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Interview
with Scott Wherle and Eric Wolfe Hanson
Part 3
(back to part 2 or jump back to part
1)
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ISO: Can you explain a little more in detail what the idea behind Biotron and Microtron "melding" together was supposed to be about? Eric: That came from Scott or Josh. A way to give Biotron a path from the bad guy side of the room to the good guy side. I wanted him to gain sentience and make the decision himself to go good. To grow his own conscience. But I guess the idea here was that pictures of little kids and wheat fields and good old American sweetness was a more logical reason. It was also a way for Microtron to get a spark of life. |
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I had an idea to introduce Microtron later. As Biotron would pretty much have to stay in a cargo bay on the ship, he makes a small robot avatar to be able to roam the ship. This was also a way to keep an eye on the rest of the crew, who he really didn't trust yet. But after awhile, Microtron, too gains sentience. He basically rebels. And then you could have had this nice dichotomy of Biotron who rebelled against his masters, tying to break the will of his own rebellious slave, Microtron. Scott: The
ports on both Microtron and Biotron were exactly the same, hinting that
the designer of both robots might be the same guy. I would've touched
on this at some point during the second arc. But their "melding" was
simply to bring them both to sentience. |
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ISO:
Whose idea was it to make Galactic Defender a chick? Was it your intention(s)
to make her and Ryan hook up in the future like Dan did?
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Scott: I think one of Steve Kurth's early designs was of a female he was calling Galactic Warrior. When I saw that I needed someone on the inside of the Pens to help Ryan get out, I thought back to this character and asked Eric to come up with a new design, calling her Galactic Defender. She looked a whole lot like the character Steve came up with, so it worked out well. She was another character who was the last of her kind because of Karza. She and Ryan were never intended to hook up. She was supposed to die. She was a means to an end. Another GD would've stepped up to take her place in the second or third arc. Eric: Y'know, I don't honestly remember. I think Scott also wanted her to have that shadowy skin. I did see a cover where she had the exact same helmet I designed for her. And I never sent this to Devils Due. I guess it was obvious where I was going with her suit, but it was still cool to see another artist I didn't talk to about it, pick up on it and run in the same direction. |
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ISO: Did you have the whole Acroyear/Monk/armor draining his life force idea from the beginning? How did you like the reveal of Acroyear's face by vol.2 #3? Is this the kind of thing you had in mind? Eric: I didn't. I pitched a very sweet idea for Acroyear's origin. I'm not going to spill it right now, as I have adapted it for an even better comic idea that I hope to get out in the next year. It's called ARC. It's science fiction with some religious elements tossed in, but at it's core it's really just a fast-paced, violent revenge fantasy. It's more Payback than Star Wars. When I get the story together, I'll let you know what the Acroyear version was, if you'd like. People can check my website or updates on this project. It should be very cool. I didn't see the reveal in volume #2. But I'll give you one hint for my origin for Acroyear: my reveal for Acroyear's face would have been AFTER his head was lopped off in battle. (at this point, Eric gives the "OK" to reveal this info) Scott: Acroyear was supposed to be dead inside the armor. It was this weird plot device Eric came up with and I expanded on. His helmet was supposed to get cracked at the end of the second arc, exposing the dead body inside. He was a corpse, inhabiting this mystical armor created by his people. It's a little complicated to explain in short. I honestly don't know what Dan did with it, so I can't really comment. |
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ISO: You guys had the Earth invasion storyline planned initially, how would your story line have gone? Scott: I'll send you that plot summary soon. You can link your readers to it, so they can see what I had planned. Not sure how close it is to what Dan actually did, so it'll be interesting to see what people have to say. Eric: Not sure where Scott wanted to go. I wanted to make a few aborted attempts for Ryan to return to Earth, with the Micronauts ending up bite-sized, just like the Marvel comic. And then instead of Karza invading Earth, I thought it would've been cool to go the opposite direction. With the Earth violently invading Karza's throneworld. Most likely after a large war had already devastated the empire. Maybe the Micronauts had already defeated Karza and taken over, so that they were the ones who have to repel the humans. |
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ISO: Time to clean up some "lost" plot ideas and "lost" concepts: what was the deal with the baby Biotron rescued and put into his chest in vol.1 #5? Eric: Ah, so they did do this! Baby Time Traveler, my good man. I think the baby was my idea, and making it TT was Scott's. Scott: This is addressed in my second arc summary, but the nutshell of it is that it was Ryan Archer's twin, his growth artificially halted as a means to trap the Time Traveler. It was reasoned that the baby's innocence would serve as a cage the TT couldn't escape from, while Karza worked on Ryan trying to figure out how to access the TT's power, which Ryan's abilities were in tune with. We were going to reveal at some point that Dallas Archer was a refugee of some kind from Karza's dimension, and that the two boys were the spawn of Dallas and an Earth woman. ISO: Which characters did you want to use but didn't get the chance before leaving the book? Scott: Force Commander. I had too much going on as it was in my first and second arc, so we wouldn't have seen him until the third. Just so ya know, he'd have been Dallas Archer, whose body we never saw at the end of Issue 1. Eric: Force Commander. A powerful tool created by a large militaristic church as sort of an Anti-Karza. ISO: What other characters from the toy line did you have in mind to bring into the later stories? Eric: All of them. We would've gotten to them all. |
