Art & Story 68 – The Big Isenberg
December 9, 2008 by Jerzy
Filed under Art & Story, Podcast, Uncategorized
It’s another interview episode, stuffed to the gills with content. This week we had the pleasure of talking with Marty Isenberg, story editor behind the fantastic Transformers: Animated cartoon series.
We talk about character building techniques, writing “a” and “b” stories, and how collaboration with the art director is an essential part of an animation writer’s repetoire. A lot of our conversation revolves around his work on the Transformers: Animated series, but I’m confident that the bulk of the discussion will be useful to cartoonists, young and old. Besides, you could do a lot worse than check out the series, and if my gushing about it back in The Big Deconstruction wasn’t enough to convince you, maybe this episode will get a few of you to watch the first three episodes, at least. It’s so much better than shows like Lost–you don’t have to watch from the very first episode in order to enjoy it!
Please note: Some of the Amazon links above are for the “Cine-Manga” collections of the Transformers: Animated series. The series we referred to is called “The Arrival”.
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Was there no Big Honor this week? I’m hoping to hear it soon since I’m an impatient jerky teenager.
We’re putting that in next week’s show, Steph. Sorry, should’ve told you that!
Linked here from tfw2005.com – great interview! I’ve seen Marty at BotCon – and he was funny, informative & gracious when I caught up w/ him at the end of the con.
The TFA:Arrival series is also very enjoyable, and has all-new stories.
Enjoy your stay in DC (I live S of it, but am not comic-art fan/geek, aside from W. Pini’s Elfquest work).
I actually preferred Budiansky’s run to Furman’s. The toy comes first, so I don’t mind the non-toon aspects (unlike Batman, Spider-Man, or Superman Adventures in the 90’s, which too often played closer to the DCU than the cartoon), and I thought Furman overplayed, for example, Starscream’s cowardice compared to the more subtle deviousness he showed in “The Underbase Saga”. I have other issues, too, but this is your blog, not mine.
The Animated collected volumes are actually episode adaptations, not Marty’s original stories. Those are in the “Arrival” miniseries, which are only four or five issues in thus far. Good stuff, though. (Yes, I’m a Transfan, too.
Also came from TFW2005.)
To correct a small error at the end of the podcast, there aren’t any collected editions of the Animated: Arrival comic yet. The TPBish things you’re seeing on Amazon are these weird “cinemanga” things that just put speech bubbles over screencaps from the cartoon to make simple “adaptations” of episodes. Don’t buy these expecting original comics!
Corrected in the post, Chip. Thanks to everyone who corrected us on this! The Amazon box we posted rotates between the Cine-Mangas and The IDW comics, so I posted a note making the distinction.
And ShadowWing–I too loved “The Underbase Saga”. Budiansky’s work is certainly worth the read. You can’t fault a guy who wrote a story called “The Car Wash of Doom!”
You obviously don’t travel the fancircles I do. Budiansky takes a lot of flak from the community for that, which is a shame. The title may not make sense, (perhaps “Wash and Roll Out” or something would have been better?) but the Decepticon plan works very well.
And thank you for bringing us the interview. Any chance on one of my favs, Bob Forward (who also has Beast Wars among his credits, as well as other shows I love), on the show? Whenever I see his name as writer, I know I’m usually in for a good story.