Speaker 1: Hey, how's it going. You are listening to another episode
Speaker 1: of nerdive said, I'm your host if you wide away,
Speaker 1: and sitting night next to me as always is Danny Fernandez. Yes. Yes,
Speaker 1: and today we're talking about afro anime because you know
Speaker 1: what it is, what is about, and you know the
Speaker 1: things and inspirations and I'm I'm actually really excited about this.
Speaker 1: Uh you know, what do you know about afro anime, David?
Speaker 1: I mean, the first thing that comes to mind would
Speaker 1: be Boondocks. Um and our friend Lashawn Thomas worked on that.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah he sure did. Yeah he directed, and uh
Speaker 1: it was really interesting. We had him on an episode
Speaker 1: of krilling It our Old our old anime podcast, which
Speaker 1: was funny because I didn't know that he wasn't a
Speaker 1: Dragon ball Z fan. Do you remember that? If so,
Speaker 1: we I asked him to come on and right before
Speaker 1: we were or it was a live show on hyper RPG,
Speaker 1: and he was like, oh, by the way, um, I
Speaker 1: don't really like Dragon ball Z. Yeah. I was like,
Speaker 1: what why did you agree to be on our show?
Speaker 1: Is it? What? What do you what did you think
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about? Anyways? My favorite thing about
Speaker 1: that though, was that he brought up how so many
Speaker 1: we people argue about what's anime what's not anime? And
Speaker 1: he was like, no one has this argument in Japan
Speaker 1: where he works. He works in Japan, um and he
Speaker 1: was like, nobody has this argument there. We're just creating
Speaker 1: everybody's creators and we're just trying to create and nobody
Speaker 1: is arguing about what's considered anime. I think that's a
Speaker 1: really Western thing that that people put on. So I
Speaker 1: am also interested in this conversation. Yeah, well, you know,
Speaker 1: before I introduced them, uh these are the day brothers
Speaker 1: on you and o b U day uh I know
Speaker 1: on you. We go back back when I started at BuzzFeed.
Speaker 1: I found out he was Nigerian. That was it. That
Speaker 1: was it. I was like, bat I. I am like,
Speaker 1: it's so funny every time someone asked me about a
Speaker 1: Nigerian in a comedy and it's like, yeah, I know them.
Speaker 1: If I know you're on Nigerian, I'm gonna connect with you.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to create a mafia here, you know, and
Speaker 1: so so me. You know, we clicked up and you know,
Speaker 1: uh I was wearing a DBZ shirt one day and
Speaker 1: then he was like yo, and then we just got
Speaker 1: into this whole conversation and he told me about his
Speaker 1: production company, calling Up Productions and Afro Anime and what
Speaker 1: he was creating. And I was like, you know, we
Speaker 1: gotta get you on ther defficent. And so that was
Speaker 1: pretty much the story and I kind of I'll let
Speaker 1: him take it from here. So yeah, without further Ado,
Speaker 1: Obie and Ony day, how you doing? What's hey, how
Speaker 1: y'all feeling? Man, it's been a day? But I mean
Speaker 1: the energy and here is dope, you know, like I
Speaker 1: like what I'm feeling right now. Yeah, it's a nice
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess you will just jump right into it.
Speaker 1: For anybody who's never heard of it or don't know
Speaker 1: what what we're talking about. What is afro anime? Well, um,
Speaker 1: it's really based on like the first part of the
Speaker 1: word afro. So like when people hear afro enemy, you
Speaker 1: don't want to think about a throw like a hair.
Speaker 1: Afro is more about that inspired by Africa, taking it
Speaker 1: from the African lens. So if you're talking about fighting
Speaker 1: with weapons, you're gonna look at African weapons. If you're
Speaker 1: talking about martial arts, you're not gonna see uh jiu jitsu.
Speaker 1: You're gonna see like lamb or um some sent other
Speaker 1: Senegal wrestling techniques. You're gonna see African techniques. And that's
Speaker 1: the Afro so basically African inspired in terms of lore techniques,
Speaker 1: magic juju in an anime kind of medium, which is
Speaker 1: like you know, when someone's angry, you have that not
Speaker 1: on the head, you know, powering up some of those things.
Speaker 1: It's a you know, we in creating the name, it
Speaker 1: was kind of like it's very much African and die sport,
Speaker 1: but we we also are going to give you know,
Speaker 1: shouts out to the people that kind of you know
Speaker 1: brought us to the genre. Like you know, So it
Speaker 1: wasn't like we're going to create a name that completely
Speaker 1: like disregards the contribution of those who did amazing work
Speaker 1: and anime that got us even thinking about creating stories
Speaker 1: in this media. Um, we're going to create a name
Speaker 1: that okay, shows show some love, but then very much
Speaker 1: lets you know, this is Afro anime. This is uh,
Speaker 1: we're gonna tell stories through the African lens. Right. So
Speaker 1: I used to always say that you know, when you're painting,
Speaker 1: you have this like you know, your oils and all
Speaker 1: that and so anime is kind of like that you
Speaker 1: have always, but what you're drawing is the continent. You're
Speaker 1: drawing certain themes in the continent, Pan African specifically, Nigerian specifically,
Speaker 1: from Kenya specifically, these different ethnic groups spirits. So when
Speaker 1: you're talking about you know, now has the nine tails,
Speaker 1: we have a tortoise. You know when we when we
Speaker 1: you know, shout out to a Nancy. You know what's
Speaker 1: talking about when we talk about Nancy, you know what
Speaker 1: we're talking about West African thing. So you know, that's
Speaker 1: sort of what Afro anime is. What were some of
Speaker 1: the because um, you both grew up watch anime, what
Speaker 1: were some of the titles? I guess that really got
Speaker 1: you interested in moving into animation. I mean I got
Speaker 1: it first and foremost. Give a shout out to whoever
Speaker 1: made the decision um On Cartoon Network to create Y.
Speaker 1: You don't realize how you've affected an entire culture of people.
Speaker 1: I'm talking about from hip hop to like animation to
Speaker 1: even comedy. It's so much ingrained into the culture. I
Speaker 1: just heard this new artist um Dollion or something like
Speaker 1: that or the Stallion, and she had a bar that
Speaker 1: was like hair yellow like gog. I was like, see
Speaker 1: this is what I'm talking about, Like we know where
Speaker 1: this came for us. So shouts out to tonomly like,
Speaker 1: I don't know. We used to rush and get our
Speaker 1: homework done just so we can get in at that
Speaker 1: primetime hour from DBZ Gundam Wing to Cowboy Samurai Jack
Speaker 1: like Ronnie Ketchens there, and that was like are like introduction.
Speaker 1: And then we were like we started getting on the
Speaker 1: internet more and were like, wait a minute, there's some more.
Speaker 1: You know, sometimes you got to get it, but that
Speaker 1: was the only way we could get it back. That's
Speaker 1: what we're saying. These kids will never know. But you
Speaker 1: can go to Funimation and crunchy roll and get the
Speaker 1: subs and dubs immediately when they were leased. When you
Speaker 1: back in the day when you where you felt dope,
Speaker 1: like when anime was out. We all remember that summer.
Speaker 1: You you got those those subs, and you come to
Speaker 1: school and people who were still watching on two now
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh, I'm already ahead, that already happened.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you already got to the boot. Who's boot?
Speaker 1: I don't know? Yeah, And then the thing about it
Speaker 1: was that for me especially was that it was a
Speaker 1: kind of an opportunity for me to kind of kick
Speaker 1: it with my bro. So I had another younger brother
Speaker 1: who was growing up and born in two thousand, so
Speaker 1: we all kind of found a pastime and watching the
Speaker 1: anime together. So like you know, like I seen I've
Speaker 1: seen things on TV when something happened to a girl
Speaker 1: or whatever and she's eating ice cream or whatever. For me,
Speaker 1: it was a bowl of cereal, my brothers and anime.
Speaker 1: That was it. Like I would have the worst dead
Speaker 1: but yo, anime cereal and we just sit and watch
Speaker 1: anime and I feel good after that. And like I
Speaker 1: didn't realize that it was ingraining in me something like
Speaker 1: the thing about anime and cartoons, American cartoons that was
Speaker 1: different was the philosophy. And like no matter where I traveled,
Speaker 1: I remember, we wasn't. I wasn't. I spent time in China.
Speaker 1: I was studying out there, and there was something going on.
