B-Mask

October Update (3 videos done, more soon!!!)

3 video essays DONE!!!

And thus, the promise is fulfilled. The writing streak I was on the last few months has lead to a whopping three video essays this October, all themed in some way around the evil holiday spirit, two of them overhauls of scripts I wanted to release some time ago. In the gaps left between bigger projects, I really wanted to push myself and see if I could achieve more for a change, being less precious about my work while attempting to maintain standards, and these three helped me really feel out that balance. I'm extremely pleased with how the month shook out as a result and delighted that my long planned Scream essay now forever has an Oct 31st stamped as its published date. Get in.

And yet the work continues! I can't promise to be putting out quite as many video essays in November, but as mentioned last month I've been working on enough that there'll be a steady flow of them coming through, giving me enough room to also ramp up to work on the bigger projects without it feeling like I've vanished. The ones heading your way include-

• Another short video game piece, on something I've talked about before. As mentioned this was already recorded, though I may make a change based on another game from the same company came out not long ago which I also played and completed, though I wouldn't have thought that it would be a drastic rewrite. You may be able to figure it out from this info but no spoilers for now.

• A slightly longer video I've written on a show that came out this year and was cancelled just a month after. It's incredibly niche, I don't expect anyone else to have seen it or for the video to do very well, but the script came together fast and I just wanna talk about it. Definitely one I want out this month. Will not be taxing to make at all, will dash off a recording sometime this week.

• The comic-book adjacent one I talked about. This one I initially planned to record and complete for Halloween- but one look at the clock as I was halfway through the script made me realise I would never release it in time for the deadline, and made me dash for the Scream draft I'd already been working on. Luckily this video isn't actually Halloween specific, it just kinda also fits there, so I'll be able to record that and start putting it together not long from now. It's another example of something I really should just make public as content instead of sitting on it waiting for a good moment or angle.

• I'm also making an attempt to try to re-release the Nightmare before Christmas video. Last year I worked to get it out before the deadline and failed, and uploaded it here as an exclusive instead. I actually ended up going to a Tim Burton Exhibition in January and got some notes from my sister on a few things mentioned that I want to work back into the video here or there. Shouldn't take too long to fix, and the aim is to upload it in November to pre-empt more copyright bots that the first one already cleared, and then make it public in December. Means there'll be a video that month and I can ease off on racing to releases as I enjoy the Christmas break.

Otherwise, my attention turns largely back to Thunderbolts.

The rewards for that first episode are on the way- as promised the commentary for the first episode has been edited and I'm in the process of uploading it, so you'll be seeing that on here as my next post. Next will be the Timeline Tour, and last but not least I'm going to attempt a Reading List video (Part one.) I know, it's a lot, and it's taken longer than planned so you keep seeing me repeat it here, but these are always on the cards as I work through everything else.

As mentioned, the actual production of the next episode is starting well, too. I got even better news about the availability of my animator buddies next year, and should have a few hands on deck as heavy production begins on episode 2. Really close to kicking it off, and again, learning from these other projects not to be too precious and to just cut loose and get it done. Ain't getting any younger.

This is the same mentality that's having me charge through the last few big projects I keep promising as well, one fairly public, two less so. Not to bring things too down, but I do think the loss I experienced earlier this year has sharpened my focus on the time at my disposal and the reality of what 'acceptable' at this stage of my career really means. I can't control the numbers or reaction but I think I'm at a level now where I can churn them out without hurting myself or my standards, and given how much I've already written and been sitting on it's really time to stop hiding them from the world and just get them out there even as I balance other plans. Sounds like a lot written out, but I am pacing myself just enough.

Still can't figure out Sly 4 but hey, one set of videos at a time, right?

Once again, a huge thanks to all of you sticking by and continuing to support my work. Tthis will soon start to get funnelled back to the creatives who'll help me bring the next leg of The REAL Thunderbolts story to life- and you won't believe where we're headed next.

Til then!

-B

Scream's Subversive Legacy

And that's another video in the bag!

I'll lift the curtain on this one a little- I announced I'd been writing a lot and had another, longer, video planned for this month. This is actually not that video. That one is still happening, but actually turned out too long to really do in the time I had planned, so, in a mad dash of inspiration rewatching Scream, I instead returned to an old draft I had on the franchise and spruced it up to get this. It's probably the most I've scrambled and changed things around as I've made it, even affected by the insanely coincidental timing of the trailer for the next movie dropping like a day before I was done- which all feels fitting given how the films were made!

Either way, I hope you guys enjoy it! I've really been pushing myself to finish old ideas and be less precious in just getting my thoughts out there, with plans to take this across into my continuing work on my bigger projects in the next few months. So far, so good, and hopefully more on the way real soon.

Til then!

-B

Crow Country Had to be Retro

See, I told you I'd been productive!!

It's another short video, this time covering a game I played and loved last year, Crow Country, and detailing how it leverages its existence as a Retro title to say something big about the future. I had most of this script done last year, but it was written very close to the end of Halloween and , as work on everything else piled up, I decided to come back to it later. When I gave that script glance recently I was still very happy with how it looked and managed to get it on its feet with a few tweaks, and I'm thrilled to have it done well within All Hallows month.

(This was a quick re-upload btw- originally in the former cut I listed Hi Fi Rush as an indie game in the opening which it absolutely was not, and I didn't remember that until a comment pointed it out. Slightly irked as I had quite a few people check this one before it went out and they didn't catch that, but here we are.)

Hope you guys are enjoying these little videos either way- even with plenty of plans for more I can't promise another this month, but there's absolutely more on the way in the very near future. Stay tuned!

-B

A Truly Bananas Final Boss

Tadaa! The first of the short video's I've been working on, a quick look at Donkey Kong Bananza, and its incredible final boss, an hour-long setpiece I just had to gush about.

As you can see this one's pretty quick and dirty, deliberately so- not long after the Thunderbolts Video was done I buried my head in some video games to try and re-focus myself and Bananza proved to be the perfect way to get my creative juices going. I took my very raw feelings after playing it and drummed up a video trying to process those while talking about what I think it means to the series as a whole, and it kickstarted me writing again and seeing how fast I could take a script from the page to the edit bay. Maybe I could have spent more time fleshing it out and clarifying some of the analysis, but I wanted to keep it loose and have some fun, and you can thank this one for kicking me back into being as productive as I've been the last few months.

Anyway, hope you guys enjoy this one, and I'll be back again real soon with another short video game related video. As you can see, this one is villain-based to kickstart the Halloween vibes this month, and we have something spookier still to discuss...

-B

August-September Update (Next video((s!))

Heya Gang!

So the last two months ended up being really, really productive.

I didn't properly update in August for a couple of reasons- the main one being that I was deciding on the order to release my behind the scenes content for the first episode of The Thunderbolts Story, and didn't really want to say anything until that was sorted, and while most of it is, two things are not.

Some of that has been published now- The first was the write up, which you've seen, and then the Q&A video, which is out, but what I really wanted done was the Timeline Tour and the Commentary. Both are recorded and the Commentary is edited, but as mentioned the Tour is a bit trickier to make and I want to cross reference both again- at this point I'm debating getting the commentary out first just to have it crossed off my list and to give the Tour better focus. Bloopers are done but need visuals, And of course, work on Episode 2 rumbles on, as I continue to edit audio and block out the sequences. Quite a bit still to figure out, as you can tell.

However, in that time, I've also been writing like a demon. Last time I talked about finishing drafts I'd already written, for videos both long and short, and with fresh eyes I felt like I could see the fixes they needed and started final drafts. Four of those were completed, three of those were recorded, and I was so in the flow of things I even managed to come up with a whole new video, so that's five projects ready to be fed through the pipeline. I also looked at a couple of long-ongoing things and started shaping those out too, so we're in a really good place to keep things going.

The three recorded videos are all short ones about video games, the timeline above being the first of those. As you can see it's really close to complete, it just needs some tweaks that will round it out and then I should be ready to drop it in the next week or so. The next one is Halloween related so I really want to prioritise that for this month, and the third I'm going to hold off on until later and switch focus to the new video I wrote, which will also work really well for the month, though it's not the end of the world if we miss that (Even the next video is, somehow, slightly Halloween related). None of these are difficult to make at all, most of the work having gone into the writing and audio, so hopefully the next two will come together as quickly as the first.

Following the math so far? If it seems kinda rammed it's because I was trying to follow my impulse to write while it was strong, and then push myself to get them recorded as soon as I felt they were good, trust myself a little more. After months of working on a single video it's been really freeing helping me flex my creative muscles a bit, and it's amazing how much the normal video-making process seems so much easier after a monster like the last one, like going down in weights or something, and all of it will feed back into improving the next TBS Episode.

This does suggest to me that Episode 2 will probably not be out this year, but I do think we'll have quite a lot of it underway by the end of 2025. I've of course been bouncing back and forth to that script as well and am pretty happy with it, so, when I've put out these other videos and can afford to slow down a little, I'll be trying to get that recorded very soon as well. I've had some offers of help on the animation alongside my existing artists so I have a good game plan for production, which should also help speed things up immensely.

After some very rough months, the last two have been extremely promising, so hopefully you'll enjoy the stuff I've cooked up. I stress again that these are an extremely varied set of subjects, and I'm not expecting any of them to do huge numbers, but the new one I came up with is comic book adjacent in a way that doesn't betray the other mediums I discuss, so I'm quite pleased that's finally come together. Nothing groundbreaking, just me talking about something I really like (for the second time) in a more traditional, Youtuber format, because why not.

Thank you all for your continued patience and support, and I'll see you real soon for the next video!!

-B

Behind The Real Thunderbolts Story- Episode 1

  With the first episode complete, it’s time to let you guys know how this project came to be, starting with this write up detailing my experience making The Thunderbolts Story, a video series where I go through the history of the comic to a certain point and discuss not only what made it special, but also what is says about the era of comics it was created in. 

 However, with this being the first part, I think it’s important to use the write up to let you in not just on how the episode was made, but how the series itself began. We’re going to go all the way back to 2020, when the Fantastic Four video had wrapped, I had yet to undergo radical eye surgery, and a sneaky pandemic was about to change everything.

What a time. 

----------------------------

The Start

 ‘There was an idea.’

 After completing the Fantastic Four video, I knew I would want to do another comic book related one. It was getting a good reception, I’d enjoyed what I’d learnt putting it together, and I really wanted to try something like that again. However, I didn’t really want to be a comic book Youtuber. People wanted me to do Spidey and X Men and I loved all those guys, but I didn’t really want to commit to 100 more of those knowing other people would probably scoop them up in the time I spent trying to make them, and I had so many other projects I wanted to do that would be quicker (comparatively speaking, anyway.) But, as some of you might remember, I did let slip once or twice that there was another comic I felt I could do something interesting with. 

 Thunderbolts was very high on my list, I felt like I already had some good angles on it, and as far as I could tell literally nobody on Youtube really cared enough to do the full throated version of its history. I wasn’t sure how serious I was about trying it yet, as I was looking at starting up some other stuff in my real life and considering just how serious I was getting with this whole Youtube thing given the FF video hadn’t exactly taken off. It seemed like a bit of a crossroads- was the FF kind of my last big thing, or was I going to continue down this path and try another?

 And then a crazy thing happened- a global Pandemic. 

