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After the comic
books, Virtex was to find new life as a series of animated “webisodes”
at the fast-growing pop culture portal ActionAce.com.
ActionAce.com
had set up a new channel on its website called NeoGlyphix
– a section for original animated content with new and licensed
characters. VIRTEX was to
be the first of the series developed, targeting ActionAce.com’s core audience of anime, comic, and action
figure fans.
Casey Lau would
serve as Executive Producer and Jeff Kwan would lead a team of animators
and artists working in Macromedia’s Flash and USAnimation’s
ToonBoom animation software to develop the four part “Queen
of the Dead” animated series. This would basically
pick up the story where it had left off in the comic book series
and have VIRTEX confront
the next outlaw – the deadly walking corpse Harvester.
The NeoGlyphix
team worked round the clock to launch the first episode in early
February 2000 and ran all 4 episodes in a weekly format. At the
time web animation was in its early stages and a lot of kinks had
to be worked out. For better or worse, it was Lau’s decision
to make the series an “animated comic,” opting for “word balloons” instead of actors’ voices.
The argument back then was that it would be easier to translate
into different languages – ActionAce.com members hailed from many
different countries – and to continue to treat Virtex as a comic rather than a cartoon.
We have archived all
four episodes here for you to watch – as well as the JCBlink.net
site. You must have the Flash player plug-in to view.
These episodes
are considered canon in the Virtex saga and, while not planned as
the next arc in the comic book, they, with the addition of a bit more meat in the subplots and information on Arkimet and the JCB, would have most likely been
the third arc. Because of the obvious constraints of the
format we left them out and went for a more action-packed story.
WARNING: Since
these were created in the early days of Flash, you may notice slow
transitions between scenes. We call it "chugging" - like
a steamboat would chug across the river. Please accept opur apologies.
Jeff Kwan recalls some interesting background information
on these episodes:
QUEEN
OF THE DEAD: PART ONE
Watch Part One | Download
Flash Player
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INSIGHT
FROM STORYWRITER/PRODUCER JEFF KWAN
Harvester was actually based on a serial killer I read about who, for some inexplicable reason, ran around slicing people open and surgically removing one – and only one – of their internal organs. I always wondered what he was using them for, and held out a secret hope that it was for something really cool. Originally, Harv was designed to be hot – as opposed to the desiccated corpse you see today – until, of course, Casey sewed her mouth shut. Hidden away somewhere safe where no one will ever see it, is the very very first, very very bad character sketch I drew of her...
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INSIGHT
FROM STORYWRITER/PRODUCER JEFF KWAN
The two girls, affectionately called Girl1 and Girl2, entertaining the Bar Code man – who, incidentally, bears an uncanny resemblance to Flash Animator Elvin DeGuzman – are an homage to Meaghan and Nicole, two striking young women who very generously helped us out with our extremely demanding storyboard meetings at 650 Howard Street. Unfortunately for our audience, the most interesting parts of their anatomy – lovingly animated by Rob and Joe Sharp – lie beneath the episode's black “widescreen” bars...
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INSIGHT
FROM STORYWRITER/PRODUCER JEFF KWAN
Back in the ActionAce days, five would hit the clock and we would hit the bottle. I had intended Harvester to have one of those little girly backpacks – shaped like a scarab – out of which little wings would pop out that she could use to fly. I imagine that it was one of those days when Casey was handing out beers that the part of my brain that remembered that became preserved with booze. I've always hated those little packs anyway, and have added that to the list of reasons why it's okay to abuse liquor.
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INSIGHT
FROM STORYWRITER/PRODUCER JEFF KWAN
I think one of the most often asked questions about “Queen of the Dead” is “why did you kill the little kid?!?” Actually, the first cut of the episode ended quite happily, with little Frank keeping his retarded little skull intact, but the night before we went live, our Animation Director Joel Reid put together a new scene that Flash Animator Marcel Trenchard slipped in at the last minute. Sometimes I justify the new ending with the explanation of Virtex testing the limits of a world he is beginning to suspect is not real, but most of the time it's because we knew the Greybeards were going to hang Neo out to dry. Had everything not hit the fan, I had a special story lined up (“In the Shadow of Gemini”) about the Templar Twins, where we would have had the very satisfying opportunity to kill off the redheaded scourge of NeoGlyphix's production process – if you ever meet Flash Artist Cesar the Pleaser, ask him to do an impression of her. Even though it never got to the screen, I like to think she can be found in eStudio's “I Want a Fat Babe...”
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The story
does not end there, because of the time taking to produce the
above episodes, ActionAce.com mangement required the Neoglyphix
team to create a stop-gap for the public to see as a prelude
to what was to be expected from the Neoglyphix division. Jeff
Kwan came up with a three-part prologue that featured the origins
of JCB Director Arkimet as a simple slide-show that set the
stage for the upcoming animated show. It is quite an interesting
read to learn the detail we developed on the backstory for Arkimet
that although not necessary to the Virtex story is an interesting
supplement to the above epsiodes.
INSIGHT
FROM STORYWRITER/PRODUCER JEFF KWAN
In the beginning, the Virtex Files were going to be voiced over. Casey, to my horror, wanted me to do the voice acting. I think the first part was even recorded. I will go to my grave a very happy man if no human ears ever hear that audio... Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure I remember our Production Animators John Watkins-Chow and TeeJay Frias quite enjoying listening to me as Arkimet. I really hope the "I Love You" virus wiped that MP3 out of existence...
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THE
JUSTICE CYCLE BUREAU: ONLINE DATABASE
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doesn't end there - a special JCB weblink was created as an
online database for readers to log-in and keep track of all
the outlaws Virtex was hunting and to build a community where
viewers could also enlist as a JCB agent thus developing an
online following that was to then branch into online gaming
and to really create a pseudo-reality to the Virtex world. A
fun piece of flash work that is archived here for you to enjoy.
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