Speaker 1: And my bro was like, honestly, we just have a
Speaker 1: Dragon ball Z mindset where it's like, yo, we go
Speaker 1: through all this BS, if we don't die, we can
Speaker 1: power up, get stronger. I just keep going. Like that
Speaker 1: was you just said that to each other. It was
Speaker 1: like the most important thing was training. So when it
Speaker 1: came to language, we went hard in language because it
Speaker 1: was like training. So that's what kind of was. Or
Speaker 1: we tried to build a hyper time chance and you
Speaker 1: know what trad part is he figured it out. Hey
Speaker 1: note went to our old coach and I was like, look,
Speaker 1: if you support us, I'm gonna come back. You know,
Speaker 1: help us build something that could both tracks star I did,
Speaker 1: like for real, like I wasn't bs and it probably
Speaker 1: training with the weighted cuffs and like Piccolo and I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: I gotta say to have to come back today. I
Speaker 1: totally relate to that, like sitting down and watch to
Speaker 1: see you're watching an anime if you if you haven't
Speaker 1: done it yet, it's always good to go back and
Speaker 1: do it, or like to just fully weep out as
Speaker 1: I was saying me and it was me, Brodie Reid
Speaker 1: and Bide and Bazoon. We went to go see your
Speaker 1: name and then from there drove to a little tokyo
Speaker 1: and had ramen and I was like, man, this I'm
Speaker 1: living my best sports ten year old life right there
Speaker 1: and it felt good. So I'd say, you know, take
Speaker 1: time out your day to do that. But to get
Speaker 1: back on the track, let's talk about how did y'all
Speaker 1: end up coming together to to do this, Like were
Speaker 1: you already involved in art and it just kind of
Speaker 1: happened that way or was it just a kind of
Speaker 1: lightbulb moment? No, man, Um, I was in the Bay
Speaker 1: Area at the time. I was working for Apple, And
Speaker 1: while working for Apple, I just learned so so much.
Speaker 1: Like tell people I went to Apple University because those
Speaker 1: like four or five years was just like incredible, Like
Speaker 1: I got to really understand how certain things and innovation worked. Right.
Speaker 1: So one of the things I learned while being there
Speaker 1: is how to identify, um basically the whole in the market,
Speaker 1: how to identify that X how to identify the X
Speaker 1: factor and then go for it before anyone else does. So,
Speaker 1: you know, it was what so, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to go any further here, tired of
Speaker 1: working for somebody. This is not working, isn't really meaningful
Speaker 1: to me, So let me take what I know and
Speaker 1: you know, look at the and just look at the industry.
Speaker 1: So I looked, and I happened to look at the
Speaker 1: chain industry, and I was like, Okay, let me identify
Speaker 1: these trends. Okay. I see they've literally squeezed every European
Speaker 1: folklore that they could and retold the story fifteen different times.
Speaker 1: It's dead. Okay. I see Japan and the Asian community,
Speaker 1: they've they've taken their own stories and told it their
Speaker 1: way and now licensed it out. And now people are
Speaker 1: hip to that and they're loving it, they're learning it.
Speaker 1: They're some billion dollar industry. Great. I see they're starting
Speaker 1: to tap into a little bit of the Latina Latino community. Um,
Speaker 1: they're starting to do more stories there. Okay, wait m hm. Africa.
Speaker 1: No one's telling African stories nobody, And I'm like, this
Speaker 1: is it. I know, we grew up with our father
Speaker 1: telling us oral folklores and traditions and like I doubt
Speaker 1: with our bedtime stories right uh Mazi and by the Tortoise,
Speaker 1: and we learned all these African folklores. This is what
Speaker 1: we learned. This is our culches, what we grew up with.
Speaker 1: And I was like, that's it, that's the next thing.
Speaker 1: So two thousand eleven called him he was in China.
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, I just come back from how I
Speaker 1: was in it. I was taking like a course on
Speaker 1: Chinese art, art in China. Okay, you just come back
Speaker 1: from China? Okay. And I was like, yo, it's gonna
Speaker 1: sound crazy, but I want to start a studio and
Speaker 1: I wanted to create a show. And I'm like all right,
Speaker 1: He's alright, bet And I was like, I was thinking
Speaker 1: small scale, right. I was like, we can do like
Speaker 1: a you know, flip door of the Explorer type whatever. Whatever.
Speaker 1: He was like, nah. I was like what. He had
Speaker 1: a very Kanye moment. He was like, nah, I don't
Speaker 1: like that. That's not how we grew up. I'm like, okay.
Speaker 1: He was like, what do we always watch? What what
Speaker 1: do we watch? I was like, watch Animal. He's like,
Speaker 1: say again, were watching? He said, we watched anime? All right,
Speaker 1: then that's what we're doing. I'm like, all right, but
Speaker 1: if we're gonna do anime, just it's it's not gonna
Speaker 1: be the same way. It's going to be different. He
Speaker 1: was like most definitely. So we're gonna do it. We're
Speaker 1: gonna do it the right way. I'm like, okay, so
Speaker 1: what do we do next? He said? We read? Like
Speaker 1: we read. He's like, we read, so Obi, He's gonna
Speaker 1: tell this part of the story. But basically he said,
Speaker 1: we will not write Uni until we read the godfathers
Speaker 1: and god mothers of African folklore, mysticism and you know,
Speaker 1: Juju science fiction. We gotta we gotta know the greats
Speaker 1: who's on our mount rushmore until we figured that out,
Speaker 1: until we know the stories, until we read their work.
Speaker 1: When you're writing, so Obi goes and does massive research.
Speaker 1: I mean, luckily for me, I had a job, so
Speaker 1: so Obie Obie would be like, here's the book, and
Speaker 1: I'll be like, here's the cash, here's the book, here's
Speaker 1: the cash. Here's the book, here's the cash, and then
Speaker 1: we we blinked in them. Those a huge library, over
Speaker 1: five pages written, and we had a solid, solid, solid
Speaker 1: story and it's like, okay, let's start putting faces to
Speaker 1: these characters. But um, just some of the people Obie
Speaker 1: kind of had us go through. Ames Tetola ben O Cree,
Speaker 1: Nadio Kodafo, who eventually ended up being our writing consultant
Speaker 1: for Mysticism in Juju. She ended up being a just
Speaker 1: a dope friend. Now you know, we fam that right,
Speaker 1: So um even we got love from um, a man
Speaker 1: who wrote the novelization of Star Wars and star Alan
Speaker 1: Dean Foster. He gave us love for our work. He's like, yo,
Speaker 1: this is it. This, this is it. I'm tired of
Speaker 1: all that other stuff. This, this is it. Um. So
Speaker 1: from two thousand eleven too, I want to say two
Speaker 1: thousand thirteen were developing I P. And then after we
Speaker 1: developed the show, our first premier show called Red Origins,
Speaker 1: we decided to do an animation right first Kickstarter felt
Speaker 1: we didn't know what we're doing. You know, we literally
Speaker 1: did not know what we were doing. We were learning
Speaker 1: as we're going, and you know, I know we talked
Speaker 1: about this saying, now you pay for your ignorance, like
Speaker 1: physical cash. Everything you don't know, you will pay for it.
Speaker 1: For example, so you did a Kickstarter and it didn't
Speaker 1: go through. Okay, okay, we went hard, but then it failed.
Speaker 1: That was a hard elf me. I was like, it's
Speaker 1: a lesson and I was like, he becluse that chapter.
Speaker 1: I was like, no, no, no, no, we gotta how
Speaker 1: could you tell what you did wrong? Well, there's many
Speaker 1: things that it actually helped. One thing you have to
Speaker 1: build that following number one. Number two like only said,
Speaker 1: whatever you don't know, you pay for so when artists
Speaker 1: are like when you don't know like character turnarounds, front backs, expressions,
Speaker 1: all those things, you end up paying for that in
Speaker 1: animation phase. So like we were over paying for like
Speaker 1: um for creating animation. We didn't know, okay, storyboarded, make animatic.
Speaker 1: Then you go to work with you know, just so
Speaker 1: people can understand this from the job. I and Obi
Speaker 1: had zero animation background, yeah, zero. So yeah, but you
Speaker 1: know where we come from the culture of you know,
Speaker 1: if you don't know it, figure it out. Rather you manage,
Speaker 1: you manage, manages, manages. I was like, I was like,
Speaker 1: who's that my uncle? You only you only have three
Speaker 1: three wheels in the car again, it can drive, And
Speaker 1: that's like African mentality, like just just managed. I think
Speaker 1: what a lot of people don't know too, is that
Speaker 1: a lot of these if we're talking about anime, a
Speaker 1: lot of these studios are in South Korea. Like even
Speaker 1: the one Japanese properties still made in South Korea. A
Speaker 1: lot of the animation here is still made. It like
Speaker 1: the really pretty anime that you see is made there.
