Interview with Natural Born Kittens creator
Paul •
A landmark for the UK anime community was confirmed last week after news broke that the first ever UK/Japan anime collaboration had been agreed.
Larry Bundy Jnr and his brainchild “Natural Born Kittens” had apparently signed a deal (in principal) with the highly acclaimed anime production company Madhouse to produce a 26 episode TV series based on his crazy story.
Just as the news was beginning to settle into the UK community, we were able to pose a few questions to Larry about him and his anarchic comedy strip!
Paul: How long have you been working on NBK and when did you realize it was beginning to get popular?
Larry: About Eight years now. I always wanted to do manga for many years, basicilly straight after leaving school and I came up with an idea for a comic called “DIM MAK: The Apocalypse Child”, (DIM MAK means Loving Touch of Death in Chinese) Quite a dark story about Humans discovering Angels and Demons were aliens and that Earth was a battleground. But Humans were more interested in gaining their powers than fighting alongside them.
Anyhow, I really came up with that idea mainly as an entry to a competition Pioneer (an ex-British anime video distributor/ and creator in Japan) had in the back of their video boxes. The prize was to have the concept looked at by their anime studios in Japan and have a strip published in Manga Max magazine.
It turns out that no-one won to competition in the end, but it did make me think about what direction I should be going. Writing DIM MAK was depressing me and it’s constant doom and gloom were really getting boring. I’d try to write the occasional joke but it looked horrid and out of context.
I remembered I had an idea for a furry story (actually while on the phone trying to order some anime DVD’s from a mail order company) about Britain in the 70’s trying to compete in the Olympics against the USSR by creating beings made from Cat and Human DNA, but the experiment failed as they turned out to be complete idiots. But it always got a laugh whenever I mentioned the idea to friends, so I thought why not use anime/manga as a comedy? It’s a very long established as comedy in Japan but the stereotypical view of anime from westerners was of dark cyberpunk stuff.
So when I tried pitching the idea to American comic companies, they loved the idea. They loved the weird Monty Python-esque story ideas. So I thought I could be onto something… And it took off from there. I thought if comic companies like it this much, should I have a stab pitching it to TV production companies as well – I’ve got nothing to loose.
But it really took off when the website launched at Christmas 2002. People all over the world started visiting the site and complimenting me on how much they liked the strips. A lot of the interest was really helped by the UK anime community – they were always willing to give it a plug on their sites, spam other’s forums, and they really gave it a push. Something I’ll be eternally grateful to them for.
Paul: Was it a dream of yours for NBK to become an anime series?
Larry: Well I always thought it would be a dream – I thought it would be a comic, possibly even at best a flash animation. But never done by an anime studio (I must stress that we’re still only at the talking stage with Madhouse, and there’s still a long way to go, and many possible pitfalls. But it’s looking good so far.)
Paul: How does it feel to be the first apparent UK/Japan anime co-production? Do you think there is a lot of untapped, anime + manga talent out-there in the UK?
Larry: It was untapped about ten years ago, but the UK community has really started making a real presence on the culture now. They know that life isn’t going to hand them it all on a silver platter, but they’ve gotten up to fight.
Some are making a real mark in the industry – you only need to look at people like Niki Broughton, Wil Overton and Vanessa Wells, who are all starting to make their name with anime in the video game industry while Katy Coope and Ben Krefta are getting the book publishing world excited with their work. Even people like Ashe Raven’s Moon Wolf Projects and the Sweatdrop crew are ignoring “the man” altogether and starting their own publishing companies… and are becoming incredibly successful now.
Paul: How do you feel to be working with the famed Madhouse Production? Did it amaze you when you found they were interested in working alongside you guys?
Larry: Like I said, we’re not working together yet, but there is a genuine will on both sides to do so. But even as a possibility, it still hasn’t sunk in yet. A company as big as Madhouse (a company known for making some of animation history’s most important shows/movies) taking the likes of me seriously, a lowly Brit who’s virtually appeared from the middle of nowhere with very little credit to his name. It’s just incredible.
It seems so unlikely that I mentioned it to one person and they thought I was referring to the 80’s clothing store chain Madhouse, rather than the anime company!!!
Paul: Any other comments? Go on; tell us your fav anime series? ;o)
Larry: OOh, I love a lot of anime. I’ve always been a fan of shows such as Rumiko Takahashi’s creations, as well as shows like Cowboy Bebop, Rurouni Kenshin etc. Tenchi Muyo will always have a place in my heart for rekindling my interest in anime, and I’ve started watching old episodes of Dogtanian of all things recently.
I also can’t possibly end this question without saying that I enjoy Ghibli/Miyazaki’s creations, I’d get lynched! lol.
That’s it folks. I hope this short interview has been useful to you and I’d just like to thank Larry for agreeing to answer my pointless questions! You can view the official Natural Born Kittens website [here].
