Doktor Kaboom! • UNDER PRESSURE

CREDIT – DAMIAN ROBERTSON

David Epley aka Doktor Kaboom is an actor, comedian and scientist who entertains family audiences through top-notch live comedy, with a science twist. We caught up with him to find out more about his forthcoming show, Under Pressure, coming to this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

How would you pitch Doktor Kaboom for fans of science and science fiction?

Fans of science love the fact that I know what I’m talking about and am able to present it with intelligent comedy in ways audiences can understand. No “magic”, no condescension, there are even easter egg jokes that science nerds will love but others might not even know are there! They also get to see friends and family members who think they don’t like science become fellow fans. Sci-fi fans will love the characterization of Doktor Kaboom and the comic allusions to our favourite shows and books that might pop up unexpectedly.

And how would you pitch it to someone who doesn’t really like practical demonstrations?
I don’t do practical demonstrations as most people think of them. I’m performing comedy routines. If anything my practical demos may be better described as impractical! I mean, how practical is shooting a ping pong ball into a gong at 300 mph?

How is Under Pressure different from previous shows?

I’ve always included moments of empowerment for my audiences, especially the volunteers. This show is the first time I’ve focused on a particular subject, something I have seen a strong need for. I’m using the physics of pressure as metaphor for the stresses and anxieties of life. I’m hoping to open up conversations within families and give them a shared vocabulary to use.

What’s your most incredible science fact?

My favourite right now is that we have the most taste buds we’ll ever have when we are born, and we lose them throughout our lives. This is because most plants that are toxic to us are fairly bitter, and as babies and toddlers we put everything into our mouths. With all of those taste buds, the bitter stands out strongly and we spit out what’s toxic. It also affects how everything tastes and why taste changes over our lifetimes. This means that when a child tells you broccoli tastes bad, they’re right! Because it absolutely does. To them.

How does science fiction help improve the world?

Sci Fi is the imaginative process of what can be, based on scientific discoveries. Almost everything we take for granted in terms of our daily technology was first conceptualised in science fiction. The internet, the cell phone, tablets, airplanes, etc. etc. etc. – all were creations of artistic fantasy long before they were possibilities, much less reality.

What key idea or message helped you develop this show?

I noticed after the pandemic that the children of the world had been psychologically traumatised by the shutdowns, and that no one was talking about it. Self harm is on the rise among young people, as is anxiety, depression, and just about every other mental health issue, and there is no awareness or leadership at a national level anywhere! Families and teachers are left on their own and no one is giving them tools. So I am.

Why the Edinburgh Fringe, again and again?

I am addicted. It is the hardest month of my year, but also the most glorious. The audiences are brilliant and supportive, my venue The Pleasance exceptional in their support, and I get the thrill of meeting, seeing, and befriending amazing performers from all over the world!

What is your favourite moment in the show?

Anytime my volunteer takes over the focus and I get to step back and watch them shine! As far as specific moments, well, I love making it snow on stage.

What’s next?

I filmed the show recently to pitch to streaming networks, like Netflix, as a comedy special for the whole family. Once the editing is done, then I’ll be trying to figure out how to make that happen.

Doctor Who or Doctor No?

WHO! TARDIS and a sonic screwdriver FTW! And psychic paper! Pure genius.

Rick or Morty?
LOL Rick. I love pickles.

Truth or Beauty?

Is it too hacky to say that truth is beauty? Yes, yes it is. So, I’ll say Truth, hands down.

Doktor Kaboom!’s new show ‘Under Pressure’ will be at the Pleasance Courtyard Beyond at 1.40pm for the entire fringe; for tickets go to www.edfringe.com

Check out our features on 2025’s Top Returning shows, and our keenly anticipated picks of new shows.

Dylan Adler • HAUS OF DY-LAN

Dylan Adler naked except for a small house on his crotch CREDIT – KIM NEWMONEY

Dylan Adler is a Los Angeles based comedian, actor, writer, and musician, who’s credits include The Late Late Show with James Corden, After Midnight and Comedy Central. His new show, coming to 2025’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe is called Haus of Dylan. It is about growing up, getting bullied and screaming at your therapist, all to some jaunty musical themes. We caught up with to find out more.

Introduce yourself please.
I am a mentally ill gay Asian musical comedian ready to sing for you! I was a former classical musician and composer but then fell in love with comedy and world has never recovered.

How would you pitch Haus of Dy-lan to a fan of slapstick comedy?
Come see a Gay Asian bitch throw himself around the stage for an hour! He will move around so much that by the end of the show he will be drenched in sweat. At some points he will contort his face to make himself look like the devil. He will also do a backflip and if you’re lucky he will fall on his ass. Pleasance Beside at 19:30!

And how would you pitch it to someone who is into Star Trek?
Come see George Takei’s Grandson perform his gay comedy show at Pleasance Beside at 19:30!

How personal do you get with this show?
The show gets uncomfortably personal. I talk about being a bedwetter until age seventeen, my Japanese grandpa signing up to be a Kamikaze pilot, and wanting to get peed on. Sorry mom.

Where do you get your sense of humour from?
I get my sense of humor from my mom. The Japanese side of my family is very funny and loud. My mom is very loud and the majority of her jokes are delivered through a scream which is something I have inherited. Pretty much every one of my moms friends have told me that she should’ve gone into comedy but my mom says “At office I’m always cracking jokes so I basically do comedy and get paid”. My mom is also a fag hag and she introduced me and my gay twin brother to “Project Runway” and drove us two hours to get our book signed by Tim Gunn. Her humor is very gay and so am I!

Is everything better when it’s set to music?
Not always! As a musical theatre bitch I’m always tempted to add music to a comedic premise or underscore a joke to music. There are cases where a joke is comedically enhanced by music. Music can inject energy into a joke, add comedic tension, and help move a story along. But oftentimes music can actually undercut the punchline of a joke or distract from the comedy of a story. I personally don’t think music should be added to a comedic premise for the music’s sake. The music should always be serving the comedic premise in some way. The only thing that’s always better set to music is anal.

What does your twin think about all this?
My twin brother is actually starting stand up comedy which I feel very mixed about. Comedy was “MY THING” and he just has to swoop in and take it!! I will uplift queer Asian voices but not his voice! But, honestly a part of me is happy he’s doing comedy so now we can talk about comedy together. Whenever I tell a joke about my brother I run it by him beforehand. Most of the time he approves but there have been times he has made me make adjustments.

What do you think “a ‘theatre kid who escaped Alcatraz’” means?
A mean teenager on Tik Tok commented on one of my videos that my energy is “theatre kid who escaped Alcatraz” and unfortunately I think he’s correct. My energy onstage does give “Theatre kid, but something is off”. My onstage persona is very flamboyant and theatrical but also a little demonic and twisted. I think Jacob2749 honestly hit it right on the money. 

Why the Edinburgh Fringe?
It’s been a dream of mine to bring my solo show but I’ve never been able to afford it until recently! Edinburgh is all end be all of comedy festivals and I want the experience of performing my show consecutively for a month. I want to be able to sell my show as a special and tour it around the U.K. and the U.S. I’m ready to experience a mental breakdown at the festival but then come out it stronger, wiser, and even gayer.  