Speaker 1: So the fact that you're trying to make something here
Speaker 1: right unheard of? Right, it goes back to only only
Speaker 1: was trying to only came from the Bay with this
Speaker 1: like entrepreneur spirit. Baby, so we're gonna do it. I'm
Speaker 1: a researcher and my focus is on on the continent
Speaker 1: and in politics and Chinese African Chinese major and so
Speaker 1: he talked about just pushing all that research and then
Speaker 1: trying to make it happen. And so with the Kickstarter,
Speaker 1: when we figured out, okay, we had to have this art.
Speaker 1: We have to really look at our art, you know,
Speaker 1: we have to really look at our characters. And so
Speaker 1: when we got a stronger, like we got an art director.
Speaker 1: Like the whole concept of having an art director I did.
Speaker 1: We had no idea that was an important concept. No
Speaker 1: idea like so, you know, building the following online on
Speaker 1: Facebook and Instagram, on Twitter or whatever, Twitter being a
Speaker 1: big part making sure your platforms are set up, then
Speaker 1: coming out with art incrementally. This is before Patreon all
Speaker 1: that stuff like slowly, slowly bring out your art, Um,
Speaker 1: go to more cons and start talking to more people.
Speaker 1: We only went to like one you know what I mean, Um,
Speaker 1: telling your story online, telling your story online, keep giving
Speaker 1: behind the scenes stuff like when we say we did
Speaker 1: everything in house, we did everything in the house, even
Speaker 1: from the music standpoint, which is huge, right, um, and
Speaker 1: we would even like me just thinking about the concept
Speaker 1: of music, I was like a camera better beyond because
Speaker 1: this is content, we'll flip it out right, And then
Speaker 1: it just gets people more invested in the process, more
Speaker 1: invested in the story, more invested in our success because
Speaker 1: they've been on the ride with us from the beginning, right.
Speaker 1: And then so once you got your art director and
Speaker 1: you've got your characters, you got to turn around your
Speaker 1: expression sheets, have everything figured out. Then you've got to
Speaker 1: sit down with your your writers and break down the stories.
Speaker 1: And that's what helped us get to our second kickstarter.
Speaker 1: And then of course you know you will succeeded. Let's
Speaker 1: let's let's let's get that off the way first, which succeeded.
Speaker 1: And then getting your family involved, like that's the funny thing,
Speaker 1: that's one thing we made a mistake a little bit.
Speaker 1: Then enduring community is huge, huge, huge. I mean the
Speaker 1: Black Dice sport community is huge. There they're looking for that.
Speaker 1: This is the time before podcast, this era when we
Speaker 1: did this kickstarter, this is a time before podcast and
Speaker 1: content push. So it was it was just a different
Speaker 1: time before the Facebook girls even came out and all that.
Speaker 1: So really your community was was critical. Well, if I
Speaker 1: can just jump in for the time you're talking about
Speaker 1: is very interesting because I feel like now black nerdiness
Speaker 1: is very mainstream. But there was a moment not too
Speaker 1: long ago where black people on Twitter figured out that
Speaker 1: we all liked dB Z for some reason. We all
Speaker 1: thought we separately liked it and we didn't. But you
Speaker 1: had the same dudes who was jigging, dudes you know,
Speaker 1: who were also into d b Z. Yeah, yeah, and
Speaker 1: so like it exploded online and right around the time
Speaker 1: that now we hear it in music and all that.
Speaker 1: But there was a time when we all thought it
Speaker 1: was like our little corner and it wasn't as like
Speaker 1: in vogueer cool to just flaunt your nerdiness. So now
Speaker 1: we I think we are in the era now where
Speaker 1: people are super seeking it out too, especially when you
Speaker 1: got taste of it like Afro Samurai and Boondocks. I know, people,
Speaker 1: there's something you you touched on that I think is
Speaker 1: is really important. I want to highlight because it's something
Speaker 1: we've talked about in past episodes where Hollywood, especially coming
Speaker 1: from this personal spot in Hollywood is there is a
Speaker 1: regurgitation of just the same Eurocentric stories. And then I
Speaker 1: think you were right. You did see that trend. You
Speaker 1: had Coco, you had Book of Life, and even then
Speaker 1: we're slowly getting but it's slow. It's afraid because like
Speaker 1: because they don't know these stories. So it's either they're
Speaker 1: waiting for the Latin xt creator to come and bring
Speaker 1: it or still it. You know what I We're saying
Speaker 1: like all the way fun but like so that it
Speaker 1: was great because you know, I did have that flavor
Speaker 1: because I don't know if you know this kickstarter called
Speaker 1: Orian Legacy of Kreyo Don it was. It was a
Speaker 1: it's a Cameroonian game studio called Yeah. So when that came,
Speaker 1: I just immediately supported. I didn't I didn't care, like
Speaker 1: people were like, do you well, do you know if
Speaker 1: I was like, I don't care. I want this to
Speaker 1: be made for reasons of like this, like they were
Speaker 1: telling a story, an African story, and those are stories
Speaker 1: you don't hear. And you know, even within myself, I
Speaker 1: found more success because you know, you're writing pilot, you're
Speaker 1: trying to get stuff, and you start with like what
Speaker 1: you know, like Okay, what's a friendly ensemble husband and
Speaker 1: wife and now I myself and dipping into too, like
Speaker 1: all right, well let me go deep inside and you know,
Speaker 1: without like you know, lasting too much. But it's just like,
Speaker 1: you know, I want to do a story about like
Speaker 1: a man who like has you know, uh connection, he's
Speaker 1: he's a shaman and he connected with mommy want to
Speaker 1: and like that's his connection. But that's like still very general,
Speaker 1: like y'all are talking deep cut stuff that aren't even
Speaker 1: touched like I'll say mommy wanted, and even some white
Speaker 1: people are like, oh yeah, I've heard of that, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, not you. And and just so you
Speaker 1: don't get surprised if it comes out later on you
Speaker 1: have a project like that, but yeah we'll talk, Yeah
Speaker 1: we'll talk. No, but yeah, but even just within working
Speaker 1: with people, because I've been lucky enough this year to
Speaker 1: work on a lot of fantasy stuff. And like my
Speaker 1: take is like I was, I I can bring a
Speaker 1: whole new look because Nigerian mermaids are different than very different.
Speaker 1: And I put people onto that and their mind was blown.
Speaker 1: I was like, that's why you need Africans in this room,
Speaker 1: because we are our our myths, our folklore so different.
Speaker 1: Know what you're saying is crazy, It's like true because
Speaker 1: it really bothered me when during the hip hop time
Speaker 1: they were talking about there's no black mermaids. There's this
Speaker 1: thing that happened on Twitter or something like oh there's
Speaker 1: no black mermaid. That was like it blew my mind.
Speaker 1: I was like, you know, the most basic like black
Speaker 1: mermaid is Mammy Water, Like that's like your Google like
Speaker 1: you like what I'm saying, like like basic, that basic
Speaker 1: black mermaid. You feel not even not even a black mermaid,
Speaker 1: black goddess like you know that on that O P level,
Speaker 1: like like she can probably if you do it right,
Speaker 1: she can body vegeta yeah, I'm not even I'm not
Speaker 1: trying to look I know and I believe it, you know,
Speaker 1: so yeah yeah. And that that's when we talked about
Speaker 1: the research, like all that deep research to uncover what
Speaker 1: Google and wiki couldn't provide. Because that's my problem with
Speaker 1: Google wiki, like bump Google and wiki early on two
Speaker 1: times you're type in Africa whatever it flies, you know,
Speaker 1: all that crap. It was so hard to find stories.
