda shy on the latter, as fewer and fewer people seemed to be dressing up. But this year, I'm sure thanks to David Grabias and the DVD Crew, people really went to town. I was especially gratified to see so many canon characters. All the original characters are neat, but for me it's much more fun to see one of my "babies" brought to life.

BEST IN SHOW: Having said that, the runaway hit was an original Gargoyle named, I think, KORUL: the Gargoyle who was afraid of heights. He had an amazing costume, with detractable wings and sang a filk song to the tune of Rubber Ducky. Brilliant.

The awards for Canon Characters:
1st: Shari as Ekidna (bloody amazing)
2nd: Jade as La Belle Elisa (so cute)
3rd: John as the Renaissance Hunter (very cool)

The awards for non-canon:
1. Caille as Argenta (also with amazing wing action)
2. Somebody as Dancer
3. Space-Babie as Laurie Canmore

The Thom Adcox Memorial Award went to Revel as Dracon. Just for the attitude. But he refused to drop trow.

Cutest Couple: Alan & Jackie as Xanatos & Fox from "Eye of the Beholder"

Cutest Old Married Couple: Tony & Andrea as Dracon & Bad Elisa (I loved Jen's line that "Bad" means "Cleavage".)

The Gorelisa Award went to Laurean as Tom. (Staff weren't supposed to be eligible, but (a) it was a limited field of cross-dressers this year and (b) she was just so darn cute and funny.)

We gave a late-comer award to Lynati, who showed up at the very last second with a truly amazing Ophelia costume. Kicked ass.

Winner in the Junior Division was Becca as a terrific Bronx.

The Cosplay winners were Sapphire, Chameleon Girl and Ethan, doing a hilarious recitation (complete with props) of our opening Narration. Totally cracked me up.

There were other great costumes as well:
Elisagargoyle
Fox in her evening gown with the Eye of Odin from "Eye"
Thailog
A Quarryman

And the staff... with all they had to do, they still managed (almost to a man) to dress for the occassion. And they truly looked great.

Jen & Alan came as Gruouch & Macbeth
Patrick & Cindy came as Puck & Titania
Kaylee & Si came as Princess Katharine & Tom (and that kiss was great)
Rob was Lex Luthor (by default, I gather)
And of course Karine showed up as a Pregnant Fox from "Walkabout"...

And the DVD Crew got it all on tape... I am such a proud Papa.

NEXT: THE NIGHT IS YOUNG. (Well, actually, the night is fortyish, but every once in a while, the night has to behave as if it's still in college, you know?)


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GATHERING 2004 JOURNAL - Saturday, August 7 (Nightpart I)

After my interview with Emru, but before I headed upstairs, I finally had time to browse the wonderful art show. There were a lot of great pictures and some very funny action figures. Not enough smut for my taste, of course, but it's hard to top the Gargoyles fandom in the art department. I just love seeing your stuff every year.

But the one piece that really spoke to me was Andrea Zucconi's portrait of Elisa. I'm not sure if I can exactly put my finger on why, but I really found it stunning. I don't vote in the contest. I never seem to have the time and the sheer number of categories is a bit overwhelming, but I would have voted that Elisa painting as best in show. JMHO.

Anyway, at 6pm I came back downstairs for the banquet. By the time I got there most everyone was seated. Keith still hadn't arrived but was due within the hour. Becca Morgan drew a number out of a hat, and Karine sent me to sit at a table on the far right. I sat down next to Liz -- who then proceeded to kick me out. I hadn't heard it, but I guess Karine had mistakenly announced that Liz's table would get Keith. So Liz sent me away. I returned to Karine, who sent me back to Liz. I felt like a definite consolation prize right about then. (At best.) But considering that Keith didn't arrive until the Q&A, making it impossible for him to simply converse with his table mates, I still think Liz got the better deal. But you'd have to ask her.

Anyway, dinner was very enjoyable. I shared the table with the Zucconis and Liz and Kelly and Chameleon Girl and Taylor, I think. Karlyle, were you there? A couple other people too. I'm blanking out at the moment.

Kelly told us all of her obsession with Dr. Doom. (How obsessed is she? Well, let's just say I found myself getting jealous.)

The menu cards, printed up by our hotel contact Daniel were extremely cool, featuring a nice portrait of Goliath.

The Menu:
*Nordic shrimp cocktail with avocado sauce
*Mixed greens with walnut oil
*Stuffed pair of quails ith grape and Port sauce
*Potatoes and market fresh vegetables
*Seasonal fruit charlotte with strawberry coulis
or
*three chocolate Bavarian cake with rasberry coulis
*Coffee & tea

Truth is, I'm a man of simpler tastes. The shrimp and salad were great. But I'm not a big quail fan. Not a big poultry fan, honestly. I think of birds as hassle food. Too many bones. But everything tasted great, and as you all know I'll eat anything but lamb.

As the hour came and went without a sign of Keith, Patrick or Carol, Karine asked me if I could get Carol's cellphone number. It was up in my room. So I made a quick run upstairs.

I reentered only to hear an unmistakeable voice announce: "Ladies & Gentlemen, Greg Weisman". Keith had arrived in the couple minutes while I was gone. (And vengeance belonged to those that I had fooled in the past.)

