Mad Saints

Mad Saints is an American animated television series created by Geo Moreno which aired on from January 29, 2011 to March 28, 2015. Blending, , , and elements, the series follows four adolescents descended from supernatural and mythological beings as they protect Earth by battling threats from mythology while attempting to blend into human society. Its main characters are Jasper Dark (Baxter Adamson),  Ken Ochoa (Dominic Dominguez),  Michael Morningstar (Floyd MacLeod), and  Sebastian Blake (Joaquin Sanchez). Moreno describes the series' story as "starting out fine, then becoming increasingly entangled in ".

Moreno first conceived Mad Saints as a graphic novel, but ultimately chose to turn it into a television series to avoid condensing the storytelling too much. He then developed the Brain Wave episode "Death of a Monster", which inspired him to make a full-fledged television series. He brought the pilot to in 2009, and the network subsequently greenlit it. Moreno and Jonathan Anderson were the series' original executive producers, with Steven Subaru, Shane Bergen, Tony Gambino, and Maura Morrow joining later in the series' run. Animated by Linkhouse and then Studio Memo, Mad Saints was produced by Geo Pictures in association with.

Though Mad Saints was never a Top 30 hit in the, the show drew in high ratings for The CW during its second through fifth seasons, and was met with high viewer numbers when it began airing in syndication on in 2017. The show has developed a large fanbase and received critical acclaim for its visual design, voice cast, worldbuilding, character development, storylines, music, and overall originality, though it garnered criticism from conservatives over its depictions of mythology and its violence, mild language, mature references,  rating, and primetime time slot have sparked a debate over whether or not it qualifies as. It has been nominated for several and other awards, and has been credited with launching the careers of its young voice actors. In 2020, the series was ranked #1 on MoonJump's list of the Top 10 Greatest Animated Series of the 2010s.

Setting
Mad Saints takes place in the fictional city of Las Aguas, in a world where humans—initially unbeknownst to them—co-exist with the descendants of supernatural and mythology beings tied to numerous cultures. The city is based on cities like —where Geo Moreno grew up—and. Frequent locations shown to be in Las Aguas include West Bend Middle School, Las Aguas High School, the Food Palace restaurant, and the supermarket Sparker's.

and are also prominent locations in the series. As opposed to mythology, where they are simply abodes in the afterlife, Mad Saints depicts them as full-on alternate universes existing parallel to what we know as reality. Moreno did this because—as stated in a 2014 —"one being in the sky and the other being underground makes no sense because [...] digging nor flying will help you find either place, so they might as well be alternate universes".

Characters
The series focuses on four teenage boys who are among these beings and are often referred to as "Freaks": "street smart" Jasper Dark, intellectual but short-tempered  Ken Ochoa, hotheaded  Michael Morningstar, and friendly  Sebastian Blake. Together, they form the "Mad Saints", a team dedicated to stopping supernatural threats which harm both themselves and humanity and search for others like them, all while disguising themselves in an attempt to blend into human society and dealing with unusual problems in their personal lives stemming from their supernatural nature.

The series has a wide range of supporting characters and diverts from the usual "good guys vs. bad guys" formula through its character development. For example, the boys' high school principal,, is an antagonist when he first appears in season 2, but evolves into an anti-hero of sorts by season 4 as the series further explores him as a character. Furthermore, —a human boy introduced in season 1 as an antagonist planning to expose the main characters as "Freaks"—is revealed to have a traumatic past that resulted in a hatred of the paranormal and a mission to prove it exists, but ends up joining the protagonists. Mad Saints also diverts from clichés about its characters' species, such as angel Michael not always helping people, behaving recklessly, and sometimes showing sinister intentions while demon Sebastian is kind and always willing to save humans, good or bad.

Development
Geo Moreno conceived Mad Saints as a graphic novel titled Freakish Sainthood circa 2002, shortly after graduating from college. The main characters closely resembled those in Mad Saints, four teenagers descended from mythological beings: Leo Sky, Ken Lopez, Sebastien Storm, and Angelo Morning Star. Moreno has stated that "I made it to the writing phase before I just ditched the project", and has also noted that "I couldn't properly write the story without it feeling super rushed, and I felt like I needed to start a whole series". He conceived the first three entries in the proposed series and then "gave up", deciding to continue focusing on his animation career for the time being.

In 2004, Moreno joined the crew of the animated anthology television series Brain Wave, and soon began working on the episode "Death of a Monster", which aired in January 2005. It was given a similar premise and design to Freakish Sainthood. Having written, storyboarded, and directed the episode, Moreno was congratulated by the show's crew, who greatly enjoyed the episode's comedy horror style and visuals. Due to the praise, he contemplated turning the episode into an actual animated series, writing in his autobiography The Geo Moreno Book that "the project worked better as a TV show than a comic series".

In 2008, Moreno started developing his show and thereby left the crew of Brain Wave to focus on his own project. During development, Leo Sky became Jasper Dark, Ken Lopez became Ken Ochoa, Sebastien Storm became Sebastian Blake, Angelo Morning Star became Michael Morningstar, the setting became a city, and Mad Saints became the title of the series. He decided to write a, meaning the episode would introduce the characters and setting, as opposed to "just jumping right into [the] story", and wanted to "introduce the protagonists and their deepest secrets and desires". He also sought to to avoid "overdeveloping some characters while leaving the others underdeveloped", a principle which would be kept in place for the remainder of Mad Saints' run.

Moreno wrote the first draft of the pilot in twelve hours at. He then brought the pilot script to. , President of Entertainment at the network, accepted the idea of an animated series "written like a normal primetime show", though she still thought it could "use some work". A short series of rewrites developed the show into its final product, a slightly dark-humored urban fantasy-type series. Screenwriter and animator Jonathan Anderson was brought onboard as an executive producer. The show was picked up "last minute" by The CW, and scheduled to premiere during the 2010–11 television season.

Casting
Moreno himself wanted the show to include child voice actors for the entire main cast and a large part of the supporting cast. In the main cast, Baxter Adamson voiced Jasper, Dominic Dominguez voiced Ken, Floyd MacLeod voiced Michael, and Joaquin Sanchez voiced Sebastian; the former two were 15 when recording began, while the latter two were 14. Additionally, Marcie Rosado was 13 years old when she was cast as Jackie Powers; Bernard and Moreno agreed that her "sweet, pitched up voice" made her perfect for the role. They had similar opinions about Percy Ortega, who voiced recurring antagonist Simon Estrada and was cast at 15; and Jamie Faye Stone, who voiced Gracie Hanson, was cast as 16.

Many of the older supporting cast members were people either Moreno or casting director Pierre Bernard already knew. For example, Bernard cast Kearney Forbes as Lucifer after having met him while working on The Boring Life of Jack. Frank Delgado, the voice of Damian Ochoa, previously voiced Alexius 3 in DSTRYR, after which Moreno befriended him. Another friend of Moreno's, actor and Sunset Band lead singer P.G. Quimby, voices Michael's grandfather Alastair. Moreno and Bernard both knew Martha Sage, the voice actress of the protagonists' teacher Mrs. Wayne, from the 2007 film The W.

Many minor characters were voiced by crew members. One example is Geo, a background character who appears once a season and was voiced by and based on Geo Moreno himself. Producer Dominic Agostino and composer Michael Marcie provided the respective voices of minor characters Dom and Mikey. Executive producer Shane Bergen voiced some other, less important characters.