Shadowpaw

Webmaster of The Soda Fountain

 

Do you have an AIO website, if so, what? If you are currently working on a new one, please tell us about it.

Yes, I do have an Adventures in Odyssey website. Rather, I had an AIO site... "The Soda Fountain". A few months ago, March to be exact, I decided it was time for me to shut 'er down. However, starting just this past week (August 19), I have joined the AIOHQ team and will continue to help out with the site for as long as possible. There's many great things in store :o)

 

Who is your favorite character of all time and why?

Favorite character of all time? Wow... there's been a lot of characters that have come and gone over the years. I'm not sure I'd be able to pick just one, however since you asked I guess I'll give it a shot. Forgive me for dividing this up into sections, but if I'm going to answer the question I might as well do it thoroughly. My favorite child character of all time would definitely have to be Jimmy Barclay. He was funny, annoying, endearing, and witty... and he was a real character with real problems. He was easy to relate to, and wasn't some cardboard character that the writers just thought up and threw into the mix. The whole Barclay family was like this, and boy Odyssey isn't the same without them. (On a side note... my current favorite child character would have to be Alex). Now, onto my favorite adult character of all time. This is definitely harder then the first, since I haven't really ever given it much thought. I really like Regis and Edwin, Whit and Connie, Tom and Huck (oh wait, he's not on Odyssey is he?)... but my ultimate favorite adult character would have to be Eugene. He's a dork, sure, but he lays claim to some of the best lines in AIO history and I find him much more comical then other characters on the show. Besides, who can forget any of the scenes between Bernard and Eugene, Eugene and Connie, Katrina and Eugene? I liked him from the very moment he stepped into Whit's End, and I'll still like him when he finally decides to move on... or the series ends, whichever comes first.

 

Which character do you resemble the most and why?

Hmmmm, another tough question. I guess, though I'm not so proud to admit it, the person I resemble most would have to be Bart Rathbone... Like our friend Bart, I've always taken the cynical approach to life and have made my fair share of sarcastic comments. Though I certainly don't hope to ever fall into the same kind of trouble Bart has got himself mixed up with, and I pray to be a much better family man then he's proven to be. :o)

 

What is your favorite episode of all time and why?

Good... an easy question ;o) "The Time Has Come" tops the list, though not a wonderfully crafted plot or anything to be found in this episode... it reflects upon the life of Eugene, and a very important decision he has to make with his life. It's one of those feel good episodes that you just got the chills listening too, due in no small part to the superb audio production found within. "Greater Love" and "The Mortal Coil" are also up there, but then again... so are 400 other episodes :o)

 

What is your favorite AIO website and why?

Well geez, that's kinda an unfair question isn't it? :o) Obviously my first choice would have to be my own, while it is no longer updated I still have a sense of pride in the site as well as the good memories (and the many bad memories) AIO Survivor and the like provided me. However, for information I always have and always will, turn to the AIOHQ. They've got everything you'll ever need as a true Odyssey fan (and everything you don't), and it was the site that sorta inspired me (on a spur of the moment) to create my Soda Fountain. However, The Odyssey Scoop is quickly rising the AIO fan page ladder, and I'm happy to say I like what I've seen so far!

 

If you had one wish for AIO, what would it be?

I'm probably gonna turn a few heads with this one... but I would like it if Regis Blackgaard was still around. I kinda wish that his whole saga wasn't wrapped up, and in my mind there are still many questions yet to be answered about the man. Other then that, I only wish they hadn't gone the 15 minute route (and no, I'm not talking about the episode), cause it really diminished the fun of listening to a story unravel. It was boom, boom, boom... too little, too fast, with no development time for plots.

 

What is your favorite part of Adventures in Odyssey?

A: A: Listening in on other people's lives. While the characters certainly aren't real, and some of the plots are far fetched, the storylines and characters are interesting enough to keep wanting to come back for more. Most AIO fans feel like they know each and every character on an individual basis... and everyone has a different idea of who and what these people look like. Something a television show could never, and will never capture.

 

Would you ever consider working with AIO and why?

Yes... I've considered it, but not seriously enough to ever act upon it. I think most fans of the series would love to work on it, in some shape or form, but the reality is it's a very talented pool of people they employee and Joes like us could never hack it :o) That's not to say I wouldn't try it, if the opportunity presented itself, but unless it's really God's calling then I would have to pass the job on.

 

What is your favorite section of my website?

Well I can tell you it'll be my interview once it goes up :o) Hehe... and of course your Extra Extra section provides a good read, as does Fun Facts :o) I like a lot of your site!

 

How do you imagine Whit's End and the town of Odyssey?

Nothing like the video series depicts. For me, Whit's End was a square building (seen from above), and a rectangular front seen from the entrance. Whit's End was written in big red letters across the top of the front, and large double doors were there for people to enter. Once inside it looks very similar to what Whit's End in Colorado springs looks like, though not nearly as colorful. Ok, so maybe I have a pretty bad imagination... but that was, and still is, the way I picture it. The town itself looks just like any small town would... old looking buildings, lots of history... a few landmarks scattered throughout the town. And no clock tower. :o)

 

Out of the albums, books, and videos, what do you like best?

