1. How involved were you in all storylines?

IR: Dean Stefan and I would break each story and the overall story arcs. When we were working with another writer, they would be part of the episode brainstorm as well.

2. How do you feel about She-Ra?

IR: Great. She is an important part of the He-Man mythology and our plan was always to include her when the time was right.

3. What were the future plans for a season three?

IR: He-Man and the Masters become renegades when Hordak returns and takes over Eternia.

4. What was your favorite episode?

IR: Power of Grayskull. There’s a good story behind it. Gary Hartle and I were sitting at lunch in mid-2001 and he told me how much he liked the original sculpture the Four Horsemen did of He-Man with long hair. I agreed and decided we should find a way to work it into the new series – but how? At that moment the concept of King Grayskull began to take shape on our lunch receipt. Gary and I fleshed out the story right there on the spot, then we called Dean on his cell phone.

One of our objectives with the new series was to improve the existing mythology and understand more about why the world existed as it did. I think we accomplished this goal with episodes such as the Power of Grayskull.

5. How were the writers of the episodes selected?

IR: The writers were selected based on their past experience writing action/adventure/fantasy shows.

6. How was Mike Young Productions selected?

IR: At the time we were exploring many options, but settled on MYP because we knew Mike Young, Liz Young and Bill Schultz would deliver a high-quality series for a reasonable budget. As I’m sure you all agree they did not disappoint.

7. Some episodes basically amounted to commercials, like the Dragon Walker, episode, and the Anwat Gar episode. Was the creative team opposed to doing these types of episodes? I assume that Mattel required that they were done.
(Not trying to be rude).

IR: Anwat Gar: From a story standpoint we wanted to explore many different aspects of Eternia – including ancient civilizations. Regarding the Dragon Walkers we thought it would be cool to see revisit the dragons from season 1 in some epic dramatic battles. We came up with the idea of the Dragon Walkers as a way for our heroes to be involved.

8. Does King Greyaskull replace He-ro, or would there still have been room for him in the MVC series?

IR: I think anything is possible in the world of Eternia as long as it fits the characters and the logic of the world. This was how we approached everything.

9. Will the new 'toon ever see release on DVD?

IR: Yes. Once we have more details, we will share them.

10. Were there any plans to expand the Horde beyond what was shown (whether or not She-Ra was really to play a part in that)?

IR: Yes. The plan was for Hordak to return from Despondos and take over Eternia.

11. What is MYP doing/are working on now?

IR: MYP is doing some great shows right now. Piggly Winks and Pet Alien are the two that immediately come to mind.

12. Is there any chance of a direct to video/DVD MOTU movie special?

IR: I personally would love to do one, but it would have to make financial sense. Don’t underestimate the power of the fans…

13. How were the episodes selected? Or, to put another way, how were episode ideas developed and then scripted? Were there any episodes that started out one way and ended up a totally different version? Were there any episodes that just "didn't make the cut?"

IR: The He-Man team would discuss series arcs, character arcs, etc… and map out the episodes accordingly. Then a writer would be assigned to write the episode under Dean’s supervision.

14. My main question that comes to mind is about Veena. How did she turn over Grayskull's protection to the Sorceress we know today, or is she the same Sorceress that was once King Grayskull's wife? In the King Grayskull episode when she first said there would come another guardian of Grayskull I got the impression that she speaking of Teela.

IR: Glad you liked it. Veena, like the Oracle and King Grayskull, is an ancestor of her contemporary.

15. Will tthe show that was released already be on dvds and 2 will it be possible to do more eps w the other seasons like other shows have done for more seasons on dvds only and let the really big fans get to watch and enjoy the series from there?

IR: Yes, the new show will come to DVD. Regarding more episodes, anything is possible – look at what happened with Family Guy.

16. I know it was HINTED that Fisto was Teela's father...was that going to be the case? if so...WHY? I mean not to step on anyone's toes but i think the idea that her real father was dead was a much better storyline...not EVERYTHING has to be a twist you know?

IR: When we decided to make Fisto and Duncan brothers (for dramatic reasons), we came up with the idea that Teela’s real father could be Fisto. We felt it worked on many levels.

17. Also why did you decide to make Duncan and Fisto brothers...I actually liked that idea as it brought some tension to the good guys

IR: To add depth to the relationships between the Masters of the Universe.

18. Why was the choice made to call the good guys the "Masters of the Universe"? Masters of the Universe is a GREAT name for a line but not for a team. it doesn't roll of the tongue like avengers or xmen etc. I think the idea that they were all masters of their respective traits (bad guys too) was much more appealing. (ie Heroic master of capture, evil master of escape etc)

IR: We wanted to work it into the show and felt that the title of “Masters of the Universe” fit the heroic superheroes of Eternia better than the heroes AND the villains (we also had cool names for them like Evil Horde, Snakemen, etc…)

19. Did mattel push to have more episodes made and did they see the cartoon as something more or just a way to advertise the toys?

