Mutant X Interviews: Peter Mohan (9/04 S2 DVD extras)
S2 DVD Extras 9/04: Peter Mohan Interview
Hi, I’m Peter Mohan. I’m the supervising producer on the show. And I basically I create all the stories and I supervise all the scripts being written and rewrite all the scripts being written for the series. The show has a lot of great elements to it. Of course the basic franchise of the show: these young people who are still trying to sort out their own lives and their own powers and who are thrown up against huge challenges every week. It’s just a great place to be working from. And what I found too was interesting was the challenge of this new season where last season the franchise was that the new mutants were solving the problems that had been created by the Genomex corporation; the franchise changed this season and was expanding. Them having finished the remnants of the Genomex corporation, they’ve now turned outwards to the world. While still keeping their powers a secret, they’re now heading out to solve world problems. Adam using his great intelligence and connections and wealth to direct them toward solving injustice as he sees it, wherever he sees it. And that’s quite exciting because there’s so much more then the simple ‘mutant of the week’ story we can do. Suddenly we’re fighting world catastrophes, political situations, major crime situations. And not to lose the fantastical and science fiction premise of the show, they’re of course also fighting villains who are almost supervillains by virtue of their scientific expertise, or people who do have powers of their own. Magical stories, for example. Once you open the box, the number of stories is endless.
The shows last year were great. They were very kinetic and exciting, and there was a lot of action. But what we’re looking to do is as these characters get out more into the world, we’re getting much more into these characters. We’re now knowing what kind of conflicts they have with each other, within themselves, with their families, with the world. We’re learning what they love, what they care about, where they want to be. And that is informing the action they take and the way they go about these cases. They did become more powerful toward the end of last season. But part of the issue of bringing them out into the real world is that it’s not a mutant against mutant big powerfest every battle that they’re in. They’re working secretly, and so they’ve got to sneak into situations. They have to use subtle approaches. There’s a lot more of an Alias or Mission Impossible feel to a lot of the operations that they do then a straight up comic book blast up.
The scripts are more actors’ scripts. They’re scripts that deal with what those characters are feeling, and sometimes when a script is mostly information or just things blowing up, it’s tough for characters to even remember their lines because it’s like remembering random words. But these are clean through lines for them emotionally in these stories. I think that they’re responding to that and that’s bringing up their game as actors too. The performances I’ve seen from them have just been fabulous in some of this new material. People who are watching at home, who invite these characters into their living rooms every week don’t really care if something explodes or a McGuffin at the end of the show, you know, blows up. They care about how our characters feel about that and how they feel about each other. And it’s really getting those personalities clashing with each other, working out their own personal demons and becoming stronger, and becoming closer that we care about. And that’s what we’re striving to get to every week now.
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