What is your favourite moment in the show?
My favorite moment in the show is near the end when I sing a song about my experience touring the American South for the first time called “In the Heartland”. It’s a newer song and it’s always exciting to perform something that feels fresh. In the song I try to emulate the storytelling elements of my favorite country songs and I feel like the audience goes on a satisfying journey. I based the song’s melody off of my favorite “Chicks” song “Wide Open Spaces”. And I’ll admit I love doing a country accent. 

Where else can we see you?
I’m planning to tour the U.S. and U.K. after Edinburgh Fringe and eventually tape my show as a special. My Late Night set on James Corden is on YouTube! You can also listen to me and my friend Kelly Bachman’s comedy album “R*pe Victims are Horny Too” on Spotify and Apple Music. We wrote a musical comedy hour about our experiences healing from rape trauma and we’re very proud of it. 

What’s next?
Filler and Botox! Just kidding. I definitely would love to have a comedy special and sell my TV Show and Feature. I also want to continue touring around the U.S. and U.K. 

Sondheim or Webber?
Don’t make a theatre f*ggot choose! I love them both. When it comes to music I can play that my whole family can sing along to I go with Andrew Lloyd Webber. I love me some Phantom of the Opera even though the movie permanently traumatized me as an eight year old. I pick Sondheim when it comes to music and lyrics that continues to captivate and surprise me even after playing it for years. Sondheim songs are very intricate and complex which can make them difficult to learn, but I enjoy the challenge. My favorite Sondheim song is “Send in the Clowns”. The best performance of it in my opinion is from Dame Judi Dench. 

Pirates or Ninjas?
I’ve been called a “Butt Pirate” before but that’s neither here nor there. I am embracing my Japanese heritage and choosing Ninjas! I could never have been ninja because I’m too loud and have IBS but I respect their hustle! 

Truth or Beauty?
BEAUTY PLEASE! The truth is hard and scary and I will gladly take beauty over truth. Take me to Disneyland and let me dissociate while eating a Mickey Mouse creamsicle. Thank you. 

Dylan Adler’s debut comedy show ‘Haus Of Dylan’ will be at the Pleasance Courtyard Beside for the entire fringe for tickets go to www.edfringe.com

Check out our features on 2025’s Top Returning shows, and our keenly anticipated picks of new shows.

Maxwell the Bubbleologist • THE FLYING BUBBLE SHOW

MAXWELL THE BUBBLEOLOGISTPHOTObyTILDAJEAN

We caught up with Maxwell the Bubbleologist, who has been pushing the boundaries of what’s possible with soap, breath, and imagination for the last decade. His new show, The Flying Bubble Show, combines entertainment, education, and sensory arts. It’s also the world’s first fusion of aerial performance and bubble artistry. We caught up with Maxwell to find out more about the The Flying Bubble Show, coming to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe this August.

How would you pitch your show to someone unfamiliar with circus?
“Well, I fly through the air and blow bubbles.” That line alone tends to scramble minds delightfully. The technical explanation? I’m strapped into a custom rig operated by a very strong 20-year-old on a ladder—when he descends, I ascend. As I float overhead, bubbles pour down over the audience in waves of wonder. It’s part circus, part performance art, and entirely unique.

CREDIT – PHOTO: TILDA JEAN MaxwellFlyingBubble

Are you the world’s only bubbleologist?
Absolutely not—and that’s a beautiful thing. There’s an incredible global community of bubble masters. Pioneers like Tom Noddy, Eiffel Plasterer, Sterling Johnson, and Louis Pearl paved the way, and bubble play goes all the way back to the 1800s. But I am the world’s only flying bubbleologist.

How did you build the mythology of your show?
The show is built on the hero’s journey—the quest for mastery. It’s about following a spark of curiosity and seeing where it leads. That mirrors my own story.

I always wanted to be a performer, ever since I was a child. But after moving to a new country, I didn’t know how to make it happen. I was working odd jobs, searching for a way in. Then one day, I started blowing bubbles—not with any career plan, just because it fascinated me. It felt good. It lit up my mind. So I kept doing it.
One thing led to another. Bubbles became a passion, then a practice, then a profession. And over time, I built a whole world around them. THE FLYING BUBBLE SHOW is the story of that journey—of following instinct, taking risks, and trusting that curiosity and creativity can take you somewhere extraordinary. Because they can.

Where is the most interesting place you’ve performed this show?
THE FLYING BUBBLE SHOW may only be a year old, but it’s already gone full globetrotter. We’ve performed in the UK, Italy, Portugal, India, Australia, and the Maldives. Each show has had its own kind of magic, but Adelaide Fringe stands out. The crowds were electric, and the show evolved night by night—it became more than just a performance; it was a living, breathing thing.

That said, performing in the Maldives, floating under coconut trees and landing softly in the sand? Also not terrible.

What’s the zaniest thing you’ve done to get this show made?
Oh, where do I start? I wasn’t an aerialist when I had the idea. I lived in London, where aerial space is rare, expensive, and—understandably—not keen on being doused in soap. So I turned to India, where I’d toured before, and found a home at Bliss Circus in South Goa. I flew out, with no show yet, just the spark of an idea: I want to fly and blow bubbles.

That’s where I met Rufus Corvino, a British-born rigging wizard raised between Portugal and India. We tinkered, tested, and schemed over a few short weeks. By March, Brighton Fringe offered me a slot . The show was still a concept. We had no promo material I said yes, booked a photographer the next day, Thomas from Head First AAcrobatssaid the show looks a bit too new for the stage, but gave me the option. This was a crucial moment. We got the green light, and in May we debuted. We sold out 96% of our run and the whole thing just took off. TV spots. Australia. A dream lurching into reality. It’s all been gloriously zany.

Why bubbles?
It might seem random — a career in bubbles. But anyone who’s blown bubbles for a living knows: everybody loves them. That sounds quaint, even obvious, until you realize how rare that is. There’s no divide. Bubbles are a universal yes. Across age, culture, language, background — no barriers. I’ve performed in places where I didn’t speak a word of the local language, but I didn’t need to. I have a visual vocabulary with bubbles. I can communicate through awe.

Bubbles allow me to reach anyone — children, adults, elders, neurodiverse minds—and offer a shared moment of wonder. They go deep: into sensory therapy, into education, into science and breathwork. And because expectations are so low (you blow them, they pop), the room I have to exceed those expectations is enormous. I’ve spent ten years exploring what more they can do—and I’m still only scratching the surface.

How similar is this to other projects you’ve worked on?
It’s unlike anything else. The fusion of aerial and bubble artistry cracks open a whole new realm of physical storytelling. I’ve worked on dozens of bubble shows and immersive projects, but nothing compares to soaring over a crowd while a cloud of bubbles trails behind. The artist flies, the bubbles fly—it’s a duet of levity. A marriage of elements. They belong together in a way I didn’t fully understand until I did it.

What is your favourite moment in the show?

There’s a moment before it begins—when I’m backstage, watching the audience fill in. Hearing the excited chatter followed by The excited silence when the lights dim down for the intro. I feel the weight of the journey that brought me here: an idea born in a dream, now materialized into a full theatre brimming with people who’ve chosen to share this experience. Then: the launch. I fly in at full speed. It’s thrilling, sometimes scary, but the roar of the crowd as the show begins never fails to hit me right in the chest.