 Suddenly, I had all this time on my hands. You can certainly go back and track my Youtube career really ramping up around that time- many more video essays released and doing whatever I could to stay afloat and busy as the UK ground to a complete halt. I had a lot of projects and drafts of other essays on the go to keep myself occupied while all of that was going on in the background, and really, that was where I found the time to get serious with another big Marvel project. I took a look at the comics I already owned, reaffirmed just how much that story stood out to me from the other choices, and made a vow to go all in on the best possible video I could imagine for that team’s journey.

And so it began. 

 The Choice

 Thunderbolts is one of Marvel’s most unique books. The hook of Bad Guys pretending to be Good Guys is an incredible premise, a red hot idea that they’d hinted at before or done very light takes on, but had never taken all the way, and it ended up creating a book that remained fascinating for years. Spider-Man was always my first Marvel comic love, and the X-Men, Fantastic Four, Avengers and more all held extremely special places, but Thunderbolts felt like it was made purely for me- getting into the interpersonal relationships of the people who’s main gimmick was fighting superheroes, and showing the effects of Marvel continuity on their lives. A book about villains. Hell yeah. 

 There was so much I wanted to talk about, but unlike the FF, I realised this would have be very different. For one, the Thunderbolts were not as easy to pitch because it came with baggage. The FF I could be really loose with and sell in a broader way, but so much of the Thunderbolts appeal was the fact they existed and had lives before their own story, as well as it being a very specific set of events within a linear narrative you couldn’t just jump into at any point. I found their adventures often covered multiple eras of Marvel that would have to be more directly discussed, and I had always felt they represented things about those eras that was also going to be worth discussing. They also, at the time I came up with the idea, had never been properly adapted. There was a very quick attempt in one of the Avengers cartoons in the 2010’s, but it wasn’t particularly well explored, and I felt like nobody was ever going to adapt this the way I’d always seen it in my head.

 That lead to some key decisions early on- that it would be a multi part series, that it would cover more than just  the Thunderbolts own comics, and that, crucially, it would be a narrative as much as an analysis. 

 The Plan

 The first thing I did was outline everything I already knew. All the runs I’d already read, the characters I wanted to follow, and the tie ins I needed to line up. I took out a new set of shelves and gathered all the material I already owned to read through, and began to go through in order. I made notes of important scenes and details and filed them away for later. When I came up against gaps in the collection, or references to events I didn’t know, I’d make a note and circle back to those later, and if I liked what I read or thought it was relevant, I would commit to a full physical purchase of those issues. This lead to a lot of explorations into researching the character’s other appearances, from their debut onwards, and literally any events that had an effect on the story outside of the main comic. I knew fairly early on where I wanted to end the entire series, so I went all the way up to that moment and a bit beyond, and eventually, I’d worked out a pretty clear roadmap.

 The difficulty at that point would be choosing how to divide the episodes. Sometimes there were really clear stories like the very first arc, but sometimes the later runs felt more loose in how they were shaped, the eras not equally defined, and I knew some episodes were going to end up longer or shorter than others with the weight of how many comics would be included. In the end my decision came down to wherever I felt the thematic arc of that episode reached a natural conclusion, one that would play well in a video regardless of how much material came before it. Overall the Thunderbolts is and always has been about the concept of redemption, but I wanted to build to that with other themes under its umbrella, and worked long and hard to organise the episodes until they felt like they had the right stories contained within their respective themes. Once that was done did the writing truly begin. 

 It was an extremely intense process. I basically started drafting the essays straight away- I let my fingers just go and tell me what I wanted to say most and get things down on the page, knowing in my mind where certain cutaway sequences might appear. I didn’t edit myself much and tried to just barrel through the story as I saw it, believing I’d be able to reshape it the way I wanted once I had all the clear beats of the story down. Doing so began to suggest sequences I’d want to do more with than just voice overs- it became really obvious that this was a story that had to be told in a very specific way to emphasise certain moments. No way I could just do this with comic panels alone.

 There was one more thing that began to leap out at me- the role of Bob Reynolds, the Sentry. As a kid, I’d never really understood this character, he seemed totally random (what is this confusing all powerful deus ex-machina guy doing in my Avengers books?) but he was so pervasive when researching the timeline that I made it my mission to sit down and read everything he’d ever been in. In doing so, I actually ended up loving the character- and saw, quite clearly, that he existed in parallel to the Thunderbolts story. He debuted really not long after they did, born from a lot of the same sentiments going around comics at the time, and through a member of the British Invasion group reshaping comics, Paul Jenkins. Sentry’s conflict was extremely similar to the Thunderbolts, in ways I had already considered, but most of all, he and his story was about the superhero archetype, the raw appeal of great good against great evil, underscored by a narrative on how difficult it was to maintain that in a new era of moral ambiguity. 

 In a series that was going to be about the very concept of heroes and villains, and the conflict between choosing those roles, Sentry became a really clear way for me to talk about that through every episode, setting a tone that would compliment the main story. What really sold me was reading a comic set before his debut- The Age of the Sentry- which told an idealised version of his history within the Marvel universe through Reed Richards, recounting an unreliable narrative to his son. It just seemed totally perfect, a way to hand over the baton of storytelling from the FF video, and seemed to tell me that I was on the right track. 

 Clearly there were a lot of moving parts here, but that gave me the confidence that this wouldn’t just be a boring recap. With so many comics chosen outside of the main story as well as a bunch of thematics across the eras that tied together, the selection of those scenes would in itself be an analysis, the videos a patchwork creation that, when fully stitched together, would express an idea that couldn’t otherwise just been seen in the source alone. I knew this was going to be a lot of work, but I felt compelled to complete it, and spent the next couple years between everything else just getting that done. It took a lot of drafts, thanks to constantly checking myself and looking at anything I’d missed (there always seemed to be something) but eventually, I did complete everything, or at least assemble a lot of drafts I was happy enough to keep as my foundation. 

 Didn’t mean for it to take quite that long, but that’s how it worked out. 

The Cast

 With all the scenes chosen, it was time to cast the roles. 

 My feeling was that not only should the entire series be drafted to completion, it should be recorded to completion too. I wanted the cast not to feel tied to an incomplete series that either wasn’t done or worse, might be abandoned under the pressure of writing it as it happened. Recording them all at once meant I’d have consistency, getting everyone while they were available, not having to remind themselves of how to deliver the performances chosen, and that everything would be ready to go after each episode was complete. Plus, most of the money I’d saved at that point for the project could cover it so that everybody was paid a fair amount, and I didn’t know when I’d come into that kind of cash again. Sure, there would be additional scenes and retakes that might come up later, but I had the whole series fresh in my mind at that point and wanted to complete the performances while I was still in that space mentally. 

 Now, I had a host of actors already on call from the FF video that I wanted to work with again, but I also wanted to seek out some fresh talent for the voices I was still deciding on, as well as see what was happening in the VA sphere while I’d been busy on other things. I had very specific vocals in mind for certain characters I wanted to hunt down in the wild- and, well, that’s pretty much what happened, without the guns I guess. 

 I did an extensive dig through all the social media apps, looking for demo reels and going by three main things- quality recordings, impressive range, and killer acting skills. Most useful were anytime I saw a commercial reel- if you can sell something with your regular voice, you can probably sell just about anything else. I collected names for hundreds of people and sorted them into potential roles that I then had to sift through. I did also go to some effort to ensure characters of any particular heritage were as closely cast as possible, while also not locking those actors into only roles of that heritage. While the main cast was going to have a lot of material, I felt that the actors in smaller parts could take up a variety of roles, so that in the end everyone had more or less the same amount of stuff to do. In the end, I chose 40 or so people, with some backups in case anyone turned me down, and them emailed to confirm everyone’s place in the series and the rates they were okay to work by. 

My key cast in this episode were incredibly important to get right, given they'd define everything from this point, and I think we picked the right group-

• John Whinfield as Helmut Zemo (Baron Zemo/Citizen V) . His reel came to me on a simple retweet and I found his energy infectious. I needed someone who could catch the nobility and bitterness of the character, and John caught that in spades.

• Abigail Turner as Karla Sofen (Moonstone/Meteorite) . She'd been a terrific Sue Storm and I wanted to push her to the complete opposite end of the spectrum, knowing she'd have the chops to cover such a deeply complex, nasty character.

• Jalen Askins as Paul Norbert Ebersol (The Fixer/Techno). His reel displayed great range and I felt he could bring forward Paul's arrogance in a way that was as charming as it was obnoxious, and he rode that line on every take.

• Kailynn Haskell-Harbert as Abner Jenkins (The Beetle/Mach 1). Kailynn had the voice I was looking for- someone who could believably sound like a washed up crook and a potential hero in the making.

• Peter J Kanis as Erik Josten (Goliath/Atlas.) Another FF alumni who had killed it as Doom, and who I wanted to put in a contrasting role with a voice closer to his own, to again show the subtleties he was capable of with another conflicted character.

• Ghia Burns as Melissa Joan-Gold (Screaming mimi/Songbird.) She had this incredible voice that went from 0-100 which is exactly the edge I wanted for Melissa, who played both victim and perpetrator throughout her life.

• Crystal Lee as Hallie Takahama (Jolt), who had an incredible reel and enthusiasm that sold every line Hallie delivered, which was important in making such a suddenly introduced character so likeable from the start.

• Marlon Dance-Hooi as Bob Reynolds (The Sentry) another actor with incredible range who caught every facet I wanted for Bob, able to hit literally every version he'd project through the story so uniquely and yet all of the same mind.

(I will of course talk about the supporting players in more detail elsewhere as well- many of whom have larger roles in later episodes!)

 The thing about the Thunderbolts, from beginning to end, is that it’s about a set of characters who play more than one role. You’re not casting an actor just to play one character, you’re casting them to convey different versions of that same person in different roles and identities under the pen of dozens of different writers, and you have to somehow make them sound believably consistent and all part of the same person. So that became a huge consideration in casting the roles, listening to the range of each actors reel and determining if they could play all those different colours without feeling like the character themselves would be unable to do that. I also wanted to make sure there was vocal chemistry between everyone. As important as it was to get the right sound for each member of the main team, they also needed to sound distinct within a group and compliment each other in some way. It’s hard to truly describe but it’s like an instinctual thing, not wanting people to ever feel like I was mistaking one character's tone for another. 

 Overall I’m extremely proud of the casting, and the actual recording process was incredible- because this time, we did it live.

 There were a couple occasions I had remote recordings as before, where the actors do it in their own time due to busy schedules and whatnot, and then send it all to me way later, but this time I worked up the courage to try and organise live sessions. I love live theatre, always have done, but I’d never directed strangers before, let alone for voice sessions, and I was extremely nervous about how this would go down. I needn’t have worried- every actor was extremely friendly and accommodating, and willing to do whatever it took to do the job to my specifications. I’d explain a scene, give a little context, and then we’d either do a couple takes of a line in isolation or a full read through with me acting out the other parts so they had something to work with. It just made things so much easier, them hearing immediate feedback on what they were doing, getting the tenor of me as a person on the other end and generally being able to play with the material. 

 I had an absolute blast, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. 

 It was an incredibly long, multi-month process however, running all the way from early 2024 into the beginning of 2025. The priority of course was recording all of the first episode, amongst the 40 or so actors chosen, and as soon as that was done, I started putting it all in the timeline, getting the rhythm of the audio as planned and then going through with SFX and initial visual blocking with the comic panels. I had a library of SFX on hand already, but I was still going through and looking for assets as I concentrated on each scene, really taking the time to find sounds that matched the moment or didn’t feel exactly the same as something I’d already used for similar motions and background tones. It’s always an interesting process as you gauge the look of the space in the blocking and what sounds might be happening there, double checking that you correctly directed the actors to match the action of the images in your notes and the space they were speaking in, all those little details that suddenly matter when faced with the actual panels. 

