Abrams and Whedon Discuss the Webseries Medium
They created two of the most memorable television series on The WB, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Felicity. They went on to develop additional shows for other networks—Firefly for FOX and Alias for ABC—and while each series was critically acclaimed, neither drew significant viewer ratings. They even directed back-to-back episodes of the NBC comedy The Office in 2007, prompting Kristin Dos Santos of E! to declare them “the two best TV directors alive.” And they are considered to be amongst the most innovative and groundbreaking television producers of the Twenty First Century.
J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon were also the featured speakers at a San Diego Comic Con panel on July 23, 2010, entitled “The Visionaries,” that was sponsored by Entertainment Weekly. While the two had a lot to say regarding the business of television as well as the motion picture industry—Abrams directed the recent Star Trek reboot while Whedon is slated to helm The Avengers—they also had some interesting comments regarding the emergence of the World Wide Web as a vehicle for original online video. (Transcripts of the entire panel discussion are available at SlashFilm.)
Joss Whedon, of course, has already had success on the Internet with the musical webseries sensation Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. Although still an ardent supporter of the new medium, he also appeared a bit disappointed that more Hollywood creators did not follow his lead and jump into the fray. “After Dr. Horrible, I was waiting for everybody else to show up at the party,” he told the crowd. “I was like, ‘OK, now we’re going to get this all together. We’re going to make a ton of Internet stuff.’”
Whedon believes that Dr Horrible provided a working business model for future endeavors—create a buzz, provide free but limited online availability then offer the product on the likes of iTunes and Hulu before releasing a DVD version—that proved to be financially successful. “Dr. Horrible made money,” he explained. “It made money for me. I was the studio. But also for the writers, the actors. All of them were profit participants. So it really worked as a model by which people can actually go ahead and make a profit on the Internet. People always say, ‘Well there’s no money there at all.’ Obviously there is much less than can be had in movies and TV, but it can be done.”
While J.J. Abrams is one of the many who have yet to follow Whedon onto the World Wide Web, he did not deny seeing the benefits of creating for the Internet. He specifically cited the advancement of technology in this current day and age, commenting that he “shot a commercial for a Star Trek DVD literally using the camera that I used to film my kid’s soccer games.” But he also noted that the potential for venturing into the realm of the webseries is even more appealing for a Joss Whedon or J.J. Abrams because of the many beneficial relationships they have developed within Hollywood.
“Doing something like Star Trek, clearly you need the resources of a studio,” he remarked. “But when you have an idea for something and you’ve got friends, why not ask them if they want to do this? They can be owners of this thing. They can put their heart and soul into it. And it’s a shorter, typically, investment of time.”
Abrams added that although it was not official yet, he is actually in the early stages of developing an online project with another creative-type who also happened to be at Comic Con, although he would not reveal that person’s identity. “It will hopefully be out soon,” he promised the crowd.
For his part, Joss Whedon commented that his next venture onto the World Wide Web will unfortunately be a ways off. While he has been working on a sequel to Dr Horrible with co-creators Jed Whedon, Maurissa Tancharoen and Zack Whedon, it has been a struggle because of the various time constraints for all involved. Add the fact that the two lead characters, Dr. Horrible and Captain Hammer, are portrayed by Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion—both of who have starring roles on the Monday night television shows How I Met Your Mother and Castle—and the scheduling conflict grows even more.
“If we had the time, we really do feel like we know what the movie is, and we really want to do it, and we want to do it on our terms,” he said. “But our terms seem to be interminable.”
Whedon also revealed that he had been working with comic book creator/writer Warren Ellis on an original webseries called Wastelanders. Unfortunately, being tabbed to direct The Avengers has put the project on hold but the two are committed to completing the project at some point in the future. While Whedon offered little details in regards to the Wastelanders, Ellis posted a few more tidbits about the series on his website a few days later. “Wastelanders is where Joss’ sense that too few people followed the example of Dr. Horrible meets my obsession with the Quatermass serials, which were half-hour episodes,” he wrote. “Short-form genre serials of the kind that TV just doesn’t make anymore. What we eventually came up with was very much a fusion of British and American styles, and very much a fusion of my style and Joss’ style. And full-on science fiction.”
J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon have already redefined the television experience for millions of viewers with previous creations like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Lost, while Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog demonstrated the potential of the webseries as a creative outlet. Here’s hoping that these two “visionaries” bring their innovative and groundbreaking abilities to the Internet in the foreseeable future and help usher the webseries into the mainstream as well.
Anthony Letizia (August 2, 2010)
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