2023 Year in Review

2023 was an interesting year for the Sunbow Marvel Archive. Thanks to the various contributors, material from a wider variety of shows is now available and also helped in demystifying a series that has previously been considered "lost media."

In terms of general organisation, the website has been streamlined to collect the material for 24 shows on 6 pages.

For Transformers, the march towards series completion continued with full or partial storyboards for another 10 episodes, over 100 audition sheets from voice director Wally Burr's collection, plus various model sheets, backgrounds and the script for The Killing Jar.

The biggest Transformers-related item saw release in August. Three years since it was found by Flint Dille and scanned by Jim Sorenson, the very first script for The Transformers: The Movie is available to the public.

G.I Joe saw its first newly-revealed scripts in over a decade, with Flint Dille's Skeletons In The Closet and Doug Booth's My Favorite Things

An unexpected surprise came in the form of over a dozen My Little Pony storyboard sets, sold from the estate of artist Wendell Washer. Including the first special Rescue At Midnight Castle and a selection of episodes from the main series, spanning from the first episode Ghost Of Paradise Estate to the final one The Prince And The Ponies.

Beyond paper material, a selection of dialogue reels from various Marvel Productions' series came to light. Among them was audio from The Young Astronauts, Marvel's ill-fated series about space exploration that was cancelled in mid-production due to the Challenger shuttle explosion. The reels covered dialogue for the episode Ghost Ship, as well as auditions for the series narrator, featuring a who's who of 1980s voice actors.

 

With 2024 marking the 40th anniversaries of Transformers, Muppet Babies and My Little Pony making their television debuts, who knows what untold stories will be uncovered in the year ahead.

My Little Pony: Model sheet gallery

Following on from my post at the end of October, detailing the numerous My Little Pony N Friends storyboards and other material donated to the Archive by user yanchagraffiti, below is the link to a gallery of a 185 sheet model pack. 

Covering Attitudes, Turnarounds, Mouth Guides and Construction Models for the various types of ponies, Megan and her family, the Moochick and his rabbit, the Grundles and the Bushwoolies.

View them all at My Little Pony N Friends model sheet gallery

G.I Joe: Skeletons In The Closet script

Newly uploaded to the Archive is another item originating from Flint Dille's storage: his third GI Joe script, Skeletons In The Closet

Read the script at G.I Joe Part 1 and compare to the episode linked below as we delve into the origin of Destro, Lady Jaye's family tree and...The Evil That Lies Within?

My Little Pony N Friends: Storyboards for 13 episodes, model sheets and more

Thanks to yanchagraffiti, the Sunbow Marvel Archive now hosts a large collection of storyboards and other material from My Little Pony N Friends.  

All of the material was formerly owned and mostly drawn by artist Wendell Washer, who sadly passed away in 2022.  Here is what is available so far:

• 4012 Rescue At Midnight Castle: Sunbow press pack, 2x partial Act II storyboard, full Act III storyboard
• 185 page model sheet pack, broken down into Attitudes, Turnarounds, Mouth Guides and Construction Model sections.
• 01 Ghost Of Paradise Estate, Part 1: full storyboard
• 22 The Return Of Tambelon, Part 4: full storyboard
• 23 Baby, It's Cold Outside, Part 1: storyboard samples
• 29 Would-Be Dragonslayer: partial storyboard
• 38-47 The End Of Flutter Valley: Part 2 song sequence, Part 3 full storyboard, Part 4 full storyboard, Part 9 full storyboard
• 54 Quest Of The Princess Ponies, Part 1: full storyboard
• 58-59 Somnambula: Part 1 full storyboard, Part 2 partial storyboard and sketches
• 61 The Prince And The Ponies: full storyboard

View them all in PDF form at My Little Pony N Friends or in viewing gallery form at the Storyboard viewing gallery index

As a taster, the Witches from the Volcano of Gloom are cooking a Dark and Dirty tune below:

New page: D&D, Young Astronauts, Pandamonium

New page at the Sunbow Marvel Archive, combining Marvel's early network endeavours of Pandamonium, Dungeons & Dragons and The Young Astronauts at the following link.

