MZP: What first drew you to writing? And when and how did you decide to transfer that hobby to Virtual Series'?

Jay: Man... it's hard to say. There wasn't really one moment where I was like "I have to write!" I know what first introduced me to scriptwriting, and that's when I was a senior in high school, my english class was put in charge of writing a play for the drama department. I didn't have an active role in the writing of it, but I did do some editing on it, so I read it plenty of times. It wasn't until about two years later that I discovered the whole VS thing - with Star Trek: Renaissance.

MZP: What was that particular show about and how did you get started on it?

Jay: Oh, I wasn't a part of the staff - just a huge fan of the show. I'm a big Star Trek fan, and it was the first VS I had ever read - the concept was very interesting to me, and as much as I would have liked to have worked on the show, my writing wasn't anywhere near where it would have needed to be. This is before I had ever really written anything, so I was obviously very rough around the edges like most newbies are. It was about a year and a half later when I began working on my first VS - another Trek show - Frontiers. That was as an editor, and eventually co-executive producer. I still credit Renaissance for really introducing me to the VS world, though. I wouldn't have joined the Frontiers staff without it, and probably wouldn't be here now.

MZP: With such a heavy Star Trek, and obviously a Sci-Fi, background, what brought you to the world of Spider-Man?

Jay: It might surprise a lot of people, but I'm not a big comic book reader - I read Ultimate Spider-Man, and that's about it - and didn't even begin reading it until after I started doing research for G&C. That's when I discovered it - on Wikipedia - while looking up some background on the characters. I read as a kid, but that was ages ago - I stopped right about the time the original clone saga began. My biggest experience was with the movies, and with the 90's animated series. I remember watching the movie - the second one - on DVD and thinking how much better it could be if they had more time to develop the story. I always thought it could be done so well in a TV format, even though I'm a big fan of the movies. It was actually Smallville that really got the gears turning, so to speak. I stumbled upon a few reruns on TV and was hooked - I bought the DVD's and caught up, and the more I watched, the more I wanted to do something about this Spider-Man series I had been toying with forever. When I finally decided to do it, I started to do some research and found USM, and that's when I started to play around with changing some of the ideas I had. Some of them were similar to what USM had done, and I didn't want G&C to be a copy of anything - Smallville or USM - so I tried to make it as unique as possible without messing with a lot of the basics that make Spider-Man what it is.

MZP: What are some of the major decisions you've made about the show? What have you kept the same, and what have you changed, and why?

Jay: Um... wow. There's a lot. There are things that changed at various stages, there are the very, very early ideas which was more of a college-age series, featuring Peter, MJ, & Gwen as the three regulars. At the time the idea was for the pilot to take place around the time of Peter and MJ's high school graduation - they moved onto college, and that's where Gwen came into the picture. She was a lot more aggressive than she is now - the entire show was really - the plan was to portray Gwen as this hardcore party chick. She was going to be into drugs, and all sorts of bad stuff, and Peter and MJ would kind of become her way out of that lifestyle. I was going to go with a more corporate-based environment as far as the serum was concerned - the idea being that it was being done without the government's knowledge. I didn't really get too far into planning that stuff in any detail, though. Peter, MJ, & Gwen have always been part of the show - which is kind of odd, because like I said, I'm not a big continuity buff. I knew who Gwen was, but I had no knowledge of USM at the time, and didn't know she was being used there as well. The fourth regular spot has been held by quite a few characters - a younger Robbie at one point, Harry Osborn, even Kenny McFarlane (aka Kong) was penciled in at one point. I eventually decided on Eddie, because I wanted something different, and I did want a guy - I felt like Peter needed that male best friend, which if you know anything about Smallville, Clark has all these girl friends, and really no guy friends. The same can be said with Peter in USM - but I guess that just makes them lucky.

