Speaker 1: Hey Christie, Hey will I don't often tell people this,
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna say it to you. You're a vision
Speaker 1: in pink. I don't know what else to tell you.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, you're a vision in pink. Some people
Speaker 1: can't pull off pink and think, well, black works for everybody.
Speaker 1: Pink doesn't work for everybody, but black works for you. Well,
Speaker 1: because you're Batman. So oh, I thought you're going to say,
Speaker 1: because you're fat, and we want to make sure that
Speaker 1: you don't look too big, so we we cover you
Speaker 1: in black. You are not. It's very sweet though for
Speaker 1: you to not think that. But you are your vision
Speaker 1: in pink. That's all I have to say. That's hashtag.
Speaker 1: You know you pop? You pop, Christie. That's what it is.
Speaker 1: One needs to pop. I'm very excited for today's guests
Speaker 1: because we have a serious history with today's guests, don't we. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Steve Loader, he is a huge animation director. In his
Speaker 1: titles include Kim Possible. As of season two, he really
Speaker 1: saw so much of Kim Possible, like growth that we're
Speaker 1: going to chat with him all about just It's a
Speaker 1: reunion of sorts, isn't it? Yeah? It is? And the
Speaker 1: thing that's cool is and you really brought this up.
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you did. During the interview about everyone's
Speaker 1: gonna be like but we had the director, you know,
Speaker 1: Lisa Shaeffer came on. It's like, no, no, no no, there's
Speaker 1: multiple directors that are involved in an animation project, and
Speaker 1: so I was really glad that you you brought that
Speaker 1: up because there's a big difference we did. Steve was
Speaker 1: a director and Lisa was a director. Two completely different
Speaker 1: jobs but really interesting in both amazingly necessary. So I
Speaker 1: was very excited to talk to Steve. It's a cool episode,
Speaker 1: it really is. So everybody, Steve Loder, stay, how are
Speaker 1: you well? How are you guys doing? I was fine
Speaker 1: until my computer decided to not be good anymore. Um Man,
Speaker 1: computers are the worst. Terminator is a thing that could happen.
Speaker 1: I don't like any of it. You don't trust it.
Speaker 1: He doesn't trust that. I don't. I don't. I've been
Speaker 1: watching alone, and I think that's the way to go.
Speaker 1: The more I'm thinking about it, Loan, is that is
Speaker 1: that is that contest where you go out in the
Speaker 1: middle of the woods and try to live right? Yeah,
Speaker 1: watched that. We watched that. Yeah, my my my wife.
Speaker 1: My wife jokes that I would tap out on the
Speaker 1: boat ride there one thousand percent thousand. I think that
Speaker 1: if you haven't seen it, Steve, it is a really
Speaker 1: great show. But it's also you get to root for
Speaker 1: people to like, Who's who are you rooting for? On alone?
Speaker 1: I'm rooting for the mostly for the animals, but that's
Speaker 1: just me. How are you, Steve? Thank you, Welcome to
Speaker 1: the show. This is awesome. Yeah, I'm honored to be
Speaker 1: his is incredible. We're so excited to have you here
Speaker 1: because we have quite a hist Can you remember the
Speaker 1: first time that we all work together? Was it two
Speaker 1: thousand two? Yeah, somewhere in that zone. Yeah, so twenty
Speaker 1: so we're twenty years Oh yeah, definitely. Yeah. We should
Speaker 1: probably introduce Steve, shouldn't we? I'm sorry, should be and Steve.
Speaker 1: We are so happy to have Steve Loder here with us,
Speaker 1: who's a director and a producer of animation, of all
Speaker 1: types of animation. But really it should be most known
Speaker 1: for Kim Possible, because that's where we know him from.
Speaker 1: So that's really the only world we need to talk about.
Speaker 1: But that's actually not true because we're talking American Dragging,
Speaker 1: Jake Long, Brandy and Mr Whiskers, the Tinkerbell film series,
Speaker 1: The Ghost and Molly McGee Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur,
Speaker 1: which is both upcoming that's February three. We'll get into
Speaker 1: all of that kind of stuff. But let's be honest, Steve.
Speaker 1: It's Kim Possible, That's what we're talking about. Kim Possible
Speaker 1: has been in my life, not only during production but
Speaker 1: even past it. Um, because I'm I'm a comic book geek,
Speaker 1: I'm a film nerd, so I go to the conventions
Speaker 1: a lot. There's always a Kim cost player, always, always right,
Speaker 1: always yeah. And it's amazing because yeah, it's it's the
Speaker 1: legacy just continues. I mean it really people really love
Speaker 1: the show and it's just really wonderful feeling. How did
Speaker 1: you get involved with it? Yeah? You know. The funny
Speaker 1: thing is I joined second season, um, and since then,
Speaker 1: I've I've done fifty plus episodes of Kim I think
Speaker 1: I've expised Mark and Bob. I think I've probably been
Speaker 1: on at the longest and you guys, so yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's it's been an amazing ride. But yeah, it was
Speaker 1: slightly intimidating kind of coming on board because the reputation
Speaker 1: was already there, the fandom was already starting to build.
