A video done by Haloflooder, a member of IZFAS.
It’s a compilation of the work as narrated by Agent Dark Booty (voiced by Swiblet) as he explains how Invader Zim can be brought back.
Recently published, and an amazing video to boot!
Don’t forget to re-blog!
Haloflooder’s youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/haloflooder
(Be sure to re-blog to spread the word of the group :D)
A scene and preview of the episode Nubs of Doom, written by Jhonen Vasquez and Eric Trueheart, yes, the same person we interviewed a while ago. You can check the interview at our previous post.
This scene was done by TallestSarah, one of our awesome animators, and the backgrounds were done by InvaderNat and Cosmographia.
We asked Eric Trueheart, known as one of the main writers for Invader Zim, to do a quick interview with us in hopes to understand better the show we have adopted. According to our interviewer, ArtistFormerlyKnownAsG4P (G4P for short), Trueheart responded without haste. Friendly and all, he gave us some laughs at his charm and witty writing in what will be known in IZFAS-story as the Trueheart heart-to-heart interview (not really, I just made that up).
And now, without further ado, I present the interview with writer, Eric Trueheart. Starting ArtistFormerlyKnownAsG4P as the interviewer, and Eric Trueheart as the kidnapped *ahem* volunteered writer:
Q: What was it like to work with Jhonen?
A: Strange. He would come in every day wearing an astronaut suit and a rubber hat. He would call everyone “Skeezix,” for no reason, probably because he didn’t believe in names. He kept a pet condor named “Squidgy” in his office, and he would refuse to meet with anyone until they beat Squidgy in a staring contest. (Fortunately condors have only one eye, so he was at a natural disadvantage.) Every day at 11:30, he had to stab someone in the leg with a pair of felt chopsticks. You can imagine how hard that was. He ate live babies, shot meson beams from his eyes, and could crush a refrigerator with his forehead. But on the whole, he was a lot of fun.
Q: What made you come to write for the show?
It was a complete accident. I was right out of film school and was lucky enough to have landed an agent. I’d written a South Park spec with a lot of pork jokes — I think Cartman started a church worshipping pork chops or something — and they sent it to the Invader ZIM offices. My manager at the time hated it, but Jhonen loved the pork jokes, so I got the meeting. I pitched what became “Bad, Bad Rubber Piggy,” and they hired me on a test basis. Then, when my initial contract was up, I threw staplers at the head of the studio from behind a wastebasket until they agreed to keep me long term.
Q: In general, how long did it take you to write a 15 minute or 30 minute episode?
A: Honestly, I don’t remember. We would first pitch them as half-page premises. If the execs liked ‘em, we’d flesh it out to a 4-5 outline. Then we’d write the first draft of the script. I think for an 11-minute — that’s how much show is actually in there among the commercials — we had about a week to write the first draft. Then there’d be revision notes from the network, etc. You usually had a few scripts in the pipeline at once, so there was a lot of overlap. Then it had to be translated into a language only giant robots can understand. Nobody ever knew why. We were all too afraid to ask.
Q: Which character did have fun writing for most?
A: Pissy the Angry Astronaut Clown, but he was cut from every episode.
Honestly, I don’t know if any one character was the “most” fun. It was fun making them all work with each other. GIR wasn’t nearly as much fun if he wasn’t driving ZIM crazy.
I will say, though, I don’t think Dib gets enough credit. I liked it when we took Dib off on his own for no good reason. “Chickenfoot” is one of my all-time favorite episodes.
Q: What new things have you been working on?
A: Setting policemen on fire. Also, breaking into hour-long drama, where they pay you like a grown-up. And I’ve had a couple pilots for animated shows here and there.
(But if you want to watch a comedy short I directed not too long ago, there’s this:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9BArVEb3oI )
Q: What is the thing that you wrote that you feel was your best?
A: I wrote a twenty-five volume epic poem about a man with his knees possessed by the Gods of the underworld. One knee wants freedom, but the other knee relishes being enslaved for eternity. I think it’s got graphic novel potential.
Still, I couldn’t tell you what was my “best.” It’s hard to look at my own wordsy suff that way. I’ll always have a soft spot for “Rubber Piggy,” ‘cuz it was my first script. And I really enjoyed the ones I wrote with other people. “Megadoomer,” “Dib’s Wonderful Life of Doom,” “Tak: The Hideous New Girl,” those are all up there.
I also think the “Pants!” episode would have been one of my all-time favorites if the network hadn’t killed it. Same with “Squishy: Hugger of Worlds,” which I was writing with Rikki Simons the day we were cancelled.
Q: Have you heard of IZFAS? And if so, what do you think of it?
A: Are you the guys cloning glow-in-the-dark sheep? Because that’s really cool.
Actually, you’re the good people animating all the lost episodes, right? Let me just say, you have taken on a Herculean task of Insane Magnitude. “Invader ZIM” damn near killed dozens of animation professionals working 60-80 hour weeks, both here and in Korea. If you have the sheer force of will to pull it off, you will be gods among stuff. (So don’t get too discouraged if it takes you a while.)
Q: Last question: if there was one thing you could change about something you have ever written, what would it have been?
A: I would have written every script in sparkly letters of gold! Then I’d have buried all the stories by the light of the full moon, and told no one where they were hidden, save for a map tattooed on the inside of my eyelids. They’ll never find me gold! NEVER!!
Actually, I have a big regret about “Dibship.” We had no idea the ship in Dib form was going to look so hilarious until we got the animation back. I mean, we’d seen the storyboards, but we didn’t predict how well it was going to turn out. Once I saw it, I wished I had written the final chase with the ship in Dib form. We needed more Dibship, dammit!! It would have been awesometastical.
(Oh, and I think the “Voting” episode could have been more interesting. I feel like it’s pretty on-the-nose as it is. Maybe it needed some giant robot pigs shooting burritos from their nostrils. On fire, or something. I dunno.)
G4P: Thanks for your time, great to see you give us some input, we are big fans, and keep on doing what you’re doing.
E. Trueheart: Thanks! You keep doing what you’re doing! Unless it’s slowly eating you from the inside-out. In that case, stop.
———-
Once again, we thank Eric Trueheart for taking his time to answer our questions. Personally speaking, I would love to know more about the concept for Squishy since we’ve been recently working on the concept for the planet-hugging monster. However, we could always simply ask another day, am I right?
…Guys?
All right, well, that’s all the questions we have for now, and we’ll be sure to get more interviews as time rolls on. You can count on that one for sure.
Special thanks to G4P for asking for the interview in the first place. The awesome member/admin has his own review website which can be viewed here: http://enoughwiththesingingalready.tk/
As for Eric Trueman, he has his own place to call Net-Home along with a biography and resumé in his website: http://www.erictrueheart.com/
Thanks again for reading, and have an excellent night, folks!
~Cosmographia
IZFAS admin
Another of the promo videos. This one was created by our Tak’s voice actress, InvaderToto.
Visit InvaderToto’s site at: http://www.invadertoto.deviantart.com
One of our many promo videos that were released in a series back in July. We hope these promotional videos can help promote the website and recruit the much-needed help.
This video was done by Cosmographia. Visit her page at: http://www.Cosmographia.deviantart.com
This is the ever-famous (if not infamous) IZFAS short from 2006. This was done by the first group as a pilot, and we are now back in action!
IZFAS was “killed” due to the main site being put on a cheap server that died eventually. The site died and everyone scattered. Now, this group is being revived and it’s slowly pulling everyone back, and we plan to continue where the original IZFAS left off, starting full-length episodes.
