When launching a cartoon series about a bunch of gods from different major religions hanging out together in the modern world, it was probably a wise move by its creators to not include the prophet Mohammed in their makeshift pantheon of dieties.
Instead, Smoking Doors Productions founders Jeff Cooper and Grahaeme Cowie opted to go with some of the top dogs of Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism and Greek mythology for their new show Impotents that imagines them in their early days before they grew into their respective powers.
“These are not the gods you think you know,” explains Cowie. “These are four flawed twentysomethings living in the modern world trying to realize their vast potential.”
In other words, they haven’t become omnipotent yet and so are still “impotent.” The fact that they’ve chosen a dick joke for the title hints at the irreverent tone of the series, which will follow the adventures of a young call centre worker named Jesus and his three dysfunctional besties: a chubby, pot-smoking slacker named Buddha, an obnoxious and horny (tusky?) elephant named Ganesh, and bored hottie “Missy,” who religious scholars know better as Artemis, daughter of Zeus and the Hellenic goddess of the hunt and protector of young girls.
Hilarity ensues. Or at least the two childhood pals are hoping will ensue. They’ve pitched the animated series to some networks but, due to the sacriligious subject matter, are turning to Kickstarter to launch a web series to help convince them.
“We’ve garnered a lot of interest [from studios] in this but, because it is outside of what they typically think of as ‘safe’, they want to see this thing go further,” says Cooper. “They want to see an audience, which is how we came up with the idea of a web series. It’s something we can make independently.”
Their campaign includes a variety of goodies for entice backers to invest in their $20,000 target, ranging from T-shirts, keychains and other swag to an IMDB producer credit or having their likeness drawn by Cowie and be included in an episode.
So far the two have already completed the script for the debut episode, a dream sequence that sees Jesus, Buddha and Ganesh locked in a maximum security prison, and they’ve in the process of casting voice actors.
All they need, not unlike the cartoon characters themselves, is for people to believe in them.