 With all of that done- the sequences recorded, blocked and timed with SFX, I was like, great, let’s start editing.

The Edit

 The very first episode was by far the easiest to structure in the writing process. It’s the most obvious arc- The Thunderbolts pretending to be heroes, realising they kinda like it, and suddenly forced to see if they can do the job for real. I knew exactly where I wanted to start and end, and I had a lot of the key beats figured out, like Zemo’s past, showing the team being assembled, the execution of the plan and talking about why it worked, and then why it stopped working. So much of it was emotionally really clear in my mind.

 But I wasn’t sure how I was going to actually present it.

 Here’s the dirty secret- I assumed I’d do what I did on the FF video again. I thought it was going to be still pictures with some editing tricks, accompanied by a couple of things I’d arrange to have artists recreate. However, it came to a certain point where I realised I just wouldn’t be able to afford to do that. Having paid for all the voice work already, 40+ people over nearly a 100 sessions, I didn’t have as many funds left over to complete the art as I wanted, nor did I necessarily know everyone who’d be able to help. Plus, I didn’t know exactly how I was going to visualise the stuff in-between where it was just me narrating or presenting ideas like how it was made, analysing the choices or just filling in some narrative details. 

 And the problem was I wanted it to look better than the FF video. While I am proud of it and how it was received, the truth is it was absolutely overcompensating in the edit for the fact that I couldn’t really move the panels or make them look dynamic. I thought everything had to be blown up big and moving a lot to keep people’s interest as well as using as many panels from the comic as humanly possible to show just how much I’d read and that anyone worried things were missing could see it was all acknowledged. Instead it made the video feel a bit feverish, very frantically cut and edited with very little stuff just taking its time to settle, hiding speech bubbles and panels as if that would somehow break the immersion. I knew this had to be different, and that it had to respect the medium of the comic more.

 It all came to a head when I was blocking out the sequences. As I put that together, I was getting very frustrated that I couldn’t portray all the nuances of the acting with the still pictures. These guys were giving incredible performances, and truth is they sometimes did extra things that were so good, but were so impossible to convey with those panels alone. I was editing one performance from Crystal Lee, who was playing the scene were Jolt realises the Thunderbolts might not be able to help her after all- and it was so moving, so conflicted, and I couldn’t get it to play based on the images alone. I threw up my hands in the air and said ‘screw it- we animate.’

 That was how I forced myself to figure out a way to animate the scenes, and I had a vague idea how it could be done. 

 I had the luxury in some ways of growing up in the 90s and early 2000’s because it steeped me in all of this weird stuff people were trying, often making limited motion go a really long way. You know I'm a fan of the Sly Cooper series and what they were doing with their 2d Cutscenes, which extends to Sucker Punch's work on the Infamous cutscenes as well, and I was thinking of stuff like the weird live action Titanic point and click game, and paper stop motion cut out content in general. There was a basis for me to try all of this- I’ve always been an animation fan and have a degree in the subject with some work experience, but realised my strength was more in talking about it than doing it, so I never pursued it as a career and instead put the skills of the course to monetary use in other ways- but I knew I could pull out that knowledge in a situation like this, and I figured it’d be feasible, certainly with the technology and skills at my disposal in the 2020’s, to make a limited motion comic. 

 I knew I could go into Photoshop and cut all the pieces out for the characters, and the try to draw in the backgrounds behind them. Of course, I do not consider myself a great artist, let alone a great photoshop user, so this was all very new and daunting to me, but I figured I could cheat a lot and just learn on the job to get better at it as I went. I also knew I needed to draw in new features, like blinks, mouth shapes, hands and all sorts that would have to change or be added based on the context of the performance. That already seemed like maybe I’d set the bar too high. There were sequences where I had to create entire new drawings for it they turned around. Some had intense action or energy blasts. One scene was entirely in the rain! And I had to remove it! In every panel! On every character! Agggghhhh!

 But again, things got easier as I learned on the job. I also realised it was okay, on occasion, to cheat. Some backgrounds were just block colours, some you could obscure or use multiple times or flip to make it seem like the shot was different. I’d use assets from other pages and panels as and when needed, so long as they looked like the same model as the character in the shot. I had to tell myself it was okay if the page itself didn’t have all the material I wanted- I could find it elsewhere in the book if I looked hard enough, and that did prove to be the case (hell, this is pretty much how a lot of puppet-animated shows are put together with multi-use assets and whatnot.) I also used, as planned, a lot of free online presets that you could download and overlay however you wanted which equally helped out. The more I adapted to this mindset, the easier it became to solve severe visual storytelling problems. 

 In the end the motion comic stuff took around 3-5 months of work, solidly sitting in front of Premiere and Photoshop every day, time I feel I could now considerably cut down with the knowledge applied and with the possibility of getting others in to help achieve what it was doing. It was gruelling, but it got me over the finish line. 

 The visuals for the narration was where I wanted to try and figure out the balance between honouring the comic, matching the feel of what was being discussed, and finding a consistent voice that would be carried across the entire series. Anything I decided to do would be the template going forward, so I had to tread carefully and find a visual language I was comfortable with, and really it was something I felt out as I went. For the objective, factual stuff around comics themselves, I went for a really pared back, stereotypical video essay style. Set background texture, lots of panel and page cut outs, nothing terribly strenuous. Then bits of the in-universe narration would start to get more immersive- backgrounds of generic shapes representing wherever the scene was set, and letting unedited panels be shown at their proper aspect ratio within borders, again, trying to find a way to keep it simple.  And then I’d play it up a bit when it got more dramatic, telling the story of the Zemo’s or the assembling of the team, letting that get you into the heads of those characters and sometimes match the energy of music behind it. 

 It was easy to do once I got the rhythm of it all down, but it did take a long while to settle on, and I think it was worth taking that extra time. There were still, however, the final flourishes I wanted to add, and had been working on alongside this process. 

The Art

 The big thing I knew I wanted to do with this since the start, however, was that I wanted some original art. 

 As much as I love the original comic, the truth is there were things I feel about it that didn’t entirely exist on the page the way I saw them in my head. I’m a big fan of visual juxtaposition and allegory, and while I could explain all the subtext of the series to death, I wanted people to really emotionally respond to it by physically seeing that stuff on the screen. I also really wanted to do something that felt like it had a lot of different textures- again, the 90’s and 2000’s were great for this and it seemed to fit the pop culture scam the Bolts were pulling off, different flavours of American propaganda and commercialism that allowed them to get away with it all. 

 I was extremely lucky because of my degree to have some very close friends in the animation industry, and who were willing to help get this started. Rufus and Bonnie leapt at the chance to work together on what we called Saturday Morning stills of the characters, ones I could use throughout the video both to illustrate the point of what the team wanted to be seen as and to serve as visual aids for other points made concerning their design. It already elevated the feel of the video and became my calling card to get other artists on board, and I’m completely indebted to them. 

 I’d also made some fans along the way who just wanted to be a part of the project. Some had messaged me years ago and I think they thought I was brushing them off by saying ‘I’ll talk to you later’, not realising I’d legit come back and hire them because I liked their work so much. Grambo (Tyler) was top of my list given how off beat and aggressive his style was, Copy I still had on call from the FF video, and of course Aron was my first choice for the Dexters Lab inspired animation. I’d also met a guy called Cable Comics (Cabtaxi) on Discord who had a style that was, honestly, pretty much everything I wished mine was, so of course set him to work on the hands down best villain stills for the big reveal. 

 I had a good team of talented people helping whatever happened- but it became pretty apparent that I still needed coverage that I could pay for with what was left of the proceeds. I put out one more call on twitter very late in the process and was floored by the responses. A whole gaggle of artists came out of the woodwork and I signed up a few while keeping an eye on the rest for the future. Tenshi and MBT were invaluable in fleshing out some sequences I had in mind and just knocked it out of the park with their contrasting styles. MBT (Graham) had this fascinating next-level take on storyboarding, really thinking out the texture and nuances that would bring forward John’s performance as Zemo. Tenshi is like a demon, he would draw up stuff and have it finished in like a day after getting assigned and ALWAYS able to hit the target when it came to switching up styles, I couldn’t possibly thank him more. 

 A few of you might have noticed some of the art is for sequences that aren’t actually in the comic. The rally, for example, never happens, at least not that way. It was an idea I had in mind that was extremely specific to capture a particular emotional beat, and it’s also part of something I want people to consider going forward. I’ve called this the ‘real’ Thunderbolts story, inspired by, of all things, the ‘Real’ Ghostbusters cartoon, which wasn’t ‘real’, was it? It played itself that way to act like the film was the fake story and the cartoon was the actual reality. At first glance it might seem like I’m doing it to contrast with the existence of the film, which is intentional, but I think the ‘real’ of this series is an important thing we’ll be playing with as we continue, looking at the perception of the comic as it continues and how it relates to the true identities of these extremely conflicted characters- as well as my view of what’s actually being said.

 So, without saying too much more, do think on that as the series continues. 

The Music

 A quick word on the music too- this is very much what I always start with.

I try to find what emotionally matches the story and gets me going, even if I can’t necessarily use it in the video due to copyright. Some things I knew I'd be able to get away with, some I had to hope and pray, and some I'll edit to buggery until they stop triggering the system. I knew early on that I wanted The Misfits 'Universal Appeal'- not only because it fit so perfectly, but because it also called back to a video I'd already made on Jem and the Holograms. Really, every track has a couple of meanings, some more obvious than others.

Sometimes I just get really lucky- I sought out things with 'Thunder' in the name very early in searching for the right sounds, and the Thunder Force games fit the bill and kind of established the base sound I was after when it came to scoring their action. Once again, aggressive, but also heavy on electronic sounds and guitars, anything that matched the lightning bolt imagery. The 'Tan Tan Ta Ta Ta Tan' theme was just such a good heroic take and matched the era so of course I had to go with it as the Thunderbolts Motif, and you'll hear it and a few other tracks a couple times throughout.

Still, there was one song I really wanted, which I’d teased all the way since the original trailer years ago, that I actually wasn't sure I'd get. The Stranglers 'No More Heroes' is pretty on the nose, as titles go, but I wanted the aggression it came with, and to present it differently. You can see the song both as a lament and as a bunch of villains celebrating that they finally got what they wanted, which to me really sells that this is a series about Marvel villainy as a whole. Luckily a new service for content creators had been devised where, for a small fee, you can pay to use a library of existing popular songs, and while it’s not completely extensive so far, it did have almost all of The Stranglers output, which was a godsend for this project. I’ve been advocating for something like this for a long time and I’m glad it finally exists for us to use. 

 I’ve tried to be extremely careful with the tracks from this point regardless. Most of the choices I wanted I got, and I found great backups for the ones I didn’t get, and I’ve been tracking what I can and can’t use well into the later episodes as well. Sometimes I get lucky with a track that doesn’t trigger the system but sometimes I get caught unawares, and I have a lot of methods and backup techniques on standby to make that an easier process than it’s ever been before. 

 Really, I just hope Lickd uploads all the songs I want in the next month or something. 

 The Film

 I devised this series in 2020, and made some decisions I’ve stuck with since, even after many drafts. However, I was made aware that a film was in production in 2021. I assumed this would take a while to get made, longer than it would take me to make something. Then, in 2022, at D23 (which I attended), they announced the film was now going ahead fairly quickly, revealing the premise and lineup of the team. Both were very different from the original story, but now, I was in full panic mode. 

