Entertainment

‘Defiance’: minding the myth

Keeping track of the “Defiance” mythology became complicated enough that an associate producer was given the task of creating an online wiki to chart everything.

“We promoted someone from within — Brian Alexander — to be the myth coordinator,” says executive producer Kevin Murphy. “His job is to make sure everything is consistent between the game and the show and find the connections between the two.”

“I was really seeing the possibility of creating a new story dynamic between the two platforms,” says Alexander, who grew up on video games and previously worked with Murphy as a script coordinator on “Desperate Housewives.”

He created an online “Defiance” encyclopedia that details everything from the characters in the video game and the TV series, the names of all the alien races, important places as well as the way culture, technology and law work there.

Alexander says, “When I started, there were documents scattered all over the place so I thought it made sense to create a central depository — or an internal wiki — to track it all.”

The intensive tracking allows creators to work together very closely when it comes to designing storylines for both the show and the game. For example, some of the creatures and villains from the game will appear in the show later in Season 1, while other characters will leave the show and reappear in the game.

Some of the information gathered on the wiki will show up at http://www.defiance.com. Alexander has written a primer to the world of “Defiance” that’s up on the show’s Facebook page and he’s also contributed “newspaper” articles to the show’s Tumblr site.

“There are dossiers on characters, language and races,” he says. “That’s the great thing — all of these platforms are almost like a third portal into the world. Fans will really be able to see that every facet of this thing really has been given a tremendous amount of thought.”