'Paper Girls' on Amazon Prime Video: Brian K Vaughan and Cliff Chiang spill beans on sci-fi series
There has been an increased love among viewers for coming-of-age stories sprinkled with a dash of sci-fi and Netflix’s ‘Stranger Things’ is proof. For those ardent sci-fi drama fans, Amazon Prime Video is bringing a totally novel and out-of-the-box coming-of-age series, ‘Paper Girls,’ based on a comic book of the same name. It is an 80’s era story of four young women who deliver newspapers and soon get deep into a time-travel adventure.
When ace writing duo Brian K Vaughan, best known for his comic book ‘Saga’ and Cliff Chiang, known for his iconic comic ‘Catwoman: Lonely City’, launched their comic series in 2015, they stirred up things by making their protagonists young women from the 80’s who get thrown into an exhilarating time-travel adventure.
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In an interview with EW, when asked about what inspired them to create the comic series, 'Paper Girls' executive producer Vaughan said, “Growing up in the suburbs of Cleveland, there was one year when I was around 12, where all of the paper boys in our neighborhood were suddenly replaced by paper girls. I just thought it was so badass that these 12-year-old children were going out at 4 a.m. to deliver bad news to adults. It was just so interesting and captivating that they were newspaper delivery kids, sort of a dying breed, and yet they were the first of their kind. I thought, this is such an interesting group of young women. They would make a great heart of a story. So it started with that inspiration and expanded from there."
Talking about the central idea of the young girls meeting their future selves being so natural in this time-travel adventure series, 'Paper Girls' executive producer Cliff Chiang says, “The idea of them meeting themselves in the future just seemed so natural because a lot of time travel is so much about what could happen, what regrets you might have, and seeing how your future self turned out. I don't know if anybody's turned out the way they thought they would 10 years ago. So for these girls who are just on the cusp of becoming teenagers and then adults, to see where your life ends up is a really cool thing. Having Ali Wong play older Erin is fantastic because we know her so much through her comedy, so then here to see her do something dramatic and a little bittersweet is a really fantastic showcase for her."
Opening up on how they’ve built the characters of the girls in the series within the mould of icons like ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ and ‘Beatles’, where each member represents a distinct personality archetype, Vaughan described how Tiffany has a trait of being addicted to video-games, whilst Erin is particularly close to Chiang's heart. Chiang said, “That character is really important to me. To be able to tell a story featuring an Asian-American character that's not necessarily an immigrant story but a coming-of-age story. I kind of didn't realize how much I needed it until I was drawing it. Because of that, this project is really close to my heart and that character in particular is one of my favorites. Her kind of sweet nerdiness is something that I sympathize with deeply from growing up. Between Erin and Tiffany and KJ and Mac, there's such a great diversity within the group of personalities. I think it's easy to find yourself in one of them, if not all of them."
Also spilling the beans on how the series adaptation takes their comic book story to totally new levels, Vaughan said, “I think sometimes people read a comic and are like, 'oh this is just storyboards, let's just shoot this.' But comics are its own unique medium, and television can do things that we can't. Like with needle drops, just the addition of music adds an incredible layer to this that we didn't have access to."
"These young performers are some of the best younger actors I've ever seen. This show really takes such advantage of the medium. If you've never heard of Paper Girls, if you're not familiar with this comic, then the show is still 100 percent accessible and I think you will love it. But if you're a hardcore fan of the comic, it's still going to be extremely surprising to you. With our blessing, they go to some places that we never could as a comic and there are new characters, there are new threats," he added.
In an old interview with Deadline dated July 2020, opening up on their excitement to bring the story to life, the series showrunners Folsom, Cantwell and Rogers said, “As huge fans of what Brian and Cliff created in Paper Girls, we couldn’t be more excited by the opportunity to bring this incredible adventure to life. This is a story with so much heart, and so many unique colors and dimensions. our sincere hope is not only to do justice to the source material, but to make Paper Girls unlike anything else currently on TV."
In this interview, Albert Cheng, who is the COO and Co-Head of Television, Amazon Studios, added, “We love bringing Paper Girls to our global Amazon Prime Video audience as an original series. Brian’s beloved, widely acclaimed and multiple Eisner Award-winning story delivers a gripping concept grounded by compelling characters. We have a great partnership with Legendary and Plan B, and the perfect creative team of Stephany, Christopher, and Christopher, to bring Brian and Cliff’s graphic novels to life."
When it comes to the unique group of girls who are the lead protagonists of the story, 'Paper Girls' stars Sofia Rosinsky as Mac Coyle, Camryn Jones as Tiffany Quilkin, Riley Lai Nelet as Erin Tieng, and Fina Strazza as KJ Brandman along with renowned stand-up comedian and actress Ali Wong as the adult version of Erin. It is a modern day time travel story after all.
‘Toy Story 4’ co-writer Stephany Folsom has written the screenplay of ‘Paper Girls’. She is the co-showrunner alongside Christopher Cantwell and Christopher C Rogers. Brian K Vaughan and Cliff Chiang are executive producers.
The much awaited series releases globally on July 29, 2022 on Amazon Prime Video.