Per an email from his longtime collaborator Steve Perry, writer Michael Reaves passed away on Monday, March 20, following a lengthy battle with Parkinson’s disease. A prolific novelist, TV, short story, and comic book writer, Reaves was best known for his Emmy Award-winning work on Batman: The Animated Series, on which he served as a story editor, and countless other animated projects — including Batman: Mask of the Phantasm — as well as several Star Wars novels. He is survived by his ex-wife, Brynne Chandler, and their three children, including author Mallory Reaves.
James Michael Reaves was born in San Bernardino, California on September 14, 1950. He did poorly at school, but enjoyed writing short stories. He was rejected by the magazines he submitted these to until 1972, when he was accepted by the Clarion Science Fiction Writers’ Workshop in East Lansing, Michigan. In 1974, he moved to Los Angeles, where he worked at a bookstore, and then a Sears store while trying to break into Hollywood. The following year, he sold his first script, which was an episode of The Secrets of Isis, and he went into writing full-time. His first novel, a young adult book called I, Adult, was released in 1978, and his first adult-aimed novel, Dragonworld (written with Byron Preiss) followed in 1979.
He contributed to almost every major cartoon of the 1980s, penning multiple episodes of Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, Dungeons & Dragons, The Real Ghostbusters, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. His most prolific work during the early part of the decade was The Smurfs, which he wrote 63 episodes of from 1981 to 1983. Live-action projects included The Twilight Zone, Star Trek: The Next Generation, 1990’s Flash, and Father Dowling Mysteries. He made his comic book debut with 1987’s “Teen Titans Spotlight” #14, an issue featuring Nightwing and Batman, which he followed with three issues of Eclipse Comics’ futuristic sci-fi action series “Fusion” (written with Steve Barnes.)
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Originally Posted by Cameron Samurai