 Knowing that the Bolts were always about surprising reveals, I had a suspicion they might still do something related to the comic and scoop my effort to recreate the surprise on a public that might otherwise not know. I’d enjoyed being a focal point for the Fantastic Four in an era where nobody was either talking about them in much depth or when they had no active adaptations on screen, and I’d hoped to recreate that with the Bolts, and now I found myself in slight competition with something that might steal, forgive the pun, my Thunder. Sure, I’m just some Youtube guy, and I wasn’t expecting a million views overnight, but I still anticipated a little sense of cultural conflict there. I didn’t want to look like a lame runner up or copycat of any parallel ideas had in adapting their story- and err, that did kind of happen, in the end. 

 I had tried to speed up the process and I did get some surprise help on that front- there were some major strikes had in 2023 that delayed their production, originally meant to finish a full year sooner, and gave me way more time to improve what I was doing and focus on getting it complete. I even managed to arrange a trailer that I could put out once the recording was completed- but the writing took so, so long to complete, for every episode, between everything else happening either for what I was trying to make on top of that and in my personal life, that it just became insurmountable. The scripts weren’t done until the end of 2023, the casting and recording dipped well into early 2025, and while I had mostly all the material I needed for episode one in the middle of 2024, the actual process of animating and making the sequences just took so much time, even without major breaks, that I was feeling fairly burnt out. I pushed but I could’t make it to the deadline of the films final date- and accepted my loss and went to see the movie pretty much the day it came out. 

 Now, I will talk about the movie more elsewhere, but I can say I did like it, and I didn’t feel we were that much in conflict, didn’t make me feel like what I was doing was redundant. Still, I was shocked by just how similar the choices made were in some respects. They did a few other stylistic things I felt I was touching on in my piece- the use of commercialised propaganda for the imagery in the credits, that hit a little close to something I felt I was trying first. There’s another line right at the start of the film that eerily echoed something I’d said at the very end of the video a well. Really though, it was the use of The Sentry that shocked me the most. I really thought nobody else had made the connection I’d made, and then in like 2023 it was pretty much confirmed he was in the movie. I had a feeling the director and I had clearly made some very similar observations and sure enough, when I saw the movie, they’d speed-ran a lot of thoughts I was spending an entire series building up to. Not everything, but a lot of the fundamentals. Talk about parallel thinking. 

 (At least, if you check my trailers, you can see he was always included.)

 I did consider changing my plans, and spoke to friends about it. They all told me no. Stick to my guns, tell the story I intended to tell, don’t change for the film, and I did just that. I didn’t change any of my video as it stood before I saw the film- with one exception. Tenshi had come aboard as an artist late in the game and was able to bring a lot of sequences I wasn’t sure I could ever create to life, including the commercialism sequence. I’d already planned well in advance the images I wanted, one of which I’d drawn up for the trailer, but in asking for the final takes, I changed my plan for Atlas and asked him to create one based on the cereal box in the film. It was my one nod towards them to acknowledge that I felt we were on the same page. I do think the video probably would have done better as the hype for the movie built up, but I’m happy to accept where we are because the video did come out the way I wanted with that extra time spent. 

 I still think the series going forward has things to say beyond the comic and the movie that I don’t think anyone else has mentioned- the only hope I have is that people accept how I’m presenting Sentry with so much of his story now pretty publicly out there. I’m playing a long game with the character, and even though most of the information was always public knowledge, I felt that I was building to it in a way that a lot of people weren’t prepared for or really didn’t know, and I’m sticking to my choice of presentation. That said, I still have things in my original plan that I can’t really talk about yet that I hope will surprise people. Some things to say about him even the movie hasn’t discussed and that I don’t think fans of comics will expect. So stay tuned. 

 The Future

 The first episode finally being out is crazy to me. I’ve been sitting on this so long wondering if I could even make the version of it in my head real, how much I’d have to compromise, and in the end I got maybe 90% of exactly what I wanted to see on screen, which is an insane statistic for a project like this. It’s an ambition realised purely because it was so clear to me and to see people respond to it the way I hoped is enormous, and totally validates all the beliefs I had about the stories effectiveness for years and years. 

 And now I have to maintain that. 

 The second episode is very unlike the first. All the planning, recording and even prep for the style of the video has been completed, which was always ongoing behind episode one even before that was done, but it doesn’t mean I want to just do the same thing exactly the same way again. There’s a few tricks I still want to try and mediums I want to incorporate going forward, and maybe even commission other aspects if possible that can change the nature of the story. I always wanted it to evolve little by little visually as it went on, and I think now that I know my limits it’s easier to plan that.

 Narratively it’s also very different in tone. Episode 2 has some big moments but it’s not the clear, almighty concept that was the first episode. It’s much more about exploring who the characters have become in the wake of the incident, given they were really forced into making a choice at the end and not one they now have to completely stick with. Certain characters are still going to have to decide what they want their life to look like, and we’ll explore all of them in much greater depth than we managed with the first, as well as the question of who’s going to lead them now that Zemo’s out of the picture. We cover a lot more content due to the nature of the arc and how much can be condensed from comic jargon into simpler stories, as well as even criticisng a couple of decisions that seemed to veer away from where the series should be headed, as well as praise some of the better decisions made to keep it fresh and exciting.

I think it will also, pretty much as soon as the next episode uploads, be entirely obvious who out of the group is my clear favourite, as really, I feel this is one person’s story above them all. 

 I want to maintain a lot of secrecy the way I did before- even though the story is out there for anyone to read, and you should, I feel my focus and plans are still worth keeping under wraps to ensure some surprises in how the tale is told, which certainly happened with this episode. I can reveal a few things though. The Sentry will remain an important part of the story going ahead. Zemo isn’t done with, though I’d hesitate to call him a Thunderbolt anymore. Oh, and the mysterious conversation at the very end of the video. That character is a very, very important part of this story. Voiced by the wonderful Tom Schalk, there’s someone I’ve been wanting to talk about for years who will finally get the exploration in video essay form I think he deserves. I hope it won’t take too long before I can say his name, but I think anyone who follows what he’s saying and knows comics can probably figure it out. All you need to know is that he, much like the Thunderbolts, has seen an opportunity that wasn’t there before. 

 ‘Now you can have all the Candy you ever wanted!’

  Hopefully, if you liked episode one, you’ll be just as intrigued with the second. 

----------------------------

  As usual, I’d like to thank all your continued support in making this episode happen. Hopefully the above gives you a little more insight into how these things have come together, but do understand that you guys were a big part of why any of it was completed and why I was able to take it over the finish line. This continues to be the case as we progress into the later episodes- and you can be sure when they’re done I’ll be back with write-ups on those as well. 

 Til then!

 - B

July Update (stuff on the way!!)

Heya gang!

Apologies for the late update- has been quite a difficult month, not just decompressing from the release of the video and starting on plans for what's next here or there, but also dealing with a lot of personal events in my private life, both good and bad, that were always going to take priority. We're on the other side of all that now though, so I can really get back to everything I need to do in earnest.

So!

In terms of The Thunderbolts video, you've got a few things still to look forward to. The first is the stuff that's going to be for everyone- I did a public Q&A that I have now condensed into the most frequently asked questions, and I'll be recording responses to that and making a video from it pretty soon. I need to put together the bloopers, of which we have a few, and continue making bits of the video into short formats for other platforms in an effort to help it and my channel out. Also thinking about a recommended reading list video, which was always my intention for each part of the series, but the formatting in my mind has changed so I need to now grapple with that.

Then there's Patreon content- I am considering a writeup for this leg of the journey, and then also a Timeline Tour which in this case is going to take a little extra work than my other TT videos, just thanks to the nature of how this one was made, and there will be a commentary where I get to go into other details on the video as they occur. Not sure the order this will all happen, but it will be dealt with soon.

Then I have to get into making episode 2- no, wait, that's already happening! Those who have been following these blog posts for a while know that I've already recorded the vast majority of the material for the cutaways and I'm happy to say that episode 2's dialogue is all in the timeline. I've begun blocking out the action with the panels from the comics (and other stuff) and will start looking into timing it all out and getting the appropriate sound effects in there. There's still some things to figure out- while it was drafted many times, I'm tweaking the script again based on how the first video came out, thinking about actually adding one or two very short scenes and debating if a few lines need retakes in the context of being animated.

I have absolutely no idea how long the episode is going to take, but I don't want it to take anywhere near as long as the first did. It put a strain on my life as much as on the people waiting for it, and I've learned so much making the first one, and want to use that as a template going forward with maybe some friends helping out on that basis. I also however don't want to put a date out there and jinx it- so just keep your eyes peeled for news here as we continue.

And believe it or not, there are other videos still in the pipeline.

This is obviously good for my long time followers who like more than just my comics stuff, but the truth is the Thunderbolts video was not a runaway success and more of a very slow burn, for a variety of reasons, which means while it has done pretty well, I actually haven't made quite enough from it to both justify spending as much if not more cash on the visuals as the first ep yet, even if just to make it go faster while I survive in my real life too- soooo, I need to release other videos to help with that. Previous videos like Frasier, Rayman and Inspector Gadget of all things did so well that they did end up helping fund the TB vid alongside you guys, and I have a bunch of drafts I'm getting ready to turn into vids that, after the work on the Bolts, shouldn't be anywhere near as strenuous. Plus, half the reason I do other topics is that it really helps me wipe the slate clean and re-focus between projects, so I don't feel like I'm stuck on the same thing over and over again.

Once again, as usual, I have to thank you all for the support to keep these projects ticking over. I cannot stress how much having Patreon contributions made a difference in the production of this series so far in a way that would never have been possible on my own, and I'm glad to see people wanting to continue that support going forward. The reaction to the first episode from every commenter was just immense and I promise you we've barely even scratched the surface of this story and what it means to me- I just need to get to making the rest of it.

Time to get back to work- til then, friends.

-B

The REAL Thunderbolts Story | E01: Justice, Like Lightning

And lo, 'tis done.

Guys, thank you so, so much for your support and patience over the incredibly long time it's taken me to create this. Every month I found myself deeply grateful there were so many people who were willing to back this project and see it happen, and while I always worried about whether I would live up to expectations, I never stopped appreciating that others wanted to see it finished, too. I cannot express how invaluable every penny spent has been to making this, and future episodes, a reality- and I hope I can get a move onto the next episode after taking a short break.

I'll be back with behind the scenes updates, commentaries and even other videos around this one, but until then, once again- thank you all for getting me here.

And for letting me finally be able to say that Baron Zemo is Captain America's best villain.

-B

May Update (The last TBS note)

Hi Gang!

A final update on the Thunderbolts Stories first episode- I'll keep this brief.

I have three pieces of art that I'm waiting on- which are all over halfway complete and should be with me extremely soon (their edits are prepped already with placeholders). There are some tiny bumps I'm ironing out- premiere is running slower with the full file and tweaks take slightly longer than I'd like. I will also need to upload a test version to see if Youtube flags the music at any point- I've tried to not only work around this, as usual, but also to use a program that allows me to purchase rights for the video. If this doesn't clear then I'll have to figure this out and re-edit the credits.

Other than that, it's done, and pretty close to my original intentions.

Very excited for you to finally see what i've been cooking, and I thank you all once again for your continued patience as I attempt to get this made public. I owe a lot of behind the scenes content once this is done, too.

We'll see what you guys make of it when it's finally out!!

-B

April Update (The Final TB Edit progress)

Hey gang!