Speaker 1: So it was a little intimidating, but it was what
Speaker 1: a what a marvelous feeling to, you know, to to
Speaker 1: work on this amazing show. Well, now see, but let's
Speaker 1: talk about like your exact job too, because we had
Speaker 1: Lisa Shaper talk to us a lot in studio and
Speaker 1: then what exactly is it that you then did for
Speaker 1: people to understand how you direct an animated show? Yeah, so,
Speaker 1: so pretty much director of animated show is it's kind
Speaker 1: of involved in the beginning. So we, uh, we look
Speaker 1: at this scripts. You read the scripts that that Mark
Speaker 1: and Bob and his writing team we're putting out Mark
Speaker 1: McCorkle and Bob school E, the creators of the show,
Speaker 1: and um, we get an early idea of kind of
Speaker 1: the visuals and the timing and the pace and some
Speaker 1: of the designs and some of the backgrounds. We start
Speaker 1: to figure out the visuals of it. Um. And then
Speaker 1: as we're starting to figure that out, we usually attend
Speaker 1: the records that leads a Shafer is directing, which is
Speaker 1: where you guys are doing an amazing job and the
Speaker 1: thing that's that's great about going to the records is
Speaker 1: we're listening for um peaks and values, because when you
Speaker 1: animate a character, you really want to have a character
Speaker 1: that has these kind of like just kind of peaks
Speaker 1: in their voice and then it drops down. And because
Speaker 1: that's really kind of where we anchor our drawings too,
Speaker 1: that's where the expressions change or they the head gets bigger,
Speaker 1: the body arcs back, or the body reduces down. So
Speaker 1: we really look for kind of those highs and lows
Speaker 1: in the voice because we really like latch onto them. Okay,
Speaker 1: And so peaks and valleys. Will has talked about the
Speaker 1: fact that by season four, I guess um Ron was
Speaker 1: so peaky. Did that change not a lot of valleys.
Speaker 1: It's honestly, it was great because when you have when
Speaker 1: you have a voice that's kind of that that peaked
Speaker 1: or that that kinectic um, you animate to that. And
Speaker 1: Ron kind of got if you look at the scenes
Speaker 1: went on, he got a little more animated physical, which
Speaker 1: was great because it provided great contrast for Kim, who
Speaker 1: was very collected and calm. So it just it was
Speaker 1: a really great visual you know, to to animate to. Actually, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that Ron did get more and more like
Speaker 1: a storylines as we as we progress, and he became
Speaker 1: much more active during missions. Do you remember that? Oh yeah, definitely, Yeah, certainly.
Speaker 1: I mean in season three, I think it's really where
Speaker 1: it started to kind of pop, because, yeah, in season
Speaker 1: two there was a couple of moments where trying to
Speaker 1: bring him into the missions, but it was always a failure.
Speaker 1: But it felt like in season three with Exchange and
Speaker 1: the monkey Fist powers and it really started. And also
Speaker 1: by the end of season three, we did so the drama,
Speaker 1: so we had to be rawn leveled up to a
Speaker 1: place that it really felt like, Okay, he could kind
Speaker 1: of hold his own in a situation. Well, your first
Speaker 1: episode ever was a run episode. The first episode you
Speaker 1: did was the Wrong Factor, Right, Wrong Factor? That's right? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that was that was that was an interesting episode
Speaker 1: because that was that was them trying to find a
Speaker 1: new purpose for Ron. Uh So, which episode was? What?
Speaker 1: What was the log line on this one? Ron Stop?
Speaker 1: It was awesome film at eleven that yeah, And and
Speaker 1: that was the the Agents of Shield group from Impossible
Speaker 1: his name I cannot remember. At this particular moment, they
Speaker 1: had they had interest in Ron and so they were
Speaker 1: going to kind of enlist him for that. And you
Speaker 1: know what's what's what makes the Ron factor so special?
Speaker 1: So that was yeah, kind of what the episode was about.
Speaker 1: The one makes special is this partnership with Kim. Honestly. So,
Speaker 1: so wait, let me ask this because we always, Christie,
Speaker 1: we always do this. We always jump in the middle
Speaker 1: and then we jumped to the end and then we jump.
Speaker 1: How when's the first time you remember hearing the words
Speaker 1: Kim Possible? Um? Okay, this is an interesting story. Um. So,
Speaker 1: most the genesis of Kim Possible actually started on an
Speaker 1: animating series called Clerks, the animated series Kevin Smith's series.