Speaker 1: So people were like, oh Google, I was like, no,
Speaker 1: it's a popular search engine, they went that direction and
Speaker 1: Wiki like they don't really to me, they don't care
Speaker 1: about what black people are searching for. We are searching
Speaker 1: for our stories. And that's what Colon Productions is about. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's and and the thing that that that is
Speaker 1: the one kind of minor flaw. And the thing like
Speaker 1: Wikipedia is it's it's it's built by users and then
Speaker 1: there's no if there's no information, like you know, once
Speaker 1: y'all start, once all these projects are working on drop,
Speaker 1: I promise you, it's gonna start to fill the coffers
Speaker 1: because people are gonna be now searching it out, seeking
Speaker 1: it out, and that's what you hope to do. And
Speaker 1: that's why I like, you know, it is funny to
Speaker 1: see like kind of the gate keeping in there. We
Speaker 1: always we're actually working on creating our like internal wicki
Speaker 1: as we're going just so it's like put it out,
Speaker 1: We put it out, you know what I mean, Like, no,
Speaker 1: we're not gonna let you write the story. Yeah, we're
Speaker 1: not gonna let you write about us writing the story,
Speaker 1: which we're gonna give it the truth, yeah, which he said,
Speaker 1: Like you said, one of the one of the writing
Speaker 1: requirements is you have to read Neddia Korford's which you
Speaker 1: can't write like people Jesus, Oh, well, I letna say
Speaker 1: this because he's probably gonna skip over this. So as
Speaker 1: we as we're building the studio, right, I kind of
Speaker 1: was taking over more of the animation side, was taking
Speaker 1: over more of the writing side. When people would try
Speaker 1: to come and work for the studio, Obi gave them
Speaker 1: a writing a reading requirement, and that's how he was
Speaker 1: able to deconstruct a lot of these Western ideals from
Speaker 1: them before they touched any of the work. And if
Speaker 1: they refused to do to do any of the reading,
Speaker 1: they didn't get right because basically, like when you said, like,
Speaker 1: no matter what, we're naminering Americans, So we have to
Speaker 1: deconstruct ourselves. Only know that pigeon that broke, I don't
Speaker 1: know that pigeon broken enguring like like that that language,
Speaker 1: I don't know. There's a lot of stories even though
Speaker 1: our fathers told us we were not there. You feel
Speaker 1: me so like there's a lot of deconstruction on our own,
Speaker 1: on our own, like really deep program how we see
Speaker 1: water spirit or mermaid, how we see what is a
Speaker 1: warrior instead of a samurai? I had to erase that,
Speaker 1: you know, and even the idea of good and bad,
Speaker 1: we had to break that idea because and the African lens,
Speaker 1: that's not really a thing. Yeah you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: You might have your protagonists, your antagonist, but even uh
Speaker 1: quote unquote bad guy, it's someone who literally just has
Speaker 1: this different point of view and they and they try
Speaker 1: their best to make you understand the point of view,
Speaker 1: and it challenges your understanding, you know, and to add
Speaker 1: on that essentially like because of the American cartoons good
Speaker 1: versus evil, you know, and anime kind of mix it
Speaker 1: up a little bit, like Miyazaki when you see um
Speaker 1: Princess Mononoke, which is my favorite and favorite anime, and
Speaker 1: the dude in the middle of protagonist is like, yo,
Speaker 1: she's hot. I really like her, but she's like she's
Speaker 1: gonna bother, She's gonna kill me, Like she's all about
Speaker 1: this forest. But like, I understand what's going on in
Speaker 1: this development, you know, in mining, I understand there are
Speaker 1: people who live here. And so it was a very
Speaker 1: very nuanced story and so with the African cosmologies and
Speaker 1: stories and all that, I was like, there is that
Speaker 1: we have um this in between characters these tricksters, like
Speaker 1: it's not just this or that. And one of our
Speaker 1: our leading stories coming out with this key Electron girl,
Speaker 1: there's a there's a part in the show where she's
Speaker 1: about to like fight everybody to like make this world
Speaker 1: more clean, and her father's like, look, it's more complicated
Speaker 1: than that. You can't just go around and just bust
Speaker 1: caps like Batman, Like. It's much more nuanced than that.
Speaker 1: And so that's what we introduce to make it still
Speaker 1: animate and not cartoon. You give me yea yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh, you know it's it's something you said stuck
Speaker 1: out to me because it's originally what what kind of
Speaker 1: uh made me gravitate towards on you so strongly, And
Speaker 1: we'll get into that right after these messages and welcome back.
Speaker 1: Hope you enjoy those, Masha Shaws. We are back with
Speaker 1: the Day brothers. But yeah, no, something you said to
Speaker 1: me is how you know, uh how own you speaks
Speaker 1: pigeon and all that, and he kind of put that's
Speaker 1: kind of what I felt. You know, as I get older,
Speaker 1: get a road in age, you know something uh you
Speaker 1: know I see among a lot of my you know
Speaker 1: ethno peers, is their relationship with their ethnicity. And you know,
Speaker 1: my mom's from Louisiana, my dad from Nigeria, and you know,
Speaker 1: my dad gives me what it gives me. But like
Speaker 1: you know, the way I grew up, I was never
Speaker 1: surrounded by a lot of other Nigerians, like you know,
Speaker 1: we went to the association meetings. I don't know, boared
Speaker 1: out of your mind. You gotta break it down association.
Speaker 1: So then juran Is like to meet in big organizations
Speaker 1: men and women. They called associations associations with this so
Speaker 1: we're very You could be three years old and you
Speaker 1: know how to conduct a meeting because you like in
Speaker 1: no corporate meetings, nothing compared to what I have to
Speaker 1: sit through, you know. Yeah, and then usually your parents
Speaker 1: by the by the time your adults are salty with
Speaker 1: the or with the association because it's it's a lot
Speaker 1: of stuff go down. My minds are just for any
Speaker 1: Nigerians just listening and burning. Oguashi Uku Association and Oceanili
Speaker 1: those were the two min as. Was the Hallo Association
Speaker 1: and they hal Association Association uh and then also the
Speaker 1: then Juring Evil Community San Berndino. Yeah, that's what's up.
Speaker 1: You need to find me one of those. Well, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna make the l a one. They're probably already this one.
Speaker 1: Let me stop um. But yeah, no, my dad was
Speaker 1: the president and like buying out like for my birthday.
Speaker 1: You know how Facebook has the like you could donate
Speaker 1: it to the cause, and like I saw like and
Speaker 1: y'all in there, and I was like, yo, Dad, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna do He was like, don't do that. Like, yikes,
Speaker 1: what happened? Our dad started the Ninjeran community really, yeah,
Speaker 1: in Sambordino County. Oh that's so quick question. Did y'all
Speaker 1: grow about here? Yeah? Oh shop one time. I very
Speaker 1: rarely almost break the cursing room that all the time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So you're hitting on two points. Because I'm a big
Speaker 1: I like to have big connections with natives and big
Speaker 1: connections with Nigerian's. I grew up in Compton and we're
Speaker 1: out there, so we're so close. Yeah, you know, so
Speaker 1: as I grow older. You know, that's why I like
Speaker 1: the first thing I said when I met you, I
Speaker 1: was like, Nigerian Independence date, hit me up, let me go.
Speaker 1: He's like, I got you, and he's been keeping me
Speaker 1: in the loop. You know, I've been I was in
Speaker 1: this room and it was keeping me busy. But now
Speaker 1: I'm back, so you see yeah, oh yeah I saw that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So but let's we've been talking about Afro anime and
Speaker 1: there are certain things that stuck out to people as
Speaker 1: Afro anime. And you know, there's there's something we talked
Speaker 1: about during the break that I want to hear you
Speaker 1: display for all the listeners, but also why I think
Speaker 1: that's a good thing because you almost said it like
Speaker 1: it was a negative, But I think it's a good thing.
Speaker 1: So we're gonna talk about Afro Samurai and the Boomdocks,
Speaker 1: which are like the two I think closest things people
Speaker 1: will think of if they're like Afro animate. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: the problem if you google, if you google, But real quick,
Speaker 1: I will start by saying the good. Yeah, I'll start
Speaker 1: by saying the good. Um. Shout out to Aaron McGruder.
Speaker 1: I don't think he realizes what it meant to young
Speaker 1: black kids who had a newspaper in their hand and
Speaker 1: will go to the comics section and see representation. Can
Speaker 1: we just take I'm gonna just take two seconds to
Speaker 1: really land on that, because you are so right. I
Speaker 1: would because I would run into the Sunday Funny and
Speaker 1: you know, first we have that one for better or worse.
Speaker 1: I think it was the other Black family and shout
Speaker 1: out to him too. I'm not gonna talk, but when
Speaker 1: I saw Boondocks, that changed my life because not only
Speaker 1: was it this this black family, but it also had
Speaker 1: an anime style to it. So I was like, I'm
Speaker 1: in because you know, really truly like too, because before
Speaker 1: that like animate to me was just you know, your
Speaker 1: dbcs or Youku show Tinchi muo. So to see like
Speaker 1: an Afro done in an anime style, it just opened
Speaker 1: my eyes to a new world. So yes, you're I
Speaker 1: totally know, like that is the good of being like,
Speaker 1: oh you change my world. That's the best thing I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say. And then that can start off. So here
Speaker 1: you go. So first of all, to start with Boondocks, now,
Speaker 1: I mean, and I do this with African futurism. Now,
Speaker 1: if you represent just the continent, you actually represent the
Speaker 1: largest amount of Black people in the world period, So
Speaker 1: that representation is actually small by Boondocks actually does not
Speaker 1: represent the Dia spore, like if you would actually start
Speaker 1: from a continental perspective, just by numbers, game. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: number one. Number two is like Boondocks had this thing
Speaker 1: where like like what's that? What's that? One? Um dude
Speaker 1: with the like like like why would I create a
Speaker 1: character give life to an imaginary character that hates on
Speaker 1: his own people? I can't do it? Like no, this
Speaker 1: is very important, Like you gotta understand the power of media.