Now I know there are people AT mattel that love MOTU and fought for it but these questions are more so from the business standpoint.

IR: Masters of the Universe is one of the great brands. Like many similar brands, MOTU manifests itself in many forms: Entertainment, Toy, Video Game, etc…

20. DVDS the new series NEEDS to be put on DVD.

IR: This is the plan. We will let the fans know more when we have more details.

21. What exactly happened to Randor's knee? how did he injure it? Why didn't we see more of the mythology of Eternia developed (not like the King Grayskull stuff etc.) but more so why didn't we really get into the heart and soul of the planet...the locations the beliefs the stuff that makes the world so rich

IR: Randor’s knee was an old battle injury. We gave him that injury as a way to convey the passage of time between the scene at the Hall of Wisdom and the scene at the Palace. Regarding the mythology of Eternia, I think we did a great job of exploring more of the planet, the creatures and the various denizens.

22. Why did you nix Granamyr? he is a great charcter and Talking dragons are not a far fetched idea. (if you accept dragons you can easily accept that they talk)

IR: We decided not to have animals talk in this Eternia universe. Talking animals and creatures can tend to skew the tone of a show very young.

23. Also why was the UNIVERSE aspect taken out? they were just stuck on Eternia...made the show feel smaller.

IR: We wanted to keep He-Man out of space and go back to what made the original great.

24. He-Man - he wasn't written with a lot of character depth, which was a shame. now don't get me wrong i loved the new series, but these are some of my questions.

IR: We debated whether or not to focus the series on He-Man or the entire team. We opted for the latter based on the great cast of characters we had to work with.

25. Grayskull...why was it drawn so dull and plain? the new toy looked better than the one in the toon...the show's version lacked a certain mystery.

IR: I was very happy with Grayskull in the series. Some episodes it looked better than others, (the overseas animators didn’t always get it right) but overall I was very happy.

26. The show started off with a nice level of continuity...each ep leading into the last but that kind of diminished...at least in a real strong storyline sense..why..also did skeletor know about the sorceress, it didn't really seem to be the case...if not why?
First off, I thought the new cartoon was awesome an the artwork envolved was fantastic..but on with the questions:

IR: I think we maintained a fairly good continuity throughout all the episodes. I don’t think there was an episode without some aspect of continuity.

27. Why was the time that they were shown so early 4pm was really early for the mian collectors that this was marketed for...the people that grew up with the original He-man cartoon missed out on wathen this sometimes becuase of working.

IR: The show was not targeted to adults, but we obviously had aspects for the fans.

28. Why weren't some of the other characters brought into it..there was soo much that could have been done if it hadn't been soo limited to certian charcters.

IR: I think we introduced a good amount of characters in the 39 episodes. Any more would have been difficult.

29. Are there any finished cartoon episodes that weren't aired? and if so are there plans for VHS or DVD's of the complete line..an if there are episodes that haven't been aired would they be put on to something like that?

IR: There were no episodes produced that did not air. We did write a 40th script however.

30. I'd also like to ask Ian Richter, is there anything you regret about the series or how it was handled (aside from it being discontinued)?

IR: I think we could have pumped up the action more in the first season and updated He-Man to make him more relevant to today’s kids (we did this by the time we hit season 2).

31. First off, I love the new MotU cartoon. You guys have done great work. I have only a couple of questions at this time... Is it possible for you guys to do a DVD series with new unseen episodes? I mean something featurelength, but that ties in with the series.
And my other question... Why was Mossman's design changed so much for the cartoon. I understood that the 4HM allready had designed him, and he was supposed to look very differently.

IR: Glad you like it. A DVD release is in the works, but there are no unseen episodes. We initially based Moss-Man in the series on the Four Horsemen design, but we decided to make him even bigger and more powerful.

32. I was wondering what you guys had in mind for Evil-Lyn. Was she going to free Hordak, eventually? Or stay faithful to Skeletor?

IR: Good question. The plan was for her to ultimately succeed in freeing Hordak.

33. When Hordak showed up, were Skeletor and his crew going to be any threat? Cuz, what the Snake Men did to em' was prett ugly. (Which leads me to ask -)

IR: Yes and no – we wanted Hordak to be an extreme threat when he showed up, but ultimately the plan was for Skeletor to come back and defeat Hordak by the end of season 3.

34. Why did the Snake Men school Skeletor and his crew so bad? Did Mattel ask you guys to make the Snake Men more powerful? Skeletor couldn't beat Hsss?

IR: We wanted the Snake Men to be truly formidable. The plan was to introduce many powerful villain factions to keep the audience guessing who would prevail.

35. First off, I'd like to say that while it was running the new MOTU cartoon was the only show I watched on television. So hats off to you for getting me use my TV for something other than my DVD player or nintendo for once. Even though I know it really doesn't mean much in the grand scheme of things, that really was a big accomplishment. And I know you're going to get ten million requests for the new show on DVD, so instead of saying that again I'll just get straight to my question. Is there any way