There are many favourite moments—the big wow beats, the quiet lyrical ones, the collective gasp. But maybe my favourite of all is just the feeling that, for a brief time, a whole theatre of people are fully present, eyes lifted, united in a moment of magic.

Where else can we see you?

After Edinburgh, I’m heading to Sydney, Adelaide, India, the Maldives, and Brighton—with a few more surprises likely popping up as the months unfold.

What’s next?

As soon as THE FLYING BUBBLE SHOW wraps in Edinburgh, I head straight to Sydney for another 22-show run. More countries, more bubbles, more flights—both literal and poetic.

Gum or chocolate?
Chocolate. I don’t like gum. Bubbles should be in the air, not in your mouth.

Doctor Who or Doctor Frankenstein?
Neither. Doctor Bubble, obviously.

Truth or Beauty?
Truth. Always truth. And when it’s wrapped in beauty? That’s the sweet spot.

The Flying Bubble show will be at the Underbelly Circus Hub The Beauty at 3.10pm for the entire fringe for tickets go to www.edfringe.com

Check out our features on 2025’s Top Returning shows, and our keenly anticipated picks of new shows.

STARBURST’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2025 Picks

robertson

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe has been going strong since 1947 and has hosted thousands and thousands of acts over the years. This year’s fringe features over three thousand total shows, many of which would delight STARBURST readers. We dived deep to pick out ten shows that we keenly anticipate.

John Robertson: Plays with the Audience
John is best known for his internationally renowned live-action video game The Dark Room, and we really liked his crowd-work powered show Human Hurricane. His new show will include songs, comedy, a bit of crowd work, improv and, most of all, fun.


How to Win Against History
An utterly fabulous retelling of the tale of Henry Cyril Paget, the late 19th century’s wealthiest man, who lost it all by being his fabulous self. It’s a musical about trying to be true to yourself when the world is truly against you.

Woody Fu: One Man John Wick
Woody has seen all of the John Wick movies (though maybe not the terrible TV series). And now he wants to re-create them for your delight. With a little bit of help from the audience, Woody will embody the power of Keanu Reeves. Car chases, explosions and dubious motivations, this show may well have it all.


Broken Bard
Louis King is best known for his work as a retro-video games journalist and writer, which features a sharp wit mixed with biting observational humour. Their exciting new show will tackle topics such as PTSD, depression, anxiety and gender dysphoria with passion, knowledge and comic timing. A must-see.


Space Hippo
Award-winning puppet show about launching a hippo into space in order to save the planet Earth.  All the hippo wants to do is get home to their children, but instead, they find themselves in the middle of an intergalactic war. Surreal puppet fun from masters of the art.


Gladiatrix
In 200 AD, doomed Roman Emperor Septimius Severus banned any female from the arena.  Part stage-combat show, part historical drama and part social commentary, Gladiatrix explores what happens when the state tries to control what women do with their bodies.


Parody of the Rings
Sweding is the practice of re-enacting a movie in a low-budget way. Parody of the Rings is a bold attempt at re-enacting Peter Jackson’s iconic fantasy trilogy in only an hour with two very funny guys.

Lesbian Space Crime
Science fiction has always been a way to explore real-world concerns and issues through metaphor, elevating the conversation in a way that is accessible to many more.  This musical comedy about intergalactic dirtbags has vital things to say from deep within its queer heart. Sounds like a recipe for great sci-fi to us.

Ghosted! A New Musical

It’s always exciting to see new musicals at the fringe because every once in a while, they turn out to be something utterly spectacular. Written to appeal to fans of shows such as Ghosts, The Rocky Horror Show and Beetlejuice, this tale of supernatural silliness could turn out to be something truly special.

Also, an honourable mention to The Britpop Hour with Marc Burrows,not exactly our sort of thing, but Marc is amazing, and his previous show about Terry Pratchett was very good.

Our list of returning shows coming to 2025’s Edinburgh Fringe can be found here.

You may want to check out our previous guides from 2017, 2018, 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024.  You may even want to check out our picks for 2025 in other parts of the world, such as New YorkHollywood, Durham, Camden, Greater ManchesterBuxton and Brighton. 

You can book for the Edinburgh Fringe via the EdFringe website.

This article has been edited to remove dead links.

STARBURST’s Favourite Acts Returning to The Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2025

Elf Lyons

STARBURST has been covering the Fringe seen for years now, as it’s often the best way to find exciting and interesting talent before anyone else. Every year, we see amazing shows at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and if we are very lucky, those shows get to come back so we can recommend them to all our lovely readers. Here are ten of the best shows returning to the Fringe.

Elf Lyons: The Bird Trilogy

We absolutely adored the Stephen King-inspired show Raven, which forms one-third of Elf’s Bird Trilogy.  Lyon brings a sense of joy, weirdness and unique physicality to all their work. Brilliant.

MYTHOS RAGNAROK
Mythos Ragnarok
Wrestling is a much-misunderstood art form, but it’s basically high-impact ballet with a bigger audience. Mythos Ragnarok tells classic Norse Myths in the form of a wrestling show. There’s nothing in the world quite like it. Go see and bring your friend who doesn’t get wrestling to come along as well. 

Shantify!
Classic Showtunes remixed as sea shanties? Absolutely fantastic. Wall-to-wall bangers throughout, and all performed by some of the most eye-catching talents to be found at London’s West End. Bring your nautical sweater and get ready to clap along.

Dan Collins - DUNE! THE MUSICAL
Dune The Musical
Despite not getting a well-deserved Hugo nomination due to a technicality (apparently, the rules make it almost impossible for live theatre to get nominated), we still love this show. It’s Dune! As a musical. If you have not seen it yet, you really need to do so.


Chris Grace: Sardines (A Comedy About Death)
Of course, Death is funny; that’s why it gets the last laugh. Chris Grace is amazing at talking about important, life-changing things in a very, very funny way.  He’s the sort of comedian that other comedians envy; go see.

007 Voices of Bond
The Bond movies have had some amazing music over the years. Let the vocals of Maia Elsy and The Night Owl band delight you with classic tunes such as Goldfinger, Skyfall, Diamonds Are Forever and much more. 

LIVE MANGA
Live-action comic book silliness from two of the best clowns in the world. This is a show filled with slapstick, cartoon fun that transcends the language barrier through humour. Fun for all the family.

AL! The Weird Tribute…

Boasting the longest title on this list as well as the longest PowerPoint presentation at the Fringe, this excellent shaggy dog story of a show is filled with musical comedy and is a must for filkers and Weird Al fans alike. 



Classic Penguins
Watch one incredibly talented idiot run through all the Penguin Classics he can think of in this amazingly stupid show. It is brilliant in the dumbest possible way. Very rude, very clever and a highlight of the festival.

Juliette Burton Going Rogue
A stand-up show about mental health, cosplay, superheroes and everything geeky? There’s a lot to love here, and Juliette Burton is a fantastically kind, clever and deeply funny comedian who gets what loving geeky and nerdy things are all about. Go see.

Our list of new shows coming to 2025’s Edinburgh Fringe can be found here. You may want to check out our previous guides from 2023 and 2024You may even want to check out our picks for 2025 in other parts of the world, such as New YorkHollywood, Durham, Camden, Greater ManchesterBuxton and Brighton. 

You can book for the Edinburgh Fringe via the EdFringe website.