Speaker 1: You gotta understand the power of media. This already is
Speaker 1: in our community. It's already there. Now we have a
Speaker 1: name for them. And like, my my take on that
Speaker 1: is that because you it would do a disservice for
Speaker 1: what Boondocks was doing, because yeah, we created Uncle Rucks,
Speaker 1: but we still have Sheriff Clark out there. We still
Speaker 1: got what what about the Ben Carson? I know this,
Speaker 1: this just hurts to say because he's my man. But
Speaker 1: like right now in this plan, yeah, you know we
Speaker 1: have those. So like I think that put like a
Speaker 1: word because there is this idea of like you know,
Speaker 1: there's this idea that like, you know, I feel like
Speaker 1: it is something to like he was speaking to like
Speaker 1: this type of person that we always see. And I
Speaker 1: think it's because like Boondocks is like specific, but I
Speaker 1: think that still drives home your point that it's only
Speaker 1: covering this small aspect of it. I'm the biggest, biggest, biggest.
Speaker 1: I don't know what I want to say say, I
Speaker 1: don't want to say I guess proponent, but I guess,
Speaker 1: like I say this a lot where there's truth to
Speaker 1: let that media you're controlling. And there was a point where, like,
Speaker 1: you know, you did have certain folks you know, Um,
Speaker 1: I don't think I need to say which folks who
Speaker 1: would take that character and really like him for the
Speaker 1: wrong reasons. Yeah, yeah, it's that Dave Chappelle off camera left. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I know what I'm talking about. You know what I'm
Speaker 1: talking about. Yeah, So, so, like I that is extremely valid,
Speaker 1: and that was the main thing, like you said, like
Speaker 1: you have characters that can easily become these like caricatures.
Speaker 1: It got really hyper and like that's what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: Like you know, you had your Hui, but he was
Speaker 1: dipped in Japanese philosophy, you know, Like it was like
Speaker 1: I couldn't like those things, like like we're again having
Speaker 1: this one individual of African descent fully involved in Japan
Speaker 1: full like as if we ebles your boss uh about something?
Speaker 1: How some Messaia you can keep going who don't have
Speaker 1: traditions that are really powerful that can help you navigate
Speaker 1: the streets of whatever. And then so a lot of
Speaker 1: those things, like the kind of showed this kind of
Speaker 1: depiction that to me was very much, very close to
Speaker 1: what's that dude media type individual? Yeah, I put that
Speaker 1: in and I put in the same class because that's
Speaker 1: the thing is like like the fro like like that's it,
Speaker 1: and and the corn Rows like there's some there's like
Speaker 1: literally with African futureism and all these like what we're
Speaker 1: trying to do and independent creators are trying to do.
Speaker 1: It's like even hair. Hair is the most political thing
Speaker 1: that literally we have so many different styles now whenever
Speaker 1: we try to have a character draw draw one of
Speaker 1: our characters, they draw Huey. Remember that. Yeah, there was
Speaker 1: just to kind of take you back when earlier when
Speaker 1: I talked about how everyone had to go through Obie's
Speaker 1: regiment of reading African literature. We had to deconstruct a
Speaker 1: lot of our artists. A lot of our artists who
Speaker 1: we worked with, you know, they were taught Western styles,
Speaker 1: maybe Japanese styles, So when we brought them to an
Speaker 1: African story, they would bring that with them, and we
Speaker 1: had to literally break that because there would be a
Speaker 1: situation where there's a full description of how this character
Speaker 1: is supposed to look, and the artists would come back
Speaker 1: with this random, uh stock African mask, not even African masks,
Speaker 1: like a ticking mask on the arm, and then some
Speaker 1: Hughey type hair and we're like and no shirt, Like wait,
Speaker 1: that's where did you get this from? And they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is like it's an African character, Like did you
Speaker 1: read the description? No? And then with one of our
Speaker 1: other characters, we have to actually stop one of our
Speaker 1: artists because we realized every scene the character was getting
Speaker 1: lighter and lighter and lighter, to the point where I
Speaker 1: was like, whoa, bro, what is what is going on?
Speaker 1: And he was like, oh, um, I don't don't. He
Speaker 1: couldn't even answer me. He didn't he didn't even realize
Speaker 1: what was just and like what was internal? Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's totally systematic and you see it all the docks
Speaker 1: is part of that system. And even depiction of black women.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about that. Boondogs like like boondogs is not
Speaker 1: it's not it in terms of like I'm being real, like, like,
Speaker 1: is there any depictions of black women that y'all that
Speaker 1: y'all could like vibe with in budogs have exactly exactly exactly,
Speaker 1: you ain't gonna get me before I look at I
Speaker 1: do want to say we. I mean, if he and
Speaker 1: I have these conversations that unfortunately also a lot of
Speaker 1: times when you are the first, you bear the weight
Speaker 1: of your entire community. And that happens a lot in
Speaker 1: my community as well. And I think, like I totally
Speaker 1: understand that. Well, here's the thing is is that and
Speaker 1: here's one where I'm going to come in for aaron
Speaker 1: just for a bit. We are blessed that we we
Speaker 1: we and we have to admit that the three Nigerian
Speaker 1: sitting at the table, knowing like our culture where we
Speaker 1: from all those things, we have to remember that a
Speaker 1: lot of African Americans aren't blessed with that information and
Speaker 1: so they have to go off of what they grew
Speaker 1: up doing. And I think that's why it's Afros and
Speaker 1: uh and I think it's corn Rows and I think
Speaker 1: like the the the caricature nous of it, that whole
Speaker 1: show is talking very specific and I think you're right
Speaker 1: in due time, especially now, if you look at that
Speaker 1: compared to what we see in Black Panther, the the
Speaker 1: diversity in not only clothing, Like I almost wept when
Speaker 1: I saw for the first time the big screen the
Speaker 1: clothes we see growing up display that being said, Riley
Speaker 1: is a specific black person. Huey is a very specific
Speaker 1: black verson even whose cedric yarbrowers character uh the like
Speaker 1: whitewash black Tea. It is a show of yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean and right there in the name, it is a
Speaker 1: show of caricatures. And I think that was and I
Speaker 1: think the I think it wasn't for us in the
Speaker 1: sense of like like a black creator gets a show
Speaker 1: and it's not for black people. That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: See what I'm saying, That's what And it goes to
Speaker 1: Afro Samurai. We can jump, we can literally jump from
Speaker 1: animate enemy. If you look at Afro Samurai, this is
Speaker 1: an opportunity. Afro Afro even though you don't I don't
Speaker 1: like the name Afro Samurai is a blank slate that
Speaker 1: you could have put the most. It's a dope character.
Speaker 1: It's a cool character, not even really a blank slate.
Speaker 1: If you know anything about history, what do you mean
Speaker 1: just the black Samurai who was no, but not right
Speaker 1: right whatever, right right right? Everyone was. Some of these creators,
Speaker 1: I think, have had to buck up against people, tell
Speaker 1: people telling them that they can't make what they want
Speaker 1: to make, and sometimes they have to give in. I'm
Speaker 1: not saying anything about I don't know Aaron's story. I
Speaker 1: don't know that. I'm just saying I know that a
Speaker 1: lot of creators of color. I'm not trying to make
Speaker 1: an excuse for it. I'm just saying, this is what
Speaker 1: they have heard. The generations before us. I know because
Speaker 1: we have had them on the show and we've talked
Speaker 1: to them about it, have had to go at the
Speaker 1: whims I guess of studios. And let me go back
Speaker 1: to what you said. What was our lessons from our
Speaker 1: first Kickstarter? When you're creative, the most important thing is
Speaker 1: to be fearless. Period. I don't after the first the
Speaker 1: first Kickstarter, the second Kickstarter, it was like, you want
Speaker 1: to talk about powering up, you want talk about living
Speaker 1: under dragon ball z over nine thousand. It takes an
Speaker 1: incredible fearlessness and self confidence. The positive things that our
Speaker 1: parents are, communities associations put into us times nine thousand
Speaker 1: to come up with a work that depicts something as
Speaker 1: true as you possibly can make it, even when you
Speaker 1: know it's not popular, like how can you watch DBZ
Speaker 1: and then you try to water down your stuff. It's
Speaker 1: not gonna work. And that goes with Afro Samurai. And
Speaker 1: that's why we came out with our work. We knew
Speaker 1: it wasn't popular. Then we still we still powered up
Speaker 1: and did it. Then Black Panther hit and now everyone's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: but kinda forever, what are you talking about? We was
Speaker 1: on that already. There's a lot of African futurists, African
Speaker 1: futurisms like um authors doing it. Now everyone's jumping on it.