Speaker 1: Here's here's why. It had the entire team on that
Speaker 1: show except for Mark and Bob. So pretty much every
Speaker 1: single person that worked on Kim Possible worked on that
Speaker 1: show in Steve Silver, Chris Bailey, myself, Nick Philippi, and
Speaker 1: the Ice everybody, and so we kind of formed the
Speaker 1: look of Kim at least partially on that show. So
Speaker 1: that when Kim Possible kind of was starting to kind
Speaker 1: of bubble to the surface and we kind of started
Speaker 1: to hear about it, it was kind of like almost
Speaker 1: trans finding that entire team onto Kim. So it was
Speaker 1: it was an unusual experience because it was it was
Speaker 1: a type of thing where at that time at t
Speaker 1: v A, there was a lot of kind of um
Speaker 1: kids in school kind of shows going on, and this
Speaker 1: one was kind of a spin on that. And also,
Speaker 1: um what was great about hearing about this initially is
Speaker 1: it was a female empowerment story, which is usual because
Speaker 1: at that time I think you had Buffy the Vampire
Speaker 1: Slayer and maybe Xena, but there wasn't a lot of
Speaker 1: strong female protagonists. Ye power Puff Girls Puff animated, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: so it was an exciting project to even hear about
Speaker 1: to say, oh, this is really going to kind of
Speaker 1: move the needle. So you're essentially saying that Kim and
Speaker 1: Ron were originally Jay and Silent Bomb. Yeah, was transition
Speaker 1: in a way. You're definitely J then in that relationship.
Speaker 1: I would imagine that would be that was probably accurate.
Speaker 1: Oh that's so funny. That is so funny. When did
Speaker 1: Bob and Mark come in there? Yeah? When did When
Speaker 1: did so? When did they kind of the whole team
Speaker 1: get put together for the first time? Because they pitched it.
Speaker 1: I remember they said they pitched it in in in
Speaker 1: the in the elevator going up to Gary Marsha's office,
Speaker 1: they were like, they came up with it, and yeah,
Speaker 1: she can do anything. He's run stoppable, he can't. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like a lightning. I mean that that's what. What a moment,
Speaker 1: just a creative moment to just get that level of inspiration. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was. It's it kind of I think, you know,
Speaker 1: as as animation um goes through development process, it usually
Speaker 1: kind of sticks with the show creators and the writers
Speaker 1: just for a little bit of time, so as they
Speaker 1: start to write out kind of longer log lines of
Speaker 1: the characters and who the characters are and things like that.
Speaker 1: So there was probably a period of time spent of
Speaker 1: Mark and Bob just kind of isolated working on that.
Speaker 1: But then probably right as Clerks was ending and there
Speaker 1: was an opportunity to start to go into another production,
Speaker 1: it just looked like, well, here's a seasoned crew that's
Speaker 1: ready to just kind of jump into a show. And
Speaker 1: and and also it was great because a lot of
Speaker 1: the people had um experience on different types of show
Speaker 1: other than Clark's. We had, you know, the kids stuff
Speaker 1: we were doing for Disney, but a lot of them
Speaker 1: had adult animated experience here and there said it really
Speaker 1: just kind of made it made Kimpossibles kind of elevated
Speaker 1: the quality of show. Oh my gosh, I mean, it's
Speaker 1: so interesting to me in retrospect how many other shows
Speaker 1: almost pirated the look of that animation. So like after
Speaker 1: Kim Possible came out, there was these commercials for Assurance
Speaker 1: and oh yeah, I was like, you've got to be
Speaker 1: kidding me. Pink hair, she's got a communicator, Like she's
Speaker 1: still flipping in, like flipping in and out. The direction
Speaker 1: of it was very clearly ripping off of Steve and
Speaker 1: Well it involved they even those commercials even involved because
Speaker 1: we we kind of for a moment in season three,
Speaker 1: we gave Kim the super suit that right with the glow. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then they I think they did that in the
Speaker 1: commercial too. She did have a suit. I know, I
Speaker 1: was watching it fuming, and I was like, nowadays, I
Speaker 1: think Disney would probably actually go after something like that
Speaker 1: for for new But I will say, I will say,
Speaker 1: what was it like using new technology directing with this
Speaker 1: with the robots that we had in the movie? Um,
Speaker 1: which movie was that that we had the robots? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was that was the It was the first time
Speaker 1: the studio had been introduced to CG and it was
Speaker 1: kind of done out of necessity because we knew that
Speaker 1: there was going to be armies of these characters and
Speaker 1: it's really just at that certainly at that time it
Speaker 1: was really hard to draw just the pencil mileage alone.
