Demona May Stephens writes...

Happy Birthday Greg W.
Sorry it wan't a question but I have to say it before I forgot again..

Entity writes...

Personally, if GARGOYLES was still on the air, I would prefer it pay as little notice to the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center as possible. GARGOYLES was about many things, but it dealt with them in its own, contained way. It created its own situations and through them addressed real life issues. I would not want GARGOYLES to become a commentary on current events. It's a fantasy/sci-fi show, and therefore removed from our world, both by theory and in established practice. GARGOYLES is best a timeless show, don't you agree?

Laura 'ad astra' Ackerman writes...

Lastly the hard one: I took a quick look through the waiting to be answered section, (mea culpa, I don't usually check that part, only the actually answered sections), and I saw a few questions about the recent terrorist attack and the Gargoyles universe. I too am wondering what your thoughts on it are. Forgive me for being presumptuous, but my gut reaction is that you would want to deal with it. Gargoyles never stayed away from difficult issue, and this one came to it. If and (hopefully) when the show continues in some form, and assuming Disney allows you to, how would you handle it? Until now you have said you are leaning to continuing the show post Journey and going through the intervening years at a quick pace. It wouldn't necessarily be obvious what year it is in the story, but the people who are interested would be able to fit it into place and know the time frame from the internet. Now the time frame will be obvious with the most cursory glance.

Aside from the logistics of fitting it in and when, is the issue of how. Gargoyles has it easier than your run of the mill superhero. First off, it happened in the morning, so there us no question of them having been there. (And the fact that so many characters in the show are cops puts us literally and figuratively at ground zero.) Second off, they are strong and they can glide, but they have no way of magically lifting building high stacks of rubble, or zeroing in on survivors under those stacks. They cannot teleport, or put trapped survivors in stasis until they can be reached. In short, they are little more than a few extra sets of extremely strong hands. Still, for a fictional story to save one more life than we have so desperately managed to save strikes me as somewhat offensive. With the heartache and heroism we have seen in the past few days, it is so hard to find the balance between doing disservice to a difficult issue by ignoring it, and doing disservice to that same issue by trivializing it. Not that it shouldn't be tried, In between the extremes is a major service art plays to humanity.

Personally the whole incident has been as bizarre as it is horrendous. Sometime in the middle of Rosh HaShanna I found myself praying I would turn the television after the holiday to hear they found even just one more survivor. I am sure many were doing the same thing, but I was praying that for the rescue workers, so that they would have something to help them go on. At the same time I still hadn't, haven't completely registered the event. The numbers are too big to compute. And yet, I saw the second tower fall from Christopher street, the closest the subway got to work, and knew I had to continue walking south to work to get to my non-telephone based e-mail to be sure I could contact the outside world and get word out I was fine and find out about all my friends who worked even further downtown than I, (not to mention getting word to cousins in Israel who are used to the calls going the other way). I was able to hear that all my friends got out unharmed by noon and began the long walk home. All along the way people had set up radios and televisions for everyone to huddle around and sort out what exactly had happened. I have always maintained New Yorkers are far more friendly and caring than we will admit, but now, it is obvious. By the time we reached the 12th street the people lined up to give blood filled avenues by Saint Vincent hospital. They had so many people asking to volunteer that we were told
to try again in several hours. My friend had chosen a bad day not to wear sensible shoes, and we were stopping into shoe stores all the way north to find her a pair of Keds without luck.

Of course, once I got back to my apartment, and later at friends, we watched amazing amounts of news. With exception of sabbeth and the holiday, I don't think I've gone more than 5 hours without checking it in one way or another. In the days before we were allowed to go back to work we switched off between the news and silly things. I saw The Princess Diaries, my boss admitted to a slightly more
serious movie, but not much more. Thursday the wind shifted and we could smell the smoke. The wind still mainly blows away from us, but every once in a while it turns north again and it smells as if the city decided to put all its ovens on self clean mode. But for the most part the weather had been bizarrely clear and lovely.

Since then we have heard stories of heroism and humanity. Instead of panic and everyman for himself, people were orderly as they made their long way down. Strangers helped, even carried, each other down the stairs. Hundreds of firemen, police and other rescue workers ran back in and up and most probably died in the collapse. Thousands are dead, but thousands were saved by human kindness at the most basic and heroic level. I have never been more proud to be a New Yorker. [And that isn't even dealing with all the people that flocked to NY to help, nor the war I feel we must fight and pray we are mature enough to handle as we have not been in the past.] Everyone here knows at least someone who lost someone. And you can't help but look out windows that used to see the towers, or just down the street, and see a surreal open skyline still full of smoke.

I can't see how any story set in this city at this time can ignore the events, yet I am still too close to know if it is possible to do it justice. I am a (supposed) adult who has had more exposure to terrorism
than most New Yorkers and have an ability 'get used' to new status quos quicker than many. You have repeatedly said that Gargoyles would remain child friendly, even if the topics became more mature. I cannot help but think that children are in even more need than adults to make sense of these events and how it changes us.

thanks for the answers, (and the chance to vent).