Speaker 1: Like That's why I want to make very very clear
Speaker 1: part of what African futurism and calling the production is
Speaker 1: is that fearlessness, that desire to fight for a story
Speaker 1: and and and that's what that's what I want to
Speaker 1: I wanna know, yeah, and that and that's true, and
Speaker 1: I think that's like definitely what we need now. But
Speaker 1: I think that that is where it's standard, where it's
Speaker 1: like you just didn't we gotta remember we're talking about
Speaker 1: gate keeping, who holds the key. Luckily, we live in
Speaker 1: an era now where we don't have to go through
Speaker 1: the same door. You can. You can kick started. I
Speaker 1: know that when I when I make the thing we're
Speaker 1: gonna talk about when I make my joint, people gonna
Speaker 1: be like what because And this is because studios their
Speaker 1: job is to make sure they keep their job and
Speaker 1: prepare for the worst. And what the people with the
Speaker 1: money are gonna say. Uh, this definitely is gonna make it.
Speaker 1: But I'm gonna just say it anyway. The show I
Speaker 1: took out was about a gym, but had nothing to
Speaker 1: do with with anybody being buff. It had nothing, not
Speaker 1: a single thing to do. I I said it in
Speaker 1: the pitch. I wrote it in the dock. I said
Speaker 1: that no one has to be dubbed. The message that
Speaker 1: this is sending is that anybody could be in the gym.
Speaker 1: It's just a workplace comedy that happens to take place
Speaker 1: in the gym. I don't know how many people passed
Speaker 1: on it because they were like, how are we gonna
Speaker 1: find buff funny people. It's like I told you all
Speaker 1: a million times, but but like that's just the that's
Speaker 1: that's so that's but like that being said, it um
Speaker 1: like it's just like like for me, I think they're like,
Speaker 1: there's some things boondogs got right. I think there's some
Speaker 1: things that got wrong. I really do agree. People really
Speaker 1: took the the ruckiest thing and ran with it. There
Speaker 1: was I mean, but I mean we see this every
Speaker 1: day on Twitter where some people he was like, you're
Speaker 1: going real wild on that joke. You just so like
Speaker 1: y'all get Dr Tona all the way back that I
Speaker 1: went over to Black Panther R. What do you mean? So? Uh?
Speaker 1: Watching Black Panther um first of all the world creating
Speaker 1: was kind of the way. I don't I don't even
Speaker 1: think people can truly appreciate Black Panther unless you've done
Speaker 1: research on African architects, sure one, and and African clothing
Speaker 1: and that you can't truly appreciate Black Panther unless you've
Speaker 1: done some of this basic of research. Yeah, let's I mean,
Speaker 1: let's just take this quick side boll What did y'all
Speaker 1: think as soon as you heard my man? Uh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: well what did you say? I was like, what it was?
Speaker 1: I know, I was the only one who was like, uncle,
Speaker 1: that sounds very familiar. That dialect seems very familar. He
Speaker 1: said it, He said it, Yeah, he said he he
Speaker 1: didn't the Ebo Solucu, his accent, his whole demeanor, demeanor
Speaker 1: was very much a Niningerian specifically Ebo culture. Ebo, So
Speaker 1: there's multiple ethnicities in Ningeria, so they have a caricature.
Speaker 1: Our guests are Riley of sewords of an uncle type
Speaker 1: who's very stubborn when he when he speaks, he speaks
Speaker 1: the attention. Yeah, yeah, we saw it. But I think
Speaker 1: with Black Panthers, and I know we talked about this. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't want to really destroy people's love for this,
Speaker 1: but we want you to try to think deeply, Okay,
Speaker 1: just really think deeply. Everything starts at the root. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when we create stories, it has to come from something
Speaker 1: real that's happened on the continent or folklore or mysticism
Speaker 1: or whatever the case may be. Period. That's African futurism.
Speaker 1: That's called our production. That's how we wrote Black Panther
Speaker 1: was not written by someone of African descent. Start there
Speaker 1: like the comics. The comics start there. So when you
Speaker 1: start there, you can just start to understand how if
Speaker 1: you keep moving and don't address what's happened in the past,
Speaker 1: something's gonna go horribly wrong. You have a wealthy society
Speaker 1: right of black people, of black people right in Africa,
Speaker 1: who's removed from the continent, who has all these resources, right,
Speaker 1: all this technology and all this stuff, and they do
Speaker 1: nothing for the continent. Number one, they have they literally
Speaker 1: have the power to create hegemony, unity within all within
Speaker 1: the continent. Do nothing. Okay, at the end, after everything happens,
Speaker 1: they're gonna open up our boarders and start helping out people.
Speaker 1: Where do they go because technically what kind of supposed
Speaker 1: to be in East Africa? So the logical thing is,
Speaker 1: if you're gonna start helping people out, you probably start
Speaker 1: to the person right next to you. Nope, you skip
Speaker 1: all Africa and Land and Ethiopia, Degeria, skip all that,
Speaker 1: and we end up in Oakland. Wait a minute, Homie,
Speaker 1: charity begins at home. If you're gonna build this out,
Speaker 1: like you said, you're gonna build it out, you know
Speaker 1: saying you might don't want to start from the continent,
Speaker 1: and even the even with kill Marker's character, right, if
Speaker 1: you're really thinking from a strategic standpoint and you're trying
Speaker 1: to take over and do some clandestine stuff and you
Speaker 1: need an army, might make sense to start with the
Speaker 1: people that you can actually touch that are on the
Speaker 1: continent that you're already currently on, because if you can
Speaker 1: rally them again around the message, you have a real army,
Speaker 1: right instead of kind of sprinkling out to diaspora where
Speaker 1: you know, I can I can go deep, I can
Speaker 1: go deep. But you know what I mean, I think
Speaker 1: with especially like a property like Black Panther and what
Speaker 1: we're finding for all the Marvel properties or these are
Speaker 1: these are properties that were written back in the seventies
Speaker 1: said by you know some Jewish white dudes in New
Speaker 1: York who you know. So that's why I think even
Speaker 1: in that movie, I mean, at this point we're gonna
Speaker 1: get into it. You should have saw it by now,
Speaker 1: they tried to tackle one of the biggest I think
Speaker 1: plot holes in Black Panther, which is why the heck
Speaker 1: if you have this African continent with all this power money,
Speaker 1: you didn't stop slavery, and I think they're trying to
Speaker 1: do that, and it just kind of just it's just
Speaker 1: it's so please please, thank you so much, fine for
Speaker 1: bringing that up. Let me because you know what's crazy, No,
Speaker 1: it's not crazy. After this movie, I know black people
Speaker 1: who genuinely had that sensement like, why didn't you guys
Speaker 1: come for us? Oh? Really, why didn't we come for you? It?
Speaker 1: Oh do you want to see it? He I mean,
Speaker 1: you may have a different perspective ahead. I mean, we
Speaker 1: were kind of dealing with our own colonization, kind of
Speaker 1: occupied with Britain, Portugal, Belgium, France, Italy. You can't, I mean,
Speaker 1: what do you what do you like? Get lay? Wait? Wait, wait,
Speaker 1: hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. I do.
Speaker 1: I do like the way they went about that because
Speaker 1: the reason I said that is because just like everything
Speaker 1: starts at the roots, the responsibilities can start at the roots.
Speaker 1: I love the things I experienced as a black man
Speaker 1: traveling around the world. I begin to understand that if
Speaker 1: those leaders in the continent, from Gohnna to South Africa
Speaker 1: to Mozambique to if they spoke up to some of
Speaker 1: the chocities that happened to our people in the diaspora,
Speaker 1: it would have a huge impact. This is really important.
Speaker 1: So that's so I kind of side with that idea
Speaker 1: that if you're the parent diaspora or whatever, act like it.