Anyway, food was saved for Keith and Patrick. Though Carol had to go back to the airport to gather up Keith's family. Keith struggled to eat while I tried to moderate the Q&A. Unsurprisingly, there were a LOT more questions for him than me. And unsurprisingly, if you know him, he had a lot to say. A lot of wonderful stories to tell. I love that man. I tried to give him a bit of time to eat. But hey, he's his own worst enemy in that department. Thank God.

(I'll refrain from commenting about the caterwaulling from the next room.)

We finally brought the Q&A to an end to give people time to change into their costumes.

COMING SOON: The Masquerade!!!


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Still recruiting journals...

Todd informs me that 21 of you have posted Gathering Journals here at ASK GREG.

I'm very grateful to you guys, but that's less than 14% of this year's attendance, which frankly is kinda pathetic.

Please, PLEASE, take a few minutes to write up your journals and cut and paste them here. And if you've already done it, pressure those who haven't and or spread the word.

This isn't a whim. I need the numbers to show the PTB.

Thanks.


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THE GATHERING 2004 JOURNAL - Saturday, August 7 (Daypart)

Despite a wake-up call that I DO remember receiving, I WAY overslept on Saturday, barely managing to shower and get downstairs in time for our second set of Auditions at 10am. Jen was putting out some fire somewhere, so we got to a bit of a late start, but we still had plenty of time to fit everyone in.

As usual, we were using the original audition sides that the actual voice actors used to audition for Gargoyles. Demona, Hudson, Goliath, Elisa, Brooklyn, Lexington, Broadway and Xanatos were all written by Michael Reaves and edited by me. Angela was written a year or more later by me.

We got a good turnout, with plenty of women auditioning, including many staff members.

At 11:30, Jen and I went upstairs to my room to cast the piece. There was time for lunch, but neither of us bothered.

We posted the cast list at 12:30pm, but not who was playing what parts.

I had a mug-a-guest next. One or two intriguing questions got asked, and I think I answered one of them, but from what I've seen posted, some conclusions were then jumped too based on facts not in evidence.

Next up was the Radio Play Rehearsal. With a cast of 31, I was very pleased that every one showed up and more or less on time too. I passed out the parts and scripts and we just had time to run through each act once. My favorite bit there was when Jen as Fleance said: "If he gets past us again, you can KISS our paychecks goodbye." And Zehra as Elisa responds with: "Pucker up." I made a rude remark that got a big laugh. But honestly, aren't the possibilities intriguing?

Anyway, as many of you know, we performed "THE JOURNEY" in the auditorium. This version was re-edited for the Radio Play, but came closer to reflecting my original intentions for the script than the strangely edited version (with those awful Goliath voice overs -- which I did not write) that they used in Goliath Chronicles.

THE GATHERING PLAYERS (2004 Edition):
Goliath - Rob St. Martin
Elisa Maza - Zehra Fazal
Brooklyn - Dylan Blacquere
Broadway - Revel
Hudson - Alan Torvik
Lexington - François Ferland
Angela - Annie S.
David Xanatos - Rob Irwin
Owen Burnett - Seth Jackson
Bronx - Syrth
John Castaway - Erik Mambu
Vinnie Grigori - Michael McAdam
Banquo - Ethan Gilchrist
Fleance - Jen Anderson
Art - Alex "Carter" Garg
Billy's Mom - Laurean Broadbent
Travis Marshall - Lanny Fields
Margot Yale - Cindy Kinnard
Matt Bluestone - Eric "Gorebash" Tribou
Lennox Macduff - Chris Rogers
Maria Chavez - Natalie "Vashkoda" Quanquin"
Lois - Jade Griffin
Fox - Kaylle
Alex Xanatos - Liz Chesterman
Cagney - Mary "Stormy" Pletsch
Jogger - Isabelle Filiaircault
Quarryman #1 - Tony Zucconi
Quarryman #2 - David Brown
Quarryman #3 - Sarah McEvoy
Quarryman #4 - Taylor Hord
Announcer - Dan Blundon
Narrator - Greg Weisman

Everyone was just great. Dylan & Revel actually kind of did pretty good Brooklyn & Broadway impersonations. I also loved hearing Lex with a French accent and cast François for that intentionally.

I loved how Jen & Ethan played off each other. And I really loved how Chris & Cindy played off each other.

And Lanny, I believe, has been in all seven radio plays. An impressive record.

And real props to our four leads: Michael, Eric, Zehra & Rob, who were all terrific. Rob had a particularly difficult job subbing for a still MIA Keith David. And Eric was really brilliant. His final "Dream of Me" line gave me chills.

As usual, the DVD squad was around filming. It was hard for them to predict who was going to speak and to mic those people, but hopefully they got some useable footage.

I'd also like to thank everyone who auditioned and didn't get cast. It really is appreciated when you lend your support. And keep trying!!!

Immediately after the radio play, I signed some scripts. (Alan got lucky as his Hudson script was signed by Ed Asner, thanks to Carol snagging Ed's signature when she went to record him for the Opening Ceremonies welcoming tape.)

I was supposed to have a signing with Keith about then. But of course, Keith wasn't there yet. And there isn't much left for me to sign in the fandom. So I sat there for about 45 minutes, talking to Emru Townsend for his magazine FPS. Emru had interviewed Keith and I years ago over the phone. So this was something of a follow up interview. Emru (who by the way has an AMAZING voice) and I had never met in person, so it was great to see him finally. He and I just talked. I don't remember exactly what I said though I have the distinct impression that SOME of what I said about the animation industry should probably have been "Off the Record". But, hey, getting blacklisted at studios is nothing new to me. (Oh, well.)

Around 5:30pm, I went back upstairs to rest and change to a slightly nicer shirt before the banquet. I think I called Beth and the kids. And I almost dozed. But I stayed awake... for a LONG time.

STAY TUNED for (Nightpart)


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THE GATHERING OF THE GARGOYLES 2004 JOURNAL - Friday, August 6 (Bring on the Night)

After Opening Ceremonies, Karine wanted to make another effort to go to the Crepe place that we had missed the night before. I ran upstairs to drop off all my junk and to quickly call home.

Then we were off and walking into Old Montreal. This time I had a sweatshirt, which kept me comfortable. Our group included myself, Karine, Mark & Mark, Zehra, Kathy, Shaun, Laurean, Ian and... Gen? (Sorry, I just can't remember.) It was a great group. I heard all about Zehra's plans to translate a Japanese play into English and then direct and produce it at Wellesley. Wow. I also listened to Laurean & Zehra compare notes on Japan, and caught up a bit with Kathy.

Karine wanted to eat outside, because they have a beautiful multi-tiered patio, but that would have been a half-hour wait and by eating inside we could be seated right away. So we admired the patio and, well, sat. Inside.

Dinner was great. I had Crepes Florentine, and then a terrific dessert crepe with Vanilla Ice Cream. I was also seated between two lovely ladies, Karine & Zehra, all the lovlier because they were generous enough to let me taste their dessert crepes as well.

Of course, our waiter was very nice, but a tad dangerous. Dropping plates. Shattering dishes. Spoiling food and even dropping a knife in MY LAP!!! YIKES!

We had plenty of time to eat, but because of delays caused by the server's lack of grace, I found myself observing what's unfortunately become another Gathering tradition: Kathy and I RACING back from dinner to arrive late to my next scheduled event: in this case the Blue Mug in the packed con suite.

This was perhaps the least Blue Mug we've ever had. And I have to admit I missed spending some quality time in the gutter. Some of the lack of azure is probably directly attributable to the absense of a certain pants-challenged voice actor with the initials TA, but I think frankly a bigger reason was that everyone's curiousity about details of the DVD overwhelmed other topics. We did have a couple of smutty moments though. Christine still thinks she scares me. And she did manage to catch me with a question I hadn't given any thought to, but I'm harder to shock than that. (I know Keith had been looking forward to the Blue Mug, as well. And I'm sure he would have done well in Thom's place, but unfortunately, Keith STILL hadn't arrived. In fact, it had become clear that Keith was going to miss most of Saturday's activities as well.)

At around 2am, Karine used the excuse of my bathroom break to end the session. I headed back down to my room. Ate one of Maui's Godiva Chocolate bars. Called Beth, thanks to the time difference, and then went to bed around 2:30am, which was decidedly early for me.

NEXT UP: THE DAY THAT KEPT ON TICKING...


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THE GATHERING 2004 JOURNAL - Friday, August 6 (Opening Ceremonies)

I typed most of this up yesterday, but then a glitch ate it. So here we go again.

Now one of my LEAST favorite things to do is to recreate a lost document. It's much worse than composing something from scratch. You're always trying to reclaim the "magic" of whatever you wrote on your first pass. And it never quite works. So if the following is magic-free, you know why…

… I came to OPENING CEREMONIES loaded for bear, with 5 Video tapes, 2 Audio tapes and color xeroxes of a Buena Vista Home Entertainment PowerPoint Presentation.

Karine got the ball rolling, welcoming everyone to the con.

Jen got up and awarded the FAN GUEST OF HONOR award to GOREBASH. He can protest all he wants, but the guy deserves this award simply for inspiring the Gorelisa Award. (And, oh yeah, there's also Station 8 the Gargoyle Fiendsite and ASK GREG too.)

Chris Rogers came up to pitch G2005 in Las Vegas, which sounds really, really cool. I loved Laurean's new mascot. I know that there's a traditional naming of the mascot contest, but I loved the name "Blue-Eyes". So if no one wins, I'll be okay with that.

Cindy spoke, and Liz, and then the Ceremonies were hi-jacked by Abram & Maui and the Clan Olympics. The first event was goofy fun to watch. Eventually things settled back down, and shortly it was my turn to speak…

And, boy, did I have a lot to say this year. More than usual.

Carol Wagner had assembled a welcome tape recorded by various members of the show's cast & crew: myself, Keith David, Producer-Director Frank Paur, Board Artist Troy Adomitis, Board Artist Vic Cook, Development Art Director & Producer Bob Kline, Development Art Director Dave Schwartz, Actor Crispin Freeman (a past Gathering Guest) and of course Ed Asner, the wonderful voice of Hudson.

I played my little, "Ladies & Gentlemen, Keith David!" trick. And everyone looked, just as they had in 1997 at the first Gathering. It's cruel, I know. But I'd never do it if I thought that Keith wouldn't eventually show up. Which he did. Although not for another 26 hours or so, unfortunately.

