Interviews: Part 1 with Adam Fortier || Part 2 with Pat Lee
Representing Dreamwave Productions is Adam Fortier.
Seibertron.com: First off, I would like to thank you for allowing myself, and the members of Seibertron, to have the opportunity to conduct an interview with your company. It's amazing how technology has truly made the world a much smaller place.
I allowed the members of Seibertron.com to post their questions on the message board so that they could have this opportunity to have answers to THEIR questions, not mine, hence the delay in my e-mail response to your previous message. I kept their individual questions intact unless there were duplicate or similar questions.
As you can imagine, the rumor mill has been churning non-stop since this "surprising" news was announced on December 12th, 2001. I don't believe any of the major Transformers websites' webmasters had any insight on this announcement.
On that note, I would like to know if you plan on future interaction with the Transformers message boards and webmasters?
Dreamwave Productions: The message boards and webmasters are essential to getting the message out to Transformers fans that have no real knowledge of the comic book medium. We would love to do many things with them (and have a few planned!), but unfortunately, have no real idea how to get a hold of all of them. To that extent, we're just going to have to work with those that we know about, and hope that the others contact us themselves. The internet is a way to get the news out immediately, and that's important when we need to educate a large group of people on our comic book in a short period of time.
Seibertron.com: On a personal note, I would like to know what your official position is with Dreamwave Productions and what level of involvement you will be having with the new Transformers series.
Dreamwave Productions: Well, my official titles are Director of Marketing, New business development, merchandising and licensing .,. I was the guy that talked to Hasbro, and I still talk to them on a pretty regular basis.
Seibertron.com: Many fans have inquired about Simon Furman's involvement, if any, with the Dreamwave Productions' Transformers comics. Simon Furman crafted much of the original Transformers comic book series and continues to do so by being involved with Mainframe's Beast Wars cartoon and the BotCon conventions. To say the least, Simon Furman has been very influential on the world of the Transformers. Has Dreamwave Productions had any contact with Simon Furman or do you plan on taking the Transformers concept in a direction different than his?
Dreamwave Productions: We've already announced that we'll be working with Simon Furman in some capacity. We're working on a limited series as we speak. The continuity question is one that I get a lot ... we want to make sure that, at least at the beginning, we kind of leave things ambiguous, so that there's no real confusion regarding what's going on. While a lot of the serious fans know exactly where each continuity comes from, they need to realise that most of the casual Transformers fans just watched the cartoon, and played with the toys. So, if we jumped right into comic book continuity, that would confuse a great many people. This does not mean, however, that we're going to ignore continuity forever.
Seibertron.com: I understand there will be a six-issue limited series that will be released in April 2002, which coincides with Dreamwave Production's first month of separation from Image Comics. Where will this six-issue limited series fit in with the original Generation One Transformers cartoon or comic? What are you using as cannon for the basis of the Generation One comics?
Dreamwave Productions: You can kind of see the above answer. We're trying not to mention certain points of contention, and deal wtih just the characters as they are. It's hard to contradict something when you just don't mention it. This isn't meant as a cop out, it's done so that the largest group can enjoy the comic book. We might deal with some issues at a later date, but will be extremely picky as to what we do stories on, and what we don't do stories on. In order to even ATTEMPT to clean up the continuity within Transformers we'd probably need A LOT of time!
Seibertron.com: Speaking of Generation One, it is clearly divided into 2 segments - before and after the movie. When will the story take place - before or after Transformers: The Movie?
Dreamwave Productions: Right now, the story is taking place before the movie. We like the movie characters, and would probably do something with them a little later on, but for now just want to deal with the core, original characters ... but you can expect to see the movie characters later on.
Seibertron.com: Any word on main characters that will be featured in the Generation One story other than the obvious choices like Megatron and Optimus Prime?
Dreamwave Productions: Shockwave, Starscream, Devestator, all your faves (yes, I know that I only mentioned decepticons, but they're my favourite ... we will rule!)
Seibertron.com: The fans have noticed in previous interviews that Dreamwave Productions hasn't referred to the new Transformers series that debuts in 2002 as Transformers: "Armada". Have you been sworn to secrecy by Hasbro about sharing information regarding the new series? Can you at least tell us if Unicron will be involved in any way with the Transformers 2002 storyline?
Dreamwave Productions: No comment ... it would be commenting on the seris even if we said we weren't allowed to comment :) I can tell you what they're planning kicks ass!
Seibertron.com: As I said above, the internet has made the world a very small place. Many fans are now familiar with the Japanese characters that never made their way overseas. Any chance that Dreamwave Productions could fit some of these remarkable characters into the storylines or do a separate mini-series featuring the Japanese characters?
Dreamwave Productions: We love the Japanese characters, and might consider bringing them in in some capacity, but there are currently no plans in the works.
Seibertron.com: Who will be the staff working on the Generation One comic book? How about the Transformers: "Armada" comic book?
Dreamwave Productions: Chris Sarracini will write G1 and the ongoing comic, and Pat Lee will pencil G1. As for everything else, we still have to confirm with the individuals.
Seibertron.com: I realize many of the extra products such as calendars and posters are most likely tentative based upon the success of the new comic book series. Are you able to share with us the tentative release dates for the extra products? How will this new, additional merchandise be marketed/advertised and where will it be available?
Dreamwave Productions: We're releasing 4 posters in April (the optimus prime picture, the megatron picture, the Autobots, and the Decepticons), so I think that's pretty early! As for calendars, we want to make sure it's not just a reprint of a bunch of pictures we've already done, so we'll probably release those next year, in plenty of time for the Holidays!
Seibertron.com: That's all of the questions that I've got for now. Thank you for taking the time to answer these questions above. It really means a lot to the fans that you've taken your time to personally answer these questions.
Dreamwave Productions: Hope that helps, any more questions, you let me know!
Read more Dreamwave Productions interviews at the following websites:
