Mike McMahan: We cast a wide net.
We were talking to tons of people.
Its pretty tough to recast a character that youve lived with for so many years, you know?
Ah, romance.Image: Hulu
And weve seen him do comedy, too, and Legion as well.
We didnt have to explain the show to him.
He already knew everything!
Image: Hulu
And then, he dove right in and he gave us an American accent.
He gave us a British accent.
Our goal waswe werent looking for a voice to replace a voice.
Image: Hulu
We were looking for a voice to be the next thing you loved.
Thats why we leaned into it being so different.
And there was something so ludicrous about having a character go British and not hiding our work at all.
Image: Hulu
It was almost like an open notes test of like, Look, its a super fucking different voice!
But were writing up to him.
Were having a blast with him.
Image: Hulu
He loves the show.
He embodies Korvo in a really amazing way.
Josh Bycel: Yeah.
io9: On to the Valentines Day special.
With no love on earth, tiki drinks and parrots rush in to fill the void.
What brought that idea about?
Its such a immediate fuck-you to Valentines Day.
Bycel: Its based on your life a little bit, though, too.
McMahan: Yeahmy wifes birthday is on Valentines Day and it just fucks up our dinner.
We cant go anywhere.
Everybody has a heart-shaped pizza.
We dont want that.
What about, like, divorced dads?
What do divorced dads suddenly get into?
We all just laughed at that because it felt really honest and oddly Americanand it also felt very consumerist.
Our aliens love the mall.
We just loved it.
io9: How did you get Linda Hamilton to do the guest voice?
McMahan: Because shes fucking cool as hell.
Shes the coolest person Ive ever met.
Shes been cool her entire life.
She totally got it.
She was cracking up doing it.
She knew what we wanted.
Josh, she was awesome, right?
Bycel: She was amazing.
Shes everything youd want her to be.
And she was so game to just sort of try everything.
Did you get any pushback whatsoever?
Bycel: We have two aliens doing weird alien sex saving the world!
Thats more important than racy!
McMahan: Have we ever gotten that note [to tone things down]?
Bycel: Weve gotten it a little bit.
We somehow think its funny to have animated characters having steamy, racy scenes.
And I was like, Can we just lose some of the detail from that silhouette?
We wanted to get them married.
It just felt right for the characters and for the show.
We kind of wrap up season four in episode one, then the Valentines Day special happens.
io9: Is season five coming this year at some point?
Bycel: It should be.
I think in summerits late summer sometime, I believe.
io9: As mentioned, Solar Opposites is known for its pop culture references.
Whats the process like for the writers when youre deciding what makes the cut?
Does it just come down to trusting the audience is as nerdy as the people making the show?
McMahan: Josh loves Book of Eli!
He brings it up every day.
[Laughs]
Bycel: Its stuff that makes us laugh.
Was it season three, when we did a whole story based on the Sylvester Stallone movie Daylight?
McMahan: I had only seen the trailer!
But part of what we love iswere not going to be cutting-edge.
I think it would be weird for us to be like, Heres our Oppenheimer parody.
Leave those references to a show that can be more nimble and faster than us.
But what really makes me laugh is: what are the things nobody asked for?
Solar is a show that gets to break the rules like that all the time.
And that makes us laugh.
io9: Might we see more holiday specials in the future?
McMahan: Actually, weve done another one thats ready to go after season five airs.
I would love to do a holiday special every year.
I like doing little weird onesId love to do a Casimir Pulaski Day episode because Im a Chicago guy.
But I also really want to do more Christmas specials.
I feel like thats a real sweet spot for us.
But yeah, I would be happy to do specials forever.
Bycel: I love the one we have coming up.
Its almost a little bit of a combo platter of some fall stuff.
We love that you dont usually see that.
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