I made a little sales pitch for a few of the con's events. The Blue Mug that night, for example. But especially for the Radio Play. I had need of a huge cast and needed more people (especially females) to audition. On top of that, I was nervous that if I did get a full cast, they would outnumber the audience, so I also made a plea for people to attend the show.

I gave my thanks to Karine and her extremely hard-working staff: Rob, Ian, Shaun, Cindy, Patrick, Jen, Kaylee, Laurean, Liz & Carol. I also thanked a few select people who I know helped out: Kelly, Kathy, Christine, Steph and Alan. I'm sure I fogot a bunch of people then and now, and for that I apologize.

I plugged both G2005 in Vegas again, as well as ASK GREG, Gorebash & Station 8, reminding people ONE MORE TIME to please post Gathering Journals at Ask Greg ASAP after the end of the con. (So, have you?) I also pointed out A Fan's map of attendees at the back of the room.

Then it was time for hand counts. How many Gathering Con Virgins? [A goodly amount.] How many had been to at least two Gatherings? At least Three? Four? Five? Six? Seven? ALL EIGHT? The number of the latter was very gratifying. [I'm forgetting a couple people, but I think they included A Fan, Karine, Noelle, Lanny, myself (if I count) and at least a couple of others.] These are the troops that should really inspire the rest of you.

I then held up the materials that Buena Vista had sent me. Of course, they were probably IMPOSSIBLE to see even from the front of the room. But they included a few remaining postcards promoting the DVD's release from the THOUSANDS that were distributed at the San Diego ComicCon earlier this summer. (I ended up giving these to Patrick to pass out to the hard-working staff.)

Also on hand was Buena Vista's 7-Point PowerPoint Presentation Slide Show, which I've transcribed here [with a few comments]:

1. GARGOYLES

2. "Visually Stunning and Dramatically Stirring, Gargoyles Defines Fantastic."
--Ray Stackhouse, TV Guide

3. A Mythical World
--An Animated Series About Ancient Creatures Who Come to Life at Night to Protect Manhattan from Evil
--10 Year Series Anniversary
--Voiced by Well-Known Talent from the Star Trek Franchise Including:
*Jonathan Frakes
*Michael Dorn
*Brent Spiner [who doesn't actually appear in the first season. whoops.]

4. A Loyal Fan Base
--Gargoyles Was the 23rd Most Requested Disney Title of Q2 '04 [certainly, we can do better than that, right?]
--Chat Rooms and Fan Websites Are Buzzing with News of the Upcoming DVD Release:
"OMG! I can't wait. 10 long years and finally my fave cartoon will be on DVD!" - SportyShorty, IMDB Fan Posting
--Annual "Gathering of the Gargoyles" Convention Attended by Thousands of Fans [If you add 'em all up, sure.]
--Gargoyles Airs Every Night on TOON DISNEY CHANNEL and Saturdays on ABC FAMILY

5. A Product Fans Are Clamoring For
--Two-Disc DVD Set
--Includes All 13 Episodes of the First Season of Gargoyles [uncut, I should add]
--Special 10th Anniversary Edition [as opposed to all those other editions, right?]
--Bonus Features:
*The Gathering of the Gargoyles [original documentary filmed at G2004]
*Original Show Pitch by Greg Weisman - Show Creator [previously available ONLY by attending the Gathering]
*Audio Commentary on Origanl Episodes 1-5 [Originally, I had been hoping for commentary on all 13 episodes. Budget constraints made that impossible, as Buena Vista truly has no idea how well this will sell. (We'll have to show them, won't we?) They came back to me saying they could only afford commentary on two episodes, suggesting either the first two episodes or the first episode and "Deadly Force". I went back to them, protesting that our pilot was five episodes and that it would just be weird not to at least have commentary on the whole thing. They discussed it and agreed. So we wound up with five episodes with commentary instead of two, more than doubling the budget. I then tried to convince them to do "Deadly Force," but they ignored me. Oh, well.]

6. On-Air Synergy Support
--Synergy Support from:
*TOON DISNEY CHANNEL
*ABC FAMILY

7. Pricing and Timing
--Perfectly Timed for Holiday Gift Giving and Gargoyles 10th Anniversary
--U.S.: Two-Disc DVD $29.99 SRP/$19.95 MAP
--CE: Two-Disc DVD $36.99
--NAAD: December 7 [THAT'S RIGHT!!!! THAT'S THE BIGGEST NEWS OF ALL. An official release date: DECEMBER 7th, 2004!!!!!!]

The point I was generally trying to make, is that this is really a make-or-break year for the fandom. The DVD is coming out. And you have yourselves to thank. Particularly those of you who have attended previous Gatherings. Disney took notice, and you're continued support gave me the wherewithal to push them. But now the ball is squarely in your court.

People are always asking me what they can do to get the show back in some way, shape or form. Now the answer is obvious. You want the show back? Prove it!!

Buy the DVD! You want the second season on DVD? Buy the first. Buy it for yourself. Buy it for friends, family and co-workers for Birthdays and Holidays.