Marvel Network Shows 1982-1986

The standalone D&D page will remain for a time, but will no longer be accessible from the main banner.

(VIDEO) The Young Astronauts: Wendy Hampton auditions

With thanks to yanchagraffiti for providing the files, linked below are auditions for the character of Wendy Hampton, on the Marvel Productions' series The Young Astronauts.

These are specific excerpts from an hour-long reel.

Susan Blu

Nancy Cartwright

Jeannie Elias

(VIDEO) Transformers dialogue recording audio: The Revenge Of Bruticus

Thanks to the winner of a recent audio reel auction, who has supplied digital files, I can now present the full dialogue recording audio for Transformers episode The Revenge Of Bruticus.

54 minutes in total, the recording is effectively split in half, with one group of actors doing pickup sessions, and then the main ensemble from beginning to end.

For those wanting to follow along with the available written material, links are provided below

Dialogue script
Full Script (final)

Timecodes:

0:00 Bruticus 
3:08 Kickback and Shrapnel 
05:00 Tracks
05:45 Walla (people screaming in terror) 
06:40 Inferno 
07:07 Shrapnel, Kickback and Ramjet (underground parking lot) 
07:53 Walla (refugees), Woman on rooftop (Morgan Lofting) 
09:21 Bruticus (final fight) 
11:01 Insecticon voracious eating 
13:35 Red Alert 
13:57 Ensemble recording (start to finish)
54:13 End

(VIDEO) The Young Astronauts: full episode dialogue and series narrator auditions

With thanks to yanchagraffiti, the Sunbow Marvel Archive presents audio from Marvel Productions ill-fated series The Young Astronauts.

First is the full episode dialogue from MP 800-04 Ghost Ship.  Main session recorded 10th October 1985.  Pickup audio for Rick and Wendy Hampton recorded 3rd December 1985

(Thanks to Townsend Coleman for cast info)

Cast:
Commander Hampton: ?
Rick Hampton: Townsend Coleman
Wendy Hampton: Nancy Cartwright
Mikey Hampton: Stephen Dorff
Retro: ?
Mr. Flynn: Charlie Adler
Sam Turrell: James Avery
The Starseeker: ?

(If anyone can help with identifying the remaining voice cast, please get in touch)

Video runtime: 21:22

Next are the auditions for series narrator, with takes from the following actors:

Peter Cullen
Irv Immerman
Larry Marshall (3 takes)
Ed Gilbert
Aron Kincaid
Ron Gans
Bill Ratner
Norman Alden
Chris Stevens
Danny Dark
Gene Moss
Jack Angel
Bernard Erhardt
John Stevenson (2 takes)
Ron Feinberg
Joe Leahy

Video runtime: 13:38

Page index

Marvel Superheroes - 1981-1989. Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends, The Incredible Hulk, Pryde Of The X-Men

Dungeons & Dragons - 1983-1985

G.I Joe: A Real American Hero, Part 1 - 1983-1985  

G.I Joe: A Real American Hero, Part 2 - 1986-1992.  

The Transformers, Part 1 - 1984-1985

The Transformers: The Movie

The Transformers, Part 2 - 1986-1990

The Marvel Muppet Connection - 1984-1991.  Muppet Babies, Little Muppet Monsters, Fraggle Rock

My Little Pony N' Friends - 1984-1986.  My Little Pony, Potato Head Kids, The Glo Friends, Moondreamers.

Sunbow Syndication - 1985-1987.  Robotix, Bigfoot And The Muscle Machines, Inhumanoids, Visionaries, Air Raiders.