I know, I know, I haven’t quite made the deadline, but man, did I try.

What you’re looking at here is almost a full video, about 85% done- but we’re still missing some key elements that are not only leaving it feel unfinished, but sloppily thrown together in places. This next month is about polish more than anything else- we’re really close to my original vision for this whole thing, which is great, so I hope in the end it’ll be for the best. Your main takeaway from this is that the next time I update here will be to say when it's out. No exceptions.

There’s a few reasons as to why this has happened- part of it is how long it took to create the individual sequences leading up to this month. (I haven't revealed exactly why that is yet, but I hope when you see you'll go oh, THAT'S why this took so long.) Beyond that it was really quick to assemble most of the visuals for the narration, but I realised I needed to rewrite a few parts, which changed some of the choices, and my audio hasn’t quite been where I want it to be, and has been a real pain to try and figure out (recorded this whole thing at least three times now). A big decision has been deciding how to display some of the panels and art in ways different to the Fantastic Four project- a major criticism I’d see was how quick and kinetic those panels were displayed, many extreme zoom ins to hide comic book speech bubbles for immersions sake, and I’m trying something different here where we respect the form of comics a little more, while making it easier to read what’s on the screen quickly, inventing the style as we go. It’s important for me to settle on that because it’ll inform the visual language going forward on the rest of the episodes, even as it evolves, and hopefully having that system resolved will make editing future instalments a little quicker.

There’s another thing that happened- I got mad fatigue. I’d been taking a lot of caffeine to get myself through this every day and that, plus not really going out as much to compensate for the deadline, took its toll on my sleeping pattern. Would wake up way too early with boundless energy and then just crash a few hours in and be completely useless, even if I took a nap. I’m working to ease that off and I’ll probably have a little health break the month following this release as previously mentioned, not so much mental but physical. Even with those extra working hours I don’t know if this would be finished, but they definitely took some time out of the last two weeks or so. I really have to apologise, my body just did not want to keep up with me on this one.

The last component was that I did, in fact, take a peek at what was going on with the movie. In the end they had an early screening (in London, of all places) and I paid attention to what people were saying, trying to seek out a few reliable spoilers to some of the key things I thought they might be doing. Then, literally today, a friend of mine saw the movie and I asked them some simple yes or no questions on things I wanted to know without completely spoiling the movie, just to see how they lined up with my plans.

We are definitely of the same mind on one element- which even now is so shockingly coincidental, and I am worried about. I feel like nobody is going to believe me that we came to the same conclusion on this and that I’m copying their work, but again, we’ll discuss all of that later. Otherwise, it sounds like the first episode isn’t undone by their choices in any way. Part of me is baffled by that, but another is relieved. My original worry was, if they got the jump on me with the sources premise, it’d kill the way I was telling it in the video and what I had to say- but it sounds instead like we’re running very different approaches to the original concept, and that makes me feel less like a lame runner up. Either way I’m booked to see it on Friday, and putting my interest in the comic aside I’m quite excited for what sounds like a good time for the MCU. Feel like they’ve needed something like this for a while.

Anyway, sorry to leave you all waiting a little longer and for the excuses- I’ll be honest, I had no idea I could even do this the way I’m doing it and now that after being a weird dream of sorts in my head it actually exists, but I just wanna get it across the finish line. Whatever happens it will be done within this month. Too many things I need to get onto, and we’ve all waited long enough. Thank you all again for the continued support to help me get this to where it needs to be, I think, or at least hope, you’ll like how this one turned out.

Til then ;)

-B

March Update (Thunderbolts Final Edit)

Hey gang!!!

 Let’s start with the big news- Episode one of the Thunderbolts Story is in the edit bay.

 What does this really mean? Well-

•  All the planned excerpt scenes are in there.

• All my narration audio has been recorded and edited.

•  Both have been spaced and edited together.

 Now, there are still things that are subject to change. I’m keeping track of minor tweaks I want to make to the scenes, as well as bits of the recording I might want to redo, but this has been the same with all my other projects. All that matters is I have a full timeline to start filling in, mostly concerning the visuals to go over the rest of the narration- which, as you can see, is already taking place, and quite quickly too.

 It’s that usual thing of me going over all my collected material and deciding what visuals work best where, and how I might want to display them, and for now all I’m doing is just getting all of that filled in and planned before I do a second pass and then work into them with pans, zooms, overlays, even more photoshop edits. A lot of it is just still images, so this gives me a lot of flexibility and freedom in how long I want anything to stretch on for, which I don’t always get with video clips, so the first step of getting those visuals blocked out is proving reasonably relaxed so far.

 Altogether, it’s come out to about 2:10:00, but I reckon as the final edit takes shape we’ll probably be more like 2:30:00, maybe slightly more. My narration came to about 54 minutes, so that means a lot of the runtime that I have to physically edit has already been taken care of. All in all, that’s a very healthy shape for this to be in!

 Now, does this mean I’m definitely going to beat the movie’s deadline?

 I… don’t know.

 I’ve been working pretty solidly for three months now and I do feel kind of exhausted. It’s been a long time to crunch on a project that I’d already been trying to get into production for the last couple years, and I’m definitely going to need a little break after this, just to recover and get, you know, outside and moving more again. Definitely hoping I’ll be making enough from this to get more people involved on the next couple videos, as it’s a very daunting task to do the rest of this alone. Hopefully, with one episode done, more people will be able to better see what I’m doing and grasp how they could get involved.

 On the other hand, the rest of the video edits are a lot less arduous and I kind of just want this out there. Not having a new video on my channel in a while and having sat on this for so long are both really good motivators for me to want this out in the world as soon as possible. Plus I wanna see this movie without the baggage of changing the vision of my video with any nods to things it might be doing connected to the original comic, IF it has any. So these are all good motivators to push me through this, and not overthink too much more of the process.

 The good news is that having the video on it’s feet, I’m getting my first glimpse of how this flows and I think all my planning is actually going to pay off. There’s one aspect I’m unsure about, but I’ll let you judge if it was worth getting in there. It’s been a long road to see this exist and I have no idea if I’ll regret it or not once we finally drop, but it feels good for something that was so ambitious in my head to actually exist now as something real and tangible, and I’m extremely grateful to what I now realise is a sizeable team of people who helped make this possible, and even as we speak are bringing their best.

 Can’t promise we’re totally in the home stretch yet, but fingers crossed this month will see real progress towards the final draft. If I do hit the target, well, then I guess that’ll just be a real nice bonus.

 Soon, friends.

-B

February Update (Further Thunderbolts Progress)

 Hey Gang!

 Not a huge update this month- honestly, every day has once again been spent on creating The first Thunderbolts video, and largely on creating the voice acted sequences. 

 Last month we were at 25 complete scenes, and that number has since grown to 42. It may seem a smaller jump, but it’s actually been a heavier workload in the best way. Having completed 25 of the less complex scenes, I had more confidence doing the heavy lifting in some of the longer, more difficult sequences, and figuring out how to resolve a huge number of technical problems we’ll get into later in some behind the scenes discussions. We also have at least 3 other scenes about ready to come out of the oven, and the rest all in the edit bay, so it’s not going to take too much longer to complete the full set now. One artist has also completed their sequence, and another is assisting with the very last shot, and their stuff is shaping up really really nicely.

 That takes us to around 75 percent done in terms of those individual scenes, essentially 50 percent of the overall video. My hope is to have them all done by at least the middle of next month, and even if I don’t I’ll just crack on with the full edit and do what I can, given I have tweaks to make to certain bits and pieces as I go anyway. The video itself, with all these sequences over the finish line, shouldn’t take too long to make beyond that- for context, the Fantastic Four video, all non-video essay sequences included, took a solid 2 or so months to physically create after everything else was assembled, so I feel we’re already ahead of the game. Still, this is going to look a little different overall, so there’s a few logistics I’m just going to have to figure out when they hit me on the timeline. 

 I’ve learnt a lot during this process, and there’s a lot I can already see how to improve- I’ve been working to finish all these sequences in Premiere, but I’m thinking for the next one I might switch over to After Effects and start teaching myself how to get even more creative with it. If you’re worried that the episodes will look visually inconsistent should I make such changes, don’t be- the plan from the start was always to change and evolve the look as the series went on, with a lot of deliberately planned sequences that would get more intense as each video funded the one that would follow. There’ll be a baseline set by that first video I can always fall back on, so I shouldn’t be in danger of not being able to do more- and I think the first video should absolutely look a little rudimentary to stay in keeping with the time period, to a certain extent. 

 I also hope that will generate interest from people who’ll want to get involved- truth be told I think I’ll absolutely need help getting the next few episodes completed, purely from a time-saving angle. I know what I can do now, or what it can look like, but just me doing a scene a day alone is what’s really making it take so much longer. Having this as an example when it comes out I think will increase the odds of that happening beyond just getting more funding because, while people will and can always be paid to help, it’s a lot easier to get their enthusiasm and involvement when they can see the scope of the work and what it would take to create. 

 Either way, I’m taking this weekend off. Going to see some buds and kick back for a solid 4 days and then get right back to it. Thank you again for the ongoing support, and I’ll catch you all next time with another update!

 -B

January Update (Thunderbolts Progress)

 Hi gang!

 A lot going on at B-Towers at the moment, largely on the Thunderbolts project. This has lead to a lack of video this month, but it's all been to the benefit of getting this project completed, as you'll see in the rundown of what i've been up to below (without giving anything big away, of course!).

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 25 Scenes Completed

 I’m happy to report that after months of testing and editing, we’re finally seeing finished shots come through the pipleline. It’s taken a while to figure out how the voice acted scenes were going to be depicted as I wanted to break the constraints of the FF video without going crazy, but I’ve come up with something that is not only feasible for me to produce and look right, but that's getting faster and easier to make. There's still things I need to figure out, but as of two weeks ago I've gotten into a good rhythm for getting these done and I'll be following it as far as I can until I need extra help.

 Doing the math, I’d say this now represents about 35-40% of all the scenes devised, not including the much easier rest of the video to edit, and that’s a good place to be at. I'm working on even more as we speak!

 New Artists Employed

 Our number of employed artists adding their own flair to aspects of the project has risen from three to five. Two had been working very casually in their spare time on a few extra assets to add flavour to the video, and one was doing the same while also assisting me with small details in the actual scenes, which I am currently completing alone.

 Now with the proceeds so far we've hired an animator working on one very short segment, which has been approved and is entering final colour and cleanup, and another illustrator, who has so far produced some incredible drawings for another section of the video. I’d love to share anything from either artist properly but I can’t without giving anything away- but it’s made a big difference and I think they’re going to look great in the final product!

 I have a couple more things I need to commission this month but it’s truly great to see as much of the vision come together as possible like this.

 The Final Episode Recording

 On Saturday the 18th, we finally managed to get a bunch of the core cast together to record for the last planned video in the series. The idea was that, if the first video caught no traction and I didn't get anywhere near the funding I expected to continue growing the series the way I wanted, I could at least have the entire story recorded to tell with no bells and whistles whatsoever, so you'd always have an ending to the story. I was extremely nervous- I’ve never directed so many actors before, certainly not in this format, and had no idea how it was going to go.

 Well, it turned out amazing. Eight of the most incredible voice actors, some who’d literally never spoken to each other before, turned up and gave incredible, committed performances and brought the story to a close beautifully. This was mostly a readthrough- meaning we went through the script from top to bottom with stage direction notes included, so I didn’t pause us and direct several takes of a scene or line, and as it turns out, I didn’t really have to. These guys had been doing the parts for so long now they were able to pull off all the inflections and ideas I had in mind, as well as bouncing off each other and using each others energy perfectly. It was a blast, and I could not be prouder of this terrific cast coming together for my weird little Youtube thing.