STARBURST’s Top TTRPG Shows At Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2025

Watching people playing Dungeons and Dragons (and similar games) has become its own genre of entertainment, with shows appearing at venues ranging from the likes of Wembley Arena to the back room of a pub. We take a quick look at five shows we’re looking forward to seeing at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. (And if you aren’t free this August, maybe consider catching some of these performers at Tabletop Scotland in September.)

Call of Cthulhu – Live in the Library
One of the longest-running TTRPGs in the world, the classic horror game Call of Cthulhu is one of the main reasons why we are still talking about cosmic horror. This live show will put top gamer-performers through their paces as they explore the depths of the Mythos, all set in the background of rather gorgeous National Library of Scotland.

Tartan Tabletop
Now very much a regular Edinburgh Fringe show, these veteran gamers have travelled around the world with their Dungeons and Dragons based, goblin inspired silliness. It’s not quite got a cult following yet, but it’s very close. Go see it before they get famous.


Comedians & Dragons
Sometimes, what you want from an improvised storytelling comedy show is pure, unadulterated chaos. Comedians and Dragons is a very raw, very funny and very easy to get into show. Well worth checking out.

Blood on the Clocktower: Live
The social deduction game Blood on the Clocktower can best be described as Traitors with teeth.  This live show takes four comedians who have to figure out who the secret demonic killer is. The audience ‘helps’ in a way. It’s brilliantly hosted by No Rolls Barred‘s Jon Gracey and frequently has some amazing guest comedians.

Ten Party Games – Jollybox!
Fringe legends, the Jollyboat brothers know how to have fun and love to play games. Though this show is more of a Jackbox-style affair, they are also massive D&D nerds who are currently developing their own TTRPG.  Regardless, if you like games and fun, this is a good night out.

Check out our features on 2025’s Top Returning shows, and our keenly anticipated picks of new shows.

Keith Rosson • THE FEVER HOUSE DUOLOGY

Keith Rosson is the author of the critically acclaimed Fever House duology, and upcoming Americana-noir horror Coffin Moon, which follows a Vietnam veteran and his adopted niece who hunt – and are hunted by – the vampire that slaughtered their family.

How would you pitch The Fever House Duology to a fan of the Evil Dead movies? I think the Evil Dead franchise has a lot of camp in it, a lot of kind of gruesome, joyous irreverence. And while Fever House definitely leaps headlong into a lot of horror tropes (zombies, cursed objects, secret government agencies, the occult), it does so in a way that’s as bombastic but alsomaybea bit less tongue in cheek. I guess I’d pitch the books to Evil Dead fans by saying, “Enter at your own risk. Each are gnarly, and frenetic, as fast-paced, but each are entirely their own things.”

Why a Duology?

Fair warning: There is a significant cliff-hanger at the end of Fever House. It drives people up the wall. I originally wrote Fever House with zero plans to write a sequel. None. I loved that ambiguity, that sense that “Oh my God, this story is just getting started.” Paul Tremblay in particular is a master of that sort of storytelling, those kind of gauzy, questionable endings. So that was my plan, and then we sold the book to Random House five days after it went out, and my editor, in our first phone call, asked me if I would write a sequel and I said, “You just changed my life. I’ll write dog food ad copy for you if you want me to.” So I wrote The Devil by Name, and then I rewrote it, then I rewrote it again. As of now there are no plans for a third book.

I think this is the first venue I’ve told this to – I secretly hope film/TV stuff really takes off, or there’s some other impetus for me to revisit this world. I would love to get to go back and write a third book someday. I think The Devil by Name does a good job of wrapping things up as a duology, but I’m also a writer, and there are always little carrion birds chirping in the back of my brain about how I’d make the Fever House books a trilogy. There are ideas. The will is there.

Why zombies?
Generally, how I write is I come up with four or five things that will hold my interest in a novel and I start writing about them and kind of figure out how all of these things interconnect as I go. Flying through the dark, figuring it out as I go. I also love taking tropes and twisting them a bit, trying to turn them on their heads. So in Fever House, it’s zombies, secret ops, the punk explosion in the 1990s, and legbreakers. I just take that stuff and run with it.

Where did the idea for The Message come from?

It came organically in the way that I wanted a number of artifacts from this devil. I had the hand, that was one of the first images I had of the book, and this skinny kid running down the street with a black leather doctor’s bag in his fist, and inside is a severed hand and a bunch of money. But what other body parts could there be? An eye? A tongue? Or what about the devil actually speaking? What would happen if there was actually a recording of a devil speaking? How that affect the world? You get a thread and you pull and see what’s revealed.

If you could sit one of the characters from the books down and have a word with them, who would it be and what would you say?
I would love to sit down with Katherine Moriarty and listen to her tell war stories from her Blank Letters days. That would be so fun. I would not, ever, want to hang out with Hutch Holtz, because it probably meant that I had screwed up bigtime, given what he does for a living.

 



Which character was the most fun/interesting to write?

I love the two legbreakers we meet on page one, Hutch Holtz and Tim Reed. They were a blast to write, and trying to humanize these bad, bad men was so fun, and made me really flex those writer muscles. But beyond trying to infuse them with some measure of humanness, I could write about dangerous men hitting people in the knees with hammers and collecting overdue cash all day long. Love crime stuff.

What works of horror fiction inspire you?
Obviously, King. Grew up on his stuff. His stories are embedded in my DNA at this point. But as far as contemporaries go, off the top of my head, I’ve been coming back again and again to Nathan Ballingrud’s story collections, Wounds and North American Lake Monsters. There’s a story in NALM called “Wild Acre,” about a guy who survives a werewolf attack. His two friends are killed during the event, and the killings take place in the first five pages. But the main character survives, see, and the rest of the lengthy story is how this man navigates the trauma that follows that event. It’s brilliant, and an examination of trauma and masculinity and toxicity and it totally transcends what I always thought horror was supposed to be. There are more folks that inspire me sure, but Ballingrud’s work is definitely up there.

Why do we keep returning to the end of the world?
It’s unknown, for one, so there’s breathing room and room to experiment with interpretation. But also, I think there’s a part of us that are fascinated with the notion of shrugging off societal expectations, or re-centering them into something different. It’s a kind of relief at the idea of the end of the world because everything’s gone, yes, but so are our obligations: rent, and bills, and work, and all the wretched, brutal minutiae that grinds us down so much every day. The world as we knew it is gone, and we can rebuild it, that’s a fascinating idea.

What’s the toughest part of the writing process for you?

None of it is particularly hard. I love all of it. This is the best job in the world for me. I love getting sloppy in a first draft, giving myself permission to just got for it, get the idea down and worry about line quality later, and then seeing the scaffolding tighten and become more readable with subsequent drafts. I do think I struggle a bit with giving myself permission to experiment a bit. Like I have a notion of how narrative should go, and how stories should unfold, and I could stand to be a little less rigid. A lot of cool, happy mistakes take place that way, when I give myself permission to cut loose a bit.

If you take something from your writing and put it in the real world, what would it be?

Hmmm, not sure. Not sure how specific or broad you want me to be. Personally and this is a Fever House reference I’d love to check out either Peach Serrano or Herman Goud’s collections of weirdnesses, I bet they have some fascinating stuff in there. I wonder if they ever knew each other?

