Another Chris Ryall interview

KingMob · Post by **KingMob** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 3:15 am

I'm afraid it's over here as I did it myself.
First interview and I just asked things I genuinely wanted to know after browsing through IDW's site and a few articles about their past material on CBR, so apols if not very good.

Post by **Denyer** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:10 am

Interview reads well, once I'd scrolled down and my retinas stopped going into spasms from the yellow...

What I picked out as particularly interesting:

we’re gonna pack an awful lot into each issue. [...] I’m just not one for the whole idea of “decompression.” That word should maybe be switched with “meandering” in a lot of books that say they’re doing decompressed storylines.

We’ve talked to Guido Guidi and James Raiz, among others, both of whom are doing some work for us now. With more to come.

Transformers have been on Earth a lot longer than any human character in the books have been alive, so it seems to me that someone or other would’ve discovered them along the way. Tough to keep anything that size hidden forever… so I’m sure that certain people in various countries’ governments know of them, and have their own plans. They might even be working with them… and also working to discredit the average person who reports a sighting. But I’m sure there are Web sites and conspiracy sites out there that talk about these sightings… which is a small tease for something we’re going to drop on everyone between now and when the 0 issue launches.

Hmm... 'real' conspiracy spoof site? The interactive approach has certainly worked well for the recent BBC Doctor Who series...

Shanti418 · Post by **Shanti418** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:45 am

I thought it was a great interview, King.

I feel as though we've got a pretty solid idea of what the angle is going to be in this new series, as far as the whole "conspiracy/robots in disguise" thing. The only thing that remains to be seen is how the execution is. But I do think we have definite reasons to be optimistic.

As long as they don't listen to the people who post responses like this:

I just hope they bring McDonough & Patyck back into the Transformers. They have a lot more characterization in their stories than Furman.

Post by **Best First** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 9:11 am

Great interview SEIBERTRON.com, er, i mean King Mob.

Hee Hee.

Nah, good work mate.

I find teh notion TFs have been around for quite a while curious... although i'm not sure ho wmad i am on this whole conspiracy lark - despite what Chris is saying it sounds like an excuse for decompressed plotting. I hope any revelations come thick and fast.

PS - what the **** is up with that yellow?

Post by **spiderfrommars** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 9:43 am

Cool interview KM. You got there before us and I commend you!

I'm getting the impression that the alt. modes won't be based on real vehicles?

I see after every Ryall interview we're still getting "Bring back Mick!!!!!" posts.

I quite like that new site design actually.

Stormwolf · Post by **Stormwolf** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 9:43 am

I just hope they bring McDonough & Patyck back into the Transformers. They have a lot more characterization in their stories than Furman.

Brendocon · Post by **Brendocon** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 9:47 am

Methinks somebody is confusing the terms "characterisation" and "characters".

Metal Vendetta · Post by **Metal Vendetta** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 11:36 am

Nice interview, KM!

The conspiracy angle, we haven't seen that since the days of III and RAAT, could be a nice intro to the series. Glad to hear that decompression has gone the way of Mick and Patyk too.

Post by **Best First** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 12:02 pm

"Dear IDW

I write on behalf of fans of decompressed plotting. Many of us transfans really enjoyed decompressed plotting and think it shold be given a chance to finish what it started (in, say ten years time) at Dreamwave. Please find below a link to a petition signed by over 400 of my fellow transfans backing this call.

Yours sincerely,

Jeff Random."

Impactor returns 2.0 · Post by **Impactor returns 2.0** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 2:45 pm

I love the way that web site slows down my twin 64 bit xeon cpu computer...

Predabot · Post by **Predabot** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:08 pm

Cool interview KingMob. I just saw this at Seibertron and went back here to see if you had posted it.

I must say, the alt-modes thing is of course still bugging my purist heart, and what does he mean with:

SEIBERTRON.com: And are there any issues with car companies not keen on their images
being used?

Chris: We’ll avoid that altogether, I think.

Does he mean that he thinks, without the shadow of a doubt, that he wont have any issues with the car companies whatsoever, or is it that he simply doesn't want to answer that question??

As for the conspiracy-thing, meh. It's been done before, as has been pointed out, with Tripple-I and RAAT, no need to do it again. IF it means that we'll get to see Megs squish a ridiculous amount of fleshlings, I'm all for it tho.

I suppose that the fact they don't have a house-style at all is cool, some diversity is always nice. Just don't put an artist not suited for drawing robots and tech on a TF-book tho.

Impactor returns 2.0 wrote:I love the way that web site slows down my twin 64 bit xeon cpu computer...

Dude, how is that possible? It runs rather smooth on my 2.5 ghz 32bit processor, acctually, even better than the old design. There's no slow-down now. And when moving between the news-topics it's lightning-fast! A clear improvement to me. No doubt the fact that you have double 64bit processors, is this sort of problem with scripts ussual on systems like that?

