Questions Answered

I feel very weird writing so much about myself, I hope it's not too boring and if it is I split it up into sections so you can easily skip bits. If I didn't answer your question specifically it's because I thought it was covered in a different answer, if it wasn't I apologize, ask again and I'll get it next time I do this.

What’s your background?

I grew up in the South-East of England but I’m going to skip the first 18 years and go straight to the fact that I did an undergraduate degree in politics and philosophy and a masters degree in political theory at the University of Essex. I don’t consider myself a philosopher or even an expert, but I did all the reading and that means I have loads of half remembered interesting things I can draw on.

After University I struggled to find a job. I don’t interview well and political theory is not a super practical skill. I eventually got a job in Finland at a small public policy think tank where I worked translating papers written by economists into language normal people could understand. 

The job was a fixed-term contract and when that ended I stayed in Finland as by that point I had a partner, two dogs, and a baby on the way. I took some parental leave, worked for the post office, and did some freelance bits and pieces of copy-writing and translation.

My partner bought me an ipad last Christmas and I started learning to draw and animate. I posted my creations and to my surprise found an audience before I’d learnt how to draw or animate very well at all.

What influences/inspires you?

The big 5

Terry Pratchett - I’m obviously influenced by his humour, his tendency to sneak deep wisdom about life in amongst a bunch of silliness, and the fact that a lot of his books revolve around a misfit bunch of fantastical beings working together to put the world to rights. But more than that, what I hope to emulate in my writing is his deep compassion for every character he writes about, and his depiction of diversity not as something we have to deal with in order to be virtuous people, but as something we need in order to win.

Ursula K Le Guin - Beautifully drawn worlds that manage to be full of political and philosophical thought without sacrificing compelling characters and plot. In particular Shevek from the dispossessed is a big influence on the angle I try to come at a lot of answers from. Not “this is wrong and evil” but “I genuinely don’t understand why you would organise things like this”.

Peter Watts - I wouldn’t recommend Blindsight to anyone who isn’t into hard sci-fi, it’s a strange and tough read, but it’s brilliant, and the reason my robot characters so often bring a “how is this issue affected by consciousness” perspective to the table.

G.A. Cohen - Rawls and Nozick loomed large in my political philosophy courses and they both annoyed me. Rawls because he seems to be an egalitarian but came up with an elaborate theory that is mostly used to justify a bunch of inequality (whether that was his intention or not). Nozick because he’s the one smart libertarian (not a coincidence that in his later life his libertarian principles led him to support a bunch of policies your regular libertarian would hate).

There’s lots of good marxist critiques of those thinkers that focus on how they ignore historical context, material conditions, and power dynamics. But there’s something way more satisfying about taking them on on their own terms and that’s what Cohen did. Not “you’re approaching this issue in the wrong way” but “your conclusions betray the values you claim they are based on”. 

Mark Fisher - He writes beautifully about modern capitalism, mental health, and hopelessness. There’s lots of other writers who address these topics in a more rigorous and in-depth way, but they all, in my opinion, lack his clarity. That’s not necessarily a criticism, academic work often seems impenetrable if you’re not well read in that area, but his ability to express complex ideas eloquently and in a way anyone can understand is something I shoot for in my work.

Other stuff I like

N.K. Jemisin - Really beautiful writing, really cool worlds.

Ted Chiang - The master of taking an interesting (often academic) idea and turning it into a compelling short story.

Arrival - Very different from the Ted Chiang shorts story it’s based on, but equally great.

Severance - Cool concept used to deliver a message with humour. The fact that there’s often years of time between seasons now is part of the reason there’s not much TV on this list but I give this a pass.

Joe Abecrombie - Not as epic and more meta than ASOIAF but similar vibe and full of great morally-grey characters. And split up into trilogies which are complete and don’t leave you hanging indefinitely.

Robin Hobb - The Realm of the Elderlings has some slow bits, but I don’t mind because it’s great to hang out with some of my favourite fantasy characters ever, even when they’re not doing much. I think of nighteyes a lot when writing for the werewolf.

Derek Parfit - Philosopher that wrote a lot of cool thought experiments about personal identity.

Daniel Kitson - A British Comedian who consistently writes stuff that is cleverly structured and full of heart.

Red Dwarf - I have no idea how well this holds up but it gave me an early introduction to how well speculative fiction and humour can work together. 

Amartya Sen - I think he’s a really thoughtful writer and unusual in being a proper economist who also writes about philosophy. You can tell he really cares about the things he’s writing about, it’s not purely an intellectual exercise to him. 

Peep Show / Spaced - Foundational to my sense of humour. 

Matt Bruening - Kind of a weird inclusion as he’s a bit of a troll, but he writes very clear and consistent left-wing policy analysis that takes on liberal wonks on their own terms. 

Hades - I sank hundreds of hours into this game. Probably part of the reason I ended up making a series filled with gods.

Calvin and Hobbes - Captures the joy and intensity of childhood and friendship. Also full of philosophy.