Laura

Lady Leto writes...

I asked this before

Lady Leto writes...
Dear Greg.....

This is a respond to one of your ramblings. You asked:

'Is there anyone out there for whom City of Stone was your first Gargoyle experience? If so, I'd love to hear from you. Did you have a clue as to what was going on?'

Well I was getting my Dad to watch it with me for the first time. And throughout the whole thing he was asking me many question, most of them pointless like do all Gargoyles have tails? And kept on me about names. (Hudson right, nothing is real to humans till they have names.) So yes even with the flashbacks, "Previously" segment, and a hard core garg fan, he was very confused. I think next time I try to get him into Gargoyles I'll start at the beginning.

Also wanted say that it is really cool how you answer all these question. (I have been to the Archives.) It must take alot of time! And you even put up with the not so great questions! I just wanted to say thanks!

Greg responds...

You're welcome. Too bad about your dad. I was afraid of that. Did it at least intrigue him enough to make him want to see more? Or did the confusion just alienate him from the series?

I finally got my dad into the series! I picked an episode by random, it was Revelations. And he liked it! He doesn't like cartoons at all. We watch an episode each week. His favorite character is Hudson, and episode is 'The Mirror' (he thought Puck was really funny!). Well anyway, maybe I can talk him into going with me to the Gathering in 2003 (since we live in Tampa).

Greg Bishansky writes...

Happy Rosh Hashanah Greg. Though it may be closeto Channukah when you read this.

Zarok writes...

I'm glad to see your OK greg. I don't know if you still live in New York(since all of your stories are based there), so I feared for your saftey when I heard about the attack. I'm quite relived now. My sympaties to you and all the american people.

Sapphire writes...

Being a Canadian I am horrified of the thousands of our American cousins murdered in New York today, I hope that the terrorists are caught soon and be made to pay for their hidious crime. I just want to let all Americans who read this that Canada mourns with America and has always considered America as a very close friend and wishes America well.(including you too Greg)

The Cat writes...

Hey Greg,

I'd figure since I just got a call back from Jeff Bennett that I'd better check on you. If you are ok could you tell me how Bill(Broadway) and Thom(Lexington) are doing? I'm really conserned about how ya'll are doing and now more than ever. I know that sometimes the actors go to New York to work and Jeff got a hold of my answering machine, so he didn't elaberate(hope I spelled that right). Well, how have you been let's say between November of 1999 to present day? Since I met you, Jeff, Bill and Thom in November of '99 through Make A Wish.

Well I got homework write ya later, Bye.

Demona Taina writes...

Greg, I'm glad to hear that you're okay. I hope your family is, too.

Well, I just dropped by to let you know of something. Curiosity got the best of me yesterday so I searched in the episode Future Tense for the World Trade Center that was destroyed yesterday, and I couldn't find it. You could usually see it from the Statue of Liberty, right? Well, they weren't there. Scary, huh?

Siren writes...

I read through about the reasons why Gargoyles was booted out. And I certainly understand them 100%. No company is going to keep making something that isn't giving them a good profit, it's bad for buisness. I've seen a lot of Disney animated shows. At least one episode from everyone since the Disney Afternoon. Disney Afternoon I thought was great. Ducktales, Talespin, Rescue Rangers, even Marsupilami (spelling might be wrong, but can ya blame me?). Gargoyles is by far my favorite show. Now I am not a big fan of anime. I do like some, for instance, Princess Mononoke is just about my favorite movie. The animation was the best I've seen since Gargoyles and the story was excellent. Also well cast for the American dubbed version. Mononoke was the number one movie of all time in Japan, till Titanic knocked it down a spot. Never did I hear of such a thing. An animated movie is number one in a country and knocked all the classics down. Though I think it deserved that spot...even more so then Titanic. Which got me thinking about the difference between the two cultures. Americans seem to think animation is intended for kids. There certainly have been break throughs, but majority of those breakthroughs, were made in Japan. The Japanese seemed to tap into something in animation that Americans have failed to. It's not the form of the movie it is the story. I also think Japanese have more pride in the animated movies, seeing them more as artwork then as kiddie shows which is why they can work so hard at it AND the PUBLIC appreciates it. You and the rest of the Gargoyle crew worked so hard and made the best animated tv show in my mind. I just guess the American public wasn't ready for it. They aren't to that mature point to say animation isn't just kiddie flicks and cute fuzzy animals. They can have deep feelings and emotions as much as any actor. You have at least 2 people behind each character. The animator and the voice. I know there are many other animators of the characters, but I think you know what I mean. I am sorry that the majority ruled this time and they didn't appreciate it or bother to give it a chance or whatever. I still have that hope it will be back in one form or another. Maybe one day it will be it's time to be the next Batman or Superman. They started out slowly too and look at them now. One never knows.

After all that, was wondering, "Do you know how well Gargoyles did in Japan?"