Albums by far... I've read none of the books, except the Passages series, and I don't care too much for the videos. While Passages is good... it just isn't Odyssey for me, and the albums are the way things should be... since that is the way they were.

 

What is one interview question that you would add to this? Answer it.

The one interview question I would like to add is this:

 

What are the two interview questions that you would like to add? Answer it.

Ok... thanks for asking. In that case, here are the two questions I would like to add.

 

How did you first get interested in Odyssey?

As far back as I can remember, Odyssey's been playing a role in my life. I can't remember a time when Odyssey didn't exist for me, and to prove this I have some of the rare first copies of Officer David Harley episodes, and more then a dozen Odyssey USA tapes. Up until 1996, I would get an album or two for Christmas and birthdays, never really knowing how many episodes were out there... just that I owned probably 15 or so sets. Then I found an ad in the newspaper for a new Christian Radio station in town, which would begin airing the Odyssey series. The day I tuned in, there was a commercial for the new "Complete Guide to Adventures in Odyssey" that would be available at my local Christian bookstore. While I was not a huge fanatic of Odyssey at the time, I still enjoyed the show and was interested to see what I was missing, so I picked up a copy a few weeks later. Now, the rest of my story would better fit into the next question:

 

What events lead up to your creation of the Soda Fountain, why did you shut it down, and is there a future?

About a month later, I had snatched up every other album available at the time, and begin listening to the series with a new frame of mind. Very shortly after that time period I was browsing the web, and I thought to myself "Wow... I could do an Adventures in Odyssey website! Wouldn't that be cool?" I knew a bit of html at the time, and with the help of Frontpage I was able to do a quick mock up of my website. The background was an ugly green, and I had nothing fancy to show for it. So I ran around the web looking for album images that I could put on my site... after finding only 5 or 6 good album cover scans on the web at the time, I gave up and didn't think about it anymore for quite some time. During this time period, apparently a few sites began to sprout up here and there and I was surprised when 3 years later I typed "Adventures in Odyssey" into a search engine and discovered fan sites now existed. I was first taken to the Ultimate Adventures in Odyssey website, and when I saw that the episodes were now only fifteen minutes I was very surprised. I had just received "Hidden Treasures" for Christmas a few weeks earlier (that was probably the reason I decided to do the search), and while that was the newest album at the time... I had not listened to the radio version of the show for quite some time, and had no idea what changes had occurred. Looking to find out more about this new episode format, I found myself looking at the AIOHQ. It was this day that I remembered I had once wanted to build an Odyssey web page, and with the help of my recently purchased scanner, I quickly coded a web page and went about scanning pictures and cutting around edges for the site. It took about a total of three days for me to create my site, logo and buttons from scratch, and what I did those three days is what appears on the web today... very little has changed except for what I added. Now, as I said, very little thought had gone into the web page and I wasn't really sure where I was headed once it was completed... I had no idea what kind of commitment I had just made, and the constant updating began to take it's toll. Less then a month after the site went up, the episode and album guide accompanied it, which was a huge project in itself and just stuck with writing reviews and posting news when other people posted updates to their sites. When summer came, I realized I needed to attract more hits to my site, and since I had become attached to watching the television show "Survivor", I figured it would be really cool to have the people from Odyssey stuck on an island. Again, without thinking much about the consequences, I drew up a Survivor section for my site and for the next 72 or some odd days, my life was completely sucked out of me and I dreaded the time when I would have to write up an article on the events of the day. Once it was over, I was very, very relieved and pretty much vowed to myself to never make a stupid mistake like that again. When February rolled around, something came up that prevented me from keeping up with the world of AIO and I didn't update for a while. When I finally got things back in order, let's just say I wasn't looking forward to going back to the site... I liked the time away from it. So I decided enough was enough, and shut the Soda Fountain down until I could figure out what to do. I currently believe I will continue with the site next summer, that being the summer of 2002, but that's just how I'm feeling right now... I could very well get it back up and running much sooner then that... or I could just decide to forget it completely. I apologize for taking up so much space with my response, but this so far has been the only outlet in which I could express what occurred.

 

Who is your favorite actor on Adventures in Odyssey?

I like a lot of the actors! But the person I think does the best job is Corey Burton. He's got a WIDE variety of characters, and it's sometimes a challenge trying to figure out if Burton is playing the role or someone else. He's a great voiceover artist, and I love all the characters he does, not only Odyssey but elsewhere in our world.

 

Which actor would you want to meet the most?

I think I would most want to meet Ed Walker... the voice of Bart and Tom. I think he would be really joy to talk with, especially with him being one of only two cast members left from Family Portraits (the other being Katie Leigh). He's also got quite a history, and I'm sure he'd be a great story teller :o)

 

If you were to delete ONE thing from AIO history, what would it be and why? ( A lot of fans will say split episodes = )

Sure, why not, split episodes :o) But that's a cop out since you suggested it... so I guess I would have to say the one thing I wish was deleted from AIO's history is the creation of the video series. Some people love 'em, some people hate 'em, but most people just plain old don't like them.

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