Exclusive Interview with Teen Wolf’s Jeff Davis at NYCC
I got the amazing opportunity to talk to Teen Wolf’s Executive Producer Jeff Davis again at New York Comic Con. During our interview, he gave a sneak preview of the mysterious “Beast” that will be featured in season 5B and hinted at what fans can expect from the upcoming season.
What can you tell us about “The Beast”?
“It’s a big creature and we’re still working on it.”
Will 5B start with another cold open?
“Yes! 5B actually starts back with Lydia. One of the first images is actually in the trailer, and that’s Lydia moving in the water towards a bridge. That’s exactly how 5B opens, so it all comes back around to Lydia. Lydia is telling the story of 5A to Dr. Valack. Holland has had a lot of fun doing these scenes in Eichen House because the first 5 episodes she’s in Eichen House locked away. She’s basically trying to come back and help her friends, and we have some characters in Eichen House that are going to be a lot of fun, I think. I can’t tell too many secrets, but it’s a big season for Holland and she’s amazing, you want to write for Holland because she’s just so good.”
Is Aiden coming back?
“Not presently, but we’ll see.”
How is season 5B different from previous seasons?
“It’s definitely a more epic feel. It’s definitely the whole world could explode kind of season. We wanted to make things big and epic. What’s funny about TV is that for some reason TV only seems to exist in one town. If you go to a certain place, they’ll say things like, ‘I didn’t know Beacon Hills had a downtown.’ I’m like well no, ‘that’s downtown, that’s another town.’ It’s funny because we were trying to expand the world, like they go to New Mexico in one episode. We have a Stiles and Scott road trip to New Mexico to find Kira, which I think is going to be a fun episode. When you shoot in California there’s such a variety of locality that you can make different places look like different cities and different countries. They did it on Alias for years.
At the panel you had old women wearing Beacon Hills lacrosse sweaters, 12 year olds, and a lot of male viewers, do you have those demographics in mind when creating content for the show?
“In the writer’s room, the only viewers and the actual audience we have in mind first are ourselves. We basically sit there and say what we would like to see, what would be fun, who are the new villains, what do we want to see Stiles and Scott go through. After that, when we come up with some ideas then we say, ‘Oh the audience is going to hate that, we can’t do that. Or maybe the audience will like that. Or who cares if they hate it, let’s do it anyway!’
As writers, you have to please yourself first. If you try to keep the audience in mind I think it ends up being a kind of fan service that doesn’t seem to work out ever. The shows that do the fan servicing, half the fans like it and the other half of the fans hate it. I think you just have to please yourself and hope for the best.”
How much do you take your huge online presence into account?
“It’s hard because I look at other show runners, like Game of Thrones, say they don’t look online at all, they can’t. So I’ve been told don’t ever look online because there can be so much negativity. It’s like you can have 10 thousand positive remarks online, then one person says ‘I thought this episode really sucked!’ and then you’re like ‘Damn it!’ You go to bed at night thinking, maybe it did suck. You’ve got to learn to stay away from it, otherwise it gets to you. I still sneak a peek at Twitter when the episode airs to see how they’re reacting, It’s fun to see that, that’s like live theater.”
You’ve done fan events in the past, such as the Fan Art Exhibit…
“I loved that, that was amazing!”
Can fans expect anything like that for the upcoming season?
“That’s all up to MTV I think. That would be great! I would love that! We actually had several Make-A-Wish visits last week. It’s just incredible to see. These kids that come with their families and their parents and they tour the sets and it’s an interesting thing to see all of the stuff happen. I forget it because I’m there everyday. But some days I walk around the set and I’m like this is all fake and this is all make-believe, what an incredible job to have. That’s very gratifying! Some days it’s hard, you sit there and think, I’m making a show about teenage werewolves, it shouldn’t be this hard. Then the Make-A-Wish families come and you see this is actually very meaningful.