And if you could take one artwork/piece of media/ thing and ensure that it would survive for
thousands of years, what would it be?

Ah, too much pressure! Have you read Will Self’s The Book of Dave? It leapfrogs off this idea to fascinating results. It’s been maybe 20 years since I’ve read, and it’s not an easy book to read, literally, but essentially a future civilization, centuries after the fact, finds a London cab driver’s unhinged treatise that he had fabricated in metal and buried in a backyard, and they form their society around it. I’m due for a reread, but in the meantime, I feel like I’d say here would probably backfire, just like it did for poor Dave.

Simpsons or Futurama?

Simpsons for this guy.

Doctor Who or Doctor No?

Who.

Truth or Beauty?

Oh, gosh. A heady question, and one maybe too wise for me. I feel like they’re often intertwined, right? I also feel the world right now is a bit starved for beauty, but the same could be said for truth. Tough one. Let’s go with truth first, and hopefully beauty will be revealed in the aftermath.

Keith Rosson is the author of Fever House, published  by Black Crow Books (ebook out now).  It can be found here, here, here and even here. Keith’s website can be found here. 

THE TELEPHEMERA YEARS: 1993, part 4

Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, 1993-94

Ah, telephemera… those shows whose stay with us was tantalisingly brief, snatched away before their time, and sometimes with good cause. They hit the schedules alongside established shows, hoping for a long run, but it’s not always to be, and for every Street Hawk there’s two Manimals. But here at STARBURST we celebrate their existence and mourn their departure, drilling down into the new season’s entertainment with equal opportunities square eyes… these are The Telephemera Years!

1993-94

The top ten shows at the end of the 1993-94 season looked very similar to those from 1992-93, with 60 Minutes retaining top spot for CBS, and top five placings for ABC’s Home Improvement and Roseanne. Coach, Monday Night Football, Murphy Brown, and the CBS Sunday Night Movie all kept their top ten slots, and there was an enforced change as US viewers had to get used to life without Cheers. The big new hit was Seinfeld, now in its fifth season and finally becoming the show about nothing that said everything to US audiences, forming a solid sitcom quartet with Mad About You, Wings, and new arrival Frasier, a Cheers spin-off, that commanded Thursday nights for the peacock network.

Elsewhere, David Letterman moved from NBC to CBS, The X-Files arrived on Fox, southern belle Brett Butler gave ABC a new hit in Grace Under Fire, and there was plenty of new genre fodder with Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, seaQuest DSV, Duckman, and Weird Science all beginning their runs to more than make up for the loss of Star Trek: The Next Generation. But those were all shows made for grown-ups; what were their offspring tuned to in Fall 1993? This is the story of the season’s new Saturday morning offerings…

Cadillacs and Dinosaurs (CBS): After graduating from Kutztown University of Pennsylvania in 1977 with a Fine Arts degree in painting, Mark Schultz worked a series of dead-end jobs while he worked out what he wanted to do with his life. Inspiration struck in 1980 when he discovered the burgeoning independent comics scene that had been sparked by publishers such as Aardvark-Vanaheim, Fantagraphics, and Kitchen Sink Press. A comics fan from his youth, Schultz was particularly interested in the EC Comics of the 1950s, adapting his art style to match classic artists of that period. In January 1987, Schultz’s work appeared in Marvel Comics’ Savage Sword of Conan #132, where he inked over pencils by Val Semeiks for a back-up story, but that was a one-off work for the major publisher, much of his time since his decision to go into comic books having been spent working on his own title, Xenozoic Tales. The first story featuring the Xenozoic Tales characters appeared in Death Rattle #8, an anthology title published by Kitchen Sink in December 1986. Two months later, Xenozoic Tales #1 arrived from the same company, with further issues following initially on a bi-monthly schedule but then erratically as time wore on, with the final issue in the series – #14 – released in October 1996.

The black and white comic featured the adventures of mechanic Jack Tenrec and scientist Hannah Dundee, two of an extant population of humankind that emerges after spending 500 years underground in bunkers following a cataclysmic crisis that struck in the 1990s. The world they return to has changed, rewilded, and is now populated by previously extinct dinosaurs and mammals. Dubbed the Xenozoic Era, humanity’s remnants have gathered in isolated cities who distrust one another, and Hannah is an ambassador from the city of Wasoon (the old Washington, DC) to Jack’s City in the Sea. Jack is looked to as a leader by the people of the city, more than the Governors that oversee them, and he is also friendly with the Grith, a race of evolved humanoid dinosaurs with whom he communicates telepathically. it’s a world full of danger and adventure, and Schultz’s beautifully detailed artwork made it a pleasure to visit.

Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, 1993-94

The series was a critical hit from the off, winning both Harvey (named for EC Comics legend Harvey Kurtzman) and Eisner (in honour of graphic pioneer Will Eisner) awards, and attracted the attention of Galaxy Films, who thought the concept perfect to adapt as a live-action movie but first suggested building up the franchise with merchandise, toys, video games, and an animated series. Galaxy also suggested a change of name, focusing on a tagline under the Xenozoic Tales logo on issue two of the series that read, “Cadillacs and Dinosaurs”.

After securing permission from General Motors, who owned the Cadillac trademark, it was under this name that Marvel Comics began reprinting the series in colour under their Epic Comics banner, a six-issue run from November 1990 to April 1991 that brought the series to more mainstream attention. It was also the name for a video  game produced in Japan by Capcom, the company behind the legendary Street Fighter series. Released in arcades in both the US and Japan (where it was titled Cadillacs Kyōryū Shinseiki), the game was popular with players and critics, and whetted the appetite for what came next…

One of those involved in developing the video game was screenwriter Stephen E de Souza. After cutting his teeth as a story editor for the likes of The Six-Million Dollar Man and The Hardy Boys Mysteries, he worked as a producer on Knight Rider and created The Powers of Matthew Star. In the 1980s, he became known as a writer of action films, working on 48hrs, Commando, The Running Man, Die Hard, and more, and while preparing to make the 1994 Street Fighter adaptation, he did some other work for Capcom, including Cadillacs and Dinosaurs.

Cadillacs and Dinosaurs, 1993-94

Impressed by the concept, de Souza secured the TV rights to the property and engaged Canadian animation studio Nelvana to produce a thirteen-episode series, with CBS ready to add it to their Saturday morning line-up for Fall 1993. The series followed the storyline of the comic books, although Jack’s tempestuous character was toned down somewhat and he was positioned as the leader of the Mechanics, a band of freedom fighters dedicated to overthrowing the corrupt rule of Governor Wilhelmina Scharnhorst. As in the comic book, the Terhune clan of vicious poachers are also on hand to threaten Jack and Hannah, but at least they have Hermes, their trusty allosaurus pet, to protect them.

Cadillacs and Dinosaurs debuted on September 18th 1993 as part of a CBS Saturday morning line-up that included fellow new arrivals Marupilami, the All-New Dennis the Menace, and Beakman’s World. The first episode was written by de Souza, with a team including animation veteran David Wise (who wrote five episodes) and comic book writers Marty Pasko and Marv Wolfman scripting the rest of the series. Critics liked the show, but it wasn’t renewed at the end of its first season, a disappointing if not uncommon end to Jack Tenrec’s TV adventures. There was an accompanying line of action figures produced by Tyco and a second video game – Cadillacs and Dinosaurs: The Second Cataclysm – was released in June 1994 for the Sega CD, with some of the programming done by a young programmer named Elon Musk.

