SURVIVING AN INFAMOUS TELEVISION SERIES CALLED VR MAN
Or The Art Of What Not To Do When You Produce A Television Series
(TRAILER LINK TO THE SERIES)
One reason why the life of a television writer is interesting is that every day, you are solving a different problem in production. Every television show carries with it, a unique signature of hassles and issues.
During the production of my television series, Fighting Spiders, a rainstorm swept away an entire set that was constructed in the forest. It caused a delay in our shoot. That was just one of many problems that plagued the series. It was normal though. Par for the course in the production of any series. But I think I can safely say that no other television series in Singapore was plagued with as many problems as a series called VR MAN.
Here are some of my recollections, salvaged from my brief stroll down Amnesia Lane.
I did not write the show. I was working on another show. However, I did work in the same office as the writers and producers who worked on the VR MAN. I was the writer fly on the wall in the office that housed the team who did….
The Infamous Show Called VR MAN
For those who do not know what VR MAN was all about, it was Singapore’s first superhero series. VR stood for Virtual Reality. It was an idea that was light years ahead of its time. It starred James Lye as a man who could change reality. VR MAN was one of those shows that acquired a reputation of being so bad that it was good. The performances were cringey. The effects were cheesy. The plots were ludicrous. The dialogue was unrealistic. Back when it came on air, the show attracted bad reviews the way a piece of left-over mango would attract flies. Hordes of them. Impossible to bat away. The main star was so affected by the show that he quit acting. A stuntman fainted on set. Writers had nervous breakdowns. Episodes were shot and then had to be discarded because no one dared to put them up on air because management felt that the tsunami of hate that would come down on them would shut down the entire station. That was how bad it was. But how did it start that way?
What’s the origin story?
It Began With A Premise
The success of any series begins with the writing. So is the failure.
I can’t remember if I was in the room when the idea for VR MAN first came up. I was hauled into the office to help contribute ideas for a superhero series. I thought they were joking and so I said, how about a hawker who sells Char Kuay Teow (fried noodles) by the day but fights crime at night. He shall be called — wait for it — WOK MAN!
The idea was seriously considered but I thank my lucky stars that it was rejected. The next thing I knew, they had instead gone for VR MAN. I remembered feeling a surge of relief that I was not involved. I could not flee fast enough. Maybe it was the premise that instinctively raised alarm bells in every fiber of my gut. A man whose superpower was to change reality. If this was pitched today, it would be possible, except that VR MAN would be known as Dr. Strange. But this was the 90’s. Production budgets were still decent but insufficient for a show that would be driven by special effects. And the technology was just not there at that time to support the ambition that was inherent in the concept. To this day, I could not understand why the writers decided to forge ahead with the concept. No one, and certainly not the executive producer, knew what “changing reality” meant. Earlier drafts, and again I am digging deep into my recollection, had VR MAN being able to create a reality where the Stamford Raffles statue was able to walk. Also, Dick Tracy, the movie was screened then, and the creative team decided that the production design of VR MAN would be inspired by the production design of Dick Tracy. Inspired is a very loose way of saying that the team lifted the color design of Dick Tracy wholesale and slapped it on the VR MAN sets. Everything was in primary colors. Red, green, yellow. The pilot episode even had a CG dragon flying through the Singapore sky.
It was too much reality for the network to take. They decided to scrap all seven episodes which have already been shot and told the production team to start from scratch.
I have learned since then that before one even commits an ounce of brainpower to the conceptualizing of episodes, one should first examine every contour of the premise with a loupe. Does the premise make sense? Does it resonate with a hard crystalline clarity? If it doesn’t, then as a writer, you should continue to polish until it does. And if it does not work on paper, for the love of God, do not commit to production. That adage, if it ain’t on the page, it ain’t on the stage.
Believe it with all your heart.
Maybe the writers figured they could get away with it if they focused on developing the characters. Perhaps they thought if they created a Sherlock Holmes, or a Professor Moriarty, then the stories will come. At that time, the writers on that show were partly made up of playwrights and journalists. None has worked in science fiction and fantasy before. None were familiar with comic book tropes. Once again, alarm bells should have been sounded. When I managed to get hold of a draft script of a VR MAN episode and read it, I thought the bells should have been put aside and this time, fog horns should have been activated. Huge long chunks of dialogue punctuated the page. If VR MAN was set on a stage, with the actors standing and proclaiming their intent and world views, perhaps it could have worked. But this was television. In real life, in a conflict-driven scene, no one will stand and let you finish your diatribe before you retort. People will cut in. Having pages and pages of chunky dialogue will kill the pacing of the episode. The editor will have a hellish time cutting the scene. This was a classic case of writers who have not properly adapted their writing to the platform. And the executive producer did nothing to correct the direction of the scripts. I knew the rewrites alone would clog the production.
But maybe the rewrites were worth the trouble if we had great….
Villainous Characters
A hero is defined by the villain. The greater the villain, the better the hero. For VR MAN, they created a villain. All very good. Then they decided to give the villain a name. After weeks and months of brainstorming in front of a whiteboard, they came up with the name. They would call the villain –
THE CLICK-CLICK MAN
Why? Because he had a habit of pressing the top of his pen with his thumb, it is the first thing you hear when he approaches you. I remembered that when I heard the name, I silently thanked the Gods Of Television that I was spared the awfully painful job of writing for that show. I remembered mulling over a rewrite on a script for my show, Shiver, when I happened to overhear an American script consultant, in deep discussion with the VR TEAM of writers on how they should describe VR MAN’s power. I peeked around the corner of my table and noticed a group of adults, huddling in front of a whiteboard. On the board were arrows and circles and strange amalgamations of words in black ink as if the group was trying to decipher the secret meaning behind a magic rune.