The Moomins - Mainly the comic strip. Weird and heartfelt. Also full of philosophy.

Why did you start the series?

Mainly because I always fancied myself a writer but I have adhd, social media brain, and a day job so I struggle to finish anything long form. Short animations seemed like a good medium to actually get some stuff finished.

Where did the idea come from?

I’d made a video with a bad yeti pun, a video about bigfoot playing hide and seek, a video criticising street interviews that set out to make people look stupid, and a couple of videos I’d ended with the line “this world only exists inside the head of a giant dachshund”. I wrote a half-joke about godzilla complaining about “skinny dude” (slenderman) taking jobs from the traditional monsters, and added all these elements together to create the first video in the series.

That first video wasn’t very deep or philosophical, it was monsters and cryptids complaining about their problems, the philosophy came in because in order to continue the series I had to write a lot of interesting answers to questions, and philosophy was a good source of those that I already knew a bit about.

This feels like a boring answer, but I think a lot of good ideas come from stitching a few okay ideas together. The only difference is I stitched together a few okay ideas that I’d already shared with the world.

How do you write the series?

One episode at a time with only a vague idea of where the overall story is going. I normally start with one thing I want one character to say, and frame the question around that. Once I have the question I normally have a few other things I want to say about the topic and work out which cryptid is best to deliver those answers. Then I look at the characters I haven’t used and think about how they would answer and include any that have an interesting take.

A lot of this I don’t do formally sitting at the desk, I have two terriers who go crazy if I’m not outside doing stuff with them a few hours a day, so I run through various possible answers to questions while I’m walking in the forest or throwing a ball.

The hardest part is giving a 1-2 minute video an ending that feels satisfactory. The one’s I’m proudest of have a proper resolution (Laika getting home, the undead party, dragon and the huskies saving christmas). The most popular ones tend to end abruptly on Godzilla or King Kong dropping a cool line.

Do you have an ending planned?

I’m thinking of the overarching story in parts. Part 1 ended with the gnomes, Part 2 started with the interviewer learning of the forest jar and will end with the siege of the litigious mouse’s castle. I have a bunch of ideas for that ending but I haven’t decided exactly how it’s going to go yet because I haven’t decided what I want to do with this format.

I’m not going to abandon it completely but I might want to shift it a bit. I feel like at some point I’m going to run out of broad questions and interesting answers and have to switch to specific questions and detailed answers, but it hasn’t happened yet and how I end part 2 will depend on how I feel about that closer to the time.

Who are your favourite characters?

Mermaid and Godzilla.

Mermaid because she consistently helps me come up with interesting answers that aren’t political or philosophical, and often expresses my own insecurities and concerns about a topic, rather than an intellectual opinion.

Godzilla doesn’t have a specific angle they always come at a topic from, but I still feel like their answers are (mostly) consistent with the character I’ve given them. This makes him feel more complete to me than some of the others.

If you could, what advice would you give to yourself before starting this series?

Consistently title and organise your audio, image and video files. 

Other than that it’s difficult. I sometimes wish I did things the other way around. Instead of making 6 short videos and stitching them together into an episode, make an episode with better pacing and a less abrupt ending and stuff, then cut some shorter content out of it to post on Instagram and so on. But I don’t know if I would have worked as hard and been as prolific doing it that way. Being able to get something finished and out and see the reaction gave me a motivation I wouldn’t have had if I’d been doing one longer video a month.

Something I want to do is go back and rewrite the first twelve episodes into a mini-movie, I’d make it widescreen and slow down the pace a bit, make something that feels more complete and polished. But that’s a big project and I’m not sure I want to stop making new stuff in order to pursue it.

Do you have a settled answer to the various philosophical questions your videos touch on?

It’s a really unsatisfactory answer, but no, not really. I think a lot of the questions I deal with don’t have any one right answer, that’s why I pick them. I do feel like I’m slowly piecing together a more coherent complete worldview but I’m not there yet.

What tools do you use to make the videos?

Toonsquid - The ipad app I use to draw and animate.

Logic - The digital audio workstation I use to record and edit the dialogue. (I don’t do anything you couldn’t do in a free program like audacity or garage band, I just have logic because I fiddle around making music from time to time).

Elevenlabs - The tool I use to change my voice for all the different characters.
Capcut - The video editing tool I use to compile all the clips together, add music, and subtitles.

Have you ever considered the Forest Jar in other forms of media? Are there any IP issues?

I think I could make a great coffee table book, and I’d love to do a Forest Jar roguelike (or a tower defence game could work pretty well). I’d love to make something with proper animators and artists and voice actors. I can’t do any of those things alone though, and I’m at the moment working under the assumption that if I keep going and make what I’m doing good enough people will eventually come to me with offers. And if they don’t but I get enough patrons to do this full time I’d be happy with that.

There would be issues with the movie monsters’, but their art and characters are not close to infringing on any IP so I think it would just need to be a name change. Clifford and Zagreus are more tricky, but they don’t feature a lot.