Speaker 1: So we came up with the system of Okay, how
Speaker 1: are we are we going to do this? And it
Speaker 1: was it was a learning curve. Nowadays CG super easy
Speaker 1: could do it at home, but then it was it
Speaker 1: was pretty tough. Wow. Interesting you you laid the two
Speaker 1: D animation that you guys were doing, and then you
Speaker 1: did it almost like there was a temp non existent background,
Speaker 1: so that inlaid the CG robots and at the time
Speaker 1: of doing that, it was very I mean because we're
Speaker 1: talking to Ago total and then right and then we
Speaker 1: had to um, we were called rotoscope. We had to
Speaker 1: kind of take the CG model because we had to
Speaker 1: put it then in our lines, so it had to
Speaker 1: look like it was drawn so that it mixed with
Speaker 1: the characters. And I remember the crazy thing about that
Speaker 1: was you had the giant robots and that's okay because
Speaker 1: they're big, and they take up a lot of space
Speaker 1: on a frame. But there was moments where it was
Speaker 1: the tiny robot and Ron was holding the time like
Speaker 1: interaction of that you know scope. So that was Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was tricky, but it's a lot of fun. I
Speaker 1: mean it was. It really felt like we were leveling
Speaker 1: up the show. I mean, so the drama is easily
Speaker 1: my favorite. Kimpossible uh project. It was great. It was
Speaker 1: really good. Yeah, Steve, As much as we go down
Speaker 1: memory lane, we also like to talk about just how
Speaker 1: talented you are and that you you've continued to work
Speaker 1: with you know, with Disney and well, wait before we
Speaker 1: go forward, I want to go back. I want to
Speaker 1: go back here. Yeah, exactly, you said. You you know,
Speaker 1: you're a comic book nerd and everything, A big nerd myself.
Speaker 1: So it is animation something you always wanted to do?
Speaker 1: Or did you? Or you did you originally want to
Speaker 1: be a filmmaker? What like, what were your plans when
Speaker 1: you got into this industry? It was definitely cartooning? Um,
Speaker 1: I mean, because the thing is, I how I got
Speaker 1: into the business is, um, there was a Disney artist
Speaker 1: drawing for kids at a shopping mall, like in New
Speaker 1: Jersey and so me and my brother, who's also an artist,
Speaker 1: we went out, you know, to see this guy and
Speaker 1: we showed him our drawings and he's like, yeah, these
Speaker 1: are great, why don't you work for us? And it
Speaker 1: was so straight up. So I worked for Disney straight
Speaker 1: out high school. It was for consumer products, was doing
Speaker 1: drawings for You were found at a mall. You were
Speaker 1: found at a mall by somebody who works for Disney,
Speaker 1: and you started working right out of high school for Disney. Kidding, yeah,
Speaker 1: day after high school. So they after graduated, boom right
Speaker 1: right right into the Disney UM and go back east
Speaker 1: or did you move out here? It was back east
Speaker 1: at that time. Yeah, so I was doing that UM
Speaker 1: and then being back east, I had the opportunity I
Speaker 1: did some work for Jim Henson, which was a lot
Speaker 1: of fun, non Disney, non Disney Jim now Disneys and
Speaker 1: everything Disney. UM. But yeah, we did some work for
Speaker 1: Jim Henson at the time. But the thing that kind
Speaker 1: of pulled me into animation is I saw the pilot
Speaker 1: for a show called Renn and Stimpy. Yeah, yeah, the
Speaker 1: Lightning Bolt, and yeah I had to work on that,
Speaker 1: and so yeah, I moved out to l A. I
Speaker 1: didn't know anybody out here. Uh, found the studio, found
Speaker 1: a department close by, and and got the gig. And
Speaker 1: not with your brother. You and your brother kind of split.
Speaker 1: He came. He came later. He's he actually does um
Speaker 1: book illustrations for Disney, so illustrated animator guy. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's so. Was it was this Nickelodeon was in Burbank
Speaker 1: at the time. Did you move to Burbank? Is that
Speaker 1: what you just did? Yeah? Yeah. Actually it's funny because
Speaker 1: they put Renist to be in a separate building, so Nickelodeon.
Speaker 1: You had all the fun stuff going on Nickelodeon, and
Speaker 1: I guess they kind of knew and they said, we're
Speaker 1: gonna put Rendist to be in a different building five
Speaker 1: miles away, which won't be fun at all. You're in
Speaker 1: the warehouse. Yeah, basically, but you know what it was.