Schultz returned to (slowly) producing issues of Xenozoic Tales, but in February 1994 a Cadillacs and Dinosaurs comic book from Topps Comics was released, written mostly by Roy Thomas and illustrated by a variety of artists across its six-issue run. In 2004, Schultz took over as writer and artist on the long-running Prince Valiant newspaper comic strip, and he still writes the strip today, although Thomas Yeates took over as artist in 2012. There have been periodic but as yet unfulfilled promises to continue Xenozoic Tales in the years since it went on “hiatus,” and a 2015 prose novel – Flesk – appeared to provide a backstory to the cataclysm.

Exosquad (syndication): Jay Segal had a colourful career even before he was made an executive vice-president at Hanna-Barbera in 1982. An uncredited script doctor on the first Star Wars movie, he spent time in Japan working with Tōei on the script for Legend of the Super Galaxy, a movie spin-off from the TV anime of Shōtarō Ishinomori’s celebrated manga Cyborg 009. While he was there, he worked with Tsuburaya Productions on Ultraman: The Jupiter Effect, the first attempt to produce an Ultraman movie specifically for a US audience, announced in May 1980 as having a $10,000,000 budget and to be shot at a series of locations across the US including New York City, Washington, DC, the Houston Space Centre, and the Grand Canyon.

The Jupiter Project failed to get beyond pre-production and Segal took that position at Hanna-Barbera, where he worked on The New Scooby and Scrappy-Doo Show, Shirt Tales, The Biskitts, and The Smurfs before taking the story editor role on Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show, the sixth incarnation of the long-running DC Comics cartoon. In 1983, he was creative supervisor for a new project at Hanna-Barbera, a tie-in with toy company Tonka, who had bought the rights to a line called MachineRobo from Japanese toy company Popy. Tonka wanted to replicate the success Hasbro had in turning Takara Toys’ Micro Change and Diaclone lines into Transformers, and developed GoBots, sentient robots from the planet GoBotron warring on Earth.

Although it is still preferred by some to its competitor, GoBots never achieved the popularity of Transformers (and, ironically, Tonka’s properties now reside with Hasbro after a series of mergers), and – after scripting feature film spin-off GoBots: Battle of the Rock Lords in 1986 – Segal was given the chance to create his own show for Hanna-Barbera. Co-created with Kelly Ward, who was part of Segal’s team on GoBots (and played Putzie in Grease), Wildfire was a fantasy adventure yarn that debited in September 1986 and ran for thirteen episodes.

Ultraman: The New Adventure, 1987-88

His next job was another toy tie-in, Kenner’s Sky Commanders, which Segal developed from the bare bones of the toy line, and in 1987 he came full circle, brought in to consult on a new co-production between Hanna-Barbera and Tsuburaya, a second attempt to do Ultraman and the first time an American studio had partnered with Tsuburaya to produce a film based on the famous Japanese superhero. 1987’s Ultraman: The Adventure Begins used much of Segal’s script from the 1980 non-starter but was a fully animated affair. It was intended as a pilot for a possible series but released theatrically in both Japan and the US, where it performed poorly. Segal had been unhappy with changes made to his script during production and insisted his name did not appear on the final product, the script instead credited to John Eric Seward, a pseudonym taken from Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

Segal continued his work at Hanna-Barbera, supervising The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley, The Further Adventures of SuperTed, a Hägar the Horrible special, Fantastic Max, and Midnight Patrol: Adventures in the Dream Zone, as well as an unsold pilot for an animated Rodney Dangerfield series called Where’s Rodney?, but in 1990 he moved to Universal where he became the head of Family Entertainment. Less hands on than he had been at Hanna-Barbera, one of his first moves was to establish Universal Cartoon Studios, which debuted in September 1991 with an animated series based on Back to the Future.

Still a writer at heart, he resumed work on a project he’d begun while still at Hanna-Barbera but that had been shelved while he got his feet under the table at Universal. Informed by his time in Japan, it was a “giant robot” series originally titled Exoforce but when Segal made a deal with toy company Playmates to produce a toy line based on the show, trademark conflicts forced a change of name to Exosquad. The bare bones of Segal’s concept went through several hands, including Mark Hoffmeier and Eric Lewald, who worked with Segal on GoBots, Wildfire, and Sky Commanders, and both were given co-creator credits alongside Segal. A chunk of the design, world building, and the feel of the show, though, was down to Will Meugniot, a former comic book artist working in animation since 1978 when he joined Hanna-Barbera as a story director. and story editor Mark Edens, who had developed X-Men: The Animated Series for Fox alongside Lewald.

Exosquad, 1993-94

Exosquad takes place between the years 2119 and 2121, a time when humanity has escaped the confines of Earth to terraform Mars and Venus. The three planets form a tripartite “Homeworlds” for the Terrans, but not everybody is on board with this new status quo, and Pirate Clans – exiled to the Outer Planets – continually raid Terran ships. As the series starts, the Earth Congress finally reaches its limit and dispatches the entire Exofleet to the Outer Planets to deal with the threat of the Pirate Clans and this is the signal for an uprising by the Neosapiens, a race of artificially engineered beings used in the colonisation of Mars and Venus. A previous uprising fifty years earlier had been put down brutally, but the Neosapiens had bided their time and waited for the perfect opportunity.

With a cast of dozens, the show largely concentrated on the exploits of Able Squad, an elite, unisex, multi-racial eight-person unit that pilot Exoframes, powered exoskeletons in the mecha tradition found in manga and anime such as Mazinger, Mobile Suit Gundam, and Cyborg 009. Led by Lieutenant JT Marsh (voiced by Robby Benson, who had starred as the Beast in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast), and also including Nara Burns (Lisa Ann Beley), Alec DeLeon (John Payne), and Marsala (Gary Chalk), they find themselves at odds with the rest of the Exofleet and its commander, Captain Marcus (Richard Newman, who also does double duty as Neosapien Governor General Phaeton). However, Able Squad may just be the Terrans’ best hope of stopping the Neosapiens, but only if they can bring both the Pirate Clans and the Earthbound Resistance led by former Security Force misfit Sean Napier (Payne again) onside…

The first, thirteen-episode season of Exosquad premiered on September 18th 1993, syndicated both on Sundays and as the sole offering of the weekday afternoon Universal Family Network, a concept introduced to combat The Disney Afternoon. It built an impressive audience, especially when paired with Monster Force, an action-adventure show developed by Marv Wolfman that featured the original Universal monsters as agents, on Sunday mornings, and Universal were only too pleased to order a second season, this time of thirty-nine episodes, with new episodes beginning on weekdays from September 29th 1994.

Exosquad, 1993-94

The show’s return was accompanied by a third series of action figures from Playmates, joining the first two waves that had begun appearing in toy stores in late 1993. With 3¾ inch figures packaged with their Exoframes, the young and young-at-heart could recreate the show’s action at home, something they could also do with a Sega Genesis videogame released in 1995. A one-off comic book tie in was also published by Topps in January 1994. Season two of Exosquad finished with the death of Phaeton and the end of the Neosapien uprising but dangled a tantalising thread as mysterious aliens attacked the Outer Planets. Ratings had dwindled, with many local affiliates choosing to air the show in the early hours due to its mature content, but there were hopes that it might continue and some sources report that work had begun on the first episode of the third season, as well as a possible spin-off show that Segal had given the working title of ExoPirates .

