Echo Wu was about 5 or 6 years previous when she advised her dad and mom she wished to be a cartoonist.
At the time he meant it in essentially the most basic sense of the time period comics, like these in magazines or comics. But he additionally cherished animation, citing Pixar movies, anime like “Sailor Moon” and even a sequence about Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, among the many issues he watched whereas rising up.
“It was one thing I may watch with my dad and mom, who did not converse English very nicely on the time,” Wu says throughout a latest video name. “In our household we advised tales with out language limitations. You may watch ‘Tom and Jerry’ and it would not matter if there have been subtitles since you would get the story.”
So it is becoming that Wu’s first sequence, “Jentry Chau vs. the Underworld,” is what the creator and showrunner describes as “a love letter to my childhood.” Now streaming on Netflix, the animated present follows the eponymous Jentry (voiced by Ali Wong, who additionally serves as an govt producer), a highschool pupil who learns on her sixteenth birthday that the demon king of the underworld is searching for her for supernatural causes. powers she has fought to suppress since she was a baby.
An encounter with one of many demon king’s henchmen leads Jentry to be introduced again to her Texas hometown by Gugu (Lori Tan Chinn), her demon slayer great-aunt, the place she should juggle typical teenage issues like highschool orientation and deeper issues. similar to studying to manage one’s powers, preventing demons and processing surprising household secrets and techniques.
Echo Wu says “Jentry Chau vs. the Underworld” is a love letter to her childhood.
(Nick Lennon)
“I wished to attempt to make a present that mixed plenty of my completely different pursuits into one,” Wu says. “There are horror parts and there’s motion, however there’s additionally a YA teen romance.”
For a youngster like Jentry, possessing superpowers that enable her to combat demons is not precisely one thing to rejoice. High college and the concept of not becoming in is way extra terrifying to her than any supernatural monster.
The present is about “in highschool as a result of highschool is a spot the place you are all the time afraid,” sWu says. “You’re afraid of your feelings, you are afraid of doing the flawed factor and feeling embarrassed… Talking to a boy, for Jentry, is scarier than having to defeat the mogwai king of the underworld.”
Much of Jentry, Wu explains, relies on his personal expertise and character, a lot so that there have been occasions when it was troublesome to not take private studio notes on the character. (“I am unable to assist however combat for her,” Wu says.)
And the landmarks and neighborhoods of Jentry’s hometown additionally resemble these of Wu, who was born and raised within the Dallas suburb of Carrollton, Texas. Some furnishings in Gugu’s home can also be primarily based on furnishings present in Wu’s dad and mom’ home.
Jentry would reasonably slot in at college than have superpowers.
(Netflix)
“Jentry” arrives as Hollywood studios and streamers have retreated from animation, notably reveals primarily based on unique concepts, after scaling up throughout the peak of the streaming wars. Numerous animated reveals in varied phases of growth have been scrapped and even faraway from streaming platforms as corporations attempt to lower prices. This risk-averse panorama has additionally seen film studios lean extra closely on present properties for reboots and revivals.
“The purpose of the present was all the time to really feel unique and really feel prefer it was a brand new tackle issues,” Wu says. “I hope it sparks extra unique concepts to (make it) via the sound and storm that’s the growth and manufacturing course of.”
Although Wu studied animation at school, incomes a level in laptop animation, “Jentry Chau vs. the Underworld” marks his first Hollywood mission. He says directing his first present with out having earlier expertise on different sequence — which would come with a style of what it is wish to see one thing he labored on launched into the world — was “scary.”
“There was plenty of trial and error on this very first present,” Wu says. “I really feel like I acquired plenty of cheat codes on this sport after which began at stage 20 and simply saved going via them. It’s such a weak feeling proper now (as a result of) it is so near my childhood expertise and …you are feedback on trailers dropping and folks not realizing that it is one thing different human beings labored on.
Wu started internet hosting the present in 2020, however can hint a number of the concepts that in the end advanced into “Jentry” to when she moved to Los Angeles in 2017.
“One day I used to be taking a stroll and (thought), ‘I actually need to do one thing a few jiangshi,’ a hopping Chinese vampire,” Wu says. “They are cool monsters which can be utilized in popular culture however not sufficient.”
Jentry, left, Ed and Gugu in “Jentry Chau vs. the Underworld.”
(Netflix)
That thought in the end led to the conception of Ed (Bowen Yang), a jiangshi who insinuates himself into Jentry’s life to turn into his supernatural sidekick and greatest pal. Among the concerns Wu labored on earlier than the character turned the aspiring social media star audiences encounter within the sequence was how a jiangshi would get to Texas and why.
“The thought was that this jiangshi shipped himself from the Chinese underworld to America to pursue the nice American dream of being a scary monster,” Wu says. And though parts just like the tone and magnificence of the story advanced as Wu labored via completely different iterations of the script, he says that “that comedy in Ed by no means strayed from the unique thought.”
In its early phases, “Jentry” was conceived extra as an animated household comedy, Wu explains. But over the course of the pandemic, she has turn into extra all in favour of tackling the heavier themes the sequence tackles, which embody intergenerational trauma and fighting household expectations.
As a consequence, many parts of Jentry’s coming-of-age story are additional nuanced. The present’s love triangle is not nearly Jentry selecting a man, but additionally how she views her supernatural powers and her connection to them. The present’s villains aren’t simply the underworld demons Jentry faces in battle, but additionally the folks closest to her and the way the alternatives they’ve made have affected her.
“Having to cope with a sophisticated relationship with your loved ones members and a sophisticated relationship with your self and your id, that was all the time what I assumed was most interesting about ‘Jentry,’” Wu says.