I, like Spidey, rather like the new design myself too, it could use some tweaking, with the small news-menu on the main-page having a diff bground as the current one with blocks is confusing when you have such small white text on it. And the Bumble-bee pretender could be slightly shrunk as it covers one or two letters of the text at places. I suspect that they will change the theme every week, this weeks got Bumblebee, next will be Prowl perhaps, and sport more blue etc.

Overall it's a quite stunning re-design, in a positive way.

Señior's Covenant · Post by **Señior's Covenant** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:11 pm

Personally I think it was him basically saying, "Let's not go there.". I'm sure there's issues, and considering how far into the creation process they are such issues would be evident. Bumble Bee is a constant issue these days, not a major one, just a constant.

Great interview Mob!

Osku · Post by **Osku** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:26 pm

Well done interview.

Post by **Denyer** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:29 pm

Predabot wrote:Does he mean that he thinks, without the shadow of a doubt, that he wont have any issues with the car companies whatsoever, or is it that he simply doesn't want to answer that question??

They're never going to transform.

Señior's Covenant · Post by **Señior's Covenant** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:34 pm

Reverse Action-Masters.

Impactor returns 2.0 · Post by **Impactor returns 2.0** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 4:59 pm

Señior's Covenant wrote:Reverse Action-Masters.

Is it just me then - but the image on the right hand side of the screen slows the page scrolling down untill its off screen.

hmm oh well. I never go there.

Hound · Post by **Hound** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 5:51 pm

Predabot wrote: I must say, the alt-modes thing is of course still bugging my purist heart, a

The thing is, in the grand scheme of things, the amount of time spent by Transformers in alt mode in the comic has always been minimal. So is it really much of an issue now? You will probably only see the Autobots in car mode for example, when they travel from place A to place B.

Shanti418 · Post by **Shanti418** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 5:56 pm

Maybe I'm missing something on this whole companies thing:

I understand in the movie you gotta make Bumblebee a Mini Cooper or something because VW doesn't want to be involved.

I understand in the toys you can't make an Alt VW Bumblebee because VW doesn't want to be involved.

But is it really copyright infringement to draw an unmarked car resembling a VW for Bumblebee in the comics? It seems like that's what they did in the Marvel days. I don't see what's stopping them from making Bumblebee a new VW Bug, or Prowl into an Impala police cruiser, irregardless of what any car company thinks, as long as they don't use the logo anywhere. Am I missing something, or have copyright infringement and intellectual property cases really gained THAT much strength in 20 years?

Post by **Denyer** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 7:20 pm

Certainly hasn't stopped reprints... or movies featuring cars...

Hasbro only care because of toy tie-ins.

Autobloke · Post by **Autobloke** » Mon Jun 13, 2005 9:14 pm

Shanti418 wrote:I feel as though we've got a pretty solid idea of what the angle is going to be in this new series, as far as the whole "conspiracy/robots in disguise" thing.

Great, MORE humans to take the story away from TFs.

I hope it isn't going to be a big part of the storylines. If I want dodgy conspiracies then I'll watch the X-Files. But only if you hold me down.

KingMob · Post by **KingMob** » Tue Jun 14, 2005 12:59 am

Cheers for the kind words!

Interview reads well, once I'd scrolled down and my retinas stopped going into spasms from the yellow..

what the **** is up with that yellow?

I've been hearing that all day. Apparently it's the actual colour of yellow on the old boxes, but I imagine it'll be toned down; several people have had to go to surgery after viewing it. I have my monitor set dark, I only turn the brightness up when playing games or checking graphics I've made for someone, so it didn't kill the hell out of my eyes quite so much. But apols if viewing it is unpleasant.

I love the way that web site slows down my twin 64 bit xeon cpu computer...

That's odd. Apparently most users are reporting significant speed-up, not slowdown. A few folks had slowdown, but once they cleared their cache they reported faster browsing than under the old scheme also. You can turn off the image and change the size of the content window, but if you don't go there anyway then who cares.

I was curious about the car licensing because it's turned out to be an issue with new toys. So I was curious if it would be an issue with new comics, and who better to ask? Esp as Hasbro are apparently 'fully behind' IDW's decision to update the property.
I knew reissue toys and reprint comics weren't a hassle, but was genuinely uncertain how car companies who object to toys being made featuring their branding and product would feel about a 'realistic' comic set in 'the real world'. It's an interesting issue for me; on one hand apparently Samuel L. Jackson and Eminem don't seem to mind appearing in Mark Millar comics, but other people aren't so charitable and ahve slapped Marvel around about it in the past. And when you have photorealist artists like Bradstreet possibly involved on covers, it was just something I was interested in; the thing with the King of Spain and Magneto was also fresh in my mind.

Glad the comments are largely positive, thanks again!

Predabot · Post by **Predabot** » Tue Jun 14, 2005 3:25 pm

Hound wrote:The thing is, in the grand scheme of things, the amount of time spent by Transformers in alt mode in the comic has always been minimal. So is it really much of an issue now? You will probably only see the Autobots in car mode for example, when they travel from place A to place B.

I have been thinking, and in theory you might be correct, as I did enjoy the other takes on new alt-modes.