In the end, neither came to fruition, and nor did a direct-to-video feature film tying up loose ends. The toy line continued through to 1996, eventually encompassing six series and over forty figures and vehicles, but sales fell off without a TV show to drive them. While Segal remained at Universal there was always the hope that he could bring the show back but a restructure after the company was bought by Seagram in 1995 saw him step away from his role there a year later. Initially working as a consultant for companies including former Universal chief Sid Sheinberg’s Bubble Factory and children’s entertainment software company Cloud 9, he later joined Amnesty International’s media department as an executive director.

Three decades after its cancellation, Exosquad retains a strong fandom who are chomping at the bit for a revival. Universal retain the rights and although DVDs are long out of print (and only contained season one), it was one of the initial offerings on NBCUniversal’s Peacock streaming service when it debuted in July 2020. Its themes of human expansion into the solar system, an underclass of workers, and a small band trying to keep a fragile peace would find later find expression in The Expanse, a 2015 series based on the novels by James S A Corey that ran for six seasons on Syfy.

SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron (Cartoon Network): Jacks of all trades, Christian and Yvon Tremblay began their creative careers in the basement of their parents’ home in Montreal, Canada. Self-taught in drawing, sculpting, and animation, they formed their own graphic design company. The brothers were working on a set of sleepwear designs when Yvon remarked that one of Christian’s characters looked like a fighter pilot. This set them off on a blur of creativity, adding more characters to the set along a jet plane theme, anthropomorphised cats matching the likes of the USAF’s F-14 Tomcat (and any number of previous Grumman planes). Contacting Hanna-Barbera’s development group, they were invited to Los Angeles to pitch their show, impressing executives to the point that Hanna-Barbera President Fred Seibert called an ”incredible presentation” that “we couldn’t say no to.”

Although they had some animation training, the brothers were not animators by any stretch of the imagination and so Hanna-Barbera put them together with experienced producer Davis Doi, story editor Glenn Leopold, character designer Lance Falk, and director Robert Alvarez. The Tremblays moved to Los Angeles and work began on turning the brothers’ initial concept into a workable, screen-ready thing that was sent to studios in Japan and Taiwan for animation. Out went the initial plan for the show’s two heroes to be called Chuck and Yeager, in honour of the first man to exceed the speed of sound, replaced by Jake “Razor” Clawson (voiced by Barry Gordon, Donatello in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) and Chance “T-Bone” Furlong (Charlie Adler), former operatives of Megakat City’s paramilitary law enforcement agency The Enforcers until they were discharged for disobeying the orders of self-serving Enforcer Commander Feral (played by the voice of Space Ghost, Gary Owens).

Now working at a salvage yard, the pair use spare parts to build their own fighter jet, the Turbokat, and use it to patrol Megakat City as the SWAT Kats, vigilantes protecting the city from the likes of criminal mastermind Dark Kat (Brock Peters), twisted genius Doctor Viper (industry veteran Frank Welker), undead sorcerer Pastmaster (Keene Curtis), and a troupe of robot gangsters known as the Metallikats. Their allies included the hapless Mayor Manx (Jim “Winnie the Pooh” Cummings) and his clued-up deputy Callie Briggs (Animaniacs‘ Tress MacNeille), who would alert the Kats to danger but still did not know their secret identities, while Commander Feral was antagonistic to their activities, often threatening to arrest them on sight.

SWAT Kats, 1993-94

SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron debuted on Cartoon Network on September 11th 1993, with new episodes airing weekly through December 4th. Their origin story was told in episode three and across a first season of thirteen episodes – all directed by Alvarez, with scripts mostly from Leopold and Falk – they kept the city safe, even warding off the threat of their deadliest enemies teaming up in the season finale at the behest of new arch-nemesis MadKat (Roddy McDowall).

With interest at a high from syndicated markets for the Fall of 1994, a second season of SWAT Kats was ordered, debuting on September 10th 1994. There was a new addition to the cast in the shape of Lieutenant Felina Feral (newcomer Lori Alan, later Pearl Krabs in Spongebob Squarepants), the niece of Commander Feral, who openly works with Razor and T-Bone knowing that she is too good an agent for her uncle to fire (and that her father wouldn’t let him hear the end of it if he did). New adversaries such as Mutilator and Turmoil appeared but there was also turmoil behind the scenes as Cartoon Network owner Ted Turner made it known that he thought modern cartoons, including some of those on his network, were too violent, and that he’d prefer it if the likes of Scooby Doo and The Flintstones occupied his airtime.

SWAT Kats, 1993-94

The second season was cut short after just twelve episodes, someway short of its series order, with three more episodes almost complete and a further four in the early concept stages. For years it was thought that Turner directly cancelled SWAT Kats himself, and Falk himself said as much in a 2009 interview, but the Tremblays later said Turner was on board with their show and that his ire was directed more at shows like Beavis and Butthead, which featured easily copied violence. SWAT Kats was merely collateral damage, Turner’s edict affecting merchandising deals for the cartoon, with executives wanting to ensure that the tie-ins were age appropriate. The delay in getting toys and other merchandise on shelves affected the amount of money the show was bringing in versus how much it was costing to produce.

The final episode of the show premiered on Christmas Eve 1994, a day before kids across America unwrapped the action figures produced by Remco that accompanied the show’s second season. A one-off, clip-show special that was created to fulfil syndication obligations aired in January 1995, and a videogame for the Super NES was released in August that year, but that was it for SWAT Kats, with the Hanna-Barbera crew moving on to Cow & Chicken, I Am Weasel, and The Real Adventures of Johnny Quest, while the Tremblays began work on their next project. Mega Babies, a trio of mutant babies who fight off evil, was a co-production of Quebec studio Cinégroupe and Landmark Entertainment which debuted in October 1999 on Teletoon in Canada and the Fox Family Channel in the US.

In July 2015, the Tremblays made an announcement that they were Kickstarting a SWAT Kats revival, seeking various amounts for concept art, production samples, and other stages, right up to a full, seventy-minute movie. In the end they crowdfunded enough for a two-minute trailer which they first shopped to Warner Bros, who expressed interest but ultimately passed. In 2020, Christian Tremblay updated the campaign with a positive message explaining delays in the project, and – as of 2022 – SWAT Kats Revolution was reported to be in pre-production at Toonz Media Group in India, with X-Men Evolution writer Greg Johnson working with Christian Tremblay on the scripts.

Cro (ABC): Although they are known mostly for Sesame Street (and indeed are now called the Sesame Workshop), the Children’s Television Workshop were responsible for a string of other series beginning with 1971’s The Electric Factory, all designed to educate and entertain generations of children glued to their TVs. The 1980s brought 3-2-1 Contact, Square Television, and Mathnet, along with Encyclopedia, a co-production with premium cable service HBO developed by the Workshop’s for-profit arm, Distinguished Productions, Inc. In 1993 they began working on a show for ABC that was partially funded by the National Science Foundation, an independent agency funded by the US government. Designed to introduce basic scientific concepts in the fields of physics and mechanical engineering, the show was co-produced by Film Roman, an animation studio founded in 1984 by industry veteran Phil Roman which had recently hit paydirt with The Simpsons.