Speaker 1: It was kind of good because it was a pretty
Speaker 1: rebellious crew. It was a pretty eccentric crew, So that
Speaker 1: was it was a fun experience. It was a challenging experience. Um,
Speaker 1: my first gig, and it was a challenging show. Um,
Speaker 1: but you know, since then, my my resume is all
Speaker 1: over the map. I've done some more adult stuff. I
Speaker 1: did a show called Duckman, I did preschool stuff. Thinking
Speaker 1: Clubhouse a little bit um, yes, but but honestly, it's
Speaker 1: impossible that it is always the one that people want
Speaker 1: to reminiscent talk about, which I'm more than happy to
Speaker 1: talk about. It's such an important part of my life.
Speaker 1: I'm looking at a picture of all of us right now.
Speaker 1: We all look so young. We're posting that on our
Speaker 1: on our Instagram. I have a shirt that's literally still
Speaker 1: out of print. He says. Everyone loves an Italian girl.
Speaker 1: You look like you just went to a Rusted Root concert.
Speaker 1: I remember that picture. I remember that picture. That was
Speaker 1: last record, I think, and it was like we never
Speaker 1: got to really see each other in person, So I
Speaker 1: do think if it was our last record, I think
Speaker 1: I remember being like, this is sad that this is
Speaker 1: our last recording, and that this is the only time
Speaker 1: I got to hang with Will. Yeah, we didn't see
Speaker 1: We didn't get to really hang out much. No. No,
Speaker 1: I was in New York. You were learning, you were
Speaker 1: at college learning. Yes, yeah, it should be twelve years
Speaker 1: of finished. I should have just deleted. I guess see
Speaker 1: Steve and I are both smart. We went right from
Speaker 1: high school to work. We decided to go to school
Speaker 1: bills exactly. So Steve, if Kim comes ever comes back,
Speaker 1: like if we were ever, if that ever happened, what
Speaker 1: would you want for Kim? Like, who do you get Kim?
Speaker 1: Does Kim need to grow? Does she need to like
Speaker 1: be a different person, and does she need to be
Speaker 1: more modern an adult? Is she a kid? Like? That's
Speaker 1: what I would if if like, if we're going to
Speaker 1: bring her back, would you pick would you bring her
Speaker 1: back right where we started, where they're in high school still,
Speaker 1: would they be in college? Would they be adults now? Like?
Speaker 1: What would I'm curious where you'd go with it? Well,
Speaker 1: it always when we finished Kim in season four, Um,
Speaker 1: I think we're all a little burnt out at that time.
Speaker 1: And we've worked on the show for it for a
Speaker 1: long long time, but we always felt that there was
Speaker 1: more stories to tell than we always kind of hoped
Speaker 1: that we were going to pick it up after a
Speaker 1: short break or a short vacation, So it was always
Speaker 1: in the back of our minds. And I remember, you know,
Speaker 1: over years, you know, I'd run into Mark and Bob
Speaker 1: and we just kind of joke about, oh, maybe it
Speaker 1: would be this, or maybe it would be this, and
Speaker 1: it just depended on the on the particular moment of
Speaker 1: this is this is the future for for Kim and Ron.
Speaker 1: There was one thing that was interesting on was it
Speaker 1: the sitch in time or maybe the sort the drama
Speaker 1: DVD release. I had to do some art where it
Speaker 1: was like you show Kim and Ron as they get
Speaker 1: older and younger and that kind of thing, and I
Speaker 1: did drawings for that, and the drawings that I did
Speaker 1: for adults Kim and Ron I thought were the best drawings,
Speaker 1: and they decided not to use them, but they decided
Speaker 1: to use the old versions of Kim and Ron. And
Speaker 1: what was kind of sad about that is it was
Speaker 1: kind of a joke because we made Kim and she
Speaker 1: was like an agent of of Shield or whatever that
Speaker 1: you and but but here's the thing, we we we
Speaker 1: we we did it so that again this was a joke.
Speaker 1: We did it so that she looked like doctor Director,
Speaker 1: so she had the I patching and kind of overweight
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. And what was what was terrible
Speaker 1: about it was it only worked and you saw the
Speaker 1: adult versions of them, which were sleek and they were fit,
Speaker 1: and they were fighters and and so the audience missed
Speaker 1: the good middle part and that and man, they did
Speaker 1: not like it. Wow, jumped right to it. Yeah, this
Speaker 1: is well. I mean this is also at the time
Speaker 1: what the the Internet was kind of in its infancy
Speaker 1: at the time, so we were learning was not really
Speaker 1: but starting to get you know, feedback and stuff like
Speaker 1: that that was instantaneous. Was it was an entirely new thing. Um. Okay,
Speaker 1: so now we're now we can jump ahead to what
Speaker 1: you're working on now because you're working on a bunch
Speaker 1: of different stuff, right, yeah, yeah, the So yeah, so
Speaker 1: we have The Ghost and Molly McGhee, which is a
Speaker 1: really great show. Um, it's currently on air. I got
Speaker 1: Ashley Birch and Dana Snyder are doing the voices on that.