But those were all diff-time-line alt. universe stories, with the ongoing sporting the classic modes. And it sure will feel odd with the ongoing, "official continuity" (yeah right..) not containing forms that aren't toys.

Yes, I think this is at the heart of it. And of course my rampant nostalgia. There's just something special about the classics.

Señior's Covenant · Post by **Señior's Covenant** » Tue Jun 14, 2005 3:30 pm

Predabot wrote:There's just something special about the classics.

And that's what's making this more and more easy for me. It can't stay the same, nothing anywhere stays the same. Everything tends to change sooner or later. I'm becoming more content with settling on the days of Marvel being just that; THE classic continuity and one I live by in my TF assumptions for the mostpart. It's 2005, I don't mind an update for the new official continuity. If it's better than the expensive fan-fiction Dreamwave was ****ting out ever-so-often, I'll be a happy old fart.

Autobloke · Post by **Autobloke** » Tue Jun 14, 2005 9:48 pm

KingMob wrote:I knew reissue toys and reprint comics weren't a hassle

Didn't the reissue of Hotrod have to be renamed 'Hot Rodimus' or 'Rodimus Major' or some other nonsense though? I have this reissue, so I know it was changed - just can't find it out to check the new name.

KingMob · Post by **KingMob** » Tue Jun 14, 2005 10:23 pm

Autobloke wrote:
KingMob wrote:I knew reissue toys and reprint comics weren't a hassle
Didn't the reissue of Hotrod have to be renamed 'Hot Rodimus' or 'Rodimus Major' or some other nonsense though? I have this reissue, so I know it was changed - just can't find it out to check the new name.

Yes.
AFAIK Hot Rod is known as 'Hot Rodimus' in Japan and Takara reissues label him as such. Hasbro was forced to use 'Rodimus Major' for their reissue due to losing the rights to 'Hot Rod'.
I am iffy on this, but I think they might have the rights to that name back now; I may have just totally made that up, however. I seem to recall them getting back a bunch of names and Hot Rod might have been one of them. I think they got Jazz back as well, so no more Autobot Jazz.
But that's a name question nor a car question and is more Hasbro's side of things and wasn't what I was actually interested in.

The question I was wondering about was whether car manufacturers had issues with their distinctive likenesses and trademarks being used in the new comic if the characters are updated into modern models of their car makes.
Imagine Bradstreet doing one of the old UK covers, one of the ones from Man of Iron, with a Porsche Cayman being chased by a F-22 or something. That would rule.
Unless Jazz couldn't be shown to be a Cayman and had to be a generi-sub Porsche shape. Or had to be a Mazda.
We already knew there was no problem with using the names.

Autobloke · Post by **Autobloke** » Tue Jun 14, 2005 10:28 pm

That's good - 'Autobot Hound' really bugged me. Not that I ever called him that anyway.
I suppose car likenesses will all come down to money or willingness to participate. Is VW still against Bumblebee being a - well - VW?

Post by **spiderfrommars** » Tue Jun 14, 2005 10:40 pm

Murphy mentioned something about the Herbie movie getting there first. In which case, VW really dropped the ball on that one.

Back on the names thing for a second, I think its vaguely ridiculous that only one company can have the rights to names like 'Hot Rod' 'Jazz' etc. I mean, they're pretty bloody common words. Stuff like 'Jhiaxus' 'Unicron' or 'Hordak' (did Furman nick the idea from Death's Head from him? - I digress) I'd understand.

Shanti418 · Post by **Shanti418** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 12:47 am

Yep, it's all Herbie's fault. Damn Herbie.

It's probably Herbie's fault Lindsey Lohan's gone blonde and aneorexic, too.

Where's a bucket of Scraplets when you need it?

Scraplet · Post by **Scraplet** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 12:13 pm

Shanti418 wrote: Where's a bucket of Scraplets when you need it?

You called. Do I qualify as a bucket?

Brendocon · Post by **Brendocon** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 12:24 pm

KingMob wrote:AFAIK Hot Rod is known as 'Hot Rodimus' in Japan and Takara reissues label him as such. Hasbro was forced to use 'Rodimus Major' for their reissue due to losing the rights to 'Hot Rod'.
I am iffy on this, but I think they might have the rights to that name back now; I may have just totally made that up, however. I seem to recall them getting back a bunch of names and Hot Rod might have been one of them. I think they got Jazz back as well, so no more Autobot Jazz.
But that's a name question nor a car question and is more Hasbro's side of things and wasn't what I was actually interested in.

Use of character names in published fiction is a completely different issue to the use of trademarked names for the manufacture and distribution of toys.

To rephrase: The fact that Hasbro can't call a toy "Hot Rod" doesn't mean that IDW can't publish a comic with a character called "Hot Rod" in it.

Hasbro didn't need to trademark the names GB Blackrock, Circuit Breaker, Richard Branson or Donny Finkelberg any more than they needed to Skyfire or Orion Pax. It's a "copyright-of-intellectual-property" matter, rather than a "name used to identify trade item" matter.