Jem - 1985-1988

Defenders Of The Earth - 1985-1986

Marvel's New World - 1988-1996.  Robocop, Rude Dog And The Dweebs, Little Shop, Time Challengers, Siegfried And Roy, Biker Mice From Mars

Sunbow Round Two - 1991-1996.  Bucky O'Hare, Conan The Adventurer, Conan And The Young Warriors, The Tick

Unproduced projects

Commercials

Toyfair Catalogues

Storyboard viewing gallery

Briefing/reference binder galleries

Other companies

The Young Astronauts: more information

Thanks to dialogue audio reels being sold on ebay, there is now more information on Marvel Productions ill-fated 1985/86 animated series The Young Astronauts.

First up is a full show reel for episode MP 800-04 Ghost Ship, recorded during November 1985 and re-recorded with revised dialogue the following month. The reel confirms Townsend Coleman and Nancy Cartwright among the main voice cast.

The next reel contains auditions for the series narrator.  Recorded at Wally Burr Studios, the actors confirmed to have read for the role are

• Peter Cullen
• Erv Immerman
• Larry Marshall
• Ed Gilbert
• Aron Kincaid
• Ron Gans
• Bill Ratner
• Norm Alden
• Chris Stevens
• Danny Dark

If any more reels that can shed light on this series become available, they will be showcased here.

Transformers: storyboards, unused premises, briefing material and more

Added to the Archive this month is a plethora of Transformers material, with storyboards from the following:

• Unproduced pilot miniseries/Season 1 intro sequence 
• More Than Meets The Eye, Part 2
• More Than Meets The Eye, Part 3 
• Transport To Oblivion 
• Roll For It
• The Ultimate Doom, Part 3
• Countdown To Extinction
• Unproduced Season 2 intro sequence
• Unproduced commercial bumper
• Autobot Spike
• The Immobilizer

Additionally, a quartet of story premises, written by storyboard artist Wendell Washer during early Season 2, have also become available.  Along with the early version of the 1985 New Product briefing he was given for reference.

All of these can be viewed at The Transformers, Part 1

Below is an animatic edited by me of the unproduced season 2 intro sequence:

Other companies page

I have re-opened the page dedicated to production material from show created by companies other than Sunbow or Marvel during the '80s and '90s.  Showcasing items from shows such as Ruby-Spears Mister T cartoon and an early outline for the Challenge of the Gobots movie: Starquest.  

One major addition since the last time this page was featured on the Archive are 41 scripts from Filmation's She-Ra: Princess Of Power.  Uploaded to the Internet Archive from the old BCI Eclipse DVD set, including all 28 scripts from Season 2 and featuring works by Bob Forward, Larry DiTillio and J. Michael Strasczynski.

View them all at Other Companies

The Flint Dille Collection: Bigfoot And The Muscle Machines

Some more material originating from Flint Dille's storage has been granted release.

After Ron Friedman's two attempts to create an outline for the Super Sunday anthology show Bigfoot And The Muscle Machines, Flint was tasked to take over the project.

The Archive is pleased to add Griffin-Bacal's briefing binder detailing Playskool's toyline, started in 1983 and inherited by Hasbro in 1984. For the series itself, Flint's full outline and two versions of the first episode script Cryptic Cargo.

Additionally, the Archive has added a Super Sunday press release which gives an insight into the early development of Robotix.  As well as brief synopsis for show ideas "Starlite" and "Stoney"

Both versions, along with auditions sheets read by Susan Blu and the full character lineup, are available at: Sunbow Syndication 1985-1987

Transformers The Movie: Ron Friedman's first script

In 2010, screenwriter Ron Friedman consigned many scripts and reference material from his days writing for Sunbow Productions in the mid-80s, to be sold by Heritage Auctions.  A group effort by fans, coordinated by Jim Sorenson, saw 31 Transformers TV scripts, briefing binders and the second script for The Transformers The Movie bought up, scanned and made available online.

One item that eluded this endeavour was Friedman's first script for the Movie.  Completed in February 1985 and rejected by Griffin-Bacal, who supplied a new outline for Friedman to make a second attempt, before Flint Dille was called in to make heavy re-writes as production commenced.