Cro featured the exploits of the titular caveboy and his pal, a woolly mammoth named Phil. When scientist Dr C and her assistant Mike travel to the Arctic, they discover Phil frozen in ice and, upon revival, he tells them of his adventures in the Ice Age with Cro. When situations in the modern era invoke principles of physics or engineering, Phil relates a story from his past where Cro encountered and solved a similar problem. Taking inspiration from David Macauley’s book How Things Work and developed by Mark Zaslove, who also developed The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and created TaleSpin for Disney, Cro’s name came from the Occitan word for cave. Occitan was a language spoken in southwest France, an area rich with palaeontological discoveries, and also a nod to his status as a Cro-Magnon who lives with a tribe of Neanderthals.

Cro, 1993-94

Cro debuted on September 18th 1993, leading off a line-up that also introduced the animated adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Tales of the Cryptkeeper, and CityKids to the ABC Saturday morning schedule. Jim Cumming provided the voice of Phil, with Doogie Howser, MD’s Max Casella as Cro and Cumming, Ruth Buzzi, and Frank Welker voicing the Neanderthals. Peril came in the shape of a pack of dire wolves led by Big Red (Charlie Adler) and yellow-eyed Smilodon Selene (Jane Singer). With competition from Marsupilami on CBS and Jim Henson’s Dog City on Fox, Cro regularly won its timeslot and was renewed for a second season beginning in September 1994, where it easily outrated CBS’s The Little Mermaid and Dog City once more.

A move to a noon timeslot saw ratings improve further but despite that, ABC cancelled the show after eight episodes of its second season with no explanation, although the fact they replaced it with an animated adaptation of Dumb and Dumber probably speaks volumes. In response, the Children’s Television Workshop began the process of creating their own network, free from the whims of the majors, which would eventually result in the debut of Noggin in February 1999, co-founded with MTV Networks and with re-runs of Cro a foundation of its schedule.

Next time on The Telephemera Years: Nothing, nada, zilch! An empty void, the result of the completion of our journey through forty-three-plus years of TV fluff! Thanks for reading!

Check out our other Telephemera articles:

The Telephemera Years: pre-1965 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1965 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1966 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1967 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1968 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1969 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1970 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1971 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1972 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1973 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1974 (part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

The Telephemera Years: 1975 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1976 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1977 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1978 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1979 (part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

The Telephemera Years: 1980 (part 12, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1981 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1982 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1983 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1984 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera years: 1985 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1986 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1987 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1988 (part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

The Telephemera Years: 1989 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1990 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1991 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1992 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1993 (part 1, 2, 3)

The Telephemera Years: 1994 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1995 (part 12, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1996 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1997 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1998 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1999 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2000 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2001 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2002 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2003 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2004 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2005 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2006 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2007 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2008 (part 1, 23, 4)

The Telephemera Years: O Canada! (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

Titans of Telephemera: Irwin Allen

Titans of Telephemera: Stephen J Cannell (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

Titans of Telephemera: DIC (part 1, 2)

Titans of Telephemera: Filmation (part 1, 2)

Titans of Telephemera: Hanna-Barbera (part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Titans of Telephemera: Kenneth Johnson

Titans of Telephemera: Sid & Marty Krofft

Titans of Telephemera: Glen A Larson (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

Titans of Telephemera: Quinn Martin (part 1, 2)

Titans of Telephemera: Rankin/Bass

Titans of Telephemera: Ruby-Spears

Titans of Telephemera: Aaron Spelling (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

Titans of Telephemera: Sunbow

STARBURST’S Durham Fringe Festival Picks 2025

Now in its fifth year, The Durham Fringe Festival brings fringe theatre to the ancient English city.

Running from July 23rd to 27th, the Durham Fringe is still finding its own vibe but is already growing to become a unique and important part of the UK’s network of fringe theatre, feeding into the arts culture that is such an important and unique part of the UK. Let’s take a look at five shows we think STARBURST readers will enjoy.

Mission to Mars
A comedy musical about a school trip to Mars that lets the audience join in as a team of plucky students explore the science of the red planet.



It’s Your Role
Enjoy more audience participation fun with this fantasy TTRPG inspired comedy show. A member of the public is invited to join a troupe of professional actors on a fantasy adventure. This is your chance to take on the critical role of a fantasy hero.

Who Stole My Hammer?

This family-focused show asks the real questions, like who were The Vikings, who was Thor, and did Loki steal his hammer?  Part educational, part storytelling and mostly mayhem, this show promises to entertain everyone. Except maybe Loki.

Atomic Cabaret
A one women cabaret show about the history of the atomic bomb which is also a fund-raiser for CND?  It sounds like a fascinating evening’s worth of entertainment, sure to evoke a chain reaction from the audience to us.

The Witching Hour
A sharp and satirical take on justice, celebrity culture and being popular, The Witching Hour is a show about a wicked game show in which only the tallest tale tellers can hope to survive. Sounds like a great look at modern popculture to us. 

If you really want to, you can check out our previous coverage of the Durham Fringe for 2023 & 2024

You may even want to check out our picks for 2025 for other parts of the world, such as New YorkHollywood, Camden, Greater ManchesterBuxton and Brighton. 

 

STARBURST’S Camden Fringe Festival Picks 2025

This August, the UK will pay host to the world’s longest-running and largest Fringe festival. However, if, for some reason, you don’t want to travel to Edinburgh, the Camden Fringe has you covered.

The Camden Fringe has been around since 2006 and tends to have shorter runs on shows than larger festivals. Although small, it is fierce, and it’s a great place to catch stuff that ordinarily couldn’t make it to larger festivals. Here are our top five picks.

The Wizard’s Guide To Saving The World (With Added Merlin)
Terry Victor wowed crowds a while back with his portrayal of Santa Claus as an ageing superstar in his critically acclaimed show GROTTO. This new show promises to be a lot sillier and features Terry as a Wizard, telling ancient tales with modern worries. Featuring everything from love potions, this should be a memorable one-man show.

Coming out with Doctor Who
Join SJ Wyatt as they come out of the closet and into the TARDIS. This bipolar, bisexual, but not yet bi-regenerated performer will take the audience on an interactive journey that explores queerness through the lens of Doctor Who.

Merely Players: Time to Go!
STARBURST has a bit of a quest to see every Dungeons and Dragons themed comedy improv show in the UK. Merely players join the growing body of fine TTRPG-themed fun on the stage.


Any Suggestions, Doctor? The Improvised Doctor Who Parody
The UK is blessed with loads of Doctor Who inspired fringe shows this year, which is a sign of healthy and culturally relevant franchise. STARBURST has raved about Any Suggestions Doctor in the past, and the show continues to delight both fans and everyone else.

Bound by the Wind

A fantastic retelling of the story of Mulan, drawing on video game stylings and physical theatre, combining sound design and stage combat to tell old stories in clever new ways, this show sounds like it will be well worth the trip.

If you really want to, you can check out our previous coverage of the Camden Fringe for 2024
You may even want to check out our picks for 2025 for other parts of the world, such as New YorkHollywood, Greater Manchester, Buxton and Brighton.