You guys clearly put a lot of thought and care into the script for CT when it came to Brooklynn since both her and her VA (Kiersten Kelly) have a limb difference. In S4 Ep. 4 when Kenji asked for a hand Brooklynn responded by joking that she literally only has one hand left, what was the process of writing such interactions throughout the series and how much was Kiersten Kelly involved in the scripts development?
Great question! Kiersten, Peter Lee, and our wonderful consultants were integral in helping us shape Brooklynn's mentality surrounding her new limb difference. From what I remember, a lot of their guidance circled the idea of tone -- how she would react in those first moments seeing herself with a limb difference, how the others would react when seeing it for the first time, and how they would all try to act going forward. The issue according to them was that having a limb difference, while it can be a shock for someone who was born without one, was not all doom and gloom. Yes, on some level, it sucks to have a literal part of you taken away, especially in such dramatic fashion as Brooklynn had her arm taken from her. And so there were very real emotions of shock and loss none of us wanted to glance over. But, the tone of Chaos Theory was not one of JUST drama and deep, dark emotions. We wanted the show to have moments of lightness and levity, so Kiersten and Peter and our consultants made sure to beat it into our heads that Brooklynn could be funny about her limb difference. Her friends, too, could be funny about her limb difference. The others could take Brooklynn's lead in finding the humor in the situation because that's also how our consultants live their lives. They don't think about their limb differences as these dark, awful things all the time. Like so much of ourselves and our bodies, there's still something ridiculous and funny about it all. Having bodies in general is just a funny thing. So they really helped us understand that someone like Brooklynn could -- and sometimes had to -- find the humor in it all. As a queer person, I related to this a lot because a lot of queer stories, especially those told by non-queer people, can be about the drama and the sadness and the pain of coming out or other stereotypical things. Meanwhile, being queer has brought so much light and fun and hope to my life. It's another facet of me and my identity, and just like other facets, it comes with humor! So our consultants helped us make sure Brooklynn didn't fall into a stereotype, which was wonderful. I don't know if she looked at EVERY script and/or animatic, but I know she looked at MANY of them and gave notes and helped us shape Brooklynn and her friends in this regard. It was very awesome to work with her and the others on this so that we could strike the right tone about it all.
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