In Autumn 2020, former Sunbow producer Flint Dille was in the process of clearing out his storage, finding many items from his decades-long writing career.  One such item displayed online on October 9th was a second copy of that first Movie script.  Most likely in Flint's possession as reference for his and Creative Director Jay Bacal's own unsuccessful attempt at writing a Transformers movie: The Secret Of Cybertron.

The following month, Jim Sorenson flew out to LA in order to scan as many of Flint's written works from his Sunbow days before they were auctioned off.  On November 2nd, he scanned this script and sent the digital files to me for merging and OCR.

The script was used as the basis for a panel presentation at TFNation 2022, hosted by Jim Sorenson and Chris McFeely, that summarised the plot and featured fanart intepretations from a quartet of artists.

Now, fourteen years since it was first seen, nearly three years since a second chance emerged and a full year since the story was revealed to the world, the Sunbow Marvel Archive is proud to present the very first script for The Transformers The Movie (link to Movie page)

The Wally Burr Collection

Thanks to Rich Helscher, the Archive now hosts a sizeable portion of paperwork previously belonging to the estate of voice director Wally Burr.  If anyone out there owns copies of items from Wally's collection not represented here, please get in touch.

Audition sheets

Transformers (56 pages, characters A-M)
Transformers (52 pages, characters N-Z)
Transformers (19 pages, alternate set)

G.I Joe - Xamot and Tomax (Michael Bell and Corey Burton), Zarana (Lisa Raggio).
Bigfoot And The Muscle Machines - Jennifer Minerva McGraw, Red and Redder (All by Susan Blu).
Glo Friends - Glo-Cricket, Glo-Turtle, Moose (Lorenzo Music)
Fraggle Rock - Travelling Matt (Pat Pinney).
Dino Riders - Mind Zei (Peter Cullen), Serena (Noelle North).
Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes - Dr. Putrid T Gangreen (John Astin).
Bucky O'Hare And The Toad Wars - Al Negator (Gary Chalk), Bucky O'Hare (Jason Michas), Deadeye Duck (Scott McNeil), Dogstar (Gary Chalk), Jenny (Margot Pinvidic), Will DuWitt (Shane Meier).
Thor, Tales Of Asgard (2011 Direct-to-video) - Loki (Rick Gomez), Sif (Tara Strong), Thor (Matt Wolf) script samples for audition.

Scripts, Call sheets, Dialogue scripts

MP 700 Transformers

67/87 Five Faces Of Darkness, Part 2 - Flint Dille
Full script - Flint Dille's copy, included here as placeholder
Full script - Wally's notes
Call sheet and dialogue script - Ted Schwartz (Rodimus Prime) script copy.

68/88 Five Faces Of Darkness, part 3 - Flint Dille
Full script - Flint Dille's copy, included here as placeholder
Full script - Wally's notes
Call sheet and dialogue script - includes handwritten  dialogue for John Moschitta ADR session (Blurr, Wheelie, Quintesson)

69/89 Five Faces Of Darkness, Part 4 - Flint Dille
Full script - Flint Dille's copy, included here as placeholder
Full script - Wally's notes
Partial call sheet and dialogue script

70/90 Five Faces Of Darkness, Part 5
Full script - Notes by Wally Burr
Call sheet and dialogue script

91 The Killing Jar - Joey Kurihara Piedra and Michael Charles Hill
Full script - second revision, Wally's notes

Full script - third revision, notes by Michael Charles Hill.  Contributor credit: Ryan King

Call sheet and dialogue script

Storyboards

MP 4034 The Transformers The Movie
Note - though these storyboard scans have been available at the Archive since 2020, it is only through collectors buying copies sold by Wally Burr in the mid-2000s that made their inclusion possible.

