Exclusive Interview: Executioner and Friend creator Jimmy Geigerich
John Blabber: How did you learn about Bite on Mondo?
Jimmy Geigerich: I was actually contacted by Bite on Mondo out of the blue one day. They told me that they liked my work and were interested in seeing if I’d like to work with them, which of course I was!
What was the pitch process like?
It was great! I had done a few self-published comics by the time they had gotten in touch with me, and sent them over to them to check out and see if they thought they might work as animations. They got back to me and told me that they wanted to pick up Executioner and Friend based on the comic alone!
What was the production process like? Who did you work with and how was the team constructed?
This was my first time ever working on project of this capacity, but the team that I had the pleasure of working with was outstanding and made it a very enjoyable experience! Since this was based on a comic that I had come up with, all the creative decisions were mine to make, from the character and background designs all the way through to who we cast for the voices. I worked with Blue Ant Media, who helped to construct the team of Lil Blackstone for Animation and Keen Music, Voice, and Sound Design for, well, the music, voice, and sound design.
How did you get involved in the cartoon industry? What inspired you to create your own show?
I’ve been a huge cartoon fan since I was a kid and always wanted to be able to tell a story through animation, so working on this was a dream come true for me. Before this, I had some experience with cartoon pre-production as well as working on pitches for cartoons before, and was so excited when we started moving forward with turning Executioner and Friend into a cartoon.
What has been the most rewarding part of creating a show?
Hands down, it’s getting to see my characters and stories come to life in this way.
What has been the biggest challenge that’s come from creating a show?
I think that the biggest challenge comes from taking a story and characters that I’ve had complete control over for the past couple of years and handing some of that control over to other people. I sort of have a tendency to work within a bubble on my personal comics, and generally make all the decisions about story and characters and all of that myself, so it was a little bit of a personal adjustment giving some of that away. With all of that being said, this was only something that I experienced in the beginning of this process, and was completely happy with how everyone involved treated the story once we got rolling.
What advice do you have for new creators that are developing and or producing their first show?
Create something that you yourself are happy with and excited about first and foremost, and worry about what other people think later. Having a fully developed idea that you are enthusiastic about will make it easier to get other people excited about your work when you pitch it to them.
What have you learned as a creator having gone through the process of creating for Bite on Mondo?
I’ve learned a ton about what it takes to bring an idea from the concept stage to a final animated product, and how much time and effort goes into a project. I’ve also learned how to relax a little bit of my own creative control over my work and let other people take the reins.
What does the audience have to look forward to with the series going forward?
I have a ton of different adventures for Executioner and Friend to go on and a bunch of crazy characters planned for Executioner and Friend to meet (and possibly kill!) in upcoming episodes!
Do you have any other thoughts and or comments that you’d like to share?
Thank you for the chance to talk a little bit more about Executioner and Friend, and enjoy the show! Dungeon Lord’s orders!
Bite on Mondo’s submission deadline is February 15th!
Hi Ashley, thank you so much for reading and we love the feedback. Note that on that day we had 14th posts go up and only ten posts show on the front page, so it's possible the preview had already been archived by the time you got to it. One recommendation would be to add our RSS feed to your favorite news aggregator service like Feedly, this way you get all of the latest posts!