Exclusive: Christy Karacas, Creator of “Superjail” Talks Up His New Project “Ballmastrz 9009”

Christy Karacas delivers insight into the creative forces driving the post-apocalypse sports anime cocktail that is Ballmastrz 9009.

With Ballmastrz: 9009 set to release this Sunday, I had the distinct pleasure of speaking with Christy Karacas, the enigmatic and creative mind behind the cult favorite, “Superjail.” My talk with Christy was an intriguing one and revealed a lot of the behind-the-scenes influences and creative processes that go into making such a unique animation.

Courtesy: Adult Swim

Erich Hau: So, what have you been doing since Superjail?

Mostly, we’ve been working on the new show. It’s been a bit, but the actual series, we started production about a year ago, and the pilot around December. I’m an animator before a writer, so unlike a sitcom which starts with a script, we tinkered with a lot of ideas back and forth, figuring out how many characters there were, figuring out how much of the show is the sport, how much is the story, etc. It did take a while, haha.

The anime influences in Ballmastrz are clearly evident, even more so than in Superjail. Was this a natural change or is this something you just always wanted to do?

You know, I’ve always loved anime, but I never thought I’d draw like that. Near the end of Superjail, though, there was some great stuff coming out, and thought “I’ve always loved anime, maybe I should do a sports anime?” Try and do something that’s not Superjail, something more action oriented, less gag-driven. I wanted to let the things that I love about anime come through, but also do it the way I want to do it, if that makes any sense.

How did you come up with the concept of the show?

Well, I’ve always loved 70’s apocalyptic-type things like rollerball, and I noticed that while there are plenty of western sports films, there aren’t really any sports cartoons. But in anime, they’ve got sports anime for everything, and I thought I could do that, but I don’t know anything about sports, so I made up my own crazy rollerball sport. I also spent time watching, you know, The Mighty Ducks, Major League, Bad News Bears, for inspiration.

The ball, not wanting to give too much away, but the ball also has a personality in the show, and I thought it would be funny if there was, like, Michael Jordan, arguing with the ball, and what that would look like.

What were you looking for when casting the series and how did you pick the voice actors you wanted to work with?

Well, the ball is Dana Snyder, who is just one of my favorite voices and my favorite people. I always knew I wanted him to do it, I just wasn’t sure if he would. As for Gaz, she was actually the last one cast; she was kinda hard. But I heard Natasha Lyonne’s voice and I thought she was just a perfect fit, just amazing. Eric Bauza, I knew I wanted to work with him. I was picking people that I know that were funny, and cool, haha. It’s funny, sometimes you’ll draw a character and not really know what they sound like, but then you hear the right voice and you’re just, “oh my god”, and it sticks.

While being advertised as a hero’s journey for Gaz, Ace definitely appears to be a big part of a similar journey as well. How did this come to be?

We kind of think of it like Ace, Gaz and Baby Ball are the three main characters. We sometimes think of Ace being the angel on Gaz’s shoulder and Baby Ball being the devil, you know, being a prima donna, being really selfish and all that. Gaz makes a lot of bad decisions, too, but Ace is the super, 100% positive, never-give-up heart of the team, the glue who holds them all together. If it wasn’t for him, the team would definitely fall apart even more than they already do.

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How did you conceptualize some of the character designs for the monsters and teams?

You know, its funny, we thought of “The Warriors”, where every gang has a theme, and professional wrestling, where each guy has a special theme. And we thought it would be funny if every team was just completely bonkers; one team is a bunch of trains, another team is just completely out there, that sort of thing.

Looking at anime, too, there are so many crazy character designs that are just so wild and exciting. I thought there should be characters so crazy that the fans would want to draw them; we should just be as out there as we can, and to be honest, if I could do it again, I would make it even crazier.

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Ballmastrz and Superjail both have surreal, over-the-top art styles. What is it that draws you, as a creative, to visualize your work in such a unique fashion?

Well, you know, with each product I don’t want to get bored. Sometimes, in the show, the animation will become this really minimal art style, to help make sure that it doesn’t get boring. I’m not sure if I’m articulating this well, haha, but, like, I used to work on “Daria”, where, it’s a great show, but you’re drawing the same thing over and over again. It makes you want to blow your brains out after a while, artistically; nothing against the show. With this project, I told our guys, “Hey, if you want to do something different in this scene, just go for it, and we’ll okay it.” I just wanted everyone to have fun, you know?

Are there any other influences; genres or animated series of note that lend themselves to Ballmastrz 9009?

Yeah, its funny, I say this a lot in interviews, but I want to give credit to Masaaki Yuasa; I saw “Mind Games” in my early twenties, and he changes styles a lot in his work, and that was a huge influence on me. Also, a really old anime called “Space Cobra”, a sci-fi, very influenced by Star Wars with that “dirty future” look, had some amazing backgrounds. We wanted to incorporate that level of detail into the show. With computer animation, you can do so much, you can mess with like every little thing, but it can come out looking too nice, you know, too finished. We actually tried to pull the artists back a bit, so everything doesn’t look so clean and crisp, so it would give it almost a softer, more organic feel to the backgrounds. We’re really proud of the backgrounds department, they did a really fantastic job. Beyond just anime, we approached this thinking we could do it with “rough animation.” Oh, and, it might not seem apparent, but I love spaghetti westerns and we definitely had cowboy movies in the back of our heads when making this.

 

What are some themes and episode plot details that you can sneak preview for us for the coming season?

Well, I don’t want to give a lot away, but the first few episodes are pretty serialized, then in the middle, we have some one-offs but then the last few episodes answer some questions and wrap things up from the first episodes. Superjail was really episodic, and while you don’t have to watch Ballmastrz all in order to know what’s going on, but if you watch it in the order it’s definitely better. Also, they’re airing the episodes two at a time, which I think is really cool and will be really good for the show. I’m definitely excited about that.

Well, that’s all we’ve got for you. Any last words on Ballmastrz for us?

I’m just excited for people to see the show, I hope they enjoy it.

Catch Ballmastrz 9009 Sunday, April 8th, on Adult Swim.

Courtesy: Adult Swim