Speaker 1: They're incredible. Their chemistry is incredible. Um. And then coming
Speaker 1: soon coming on February ten on the Channel and coming
Speaker 1: up thereafter is Marvel's Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur. Um.
Speaker 1: And this is this is an interesting project. This is
Speaker 1: the first collaboration between Marvel and Disney TV Animation. That's awesome.
Speaker 1: That's kind of like what KP KP was the first
Speaker 1: collaboration with Walt Disney Studios and Disney so I like,
Speaker 1: I like being at the first of the Yeah, of course,
Speaker 1: of course. And it's a great show. It follows the
Speaker 1: adventures of Lunella Lafayette, who is one of the smartest
Speaker 1: characters in the Marvel universe. She's a thirteen year old
Speaker 1: super genius. She creates a portal which accidentally brings a
Speaker 1: giant red dinosaur into New York's lowery Side. And of course,
Speaker 1: when you have a giant red dinosaur, you know with
Speaker 1: you you partner with him to fight crime on the
Speaker 1: New York City. And that's my daughters are going to
Speaker 1: love this show. Like I cannot tell you how much
Speaker 1: my daughter is gonna be upset. And I'm so happy
Speaker 1: to know that you're behind that. That makes me so happy.
Speaker 1: It's a great show. And our cast is amazing. We
Speaker 1: have Diamond Whitely, bee Be Rare uh Fred Taishore is
Speaker 1: friend of the show. Yeah, um, And Lawrence Fishburne is
Speaker 1: a executive producer on the show. Is Holly Robinson Pete
Speaker 1: and Andy Cohen. And I mean there's a whole bunch
Speaker 1: of method man. I mean there's a whole bunch of
Speaker 1: people involved. Right, So you're so lucky, Like, I love
Speaker 1: seeing that you you're still doing that thing with where
Speaker 1: we had with Kim possibly so many amazing cameos. I think.
Speaker 1: I think it's a lot of fun when you can
Speaker 1: drop people in, don't you, Steve. It's totally because you
Speaker 1: get you get a different flavor. And and what's great
Speaker 1: is sometimes when you bring in kind of new voices
Speaker 1: and stuff like that, it just kind of shakes everything
Speaker 1: up just a little bit. Every everyone has to, you know,
Speaker 1: adjust to that new energy. And it really because all
Speaker 1: we're looking for on the voice tracks is, of course
Speaker 1: you're brilliant performances that elevate the animation and make our
Speaker 1: lives like, oh we really punch out drawings this and
Speaker 1: really make this exciting and move the camera around because
Speaker 1: everything is just so kinetic and popping with the motivated. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: I see. So the motivation for you to create the
Speaker 1: actual animation sort of comes from the the the spirit,
Speaker 1: the energy of our performances. I never really realized that
Speaker 1: that's where the vitality of animation comes from. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's the right, I'm human in that place, but it's
Speaker 1: the performance, that that we get from the voice actors,
Speaker 1: that that that turns it to life and how we
Speaker 1: start imagining what the animation looks like based off of that.
Speaker 1: Is that why you guys put the video camera to
Speaker 1: watch us before you started animating the pilot? Totally? Oh? Absolutely,
Speaker 1: And we would try to film as much as possible.
Speaker 1: That's actually why. I mean, I couldn't come to every session,
Speaker 1: but I try to try to come to as many
Speaker 1: things as I can because we watch you. We'd see
Speaker 1: some of the expressions that you guys would make, and
Speaker 1: we kind of doodle it, you know, on our scripts
Speaker 1: to go, okay, this for this, I remember this for
Speaker 1: that because yeah, we're looking at you know, at your
Speaker 1: whole performance. It's not just your voice. It's like we're
Speaker 1: keying in on on on facial movements and body language
Speaker 1: and everything. Oh yeah, Christy and I are very ying
Speaker 1: yang in that we She always seems to like to
Speaker 1: talk about the future and I always seemed to like
Speaker 1: to talk about the past. Who knows why. But wait,
Speaker 1: so you when you when you were getting into this,
Speaker 1: not even as a kid, what were your favorite animated
Speaker 1: series growing up? Like? What were you? What were you
Speaker 1: couldn't miss what was your couldn't miss animated Joe wow Um,
Speaker 1: I gotta admit I I was. I was living in
Speaker 1: New York, so I think we had we had more
Speaker 1: exposure to interesting and unique and rare animation than we
Speaker 1: would have in a lot of other places. So there
Speaker 1: was kind of an early introduction to the works of Miyazaki.
Speaker 1: Soto was, Yeah, that was a big film for me. Um.