 The entire session was recorded and you’ll be seeing this way later down the line, eventually, likely with snippets in the final video as well. But yeah, an incredible experience- would love to do this kind of thing again. 

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 And of course, again, I have you all to thank. All of this was paid for with both my Ko-fi and Patreon funds, and every extra donation means the video gets that much better. We still have a a few more things to commission- there’s one or two scenes and additional actors to wrap on in the final episode, a few retakes here or there, as well as the final pieces of art for the first episode, but I’m really hoping everything I need will be done by, at the latest, the first half of March, and then it’ll just be about the final edit and polish for a month or so after before the first episode finally debuts. Gunning for an April deadline, but anything could happen between now and then.

 I am sorry that this lead to a lack of video this month, I did have something written that I wanted to produce fast, but given that I’m racing the clock with the MCU I felt it was important to make as much of that time as possible. It’s rough because the videos in-between do help the cash flow and I do have projects outside of this I want to pursue (I tightened up a lot of drafts in the first half of this month) but right now I’m just doing as much as I can on this video to ensure we beat the deadline. More and more news comes out about the film concerning things they want to introduce to the world that I am very keen not to be (in principle) second on, if my instincts are correct. It’s like they made certain sneaky choices to scoop me, personally, speedrunning so many talking points and connections from my entire series behind what originally seemed like a largely MCU specific team! But it is what it is, and hey, maybe I'm wrong and they won't surprise us with those things at all. Luckily I have a lot of work taken care of already to see this particular version through.

 We’ll catch up again at the end of February and I’ll let you know how things have progressed. Til then!

 -B

End of 2024 Update (Project progress+promises)

 Hey Gang!

 That’s another year down. 2025 is fast approaching, which makes this a good time to look back on what I’ve done so far and everything I plan to do next. Was a fairly up and down year, worked on a lot while not hitting every target, but I think a lot of good progress was made and figured it might be a good idea to frame this around those achievements. So let’s gooooo

 7 video essays!

 This year saw me create 7 video essays, on extremely varying topics which, after the Frasier video became such a success, was a bit of a risk, but I think they came out pretty good. 

 - We Visited Eisner’s Disney

 - The Secret Meaning of Return to Monkey Island

 - Fargo’s Happiest Season

 - Inspector Gadget 2 is what we wanted

 - Rayman 3 was Madder

 - How Sound completes Saul’s Journey

 - Disney’s Dark Opera (The Music of the Nightmare Before Christmas)

  Two had been a long time coming (Monkey Island and Saul), two were ones I’d always wanted to make (Inspector Gadget 2 and Rayman 3) and two were very much building on recent experiences (Eisner’s Disney and Fargo.) The one outlier was the Nightmare Before Christmas Musical analysis, which only you lucky patrons got to see thanks to Youtube’s copyright system. As we speak there are still 24 days remaining for them to drop the disputes with no sign as to when or if that'll happen, and I have no idea if I want to really make it public in January, just seems kinda wrong.

 That said I was fairly happy with everything I made this year, and out of everything I think Inspector Gadget 2 worked for me the most. Seriously, I know it’s a weird pick but it’s one I wanted to do for ages and surprisingly came together really easily. Gave me a lot of confidence moving forward and honestly, was probably the reason you saw all the video essays that appeared after that while I spent time drafting other projects. Once I saw I could put that together and get a good reaction, I figured I needed to be even less precious about every idea and carry that energy through everything else I wanted to try, especially given I knew both Saul and Monkey Island, which were long overdue promises on my part, felt like they had more pressure behind them. Spontaneously deciding to try and complete a Nightmare video essay was a hundred percent fuelled by that confidence- right down to recording all of the PS2 game for footage on the 23rd (figured I had just enough time after finishing everything else!) I already have a couple drafts under my belt I want to finish with the same mindset, and I’m grateful to Gadget for letting me hit that sweet spot, which is not a sentence you’ll see from me again any time soon.

 You’ll have noticed two things of course- none of these videos were over an hour, and I never really cashed in on the success of my Frasier video. I did have plans to do both of those things, and I’ve talked here a few times about the drafts I’ve been putting together for bigger projects, but they have naturally taken a lot longer to complete between everything else I’ve tried to achieve, needing to keep the channel alive instead of waiting for those bigger projects to be done because, well, then I’d have nothing to put out. However, because of that work, you’ll see much longer videos in 2025. One of those was from the roadmap- you know the one I put out, like, two years ago?- and was always being thought about and worried over and worked on. This year has to be the year. I can’t put it off any longer. 

 But we know what big project I’ve been spending most of my free time on…

 I started making the Marvel Project!

 All was finally revealed- my Marvel project, a 5 part series called ‘The Real Thunderbolts Story’, at long last started production. I was able to achieve all of the following this year-

 - Complete the scripts for all 5 episodes

 - Cast, direct and record 95 percent of the audio for those episodes

 - Edit the complete audio timelines of the first and second

 - Produce the final audio mix of the first

 - Assemble 40% of the final visuals for that first episode

 That essentially accounts for a lot of what my time was spent doing this year, and there’s still quite a bit to achieve, with a final set of recording sessions in the first half of 2025 and some more art to commission with the funds I’ve received during the fundraising campaign. Marvel Studio’s announced their own Thunderbolts movie for May the 2nd of this coming year, and I think, based on the speed at which everything else has been coming together, that gives us just enough time to release before they do.

 Am I still nervous about that happening though? Absolutely. 

 I’ve had this on my mind for a very long time and as usual there are some doubts about if I can hit my deadlines on everything I’m planning to do, even with so much accomplished already. I don’t know if the movie is going to do something unexpected that changes the conversation around the Thunderbolts before I get to make this public, and I don’t know if something is going to come up in my own life that’ll derail me or make things more difficult. As you’ll see, visually, I’ve taken an extra step in putting this one together, and while it’s very feasible to complete in the time given, it has given me a lot of extra work I might need to start asking for more help on. A few extra hands would absolutely see this finished sooner.

 But the bottom line is that this is now my priority for the next four months. I’ve already been managing to work on both editing this and my other projects, and I’m hoping to keep that balance until March when every day will be about getting this finalised. Rest assured, this will be the year, and I’m truly excited for people to see this team and their story the way I always have. Once the ball gets rolling, there’ll be no going back. 

 Oh, and I spent a lot of money on the project as well, BUT-

 I didn’t go bankrupt!

 Time to pull the curtain back a little here.

 As mentioned in an earlier post, last year I had to move out of my apartment after a steep rent increase and move back to my family’s home. In some ways this was for the best, because I was able to fund a lot of the Thunderbolts project without worrying about rent, as well as produce other videos in-between. I won’t lie to you, a lot was spent, but as we round the corner to the end of that process I think people will agree it was worth it. Spending on the whole series in advance was very deliberate, to do as much of it as possible while the funds were there and then not worry about the costs rolling into the future, where later episodes quality could benefit from any extra income.

 But this isn’t totally normal. I’m a single guy in my early 30’s pursuing a crazy thing that I promised myself I’d do, and while I’m so close to achieving that goal, I’m still short of proper financial independence and a clear path forward once this is over. I’m not stopping making videos because I still have so many to make, but there are some other things I want to pursue that I think I need to explore again this year. To tell you the truth, I didn’t realise how much Covid had impacted the way I thought about going outside- when it started I buried myself in work for the channel and kept my head down to pull through it, and left London before things finally eased off. Now I’ve been back I’ve only just started to think of everything as properly open again, and that some of the things I wanted to achieve are actually possible. 

 So there’s a few other options I’ll be exploring. The videos are my rock, weirdly enough for such an unstable industry, so that gives me a boost in taking those risks. I’m keeping it vague because I don’t want to make any promises but yeah, there’s stuff going on in my life around this that I need to figure out, so do bear with me while that all happens, as I navigate it through everything I'm doing with my videos.

 And I couldn’t have achieved the ability to keep making those videos -indeed any of the stuff i've done the last few years, actually- without your support. I really don’t take for granted how generous you’ve all been to let me go on this crazy quest to make videos, as well as the gargantuan project you’ve helped me not lose my shirt on. Patreon has been a lifesaver in putting this project together and again, I am so excited to show you what you’ve helped me create. As with the Fantastic Four video, the plan is for Patrons of all tiers to feature in the credits of the TBS episodes to commemorate the milestone as well. Hopefully that first episode will live up to the promise and justify your investment. It’s a biggie.

 So, a huge thank you, to all of you, once more.

 Oh, one last thing. 

 My sister got involved in something really exciting earlier this year. It was extremely funny when she explained it to me, an absolutely incredible coincidence, and something very relevant to me and this channel. I absolutely can’t tell you what that is yet and need to keep it as vague as possible, but just know that I said this now so you have something to anticipate in the news quite a few months from now. Sitting on this has been killing me but when all is finally revealed you’ll understand, I promise. 

 Til then!

 -B

A Christmas Video Essay (Patreon Exclusive)

 Surprise!

 This year I was attempting to create and upload a video essay I've been wanting to do for a while- About the Operatic nature of The Nightmare Before Christmas. I spent 4 weeks pushing myself to make it happen before the 24th and had everything ready to go, when I got hit not just with expected copyright claims, but a full on worldwide block. I accepted cutting it this close might fail- it was a gamble after all- but given all the work I put in I wanted at least some people to see what I'd done, which the recent video upload feature on Patreon allowed me to do.

 Now that I've missed the deadline for a public release things are up in the air as to whether or not everyone will get to see this before 2025. There's some ways I think it's still rough around the edges and maybe could go back in and change now I know I've lost the original deadline (this isn't the final title!), though I am fairly happy with how it's turned out. I'll talk more about it in an update here as well as having given some details on my Youtube Community page, but rest assured I will eventually come back to this at some point to try and make it public.

 Either way, if you're reading this, I hope this feels like a worthy upload and I apologise for the strange nature of how this has shaken out, though maybe that's in keeping with the nature of the film itself. We'll speak again soon- but til then, have a wonderful Christmas Holiday!!

 -B

November Update (BCS video and Thunderbolts Progress)

 Hey Hey Hey

 While I’ve had less out than I wanted, I’m reaching the end of the year with a good productive feeling thanks to a lot of long held ideas finally getting realised. It’s been an extremely busy couple of months and there’s been a lot of good and exciting news behind the scenes, so I just want to get into all that before the overall wrap-up post at the end of this year.

                                                                  ----------------

 As you might have seen yesterday, the Better Call Saul follow up video I’d been planning was finally released, and while it’s not shot off the way my other recent content has (nostalgia for cartoon content and Longform retrospectives is way hotter right now, just as well I have some in the pipeline) personally I’ve been moved by the way people have reacted so far. I love BCS so very much and was really worried I’d made a very boring video, not quite finding the flair/rhythm I wanted to cover the sound the way I felt I managed last time and also trying to skirt my way around copyright bots, which lead to it being delayed a day as I went through multiple test uploads until it finally told me it was clear (I’ll get into that in another post at some point.)

  It was a really fraught process I didn’t have a lot of confidence in, but someone in the comments put out a new perspective when they said they liked it because they felt I worded it like a eulogy. I suddenly realised this was so much more appropriate than what I’d initially envisioned and now, having rewatched it, I’m much prouder that it conveys what I was clearly feeling in comparison to my other recent videos. I’m sorry it took so long, but maybe it needed to be this way.