Speaker 1: And so that's my thing with leaders. I studied politics
Speaker 1: like you could have said something when when um Trey
Speaker 1: Von got hit. You know what I mean, when that happened,
Speaker 1: when all these individuals was dying. I was in China
Speaker 1: when it was happening, and I was like the most
Speaker 1: embarrassing thing. So I mean, we're getting really really deep
Speaker 1: because I mean there's I mean, there's so we can
Speaker 1: get we would we there from this, We're able to
Speaker 1: get so deep that we will everyone will not know
Speaker 1: what we talk about it because I got some takes,
Speaker 1: because there are some some Nigerian takes on American politics
Speaker 1: that leave me. But can I say this one thing
Speaker 1: about Afraid I mean Afro Samurai. The main thing by
Speaker 1: Affro Samurai that we could at least guy and was
Speaker 1: at least an African sword as some African like Afro Samurai.
Speaker 1: The thing is Afro Samur's a really cool character. But
Speaker 1: his name is Afro. He has a father, don't know
Speaker 1: his name, don't know where the mom is again black
Speaker 1: woman disappearing and no, he's like the best, Like where
Speaker 1: does that come from? Why do we have a ultra
Speaker 1: dope swordsman? Can we say where the techniques are coming from?
Speaker 1: The swords And then he had a person who's like
Speaker 1: kind of had this joint in his mouth the whole time,
Speaker 1: which is like, like my thing was like Samuel Jackson
Speaker 1: for real, No, no, no, Like I put Samuel Jackson
Speaker 1: Aarma Guder in this box. So you said before the
Speaker 1: Jewish people were depicting sort of our stories or whatever,
Speaker 1: and it's not right. Then we have Aarona Gruder and
Speaker 1: Samuel Jackson and it's like, yo, your your characature a
Speaker 1: certain caricature. So then when are we gonna get it right?
Speaker 1: So that's what I'm talking about with CLA Productions, Red Origins,
Speaker 1: but we're coming out with these will all be in
Speaker 1: the footnotes for y'all to click the link. And here's
Speaker 1: the thing I was gonna I was I was going
Speaker 1: to throw to you because I because everything you're saying
Speaker 1: is valid. Everything is great, And even if people don't
Speaker 1: agree with you who are listening, it's good to have
Speaker 1: these discussions because it will get your mind thinking about
Speaker 1: it and it'll get you think in a different way.
Speaker 1: That's what I why I like these discussions. I think
Speaker 1: right now we're in this era where we feel like
Speaker 1: there's only a right or wrong answer, or you can't
Speaker 1: have hard discussions. This is how you think, This is
Speaker 1: how you see another perspective. But all I can think
Speaker 1: about more than anything, is that the reason these stories
Speaker 1: haven't been told is because no one knew them. And
Speaker 1: right now I'm sitting across from two people who talked
Speaker 1: who who are you know? Who know this story? And
Speaker 1: I'm excited to see what's gonna happen when these stories come,
Speaker 1: because if you look at just what happened, because I
Speaker 1: was it was so funny, because I had that same
Speaker 1: smirt y'all have when we talked about black panthers. Because
Speaker 1: when people were talking about like this like so cool,
Speaker 1: I was like, man, you don't even know the type
Speaker 1: of stories that was coming. But it's because all this
Speaker 1: time and this is this is the type of stuff
Speaker 1: people get salty and leave one one star reviews about.
Speaker 1: But if you haven't figured out right now, we don't care,
Speaker 1: So we can. I just say, Iffy that I'm able
Speaker 1: to sit here and listen, like I'm able to sit
Speaker 1: here and listen and learn, And you have been able
Speaker 1: to sit and listen and learn as we have had
Speaker 1: different conversations with different people that don't look like us.
Speaker 1: I don't understand why people that listen aren't able to
Speaker 1: do that. I think they because they don't want to,
Speaker 1: But like, why wouldn't Like you're saying why wouldn't you?
Speaker 1: I just wanted to say that, because yes, we do
Speaker 1: get one star reviews from people, like you know, they won.
Speaker 1: I think one was like they hate white people, and
Speaker 1: like we've had so many white people on this that
Speaker 1: doesn't make sense. But also like I can sit here
Speaker 1: and learn about something from a culture that isn't mine,
Speaker 1: and that is that is helpful to me. Like I
Speaker 1: like that. That's the whole point of this podcast is
Speaker 1: not just nerds stuff, but how each of us as
Speaker 1: nerds have been affected differently based on our culture representation
Speaker 1: that we've gotten to have in the nerd community. I mean,
Speaker 1: just based on people who have who have been talking
Speaker 1: to us in the discord and tweeting at us. All
Speaker 1: those books y'all mentioned. I'm gonna need y'all to say
Speaker 1: I'm slow and quick because people are gonna want to read.
Speaker 1: We'll put we'll put them in there, we'll put them
Speaker 1: in the footnotes. But but the thing is is we
Speaker 1: have a unique opportunity, all three of us, because all
Speaker 1: three of us are storytellers, creators sitting in this room, right,
Speaker 1: Danny's a storyteller, but I'm talking about African stories. Danny's
Speaker 1: gonna be telling these bomb ass Latin X stories. I'm
Speaker 1: so excited, but like it truly is like the closest
Speaker 1: thing I have. This isn't this is an African this
Speaker 1: is an African American thing. But I was in I
Speaker 1: was I was in a situation where I was in
Speaker 1: a room full of white people and I mentioned Tales
Speaker 1: from the Hood. I was like, oh man, that was
Speaker 1: so crazy that end when he transforms into demon, nobody
Speaker 1: saw it. And when you think of nobody seeing tales
Speaker 1: from the Hood, and then if you think back even further,
Speaker 1: these are the people who are telling stories, and you
Speaker 1: think that every black person has to ingest the story.
Speaker 1: Now run me back how you all said, y'all hurt
Speaker 1: these African stories where they not traditionally from the mouth
Speaker 1: of our parents traditions. Yeah, it's up to us to
Speaker 1: present them to inspire the next generation so that we
Speaker 1: can get these new afrocentric versions, and and the onus
Speaker 1: is on us to also respect. That's why the one
Speaker 1: thing that got me so hyped is how you said,
Speaker 1: the first thing y'all had to do was to read
Speaker 1: and research, because if y'all want to do it, y'all
Speaker 1: want to get it right. There's so many people who's
Speaker 1: just so quick to just tell a story. They don't
Speaker 1: want to get it right. No, but look enemy, these
Speaker 1: Japanese creators, they sit there and do my Kashi Naruto
Speaker 1: like some of these. I studied the grades, and jay
Speaker 1: Co said, I studied the grades. That's what we did.
Speaker 1: I went back to eighties enemy, study the grades. What's
Speaker 1: the best enemy? One piece? Narrowto you too, most highest
Speaker 1: gross sing I went back studied it looked at um
Speaker 1: um like Toto the mass Layer, Moroni Kenchen one of
Speaker 1: the most best historical animies. They told you so much
Speaker 1: about the Major era, like they went into their history.
Speaker 1: How come I know more about Japanese history and some
Speaker 1: of the stuff I like my own, like like you
Speaker 1: know history, you know what I mean? That's the part
Speaker 1: of meeting this part of like anime they really respected.
Speaker 1: I don't know about Yakuza us Like, how do I know?
Speaker 1: I don't want to know about Yakuza. How do I
Speaker 1: know about the Edo period? Yeah, well, we're gonna We're
Speaker 1: gonna get some final thoughts, uh and wrap this thing up.
Speaker 1: This has been great, It's good, it's such a this
Speaker 1: is I'm having the most fun I've had in a while.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've had fun on every episode we just
Speaker 1: did Captain Marvel. I love my job. Uh So, but
Speaker 1: when we get back, we're just gonna wrap up. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna I'm gonna give one thing I like to do
Speaker 1: when I have Creators on is to hit us with
Speaker 1: that elevator pitch to get everyone on that and uh,
Speaker 1: and then we'll just say where people can find you
Speaker 1: and then close it out. So thanks for listening. I
Speaker 1: hope everyone's having as much of a good time as
Speaker 1: we are. We'll see you in a second, all right,
Speaker 1: and welcome back to Nerd Efficent. This is the afro
Speaker 1: Anime episode. I mean one thing before we go in
Speaker 1: the closing thoughts that I think like if if people
Speaker 1: you know, because you know how people being, if people
Speaker 1: came in was like afro Anime, the names you just
Speaker 1: dropped before that break you you can't help but be
Speaker 1: salved that y'all know what you'all talking about. But you know,
Speaker 1: I guess, like, what are you what are some closing
Speaker 1: thoughts that you want people leaving this episode, you know,
Speaker 1: thinking about and knowing, Uh yeah, no doubt. Um so one,
Speaker 1: I just know there's a lot of people that want
Speaker 1: to tell stories. Please, you owe to yourself and you
Speaker 1: old to the people that are going to be consuming
Speaker 1: your media to do your research. Like, media is powerful.