More than that, SPREAD THE WORD!!!!! Even if everyone attending G2004 bought ten copies, that would only be a drop in the bucket. We need to reach out to fans who have drifted. To people who don't yet know about the fandom. To people who perhaps haven't even seen the show yet.

Disney has no idea how many units this thing is going to sell. Their downside is fairly protected, but the upside is potentially huge. FAMILY GUY sold so many DVDs that they're making new episodes. FIREFLY, a series that didn't last one season on television (despite its brilliance), sold so many DVDs that they're making a theatrical feature film. We would have to sell a ton of DVDs to match their success. But if we do, the sky's the limit.

You're my missionaries here. So support the fandom. Make ASK GREG a weekly stop… I'm going to try to coordinate efforts to boost DVD sales, so keep posted for news and updates:

www.s8.org/gargoyles/askgreg/

Pre-Register to G2005 (or at the least purchase a fully-upgradable Supporting Membership).

Keep checking

www.gatheringofthegargoyles.com

[It's still the G2004 site for now, but it'll shortly turn over to feature info on G2005.]

Keep in mind that money that comes to the con EARLY is worth more than money that comes late. To afford multiple guests, the con needs funds earlier than later. That's why pre-registering is cheaper. Buy now, save money and the worst thing that happens is that you cannot attend and you've contributed a few bucks to the fandom you love.

[Keep in mind, I earn nothing from Gargoyles or the fandom - other than massive ego boosts. Nothing to sneeze at.]

But don't give up on attending G2005 either. You have a year to save up a Gathering fund. A year to arrange for roommates or pals for a road trip. Flights to Vegas are traditionally inexpensive from most locations. Again, bring in new newbies by showing them the show and addicting them. We want to break all attendance records.

Now, you may think I'm riffing here and have gotten off topic. But in fact, I said all this and more at Opening Ceremonies.

Right about then, I introduced the DVD Vid-Documentary Crew (David, Howard & Thierry). They were there to tape the entire convention. All the primo events. But they were also there to interview the fans about how Gargoyles changed their lives.

Then … finally… I got to what I like to call my own version of the Rocky Horror Gargoyles Show.

I showed the original Gargoyles Pitch Video.
The original Gargoyles Promo Video.
The original Gargoyles Presentation Video (narrated by Jonathan Frakes).
The original pitch for "The New Olympians" spin-off series.
The original pitch for "Gargoyles: The Dark Ages" prequel series.
The animatic/storyboard/leica reel for the "Bad Guys" spin-off.

That was followed by the Audio Tape of the never animated "The Last". This was a cross-over episode between Team Atlantis & Gargoyles featuring the voices of Marina Sirtis, Frank Welker, Sheena Easton, Cree Summer and others. As usual, the grunts of battle had different implications in a vacuum. And given the dirty minds of most of the attending, those implications are fairly self-evident.

And thus ended Opening Ceremonies. But Friday wasn't over. Stay tuned for more…


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ARGGHH

I just typed up half a ramble and it vanished.....


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THE GATHERING 2004 - Friday, August 6 (Part One)

And we're back...

Friday was an eventful day, so I'm breaking it down into two rambles.

I got my wake-up call, lingered for a few minutes, showered and shaved (or trimmed, I should say). Then I went upstairs for my big interview with David Grabias and the DVD guys (Howard the DP and Thierry on sound, I think). David asked me some questions, I'm sure looking for some great short pithy responses that would make nice sound bites for the DVD documentary.

Of course, I have many talents, but being short & pithy ain't one of them. My 45 minute interview lasted an hour and a half. At one point, David sent me back to my room to change shirts so that he could pretend that a little intro I was doing for the original Gargoyles pitch (which will also be on the DVD) was shot on a different day. The thing that interests me is that you'll be seeing me intro the thing at age 40 and then jump back to me at age 30 pitching. I think as an Easter Egg or something they should create a little mini-morph of me aging rapidly.

After that I brought Erin & Benny's art down to Cindy. We took a few minutes to figure out which piece went with which title card. But it was all fairly self-evident.

I saw Zehra at that point, I think. I was really glad she came back this year. Also saw Noelle somewhere in here and Lexy & Marty and others.

Next up was the Voice Acting Seminar. I brought the same old stuff to cover. Stuff I developed doing a Seminar for Telemarketers (waves at Sapphire), a.ka. that time I was truly doing the Devil's Handywork. I've used it for at least a couple years now, but I wasn't afraid of it getting old, because the plan was for Keith and I to do this seminar together. His take on the stuff (his take in general) would provide us with a unique experience. Problem was that Keith hadn't arrived on Thursday night as planned. His movie in Miami was rained out a couple days which caused a delay in his flight for said couple days.

So I'm doing this on my own. Which isn't a problem, per se, except that it's the same old stuff. But there were enough newbies to let me get away with it.

I began by reciting my meager qualifications as stage actor, stage director, voice actor and voice director. Then I broke out the scenes.

We started with the Demona audition side, which Jen read -- way too well. It was frustrating as my schpiel sort of depends on some amount of badness in order to allow me to riff on how to improve. She didn't really provide that. Damn her talent!!

Anyway, Seri got up and read Demona. And she did a good job, but I was able to force her to read the last line over and over in order to make a point about acting choices.