The biggest thing with Eddie was that I didn't want to have Peter and Eddie become Clark/Lex from Smallville. I wanted a genuine friendship between them - and there's the obvious questions about Eddie and his future, and what's going on with that, but honestly at the time, there wasn't a lot of thought given to the future and long-term plans, it was all about the concept, and rounding out the main cast. I went with Eddie after a couple of staff members made the suggestion, and originally he was going to be the quiet, shy one, and Peter the wise-cracking type. That changed when J.B. got a hold of him - that's executive producer J.B. Gibson - he basically created the Eddie character as you see him in the pilot. He's just this wide-open, wise-ass guy, and says whatever's on his mind. I thought that was just brilliant, and it wasn't something we ever discussed - JB sent in a draft of an episode, and that's just how he wrote him - and I was just like "whoa... maybe this is the way to go." and we did. I think it's one of my favorite things about the series - just wondering what he's going to say or do next - because there really is no telling. He's just a blast to write for, because there are so many things he can say that nobody else can, or if they did, get away with.

MZP: Has there been any fan response to these changes and such?

Jay: Not a lot just yet - at this point only a few people have read the pilot and given any feedback. A few of the comments I've gotten like the changes, and a few don't. I think it's important for everyone to realize that this isn't 616 Marvel - it's not even Ultimate Marvel - it's something new. It's not going to be a comic book VS - it's based on a comic book, sure, but that doesn't mean it's going to be written like a comic book. I'd say fans of Ultimate Spider-Man, and of the Ultimate titles in general will take to G&C better, simply because it takes a similar approach to the Marvel universe. It's a lot more grounded in reality - even more than the Ultimate titles, in fact - you won't see anyone referred to by a superhero name other than Peter - at least not on a regular basis. For us, it's not Scorpion, it's Mac Gargan - it's not Rhino, it's Alex Sytesvich - you get the idea. We're not going to go as far as they do in the comics with super powers - we have a rating system for mutants, and I tried to keep it as grounded in science as I could. I think this is going to put off some folks who are expecting a script-based comic book type of deal here, because it won't be. Smallville isn't done as a comic book, it's done as a TV show, and that's probably the best place to start as far as the style of the series. There's going to be more drama involved - maybe quite a bit more than people expect - but it is a Spider-Man show in the end, and that's always been a huge part of the character. I think the best way to put it is that - if you're a fan of the movies, and of Ultimate Spider-Man - you'll like it right away. If you're a 616 person, and like your knock-down, drag-out fights in every issue (or episode) it might take some getting used to the pace of it.

MZP: Why did you decide to pace it this way?

Jay: Because in the end, it's not about how many buildings you trash, or how high the body count it. Sure, there's a time and place for that, but it can't be the backbone of what you do creatively. People call shows like 24 action-driven, but they're not - they're plot-driven - and that's a common mistake with people. They see guns and car chases and explosions and they assume "oh, this is an action show." but if you really sit down and watch it, it's not. Just take a look at the Spidey movies - they're full of great action scenes and fights, but in the end, it's the characters that make them work. What would they be without Peter and MJ's romance? Without Harry's conflicting emotions toward his father? Without Peter's dealing with Ben's death? I'd say G&C will be about 50% character-driven, 40% plot-driven, and 10% action-driven. If you've read the pilot while it was posted, you know it wasn't filled with action - it's mostly an intro to the characters, and their situations, and of course setting up how Peter gets his powers, but there's not a lot of action going on. The second episode has quite a bit more action, but even then it's not the core of what we do - of what we're trying to do - because I think whenever that's the case, you get a popcorn flick (or in this case show) and that's not what I want. The pilot builds up a lot of story, and much of it is dealt with in 1.02, but not everything - some of it changes, and becomes something else into 1.03, and then again into 1.04 - the entire show will be very much an arc-based series.

MZP: What brought you to MZP?

Jay: I actually had never heard of MZP until a few months before I pitched G&C. I was reading the Wikipedia article on virtual series, and found a link there, and it was always in the back of my mind, but the plan was always to do G&C independently. I didn't figure it was something they'd be interested in - most of what they had at first glance seemed to be supernatural shows - so I didn't figure a Spider-Man show was anything they'd want to be involved with. A few months later, I did some more looking and saw that they had shows like teIam, and Pathways, and Natasha Tyreen, and I figured it was worth a shot. The other thing was that I was new to them - I had worked over at Virtual Star Trek for over two years, but as far as they were concerned, I didn't figure they'd be too crazy about picking up a show run by someone they saw as a newbie. The appeal was the audience that was already in place, and the credibility - because if you're on MZP, people who know anything about VS - they know you're pretty good, because MZP doesn't produce sub-par shows. I also knew the key to making this work was to build a staff - I had seen VS's die because of lack of writers, and I knew G&C needed a staff - we had a small one before I pitched it, but now it's literally three or four times that size.