Speaker 1: There was a film called Castle Cagliostro which is looping
Speaker 1: the third so so it was kind of things like that.
Speaker 1: But of course Uh tex savery uh cartoons and the
Speaker 1: Bugs Bunny stuff that was done by Bob Clampett and
Speaker 1: Chuck Jones. So it was a lot of that earlier
Speaker 1: because what was you had that stuff when you would
Speaker 1: come home from school, it would be on TV. They
Speaker 1: would they would rerun all of the Warner Brothers cartoons.
Speaker 1: The Disney stuff you had to kind of get on tape.
Speaker 1: They didn't really there wasn't really an outlet to see
Speaker 1: the Disney stuff. But so there was a constant exposure
Speaker 1: to kind of the animation that was done in the
Speaker 1: in the fifties and fors and fifties, and I think
Speaker 1: that also kind of found its way into impossible. I
Speaker 1: think that the the art sensibility of styling, certainly the
Speaker 1: backgrounds and the very much the backgrounds. The background, I mean,
Speaker 1: there's almost something and this is it's a it's a
Speaker 1: weird kind of correlation. But I always thought there was
Speaker 1: something almost flint Stones esque about the background of MS.
Speaker 1: It was very very cool. And so were you. Also
Speaker 1: you talk about Mirazaka, you also like an Akira fan.
Speaker 1: Did you go through your Cura phase and all all
Speaker 1: the classic enemy Akira ghost in Michelle Ya, all that
Speaker 1: stuff that just kind of showed up, you know in
Speaker 1: New York was and it was we were all exchanging
Speaker 1: tapes because at that time it was it was like
Speaker 1: either poorly dubbed or poorly Yeah, so that was the
Speaker 1: only wow. That's so that's so fascinating because when you
Speaker 1: think about it, with Disney, their i P is is
Speaker 1: making their i p accessible to everyone was probably a
Speaker 1: lot harder to justify back then with the way that
Speaker 1: people were making their money. Um, and now it's accessible
Speaker 1: to everyone because everything is streaming. So I can only
Speaker 1: think about how fast the learning curve will be for
Speaker 1: like a young version of you now, Steve, like, who
Speaker 1: is this? Do you mentor? Do you mentor like younger animators?
Speaker 1: How does that work? Do? Yeah? Do that? At the studio? Um,
Speaker 1: we we we bring up a lot a lot of
Speaker 1: people that are either just kind of coming into the
Speaker 1: industry maybe their interns and they're trying to figure stuff out,
Speaker 1: and so yeah, like I've done a number of mentoring
Speaker 1: projects over the past year in particular because yeah, look, ultimately,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm going to retire at some point soon
Speaker 1: and you're not not yet. Okay, I want you know,
Speaker 1: I want to be able to enjoy you know, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna sit back TV, so you get to enjoy nothing.
Speaker 1: You have stuff to do still, Steve, you get to
Speaker 1: enjoy nothing. Yeah, but I want the next generation there,
Speaker 1: I want. I want to enjoy their work. So yeah,
Speaker 1: of course I want. I hope as much as I
Speaker 1: can absolutely that. Yeah, we got to we got to
Speaker 1: see you briefly at D twenty three, but we we
Speaker 1: got to meet your son. Does your son? Um? Does he?
Speaker 1: My son Nico wants to be a voice actor, Okay
Speaker 1: in our contest contest, he's pretty great. Um, I got him.
Speaker 1: I got him a spot on Moon Girl. So he
Speaker 1: had his kind of his first taste of voice acting
Speaker 1: in the studio, which was great. But yeah, that's something
Speaker 1: he loves to do. He does a lot of the
Speaker 1: dubbing on anime right now, okay for friends and stuff
Speaker 1: like that. But yeah, but yeah, but he loves animation.
Speaker 1: I think it was just it was part of the household.
Speaker 1: I mean, it was avoidable in a way. I guess
Speaker 1: it's a great it's a great household to grow up
Speaker 1: in when you're growing up around animation pen or a microphone.
Speaker 1: I guess it's like one of the other both. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's so well. Unfortunately, Steve, we've got you know,
Speaker 1: we have a heart out today, which stinks. But but no,
Speaker 1: we were we were so excited to get a chance
Speaker 1: to talk to you. And again everybody, uh don't forget
Speaker 1: we got Ghost and Molly McGee and moon Girl and
Speaker 1: Devil Dinosaur, which both sounds so great. The Moon Girl
Speaker 1: and Devil Dinosaur does sound like, uh, just the cool
Speaker 1: the coolest idea in the world. Fans of Kimpossible who
Speaker 1: will enjoy the show. It feels like a nice companion
Speaker 1: piece in a way. So yeah, this is the coolest
Speaker 1: thing in the world, and we hope we're not done yet,
Speaker 1: Steve with with whatever happens in the future, anything is
Speaker 1: possible for a possible. Yes, that would be so cool.