                                                                  ----------------

 In the meantime I have been hard at work on The Real Thunderbolts Story’s first episode because, yes, the dialogue for that is now 100% recorded and complete. Pretty much as soon as I got it and edited all the audio into the timeline I started experimenting with the look and, friends, things have gotten a little bit extra. 

 I should really set this up first- as with the Fantastic Four video, we have a number of isolated scenes from the comics dubbed by the actors in-between the analysis where I show the respective panels, sometimes with pans and zooms or movements just to make them feel alive and, I’ll be honest with you, it was feeling really limited. The actors were bringing stuff to the performances I wasn’t able to do justice to that way and honestly, I felt like I could do better. So, I began trying some new things out, and, well, I got very, very carried away. 

 I’m not going to tell you exactly what I’ve done yet, I’d like that to be a surprise, but I think this video has now become something even better than I planned, and without seeming insurmountable. Despite being a lot of extra work stretching into the rest of the episodes, I’ve already assembled about half the scenes in three weeks or so of solid work, which means we are still well on track to have them all done long before the movie comes out. I’m not convinced everyone will love this change- if you liked the amateur charm of the old video this might bother you a bit- but I’m still trying to give the video a textured, hand crafted look to avoid that sort of typical motion comic feel, so hopefully it will pay off in the end. My only hope is, if people like it, it might inspire others to help me on future episodes, because it is all just me right now and it’d be nice to share the workload.

 The last real steps of this episode after those scenes are done will be to focus on my analysis sections which will be a lot easier to edit, as well as continue working with the artists providing their contributions as well. We also, as I’ve probably alluded to, are arranging a group recording session with the main cast for the final episode which I will be documenting as we go. I have no idea if this is going to work, but I’m quite excited to get even more of these wonderful people together to close out something I have been thinking about for probably way, way too long now. 

                                                                  ----------------

 Anyway! Thank you all once again for your continued support, which again has been instrumental in allowing this to happen. It’s been a tough year but Patreon has been invaluable in ensuring the quality of this new series can be maintained and I’m really hoping you’ll see your investment pay off in a big way when the first episode lands next year. I’ll be back at the end of December to talk about my plans and wrap up everything discussed so far, so until then, take care of yourselves and have a wonderful Christmas, or at least a really good rest, because boy, we need it.

 -B

How Sound Completes Saul's Journey

 Whew. Promises upon promises have finally lead us to the eventual follow up to my original Better Call Saul video! I'm only sorry this wasn't closer to the time it first released- just needed, between all my other planned projects, to properly unpack my feelings and give this the sendoff I felt it deserved. Really hope this lands for those who were waiting- and if you haven't seen the show yet, ouh, are you in for a treat.

 -B

October Update (Project Progress)

 Heya Gang!

 Quite a bit of work going on this month, though it hasn't resulted in a video. The timeline you're seeing here is for the Better Call Saul video- which was going really smoothly, until I lost confidence a bit with the second half, which didn't quite ring true to me when all assembled together. I didn't have a spooky video planned for Halloween to replace it this time, and I didn't really want to release it in the back end of October with all the parties and the vibe going on around then, so I'm going to work into this one a little bit more. Do bear with me, we'll definitely have this out eventually.

 I also worked extensively on another video as I thought over those issues...

 This is the extremely messy timeline for the very first episode of The Real Thunderbolts story, and I wanted to breakdown the process so far- what you're really seeing, essentially, is me assembling as much of the final audio for the individual performed scenes. I'm getting the pacing, placement and levels sorted, experimenting with pieces of music, and using very simple edits of the comic pages above to better inform what sounds and sound effects I need, as well as what I want to add to the existing art to better punctuate the phenomenal voice talent. Obviously all the major dialogue is here, that's how all these scenes can be assembled, but there's a very small amount of retakes and additional material we're getting covered just to pave over a couple of oversights here and there from the script. The bits right at the very end you're seeing, separated from the others, are to be inserted in other parts of the body of the video, but I wanted to feel the flow of the main action before really committing to where they'll go just yet.

 The plan at this point is to have all the audio timed and sorted out for these and then to export them as their own files, and then do the final visuals in a separate sequence with those tracks. Then I can insert those scenes into the final timeline and work my own narration, final music cues and edits around those, so i'm not just working with a big messy timeline that freezes up every time I want to make an edit like the FF one ended up doing. What a shock, I've finally hit on a production pipeline, it only took 4 years.

 It feels like it's on track to come out before the movie next year, and the rest of the series is in a good place too. While fighting writers block on my BCS revisions I went ahead and started laying down audio for the later episodes- with everything up to the penultimate episode now 95% recorded and everything up to the beginning of the first episode in the timeline. The final episode is about 50% there- we're still trying to organise a final reading with the core cast, but everyone's on board to make it happen. The most important thing to me, even if I can't hit every visual high I'm aiming for, is that the entire story is completely told in audio form, and that's absolutely where we're headed. Cannot wait to show you all what this talented bunch has done with this material. Truly, I'm in awe of how these performances are sounding, and I think you'll feel the same. A huge thanks, once again, to every one of you for ensuring I can keep everyone on the payroll into the home stretch.

 Alas, I didn't hit on an emergency Halloween video as usual to compensate. Honestly, I can't say I've really been feeling it this year, what with everything I've been trying to accomplish and where i'm at right now, I haven't even got a party to go to! I'm a little bummed about that as it's one of my favourite times of the year and I'm hoping to change that next time around, but I was pleased to see a little bump in views for all the Halloween stuff I made in the years prior. Feels like it was worth putting in the time way back then to ensure there was some B-content to enjoy.

 Have a fangtastic Halloween and don't open the door, keep the Musketeer Bars to yourself. Mmm.

 -B

September Update (Next projects and progress)

 Hey Gang!

  A very happy and productive month, as you've probably been able to tell!

 First of all a huge thanks to those who came to support this channel after the Thunderbolts update video was released. As discussed in the last update the final script was almost locked, and as of this month I'll be starting the final recording sessions to ensure we have a complete series in audio form, allowing me to focus on the art and editing. You guys have really come through and helped make this possible, so when the final videos are done, remember that it was you who allowed it to exist at all. Incredibly grateful to you all and excited to start getting this out there!

  The progress on the Thunderbolts series has actually freed up my ability to deliver some of my other projects. I promised last month I had been working on two videos- one was the Better Call Saul follow up, and the other was the Rayman 3 video, something i've been trying to make for a long, long while, but never quite found the time or inspiration to finish. It's funny how in the end it came together much faster for me than the BCS project- I had scripts and audio completed for both, and in the end the Rayman one just seemed to come forward a lot quicker. Sorry for the shift in schedule, it's just the nature of how these projects compete for attention, and part of me felt like I needed to change mediums after the Fargo piece. Finally, we'll be getting the BCS follow up after promising it such a long time ago now.

 I was also debating if I'd do a Backstage Blog on the Rayman video, as I'm not sure if I have that much to say outside of what was in the video itself. You'll have noticed I've left those out for projects like the Gadget video as well, but I think there's an unspoken understanding that some require more detailed work behind the scenes in their thought process than others. Really, it's the Thunderbolts videos you're going to want to see the math on, so I can promise those rewards are already being prepared. I do however have something I want to upload for the Usher+ backers, so keep an eye out for that.

 There was another reason I ended up choosing the faster video to edit- two of my extremely close friends got married this weekend. As we speak I'm currently still away from home, enjoying the company of people I haven't seen in a very long time, and was glad to have something out for folks to enjoy while that was happening. It's been an amazing weekend and a good chance to get some distance on my projects for a little bit- but rest assured i'll be back at it next week, with everything i've been working on and beyond.

 Thank you all again, and I'll have the next project for you real soon!

 -B

Why Rayman 3 was Madder

 Well hey! I know, a bit of a surprise- this was one of the drafts I hammered out a while back, actually based on another draft I was intending to release ages ago but never quite got around to finishing. Something about the recent appearance of Rayman in both the Mario/Rabbids game and the Laserhawk animation sort of re-opened the conversation in my mind, and I felt it was worth just finally getting these thoughts out there. I hope you enjoy hearing things I've been sitting on for a good few years- and I promise, there's still more where this came from!

 -B

Commentary: We are the Fantastic Four (2020)

 Hi everyone! As promised in my last update, this is a commentary I recently recorded for my 2020 Vide Essay 'We are the Fantastic Four'. This was an interesting one to record for me, where you can hear me trying to keep up with my own pace and then slowly open up and pace myself as I remember putting it together, and even get a little tearful by the end. I'm very happy that I still feel the way I do about it upon a revisit, and I hope this offers you guys more insight into my thought process and approach to the comics, as well as some extra information a few years on. Thank you once more for all your encouragement and support- I hope what comes next is something I feel just as proud of creating.

 -B

August Update (Thunderbolts Progress + other videos)

 Hey gang!

 Short update for the past month- a very quick rundown of where everything’s at right now.

 One! The script for the final episode of the Thunderbolts series, at long last, has a completed draft, which I spent quite a bit of this month intensely working with finish alongside all the advice I could get from close friends working on the project. There’s one thing in the middle about it I don’t think is working for me and it’s still subject to change, but otherwise the structure of it is done and I can soon start handing out the scripts of chosen scenes to the rest of the cast. I apologise for letting things fall behind again while I worked on it- I just didn’t want to suddenly switch focus on something else while inspiration hit me, given this has been the one thing keeping my schedule back for the last few years. 

 Two! I recorded and edited the audio for a fundraising video, which I fully intended to release way earlier this month, but had to rearrange somewhat based on projections after completing the draft. I also recorded a commentary track for the Fantastic Four video- want to give it another listen through to assess it and then will have that uploaded for the ASM backers.

 Three! I’m now sitting on the edited audio for 2 of those other video projects I’d written. They were recorded with an eye to releasing them between work last month and I just never reached them due to how intensely focused I ended up getting on that script, but now that I’m in the process of production and raising funds it’s pretty vital that I get them edited and out there. Quite determined to get the Better Call Saul video out next- though I am hoping and praying I can find potential ways around the audio copyright for any samples because yes, it’s once again about the sound. 

 Again, huge thanks for your patience- your input in essentially helping this project get voiced so far has been deeply invaluable, and I think you’re gonna love how it’s all sounding. A lot of the dialogue for the first episode has been almost completely assembled in the background, and I anticipate it only being a few more sessions until all of the series dialogue is fully completed. I’m gonna get back to all of this- and catch you guys next time!!

 -B

July Update (Marvel Project revealed + next steps)

 Hoo, so, back to business.

 First of all, I'm so thrilled for all of you to finally know the project I've been dutifully working on since 2021. The Real Thunderbolts Story is an enormous project but one I've spent a long, long time trying to organise and ensure that production runs smoothly. To have everyone know what it is I've been doing after so long is a bit surreal, but also a huge relief. Feels good to have it out there!

 Now, the trailer was always planned to come out this year, but it would have been a little later to coincide with all the voice actors roles being completed- of course, Marvel Studios timetable stepped up and I felt I had to react accordingly and get a trailer out before their own was revealed at SDCC, meaning this month was mostly spent on making sure that would happen. Lots of production assets for the first episode needed to suddenly be prioritised and completed either under budget or between other people's busy schedule in order to get it together, but we got there, and I'm very happy with the result.

