From such small acorns do the mighty oaks grow… well, if we’re comparing ourselves to trees, anyway. I mean, I’m sure MZPtv and a tree have plenty in common, when I think about it – lots of ‘branches’ (as in our many and varied shows) stretching off into the wild blue ultrabeyond, a good strong trunk (the several hundred members of our forums who are the backbone of this place), and, er… we have ‘moss.’ Which stands for… no, sorry, already out of steam with this particular metaphor.

Anyway! History lesson time. Sit comfortably, or uncomfortably if you prefer it that way, and we’ll begin…

A long, long time ago (I can still remember), way back in 1994, a young British student named Lee Chrimes sat down to write a story for his English class. The story grew to a 36-page behemoth that kickstarted young Lee’s desire to write, create new worlds and characters and see if he could one day make some money out of any of this! This interest rolled on over the next ten years, taking in waypoints such as a succession of feature film screenplays, pilot episodes for various TV show ideas and even the odd attempt at a novel or two. You can find most of those here on MZPtv, should you wish to delve back into these things – we writers have such fragile egos. Like eggs made of self-pity.

Fast forward to Spring 2003. Lee joins an online Buffy the Vampire Slayer virtual continuation (a script-based series following on from the show’s final episode), both to develop his growing writing muscles (which are apparently located in the elbow and left thigh, according to ‘scientists’), and also keep working on his own Buffy spin-off, Chris & Sunday, which he’d started work on the previous year. His work on the Virtual Continuation was well-received, inspiring Lee to create the Monster Zero Productions message board, the mission statement being to develop and promote his own work, and also recruit other writers and producers, young and old, to create an online community of writers and bring more virtual series to the world’s attention.

When the rest of the Buffy Season Eight team fell away, Lee took up the slack, moved the fledgling Season Nine onto the MZP forum and built up a new team, spinning off an Angel continuation, an original series based around Faith and the well-received (and long-running) Slayer Academy. Several original shows also joined the roster around this time as Lee stretched the reach of MZP into other like-minded websites, finding that there were a host of other crazies out there doing similar things.

Fast forward again (see? isn’t time lapse fun!) to Autumn (or ‘Fall’ as the Yanks call it) 2004. MZP has now blossomed into a community of over a hundred members, both staff and audience members, with no less than three websites also adding to the circulation – Somewhere InBetween, designed to produce the show of the same name (the rebooted version of Chris & Sunday, translating it into an original series), MZPtv to produce and promote original virtual series, and Virtual Mutant to continue the good work of the various Buffyverse original series and continuations.

But that was a long time ago. Seven years in fact, and in that time the MZPtv roster has continued to grow, expanding to cover new shows in every genre – fantasy, action, horror, drama, mystery, sci-fi and comedy, with additional spin-offs, continuations and adaptations alongside our original works. Our movies section is thriving with new projects now airing all year round, and several writers have turned their hand to mini-series to allow even more great ideas, characters and stories to come to fruition.

By 2008 we’d racked up thirty completed seasons of VS entertainment, redesigning our sites several times to keep our fresh and innovative style, and in 2011 as we launch this new site, our list of shows past and present now numbers over forty. With a new and improved Pilot Season running twice a year to select the cream of the new shows and promote them to full-time status, there’s always something happening on MZPtv – and you’re just a click away from becoming a part of it!

As the saying I just made up goes, ‘If you keep readin’ ‘em, we’ll keep writin’ ‘em.’

Keep it MZPtv!