(Super Average concept art by Jesse Zhang aka @iamprikle)
Hey you, so I recently had a pretty lengthy ramble about Eddsworld Legacy and a lot of the decisions that we/I made in my vlog. This was in response to the criticisms I’ve faced since (and even more so after) show running the series. I know most people won’t dedicate 12 minutes of their life to my on-camera mumblings so I figured I’d sum up one of the most important points in a blog post (since it was largely a blog post that spawned those criticisms). I want to talk about the character of Tord, why he was brought back, and what it meant. I’ll try (and likely fail) to keep this brief.
In 2008 I came up with the idea for a series called Super Average, a show I still plan on making one day. The dream was to write it with Edd and have him lead the animation. For obvious reasons, we never got the chance to work on it together. We had however planned on fusing it with Eddsworld, setting it in the same universe, and having the big, bad villain be a fellow named Red Leader. Hell, he’s even name-dropped in WTFuture (2010). While we were never going to reveal the identify of this villain, it wouldn’t have taken a rocket scientist to figure it out.
With Edd gone, development on Super Average was put on pause while I/we worked on Eddsworld Legacy. However, I always knew that Red Leader would one day live on in Super Average so we kept throwing little hints to the greater narrative into the Legacy episodes. The Red Army, the Red Leader ‘R’ logo, etc.
That brings us to the finale of Eddsworld Legacy: The End. Tord was brought back largely because we thought it would be a cool episode that would give the fans what they’d been begging for for years. We also thought it could provide a payoff for all the foreshadowing in case Super Average never came to pass. Part 1 was planned to have Tord showing up, destroying the house to retrieve a super weapon, and leaving. Part 2 was going to be a house hunt episode (and also a musical). Obviously this changed during writing into more of a rivalry story (playing on the Tom/Tord rivalry of earlier eddisodes). As for the musical eddisode, we put Trick or Threat together instead.
After The End was released I stupidly said that the episode, and subsequently Tord, was a metaphor for the return of Edd’s cancer. Eddie, my writing partner, doesn’t even recall me mentioning this as we wrote the episode. In reality, the only way I worked this metaphor into The End was with the destruction of the gang’s house and the need to get a new one.
Tord wasn’t a metaphor for cancer, I just wanted to seem like a smart writer.
With Eddsworld Legacy over, I’ve picked up work on Super Average again. The characters have been designed (including Red Leader), a pitch has been made, and a pilot script is currently in production. However, with consideration of criticisms and hindsight from Eddsworld, I’ve decided to scrap the character of Red Leader. The design and character will no doubt be repurposed if the series begins but Red Leader will never be seen again. This is to not only distance myself from Eddsworld as it’s time for me to do but also to relieve the character of Tord from my control. I’ll leave ol’ Red’s designs here for the memory.
(Super Average concept art by Sophie Fletcher aka @tomee-bear)
If you want to know more about my motivations behind Eddsworld Legacy, my issues with budgeting, and the writing choices, feel free to watch my vlog.
