Where in the deep Universe did Roy start?

The origins of the Roy Chronicles and the journey to what you know and love, today.

It was a dark and stormy night, when I started writing this entry. Enough about now, let's dive into why this Roy thing is a big deal.

Well to go back to beginning we must put on our imagination caps and dial it back to 2016 where a script was being read through for the first time. A group of university students, named Theatre of the Mind, started their journey of their first radio show, Drifting Beyond. This project was split into different teams (writing, foley, editing, recording, and publicity), to produce a radio show that would hopefully change the radio. The writers, Jacob Lawson, Christopher Miller, and Nick Angelos, wrote a 16 episode show with adventure, tension and some bad mamma jamma aliens. They never knew what they would inspire.

“What do you guys want to do this show on. Serious, we been joking around to much, and have nothing. -Jacob Lawson”

Roy escapes the realm of just being an Idea

Within the first two episodes, a character was introduced without a name and had a few lines that was not really that important. The voice actor that voiced him understood that this character did not matter and would never be seen again, since he was a slave in a slave gladiator facility, where his end was near. The voice actor (Billy) grew bored and restless while he waited for his next character, so he decided to take that one character he had and run with it. Just like forest in that one movie most people couldn't name, he ran with it to the furthest length possible, giving him his own show and merchandise. Now it started as a name (Roy), then a ridiculous voice. Than the more Billy messed with the character, the more Roy came to life. Once the voice was recorded and wasn't edited out of the episode and did go on the air, that's when Roy made guest appearances.

Throughout the process of creating Drifting Beyond, Billy started taking on the role of stage manager by making sure everything went smooth during the recording and putting the episodes on the radio. At the most random times, Billy would break into being Roy and would improve a joke either at random or responding to the scene that was just recorded. The cast and the person working on recording would snicker or break a smile. Roy loved that, and grew hungry for more. The more Roy would say the better the responses became, until it just became a thing. Then, Billy created an atmosphere that the character would create when activated. Roy's name spread over the span of the radio show, Billy would talk through the character in more places, around friends, random strangers and to himself in the mirror.

Now most little things like saying a few jokes as a character never lasts long, people grow tired or annoyed by it, but Roy was different. Billy didn't use the same lines over and over again, but kept improving new lines. Now the end of the first season of Drifting Beyond concluded in April of 2017 with 16 successful episodes and went on break for the long summer. The show would come back for a second season in the fall, when school would start up again. For the character Roy, something magical happened, Roy officially was going to get his own chance to tell his story. The origins of how exactly it was mentioned and agreed to is a little bit hazy, but all I know is the idea was mentioned and then agreed to. What probably went down was Billy probably talked about how it could be fun to see what Roy could do with a show and a heavily supportive faculty of Theatre of the Mind agreed. What Billy didn't know was that writing for a character that only started with a few lines and no real character definition would be extremely hard. Not to also mention that this character was mostly known for

his improve jokes and gags, not scripted dialogue. But without really caring about this problem Billy marched toward to his doom.

Now obviously Billy Deardoff, aka me, made something that worked, but was it successful? It depends on the definition of successful. Roy did become official, with 8 episodes (so far) that did end up on the radio. Roy did become a functional character that did have some what of a story plot. I would say that it was successful for it was not Roy saying random things that seemed like a dictionary and multiple 8-year-old joke books puked up and served on a silver platter. But it also could be extremely better. My problem is not with my talented krew of voice actors and sound and music creators, those guys and gals rock. They are what make the Roy Chronicles fun and bearable for the audience to hear. Actually as a confession, when I first heard my voice actors read the script in their characters I almost cried. Writing a script is fun but stressful, in the hope that it works and makes sense, but when it comes to life through the voice actors its magical. They kept surprising me through out the whole process, they are all extremely talented and I am being serious. Some of my voice actors I thought would be limited to what they could do, and then they showed me what they were really made of, magic goo. I am proud of all of them, and the journey they all traveled to make my dream into a reality. Now on to what my problem is with Roy it's the...

Roy thinks that all of the readers of this... novel, don't want to hear what's wrong with Roy. To Roy, there isn't anything wrong, the voice in Roy's head might disagree. But his opinion is invalid to the amazing Roy, Captain of Adventure. Yes, Roy is a captain, check Roy's online degree. Roy got though the Internet Surfing Academy of Oogle Gay. Roy out.