Then we did a few others scenes. The Tea Scene from MIA is one of my favorite acting lessons. The tag from Thrill of the Hunt. And the "Friend" scene from Awakening 1. It was all fun. The DVD crew came in and filmed a bit, which was a running theme throughout the con. It actually made everything feel fresher and more exciting.

I think I have a new reality series to pitch....

Anyway, next up was our first round of auditions. Of course, I had forgotten the audition forms in my room. So I searched for the elevator. BTW, the hotel was great, but the entire weekend I had some kind of weird trouble finding my bearings, i.e. the elevators and/or restrooms. I constantly found myself walking in circles.

Jen and I ran the auditions, like old times. I get to force people to bark like a dog or meow like a cat and when I remember to speak with either English or Scottish dialects. Every year is unpredictable. There have been years when almost no men audition and I have to drag Hudson off the street to play a part. This year, at the Friday audition, we have tons of men and only two women. It's panic time as this particular radio play has an IMMENSE cast of 31 (not counting me). And at minimum (even with some cross-gender casting) I feel I need at least seven women for clarity.

Throughout the day, Keith's flight keeps getting pushed back.

And people keep giving me stuff.

Maui gives me a box of Godiva chocolate bars. Not a box of chocolates, mind you, but a box of chocolate BARS.

Kathy feeds my Buffyverse obssession by giving me a Buffy Companion book.

Tony gives me his Annual Gathering CD. (Which I listened to on the way back from San Diego. It's great.)

Wingless gives me a Banana Splits CD. (Which I listened to on the way to San Diego. It's VERY Cool.)

Michael gives me his Demo CD. (Which I haven't listened to yet, but I will. But Michael, here's my question: I already know you're good. But are you planning a move to L.A.? What good is your CD if you're not here to audition if and when I get something (please God anything) to have you audition for?)

I got four cool con t-shirts and pins (which I had paid for) from the staff, as well as a staff t-shirt from Jen (which I did not pay for).

I got Subway from Alan, which I also paid for, cuz frankly Alan still intimidates me a bit. It must have something to do with how cosey I get with his wife.

I got my con badge and the VERY cool program that Si put together. It includes a picture of me with a pillow over my head. I'm told this is a great picture. I find it interesting that the best picture of me is one where my face is covered.

I got a G2005 Vegas t-shirt from Chris at some point.

I got a UPS package which contained stuff from the Buena Vista Home Entertainment folk for use at the Opening Ceremonies.

And best of all, I got BLACK ROSES from Christine. Which is cool. But cooler still, is the dedication, to me and Salli and I guess all of you. I have never had a book dedicated to me before. I can't tell you what that feels like. It really makes my day on a day that makes my year.

NEXT UP: OPENING CEREMONIES (the never-ending story)


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GATHERING 2004 JOURNAL - Thursday, August 5

Time to journal.

As usual, let me open with a few caveats, apologies, etc.

I'll try to be as complete as possible, but inevitably I may forget a few names or forget to include a few people or events. My apologies. Please don't feel slighted. The con for me is always a great time, but also a whirlwind of people. With few exceptions, I only manage a few minutes with everyone. Sometimes it takes me two or three years to really nail a name to a face. (The fact that many of you have multiple names doesn't help either.)

I'd also like to mention a few of the people I didn't see, people I hope to see next year. Former con-chairs like Jubes and Batya and especially Mae Lee. People who made an impression, like Spike and Vanessa and many, many others. I'd like to ask all of you who did attend and/or all of you who are reading this now to reach out to fans who have wandered. As many of you know (and as Friday's G-Journal will soon make clear) this is really a make-or-break year for the series. We need to re-energize, rejuvenate and REAWAKEN the fandom. Especially those who have drifted away. We need everyone!

Speaking of which, here's ANOTHER reminder to post your GATHERING JOURNALS here at ASK GREG. Cut & Paste. If necessary, enter them a con-day at a time as I'm doing. If you're reading this and you know of people who attended the convention who haven't yet posted their journal, get on their cases. I think we've got about a dozen so far. I appreciate them all, but that's NOT nearly enough. We had 200 people attend the con. If we can't get at least 100 journals here at ASK GREG, I'm going to be VERY disappointed.

Finally, as most of you know, my diaries tend to center around food. Basically, I love to eat, and it's something I really have a talent for. I love great food and horrible junk. And I'm often obssessive about the subject. Strangely, or perhaps not-so, my memories of this adventure do NOT revolve around food. In part, because I didn't get to eat as often as usual. Just not enough time. In part, because I had such a blast just spending time with all of you. Thanks.

ANYWAY, enough preamble. Let's get gathering.

The week before the Gathering had been extremely eventful. Good things and bad things were happening to my family, especially my siblings. For more info on both check out the very well-written websites of Robyn Weisman...
http://barbaricmysticalandbored.blogspot.com/
and/or Jon Weisman...
http://www.all-baseball.com/dodgerthoughts/

Over at my house, things were almost as crazy. We had taken out a loan to paint the exterior of our house. Right after we were financially committed to that endeavor, our upstairs bathroom cracked its shower pan, creating (ultimately) a hole in the ceiling of our entry hall. We have had to totally demolish that bathroom in order to repair it, which caused further damage to our bedroom, living room and powder room. Even our doorbell has stopped working.