Speaker 1: Now can people if they which I'm sure they're gonna
Speaker 1: want it. They're gonna want to follow your career and
Speaker 1: everything you're doing. Do you have any socials people can
Speaker 1: follow you on? Yeah, I'm on Instagram and Twitter. Um
Speaker 1: it's at Steve Loder on so yeah, check it out.
Speaker 1: You guys, you for joining us. Kim Possible would not
Speaker 1: have been Kim Possible without without you involved and kind
Speaker 1: of helping to guide the ship. So now I appreciate that.
Speaker 1: But honestly, you know, you guys did a lot of
Speaker 1: have you lifting to make that show great? So all
Speaker 1: your work, that's very sweet. You just made Christie blush.
Speaker 1: Look at that, you just made Christie blush. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much Steve for joining us, and everybody please go
Speaker 1: watch all the new stuff and the older stuff because
Speaker 1: it's all it's just all good, it really is. It's
Speaker 1: all good and Steve is attached to it's good. So
Speaker 1: please come back too, because we have this conversation is
Speaker 1: not done yet. We have a lot left to talk about.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the past, Chris. He wants
Speaker 1: to talk about the future. But we've got a lot
Speaker 1: left to talk about. So if you can come back again,
Speaker 1: we'd really appreciate it absolutely anytime. Thank you so much, Steve.
Speaker 1: We'll talk to you again soon. Thank you. Bye. Oh
Speaker 1: that was so cool. Yeah, I hate that we have
Speaker 1: to cut it short, but we have to cut it short.
Speaker 1: What is he He's going to a booking or something, right,
Speaker 1: He's a busy man. He's a busy guy. And um, yeah,
Speaker 1: my something happens. I think this the room I'm in
Speaker 1: is destroyed in like fourteen minutes. The room is going
Speaker 1: to countdown? Does a countdown? Um? If we got it?
Speaker 1: But no, So yeah, everybody, go check out Ghost and
Speaker 1: Molly McGee and moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur of course
Speaker 1: is coming out February tent And that does sound like
Speaker 1: something that's going to be like your kids are gonna
Speaker 1: love that. That sounds that sounds awesome. So thank you
Speaker 1: everybody for joining us, and go check out Steve all
Speaker 1: the stuff he's done. You will not be disappointed. He's
Speaker 1: a phenomenal artist and a wonderful director and producer. Um,
Speaker 1: so go check out everything, and until then, don't forget.
Speaker 1: We're gonna be doing our super awesome contest to become
Speaker 1: the next big voice actor. It is real, people, it
Speaker 1: is true. It is happening and January nine through February nine,
Speaker 1: and you can submit all of you. It's gonna be
Speaker 1: a video. Can't be over two minutes. I hear voices
Speaker 1: at I heart radio dot com. Well, we really want
Speaker 1: to make sure that you, guys know where to submit
Speaker 1: your two minute long sort of audition tapes for us.
Speaker 1: Don't just just do it, guys. You know you're listening
Speaker 1: out there, if you're listening to the podcast, don't be scared.
Speaker 1: We're here to help you and get you a really
Speaker 1: great opportunity. Um we know you're out there listening. We
Speaker 1: have great fans and uh yeah, let's do this. Let's
Speaker 1: find somebody, right will Yeah. I agree. I can't wait.
Speaker 1: It's this is getting very exciting, so I can't wait.
Speaker 1: There's gonna be some cool stuff in the future. So
Speaker 1: thank you everybody for joining us. Don't forget to enter
Speaker 1: the contest. Don't submit early. By the way, we're getting
Speaker 1: told from our producers, do not submit early. We have
Speaker 1: to wait until January nine. Yeah, if you think you
Speaker 1: have what it takes to step up to the microphone,
Speaker 1: then put your voices where your mouth is. Thanks everybody.
Speaker 1: I Hear Voices as hosted by Wilfredell and Christy Carlson Romano.
Speaker 1: Executive produced by Wilfredel, Brendan Rooney, Amy Sugarman and Vicky
Speaker 1: Ernst Chang. Our executive in charge of production is Danielle Romo,
Speaker 1: Our producer is Lorraine Vera Wez and our editor slash
Speaker 1: engineer is Brian Burton. And that was my announcer voice.
Speaker 1: Some side effects of listening to I Hear Voices are
Speaker 1: sore abs from hilarity falling down the coco melon rabbit hole,
Speaker 1: sneezing due to mass nostalgia, and hugs. Follow I Hear
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Speaker 1: any of the amazing voices. Be sure to follow us
Speaker 1: on Instagram and TikTok at I Hear Voices podcast. You
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