Speaker 1: It's so powerful, and you have to understand and respect
Speaker 1: that power and that responsibility to tell the right story. Right.
Speaker 1: You don't have to draw from the Western lens when
Speaker 1: there's an African lens. Go to a library like, it's
Speaker 1: there for you. It might not be on Google, might
Speaker 1: not be on Wikipedia, but it's there. And if you,
Speaker 1: if you do yourself the honor of researching it, you'll
Speaker 1: find out how fascinating our culture is because we have
Speaker 1: some of the most craziest folklore, secret societies, mysticism that
Speaker 1: you will ever ever experience. And it's your birthright, it's
Speaker 1: your culture. So again, Oh that was that was deep
Speaker 1: and I like it. Okay, then let's go. Let's go
Speaker 1: to the fun part. Give everyone who's listening now an
Speaker 1: elevator pitch why they need to check out colon Ut productions.
Speaker 1: And you know you dropped, You dropped some some some
Speaker 1: of the projects you're working on, So hit us with
Speaker 1: some of those two no doubt so Colna Productions. We
Speaker 1: are a studio that tells stories to the African lens.
Speaker 1: We dabble in mysticism, African futurism, um juju, which is
Speaker 1: African magic. We really go deep and explore the content
Speaker 1: in the way that you've never seen before, and it's
Speaker 1: all rooted and just amazing storytelling. Our first project Read
Speaker 1: origins amazing story about this young boy and it's two
Speaker 1: friends that mystically get transported to Neo Africa and they
Speaker 1: have to save the continent because there's a power struggle
Speaker 1: between the ancestral gods and the new age tech. So
Speaker 1: that's one of our projects which is amazing and dope.
Speaker 1: We have Kissi the electron Girl, this little girl who
Speaker 1: has an affinity for technology and one day she goes
Speaker 1: to an e way site and she finds something that
Speaker 1: changes her life completely. She's able to fuse with technology
Speaker 1: in a crazy way and she develops this amazing relationship
Speaker 1: with this robot and we take it from there. We
Speaker 1: explore how African rock with technology, right. So that's also dope. Man.
Speaker 1: We have so many projects. But we also got to
Speaker 1: give a shout out to Neddio kodaf Or. She has
Speaker 1: a lot of projects that are out there now. Uh
Speaker 1: Kata which an amazing series, BNTI series, amazing series. One
Speaker 1: of her books, Who Fears Death, just got picked up
Speaker 1: by HBO and it's going to be executive produced by
Speaker 1: George R. Martin. There's some other projects going on that
Speaker 1: we can't even talk about. But you know, it's it's mixing,
Speaker 1: it's working. We're on web tunes. You can find Red
Speaker 1: Origins on web tunes. You post the comics there. You
Speaker 1: see the Electron Girls about to drop us on web tunes.
Speaker 1: You can follow us on Conda Productions uh dot com.
Speaker 1: Actually no, you can follow us on YouTube. Go to
Speaker 1: Colner Productions. You'll see a lot of our animations like that.
Speaker 1: Ko l A n U t Production just indeed and
Speaker 1: ConA Productions. We we do a lot of our own
Speaker 1: original music. So we do Afro hip hop. So what
Speaker 1: does that sound like? All of our scores are original.
Speaker 1: We get traditional, real African instruments. We take you on
Speaker 1: a journey. It's it's wild stuff, man, I'm telling you right, now,
Speaker 1: um yeah, Facebook, follow us, Instagram follow us. Then Neptune
Speaker 1: is Blue. So Natur's Blue is also one of my
Speaker 1: favorite projects about to come out this year. Um. And
Speaker 1: it's a musical space odyssey. We're taking Black people into
Speaker 1: space and we're exploring how that is. And these are
Speaker 1: musicians that go into space and we explore what it
Speaker 1: means to have a relationship with money, and also we
Speaker 1: explore what it means to feel and have feelings and
Speaker 1: how us as a culture and Black people in the diaspora,
Speaker 1: how we deal with pain. And we do this through
Speaker 1: these musicians and these amazing characters. And I literally we
Speaker 1: we take you on a journey through music from the
Speaker 1: continent through the diaspora. Even the spaceships are different, and
Speaker 1: the spaceships are different as well, man, even the space
Speaker 1: outfits are different. It's it's wild, it's aliens, all of that. Man,
Speaker 1: We we dive in. We are in the future. It's
Speaker 1: afro futurism. Um, with African futurism ConA productions. We just
Speaker 1: tell them in stories and we do dope. So basically, yeah,
Speaker 1: like as he described, like you know, musicians, everyone can
Speaker 1: vide with that. And an African musicians, like, let's bring
Speaker 1: them up, you know. And I saw on the wall
Speaker 1: something called they said they had the Cotton Club, and
Speaker 1: I was like, that's Harlem, That's that's that's that's the
Speaker 1: African Americans. So like we do all all these cool stuff,
Speaker 1: but from the root is African. So you're not going
Speaker 1: to just see people with spears and it's you know,
Speaker 1: we're gonna take it to the anime level, that like
Speaker 1: extreme dope level. You know, you're Kabo Bebop, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. We're gonna you see these dope anime,
Speaker 1: we take it to the next level. We're gonna educate you.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be the Really when you dive into Afro anime.
Speaker 1: It's almost like a lot of people ain't feeling him
Speaker 1: right now, but hear me. I'll just hold on for
Speaker 1: a seconds, almost like listening to a tract from Ya Kanye. Right.
Speaker 1: One of the reasons why I really loved Kanye was
Speaker 1: it was like listening to his music was a history,
Speaker 1: a history, you know, tests from museum, Right. I got
Speaker 1: to dive into his samples and learn more about Nina Simone,
Speaker 1: you know, Curtis may faild uh you know, uh kids Charlemagne, like,
Speaker 1: I got to really learn, you know, Alan Parson projects,
Speaker 1: I got to really learn more about music. And that's
Speaker 1: how we approached this. After anime, we we we give
Speaker 1: you the front, and the front beautiful is dope. But
Speaker 1: then if you start diving in, really get into the culture,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. So that's what it is. Oh,
Speaker 1: that's great, Okay, And now that that's out of the way,
Speaker 1: and everyone's already trying to download everything you all made,
Speaker 1: where can people find you online? Online? So, like I said,
Speaker 1: you can find us on YouTube calling up Productions. You'll
Speaker 1: find a lot of our animated shorts were thrown on
Speaker 1: their um a lot of our projects YouTube. Facebook, you
Speaker 1: can find us Instagram. You can find us calling up
Speaker 1: Underscore Studios. Um. Yeah, we'll put all of this in
Speaker 1: the show. Web tunes on web tunes yea, So web
Speaker 1: tunes is Patreona. We need that support. Let if be fearless,
Speaker 1: the part of a saying, the part of a saying,
Speaker 1: you know, it's tough. So we need that Patreon, need
Speaker 1: that page ain't cheap creating. We need that Patreon shows support.
Speaker 1: You know, we talk back. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: I'm not afraid to talk to anybody. I know. We
Speaker 1: will talk to you, will engage with you, and we
Speaker 1: take feedback. Man fearless feedback culture. That's how we rock
Speaker 1: because we're African and our fathers just you know, would
Speaker 1: say crazy things to us. When you have to eat
Speaker 1: it something, you don't say that little feedback and I've
Speaker 1: hurt nobody, and you know me. I'm always if y
Speaker 1: W A D i w E on Twitter and Instagram,
Speaker 1: if d S on Twitch if you want to see
Speaker 1: me play video games and have discussion about movies or
Speaker 1: episodes or why I'm dying so much in Apex Legends,
Speaker 1: and don't forget the discord Discord dot g G slash
Speaker 1: Salt Squad and that's where we talk about all types
Speaker 1: of stuff and it'll keep you up to date. When
Speaker 1: I'm streaming, I'm at Miss Danny Fernandez. I am at
Speaker 1: Wonder Con. I will be there on Friday, four pm.
Speaker 1: It's room two c D. I'm on LGBT and Minority
Speaker 1: host How to Break Through to and then Saturday Most
Speaker 1: Dangerous Women. Uh, it's at eleven am, same room to
Speaker 1: thirteen c D. Both have stacked panelists and so excited
Speaker 1: and many people that have appeared on here. We have
Speaker 1: a uh Wandser is coming on. We have Chris Lamb
Speaker 1: who's coming up in a future episode. Markie McCarty. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a lot of a lot of dope guests that are
Speaker 1: going to be on the Pan Dope Dope, so definitely
Speaker 1: show up, hang out and where your nertives and shirts
Speaker 1: to wander go so we know where you are and
Speaker 1: as always, stay nerdy.