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Scott: I had a way to work in Karrio, if you can believe that. He was supposed to be in the first arc, but I was unable to make everything I wanted to do work right. Otherwise, Steve and I had planned on bringing in a lot of the characters I think showed up in his and Dan's run. Like Red Falcon and the other Barons. Wasn't sure what I was going to do with them, but Steve had tons of ideas. |
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ISO: Were there any other story plots discussed or written before/during your runs on the book? Scott: Tons. The very first storyline I'd come up with, before I got the gig as writer, was to have the Micros wake up in some weird landscape and have to fight their way to freedom. We'd have discovered eventually that they were actually inside Karza's body (hence the Micro in their name), and that everything they fought against were internal mechanisms and antibodies. Then I found out about some kind of failed Micros revival (was it a cartoon?) that involved something called Karza's Kancers and Kolds or some such, and I abandoned the idea. Everyone seemed to like the idea, but I just didn't want to chance anyone thinking I was ripping off someone else's ideas. Turns out that happened anyway. People thought my first couple issues resembled Farscape, which is funny considering I've yet to see an episode of the show to this day. |
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 "Rocket Tubes" concept art by Eric Wolfe Hanson |
Eric:
There was nothing when we started. In fact
I was told early on to start designing character, ships, and cities, with
NOTHING to base them on. No story, no springboard, no characters except
for the 2 or 3 I knew would be in the book. That sucked. I myself came
up with about 10 useable story concepts for the series. Some were very
far removed from this concept. But I was able to shoehorn some of my ideas
in, sometimes by way of my own sheer belligerence. I really would've loved
to have been able to develop and write this book. As much as a pain in
the ass as this whole thing was, if someone came to me and said "hey,
we're tossing out the Devils Due continuity, would like to start over
and write this comic, I'd do it in a split second." Hell, I'd even write
it within the DD continuity.
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ISO: Anything you would like to say as a final word on your guys work on the book? How do you feel about it being supposedly cancelled? Eric: We tried to make a good book. Sorry it sucked and for any tarnishing it make have caused the Micronauts. It's a property with a lot of potential. Hopefully, this book will be forgotten and the concept will get another chance down the road. Maybe they'll make a movie and it'll rock. And maybe Devils Due can spin a new comic from that. Maybe I'm too hard on the poor thing, but that's just how I feel about the book. Maybe it's somewhat colored from the behind the scenes stuff. I dunno. But aside from Dan, Pat and everyone else losing income, it's probably a blessing it's cancelled right now. Allows for a fresh start later. And I'm sure DD isn't sad to not have that albatross hanging around it's neck. And hopefully everyone involved learned some things. I know I did. Scott: I don't really have a final word. I guess I said all I care to above. Being cancelled is probably a merciful end. The stigma of being "another 80s property" coupled with the fact that we just didn't do a very good job of re-launching it in the first place probably killed much interest in the property. Maybe if some time passes and people can forget about what a mess the DD re-launch was, someone can come back to it later with a fresh outlook and make it viable. I'd love another crack at it, personally, but that's mostly because I know what I did wrong the first time around. Kinda too late to fix it now. |
 Princess Persephone concept art by Eric Wolfe Hanson |
ISO: Anything you would like to plug? Websites, upcoming work, anything for sale, etc? Scott: Two websites. My personal one at www.wherlegig.com and a site I edit and write for called www.randomville.com, which covers independent entertainment in a way that doesn't talk down to its audience. That's about it. I've got irons in the fire, but artistic setbacks are drawing (no pun intended) them out much longer than they need to be. Soon. Soon. Eric: Go to EricWolfeHanson.com and ArtofWolfe.blogspot.com. I've still got some Micronauts pages for sale, that I have priced very cheap (I just had back surgery, so I'm trying to sell off some stuff to help with expenses). And keep and eye out for ARC! I think Micronauts fans might like it. Hope to have it going in 2005! Also: anyone I pissed off here is free to contact me and bitch me out if they so please - ericwolfehanson@aol.com Inner Space Online would like to send out many thanks to Scott Wherle and Eric Wolfe Hanson for taking the time out for this interview, to fill in fans and to generally set the record straight. Here's hoping that the powers-that-be learn from these insights. |
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Scott Wherle before writing Micronauts (above) and after Micronauts (right) |
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 Eric Wolfe Hanson consumes his work |
click here to go back to part 1 or
part 2
Dave Waugh 10/22/04