MZP: Tell us a little about the story process you've been through, what's worked, what hasn't.

Jay: It's all about logistics, really. I know the general direction the series is going to go in from start to finish, but in the end, it's all about making sure everything makes sense, and there are no plot holes. There are a few things that have changed from the early ideas - things like Gwen's drug use - and Eddie's... entire character. Ben's death is something else that's changed - the original idea had him working for OsCorp, and he was killed by thugs working for Wilson Fisk, but that received some bad feedback in the initial pitch on MZP, and some of the staff felt it might be better to go in another direction, so in the end, we did. It's a lot closer to the original story. Some of the stuff with Osborn and Fisk has changed a bit, and Nick Fury and SHIELD are quite a bit more involved than I originally had in mind, but I think it's for the best.

MZP: What are some plans for the future of the show that you can tell us about?

Jay: Not much without spoiling things, actually. To drop some hints, though for this season, I'll say that the scene in the pilot with MJ & her dad sets up so much for the future. Not just dealing with MJ, but with her father, Peter, Fisk, Osborn, Nick Fury... there's a lot more set-up in that scene than anyone can imagine this early on. It establishes some things that will last all the way to the end of the series.

MZP: How many seasons do you have planned? How far do you want to take this?

Jay: I have six seasons planned, and maybe a movie or two after that. We'll be going on a timeline of roughly one season = one year. That changes between some seasons, but I know the general direction each season will take, and how each season leads to the next. This is major arc stuff too, not stand-alone's - those are just now starting to be pitched for season 2 - one of them I'm very excited to see just for the sheer weirdness of the concept behind it. The plan is to do 13-episode seasons, with 6-8 shorts released each season. I'd love to do more, but in the end, my experience tells me to keep it at 13, because with a VS, you only have so much time. None of us do this for a living, and all of us have real lives, so to be expected to do 22 episodes per season is a bit much for me. I know there are a lot of shows here that do that, but it's my personal opinion that doing 13 episodes not only keeps everyone fresh from a writing perspective, but makes it so that nobody gets burnt out, and it also kind of forces you to weed out the bad ideas. With only 13 per season, you really want each one to count, so a lot of those ideas that would otherwise make mediocre episodes are cut because there simply isn't enough room for them.

MZP: Tell us a little bit about the staff and the behind the scenes stuff. How are stories decided on? Do you say 'this is what I want...' or is it more of 'hey everyone, what ideas do you have?'

Jay: Like I said, I have a general idea of where each season is headed, and they all know that. I try to leave room for as many stand-alone's as possible, and the one rule behind the scenes is that nothing is ever set in stone. I generally give writers a general idea of what I'd like to see with an episode, and let them come up with the storyboard - I read it, make suggestions - and eventually we have the final product. The person with the most input is executive producer J.B. Gibson - not because of his position - but because we talk every day on AIM. We hammer out ideas, and make suggestions, and that's how a lot of the long-term plans come about. On staff right now we've got a lot of talent - Robert Kenneth, Aaron Driscol, Rob Torres, Jamel Baker, Colby Pryor, Rich Gentile, Tom "Domino" East, and our video/animation guy Mike Weiss. Some of them you know from other MZP shows, some you may not.

MZP: When do you plan on releasing the show? And what can you tell readers to expect in the coming season, aside from what you've already said of course?

Jay: The official launch date is September 5th - which oddly enough also happens to be my birthday - it's a Wednesday. I think people should expect to get to know Peter under the mask even better than they will as Spider-Man. There is no Spider-Man in the pilot, or 1.02, or for that matter 1.03 either. We're going to use those first four episodes to tell the origin story as realistically as possible, because lets face it - putting on a mask and swinging around Manhattan isn't something a 16-year-old kid is just going to do. There's a lot more to it than that, and by the time we get there, people will know just how much more.

MZP: is there anything else you wish to add or comment on that you haven't already?

Jay: That about does it. I hope this has helped people get a feel for what G&C is going to be all about, and there's much more I'd like to say, but I wouldn't want to spoil anything.