I have received a ton of guesses as to the identity of the secret interview from the inner workings of the Guardian Project, and the true identity is…. none other then Tony Chargin,the executive vice president of GME creative affairs and co-creator of the project.

I am extremely thrilled to bring this interview with my readers and I won’t delay it any longer!

1. When you started going to the cities to research backgrounds for each of the Guardians did you have a group of powers in mind initially or did you guys wait for after each interview and visit to start from scratch?

Because there are 30 Guardians, it was necessary to look at them as a whole while we were creating them so they would be unique both in look and feel as well as to not have too many overlapping powers. We wanted to give the teams a foundation for what we were trying to accomplish and then engage in a dialogue to tweak each Guardian in tandem with the team. Some teams loved our initial concept and others worked with us to create even better ones.

2a.On the Guardian Project site I noticed a few small details about the Guardian Bios. Do the colors in the backgrounds of each thumbnail have any significance?

They’re just the alternate color in the specific team’s colors. For example the Blue Guardian is primarily blue so his background is gold.

2b I also notice each bio had a different icon next to their names in the bio itself. Do they also have significance as in grouping some together?

Each Guardian is a member of a Guardian military branch. There are 6 branches comprised of 5 Guardians each. The branches are Army, Marines, Air Force, Elementals, Special Ops and Artillery. The emblems on each Guardian bio are the representative badges of whatever branch they belong to.

 3. Are there any plans to have cross overs into the Marvel universe in the comics?

The Guardian Project is in no way affiliated with Marvel.

4. I really like the idea that the guardians represent a social network for Mike Mason, being mentors friends and like siblings. Was this designed to appeal to parents and to possibly have some implied life lessons in the stories?

The basic foundation for the Guardians is family values and teamwork. Not in a preachy way but in a way that lets kids know that being a part of a team and achieving your goals by working together is something to aspire to. It was designed as a property that would appeal to both parents and kids as something they can enjoy together. It’s something that I’ve already been doing as a parent myself.

 5. Where do you (or would you like to see) see the Project in 5 or 10 years down the line?

On a personal level I’d love to just be able to still be telling our story because it will probably take 5 – 10 years just to get through all of the story arcs and back-story explanation. Professionally, a feature film would allow us to really get crazy with our animation so that would be incredible. And of course anything that allows the audience, especially kids, to interact with the Guardians in realistic ways would be great.

Future of the project

 1. I noticed that when I went to the RBC center to Hurricanes games this week I did not see any mention or reference to the Guardians yet. Is this by design or is the NHL wanting more time to incorporate them into official game presentations on jumbo trons across the league.

The idea was to make a big splash and then allow the project to grow organically.

2. With so much positive press about the weekend, the game and most importantly the positive reviews on the Guardians themselves do you think it’s very important to strike while the iron is hot and get the product out there as soon as possible?

As I said above we have a plan in place that we think works for what we’re trying to do. We’re thrilled about the response we’ve gotten but we’d never compromise our storytelling and our plan for releasing that story just to capitalize on that initial response. I think we more than proved that there is a large audience for the Guardians and we’d rather stick to our plan, take our time and give those fans something amazing.

3. I saw a ton of Guardian shirts that looked great at the fan fair, and the word is sales as a whole were great. However, I did notice that only 2 posters of guardians were available on the store. Will all of the guardian posters be available at some time as well as apparel or is this limited to interest on the site?

All of the Guardians will have their own merchandise. The fact that we sold out of our merchandise was thrilling, particularly since we haven’t even scratched the surface of the story. Those that are invested from the beginning will definitely be rewarded!

4. I noticed the vault is being updated every few days with more Guardian animations. Is this the next round of unveils or is there something morephysical we can look forward to next such as regular Comic line or DVD or TV show?

The vault isn’t just being updated. We’re allowing the user to follow along with Mike as he powers up his Guardians and frees them from Deven’s clutches. It’s being done in a very methodical way so the users can slowly get to know and interact with each Guardian and learn more about Mike.

5. I have read that you guys turned down a TV show due to the network wanting to limit the scope to just a few characters. Has this interest changed since the All-Star reveal? Are they more receptive to a broader scope of a show? The Super Hero Squad and X-men shows were both based on ensemble groups, while not as big, were still groups and successful shows. Can we hope to see this come to fruition?

Absolutely. We have a very specific and story driven way to focus the show on different groups of Guardians each episode. Why Mike chooses certain Guardians each week, how he powers them up, what his limitations are and how they all work together are big story points in each episode. Unlike other shows we can’t afford to focus on some Guardians over others. Certainly we expect fans to gravitate to their favorites but in Mike’s world they’re all equally important and they’ll all be equally represented.

 6. In your planning for show or a group of feature length movies or DVD’s are you planning on making them all beautiful motion capture animation as in the All-Star presentation or more traditional animation styles? I know if would be harder, more time consuming and most likely more expensive but to see regular installments or a feature length film animated as beautify as the 1st

installment would most definitely appeal to a huge audience and could be a huge hit.

It will be the same quality that you saw in the All-Star event. What the people over at Vicon and House of Moves have done in terms of animation is nothing short of revolutionary. Their effort and ingenuity are the real miracles.

 Some Personal Questions 

1. Could you tell the readers a little about yourself? Where did you grow up?  What are now or were your hobbies?  Which comics and characters were you into as a child?

I grew up in San Jose California. Shockingly I was into comic books and sports. My favorite character growing up was always Wolverine but interestingly I never really collected X-Men. My collection list was Daredevil, The Punisher, Vigilante, Spider-Man and a little known comic series called Power Pack which was actually the first series I ever collected and got me hooked. Of course I always had a thing for the Scarlet Witch but who didn’t?

2. Did you have any gaming hobbies as a child and do you do much gaming today?

I hate to say it but I’ve never been much of a gamer. In fact the only game I played religiously was Hockey ’94. You know the one they played in the movie Swingers? I always played Calgary back then, Theo Fleury was the man.

3. Do you play any MMO’s currently… If so which ones and what are your favorites?

They weren’t around when I was younger and between two kids, my wife and spending every waking hour working who has the time? Fortunately we’ve got an army of gamers over at Vicon that guide me in the right direction.

Some thoughts on the interview. I was excited to get some ideas as to the future of the project. If it was merely a feature comic or graphic novel here and there I would have just dismissed it as good but missing the potential of it all. However, seeing that there is a bunch of other projects in the works such as TV/Movie possibilities REALLY makes me stoked as to the future. The quality of the initial presentation was so good that knowing we will likely see this same quality in some visual media only makes us jones for more. 

I think them breaking the Guardians into sub-groups helps with some show and comic stories, as they can focus on different groups each episode or even a full print title for each one. It increases the potential a ton and you know what you are going to get rather then watching an episode and hoping/wondering which guardians we will see each time.

Finally, I want to again thank Tony for his time and willingness to talk to me today and hopefully if we get a bunch of feedback I will see if I can get some followup interviews as content is release and we can check in every few months with Tony for some updates and juicy tid-bits!

Please mail me any questions in case I am able to get any further interviews with the brain trust of the Guardian project, and I will try and get each and every one of them answered in due time.