Storyboards artists:

Peter Chung
Jooin Kim
Chung Hwan Oh
Sioak Park
Sangil Shim
David Shin
Soo Young Chung
Del Barras
James Gomez
Ernie Guanlao
Doug Lefler
Rico Rival
Romeo Tanghal

(If anyone has information about which artist did which sequence, please get in touch so they can be properly credited)

* = scene truncated

+ = scene cut, but dialogue retained and moved.

Sequence 1: 6, 9, 18 before 17, 29, 34, 37 divided into 37A and 37B, 38, 39 divided into 39A and 39B.

Artists: Peter Chung

Sequence 2: Entire sequence simplified.  Green star, satellites, asteroids, ice crystals, stellar ring, nebula and swirling vortex all out.  Superman credits or Star Wars crawl in

Sequence 3: 7*, 22 no pan - static shot.

Artists: Peter Chung

Sequence 4: 1 no pan.

Sequence 5: 2-9, 31 replaced, 36

Artists: Peter Chung

Sequence 6: 15, 24*, 25, 34, 45-48A, 52, 56 replaced, 57-72, 89*, 90

Artists: Peter Chung

Sequence 7: 31, 32, 39-44B replaced by early trailer footage, 54, 55+, 62-65, 67, 68+, 69-72, 83-87 no effects.

Artists: Peter Chung

Sequence 8: 4-8, 11, 37, 37A, 48, 49, 54, 55, 62 replaced by 104, 71 replaced by 78, 80, 81, 83*, 86, 102-111, 116, 122-126, 128+, 130-135, 151, 152*, 183, 188* 

Artists: Peter Chung

Sequence 9: No visuals cuts, 10 second cut to score due to timing issue.

Sequence 10: 2

Sequence 11: 18, 31A, 32, 33, 36*

Sequence 12: 3

Sequence 13: 2, 4C, 10-12, 30, 32

Sequence 14: 2, 16, 18-20, 26, 27

Sequence 15: 24-28, 44, 53*, 57A*, 61, 61A revised, 61B-64, 66, 76, 77, 80, 82 cont. with action from 83, 84A, 84B, 99, 102-105, 107*, 108-112, 114-126

Sequence 16: 2*, 17*, 18-21, 23-25, 34+, 40, 41, 47, 48, 54, 56, 62, 73, 74* 

Sequence 17: No visual cuts, Hot Rod dialogue moved from sc. 11 to sc. 1

Sequence 18: 3, 5, 6, 8, 15, 16

Sequence 19: 10, 11, 17, 23+, 30A, 33 static, 35, 38-41+, 53*, 71

Sequence 20: No cuts

Sequence 21: 1-3, 5-7, 11*, 12, 19A

Sequence 22: 1, 3, 8 revised, 10 revised, 13, 27 revised, 28-30, 32*, 33-35, 37-40 

Sequence 23: 2B, 2C, 3-5

Sequence 24: 33F, 40*, 41, 42, 45, 49, 50, 53 revised, 59+

Sequence 25: 7-11B revised: 8, 10 cut, 7 and 9 action on 11, 14*

Sequence 26: 3C-3H, 14A, 15-15B action moved to 14D, 15-15G, 18, 21, 22A-22C, 23B, 26-27B, 48A

Sequence 27: 1, 12, 14-16, 25 replaced by 25A and 25B, 29, 30, 28 and 31 continuous scene, 34, 35, 39, 41-42, 43-47, 48 revised, 49, 55, 56, 60 moved to 49F, 61-64, 65-70 moved to 49A-49E, 75-77, repeat of 71, 78 moved to 82A, 79, 83, 84

Artists: Peter Chung

Sequence 28: 2

Sequence 29: 13 and 14 revised (Unicron uses eye laser, not hand)

Sequence 30: 27, 28, 41-42, 46, 47A, 47B moved, 52 replaced by 40, 53

Sequence 31: No cuts

Sequence order in finished film

1 to 13

14-1 to 14-29

15-1 to 15-6

22

14-29A to end of 14

15-7 to end of 19

21

20

23 and 25 combined as a continuous sequence

24

26 to 31