Executive Producer Tim Burns on My Babysitter’s a Vampire Cliffhanger

Happy New Year!

I’m a little late on this but My Babysitter’s a Vampire show runner/executive producer Tim Burns replied to a fan in November on the Facebook group about the S2 cliffhanger and our S3/movie that we won’t be getting. Consider this my late Christmas gift to spread to the rest of the [still very active after 3 years] fandom.

And I think this reply from Tim is very nice and it shows us that the producers wanted the show to go on, or attempt to make a second film to give us ‘closure’. I don’t know how Canadian TV goes but typically in the U.S., the showrunners/producers move on after a certain length of time of the show being canned. The MBV producers & Fresh TV have been active in social media with the fans since the last episodes aired in both the U.S. and Canada back in 2012-early 2013 and I’m sure we all thank them for it. I know I do! And I just think it’s astonishing that here we are 2015-16 and people are still abuzz about ‘Vampire’.

And unfortunately, this may be my last post. Unless someone (YTV, Teletoon, some network in Canada) decides to do something regarding the show/a movie. I’ll still be on Twitter (@AllThingsMBAV) from time to time though, but mostly retweeting and remembering. Below is what Tim said:

“Hey Lara. I like your post, and I feel your pain! As one of the executive producers, and the head-writer “show runner” of the series, all I can sai is that we tried very hard to make a season 3, or a second movie, happen. The ‘Lucifractor’ storyline was my idea in the first place, and I DID have some solutions in mind for how we would continue the story… I even created a few different scenarios for the second movie. But we hit nothing put problems with broadcasters, budgets, and some difficulties keeping the cast together. It’s not surprising that such talented young actors want to move on to other things… All I can say is that it was just as sad for us as it was for you to see the series cut short at the season 2 cliffhanger. I haven’t completely given up hope that the story will continue some day -- even if it means doing so with a ‘next generation’ of characters. It’s out of my power – I’m just a writer. But the entire team of writers, actors, and producers who created the show are proud of the series, and it means a great that loyal fans like you still keep the flame alive. I wish I had better news. But all I can say is ‘thanks’ for your support, and ‘sorry’ that we left everyone hanging. If we ever find a way to raise MBV from the grave, I hope you and the other loyal fans aren’t too old to still enjoy iy. Thanks for being a fan! (PS. Your English is fine. AND I know where the Lucifractor is now… it’s on my desk!”

RE:Fresh Blog Interview With Executive Producer Tim Burns

The first part of an interview with My Babysitter's a Vampire executive producer Tim Burns, with Brendan at the RE:Fresh Blog:

Hey gang!


Almost a whole year ago, while the second season of My Babysitter’s a Vampire was in production, I got the chance to sit down with Tim Burns, the screenwriter of the MBV movie and the lead writer and co-producer of the series! We talked about how the story and characters changed during the writing process, what inspirations he draws on in his writing and even some of the rules for magic and monsters in the Whitechapel universe… and then I had to stay quiet about it to avoid spoiling any surprises!


Now that new episodes of MBV are airing on Disney Chanel we’re finally opening the vault doors and letting all of you in on a very special behind the scenes look at the hit show!


Brendan: The fans know a lot about the actors on the show but not nearly as much about the other people who make it happen. In your own words, what do you do?


Tim: What do I do? I ask myself that on a daily basis! I was involved in this project starting shortly after ‘ground zero’. Tom [McGillis] and Jen [Pertsch] had had the original idea for Babysitter; I think they’d come up with that with Brian [Irving] and George [Elliot]. But it was quite different when it first started. They already had this fantastic three page pitch about the fundamentals of what the series is, all the core ideas for the story. I came in about early 2009 when Fresh TV wanted to do the movie. I looked at what they had and I had some ideas of my own that involved adding some characters and changing some characters.


Brendan: How did the characters change from that initial story idea?


Tim: If I think back to the original, original pitch, I think Ethan was a bit more of an average, skateboard-crazy, everyman kid. I’m more of a geek; I ate at the nerd table in the cafeteria and I had my nerdy friends and we were always on the outside so I pitched a version that was a little more about these outsiders. I think the central idea for me was that they could be getting chased by vampires, they could be about to be killed, but if one of those vampires was a good looking girl they’d be just as excited about that as seeing a vampire. I think that’s a tough decision when you’re young! That was where I started, drawing from my own background. I brought that into the movie when I wrote it.


Brendan: What were the biggest changes to the concept itself?


Tim: Ideas like the Benny’s grandmother being a wiccan earth priestess started to spin into it because I mistakenly thought the vampire craze would have played itself out two years from then. I thought that Twilight was so huge that two years from then people would be so sick to death of vampires so I said it shouldn’t be just a vampire show, it should be a world that combines the best of all those mythological creatures so we could do a werewolf episode, so we could do trolls or pixies and vampires are just part of that ‘family’. That’s why I liked the idea of Benny as the spellmaster and Ethan with his seer abilities and expanding the world so every week it wouldn’t just be, “Oh no, you’re a vampire!”

We’ll be bringing you more of my interview with Tim in weeks to come. In the meantime, you can catch another new episode of My Babysitter’s a Vampire tonight at 7:30 PM on Disney Chanel and a marathon of the first four episodes of Season 2 this Saturday, July 28th, from 8:00 PM to 10:00 PM!


Stay fresh,
Brendan

Anatomy of My Babysitter's a Vampire

The Writers Guild of Canada has a very interesting article on the "Anatomy of My Babysitter's a Vampire" by executive producer/show runner Tim Burns. Although MBAV is not a Disney Channel original series, I find it to be one of their best (compared to it's current original programming)!

My Babysitter’s a Vampire showrunner Tim Burns describes the show this way "The comedic tone is twisted, quirky, weird and stupid, and true to the worldview of a 12-year-old self-confessed geek."


This combination has proved winning  for the show, helping it  take a bite out of the crowded youth demonic film and TV market dominated by the likes of the Twilight movie franchise and The Vampire Diaries. It’s undead youth programming, set in the world of geeks and nerds.

"We knew we were pushing the envelope while writing season one, so when it showed up on Disney, it stuck out and got noticed because it isn’t the usual type of show that goes through their development process," says Burns. "It was a strange fit for them but it touched a nerve with their audience which is great."

Zeroing in on Audience
From the outset Burns stuck to the vision of making a show about nerd boys for nerd boys, and didn’t stray from that.

"We knew who we were writing the show for and, if anything has been proven, it’s that this approach can pay dividends because you aren’t watering down the tone of your show," says Mike Kiss, executive story editor on season one and consulting producer on season two. "If you make a show that knows what it is and is fun to watch, I think an audience will find it. If you go after your core audience, you are going to get a lot of spillover."

Read more: Writers Guild of Canada - Anatomy of My Babysitter's a Vampire