Nostalgia is a powerful force when it comes to pop culture. Flip through any streaming service menu and there are dozens of shows that took inspiration from Stranger Things to tell their stories in the 1980s. The 90s are close behind with offerings like That 90’s Show appealing to the next generation looking back.
Pixel Circus hopes that they’ll be able to ride the impending wave of Y2K nostalgia. Sunday Spy Club offers a story inspired by shows like Totally Spies, Powerpuff Girls and the Charlie’s Angels films to tell an adrenaline fuelled spy story of cool gadgets, sleek heists and girl power. We spoke with the main cast members about they characters, their inspiration and how they hacked the rules of Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition in a McGuyver like fashion to tell their tale.
“The Sunday Spy Club has existed as a little note to myself in my phone’s notes app (where all of my best 3am ideas live) for about 8 months before it became a reality, said Saige Ryan, who co-crated the show and plays Summer Steele. “I love playing in genres and tropes, and I had this exact cast picked out for it from day one. I feel so lucky to have been able to hand this concept over to Mayanna and let her run with it and build a story around it.”
“Saige reached out to me to collaborate and after we ran a few test games for her and some folks over at Pixel Circus, she showed me the concept and the pitch deck,” said Mayanna Berrin, co-creator and GM for the show. “From there we discussed the narrative and Saige pulled together a phenomenal cast of hilarious femmes, a gangbusters production team and enough sleepover snacks to feed an entire college campus and we shot something truly magical.”
The cast came together for a Session Zero that also featured marathons of media inspirations in the Y2K era. They took the time to discuss high school stereotypes, their own experiences and the characters they wanted to see in a story like this. Pretty soon, concepts started flowing from brain to character sheet.
“We started by brainstorming our favorite 00’s tropes, character archetypes, and then helped each other form them into more specific and distinct roles within the friend group,” said Becca Scott, who plays Avert “Malware” Mallard. “Of course, every spy group needs the techie hacker. I find character creation is so much more fun when it’s a collaboration, because friends are always better at seeing you than you are at seeing yourself, and the same goes with distilling the personality you want to create in a show like this.”
“The first prompt we got was along the lines of ‘what are some of the high school stereotypes you can think of?’,” said Mica Burton, who plays Astoria Huntley. “My brain automatically went to the spoiled rich girl. The Clover, the London Tipton, you know the type. But in all of those seemingly shallow and vapid characters is a girl who fiercely loves her friends and will go down fighting with and for them. Thus Astoria was born.”
Sunday Spy Club uses Fifth Edition D&D as the basis for the game rules. The team enjoyed the challenge of hacking a fantasy rules set to run a modern spy game. That included mixing in elements from other RPG systems.
“We utilized a lot of systems already present in 5E as well as some flavor from Blades in The Dark,” said Berrin, “but for the most part 5E gave us all the tools we needed and then Saige entrusted me to sprinkle on some delicious spy and sci-fi spice.”
“Yes, we had a traditional race, class, and spells/actions,” said Burton. “but we had to get creative and figure out how to translate those into ‘real life’ spy abilities. Sending stone? A Sidekick cell phone. Firebolt? Laser lipstick.”
Looking back on the 2000s was a huge part of the appeal for this storyline. Many of the cast members go to relive their favorite parts of the era. Others got to get their hands on things they didn’t have back then.
“There is a green shirt with a white collar that I will dream of forever,” said Krystina Arielle, who plays Tinsley Clifford. “I also wanted, and never had a Sidekick, so this was also a treat!”
“Genuinely,” said Burton. “I was thriving every second of immersing in the 2000s nostalgia. I felt like I really got to soak up all the things I did or desperately wanted to enjoy from when I was in middle school. Especially the Sidekick. I was never allowed to have a Sidekick so this felt like a personal redemption arc for me.”
”Let’s be real,” said Scott. “it’s always the fashion. We can reimagine our favorite parts, and still not give up our highwaistedness for the terrible 1 inch zippers of yesteryear denim. Also, our AIM equivalent messaging system, K.I.S.S., really brought me back to a simpler time where you had to sit in front of a desktop for hours waiting for that door opening sound of the AIM login.”
“Looking back on the shows and music of the 2000’s it’s incredible how celebratory and colorful it was,” said Berrin. “There was so much excitement at the turn of the millenium for a technological future that incorporated playful colors and shapes as well as the latest innovations. It’s exciting to see us swinging back around again to that approach to technology and fashion now with Gen-Z’s obsession with the 2000’s.”
“We had so many nostalgic gadgets and accessories,” said Ryan. “I felt like the girl that I would have stared at in a mall in the early 2000s.”
Created in partnership with Blackmagic Design, the mission begins Sunday, July 21st on the PixelCircus Youtube channel. For fans who want to Sunday Spy Club live, Pixel Circus is hosting an event at Gen Con on Sunday, August 4th.
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