Exclusive: “Apollo Gauntlet” Creator Myles Langlois Is Just Happy To Be Here

Next week will see the season one premiere of Adult Swim’s Apollo Gauntlet and as such we had a chance to chat with the show’s creator about what fans can expect in the upcoming season followed by a comprehensive breakdown of each of the characters so that you are primed and ready for premiere.

Back in 2012, animation studios Titmouse Inc, and Six Point Harness conceived the simple and laughable purpose of launching a Youtube channel that would feature a bunch of new and original series from up and coming producers. Some of those ideas would be just plain silly such as Dogsnack, a series revolving around a dog that ate farts, produced by Dick Figures producer Ed Skudder. But among the pile of pitches you’ll see some real diamonds that eventually grew legs and  became something. Axe Cop would see a FOX adapted animated series that would last for two incredible seasons. Cat Agent’s been announced for a new season that’s set to premiere before the end of this year. And yes, Apollo Gauntlet was one of those series. As the years went by, animation studio Six Point Harness would go on to work on some fabulous projects and would eventually see them acquire the Mondo Mini Shows brand which is currently available on the VRV streaming service. Now, Six Point Harness is staring down the barrel of Apollo Gauntlet’s first season premiere on Adult Swim.

Originally from Manitoba, Canada by way of a small nickel-mining town, Apollo Gauntlet creator Myles Langlois would eventually move to Brandon, Manitoba, Canada where he would gorge himself on a steady diet of 80s cartoons like He-Man and She-Ra, fascinated by the simplistic direction of animation on top of beautifully painted backgrounds, “those shows made an imprint on me as a kid”. While Myles didn’t go to school for any sort of video or animation production, Myles would try his hand at live-action filmmaking, “the movie came out pretty good, but I wanted to do something where I didn’t have to pay actors or rent expensive camera equipment but still be creative.”

Enter Myles’ discovery of Anime Studio, “out of an act of desperation” as he calls it. Now known as “Moho”, the Smith-Micro animation software platform was Myles’ way of doing what he envisioned, but on a much smaller and cheaper scale than what he was doing before. Eventually, Seth Cooper and Devin Flynn saw Myles’ work at an art show who then brought it to the attention of Brendan Burch, studio head of Six Point Harness. “People would comment and say, ‘I like how he made the animation look bad on purpose, to which I would say, “No, this is me working hard”. That’s because Myles produced the Apollo Gauntlet series by himself until the series was ultimately picked up by Adult Swim. “It was really just dumb luck that those guys would see my work and then it would eventually get put on TV.”

For fans of the web series, need not worry. Myles wants you to know that the Adult Swim series doesn’t change much in terms of art direction, but that he had plenty of help this time in the production of the six episodes coming of Apollo Gauntlet, “There’s definitely a line that I didn’t want to cross, but when it came to producing the series I was very liberal with the producers in terms of character designs and other facets of the show because these guys are geniuses and I would be stupid to try and be a dictator and tell them what to do.”

While the producers of the series reportedly did a great job in sticking with Myles’ scripts all the while coming in loaded with their own suggestions, the budding producer came up with premises that definitely have arcs, you can watch each episode and not know anything about each of the other episodes. Every episode mixes things up a bit and, “I wanted to make the show as interesting as possible with a wide variety of different episodes”.

To help tell the story of these different episodes, Myles has employed a number of silly characters at his disposal that may or may not be heroic. The character of Apollo Gauntlet is that of an Earth cop (well, Canadian cop) who becomes a superhero in a strange, inter-dimensional world known as Kingdom Bellanus.

Armed with his magical, talking gauntlets to help him fight evil and a skin-tight suit Apollo Gauntlet is definitely man enough to handle his own business … but why not add a team anyway? Yes, Apollo also has a team of “kinda” heroes to support him that may or may not actually be of any help against a litany of villains who may not pose much of a threat anyway.

Apollo Gauntlet premieres July 9, at 12:15 a.m. (ET/PT), and will also be available for streaming at AdultSwim.com beginning July 7. Read our review of the Apollo Gauntlet pilot episode here.