Does the VR MAN leap over tall buildings in a single bound?
Of course not.
Is the VR man able to command creatures of the sea?
Nah.
Or RUN at the speed of light?
Nope.
But the VR MAN can change your reality. And when he does that, he — VIRPS.
That was the word the team invented. A new word in the lexicon of Singapore Superhero-dom.
That was when I virped my silent thanks to the Gods of Television.
The writers who worked on that show were in cubicles just a short distance from mine. They looked haggard, drawn-out, their eyes haunted by a yearning to be free but there was something that wriggled in their hearts as well, a determination to see the thing through to the bitter end. I knew the scripts were not ready. I knew that getting the scripts ready would take another year or so. The writers were unfamiliar with the genre they were trying to write, and there was a lack of leadership from the executive producer. Everyone on the VR MAN ship was just hoping that somehow the vessel would find land somewhere if they let it drift long enough.
Then it came time for the production.
Again, note that much of what I am telling you was what I had heard back then. It’s all hearsay. I hear and I say. There was much debate over what kind of costume VR MAN would wear. The team came up with some designs. But no one, absolutely no one, wanted to give the green light to any of the designs. They left it to the executive producer, who had about as much experience with a superhero series as a can opener had with software engineering. He dropped by my cubicle and sought my opinion. I told him that whichever he chose, was fine with me. The whole costume saga had DISASTER scrawled all over it in bright neon-glow letters and I was not going to give the executive producer the chance to pin the blame on me should the disaster become a reality.
Then he told me that he asked his three-year-old kid which costume design was the nicest. The suit had cost about 50,000 dollars, I think, to make. That’s 50 thousand of production money from the broadcast station. And the final decision rested on the whim of his three-year-old son. Not his creative team.
The suit was eventually made.
The stuntman wore it.
And fainted.
Because it was so tight that the stuntman could not breathe in it and under the hot lights on set, the stuntman was subjected to a slow boil. Until he collapsed in the tv studio. Then the lead actor put on the suit, but there must have been some issue with the measurements because when he put it on, the suit immediately tore at the back. Now you were left with a superhero with a torn costume. It was not the desired reality.
The only way to change THAT reality was to stop production while a junior producer rushed to Beach Road to look for an alternate suit. They eventually found one that looked like what Batman might have worn if he went shopping at Beach Road in Singapore on a budget. And that suit became the definitive VR MAN costume.
When the series was finally telecast, the ratings were abysmal. No one was surprised. If I am not mistaken, it hovered between zero and one percent. The reviews that came in were unflattering. Critics gleefully picked apart every aspect of the series. Forgive them, God, for they know not what they do. At the same time that VR MAN aired, there was a Chinese Blockbuster series called The Golden Pillow, which starred Zoe Tay and a Hongkong veteran actor, Alex Man. That series was a 40-episode epic drama. I bring it up because the budget of that series was close to the eventual budget of 13 episodes of VR MAN.
All those delays, and reshoots, all added up.
But something strange happened in the final episode of VR MAN. VR MAN began with a single-digit for its first episode but ended with a double-digit rating for its finale. Was the audience unable to resist coming back to see just how the whole thing played out? Was it like one of those phenomena when you see an accident unfold in slow motion, and even though you know you should tear your eyes away, you can’t help but come back to see the aftermath, just so you can tell your friends how bad was the wreckage?
I will never know.
The series took its toll on the cast and crew. Writers went on leave and took a break to recover their confidence in ever putting words on a page again. It was as if they had survived a terrible war, and they didn’t want to think of it lest they succumb to another post-traumatic stress blues attack. The lead director offered to fall on the sword for the abysmal ratings. He went back to India, and never returned to Singapore. The lead actor, James Lye, quit acting and is now happily improving the financial reality of the clients of investment bankers. The head writer left the station shortly and returned to his true métier — insightful and intelligent reporting on local politics.
Final Takeaway
Creating anything for television and film is difficult. An idea like VR MAN was ahead of its time. It demanded a very experienced production team as it involved heavy special effects. It required experienced writers who have worked in the genre before. It required sturdy showrunners, and executive producers with a clear vision and who can shepherd a room of writers to execute the vision. There was none of that. When it came to writing, the process was not given due consideration. Basic storytelling issues were not ironed out. The scripts were rushed into production. The show was greenlit without a solid premise. Production was greenlit without solid scripts. It was a “What Not To Do When You Produce A Television Show” in every way, from top to bottom.
And yet, the writers earned my admiration, for their steel in seeing the project through. History is filled with many accounts of victories and major defeats on the battlegrounds. Much can be learned from defeats and success is borne on the backs of many failures. VR MAN may have been a loss, but it was rich in many lessons. The real tragedy to me was that VR MAN scared the broadcast station so much that it effectively killed off any chance of another sci-fi fantasy series to be ever pitched and produced again for many years. I thought it should have been a siren call to everyone that we have learned and we can definitely do better.
Perhaps we need to change that reality.
VR MAN, where are you?