Plus, I got a stye in my eye. For a couple of days, it was swollen up, and I thought: "YAY, MY DISFIGUREMENT CAN BE IMMORTALIZED FOREVER ON THE DVD!" Fortunately, it faded by Thursday and was all but gone by Friday.

Also, there was that ladder thing. How many Gargoyles-Creators does it take to screw in a light bulb? I was up on a ladder changing a ceiling bulb. I had the old bulb out and in hand, when the ladder (which is missing three out of four rubber feet) tipped me off. I landed on the hand holding the lightbulb, which <SHATTERED> on the brick floor. Blood and glass everywhere. The wounds, such as they were, turned out to be very superficial once they were cleaned off and the imbedded glass was tweezered out. I was wrapped in gauze for a night and my daughter took to calling me "Daddy Mummy" or "Dummy" for short. Smart kid. Anyway, by the next day, I was down to two band-aids. By Thursday, the puncture wounds were barely noticable.

More seriously, there's Norman, our ten-year-old Bassett Hound. Earlier this year, Norman was stricken with a life-threatening ear infection. We tried multiple courses of anti-biotics (including some human versions). Nothing worked. Finally we had to have his ear canal surgically removed. Then last month, the other ear got infected. It soon became clear that we were going to have to have his remaining ear canal removed, rendering him completely deaf. It was very upsetting to all of us, and I felt horrible that I was going to be out of town during the surgery. Of course, I had made a commitment, and to be honest I really didn't want to miss the Gathering.

And the fact was, I was already planning to miss a portion of it. My daughter's birthday is August 8th, 1994. I wasn't going to miss her tenth birthday, which meant I'd be leaving VERY early on Sunday morning in order to make it home in time for her birthday dinner. That meant that I was going to have to stuff all my G2004 fun into a few short days.

So, Thursday morning I got up at 7am, reminding myself that I couldn't use my own demolished bathroom. I showered in the kids' bathroom, and made my way downstairs. I had been vaguely Atkinsing for the last three weeks and had in fact lost about eleven pounds. But the diet was done for the duration. I had Cereal and banana.

I was picked up at the house at 9:30 am. The trip to the airport was uneventful. Got to LAX and got through all the various lines without incident. Then I bought a loaf of sourdough bread and ATE the entire thing. Also had a Three Musketeers bar and a bottled water. Obviously, I was craving carbs and sugar.

Aboard the plane, I began to read "I DREAMED I MARRIED PERRY MASON" by Susan Kandell. This is a very well-written murder mystery by a friend of ours. The protagonist is Cece Caruso, a biographer who stumbles onto two murders (one old, one new) while researching the life of Erle Stanley Gardner, the creator of Perry Mason. I definitely recommend it.

On the plane, I had Tomato Juice and toyed with my meal: beef, biscuits, cole slaw, rice and a roll.

The movie was "Day After Tomorrow" and even though it was free, I couldn't bring myself to watch it. Though I did get curious about how it would end -- about what could possibly be considered a coda for it, so I ear-phoned up for the last ten minutes or so. Uggh.

The flight, like the whole trip, was easy. Customs in Montreal was a long line, but had the advantage of non-stop movement, which at least makes the wait FEEL more palatable.

Patrick, Jen & Rob were waiting for me. I was already in a good mood, but I immediately felt better. Now, the Gathering had really begun for me.

We had a completely uneventful ride to the Delta Centre-Ville (our G2004 Hotel). In the lobby, I saw Carol, Kathy & Kelly. Mandi, I think? Abram. A Fan. I checked in, and hit my room to do a VERY quick unpacking before meeting everyone in the consuite. I saw Becca right away, and asked where her parents were. Christine was standing just behind me and gave me a big hug.

The constaff had planned in advance to go to dinner as soon as I got in. There was some miscommunication, which I really regret, as some non-staffers were waiting to join us and the restaurant we were heading toward couldn't accomodate us all. Sad irony, we didn't even end up at that restaurant (as its kitchen was closed) and the place we did eat at had plenty of room. In the future, I'm gonna make an effort to be more inclusive at these things.

Not to rub it in, but those of us who did attend: Lanny, Derek, Michael, Karine, Cindy, Rob, Jen, Alan, Kaylee, Shawn, Patrick, Laurean, Liz, Carol and I had a great meal. We had taken a long walk to get to the crepe place that Karine wanted us all to enjoy. The weather was lovely but just a tad cool for a guy from California in a t-shirt. If I had just brought my sweatshirt along, it wouldn't have been a problem, but I was shivering by the time we sat down in our second-choice restaurant.

Which was great, by the way. Lobster Bisque, Fettucine Alfredo, Bread, bruschetta, a mussel and coke.

And great company. I enjoyed the walk back a bit more, even though I was still freezing. Karine offered to lend me her sweatshirt, but I'm still enough of a gentleman (just barely) to refrain from taking a pregnant woman's wrap.

Back at the hotel, I ran into Lynati, Mara, GXB, Alex, Eric, Hudson, Ethan, Maui, Kyt, Chris & Aaron. I hung out in the lobby with a few of them for a bit. But it was getting late, and I wanted to call Beth and the kids and talk to them before they went to bed.

