Megan McCarthy, the Emmy-nominated writer and producer known for “My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic” and “Centaurworld,” has taken on a new challenge as showrunner for Apple TV+’s animated series “BE@RBRICK.” Based on the iconic collectible figures from MEDICOM TOY, this 13-episode series produced by DreamWorks Animation and Dentsu Inc. follows Jasmine Finch and her bandmates as they pursue their musical dreams in a world where everyone’s role is determined by their “painted-on look.” With original music from Grammy Award-winning producer Timbaland, the show aims to empower kids through the universal language of music.
What inspired you to turn this into an animated series? And what was your approach to bringing its legacy to life?
This was something that the folks at DreamWorks had the foresight to realize had something there that could translate into really great storytelling. I mean, it’s this incredible iconic brand that people are already super interested in, and so why not expand out of that? And so for me, I was not a collector of BE@RBRICK prior.
And now I see them everywhere and know a lot more about them, obviously, but I just love this. I love the collabs that they do. I love that it really spoke to creativity, to music as well.
They do a lot of things with musicians. So that kind of intrigued me, and then I just love this idea that the BE@RBRICK all look the same, but when they’re painted, they become unique.
That’s kind of where their value comes from, and that just inherently was a story in and of itself, and so it was really about expanding upon that and finding, OK, well, what if there was a world where you didn’t get to decide how you were going to be painted and you have these hopes and dreams of what you wanted to be in the passions that you wanted to pursue and those were denied? And that felt really relevant and it felt just ripe for really fun stories in a really unique world.
With it being a music driven show, how did you work with Timbaland and the music team to create a soundtrack that enhances this story?
The show is about a group of kids who want to be in a band. So we knew that, if we’re going to root for that band, they better be really good and have really good music, and so, you know, why not reach out to the guy that creates all the best music? Timbaland. So that was really key. We knew it wasn’t a musical in terms of they wouldn’t be walking down the street and breaking a song about their feelings, that it would really be performance based.
This band would release music, would put on shows in things like that. So we knew that was key, and so as we wrote each episode, we would think about what performance would happen or what music would they release or kind of what sort of fantasy sequence that reflects the kinds of songs that they’re doing would be.
And then we would work with Timbaland and his team to craft something that felt very of the now, very relevant, but also spoke to the larger themes of our show and did capture the feelings and emotions of our characters, but in a way that felt like you could very much listen to this outside of the show and want to put it on your Apple Playlist.
How do you and your team craft the rules of this world while keeping it engaging for young audiences?
We spend a lot of time on that a lot of time on the on the world building, and making sure that though we had these characters that were all the same design in sort of in terms of their shape, that they all still had really unique recognizable iconic looks based on kind of what their profession would be or if they were students or once we got to the band and what their outfits would would be, making those all feel really unique and special. So we did spend a lot of time really crafting what the characters would look like so that so that you would really engage with them, that you would be excited to spend time with them and that they felt very three dimensional, even though a lot of them is not three dimensional, it’s painted on.
BE@RBRICK delivers powerful messages about empowerment, self expression. How did you ensure that these messages were effectively woven into the storytelling while keeping the show fun and entertaining?
I think it was you start first with character, making the characters feel really authentic, making them feel like, Hey, that character reminds me of me or reminds me of my friends because they really do have emotions that are relatable, but we also were very comedy forward. We said this is not an after school special. We’re not trying to, hit people overhead with this message where they’re like, great, I don’t I’m no longer interested in the show.
I get it. So comedy was key and comedy comes from the characters, but it also comes from how we’ve built the world. There’s a lot of really silly runners, based on the fact that there’s painted on elements in this world. So in the school, there’s lockers that are painted on. So in the background, you’ll see a kid like trying to open their locker, but they can’t because it’s painted on. So comedy was always at the top of our minds every time we went into an episode.
How’s it been working with Apple TV?
It’s been fantastic, they were incredibly supportive of this right from the get go. We all really were on the same page of the show that we wanted to make, the tone of the show that we wanted to make, the style of music that we wanted to use. So it was really great, you always get notes on things when you’re making something.
But that’s important because you can really get too close to something and not see the forest for the trees. So they were really great at helping us just make the show better and stronger and have been incredibly supportive.
What can fans expect from BE@RBRICK? And are there any exciting developments on the horizon?
We’re really focused on this season, and I think that we’ve done a really good job of reaching a really satisfying conclusion in these 13 episodes. I love cliffhangers, the episodes themselves have lots of cliffhangers, but it was really important to me that you end these 13 episodes feeling like, “yes, I’m so glad that I watched that to the end. I got exactly what I was hoping to get in very unexpected ways”. So yeah, the focus has just been right now on nailing this and getting people really excited about it.
