The Transformation
directing an ep of the wingfeather saga!
Hey Bloggerfolk!
I’m a wee bit late on this - blame Thanksgiving pie baking and general resting up - but the last of my episodes for The Wingfeather Saga is now streaming! Get ready for… THE TRANSFORMATION! (click the poster to see the animated version!)
When my boss called me at Disney World two years ago I was bracing myself for bad news (usually it’s never a good sign to be called on vacation.) I couldn’t have guessed he would ask me to direct an episode of the show (and later, co-direct a few more!) I had pitched that my episode be titled “The Song of Kalmar Wingfeather” as it’s mainly about Kalmar, Leeli, and the songs that connect and divide them. This was an especially difficult episode to write since the audience already knew the answer to the central mystery the characters were trying to solve (where is Kalmar?) so the challenge was finding a way to make that search interesting, or introduce other questions for the audience to think about. I helped with the last rounds of rewrites, even pitching that the episode be structured mainly around Leeli and her role in holding the family together (we still haven’t gotten a “Leeli Episode” yet, and I wanted to give her a moment.)
While we didn’t ultimately center the episode on Leeli, we did get plenty of time to explore her song-magic, and the magic system of the story in general. We had plenty of conversations with the author of the Wingfeather books about this, with my main takeaway being that spellcasting is really a metaphor for making good art, which I think is lovely, and also charmingly hard to define. The author, Andrew, voices one of the characters in the show, and fans have enjoyed the moment where he’s literally explaining to his own characters how the magic in the story works.
The episode is our calm-before-the-storm episode, with lots of opportunity for nice homely vignettes in Kimera juxtaposed against Kalmar’s decent, where we got to try out some really surreal visuals. I liked getting the chance to try an “alternate history” opening scene and I hope it was disorienting in just the right way! The board artists did a great job bringing these scenes to life, and Luke Pasca’s drawings (made as if they were from Kalmar’s hand) of the Wingfeather family are so heartbreaking.
I haven’t even mentioned the long-awaited finale scene of the episode, boarded by Tamal Hanley. That moment makes the whole episode worth it, but I’m pleased we were able to support that moment with additional character explorations, and of course, more time for Maraly to shine too. :) I’m pleased by how many people have said it’s their favorite episode of the season. I expect that to change the second they see our incredible fourth episode (which is my favorite episode of the season), but I’m grateful to have had my network streaming debut on this show, thankful to Chris to have given me a chance, and proud of the team for making it look so good!! Y’all rock! :)
-dh
(a small segment of one of my favorite scenes from the ep, boarded by Gabriele Derosas)
Heard about this animated series recently. Seems to be an awesome story to be shared with and along kids.
Real awesome to have worked on it. GL ahead!