 In a way this helps out the first episode's production, with most of the re-enacted scenes audio assembled in the timeline and having taken a quick detour to start tying down some of the visuals to make that trailer at all possible. I've learnt a lot in the process and earned a little confidence to move forward, and I have a feeling we'll have that first episode out long, long before the movie is released. My current aim is to get at least the first two completed before that time, with an eye to have all five finished by the end of next year, and we're in a very good place for that to happen- it just depends on funding. 

 If there's one thing my friends in the animation industry have learnt is that's you either put in the endless training to do it yourself, or you pay someone talented to get it done faster, and frankly there's only so much of the first I can do without releasing any videos and ensuring not only that everyone is paid, but that I too am surviving. The good thing is that most of the Patreon savings and video funds have lead to a nearly completed set of voice recordings for all the episodes- but I'd like to get a little extra funding to improve the visual sequences I have planned as well as keep myself out of the red.

 To this end, I'm putting together a little video to explain some of the project and see if I can secure a little extra support from my fanbase as I did in 2022. This is not going to stop me from completing the project if it doesn't work out, far from it, I'm simply assessing how much of what I want to do is possible, and whether or not it can be done in a decent time-frame, and to the standard I think this deserves. You'll also get a chance to hear what I think of the MCU's plans.

 I have to apologise for being blown way off course from the other drafts I've completed, as well as the rewards I need to deliver, but those are in good shape and I feel like I can get them done and now knuckle down to work on the rest of this series alongside it. In a way having the secret out feels better- you know now i'm still committed to this and that it'll happen, even if I'm putting out other projects to make ends meet. Ideally, I'd be getting paid to focus purely on this, but I just can't afford right now to drop very real videos I've drummed up that I could get out in that time and help increase the odds of this being polished further, and hey, I'm still pretty passionate about those projects, so you'll still be getting the best work I can offer.

 And, one last thing- Usher and ASM patrons now have access to the original cut of the trailer i devised in 2022, which will kick off your opportunity to see all my behind the scenes work on this project as we continue!

 Thank you as always for your continued support and patience. This is such a huge thing to finally talk about, and a small part of me isn't unconvinced that it'll fall flat on its face somehow, but I feel like I've come way, waaay too far to let it go now. We'll see how this works out- my only hope is for it to live up to the hype.

 Til then, my Thundyblaats

 -B

The Thunderbolts Story Trailer (2022)

 Hey Folks!

 With my Thunderbolts project finally announced, I feel I can show you some more of the behind the scenes work that went into putting it together, starting with the trailer itself and the original rough cut from way back in October 2022.

 This was when most of the series had been mapped out to the five episodes as complete drafts, with plans to extrapolate on aspects of it with slightly more ambitious edits and original art. It was always my plan to introduce the series through a trailer like this, for reasons that may become even clearer after the first episode drops, and I also felt it was a good way to pitch the series to some of my friends and potential collaborators while spurring me on to create more and get this finalised.

 Obviously plans got pushed back with my work on other projects in 2023 but writing and eventually casting continued long after the fact, as I ascertained what money I would have and when people would be available. The Frasier video helped send the funding into overdrive and the MCU announcement, which came just a little before this (but not before my initial trailer plans) helped get another rocket under me to make this happen.

 Without this I wouldn't have had a launching point to get creating on, so I'm really glad I made this when I did, even if everything happened that much slower than expected. Hopefully you'll be seeing even more of the work involved as we go- this is just the tip of the iceberg!

 -B

The Next Marvel Retrospective Revealed!

 At long last, you know the answer.

 Having begun work on reading the entire series not long after finishing the Fantastic Four video, and then slowly turning it into something much bigger, I really didn't want to give away what I was creating until I was truly ready to start bringing it to life- but now, you can all know what it is I've been working towards.

 A five-part Retrospective on Marvel's Thunderbolts.

 I will have plenty more to talk about and say in follow-up posts, as well as why this took priority over my other projects this month, but before all of that, I just want to say thanks to each and every one of you. It was the generous spirit of my Patron's support and all my fans excitement for what this could be that's helped keep this going, and that will continue to be the case as this begins to get completed. Thank you all so, so much. I hope it's worth the wait.

 Til next time!

 -B

June Update (Marvel Project+ Next videos)

 Hi Gang!

 Not the most exciting update, but not because things haven't been busy, quite the opposite- this month, I booked myself a huge amount of recording sessions with actors for the Marvel project, closing in on all the first episode's dialogue, none of which I can really talk about yet without giving too much away. Still, it's going extremely well, and I feel the entire series will be fully recorded by the end of next month, which will allow me to plow fully into editing as well as looking over other projects.

  My artist friends have also been working alongside me to start drumming up assets, mostly enough for a trailer reveal if possible, given most of the money so far has gone to the actors. Getting all the audio while the actors are available feels like a priority right now, which is why I'm tackling all of that so quickly, and then moving onto funding the art episode by episode. Trying to document as much as I can as I go so that you'll have a lot of behind the scenes stuff too!

 There is upcoming news i've caught wind of, however, that may force me to show my hand very soon. It's frustrating because I think this is something it would be nice to announce and drop fast, without people pre-empting where it's going, but a certain thing Marvel's doing is catching up with me, and I want to try and stay ahead of somehow. It probably sounds crazy because I'm having to be so incredibly vague, but this journey isn't going to be special unless I take people on it as it happens, and without spelling out everything to be expected. Fear not though- the timing of the actual video itself, if not the announcement of what it is, is well on track to get the word out before the subject becomes something else entirely. God, what is he talking about. Just remember I said all this when the reveal eventually happens.

 It's definitely distracted me from being more pro-active on getting the next couple videos out, but the drafts are complete for the Better Call Saul Video and another two things I'd whipped up, so I'll get myself to voice those as soon as possible. I also have timeline tours to get to and I will do when I get a spare moment, as well as continue working on the other big video essay I was working on. It's just a lot of things shifting priority at the moment while the resources and people are available, and given it's still just me putting this altogether it is a bit hectic- but good things are falling into place and i'm hoping, once it's over, I'll have released my best series of video essays yet. That, ultimately, will be down to all of you! I just hope you can forgive me for not getting to all my other stuff in time as this has been going on- I never meant to let things slip, it's just the way things have worked out, but plenty is on the way.

 Thank you all once more for your support and helping fund my most ambitious project. It's getting closer and closer every day- and I really hope your patience will be rewarded. God knows, I feel ready to finally talk about it real soon.

 Til next time!

 -B

Fargo's Happiest Season

  Yes, we're back to talking about Fargo, and this time we're covering the latest season- which covers domestic abuse, the political schism occurring within the last few generations, all forms of societal debt and, oddly enough, how it ends up offering the happiest message of them all. I know, left field for some of you new folks, but I really responded to this particular series and wanted to try and get my thoughts on the matter down, and honour the breadth of topics I've always covered. Was satisfying to pull together in the end, so I hope you get something out of this too!

  Will catch you all again soon,

 -B

May Update (Next video + Marvel Project)

Hi Gang!

 So close! I really planned to have the current video I'm working on out by the end of May or by June 1st, but hit a couple of snags in how it was sounding once it was altogether and ended up making a few changes. I'm still not 100% sure how it's hanging together but should have this out relatively soon- again, just me musing on a tv show I've talked about before, and how I felt about its latest season. You'll know what it is soon enough! Other video projects are lined up right behind this, so I'm hoping it's not gonna take all that much longer.

 The Work on the Marvel project is still rumbling along as well! Every week I've been meeting with new and recurring actors to record parts for the series, which again, is going exceedingly well. We're quite deep in, with the principle characters nearly over 50% complete and me now working to divide up a few remaining sides between others on board. Half of this was planned long in advance and the rest has been down to availability and discoveries made with actors during recording as to who's most comfortable doing what.

 The nice upshot of that is most of the first episode is pretty much recorded- so, in certain pockets of time through the day, I've been testing things out in the edit bay and seeing not only how it sounds but what I can pull off visually before I get more artists involved. It's great how much faster I am at finding out what works thanks to the Fantastic Four project- and I feel I have a lot more flexibility than I did before in what I can achieve here. I'm going to slow down on that a bit and try to use this month to schedule even more sessions wherever possible- which will make the ability to get properly started on that first episode a lot easier. Still need to get into funding, but I kind of wanted this next video out first, so I'm holding off til that's dealt with, and the same goes for the Timeline Tours.

 And that's where I'm at for now! Hopefully will be back with that next video- which I hear is based on a true story...

-B

April Update (New drafts and Marvel Project updates)

 Hey Gang!

 Since last time we spoke things have been way better than I expected. I was working on multiple drafts last month and two of them made it to audio files- but one, I felt, was doing better than the other, and I locked into that and got it into the edit bay to finish, even with a birthday trip inbetween. That was the Inspector Gadget 2 video which is another one of those long held promises i made to myself and, for whatever reason, it finally felt like I knew how to talk about it. It was a blast to make, after having worked on so many heavy projects or huge videos recently, and felt like a return to a lighter style I hadn't tried for a long time. And above all it got approval from my sister who shares the same view, so hey, that'll about do it for me.

 Of course that means there's another video I can jump straight onto editing. It's on a tv show i've discussed before, it's another fairly short one, and it's not particularly difficult to assemble. In fact, it's not the only other draft I have on the go- perhaps i was possessed by the spirit of a demon or something because I ended up completing five whole video drafts of smaller projects, hitting a stride I hadn't felt in years and tackling a few other pieces I'd promised to myself for a while. This means that I feel more ready to approach that next piece of unfinished business- the Better call Saul video, covering the use of music in its final seasons. Keep an eye out for that, it'll likely appear after this next one.

 I think part of the reason this is happening is that my mind is trying to work overtime to help fund my next Marvel project, which as I mentioned last time has finally entered production. Over the last month, the actors I've contacted have not only been delivering lines, but delivering them with me present in live directed sessions, and I have to tell ya, being a voice director has been a wonderful experience. I'm under no illusions that I'm anywhere close to professional or nailing the job, but it has been a pleasure working with such amazing talents and learning how to best approach each session, so that every actor is not only comfortable but feels free to experiment, and they seem to be pleased with the process too. I'm getting to bust out all my theatre training and it feels like home. I'm recording bits of that process as we go so you can hear how it's going, too.

 I have many more sessions booked and a few more actors to talk to, pacing them out purely as my current budget allows, and I think you'll enjoy some of the people we've picked and the performances we're getting. I'm also in contact with some artist buddies of mine who are helping me design some assets for the project so we can make it look real snazzy, and the ideas are shaping up nicely as we actually figure out how to best present a basic house style for certain aspects. And, last but not least, the final episode- the one I've been having so much trouble writing- is finally coming together. I had a long chat with a friend and together we had a bit of a breakthrough in how to present it. Not much I can give away, but know that it's really starting to look like a completed script, and I couldn't be happier.

 That's everything I have so far. I may have to put together an update video to secure more funding, but I also have these other drafts now on the go, so things are looking fairly bright for the next few months. I'm going to circle back and get that big, big tv show video done too- once again, I promised it too soon, and really need to get it completed. Keep your eyes peeled, B-Gang.

 Til then, my lovelies!

-B

Inspector Gadget 2 is what we wanted

 Surprise! Of the two short videos I had ready to edit, this was the one that came together the fastest, a video on Inspector Gadget 2, and while I wanted it out a little earlier I felt it needed some extra polish. Yes, another video where we talk about a silly movie and I knock a few points off my credibility scale, but not without making some wider points about adaptations of franchises as a whole. Been meaning to do this one for years and figured around my birthday was a good time to get it out there, glad to finally have that done. Enjoy!

-B