So I headed up to my room. Called home. Then tried to sleep. Wound up watching TV until at least 3 or 4am, though that was only midnight or one my time. Then I finally went to sleep.

TO BE CONTINUED...


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A Plea and/or Reminder

I'm back in Los Angeles after an amazing trip to Montreal and a fun family half-week in San Diego.

My own Gathering Journal will be forthcoming in installments, as usual.

But in the meantime, I'd like to remind everyone who attended G2004 to please, PLEASE, take a few minutes and write up your experiences in as much detail as possible.

Were you on staff? Were you a dealer? Were you there for the whole weekend or just for a few hours? Whatever your situation, please write up a Gathering Journal and post it HERE at ASK GREG. It's great if you have your own website or livejournal and want to post it there or even in the S8 Comment Room, but please CUT & PASTE your journals and put them here as well. No links please. Cut & Paste.

For those of you who've already done this, thanks. For those of you who started but didn't quite make it through the weekend, please don't run out of steam. For those of you who haven't started, START. Trust me, your memory isn't going to improve with time.

We had about 200 people at the Gathering. I'm hoping to get at least 100 diaries/journals here at ASK GREG. AT LEAST. (Frankly, I'd be thrilled with 100% journaling.) Getting them all here allows me to direct the Disney/Buena Vista powers-that-be to this site as a single clearing house.

Guys, this is important. Prove that you are going to do what it takes in the coming year to support the show by taking this simple first step.

It will be very much appreciated at this end.


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GATHERING 2004

Okay, gang,

I'm going to be off-line for a while.

I leave early tomorrow morning (8-5-04) for Montreal and the Eighth Annual Gathering of the Gargoyles.

I come home on the 8th, but then the family is immediately going to San Diego for some SeaWorld/Legoland action.

So I won't be back at ASK GREG for over a week.

But when I come back, you can look forward (I would hope) to my ramblings about the Gathering.

PLEASE, PLEASE post your own Gathering Journals, Gathering Diaries, etc. as well.

Seriously, I'm using this as a tool with Disney. We have about 200 people attending the Gathering this year. I'd like to see at least 100 Gathering Diaries posted here at ASK GREG.

Thanks.

P.S. Remember, if you see me at the Gathering, don't hesitate to come up to me and say hello. Don't be shy. Please introduce or re-introduce yourselves. I know many, many of you, but I'm traditionally not great with names. Sometimes it takes me a couple gatherings to remember. For that I apologize, but please don't take offense. I really do want to meet all of you. See you soon.

Greg


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some REAL rambling...

Okay, this is not GREG SPEAKING FROM THE MOUNT...

This is just me thinking aloud. (Well, not really aloud. I'm sitting here typing.) I don't even know if I like these ideas. They're definitely not canon.

But the following notions occured to me today...

Gargoyles don't seem to have a native language. They acquire human language ... perhaps much the same way that they acquire names. Naming is clearly addictive. And language, in many ways, is just sophisticated naming.

Clearly gargoyles are just as intelligent as humans. Before humans developed tools, Gargoyles were at the top of the food chain. They may not have created/invented as much "stuff" as humans have, but they also had way fewer needs. Necessity being the mother of invention, they had less motivation for inventing sophisticated shelter, clothes, tools, etc. But that in and of itself isn't a comment on their brain-power.

So why no need for language and names?

When it comes to naming, gargoyles clearly felt that names were superfluous if not somewhat limiting, if not downright harmful to the spirit. Humans must define things. Gargoyles know that things just are.

We are friends. What other name do we require, etc.

It fits in with their animistic/monotheistic view of a higher power. A higher power that requires no name.

Does beg a question, though if you go back far enough.

Does the sky need a name? Does the river?

Elisa responds: "The river's called the Hudson."

But she could have responded: "The river's called a river."

Did the gargoyles have a language that they ABANDONED in favor of human words -- even if those human words were Atlantean (like the term "Gorlois", the true Atlantean etimology for "GARGOYLE")?

Or perhaps...

Gargoyles are so attuned to the earth. They have biological clocks that match the seasons. They have relationships that require no names, until those names have been imposed.

Is it possible, that gargoyles once... long ago... had mild psychic abilities that left them with no need to create language? It wasn't words that they intuited (or transmitted or read or whatever) but emotions, maybe images or sensations.

Maybe it was tied to magic. Not that Gargoyles are magical creatures, but if magic was free-flowing before the Will-O-The-Whisps evolved into the Children of Mab (or whomever) and somewhat confiscated that power for their own, perhaps that magic was just part of the Earth that gargoyles were so attuned to, and allowed for some psychic congress.

Or perhaps, it is a biological ability -- based on biio-elecricity and brainwaves -- that has faded with disuse. Perhaps the very language skills that Gargoyles learned from the human race dampened their psychic intuitiveness, much as Fox's natural magical abilities were stunted by her human upbringing.

Either way, it suggests that this ability could be latent.

I'm NOT saying that the gargs we know are psychic. They've all been fooled enough, even by the INTENSELY emotional Demona (who would theoretically be broadcasting as well as receiving) to bely that notion.

But I wonder if this isn't an interesting area of speculation.

If you see me at the Gathering THIS WEEKEND, it's a topic I'd be interested in discussing.



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